Weekend Edition.

A massive undertaking.

“In my dreams I would have the perfect AI generated email first thing every morning with the most substantive articles of interest to me in foreign affairs, domestic policy, business, tech and media distilled with on point commentary. Oh wait! I already have it with News Items by John Ellis.” — Annie Lamont, co-founder of Oak HC/FT, a leading venture capital firm.

---

---

1. The Wall Street Journal:

Against the odds, the Russian economy has weathered the war. The next economic storm on the horizon: peace.

Throughout the conflict in Ukraine, massive government spending on the military has propped up Russia’s output and blunted the impact of Western sanctions. Weapons factories geared up, while outfits from clothing brands to bakeries retooled to make balaclavas and drones. The transformation has made Russia’s economy reliant on the war for jobs, wages and growth. Weaning it off that military sustenance, in a peace deal being pushed by President Trump, is an economic risk for the Kremlin.

Stepping back from a war footing, economists say, would leave Russia’s economy in a perilous position. Depleted by three years of conflict, it is grappling with stubborn inflation, labor shortages and few paths to growth, apart from the war.

If peace is agreed, any resulting reduction in Russia’s military spending would likely leave a crater in the Kremlin’s finances that would be tough to fill. At least 40% of its economic growth last year was directly driven by war-related production, not including the spillover effects of increased consumption resulting from higher salaries and war-related payouts, Heli Simola, senior economist at the Bank of Finland Institute for Emerging Economies, estimates. (Source: wsj.com)

---

2. The Washington Post: