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Willis Sparks
By Willis SparksMarch 23, 2018
Willis Sparks
Willis Sparks is a senior editor for GZERO Daily. He is also a Director in the Global Macro practice at Eurasia Group, where he has worked since 2005. He has made speeches on international politics on every continent except Antarctica. Willis holds degrees from Brown University, the Juilliard School, Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques in Paris. He also holds an honorary degree from the Moscow Art Theatre School. A native of Macon, Georgia, Willis has worked as a stuntman at New York's Metropolitan Opera. As a child, he declined an opportunity to spend an afternoon riding the Great American Scream Machine, a rollercoaster, with Ronald McDonald, for money. He has never regretted that decision.
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3: President Trump has requested a three-year extension of “trade promotion authority,” which gives presidents the right to submit negotiated trade deals to Congress for a simple up-or-down vote without amendments. It’s another reminder that Trump doesn’t hate trade deals. He hates other people’s trade deals.

160: The South Korean government plans to send 160 “K-Pop” stars to North Korea next month as a colorful prelude to the inter-Korean summit between South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

6 billion: A new interview with Bloomberg reminded the world this week that Saudi Prince al-Waleed bin Talal Alwaleed reportedly paid $6 billion to win release from detention at Riyadh’s Ritz-Carlton. In the history of bail money, that might just be a record.

9 billion: With the latest attacks on Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg’s net worth fell by an estimated $9 billion on Monday and Tuesday. That not only tops Prince Alwaleed’s bail money, it’s more than the GDP of Rwanda.

70: Some 70 percent of people in Belgium say fake news is a problem for their country. That’s the lowest percentage in the entire European Union.

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