World’s Largest Organism Is Slowly Being Eaten, Scientist Says Science Alert
Sounds emitted by plants under stress are airborne and informative Cell (!!).
Why Investment Complexity Is Not Your Friend Morningstar
Climate
The Incredible Disappearing Doomsday Harpers (AL).
Glimmering in the sunlight, bobbing like an otter The Narwhale. Kelp (see NC here).
Heat pump sales up 11% worldwide in 2022, record 40% in Europe, driven by energy crisis Andalu Agency
Water
As hydropower dams quell the Mekong’s life force, what are the costs Mongabay
Landslides in Mekong Delta increasingly serious Saigon News
Projected seasonal changes in future rainfall erosivity over the Lancang-Mekong River Basin under the CMIP6 scenarios Journal of Hydrology
China?
COVID-19 Exposed Weaknesses in China’s Rural Healthcare The Diplomat. Making Xi’s decision to kowtow to the Five Eyes and “Let ‘er rip” — because TINA, presumably — all the more creepy and disturbing.
‘Dare to fight’: Xi Jinping unveils China’s new world order FT
The politics of Taiwan’s Ma Ying-jeou referencing ‘yan huang descendants’ South China Morning Post
India
40% jump in cases in a day: Will a fresh wave of Covid-19 hit India? Business Standard. Commentary:
South Africa Mulls Options After ICC’s Putin Arrest Order Voice of America
European Disunion
The French Uprising New Left Review (AL).
Dear Old Blighty
Yousaf accused of ‘insulting’ Scots with creation of independence minister role Holyrood
Britain secures agreement to join Indo-Pacific trade bloc Politico
New Not-So-Cold War
Why Force Fails Foreign Affairs
Russia Asks UN To Hand Full List Of Bucha Victims; Presses For Int’l Investigation Republic World
Cheerleading versus shivers down your spine: what will the coming Ukrainian counter-offensive bring? Gilbert Doctorow
Hosting Russian Nuclear Weapons Will Have Far-Reaching Consequences for Belarus Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
START treaty: Russia stops sending nuclear arms info to US Al Jazeera
Can the dogs of Chernobyl teach us new tricks on survival? AP
Turkey’s parliament ratifies Finland’s application to join NATO France24
Belarus brands deployment of NATO troops near border ‘irresponsible escalation’ Andalu Agency
Terrifying impact 130 meters underground from a Russian super-sonic Kinzhal missile at the NATO command center in Ukraine! (Google translation) Pronews.gr. Big if true.
‘Russia alone can already confront the entire West…’ India Punchline (Rev Kev).
‘It’s not a pretty picture’: Russia’s support is growing in the developing world CNBC
It’s morally repugnant, but isolationism on Ukraine makes some sense FT
You Will Hardly Find This In The News… Andrei Martyanov, Reminiscence of the Future (Chuck L). Dedollarization.
China, Brazil strike deal to ditch dollar for trade Straits Times (notabanker). More dedollarization. But:
There is no dedollarization happening. At all.
Here are the major currencies’ share of global transactions since 1989. pic.twitter.com/iDUEAzsCbL
— ʎllǝuuop ʇuǝɹq (@donnelly_brent) March 30, 2023
The Caribbean
Shadowy brokers walk off with billions in Venezuelan oil AP
Biden Administration
Biden skirts bank bailout backlash Politico
2024
Donald Trump indicted by Manhattan grand jury on more than 30 counts related to business fraud CNN. 30! “The indictment has been filed under seal.” So everything right now is meta—
Trump’s statement:
Donald Trump Has Been Indicted. Don’t Get Your Hopes Up. Elie Mystal, The Nation. After the liberalgasm, a cigarette.
Why charges against Trump don’t prevent him from running for president The Hill. Re: separation of powers: “The good Thufir* is a Mentat and has anticipated this moment.” –Frank Herbert, Dune NOTE * That is, James Madison.
Donald Trump indictment thrusts a divided nation into new chapter of chaos FT
B-a-a-a-a-d Banks
Either G20 cooperates or banking crisis deepens, says Jeffery Sachs Business Standard
Volcker slayed inflation. Bernanke saved the Banks. Can Powell do both? Bloomberg
Our Famously Free Press
A Guide to Understanding the Hoax of the Century Jacob Siegel, The Tablet. Read together with–
Tablet’s Grand Opus on the Anti-Disinformation Complex Matt Taibbi, The Racket:
[Siegel] concludes with an escalating string of anxiety-provoking propositions. One is that our first windows into this new censorship system, like Stanford’s Election Integrity Partnership, might also be our last, as AI and machine learning appear ready to step in to do the job at scale. The National Science Foundation just announced it was ‘building a set of use cases’ to enable ChatGPT to ‘further automate’ the propaganda mechanism, as Siegel puts it. The messy process people like me got to see, just barely, in the outlines of Twitter emails made public by a one-in-a-million lucky strike, may not appear in recorded human conversations going forward. ‘Future battles fought through AI technologies,’ says Siegel, ‘will be harder to see.’”
Covering (Up) Antiwar Protest in US Media FAIR
Where Are They Now?: The Pundits Who Got Iraq Wrong The Present Age. They are doing very well for themselves. Exactly as the pundits who got Covid wrong are doing and will do. Now, however, there’s AI….
Sports Desk
Does the soil on a baseball field influence the players? Soils Matter, Get the Scoop
Meet the American who is the ‘true father of baseball,’ New York City physician Daniel ‘Doc’ Adams FOX
Freight Train Derailment Sparks Intense Fire in Minnesota Jalopnik
Class Warfare
The Puzzle of Financialization Harry Magdoff, Paul M. Sweezy Monthly Review
LOADED: Corporate Interests Dominate the Official U.S. Government Trade Advisory System Rethink Trade
I used AI to bet on horse-racing. Here’s what happened FT. Repellent clickbait headline, must-read article. What happens when everything turns into playing the ponies?’ Why is there no over/under on Covid deaths, for example? Or maybe there is!
Vatican rejects ‘Doctrine of Discovery’ that justified historial taking of Indigenous lands Andalu Agency
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
