Three news stories summarized & contextualized by analytic journalist Colin Wright.

Taiwan's new president faces tough time with China pressure and no majority

Summary: Over the weekend, Taiwan elected Lai Ching-te, a politician from the incumbent Democratic Progressive Party, with a convincing but not controlling parliamentary margin, which means he’ll have to make deals with other parties to get anything done.

Context: Lai will take office on May 20, and China isn’t happy about his ascension as his party opposes kowtowing to Beijing and he has long been a firebrand on the issue of Taiwanese independence; there’s some concern that this outcome could lead to more saber-rattling from China, which is in the midst of several economic and military scandals and slumps, and thus might be looking for some kind of victory to shore up its reputation internally, though Lai did temper his stance on China a bit in the lead-up to the election, indicating he’s happy to deal with them economically if they’re open to it—though again, because of that lack of a parliamentary majority, some of Taiwan’s actions in this regard will be shaped by political expediency rather than Lai’s preferences on the matter.

—Reuters

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Biden "running out" of patience with Bibi as Gaza war hits 100 days

Summary: US officials are telling journalists that the government is reaching the end of its rope with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and his rejection of international calls for ceasefires, more humanitarian aide to Gaza, and in general not indiscriminately killing Palestinians in Israel’s pursuit of Hamas militants.

Context: The real story here would seem to be that the US government has given the go-ahead for officials to talk to journalists in this way, which suggests that Biden is getting sick of taking so much flak for supporting Netanyahu’s efforts without being able to influence the direction and nature of those efforts; it’s possible that this is a stair-step move toward pulling support for Israel’s invasion of Gaza, which is a step the US government likely doesn’t want to take, but the international community has turned hard against Israel’s efforts, so this is likely a nudge telling Israel to wrap it up, or Biden’s formal position on the matter could change in the near-future.

—Axios

Volcano erupts in southwestern Iceland, sending lava flowing toward nearby settlement

Summary: A volcano that erupted late last year in southwestern Iceland has erupted again, sending magma toward a nearby community, that magma breaching the walls that were erected to keep it out.

Context: Both eruptions have been preceded and followed by waves of earthquakes that have cracked and opened up gaping holes across the landscape, and residents who were allowed to return to their homes near the volcano in late-December have been evacuated once more; new fissures are now fracturing land just outside the community, there are concerns about possible steam explosions resulting from magma mixing with pockets of water in those quake-created fissures, and homes near the flow were beginning to catch fire over the weekend.

—The Associated Press

Microsoft’s market valuation briefly surpassed that of Apple last Thursday, momentarily becoming the most valuable company in the world due in large part to its investments in generative AI technologies and companies, and Apple’s relative lack of investment in the same, paired with a drop in hardware sales.

—Financial Times

262,582

Number of employees laid off at tech companies (the 1,186 that are tracked by this site, anyway) in 2023.

That’s up about 60% from 2022, and it’s thought that the majority of these are the consequence of a tech-world recalibration toward profitability during a period of high interest rates (during which it’s more difficult to borrow cheap money) and a “right-sizing” phase in which folks are being replaced by and augmented with AI technologies, reducing the number of employees these companies require for certain tasks.

—Layoffs.fyi

Trust Click

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