| | | | | | | Presented By Walmart | | | | Axios AM | | By Mike Allen · Oct 01, 2022 | | 🎃 Hello, Saturday, and welcome to October. - Smart Brevity™ count: 1,096 words ... 4 mins. Edited by Donica Phifer.
| | | | | | ☢️ 1 big thing: Nuke threat rises | | Vladimir Putin, on a screen in Red Square yesterday, addresses a concert celebrating his illegal annexation of Ukrainian territory. Photo: Alexander Nemenov/AFP via Getty Images The U.S. and NATO are grappling with a question that once seemed to have faded along with the Cold War: Will Moscow go nuclear? - Vladimir Putin's nuclear threats are growing more direct as his battlefield position in Ukraine grows more precarious, Axios World author Dave Lawler writes.
After warning last week that Russia would consider using nuclear weapons, Putin added: "This is not a bluff." - National security adviser Jake Sullivan said at a briefing yesterday that it might not be: "[T]here is a risk, given all of the loose talk and the nuclear saber-rattling by Putin, that he would consider this."
Sullivan was responding to an address in which Putin confirmed Russia was extending its nuclear umbrella to four newly annexed territories of Ukraine. - Putin also said the U.S. had itself "set a precedent" for the use of nuclear weapons when it bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Between the lines: Putin seems to believe that if he can convince the U.S. and NATO allies that he's willing to use nuclear weapons over Ukraine, they will pressure Kyiv to surrender, says Alexander Gabuev of the Carnegie Endowment. - If Ukraine continues to retake territory Putin has now claimed, he may believe his only option is escalation. Putin's recent moves suggest he "views this war as existential for himself, for his personal survival maybe, for his legacy and for his country," Gabuev says.
Reality check: We're not yet at the top of the "escalation ladder," Gabuev notes. - Putin could knock out electricity to major Ukrainian cities, conduct air and missile strikes on particularly sensitive targets, or even use chemical weapons on the battlefield before he reaches for the world's largest nuclear arsenal.
- But Gabuev believes in the last two weeks, the chances of a nuclear strike moved from "single digits" to "double digits."
If Putin does use nuclear weapons, he could seek a "demonstration effect" — perhaps by detonating a nuclear weapon over the Black Sea or in the Arctic — or deploy a smaller-yield "tactical" nuclear weapon on the battlefield, says Andrea Kendall-Taylor of the Center for a New American Security. - The U.S. likely wouldn't go nuclear in response.
- But it could conduct a conventional military strike on Russian soil — perhaps targeting the site or unit behind the Russian launch — and pursue non-military steps like permanently seizing Russian central bank reserves, Kendall-Taylor says.
Share this story. |     | | | | | | 2. 🌀 Ian = one of the costliest U.S. hurricanes | | Photo: Joe Raedle/Getty Images Above: Deb McGinty — walking near her apartment in Fort Myers, where she rode out Hurricane Ian — says she was "thanking God that I'm alive." At least 30 people are confirmed dead from the storm — 27 in Florida and three in Cuba earlier in the week, AP reports. - Most of those drowned, but the aftereffects can also be deadly. One elderly couple died after their oxygen machines shut off.
Ian is one of the strongest and costliest hurricanes to ever hit the U.S. - The storm terrorized millions of people for most of the week. It battered western Cuba before raking across Florida, then hitting South Carolina.
Fort Myers Beach. Photo: Giorgio Viera/AFP via Getty Images 💰 Economic losses from Ian could run $180 billion to $210 billion, AccuWeather founder and CEO Dr. Joel Myers estimates. - Data shows that most of the Florida homes in Ian's path lacked flood insurance, the N.Y. Times found (subscription).
What's next: Ian, weakened to a post-tropical cyclone, will move across North Carolina today and reach south-central Virginia by afternoon. Photo: Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Above: A man carrying a gun walks with a family on a flooded street in North Port (Sarasota County), Fla. | | | | | | | | 3. 📉 S&P down for third quarter in a row |  Data: Yahoo Finance. Chart: Tory Lysik/Axios After the third quarter ended yesterday, the S&P 500, Nasdaq and small-cap Russell 2000 are now all on three-quarter losing streaks for the first time since 2009, The Wall Street Journal reports (subscription). - The Dow, S&P and Nasdaq are each down at least 21% for 2022.
| | | | | | | | A message from Walmart | | Walmart builds career pathways for associates | | |  | | | | Working at Walmart creates opportunity and provides a path for everyone to unlock their potential. In 2022, the company was recognized on LinkedIn's Top Companies: Best workplaces to grow your career. Learn how Walmart is supporting associates at every stage of their careers. | | | | | | 4. 🎂 Jimmy Carter is 98 today | | Photo: Jill Stuckey via Reuters Above: Former President Jimmy Carter, 98 and former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, 95, ride in a Peanut Festival parade in Plains, Ga., last weekend in "PLAINS PEANUTS" T-shirts. Carter, already the longest-living U.S. president in history, will celebrate today with family and friends in Plains — the tiny town where he and Rosalynn were born in the years between World War I and the Great Depression, AP reports. - The former president is looking forward to watching the Braves on TV this afternoon, grandson Jason Carter said.
The Carter Center, which the former first couple established after their one White House term, is marking 40 years of promoting democracy and conflict resolution, monitoring elections, and advancing public health in the developing world. - The former president survived a cancer diagnosis in 2015, and a serious fall at home in 2019.
- He has enjoyed reading congratulatory messages sent by well-wishers around the world via social media and the center's website, his grandson said.
Online celebration. | | | | | | | | 5. 🔮 A House freshman class like no other |  | | | Illustration: Maura Losch/Axios | | | | The House is poised for immense turnover that will likely make the chamber considerably younger and more diverse, no matter which party wins the majority in November, Axios' Andrew Solender writes. - A group of 147 non-incumbent House candidates — set to win safe open seats, or running in competitive elections — is younger and more diverse across racial and gender lines than the current House.
These candidates' average age is 47, compared to an average age of 58 among House members today. - 3 out of 10 candidates are non-white. Just over a third are women — compared to around 28% of the current House for both groups.
Eight are openly LGBTQ+. | | | | | | | | 6. 🇧🇷 Bolsonaro on backfoot | | Photo: Ernesto Benavides/AFP via Getty Images Above: A barefoot child plays soccer in a field at the Morro da Lua favela in a poor area of São Paulo, Brazil yesterday. Brazil holds first-round presidential elections tomorrow. - After mishandling COVID and failing to lift living standards for many Brazilians, President Jair Bolsonaro, 67, now faces the unthinkable — a possible first-round loss to his most despised rival, leftist former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, 76. —Reuters
⚽ Brazilian soccer star Neymar Junior endorsed Bolsonaro's uphill bid this week, in a TikTok video showing him — wearing a T-shirt from his partner Puma — smiling and dancing to Bolsonaro's campaign jingle. | | | | | | | | 7. 😷 For the COVID time capsule | | I'm in my native land of California for 16 hours, and got this pop-up ad on my phone while reading news: California Department of Public Health | | | | | | | | 8. 📷 1 for the road | | Photo: Rebecca Blackwell/AP Eduardo Tocuya carries a dog he rescued yesterday in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., in hopes of reuniting it with its human. | | | | | | | | A message from Walmart | | Working at Walmart creates opportunity for associates at all levels | | |  | | | | Walmart values all types of experience — whether acquired through work, military and volunteer service, or degrees and certificates. Key numbers: - $20+/hour and benefits for supply chain associates.
- 75% of management began as hourly associates.
- 135K associates promoted in 2021.
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