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Ukraine aid endgame, Pakistan stalemate and a shipwreck mystery

 
Today's POLITICS story

Will the House approve Ukraine funding?

What happened?
The Senate late Monday cleared the final procedural hurdle for passing a $95 billion aid package for Ukraine, Israel, Gaza and Taiwan, with 17 Republicans joining 49 Democrats to overcome obstacles from hardline Republicans and pressure from former President Donald Trump. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) was noncommittal on bringing the bill up for a vote in the House.

Who said what?
"In the absence of having received any single border policy change from the Senate, the House will have to continue to work its own will on these important matters," said Johnson, who helped kill the bipartisan border security component in the Senate bill.

The commentary
There will be a "multi-directional battle" over the bill's fate in the House, Politico said. With a "thin margin of control" and a significant portion of his caucus opposed to funding Ukraine, Johnson has "few politically palatable" options.

What next?
There are already "efforts underway to go around Johnson and pass the bill through a Democrat-led discharge petition," which would require the support of at least four Republicans, The Washington Post said. It's "tough to underscore just how rarely a discharge petition is successfully used in the House," Politico said. But if "centrist pro-Ukraine Republicans" loudly push for the aid, it's more likely "Johnson takes up the bill" in some form.

 
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Today's INTERNATIONAL story

Pakistan's post-election stalemate

What happened?
Candidates aligned with jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan won a 93-seat plurality in Pakistan's parliamentary elections, a shocking upset but short of the 169 seats needed to select a prime minister. Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's PML-N party won 75 seats and political scion Bilawal-Bhutto Zardari's PPP took 54 seats.

How did we get here?
Khan was ousted in 2022 then jailed after a falling-out with the "powerful generals" who have been "the ultimate arbiters of politics" in Pakistan since 1947, The Washington Post said. A "barrage of lawfare" kept Khan off the ballot, effectively disbanded his PTI party and forced his allies to run as independents. 

The commentary
The pro-Khan result "was an astonishing display of defiance. This was supposed to be the most predetermined election in Pakistani history," Omar Waraich at the Open Society Foundations told The Washington Post. Voters delivered the "clear message" they "no longer welcome the military's interference in politics," said Madiha Afzal at the Brookings Institution.

What next?
Pakistan's president has until Feb. 29 to convene parliament. The PML-N and PPP are in coalition talks with smaller parties.

 
 
Today's aRCHAEOLOGY Story

Wreck of SS Arlington found in Lake Superior

What happened?
A shipwreck hunter has discovered the SS Arlington, a Canadian merchant ship that sank in Lake Superior in 1940, the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society announced Monday. The Arlington went down 35 miles north of Michigan's Keweenaw Peninsula with a full cargo of wheat and, for reasons not understood, its seasoned captain, Frederick "Tatey Bug" Burke.

Who said what?
"The stereotype is that the captain goes down with the ship," the historical society's Bruce Lynn told The New York Times. But Burke had "plenty of time" to join his crew on the lifeboat that took them to safety. The captain was last seen waving to his departing crew shortly before the Arlington went under, and "the question is whether he was saying, 'Hey, hold the lifeboat' or waving goodbye," said Dan Fountain, the researcher who found the ship. 

What next?
"The odd behavior of the captain, a solitary figure," is a mystery whose solution, "like the ship itself, will never resurface," the Times said. Hundreds of ships sank in Lake Superior, but recovering them is generally "too costly and against the law in Michigan."

 
 

It's not all bad

The swamps, streams and oxbow lakes of Clarke County, Alabama, have given the area the nickname America's Amazon. Now, thanks to a land purchase by The Nature Conservancy, 7,990 acres between the Tombigbee and Alabama Rivers will be preserved, allowing the flora and fauna to flourish. Several species of fish, birds, reptiles and amphibians live here, making it one of the world's most biodiverse places, Mitch Reid, the Alabama director for The Nature Conservancy, told AL.com.

 
 
Under the radar

The legend of Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous bitcoin founder, is a mystery built for the digital age.

The puzzle began in 2008, when someone using that name released a white paper outlining the vision for "a new electronic money and peer-to-peer payment system that would obviate the need for troublesome intermediaries like banks," Wired said. The enigmatic creator sent the first bitcoin transaction in 2009, and little more than two years later, disappeared from the internet.

The absence of a leader has helped bitcoin flourish since Nakamoto disappeared, making it "robust" by forcing it to evolve unfettered in an anarchistic system, software developer and early bitcoin adopter Jameson Lopp told Wired.

In 2016, Australian computer scientist Craig Wright orchestrated an "elaborate but unconvincing demonstration" that he was the mysterious Nakamoto, Billy Bambrough said at Forbes. Since then, Wright has spent years "dragging naysayers through the courts in a largely unsuccessful attempt to legally be recognized as bitcoin's creator." 

Three years ago, a nonprofit coalition of crypto and tech companies called the Crypto Open Patent Alliance brought a lawsuit against Wright, asking the court to officially declare that he is not Nakamoto. That case finally went to trial in the U.K. on Feb. 5. 

A week into the case, the ongoing courtroom tension has "left onlookers astonished," Forbes' Susie Violet Ward said. "Each revelation seems to cast ripples of uncertainty and produce more questions than answers, further muddying the waters." The trial is expected to last about six weeks.

 
 
On this day

February 13, 2000

The last original "Peanuts" comic strip is published in newspapers, bringing to an end one of the most iconic cartoons in history. The strip’s final publication came one day after the death of its creator, Charles Schulz, who drew the daily adventures of Charlie Brown and Snoopy for half a century.  

 
 
TODAY’S newspaperS

The Israeli raid in Gaza that freed two hostages from Hamas and left 67 Palestinians dead from airstrikes leads the front page of major U.S. newspapers on Tuesday. The New York Times also has lighter fare, previewing Valentine's Day with an article on ways you can show disdain for your ex. Lilly Calman, for example, paid to name a doomed rat at the San Antonio Zoo after her ex-boyfriend. "The visual image of him getting eaten by a Komodo dragon is pretty satisfying," she said.

► See the newspaper front pages

 
 
Tall tale

Hog civilized ...

A French bar owner is devoting her time to pampering pigs. Carole Germain adopted her pig, Couscous, in 2020 and quickly learned how to trim his tusks and hooves. Using her new skills, she started offering porcine grooming services part-time and is now so busy giving pig pedicures that she has put her bar up for sale. "I thought I was the only person who had [a pig] hogging the couch," Germain told AFP. "But there are thousands."

 
 

Morning Report was written and edited by Catherine Garcia, Justin Klawans, Harold Maass and Peter Weber, with illustrations by Stephen Kelly and Julia Wytrazek.

Image credits, from top: Alex Wong / Getty Images; Asif Hassan / AFP via Getty Images; Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society; Janos Kummer / Stringer / Getty Images