{"id":1499,"date":"2026-05-04T10:12:42","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T10:12:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/?p=1499"},"modified":"2026-05-04T10:12:42","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T10:12:42","slug":"googles-quiet-internal-war-against-its-anti-military-activist-employees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/?p=1499","title":{"rendered":"Google\u2019s quiet internal war against its anti-military activist employees"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Quick note:<\/strong> Subscribe to the forthcoming Fortune<\/em> Gulf Brief. Every Tuesday, this new newsletter will deliver clear-eyed, authoritative intelligence on the deals, decisions, policies, and power shifts shaping one of the world\u2019s most consequential regions, written for the people who need to act on it. Sign up here.<\/p>\n

\n

THE MARKETS<\/h3>\n

Wall Street shrugs at record high stocks\u2014in a good way<\/b><\/h2>\n
    \n
  • S&P 500 futures<\/b> were flat this morning. The index was up 0.29% in the last session, setting a new record at 7,230.<\/span><\/li>\n
  • In Europe,<\/b> the Stoxx 600 was down 0.26% in early trading and the U.K.\u2019s FTSE 100 was down 0.14% before lunch.<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Asia: <\/b>South Korea\u2019s KOSPI was up 5.12%. Japan\u2019s Nikkei 225 was up 0.38%. India\u2019s Nifty 50 was up 0.31%. China\u2019s CSI 300 was flat.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Brent crude<\/b> was $109 this morning.<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Bitcoin<\/b> was up at $79K.<\/span><\/li>\n
  • GameStop made an unsolicited $56 billion offer for eBay<\/span> – FT<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    ONE BIG THING<\/h3>\n

    How Google defeated its internal anti-military activist employees<\/h2>\n

    Google signed a deal with the Pentagon to allow its Gemini AI to be used by the U.S. military for \u201cany lawful purpose,\u201d and when news of the deal leaked, close to 600 employees signed an open letter opposing it. \u201cI spent the last 2 months trying to prevent this,\u201d Alex Turner, a research scientist at Google DeepMind, the unit that builds the company\u2019s Gemini models, said in a post on X. \u201cShameful.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

    But Google\u2019s management is likely to ignore internal resistance, <\/span>Fortune<\/span><\/i>\u2019s Bea Nolan reports<\/span>. Following an employee rebellion in 2018, Google cracked down on in-office activism by decommissioning a lot of the internal mailing lists and deleting the internal social network, one source said. \u201cIt is harder to organize internally now.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

    IRAN<\/h3>\n

    Tehran to U.S. Navy: escort ships at your peril<\/b><\/h2>\n

    Iran threatened to attack any U.S. ship in the Strait of Hormuz following President Trump\u2019s promise yesterday that the American Navy <\/span>would guide ships<\/span> through the Strait as a \u201cHumanitarian gesture.\u201d The head of Iran’s central command said it would attack “any foreign armed force \u2026 especially, the aggressive U.S. army,\u201d <\/span>according to the BBC<\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

    The price of oil spiked up from a low of $106 per barrel of Brent crude this morning to over $110, before settling back to $109.<\/span><\/p>\n

    \u201cIran\u2019s parliamentary security committee head [Ebrahim] Azizi called [Trump\u2019s] posts delusional,\u201d UBS\u2019s Paul Donovan told clients this morning. \u201cThe oil market reaction gives weight to the Iranian view. U.S. gasoline prices are approaching USD 4.5 per U.S. gallon, which is an incentive for the administration to use calming rhetoric to guide markets. This has less impact as the point of physical shortages moves closer.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

    \u201cADDITIONAL\u201d<\/h3>\n

    If the Fed stops saying this one word, interest rates will likely rise<\/b><\/h2>\n

    One of the controversies in last week\u2019s decision from the U.S. Fed to leave interest rates at the 3.5% level was the number of dissenters\u2014three\u2014on a vote to use a specific phrase in the central bank\u2019s commentary. The phrase is:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

      \n
    • “In considering the extent and timing of additional adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate, the Committee will carefully assess incoming data, the evolving outlook, and the balance of risks.\u201d<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      On its face, nothing in those words sounds controversial. The key is the word \u201cadditional.\u201d The Fed had been delivering a program of rate cuts, so \u201cadditional\u201d <\/span>implies that the Fed\u2019s next move will be another cut<\/span>. However, this time around three members of the Fed\u2019s rate-setting committee voted against the phrase, suggesting they are not convinced rates should go any lower.<\/span><\/p>\n

      If inflation continues to rise, perhaps driven by high oil prices, expect that \u201cadditional\u201d phrase to disappear from the Fed\u2019s future statements\u2014and buckle up for rate hikes.<\/span><\/p>\n

      GIVE THEM CREDIT<\/h3>\n

      AI hyperscalers are carrying $400 billion in debt<\/b><\/h2>\n

      The big tech companies will probably spend up to $725 billion this year, building out AI data centers, according to an estimate <\/span>by The Financial Times<\/span>. But much of that spending will come in the form of debt. Already, tech companies have issued $400 billion in investment-grade and high-yield debt since mid-2025, according to an estimate by Goldman Sachs\u2019s Amanda Lynam and her colleagues in a research note seen by <\/span>Fortune<\/span><\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\n

      \u201cThe scale and scope of AI-related issuance in the credit markets is likely to be, in many ways, unprecedented,\u201d Lynam says.<\/span><\/p>\n

      MORE FROM FORTUNE<\/h3>\n

      China has a welcome mat for Trump: it just rewrote the rules on U.S. sanctions<\/span> – Steve H. Hanke and Jeffrey Weng<\/span><\/p>\n

      A decade after the \u2018Godfather of AI\u2019 said radiologists were obsolete, their salaries are up to $571K and demand is growing fast<\/span> – Marco Quiroz-Gutierrez<\/span><\/p>\n

      As economic despair mounts, Russian official admits the country has had enough of Putin\u2019s war on Ukraine. \u2018We can\u2019t even take one region\u2019<\/span> – Jason Ma<\/span><\/p>\n

      Chinese court rules firms can\u2019t lay off workers on AI grounds<\/span> – Bloomberg<\/span><\/p>\n

      CHART OF THE DAY<\/h3>\n

      Bank of America: \u201cBoom loop\u201d could open \u201cdoor to doom\u201d<\/h2>\n

      \u00a0<\/p>\n

      \"\"<\/div>\n

      U.S. GDP will have risen 75% in the seven years from 2020 (when it was $20 trillion) to 2027 (when it will be $35 trillion), Michael Hartnett and his colleagues at Bank of America forecast. They call this the \u201cboom loop,\u201d driven by increased government spending (up 60% since 2020) and inflationary trade and industrial policies. The \u201conly thing that breaks the 2020s boom loop is bond [market] collapse,\u201d they told clients in a note seen by <\/span>Fortune<\/span><\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\n

      The first sign of that collapse will be if the interest yield on 30-year U.S. Treasury bonds goes above 5%\u2014an indicator that debt investors want to be paid more for holding the debt. They are near that right now. But if they move higher, \u201cbooms\/bubbles always end with sharp jump in yields,\u201d Hartnett says. \u201cThen the door to doom starts to open.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

      NUMBER OF THE DAY<\/h3>\n

      2.5 billion<\/h2>\n

      The \u201c<\/span>installed base<\/span>\u201d of iPhones, laptops, and other devices made by Apple currently being used by customers. The entire population of Earth is 8.3 billion.<\/span><\/p>\n

      THE FRONT PAGES TODAY<\/h3>\n

      Vladimir Putin hunkers down for fear of assassination<\/span> – FT<\/span><\/p>\n

      Meme stock GameStop makes $56 billion offer for eBay in bid to rival Amazon<\/span> – CNBC<\/span><\/p>\n

      Rudy Giuliani in “critical” condition in hospital, spokesperson says<\/span> – Axios<\/span><\/p>\n

      Why Almost Everyone Loses\u2014Except a Few Sharks\u2014on Prediction Markets<\/span> – WSJ<\/span><\/p>\n

      Drone Hits Upscale Moscow Tower as City Readies for WWII Parade<\/span> – Bloomberg<\/span><\/p>\n

      \u2018The Death Zone\u2019: How Russia Is Luring Africans to Ukraine<\/span> – NYT<\/span><\/p>\n

      ONE MORE THING<\/h3>\n

      The rich get richer\u2014especially in the Southern U.S.\u00a0<\/b><\/h2>\n
      \"\"<\/div>\n

      This chart shows wage growth in the U.S. broken out by income bracket and region. Notably, the rich continue to get richer faster than everyone else. But mostly, the poor are getting richer too\u2014just not at the same rate. The best wage growth is in the South, for all income groups. Only in the Northeast does the old clich\u00e9 ring true: The rich are getting richer up there, and the poor are getting poorer too. Data from Bank of America\u2019s Liz Everett Krisberg and David Michael Tinsley.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

      #Googles #quiet #internal #war #antimilitary #activist #employees<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Quick note: Subscribe to the forthcoming Fortune Gulf Brief. Every Tuesday, this new newsletter will deliver clear-eyed, authoritative intelligence on the deals, decisions, policies, and power shifts shaping one of… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1500,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2656,2655,816,1468,744,1274,2654,445,166,1222,1714,446],"class_list":["post-1499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance-news","tag-activist","tag-antimilitary","tag-economics","tag-employees","tag-google","tag-googles","tag-internal","tag-iran","tag-markets","tag-news","tag-quiet","tag-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1499\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}