Portman’s complaint

Portman’s complaint The regional order that has prevailed in the Middle East since 1991 is said to be crumbling, if not finished. / Foreign Affairs Israel bombs an airbase in Syria to stop Turkey from rebuilding it. Turkey, it would seem, decides not to feel attacked. / The Associated Press, Reuters Related: Why did Turkey, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia team up? Because “the best defense alliance is not one that makes a state dependent on its allies forever, but one that makes it more capable of relying on itself.” / Middle East Eye In China, Microsoft is pursuing what insiders call “a strategy of retreat,” while Google shifts its manufacturing to India. / Reuters, Nikkei Asia Why plumbers in the United States are paid significantly more than plumbers in other countries—is perhaps “very interesting and not so obvious.” / Stream of Randomness In the United Kingdom, despite a “summer rainfall problem,” new water reservoirs haven’t been built in decades. / By the Numbers The second-largest reservoir in the US reaches a record low just days after Lake Mead breaks its own record. / CarbonBrief Some parts of the Mediterranean are six degrees Celsius above average this week. / EU Space Policy A new video game invites players to try surviving a heatwave in a French apartment without air conditioning. / Dezeen See also: The highest-resolution image of the sun ever captured. / YouTube If you enjoy these headlines, please join us as a Sustaining Member to support what we do and unlock access to paywalled links. “I think that agents and editors are now being asked to essentially be police.” How artificial intelligence is upending book publishing. / The Wall Street Journal [$] Rachel Cusk’s new novel appears to be partly about Natalie Portman (“annoyingly”), though it’s unclear who’s who and what’s what. / Yahoo!, The New Yorker Hillary Busis: The most notable thing about the novel is its dubious place in pop culture history: as the latest piece of evidence that we, as a society, are not capable of being normal about Natalie Portman. / Vanity Fair Gen Zers are “ghost-posting” on Instagram, i.e., using the archive feature as a way to avoid detection. / Dazed Why do young people like Shania Twain? “People want to celebrate who they are, and what they are, and they don’t want to be criticized for just being themselves.” / The New York Times Magazine [$]