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At home, she is mindful of the need to keep the spotlight on her brother. When senior officials cluster around him, reverentially taking notes, she lingers in the background. When her brother speaks in public, she hides behind a pillar, occasionally peeking out.

For Mr. Pence’s supporters, “I think the hard-line wing of the United States thinks he did a fine job,”

“The fact that he and Mrs. Pence didn’t stand when the unified team came in was a new low in a bullying type of American diplomacy.”

Her quietly friendly approach while in South Korea — photographers repeatedly captured her smiling — seemed to endear her to some observers.

Others said they were horrified by the notion that Ms. Kim could lull South Koreans, or anyone else, into forgetting the North’s repression and human rights abuses.

Henry was the sixth child and fourth son of Henry II and Catherine de’ Medici

France had been embroiled in a civil war between the crown and its Protestant or Huguenot subjects since 1562. In 1567 Henry took command of the royal army

He travelled to Poland with an entourage, but during the summer of 1574 he was informed of the death of his brother, Charles IX. He thus became king of both France and Poland

Without so much as bidding adieu to his Polish subjects, Henry made haste to  return to France by way of Austria and northern Italy

In February 1575 he married Louise de Vaudémont, a princess of the House of Lorraine, whose beauty had dazzled him on the eve of his departure for Poland

The situation had been aggravated by the accidental death of Henry II in 1559, which had left the kingdom in the hands of his widow, Catherine de’ Medici, and her young sons. As queen mother under Francis II, then as regent under Charles IX

In the absence of Henry begetting a son, the heir to the throne was his brother-in-law Henry of Navarre (1553-1610), who, as a Huguenot, was unacceptable to the Catholic majority in France. In 1576, a group of cities headed by Paris had formed an armed association, called the Catholic League, aimed at excluding Navarre from the throne. It chose Charles, cardinal of Bourbon,

As king, Henry III was apparently well-intentioned towards his subjects regardless of their faith. As he returned to Lyon from Poland in 1574, he declared a wish to be at peace with them all, and he seemed better equipped than his recent predecessors to succeed. He was probably the most intellectually gifted of the later Valois kings

The task of ruling France that the king faced in 1574 was far from easy, as so much hatred had arisen between Catholics and Huguenots

The court’s extravagance at a time of severe economic crisis incurred much criticism

He believed that his authority would be enhanced by distancing himself from his subjects

Although Henry III valued privacy, he liked to surround himself with a select group of intimate friends, mostly men of his own generation who came to be known as mignons

Whereas Charles IX had taken part in 109 civic entries during his ‘Grand Tour of France’ in 1564-66, Henry had only four in his entire reign

The king of France is so familiar with his subjects that he treats them all as his companions and no one is ever excluded from his presence, so that even lackeys of the lower sort are bold enough to wish to enter his privy chamber in order to see all that is going on there and to hear all that is being said… This familiarity, if it makes the nation insolent and arrogant, nevertheless inspires love, devotion and loyalty to its prince.

The supreme irony of Henry III’s reign was his failure to win over the capital by his presence

aloofness, extravagance and eccentricity

Believing Guise to be plotting a coup d’etat, Henry decided to exterminate him. Having lured the duke to his antechamber at Blois, the king stood by as his guards hacked Guise to death

This cold-blooded murder was by far Henry’s biggest blunder

Henry III’s only hope of regaining control of the capital was to join forces with  his appointed heir, the Huguenot leader, Henry of Navarre

Henry III on his deathbed appointing Navarre as his successor

Neither intellect nor good intentions had been sufficient to gain Henry III the love of his subjects. His life had been a tragedy

But even before 1814, when Napoleon’s defeats in Spain, Russia and Germany presented the Marshals with besetting and complex conflicts between their duty as Frenchmen, their loyalty to the Emperor and their self-respect as professional soldiers, Bernadotte had been able to rely on what might be called his excellent political health which he had preserved in sixteen years of successful evasive action against encroachments by his Chief’s all-devouring authority

His independence as a Swedish Prince reflected and expressed an inner independence of mind and outlook

The other relevant item is that twice during those ten years Bernadotte fell dangerously ill, and that during his second illness he was given up for dead. He recovered and lived to be eighty. His father and brother had died at an early age, as had his sister; yet after him the Kings of Sweden became famous for longevity

I can accuse Bernadotte of ingratitude, but not of treachery.” In his heart, le roi Jean, as he preferred calling himself after his coronation as Charles XIV John of Sweden and Norway, remained a son of the Revolution and the Empire. “What misfortunes,” he said nostalgically, “Napoleon would have avoided, if he had only listened to me

under the shadow of the historic castle of Henri IV.” When the restored Bourbon Kings poured ridicule and contempt on his origins, Bernadotte might have reminded them that at least he was from Navarre

It was not until 1788 that he was promoted sergeant-major, the highest rank normally open to a man of his background during the reign of Henri IV’s great-great- great-great-great-grandson Louis XVI

The future Marshal and King was born at Pau in Navarre in January 1763

Louis XVIII may be on the throne before a fortnight is up

The army of reinforcement, commanded by Bernadotte, Is composed of an efficient corps of fine young troops. The soldiers march gaily, without any appearance of fatigue... without causing any trouble or making any depradation. Everything is done with a good discipline, which is very surprising

These events mark the point at which the paths of Bonaparte and Bernadotte begin to separate

Henri seemed set to win the election when news of the massacre in Paris reached Poland. Overnight the atmosphere changed: lurid depictions of cruelty began to circulate

We want Henri of Valois to be our king!

The former provided for a Diet every two years, forbade the king to name his successor or to marry without its consent, limited his power over legislation and bound him to accept a permanent council of 16 senators. To safeguard religious toleration, the terms of the Confederation of Warsaw of 1573 were included in the Henrician Articles, together with a clause releasing the king’s subjects of their obligation of obedience if he broke the contract

little more than a figurehead

For Poland was far from backward culturally. A strong humanistic tradition had developed there in the 15th century

You will be powerless to do evil’, he said, ‘but all powerful to do good.

This meeting revealed sharp differences among the Poles over religious toleration

Two conditions were particularly repugnant to Henri: the obligation to hand over his private fortune to the Polish state and that which released his subjects from their obedience if he should break any condition attached to his election

Henri sat as king of Poland alongside his brother, Charles IX, king of France

Poland as such did not interest him; he was only going there to please his mother.

German Protestants had been outraged by the massacre of St Bartholomew’s Day. Yet Henri was received courteously

Protestant members of the Diet feared that, once crowned, he would expel all non-Catholics from Poland

He sentenced Zborowski to banishment, thereby unleashing a furious reaction. Considered too harsh by the Zborowskis and too light by the Wapowskis, the sentence ignited bitter criticism of Henri

He was accused of breaking his oath

By now Henri was heartily tired of Poland

On June 14th, 1574, however, news of Charles IX’s death reached Henri. Keeping it to himself, he declined to take part in a tournament that evening and instead consulted four of his French councillors as to what action to take. They were equally divided: some thought a clandestine departure would do lasting damage to Henri’s reputation, while others argued that he needed to return to France urgently

Having decided to go, Henri asked two of his French courtiers to find out how to leave Cracow unnoticed and to prepare horses and guides. For it was essential that the Poles should not suspect that he was about to ditch them. If they tried to retain him he might lose the throne of France, which he valued far more than that of Poland. He was being pressed by his mother to return without delay. His brother Alençon remained a threat. On June 15th Henri deceitfully informed the Senate that he was not planning to leave for the time being and summoned a meeting of the Diet for September

In Cracow Henri’s flight was discovered. Tenczynski and a large troop of horsemen set off in pursuit. On reaching the river the chamberlain spied Henri on the far bank: ‘Your Majesty’, he cried, ‘why are you fleeing?’ He then joined Henri at Ples, a small Austrian town. ‘My friend’, explained the king, ‘while I am taking up the succession given to me by God, I am not renouncing that which He has given me by election, for my shoulders are strong enough to support both crowns

The king gave him a valuable diamond instead. Tenczynski then returned to Cracow, leaving Henri and his company to continue their journey

Discontent and confusion erupted in Poland after Henri’s flight.

the nobles turned instead to Stephen Bathory, Prince of Transylvania. He was acclaimed by a Diet on January 18th, 1576 and, soon afterwards, accepted the conditions laid down by the Polish nobles. He was crowned in Cracow on April 29th and married Princess Anna the next day

Poles felt let down. No king of theirs had ever given up his crown voluntarily. A popular saying expressed their resentment: King Henri has done the Poles a bad turn: elected at night, he came at night, and, like a traitor, he fled at night

Savoy was allied to the Emperor and Francis’s real intention was to pressure Charles V (d.1558) into returning Milan to him.

On February 10th, 1538, he was made Constable of France, the highest military officer in the realm under the King

Henry II was dead and the authority of the monarchy was threatened by dissension and religious conflict between the great noble families of France.

He returned to England as a special envoy later that year as relations between Francis I and Charles V began to deteriorate

He acted as an intermediary between the King in captivity, Louise of Savoy who was regent in France

Montmorency worked closely with Cardinal Wolsey in establishing a ‘perpetual alliance’ between Francis and Henry VIII in 1527.

Montmorency exercised a strong but never uncontested influence upon the King

Yet like his English contemporary Wolsey, with whom he stands comparison on a number of grounds, Montmorency’s power depended entirely on his sovereign’s continuing trust and approval. Charles V’s decision over Milan in 1540 fatally undermined Francis’s confidence in Montmorency and therefore his power in the King’s regime

Francis embarked on his final war against the Emperor, who quickly allied himself to Henry VIII. The English took Boulogne and the allies threatened Paris before Francis and Charles agreed to the Peace of Crépy in September 1544. Francis I died on March 31st, 1547. On his deathbed he was reconciled to Henry

They pressed continually for war against the Habsburgs and in 1552 the Duke of Guise defended Metz from Charles V with great valour

On April 24th, 1558, Mary Queen of Scots, the niece of the Duke of Guise, who had been at the French court for almost ten years, was finally married to Henry II’s eldest son Francis. Just over a year later Henry died of injuries received in a tournament to celebrate the Franco-Habsburg peace of Cateau-Cambrésis and the fifteen-year-old Francis became king (r.1559-60). Montmorency lost influence, symbolised in the fact that the office of Great Master was taken from him and conferred upon the Duke of Guise

Francis II died in December 1560 and was succeeded by his brother Charles IX (r.1560-74), a minor, who was strongly influenced by his mother Catherine de’ Medici. This fact led members of the Bourbon family, headed by Anthony, King of Navarre and his brother Louis of Condé (1530-69), to assert their right and duty as princes of royal blood to guide the young king

These qualities were useful in serving Francis I and Henry II, both of whom sought to extend and consolidate royal authority within the kingdom of France

The Angouleme family was a cadet branch of the royal house of Valois. Francis' father, Charles, died on January 1st, 1496, and in 1498, the boy became heir presumptive to the reigning monarch, Louis XII

Louis XII died leaving no surviving son and Francis succeeded him as king on January 1st, 1515. Francis's accession was greeted favourably by the French nobility

His mother, Louise of Savoy

He was determined to avenge the defeats which Louis XII had suffered there and to capture the duchy of Milan which he regarded as his inheritance

On September l4th, 1515, at the Battle of Marignano, Francis defeated a large Swiss army allied to the duke of Milan and so regained the duchy. He secured his prize by a concordat with Leo X and, later, by treaties with the Swiss, with Charles of Spain and with the Holy Roman Emperor, Maxmillian

In 1533, Francis concluded a marriage alliance with Clement VII which he hoped would detach the pope from his allegiance to Charles V and thus help both him and Henry VIII

The young Tudor's great role-model was Henry V and he regarded northern France as his inheritance, rather in the way Francis saw Milan

In 1513, Henry had invaded France in alliance with the pope, the emperor and the king of Spain

Nevertheless, these victories and the subsequent peace treaty with Louis XII, allowed Henry to feel that controlling France was a great way of demonstrating his own impressive royal power

In England, Francis found an ally in the person of Anne Boleyn who virtually replaced Wolsey as the lynch-pin in Anglo-French contacts

Like Wolsey before her, Anne encouraged continued exchanges between the two monarchs and she also patronised English scholars in France

Henry then allowed himself to believe, incorrectly, that Francis approved of these claims

Henry VIII's accession in 1509 had generated the same kind of excitement as witnessed in France in 1515. The two kings did indeed have many personal similarities and rivalry between them was almost inevitable

Against this background and despite the difficulties, Anglo-French contacts were maintained and Francis constantly sought Henry's financial and military support against Charles V

Francis spent increasing amounts of time in Paris and at Fontainebleau where his steadily expanding artistic collections and library were shown to all important visitors

During the 1540s, Henry VIII also insisted, more than ever, that his was an imperial kingship

Much of this augmentation work was undertaken by the same John Leland who had witnessed Bude's work for Francis in the 1520s

Francis discussed Henry's building ideas with his ambassador, Sir John Wallop, to whom he also gave a guided tour of his private gallery and baths at Fontainebleau.

Henry's personal Psalter, in which he is depicted as King David, his second great role-model after Henry V, was produced by Jean Mallard who had been Francis I's court poet in the 1550s

In July 1544 thirty-one years after his first invasion, Henry once again crossed the Channel to set about the conquest of France. He managed to capture Boulogne

Francis I died on March 51st, 1547, barely two months after Henry VIII's death in January

that of the king as the warrior-leader whose greatness lay in military success and the distribution of largesse to his elite companions

Henry VIII's concept of his kingship was centred on the same ideal and his efforts to make his monarchy conform to it, partly through competition with France, pre-dated the start of Francis I's reign

This sophistication was particularly evident in Francis's artistic and intellectual patronage and it is here that his 'Renaissance' influence on Henry VIII is most apparent

On May 6th, 1994, after opening the Channel Tunnel jointly with President Mitterand, the Queen observed that Britain and France, 'for all their ages-long rivalry, complement each other well, perhaps better than we realise'

While Henry's mother, Margaret Beaufort, was an indispensable agent of his interests in England, Jasper was his political mentor in the years spent in exile

Henry VI bestowed the English honour of Richmond on Edmund, while the younger brother, Jasper, was endowed with a title and estates in Wales

After the death of Gloucester, and after several mishaps, they recovered favour under the indulgent protection of the young Henry VI

How Welsh was Henry Tudor? In blood he was a quarter Welsh, a quarter French and half English (or at least Platagenet). In so far as place of birth and residence could determine his nationality, he was certainly Welsh

As a landless exile, Jasper's most common point of con- tact continued to be Wales: most of his incursions during the reign of Edward IV

In the reign of Richard III, as events were to show, Wales and the Marches were the most vulnerable parts of his dominions

Edward IV himself, as a descendant through the Mortimer connection of Llywelyn Fawr (the Great), could be regarded by Guto'r Glyn and Lewis Glyn Cothi as the potential deliverer of the Welsh and the heir to the kings of Britain

He had been a patron of the bards since the 1450s, and was praised as a faithful supporter of Henry VI and as the man who would unite Wales under the Lancastrians.

He predicted a victory for Henry as the last of the triumphant line of Brutus and Cadwalader, kings of the Britons

The route of the march from Milford Haven avoided the south eastern Marches, which were dominated by the lords loyal to Richard III

His Welshness was thus of crucial importance in easing Henry's path to the throne, for quite literally no other route was feasible than that which took him through Wales. It was also to be an essential ingredient in the success of Tudor policy in Wales

Henry VI had commissioned both his half-brothers to represent and defend the crown's interests in Wales against the Yorkist enemies, the Vaughans, the Herberts and the Earl of March, later Edward IV.

Unless he had been presented at Henry VI's court in his youth (and there is no evidence for this), Henry was a stranger to England before his ar6val at Shrewsbury on August 17th, 1485

In his first proclamation, on August 25th, 1485, Henry announced his titles to be, besides King of England and of France, 'Prince of Wales and lord of Ireland'. This was the first time any King who had not himself been invested with the principality as heir apparent to a reigning monarch had appropriated the title to himself

Whereas letters of denizenship conferred English status upon individuals, charters of privileges were granted between 1504 and 1508 to the ancient principality and five marcher lordships in North Wales, dispensing the inhabitants from various civic disabilities imposed by the penal laws of Henry IV and Henry V

The inhabitants of North Wales were released not only from the prohibitions of Lancastrian penal laws but from those of the Edwardian settlement of 1284, which had excluded the Welsh from the plantation boroughs.

Edward IV had used motifs from the British Legend in his court rituals and had fostered an Arthurian cult in celebration of his own descent from British kings and the princes of Gwynedd

By marrying Elizabeth, Henry thus enhanced his connection with British as well as English kingship, and their son and heir personified both traditions

Richard III had referred disparagingly in two proclamations to the rebel 'Henry Tydder'; this may well have stung, so that the new King was all the more concerned to establish an honourable lineage for his family. A commission of Welsh genealogists was therefore set up to trace his pedigree. Only the report has survived, to show Henry's descent from medieval Welsh and British rulers. However fantastic its remoter claims, there is no sound reason to doubt its authenticity as an official document. Even Sir Edward Coke in his Fourth Institutes of the Laws of England (1644) accepted its validity and gave as his source for the original commission the patent rolls for Henry VII, though no-one else has found any trace of it there. (The great champion of the common law who set such store by precedents was notoriously careless in his scholarship.) Henry did not draw on this pedigree to confirm the legitimacy of his monarchy, only to embellish it. What was important for him was the historical associations with British, rather than Welsh, royalty. That these also proved to be flattering to the Welsh nation was an incidental and inexpensive form of propaganda.

His beneficence was a distinct policy that culminated in Henry VIII's measure of incorporation of 1536-43

This consolidated and elaborated upon a form of administration that had existed in its essentials in the principality of North Wales since Edward I's Statute of Wales of 1284

Owen spoke for his own class of prosperous Protestant gentry, but the very fact that Welsh commentators thought of the extension of English law as a boon and an act of grace ensured the success of Tudor rule in Wales

There was no tacit acknowledgement of their Welsh identity by Henry VII's son and grandchildren – it was something claimed for them by the Welsh

In 1603 Hugh Holland published the first (and only) book of his Pancharis, which related the love between Owen Tudor and Katherine of Valois

Nothing daunted, the resourceful author dedicated it instead to King James and his son Prince Henry, whom he addressed as the future Prince of Wales. The adaptation was plausible enough, in all senses of that word, for James, after all, was descended from Henry VII and his forebears, the Welsh Tudors; and with this reminder Holland's readers in Wales could the more readily transfer their loyalty to the Scottish Stuarts

The family of monarchs who ruled England and Wales from 1485 to 1603 did indeed form a dynasty, but they do not seem to have called themselves the 'Tudor' dynasty: the only con- temporaries who regarded them as such were the Welsh

The Trastamarans and their French allies were routed at Nájera (April 3, 1367) by Edward the Black Prince, and Peter resumed his reign. Charles V sent Henry back to Spain with more French troops, and a long civil war ensued.

The first was Isabella, eldest daughter of cosovereigns Ferdinand and Isabella and widow of John II’s heir.

Manuel and Isabella became heirs to the Spanish crowns on her brother’s death. They visited Toledo and Saragossa to receive oaths of allegiance in 1498, but the possibility of the union of the crowns ended when Isabella died in the same year while giving birth to their son Miguel, who died in infancy.

Manuel married Eleanor of Austria, sister of the emperor Charles V, in 1518, and had one daughter by this marriage. He died at Lisbon in 1521 and was buried in the Jerónimos monastery.

Erik’s acquisitions in Estonia alarmed Frederick II, king of Denmark and Norway, who allied with Lübeck and Poland and declared war in 1563, initiating the Seven Years’ War of the North.

Duke John (later King John III), who was liberated in 1567, joined with his brother, the future Charles IX, and deposed Erik in 1568. Erik died in prison.

At least 138 militants and 20 civilians have also been killed, the government says.The BBC's Jonathan Head says there are several reports that the Maute brothers, who lead the Maute group, are among the dead, with intercepted communications from jihadist groups suggesting this.

Marawi is on the southern island of Mindanao, which has a significant Muslim population in the majority Catholic country and has seen a decades-long Muslim separatist insurgency.

The US has had a small logistical military presence in the Philippines, although a programme to advise the Philippine army on fighting the Abu Sayyaf militant group was discontinued in 2015.

But he had what the White House described as a "very friendly" phone call with President Donald Trump in April, and has since said his differences with the US were with President Barack Obama's administration.

"The world of terrorism inside the city is growing smaller by the day," he said.Officials say that foreign nationals are among the militants in Marawi, with the list of countries and territories including Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Yemen, India and Chechnya.

French aristocracy who had fled the revolutionary government, for armed intervention aimed at restoring the full powers of the French king and the whole of the ‘old regime’.

He had followed events in France, but was afraid intervention would threaten his sister and brother in law, not help them (he was completely right). However, when he thought they had escaped he rashly offered all his resources to aid them. By the time of Pillnitz he knew the French royals were effectively prisoners in France.

Austria and Prussia were not natural allies given recent European history, but at Pillnitz they reached agreement and put out a declaration.

While it stated that the fate of the French Royals was of “common interest” to Europe’s other leaders, and while it urged France to restore them and made threats if harm came to them, the subtext was in the section saying Europe would only take military action with the agreement of all the major powers. As everybody knew Britain would have nothing to do with such a war at that point, Austria and Prussia were, in practice, not tied to any action. It sounded tough, but promised nothing of substance. It was a piece of clever word play. It was a total failure.

The Declaration of Pillnitz was thus designed to assist the pro-royal faction in the revolutionary government against the republicans rather than threaten a war.

France had developed a culture that did not recognise subtext: they spoke in moral absolutes, believed that oratory was a pure form of communication and that cleverly written text was disingenuous.

A decision in favor of Tsarnev would put President Biden in a difficult position. The initial decision to seek the death penalty in Tsarnaev's case was made by Barack Obama's administration — during Biden's tenure as vice president. But Biden pledged during his presidential campaign to push for the elimination of the death penalty in the federal system.

The appeals panel said the judge who presided over Tsarnaev's trial, U.S. District Judge George A. O'Toole, had rejected the defense team's request for a more distant trial venue, one where prospective jurors might be less likely to be biased against Tsarnaev than in eastern Massachusetts, and the panel maintained the judge committed other important trial errors that barred adequate screening of prospective jurors.

Appeals Judge Juan Torruella, who died late last year, said that the district judge stopped Tsarnaev's counsel from asking prospective jurors questions such as what they knew about the case before coming to court or what stood out to them from the media coverage they had seen about the bombing and its aftermath.

Torruella wrote that the district judge had relied on "self-declarations of impartiality" by prospective jurors, some of whom admitted before the trial that they were convinced Tsarnaev was guilty.For example, Torruella noted that the woman who became the jury's foreperson withheld from the court dozens of relevant social media comments that mourned the death of an 8-year-old victim, praised law enforcement officers and called Tsarnaev "a piece of garbage."

The ruling from last July ordered the District Court to impanel a new jury to hold a sentencing retrial for the death penalty convictions. But the appeals panel noted that Tsarnaev, who told the courtroom on the day of his sentencing that he was "guilty of this attack," would remain in prison for the rest of his life regardless of whether the death sentence is imposed.

The Trump administration prioritized carrying out federal executions in its final year — resuming a practice that had been paused for nearly two decades and prompting pushback from activists and lawmakers.In the final six months of the administration, 13 people on death row in the federal system were executed, including three in the week before Biden took office.

Video tends to bias towards the “peek-a-book world”: trivial content that vanishes in seconds, constantly flickering images, yet the viewer has a hard time turning away no matter the subject… because the medium is just so darn entertaining

Education ≠ entertainment

School is about asking questions; TV is about passive consumption. School is about the development of language; TV demands attention to images.

TV is always fun and entertaining; serious education is not.

by equating education with entertainment children would never learn the rigorous of serious schooling.

Subjects should be taught as history. “Every teacher,” Postman said, “must be a history teacher.” Every subject has a fascinating history.

To teach a subject without the history of how it happened “is to reduce knowledge to a mere consumer product,” he said. “It is to deprive students of a sense of the meaning of what we know, and of how we know.

To teach about the atom without Democritus, to teach about electricity without Faraday, to teach about political science without Aristotle or Machiavelli, to teach about music without Haydn, is to refuse our students access to The Great Conversation. It is to deny them knowledge of their roots

Fear Huxley’s future, not Orwell’s. Everyone is worried about Big Brother… but we should really fear ourselves. We live in a society where we can spend hours on devices entertaining ourselves.

We can amuse ourselves to death.

How we talk is how we think. “Any significant change in our ways of talking can lead to a change in point of view.”

The words we use convey meaning and if you can convince others to use your words, perspectives can shift.

Technology is a doubled-edged sword. Technology giveth and taketh away.

The printing press allowed us to codify and pass down knowledge reliability but in exchange we gave up our memories.

Mobile phones gave us constant communication but now we’re always distracted and never alone.

What should I read first?

You should start with Amusing Ourselves to Death:

The foreword is brilliant. It’s short, here’s an excerpt:

We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn’t, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell’s dark vision, there was another - slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World.

Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression.

But in Huxley’s vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books

Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism

Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance.

Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture

As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions”.

In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure.

In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.

over time, the combination of his perfect résumé, his actorly ability to change register as he unpacks a sentence, and his smoothness and self-love have begun to worry me. My fear is that his appeal will fade

Klobuchar, to my mind, is the better midwestern option. She is an engaging and successful politician. But there’s a reason she seemingly can’t get more traction. She just doesn’t command a room

I so want Biden to be ten years younger. I can’t help but be very fond of the man, and he does have a mix of qualities that appeal to both African-Americans and white working-class midwesterners. What I worry about is his constant stumbling in his speech, his muddling of words, those many moments when his eyes close, and his face twitches, as he tries to finish a sentence

Sanders has been on the far left all his life, and the oppo research the GOP throws at him could be brutal. He’s a man, after all, who sided with a Marxist-Leninist party that supported Ayatollah Khomeini during the hostage crisis in 1979. He loved the monstrous dictator Fidel Castro and took his 1988 honeymoon in the Soviet Union, no less, where he openly and publicly criticized his own country and praised many aspects of the Soviet system

On two key issues, immigration and identity politics, Bernie has sensibilities and instincts that could neutralize these two strong points for Trump. Sanders has always loathed the idea of open borders and the effect they have on domestic wages, and he doesn’t fit well with the entire woke industry. He still believes in class struggle, not the culture war

Biden has an advantage because of Obama, his appeal to the midwestern voters (if he wins back Pennsylvania, that would work wonders), and his rapport with African-Americans. But he also seems pretty out of it.

Near Union Square, in the heart of Manhattan, a police vehicle was on fire, sending plumes of black smoke into the air. In Brooklyn, protesters and police clashed for hours in Flatbush. In Los Angeles, a police post was burned in a shopping mall while nearby shops were looted. In Nashville, Tennessee, a historic courthouse was set on fire and in Salt Lake City, Utah, vehicles were burned and a man with a bow and arrow was arrested after he aimed it at protesters.

Social media posts showed flames and thick black smoke billowing from a fire in downtown Philadelphia, where an earlier peaceful protest ended with cars being set ablaze, and law enforcement vehicles came under attack in and Chicago.

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden, struck a different tone, calling protests against police brutality “right and necessary” but urging an end to violence. “The act of protesting should never be allowed to overshadow the reason we protest,” he said in a statement.

“We will not tolerate actions like these against New York City police officers,” the city’s police department said in a tweet announcing the arrest of “multiple people” for throwing molotov cocktails at police vehicles. The US attorney’s office subsequently announced that it had filed federal charges against three people over the incidents.

Numerous media outlets, including CNN, Reuters and MSNBC, reported that their staff covering protests in the city had been hit by rubber bullets fired at them. Media outlets and journalists in numerous cities reported being targeted by police with chemical agents or less-lethal rounds, and several reporters were arrested.

“The memory of George Floyd is being dishonored by rioters, looters and anarchists,” Trump said, speaking at Florida’s Kennedy Space Center after watching the launch of the historic SpaceX mission.

George Floyd’s brother, Philonise, said on Saturday he had briefly spoken to Trump about the death of his brother. “It was so fast. He didn’t give me the opportunity to even speak. It was hard. I was trying to talk to him but he just kept like pushing me off like, ‘I don’t want to hear what you’re talking about,’” Philonise told MSNBC.

In Atlanta, people set a police car ablaze and broke windows at CNN’s headquarters. In Oakland, San Jose and Los Angeles, protesters blocked highways and police fired teargas. In Louisville, Kentucky, police fired projectiles at a reporter and her cameraman during a live shot. Protests over police brutality and the death of George Floyd ignited once again on Friday, as Minneapolis faced another night of chaos and demonstrators clashed with police in cities across the US.

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A contest of ideas shouldn’t be used to legitimize disinformation. And I think it’s often taken advantage of. And I think at great news organizations, the mission really should be to introduce fact to disperse doubt — not to sow doubt, to obscure fact, if you will.

In 2017, President Trump’s praise for white supremacists in Charlottesville, Va., as “very fine people” spurred James Murdoch to give $1 million to the Anti-Defamation League. In an email to friends obtained by The New York Times, Mr. Murdoch rebuked Mr. Trump and wrote: “I can’t even believe I have to write this: standing up to Nazis is essential; there are no good Nazis. Or Klansmen, or terrorists.”

In January, James and his wife, Kathryn, expressed “frustration” about News Corp’s peddling of climate change denialism in the face of apocalyptic Australian wildfires that incinerated 46 million acres. Fox nighttime anchors picked up a false story line about arson from The Australian, a Murdoch-owned newspaper in Oz.

So it wasn’t possible to change News Corp from the inside?“I think there’s only so much you can do if you’re not an executive, you’re on the board, you’re quite removed from a lot of the day-to-day decisions, obviously,” he said. “And if you’re uncomfortable with those decisions, you have to take stock of whether or not you want to be associated and can you change it or not. I decided that I could be much more effective outside.”

Friends say that James has been on a collision course with his family for 15 years. His evolution has been profoundly influenced by his wife, a former communications executive. He is, as one friend puts it, “living much more in his own skin, realizing his better angels and his better instincts.”

But when your last name is Murdoch and those billions sloshing around in your bank account come from a juggernaut co-opting governments across the English-speaking world and perpetuating climate-change denial, nativism and Sean Hannity, can you ever start fresh? As a beneficiary of his family’s trust, James is still reaping profits from Rupert Murdoch’s assets. Can he be the anti-venom?

Murdoch watchers across media say James is aligned with his sister Elisabeth and his half sister, Prudence, even as he is estranged from his father and brother.

When Rupert, 89, finally leaves the stage and his elder children take over, that could make three votes in the family trust against one

Is there still time to de-Foxify Fox News — labeled a “hate-for-profit racket” by Elizabeth Warren — and other conservative News Corp outlets? Would Fox and its kin — downscale, feral creatures conjured by Rupert to help the bottom line — be the huge moneymakers they are if they went straight?

He is particularly excited about investing in start-ups created to combat fake news and the spread of disinformation, having found the proliferation of deep fakes “terrifying” because they “undermine our ability to discern what’s true and what’s not” and it “is only at the beginning as far as I can tell.”

He’s funding a research program to study digital manipulation of societies, hoping to curtail “the use of technology to promulgate totalitarianism’’ and undermine democracies.

“So everything from the use of mass surveillance, telephone networks, 5G, all that stuff, domestically in a country like China, for example,” he said.

I wonder if this is some sort of expiation, given all the disinformation that News Corp has spewed.

when I talked to Kathryn Murdoch over Zoom from their farm in Connecticut, where they live with their three teenagers, chickens and sheep, she was more direct about the issue of using money made from disinformation to combat disinformation.

“I think that what’s important about what we’re doing is that we’re in control of ourselves,” she said, adding: “I’m in control of what I do, he is in control of what he does. We should be held accountable for those things. It’s very hard to be held accountable for things that other people do or are in control of. And I think that’s what was untenable.”

Their foundation, Quadrivium, has supported voter participation, democracy reform and climate change projects. “I never thought that we would actually be at the point where we would have climate change effects and people would still be denying it,” Ms. Murdoch said.

Mr. Murdoch donated to Pete Buttigieg in the primary, and the couple has given $1.23 million to Joe Biden. So that’s who he’ll be voting for in November then? “Hell yes,” he said with a smile.

I noted to Ms. Murdoch that the effect of News Corp on the world is astounding when you think about it, from Brexit to Trump to the Supreme Court we may be heading toward.

After so much time in the executive suite, Mr. Murdoch seems genuinely excited to be in a smaller shop. He said last year, just for the hell of it, he thought of becoming an architect, going back to school.

“The outside world,” he continued, “it looks at you and says, ‘Well, these are the runners and riders. This person is up and down and this is success and this is failure.’ I think that that has to come much more from yourself. I’m incredibly grateful to be able to be just a totally free agent.”

I wondered what he made of Fox and Mr. Trump playing down the coronavirus, even after the president was hospitalized.“Look, you do worry about it and I think that we’re in the middle of a public health crisis,” Mr. Murdoch said. “Climate is also a public health crisis.” He continued: “Whatever political spin on that, if it gets in the way of delivering crucial public health information, I think is pretty bad.”

He added that Mr. Trump’s likening Covid-19 to the flu has been “his message from Day 1,” and is “craziness.” He thinks that “companies have a responsibility to their customers and their communities” and “that responsibility shouldn’t be compromised by political point scoring, that’s for sure.”

“I’m just concerned that the leadership that we have, to me, just seems characterized by callousness and a level of cruelty that I think is really dangerous and then it infects the population,” he said, referring to the Trump administration. “It’s not a coincidence that the number of hate crimes in this country are rising over the last three years for the first time in a long time.”

With Mr. Trump and Fox, who is the dog and who is the tail?“It looks to me, anyway, like it’s going to be a hard thing to understand because it probably goes back and forth,’’ he said. “I don’t think you’re going to get one pristine, consistent analysis of that phenomenon.”

Confirm or Deny

Most of your success has come from hard work, not luck.Isn’t that what they say — the harder you work, the luckier you get?