02/27/26

Good morning! It’s Friday, February 27th.

International Polar Bear Day.

Hey, here’s something – polar bears are super ferocious! Like, seriously, wildly, ferocious! Oh sure, they look all cute in those Christmas commercials but if you take away their Diet Coke’s they will snap! They are the world's largest, most powerful, and deadliest land predators.

Me before my coffee, am I right?

And now, the news.

Cuba

-via Axios

Ohmygod there’s so much news. Where to start? (spinning wheel noise. The one click click click)… Cuba! Cause I don’t know… the wheel.

As the United States and Cuba continue to investigate Wednesday’s incident, which left four dead and six injured after a group of ten people on a Florida-registered boat, but in Cuban water, clashed with Cuba’s coast guard, Thursday brought a few new pieces of information.

First… the boat was stolen. The owner reported it was stolen by an employee in a renovation project.

And two… uh oh – one of the people killed was a US citizen. A few of the injured were either citizens or immigrants with various types of legal statuses in the country.

Statusi.

So… again, no real understanding of what these people wanted to do if they made it to Cuba on that stolen boat, but it probably wasn’t reenact scenes from Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights.

When we know more, we’ll know more.

Afghanistan-Pakistan

-via AP News

And keeping it international (but, like, you’ll wish I hadn’t)…

On Thursday, Pakistan took to Twitter and tweeted that the Taliban had turned Afghanistan “into a colony of India,” gathered militants from around the world, and begun “exporting terrorism.”

How’s he feeling about it?

“Our patience has now run out. Now it is open war between us.”

An open war between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Uh oh.

For context, the turning Afghanistan into a colony of India thing is a reference to Pakistan’s rivalry with India, dating back to 1947. Pakistan’s fear is that Afghanistan aligning with India means they’re losing a bit of strategy by way of map.

But Afghanistan deepening its ties with India would also earn it things like more high-level visits, as well as diplomatic backing via UN engagement. Maybe some infrastructure investments from India into Afghanistan – things like roads, dams, or hospitals.

So there’s an upside for Afghanistan, in theory. If this was really happening.

But Pakistan saying this makes it seem like Afghanistan choosing India, if indeed they do, means they’re giving up all agency and just… becoming India.

And the phrase “colony of India,” obviously invokes some really bad historical (and also current…(al?) imagery. Which, in order to do that, we have to do a super quick bit of history…

From the mid-1700s until 1947, the British East India Company controlled most of South Asia.

When Britain left South Asia in 1947, it didn’t take its army, laws, borders, or government. Instead, it split its colonial state into two: Pakistan and India (again, we’re going vague. This is a broad strokes history lessons).

Pakistan inherited those British-designed institutions instead of building something from scratch.

So Pakistan is, in a roundabout way, accusing India of colonizing Afghanistan, while Pakistan’s relationship with Afghanistan comes from having rarely treated Afghanistan as an equal and instead as a strategic buffer. And they got that mentality from the British colonial thinking that built them.

It’s ironic, you see?

Okay… everyone history majors now?

Let’s get back to 2026. How fun for all of us! Because of how 2026 is so fun!

Okay, so Pakistan tweets that tweet. But why?

For the last year, Pakistan has repeatedly carried out airstrikes on Afghanistan. In return, Afghan forces attacked Pakistani border posts. So now we’ve got a little back-and-forth.

Qatar has been trying to mediate a ceasefire… this tweet probably won’t help.

Also unhelpful? On Sunday, Pakistan launched airstrikes into Afghanistan that they say killed 70 militants. (An Afghan official has debated the number.)

In retaliation, Afghanistan launched an attack on Pakistan on Thursday.

And so that, very broadly, brings us to this “open war” between the two countries. As of this recording, there have been clashes at the border between the two countries.

Russia, lover of peace, is calling for peace. It’s not great.

But, you know… that’s where we’re at right now.

Netflix Bows Out

-via Axios

Fear not, that story you just heard… You probably won’t hear about it ever again. Or any story ever. (Except of course on this podcast so I guess you should make sure this is the only thing everyone in the world is listening to…)

As you may recall, Netflix was trying to buy Warner Bros for a while. But then Paramount Skydance was like “wait! We want to own all the media everywhere!” So they attempted to do a hostile takeover. (Which the government allowed because they love hostile government takeovers so I guess the thought there is, the more the merrier!)

Well then, following that, Paramount was able to enter a true bidding war and, on Thursday, Netflix bowed out.

That means that, if this deal goes through, Paramount Skydance will own Paramount, CBS, and Warner Bros… one company to rule them all. And look, am I excited for the episode of NCIS that investigates the near-murder of the Big Bang Theory gang that was only thwarted by Dr. Carter?

Yes! Duh… why do you think I wrote all that fanfiction over during the covid lockdown?

But I also just think maybe there should be more than three companies in the entire world? Sorry, I don’t mean to be so controversial.

There’s a four-day period in which Netflix can unbow out. So… here’s hoping. Or actually, you know what? Hang on, let me just check… no, sorry. I thought maybe I had $111 billion in the couch cushions, but it looks like I’m missing (counting money noise, counting money noise), honestly like $6 or 7?

DOD v CPD

-via ABC News

Here’s something – on Thursday, the Department of Defense shot down a Customs and Border Protection drone over El Paso. That’s… we’re… those are both things from America! In America!

Dummies!

The FAA has expanded flight restrictions over Fort Hancock until June 24th. This will not affect commercial flights because of the location.

It’s possible you remember I said a couple weeks ago the FAA shut down the airspace in the same(ish) area of Texas. They said it would be for 10 days, but it ended up only being for a couple of hours. It turns out, that was because DHS used a laser to shoot down something in the sky over Fort Bliss.

Turns out it was… a balloon.

So, hence this reaction from ranking members of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure: "We said MONTHS ago that the White House's decision to sidestep a bipartisan, tri-committee bill to appropriately train C-UAS operators and address the lack of coordination between the Pentagon, DHS and the FAA was a short-sighted idea. Now, we're seeing the result of its incompetence."

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… this administration hires the dumbest of the dumb, huh?

And then they just make real dumb decisions.

Epstein Hearings

-via The Hill

Speaking of dumbs and dumb decisions…

On Thursday, Hillary Clinton showed up for her deposition in the House about her ties to Jeffrey Epstein. It was a closed-door hearing, despite her saying (honestly, kind of like a boss) that it should be made public.

But it was a closed-door hearing.

Until Lauren Bobert decided “here’s something dumb to do,” and snapped a picture of Hillary! And then leaked it!

According to California House Rep Garcia, Hillary was, “completely cooperating with the deposition and the committee” and “answering questions in full faith and in good faith.”

When asked about leaking the photo, Bobert, who apparently just isn’t getting enough attention these days, made some dumb reference to Hillary’s 2016 campaign and the leaked emails. It’s too dumb to repeat.

In the hearing, Clinton stated multiple times that she did not know Jeffrey Epstein. That she’d never met Jeffrey Epstein.

In reference to a photo of Ghislaine at Chelsea’s wedding, Hillary said she was the plus-one of a guest and they hardly spoke at all.

When asked about her feelings about a photo in the Epstein files of Bill Clinton getting a massage from a young woman, Hillary said she was not there to discuss feelings.

After the meeting, she held a presser outside where she again said the hearing should have been public and asked that the public be made public as soon as possible.

Listen, again I say… anyone who ever crossed paths with anyone who has ever spoken with Epstein needs to talk to authorities and say what they did, or didn’t know.

Anyone who commits any of these crimes deserves every punishment possible. Jail forever.

But also… the DOJ has seen these files. That’s how they know Trump is in them and need to hide them. Conversely, if they knew any Clinton was in them, don’t you think they’d say something? Like – we’d know. They wouldn’t hide a Clinton crime from us.

Just a thought.

Again, I don’t care about politics when it comes to this. If someone did this, regardless of which side of the aisle they’re on, they need to go to jail forever.

But… It’s also incredibly disrespectful to the victims and survivors to pretend like this isn’t political theater when parts of it are.

And that’s it. That’s the news.

I’m proud of polar bears. They’re so cute and fluffy… and dangerous as all get out!

But more than polar bears… because the only thing dangerous about you is how cute you are… I’m proud of you!