Happy Friday! For one Kentucky mom, stepping out the door to a wall of 22 boxes containing Dum-Dum lollipops must have caused quite the confusion. But her 8-year-old son, who coincidentally has access to her Amazon account, appeared less confused by the arrival of 70,000 lollipops: “Mom, my suckers are here!”
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Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories
- Cardinal Robert Prevost, a 69-year-old Chicago native, was elected to the papacy on Thursday by the papal conclave in Rome, assuming the name Pope Leo XIV and becoming the first-ever American-born pope. After graduating from Villanova University with a mathematics degree in 1977, Prevost was ordained as a priest in 1982 and eventually went on to serve in Peru for two decades, becoming a naturalized citizen of the country. Pope Francis, his predecessor, named him a bishop of the Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru, in 2015, and in 2023 appointed him as a cardinal and head of the Dicastery of Bishops, which oversees bishop appointments around the world.
- India and Pakistan accused one another of carrying out drone and missile attacks on Wednesday night and Thursday morning, as the conflict sparked by last month’s terrorist attack in Kashmir continued to escalate. Pakistan claimed to have shot down 12 Indian drones, while India said it prevented drone and missile attacks on 15 sites. India further accused Pakistani airstrikes of targeting three of its military bases. Pakistan has denied engaging in the cross-border fire, despite the country’s defense minister indicating Thursday that further retaliation by Islamabad was “increasingly certain.”
- Five Iranian nationals arrested in Britain last weekend are suspected of planning a terrorist attack on the Israeli embassy in London, the U.K.-based Times newspaper first reported Wednesday. British police are currently questioning four of the suspects, while the fifth has been released on bail. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Wednesday night that the Islamic Republic “categorically rejects any involvement” in the alleged plans, and suggested, without evidence, that the foiled attack was a third-party “false flag” operation designed to sabotage diplomatic relations.
- President Trump and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Thursday announced a new trade deal that will keep a 10 percent U.S. baseline tariff on British imports, but spare the first 100,000 British-made automobiles sold to the U.S. from 25 percent tariffs. The formal agreement has not yet been signed. While the full details of the deal have yet to be released, the White House said it will include the creation of a “new trading union for steel and aluminum” and lower tariff rates on U.K.-manufactured airplane parts. In exchange, the U.K. agreed to increase its purchases of U.S. goods, including beef, ethanol, and completed airplanes.
- Meanwhile, the European Union on Thursday released a list of potential U.S. imports that it plans to target in the event that no resolution is reached with the Trump administration. The list includes $107 billion worth of American products, including airplanes, automobiles, car parts, wine, beer, and liquor. Trump so far has implemented a blanket 10 percent tariff on E.U. imports, which he on April 2 announced would be raised to 20 percent before ultimately issuing a 90-day delay. “The EU remains fully committed to finding negotiated outcomes with the U.S.,” EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Thursday. “At the same time, we continue preparing for all possibilities.”
- The Trump administration on Thursday sanctioned a Chinese oil refinery and three Chinese port operators it accused of purchasing and receiving “hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of Iranian oil.” The privately-owned Chinese refinery, Hebei Xinhai, allegedly processes Iranian oil, while the three Chinese firms operating a terminal in northern China’s Dongying Port are said to have received Iranian oil imports. Additionally, the administration sanctioned six vessels and their owners, along with two Indian ship captains, for allegedly transporting illicit Iranian oil to China and the Persian Gulf.
- Microsoft founder Bill Gates announced Thursday that he would be donating 99 percent of his fortune to the Gates Foundation—more than $10o billion and one of the largest philanthropic gifts of all time. He also said that the Gates Foundation, which he founded, would be wound down by 2045 in order to ensure that it spent as much of the money as possible. The gift will allow the foundation to spend an additional estimated $200 billion over the next two decades, continuing its work in supporting scientific research, education, and global health care.
- President Trump on Thursday withdrew his pick for U.S. attorney for Washington D.C., Ed Martin—who was serving in the role on an interim basis—announcing plans to appoint Fox News commentator Jeanine Pirro to fill the position for now. On Tuesday, GOP Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he would oppose Martin’s bid over his views on the January 6 attack on the Capitol, leaving support for Martin’s confirmation in the committee deadlocked at an 11-11 tie. Martin had previously said that the January 6 attack was “staged” and referred to federal prosecutors of January 6 defendants as “despicable people.”
The ‘Latin Yankee’ Takes Rome
The Roman Catholic Church has its first American pope. But don’t worry—it’s not Donald Trump (despite his recent campaigning for the papacy).
Just after 6 p.m. local time on Thursday, white smoke from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel signaled that the papal conclave had chosen the next bishop of Rome. On the second day of voting in a closed-door process, at least 89—or two-thirds—of 133 voting cardinals lent their support to a 69-year-old Chicago native: Cardinal Robert Prevost. Now called Leo XIV, the new pope will be tasked with serving as the spiritual guide to more than 1.4 billion Catholics worldwide at a moment of growth and upheaval for ...
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Today’s Must-Read
We tend to take our modern world for granted—running water, piped-in gas, an electricity grid, internet, superabundant consumer goods, medicines, and life-saving surgeries performed under anesthesia. Citizens in a modern liberal society are like fish in water: They don't comprehend the luxuriousness of their lifestyles and could not survive without them. We are surrounded by the fruits of liberal capitalism to the point where critics of this system rely on the very tools created by it to condemn it. Yet success has bred complacency, and in the third decade of the 21st century, this complacency is now coming home to roost.
Toeing the Company Line
Smooth Operator
Has any Republican navigated the Trump era as skillfully as Marco Rubio?
Sports Betting Is a Plague
When do we admit that a principled reform has failed us?
Defending the Homeland Requires a Global Presence
Forward bases give the U.S. vital access and advantages.
Will Congress Finally Defund Planned Parenthood?
Republicans likely have the votes in the Senate, but the House is a closer call.
Why a Senate Seat Wasn’t Hard for Brian Kemp to Turn Down
The Georgia governor is just the latest Trump-averse Republican to steer clear of Congress.
Worth Your Time
- In the New Yorker, Jordan Salama detailed migrant life in the big city. “In recent years, the newest residents have come mostly from Venezuela, Colombia, and Ecuador. Such migrants line up each day at dawn at paradas—’stops’—hoping to get picked up for day jobs, like tiling, roofing, or painting. At least among Spanish speakers, paradas across New York are known by names that describe either their location or their purpose, such as ‘La de Limpieza’ (‘the Housecleaning One’) or ‘Home Depot.’ How these spring up is less complicated than one might think—people learn to do whatever work is immediately available in the area,” he wrote. “Earlier this year, after the Trump Administration took power and began what it called the ‘largest deportation effort in U.S. history,’ the numbers lessened for a while—people are terrified of ICE. A regular told me that, at least twice, an unmarked car pulled up to the parada, sending everyone running. But attendance at the parada has since returned to pre-Trump levels, despite the obvious risks. People have to work.”
- Russia’s creed is not Orthodox Christianity but “a religion of war created and propagated by state and Church officials alike,” Ian Garner argued in New Statesman. “The most important date in this religion’s calendar is not Easter—it is Victory Day on 9 May. … Under Putin, Second World War celebrations have become central to state ideology. The young president attended a Victory Day parade on Red Square just two days after ascending to office in 2000, and he has since transformed the day into a centrepiece of state religion. The increasingly bombastic celebration of Russia’s role in the Second World War has been described many ways, from ‘cult’ to pobedobesie, a Russian neologism that decries the obsession as ‘victory fever.’ But above all, this celebration bears all the hallmarks of a religion. It has its own holidays (on 9 May and other dates that mark great victories); its own temples (which take the form of memorial and museum complexes both Soviet and new); and holy scripture in the form of novels, films, and textbooks that reiterate a myth of religious sacrifice.”
Presented Without Comment
Washington Post: Trump Tells Congress To Raise Taxes On The Rich In Budget Bill
Also Presented Without Comment
New York Times: Intelligence Agencies Increase Focus on Greenland, U.S. Officials Say
In the Zeitgeist
Indie rock band Arcade Fire releases its new album today: Pink Elephant, produced by Columbia Records. If you haven’t already woken up to the Montreal-based band, their performance at the 2014 Glastonbury Festival might do the trick.
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