It’s Wednesday, March 11. This is The Front Page, your daily window into the world of The Free Press—and our take on the world at large. Today: Reihan Salam on how Zohran Mamdani needs to condemn jihadist bomb-throwers, not just Islamophobes. Josh Code reports on the $1,200 anti-recording gadget that promises to keep your home and office surveillance-free. Onetime opera singer Billy Binion writes about why Timothée Chalamet is right that hardly anyone cares about opera.
But first: A Free Press debate on the Iran war.
The most pressing question in the world right now is: How far should the U.S. go in its war with Iran?
Today, our own Coleman Hughes hosts a debate on whether the U.S. should have embarked on this war, and whether it can topple Iran’s theocratic regime to end it. Arguing in favor of Operation Epic Fury, Niall Ferguson posits that there are few greater global dangers than allowing Tehran to obtain nuclear weapons. Arguing against it is former diplomat Richard Haass, who served as the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, and who warns that the operation unleashes threats to world stability far more imminent than those we seek to eliminate.
Richard has also expanded on his reasoning in our pages today. Don’t miss his essay on the case against “preventive war,” the human and economic costs, and how the conflict could benefit Vladimir Putin.
For more from Niall on the conflict, read his initial piece on the war, explaining why Iran 2026 isn’t Iraq 2003, and his answer to another important question: Is this the beginning of World War III?
Seven American service members have already been killed in the Iran war, and some 140 injured On the home front, military families are bearing the emotional brunt of the conflict. Today, Free Press investigative reporter Madeleine Rowley, a military spouse herself, writes about the daily hopes and fears of the families of soldiers deployed to the Middle East.
And for more on what comes next, tune in to tomorrow’s School of War livestream. At 12 p.m. ET, Aaron MacLean will sit down with Iran expert Ray Takeyh to discuss what we know about the country’s new supreme leader, Ali Khamenei’s son Mojtaba. Click here to add it to your calendar, or join us tomorrow at thefp.com/livestream.
—The Editors
New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani forcefully condemned a white supremacist protest outside his home over the weekend, but struggled to do the same for an attempted bombing by Muslim terrorists. Today, Reihan Salam argues that Mamdani has a chance to right this and move beyond it. Condemning Islamic chauvinism, Reihan writes, would be both a courageous move for Mamdani, and a politically smart one.
Spectre I is the buzzy new smart device conceived to protect you from—well, devices. Last week, its debut whipped the internet into a frenzy, so Josh Code spoke to the 23-year-old inventor of the as-yet-unreleased gadget that’s caused a social media storm about the rise of anti-surveillance tech, and whether a $1,200 orb can actually make the machines stop listening.
Timothée Chalamet ruffled some feathers last month by saying he’s glad to be an actor, rather than working in opera, which “no one cares about” anymore. Chalamet’s phrasing may have been glib, but he’s right, writes Billy Binion, who is himself a former opera singer. Instead of taking offense at the obvious, argues Billy, opera companies would do well to figure out how to bring audiences back.
Anti-Indian hate on X has tripled over the past year, according to a new study by the Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI). Today, Tanner Nau reports on its findings, tracing the explosion of hate online, the three “most prolific” hate-posters on X, and how a small number of accounts drives a surge in anti-Indian bigotry.
Qualified Health used Anthropic’s Claude to screen 1M+ heart failure patients in Texas. It surfaced lifesaving interventions buried in the data.
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THE NEWS
No contender in yesterday’s special election to replace Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene secured the 50 percent majority required to win. The race will now move to a runoff between Democrat Shawn Harris and Republican Clayton Fuller in April.
Meta has acquired Moltbook, the social media platform where AI agents talk to each other, Axios reports. The merger follows Meta’s major investment in AI labeling company ScaleAI, continuing an aggressive strategy to scoop up top AI talent and tools.
Think you can spot the difference between a Pulitzer Prize winner and AI? The New York Times just dropped a quiz pitting the world’s best writers against AI-generated material, revealing that among 84,000 quiz-takers, 54 percent preferred AI-authored writing in the blind test.
YouTube will expand its deepfake detection tool from content creators to cover more politicians, government officials, and journalists in order to combat AI-generated dupes. So far, creators, who have had access to the tool since last year, have flagged very few videos for deletion. “Most of it turns out to be fairly benign or additive to their overall business,” one senior company official told Axios.
Nearly 700,000 Lebanese citizens have fled their homes as the war with Iran expands into its borders. The surge in refugees comes after Hezbollah launched rockets at Israel on March 2, prompting Israeli counterstrikes and ground incursions into southern Lebanon.
The Pentagon confirmed that 140 U.S. service members have been injured since the war in Iran began, including eight who face life-threatening injuries. “The vast majority of these injuries have been minor, and 108 service members have already returned to duty,” chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a statement yesterday.
Alabama governor Kay Ivey commuted the death sentence of Charles Burton, a 75-year-old man set to be executed this week for his role in a 1991 robbery that ended in a fatal shooting. He remained on death row even after the shooter’s death sentence was reduced to life in prison. “I believe it would be unjust for one participant in this crime to be executed,” Ivey said, “while the participant who pulled the trigger was not.”
Early Tuesday morning, shots were fired at the U.S. consulate in Toronto, with no injuries reported. The attack follows recent shootings at Toronto-area synagogues, prompting a national security investigation. Ontario premier Doug Ford suggested, without providing evidence, that terrorist sleeper cells could be involved.
Qualified Health used Anthropic’s Claude to screen 1M+ heart failure patients in Texas. It surfaced lifesaving interventions buried in the data.
More American service members die during training exercises than in combat operations, with 31.9% of active-duty military deaths from accidents between 2006 and 2018, compared to 16.3% killed in action.
Being in the military is a dangerous occupation, but your anti-war story isn’t interested in facts, just emotion. Unfortunately, this “excursion” became necessary because liberal Democrats wouldn’t hold Iran accountable for their murderous ways. This war makes the world a much safer place if Trump succeeds in regime change. At least for the foreseeable future.
Can the U.S. Achieve Regime Change in Iran?
1. Is That the goal? 2. Something I used to say about Iraq, "Iraq is never going to be Iowa. But moving Iraq in that direction even a little is a good thing."