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WorldGOVERNANCE DISPUTE: Athletes still unpaid as Soweto Marathon’s future hangs in the balanceWorldSpaceX brings Starship home early after first orbital flightWorldExclusive: Mike Johnson to travel to 22 states in final midterm sprintWorldAI's man of the momentWorldASX set for a slow start ahead of inflation data; stocks slip on Wall Street
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GOVERNANCE DISPUTE: Athletes still unpaid as Soweto Marathon’s future hangs in the balance

Almost a year after the Soweto Marathon, athletes are still waiting for prize money after a proposed partial payment was delayed. As governance issues continue, the 2026 edition is unlikely to proceed.

Published Sep 29, 2026 · 3:30 PMOriginal source: Daily Maverick1 reads
GOVERNANCE DISPUTE: Athletes still unpaid as Soweto Marathon’s future hangs in the balance
Almost a year after the Soweto Marathon, athletes are still waiting for prize money after a proposed partial payment was delayed. As governance issues continue, the 2026 edition is unlikely to proceed.
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Daily Maverick

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SpaceX brings Starship home early after first orbital flight

SpaceX's next-generation Starship rocket came back to Earth earlier than planned after its first orbital flight Monday, with an explosion visible on the company's livestream just after touchdown in the Pacific Ocean.Why it matters: The massive, fully-reusable Starship is key to SpaceX's commercial spaceflight ambitions, while NASA is counting on a modified version for use as a lunar lander in its Artemis program.Driving the news: Starship launched from South Texas just before 9 a.m. ET on a planned test flight of about 10 hours.It was set to orbit Earth about six times before splashing down in the Pacific Ocean, west of Chile. But SpaceX decided to bring it back to Earth after only about 3 hours.As part of the mission, Starship deployed 26 of the company's new, better-performing Starlink V3 internet satellites.The cause of the apparent explosion was not immediately clear, and the company didn't offer any details.Zoom in: Starship's first-stage Super Heavy booster splashed down in the Gulf of America shortly after launch.SpaceX says this Super Heavy was modified after ice clogging issues interfered with a splashdown attempt on the last test flight.What they're saying: "Flight tests until this point have intentionally flown passively safe suborbital trajectories to maximize public safety while allowing for maximum learning," SpaceX says in a mission summary."By going to orbit, the next phase of developing Starship to be fully and rapidly reusable can begin."What's next: SpaceX plans to eventually "catch" Starship in the arms of its launch tower — a feat it's accomplished with Super Heavy, but not Starship — but didn't make the attempt this time.Editor's note: This story has been updated with the latest developments.

Original sourceAxios
BAGANBAZAR GRAPHSource-attributed newsWORLD desk
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Exclusive: Mike Johnson to travel to 22 states in final midterm sprint

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is launching a six-week campaign blitz that will take him to more than 40 congressional districts across 22 states through Election Day, Axios has learned.Why it matters: Johnson is going all-in on defending Republicans' House majority at a moment when the political terrain is shifting toward Democrats.The Cook Political Report moved 15 House races toward Democrats on Friday and said Republicans would need to win a majority of the remaining toss-up races to keep control of the chamber.Driving the news: Johnson's campaign swing will be split evenly between Republican-held seats the party is fighting to defend and Democratic-held districts the GOP hopes to pick up, according to details shared first with Axios.The speaker begins his travel this week in Louisiana and New York.He'll also campaign in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin.The six-week sprint builds on Johnson's August road show, when he traveled across 18 states for 75 events in 52 cities.What they're saying: "With less than 40 days until the most consequential midterm election in modern history, Republicans are not slowing down as we give voters a clear choice between common sense and Democrats' crazy," Johnson told Axios in a statement."From coast to coast, I am leaving it all on the field to defend our House majority because the stakes have never been higher. Democrats have embraced socialism and communism and nominated the most radical candidates to ever run for Congress," the speaker continued.Zoom out: Johnson has also broken fundraising records, raising more through the second quarter than any Republican spe

Original sourceAxios
BAGANBAZAR GRAPHSource-attributed newsWORLD desk
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AI's man of the moment

Dario Amodei went from a MAGA smear campaign target, to a "Saturday Night Live" punching bag, to a private White House dinner with President Trump — all in the space of 72 hours this weekend.Such is life for the face of AI in America.The big picture: He may not have sought the status, but Anthropic's quirky, intellectual CEO has become the frontman for a technology that seems to be changing the world by the day.In the history of capitalism, there has seldom been a more unusual spokesman for a transformative industry. A physicist by training with links to effective altruism, Amodei runs Anthropic in a way some inside and outside the company have compared to a religious leader.His penchant for being plain-spoken — especially when it comes to the risk of disaster — has earned him admirers and critics in equal measure, although he has remained consistent in his positions for years.The SNL sketch captured what often frustrates allies about him: calling for more regulation and a slowdown to establish greater safety, while accelerating the theory that he and Anthropic are best-equipped to be at the vanguard.A looming IPO could make him one of the world's multibillionaires, provided he doesn't scare everyone off first. The intrigue: OpenAI's Sam Altman does more press, and fits the traditional CEO mold much more neatly.But despite that — or, perhaps, precisely because he's more unvarnished — Amodei has become the first thing people think of when they think of AI.Between the lines: Consider how Anthropic spent the last few days.⚠️ On Thursday, Axios's Maria Curi and Marc Caputo scooped a new MAGA memo doing the rounds at the White House that sought to paint Amodei as the poster child of the effective altruism movement, a recent bogeyman for conservatives who want a more muscular

Original sourceAxios