This is a five-alarm fire and should be covered as such by the media.

Because it's gendered.

Power without accountability: The Palantir manifesto The problems with our tech philosopher kings

New, from me: Take the Palantir manifesto seriously, if not literally.
It reveals that our tech philosopher kings want public money, but without public accountability. This creates a dilemma for governments unaligned with its techno-fascist vision. 🧵
donmoynihan.substack.com/p/palantir-w...

Gaza reconstruction to cost more than $70bn, officials say First damage assessment since US-backed ceasefire comes as progress on peace plan stalls during Iran war

A new UN report on Gaza estimates $71.4 bn will be needed over the next decade for reconstruction: “The scale & extent of deprivation across living conditions, livelihoods/income, food security, gender equality, & social inclusion have pushed back human development in the Gaza Strip by 77 years.”

Behind the language of legality, the new emir has pushed a political project to narrow national identity and roll back decades of democratic reform

Trump’s Not Paying Attention to His Own War But then again, do we want him to be?

WSJ: "Aides kept the president out of the room."

"It’s worth dwelling for a moment on this remarkable detail. Aides—presumably senior military officials in particular—believed that they had to exclude the president from the decision-making if it were to succeed."

open.substack.com/pub/thebulwa...

Horrendous. Very clearly a war crime, rendering, entire towns and villages uninhabitable. There’s no justification for this in war. None.

This is as good as everyone's saying it is. The anti-corruption message is a good one, imo

Syrian Billionaires Needed a Favor in Washington. They Invoked the Trump Name.

NYT INVESTIGATION: As the Trump administration & Congress last year moved to repeal sanctions on Syria, the Qatar-based family that most stood to benefit was privately negotiating a real-estate partnership with Jared Kushner and proposing a Trump golf course in Syria www.nytimes.com/2026/04/19/u...

this reminds me, i don't think SCOTUS should be allowed to choose their own clerks. standardize the hiring schedule, put the applications in a pool, blind reads (perhaps by a panel of former clerks) and random assignments.

Absolutely historic vote today where 40 US Senators voted to block the sale of Caterpillar D-9 bulldozers to Israel, citing civilian harm Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon.

Though the measure was defeated (as expected), the tide is turning. Just last year, this number was 27.

Iran used Chinese spy satellite to target US bases Leaked documents show IRGC secretly acquired system and used it to guide strikes during war in March

"Iran secretly acquired a Chinese spy satellite that gave the Islamic republic a powerful new capability to target US military bases across the Middle East during the recent war, according to a Financial Times investigation."

Congratulations!

Eyal Weizman · All they will find is sand: Gaza’s Yellow Line Most of the Gaza Strip – cities, refugee camps, schools, universities, mosques, the health infrastructure, agriculture...

The destruction of Gaza is so total that it changed the nature of echo in the ruinscape, and gunshot sounds are now easy to trace because nothing ricochets off walls www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Whistleblower says Trump officials thought USAID did 'just abortions,' asked for 'Barney-style' slides before gutting agency, per new book Read an exclusive excerpt from Nicholas Enrich's "Into the Wood Chipper"

NEW—I got an exclusive excerpt from a USAID whistleblower's new book that made me gasp multiple times. It details Trump's dismantling of the humanitarian aid agency & his team/DOGE's shocking ignorance to public health.

'Into the Wood Chipper' by Nicholas Enrich is out tomorrow. Read excerpt here:

This piece makes the important point that a blockade of Iranian ports is an act of war. Enforcement means the ceasefire is over. Without a change in the approach of U.S. diplomacy or an Iranian capitulation, the broader war will restart.

Hungarians deserve every congratulations for giving Peter Magyar a bigger margin than Orban has ever gotten in all of his rigged elections - and this within the system that Orban rigged. Magyar now has a constitutional majority to undo Orban's constitutional prison and govern as a democratic leader.

One wonders what documents in Budapest might be being rapidly shredded.

Hungary election results live: Orbán concedes to Magyar's Tisza after projections show opposition winning two-thirds majority The opposition Tisza party appeared on track to win Sunday's national election, early results showed, in a potential landmark defeat for veteran Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.

Democracy needed a win — and the brave people of Hungary are showing us how it’s done. Courage is the new currency. Let’s go. www.reuters.com/world/hungar...

Spotted in Dahiyeh. #beirut #lebanon

We really sent the guy who couldn’t pick out donuts.

"The conservative caricature of college campuses as liberal indoctrination camps persists because it is useful cover... American higher education is facing down a process of authoritarian capture that threatens the long-term viability of our system of higher education."

The death toll in Lebanon is now 2,020 with 6,436 injured

A reaper here, a reaper there and pretty soon you're talking real money (about $800 million so far). bsky.app/profile/wesl...

men can’t understand what it’s like for women to see story after story after story of women being victims of sexual violence in a culture where it’s routine; what it’s like to live in a world that is fundamentally hostile to our existence. it’s a wonder we leave the fucking house, let alone thrive.

Couldn't love this picture more after watching tonight. I vividly remember how shocking it was to see the Challenger explosion in my third grade class, to fully date myself, and Artemis II's re-entry was equal parts unnerving and thrilling to watch.

I knew it was bad but really didn’t appreciate it was quite this bad

as.ft.com/r/db911dd6-f...

Opinion | Gaza’s Rubble Is the Grave of Our Future

A powerful essay from writer Ghada Abdulfattah in Gaza:

How the U.S.-Israeli Strikes on Iran Have Damaged Schools and Hospitals (Gift Article) The Times has verified U.S.-Israeli strikes on at least 39 schools and hospitals, a fraction of the devastation so far.

Visualization of just some of the many human costs of this war. At least 1,701 civilians have been killed in Iran as of Tuesday, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency.