海角大神

2026
February
21
Saturday

Monitor Daily Podcast

February 21, 2026
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Clayton Collins
Director of Innovation

Uncertainty cloaked the prospects of peace and war this week. Monitor writers looked at the looming Gaza test for President Donald Trump鈥檚 Board of Peace and at the Russia-Ukraine conflict, while closely watching the U.S. military buildup near Iran as talks sputtered.

We updated our Epstein files coverage, as a member of Britain鈥檚 royal family was arrested and released. (We were quite early to the broader story on the comparative alacrity of the accountability timeline聽over there, as compared with the United States.)聽


A special hat-tip here to my colleague Kendra Nordin Beato, who orchestrated our Olympics coverage. Kendra sits one desk away from me. On Tuesday, Day 17 of a nearly sleepless sprint, she was getting a faraway look in her eyes. But by Thursday, she was openly exulting, from under her AirPods, in a U.S. women鈥檚 hockey win.

Kendra hosted a podcast episode a couple of weeks ago with veteran Olympics reporter Mark Sappenfield. Today, ahead of Sunday鈥檚 closing ceremonies, we offer her interview with Story Hinckley, who rocked her first Games. (Don鈥檛 miss Story鈥檚 鈥淐iao, Italia,鈥澛letter from Milan.) They should all take a bow from the podium.


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Today’s stories

And why we wrote them

The Supreme Court struck down the Trump administration鈥檚 use of an emergency economic law to set broad tariffs, reasoning that the 1977 law did not grant the president such sweeping power. President Donald Trump vowed to use other laws to keep tariffs up.

Jonathan Elkins
People in Tel Aviv protest against the Netanyahu government's efforts to remove the word "massacre" from an Oct. 7 remembrance bill. Protesters say the government is trying to downplay the horrors of the 2023 Hamas incursion to avoid accountability in preventing the attack.

The hostages, living and dead, are home, yet the war in Gaza is unfinished business for Israelis. As the country pivots toward election-year politics, how is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu鈥檚 refusal to authorize an independent state inquiry into Oct. 7 playing?

Kelly Field
A student shops at a food pantry at Austin Community College, Oct. 9, 2025.

Students without basic resources often drop out. Schools that support undergraduates鈥 basic needs are reporting better retention and narrower achievement gaps.

A letter from

Milan
Fabrizio Bensch/Reuters
International Olympic Committee President Kirsty Coventry speaks to the press at the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics in Milan, Italy, Feb. 20, 2026

The world needed the joy of these Games. So did the Olympic athletes and the fans who turned out in droves to support them.

Book review

Our reviewers鈥 picks for this month include an action-adventure thriller set in the Arctic, a locked-taxicab mystery in New York, and a group biography of three intrepid women journalists who covered the globe.聽

Essay

Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff/File
Indigenous Guatemalans, clad in traditional tunics known as huipils, crowd into the back of a truck in San Lucas Tolim谩n, Guatemala, in 1989.

Travel often gets reduced to landmarks, checklists, and tight itineraries. For one veteran globe-trotter, it's about the experiences 鈥撀爐he farther off the beaten track, the better.聽


Viewfinder

Christophe Ena/AP
Alysa Liu of the United States competes during the women鈥檚 figure skating free program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Feb. 19, 2026. Dressed in gold, the Californian performed to Donna Summer鈥檚 鈥淢acArthur Park鈥 to capture Olympic gold, breaking a long drought for U.S. women figure skaters. 鈥淛oy is her brand,鈥 The New York Times reported her coach Phillip DiGuglielmo as saying after the win. 鈥淪he pulls people out onto the ice with her and you experience that with her.鈥
( The illustrations in today’s Monitor Daily are by Jacob Turcotte. )

More issues

2026
February
21
Saturday

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