/qresearch/ -  Q Research

>>24516518

Northrop Grumman's $477 million financial hit, and the skyrocketing cartel drone threat along the U.S.–Mexico border.

While they sound like the plot of a tech-thriller, they are actually two distinct, crazy stories playing out in the news. Here is the breakdown of what is actually happening on both fronts.

1. The "$477 Million Loss" Headline

The "$477 million" figure isn't actually a loss from a drone program; it's a massive financial hit Northrop Grumman took on America's newest, highly classified stealth bomber: the B-21 Raider.

Why did they lose $477 million?

Northrop Grumman signed a strict fixed-price contract with the U.S. Air Force back in 2015 to build the initial batches of the B-21. Under a fixed-price contract, if inflation spikes, material costs skyrocket, or manufacturing runs into snags, the contractor (Northrop) has to eat the extra cost—not the government.

During their recent earnings call, Northrop revealed they had to take a pre-tax write-off of $477 million on the first five initial production bombers.

The Reason: They had to completely overhaul and adjust their manufacturing process in Palmdale, California, to prepare for a much faster, accelerated production rate to meet Air Force demands.

The Total Damage: Combined with a massive $1.56 billion hit they took earlier due to macroeconomic disruptions and labor shortages, Northrop has bled over $2 billion out-of-pocket just trying to get the B-21 assembly line moving efficiently.

2. The Cartel Drone Scene & The Information Battle

The second part of your question hits on a massive national security headache: Mexican drug cartels are aggressively expanding their drone operations, and it has turned into a high-stakes electronic warfare and counter-intelligence battle along the border.

The Cartel Drone Threat

Cartels (specifically groups like the CJNG and the Sinaloa Cartel) are no longer just using cheap commercial drones to scout border patrol routes. They are heavily utilizing weaponized commercial drones modified with dropping mechanisms to release small improvised explosives, and they are using high-end, heavy-lift drones to smuggle fentanyl and meth over border walls.

Why are they trying to get the "info"?

The cartels aren't necessarily trying to steal blueprints for a B-21 stealth bomber, but they are desperately trying to gather intelligence on U.S. counter-UAS (Unmanned Aircraft Systems) and electronic warfare capabilities.

Because U.S. border security and the military have started deploying cutting-edge tech—like signal jammers, spoofers, and experimental directed-energy weapons (lasers)—the cartels are highly incentivized to map out:

Where these jamming blind spots are along the border.

What specific radio frequencies U.S. forces are using to disable cartel drones.

How to reprogram their drone firmware (using specialized electronic components or GPS-denied navigation) to bypass American electronic defenses.

The Chaos on the Border

The tension over this drone scene is incredibly high. For instance, the Pentagon recently had to temporarily shut down the airspace over El Paso, Texas, to test experimental counter-drone lasers meant to blast cartel drones out of the sky.

The environment is so jumpy that in one infamous incident, federal agents fired an experimental laser system at what they thought was a coordinated cartel drone invasion—only for it to turn out to be four stray Mylar party balloons.

So, while Northrop Grumman is eating millions in losses down in Palmdale trying to build the military's next-gen stealth fleet, just a few hundred miles away on the border, a completely separate, low-tech but highly dangerous drone war is playing out in real-time.

>>24647849

>觀音A Gender Shift Over Time

The history of what Guan Yin looks like is pretty fascinating because the deity didn't start out as a woman.

Originally, the figure came from Indian Buddhism as a male bodhisattva named Avalokiteshvara. Early Chinese depictions from the 5th to the 10th century showed him with distinctly masculine features, sometimes even wearing a thin mustache.

However, because the deity represents ultimate mercy, gentleness, and maternal-like protection, the imagery gradually transformed over hundreds of years. By the Tang and Song Dynasties, artists began depicting Guan Yin with softer, distinctly feminine features. By the 12th century, she became entirely recognized across East Asia as a beautiful, compassionate goddess and a protector of women, children, and sailors.

Other Famous Variations

Depending on the temple or artwork, you might also see her depicted in a couple of other legendary forms:

The "Water-Moon" Guan Yin: A very famous, relaxed artistic style where she sits in a pose called "royal ease" (one leg bent up, one arm resting on her knee), quietly gazing at the reflection of the moon in the water, which represents the fleeting, illusionary nature of reality.

Thousand-Armed Guan Yin: In more complex Buddhist artwork, she is shown with multiple heads and up to a thousand arms, with an eye in the palm of each hand. The symbolism here is literal: she needs a thousand eyes to see everyone in the world who is suffering, and a thousand arms to reach out and help them all at the exact same time

>>24644080

This text is a replica or rubbing of the inscription found on the famous 板石塔婆 (Itabi / Stone Stupa) at the Masakado塚 (Masakado-zuka / The Tomb of Taira no Masakado), located in Otemachi, Tokyo.

It represents a major event in Japanese history and folklore: the pacification of the angry ghost of the samurai rebel, Taira no Masakado.

Here is the breakdown and translation of the three vertical columns, reading from right to left:

1. The Right Column: The Name and Title

Japanese: 平将門 蓮阿弥陀仏 (Taira no Masakado, Ren'amidabutsu)

Translation: "Taira no Masakado [given the Buddhist posthumous name] Ren'amidabutsu."

The Backstory: Taira no Masakado was a powerful 10th-century warlord who led a massive rebellion against the central government in Kyoto and declared himself the "New Emperor." He was defeated and decapitated in 940 AD. According to legend, his severed head was taken to Kyoto but flew all the way back to Edo (modern-day Tokyo) looking for its body, landing at the site of his current grave. Over the centuries, whenever the gravesite was neglected, devastating plagues, fires, and lightning strikes were blamed on his angry, unappeased spirit.

2. The Center Column: The Sacred Mantra

Japanese: 南無阿弥陀仏 (Namu Amida Butsu)

Translation: "I sincerely take refuge in Amida Buddha."

The Backstory: Written in a stylized, sweeping calligraphic font, this is the core chant of Pure Land Buddhism.

3. The Left Column: The Date

Japanese: 徳治二年 (Tokuji Ni-nen)

Translation: "The Second Year of the Tokuji Era" (which corresponds to 1307 AD).

The Backstory: In the early 1300s, Tokyo was hit by a severe plague that locals attributed to Masakado’s curse. A holy traveling Buddhist monk named Shinkyo Shonin stepped in to pacify the spirit. In the year 1307, he performed a massive funeral ritual, officially granted Masakado the holy Buddhist name "Ren'amidabutsu" (Lotus Amida Buddha) to cleanse his past sins, erected a stone stupa with this exact text, and buried the spirit's anger. The plague stopped, and Masakado was transformed from a terrifying ghost into a protective deity of Tokyo (and was later enshrined at the famous Kanda Myojin Shrine).

>>24657305

>>24657312

>>24657317

plz post digs and speculations on General thread, not here.

>>24656039

Admin doesn't sit on this thread all day, we're mostly on on General.

Catalog does not display new breads right away. Glad you found the thread on the index. If not on page 1, try page 2.

>>24645317

…qnotables26 is the board, similar to /qnotables. #31 is the bread #. Both/qnotables26 and /qnotables haven't been updated since 4/23. Unsure if you are being pedantic or genuinely retarded lol, sorry if it's the latter

>>24637513

We also run an aggregate of qr, https://youarethe.news

But they rely on the notables updates, either from /qnotables or /qnotables26 . However, both haven't been updated since 4/23

>>24662922

If need be we can Jerry rig a scraping solution to continue the aggregate, but a lot of infrastructure aside from ours runs on qnotables and qnotables26 so hopefully something resolves

>>24662926

>>24662922

Jim is informed about the issue.

I can also switch to a mode, where no images are getting posted. That should in theory get through.

Archiving of notable content doesn't work because of the same issue, but originally it got stuck on one notable. Somehow 8kun rejects all 4 or 5 images posted together, despite not being spam or illegal content. If I remember correctly, I tried posting them by themselves and that worked fine.

>>24667684

>mode, where no images are getting posted

I just tried that, seems to work.

Threads should hopefully get filled within an hour.

>>24668493

If it works, o7. Appreciate the effort

>>24668860

Figured, there was another change.

Previous staff was able to post up to 14k.

Now it seems it's only 6k.

Should work now, hopefully.

>>24669549

*Previously

onReady()

>>24668493

>>24668860

Image posting is always THE big issue when it comes to security. Not surprising that removing them helps.

Good luck & Godspeed.

>>24671268

I'm getting these too when trying to repost notables.

Just right now when trying to repost Japanese notable content. It's just 2 screenshots of POTUS twitter translated to Japanese.

Nothing illegal or spammy about these.

Around 20-30 thread OP images were also lost because of that, also rejected as being spam or illegal, neither was the case.

>>24672625

Anon, I think Jim only sold like 13 Protos.

Even the QR Cheerleader types that defend any besmirching of Jim no matter how slight said fuck that shit.

So, you're Jim and you have to pay the bills for a website all us moocher anons refuse to help pay for because Q said (roughly) No Paytirots no matter what.

Ads don't work because subject matter/association and let's face it it, the eyeballs left in 2026 no longer justify higher rates.

Wut do?

Pull the plug or first try alternative measures?

>>24670612

>>24669549

Updating our own nameservers now to get our site back up, but the notables are back up to speed and everything is scraping perfectly. Better customer service on here than anywhere else kek

>>24672863

You Are The News is back online, scraping nitables works perfectly again

>https://youarethe.news/

>>24672647

>Q said

>No Paytirots no matter what

Q didn't do that.

https://operationq.pub/?n=1366

—

I don't think it would be fair to say that a journalist can't make money when covering Q. But that's the difference. A journalist covering Q isn't necessarily usurping Q. The paytriots in question were trying to usurp Q. This video explains what happened very well. It certainly cleared my head about it all. https://youtu.be/gi9CQHVDg8E

—

Also:

Paytriot: Someone who pretends to be a patriot, but is *only* after money.

Jim could simply close all of this down. He doesn't get rich by it, in fact quite the opposite.

>>24674585

The AI is filtering again WHY JIM is using slop AI? Unless you train your own AI all corpos Ai are woke trash

>>24671464

Admins are aware, not much I can do after informing.

Can try contacting JW on Twitter. Better coming from anons.

>>24672625

>>24676423

Looked into this more fully.

Have several computers, all have some kind of ad blocker. But can still see the pron ads on the regular server on some.

Most of the time, I'm not on the regular server but on admin server, which doesn't show ads.

(compensates for this advantage by being slow and buggy, kek.)

Why I didn't even know the ads existed until anons started asking about them.

BV recommends this ad blocker for screening out pron ads on /qr:

uBlock Origin Lite

>>24672625

>>24678809

UPDATE -

JW says banner will be removed.

Probably already done.

can't post basic memes again

when is it being fixed?

ai bot jim uses misidentifies images as illegal?

At least one of the files you are trying to upload has been flagged as illegalcontent or spam

>>24679977

Happens to me, too. They're trying to develop AI spam detector. Admins are aware, interested in getting feedback on which images cause problems.

Try JW's email (jimwatkins007@pm.me) or DM on Twitter/X (@Jimwatkins). need to give file name and post image. Can be hard to contact because he gets badly spammed.

Can usually work around the problem by changing filename or image slightly. PITA but that's life on a chan.

>>24683075

I fucking hate woke AI slop

T

>>24683075

What's happening here is that AI is woke garbage trained in leftist labs with biases that are impossible to resolve. Especially if the prompt is "Filter illegal images" — any anime, anything with themes that the sensitivity of California liberals considers "childlike," and anything that isn't an ugly, fat, black, lesbian, empowered woman will be labeled as "illegal" or "spam." The only alternative is to host an AI without censorship, fine-tuned, creating a very specific system. It's simpler to just program a neural image-to-hash converter that calculates pixel distances, set a tolerance of, say, a maximum of 30 images per minute with the same hash (consider that memes are REPEATED, so an overly strict system causes what's happening) than to use a crappy multimodal model like Gemini, GPT, or whatever woke AI is in vogue. These systems DO NOT WORK for this, unless you want to turn the page into woke California crap and become part of Big Brother.

>>24684266

>>24684728

It's my understanding that JW is developing his own AI. No idea what the status is but that's the ticket. Suggest you try to reach him here -

>>24683075

BTW, in case ya'll don't know, without Jim's intervention, we would no longer have the ability to upload images AT ALL.

You may remember a month when there were no images on 8kun, mebbe ~Aug 2021. I remember because this caused me to move an Election Fraud thread from 8 to end.

VanWa withdrew our ability to post images at that time. 28ducks was the eventual response and later, an independent data center. Without JW's efforts, we would now have a TEXT ONLY chan.

>>24683075

for a few days anon played with images to see what was triggering filter

it's really tough to discern as very small bits of the image will trigger the filter

for example, removing an innocuous badge on Pepe's chest fixed one.

covering a portion of the SP cigars on numerous memes worked

it doesn't seem related to filename

there are bits of the blocked image that are miscategorized with no logical relation

This 'Armor of God' picture cannot be uploaded, either.

https://nerv.8kun.top/file_store/1aa78d9b10e84ccc437e49e5bf7f3f6c1f1e16521c3aa1b62eaef6c7eb6efa9f.jpg

>>24685720

here's what anon did

block quarters or half the meme then attempt to post until it goes through

then, once that works, incrementally unblock until you find the "area of the meme" that offends the filter

>>24685497

>>24685501

>>24685509

>>24685503

>>24685720

>>24685838

tx for all the examples.

>>24685838

It's the upper-right quarter, with the title 'Armor of God'. Interdasting, to use one word.

Awful lot of exactly the same looking threads here

Ironically it’s obvious you’re involved with YouTubers just from the paper trail, but just as empty as the people who listen to them

>>24689558

>Awful lot of exactly the same looking threads here

There's reasons for that

>Ironically it’s obvious you’re involved with YouTubers just from the paper trail, but just as empty as the people who listen to them

Your ignorance is amusing

>>24690312

I believe up to 50 per cent of the memes I post get this message.

>>24685121

>my understanding that JW is developing his own AI.

I doubt You need million of dollars for that and a data center, he is just working with an API.

>>24685923

Please some pony images or anime moe ere banned too