September 09, 2026
Good Morning. Canadian whisky, beer, whey protein and motorcycles all become illegal to import soon. You have three weeks to stock up. Plus, Meta’s new agent and Dr. Rhonda Patrick’s morning smoothie (first time here? Join 523,000 Betterists ).
Yesterday’s most clicked link : Cars that most hold / lose their value
TOP STORY TODAY
Canadian Trade War
Three proclamations signed yesterday bar most Canadian alcohol, motorcycles, whey and molasses from entering the United States starting 12:01 a.m. on September 29. Cheese, mattresses and motorboats were added to a 50% tariff list instead.
The alcohol list runs long: beer, wine, whisky, rum, vodka and brandy. Canadian counter-tariffs on roughly $20 billion in American goods took effect hours earlier, covering steel, cheese, appliances and farm equipment.
Canadian goods also become ineligible for long-term federal contracts. A 50% tariff on all Canadian vehicles, trucks, auto parts and steel is set for January 1. The import bans start in three weeks.
The move: buy Canadian whisky, whey protein or bike parts before September 29. | The full list of banned goods
Low Test Scores
Results released yesterday from the largest international student test ever run show 15-year-olds who use AI daily to draft writing assignments scored 481 in science. Those who almost never use it scored 509.
The 28-point gap , adjusted for family income, equals about a year and a half of school. The sample covered 760,000 students in 91 countries. Only 14% said they almost never use AI for schoolwork.
The dose matters more than the tool. Students using AI once or twice a week outscored both daily users and those who rarely touch it. Daily users gained 13 points when class required them to critique AI answers. 20 PISA points equals one school year .
The move: cap it at twice a week and make them check the AI's work.
AI Solves Another Unsolvable
OpenAI said its internal model resolved the Navier-Stokes problem, one of seven Millennium Prize questions posed in 2000. Only one had been solved before. The proof was formally checked in the programming language Lean ( WSJ ).
Roughly 10,000 AI agents worked about 88 hours and sent 2.7 million messages, burning through 130 billion output tokens, the rough equivalent of a million books. Compute cost ran into the millions of dollars.
An NYU mathematician and an Anthropic researcher, who had published a related result days earlier, said their method reached OpenAI before their own paper was out. OpenAI denies it and says it will not claim the $1 million prize. OpenAI's own account and the proof .
TOGETHER WITH SPRUCE
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GET 1% BETTER
How to Watch Every NFL Game (and the Cost)
Opens tonight, Patriots at Seahawks, 8:20 ET on NBC and Peacock. Super Bowl rematch at Lumen Field. Where the games live during the season:
- Sunday afternoon: CBS and FOX. Paramount+ $8.99/mo, FOX One $19.99/mo
- Sunday night: NBC. Peacock $10.99/mo
- Monday night: ESPN and ABC. ESPN Unlimited $29.99/mo
- Thursday night: Prime Video $8.99/mo, or free on Twitch
- Out of market: Sunday Ticket, $240 new or $480 returning
Holidays:
- Thanksgiving Eve: Netflix
- Thanksgiving: CBS, FOX, NBC
- Black Friday and Christmas Eve: Prime Video
- Christmas: Netflix
- New Year's Eve: Prime Video
- Super Bowl LXI: ESPN and ABC, February 14
Season-long subscriptions run $555 to $1,050. Nobody tells you the alternative: stack single day passes and one-month subscriptions instead , and you can hit every timeslot for under $100. An antenna covers the rest for free. Here’s the $88 breakdown .
Don’t Let Pain Make You Gullible…
“Medicine predates useful medicine by thousands of years. If you’re in pain, you’re willing to believe anything.”
- Morgan Housel, The Psychology of Money ( free )
TRENDING
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▲ Kimmel's show may end in 2027 after 24 years, though ABC calls the report speculative | 60 Minutes high pressure return
▲ Amazon says it approved 99.9% of pregnancy accommodation requests last year, a claim a new lawsuit disputes
TOGETHER WITH GUNDRY MD
100% of Americans have been exposed
This new investigative health exposé from Dr. Steven Gundry, MD, is going VIRAL This "Cellular Toxin" May Have Affected EVERY American ( Click Here to Learn Simple "Detox" ).
Big corporations do NOT want the public to know about this “toxic leak.” Because it’s directly causing severe weight gain, fatigue, and brain fog… And research suggests 100% of Americans have already been exposed.
HOWEVER — they may soon be forced to take this video down. So before that happens: In this video, they’ll show you how to FLUSH OUT this “cellular toxin” in just 75 seconds a day… So you can enjoy easier weight-management… a surge of youthful energy… razor-sharp thinking… and stellar long-term health.
Watch this report from Dr. Steven Gundry, MD
Fun Links
Meta releases new AI agent [ Resource ]
Dr. Rhonda Patrick’s morning smoothie [ Recipe ]
Today is the most common birthday [ Blog ]
“I'll Set the Table” by Musician Nic D [ Song ]
What’s next for Apple’s foldable? [ Blog ]
Apply to work for Snoop Dogg [ Blog ]
Girl Scout Cookies for dogs [ Blog ]
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