The Full Belmonte, 12/13/2023
UN General Assembly votes overwhelmingly to demand a humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza
“The U.N. General Assembly voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to demand a humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza in a strong demonstration of global support for ending the Israel-Hamas war. The vote also shows the growing isolation of the United States and Israel.” Read More. at Washington Post
President Biden and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu clashed over who should govern Gaza after the war.
“Biden suggested that the Netanyahu government’s hard-line stance has prevented the Israeli leader from accepting the U.S.’s postwar plan to have the Palestinian Authority take over Gaza, and that it would also obstruct progress toward political, economic and security arrangements that could spawn a separate Palestinian state. His comments came as Netanyahu said he would block a postwar plan to have the Palestinian Authority take over. The United Arab Emirates will condition financial and political support for the reconstruction of Gaza’s infrastructure on a viable U.S.-backed path toward a two-state solution, its ambassador to the United Nations told WSJ. Meanwhile, Israel’s military has begun to pump seawater into Hamas’s vast complex of tunnels in Gaza, according to U.S. officials briefed on the Israeli military’s operations. A spokesperson for the Israeli defense minister declined to comment, saying the tunnel operations are classified.” [Wall Street Journal]
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s pleas for aid drew sympathy from Congress but failed to break an impasse.
“Many lawmakers of both parties support tens of billions of dollars in new funding for Kyiv, but House and Senate Republicans are demanding a major crackdown on crossings at the southern U.S. border as a condition for their votes, a step Democrats have rejected. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said at a news conference following Zelensky’s meetings with senators and House leaders it was ‘practically impossible’ for any Ukraine and border deal to pass Congress before the Christmas break. At a separate meeting at the White House, Biden told Zelensky the U.S. “will stay by your side.” Separately, a newly declassified U.S. intelligence assessment estimates Russia has lost nearly 90% of its prewar army to death or injury.” [Wall Street Journal]
The House will vote on an impeachment inquiry against Biden.
“Why? Republicans want to strengthen their powers to investigate the Biden family’s finances. Today’s vote could formally authorizethe inquiry, which began in September.
What they’re investigating: Whether Biden financially benefited from his son Hunter’s foreign investment deals. But Republicans have so far failed to prove their claims.”
Read this story at Washington Post
Feds get data from Trump's tweeter
Trump speaks at a gala in Manhattan on Saturday. Photo: Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
“Special counsel Jack Smith plans to use data from former President Trump's White House cell phone in the federal 2020 election interference case, Axios' Sareen Habeshian writes from a court filing yesterday.
Smith plans to call an expert witness who has ‘extracted and processed data’ from the phones of the former president and another unnamed person.
The witness would also determine location and use of the phones during the post-election period, including on and around Jan. 6, 2021.
What to watch: The federal 2020 election trial is scheduled to start on March 4 — the day before Super Tuesday.” [Axios]
AI's virtual wall
Rancher Albert Miller walks by an autonomous surveillance tower near his property in Valentine, Texas, last year. Photo: Salwan Georges/The Washington Post via Getty Images
“The U.S. government is building a ‘virtual wall’ at the southern border by erecting hundreds of high-tech surveillance towers — some of which use AI, Axios' Russell Contreras writes.
Why it matters: A record number of people have entered the U.S. through the southern border this year.
Although there have been surveillance towers at the border for several years, the new autonomous towers can better detect abnormal activity.
The U.S. has installed about 300 different types of surveillance towers from the California coast to the tip of Texas, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit that monitors civil liberties in the digital world.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials have praised the autonomous technology as a great asset that helps agents do their jobs, and it has bipartisan support.
CBP has said more are coming.” [Axios]
Data: Electronic Frontier Foundation. Map: Jared Whalen/Axios
How it works: Autonomous surveillance towers contain 360° pan radars and sensors that can scan for miles.
The solar-powered towers are outfitted with AI software that distinguishes people from desert animals.
Images are fed back to Border Patrol personnel who can deploy agents to the area where activity was detected.
New York's top court orders new House district lines
“ALBANY, N.Y. – New York’s top court is giving Democrats another shot at drawing congressional lines in 2024, smoothing the path for pickups for the party in a state where they underperformed in 2022 and helped hand House control to Republicans.
A Court of Appeals 4-3 decision Tuesday ordered a bipartisan commission that deadlocked last year to reconvene and produce new draft plans by the end of February.
The Democratic-dominated state Legislature will then vote on the new maps. If the maps are voted down by the commission, legislators would have the power to draw maps themselves.”
Read the latest at POLITICO
Kentucky woman seeking court approval for abortion learned her embryo no longer has cardiac activity
“A pregnant woman in Kentucky who filed a lawsuit demanding the right to an abortion has learned her embryo no longer has cardiac activity, her attorneys said, signaling their intent to continue the challenge to Kentucky’s near-total abortion ban.” Read More at AP News
Georgia election worker suing Rudy Giuliani tells jurors that his lies made her fear for her life
“Scared for her life after Rudy Giuliani and other Donald Trump allies falsely accused her of fraud, Georgia election worker Wandrea “Shaye” Moss told jurors she seldom leaves her home, suffers from panic attacks and battles nightmares brought on by a barrage of threatening and racist messages.” Read More at AP News
Anti-DEI movement expands
Illustration: Natalie Peeples/Axios
“The backlash over diversity, equity and inclusion programs (DEI) is sharpening in politics, business and academics, Axios' Erica Pandey reports.
Why it matters: Diversity programs are being cut in business, pummeled by Republicans in politics and ridiculed in academics where donors have pulled millions.
‘I'm seeing a new trend,’ said Joelle Emerson, CEO of the DEI consulting firm Paradigm. ‘Those critiquing DEI aren't just the extreme, right-wing anti-progress activists.’
‘They're also liberal-leaning people who are likely values-aligned with DEI in principle, but confused and misguided about what the work looks like in practice.’
The big picture: College DEI programs support historically underrepresented students and faculty members, including people of color, people with disabilities and veterans.
Critics have argued for years that these programs make universities overly sensitive to only certain groups.
They leapt to make that connection after university presidents hedged when asked how they'd respond to antisemitism on campus.
In corporate America, DEI efforts lost momentum this year after a Supreme Court affirmative action ruling in June.
‘2023 has undeniably shifted the DEI landscape for years to come,’ Paradigm said in a report last month.
What's happening: Billionaire hedge fund manager and Harvard alumnus Bill Ackman wrote an open letter to his alma mater calling for Claudine Gay to resign as president, and said the university's DEI office was a ‘major contributing source of discriminatory practices on campus.’
Gay's job is safe, Harvard's board said yesterday.
Stacy Burdett, an antisemitism expert and former vice president of the Anti-Defamation League, said: ‘It's a reality that traditional DEI has not been inclusive enough of antisemitism and it's urgent to address the gaps.’
‘The racial justice movement as we know it may not have imagined the need to support and protect a group of mostly white people who are targeted by hate crimes and identity-based harassment,’ she said.
But she added that ‘the culture war against diversity, and efforts to turn DEI into a bogeyman don't make Jewish people safer. That's simply playing on Jewish fear to score political points.’
Flashback: Three years ago, after George Floyd's killing and the ensuing protests threw the lack of diversity at colleges and companies into the spotlight, universities were raking in funds to establish new DEI programs.
Institutions, including Brown and UT Dallas, raised funds to increase accessibility, support DEI research and hire faculty.
A slew of colleges around the country, including the University of Minnesota and Penn State, established new scholarships to support students from underrepresented backgrounds.
What to watch: Bills to defund DEI efforts at public colleges or limit or ban identity-based faculty hiring have been proposed in 20 states this year.” [Axios]
Senate Bill Would Tax Universities to Fund Israel, Ukraine and Border Security
“Republican senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas wants to levy a 6 percent tax on 10 universities’ endowments to support Israel and Ukraine and fund border security efforts.
The one-time tax, proposed Tuesday as part of the Woke Endowment Security Tax Act, would raise about $15.47 billion, according to a news release from Cotton’s office.
According to the release, the 10 universities subject to the tax would be: Columbia University, Cornell University, Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Northwestern University, the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University, Stanford University, Washington University in St. Louis and Yale University.
The bill doesn’t list the specific institutions but creates two groups to levy the tax against, according to the news release. Those groups are secular institutions with endowments of at least $12.2 billion and secular institutions with endowments of at least $9 billion that also operate a ‘state contract college’ as subject to the tax. The latter category seems aimed at Cornell, a private institution with contract colleges and schools that were created by New York lawmakers and receive state funds. The legislation would use the 2022 value of endowments to determine which universities would be taxed.
Private colleges with endowments larger than $500,000 in assets per student already pay a 1.4 percent tax on net investment income.
Cotton’s proposal comes as top university leaders are under fire for their responses to campus antisemitism and student protests in support of the Palestinian people.
‘Many of America’s so-called ‘top’ universities are failing to condemn antisemitism and violence against Jewish students on their campuses,’ Cotton said in a statement. ‘We should levy this tax on these schools’ endowments. A tax on the billions of dollars these schools have amassed would be more than enough to pay for our aid to Israel or security for the southern border.’” [Inside Higher Education]
Leaders at the University of Pennsylvania named the dean of the university’s medical school as interim president.
“J. Larry Jameson’s appointment represents an initial step in the school’s effort to move past recent turbulence over antisemitism and the limits of free speech on campus that similarly engulfed leaders at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Many in the Penn community, including students, faculty and alumni, remain concerned about what comes next—and who gets to make that call. Investor Marc Rowan, a key player in the effort to oust Penn President Liz Magill, sent a letter to the school’s board laying out how he thinks the university can recover. In his campaign against the heads of Harvard, Penn and MIT, billionaire investor Bill Ackman has taken to open letters and social media posts. Harvard’s governing board said Claudine Gay will remain president of the school.” [Wall Street Journal]
Claudine Gay will stay on as Harvard’s president, surviving a drive to oust her following a congressional hearing about campus antisemitism.
”Harvard’s board decided not to remove Dr. Gay, the university’s first Black president, from her post. She now faces the challenge of regaining the confidence of the Harvard community, which has been roiled by the war in Gaza.”
Read more at New York Times
UNLV Gunman Ogled Student as Tenured Prof in 2016: Report
“The man who fatally shot three faculty members last week at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas had resigned from a previous job—a tenured professorship at a North Carolina school—after making a sexual remark to a female student, according to NBC News. The student, Kristin Marshburn, told the network in an interview published Monday that she’d been taking future gunman Anthony Polito’s business course at East Carolina University in 2016 when the incident occurred. Polito walked into class that fall and ‘said to me that if I wore a shirt that low cut for the rest of the semester, I’d be sure to get an A,’ Marshburn said. She was taken aback by the professor’s ‘bold comment,’ she added, as were some of the other students around her. ‘I remember their faces just being appalled,’ she said. ‘They looked sad for me.’ Marshburn, now 28, said she reported the episode to the university administration. It was not immediately clear whether her report was connected to Polito’s resignation from the school the following January, but Marshburn claimed he never returned to class after the day he’d made the comment.” [Daily Beast]
Read it at NBC News
Elise Stefanik Accused of Plagiarizing Antisemitism Letter
“A Democratic congresswoman claimed that Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) copied sections of her letter word-for-word that criticized college presidents for their testimony about on-campus antisemitism. As members of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, Rep. Kathy Manning (D-NC) and Stefanik were initially collaborating, Manning spokesperson Gia Scirrotto told Politico. But emails between the two offices reviewed by the news website revealed that the pair fell out when Stefanik wanted to use the letter to push for resignations, which Manning thought was an overreaction. The New York lawmaker then allegedly used various portions of the draft in her Friday letter and took off Manning’s name. Following Politico’s request for comment on the situation, Stefanik posted on X, formerly Twitter, that Manning ‘got much less support for her weaker letter’ and was ‘now trying to do a hit piece to help panicked Democrats who are clearly on the wrong side of history protecting these university presidents.’” [Daily Beast] Read it at Politico
Project Veritas CEO Abandons Ship: ‘Unsalvageable Mess’
“Hannah Giles, the CEO of conservative nonprofit Project Veritas, announced her resignation ‘effective immediately’ on Monday, saying she’d unwittingly ‘stepped into an unsalvageable mess’ upon taking the job earlier this year. Giles was named the group’s chief executive four months after its messy breakup with founder James O’Keefe in February. In a statement posted to X, she claimed she’d taken over an organization ‘wrought with strong evidence of past illegality and past financial improprieties.’ Suggesting she’d had no prior knowledge of the infamously embattled nonprofit’s alleged improprieties, Giles continued on to say that once she’d ‘discovered’ the evidence, ‘I brought the information to the appropriate law enforcement agencies.’ Project Veritas and O’Keefe are best known for using hidden cameras to embarrass journalists and political opponents. In 2009, O’Keefe and Giles, then a journalism student, teamed up to surreptitiously record members of the national community organizing group ACORN, resulting in its eventual shutdown. This September, Mediaite reported that Project Veritas had suspended all operations and fired most of its staffers.” [Daily Beast]
Zelensky Goes to Washington
From left, U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer arrive to meet with members of the U.S. Senate on Capitol Hill in Washington on Dec. 12.Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP
“One year ago, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky received a warm welcome from U.S. lawmakers, who lauded him a David-esque war hero defending his country against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Goliath. The U.S. Congress approved a nearly $50 billion aid package for Ukraine, and lawmakers gave Zelensky multiple standing ovations during his congressional address.
This time around, though, he faces a much more skeptical Congress.
Zelensky met with U.S. senators, led by Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Republican leader Mitch McConnell, in a closed-door session on Tuesday to request greater aid for Kyiv’s war effort. He then spoke with Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson before meeting with President Joe Biden.
The eleventh-hour Washington invite comes on the heels of a White House effort last week to approve an emergency spending package that would have included more than $60 billion in Ukraine aid. But congressional Republicans continue to block the bill’s passage, insisting that immigration reform measures, including increased security at the U.S. southern border, be included in any new funding package for Ukraine. Meanwhile, the U.S. Defense Department has warned that U.S. assistance will run out by the end of this year if Congress fails to pass an aid deal.
‘I do not think it’s hyperbole to say that basically the security of Europe is at stake, and therefore the risk of American men and women having to go deal with another massive war in Europe, as we have before, if we don’t work with Ukraine to stop Russia,’ U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said on Monday.
In a rare critique of U.S. foreign policy, more than 130 European parliamentarians published an open letter on Monday appealing directly to U.S. lawmakers to pass the funding bill. In it, they warned of a coming harsh winter, continued Russian attacks on civilians, and a feared stalemate, which top Ukrainian military commander Gen. Valery Zaluzhny warned of last month. ‘Without the United States’ decisive and substantial support, Russia might have won this criminal war of aggression against Ukraine already,’ the letter said. ‘At a time when ammunition is running out and the counter-offensive has slowed down, our joint assistance is more than ever necessary.’
The European Union will provide another $54.6 billion to fund Ukraine until 2027, but U.S. Republicans are still pushing back. ‘If there’s anyone inspired by unresolved issues on Capitol Hill, it’s just Putin and his sick clique,’ Zelensky said on Monday.” [Foreign Policy]
December 13, 2023
Good morning. We’re covering the next stage of the war in Ukraine —
Ukrainian soldiers. Tyler Hicks/The New York Times
The Crimea model
“After a disappointing second half of 2023 for Ukraine’s war effort, the U.S. and Ukraine don’t fully agree about what to do next. Ukraine’s leaders would prefer to be aggressive and continue trying to retake territory that Russia holds. U.S. officials worry that approach is unrealistic.
But there are also signs of compromise — and potential consensus, as my colleagues have reported. In today’s newsletter, I’ll explain what the coming year could bring.
The big picture: Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, hopes that 2024 will be the year when the U.S. and Europe lose patience with the war and allow him to claim large parts of Ukraine permanently. ‘Putin is banking on the United States failing to deliver for Ukraine,’ President Biden warned at the White House yesterday, while standing beside Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president.
If Russia gains the upper hand, it would be a blow to European democracy and a potential sign that the world has entered a new period of military aggression. Ukraine’s leaders and their allies hope they can prevent further Russian advances and inflict enough damage to make a stalemate seem like Putin’s best outcome.
The military situation
After Russia invaded in February 2022, Putin, and much of the world, expected that his military would quickly march to Kyiv and topple Ukraine’s government. That didn’t happen, but Russia did make significant advances. It now controls almost 20 percent of Ukraine’s territory, including the Crimea peninsula, which it seized in 2014.
Source: Institute for the Study of War | Map is as of Dec. 11. | By The New York Times
The goal of Ukraine’s counteroffensive this past summer was to reclaim enough of that territory to cause Putin to fear that his forces were on the verge of collapse. That didn’t happen either. Ukrainian forces failed to break through Russia’s fortified lines in eastern and southern Ukraine, partly because Russia used drones, often supplied by Iran, to monitor Ukrainian attacks and respond quickly.
It was another example of an old military lesson: Seizing territory in war is far harder than holding it.
Still, Ukrainians did have one meaningful accomplishment in recent months. They battered Russian ships in Crimea. As my colleagues Julian Barnes, Eric Schmitt, David Sanger and Thomas Gibbons-Neff write:
It was, some officials said, a major naval victory by a country without a navy.
Longer-range British Storm Shadow missiles significantly damaged targets in Crimea. On Sept. 22, a hail of Storm Shadow missiles struck the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol. Days later, Russia withdrew parts of the fleet from Crimea.
The operations allowed Ukraine to export grain from Odesa and kept some shipping lanes open, a critical victory, but they changed little in the overall course of the war and did not allow Ukraine to retake any territory.
Ukraine’s leaders still hope to reclaim territory in 2024. U.S. officials think that a more realistic aim may be to prevent Russia from making advances while Ukraine rebuilds its battered military — and launches more attacks like those in Crimea. Targets could include arms factories, weapons depots and train lines for moving munitions.
As Julian, Eric, David and Thomas explain, ‘The goal would be to create enough of a credible threat that Russia might consider engaging in meaningful negotiations at the end of next year or in 2025.’
The political risks
President Biden and Volodymyr Zelensky. Doug Mills/The New York Times
Zelensky spent yesterday in Washington, meeting with Biden and members of Congress, hoping to persuade them to continue sending his country weapons, vehicles, ammunition and other equipment. Without continued U.S. aid, Ukraine could run out of important items next year.
Biden and most Democrats in Congress support the additional aid. Many Republicans do as well but say they will approve it only if the legislation includes measures to reduce the surge of illegal immigration during Biden’s presidency. The bill would also include aid for Israel and Taiwan.
Zelensky’s presence in Washington underscores his fear that American support is fragile. While polls show that most Americans support continued aid to Ukraine, many Republican voters do not. Donald Trump has suggested that if he returned to the White House in January 2025, he might cut off aid and pressure Ukraine to negotiate a settlement. Putin seems to be hoping for such an outcome.
Western Europe’s support is also less than solid. Hungary is poised to veto an E.U. aid package, and Germany’s government is struggling to fund its own pledge. ‘Some senior European defense officials quietly acknowledge that the weapons and ammunition that Europe is currently sending to the war can’t match what Ukraine is burning through,’ my colleague Lara Jakes, who is reporting the story from Europe this week, told me. ‘That means Ukraine could run out of some weapons early next year if the United States fails to approve the additional aid.’
As Matthew Kaminski writes in Politico, ‘Putin thinks the West is dissolute and will come apart on its own.’
Many U.S. and European officials, including strong supporters of Ukraine, believe that a negotiated settlement is the only plausible outcome in the end. But there is a big difference between a settlement based on the possibility that Ukraine could collapse and one based on the expectation of a protracted stalemate.
More on Ukraine
Last year, Congress hailed Zelensky as a hero. This year, Republicans told him Ukraine’s challenges were not their focus.
More than $75 billion in cash and equipment: Here’s what the United States has given Ukraine so far, and what it still has to offer.
Russia bombarded Kyiv for the third time in a week. Ukraine said it had shot down all the missiles, but that debris wounded dozens.
A cyberattack on Ukraine’s largest mobile operator interrupted service. Many Ukrainians rely on phone alerts to warn of Russian strikes.
Since the beginning of the war, Russia has lost a staggering number of troops, U.S. intelligence shows.” [New York Times]
“UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has comfortably seen off a revolt against a flagship immigration bill that aims to send immigrants who arrive in the UK illegally to Rwanda. Here’s a simple guide to the plan.” [BBC]
“German prosecutors have charged 27 suspected far-right extremistswith planning a violent coup. They are accused of belonging to the fringe Reichsbürger movement - ‘Citizens of the Reich’ in English.” [BBC]
A secretive Indian operation publishes dossiers and social media posts on U.S.-based Modi critics in an effort to discredit them
“The Disinfo Lab says it aims to uncover anti-India disinformation, but according to three people who worked in the organization or were familiar with its establishment, it is actually running a secret campaign to discredit U.S. government figures, researchers, humanitarian groups and Indian American rights activists. The organization was set up and is run by an Indian intelligence officer, the sources said.”
Read more at Washington Post
Delegates applaud after a speech by Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber (center) president of the COP28 climate conference, in Dubai today. Photo: Fadel Dawod/Getty Images
COP28 climate agreement makes unprecedented call for transition away from fossil fuels, but loopholes remain
“The world agreed the centerpiece deal of the COP28 climate summit in Dubai on Wednesday, making an unprecedented call for transitioning away from fossil fuels.
The agreement, known as the Global Stocktake, however, contains many loopholes that will allow for the continued use of coal, oil and gas.”
Read More at CNN
“Shipping threats. Yemen’s Houthis targeted a Norwegian commercial vessel with a cruise missile on Tuesday to protest Israel’s continued bombardment of Gaza. The Iranian-backed militant group accused MK Strinda of delivering crude oil to an Israeli port, but the ship’s owner said it was en route to Italy to deliver biofuel feedstock. A U.S. Navy destroyer quickly responded to the ship’s distress calls.
The Islamist militant group has repeatedly warned foreign ships against venturing into the Red Sea, saying it would target any vessel connected to Israel. Earlier this month, the Houthis attacked three commercial ships that they accused of aiding Israel and launched drone strikes against U.S. Navy vessels.” [Foreign Policy]
“Fight for Hanoi. Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Vietnam on Tuesday for a rare two-day foreign trip to tighten bilateral cooperation in the Indo-Pacific. The two nations discussed territorial disputes, trade opportunities, and boosting their diplomatic designations at a time when Vietnam is inching closer to the United States to counter what it fears is an overreliance on Beijing. The trip follows Biden’s similar visit to Vietnam just three months ago.
Hanoi has increasingly become a key battleground between the two great powers as China and the United States vie for control of the Indo-Pacific. Despite Hanoi and Beijing having similar political ideologies, Vietnam has drifted away from China over confrontations in the South China Sea, with both countries claiming sovereignty over the Spratly and the Paracel Islands.” [Foreign Policy]
“On Monday, Miss Nicaragua pageant director Karen Celebertti announced her retirement nine days after Nicaraguan police accused her of rigging the beauty competition so anti-government contestants would win as part of a plot to overthrow the government of President Daniel Ortega. Celebertti, her husband, and her son were all charged with treason, conspiracy, and organized crime. Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘political pageantry.’” [Foreign Policy]
Apple is making security changes to protect users from iPhone thefts.
“A new iOS setting called Stolen Device Protection is designed to defend against thieves breaking into victims’ accounts. The update follows WSJ’s reporting earlier this year on a nationwide spate of thefts where criminals stole targets’ devices and used the iPhone passcode to take over customers’ accounts, access saved passwords, steal money and lock people out of their digital memories. Stolen Device Protection is rolling out to beta testers starting today. Apple is planning to include it in a coming software update.” [Wall Street Journal]
The unthinkable waste of life in factory farming
Katrina Wittkamp/Getty Images
“Fresh horrors from the factory farming world: It turns out many of the animals who die don’t ever make it to a person’s dinner plate.
According to a new study published in the journal Sustainable Production and Consumption, nearly one in four of the animals raised on factory farms are never eaten. That means 18 billion animals end up dying, after living in often horrific and inhumane conditions, for nothing.
Vox’s Kenny Torrella breaks down the data in his latest story on the sorry state of animal welfare and the consequences of factory farming:
Nearly 17 million chickens die from factory farming and are never eaten. They make up the vast majority of this needless loss of life, according to the study. The researchers were not able to include wasted seafood in their analysis, though it is estimated that hundreds of billions of fish and shrimp also die in industrial farm settings without being eaten.
What’s driving all this waste? Manipulative breeding, improper storage, transport issues, and more.
Most of the waste is concentrated in a few countries. Ten nations account for the majority of these animals lost to factory farming, including China, Brazil, and Russia. The US is the world “leader,” however, with 7.1 animals wasted per person.
Aspirations for cutting food waste don’t seem to be making progress. In 2015, world leaders attending the UN General Assembly meeting committed to cutting food waste in half by 2030. But instead, the problem has been getting worse.
We could be doing more to reduce food waste. Changing how we breed farm animals would be one strategy: Currently, chicken farming (to give one example) is dominated by fast-growing breeds that are more susceptible to health problems. Switching to breeds that grow more slowly (i.e., naturally) could lead to fewer unnecessary deaths. So could more humane transportation and better storage at grocery stores and restaurants.” [Vox]
December 12, 2023
Good morning. We’re covering the debate over speech and safety on college campuses….
The Harvard University campus. Kayana Szymczak for The New York Times
Feeling welcome
“The Hamas-Israel war has caused so much turmoil on campuses partly because it has highlighted a tension that university administrators haven’t fully acknowledged.
Many colleges have embraced broad notions of safety in recent years, promising to make their students feel comfortable and welcome. The goal is in many ways understandable, especially for students who find campuses to be uneasy places because they are among the first in their families to attend college. One way to make students feel safe, schools have decided, is to restrict speech that upsets students.
By now, you have no doubt heard about some of the examples, most of which involve sanctions on conservative expression. M.I.T., for instance, disinvited a geophysicist from giving a lecture because he criticized aspects of affirmative action. But there have also been restrictions on left-leaning expression: Late in the Covid pandemic, M.I.T. barred students from asking others to wear a mask.
Expression is safety
Either way, a basic tension exists. Maximizing everybody’s sense of safety and comfort is often impossible. On many of society’s biggest political issues, the expression of certain views will make some students feel uncomfortable. Yet the restriction of those same views will make others feel uncomfortable — because the ability to speak honestly about important issues is a part of feeling welcome in a community.
The Covid mask debate is a useful example. Being around unmasked classmates who might spread germs makes some students feel uncomfortable. And being pressured to cover your face with a mask for months on end makes others feel uncomfortable. Neither group is necessarily wrong. Each has different priorities.
There are plenty of other examples. Debates over affirmative action are often struggles about whether colleges should enroll more or fewer students from different groups — Asian, Black, Hispanic and white. Strong opinions will make some students feel more or less welcome on a campus.
These tensions have remained somewhat sublimated until recently, partly because the debates are often one-sided. Fewer than 20 percent of students at most selective colleges identify as conservative, according to surveys by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. The conservative share is below 10 percent at dozens of colleges, including Brown, Colgate, Emory, Grinnell, Johns Hopkins, Middlebury, Oberlin, Penn, Pomona, Williams and the University of Vermont.
This war is different
Harvard’s president, Claudine Gay, at a Shabbat service held in solidarity with Israel. Sophie Park for The New York Times
The Hamas-Israel war has brought these tensions to the fore because both sides in the debate have large campus constituencies.
Many Jewish students — and conservatives — believe that colleges have hypocritically allowed celebrations of Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre and antisemitic calls for future violence. (This belief underpinned the tough questioning of three university presidents last week by Elise Stefanik, a Republican congresswoman, which led to apologies from two of the three and the resignation of one, as my colleague Nicholas Confessore has explained.)
At the same time, many Palestinian students — and their allies, who tend to be on the political left — believe they are at risk of harassment, and the loss of future jobs, for making principled arguments about human suffering and democratic rights.
The problem for universities is that they can’t always make both sides feel safe. Pro-Palestinian students, for instance, may understandably feel unwelcome if they cannot criticize Israel as an occupying power that has seized Palestinian land in the West Bank and has killed thousands of people in Gaza since Oct. 7. These students may advocate a ‘free Palestine from the river to the sea’ or a ‘right of return’ as ways to express support for a single nation that incorporates all of Israel and its occupied territory.
Pro-Israel students, for their part, may understandably hear these statements as calls for the elimination of the world’s only Jewish nation, to be replaced by yet another Muslim-dominated one. They may point out that many college activists seem to care more about the human rights record of Israel than, say, China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Hamas.
In recent years, U.S. colleges have indeed focused more on restricting speech that upsets liberals than conservatives. That inconsistency — which Jewish students and their allies have highlighted — has put university leaders in an awkward position. Whatever their own politics, they are uncomfortable publicly defending one standard for one ideology and another for a different ideology.
Many are now trying to figure out what to do. The answers are not easy. Some political speech does cross the line into harassment or even advocacy for violence. And universities, especially private ones, have the right to adopt a more restrictive standard than the First Amendment does.
But university leaders do face a basic choice. Do they want to expand the list of restricted speech to include more statements that make conservatives, Jewish students and others feel unsafe? Or do they want to shrink the list and tell all students that they will need to feel uncomfortable at times?” [New York Times]
The best meteor shower of the year will light up the sky tonight.
“What is it? The annual Geminid shower. Rice-size meteors will burn up as they reach the Earth’s outer atmosphere, creating colorful streaks of purple, green and amber.
When to look up: You could start to see “shooting stars” clearly by around 10 p.m., but the best time to view the celestial show will be between midnight and 2 a.m.”
Read this story at Washington Post
Ronald Martinez/Getty Images
Making sense of the Ohtani deferrals
“Somehow, the $700 million contract Shohei Ohtani signed has gotten even more interesting: The Athletic’s Fabian Ardaya and Evan Drellich reported yesterday afternoon that Ohtani will defer the large majority of his $70 million annual salary. Let’s crunch:
Ohtani agreed to take just a $2 million salary per year over the entire length of the 10-year contract. After that, the Dodgers will pay him $68 million per year — with no interest accrued on that amount — for the following 10 years.
The Dodgers save money threefold:
First, in the immediate term, by saving $68 million per year to spend on other players.
Then there are the luxury tax savings, as Ohtani’s official average annual value will be $46 million, which is many millions less than $70 million. That helps the bottom line, and makes me wonder if any other executives might raise an issue with the whole thing.
Long term, due to inflation, paying him $68 million in 2043 will mean less than paying him $68 million in 2024 would’ve. The proverbial can is far, far down the road.
For Ohtani, it may come out in the wash:
Yes, that $68 million per year will be worth less in a decade, but he can establish his residence anywhere and, according to the AP, theoretically avoid California’s higher tax rate on that $68 million. He has a long time to figure that out.
Ohtani also makes an estimated $50 million per year in endorsement deals. That likely won’t slow anytime soon, so it gives him plenty of flexibility to accept less now.” [The Athletic]
D.C.'s crumbling sports capital
Graphic: WUSA9
“At 9 a.m., Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin is expected to announce plans for the NBA's Wizards and the NHL's Capitals to move from D.C. to a new arena just across the Potomac River in Alexandria, Va., Axios D.C.'s Cuneyt Dil reports.
Why it matters: The move from Capital One Arena could be a disaster for D.C. nightlife. Downtown is already struggling with so many workers now remote.
Youngkin's event will be held at the Potomac Yard Metro station, the site of the planned arena and includes the teams' owner, Ted Leonsis, founder, chairman and CEO of Monumental Sports & Entertainment.
With news everywhere about today's event, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser late last night made an 11th-hour counteroffer to try to keep the teams yesterday, saying the District would finance $500 million of a $800 million renovation of Capital One — "our best and final offer."
The fine print: Virginia is offering Leonsis acres and acres of land at Potomac Yard, in a deal worth nearly $1 billion to build a sports arena and concert venue, sources say. The Virginia proposal needs sign-off from the state legislature and Alexandria City Council.
But it appears D.C.'s only hopes of keeping the teams rest on the bill getting stuck in Richmond, or the neighborhood revolting in NIMBYism.
On ESPN's "Pardon the Interruption," longtime D.C. sports commentator Michael Wilbon ripped the plan to move the Wizards: "The NBA — a city sport! ... You're going to take the city sport out of the city, turn your back on Washington, D.C., and go to Virginia. Really?!"
"What does that say to your fan base that has been loyal despite zero years of contention ... for a championship. Really?!"
Reality check: A top regional business leader tells Axios AM that with the difficulty and expense of building a state-of-the-art facility downtown, the alternative was for the franchises to leave the market completely.
Andre Braugher has died. The actor was known for his roles in ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine’ and ‘Homicide: Life On The Street.’
“Braugher's death was confirmed by his talent agency. The actor starred as Capt. Raymond Holt in the comedy ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine,’ which ran for eight seasons on Fox and NBC between 2013 and 2021. Another major turn as a cop was as detective Frank Pembleton in the NBC drama ‘Homicide: Life on the Street.’ That show ran for seven seasons in the 1990s.”
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