The path to Joe Biden’s decision not to contest the 2024 US presidential election – from his disastrous debate against Donald Trump to Kamala Harris’s almost guaranteed nomination as the Democratic party candidate for the November vote – seemed to happen at first painfully slowly, then at exhilarating speed.
In this week’s edition US political correspondent Lauren Gambino charts the dizzying 36 hours that saw Harris take White House centre stage in what has already proved to be a rollercoaster month in US politics. Meanwhile, David Smith pays tribute to how Biden, when the reality of how his age and obvious frailty diminished any chance of beating Trump finally dawned, acted with grace and dignity in handing on the baton to his vice-president.
We also take a look at whether the rest of world could now view Biden as a “lame duck” in his last six months in power. Will adversaries of the US try their luck and push on one of the many arenas of actual or potential conflict, asks the Guardian’s global affairs correspondent, Andrew Roth.
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Five essential reads in this week’s edition
1
Spotlight | A slow recovery from a global IT failure
Last week’s massive Microsoft outage caused by a botched security update revealed how vulnerable business and services, including airlines, hospitals and banks, are in our heavily networked world, reports Dan Milmo.
2
Spotlight | Nature wins after Russia’s dam strike
A year after Moscow blew up the Khakhovka power plant on the Dnipro river, Luke Harding returns to report on residents’ mixed feelings about a newly created landscape.
3
Feature | Bienvenue à Paris 2024
We look forward to Friday’s opening of the Games with Oliver Wainwright examining claims from its planners that the XXXIII Olympiad will be the greenest ever.
4
Opinion | John Harris on Labour’s need to tackle populism head-on
Keir Starmer’s new government must act swiftly to counteract false promises about how to solve Britain’s problems.
5
Culture | An excellent adventure in fiction
Hollywood A-lister Keanu Reeves and British novelist China Miéville talk about their collaboration on Reeves’s first novel, The Book of Elsewhere, with Sam Leith.
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What else we’ve been reading
As Low, married couple Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker left an indelible mark on alternative music of the turn of this century, before the band folded after Parker’s death in 2022. David Hutcheon’s interview with Sparhawk is a profound meditation on grief, love, faith, creativity and the catharsis of dancing. And don’t miss the equally moving conversation below the line. Clare Horton, assistant editor
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Other highlights from the Guardian website
• Audio | Dodging the draft: one Ukrainian man’s story
• Video | Frozen in Time: the motherhood dilemma for single women in China
• Gallery | Joe Biden’s political career across the decades
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