Tyrannosaurus Flex

The at-times very loud debate over data centers takes place in the public square. The financing and politics associated with them happen behind the scenes. Even when we’re talking about a data center that covers nearly six square miles. NYT (Gift Article): How Meta Got Everything It Wanted in a Secret Louisiana Data Center Deal. “Rewriting the bill was a critical part of a nine-month process that Meta used to cut deals behind the scenes, avoid local opposition and offload financial risk, according to interviews with more than 40 people and a review of corporate filings, tax records, property records and meeting transcripts. The secrecy was agreed to by nearly everyone involved, from utility executives to the governor’s office to a local elected official who knew about the talks with Meta and sold 300 acres of his own property for the project.” Governor Jeff Landry doesn’t apologize for the lack of transparency. “Mr. Landry bluntly acknowledged that the deal’s secrecy was unconventional, but said state officials had to think like a tech company to secure a project of its size. ‘Transparency is a very interesting word,’ he said. ‘Because what we’ve seen is people have used the word transparency to basically kill deals like this.'”

“For decades, the federal government has funneled big-ticket grants to local communities to help them take on ambitious construction projects to expand public transit. The grants, sometimes in the billions of dollars, have funded new railroad tracks, train stations and roads rebuilt for modern bus service. Today, they’re funding extensions of the Second Avenue Subway in New York and the Red Line in Chicago, as well as the Gateway Tunnel under the Hudson River and bus infrastructure in Indianapolis and San Antonio. But since President Trump returned to office, the Federal Transit Administration has not signed a single new agreement under the program, known as Capital Investment Grants.” Congress Budgeted Billions for Big Transit Projects. Trump Isn’t Spending It. “As the number of pending projects builds up, so has anxiety about the federal government’s support for major transit infrastructure. Money that Congress designated for that purpose is accumulating too: More than $7 billion hasn’t been obligated to any project.” This is what happens when a party cedes the power of Congress. Nothing they do or spend has any meaning. Or, in other words, don’t let your mouth write a check the ass won’t cash.

“Classics scholar Emily Wilson was in Greece’s Costa Navarino last year when she heard the news that would change her life: Filmmaker Christopher Nolan was planning to release a star-studded adaptation of The Odyssey, the epic poem that Wilson had spent years painstakingly translating from Homeric Greek into English.” A Penn professor thought she’d sell 1,000 copies of her ‘Odyssey’ translation. She sold more than a million this year alone.

+ For those kinds of sales, you’d expect the movie to get a rave review from Emily Wilson. Well, not so much. “It’s a family-friendly audiovisual spectacle, like an elaborate Fourth of July fireworks display [Editor’s note: Oooh!] – and with about the same level of narrative and emotional depth.” [Editor’s note: Aaah…]

Death of a Sales Job: “In 1982, Benjamin Netanyahu was the marketing director of a Jerusalem-based furniture maker when Israel’s ambassador in Washington decided that the 32-year-old had been pitching the wrong product. Instead of selling cupboards to Israelis, he should have been selling Israel to Americans. The ambassador, who met Netanyahu at a conference a few years earlier, brought him to Washington as his deputy. Almost instantly, Netanyahu became the face of Israel on American television—a fixture on Nightline and Larry King Live, pugnacious, eloquent in unaccented English acquired as a boy in the suburbs of Philadelphia.” He’s been selling it ever since. But at some point, he stopped caring whether Americans were buying. Franklin Foer in The Atlantic (Gift Article): How Netanyahu Lost America.

+ Error Defense: The major military campaign targeting Iran has been paused. Maybe to let diplomacy work. Or maybe to consider America’s declining munitions stocks. WSJ (Gift Article): Trump Pauses Iran Strikes as Officials Weigh Dwindling Air Defense Stocks. “Trump denied that dwindling munitions are a problem, insisting in a statement to The Wall Street Journal that ‘we have far more munitions than anyone in the world, and far more than we need.'” (Phew.)

+ Dinner Theater of the Absurd: At the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, Trump proved once again that he has the first known case of Verbal Cyclospora. Trump ranted and attacked rivals and the press. Just as we knew he would. And just what the fools who attended deserved. The dinner itself is not a big story. But what it represents is. Margaret Sullivan: The predictable disgrace of the White House Correspondents Dinner. (The weirdest moment was when Trump had to sit and watch as the WSJ got an award for their reporting on the Epstein birthday card.)

+ Tropic Blunder: “Trump has said at least 15 times, including as recently as last month, that the strikes have reduced maritime drug trafficking into the country by 97 or 98 percent. ‘98.2% of Drugs coming into the U.S. by Ocean or Sea have STOPPED!’ he wrote on Truth Social in April.” Shockingly, those cocaine numbers aren’t quite on the nose. WaPo (Gift Article): Deadly U.S. boat strikes have failed to curb cocaine supply, Pentagon and DEA officials say.

+ Europe’s Hot Summer: “Heat waves and scant rainfall in Europe have contributed to historic wildfires in France and Spain that have forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes in one of the continent’s biggest evacuation efforts since World War II.” And here are some photos of the wildfires raging across France and Spain. Plus, Wildfire Disruptions to the Tour de France Show How Climate Change Is Shaping Sports.

+ Breaking Away: Even this hot summer couldn’t slow down Tadej Pogačar, who won the Tour de France for third consecutive year and fifth time in his career. The Athletic (Gift Article): In the midst of his majesty: How Tadej Pogacar won the 2026 Tour de France.

+ Over a Barrel: “Cracker Barrel’s CEO is stepping down nearly a year after an attempted rebrand of the chain led to a fierce customer backlash.”

+ Chateau Marmot: “For years, Blumstein has overseen one of the longest-running studies of free-living mammals in the world, focused on yellow-bellied marmots in central Colorado … Fearing that a lack of funding might terminate the program, Blumstein recently got his lab together and they came up with a creative, if highly unorthodox solution.” Calif. researchers turn to OnlyFans as their funding dries up. (This would probably drive more OnlyFans revenue if they were studying Dik Diks…)

How hot is it getting around the world? “Japanese vending machine manufacturer SDRS has developed a human-sized, stainless-steel fridge to stave off heatstroke amid the increasingly sweltering summers brought on by climate change.” (I wonder if the refrigerator is big enough to hold The Refrigerator?)

+ “Chicago’s ‘Scream Club’ meets there every week during the city’s warmer months, bringing together a community of up to 300 people who like to scream out over the water – and it’s an activity that seems to be spreading across the US.” Chicago scream club lets people ‘give in and let go.’ (These people should try social media, they’d love it.)