Category: 3-SometimeCommentary

Netflix announced plans on Friday to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery’s studio and streaming business, in a deal that would send shock waves through Hollywood.

On Monday, Paramount made a hostile bid for the studio, arguing that the Netflix deal would be “anti-competitive.”

The Times journalists Nicole Sperling, Kyle Buchanan and Lauren Hirsch discuss what it all means for the future of TV and film.

Guest:

• Nicole Sperling, a New York Times reporter in Los Angeles who covers Hollywood and the streaming revolution.
• Kyle Buchanan, a pop culture reporter and the awards-season columnist for The New York Times.
• Lauren Hirsch, a New York Times reporter who covers the biggest stories on Wall Street, including mergers and acquisitions.

Background reading: 

• Netflix planned to buy Warner Bros. Discovery in $83 billion deal to create a streaming giant.
• Paramount made a hostile bid for Warner Bros. Discovery.

Photo: Aleksey Kondratyev for The New York Times

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

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One of the most complex medical, ethical, moral, and religious questions of our era is that of physician-assisted suicide—also known as Medical Aid in Dying, or MAID.

Eleven U.S. states and Washington, D.C. have legalized some form of MAID for terminally ill patients. And New York might join them.

Over the summer, a Medical Aid in Dying Act passed New York’s state legislature. It is now sitting on Governor Kathy Hochul’s desk as she decides whether to sign it into law.

Under the proposed New York bill, terminally ill adults with a prognosis of six months or less to live would be able to access a prescribed, self-administered life-ending medication.

Supporters argue that this is a compassionate option—one that can relieve people of immense pain and suffering, allowing patients to choose when and where they die, and to do so surrounded by loved ones.

Opponents see this as a violation of physicians’ fundamental oath to do no harm. They also worry that while access may begin narrowly, it could expand over time to include people seeking death for reasons other than terminal illness—such as mental suffering or simply a desire to stop living. Cases like this have already occurred in Belgium, the Netherlands, Canada, and Switzerland.

Rafaela Siewert sat down with two experts who see this topic very differently for a heated debate.

David Hoffman is a healthcare attorney, clinical ethicist, and professor of bioethics at Columbia University. He argues that hypothetical future abuses of MAID shouldn’t outweigh the needs of terminal patients who need this option now.

Dr. Lydia Dugdale is a physician, medical ethicist, and professor of medicine at Columbia University. In her view, legalizing this practice of physician-assisted suicide risks undermining the responsibilities of governments, medical systems, and families to care for the mentally ill, the poor, and the physically disabled. And she fears that the potential for excessively expanded access over time is too great.

We are among the many Americans who do not know what the right answer is. We see both sides—which is why grappling with the nuances of this subject is so important.

This is a debate you won’t want to miss.

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Daniel Zoughbie discusses Kicking the Hornet's Nest: U.S. Foreign Policy in the Middle East from Truman to Trump, arguing that Truman's one-sided recognition of Israel and decades of U.S. overreliance on defense distorted the region's trajectory. He traces missed off-ramps from Oslo to the Olmert–Abbas talks, explaining why partition remains the only durable framework for satisfying both nationalisms. Zoughbie recounts how polarization, trauma, and mistrust—along with U.S. missteps—undermine peace efforts even when viable plans emerge. Plus: Biden's rejected immigration tools, the inflation legacy of the American Rescue Plan, and a Spiel on Zohran Mamdani as the mispronounced word of the year.

Produced by Corey Wara

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