The Free Press

Late last night, the United States and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire. But the first day has already proven rocky: Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Israel all reported missile and drone attacks from Iran; Israel carried out major air strikes against Hezbollah, raising questions about whether Lebanon is included in the ceasefire; and Ira…

Grade inflation is out of control at Harvard—and most top colleges in America.

In 1950, the average GPA at Harvard College was 2.55, between a B− and a C+. But that norm has given way to one in which top marks are the norm, and any deviation from the top grade needs to be justified by professors pointing to some serious deficiency in students’ work. Today, the average GPA at Harvard is 3.8, between an A and an A−. Even when I was completing my PhD at Harvard about a decade ago, undergrads had the expectation that an A was the natural recompense for competent work. By all accounts, things have grown worse since.

For the past months, a band of courageous faculty members at Harvard have been trying to convince their colleagues to fix the problem. On Tuesday, however, that effort came to a standstill.

Here’s what happened: In February, a faculty subcommittee proposed a package of measures that would standardize grades across courses and limit how many students could obtain A’s. Instructors would be able to give A’s to no more than 20 percent of their students (though A− grades, notably, would still have been unlimited).

Well, there is a ceasefire. Or perhaps not. It includes Lebanon. Or it doesn’t. Iran’s 10-point plan is an acceptable working document for the United States. Or it isn’t the one U.S. negotiators saw. The Strait of Hormuz will be open. Or passage requires Iranian approval and a toll.

All this confusion is unsurprising, because the only meeting of the minds between President Donald Trump and whoever is ruling in Tehran was that the United States would stop attacking Iran. In return, Iran would stop attacking all its Arab neighbors and Israel—though not immediately, we soon learned. My own guess is that at the end of two weeks allotted for negotiations, two more weeks will be allotted, and then two more. There may never be much more than a ceasefire agreed, given the distance between Iranian and American demands. (A random thought: Trump could never have done this if Iran had captured the second crew member. It would have been a display of weakness of the kind that he’s avoided.) A simple ceasefire may be far from the worst outcome, because it avoids U.S. concessions that might be part of any detailed bilateral agreement.

The two most dangerous moments in space flight are the launch and the reentry. The launch of Artemis II went smoothly, but on Friday, when the four-person crew reenters the earth’s atmosphere, significant danger lurks.

As it begins its reentry, the spacecraft Orion will enter what’s called the thermosphere, where they will travel through heat that can reach 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit. “You’re in the middle of a fireball for about 15 minutes,” Charlie Camarda, a retired astronaut and senior engineer at NASA, told me.

He speaks from personal experience: He flew to space in 2005. That was two years after one of the worst disasters in NASA’s history, when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth’s atmosphere, killing the seven astronauts on board.

“Kanye West Banned from Entering the UK for Nazism” is another newspaper headline that, in 2010, would have sounded like an absurdist fever dream but, in 2026, is just another day ending in “y.” On Tuesday, the UK Home Office bowed to the inevitable and withdrew West’s electronic travel authorization to headline London’s Wireless Festival this July, in response to West’s recurring habit of making wildly disinhibited antisemitic statements, apologizing, and then making them again. The latest iteration of this cycle happened in January when he took out a page in The Wall Street Journal apologizing for his recent behavior, which has included but is not limited to releasing a song called “Heil Hitler” and selling what I can only describe as swastika merch from his Yeezy.com website. West blamed his behavior on his bipolar disorder. This went down about as well as the swastika merch. “Bipolar doesn’t make you antisemitic!” was the online chorus reaction, from people who believe mental illness is expressed only in socially acceptable ways.

Banning West from the UK was, as I say, inevitable, not because it was necessarily the correct thing to do, but because the row had grown to such a pitch that West’s UK concerts had become unsustainable. Since the announcement last week that West would headline Wireless, the festival’s sponsors, including Pepsi, had withdrawn their support and condemned West—although one of the organizers of Wireless said in an interview on the BBC on Tuesday morning that Pepsi had originally approved West, only to clutch its handkerchief in horror once it sensed the public outrage. This, I believe, is called corporate social activism.

As part of our celebration of America at 250, we’ve started a weekly newsletter by historian Jonathan Horn. Learn what happened this week in American history, why it matters, and what else you should see and read in The Free Press and beyond. This week Jonathan looks at the risky bet Washington made to defend New York City. To get this newsletter in your inbox every week, sign up here. —The Editors

For expelling the British from Boston in March 1776, George Washington received many plaudits: the thanks of the Massachusetts legislature; the promise of a medal from the Continental Congress; and his very first college degree—an honorary doctor of laws from Harvard College. Unfortunately for all involved, when a representative from Harvard called to present the degree on April 4, he discovered he was too late: Washington had already left town hours earlier for New York City. Credit the Ivy League of old with at least trying to honor the military.

Although there were credible reports of the British sailing for Nova Scotia, Washington could only guess where they would strike after refitting there. Trying to think as the enemy would, he bet on New York City for the exact reasons the British had longed eyed the place: its reputation as a bastion of loyalism and its strategic location at the mouth of the Hudson River. As a glance at a map will show, the British could use that waterway to help link up with their forces in Canada while using its eastern bank to quarantine the particularly rebellious New England colonies from the rest. New York City, Washington wrote, “is the object worthy [of] their attention, and it is the place that we must use every endeavor to keep from them.”

It’s Wednesday, April 8. This is The Front Page, your daily window into the world of The Free Press—and our take on the world at large. Today: Why coders are losing it. Why aging pundits are trying to impress the kids. Why the Strait of Hormuz is so essential. And much more.

But first: Is the war in Iran actually over?

President Donald Trump began Tuesday by saying a “whole civilization” would “die tonight, never to be brought back again.” He promised massive strikes against civilian infrastructure in Iran unless there was some sort of diplomatic breakthrough before his 8 p.m. deadline.

The world held its breath. And then, some 90 minutes before the attacks were set to begin, Trump announced that the U.S. had “received a 10-point proposal from Iran,” which he described as “a workable basis on which to negotiate.” Trump and Tehran agreed to a two-week ceasefire. And the president said the Strait of Hormuz, effectively blockaded by the Iranian regime since the start of the conflict, would reopen in some form in the meantime.

While it’s only a temporary truce, the announcement at least delayed the thunderous American attack Trump had threatened—which could have pummeled Iran’s long-suffering civilians. Some might see it as a cop-out, but as Eli Lake argues today, Trump has delivered a great victory for the U.S. Read the whole piece here.

However, it’s unclear whether the deal will last two weeks. Iran’s foreign minister stated that “safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces and with due consideration of technical limitations”—caveats with implications that aren’t immediately clear. Plus, Iranian missiles and drones continued to attack Israeli and Arab targets after the deal was announced.

As Aaron MacLean writes today: “If the ceasefire doesn’t lead down the path toward diplomacy, or surrender, or Trump simply losing heart and moving on, we will be back in the standoff that gripped the world on Tuesday.” Read the full piece here:

But how are everyday Iranians responding to the ceasefire? Veteran foreign correspondent Amy Kellogg was on the phone with a friend in Iran when the news broke—and he wasn’t thrilled by what he sees as a lifeline for the regime. “They will spend the next two weeks making missiles. More to shoot at the Gulf and everywhere else,” he said. As for the regime’s supporters: “They are already out in the streets celebrating.” Read Amy’s report full here:

It’s a new day in the Middle East. Now let’s see if it lasts.

—The Editors

• American journalist Shelly Kittleson has been released by an Iran-aligned militia in Iraq after being held captive for one week, according to Iraqi officials with knowledge of the matter. (For more on Kittleson’s story, read Hollie McKay’s piece, “The American Journalist Kidnapped in Baghdad Is My Friend.”)

• Anthropic is debuting a powerful new AI model to a limited group of tech companies while delaying its public release, citing hacking concerns. The model, dubbed “Mythos,” is “extremely autonomous” and possesses hacking capabilities on par with an experienced cybersecurity researcher, one Anthropic scientist told Axios.

• An Indianapolis city councilor said yesterday his home was shot at 13 times, with the assailant leaving behind a “No Data Centers” note in what appears to be a politically motivated attack. Days before the shooting, the councilor had spoken in favor of a project that aims to develop a data center in the city.

• The Securities and Exchange Commission will pay an anonymous whistleblower over $50 million for information that helped lead to an enforcement action against an unnamed firm, the agency announced yesterday. As a result of the tip, regulators took action against a company that had allegedly deceived investors regarding the performance of one of its divisions.

• Voters in Georgia’s 14th Congressional District elected Trump-endorsed Republican Clay Fuller in a runoff election for the seat formerly held by Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene. Greene did not endorse a candidate in the race after she resigned earlier this year, following a public falling-out with President Donald Trump over the Epstein files.

• Australian police arrested the country’s most decorated living veteran, Ben Roberts-Smith, on Tuesday—alleging he killed five unarmed people while serving in Afghanistan. Each of the five war crimes Roberts-Smith has been charged with carries a potential life sentence.

• Billionaire investor Bill Ackman is pitching a $60 billion deal to take over Universal Music Group, the label behind Taylor Swift and Bob Dylan. The deal would merge the world’s largest record company with Pershing Square Sparc Holdings, a specially created acquisition vehicle, and list it on the New York Stock Exchange.

• The Trump administration is holding on to Kristi Noem’s controversial $70 million jet after her ouster last month, with plans to use it to shuttle select cabinet secretaries. The plane first attracted buzz as a symbol of lavish spending by the Department of Homeland Security under Noem.

I had been trying to reach my friend Reza since the war broke out, but Tuesday night was the first time my calls went through. I spoke to him around 2 a.m. in Iran, an hour and a half before the deadline Trump gave the regime to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

“It’s a special night,” Reza said to me, sounding calm yet animated, “because of the ultimatum.”

Reza, whose name we have changed for his own safety, is a thirtysomething man in Isfahan, a city in the very center of Iran where the nation’s highly enriched stash of uranium is believed to be buried. Over the past few weeks, videos from Iran have shown massive explosions in and around Isfahan.

But by the time my conversation with Reza was over, a ceasefire will have been declared—news that, for him, will be bittersweet.

President Donald Trump just saved his war in Iran. On Tuesday evening, he announced that the planned bombing of Iran’s power plants and bridges would be called off for at least two weeks after the regime’s envoys had agreed to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Phew. While this is only a ceasefire, we just stepped back from the abyss. Trump, who had grown frustrated with the closure of the critical Persian Gulf waterway, threatened to escalate over the past week. On Sunday he set a 48-hour deadline for Iran to open the Strait or face devastating consequences. On Tuesday morning, he posted a chilling warning on Truth Social: “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.”

Now that Trump has postponed his threat to end Iranian civilization, America has won twice. First, the Iranians agreed to end their attacks on shipping through the Strait if the U.S.-Israeli military campaign stopped, according to a statement from Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi. That will greatly diminish the prospect of an oil shock and help keep markets calm. More importantly, Trump will not go forward with an insane atrocity against the people he promised to liberate.

In the opening hours of the war with Iran, President Donald Trump described its goals as the destruction of the Islamic Republic’s missiles, its missile industry, and its navy; the end of its proxies’ abilities to destabilize the region and the world; and the guarantee that Iran would never obtain a nuclear weapon. On the question of regime change, he struck a balanced tone, saying in essence that it would be a fine outcome, but don’t grade him on it. This campaign would be for limited objectives, and would end on a timeline of his choosing.

What a difference five weeks makes. Tuesday morning, Trump warned that if Iran did not reopen the Strait of Hormuz to the free flow of commerce, “a whole civilization will die tonight.” This followed his Sunday threat of large-scale bombing on Iran’s infrastructure—specifically, its power plants and bridges. And only an hour and a half before an 8 p.m. deadline, he announced that negotiations in Pakistan had borne fruit, and he would “hold off the destructive force being sent tonight to Iran, and subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz, I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks. This will be a double sided CEASEFIRE!”