Senate Advances Foreign Aid Package After Border Deal Fails
The US Senate voted 67-32 on Thursday in favor of a procedural motion to advance a stand-alone foreign aid supplemental bill just a day after the collapse of a bipartisan bill linking foreign aid to rigorous security measures at the southern border.
The $95.3B package to fund Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan comes as the broader measure, which had been privately negotiated for four months, failed to advance in a 49-50 vote — far from the 60 votes needed.
Four Democrats, including Alex Padilla (Calif.), Bob Menendez (NJ), Elizabeth Warren (Mass.), and Ed Marley (D-Mass.), as well as Independent Bernie Sanders (Vt.), joined a majority of GOP senators who voted against the broader bill. Meanwhile, lead negotiator Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) and Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Mitt Romney (R-Utah), and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) voted to advance it.
Democratic narrative
Republicans have now made clear that all their talk about securing the border is just an attempt to weaponize the issue for election purposes. Americans must be fully aware that Donald Trump and his fellow MAGA Republicans, rather than Joe Biden, are to blame for the failure of the toughest and fairest immigration reform proposed in decades.
Republican narrative
Let alone that the so-called border deal would allocate three times more money for Ukraine than for the southern border, provisions allegedly intended to bolster security in the border were completely unacceptable. This fake border reform would, in fact, make the situation worse as Biden's lenient policies would become law.
Nerd narrative
There's a 75% chance that the GOP will control the Senate after the 2024 elections, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
Baghdad: US Strike Kills Iran-Backed Militia Leader
The Pentagon stated on Wednesday that a top commander of the Iran-backed militant group Kataib Hezbollah were killed after his car was hit by a US drone strike in eastern Baghdad.
According to the Pentagon, the dead militia commander was the mastermind behind the attack in Jordan last month, which killed three American service members. Wednesday's strike comes as leaders of Iranian-sponsored militias have reportedly conducted at least 168 attacks against American forces in the area.
Though Washington originally reported one fatality in the strike, Iran-backed militia officials claimed that three were killed, including Wissam Muhammad Sabir Al-Saadi, nicknamed Abu Baqir Al-Saadi, the man in charge of the group's Syrian operations.
Pro-establishment narrative
The message from Washington is clear if US forces are attacked, it will do everything it takes to protect its troops and interests. The US has no intention of backing down when challenged, and those responsible will be held accountable with a multi-tiered response.
Establishment-critical narrative
While Iraq may have previously supported the presence of US troops in the fight against the Islamic State, America's broadening regional conflicts have now caused more death and destruction in the country than there otherwise would be. It's time for the US to remove its 2.5k troops from Iraq.
Nerd narrative
There's a 13% chance the US and Iran will be primary actors on opposite sides of war before 2025, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
World Sees First Year Above 1.5C Limit
For the first time ever, global average temperatures rose over 1.5 C (2.7 F) through a 12-month period between February 2023 and January 2024, the EU Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) reported on Thursday.
In 2015, the world's nations vowed to try to limit global warming to 1.5 C above pre-industrialization levels — which is seen as key to avoiding climate change's worst effects. Thursday's report, however, doesn't mean the Paris Agreement has been breached, as the UN deal refers to long-term temperatures.
This comes as a study published in the journal Nature earlier this week warned that global warming was already 1.7 C (3.1 F) above pre-industrial levels by 2020, predicting it could be above 2 C (3.6 F) by the end of the decade — nearly two decades earlier than expected.
Narrative A
To say that humanity has a tough task at hand would be an understatement as far as climate change is concerned. And if the reports of the 1.5 C threshold being crossed across 12 months is anything to go by, we may even have missed the chance to prevent global warming. This latest data must renew efforts to halve global emissions by 2030.
Narrative B
Since the Paris Agreement of 2015 set up the 1.5 C benchmark, the world has obsessed over this figure. Activists, business entities, and governments have all aligned themselves with this consensus goal. But it doesn't represent a scientific threshold or an ecological tipping point for the planet, as is feared. It's more of a moral threshold just to get the world to act.
Nerd narrative
There's a 50% chance that global carbon dioxide emissions will peak by 2034, according to the Metaculus forecasting community.
SCOTUS Hears Trump Colorado Ballot Case
The US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) Thursday heard oral arguments concerning the Colorado Supreme Court's ruling to remove Republican former Pres. Donald Trump from the state's 2024 primary election ballot.
Previously, the Colorado court voted 4-3 on Dec. 19, 2023 to remove Trump from the ballot due to alleged violations of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution, accusing the former president of “engaging in insurrection” during the Jan. 6, 2021 riots at the US Capitol.
Attorney Jonathan Mitchell argued on Trump's behalf that Colorado's decision was wrong for numerous reasons, including its classification of the president as an "officer of the United States," a necessary condition of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. Mitchell also cited a decision from 1869 (Griffin's case) that said Congress had to create a mechanism for enforcing Section 3; the mechanism created in response expired in the 1940s.
Anti-Trump narrative
The Constitution is clear when it comes to the consequences of inciting an insurrection, and when majorities in the Senate and House in 2021 moved forward with Trump's second impeachment, he was officially designated as an insurrectionist. So a third Trump run for America's highest office will place the US' democratic value system in potentially irreversible danger.
Pro-Trump narrative
Despite the best attempts of political and legal conspirators, Colorado's antidemocratic attempts to remove Trump from its ballot will likely crumble under the scrutiny of SCOTUS. The case is but another in a long line of illegitimate attempts to undermine Trump's road to the White House via a weaponization of the justice system.
Nerd narrative
There's a 94% chance that if Trump is the Republican nominee for president in 2024, his name will appear on Colorado's ballot on election day, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
Brazil: Police Seize Bolsonaro's Passport, Arrest Close Aides
On orders of Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, Brazilian federal police confiscated the passport of former right-wing Pres. Jair Bolsonaro on Thursday for allegedly working on a draft decree to overturn the 2022 presidential elections and arrest de Moraes, and pressuring military commanders to support a coup.
This comes as part of a broader operation, dubbed "Tempus Veritatis," that served dozens of precautionary measures, including four preventive arrest warrants. At least two former aides to Bolsonaro were reportedly among those named in the warrants, with the chair of his Liberal Party, Valdemar Costa Neto, also arrested after being caught for reported illegal possession of a weapon.
The Washington Post reported, citing two anonymous police officials, that the alleged coup plot was "far more advanced" than anticipated, involving logistical and tactical planning in coordination with senior military officials.
Left narrative
Even if the coup failed, accountability for what happened in Brazil isn't only a matter of justice but is crucial for the future of the country's democracy. The current investigation has revealed a coordinated, multi-pronged attempt by Bolsonaro and his accomplices to undermine the election's result. Despite the many similarities to the US Jan. 6 Capitol riots, the political influence of Brazil's military cannot be underestimated, and this is a concern that politicians must confront in the future.
Right narrative
You don't have to be a Bolsonaro supporter to see that Lula is using the judicial system as a means to punish his predecessor. Lula is a leftist career politician who was convicted on corruption charges before they were stunningly reversed by activist judges. Right-leaning figures across the nation are being censored, and checks and balances are being curtailed as the legal system is increasingly used as a weapon against opponents. We ought to be skeptical about charges against Bolsonaro in this environment.
Nerd narrative
There's a 16% chance that Brazil will experience a successful coup d'etat before 2040, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
Internet Shut Down on Pakistan's Election Day
Internet data and call services were shut down in Pakistan 10 minutes before the polls opened for the general election, with the government calling the outages "security measures" due to recent "incidents of terrorism." While WiFi was reportedly still working, voters claimed they were unable to book taxis to go to the polling stations and couldn't coordinate travel to the ballot box with family members.
Over 128M registered voters went out to vote for more than 5K candidates running for 336 seats. Former Prime Minister Imran Khan, whose PTI party won the last election before he was ousted two years ago, is ineligible to run after being convicted of corruption. The two leading candidates are now former three-time Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif (Nawaz party) and Bilawal Bhutto Zardari (PPP party).
Members of Khan's PTI party also claimed the internet outage kept them from using their party's app designed to help them find their respective voting locations.
Pro-establishment narrative
It seems that former Prime Minister Sharif and his party are headed toward victory again — this time, to help fix the economic and terrorism challenges that have grown in the country since he left. While some have criticized the internet outage as a method of suppression, the bombings and shootings that occurred throughout election day have shown the necessity of measures to stop even worse attacks from hindering the people's ability to vote.
Establishment-critical narrative
The government hinted at shutting down the internet before the election, and today it did. If the fraudulent arrests, convictions, and intimidation of Khan and his party — the most popular candidates in the country — weren't enough to expose this illegitimate regime, then nothing will. The US State Department in 2022 urged Pakistan to remove Khan from office, and ever since, the military regime has used every tool it has to make sure of it.
Nerd narrative
There's a 21% chance of civil war in Pakistan before 2036, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
Zelenskyy Replaces Ukraine's Military Chief
Ukrainian Pres. Volodymyr Zelenskyy has dismissed General Valerii Zaluzhnyi from his position as commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, replacing him with Oleksandr Syrskyi, who had been the commander of Ukrainian Land Forces since 2019. Zaluzhnyi was reportedly offered a different position but turned it down.
Zelenskyy and Zaluzhnyi have been at odds publicly for some time, beginning with a disagreement over the former commander's essay in the Economist last year claiming the war had reached a stalemate after Ukraine's failed counteroffensive. Zelenskyy also rejected Zaluzhnyi's call for hundreds of thousands of more troops and a return to a more defensive approach.
Syrsky was a leader in the initial defense during the first month of the war, after which he was credited with leading a successful counteroffensive in the Kharkiv region later in 2022. However, Syrsky is seen as unpopular among some soldiers, given what has been described as his Soviet-style leadership of leaving forces under fire for too long.
Narrative A
While Zaluzhnyi made a valiant effort and led the country through its first two years of the war, Syrsky is Ukraine's most experienced officer with a successful resume dating back to the war with Russia in 2014. As Ukraine faces new challenges amid shifting battlefield realities, Pres. Zelenskyy has to do what's best for Ukrainians, which right now is implementing the best people and systems to defeat Moscow.
Narrative B
Zaluzhnyi was originally picked over more senior officers because his capabilities put him in the perfect position to combat what seemed like an impossible task in early 2022. Not only has Ukraine lost a man who turned his country into a world-class military force overnight, but one who continued to maintain that strength for two years. Replacing him will do nothing but lower morale among Ukraine's people and their soldiers.
Nerd narrative
There's a 50% chance there will be a bilateral cease-fire or peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine by March 2026, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
Japan: Court Allows Gender Change Without Sterilization
A Japanese court on Wednesday approved a transgender man's request to have his gender changed in official records without first undergoing sterilization surgery.
The ruling will allow Tacaquito Usui to change his gender to male on his family registry. Usui originally applied for the revision five years ago but was rejected. In the most recent ruling, the court found the hormone therapy he had undergone made him eligible for legal gender recognition.
The ruling is the first of its kind since October when Japan's Supreme Court ruled it was unconstitutional to require the removal of reproductive organs as a precondition for legal recognition of a gender other than that assigned at birth. The ruling only applies to the provision requiring sterilization and not the constitutionality of requiring other procedures.
Narrative A
The laws in Japan are evolving more quickly than public acceptance of LGBTQ people is. Japan remains a deeply conservative country rooted in conformity, and many LGBTQ people remain closeted in fear of ostracization at school or work. It's important to maintain this view of Japan's unique cultural context before being too harsh on the government.
Narrative B
It's Japan's government, not the public, that needs to change. LGBTQ rights in the country are still far behind many other developed nations, and more needs to be done to give members of this community appropriate legal rights and protections. The government is still very traditional and conservative and is resistant to accepting gender and sexual diversity in its policies.
Russia: Anti-War Candidate Disqualified From Presidential Election
Russia's Central Election Commission on Thursday ruled that Boris Nadezhdin, an anti-war legislator, does not qualify for next month’s presidential election after deeming that too many of the signatures Nadezhdin's campaign submitted were invalid.
Per the election authority's rules, a candidate whose political party is not represented in parliament must gather at least 100K signatures from supporters. However, the Commission deemed that the Moscow area legislator did not legitimately fulfill the criteria.
An independent candidate from the Civic Initiative Party, Nadezhdin received nearly 105K signatures; however, the Commission determined that 15% of the signatures were invalid, leaving him with only 95,587 legitimate signatures. In addition to falling short of the 100K threshold, Nadezhdin was also disqualified for having more than 5% of his signatures invalidated.
Pro-establishment narrative
Despite claiming to have the overwhelming support of the Russian people, Vladimir Putin is clearly scared of any legitimate opposition. That's the only reason his electoral commission would disqualify Boris Nadezhdin from next month's presidential election. Everyone knows that Putin will imprison or even kill his political opponents, so it's no surprise he made sure that Nadezhdin couldn't run. Regardless, Putin’s support at home and abroad is crumbling as people realize the scale of his authoritarian ways.
Establishment-critical narrative
Boris Nadezhdin failed to qualify for ballot access on multiple grounds and was not allowed on the ballot — it's really that simple. While some anti-Russian and pro-Western forces may try to spin this situation as an authoritarian conspiracy, this is not the case. Russia will hold its fair and free election with four candidates next month, and the people will decide who is in charge of their nation, regardless of the whims of the so-called "rules-based international order."
Nerd narrative
There is a 50% chance that Vladimir Putin will cease to hold the office of President of Russia by Oct. 2028, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
FCC Makes AI Robocalls Illegal
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Thursday ruled that robocalls using voice-cloning technology are now illegal, effective immediately. The decision comes as the use of artificial intelligence (AI) to clone people's voices, particularly famous people and politicians, continues to rise.
The unanimous ruling cracks down on AI-generated voice cloning using the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991, which restricts junk calls that use artificial and prerecorded voice messages. Under the new guidelines, the FCC has the power to fine companies that use AI voices in their calls or block the service providers that carry them.
Regulators heightened focus on AI robocalls after a January message using the voice of Pres. Joe Biden encouraged New Hampshire voters to skip the state's presidential primary. New Hampshire's Attorney General's Office is currently investigating the incident as an attempt at voter suppression.
Narrative A
The FCC has taken staunch and swift action against AI robocalls in a move that goes a long way in protecting election integrity. The rise of AI has fueled deceptive deep-fake videos of politicians, and just weeks ago, the technology was used to interfere with New Hampshire's Democratic Primary. By clarifying and expanding on existing laws, the FCC is making it clear that bad actors will not be allowed to use novel technology to subvert democracy.
Narrative B
The threat AI poses to democracy is real and imminent, and Thursday's ruling from the FCC may not be enough to prevent AI-generated disinformation from impacting elections. As AI becomes more developed, videos and calls imitating politicians can become more convincing and powerful. Cracking down on robocalls was definitely a must-do, but the FCC needs to implement more robust laws that target all different forms of AI-generated misinformation. If more robust regulation doesn't go further soon, faith in democracy could continue to erode.
Nerd narrative
There is a 60% chance that AI will be meaningfully discussed by both candidates in the 2024 US Presidential Debate, according to the Metaculus prediction community.