The cage is closed but monkey bars are open*

Didn't want Halloween to pass this year without acknowledging the latest episode in the ongoing saga of Tulane's rage monkeys of terror. They got out again this week. 

NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) - A truck carrying lab monkeys from Tulane University’s research center was involved in a wreck Tuesday (Oct. 28) on Interstate 59 near mile marker 117 in Jasper County, Miss., authorities said.

Officials said the monkeys weigh about 40 pounds each, are aggressive toward humans and require personal protective equipment to handle the animals. Three monkeys are believed to be on the loose, authorities said.

Tulane University was notified and sent a team to help retrieve the animals. The Jasper County Sheriff’s Office said three of six escaped primates had been euthanized but three monkeys remained on the loose.

“There are three monkeys still on the loose after the officials from Tulane were able to get inside the truck and get a correct count,” the sheriff’s office said. “Officials from Tulane arrived this evening.”

Tulane issued a statement contradicting a social media post by the sheriff’s office that claimed the monkeys were carrying infectious diseases. 

The response and investigation remain ongoing. 

We here at the old Yellow Blog have been keeping tabs on the Tulane Primate Research Center for decades.  They've got some crafty monkeys there!  The last time I tried re-capped the recorded incidents I'm aware of, it produced this list of escapes occurring in 1997, 1998, 2003, 2005, 2008, and 2018. 

As of the last time I read anything about this latest incident (yesterday) there were still three monkeys on the loose somewhere in Mississippi.  

By the way, when the news of the latest escape broke, I lazily tried to use Google to search for my old posts about the monkeys.  But the heavily enshittified tool made that a lot harder than it needed to be.  I did have to read a comment from its stupid AI stating that "the blog seems to have been dormant for some time."  Is that true?  Sort of, I guess.  I thought I had been doing a decent job writing about the municipal elections... although I guess I did get behind a little bit.  I'm crossposting that on Substack, btw. A concluding installment should be up this week.

But anyway, Happy Halloween. Let's just hope, now that Susan Hutson is no longer running the jail, they won't put her in charge of the primate center... although given the standard there, maybe it's a good fit after all. 

* 

Serpas Signal

 Very comforting

Last week, Gov. Jeff Landry formally requested that the president send 1,000 troops to Louisiana.

NOPD Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick also confirmed the Guard is coming — but it’s still unclear when.

“In our society, visible presence of security is oftentimes very comforting to people,” Serpas said.

As chief of police, Serpas's main innovation was setting up random and constitutionally questionable traffic checkpoints every other week.  We were all very much comforted by that. Although it seems rather quaint in hindsight. Today there are cameras and microphones everywhere you go. Your "private messages" can prompt police to show up at your house. And, of course, masked goons are kidnapping people off the street every day.  By Serpas's count, this should be the most comfortable time in history. 

Almost harvest time

We are in the stage of the business cycle where the ruling class can either (A) take the massive piles of capital that have accumulated at the top and reinvest it in humans and infrastructure that supports humans. OR  (B) they can light a big fire, loot what they can, and have cops punch anyone who objects. 

We almost always get option B. We are getting option B. The reason it feels this intense is because the money pile is exceptionally high this time and it looks about ripe for harvesting. 

The hundreds of billions of dollars companies are investing in AI now account for an astonishing 40 per cent share of US GDP growth this year. And some analysts believe that estimate doesn’t fully capture the AI spend, so the real share could be even higher.  

AI companies have accounted for 80 per cent of the gains in US stocks so far in 2025. That is helping to fund and drive US growth, as the AI-driven stock market draws in money from all over the world, and feeds a boom in consumer spending by the rich.

Since the wealthiest 10 per cent of the population own 85 per cent of US stocks, they enjoy the largest wealth effect when they go up. Little wonder then that the latest data shows America’s consumer economy rests largely on spending by the wealthy. The top 10 per cent of earners account for half of consumer spending, the highest share on record since the data begins.