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PTA Dues

The Oscars, The Allies, The Hraunkælingarstjori

Dave Pell

Mar 16

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Sinners, one battle after another, a Frankenstein’s monster wreaking havoc ... we’ll get to the Trump administration news soon enough. But let’s start with the Oscars. I have a feeling this will go down as one of the more forgettable Oscar nights. That could be because in today’s nonstop stream of massive, anxiety-inducing news, it’s impossible to remember anything for more than a few minutes. Or maybe it’s just because TV is so dominant now that many of us were just waiting for the Oscars to end so we could get back to our regularly scheduled binge. One person who definitely put in his time waiting was Paul Thomas Anderson, who finally ended his 0-11 streak and took home three trophies for One Battle After Another. PTA was joined in his big night by several winners from Sinners, including Autumn Durald Arkapaw, making Oscar history as the first woman to win Best Cinematography, and Michael B Jordan’s crowd-pleasing win for Best Actor. From The Wire to Friday Night Lights to Sinners, Jordan has had a career of nonstop highlights. So he definitely deserved an In-N-Out break. Sean Penn won his third Oscar, but skipped the ceremony. He was hanging with Zelensky in Ukraine. Sinners and One Battle divvied up the night’s biggest wins during an event when there really were no losers. Except maybe Marty Supreme, which, perhaps suffering from Timothée Chalamet’s ping pong diplomacy, left the night empty-handed. Here’s a list of all the winners.

+ Between Sinners and Battle, Warner Bros was the dominant studio, winning a record 11 Oscars. But will this mark the end of an era as David and Larry Ellison’s Paramount moves toward closing the deal to acquire the studio? It’s hard to imagine the new leadership (that includes a growing list of former MeToo castoffs) is going to dig movies with the cultural and political messages of Warner Bros 2026 winners. It’s easier to imagine Warner’s creative output looking like a juke joint after a visit from a band of vampires.

+ Related: Kimmel won the Oscars with the line of the night. “There are some countries whose leaders don’t support free speech. I’m not at liberty to say which, let’s just leave it at North Korea and CBS.”

+ Here’s Conan’s opening monologue, Billy Crystal’s tribute to Rob Reiner, and some of the evening’s viral moments,

+ While the best movies of the year divided up the top awards, the worst movie of the year enjoyed a more unanimous win. ‘War of the Worlds’ remake sinks to the bottom at this year’s Razzie Awards.

2

The Strait Dope

It turns out that disparaging, threatening, humiliating, and nauseating allies might not have been the best strategy. So far, many of America’s strongest allies have refused Trump’s call to help open the Strait of Hormuz. So he’s disparaging them more. But it doesn’t matter, because we don’t need them anyway. Nah, nah. Trump Disparages Allies for Rebuffing His Requests for Military Assistance. “’We don’t need anybody; we’re the strongest nation in the world,’ Mr. Trump said. He suggested his request for assistance in reopening the Strait of Hormuz instead amounted to a loyalty test of America’s allies. ‘I’m almost doing it in some cases not because we need them but because I want to find out how they react.’”

+ WSJ (Gift Article): Trump Wants to Secure Hormuz. Here’s What It Would Take.

+ Things are not going well for Iran. The regime is damaged. Their ability to defend themselves and threaten others has been greatly diminished. Where things go from here could depend on allies and political strategy, which makes the above story all the more worrisome.

+ “As the price of oil soars to $100 a barrel and countries scramble to limit the fallout of the sudden loss of Middle East fuel, China has two significant advantages over its geopolitical rivals. Many of its new cars run on electricity. And that electricity is mostly powered by sources at home.” NYT (Gift Article): China’s Edge in an Oil Shock: Electric Cars and Renewables.

+ Meanwhile, the administration seems more obsessed with how the war is being covered than how it’s been planned. First, there are the attempts to sell the war using video games and sports memes, which I covered on Friday in Wii the People. Then there are threats to shut down journalism that doesn’t function as state media. F.C.C. Chair Threatens to Revoke Broadcasters’ Licenses Over War Coverage. “Democratic lawmakers and free-speech watchdogs were quick to condemn Mr. Carr’s threat as a violation of the First Amendment.” (There was a time every American would condemn these threats.)

3

Bet Your Life

“My minor report on a missile striking an open area was now in the middle of a betting war, with those who had bet ‘No’ on an Iranian strike on Israel on March 10 demanding I change my article to ensure they would win big.” Another reason prediction markets are a bad idea: Gamblers trying to win a bet on Polymarket are vowing to kill me if I don’t rewrite an Iran missile story.

4

And So The Hraunkælingarstjori Goes

Meet “Iceland’s only ‘lava cooling manager’ — or ‘hraunkælingarstjori’ in Icelandic.” NYT (Gift Article): Iceland’s Chief ‘Lava Cooler’ Is Bracing for the Next Eruption. “More than two years ago, as the earth seethed, Icelandic officials scrambled to make a plan. The first eruption in that area came just days before Christmas in 2023. Within hours, lava was just about a mile and a half from the fishing town of Grindavik, whose 3,500 residents had already fled from their homes. Billowing smoke and lava fountains reached more than 300 feet into the air. So they came up with a daring idea. If they could not stop it, could they at least steer it?”

5

Extra, Extra

Minn There, Done That: “It’s not just that I’ve had to watch the Trump administration destroy cherished alliances, like ours with Western Europe and Canada, that have upheld freedom, democracy and global trade since World War II. It’s also been the stunning cowardice and boundless greed with which leaders of big law firms and Big Tech have bent their knees to King Donald and indulged a cabinet of clowns — not one of whom they’d hire in their own businesses. But then I spent time in my native state, Minnesota, after something else that I’d never seen in nearly 50 years: a spontaneous uprising of civic activism propelled by a single idea — I am my neighbor’s keeper, whoever he or she is and however he or she got here.” Tom Friedman in the NYT (Gift Article): Why Minnesota Matters More Than Iran for America’s Future.

+ But the Beatdown Goes On: “Stephen Miller is the architect of Trump’s immigration policies, and there’s little reason to think that Noem’s ouster will change Miller’s approach. It may even serve to embolden it, by giving him fresh cover. The department has temporarily paused large-scale arrest operations in the wake of a national outcry over abuses in Minnesota, and it is in the midst of a partial shutdown owing to opposition from congressional Democrats. The Administration’s bigger ambitions show no signs of flagging, however. In fact, they are leading toward a new humanitarian and legal crisis.” Jonathan Blitzer in The New Yorker: Trump’s Mass-Detention Campaign. Meanwhile, Deportees sent by Trump to Salvadoran prison are still stuck a year later.

+ Ringing the Farm Alarm: “As the president’s immigration policies squeeze an already tight supply of farm labor, the Trump administration is making it cheaper to hire foreign farmworkers.” No, this is not the Onion. It’s the NYT (Gift Article): To Address Farm Labor Shortage, Trump Administration Turns to Migrant Workers.

+ Markwayne and the Stock Gain: “Mr. Mullin reported buying shares in Chevron, the only major U.S. oil company producing in Venezuela. Five days after the purchase, President Trump attacked Venezuela, demanding that its leadership give better terms to U.S. oil companies. Chevron’s stock price has since jumped, even as the market as a whole has slipped. The Chevron transaction, which Mr. Mullin reported in January, was among as much as $2.8 million he invested in 31 companies on Dec. 29 — and part of a pattern of large and frequent trades that has made him one of the most prolific stock buyers in Congress.” How Trump’s Homeland Security Pick, a Prolific Investor, Got a Lot Wealthier in Congress. (This is an extreme example of a wider, and bipartisan, issue. It’s flat out crazy that members of Congress can purchase individual equities. It’s also flat out crazy that members of Congress can be named Markwayne.)

+ Are You Bot or Not: “The worker uncurls its claw-like fingers, daintily grips the basket by its edges and walks it over to a conveyor that will send it through an industrial washing machine. About a minute after it grabbed the first basket off a pallet, it returns to grab another. So it goes for eight hours a day, basket after basket, pallet after pallet.” WSJ (Gift Article): When Humanoid Robots Come to a Small-Town Factory. (Please come for NextDraft next...)

+ Throw the Book at Em: Does using AI ever remind you of searching through those encyclopedias that once lined your shelves? There might be a reason for that. Encyclopedia Britannica sues OpenAI over AI training.