Working with the Trump administration, the data company could be used to target the president’s opponents

Draw a circle around all the assets in the US now devoted to artificial intelligence.

Draw a second circle around all the assets devoted to the US military.

The 1920s were the last decade in American history during which one could be genuinely optimistic about politics. Since 1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women – two constituencies that are notoriously tough for libertarians – have rendered the notion of ‘capitalist democracy’ into an oxymoron.

Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com

Some in the lagoon city are furious, others delighted, as celebrities descend for billionaire’s sort-of nuptials

The Black Death. Byron on the prowl. Rising water levels. Cruise ships the size of city blocks. Venice may have endured many tumultuous events and sinister challenges over the centuries but rarely in its long history has it had to contend with an issue quite as odd and quite as divisive as the sort-of nuptials of the world’s fourth-richest person.

Friday morning found the lagoon city doing what it does best: looking gorgeous and slightly unreal as it played host to thousands of tourists who posed in silver-prowed gondolas, chugged mid-morning spritzes or simply wilted in the muggy heat.