Ethan Plotkin

It's profoundly saddening to read that AP will no longer be assigning or running book reviews because readers don't engage with them enough and they take too much effort to plan and assign. People complain about critics as gatekeepers; wait until all that's left is marketing.

The west ignores Rwanda’s dark side – and political prisoners like my mother pay the price | Rémy Amahirwa She was arrested after planning to run against Paul Kagame. It’s time democracies woke up to the true nature of his regime, says Rémy Amahirwa

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

It's also just not true. Cyrus the Great is so revered in Jewish history that some considered him to the the messiah. The authors of the Talmud lived under the Sassanians and often had good relations with them (the Talmud loves king Shappur I). Israel was an ally of pre-Revolution Iran.

“Special thanks to our sponsor: Coinbase”

Who’s afraid of Nigel Farage? Plus: Rachel Reeves’ problems are piling up ahead of the autumn budget

Starmer v Farage and Reeves’s fiscal fix, dissected by the brilliant @stephenkb.bsky.social @chrisgiles.ft.com and @annasophiegross.bsky.social - plus hot @lucyfisher.ft.com baby news
www.ft.com/content/c005...

Trust in European Union at highest since 2007, poll shows Trust in the European Union and its institutions has risen to an almost two-decade high, a report released on Wednesday shows, as U.S. President Donald Trump upends global trade and foreign policy.

Trust in European Union at highest since 2007, poll shows reut.rs/4k9VQ5z

(Not about any of my bosses at the FT, to be clear!)

The end of this passage, from the @ftweekend.com essay, really hit home on.ft.com/3Za27pe

. . . It was, for example, a running joke at the Court that outsiders frequently mistook Souter and Breyer for each other. No one could really understand why this happened, because the two bore little resemblance. One day when Souter was making his usual solo drive from Washington to New Hampshire, he stopped for lunch in Massachusetts. A stranger and his wife came up to him and asked, "Aren't you on the Supreme Court?" Souter said he was. "You're Justice Breyer, right?" said the man. Rather than embarrass the fellow, Souter simply nodded and exchanged pleasantries, until he was asked an unexpected question. "Justice Breyer, what's the best thing about being on the Supreme Court?" The justice thought for a while, then said, "Well, I'd have to say it's the privilege of serving with David Souter."

From Jeffrey Toobin's 2008 book THE NINE, this remains the greatest Justice Souter anecdote I can possibly share. RIP.

OpenAI chief Sam Altman: ‘This is genius-level intelligence’ [FREE TO READ] The tech entrepreneur on the risks and opportunities of AI, his dispute with Elon Musk and why he has the ‘most important job maybe in history’

Good morning why not have lunch with Sam Altman. He's cooking on.ft.com/44qGt3J

watching baseball @jonbois.bsky.social

Kept trying to press the second button but it wouldn’t work

FT commenter 'grrrf' asking the important questions on.ft.com/3RwFiIn

Israel’s Dangerous Overreach in Syria Making an enemy of a potential new ally.

A good piece from two Israeli analysts on Israel's overreach in Syria: "Its approach resembles its efforts to create a security zone in southern Lebanon in the '80s and '90s—which resulted in a war of attrition that deepened Lebanese resentment." www.foreignaffairs.com/israel/israe...

Map from The Economist showing the papal centre of gravity, calculated using the known or estimated birthplaces of 260 popes, weighted by their length of reign.

To be continued...
www.economist.com/graphic-deta...

Anxious Trading Partners Promise to Buy American to Stave Off Trump’s Tariffs Countries are offering to buy more American goods in a bid to eliminate their trade deficits with the U.S., but not everyone is splurging.

To try to stave of tariffs, Vietnam is expediting approvals of a $1.5 billion Trump Organization resort www.wsj.com/economy/trad...

No trade deficit with these guys. So I guess the US will just go for the simple 10% baseline tariff?

Pope Leo X and Charles V discover environmentalism

Final_Version_of_Tarrifs_actualFINALcopy_version7_USETHISONE.docx

Not every stock is down today

Stunning news on the wires just now:

CHINESE STATE MEDIA: CHINA, JAPAN, SOUTH KOREA REACH A CONSENSUS THAT THREE SIDES WILL JOINTLY RESPOND TO THE U.S. TARIFFS

I suspected the world was upside down before today. Now I know it's true 🙃

Hopefully not a metaphor

Confirmed: Abraham Lincoln read Michael Sandel

This chyron is the ultimate hotdogman.gif meme

NDP vote share has fallen by almost half since the end of last year

The story here seems to be less about a Conservative collapse (though still down ~7 percentage points from peak) than it is about the left-of-center consolidating around Liberals

Genuinely historically accurate version:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-Day_D...

This is... remarkable. But the kicker seems key:

"Waltz set some of the messages in the Signal group to disappear after one week, and some after four. That... may have violated federal records law: Text messages about official acts are considered records that should be preserved."

Musk’s X suspends opposition accounts in Turkey amid civil unrest Suspensions affect accounts spreading information about the widespread demonstrations.

Elon Musk's social media platform X has suspended several accounts belonging to opposition figures in Turkey amid widespread civil unrest in the country.

Thread 👇

Breaking news: In an emergency session of the outgoing Bundestag, the chancellor-in-waiting won the support of 513 lawmakers, more than the two-thirds majority required for the constitutional changes. www.ft.com/content/8074...