Source: Washington Monthly
by Robert J Shapiro
“The late scholar of mass movements, charismatic leaders, and government violence foreshadowed the president’s rise and the MAGA movement in The Origins of Totalitarianism. Recent polling proves her prescience.” (02/17/26)
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2026/02/17/hannah-arendt-understood-donald-trump/
Source: CNN
“Warner Bros. Discovery wants to hear Paramount’s ‘best and final proposal’ for the media company, and is opening a brief window for discussions about a bid, while also moving forward with its Netflix merger and urging shareholders to reject Paramount’s current hostile bid. … Last December, WBD agreed to sell most of the company, including the Warner Bros. movie studio and HBO, to Netflix. WBD’s cable channels, including CNN, are not part of the sale. The deal with Netflix doubled as a rejection of Paramount. But Paramount CEO David Ellison responded by going directly to shareholders with a $30-per-share offer for all of WBD, including CNN. That’s the offer WBD is officially opposing. On Tuesday morning, WBD said it will hold a special shareholder meeting on March 20 and will recommend voting to approve the Netflix deal, which values the studio and streaming assets at $27.75 per share.” (02/17/26)
https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/17/media/wbd-netflix-paramount-shareholder-vote-bid
Source: Antiwar.com
“Sen. Graham: US Troops Could Be ‘Hit’ in Iran War, Israel To Give Hamas 60-Day Deadline, and More.” (02/17/26)
Source: Pierre Lemieux
by Pierre Lemieux
“Consider the case of the businesses begging for protective tariffs to compensate for other tariffs imposed on them by the same government.” (02/16/26)
https://pierrelemieux.substack.com/p/is-protectionism-for-national-security
Source: decrypt
“Shares in publicly traded crypto exchange Gemini (GEMI) have fallen more than 14% on Tuesday following word that the firm has decided to part ways with three of its executives following a recent announcement of mass layoffs across the company. Gemini Chief Financial Officer Dan Chen and Chief Legal Officer Tyler Meade will be replaced in the interim by Danijela Stojanovic and Kate Freedman, respectively. Marshall Beard, the firm’s chief operating officer, will also depart and leave the board, though his executive role will not be filled. Instead, Gemini co-founder Cameron Winklevoss will assume his responsibilities.” (02/17/26)
https://decrypt.co/358325/gemini-stock-dives-winklevoss-crypto-exchange-dumps-executives
Source: AI Summer
“AI safety in India, AV operators in the Philippines.” (02/16/26)
https://www.aisummer.org/p/ai-safety-in-india-av-operators-in
Source: CounterPunch
by Laura Flanders
“There’s a reason we talk more about power than individual people. Take Jeffrey Epstein. The man is dead, but the power problem lives on. The files not only revealed a whole lot of individual predators, but also an entire ecosystem of money, and power, and abuse, and protection by bankers, and billionaires, and politicians, and protectors, many of whom continue to wield enormous power at the very height of our society today. Put that creepy picture next to another, one of a sprawling network of secretive detention centers and camps where tens of thousands of people, including women and girls, are hidden away in far off places and moved from camp to camp and state to state and cage to cage without documents or phones or anyone to hear their calls. We do not come to this moment uninformed.” (02/17/26)
https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/02/17/the-trafficking-never-stopped/
Source: The UnPopulist
by Andrew Koppelman
“Hierarchical structures within religion are largely acceptable to liberalism so long as they are based on consent rather than coercion. Hierarchy must be justified, but consent suffices to justify. Shifting our focus from theory to practice, American law has never questioned the right of the Catholic Church to confine the priesthood to males, or to impose on the priesthood difficult demands such as celibacy, or to condemn as immoral homosexual sex and contraception. Liberals often harshly denounce and stigmatize these ideas, putting painful social pressure on those who hold them, but the postliberals claim more than this: outright coercion and censorship. Liberals believe in free speech, even for ideas we don’t like.” (02/16/26)
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/the-unbearable-intellectual-lightness
Source: Show-Me Institute
by Susan Pendergrass
“A recent editorial in the Wall Street Journal lays out what has been on the minds of many (or at least mine) for some time. The traditional education establishment that was in charge of all things K-12 in the last century is crumbling. In the last decade, millions of children have exited their assigned public schools in exchange for a scholarship that is a fraction of what was spent on them by the education blob. It is becoming clear — parents want to be able to choose from a range of options when it comes to the education of their children.” (02/16/26)
https://showmeinstitute.org/article/education/teachers-unions-get-desperate/
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“Hamas has rejected remarks by an Israeli government official calling for the Gaza-based group to disarm in 60 days and threatening to resume Israel’s genocidal war if it fails to comply. Senior Hamas official Mahmoud Mardawi told Al Jazeera Mubasher on Monday that he had no knowledge of such a demand. ‘Statements made by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu … and through the media are merely threats with no basis in the ongoing negotiations,’ Al Jazeera Arabic cited him as saying. Mardawi’s comments come after Israeli Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs, during a conference in Jerusalem on Monday, threatened to renew the genocidal war on Gaza if Hamas failed to disarm in 60 days, local media outlet the Times of Israel reported.” (02/17/26)