Gerald Mackenzie

@ianbremmer Does P have children? Where are they and who are they with?

prigozhin stands down two big things have changed in last 24 hours: 1 - putin in much more vulnerable position 2 - russia’s near-term ability to fight in ukraine substantially degraded

@DavidSacks @RemindMe_OfThis in 2 months

Important recent talk by Mearsheimer on current status of Ukraine War and what’s likely to happen next. Mearsheimer is the leading scholar of International Relations, and his predictions about the conflict have been highly accurate going back a decade. Key points: (1) Current status: — The Russians are winning the war. Ukraine had the upper hand in 2022 but Russia has it in 2023. The Russians have not won yet, but Mearsheimer believes they are winning and will win the war. Why? — This is a war of attrition similar to WWI. The goal is to bleed out the other side. “This is Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier standing toe to toe and beating the hell out of each other in the center of the ring.” — Who wins a war of attrition? 3 factors decide: (1) Balance of resolve. (Both sides are resolved.) (2) Population. (3) Artillery. — Russia had a 3.5 to 1 population advantage at the beginning of the war. This has grown to about 5:1 as a result of 8+ million Ukrainian refugees, 3M of which have gone to Russia. — Artillery is the “king of battle.” Balance of artillery is somewhere between 5:1 and 10:1 in Russia’s favor. The US doesn’t have enough artillery to give Ukraine; that’s why we’re talking about tanks and planes. “Two armies standing toe to toe trying to destroy each other with firepower.” Russia has a lot more men and artillery. — Casualty Exchange Ratio is at least 2:1, meaning that two Ukrainians are likely dying for every Russian. The Ukrainians’ claim of 7:1 CER in their favor is ludicrous. The Russians are not doing mindless frontal assaults. Recent RUSI report shows that Russian tactics have improved. — Ukraine pushed large numbers of troops into Bakhmut in a losing effort. Ukrainians are becoming desperate to conscript men. Russia has not fully mobilized yet. (2) What’s likely to happen next: — Russia will take the 4 oblasts they already annexed plus (if they can) another 4 oblasts to the Dnipro River including Odessa and Kharkiv. The goal would be to bring all the ethnic Russians under their control to avoid another “Donbas problem.” — Russia doesn’t want to take western Ukraine (trying to conquer ethnic Ukrainians who hate them would be like “trying to swallow a porcupine”); but their goal is to turn Ukraine into a dysfunctional rump state so it can’t threaten them or be used as a Western bulwark on their border. — There’s not going to be a peace agreement. Best case is a frozen conflict. Why? (1) the parties can’t agree on territory. (2) they can’t agree on neutrality. (3) Hyper-nationalism. Hatred on both sides makes a deal impossible. (4) No trust. Western leaders and Zelensky admitted that they had no intention of honoring the Minsk agreements and entered them just to buy time. — George Kennan, Adm. Bill Perry, Amb. Jack Matlock, and Gen. Shalikashvili said that NATO expansion was a prescription for disaster. They were right. It’s only going to get worse. Mearsheimer hopes to be wrong about this, but this is his prediction. — F16s won’t make a difference because it takes a long time to train good pilots. Also the Russians have very good air defense, and their own Air Force is ready to engage. Biggest risk of F16s is that Ukraine uses them to attack targets inside of Russia, creating an escalation, which could draw the US deeper into the war. — Mearsheimer believes that if the Russians are losing the war, the likelihood of nuclear use to rescue the situation is high. (The war is existential for the Russians.) But as it stands now, the odds of nuclear use are very low because the Russians are winning. youtu.be/v-rHBRwdql8

@campbellclaret I thought you challenged appropriately and agree with your point that the media have more responsibility to challenge the misinformation that is being promoted about Brexit. Certainly touched a sore nerve with the BBC though!

Accepted it was not exactly disagreeing agreeably but I think every now and then people who are given a free ride to talk absolute nonsense and face no responsibility for their role in damage to the nation are challenged. Added to which I wish I had known about your 1/2

What fictional character, if any, would you want to have running your country?

@FoxyLustyGrover Got my big hair energy right..

Google your first name + glamour shot (eg. “Karen and glamour shot”). Select the second image, no matter what it is, and comment with your photo.

@DArcyWaldegrave I’m the same Darcy - we need a support group or something.

@jane_adim @CharlieJGardner Yes, the way i read it was that they are not mutually exclusive. That is, planting new trees is good, but shouldn’t be seen as a substitute for protecting existing forests..

@CharlieJGardner We cannot also rule out the benefits of production forests in providing wood products. Eventhough emissions happen during harvesting, they substitute emission-intensive materials. All these points out that there is no 'one size fits all' in the case of CC mitigation.

This amazing figure from yesterday's #IPCC report shows the potential of different approaches to mitigate climate change It exposes two common misconceptions about 'natural climate solutions' 1/

@jacksonfall Hey Jackson - loving this experiment! Quick question, why couldn’t you start another instance of GPT to be your content writer Green_hustle_contentGPT?

Alright, HustleGPT has spoken. It wants to hire a freelancer to generate articles and publish them to our webflow site for $20 per article. 💡 Pro tip: When working with ChatGPT, using "Limit Prose" can cut through and give concise and decisive answers. DMs are open!

It's Day 2, y'all! I've given HustleGPT a formal challenge to get to $100,000 cash on hand as quickly as possible. Here's what it said it's going to do: 1. Allocate budget to hire content creators for our eco-friendly website 2. Explore dropshipping 3. Develop a SaaS product 🤯

Great event today at @Oracle Sydney, meeting new Australia and NZ MD Stephen Bovis, hearing from customers of Oracle and visiting their brilliant #innovation labs. Thanks so much to @sancharini for the kind invitation!

@nzhammy @nzherald I thought it was 50% and they were integrating it into Bing, creating a search “war” with google. Bing powered by Chat GPT - providing an opinion on the ‘best’ answer to a search, vs google’s ad driven ‘Selection of possible answers’ approach.

Who’s confused by the @nzherald lead article in the Business Section where it states Microsoft has acquired ChatGPT? Did I miss this? Is the Big M saying they acquired or just an investment? Semantics. But maybe I missed something ?

@FlyAirNZ - care to comment on the debacle this morning at Akl Airport. 3 flights to Nelson cancelled - 1 x weather, 1 x crew and 1 x mechanical. Sounds like a lot of coincidences to me. Fares skyrocketing, profits recovered but service standards a disaster. Not a good look.

@benshapiro Kevin McCarthy has no control over his caucus. You all wanted chaos, that’s what you’ve got. No one speaks for the GOP any more, so you can’t rely on anything the leadership says apparently.

Kevin McCarthy already said Social Security and Medicare aren't part of the debt ceiling discussion. So Biden had to change his demagogic lies in real time.

Important data (and great charts) from @climatetech_vc on quarterly venture investment. Key points: *1H 2022 funding is down from 2H 2021, but up on 1H 2021 *Total number of investment rounds is up and up *Decline in $ entirely from giant growth rounds ctvc.co/19b-2022-midye…

Hunger wars: an extraordinary thread by @TimothyDSnyder

@ZealandEarly Fantastic

I went mad for these as a kid. Going to have to visit a dairy to get a fix when back home, its been decades since I had any. Whittakers's Toffee Milk bars/sticks - First made in the 1930's. Perfectly thin, hard caramel toffee sticks covered in smooth creamy milk chocolate.

@WhittakersNZ Berry and Biscuit please!

Thanks Twhittaker's for voting us your Most Trusted Brand for the 11th year in a row! As a token of our appreciation for your ongoing support, we're giving away #tweats! To be in to WIN, let us know your all time favourite flavour 🍫

@ahi_andy Cool, Stella is in Trinity, loving it. Happy to connect them if it helps.

@gedsmack not in yet, we toured Queens, St Hilda's and Ormond

What an amazing day touring Melbourne Uni and Melbourne Colleges for our eldest. Blessed. Opportunity.

@AsherGoldman @Jasonwalls92 Yep, and a chain of supermarkets named ‘fairprice’ - that would be good too.

Your move, New Zealand Public sector.

Hey, world, this war is not about Ukraine. It's about all of you. Let me – as a tech editor at Forbes Ukraine – explain it to you in the most direct way, by naming products and technologies with Ukrainian roots. Also asking for RT