“So what works to keep mothers in the workforce, to allow fathers to participate more on the home front, and to give kids the best start possible? Here’s a wishlist, grounded in research”.
“A radical new use of deepfake technology is allowing survivors of abuse to confront their perpetrators.”
Pigeons deserve better. Sorry, Tom Lehrer.
“The Trump administration has pursued a staggering range of policy pivots this past year that threaten to weaken the nation’s ability and willingness to address a broad spectrum of technology challenges, from cybersecurity and privacy to countering disinformation, fraud and corruption. These shifts, along with the president’s efforts to restrict free speech and freedom of the press, have come at such a rapid clip that many readers probably aren’t even aware of them all.”
“At least 16 files disappeared from the Justice Department’s public webpage for documents related to Jeffrey Epstein — including a photograph showing President Donald Trump — less than a day after they were posted, with no explanation from the government and no notice to the public.”
“In Kirk’s name, they will continue to plod through long, grueling, nonsensical arguments about Egyptian aircraft and Emmanuel Macron, with people who are simply never going to listen.”
“If the new federal graduate school loan regime is proving to be a disaster politically, it is not much better as policy.”
“In American popular culture and popular imagination, burning at the stake is still associated with witches, even though this was never the result of American panics over alleged witchcraft. Burning at the stake was, in fact, a punishment allowed and sometimes required in early American law, but not for “witches.” It was for slaves.”
“The Americans Who Saw All This Coming—but Were Ignored and Maligned”.
“The goal of RFK seems to be to make it impossible for vaccines to be available in the U.S.”
The worst songs of 2025, according to Paste. Taylor Swift fans may grumble about some of this, but oy their #1 song sounds horrible.
A brief history of funny numbers.
“I don’t know.” “I don’t know.” “I don’t know.”
The main thing to remember in the whole Bari Weiss spiking a 60 Minutes story to appease Trump mishigoss is that Bari Weiss is a deeply mediocre person who never wrote a single interesting or original thing during her entire cursed tenure on the NYT opinion pages. She sucks, and she failed upward too high and fast to handle the fallout. Oh, and you can see that story she spiked here. Thanks, Canada!
“The Edge is in the news today because David Brooks is in some of the photos the House Democrats released today of Jeffrey Epstein, which seem to be from one of the Billionaires’ Dinners. Last month, Brooks wrote a column saying that we’re making too much of Jeffrey Epstein.” David Brooks is a vastly overrated public thinker, but even I will admit that he’s occasionally said some interesting things, which puts him slightly ahead of Bari Weiss. But not by that much.
“Scientists are racing to figure out why porcupines are disappearing from their former stomping grounds.”
“It’s also believed to be the first time a player and school have taken each other to court over an NIL dispute. The resolution could hinge on Wilson’s argument that the NIL agreement with Georgia’s collective was a binding contract.”
“Coughenour is one of dozens of federal judges who have found themselves at the center of a political maelstrom as they have ruled against President Donald Trump or spoken up in defense of the judiciary. With Trump administration officials vilifying judges who rule against the government, a wave of violent threats and harassment has often followed.”
“The competing narratives — medical professionals widely endorse decades of science supporting vaccine safety while the federal government under President Donald Trump does not — creates a confusing environment that ultimately shifts long-standing medical recommendation practices from the federal government and onto parents, individual practitioners, and medical associations.”
“A Loss Only Mariners Baseball Could Cure“. A beautiful story about baseball and the loss of a family member.
RIP, Dr. Neil Frank, former chief meteorologist for our CBS affiliate KHOU and former head of the National Hurricane Center. He was a trusted source for news about storms for many years, and a Houston icon.
“When Congress passed the Epstein Files law the common and undoubtedly correct assumption was that the Trump DOJ would simply weed out the Trump stuff. And as we’ve seen they’ve gone to town releasing everything about … say, Bill Clinton but in many cases obviously filtered out Trump stuff. So this basic part of the story is predicted, unsurprising and confirmed. But there’s a more complex if no less corrupt story coming into focus.”
“House Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty sued President Donald Trump on Monday — hoping to force the removal of his name from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The lawsuit from the congresswoman, who serves an ex-officio member of the board, argues that the board’s vote to rename the building was illegal because an act of Congress is required for such an action.”
“There is a whole underground world of erotic Christmas ornaments starring famous cartoon characters.” But be careful where you order them from, you might be getting ripped off.
“Donald Trump’s top 25 lies of 2025″.
RIP, Brigitte Bardot, movie star and international sex symbol who took an unfortunate turn to the hard right in her later years.
I have avoided each of the bad songs listed. Yay me! But just reading that description of the worst of the worst is bad enough.
If you want to try to understand the Epstein drops then you should be following Ellie Leonard on substack. Substack is where almost all of the really good independent journalism lives these days. Ellie Leonard takes the Epstein file drops and immediately backs them up and then organizes them and reads them. For now she has determined that the Nassar letter is most likely genuine, but she is also looking for any samples of Epstein’s handwriting to confirm.
https://ellieleonard.substack.com/