🌊 Late Night W̶i̶t̶h̶ For Jimmy Kimmel

Happy Rice Krispies Treat Day.

We owe a big thank you to Kellogg’s employees Melitta Jensen and Mildred Day who created the first batch of Snap, Crackle, and Pop in 1939 for a Camp Fire Girls fundraiser. Needless to say, they were a hit. Little did they know, decades later my mom’s Rice Krispie treats were how I would madk all my friends in fourth grade. Let’s pretend that’s a joke…

Speaking of jokes, Jimmy Kimmel told one that got him suspended from ABC, and we’re eager to hear your reaction to that suspension in today’s question.

Also, check out today’s We The 66 deep dive on a positive comeback story in the US: The unbelievable turnaround of Miami, FL. We promise Pitbull didn’t write it.

–Max and Max

KEY STORY

Kimmel Goes Down

Dozens of US workers — including Jimmy Kimmel — faced termination or suspension for public statements about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk

• Charlie Kirk, a 31-year-old conservative influencer and co-founder of Turning Point USA, was fatally shot while addressing a crowd at Utah Valley University last week

• Companies, including United Airlines, Nasdaq, The Washington Post, MSNBC, and Office Depot, terminated employees for statements deemed inappropriate about Kirk’s death

• The consequences extend beyond private companies, with educational institutions – like Clemson University – and government agencies – including the US Secret Service – also taking disciplinary action against employees for their social media posts and public comments about the killing

• ABC also announced on Wednesday it would indefinitely suspend Jimmy Kimmel’s late night show for comments the host made about Kirk’s death on Monday.

• Kimmel said, “The Maga Gang [is] desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.” The CEO of Nexstar, which owns 32 ABC affiliates, called Kimmel’s comments “offensive and insensitive”

Dig Deeper

• The Washington Post fired columnist Karen Attiah, citing Attiah’s social media posts, such as, “Part of what keeps America so violent is the insistence that people perform care, empty goodness and absolution for white men who espouse hatred and violence.” Attiah argued she only referenced Kirk in one post, where she misquoted him: “‘Black women do not have brain processing power to be taken seriously. You have to go steal a white person's slot’ - Charlie Kirk.” On his show in 2023, Kirk had said that four prominent black women – Sheila Jackson Lee, Joy Reid, Ketanji Brown Jackson, and Michelle Obama – gained their positions through affirmative action and “did not have the brain processing power to otherwise be taken seriously”

• A conservative political activist posted on X that she had contacted more than 700 employers about their workers’ social media posts

KEY STORY

Kash Patel Testifies

FBI Director Kash Patel testified before Congress about the Epstein files and his handling of the investigation into Charlie Kirk's assassination in Utah

• Both the Senate and House Judiciary Committees hold yearly hearings to oversee the FBI's operations. This year's sessions came just days after conservative activist Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at Utah Valley University, making the timing particularly significant

• Democrats criticized Patel’s handling of the Kirk assassination investigation, particularly his actions on the night of the shooting when he was dining at a Manhattan restaurant rather than at FBI headquarters

• The Epstein files emerged as a major flashpoint during both hearings, with House Democrats pressing Patel about whether President Trump's name appeared in the files and accusing him of orchestrating a cover-up

Dig Deeper

• Patel defended the FBI's response, noting that Tyler Robinson was arrested as a result of the decision to release video footage of the suspect that helped lead to the arrest after Robinson’s parents recognized him

• The FBI director confirmed the bureau is investigating a Discord group chat that Robinson was allegedly part of, with multiple individuals under investigation

• Patel maintained that the FBI has released all legally permissible information from the Epstein files, citing court orders that prevent further disclosures. He told senators there was “no credible information” that Epstein trafficked women to other individuals based on the evidence in FBI possession

KEY STORY

Google AI’s Gold-Medal Performance

Google's artificial intelligence system achieved gold-medal level performance at a major international computer programming competition

• The International Collegiate Programming Contest is considered the world's most prestigious university-level programming competition, drawing teams from nearly 3,000 universities across more than 100 countries

• On Wednesday, Google DeepMind announced that the AI model Gemini 2.5 Deep Think correctly solved 10 out of 12 problems during the five-hour competition held in Azerbaijan

• Its performance would have placed the AI in second place overall behind Russia’s St. Petersburg State University, if ranked against the 139 university teams that competed

Dig Deeper 

• Gemini accomplished something no human team could do. Google’s AI solved one problem – finding the best way to distribute liquid through a network of pipes to multiple containers as quickly as possible – within the first half hour of the competition. The AI used advanced mathematical techniques to find a solution that had eluded all human competitors

• This achievement came just two months after the Gemini 2.5 Deep Think model won gold at the International Mathematical Olympiad

QUOTE OF THE DAY

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KEY STORY

Fed Cuts Interest Rates

The Federal Reserve cut interest rates by 25 bps (0.25%) at its September meeting, marking the first reduction in nine months

• The Fed had paused rate cuts after cutting 25 bps in December 2024 amid inflation concerns. President Trump had sparred with Fed Chair Jerome Powell for months over the central bank's reluctance to cut rates

• The Fed lowered its key interest rate by a quarter of a percentage point to a range between 4% and 4.25%, the lowest level in almost three years. The decision reflected growing concern about weakness in the labor market, which officials said now outweighed recent setbacks on inflation

• A narrow majority of Fed officials projected at least two additional rate cuts this year, suggesting consecutive reductions at the October and December meetings

Dig Deeper

• The projections showed wide disagreement, with seven of 19 participants expecting no further cuts this year. Officials maintained their forecast for inflation to end the year at 3%, well above the Fed's 2% target

• Stephen Miran, a Trump nominee who was sworn in as a Fed governor on Tuesday just before the meeting, dissented in favor of a larger half-point cut

• When asked about Fed independence amid Trump's pressure campaign, Powell said, "We're strongly committed to maintaining our independence"

RUNDOWN
Some Quick Stories for the Office

🏛️ Ben & Jerry's co-founder, Jerry Greenfield, resigned from his role as brand ambassador after nearly five decades with the company, citing conflicts with the parent company, Unilever, over Gaza-related activism.

🔬 Yulia Navalnaya claims her late husband, Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, was murdered by poisoning in an Arctic prison colony in February 2024, citing two countries’ laboratory analyses of smuggled biological samples.

⚰️ Two separate hanging deaths occurred this week in Mississippi cities over 100mi apart, involving a 21-year-old black male, Demartravion “Trey” Reed, at Delta State University, and a 35-year-old white male, Cory Zukatis, in Vicksburg.

💉 Four states formed a health alliance to issue their own vaccine recommendations, directly challenging Health Secretary RFK Jr.'s federal vaccine policy changes.

🪫 South Korea began investigating potential human rights violations against over 300 Korean citizens detained during a US immigration raid at a Hyundai electric vehicle battery construction site in Georgia on September 4.

What does Roca Nation think?

🍿 Today’s Question: If you couldn’t live in the US (or Canada or wherever you are), where would you live?

🍿 Yesterday’s Question: Thoughts on the Jimmy Kimmel suspension?

Reply to this email with your response!

POPCORN
Some Quick Stories for Happy Hour

⚓ Volunteers Sink the Competition: Scientists discovered a missing 19th-century schooner at the bottom of Lake Michigan after professional shipwreck hunters had searched unsuccessfully for decades.

🇨🇦 Blame Canada!: Comedy Central delayed South Park’s Wednesday episode after creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone failed to complete production on time.

📽️ Last Call for First Take: ESPN’s “First Take” host Molly Qerim announced she is leaving the network at year’s end after nearly a decade anchoring the popular debate show.

🐻 Unbearable Visitor: A black bear was euthanized after wandering into a New Jersey Dollar General store and biting a customer on the leg.

👁️ A Tooth for an Eye: A Canadian man regained his sight after 20 years of blindness through a rare procedure that involved implanting his own tooth into his eye.

ROCA WRAP
The Other Osama

Osama Vinladen

A professional footballer carries the name of one of history’s most notorious terrorists.

Osama Vinladen Jiménez López didn't choose his controversial moniker – his father bestowed it upon him when he was born in October 2002, just over a year after the September 11 attacks.

The 22-year-old midfielder currently plays for Unión Comercio in Peru’s top football division, where only his first name, “Osama,” appears on his jersey to avoid unwanted attention. His family's naming pattern reveals an unusual fascination with controversial historical figures: His brother is called Sadam Huseín after Iraq's former dictator, and their father had planned to name a third child George Bush after the former US president.

Vinladen has learned to cope with the burden of his name, though it hasn't been easy. He recalls being mocked by friends in his youth and initially struggling with the association. “My friends used to make fun of me and at the beginning it bothered me,” he told Peruvian media. “But you learn to live with it and I feel normal now.” Despite repeatedly asking his father for an explanation, Vinladen says he’s never received a satisfactory answer about why he was given such a loaded name. When he had his own son, his grandfather suggested continuing the tradition with George Bush,” but the footballer chose Santiago instead.

The young player defends his right to keep his name, citing other Peruvians with controversial monikers. “Because there is an Osama who killed people, I don't think there has to be a law about the name,” he said. 

For Osama Vinladen, the name may carry the weight of history, but on the field, it’s his game – not his name – that does the talking.

EDITOR’S NOTE
Final Thoughts

We saw a tweet from an anonymous X account Jarvis_Best that made us laugh yesterday:

“Really not sure who to trust here, the deranged hobo podcasters who are clearly just making things up or the established, educated, credentialed main stream media with official editorial standards and practices and entire fact checking departments who are also making things up.”

Need to get him on Roca. Have a great day!

–Max and Max