Trump Tries to Use White South Africans as Cautionary Tale - Mar 15, 2025

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- The top 25 stories curated by editors and fellow readers! Editor's Pick What does switching from paper to screens mean for how we read? Psyche Ideas It’s well established that we absorb less well when reading on screen. But why? And can we do something to improve it? Continued here Editor's Note: One of these findings is the screen inferiority effect. As its name suggests, this effect refers to demonstrations that - with all else being equal - a text that is read on a digital screen will be less well understood than the same text if it is read on paper. If you're reading this article online, for example, your understanding of its content may (at least to some degree) be compromised. After reading the article, you might be able to accurately answer questions about its gist, but not necessarily be able to report the details as well as if you had read it on paper. The effect has been documented across different languages and writing systems, indicating that it is robust. Work Trump Tries to Use White South Africans as Cautionary Tale The parallels between South Africa’s attempts to undo the injustices of apartheid and the long struggle in the United States to address slavery, Jim Crow laws and other forms of racial discrimination have become a common refrain among some Trump supporters. Work Chinese Companies Rush to Put DeepSeek in Everything From video game developers to a nuclear power plant, companies across China are adopting DeepSeek's AI models to boost stock prices and flaunt their national pride. Work A past US security pact is a cautionary tale for Ukraines mineral deal - WSJ (No paywall) A mineral-rights deal that the Trump administration says will make the U.S. vested in Ukraines defense has an instructive historical precedent in Washingtons unofficial oil-for-security pact with Saudi Arabia. Work China, Russia, and Iran Hold Nuclear Talks - Foreign Policy (No paywall) World Brief: China, Russia, and Iran Hold Nuclear Talks Work In Mexico, a Grisly Discovery of Piles of Shoes, Ovens and Human Remains In a country seemingly inured to episodes of brutal violence from drug cartels, where clandestine graves emerge every month, the images shocked Mexicans and prompted outraged human rights groups to demand that the government put an end to the violence that has ravaged the nation for years. Work Under Trump, AI Scientists Are Told to Remove 'Ideological Bias' From Powerful Models The information comes as part of an updated cooperative research and development agreement for AI Safety Institute consortium members, sent in early March. Work Marco Rubio says South Africa's ambassador to US is 'no longer welcome' In Friday's webinar, Rasool - speaking by videoconference - talked in academic language of the Trump administration's crackdowns on diversity and equity programs and immigration. "The supremacist assault on incumbency, we see it in the domestic politics of the USA, the Maga movement, the Make America Great Again movement, as a response not simply to a supremacist instinct, but to very clear data that shows great demographic shifts in the USA in which the voting electorate in the USA is projected to become 48% white," the South African ambassador said. Work Australia will not revise critical minerals-for-tariffs exemption deal rejected by Trump administration Resources minister says she is ‘sad’ the US did not embrace a more reliable supply of minerals for renewable energy and battery technologies Work The Strange Experimental-Theatre Experience Giving New Meaning to Show, Dont Tell - The New Yorker (No paywall) Somewhere in Londons theatre districtI cant say wheretheres a nondescript office building with a neon sign in the lobby that reads, in blue cursive script, You Me Bum Bum Train. The illuminated sign, and the handful of nervous-looking people that gather outside four evenings a week, are the only clues that theres something odd going on. Bum Bum Train, as its known, is an immersive theatrical experience, which invites one audience member into its surrealist world at a time. It is also, for people who like that sort of thing, one of Londons most coveted tickets. What happens during the hourlong show is a closely guarded secret: participants are required to sign a nondisclosure agreement, and the website reveals almost nothing. For the show to have maximum effect, the less you know the better, it reads. If you want tickets, do not research into you me bum bum train. Work Nintendo Used to Operate a Taxi Company and, Allegedly, a Chain of Love Hotels - Inc (No paywall) Is there a game catchphrase more recognizable than Its a-me, Mario? Perhaps not. But the company behind some of the most famous video game franchisesthe Mario and Legend of Zelda seriesstruggled for many years to carve out its own identity. Throughout its history, Nintendo often threw spaghetti at the wall, trying to find a product that would stick. For nearly 80 years, the company tried various venturesuntil 1975, when it entered the video game realm and soared to profitability with the introduction of its first modern console in 1983. Work SpaceX Rocket Lifts OffIn NASA Mission To Relieve Stranded ISS Astronauts - Forbes (No paywall) SpaceX launched a crewed NASA mission on Friday to return two astronauts from the International Space Station, after technical issues with Boeings spacecraft extended their stay for nine months, leading SpaceX CEO Elon Musk and President Donald Trump to suggest they were stranded for political reasons. Work Solidarity Among Progressives Could Give New Life to Their Cause The errors. These excavations of solidarity might be prompted by a particular paradox. In recent years, Americans flooded the streets in unprecedented numbers. After Donald Trump’s inauguration in 2017, the Women’s March mobilized millions, many for the first time. Four years later, as many as 26 million people protested the killing of George Floyd in one of the largest movements in American history. Since the fall of 2023, students have held hundreds of demonstrations at college campuses across the country calling for cease-fire in Gaza. Work New map of landscape beneath Antarctica unveiled The most detailed map yet of the landscape beneath Antarctica's ice sheet has been assembled by a team of international scientists led from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS). Work Bluesky quickly sold out of the t-shirt its CEO wore to troll Mark Zuckerberg When Bluesky CEO Jay Graber took the SXSW stage this week, she managed to make fun of Mark Zuckerberg without mentioning Meta at all. Work Uncovered: Abuse at top German science institution The Max Planck Society is Germany's preeminent research organization, boasting 31 Nobel laureates. But insufficient oversight leaves international scientists exposed to abuse and the whims of the institutes' directors. There was rarely a meeting with the director that didn't feel destabilizing. Work Canada is caught in a 'double trade war' -- and one premier is urging Ottawa to drop its fight against China Amid Donald Trump's tariff threats, B.C. Premier David Eby has called on Ottawa to drop its tariff fight against China. Work The ex-Barclays CEO is having an embarrassing week. London cant stop watching - WSJ (No paywall) LONDONIn court this past week, a lawyer asked former Barclays Chief Executive Jes Staley: Do you accept you had sex with a woman at Jeffrey Epsteins brothers apartment on East 66th Street in New York? Work 'On the Tightrope': Britain Tries to Bridge a Widening Trans-Atlantic Gap Mr. Blair’s bridge-building didn’t end well, of course: France and Germany refused to join Mr. Bush’s “coalition of the willing” against Iraq, and Britain’s lock-step alignment with the United States frayed its relations with its European neighbors. Work Parkinson's treatment closer as problematic protein imaged for first time Scientists have finally pinned down a protein that's largely responsible for Parkinson's disease. Known as PINK1, the protein has been linked to the disease for decades but its structure and how to switch it back on have remained elusive - until now. Work Why Mercedes Wants Two-Speed Transmissions in New EVs--Even the CLA Most EVs don't have a transmission in the conventional sense. They use a direct-drive, single-ratio unit to transfer the motor's power to the wheels. Work House GOP subpoenas Big Tech for evidence that Biden made AI woke The 'free speech' investigation goes hunting at Apple, OpenAI, and 14 other companies. The 'free speech' investigation goes hunting at Apple, OpenAI, and 14 other companies. Work For Canadians Visiting Myrtle Beach, Trump Policies Make the Vibe Chillier Along with brandishing ever-changing tariff policies — threatening, imposing, rescinding them — President Trump has repeatedly asserted that he wants to make Canada the 51st state, leaving many Canadians astonished and furious. Some have canceled plans to visit conservative Myrtle Beach, part of a broader grass-roots travel boycott that is threatening to put a dent in the $20.5 billion that Canadian visitors spend in the United States each year. Work US Postal Service plans to cut 10,000 jobs: What to know Gabe Whisnant is a Breaking News Editor at Newsweek based in North Carolina. Prior to joining Newsweek in 2023, he directed daily publications in North and South Carolina. As an executive editor, Gabe led award-winning coverage of Charleston church shooter Dylan Roof's capture in 2015, along with coverage of the Alex Murdaugh double murder trial. He is a graduate of the University of North Carolina-Wilmington. You can get in touch with Gabe by emailing g.whisnant@newsweek.com. Find him on Twitter @GabeWhisnant. Work Trump Orders Gutting of 7 Agencies, Including Voice of America's Parent The order targeting the agencies, largely obscure entities that address issues like labor mediation and homelessness prevention, appeared to test the bounds of the president's power. Work Fact-Checking Trump's Justice Dept. Speech on Crime, Immigration and His Cases “They spied on my campaign, launched one hoax and disinformation operation after another, broke the law on a colossal scale, persecuted my family, staff and supporters, raided my home Mar-a-Lago and did everything within their power to prevent me from becoming the president of the United States.” Work 'My career is over': Columbia University scientists hit hard by Trump team's cuts On Tuesday morning this week, PhD student Daniella Fodera woke up at 7 a.m. to a call from the head of her research laboratory in Columbia University's Department of Biomedical Engineering, delivering devastating news. Work Ancient DNA Shows Stone Age Europeans Voyaged by Sea to Africa - Scientific American (No paywall) The first genomic study of ancient people from the eastern Maghreb region present-day Tunisia and northeastern Algeria shows that Stone Age populations who lived there more than 8,000 years ago were descended, in part, from European hunter-gatherers. Work Arlington Cemetery Website Loses Pages on Black Soldiers, Women in Military and Civil War On Friday, the cemetery’s website still had an active page describing Section 27, which includes the graves of thousands of African Americans freed from slavery. Another active page listed prominent African Americans — including Medgar Evers, Thurgood Marshall and Colin L. Powell — buried on the grounds. Work RFK Jr. wants artificial dyes out of America's food, but it's not clear they're harmful, scientist says In his first meeting with top food executives, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called on major companies like PepsiCo, W.K. Kellogg and Kraft Heinz to remove artificial dyes from America's food supply. Work Experts Warn About the 'Crumbling Infrastructure' of Federal Government Data Unstable federal funding puts at risk the government statistics used to track the U.S. economy and population, officials and data users warn. That's before any cuts by President Trump and Congress. Work RFK Jr. says measles vaccine routinely causes deaths. That's not true - STAT (No paywall) When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was confirmed as Americas secretary of health and human services, neutral observers might have asked themselves: Would it be possible for a lawyer who had questioned the safety of childhood vaccinations for two decades to look at the available data and reconsider his views? Work $8B Citi Field casino and park proposal gets zoning approval from NYC Council New York Mets owner Steve Cohen's $8 billion casino proposal near Citi Field cleared a major hurdle this week. Work Power bank likely caused S Korea plane fire - investigators The Air Busan plane caught fire at Gimhae International Airport in the country's south on 28 January - causing three people on board to sustain minor injuries. Work Trump?s attempt to take over Columbia University, briefly explained There?s too much news and too little context. At Vox, we do things differently. We focus on helping you understand what matters. We don?t obsess over being the first to break news. We focus on being helpful to you. We report urgently on the most important stories shaping our world, but we spend time on issues the rest of the media neglects. But we can?t do it alone. Work Primordial surf: microlightning in mist may have sparked life on Earth, study finds Charles Darwin thought it started in a warm pond. Others point to comets that ploughed into Earth. And some suspect a bolt from the blue, a lightning strike into the ocean. Work This 'Dune' isn't fiction. It's the longest conveyer belt in the US and moving sand in Texas KERMIT, Texas (AP) -- It's longer than the width of Rhode Island, snakes across the oil fields of the southwest U.S. and crawls at 10 mph - too slow for a truck and too long for a train. It's a new sight: the longest conveyer belt in America. Work Haiti's Biggest Hospital, Dependent on U.S.A.I.D., Goes Up in Smoke The situation worsened last month: Videos that circulated on social media and were verified by The New York Times showed an older building at the general hospital, as it is commonly known, engulfed in flames. Gang members had apparently set it on fire. Work The Senate votes to avert a shutdown after Schumer relents. Mr. Trump’s executive order in January said he would revive the bans in order to protect American citizens “from aliens who intend to commit terrorist attacks, threaten our national security, espouse hateful ideology or otherwise exploit the immigration laws for malevolent purposes.” Work Trump Administration Expels South Africa's Ambassador to the U.S. Mr. Rubio wrote on social media that South Africa’s ambassador was a “race-baiting politician who hates America” and Mr. Trump. He added, “We have nothing to discuss with him and so he is considered PERSONA NON GRATA.” That designation requires South Africa to end Mr. Rasool’s role as ambassador. Work Walz, Newsom and Buttigieg Are Among Democrats Stirring 2028 Presidential Chatter “Everything that Trump is doing is just so traumatic and so jarring to your soul,” said Raymond Buckley, the chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party. “It’s a good reminder that there’s a day after tomorrow. Thinking about ’28, it allows some people to survive the trauma better.” Work Five Years On, Ghosts of a Pandemic We Didn't Imagine Still Haunt Us The strains of a familiar John Prine song, maybe “Angel From Montgomery,” which at first makes you smile because you love all things Prine, but then you remember that he died in 2020 of complications from Covid, and before the next chord plays your mind is back in that dystopian time. Work USA asks Denmark for help in the egg crisis American authorities have turned to the industry association Danish Eggs and asked about the possibility of exporting eggs to the USA, reports Danish TV2 with reference to the industry magazine F?devarewatch. The egg shortage in the USA is due to bird flu. Work Trump Expands Attacks on Law Firms, Singling Out Paul, Weiss Mr. Pomerantz had tried to build a criminal case against Mr. Trump several years ago when he worked at the Manhattan district attorney’s office. The White House announcement called Mr. Pomerantz “an unethical lawyer” who tried to “manufacture a prosecution against President Trump.” Work Google Being Forced To Sell Chrome is Not Good for the Web You've got a monopoly on lemonade because you pay all the grocery stores to be the default lemonade. So we're going to force you sell your car. Work Trump's Clash With Maine Gov. Janet Mills Fuels Tensions Across State When the Trump administration issued an executive order on Feb. 5 barring transgender women from women’s sports, Ms. Libby, a 43-year-old mother of five, saw an opportunity to amplify her own position on the matter. Work Appeals Court Lets Trump's DEI Crackdown Proceed, but Judges Debate DEI Merits “Any individual judge’s view on whether certain executive action is good policy is not only irrelevant to fulfilling our duty to adjudicate cases and controversies according to the law, it is an impermissible consideration,” Judge Rushing wrote. Work The Democratic Divide: Would a Shutdown Have Helped or Hurt Trump? Federal agencies typically make contingency plans that lay out who should keep working and what programs need to operate during a shutdown. But spending experts said the decisions about what is deemed “necessary” or “essential” ultimately rest with the White House Office of Management and Budget, currently run by Russell T. Vought. Work Justice Department Moves to Dismiss Challenge to Iowa Immigration Law Yaakov M. Roth, an acting assistant attorney general, was one of the Justice Department lawyers who asked for the dismissal of the Iowa case. No similar dismissal motion appeared on Friday evening on the public docket for a challenge to a similar Texas law that Mr. Biden’s Justice Department also sued to block. Work Video: How Trump's Tariffs Affect U.S. Farmers Retaliatory tariffs are hitting U.S. farmers hard, particularly in states that voted for Trump. Ana Swanson, an Iowa native who covers trade and international economics for The New York Times, explains how retaliatory measures from countries like China and Canada affect the agriculture industry and what it means for the economy. Work Where Are Our Covid Memes Now? He's relaxed. He is chatting with his wife, who is filming. His biceps are bulging out of his black polo shirt as he shakes a cocktail shaker. It's Stanley Tucci making a Negroni, and it is how he briefly upended the internet in the pandemic spring of 2020. TradeBriefs Publications are read by over 100,000 Industry Executives About Us  |  Advertise  |  Privacy Policy Unsubscribe (one-click) You are receiving this mail because of your subscription with TradeBriefs. Our mailing address is 3110 Thomas Ave, Dallas, TX 75204, USA Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom) Followers Blog Archive ▼  2025 (7) ▼  March (5) Cannabis Use Linked to Epigenetic Changes, Scienti... Trump Tries to Use White South Africans as Caution... 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