“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel addressed the United Nations General Assembly on Friday while wearing a large button on his lapel that bore a QR code, which he urged attendees and viewers to scan to better understand his country’s actions since the war in Gaza began. The code linked to a website filled with gruesome images and videos of the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on southern Israel. Visitors to the website were warned that ‘extreme viewer discretion is advised’ … The General Assembly hall is mostly empty as Netanyahu speaks, with many delegations having walked out. But the audience gallery above the hall where member states can bring guests is full … Netanyahu is listing all the regional leaders hostile to Israel that Israel has killed in the last year or so, including Yahya Sinwar in Gaza, Hassan Nasrallah in Lebanon, ‘half the Houthi leaders’ in Yemen, and Iran’s military commanders and top atomic scientists. Speaking of Iraq’s Iranian-allied militias, he said ‘their leaders, if they attack israel, will also be gone.’ ‘Remember those pagers?’ Netanyahu says. ‘We paged Hezbollah. They got the message.’” (NYT)
“In this way, 107 Days is also, mostly unintentionally, an indictment of the kind of clubby elite liberalism that both Biden and (Kamala) Harris benefited from and to which they mostly adhered. Harris’s recognition of her own complicity creeps in every once in a while. Like Nixon, Harris uneasily mixes gratitude with grudges throughout 107 Days. She writes, ‘The rapport between Joe and me was genuine. For two people who seemingly couldn’t have been more different, our values were incredibly aligned.’ She then adds in the next paragraph that ‘the president’s approval rating of 41 percent was a ball and chain dragging down my campaign.’ Since Biden was inaugurated as president at the advanced age of 78, realism alone should have dictated that he groom Harris to take charge when and if necessary. Yet, Harris notes, he and the White House did the opposite: They gave her politically risky tasks (such as being the face of the administration’s border policy) and refused to defend her from unfair media attacks. This was true even after the disastrous debate between Biden and Trump, when a tense Jill Biden did not turn to Harris for solace or advice but instead to demand loyalty. ‘Are you supporting us?’ she asked Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff. ‘That’s really important, we need to know.’ Harris could answer honestly yes. She had, at least in her retelling, always been a good soldier and loyal to a fault … When the dam broke and Biden did withdraw, Harris also still remained loyal. Loyalty meant no public criticism of Biden even where he was clearly wrong, most glaringly in his nearly unwavering support of Israel’s onslaught in Gaza. Harris claims in private that she tried to change Biden’s mind … That Harris tried to change Biden’s mind was a good thing, but it’s not hard to miss that when talking about Gaza, she reverts to the gauzy language of empathy without making clear what concrete measures she thought were necessary to end the slaughter.” (Jeet Heer/TheNation)
“When investigators were closing in on Jeffrey Epstein, he thought about saying sorry. Merrie Spaeth, a sought-after crisis strategist who once served as the director of media relations for Ronald Reagan’s White House, helped him pick his words …Her 2008 exchanges are part of more than 18,000 emails from Epstein’s personal Yahoo account obtained by Bloomberg News. That cache reveals a sweeping array of details about his public and private life, including his callous and methodical recruitment of young women, a close partnership with Ghislaine Maxwell that went beyond what either has admitted and adoration from one of the UK’s most influential figures. The emails also provide new levels of detail about Epstein’s other connections—relationships that were less public but nevertheless crucial to him, especially once he became the target of state and federal investigations. Epstein was drawn to what he saw as the finest things in life. The substantial wealth he acquired after leaving Bear Stearns in 1981 to advise the ultrarich afforded him a Boeing 727, one of Manhattan’s largest townhouses and his own Caribbean island. And when his own hour of terror dawned in 2005, following a tip to police in Palm Beach County from the family of a teenage girl, he didn’t rely on just one champion or defender, his inbox shows, but a collection of elite professionals. Though lawyers, academics and media advisers helped him in different ways and to different extents, his network included past and future White House officials, a top Hollywood publicist, a former child-exploitation prosecutor and renowned researchers, including one on his way to winning a Nobel Prize. That support for Epstein—who harmed more than 1,000 people, according to the US Justice Department—came when he needed it most.” (Bloomberg)
“Here at the Freakshow, we’ve found a cache of previously unreported global Epstein travel records, with a curious pattern: In the years 2010 to 2014, right after his laughably brief jail stint, Epstein was jetting back and forth to Istanbul, then back to the US, frequently stopping at his tropical hideaway, which he’d made his official residence. Records from Customs and Border Protection show Epstein flying his private jet into and out of Istanbul 64 times during that four-year period, often landing at St. Thomas only to turn around and make another round trip to Istanbul the very next day. The source for all this is in CBP records here. Weirdly, these documents are in the public domain only because of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed by Epstein’s own lawyer in July 2013, after Epstein had already been making regular trips in and out of Istanbul for two years. Was Jeff checking his tracks? (Epstein lawyer Darren Indyke has not replied to email or phone messages about this FOIA. If he does, we will update.) More often than not, the records indicate female passengers were also on these flights. But their names are redacted. So many questions. Why Istanbul? Why always the private jet to Istanbul, when he flew commercial to Paris and London? Had the supply of underprivileged American girls run dry or had soliciting them gotten too risky after the plea deal? Regrets-free Alex Acosta, in concert with Epstein’s A-Team of the best American defense lawyers money could buy, released Epstein into the wild in 2009. Instead of facing potential decades in prison, he spent 13 months of his 19-month sentence in the private wing of a Palm Beach jail, and was allowed to go home to his ‘office’ by day.” (Nina Burleigh/American Freakshow)
“Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa addressed the U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday — the first Syrian leader to do so since 1967. He gave a triumphant speech about Syrians overcoming the murderous Assad regime, vowing to bring those who wronged Syria to justice, and rebuilding anew. Sharaa has also shuttled around New York City to various engagements. He even sat down with former CIA director David Petraeus, a remarkable moment given that not long ago Washington had a $10 million bounty on his head. At this point, every profile dutifully referencing his past ties to proscribed terrorist groups feels almost a cliche; yet his trajectory — and Syria’s rapid reintegration into the international community — is so extraordinary that it still demands mention. As I wrote in Foreign Policy in June, the West’s embrace of Syria’s new leadership stands in sharp contrast to its cold rejection of Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. Al-Sharaa, once an al-Qaeda affiliate, now poses for photo ops with Western heads of state, raises Syria’s flag at the U.N., and earns praise from President Trump. Optics play a role. Al-Sharaa’s rebranding has been welcomed by a Syrian diaspora eager for engagement — as reflected when he addressed Syrian Americans in New York — with minority groups such as Jewish Syrian Americans sitting prominently in attendance. But the deeper reason is strategic: Syria borders Israel, Turkey, and the Mediterranean, and its new government is hostile towards Iran and skeptical of Russia — positive factors from a U.S. and European perspective.” (Adam Weinstein/Responsible Statecraft)
“Thousands of years ago, an Ice Age hunter set down a small pouch containing essential survival tools beside a campfire in what is now the Czech Republic, but never came back to retrieve it. ZME Science reports that archaeologists recently recovered the objects at a site known as Milovice IV in southern Moravia. Although the leather or hide pouch had long since decayed, the team found 29 small blades and points. Some had been used as projectiles on the tips of arrows or spears, while others seemed to have been used to cut or scrape animal skins. Most of them showed wear patterns and signs that they had been heavily used in their lifetime. Carbon dating from charcoal layers associated with the artifacts revealed they were between 29,550 and 30,250 years old, placing them within the time when the Gravettian culture flourished across Ice Age Europe. Perhaps most surprisingly, the raw materials used to produce the objects came from a variety of sources and locations—flint cobbles, radiolarites, and even opal were obtained in areas as far as 80 miles away from the site. Researchers believe that the items comprise the personal toolkit of one expert hunter-gatherer, although they are a bit perplexed why the individual would have held on to so many partially broken pieces. ‘It is possible the hunter kept them in the hope of recycling them or even for their sentimental value,’ said Dominik Chlachula of the Czech Academy of Sciences.” (Archaeology)
“With the Jimmy Kimmel uproar, Disney CEO Bob Iger has turned the home of Snow White and the seven very little people into the crappiest place on earth … Saint Bob of Iger was once the standard-bearer for corporate cleanliness. He was even knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. With his chiseled jawline and perfectly creased pants, Iger twice seriously considered a run for the White House. A former colleague says one of the Disney CEO’s greatest gifts was Iger brand protection, the ability to keep his fingerprints off any controversial decision. In a self-admiring book about leadership, Iger intoned, ‘Don’t be in the business of playing it safe. Be in the business of creating possibilities of greatness.’ Unfortunately, he blew that possibility when he overpaid for 21st Century Fox (loading up the company with debt)), kept extending his Disney tenure by thwarting efforts to find a credible successor, and ensured that his eventual hand-picked replacement, Bob Chapek, the former head of Disney parks, was a dark-horse dud with a deficit in social skills and few Hollywood relationships. Alas, Iger’s white knight return to Disney’s CEO suite in 2022 to rescue the company from Chapek happened just when the disrupted media landscape was about to crater. Suddenly, the corporate golden boy was just another flailing media leader. An inkling that he might have misplaced his moral compass came in a CNBC interview at the 2023 Sun Valley media conference, when he failed to see the dissonance between receiving a $27 million pay package and telling striking Hollywood writers that they were “just not realistic” in their demands for increased pay.” (Tina Brown/Fresh Hell)
“The leading byline on MSNBC’s story might look both familiar and strange. Leonnig worked for more than two decades at the Washington Post, where she won or helped win four Pulitzer Prizes, including one for her unsparing examination of Secret Service failings. So why did this scoop appear at a rival news organization? Last month, (MSNBC’s Carol) Leonnig announced that she was leaving the Post via X. That post appeared just a few weeks after CEO Will Lewis sent an email to staff proclaiming that his team was embarking on a ‘strategic reinvention journey’ and that ‘those who do not feel aligned with the company’s plan’ should consider a buyout. On August 4, Leonnig announced that she was off to MSNBC. Lewis and his boss, Jeff Bezos, have been trying to reverse the Post’s slide in circulation and revenue; according to one report, the company lost around a hundred million dollars last year. As any turnaround executive knows, you often need new people to make the changes your company requires. But the Post’s recent moves have fluctuated between ham-fisted and catastrophic. Bezos’s eleventh-hour decision to yank a Kamala Harris endorsement led to three hundred thousand cancellations by subscribers; reading the once vibrant opinion section under its new editor, Adam O’Neal, feels like choking down a spoonful of congealed Cream of Wheat. And even though many excellent reporters remain, some of the paper’s most talented journalists are taking their scoops elsewhere.” (Bill Grueskin/CJR)
“Taiwan’s politicians have inflamed partisan divisions with rhetoric accusing one another of undermining Taiwan’s security, Taiwan’s ruling party pushed a failed ‘recall’ of opposition members that deeply divided the population, and President Lai Ching-te’s popularity is collapsing. Taiwan’s dealings with the United States, meanwhile, have become trickier. The Trump administration has refused Lai’s routine transit through the United States, postponed efforts to reach a trade deal with Taiwan, halted some planned arms deliveries, and expressed harsh criticism about Taiwan’s defense spending. Washington has also loosened high-tech export controls on China, which suggests that President Donald Trump puts a higher priority on reaching a trade deal and improving relations with Beijing than on steadfast support for Taiwan. The pessimism about Taiwan’s future was best exemplified in August, when an article by a former Trump administration official went viral in Taiwan. It was called ‘How Taiwan Lost Trump.’ Concerns about Taiwan’s future are understandable—but they are also overblown. Unlike many other U.S. partners that are worried about their futures, Taiwan has valuable cards to play. It is far less divided internally than its rough-and-tumble politics might suggest, and its democracy and civil society are robust. It is also home to the world’s most advanced technologies, and its economy remains strong and resilient. Precisely because of those strengths, the island is finally making progress on the defense reforms and increased expenditures that will reduce its vulnerabilities to China even if U.S. support diminishes. If Taiwan plays those cards right, it can continue to prosper—and thwart Chinese military or political designs.” (Philip H. Gordon and Ryan Hass/Foreign Affairs)
“The shirtless man in the golden mask and cape has plans to lead his own country one day. There is no location yet, but it will be a crypto- and AI-powered paradise of medical experimentation, filled with people who want to ‘make death optional,’ he says. For now, though, he’s leading a sparsely attended rave on the second floor of a San Francisco office building. A DJ is spinning at one end of an open room. A handful of people sway and jump on the space cleared out as a dance floor. It’s 10 am. At a nearby table, coffee is available with many alternative milks. The man in the mask is Laurence Ion, a programmer from Romania. After winning a Google Code-in competition as a teenager, he worked for various startups and became what he describes as ‘financially free.’ Four years ago, Ion helped launch VitaDAO, a decentralized organization for bankrolling longevity research, which attracted funding from Balaji Srinivasan, a former biotech founder and Coinbase executive, and the drug company Pfizer’s venture arm. Now 31, Ion is part of a crowd of self-styled future-builders that includes Vitalik Buterin, the billionaire cocreator of the Ethereum protocol. Ion helped organize Zuzalu, Buterin’s 2023 ‘pop-up city’ for life extensionists at a resort in Montenegro, and another pop-up called Vitalia, on an island off the Honduran coast. For his latest project, Viva City, Ion has booked this 16-story office building on Market Street. Once the headquarters of Burning Man, it turned into a WeWork, then into Frontier Tower. For the six weeks that Ion and his citizens-to-be are here—bonding over life extension, playing with blockchain and crypto and AI, and maybe occasionally sleeping over—the place will be known as Viva Frontier Tower. The vibe here is more summer camp than city-state … ‘I realized it’s going to be faster to create a city than to go through the FDA.’ To that end, Ion says, Viva City will be offering a ‘bounty’: $2 million for anyone who connects the group with a politician, anywhere in the world, who can help them acquire the land and pass the laws to establish their own special jurisdiction. In Viva City, the typical lengthy approval procedures and rules around biotechnology and experimental medical treatments won’t apply.” (Vittoria Elliott/WIRED)
“‘This is not an audience committing suicide,’ Palantir CEO Alex Karp said from the main stage. ‘This is an audience fighting to win.’ What would save us exactly, was not completely clear, but it had something to do with ambition, the new political drift, cryptocurrencies, AI, and getting to Mars. In coming here, I was hoping to answer a fundamental question: What kind of people were these who would be responsible for saving the West? And also: What kind of person pays $7,500 for a two-day conference? The All-In Summit is overseen by the podcast’s hosts, who are known more simply as ‘the Besties.’ The Besties do many things very well, including making vaguely uncool people—money managers and corporate shills—feel not only cool but like cultural necessities. Now in its fourth year, the summit is a clubby, real-world extension of the pod itself. Onstage talks feature candid, combative conversation on global politics, investing, and business with some of the most powerful people on the planet. These talks are punctuated by lavish dinners around Los Angeles, a casino night, poker tables with fake chips, caviar, and champagne, and a one-night takeover of Universal Studios. Through all of it runs a chest-thumping celebration of capitalism and the idea that America, while the home of the free, is more importantly, the land of the entrepreneur. ‘This country,’ a woman who owns a bundt cake business told me, ‘is getting into founder mode.’ No other show or podcast has paved the country’s path to founder mode so directly as All-In. On the heels of helping bankroll Trump’s campaign and hosting him on the pod, the Besties are becoming fixtures at the White House. Days prior to the summit, Sacks and Palihapitiya dined there along with a coterie of Silicon Valley’s most powerful CEOs. Before Trump even took office, he appointed Sacks as the country’s ‘crypto and AI czar’ to help shape federal policy on everything from digital money to machine intelligence.” (Zoe Bernard/VF)
“It is a time to ask questions – carefully, seriously, and without presuming that we already know what is at stake. What is at risk is not just the authority of teachers or the fate of the humanities, but the intelligibility of learning as something more than adaptive performance. Among the questions we must ask is whether something essential is being obscured. Not simply by AI’s practical disruptions, but by the model of learning that machine learning makes newly visible and dominant. The paradigm of optimization – of iterative improvement through feedback – has become a background assumption for how we design, measure, and describe learning, even in human contexts. But does this model capture what matters most in our deepest experiences of understanding? Is learning merely a refinement of performance? Or can it also be understood as a mode of orientation: a posture toward the not‑yet‑known, a practice shaped by inward responsibility, difficulty, and directedness toward something beyond utility or output? These questions became palpable for me during my first year of teaching at St. John’s College, a small liberal arts institution with no departments or majors, where students pursue a common curriculum rooted in the close reading and discussion of foundational texts. The student essays I read were often hesitant, raw, or syntactically uneven. But their awkwardness reminded me that these were projects undertaken at the student’s initiative, for the purpose of working out, however provisionally, something that mattered. I never suspected a student of submitting AI‑generated work. But if someone had, I am not sure it would have mattered in the way most discussions assume. Whatever tools may have played a role, the essays bore the marks of being authored in a deeper sense. The signs of exploratory posture, interruptions of thought, and patterns of struggle that accompany the attempt to learn something for oneself were unmistakable.” (Zachary Gartenberg/Cosmos Institute)