"Lie from NPR News, I'm Lakshmi Singh.
The Senate Judiciary Committee's weighing weather to keep acting attorney general Todd
Blanche in his job permanently.
“Blanche's tenure has been overshadowed by criticism on several fronts, included, including”
accelerated investigations into President Trump's political rivals, and the DOJ's handling of files related to the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The panel's ranking Democrats Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois addressed the Epstein case today. "Under your leadership, more than 1,000 FBI personnel were pulled off of other priorities
and directed to flag Epstein records for any mentions of President Trump. When scrutiny of the cover-up intensified, you participated in meetings in the White House situation room to strategize about how to protect President Trump."
Also on Capitol Hill this morning, a confirmation hearing for Jay Clayton to have the
nation's intelligence agencies and for Dr. Erica Schwartz, a retired rear admiral to lead the Senate for Disease Control and Prevention. President Trump is urging immigration and customs enforcement to keep conducting traffic stops despite two recent deadly shootings involving men who were not the intended targets of immigration operations.
“Yesterday, I said it would pause, stops deemed non-urgent, following a series of deadly encounters”
with civilians in Minnesota and most recently in Texas and in Maine. In those cases, federal officers cited self-defense or public safety threats. President Trump is in Pennsylvania for the state's defense and innovation summit. The event brings together government officials, military and technology leaders as well and PRSD Peshiverum has more.
The President has said to deliver a message about strengthening U.S. defense manufacturing and technology. At a time when his administration is ramping up attacks on Iran, Trump visited Pennsylvania just last month in an effort to drum up support from voters ahead of the midterm elections later this year.
His message then was that cost would soon come down, but now that conflict has reignited between the U.S. and Iran, gas prices have started to climb up again. The U.S. and Iran have continued to trade fire for another day as they compete for control of the state of Hormuz. In the U.S. triple A posted higher gas prices today, the national average is $3.89 for
a gallon of regular gasoline. Amazon's announced plans to launch a satellite internet service next year in South Africa that may put it ahead of the Starlink founded by South African native Elon Musk. Today, Amazon said it was collaborating with the internet provider, Heratel, to launch service in one of Africa's largest and most advanced economies.
Amazon is a financial supporter of NPR. This is NPR News. Inflation at the whole sale level, cooled last month, and Pierre Scott Horsley reports on the latest inflation data from the Labor Department. The prices at the wholesale level in June were up 5.5% from a year ago, and that's a smaller
annual increase than the previous month, wholesale prices actually dip between May and June by 3/10%. Retail prices showed a similar decline last month, thanks in part, to falling gasoline prices. Renewed tensions in the state of Hormuz, however, are once again pushing gas prices higher, triple A's is the average price of regular gas rose 3 cents a gallon overnight, while
diesel prices jumped by nickel a gallon. Scott Horsley and Pierre News, Washington. The arrival of generative artificial intelligence has sparked fierce debates among adults about what it should and should not be used for. Reporter Lee Gaines spoke to teenagers about what it's like to grow up and learn in the
age of AI. 15-year-old Charles Antivan and Gates Mills, Ohio says chatchipiT is like a friend. And we've been able to have very meaningful, you know, intelligent discussions. But 16-year-old Dorian Prado of Fort Worth, Texas says he's very against AI.
It makes it where thinking is optional, and that should never be the case, so it's making
a stomach because, again, we don't have to think as much. Other teens say AI is a useful tool to get help on schoolwork. For some, it's the tutor they couldn't otherwise afford. Even so, they're concerned about their and their peers becoming overly reliant on the technology.
And while some teens say they don't expect AI to replace human labor, others fear it will take away jobs from people. For NPR News, I'm Lee Gaines. Everyone wants to know if AI is conscious, but consciousness is really hard to define.
“What it is like to eat chocolate or to look at the blue sky?”
So how do we know who or what is conscious? Check out the new way scientists are finding to measure the elusive phenomenon on short
Wave.
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