Flagship

Biden’s Rorschach press conference

US President Joe Biden again refused to drop out of the presidential race in a press conference that neither reassured his critics nor fatally undermined his position. The president answered questions for nearly an hour, during which he spoke fluently on foreign policy, argued that age gave him wisdom, and said that while he needs to “pace” himself, he still maintained a full schedule. But he also called Kamala Harris “Vice-President Trump,” and earlier introduced Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “President Putin” before correcting himself. The New York Times’ White House correspondent noted that while Biden obviously didn’t really confuse those people, the mixup “certainly did not help.” One Democratic figure told Semafor that the conference was “a Rorschach test,” in which everyone saw what was in their mind already.

Zelenskyy calls for lifting of missile limits

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on the US to lift restrictions on the use of its weapons to strike targets inside Russia. Speaking at the NATO summit he welcomed a boost in military aid and a statement about Kyiv’s “irreversible” path to membership, but said that removing the restrictions was vital “if we want to save our country.” US President Joe Biden offered no sign of whether the White House would change its stance, but separately Washington announced it would station long-range missiles in Germany, capable of striking Moscow, for the first time since the 1990s. The new UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer this week said that Ukraine had permission to use British-made missiles to strike targets within Russia and that Britain “will do all we can to help Ukraine.”

Starmer’s fast first week

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer will announce plans today to release more prisoners early. Starmer, previously the most senior criminal prosecutor in England and Wales, said prisons are days from overflowing: The government is expected to say fewer offenders will be jailed, and some prisoners will be released after 40% of their sentence rather than 50%. England has high incarceration rates for Europe, although less than a third that of the US. It’s one of several swift moves from Starmer, who entered office last week: He has also removed restrictions on onshore wind building, committed to build 1.5 million homes, and announced age restrictions on the House of Lords.

Milei’s inflation wobble

Argentina’s inflation rate was forecast to have increased in June, breaking a five-month streak of cooling price rises and threatening economic growth. While international lending organizations have lauded President Javier Milei’s plan to tackle inflation, decreasing productivity still besets Argentina, as it does much of the rest of Latin America. As manufacturing jobs across the region have faded over the last few decades, workers have become “stuck” in less productive roles in services. Meanwhile poor urban planning and congestion has done little to increase the economic prospects of those who move to cities, an expert argued in the Council on Foreign Relations. As lenders — notably Chinese firms — shy away from the region, Latin America could face a lost decade.

China’s oil scandal continues

Chinese authorities expanded the censorship surrounding a cooking oil-transportation scandal as a key meeting of Communist Party leaders neared. Officials have pledged to investigate a local newspaper report that fuel tankers that transported chemicals were subsequently used to move cooking oil without being sufficiently cleaned. A system that publicly tracked tanker routes was taken down, Bill Bishop noted in his Sinocism newsletter, while online searches related to the topic have been restricted. The story — the publication of which is “a true rarity in the Xi Jinping era,” according to the China Media Project, an analysis group — comes just days ahead of a highly sensitive meeting of Beijing’s top leadership in which economic reforms are expected to top the agenda.

India’s superpower future

India will be the “world’s next food superpower” if it can remove obstacles to the agricultural industry, The Economist argued. The world’s most populous country depended on food imports until relatively recently, but is now a net exporter. “Yet big inefficiencies exist,” The Economist said, with handouts distorting the market and weighing down production: “Merely raising [yields] to the [global] average would make India a massive power,” and its rice production could outweigh the entire global rice trade. The Financial Times’ chief economics commentator agreed that India’s future was bright: Even with relatively modest improvements in its manufacturing base and development, “with its huge population and a big economy, India would be a superpower.”

Who Made Sex Political? And Will Biden — and Harris? — Survive the Vibe Shift?

After evaluating President Biden’s strategy to shut down his critics, Ben and Nayeema delve into the culture and gender wars set to define the 2024 election. They examine recent challenges to the media-fueled myth that women can “have it all,” exploring trends like tradwives, polyamory, and hot celibacy summer. They also call up Lindsay Peoples, editor of The Cut, to discuss vibe shifts, the politicization of gender, and whether the publication is putting its thumb on the scale for Kamala.

Listen now to the latest episode of Mixed Signals.

Kenya’s Ruto culls cabinet

Kenyan President William Ruto fired almost the entirety of his cabinet, a move that comes in response to nationwide protests that mark the biggest crisis of his presidency. At least 39 people have been killed since the start of youth-led protests against planned tax hikes. Ruto has been caught between the demands of international lenders such as the IMF — which wants the country to cut spending — and a hard-pressed population still reeling from soaring prices. Given Ruto has ceded to demonstrators’ demands, some believe there’s a strong likelihood the protests will continue. “For as long as they find they are making more and more progress, they will keep pushing,” a lawyer in Nairobi told Reuters.

Texas’s dangerous power outage

Texas is facing a deadly heat wave as millions remain without power, and therefore air conditioning, after Hurricane Beryl hit the Gulf Coast on Monday. Frustration has grown with the local utility company, which has restored power to around a million customers but expects to leave roughly 500,000 still cut off until next week. Users are particularly angry that the company has no app to warn them of power outages, and thousands have begun using the app of a fast food company, Whataburger, that says which nearby restaurants are open: A gray icon, indicating a closed store, usually means power is down.

Study ways to save glaciers, say scientists

A major report called for research into glacier geoengineering. As the world warms, glaciers and ice sheets are melting. The bulk of the world’s ice is in the Arctic and Antarctic, and large-scale melting could cause catastrophic sea level rise: Waters have already risen around eight inches since the late 1800s. Researchers think that some relatively simple measures, such as barriers to prevent warm water getting beneath glaciers and undermining them, could prevent much of the melting: “The actual engineering required might be smaller than you might think,” one said. But they are concerned that the efforts could disrupt ecosystems and local communities, or simply may not work.

Paris river concerns for Olympics

The Olympic opening ceremony is at risk because the Seine in Paris is swollen by rainfall. Dozens of boats will take part in the ceremony, sailing from the Pont d’Austerlitz to the Eiffel Tower, and a recent rehearsal went well. But the river is running at four times the usual rate following storms last month, raising concerns about “boat speed and maneuverability.” It’s a new concern for the Olympic organizers, who have been focused on cleanliness: Swimming competitions will be held in the Seine, and there have been worries it would be unsafe. But in a dubiously reassuring statement, Paris city hall said water quality standards had been met for “11 days or 10 days” out of the last 12, despite the rainwater washing untreated sewage into the river.

• A London competition tribunal hears an application for a lawsuit against Apple and Amazon for alleged marketplace collusion.
• Two French international rugby players accused of rape are to be brought before a court in Argentina.
• France plays Sweden in the UEFA Women’s Euro 2025 qualifiers.

The area in acres of Alborán, a tiny Spanish island off the coast of Morocco that has become the center of a people-smuggling operation. Organized crime groups have brought 518 migrants, almost all Moroccan citizens, to the barely-above-sea-level island so far this year. The 11 Spanish soldiers stationed there lack the resources to prevent them or to care for the new arrivals, and the rescue service no longer takes migrants to the mainland: The government has ordered a temporary building be erected to house them. The soldiers have learned to remain hidden when traffickers arrive, so that the smugglers don’t push migrants into the sea to make their escape, El País reported. Around 186,000 undocumented migrants crossed the Mediterranean in 2023, with more than 2,500 deaths.

Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry, directed by Elene Naveriani. Adapted from Georgian writer and feminist activist Tamta Melashvili’s 2020 novel of the same name, the film follows an unmarried, middle-aged woman living in a remote Georgian village who finds herself unexpectedly caught between love and aloof independence when she embarks on a passionate affair with the local delivery driver. A romance situated in “gentle but unmistakable social critique,” as Arjun Sajip put it, this is a story “which tells us what most films contrive to ignore: love and sex is not just for the lovely and sexy and young,” The Guardian wrote.

• Embattled Biden fiercely defends candidacy at NATO press conference.
• The most important sign that US inflation may stay down.
• Why the Democrats’ favorite podcast turned on Joe Biden.