🌊 Life After Luigi at UnitedHealth

What a year in news, Roca Nation.

From Moo Deng to the Rizzler, Raygun to Luigi Mangione, and from the attempted assassination of Trump to the unexpected cameo of Mike Tysons’s bare buttocks on live TV, 2024 was quite a year in news. It was also quite a year for Roca.

Across our newsletter, app, YouTube, and Instagram, over 700,000 new people have joined the Roca community this year. That’s enough new Roca Riders to fill the Big House seven times over. You are the best news community in the world, and we thank you for trusting us to be your daily news brief.

–Max and Max

KEY STORY

UnitedHealth’s Fallout

The CEO of UnitedHealth – UnitedHealthcare’s parent company – has moved his attention to navigating a post-Luigi world, the WSJ reported

• UnitedHealth CEO Andrew Witty has spent the month since the killing holding numerous meetings with executives and sending videos to his 440,000+ employees emphasizing that their work is important, appreciated, and saving lives

• UnitedHealth now employs full-time armed guards to patrol their HQ and monitors the web for threats

• Witty also reportedly shared with top brass that the company is outperforming and on pace for a record year

Dig Deeper

• In addition to its insurance arm, UnitedHealth approves drugs for patients, employs thousands of doctors and nurses, and negotiates drug prices

• UnitedHealth has asked social media platforms to take down certain posts and news companies to stop showing images of “wanted” posters of the company’s executives

• Some employees, meanwhile, have been receiving threatening emails

KEY STORY

Squid Game Troubles

Shares of companies involved with Squid Game crashed after the show’s second-season debut

• The massive success of Squid Game – a South Korean Netflix show about a life-or-death game – fueled a wave of investment into foreign media companies, many linked with the show’s production. On December 26, though, Squid Game season two debuted to mixed reviews

• Investors took the response to mean the show – and other foreign shows – won’t be the hits many had anticipated. One company, which distributes and markets content and in which Squid Game’s main actor is the largest shareholder, fell by 30%, the daily limit on the South Korean market, while other Squid Game-linked companies fell up to 25%

Dig Deeper 

• Squid Game received an 84% from critics and 63% from viewers on Rotten Tomatoes, however, a significant number of reviews were negative

• One influential critic at the New York Times wrote, “This season of Squid Game hints at larger-scale ambitions but does little to pursue them,” while many unofficial critics said it was a boring let-down with plot holes

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KEY STORY

Putin’s Partial Apology

Vladimir Putin issued a partial apology after an Azerbaijan Airlines plane was apparently shot down over Russian airspace

• On Christmas, a passenger jet traveling from Baku, Azerbaijan’s capital, to Grozny, in southern Russia, diverted and attempted to make an emergency landing. It crash-landed in western Kazakhstan, killing 38 of its 67 passengers and crew

• Russian media initially said the plane hit a flock of birds or bad weather, while Ukraine and independent analysts said the plane was shot down by Russian air defenses

• On Saturday, Putin said that Russian air defenses were active in the region to defend against Ukrainian drone strikes. He apologized over the incident, but didn’t say Russia shot down the jet

Dig Deeper

• On Sunday, Azerbaijan’s president accused Russia of attempting a “foolish and dishonest” cover-up and said that Putin’s apology was insufficient

• One passenger on the plane told the BBC, “I saw the fuselage shell was slightly damaged and then I got scared. I thought the plane would fall apart. I was very surprised that I was alive,” while another said, “The plane was supposed to land but it didn’t. Something exploded inside twice…we panicked”

KEY STORY

Massive MAGA Feud

Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk sparked an intra-MAGA feud over immigration policy, and Trump has appeared to side with them

• Vivek, whom Trump tapped to co-head DOGE with Elon Musk, sparked the debate with a lengthy post on X in which he fiercely criticized American culture – which he says “celebrates the prom queen over the math olympiad champ” – and promoted the H-1B visa system, which lets companies higher high-skilled foreign workers but critics accuse of massive abuse

• Musk echoed Vivek’s arguments, and on Saturday Trump said he “always liked” H-1B visas despite his previous criticisms of the program

Dig Deeper

• Many conservatives vigorously disagreed with Vivek's vision for immigration policy and American culture

• Mike Cernovich, a prominent conservative commentator, wrote, “The Woodstock generation managed to build out aerospace, the one before went to the moon, America was doing great. Underlying your post is that we were all living in squalor until being rescued by H-1B’s. Then why did everyone want to come here?”

• Another wrote, “Not being cute, this is the darkest vision for America I’ve ever read. No sleepovers, no saturday morning cartoons. No joy. Nothing to look forward to but endless grinding competition. Life itself sacrificed. In its place, ‘success’”

RUNDOWN
Some Quick Stories for the Office

✈️ A Jeju Air flight crashed during landing in South Korea, killing at least 174 people and marking one of South Korea’s worst-ever airline disasters

☀️ A probe that made the closest-ever approach to the Sun is “in good health,” NASA said

🇰🇷 South Korea’s opposition-controlled National Assembly impeached the country’s acting president, who was filling in after the Assembly voted to impeach the elected president

🪖 ​​Taliban forces launched strikes on Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan, sparking heavy fighting that killed at least 19 Pakistani soldiers

🇺🇸 President-elect Donald Trump asked the US Supreme Court to delay the upcoming TikTok ban while he works on a "political resolution"

🇺🇸 President Jimmy Carter – the longest-living US president – died on Sunday at age 100

COMMUNITY
What does Roca Nation think?

🧠 Today’s question: What was the best event — concert, sporting event, or otherwise — you attended in 2024?

Reply to this email to let us know what you think!

POPCORN
Some Quick Stories for Happy Hour

📽️ RIP, Chuck: Charles "Chuck" Dolan, the founder of HBO and AMC, died at 98

♟️ Rookie Move: Victor Wembanyama, the NBA's 7-foot-3 Rookie of the Year, made a surprise appearance at New York City’s Washington Square Park, announcing on social media that he was there and ready to play people in chess

🐌 Shell-ebration Time: 1,300+ critically endangered Desertas Island land snails were released onto a small Atlantic Island after being bred at a British zoo. The release marks the return of a species thought extinct for a century

🐕 Florida Dog Rings Door Bell: A four-year-old German Shepherd named Athena made a remarkable Christmas Eve return to her Florida home after being missing for over a week, alerting her family by ringing the doorbell at 2:30 AM

👖 Check Your Pants: World chess number one Magnus Carlsen abandoned the Fide World Rapid and Blitz Chess Championships in New York after officials demanded he immediately change out of his jeans and imposed a $200 fine

ROCA WRAP

Mine Your Own Business

El Salvador

This country has ended its worldwide-first ban on metals mining.

A densely populated nation of 6M, El Salvador made history in 2017 by becoming the first country to completely ban metals mining. In 2019, though, President Nayib Bukele took power and promised aggressive economic reforms. One policy he sought to change was the mining ban, which he called “absurd.”

Last week, Bukele's allies in Congress voted 57-0 to overturn the mining ban, granting the government authority to oversee mining activities. The new law prohibits mercury use and protects some nature reserves, but opens most of the country to potential mining operations.

The president claims studies of just 4% of viable mining territory revealed gold deposits worth $132B, equivalent to 380% of GDP. With poverty levels high, development standards low, and national debt at 85% of GDP, Bukele argues mining could bring "unprecedented economic and social development."

The move was opposed by environmentalists – who argue mining poses unacceptable risks to water, soil, and biodiversity – as well as the Catholic Church, which is powerful in the country. But Bukele – whose gang crackdown has made him one of the world’s most popular leaders – said it was God himself who had enabled the shift: “This wealth, given by God, can be harnessed responsibly to bring unprecedented economic and social development to our people.”

ROCA VIDEO
A Year of Gaslighting: How the Media Lied to You in 2024

Both sides of the partisan media lied with criminal levels of shamelessness this year. They built false narratives to score political points and told you to deny your own eyes and ears. We highlight the biggest lies from this year, ranging from the hysteria over the Springfield, OH, pet-eating narrative to the coverup of Biden's mental decline. Let us know what we missed in the comments.

–Max and Max

EDITOR’S NOTE
Final Thoughts

It felt like the day was never going to come, but RIP to President Carter. The peanut-farmer-turned-US President lived past 100, making him the longest-lived president in US history. He died in his hometown of Plains, GA, which is where he married Rosalynn, his wife of 77 years, in 1946. She died last year, so now they are reunited again. It is hard to believe that he lived long enough to see both the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the 3D premiere of Inside Out 2. What a life.

–Max and Max