Thanks @nytimes.com for naming my book to its recommended reads ("Toggling between extravagances like simulated World War II battles and dueling luxury disaster refuges, Osnos takes the reader deep into our new Gilded Age.") As it happens, front-page photo is a sign of the times:

This may be a good time to re-read Jeffrey Winters’ landmark study of oligarchy in which he explains why “ruling” oligarchies (e.g. the Mafia Commission) tend to devolve into “warring” oligarchies of the kind that defined medieval Europe.

It’s interesting to watch Musk, in image-rehabilitation mode, rapidly adopt a series of positions that polls plainly show will be popular: 3rd party, distance from Trump, etc. At this rate, by nightfall he’ll be tweeting: “who likes free pizza?”

In Washington 6/13, speaking at the one-and-only @politicsprose.bsky.social Details: politics-prose.com/evan-osnos 4/x

This image is circulating among intelligence specialists tonight

Book news: “The Haves and Have-Yachts: Dispatches on the Ultrarich” was scheduled to be published this fall, but the publisher has moved it up to June 3rd, because it describes a world upon us now. Details and pre-orders here: www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Ha...

Very sorry to hear of the passing of Rutherford Chang, highly original conceptual artist, familiar to Asia hands, e.g. in 2008, he cut out 4,000 ink-dot sketches from the WSJ and reassembled them into a yearbook-like piece of art. A study of priorities and power. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/09/a...

As a time-capsule of America since 9/11, I don't think you'll find a set of images more evocative and encompassing than Peter van Agtmael's in “Look at the U.S.A." www.newyorker.com/culture/phot...