Secretary of Defense War Pete Hegseth might not seem to have much in common with techbro oligarchs META CEO Mark Zuckerberg and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, but all three are examples of the kind of elite impunity that marks late state American empire as we slide headlong into the polycrisis.
They’re also deeply connected on multiple levels, but more about that later.
Let’s start with Greasy Pete, Hegseth that is.
Pete’s DoD DoW Sure is Slippery When It Comes to Benefits for Killed Soldiers’ Families
The UK Telegraph had the slimy deets but I have to lead with the tweet embed so readers can see how young, lovely, and “All-American” the dead pilot and his widow are:
https://t.co/pIWCLIG1RS
— Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) September 9, 2026
From the Telegraph, via AOL:
Libby Klinner, a widow, wrote on social media that the US air force had deemed her ineligible for additional benefits following the death of Major Alex Klinner, her 33-year-old husband, because Congress had not officially declared war.
He was one of six crew members of a KC-135 refuelling aircraft that crashed in western Iraq in March while supporting US strikes against Iran.
Since the Iran war began more than six months ago, 18 US service members have been killed and 780 wounded.
“My husband lost his life because we’re in a war – and then I was told that because it’s not technically a war, we lose out on something,” Ms Klinner told the Associated Press. “It all comes down to principle.”
After she expressed her frustration in an online post that went viral, the US air force clarified that his final pay cheque included hazard pay and combat-related tax breaks.
US officials also acknowledged that they had initially provided inaccurate information, and that her husband’s last pay cheque had included – but incorrectly itemised – “combat pay”, which amounts to $225 a month, and was not conditioned on a formal war declaration.
Major Alex Klinner, pictured with his wife Libby and their three children
Major Alex Klinner, pictured with his wife Libby and their three children
“What this experience made clear to me is how difficult it can be for a grieving family to navigate classifications, terminology and government processes at the very moment we are least equipped to do so,” Ms Klinner said in a statement.“No Gold Star family should have to become an expert in government language to understand what they are entitled to. Alex understood the risks that came with his service, and he trusted that if the worst happened, his family would be taken care of.”
Whether or not the family blogging going on with Iran is a war, Hegseth’s DoD is getting heat on Capitol Hill for not keeping accurate accounting, of the dead and wounded, that is.
The Senate Wants an Accurate Casualty Count
It’s been obvious to NC readers that the official US casualty count was way too low to match what we’ve seen reported about hits on US bases in West Asia.
Now it seems the Democrats in the Senate are catching on and they’re in a much better position to do something about it.
First up, Senator Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) per The Hill:
On Thursday, a group of 12 Senate Democrats, led by Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), who sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee, asked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth about the department’s handling of the database
“Delays or inconsistencies in publicly reporting these casualty figures further impede Congress’s ability to conduct oversight and limit the public’s understanding of the operation’s costs. This lack of transparency undermines confidence that military families and the American people are receiving a complete and accurate accounting of the sacrifices made by those serving in uniform,” the senators wrote in the five-page letter.
Last Monday, the Pentagon said that nearly 100 U.S. service members have sustained injuries since July 7, which is when President Trump formally notified Congress of the new hostility restarting against in Iran.
Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) has been pushing a bill to fix some of this since early August, via ABC:
Duckworth, who served as an Army helicopter pilot in the Iraq War and suffered severe combat wounds, losing both legs and damaging her right arm, said she has lost confidence in Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth being transparent about the war’s toll.
Historically, the number of U.S. troops dead and wounded has served as the best snapshot for the public accounting for a conflict’s cost and whether the fight was worth it.
“I don’t have the confidence in the Pentagon, and Hegseth in particular, being honest with the American people,” Duckworth said in an interview with ABC News.
The Pentagon’s change effectively splits the conflict into separate accounting buckets. The new category encompasses all U.S. military deaths and injuries across the area of responsibility of U.S. Central Command since July 7, according to a U.S. official, which includes the Middle East, Egypt and parts of Central and South Asia, rather than isolating casualties from the Iran conflict itself. The move separated that accounting from the tally of killed and wounded earlier in the war.
At the time, acting Pentagon Press Secretary Joel Valdez attributed the changes to technical issues.
The Defense Casualty Analysis System serves as the federal government’s authoritative public record of war dead and wounded of major conflicts. The database is maintained using casualty reports submitted by the military services.
Separating individual phases of a war is unprecedented and can make it more difficult to produce a clear, cumulative accounting of the conflict’s human toll. …
Duckworth’s bill, if passed, would require the Pentagon to combine all casualty records for the Iran war into a single count and notify the next-of-kin of those killed of the corrections.
I don’t expect much to happen until the new Senate is sworn in, but it’s good to see Democrats doing a little something here and there, now and then.
Especially when the publicly released information is already this grisly:
| When | What the Pentagon did | Public toll |
|---|---|---|
| 28 Feb 2026 | The US–Israeli air campaign against Iran begins. It is given a name — Operation Epic Fury — but no casualty category. (background) | — |
| Apr 2026 | Epic Fury is added to the Defense Casualty Analysis System, more than a month after the operation started, after The Intercept publicly called out the undercount. (Military Times) | 13 dead 365 wounded |
| 7 Jul 2026 | Reset one. A new category, “Overseas Operations,” takes effect — covering every US death and injury across CENTCOM’s entire area of responsibility, from Egypt through Central and South Asia, rather than isolating the Iran war. (The Hill) | — |
| 28 Jul 2026 | The Pentagon confirms the new category and ties it to “the end of Operation Epic Fury.” Acting press secretary Joel Valdez attributes the changes to technical issues. (Washington Post) | 18 dead 624 wounded |
| 6 Aug 2026 | Sen. Tammy Duckworth and 17 Senate Democrats move to force all Iran-war casualty records back into a single count, and to require that next of kin be notified when a record is corrected. (ABC News) | 18 dead 689 wounded |
| 6 Sep 2026 | Maj. Alex Klinner’s widow goes public: she was told the family did not qualify for hostile-fire pay or the combat-zone tax exclusion because Congress never declared war. The Air Force later called its own guidance wrong and paid. (Telegraph) | 18 dead 780 wounded |
Now on to the techbros and if you’re wondering what they have to do with SoW Hegseth, hell some of their key employees work for him.
In June 2025 the Army stood up Detachment 201, the Executive Innovation Corps, and directly commissioned four technology executives as lieutenant colonels in the Army Reserve: Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth and OpenAI’s Kevin Weil.
Great! Glad everyone’s so close. Or is it one of those small clubs we ain’t in?
Oh and before we leave the Drunk at the DoD DoW, let’s check the great tech work he’s overseeing at the Pentagon, via MIT’s Technology Review:
As part of a string of moves aimed at “reducing bloated bureaucracy and wasteful spending in favor of increased lethality,” Hegseth cut the size of the Office of the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation in half. The group was established in the 1980s—following orders from Congress—after criticisms that the Pentagon was fielding weapons and systems that didn’t perform as safely or effectively as advertised. Hegseth is reducing the agency’s staff to about 45, down from 94, and firing and replacing its director. He gave the office just seven days to implement the changes.
It is a significant overhaul of a department that in 40 years has never before been placed so squarely on the chopping block. Here’s how today’s defense tech companies, which have fostered close connections to the Trump administration, stand to gain, and why safety testing might suffer as a result.
The Operational Test and Evaluation office is “the last gate before a technology gets to the field,” says Missy Cummings, a former fighter pilot for the US Navy who is now a professor of engineering and computer science at George Mason University. Though the military can do small experiments with new systems without running it by the office, it has to test anything that gets fielded at scale.
“In a bipartisan way—up until now—everybody has seen it’s working to help reduce waste, fraud, and abuse,” she says. That’s because it provides an independent check on companies’ and contractors’ claims about how well their technology works. It also aims to expose the systems to more rigorous safety testing.
The gutting comes at a particularly pivotal time for AI and military adoption: The Pentagon is experimenting with putting AI into everything, mainstream companies like OpenAI are now more comfortable working with the military, and defense giants like Anduril are winning big contracts to launch AI systems (last Thursday, Anduril announced a whopping $2.5 billion funding round, doubling its valuation to over $30 billion).
Hegseth claims his cuts will “make testing and fielding weapons more efficient,” saving $300 million. But Cummings is concerned that they are paving a way to faster adoption while increasing the chances that new systems won’t be as safe or effective as promised. “The firings in DOTE send a clear message that all perceived obstacles for companies favored by Trump are going to be removed,” she says.
Techbros before hoes taxpayers amirite?
Oh well, on to the techbros themselves.
Mark Zuckerberg Set to Testify Under Oath? Break Out the Checkbook and Settle the Case
In mid-August, I posted about the lawsuit filed against Meta by 29 attorneys general and Meta’s claims that the suit could potentially bankrupt the company.
Since then, it’s already been settled, coincidentally one day after Instagram head Adam Mosseri testified and one day before Zuckerberg himself was set to take the stand and testify under oath.
And the price tag?
The headline number varies depending on whose headline the algorithm pushed to the top. $16.7 billion at CNBC, $17.1 billion from Connecticut’s attorney general, $17 billion in the trade press and $17 billion in the law-firm write-ups, and “up to $18 billion“ at NBC — with Breitbart putting $18bn in the headline.
Quite a bit less than the $1.4 trillion price tag that Meta had their cronies in the tech and business press parroting going into the case.
But let’s put that $16.7 up to $18 billion in context:
| Meta Platforms, Form 10-Q, quarter ended 30 June 2026 | Figure |
|---|---|
| Revenue, Q2 2026 | $60.80bn |
| Net income, Q2 2026 | $15.85bn |
| Revenue, first half 2026 | $117.11bn |
| Net income, first half 2026 | $42.62bn |
| The settlement, at $17.1bn over ten years | $1.71bn/yr |
| That annual payment as a share of first-half profit alone | 4.0% |
| Whole settlement, expressed in current net income | about 10 weeks |
| New Mexico, in the trial that opened 8 Sep 2026, intends to seek | up to $62.85bn |
Matt Stoller had a critical take at The Big Newsletter:
He made a bold claim at the beginning:
Meta and 47 states settled a major case on alleged social media harm to children. …what no one else seems to have noticed is that this deal basically sets up a Food and Drug Administration, for tech. And that’s very important, even if the settlement itself is kind of lame.
Then followed with a highly recommended history of the political fortunes of Big Tech in the US. After that he went into the whys and wherefores of the settlement:
In 2023, state attorneys general sued Meta, alleging the social media giant built technologies to “entice, engage, and ultimately ensnare youth and teens” and lied about the harms. There were dozens of supposed legal violations, including consumer fraud, deception, unfair competition, and violations of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act.
The gist of the complaint was that the company had a toxic incentive system. It sought to “maximize the time that young users spend on its Social Media Platforms,” because “more time young users spend on Instagram and Facebook, the more Meta earns by selling advertising targeted to those users.” So Meta “developed and refined a set of psychologically manipulative Platform features designed to maximize young users’ time spent on its Social Media Platforms,” and then lied about it.
Meta was fighting this case aggressively, citing the First Amendment and Section 230, but it decided to settle because two things happened last month. It lost two related cases, one against New Mexico on the harm it caused to children, and another in Los Angeles to a private litigant alleging the company addicted her as a child. Both were highly embarrassing losses, and had overcome the company’s legal defenses.
So the company decided to agree to product changes, which it previously resisted. I’ve spent the last day or so go over the settlement, and aside from the multi-billion dollar payouts to the states, it requires a host of product modifications to redress the harms that Meta has fostered towards teens. And I have come to something of an odd conclusion.
First, this settlement is historically important. Unlike the Cambridge Analytica nonsense or the corporate fines of banks from the financial crisis, this one is actually real. I’ll get into the details below, but that’s the takeaway.
Second, this settlement doesn’t touch the core problem with Meta, which is that it makes money from tracking and advertising. You can put whatever guardrails on usage you want, but if Meta makes money from kids using its platform, it will find ways of enticing kids to use its platform. So I don’t know what kind of impact it will really have.
The states also failed to demand some very obvious changes, like having Meta stop using mandatory arbitration agreements, which would have allowed users and partners to bring cases against other forms of deception or fraud.
Stoller then went into the meaning of the case and here’s my summary of his analysis: The states actually get about $12bn guaranteed, rising to just under $18bn only if TikTok and YouTube sign comparable deals, plus $1bn to Texas, which sits outside the group (go Ken Paxton!, lol /jk kinda).
The money goes to broad public-safety spending and litigation costs, not to families. The deal runs five years — ten if the competitors join.
Stoller reminds readers that state AG’s are elected officials who have to go to legislatures for their budgets, so bringing home cash is worth something politically. Stoller compares it to their “paltry egg price fixing settlement.” And the sting: he reads about half the payment as tax deductible, meaning the federal government effectively eats a little under $2bn of Meta’s penalty.
But Stoller’s main point is that the settlement imposes a real regulatory regime, and it is built to become an industry standard — the document explicitly encourages TikTok, YouTube and Snap to accept the same terms. That is why the payment scales with their participation. The penalty is structured to recruit Meta as the enforcer of its competitors’ compliance, which is also why Meta took out full-page newspaper ads pressuring TikTok and YouTube to match it.
And this is far from the end of Meta’s legal headaches:
| Case | Where it stands | Exposure |
|---|---|---|
| New Mexico State AG, went alone |
Refused the group deal and tried its own case. Won $375m in civil penalties in March 2026 and $567m more in early August. AG Raúl Torrez says the multistate deal is weaker than what his state already won. | $942m won |
| New Mexico, second track content moderation claims |
A further trial, on claims expanded to include content moderation, was set to open 8 September 2026. Meta’s own 10-Q tells shareholders the state intends to seek up to $62.85bn. | up to $62.85bn |
| Florida State AG, opted out |
The only state to reject its share. AG James Uthmeier called the settlement “peanuts” and said he would “see them in court.” | no figure filed yet |
| MDL 3047 N.D. Cal., federal |
Personal-injury and school-district claims against Meta, TikTok, YouTube and Snap. 3,137 cases pending as of the JPML’s 3 August 2026 report, out of 3,312 filed since the MDL was created. | 3,137 cases unquantified |
| School districts inside and alongside the MDL |
Roughly 1,300 district suits. First federal bellwether — Breathitt County, Kentucky — settled for a combined $27m in May 2026 before trial. Next bellwethers, Tucson Unified and Charleston County, early 2027. | $27m per bellwether |
| JCCP 5255 LA Superior Court |
Expressly not resolved by the state settlement. Produced the country’s first social-media addiction verdict — K.G.M. v. Meta & YouTube, 25 March 2026: $6m ($3m compensatory, split Meta 70% / Google 30%, plus $3m punitive). Meta is appealing. | $6m first verdict |
| FTC v. Meta monopolization |
District court ruled for Meta in November 2025; the FTC appealed in January 2026. The remedy sought is divestiture of Instagram and WhatsApp, not damages. | structural remedy |
So we may still get to see Mark Zuckerberg humiliate himself on the stand, under oath, as opposed to humiliating himself on The Joe Rogan Experience.
As far as my Googling can tell, Lina Khan is the dog that hasn’t barked on this case. If anyone has seen her saying anything about her old enemy, please share in the comments.
Now let’s get to Sam Altman and get out of here.
Did OpenAI Steal a Mathematician’s Work and His $1M Prize?
OpenAI made an interesting claim:
We’re sharing a solution to the Navier-Stokes Millennium Prize Problem, one of the deepest problems at the frontier of mathematics.
The proof was produced by a group of agents, using an OpenAI next-generation model significantly more capable than GPT-6 Astra.
The problem… pic.twitter.com/8zol3BPTL4
— OpenAI (@OpenAI) September 8, 2026
Forbes quickly had an interesting report in response:
In late August, OpenAI sent a thousand agents off to solve one of the most difficult math problems in the world—one of the seven original “millennium prize problems.” They spent 50 hours and millions of dollars worth of compute. Today OpenAI said its agents solved the Navier-Stokes equation—a 200-year-old mathematical formula that describes how gasses and liquids move.
Such an achievement would underscore how quickly AI has developed since the early ChatGPT days. But it’s also swirling in controversy over who gets credit for it—an increasingly important question as AI takes on more complex work. About a year ago, NYU math professor Tristan Buckmaster teamed up with Anthropic researcher Levent Alpöge and used a mix of both OpenAI and Anthropic models to solve the same problem, feeding entire drafts of their proofs into Codex. On Monday, Buckmaster claimed that OpenAI rushed to solve the problem after discovering their progress, alleging that the AI behemoth copied his approach and even tried to remove the Anthropic researcher from getting credit for it.
Sebastien Bubeck, an OpenAI researcher, said in a press briefing that OpenAI started looking into the problem after rumors surfaced that Anthropic had made headway on it. He denied that the company’s researchers or agents looked at Buckmaster’s Codex prompts. “To be clear, we did not use their prompt or proof to prompt our models or direct our agents,” he said.
TechCrunch had by far the best coverage:
OpenAI’s post confirms much of this timeline, specifically saying that the latest effort began on September 1, inspired by rumors that two Millennium Prize problem had been solved. Additionally, the post confirms the ongoing conversations with Buckmaster and Alpöge.
Although the problem is widely pursued among mathematicians, the specific tactic taken by Buckmaster and his collaborator is far less common. As a result, Buckmaster found it suspicious that OpenAI ended up taking the same approach at the same time.
“The route to the Clay problem through a smooth force, options c and d in Fefferman’s statement of the problem, is the route Luis and Diego opened and the one Levent and I had quietly chosen to attack,” Buckmaster wrote. “Almost nobody else I know of was working on it,” he continued. “It is not the direction one arrives at in a few days by giving a model the problem statement.”
While Alpöge is employed by Anthropic, he was not conducting this research on the company’s behalf. As a result, the duo used a mix of models, relying primarily on OpenAI’s Codex in their work. Even so, Alpöge’s affiliation with a rival lab seems to have been a sore point for OpenAI, and Buckmaster alleges that OpenAI mathematician Sébastien Bubeck asked him to remove Alpöge’s credit as part of a proposed compromise.
When Buckmaster pushed to make the dispute public, he says that Bubeck replied: “Why would you ruin your career?” Buckmaster says that when he pushed back, Bubeck followed up with: “If you don’t want me to be nice, then I don’t have to be nice.”
Buckmaster also raised concerns that, because he used Codex extensively in assembling the project, information from his work could have informed OpenAI’s own efforts to solve the problem. OpenAI reserves the right to train models on Codex interactions, although users are able to opt-out. If the OpenAI team used a model trained on Buckmaster’s own Codex interactions, it’s plausible that it could have regurgitated his work when faced with a similar problem.
OpenAI’s denial is worth posting in full, via the NYT:
“We (the researchers and the agents) did not see any of their work through any means until they released it publicly,” and “we did not use their prompt or proof to prompt our models or direct our agents.” Then the sentence underneath it: “While unlikely, we cannot rule out that de-identified data derived from their usage of our products helped improve our models.”
That team at OpenAI seems really nice, don’t they?
And this story is just the tip of the bad PR iceberg OpenAI is steaming toward full throttle.
News stories are one thing, but movies move minds. Check out all the bad OpenAI PR coming to a theater or streaming service near you soon:
That’s all for today. Hang tough, y’all.
Support my work at NatWilsonTurner.com. Today I dropped the second of four parts of “Joe Biden’s Three Genocides in Four Years”, forgive the extended play on part two, but Biden worked on family blogging up Ukraine for 30 years before he was POTUS.
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