Reading archive 2026-02-27

What Is Palantir? An FAQ.: The Peter Thiel–founded, ‘Lord of the Rings’–inspired company has a massive government presence and is seemingly always at the center of controversy. So, uh … why does hardly anyone know what it does? - "Born in Germany and raised partly in South Africa, Thiel was one of Trump’s earliest boosters in Silicon Valley and has been one of Silicon Valley’s biggest Republican donors. Politically, Thiel is often described as a libertarian, which is an interesting conclusion to draw about a guy whose work has consistently had the effect of enhancing state power and who once famously said, 'I no longer believe freedom and democracy are compatible.' There’s a sort of übermensch libertarianism that you often encounter in narcissists who see themselves as Ayn Rand protagonists; full of elevated ideas about their own grand destinies, they believe they themselves should live in unconstrained freedom, but they don’t really care if their housekeepers do. (Generally, they seem pretty happy with any hierarchy that places other people beneath them, which is not how libertarianism is supposed to work.) Maybe Thiel is that sort of libertarian? I wouldn’t know."

Trump, seeking executive power over elections, is urged to declare emergency: Activists who say they are in coordination with the White House are circulating a draft executive order that would unlock extraordinary presidential power over voting.

What Your DNA Reveals About the Sex Life of Neanderthals: Most people alive today carry fragments of Neanderthal DNA in their genome. Now scientists are gaining a more intimate understanding of the ancient encounters that put it there.

We’re about to turn night into day. Is that a good idea? - "If Reflect Orbital succeeds — a big 'if' for a company that has yet to launch a single satellite — it would by definition increase light pollution when it illuminates areas that have been in the dark. But Nowack said he can light cities with 'less total photons spilling into the environment than streetlights, with the same illumination level on the ground.' As for its effects on birds and other creatures, he said, 'we’re going to be doing these studies with the first satellites.'" [ed. note: lol that's bullshit]

Families frustrated with airline seating: ‘A 2-year-old should sit with their parents’: Should parents have to pay extra to guarantee an adjacent seat for their toddler?

As MAGA embraces Erika Kirk, Candace Owens goes on the attack: The right-wing influencer launched a video series about Charlie Kirk’s widow that is provoking outrage among conservatives — and raising Owens’s profile.

The hypothetical nuclear attack that escalated the Pentagon’s showdown with Anthropic: Start-up Anthropic and the U.S. military are careening toward a clash over government use of artificial intelligence — and whether it should be allowed to kill.

Why I Got Thrown Out of a Jasmine Crockett Rally: The crowd was fired up. The candidate was on her game. And I was escorted out by armed guards. - "'Are you Elaine?" she asked. I recognized her from the entrance of the event, where I had identified myself as she'd waved me into the building's press area. Yes, I answered. 'Her team has asked you to leave,' she said. When I asked why, the staffer looked at her phone and read dutifully: 'They just said, 'Elaine from Atlantic, white girl with a hat and notepad. She's interviewing people in the crowd. She's a top-notch hater and will spin. She needs to leave.''"

Trump’s Favorite Voter-ID Bill Would Probably Backfire: Congressional Republicans are trying to pass a strict “election integrity” law that seems almost custom-designed to disenfranchise their own supporters. - "Trump beat Kamala Harris among voters who didn't regularly participate in elections. In the low-turnout, off-cycle elections that have happened since then, Democrats have overperformed dramatically, suggesting that their advantage with the most educated, plugged-in voters remains strong. In other words, the politics of voter ID have not caught up to its new partisan implications. Making voting more difficult would most likely hurt Republicans' chances, yet they're pushing hard to make that happen; meanwhile, Democrats, who insist that Trump and a MAGA Congress are existential threats to American democracy, refuse on principle to help Republicans sabotage themselves.

...

"The Democratic analyst David Shor has found that Democrats dominated in 2024 with voters whose political identity was very important to them. If every eligible voter had voted, Shor concluded, Trump would have won by five points instead of one and a half."

Reading archive 2026-02-25

A professor challenged the Smithsonian. Security shut the gallery.: As President Donald Trump seeks to reshape its museums and other cultural institutions, wall text has become a battleground and documentation a form of resistance.

Don’t save Social Security: Trying to fix the retirement program is infeasible. Better to find new ways of achieving its goals. - "As two experts on the program recently wrote, Social Security sends only 7 percent of its benefits to the poorest 20 percent of senior citizens. The richest 20 percent receive 29 percent.

"The rationale for the disparity is that there should be some connection between how much a worker puts in and how much he takes out. But that link is pretty loose, and nearly all current retirees receive more than they paid. A middle-class worker who retires in the next decade will, on average, receive 47 percent more than the sum of what the person paid in taxes and the interest on that money. The skewed benefit structure means that even though Social Security paid out $1.6 trillion last year, around 6 percent of seniors still live in poverty.

"To get a sense of how perverse that is, consider another recent finding of the CBO: If everyone older than 65 were given a flat annual benefit worth 150 percent of the poverty line — that would be about $32,500 for a couple this year — the program would no longer be insolvent and senior poverty would be abolished."

Electric buses are passing a brutal cold-weather test in Wisconsin: Madison is proving that electric buses can run through frightfully cold winters, providing a blueprint for zero-emissions transit in other frigid locales.

Ukraine: Still Standing: Years after Russia’s invasion, Ukraine’s endurance is the story

‘I Genuinely Am Upset That Your Kids Are Vaccinated’: Del Bigtree, a longtime ally of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., isn’t just anti-vaccine. He’s pro-infection.

Why covid-19 is “a vascular disease masquerading as a respiratory one”

Reading archive 2026-02-24

FBI Director Kash Patel defends partying with U.S. Olympic ice hockey team: Videos of Patel celebrating in Italy went viral Sunday night, prompting criticism and questions about his judgment during a critical time for the FBI.

GOP lawmaker quietly questioned ‘disturbing’ East Wing demolition: Rep. Michael Turner, co-chair of the congressional Historic Preservation Caucus, wrote to a top White House aide about his “substantial concerns” as party leaders publicly backed Trump’s decision.

He made a fake ICE deportation tip line. Then a kindergarten teacher called.: A Nashville comedian’s deportation hotline, set up as a joke, has gone viral among viewers who say it shows the “banality of evil personified.”

Ex-ICE instructor testifies that agency slashed officer training, lied to Congress" A former instructor for Immigration and Customs Enforcement told congressional Democrats the agency has cut “vital classes” from mandatory training for recruits.

High-End Construction Really Does Help Everyone: A new rung at the top of the housing ladder permits people lower down to climb up.

Reading archive 2026-02-23

The No. 1 item food stamps buy is a travesty. Now states can say no. [ed. note: when the Obama administration tried this, it was nanny-state nonsense]

Judge Cannon orders secrecy for report on Trump classified-documents case: A federal judge in Florida blocked public release of special counsel Jack Smith’s extensive report into the classified-documents case against President Donald Trump. - "Cannon attempted to differentiate the release of Smith’s report from other cases [such as Robert K. Hur's case against Biden], saying that there was no precedent for releasing a report in a case in which the charges have been dismissed and the defendants maintain their innocence. The lack of precedent existed largely because Cannon’s order dismissing the case on the grounds that Smith’s appointment was unlawful was, itself, unprecedented." [ed. note: this fucking cunt]

This economic idea transfixed Wall Street and Washington. It may be a mirage.: Massive investment in AI contributed “basically zero” to U.S. economic growth last year, Goldman Sachs has calculated.

As Andrew fell, Queen Elizabeth II held out hope, and Charles and William fumed: As sordid allegations engulfed Prince Andrew, Queen Elizabeth II showed a mother’s love, King Charles III a brother’s fury, and Prince William, a nephew’s dismay.

Are ‘flushable’ wipes really flushable?: After flushed wipes caused a sewage spill in the Potomac River, local authorities are reiterating their call to ignore the “flushable” label.

Reading archive 2026-02-20

Prince Andrew's Arrest: Across the pond in Britain, accountability is a serious matter

DOJ struggles as White House presses on voter fraud: Efforts to prosecute noncitizen voters have been slowed by lack of evidence, officials say, while Trump aides push for a broader crackdown.

Reading archive 2026-02-19

Europe and Canada Are Like the Kids in an Ugly Divorce: Europe and Canada seek “strategic balance” between Washington and Beijing but often just get caught in the middle. - "'We are being bombarded with complaints, grievances, tariffs, more tariffs,' Giles Gherson, president and CEO of the Toronto Region Board of Trade, Canada's largest chamber of commerce, told us. 'As soon as the concessions are made and they're pocketed, new demands show up-and relentlessly.'"

When politics comes to the parenting group chat: A parents’ group tried to establish boundaries for discussion on their WhatsApp chat. It led to a schism. - "What happened in Peanuts, it seems, is not unique. Neighborhood group chats are, in some ways, like all social media, where all roads lead to the proverbial comments section. In 2023, Mother Jones reported on a parent group in liberal Ann Arbor, Michigan, that spiraled out of control after commentary about Gaza. Moderators of that group decided to ban all posts about Israel and Palestine to keep the peace. New York Magazine reported that a parent Facebook group on New York’s Upper East Side 'devolved into panic and infighting' after Zohran Mamdani was elected mayor."

The Atlantic’s essay about measles was gut-wrenching. Some readers feel deceived.: Some critics and physicians said Elizabeth Bruenig’s second-person account of a mother confronting a child’s death from measles felt misleading once they learned the story was reported fiction.

"Enormous structures tend to be built to last. Airport terminals are usually the reverse": Greater effort must be made to retain decommissioned airport terminal buildings, writes Anthony Paletta.

Trump Action Tracker: Documenting the actions, statements, and plans of President Trump and his administration that echo those of authoritarian regimes and may pose a threat to American democracy, since January 2025.

The Cult Deprogrammer Who Needed Deprogramming: For 20 years Rick Ross was in a ‘cult’ of his own. “I’ll tell you what kind of person joins a cult,” he says. “Every kind.”

The man who saves people from the world’s most dangerous cults: ‘Deprogrammer’ Rick Ross shares the lessons learnt from a career spent reuniting families with loved ones lost to destructive sects

I was raised in a cult that groomed me into a chess prodigy. I used it to escape: Danny Rensch was born into a life of indoctrination. But as ‘the Collective’ loosened its grip, he advanced

'Just push us into the sea': The frustration of an area failed by politics - "Pat, 64, says the village has been left to 'disintegrate' and believes the role of the EU was misunderstood. 'Everybody thought the EU was about people coming into the country. They didn't portray what benefits we were having.' 

"Denise sees investment in other nearby towns, like Seaham, and feels aggrieved that it hasn't been replicated in Horden. Her vote lies firmly with Reform UK. Brexit has failed due to the way it's been enacted, she says, and it's time to turn back to Nigel Farage."

A ‘smut renaissance’ has arrived: The success of “Ember and Ice,” starring Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams from “Heated Rivalry,” underscores the growing popularity of audio erotica.

Democrats revive a once-taboo idea: Capping grocery prices: Economists hate the idea of price controls. Democrats are exploring how they can address high food costs that have frustrated voters.

After leaving WHO, Trump officials propose more expensive replacement to duplicate it: HHS proposes spending $2 billion a year to re-create systems the U.S. accessed through the WHO at a fraction of the cost, according to officials briefed on the matter.

Inside the Hidden Network of Resistance in Minneapolis: Waves of federal agents forced countless Minnesota residents into hiding. Countless more responded with a movement unlike any other. A deeper look reveals the heartbeat of resistance—and the soul of the city.

5% of People Detained By ICE Have Violent Convictions, 73% No Convictions

Reading archive 2026-02-18

The 2020 ‘stolen election’ obsession: Cynical? Delusional? Reptilian? Trump believes his losing at anything is impossible. Thus, Biden’s win must be fraudulent.

Teen arrested after approaching U.S. Capitol with loaded shotgun: Capitol Police say an 18-year-old wearing tactical gear ran toward the Capitol before being arrested.

Reading archive 2026-02-17

Something Big Is Happening - "Start using AI seriously, not just as a search engine. Sign up for the paid version of Claude or ChatGPT. It's $20 a month. But two things matter right away. First: make sure you're using the best model available, not just the default. These apps often default to a faster, dumber model. Dig into the settings or the model picker and select the most capable option. Right now that's GPT-5.2 on ChatGPT or Claude Opus 4.6 on Claude, but it changes every couple of months. If you want to stay current on which model is best at any given time, you can follow me on X (@mattshumer_). I test every major release and share what's actually worth using."

Stephen Colbert says CBS blocked interview with Texas Democrat over FCC concerns: The on-air condemnation comes before Colbert’s “Late Show” goes off the air in May, a decision the network previously called “purely a financial decision.”

Another government sop to an ailing industry: An executive order requiring the military to purchase coal puts politics over the free market.

Researcher skeptical of ‘Havana syndrome’ tested secret weapon on himself: In 2024, a Norwegian researcher skeptical that pulsed-energy weapons could do damage to human brains built a device and tested it on himself. It didn’t go well.

A relationship on the rocks: Europe and America need each other, but trust is gone:  This year’s Munich Security Conference was milder than last year’s, but Donald Trump has fundamentally changed transatlantic ties.

D.C. mayoral hopeful pledges more affordable child care amid shrinking budgets: A proposal from Janeese Lewis George aims to make child care more accessible for families. But the city would have to fund it during an economic downturn.

‘Us versus them’: The battle that’s tearing a small Virginia town apart: “We are a microcosm of how politics are in this country right now,” said one resident of Purcellville.

Ukraine detains ex-energy minister as high-level corruption case widens: German Galushchenko’s arrest is connected to a $100 million corruption probe that has ensnared senior officials and shaken President Volodymyr Zelensky’s office.

Rubio lends hand to Hungary’s Orban as he faces tough election: “We want this country to do well,” Marco Rubio said during a visit to Budapest, “especially as long as you’re the prime minister.”

Mitch McConnell is taking a beating in the race to replace him: Three GOP candidates, all former McConnell interns, are keeping their distance as they seek to align with President Donald Trump.

Matt Lauer’s Accuser Complicates Her Story: Brooke Nevils’s memoir is also a reckoning with many misconceptions about #MeToo narratives.

Why MAGA Wants You to Think Slavery Wasn’t That Bad: Both the left and the right try to co-opt it, but the real story of American slavery doesn’t serve any one faction. - "'The destruction of slavery is one of the great American achievements,' Sean Wilentz, a historian at Princeton and critic of 'The 1619 Project,' told me. 'Taking slavery seriously in American history is not anti-American. The story of slavery in the U.S. is about an ancient institution that was planted here, thrived here, and then was confronted and ultimately attacked in the 19th century through enormous sacrifice, including military conflict. That's an extraordinary American story.'"

Putin Didn’t Know How Good He Had It: The Russian leader has gotten the world he wished for—and it’s threatening to crush him.

Reading archive 2026-02-13

What Alcohol Does to the Body: From the moment you take a sip, drinking starts to influence your biology. Here’s an inside look.

Consumers and businesses paid nearly 90% of Trump tariffs in 2025, new analysis found

Using a law deployed against mob bosses, D.C. files suit against a landlord: The suit, filed by D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb, claims the landlord and two of his family members enriched themselves while leaving tenants in squalid, unsafe conditions.

How to make sure the Stalinist in the Kremlin faces a grim future: Crippled by his Ukraine misadventure, Vladimir Putin is surely defining success down.

The Epstein Emails Show How the Powerful Talk About Race: The files reveal the disgraced financier’s interest in “race science.”

Zelensky Makes His Pitch to Trump: Ukraine’s president calls on his most powerful ally to not squander the chance to make peace.

This Is How a Child Dies of Measles: When your family becomes a data point in an outbreak [exemplum]

John Oliver Keeps Pushing the Rock Up the Hill: As ‘Last Week Tonight’ launches its 13th season into an atmosphere of division and anti-information, its host explains how the show has changed—and why they keep making it

Reading archive 2026-02-12

Please, Not Another Kennedy: Nancy Pelosi reportedly plans to endorse JFK’s grandson for Congress. Why? - "As a Kennedy, Schlossberg has been a lifelong celebrity in the traditional definition of the word-a person who is famous for being famous. He's been profiled in Town & Country, on the Today show, in The Washington Post, and in The New York Times. The theme of this coverage is that Schlossberg (1) is a Kennedy, (2) is handsome, and (3) posts lots of edgy content on social media. To suggest that he has failed upward would give him too much credit because failing requires having been entrusted with some responsibility in the first place."

A Foreign Policy Worse Than Regime Change: The world is threatened by the president’s self-absorption and incoherence.

Russian War Spending May be Maxed Out: The official budget deficit surged last year, as did off-balance sheet military spending via the banking system and unpaid bills. That might be tough to sustain, especially with lower oil revenues.

Trump’s Gaza Plans Are Profoundly Unserious: Conditions on the ground call for immediate humanitarian relief, not gauzy real-estate fantasies.

People Who Don’t Understand Downtowns Are Destroying Downtowns: A far-fetched plan to demolish Dallas’s seat of government reflects the city’s diminished role in the region.

What Mamdani Doesn’t Know About Tenants: Fixing New York’s affordable housing isn’t as simple as going after bad landlords.

Tariffs are just a rehearsal for taxing every American’s consumption: When staggering entitlement costs finally come due, a desperate need for more revenue will kick in. - "Those socially conscious Europeans, whatever fiscal messes they have created for themselves, have had no qualms about taxing their whole populations. The primary vehicle is sales taxation, in the form of value-added taxes, which accumulate along a product’s value chain and are ultimately paid by the consumer. VATs extract roughly 9 percent to 10 percent of middle-class incomes across the euro zone and can result in middle-income citizens paying for nearly half of all VAT revenue. Every country in the 38-member Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development except the United States has one.

"That’s a major reason the U.S., frequent misrepresentations to the contrary, has the most progressive tax system among the most developed countries. Here, the top 10 percent pay about 70 percent of U.S. income taxes, and more than half the total U.S. taxes even when payroll taxes are included. The dreaded 1 percent pick up more than a quarter of the entire federal tab."

The Myth of the Police State: No one, not even the supposed beneficiaries, is protected. - "Mass revenge simply did not happen. That seems hard for people who never experienced such a total upending of a political hierarchy to understand. But in my years in South Africa, living in rural Afrikaner towns as well as in cities, I’ve heard much more about the shock white South Africans felt at how warmly their neighbors and colleagues of color have treated them than I’ve heard complaints about the opposite. An overwhelming number of South Africans of color understand that white people’s lives were not blissful under apartheid either."

Reading archive 2026-02-11

The New Laser That Can Take Down Aircraft: Russian strikes have forced Ukraine to build high-tech air defense on the cheap.

Dad unlawfully killed daughter in Texas shooting, coroner rules

Nate Silver Is Making This Up as He Goes: Once a principled data journalist, the FiveThirtyEight founder has revealed himself as just another hack spouting off on social media. [ed. note: from 2019]

Jeffrey Epstein Introduced Melania to Donald Trump, New Bombshell FBI Files Claim

Kremlin and Kazakhstan Both Have Kompromat on Trump, Says Ex-KGB Spy Chief: The ex-KGB official and Kazakh spy chief who claimed Donald Trump had been recruited by the KGB on his watch now says that Kazakhstan tried to used kompromat videos to blackmail Trump.

Trump’s family is embroiled in a $500m UAE scandal. We’ve hardly noticed: A crypto startup founded by Trump’s family signed a huge deal with the UAE president’s brother. Where’s the political fallout? - "Two weeks after MGX’s $2bn investment in the Trump family’s crypto firm, the Trump administration allowed the UAE to buy hundreds of thousands of advanced computer chips critical for AI development. The chips are made by US companies, especially Nvidia, and the Biden administration had restricted how many chips certain foreign countries can buy to prevent the technology from being misused. But Trump scrapped those restrictions."

The case for keeping your garden dark at night: Outdoor lighting is having an outsize impact on the flora and fauna that share our habitats.

Inside the Kennedy Center’s scorched-earth Washington National Opera split: How an opera leader plotted a path to leave the legendary arts center after the Trump takeover alienated audiences.

She bounced a $25 check in 2014. ICE tried to deport her.: A Missouri grandma and lawful resident spent months in detention for a decade-old misdemeanor, underscoring the massive scope of the administration’s deportation efforts. - "When Donna was detained, Jim wrote to every member of Missouri’s congressional delegation. He struck out, but then help came from an unexpected place: Rep. Seth Magaziner, a Democrat who represents Rhode Island. Magaziner brought Jim to Washington to speak at a panel on Trump’s immigration crackdown. At the event, Jim was asked why he had voted for Trump. He paused. 'Because I was an idiot,' he answered."

Amtrak’s new trains are arriving soon. Here’s what to expect.: Upgrades mean no more fighting for power with your neighbor or touching icky bathroom handles.

Reading archive 2026-02-10

Trump Has Betrayed the People of Coal Country. They Love Him Anyway.: "He thinks our people are idiots."

A Raid in a Small Town Brings Trump's Deportations to Deep-Red Idaho: Wilder, Idaho, prided itself on comity. Then federal agents stormed a racetrack outside of town in October, and the reverberations are still shaking the community.

Trump is making voters uneasy. Democrats are pushing them away.: Punishing the wealthy might make Democrats feel good, but it won’t convince many voters. [ed. note: shill from libertarian think tank]

Don’t Let Climate Fatalism Become a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: The idea that it’s “too late” to reduce emissions fuels cynicism and despair, putting us on an even worse trajectory. - "And finally, stress less about the small stuff — recycling, plastic bags and food wrappers, food miles, turning the lights off, leaving devices on standby — especially if it comes at the expense of the big things listed above. This is a concept called 'moral licensing,' in which people feel they’ve contributed to the small stuff and therefore ignore their more carbon-intensive behaviors. People will often feel proud about bringing their plastic bag to a supermarket (which has a tiny carbon footprint) and then fill it with meat and dairy (which has a much bigger impact)."

Should you feed a cold and starve a fever? Here’s what experts say.: What nutrients do you need to help your body as it fights an infection?

Buy-it-for-life coffee makers can save money, reduce waste, brew better: That new $50 drip coffee maker on your counter? Destined for the landfill after a few years of dispensing mediocre coffee.

Student injured, another arrested in shooting at Wootton High in Maryland: Police in Montgomery County arrested the suspect near the school in Rockville.

The history of figure skating’s most controversial trick — the backflip: This is the first Olympics to feature backflips in over 25 years.

Two men were paid by D.C. to stop violence. Both are charged with homicide.: Frank Johnson is the second violence interrupter in the city to face charges in the fatal shooting of a former college basketball star. - "Johnson previously worked for Life Deeds, according to documents The Post obtained through a records request. He was terminated from Life Deeds in December 2023, three months after the fatal shooting of Bozeman, after he was charged with an unrelated felony gun possession offense. Johnson was convicted — only to be rehired as a violence interrupter last year for a different organization receiving D.C. government grant funds. Now, he has been fired again following the murder charge, according to the Rev. Judie Shepherd-Gore, the executive director of InnerCity Collaborative Community Development Corporation, where Johnson had worked as a violence interrupter since last year.

...

"It was the second time in five years that Wynn, who was well known in the violence intervention space, was charged with murder. He was also accused of committing a homicide in 2020. Prosecutors dropped that case for lack of evidence, and Wynn was allowed to continue working as a violence interrupter."

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Moderation used to help Democrats win, but its advantages now have been greatly exaggerated. - "This brings us back to a crucial point: successful anti-authoritarian movements don’t win by moderating their positions on a traditional left-right axis but by creating an entirely new one. They mobilize previously disengaged citizens by framing the struggle not as a contest over policy, but as a fight for the fundamental fairness of the system itself.

...

"Scholars of democratic breakdown know that moments like this demand institutional coordination, civil society mobilization, and the political courage to name and confront the authoritarian threat on its weakest flank. Every democracy facing this challenge has learned you don’t defeat authoritarians by being more reasonable. You defeat them by being more determined and by uniting the country against their most visible vulnerability: their corruption."

Forum How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Moderation helps when margins are small. - "But, of course, [an ideologically dogmatic party] runs the risk of empowering fascists, threatening the foundations of American electoral democracy, costing millions of people their health insurance, subjecting the country to a terrifying new regime of internal immigration enforcement, making less-than-zero progress on climate change, and depriving millions of women of their basic rights. To me, that makes “shoot the moon” a bad bet—Democrats have been trying a version of shoot-the-moon since Obama’s reelection, it has hurt, and the solution is to stop doing it. But it would be an intellectually stimulating debate. Highly ideological leftists are aware, I think, that the mood in the Democratic Party is very alarmed by Trump and Trumpism and that if we had square argument about the benefits and risks of shooting the moon, their side would lose."

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Trans rights aren’t tanking the Democrats.

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: We need reconstruction, not restoration—as FDR knew.

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Democrats must rebuild in rural America. - "Each of the last six times Republicans won majority control of the Senate, they were elected by a group of states in which less than half the county’s population resides. Moreover, because the Senate is tasked with confirming nominees to the Supreme Court, this electoral bias translates into outsized power to shape the judiciary and, in turn, the rulings it hands down. Four of the six sitting conservative justices were confirmed by senators from states that are home to less than 50 percent of the U.S. population. In short, the rural-urban divide helps facilitate minoritarian rule."

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Macroeconomics is the driver, not median voters. - "Unless Democrats offer a message far stronger than anything they have in a long time—unless, in Warren’s words, they 'aggressively challenge the status quo' and 'chart a clear path for big, structural change,' especially on the economic front—they will remain easy targets for caricature. Promoting a Whig revival around democracy and Obamacare tweaks, supply-side tinkering and free trade, or abundance-by-deregulation, jobs, AI wonders, and all the rest risks cementing their status as a permanent minority party."

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: The focus should be fighting plutocracy.

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: The antidote to cynicism is going big. - "The notion that moderation would serve as a corrective to this perception is wildly off base. The millions of Biden voters who sat out crave more differentiation, not less, and a grander vision of an economic and political system that they could thrive within. None of them were in the mood to tinker around the edges. The antidote to cynicism isn’t to get small but to go big."

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Jesse Jackson’s campaigns point the way. - "The path is clear: seek out an authentic candidate with an agenda that expands our ideas of what is politically possible, someone who can lead a diverse coalition united by a renewed sense of justice and collective purpose."

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Public opinion is only partly malleable.

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: We have no choice but to fight.

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Voters don’t think like strategists. - "Bonica and Grumbach are correct that the empirical case for moderation has largely collapsed. But the more significant lesson from our collective work is that the entire moderate-progressive debate constitutes an elite construction—one that projects the strategist’s hyperideological conception of politics onto an electorate that predominantly does not reason in those terms. When one abandons the pretense of optimizing one’s way to electoral victory, something clarifying emerges: the necessity of determining what one actually believes, and campaigning accordingly. That, after all, is what democratic politics is supposed to entail."

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism: Democrats can’t simply react to polls. They must lead.

Reading archive 2026-02-09

 Killers without a cause: The rise in nihilistic violent extremism: “The message is there is no message.”

The AI boom is so huge it’s causing shortages everywhere else: The $700 billion AI spending spree has few precedents. Good luck finding an electrician or a reasonably priced smartphone.

Another ludicrous canceling of a name from the past: Shaming the dead is an asinine culture warriors’ pastime. Now it’s the great diarist Samuel Pepys’s turn. - "It is notable that the ire of activists never seems to be directed at Karl Marx, whose repeated use of the most objectionable racial slurs in his personal correspondence is curiously overlooked. Meanwhile, protesters in Portland, Oregon, in a 2020 demonstration that organizers called an 'Indigenous Day of Rage,' tore down statues of former presidents Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt."

Ice dance will incorporate queer culture unlike in any other Olympics: Officials asked teams to open their millennial playlists and skate their first program to music from the ’90s.

Will Texas elect a Democratic senator?: James Talarico, a liberal minister-in-training, fights an uphill battle to capture a GOP Senate seat in deep-red Texas.

The unflinching hosts of ‘I’ve Had It’ aren’t backing down: Jennifer Welch and Angie Sullivan have emerged as effective political commentators.

American Milk Has Changed: A dramatic increase in fat content is causing pains in the dairy industry.

Reading archive 2026-02-06

Good news: We saved the bees. Bad news: We saved the wrong ones.: Honeybees have never been in danger of extinction. But scientists are finding that they can accelerate the demise of native bee populations.

Ron Wyden Only Talks Like This When The Spies Do Something *Real* Bad: No, I don't know what they did. But I have a lot of experience with the senator

The Means-Testing Industrial Complex - "The CBO conservatively estimates that these rules will strip Medicaid coverage from over 7 million people. For millions of working Americans this maze of new rules will mean losing their life-saving health insurance and financial ruin. For Mark Begor, Equifax, and other government contractors, this maze of new rules means profit.

...

"With governments entirely reliant on Equifax to administer life-saving benefits to millions of low-income Americans, steep price hikes quickly followed. The New York Times uncovered that in many places, the toll paid to Equifax for the Work Number doubled, then tripled, and more than quadrupled in only a few years. Local, state, and federal agencies have helplessly watched their public funds raided, boxed in by the dual forces of means-testing requirements and unconstrained market power.

...

"Again, new work requirements for Medicaid highlight the profits to be made from adding complexity to the safety net. Since Georgia implemented work requirements in 2020, they have spent twice as much on Deloitte consultants and administrative costs as on healthcare for people. As the other 55 states and territories are now forced to join Georgia and implement new work requirements, millions will lose their healthcare and Deloitte will cash in."

James Comer Gives Dems an Unexpected Gift: The House Oversight Committee swung at Clinton but might have hit Trump. [ed. note: dragging an ex-president in front of Congress sets a precedent that Trump doesn't like]

Tulsi Gabbard is showing why her job shouldn’t exist: Trump’s director of national intelligence is making worse the problems with the ill-conceived role.

What Democrats are demanding in exchange for funding ICE: Republicans have criticized Democrats’ proposals as “a ridiculous Christmas list” but say they’re willing to negotiate.

Trump shares, then deletes video depicting Obamas as apes: Tim Scott, the sole Black Republican in the Senate, called it “the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House.”

Bollywood Embraces a Taj Mahal Conspiracy Theory: The internet and a new film have breathed life into old conspiracy theories about one of the world’s most famous landmarks. - "The film’s promotional materials promised to 'reveal the untold history' of the landmark. It doesn’t. What it has done instead is rehash discredited claims that once were relegated to the fringes of the internet, giving prominence to efforts to inflame sectarian tensions.

...

"[P.N. Oak, inventor of this lie] also published numerous other books claiming that Christianity and Islam were in fact offshoots of Hinduism and that many physical landmarks of those faiths, including St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican and the Kaaba in Mecca, were originally Hindu temples. 

"Oak didn’t disguise his intentions. Born in the British colonial era (and having fought on the Japanese side in World War II), he founded the Institute for Rewriting Indian History, which sought to recast the nation’s history as one of conquest and colonization of its true Hindu identity."

Reading archive 2026-02-05

Washington Post Lays Off More Than 300 Journalists: The layoffs cut into The Post’s local, international and sports coverage, and reduced its entire work force by about 30 percent. - "Much of [Weill Lewis's] tenure has been tumultuous, including a shake-up of newsroom leadership and scrutiny of his ties to a phone-hacking scandal while he worked for News Corp. Just before the 2024 presidential election, Mr. Lewis announced a new policy from Mr. Bezos ending presidential endorsements by The Post’s editorial board, which blocked a drafted endorsement of the Democratic candidate, Vice President Kamala Harris. Hundreds of thousands of Post subscribers canceled their subscriptions in response. 

"In a staff meeting in 2024, Mr. Lewis warned that The Post was in trouble. 'We are losing large amounts of money,' he said. 'Your audience has halved in recent years. People are not reading your stuff.'"

House rejects D.C. tax changes, potentially costing the city $600M in revenue: If passed by the Senate, the measure could lead to a months-long suspension of the city’s tax filing system.

No, Billie Eilish, Americans are not thieves on stolen land: Civilization depends on secure property titles, not sincere apologies. - "It is easy to call land stolen, but what about the innocent purchasers who acquired in good faith in the interim? Are they thieves? Is Eilish a thief because, as the Tongva tribe recently asserted, her $3 million mansion in Los Angeles sits on its ancestral homeland?"

What to know about the rare condition Catherine O’Hara had: The late actor and comedian was born with a condition called situs inversus. Here’s what that means.

As West goes after Russia’s oil fleet, Moscow fears for its war funding: New European measures to crack down on Russia’s shadow fleet could severely hurt its economy at a time when it is looking increasingly vulnerable.

Democrats have an early front-runner: Gavin Newsom’s bet on joyful combat and coiffed charisma is paying dividends.

Gavin Newsom is very similar to Kamala Harris: Two San Francisco local elected officials who successfully ran statewide in CA - "My point, though, is that going from holding statewide office in California to running in a national election is not like the A.F.C. champion going to the Super Bowl. 

"It is hard to win these jobs, and getting them involves a real display of political skill. But that skill is not beating Republicans in elections. It’s catering to Democratic Party insiders and affiliated advocacy groups and generating media buzz and endorsements. And this environment is a bad training ground for developing politicians who are good at beating the opposition party. It’s as if you took the winning team from the Champions League and then sent those players to the N.B.A. Finals on the theory that they’re top-notch athletes. You’re selecting on the wrong thing. And it shows."

Our 2024 Wins Above Replacement (WAR) Models: The races where fundamentals pointed to one outcome, but candidate quality led to another

He lost a pinkie trying to kill a man. From prison, he made things worse.: A case in Maryland involving a former high school wrestling star challenged a judge with a difficult question: Who deserves mercy?

Why this vegan environmentalist thinks meat is the future: A new book argues that people will never give up meat — and that plant-based and lab-grown meat will be the “next agricultural revolution.”

D.C.’s largest office-to-residential conversion is officially underway: A former office in Dupont Circle will become a 15-story, 532-unit apartment building, the kind of transformation that D.C. officials see as key to downtown’s future.

On Greenland, Europe stood up, Trump blinked, and the E.U. learned a lesson: For some in the often fractured E.U., Trump’s retreat on the Arctic territory proves that retaliation — not conciliation — is the answer to his hardball tactics.

ICE surge creates new headache for Maine’s Susan Collins: The most vulnerable Republican in the Senate would not say whether she supported the federal enforcement effort.

On a paradise island in the Pacific, meth and HIV epidemics rage: International criminal syndicates have been using Fiji as a transshipment point for drugs originating in Southeast Asia and Latin America. - "Law enforcement officials, customs agencies, U.N. officials and others who investigate drug syndicates believe that the groups operating in and around Fiji are working with each other, bringing together Chinese triads, Mexican cartels, Australian biker gangs and other syndicates with connections as far away as Nigeria."

Reading archive 2026-02-04

Stephen King’s The Shining, If the Hotel Had Possessed Wendy Instead of Jack

The Evolutionary Brilliance of the Baby Giggle - "Indeed, this idea — that laughter is primarily social, less about comedy and more about connection — holds true for adults as well, and has been underscored by research showing that laughter overwhelmingly occurs in the company of others and typically follows banal remarks in conversation, rather than in response to jokes or punchlines. 

"The signature belly laughs seen in the video above are involuntary, bursting forth during genuine, uncontrollable amusement. This type of laughter is driven by the brain’s limbic system, structures crucial for emotion, memory and motivation. But by 6 months, our lab has found, infants can intentionally produce a laugh. This ability comes not from the limbic system but from the brain’s language areas and emerges at the same time as babbling. Six-month-olds will deploy laughter to prolong a game of peekaboo or to signal a desire to join in."

Texas Democrats taste victory, then turn on each other: Days after their win in a state Senate race, reports of a racially charged comment roil the U.S. Senate primary contest.

As cold-stunned invasive iguanas fall from trees, Floridians scoop them up for killing: These cold-blooded reptiles’ nervous systems shut down when temperatures dip into the 40s and below. This time, that meant killing season.

Choose your crisis, Congress: Six paths to fiscal disaster: The national debt is nearing $39 trillion. Dire consequences are coming.

Trump, in an Escalation, Calls for Republicans to 'Nationalize' Elections: The comments, made on a conservative podcast, follow a string of moves from his administration to try to exert more control over American elections.

What a swing House district in Colorado shows about Republicans’ immigration fallout in the midterms

Kansas Legislature Passes Trans Bathroom Bounty, Drivers License Revocations: “They're using very overtly anti-democratic measures to pass all this stuff because they know that it's unpopular.”

These Trump voters 'formed a suicide pact' and Republicans are panicking: ex-GOP operative

‘They Voted For Trump, And Now They’re In Tears’—Now Rural Farmers Say Tariffs & Costs Are Pushing Them Toward Bankruptcy

St. Peter police chief intervened and got federal agents to release resident, sources say

Donald Trump vowed to unleash U.S. oil. A year later, low prices are squeezing Texas producers.

Reading archive 2026-02-03

The Melania Trump Documentary Is a Disgrace: The exorbitant film captures the rotten state of the entertainment industry.

Trump’s New Method of Humiliation: The president doesn’t seem to fire people anymore, but he marginalizes them in other ways.

Moderna’s chilling announcement is a symptom of a deeper sickness China is on track to become the world’s pharmaceutical leader if the U.S. keeps blowing its edge. - "China’s pharmaceutical industry, long known for making precursor chemicals and cheap generics, is steadily moving up the value chain into innovative compounds. If China gains the upper hand, the U.S. risks seeing supplies of critical drugs held hostage during conflict. The pandemic gave a taste of what that might look like, as did China briefly cutting off U.S. access to critical minerals. No one in the free world wants to face blackmail to access cutting-edge medicines."

Homeland Security is targeting Americans with this secretive legal weapon: In October, a retiree emailed a DHS attorney to urge mercy for an asylum seeker. Then DHS subpoenaed his Google account and sent investigators to his home. [ed. note: administrative subpoenas]

House vote could upend D.C.’s tax code, hit revenue mid-tax season: D.C. officials say the potential action from Congress would sow fiscal chaos for the city.

The grave risk of Trump’s Kennedy Center shutdown: Even in the best-case scenario, the president’s plan will only strain the performing arts ecosystem required for the center to thrive.

What to know about rats and trash during the cold: “Dog poop is a snack for rats,” one rodent expert said. “It’s like an energy bar.”

How D.C. allowed ‘completely inappropriate’ spending by anti-violence group: Life Deeds used more than $400,000 in city funds to hire businesses owned by its employees and spent money on trips to a New Jersey shopping mall, lavish meals and a pool party with alcohol. - "'It cannot be a free-for-all,' Pinto said. 

"Her concerns were informed in part by feedback from University of Maryland professor Joseph Richardson and his research partner, Daniel Webster, who have been evaluating D.C.’s violence intervention programs for a forthcoming study. Webster, a professor at Johns Hopkins University, has testified that ONSE did not employ enough violence interrupters and did not use strategies backed by sufficient research. 

"'Thus far, I will be very clear and frank that we’re not seeing beneficial effects' from violence interruption programs in D.C., he said at a D.C. Council hearing in October 2024."

Why this nutrient is great for your gut health: What’s more, cooling and refrigerating certain foods like rice, potatoes and pasta boosts their resistant starch.

Reading archive 2026-02-02

What I discovered about Josh Shapiro at the Pennsylvania Farm Show: The governor champions a 67-county strategy to win voters in a critical battleground state.

Millions of gallons of sewage spilled into the Potomac. Here’s what we know.: Experts say clean up efforts could reach $10 million and environmentalists worry about impact to wildlife.

Trump wants to build a 250-foot-tall arch, dwarfing the Lincoln Memorial: The president is eyeing a plot of land near Memorial Bridge. The art critic who proposed the idea called for a smaller arch or for Trump to pick a new site.

Minneapolis’ Hotel Workers Are on Edge: Staff across the city told NOTUS how their lives have changed since the start of the federal immigration operation. “It’s frightening,” one said. - "The first woman, a foreign-born naturalized U.S. citizen, resents how her undocumented coworkers spend their days cleaning the rooms of agents who are 'hunting down their family members.'

"'When I see them in the hallways, they avert their gaze,' she said of the federal agents in her hotel. 'They know what they’re doing is shameful. They’re nearly all Hispanic, but they don’t speak Spanish! They’re the children of illegals. But they forgot where they came from.'

"A third woman at yet another hotel, who’s undocumented, said she observed what she called the 'typical' racial labor dynamic: a few polite white supervisors commanding Latino men. 

"'The supervisors are respectful. The agents — they aren’t really officers. These are delinquents,' she said.

For traditional Catholics, Charlotte Communion dispute is a battle line: A Charlotte bishop issued an edict about the preferred way to perform the sacrament: standing up. The backlash was fierce and speaks to a broader fight within the U.S. Catholic community.

The real reasons Sundance’s legendary film fest is done with Park City: Next year’s move to Boulder was foreshadowed by red flags and rising costs.

Inside Musk’s bet to hook users that turned Grok into a porn generator: Under pressure to boost its popularity, Elon Musk’s xAI loosened its guardrails and relaxed controls on sexual content, setting off internal concern.

Why do dead leaves stay on trees during winter?: Scientists are investigating the reasons some plants still wear last season’s tattered clothes.