◼ “Extrem dumm,” tweeted Elon Musk, in German, to ensure his meaning isn’t diluted in translation, after receiving word that sabotage had rendered the Tesla Gigafactory outside Berlin inoperative for about a week. The environmentalist outfit that claimed responsibility for arson at one of Europe’s largest electric-vehicle plants calls itself the “Vulcan Group”—after the Roman god of fire, presumably, rather than the highly rational, dispassionate aliens of Star Trek. Highly illogical.

◼ France voted to enshrine abortion rights in its constitution. Thousands of Parisians gathered in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower to celebrate the amendment, passed on March 4, that cements abortion’s status as a “guaranteed freedom” in the country. The crowd, featuring topless women in body paint, screamed and broke out into the girl-boss Beyoncé song “Run the World (Girls).” President Emmanuel Macron announced a “sealing ceremony”—a tradition reserved for the nation’s most significant laws—to be held on International Women’s Day. The amendment limits the ability of future French leaders to “drastically modify” the existing law, which permits abortion up to 14 weeks into pregnancy. France was supposedly inspired by the end of Roe in America. But the Roe regime was far more extreme than what France, like several U.S. states, is celebrating. Sad, still, to see the birthplace of the slogan “liberty, fraternity, equality” so cruelly exclude unborn children from all of those goods.

◼ The post-Covid political environment has seen a seismic shift in favor of school choice, but even some red states have lagged. The Texas house, though controlled by Republicans, voted down Governor Greg Abbott’s school-choice plan. He then took his case to the voters by endorsing a slate of pro-school-choice primary challengers to ten incumbents. Five other Republicans who sank school choice retired rather than face a challenge. Of the ten challengers, five won and three were forced to a runoff. Three of the retirees’ seats went to pro-school-choice nominees, with the other two races going to runoffs. Abbott’s campaign likely benefited from intersecting with a less noble backlash against some of the same Republicans for impeaching state attorney general Ken Paxton. It will be taken as vindication by Paxton and may elevate some people who do not prove responsible in office. But the net result is likely to strengthen Abbott’s hand in enacting conservative policy in Austin and give more freedom to Texas parents and their children.

◼ The largest union filing for recognition from the National Labor Relations Board so far this year would cover 3,100 employees. They want to join the United Auto Workers union. Is it the Volkswagen plant in Tennessee that the UAW has tried to unionize in the past? Is it the Mercedes plant in Alabama? No, it’s 3,100 non-tenure-track faculty at Harvard who want to join the UAW. They would join Harvard’s graduate students and undergraduate nonacademic workers, who have already done so. About 100,000 of the UAW’s 380,000 active members are in higher education, and there are about as many UAW members in the University of California system as there are at General Motors. We’d still rather be governed by the first 3,100 names in the Boston phone book than by the 3,100 non-tenure-track faculty at Harvard—especially if they’re UAW members.

◼ Already, hundreds of people had been arrested for laying flowers at makeshift memorials to Alexei Navalny. Nonetheless, thousands gathered for his funeral in Moscow. One man said, “I’m afraid, of course, but despite the fear, a man died in prison and we are here. It’s the least we can do.” A woman compared Navalny and Vladimir Putin, his jailer and effective murderer: “One sacrificed himself to save the country, the other one sacrificed the country to save himself.” Many foreign diplomats, including the ambassador of the United States, attended the funeral. When we speak of “democratic solidarity” with people under dictatorship, this is the kind of thing we mean. After the funeral, the state arrested an untold number more, using surveillance footage and facial-recognition technology. Putin has gone far to re-Sovietize Russia. As in Soviet days, some of the bravest people on earth are Russian.

◼ In the 1980s, when the U.S. had Ronald Reagan and the U.K. had Margaret Thatcher, Canada had Brian Mulroney. In a debate before the 1984 Canadian election, Liberal Party leader John Turner said he had no option but to allow Liberal patronage appointments in government. With righteous anger and trademark Canadian respect, Mulroney retorted, “You had an option, sir,” and his clarion call for confident leadership earned his party an outright majority in Parliament in a landslide victory. It might seem obvious that the U.S. and Canada get along, but that’s in large part because of Mulroney. A previous government, under Pierre Trudeau, had cozied up to Castro in Cuba and thumbed its nose at the U.S. Mulroney joined America’s stand against communism around the world and pursued a free-trade agreement with the U.S., which was later expanded to include Mexico and became NAFTA. He privatized numerous state-owned enterprises, oversaw the stabilization of inflation, and made Canadian politics competitive again, paving the way for the Conservative premiership of Stephen Harper—and soon, most likely, that of Pierre Poilievre. Dead at 84, R.I.P.