CL Super Typhoon Dolphin is heading for Hong Kong, and the government's messaging is already ahead of the storm: calm, procedural, reassuring. A warning signal is not a plan. Hong Kong has weathered worse than this storm. It has not always weathered it gracefully.-- CL

MB Russia's air defenses over Kyiv are thinning as Moscow presses the gap, Taiwan is running drills under Beijing's watch, and Washington is mid-confirmation on a new attorney general while one senator breaks ranks to vote no. Three rooms, one instinct: insist it's under control until the exercise, the funeral count, or the floor vote says otherwise.-- MB