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Here’s what you need to know
Joe Biden isn’t budging on Afghanistan. The US president blamed Afghan leaders for the chaos, and said the 20-year US engagement was never intended to reconstruct the country.
The Taliban invited women to join the government. The militant group also offered an amnesty to former officials, but many Afghans remain skeptical, the Associated Press reports.
A tropical storm hit earthquake-ravaged Haiti. Flash flooding and mudslides are likely to make rescue efforts even more difficult—more than 1,400 people are confirmed to have died.
New Zealand is in lockdown. One man tested positive for Covid-19, the first case in six months.
Tesla’s Autopilot is under investigation. The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is looking into collisions between Teslas and first-responder vehicles with flashing lights.
Blue Origin is suing NASA. Jeff Bezos’s space company is escalating claims that the agency unfairly picked Elon Musk’s SpaceX for a lunar landing project.
What to watch for
The Taliban’s seizure of power in Afghanistan is being treated as a crisis in much of the Western world. The UK reconvened Parliament in the middle of the summer recess, prime minister Boris Johnson has called for a virtual meeting of G7 leaders, and the EU is holding an emergency meeting today. A Taliban-led Afghanistan could also mean all sorts of problems for India.
But for others, it’s an opportunity. Russia’s ambassador in Afghanistan, Dmitry Zhirnov, meets Taliban leaders today, while China invited a delegation from the militant group to Tianjin just weeks ago. Neither country is closing its embassy in Kabul.
The battle for influence in this strategically important—and resource-rich—country will no longer involve the West. Instead, Russia and China are preparing to do business with the Taliban on its home turf.
Charting rare earth production
Last week, US legislators introduced a bipartisan bill that would provide tax credits for the domestic production of permanent rare earth magnets—important components of products like wind turbines, electric vehicle motors, smartphones, and missile systems. The proposal represents a sizable business incentive for companies like USA Rare Earth, which could see between $40 million and $60 million in tax credits once fully operational.
Currently, China produces 87% of the world’s neodymium-iron-boron (NdFeB) permanent rare earth magnets. The country has long used a series of tax tools to support and shape its rare earth industry.
Can crypto go green?
Bitcoin is surging again, and energy experts know what that means: Carbon emissions from bitcoin “mining” are about to take off, too. Today, the carbon footprint of bitcoin is comparable to that of a major city. But there are ways for bitcoin to go green—and miners could have a financial stake in doing so.
✦ Find out what’s in store for low-carbon crypto in this week’s The Forecast email, available to Quartz members. Get 40% off a membership with code QZEMAIL40.
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⏱ A timeline of US engagement in Afghanistan
🎬 China’s state TV may be trolling the US over Afghanistan with a movie
Surprising discoveries
Pizza Hut’s newest toppings in Taiwan are pig’s blood and century eggs. The company chose them by scraping social media posts and creating word clouds of popular foods.
Scammers are extorting authors on Goodreads. If writers don’t agree to pay for good reviews, their books are overwhelmed with bad ones.
Florida’s governor sees a Fox News host more than his lieutenant. In the first six months of 2021, Ron DeSantis made eight appearances on Sean Hannity’s show and met with Jeanette Nuñez seven times.
Nvidia replaced its CEO with a CGI rendering for a speech. Are deepfakes the future of business meetings?
The last intact statue of an Albanian dictator has an unlikely guardian. Eighty-year-old Sabire Plaku is partially deaf and blind but still checks in on the Enver Hoxha monument daily.
Correction: Yesterday’s brief incorrectly referred to Roblox as the company behind Fortnite. Our Gen Z children still have not stopped rolling their eyes.Â
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