“5 Big Ideas for Improving the Endangered Species Act”.
“It might seem fantastical that these men would open up about their law-breaking to random strangers on a dating app, but the fact is, few women want to talk to them at all, and that phenomenon has only intensified since the Dobbs decision eliminated federal abortion protections.”
RIP, Laura Lynch, founding member of the Dixie Chicks.
“Jan. 6 rioters the far right claimed were antifa keep getting unmasked as Trump supporters”.
“Welcome to our annual list of the worst technologies. This year, one technology disaster in particular holds lessons for the rest of us: the Titan submersible that imploded while diving to see the Titanic.”
RIP, Mars Williams, saxophonist who played with The Waitresses and The Psychedelic Furs.
“‘Succession’ Fans Can Now Buy the ‘Ludicrously Capacious’ Handbag, Roman’s Walmart Outfit, and More at Auction”. Looks like your 2024 Christmas shopping can begin now if you want it to.
“The corruption of American Christianity is nothing new: Modern-day pharisees from Jerry Falwell Sr. to Paula White have spent 50 years weaponizing the gospel to win elections and dominate the country, exploiting the cultural insecurities of their unwitting brethren for political, professional, and financial gain, all while reducing the gospel of Jesus Christ to a caricature in the eyes of unbelievers. The resulting collapse of the Church’s reputation in this country—with Sunday attendance, positive perceptions of organized religion, and the number of self-identified Christians all at historic lows—leaves evangelicals estranged from their secular neighbors like never before. Unbelievers might well prefer it this way. They might be tempted to shrug and move along, assuming that the crack-up of evangelicalism isn’t their problem. They are mistaken.”
“Our digital life has become increasingly impermanent and is mostly outside of our control, making the threat and pain of digital loss ever more acute.”
RIP, Tom Smothers, half of the Smothers Brothers and co-host of one of the most socially conscious and groundbreaking television shows in the history of the medium.
“Special counsel Jack Smith asked a judge on Wednesday to bar Donald Trump’s lawyers from injecting politics into the former president’s trial on charges that he schemed to overturn the results of the 2020 election.”
“Perhaps the lesson here is simple: Any Republican who wants to monitor our sex lives or reading habits must first hand their iPhone library over for public inspection. That would invite a blessed silence from the would-be arbiters of sexual morality.”
“The New York Times is suing OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement, alleging that millions of its articles were used by the groups to train their AI models without the paper’s permission.”
RIP, Herb Kohl, former Democratic U.S. senator from Wisconsin and former owner of the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks.
“This is the kind of testimony that Trump-friendly witnesses — even Mike Pence!! — have often offered in the press. And Trump could call a long list of people who’d be happy to claim that Trump believed and still believes that the election was stolen. But as the filing notes, that would be inadmissible testimony for several reasons. It would also be a ploy to help Trump avoid taking the stand himself.”
“The Absolute Worst Political Predictions of 2023″.
Gaston Glock, the Austrian engineer who invented the Glock handgun and became a billionaire as a result, has died.
“It’s an interesting set of vegetables to emerge from the word salad of her response. Which side exactly, in Haley’s history of the Civil War, represented capitalism and economic freedom and which side represented government getting in the way of human liberty? Was she referring here to the kind of capitalism that involves the free trade in human beings? Or was she referring to the kind of capitalism that involves human beings having the right to enter and exit contracts of employment for which they receive wages? She was not altogether clear on the subject.”
I’m waiting for Trump’s lawyers to make the argument that perjury laws are an unconstitutional infringement on free speech. Surely it’s not long now…