ITK Daily | February 21

Global Street Smarts means better Geopolitical Business Communications.?

Happy Tuesday.

Here’s today’s ITK Daily.

To be ITK, know this:

+ "Joseph Biden, welcome to Kyiv!" -- Volodymyr Zelemskyy in a Telegram post

Joe Biden's visit to Ukraine is historic. Even more so considering Putin can't even leave his dacha.

+ US notified Russia "hours" ahead of the trip.

WP: On surprise trip to Kyiv, Biden vows enduring support for Ukraine

Politico: Biden brings hope — as well as pledges of cash and weapons — to Ukraine

Biden visits Kyiv ahead of anniversary of Russia’s invasion: It was a landmark moment in his presidency, coming against the backdrop of the one-year anniversary of the invasion.?Politico

+ “This was a risk that Joe Biden wanted to take,” said Kate Bedingfield, the White House communications director. “It’s important to him to show up even when it’s hard, and he directed his team to make it happen, no matter how challenging the logistics. He wanted to stand shoulder to shoulder with President Zelenskyy and remind the world as we approach the one year anniversary of the invasion that Kviv still stands.”

Sneaking a president from DC to Kyiv without anyone noticing?AP

+ Biden’s surprise 23-hour visit to Ukraine on Monday was the first time in modern history that a US leader visited a warzone outside the aegis of the US military — a feat the White House said carried some risk even though Moscow was given a heads-up.

+ Biden traveled with a far smaller than usual retinue: Sullivan, deputy chief of staff Jen O’Malley Dillon and the director of Oval Office operations, Annie Tomasini. They were joined by his Secret Service detail, the military aide carrying the so-called “nuclear football,” a small medical team and the official White House photographer.

+ Biden headed to the US Embassy for a brief stop before departing the country by train back to Poland aboard a well-appointed, wood-paneled train car with tightly drawn curtains, a dining table and a leather sofa.

The Biden White House operated under cloak-and-dagger secrecy to plan his Ukraine trip?Bloomberg

+ It was during a huddle in the Oval Office on Friday that Biden made his final decision to go. Even inside his own White House and Pentagon, very few people knew about it.?

+ To avert the risk of any leaks and also for security reasons, it was determined that the traveling party would be very small: Only a handful of Biden’s closest aides, a small medical team, two journalists and Biden’s security detail.

+ Photographer Evan Vucci of the Associated Press and reporter Sabrina Siddiqui of the Wall Street Journal were chosen from the originally-scheduled group of media travelers.?

+ The pair was called into the office of White House Communications Director Kate Bedingfield on Friday and were sworn to secrecy.

In Biden’s unannounced visit to Kyiv, a preview of an increasingly direct contest with Putin: NYT reports the vastly different world views of President Biden and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia will become vividly apparent in a rare split-screen moment on Tuesday.

AP: Moscow downplays significance of Biden’s visit to Kyiv

WSJ: Biden’s visit to Ukraine comes as China’s foreign minister set to arrive in Moscow

China’s top diplomat to discuss Ukraine war during Moscow visit: FT reports Wang Yi’s trip underscores deepening ties with Russia that have caused alarm in the west.

Biden and Xi are treading softly to contain conflict in Ukraine: Zelensky may warn of world war but he simply wants to stop China from arming the enemy.?Michael Binyon

+ At the start of the war the West hoped that Beijing could persuade Moscow to seek a negotiated solution. A year on that looks far away, with both Russia and Ukraine insisting that they will fight until victory. But Wang may still want to outline plans for a settlement and may make any material help to Russia conditional on a willingness to negotiate.

In China, worries about a weakened Russia prompt a rethink: Concern that a Russian setback in Ukraine would cripple China’s partner against the West helps drive Beijing’s push for an end to the war.?WSJ

+ Some foreign-policy strategists in Beijing have raised the question of whether China should consider providing military support to Russia for defensive purposes—a scenario they say could significantly increase the costs of the conflict. That, in turn, could give China some leverage in proposing options to end the conflict.

+ China and Russia share the objective of trying to reshape an international order that both view as biased in favor of the developed world.

+ A January policy report by the influential Washington think tank, Rand Corp., entitled “Avoiding a Long War,” has caught the attention of many in China’s foreign-policy establishment, according to the people close to Chinese decision-making. The report argued that the longer the war drags on, the greater the risk of an escalation that could put Russia in direct conflict with NATO.?

+ “The Chinese will not sit aside to watch the Russians being completely defeated. The peace proposal is a step toward that goal,” said Yun Sun, director of the China program at the Stimson Center, a Washington think tank. “I doubt the Chinese could propose anything substantive about a settlement beyond calling for peace and dialogues.”

‘China is trying to interfere’ but Canadians alone determined recent elections: Trudeau?Global News

+ Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday China is trying to interfere in Canadian democracy, “including our elections”

+ On Dec. 21, 2022, Global News reported that an unredacted 2020 national security document alleges that Beijing used an extensive network of community groups to conceal the flow of funds between Chinese officials and Canadian members of an election interference network, all in an effort to advance its own political agenda in the 2019 federal contest.

I am surprised American China Hawks aren't talking about what is happening in Ottawa.

Can a transnational legislative alliance challenge China??The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China aims to coordinate democratic countries' responses to China. Political analysts, however, say there are limitations to the group's ability to formulate concrete measures.?DW?

+ The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC), an unofficial organization that includes lawmakers from around 30 countries, held a symposium last Friday in Tokyo, bringing together dozens of lawmakers from several democratic countries to call for tougher policies on China.

Nuclear submarine plan shows risk lurking beneath China-Australia reset?Bloomberg

+ Albanese is expected to travel to Washington in mid-March to unveil the design for a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines to be built with the help of the US and the UK.

+ Australian Trade Minister Don Farrell told Bloomberg last week that rebuilding the relationship with Beijing was “hard work” and acknowledged there would be “hiccups along the way.” Still, he said it was in Australia’s interests to “stabilize” relations with the world’s second-largest economy.

Rattled by China, US and allies are beefing up defenses in the Pacific: But ‘everything needs to go faster,’ says Indo-Pacific command’s top admiral.?WP

+ The trend, the Biden administration says, reflects efforts to create a free and prosperous Indo-Pacific through the steady forging of partnerships — moving toward what it calls a “latticework” of mutually reinforcing coalitions.

+ Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s eye-watering military growth — already boasting the world’s largest navy and last year conducting more ballistic missile tests than the rest of the world combined — has stoked regional fears that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is a possibility.

+ The AUKUS deal has angered the Chinese, who view it as a deliberate provocation and accuse the United States and partners of trying to contain China through an “Anglo-Saxon clique.” China’s Foreign Ministry has attacked the arrangement as potentially undermining the international nuclear nonproliferation regime.

+ India, which will host this year’s Group of 20 meeting of the world’s leading economies and aspires to great-power status in its own right, has come to view China as its principal adversary following several years of violent border clashes with Chinese troops that have caused fatalities on both sides. That has pushed New Delhi closer to Washington.

+ Just last month, Washington and Delhi held the inaugural meeting of a strategic partnership announced in May by Biden and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi that encourages their domestic industries to jointly develop artificial intelligence, jet engines and semiconductors.

+ The US military holds more than 100 exercises with countries in the Indo-Pacific each year.

With an eye on China, Philippines moves closer to US interests: NYT reports driven by worry about China’s aggression, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has adopted the most muscular foreign policy approach that the Philippines has seen in close to a decade.

US engages in strategy to remove Wagner Group from Africa: Washington made an offer to the Central African Republic to train its army and increase humanitarian aid, in exchange for the expulsion of the Russian paramilitaries.?Le Monde

+ While this is not a formal ultimatum, according to our sources the US is giving the CAR head of state 12 months to distance himself from the Russian mercenaries, who, after the signing of a formal agreement between the two countries, began deploying in early 2018.

+ Long neglected by diplomats and donors, the Central African Republic has become a battleground for the West and Russia.

+ The approach attempted by the United States is part of a broader American containment strategy. But in Mali, as in Sudan, where Wagner is acting as a proxy for the ruling juntas, the US room for maneuver is more limited.?

+ Barring a diplomatic turnaround, the Russia-Africa summit scheduled for July in Saint Petersburg would showcase this partnership as an example for all its peers on the continent.

Burkina Faso announces French military task force has left the country: FT reports the transitional government says its own troops will defend the nation against Islamist militants.

Japan and Germany plan broader high-level talks beyond 2-plus-2: Meetings to deal with China, Russia, and other shared challenges.?Nikkei

+?Japan and Germany will establish a new framework for regular high-level meetings as early as March, covering a wide range of topics but focused on deterring China and Russia, senior officials from both countries told Nikkei.

+ "The political and military rise of China, the threat posed by North Korea as well as the massively impaired relations towards Russia are key challenges for Japan that we share."

+ Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has frequently warned European countries that "Ukraine today could be East Asia tomorrow." A united international front is considered essential to deter China from invading Taiwan.

Italy working on measures to boost Milan bourse's allure?Reuters

+ Last year 15 companies abandoned Euronext Milan, including the infrastructure group Atlantia and Agnelli family's holding company Exor, with six newcomers to compensate for exits.

+ Some of those which delisted were drawn to other bourses, notably Amsterdam, where regulations help leading shareholders to preserve a tight grip on companies.

+ Adding to the challenge, Italy's family-run businesses are unwilling to relinquish control by listing unless they need cash for M&A or other expansion strategies.

After Sturgeon, Scottish independence warriors have 1 last shot: Politico reports whoever succeeds Sturgeon as Scottish National Party leader will face the same fundamental challenge in trying to take the country out of the UK.

The Times: Kate Forbes launches bid for SNP leadership

Kate Forbes and Humza Yousaf are a worldview apart: Differences between the candidates will shine a light on tensions within the SNP and the country.?Alex Massie

+ None of the three candidates campaigning to succeed Nicola Sturgeon has any great record of accomplishment.

+ All the candidates will doubtless have to pretend independence remains an imminent possibility.

India enjoyed a free and vibrant media. Narendra Modi’s brazen attacks are a catastrophe: The prime minister’s cynical raids on the BBC are the latest populist clampdown on a press and broadcasting ‘elite.’?Kenan Malik

+ In January, the BBC broadcast a two-part series, India: The Modi Question, which looked forensically at the role of Narendra Modi in fomenting the Gujarat anti-Muslim riots of 2002 in which at least 1,000 people were killed. Now the prime minister of India, Modi was then the chief minister of Gujarat.

+ The response in India was swift.

+ Kanchan Gupta, an adviser to the ministry of information and broadcasting, called the documentary “propaganda and anti-India garbage” that “reflects BBC’s colonial mindset.”

+ Then, last week, the authorities raided BBC offices in India, supposedly to investigate “tax evasion” by the corporation’s Indian operation.

+ Journalists, especially female journalists, and those critical of Hindu nationalism, have not just been censored, they have been assaulted, even killed.

+ As rightwing populists do in many other nations, the BJP presents its battering of the media as a challenge to the “elite”. It is, in reality, an attack on any criticism of the elite. The slow strangulation of a free and independent media is a catastrophe for India. But not just for India. It is a development that should trouble all of us.

Biden drawing up a 2024 playbook that looks a lot like 2020’s: President Biden’s strategy is to frame the race as a contest between a seasoned leader and a conspiracy-minded opposition, while batting away concerns about his age.?NYT

+ Forget the Wilmington basement. This time he will have a Rose Garden. And Air Force One and a big white mansion and all the other advantages of incumbency in a year when he is not forced by a pandemic to stick to streaming from downstairs.

+ Whit Ayres, a veteran Republican pollster, said a rematch between Biden and Trump would be the best scenario for the president. “At this point, President Biden just needs to seem like he is still very much with it and able to do the job and at that point his fate is largely out of his hands,” Ayres said. “He’s got to pray the Republicans blow themselves up again.”

+ “Joe Biden’s campaign team doesn’t have a strategic problem; they have a candidate problem,” said Chris LaCivita, a Trump campaign consultant. “Americans have now watched Joe Biden wreck our economy, and he’ll have to answer for it. Biden won’t be able to hide in his basement like last time.”

+ Democrats expect Biden to make his bid official no earlier than April to put off scrutiny of his fund-raising until the next reporting deadline in July.

+ An April kickoff would be consistent with Mr. Biden’s 2020 campaign, which formally got underway in April 2019, and President Barack Obama’s re-election bid, which formally began in April 2011.

+ No decision has been made about where the campaign’s headquarters will be.?

+ The president has pushed for Wilmington, his hometown, according to people briefed on internal discussions.?

+ But some advisers fear that such a location would make recruitment harder, with younger campaign aides not eager to spend a year in a sleepy, small town. They are pressing instead for Philadelphia, where Biden’s 2020 effort was based.

Trump’s White House accomplishments aren’t so easy to sell on the campaign trail: Operation Warp Speed and the overturning of Roe aren’t necessarily clear political winners anymore.?Politico

+ Donald Trump faces a dilemma just months into his third run for president: Two of his most important achievements from the White House have become politically complicated or just plain too hot to touch.

+ Operation Warp Speed, the public-private partnership that developed a coronavirus vaccine in record time and which Trump once called a “miracle,” has become vilified among a group of conservatives.?

+ And the toppling of Roe v. Wade by Trump-appointed Supreme Court justices has turned into a political Rorschach test for Republicans, with one camp seeing it as a boost at the ballot box and the other fearing it is a hindrance.

+?He was personally booed for telling a crowd he had gotten a booster shot.

+ A new Rasmussen Reports survey finds Donald Trump tops both the lists of the “best” and “worst” presidents.

AP: Trump absent as Iowa 2024 GOP caucus train begins to roll

Feeling ‘overwhelmed’ and ‘fatigue,’ some GOP voters look beyond Trump: WP reports in recent focus groups of persuadable Republican primary voters from key early states, most stood by their past support for Trump, but the future was a different issue.

Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis to court big-money donors at dueling Palm Beach events: WSJ reports the former president and the Florida governor this week intensify fight for campaign cash.

Chris Sununu eyes the GOP’s ‘normal’ lane in 2024. Does it exist??The New Hampshire governor’s flirtation with a presidential run is a test of abortion politics, Republican media strategy, and the durability of the MAGA mentality. “I’m conservative,” he says. “I’m just not an extremist.”?NYT

+ After three consecutive disappointing election cycles for his party, Sununu says the time for indulging Trump’s delusions has long passed.?

+ The midterms, he argues, proved that the nation, including many Republicans, had little interest in the far-right candidates the former president backed.?

+ Even nominating a onetime Trump acolyte from the prospective 2024 field, like Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida or the former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley, is a misread of the moment, he says.

+ But the case for Sununu, and against Trumpism given recent electoral history, is even simpler, in his telling: Check the scoreboard.

+ Sununu won re-election by more than 15 points in a state that has awarded Democrats each of its federal offices, the sort of big-tent showing he says his party will require in 2024.

+ “I’m conservative, I’m just not an extremist,” Sununu said. “Sometimes people confuse conservative with extremist.”

+ Part of Sununu’s appeal in New Hampshire is his approachability. “He can tell you the betting line of the Patriot game,” a GOP strategist said.

+ His political mantra — “Be normal”

+ Some national Republicans suspect Mr. Sununu is talking to an electorate that largely does not exist.

+ Sununu has found fault with DeSantis and other Republicans who shun traditional news organizations or unscripted public encounters.

+ “I would love to see what happens when he walks in here,” Sununu said over milkshakes at Red Arrow Diner in Manchester, “to sit down, to have a milkshake and just chill. I don’t know! I’ve never seen it.”

Wonderful examples of high-low communications from Sununu here.

The maze is in the mouse: What ails Google. And how it can turn things around.?Praveen Seshadri

+ Google has 175,000+ capable and well-compensated employees who get very little done quarter over quarter, year over year. Like mice, they are trapped in a maze of approvals, launch processes, legal reviews, performance reviews, exec reviews, documents, meetings, bug reports, triage, OKRs, H1 plans followed by H2 plans, all-hands summits, and inevitable reorgs.

+ Google has four core cultural problems: (1) no mission, (2) no urgency, (3) delusions of exceptionalism, and (4) mismanagement.

+ Does anyone at Google come into work actually thinking about “organizing the world’s information”? They have lost track of who they serve and why.

+ Overall, it is a soft peacetime culture where nothing is worth fighting for.

+ Within Google, there is a collective delusion that the company is exceptional.

+ Google can no longer seek success by avoiding risk. The path forward has to start with culture change, and that has to start at the very top.?

+ Google’s executives should look at what Satya Nadella did at Microsoft: (1) lead with a commitment to a mission, (2) set aside the peacetime generals who underpromise and underdeliver, and (3) winnow the layers of middle management that have accumulated over time, many promoted gradually beyond their capability, and now incapable of change.

Advertising as crossword clues?Dave Trott

+ Yup, everyone gets 2,000 ads each, every day, thrown at them.

+ So do we really think we need to be making advertising that has to be worked out like crossword clues?

How Harvard Business Review thinks it can add subscribers while getting more expensive: By creating new products and taking advantage of its extensive archives, HBR’s plan is to both offer more to and ask more of subscribers.?Nieman Lab

+ “We actually compete with sleep … and we’re winning.” -- Reed Hastings, CEO Netflix

LAT: Supreme Court for first time casts doubt on Section 230, the legal shield for Big Tech

Big Tech is about to have an epic week in the Supreme Court: The stakes are high as the Supreme Court takes its first look at a law Republicans and Democrats have both criticized for giving too much protection to the tech industry.?Politico

+ Tech companies are bracing for the US Supreme Court to hear one of the most consequential cases facing the trillion-dollar industry to date — a ruling that could potentially make them liable for the recommendation of harmful content on their platforms.

+ The case, Gonzalez v. Google, seeks to hold Google’s YouTube liable for the death of a woman killed in a 2015 terrorist attack. Her family is suing the company for recommending ISIS videos used to recruit potential terrorists for attacks across the world, and contending that a federal liability shield for tech platforms doesn’t protect YouTube’s use of algorithms to recommend content.

+ At the heart of the case, the court will take its first look at Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act — a law passed in 1996 that gives internet providers and similar companies legal protections for hosting most posts from users, as well as moderating and removing such content.

+ “I don’t know if the American public is ready for not having personalized algorithms anymore. How does TikTok operate without personalized algorithms? You just get any random video that’s ever been posted?”

+ A ruling in Gonzalez that finds Google’s recommendation algorithms aren’t protected under Section 230 may backfire if the court later upholds the Texas and Florida laws that ban platforms from removing content.

Google case heads to Supreme Court with powerful internet shield law at stake: Company’s defense against liability in 2015 Paris terrorist attack invokes ‘Magna Carta of the internet.’?WSJ

+ The law at issue, known as Section 230, gives internet platforms legal immunity for almost all third-party content hosted on their sites. A decision to limit that immunity could scramble the business models of the internet’s biggest companies—especially social media platforms such as Instagram, TikTok and Google’s YouTube that rely heavily on recommendation algorithms.

Why Big Tech should break itself apart?Mihir A. Desai

+ "In the face of persistent antitrust cases, Big Tech firms should take the initiative and split legacy businesses from new, faster-growing ones — not because it would benefit customers or society but because it would serve the investors and employees that are critical to the future of these companies."

+ "Breaking up is hard to do — particularly for relatively young, founder-led companies that have experienced astronomic growth. But it is highly preferable to a decade of litigation, underperformance with investors, a growing inability to attract the best talent — and a slow road toward mediocrity."

Meta asks users to pay for verification following Twitter move: The Meta Verified feature may add $2 billion to $3 billion to Meta’s annual sales, Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Mandeep Singh wrote in a note.

Toto, a Japanese company known for its bidet toilets, plans to more than double the number of US cities with dealer-run showrooms for its products as the manufacturer expands abroad, President Noriaki Kiyota told Nikkei recently.

The French retail clothing sector is in crisis: Shaken by the rise of new habits and players, the clothing and footwear market continues to transform, primarily affecting entry-level retailers in shopping centers.?Le Monde

+ The French just don't shop as much anymore. Younger customers are shunning the Pimkie, Kooka?, Naf-Naf and Cama?eu stores that dressed their mothers.

+ And they are converting en masse to online sales, especially on foreign sites, or rushing to buy second hand.?

+ The footwear market is also being beaten by the advent of Foot Locker, Courir and sites selling sneakers.

Reuters: Britain's Tesco raises store workers pay by 7%

+ "Virtually every writer I know would rather be a musician.” -- Kurt Vonnegut

How did The Rolling Stones get their name??Sam Kemp

Art fair visitor breaks a Jeff Koons balloon dog sculpture: NYT reports a woman accidentally knocked over a bright blue dog sculpture at Art Wynwood in Miami, causing the $42,000 artwork to shatter, witnesses said.

BAFTAs 2023:

Film: All Quiet on the Western Front

Outstanding British film: The Banshees of Inisherin

Director: All Quiet on the Western Front

Best adapted screenplay: All Quiet on the Western Front

Best original screenplay: The Banshees of Inisherin

Best actress: Cate Blanchett – Tár

Best actor: Austin Butler – Elvis

Best documentary: Navalny

Manchester United begins sifting through numerous bids for club: WSJ reports the English soccer giant received two public offers and several more private proposals to acquire the club from the Glazer family, which has owned it since 2005.

Liverpool FC owner John Henry calls off sale: FT reports the US businessman is still open to securing new investment for the football club.

Is MLS truly a major league in the US? It depends where you are: Teams from America’s largest cities have won the last two editions of the MLS Cup. But their victories struggled to break through to the mainstream. James Nalton

+ MLS is entering its 28th season and soccer’s popularity in the US is evident from the thousands who play the game, as well as the popularity of the Premier League, Liga MX … and even a team from north Wales. But many US soccer teams, including those in MLS, can sometimes fail to breach the wall of sporting consciousness in their own back yards.

+ “I liken MLS to indie rock in the 90s. It’s just kind of waiting for its Nirvana releases Nevermind moment. And that might be happening with the World Cup being here in 2026, with this Apple TV deal, and with more and more stars coming over.”

Enjoy the ride + plan accordingly.

-Marc?

Marc A. Ross | Chief Communications Strategist @ Caracal

Caracal produces ITK Daily.

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