Presented by

Fifty years ago, in the thick of the Cold War, an army of engineers and technicians, political and social scientists, physicists and diplomats rose up to meet the demands of history and avoid global annihilation.

But after the Cold War fizzled out, interest in the nuclear field began to wane. As the U.S. turned its attention to the global war on terrorism and as technology leaped and bounded ahead of the work you’ll see in Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan’s latest blockbuster, nuclear weapons were demoted from the existential threat facing humanity to merely an existential threat. And as a result, writes author Bryan Bender in this week’s Friday Read, American expertise in nuclear weapons and safety has degenerated to an alarming extent.

The intellectuals who had developed robust plans and strategies for avoiding or, if the worst came to pass, surviving a nuclear war have aged into the twilight of their careers. Nearly 40 percent of employees and contractors at weapons labs and other facilities overseen by the National Nuclear Security Administration, the federal agency responsible for “enhancing national security through the military application of nuclear science,” will be eligible for retirement this year, according to a report by N Square.

The disappearance of nuclear weapons experts comes at a particularly troubling time. A hot war rages in Europe, China seeks to rival the nuclear arsenals that Moscow and Washington command and Iran continues to make progress toward a bomb of its own. “This is perhaps the most dangerous point in the history of the nuclear age,” says Joan Rohlfing, a former top nuclear adviser at the Departments of Defense and Energy and current president of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a nonprofit dedicated to reducing the threat of weapons of mass destruction.

“All the ingredients are here for a catastrophe,” she tells Bender, who interviewed more than a dozen experts across the ideological spectrum about the United States’ dire lack of preparation for a future nuclear scenario. “I think there is a high degree of denial because we have gone so long without nuclear use. We are discounting the warning signs that are right in front of us.”

Read the story.

“All around the United States Senate, we are led by elderly people, and their frailty, their weakness, and in Mitch McConnell’s case, his decrepitude, is showing severely.”

Can you guess who said this about Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell this week? Scroll to the bottom for the answer.**

Republicans Don’t Agree About Capitalism Anymore … “Market fundamentalism.” “Libertarian dogma.” “Zombie Reaganism.” These sound like the sort of broadsides the left has launched at conservatives for years. But in fact, they’re coming from inside the GOP, as a newer, nationalistic, market-skeptical arm of conservatives seeks to advance a more pro-labor vision of Republicanism. Last week, traditional free-market conservatives published Freedom Conservatism: A Statement of Principles, a manifesto of longtime GOP shibboleths aimed squarely at the forces of the so-called New Right. It all comes down to this: “Should the Republican Party retain its half-century identity as the party of global, finance-dominated neoliberalism — or embrace impulses associated for the past century with the left?” writes Michael Schaffer in this week’s Capital City column.

Hunter Biden’s initial court appearance on Wednesday took a turn when his plea deal was placed on hold. Haven’t kept up with the case? Use these details to sound like a studied court-watcher:

- The proposed plea agreement and diversion agreement, which POLITICO obtained and published, would have seen Biden plead guilty to two misdemeanor tax charges and sidestep a felony gun charge (he owned a gun while regularly using cocaine, and federal law prohibits drug users from owning firearms) if he kept his hands clean for two years.

- But U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika questioned the deal’s constitutionality, which included stipulations for not prosecuting Biden over tax crimes in the future. She sent both sides back to work to address her concerns. With the deal on hold, Biden pleaded not guilty to all three charges.

- No, the deal isn’t completely dead yet. Prosecutors and Biden’s lawyers will have to address the judge’s concerns and clarify the agreement. If she ultimately approves it, Biden could withdraw his not-guilty pleas, instead pleading guilty to the tax charges; DOJ would defer prosecution on the gun charge.

- Could President Joe Biden simply pardon his son? Don’t count on it. When she was asked about the possibility on Thursday, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre replied, “No,” and declined to comment further.

Bruen Was Bigger Than You Thought … It’s been a little over a year since the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision overturned a longstanding law in New York that required gun owners to establish “proper cause” in order to obtain a license to own a gun small enough to be concealed, and it’s had a striking impact on lower courts. Jacob Charles — a law professor at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, and a critic of Bruen’s focus on historical analogues in evaluating a law’s constitutionality — has tracked every federal court case citing Bruen, and his research shows just how long a shadow the decision has cast over the courts, with at least 16 laws invalidated in whole or in part following the decision. “The Bruen method is at its core anti-innovation,” he tells Matt Valentine. “So there can’t be innovative responses to challenges today that deal with gun violence.”

What DeSantis Could Offer Hollywood … Striking actors and writers in Hollywood wouldn’t seem to have much in common with Trump’s top primary rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis — least of all his culture war against Disney and its representation of LGBTQ characters and themes. But when it comes to challenging corporate authority, there’s more overlap than you might think, argues Matt Stoller, director of research at the American Economic Liberties Project. “If the right and left join forces,” he writes, “they might be able to take on the entertainment behemoth — and even push to break up the company.”

**Who Dissed answer: It was Steve Schmidt — the political consultant known for his campaign work with George W. Bush, Arnold Schwarzenegger and John McCain — who left the GOP during Donald Trump’s presidency. His comments followed an episode this week in which McConnell froze up mid-sentence during a press conference and was escorted away.

[email protected]