President Trump says only Iran's unconditional surrender will end American and Israeli bombardment. The US and Israel say much of Iran's capability has been destroyed but Iran is fighting back. We speak to one of the few international journalists in Iran about the latest attacks.
Also in the programme: Ukraine and six European nations boycott the opening ceremony of the Winter Paralympics because of Russian and Belarusian athletes taking part; and a firefighter in Texas recounts how his team rescued two people whose hot air balloon got entangled in a 300-metre tower.
Photo: US-Israeli attacks continue in Iran amid escalating conflict. Credit: ABEDIN TAHERKENAREH/EPA/Shutterstock
What do we want from sports? The very best athletes competing as hard as they know how, putting all their effort and training and natural ability to the test against their opponents. But this time of year, that’s not the product the NBA is putting on the court. Instead, teams at the bottom of the league are competing … to lose, because it could help them get a top pick in next year’s draft. It’s called tanking — it’s bad for fans, and it’s bad for the league.
Tanking has gotten especially egregious this year. Even NBA Adam Silver has called out teams for tanking. He recently announced that league bigwigs are considering “every possible remedy” to “align incentives.”
Today on the show — Planet Money fixes the NBA’s tanking problem by … fixing the NBA draft. We get solutions from Hockey Hall of Famer Jayna Hefford, World Cup Champion Sam Mewis, and long-time NBA analyst Zach Lowe.
This episode was hosted by Keith Romer and Erika Beras. It was produced by James Sneed with an assist from Sam Yellowhorse Kesler. It was edited by Jess Jiang and fact-checked by Sierra Juarez. Alex Goldmark is our executive producer.
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P.M. Edition for Mar. 6. The Labor Department said today that the U.S. lost 92,000 jobs in February—a greater drop than economists expected. WSJ economics reporter Justin Lahart discusses the sectors affected, and what this report means for the Federal Reserve. Plus, President Trump calls for “unconditional surrender” in Iran. And WSJ markets reporter Hannah Erin Lang says U.S. stocks dropped after the weak employment report, while oil prices continued their rise, notching their biggest weekly gain on record. Alex Ossola hosts.
Nasdaq leads major U.S. indexes lower as the unemployment rate ticks up to 4.4% and oil prices surge to more than $90 a barrel. Plus: Gap shares slide on weak sales for its Athleta brand. Katherine Sullivan hosts.
An artificial-intelligence tool assisted in the making of this episode by creating summaries that were based on Wall Street Journal reporting and reviewed and adapted by an editor.
The conflict in Iran is on every investor’s mind as stocks seem to sink day after day. But panic is never the right answer and we discuss what we’re doing (or not doing) in today’s market. Then we deep dive into an unloved company, Disney.
Travis Hoium, Emily Flippen, and Lou Whiteman discuss:
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Reproductive technology is a modern miracle. It's made it possible for millions of people to become parents who might otherwise not have been able to. But growing demand has spawned a multibillion-dollar industry that’s largely unregulated in the U.S.
In our first episode looking at the wild west of the fertility industry, Ryan Knutson speaks with a three-time surrogate who ended up in a big legal battle. Nia Trent-Wilson was left with hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical debt after a family didn’t pay up after delivery. WSJ’s Katherine Long reports on how the industry fosters a dramatic power imbalance between surrogates and intended parents.
CrowdScience listener Ndanusa in Ghana, is gazing up at the stars, and wondering. Big philosophical questions, like… what keeps our universe in balance?
From our perspective here on earth, the universe seems like a vast, harmonious system, perpetuating eternally without change. But Ndanusa knows a thing or two about the stars, and he knows that they use up hydrogen as they burn, and release helium. And he’s wondering, is there something out there which does the opposite? Something that uses up helium, and produces hydrogen, to keep the universe in perfect, chemical equilibrium?
His question makes sense! Here on earth for example, animals use up oxygen and produce carbon dioxide, and plants do the opposite. A perfect cycle of production and consumption which (at least in theory), keeps our planet in perfect balance. Could the same kind of system be in place in the wider expanse of the universe?
His intriguing question leads presenter Alex Lathbridge on a journey into the blackness of deep space, the ancient origins of our universe, and the complex physics of the stars. He pops into the Ghana Radio Astronomy Observatory, just outside Accra, where astrophysicist Dr Proven Adzri helps him peer into the earliest few seconds of our universe, and find out what set the stars burning. And at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Dr Linus Labik talks him through what’s going on at the atomic level. And in the deep blackness of the night, up above the tree canopy of Kakum National Park, he takes a peek at the stars for himself. Local guides Chris and Kwabena explain how much meaning there is behind the stars in the night sky.
Presenter: Alex Lathbridge
Producer: Emily Knight
Editor: Ben Motley
(Photo: Large orange and purple exploding orb - stock photo Credit: Soubrette via Getty Images)
Plus: Iran’s attack on the world’s largest liquefied natural gas export facility could be trouble for the global semiconductor industry. And DraftKings is working with ESPN to link March Madness brackets to sports betting accounts. Danny Lewis hosts.
Republicans and the Supreme Court have put basically no guardrails on Trump, so he started a global war that is costing taxpayers $1 billion a day. He shrugs about soldiers dying, and he lies about the school full of children that Americans likely killed. And he's downright giddy that because he signed off on all the bombing of Iran, he may get to choose the country's new leader. At the same time, one of the few occasions when Republicans stood up to him resulted in the firing of his first Cabinet member, the scandalous Kristi Noem. Plus, new job loss numbers show how Trump continues to hurt the working class, fuel prices are rising, the administration is again helping Russia in its war on Ukraine, Rand Paul may have an issue with Noem's chosen successor, and have the Dems' chances of retaking the Senate improved?
Neera Tanden, with the Center for American Progress, joins Tim Miller for the weekend pod.
