Extra, Extra
Bringing a Knife to a Gunfight: “Russia appears on track to produce nearly three times more artillery munitions than the US and Europe, a key advantage ahead of what is expected to be another Russian offensive in Ukraine later this year.” Meanwhile, the House continues its weaponized incompetence. Back at Mar-a-Lago, Trump had his meeting with one of the authoritarians he idolizes: Viktor Orban, who explained: “He will not give a penny in the Ukraine-Russia war. That is why the war will end.”
+ With Friends Like These… “Divisions between US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu burst out into the open again over the weekend as the two traded barbs in interviews over Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.”
+ A Port in the Storm: “The result underscores a political tilt to the far right across Europe. Portugal, which only returned to democracy after the fall of a fascist dictatorship 50 years ago, had long been considered immune to the rise of right-wing populism across the continent, which is expected to result in gains for far-right parties in European elections in June.” Portugal’s conservatives win election as far-right surges.
+ Grilling Barbecue: “In interviews, he poses as a God-fearing Caribbean Robin Hood and celebrates freedom fighters and agitators including Fidel Castro, Thomas Sankara and Malcolm X. ‘I like Martin Luther King, too,’ the Haitian gang boss Jimmy Chérizier told the New Yorker journalist Jon Lee Anderson when they met last year. ‘But he didn’t like fighting with guns, and I fight with guns.'” Is the feared gang boss ‘Barbecue’ now the most powerful man in Haiti?
+ That’s a S’moré: “The problem was scale. Smashmallows were designed to look like an artisanal, boutique product, but that wasn’t enough for Sebastiani: He wanted to manufacture billions of them, to build a company that would bestride Candyland like a squishy colossus. That meant he had to grow fast and figure out the engineering on the fly — the classic entrepreneurial strategy of Silicon Valley. When it works, you get Tesla; when it doesn’t, you get Theranos. This is the story of the Theranos of marshmallows.” S’more! S’more! His artisanal marshmallows were the greatest. Then he tried to scale them.
+ Number One Son: Interesting interview by David Marchese in the NYT (Gift Article): Jeremy Strong Isn’t Sure He Knows Who He Is. “Listen, there was a moment when the show ended where I felt a profound sense of, Was this the thing? Was this the event of my life?” (I felt that way after my first blog post. And the answer was probably yes.)
+ March 11: Four years ago today the world began to shut down. As it did, Trump continued to downplay the virus and Fox News execs prepared an internal email announcing the implementation of several safety measures, including a directive that any staff member who was able to work from home should begin doing so. Their viewers received no such warnings. On air, the lies about the virus continued apace. At least in this one way, it was just another Wednesday. Are you better off today than you were four years ago? Are you kidding…
