Members phkrause Posted April 4, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 4, 2023 April 3, 2023 This morning, my colleague Reid Epstein, who’s been covering the Supreme Court election in Wisconsin, explains why it’s become such a closely watched race. The vote is tomorrow. — David Leonhardt By Reid J. Epstein Good morning. The status of abortion rights in Wisconsin is a major issue that hangs in the balance in this election. The Wisconsin State Capitol.Taylor Glascock for The New York Times A powerful seat Wisconsin is a microcosm of the country. It is narrowly divided politically, though Democrats have a slight advantage in the popular vote in statewide elections. And, as in Washington, Republicans have structural advantages in the government that give them outsize power. Conservatives have controlled the state’s Supreme Court since 2008, and Republicans have held a hammerlock on the Legislature since 2011, when the party drew itself an impenetrable majority after taking control in a wave election. Tomorrow, Wisconsin will hold an election for a seat on its Supreme Court, and it is no exaggeration to call the race, for a 10-year term, the single most important American election of 2023. It is already the most expensive judicial race in the nation’s history. The candidates and the super PACs supporting them have spent nearly three times as much on this race as in any prior court election. Why is a single state race crucial? Because whichever side prevails will hold a 4-to-3 court majority, and this is the first American election in which the winner will single-handedly determine two big issues: the fate of abortion rights and whether the state has a functional representative democracy. The winner will also set the course for the 2024 presidential election in a state where fewer than 23,000 votes decided four of the last six such races. If the liberal candidate, Janet Protasiewicz, wins, Wisconsin will almost certainly become the first state to allow abortion again after outlawing it with last summer’s ruling overturning Roe v. Wade. And because Democrats are likely to challenge the makeup of the state’s legislative districts if the court has a liberal majority, the near supermajorities that Republicans enjoy in the State Legislature would also probably not survive until the 2024 election. A victory for the conservative candidate, Daniel Kelly, would mean abortion remains illegal, the gerrymandered maps stay in place, and Wisconsin remains a dysfunctional democracy for the foreseeable future. Janet Protasiewicz and Daniel Kelly.Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York Times The biggest prize Abortion became illegal in the state last June, when the U.S. Supreme Court eliminated the constitutional right to an abortion, throwing the question to the states. Wisconsin’s near-total ban on abortion — enacted in 1849, a year after statehood and seven decades before women could vote — suddenly became the law again. Protasiewicz (pronounced pro-tuh-SAY-witz) is a judge and former prosecutor from Milwaukee who has so emphasized her support for abortion rights that nobody could be confused about how she’d rule on the 1849 law. In interviews and television advertisements and during the lone general election debate, she has stressed her belief that abortion decisions should be left to women and their doctors, not to state legislators. Kelly, a conservative former state Supreme Court justice who lost a re-election bid in 2020, has the backing of the state’s leading anti-abortion organizations and has repeatedly stressed his opposition to the practice. Protasiewicz has bet that her support for abortion rights will energize Democratic voters and persuade enough independents and moderate Republicans to win. It is a big wager on the continuation of the politics that helped Democrats exceed expectations in last year’s midterm elections. Democracy is on the line When I got my first full-time job in journalism at The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in 2002, Wisconsin was an evenly divided state but one where control regularly switched back and forth between the two parties. That ended after the 2010 Republican wave, when the party took both chambers of the Legislature and Scott Walker was elected governor. The G.O.P. weakened public-sector labor unions and drew itself the most aggressive gerrymander in the country — near supermajority control of both chambers in a 50-50 state. In 2020, Joe Biden won Wisconsin but carried only 37 out of 99 State Assembly districts. Republicans also changed state law to make voting more onerous, enacting a strict voter ID law, while the state’s Supreme Court banned drop boxes for absentee ballots last year. Wisconsin now ranks 47th out of 50 states on how easy it is to vote, according to the 2022 Cost of Voting Index. Protasiewicz calls the Republican-drawn maps “rigged,” has suggested the labor law is unconstitutional and says she agrees with the liberal dissent in last year’s Supreme Court drop box ruling. Kelly says redistricting is a political problem to be solved by legislators — the very people who created it. This race will have real impact on national issues, too. Wisconsin’s Supreme Court was the only one in the country that agreed to hear Donald Trump’s challenge to the 2020 election, eventually rejecting — by a single vote — his attempt to throw out 200,000 ballots in the state’s two big Democratic counties. Kelly, when I interviewed him in February, declined to say whether he agreed with the decision to uphold the 2020 results. The 2024 presidential election in the state may be close enough to be contested in the courts again. New congressional maps could also put up to three Republican-held House seats in play. Tomorrow’s other big election: Chicago’s mayoral runoff race has focused on crime. The election pits a former schools executive, Paul Vallas, who is campaigning largely on a pro-police platform, against Brandon Johnson, a county commissioner who favors solutions that go beyond policing. Here’s what matters in four of the city’s wards. More politics news Democrats are using messages about abortion in their campaigns, even when the office they’re running for has little say on the issue. Asa Hutchinson, a former governor of Arkansas and a Trump critic, announced his bid for the 2024 Republican nomination. The Biden administration blacklisted a spyware firm. But the government signed a secret contract with the company. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Trump’s Indictment Donald Trump is using his criminal indictment to raise money and promote his 2024 presidential campaign. Trump spent the weekend making plans for his arrest, while officials in New York prepared for potential turmoil. War in Ukraine The Russian authorities said they had detained a woman in the killing of a pro-war blogger in a bombing in St. Petersburg, Russia, yesterday. In a call with his Russian counterpart, Secretary of State Antony Blinken demanded the release of the imprisoned American journalist Evan Gershkovich. A Russian children’s rights advocate says she’s rescuing abandoned Ukrainian children. The International Criminal Court accuses her of abducting them. Residents in a Ukrainian city near active combat refuse to leave. The Times rode with the police trying to evacuate them. International Saudi Arabia, Russia and their oil-producing allies said they would cut production, an apparent effort to increase prices. The Israeli government moved forward with a plan to establish a national guard, a political victory for a far-right minister. Sanna Marin, Finland’s prime minister who found international popularity, lost a national election. Pope Francis left the hospital after receiving treatment for bronchitis. Other Big Stories Storms have resurrected a California lake that was drained.Mark Abramson for The New York Times “This could be the mother of all floods”: California residents are bracing for the melt of this winter’s snowfall. Anti-abortion groups argue abortion pills are dangerous. More than 100 scientific studies have concluded that they are safe. The police found the body of a 2-year-old boy in the jaws of an alligator in Florida after his mother was stabbed to death. Opinions Gail Collins and Bret Stephens discuss Trump’s indictment and the 2024 election. Women’s sports deserve to be mythologized like men’s sports are, Kate Fagan writes. “The Last of Us” is right: In a warming world, fungal infections are a public-health blind spot, Dr. Neil Vora says. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS Secret to happiness: People in Finland say it’s knowing when you have enough. Looking for love? Move abroad. Metropolitan Diary: Getting his daily steps in. (All 113,772 of them.) Quiz time: Take our latest news quiz and share your score (the average was 8.8). Advice from Wirecutter: The best creamy peanut butter. Lives Lived: Seymour Stein championed acts including the Ramones, Talking Heads and the Pretenders on his label Sire, and helped found the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. He died at 80. SPORTS NEWS The victorious L.S.U. players.Tony Gutierrez/Associated Press N.C.A.A. champions: Louisiana State beat Iowa, 102-85, winning its first national title in women’s basketball, The Athletic writes. “I think we have a lot to be proud of,” an emotional Caitlin Clark, Iowa’s star, said after the game. Colorful and divisive coach: Kim Mulkey, L.S.U.’s coach, wore a tiger-striped pantsuit of pink and gold sequins. But don’t mistake her for any triviality, Jeré Longman writes in The Times. It was Mulkey’s fourth national title as head coach. Chaos on the track: Max Verstappen won the Australian Grand Prix yesterday, but it was not a leisurely competition for the title front-runner, The Athletic’s Madeline Coleman writes. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Leonard Scheicher and Girley Jazama in “Measures of Men.”Julia Terjung/Studiocanal GmbH History on screen Modern Germany has frequently grappled with the Holocaust, but it has not paid much attention to its role in the 20th century’s first genocide, when German colonial forces killed many people in what is now Namibia. A movie, “Measures of Men,” aims to change that. The film tells the story of the killings through the eyes of a German anthropologist who becomes complicit in the slaughter. It has been screened for lawmakers in Germany’s Parliament and will be shown in schools too. “Cinema allows us to awaken emotions, and implant images that can let you see events differently,” Lars Kraume, the director, said. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Linda Xiao for The New York Times Maqluba is a Palestinian dish made with rice, meat and fried vegetables. Theater The Broadway adaptation of “Life of Pi” is rich and inventive. Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was pocketbook. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Get down (five letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. P.S. Wordplay columnist Rachel Fabi’s mom engaged in some lighthearted trolling in the comments section of a recent Times Crossword puzzle. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about Trump’s indictment. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 5, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 5, 2023 April 4, 2023 By David Leonhardt Good morning. The Manhattan indictments may not even present the biggest legal threat to Donald Trump. Donald Trump arriving at Trump Tower yesterday.Dave Sanders for The New York Times The other three Donald Trump is expected to turn himself in to the Manhattan authorities today. Further down, you can read about the latest developments and what to expect today. I also want to devote part of today’s newsletter to the other three criminal investigations of Trump — because at least one of them could end up being more significant than the charges in Manhattan, both legally and politically. Why? For one thing, some legal experts view the Manhattan case skeptically. The closest analogy to it may be the 2012 trial of John Edwards, the former Democratic presidential candidate, who was accused of violating campaign-finance law by hiding payments to cover up an extramarital affair. Jurors acquitted Edwards of one charge and deadlocked on the others, a reminder that many people are uncomfortable criminalizing scandals that revolve around consensual sex. The political impact of sex scandals is similarly questionable. Trump has a long, public history of cheating on his wives, as any reader of New York’s tabloid newspapers knows. It did not keep him from being elected president any more than Bill Clinton’s reputation for infidelity kept him from winning in 1992. Clinton also lied about an affair while he was president — under oath, no less — but many Americans nonetheless believed he should remain in the job. The case against Trump could turn out differently, of course: He could be convicted. Even if he is, though, the charges do not seem likely to change many voters’ views of Trump. Two of the other three investigations into Trump are somewhat different. They are about democracy, not sex, and there is already reason to believe that they are more politically threatening to him. One of the two is a federal investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election, including his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. The second involves those same efforts, but only in Georgia, where local prosecutors are looking into his failed attempt to overturn the result. Prosecutors have not yet announced whether they will bring charges in either case. Both stem from Trump’s rejection of basic democratic principles that other leaders of both parties have long accepted — that the loser of an election should concede; that politicians should not tell brazen and repeated lies; that violence is an unacceptable political tactic. Over the past few years, a small — but crucial — slice of voters who are otherwise sympathetic to the Republican Party have indicated that they are uncomfortable with Trump’s attacks on democracy. In 2020, he became only the fourth president in the past century to lose re-election, even as Republican congressional candidates fared better than expected. Last year, Trump’s preferred candidates performed about five percentage points worse than otherwise similar Republicans, my colleague Nate Cohn estimates. As a result, every election denier who ran to oversee elections in a battleground state last year lost. An indictment and a trial in either the Jan. 6 case or the Georgia case would again focus attention on Trump’s anti-democratic behavior. Most of his supporters would probably stick by him, but the cases probably present a greater risk to his standing with swing voters than a case revolving around the cover-up of an affair. And if polls were to show Trump clearly losing a hypothetical rematch with President Biden, some Republican primary voters might become nervous, hurting Trump in the primaries. I’m not predicting that outcome or any other specific scenario. There is a great deal of uncertainty about Trump’s legal problems and the 2024 election. I merely want to remind you that while attention will understandably focus on the Manhattan case this week, Trump’s legal problems are larger than this one case. Here’s our overview of the other three cases, compiled by my colleague Ian Prasad Philbrick. 1. Jan. 6 This is a federal investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election. The investigation appears to be focusing on Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 attack, on attempts by him and his allies to recruit fake presidential electors in key states, and on their fund-raising off false voter-fraud claims. Typically, the Justice Department tries to avoid taking actions that could influence the outcome of a campaign that has formally begun. (James Comey’s rejection of this tradition in the Hillary Clinton email case was a major exception.) If Jack Smith, the special counsel overseeing this Trump inquiry, follows the tradition, Smith may make an announcement about whether to bring charges well before the end of this year. “He wants to resolve things quickly. But we cannot say how quickly,” my colleague Alan Feuer, who’s been covering the case, said. 2. Georgia After Trump lost the 2020 election, he pressured Georgia’s top elections official “to find 11,780 votes,” enough to overturn his defeat. A grand jury investigating those efforts heard from 75 witnesses, including Rudy Giuliani and Lindsey Graham, and recommended that prosecutors charge multiple people with crimes. It’s unclear whether Trump is among them, because much of the grand jury’s report remains secret. But the jury’s forewoman has hinted he was among them. The charges could include attempted election fraud and racketeering related to Trump’s involvement in a plan to recruit fake presidential electors. Prosecutors will likely decide whether to charge anyone by next month. 3. Government documents The third case — involving the handling of classified documents — is probably less threatening to Trump, at least from a political standpoint. Many politicians, apparently including Biden and former Vice President Mike Pence, have broken the rules for handling classified material. It’s partly a reflection of what many experts consider the over-classification of documents, including many that contain mundane information. Trump’s case does seem more extreme, however. He not only took hundreds of classified documents from the White House but also repeatedly resisted giving many of them back. Charges could include obstruction of justice for defying a subpoena. Smith is overseeing this inquiry as well, and the timing of a resolution remains unknown. The latest news Police officers and Secret Service agents will escort Trump from his home in Trump Tower to the district attorney’s office in Lower Manhattan, where he will surrender. Follow today’s developments. The New York Police Department has been put on alert. But officials say they do not expect a major backlash. Trump added a lawyer to his defense team, a former federal prosecutor with experience in white-collar cases. The case against Trump could hinge on an untested legal theory. Here’s what we know. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Politics Voters head to the polls today to decide the runoff for Chicago mayor and to choose a new judge for Wisconsin’s Supreme Court. About 15 million Americans could soon lose their health insurance because of the expiration of a pandemic program that automatically extended Medicaid coverage. Some Republicans fear that legislation to limit press freedom in Florida, drafted at Ron DeSantis’s urging, could expose conservative outlets to libel suits. Other Big Stories Clockwise from left: Christina Koch, Victor Glover, Jeremy Hansen and Reid Wiseman.Josh Valcarcel/NASA Johnson Space Center, via Reuters Meet the astronauts of the Artemis II mission, they’ll be the first people to fly around the moon in more than 50 years. Finland joins NATO today. It’s a strengthening of the Western alliance and a strategic setback for Vladimir Putin. More severe weather is on the way to the Midwest and parts of the South, the same area that tornadoes hit a few days ago. From convenient to a nuisance: Parisians voted to ban electric rental scooters. Freeing Paul Rusesabagina, depicted in the movie “Hotel Rwanda,” involved secret diplomacy, lawsuits and Hollywood. A ranch owner in Arizona was charged in the shooting death of a migrant. Some conservative ranchers say the owner was the real victim. Opinions Matthew Walther supports gun rights, but he thinks that the fetishism of AR-15 fandom is dangerous. Baseball’s new rules are a desperately needed makeover, Steve Kettmann writes. MORNING READS A member of the Blackfeet Nation in Montana resting after shooting a bison last month.Michael Hanson for The New York Times The hunt: Their job is to kill bison who roam beyond Yellowstone’s borders. Up in the air: Take a close look at California’s snowy mountains. Baby’s first social media handle: Sorry, that profile name is taken. It belongs to a newborn. Love story: She thought her crush on a colleague was secret. Until someone asked, “Why do you have Jake pinned to your screen?” A Morning watch: She survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. This is her story, in her voice. Lives Lived: As a young man, Raghavan Iyer didn’t know how to cook a simple potato curry. He went on to teach America’s heartland how to prepare Indian cuisine. Iyer died at 61. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Connecticut players celebrating their win yesterday.Godofredo A. Vasquez/Associated Press N.C.A.A. men’s tournament winners: The UConn Huskies claimed their fifth national title with a 76-59 drubbing of upstart San Diego State. They survived a chaotic men’s tournament which saw all four No. 1 seeds lose before the Elite Eight. From the sideline: UConn’s dominance in the men’s tournament has brought out the inner calm in its head coach. A possible invite: Jill Biden suggested that the women’s runner-up, Iowa, could also be invited to the White House alongside national champion L.S.U. Tigers star Angel Reese responded with laughing emojis. Oral history: Twenty years ago, the Boston Red Sox created “the most fun clubhouse in baseball.” The Athletic called those players. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Revising classics Authors’ estates have been altering the text of well-known books to remove language that some may consider offensive, raising questions about art and censorship. But for publishers, there’s another important factor: making sure those books still sell. Agatha Christie continues to find new fans, and her estate had those readers in mind when it recently removed bigoted language from some of her novels. Christie’s estate learned long ago how lucrative such a change could be: In the 1980s, it dropped the title from the U.K. edition of one novel, which contained a slur, and adopted the U.S. title, “And Then There Were None.” It remains her best-selling book. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook David Malosh for The New York Times Pair radicchio with a tasty dressing. What to Watch The documentary “Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields” includes an absorbing collage of archival footage. What to Read In “A Fever in the Heartland,” Timothy Egan traces the Ku Klux Klan’s expansion in the 1920s. Late Night Stephen Colbert wondered if Trump would get a mug shot taken. Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was commodity. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Sports stadium (five letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David P.S. We have winners in The Morning’s March Madness pools: “KarlyRenee” in the women’s bracket, and “Archytas” in the men’s. Congratulations! If you’re one of them, email us at themorning@nytimes.com to receive your prize. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about Wisconsin’s Supreme Court election. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 6, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 6, 2023 April 5, 2023 By German Lopez Good morning. The case against Trump is about more than Stormy Daniels. Donald Trump at the Manhattan Criminal Courts Building yesterday.Dave Sanders for The New York Times Trump’s day in court Yesterday, Donald Trump became the first president, current or former, to be charged with a crime. Prosecutors accused him of coordinating a scheme during the 2016 presidential campaign to cover up potential sex scandals and of committing fraud to keep them quiet. Trump pleaded not guilty to 34 felony charges in a Manhattan court. Court filings detailed several instances in which Trump allegedly bought the silence of others during the campaign to bury damaging stories. By pointing to those examples, prosecutors described a pattern of behavior that could help convince a judge and jury that Trump is guilty. You might be wondering why Trump’s sex life, falsehoods and campaign dealings from years ago are worthy of criminal charges. After all, most of us are used to politicians, particularly Trump, misleading the public. And Trump routinely bragged about his sexual endeavors when he was a celebrity real estate developer. The Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, argued that Trump had gone above embellishing or misleading the public and, through the hush money scheme, had violated a number of laws to deceive voters. “That payment was to hide damaging information from the voting public,” Bragg said. Trump continued to portray the charges against him as politically motivated and unfair when he spoke last night at his home in Florida, where he flew after he appeared in court in New York. “This fake case was brought only to interfere with the upcoming 2024 election, and it should be dropped immediately,” he said. Trump’s unhappiness about the indictment came through in his speech. “He’s angry and vengeful, soaked in grievance,” my colleague Jonathan Swan wrote. “Nothing boisterous or celebratory about it, as some predicted.” Today’s newsletter will explain the charges, the scandals behind the case and other details we learned from Trump’s arraignment. Three scandals All of the criminal charges are related to a $130,000 hush payment to a porn star, Stormy Daniels, who says she had an affair with Trump. Bragg suggested that he would try to demonstrate in court that the payout to her was how Trump did business, not a one-off mistake. “It’s not just about one payment,” he said. Court documents laid out three instances in which prosecutors said Trump had suppressed information during the presidential race. All were already public. “It is still extraordinary to hear the district attorney telling this story in the context of a criminal arraignment,” my colleague Jonah Bromwich wrote. First, Daniels. During the final weeks of the 2016 campaign, she tried to sell her story of a decade-old affair with Trump, which he denies. Daniels’s representatives approached The National Enquirer. But its publisher, David Pecker, was a longtime ally of Trump’s who had agreed to look out for potentially damaging stories about him. Eventually, he helped arrange a deal in which Trump’s lawyer at the time, Michael Cohen, paid Daniels $130,000 to stay quiet about the affair. Later, when he was president, Trump reimbursed Cohen, and prosecutors say that’s where the fraud began. Trump’s company classified the repayment as legal expenses, citing a retainer agreement. Prosecutors say there were no such expenses, and that the retainer was nonexistent. The felony counts related to invoices Cohen submitted, checks Trump wrote to reimburse Cohen and Trump Organization ledger entries that recorded the reimbursements. Prosecutors also raised the account of another woman, Karen McDougal, who says she had an affair with Trump, which he denies as well. McDougal, a former Playboy playmate of the year, had similarly tried to sell her story during the campaign and reached a $150,000 agreement with The National Enquirer. Rather than publish her account, the tabloid suppressed it in cooperation with Trump and Cohen, prosecutors say. Finally, prosecutors invoked a payment to a former Trump Tower doorman. He claimed that Trump had fathered a child out of wedlock. The National Enquirer paid $30,000 for the rights to his story, although it eventually concluded that his claim was false. The charges The charges against Trump are all counts of falsifying business records. Typically, those charges are misdemeanors in New York; prosecutors elevated them to felonies by alleging they were linked to violations of election and tax laws. They suggested that the Daniels payment amounted to an illegal campaign contribution, as covering up Trump’s affairs might have benefited his 2016 campaign. And by disguising the payments as legal expenses, Trump also tried to misrepresent the payments to the tax authorities, Bragg said. New York prosecutors have never brought an election-law case involving a federal election before. The unique charges and circumstances of charging a former president could make the case harder to win, because courts often rely on past cases to issue rulings, as this newsletter has explained. But the connection between falsifying business records and potential tax law violations could put the case on firmer ground, as my colleague Charlie Savage wrote. Compared with the election-related allegations, the tax claim is “a much simpler charge that avoids the potential pitfalls,” said Rebecca Roiphe, a New York Law School professor and former prosecutor. Trump’s supporters, and even some of his critics, have argued that the charges stretch the limits of the law. They point out that other prosecutors didn’t file charges over the hush payments and claim that Bragg himself at one point gave up on the case. “Alvin Bragg is picking up the trash that the U.S. attorney’s office wouldn’t touch, that his predecessor wouldn’t touch, that he wouldn’t even touch the first time,” said Jim Trusty, a lawyer who is representing Trump for federal investigations. What’s next? The case is expected to last awhile. The next in-person hearing is scheduled for Dec. 4. By then, the 2024 Republican primary campaign will be in full swing. More Trump news Inside the courtroom, Trump sat mostly silent as prosecutors described the case against him. He leaned forward to enter his plea of “not guilty.” Trump was released after his arraignment. That wasn’t special treatment: In 2020, a New York law eliminated bail for most nonviolent crimes. Protesters on both sides gathered outside the courthouse. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene made an appearance but was ushered away as demonstrators banged on her car’s windows. Trump had no mug shot taken. Still, his campaign put a fake one on a T-shirt. We don’t yet know who will pay Trump’s legal bills — him or his donors. Most hush payments are not a crime, but the question is murkier for politicians. The White House hopes the chaos of Trump’s legal challenges will remind some voters why they chose President Biden in 2020. Read the indictment, with annotations. Commentary Karen Friedman Agnifilo and Norman Eisen, Times Opinion: “There’s nothing novel or weak about this case. The charge of creating false financial records is constantly brought by Mr. Bragg and other New York D.A.s.” Harry Litman, The Los Angeles Times: “Bragg chose both to lay out the extent and gravity of Trump’s offenses while also maintaining maximum flexibility to alter legal course.” Richard Hasen, Slate: “It is far from clear that Trump could be liable for state campaign finance crimes as a federal candidate.” National Review’s editors: “If Bragg had evidence that Trump committed state tax or election-law crimes, he wouldn’t hesitate to charge them.” Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Politics Janet Protasiewicz at her election-night party.Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York Times Wisconsin voters elected Janet Protasiewicz, a liberal judge, to a swing seat on the State Supreme Court. The shift could end the state’s abortion ban and legislative gerrymanders. Brandon Johnson, a progressive county commissioner, won the Chicago mayor’s election, beating a more conservative Democrat who ran on a pro-police platform. Other Big Stories Storms brought hail, blizzards and tornadoes to the Midwest. The volatile weather is forecast to last into today. The U.S. announced another $2.6 billion in military aid to Ukraine, including $500 million for ammunition and equipment from U.S. stockpiles. The Israeli police raided a holy site in Jerusalem and arrested hundreds of Palestinians. Armed groups in Gaza responded by firing rockets. The F.D.A. plans to allow older and immunocompromised Americans another updated Covid shot. Johnson & Johnson agreed to pay $8.9 billion to tens of thousands of people who claimed the company’s talcum powder products caused cancer. Rupert Murdoch appears to have ended his engagement to Ann Lesley Smith after two weeks. It would have been his fifth marriage. Opinions Vladimir Putin should have read Evan Gershkovich’s reporting on Russia, not imprisoned him, Bret Stephens writes. Child stars are speaking about growing up under a withering public gaze, Jessica Grose writes. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS A flying fox bat in Melbourne.Christina Simons for The New York Times Stay cool: Sprinklers protect Australia’s flying foxes from heat waves. Peak Emily: A generation of Emilys is entering adulthood, and the name is everywhere. Scheduled fun: Corporate tools are creeping into our personal lives. No more white shorts: New Zealand’s women’s soccer team is changing its uniform over concerns about period leaks. Lives Lived: Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou trained to be a concert pianist before becoming a nun. Years later, her recordings gained fans worldwide. She died at 99. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC A defense: Iowa’s Caitlin Clark said that the L.S.U. star Angel Reese should not be criticized for how she celebrated in front of her during Sunday’s title game. A new team: The National Women’s Soccer League announced an expansion franchise in the Bay Area, spearheaded by former women’s soccer stars, including Brandi Chastain. Coming to the small screen: The Warriors star Steph Curry will play himself in “Mr. Throwback.” Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS “High School Musical 2” in the “Got Milk?” campaign.Jason Merritt/FilmMagic, via Getty Images The Not Milk generation You may remember the ads from the ’90s and 2000s: celebrities such as David Beckham and Britney Spears sporting white mustaches above the words “Got Milk?” For many young people today, the answer to that question is: no. “Nobody drinks regular milk on purpose nowadays,” Masani Bailey, 30, told The Times. The dairy industry has started a new campaign to win over Gen Z, employing Olympic athletes and video game celebrities to hype the benefits of dairy. “We have to reclaim milk’s mojo,” one industry executive said. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook David Malosh for The New York Times This peanut and caramel matzo brittle is addictive. (Times Cooking has more Passover recipes.) What to Read In the novel “Natural Beauty,” a beauty brand turns self-improvement into a nightmare. What to watch It’s ridiculous how entertaining “Air” is given that it’s a movie about shoes. Late Night The hosts discussed Trump’s arrest. Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was infirmary. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Insult (three letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — German P.S. The U.S., Britain and 10 other countries signed the treaty that created NATO, The Times reported 74 years ago today. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about Trump’s arraignment. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 7, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 7, 2023 April 6, 2023 By David Leonhardt Good morning. What should we make of the role that abortion played in both the Chicago and Wisconsin elections this week? Brandon Johnson and Janet Protasiewicz.Evan Cobb for The New York Times, Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York Times Wisconsin vs. Florida The elections this week in Chicago and Wisconsin were different in many ways. One was for mayor, the other for a state Supreme Court seat. One was in an overwhelmingly Democratic city, the other in a closely divided swing state. But there was at least one issue — abortion — that was part of both campaigns. And the outcomes of both elections had something in common: The more liberal candidate won. In Wisconsin, abortion dominated the race to fill a pivotal seat on the state Supreme Court, with the winner, Janet Protasiewicz, making clear that she would vote to overturn the state’s abortion ban. She beat Daniel Kelly by 11 percentage points. In Chicago, the issue played a much smaller role, partly because mayors have little control over abortion policy. Still, the winner, Brandon Johnson, used a past statement of personal opposition to abortion by his opponent, Paul Vallas, as part of an argument that Vallas was far too conservative for Chicago. Johnson won by about three percentage points. Together, the elections add to the evidence that abortion can be a potent issue for left-leaning candidates in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s unpopular overturning of Roe v. Wade. Some Democrats have come to see the post-Roe politics of abortion as so favorable that they believe the party should organize its 2024 campaign around the issue, as Rebecca Traister recently described in New York magazine. These Democrats’ argument is as simple as the headline on the magazine’s cover: “Abortion wins elections.” Today, I want to examine that claim, considering the supporting and conflicting evidence. With help from colleagues, I’ll also help you understand the other lessons from Chicago and Wisconsin. ‘What happened?’ After the Supreme Court overturned Roe last June and allowed states to ban abortion, more than a dozen quickly imposed tight restrictions. Today, abortion is largely illegal in most of red America, even though polls suggest many voters in these states support at least some access. In response, Democratic candidates in Republican-leaning states emphasized abortion in last year’s midterm campaigns. The Democrats saw it as a way to energize liberals and win over swing voters and moderate Republicans: In Georgia, as CNN reported in September, Stacey Abrams had “found an issue to center her campaign around as Election Day approaches: protecting abortion rights in Georgia.” Abrams, a Democrat, was trying to defeat Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican. In Florida, television commercials for Democratic Senate and governor candidates mentioned abortion nearly 28,000 times, according to one estimate. In Ohio and Texas, Democrats also emphasized the issue in statewide races. Democratic donors were hopeful enough about all these races that they poured money into them — and yet the party lost all of them. In some cases, the outcomes were landslides. “Abortion was supposed to be a defining issue for Florida Democrats,” read a headline in The Tampa Bay Times. “What happened?” The answer seems to be that abortion is a winning issue for Democrats, but only in some circumstances. When a campaign revolves around the subject — as the Wisconsin Supreme Court race did this week and voter referendums in Kansas, Kentucky and Michigan did last year — abortion can win big even in purple or red states. And when abortion serves as a symbol of a candidate’s broader conservatism — as in Chicago, and as some Democrats have used it in other mayoral races — the tactic can also work. But there is not yet evidence that abortion can determine the outcome of most political campaigns. In hotly contested races — for governor, Congress and other offices — most voters make their decisions based on an array of issues. And many Republican voters who support some abortion access are nonetheless willing to support a candidate who does not. In the latest edition of his newsletter, Nate Cohn, The Times’s chief political analyst, combines abortion with another major issue — democracy — and makes the following argument: “If the 2022 midterm elections offered any lesson, it was that liberals excel when abortion and democracy are on the ballot. Liberal voters turn out en masse. A crucial sliver of voters — perhaps as few as one in every 30 or 40 — will flip to vote for the Democrat when they otherwise would have voted Republican.” My colleague Reid Epstein, who covered the Wisconsin race, put it this way: “The difference in Wisconsin is that voters were playing with live ammunition. The Protasiewicz campaign and Democrats broadly made it clear from the very beginning to voters that she would be the deciding vote to strike down the state’s 1849 abortion law, while the conservative in the race, Daniel Kelly, would be a vote to keep it.” For the other implications of the Wisconsin race, especially for the state’s heavily gerrymandered legislative maps, I recommend Reid’s latest article. More on Chicago In Chicago, Johnson offered a playbook for winning an election in a heavily Democratic city as a strong progressive. Johnson ran left in the first round of voting, becoming the favored candidate of liberal activists, and then moved back to the center in the final round (by effectively disavowing his earlier support for defunding the police). He has signaled that as mayor he will pursue a progressive agenda, raising taxes on the rich and on corporations to pay for new services “Johnson talked frequently on the campaign trail about public safety,” Julie Bosman, The Times’s Chicago bureau chief, told me, “but he spoke about it in the larger context of increasing funding for public schools, creating anti-poverty programs and doubling youth employment.” Julie added: “This election tested the limits of the old-fashioned law-and-order message that drove Eric Adams’s win in New York. Voters I talked to at the polls yesterday said they were concerned about crime, but many of them said that they favored Johnson’s approach of building up social programs to fight poverty and violence, rather than trying to flood the streets with more police officers, as Vallas advocated.” For more on Chicago, see Mitch Smith’s story about how Johnson united a coalition of young, Black and progressive voters. Related: Idaho made it illegal to help someone under 18 leave the state to get an abortion without parental consent. “Who would like to watch me slay a zombie?” Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, asked before signing legislation repealing Michigan’s abortion ban. Republicans gained a supermajority in North Carolina’s legislature after a Democrat switched parties. It could let them ban abortions. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Trump Indictment Donald Trump spent nearly an hour inside a Manhattan courtroom on Tuesday. Here’s what happened. Trump’s charges bring uncertainty to both parties: Some think the case is flimsy, others that it has the potential to reverberate politically. Some of Trump’s aides acknowledge that the Manhattan case is bad for his campaign. Republicans say they will question Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, about Trump, but the reality is more complicated. From “all a pattern of behavior” to “such nonsense,” four Times Opinion writers assess the indictment. International These maps show Russia’s gains in Ukraine this year: three small settlements and part of the city of Bakhmut, a battlefield with limited strategic value. Emmanuel Macron, the French president, and Xi Jinping, China’s top leader, are speaking in Beijing today. Macron said China could help bring peace to Ukraine. Speaker Kevin McCarthy hosted Taiwan’s president in California, a show of defiance to China. Other Big Stories Tennessee Republicans will vote today on whether to expel three Democratic lawmakers who joined a gun-control protest in the state legislature. A tech executive who founded Cash App was stabbed to death on the street in San Francisco. Catholic clergy in Baltimore abused hundreds of children and teenagers over six decades, according to the Maryland attorney general. In Ohio, a state that depends on the auto industry, electric cars are reshaping jobs. Oil and gas projects are back: Alaska’s Willow Project is one of hundreds that have been approved worldwide in the past year. A study rebutted decades of research claiming that moderate drinking has health benefits. Opinions Performing an abortion in Tennessee is a felony. Dr. Elise Boos has been doing it anyway. If something is advertised to you online, you probably shouldn’t buy it, Julia Angwin writes. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS HOKA Big sneaker: Hokas broke the billion-dollar mark in 2022. How? Fancì Club: Meet the man behind the internet’s favorite outfits. Astronaut wrangling: NASA can send people to space. Engineering a surprise proved tricky. Retirement: Should we rethink how many years we work? Advice from Wirecutter: See if an outdoor TV is right for you. Lives Lived: Klaus Teuber began designing board games to unwind. One of his creations was The Settlers of Catan. Teuber died at 70. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Tee time: Only three players have repeated as Masters champions: Tiger Woods, Nick Faldo and Jack Nicklaus. Can Scottie Scheffler join them? Here are 10 things to know about this year’s tournament. Bucks and Nuggets clinch: Milwaukee and Denver are the No. 1 seeds in the N.B.A. playoffs. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS The pianist Kirill Gerstein.Stephan Rabold Reconsidering Rachmaninoff Sergei Rachmaninoff is a popular composer, but many classical music experts dismiss him as a sentimentalist who leaned into nostalgia. Now, 150 years after Rachmaninoff’s birth, the pianist Kirill Gerstein is re-examining the composer’s artistry. “We’ve tried various ways of dismissing it,” Gerstein said of Rachmaninoff’s catalog, “and it’s not going away, so possibly we can say: Well, maybe it’s not just because it’s pretty and it’s popular, but because it has a real core of aesthetic value.” PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Bobbi Lin for The New York Times Hot cross buns are a delicious symbol of Easter. What to Read In “The Peking Express,” James Zimmerman tells the story of justice-seeking bandits who derailed a train in rural China a century ago. What to Listen to Five minutes that will make you love the jazz pianist Mary Lou Williams. Late Night The hosts discussed Trump’s return to Mar-a-Lago. Now Time to Play The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were cofounded and confounded. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Prohibit (three letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David Because of an editing error, yesterday’s newsletter misstated the history of the type of charges against Donald Trump. The Manhattan district attorney more frequently files charges of falsifying business records as felonies, not misdemeanors. P.S. Washington State University gave Dean Baquet, The Times’s former executive editor, its Edward R. Murrow Lifetime Achievement Award. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about U.S.-Africa relations. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 8, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 8, 2023 April 7, 2023 In today’s newsletter, my colleague Emily Bazelon, who writes about legal issues and American democracy, looks at a new partisan debate over how government should work. — David Leonhardt By Emily Bazelon Staff Writer, NYT Magazine Good morning. Republican legislators are circumventing voters who elected candidates who promised to send fewer people to jail. Outside the Mississippi Capitol in Jackson.Rogelio V. Solis/Associated Press Exercising discretion A fight has erupted in several states between Republican lawmakers and locally elected Democrats over how to respond to crime. Democratic district attorneys (often serving cities with many Black and Latino voters) say they are prioritizing serious crimes. In response, Republicans (often representing mostly white and rural areas) have accused them of ignoring criminal law and are making it easier to remove them from office. Today, I’ll explain what’s happening and why it matters. The policy fight Since 2015, dozens of prosecutors promising progressive reforms have taken office across the country. They vowed to send fewer people to prison and reduce the harms to low-income communities that are associated with high incarceration rates. To achieve that goal, many of these prosecutors said they would use the discretion the law generally allows them to decline to charge categories of crimes, like low-level marijuana offenses. About 90 prosecutors, out of more than 2,000 nationwide, also pledged not to prosecute violations of abortion bans. Many of these prosecutors have been re-elected, a sign of sustained voter support. Still, conservatives argue that the district attorneys are shirking their duty. Declining to prosecute a particular case is legitimate, they say; ruling out charges for a category of offenses is not. As a Republican legislator in Tennessee put it, “A district attorney does not have the authority to decide what law is good and what law isn’t good.” The conservative Heritage Foundation devotes a section of its website to attacking “rogue prosecutors.” Challenging local control In Florida, Mississippi, Tennessee and elsewhere, Republican lawmakers have moved to oust or constrain prosecutors and officials who oversee the court system. The Republicans, who largely represent rural areas, are often aiming to thwart voters in cities, including many Black and Latino residents, who elected candidates on platforms of locking up fewer people. Examples include: In February, the Mississippi House passed a bill that establishes a new court system in part of the state capital, Jackson, a majority Black city run mostly by Black officials. In the neighborhoods where most of Jackson’s white residents live, the legislation would effectively replace locally elected judges with state-appointed ones and city police with a state-run force. Tennessee lawmakers in 2021 gave the state attorney general the authority to ask a judge to replace local prosecutors in cases in which they refuse to bring charges. Republican lawmakers criticized the district attorney in Nashville, Glenn Funk, who said he would no longer prosecute simple marijuana possession. Funk also said he would not charge businesses that ignored a state law requiring them to post signs saying transgender people could be using single-gender bathrooms. When Deborah Gonzalez, a progressive, ran for district attorney in Athens, Ga., in 2020, Gov. Brian Kemp tried to cancel the election. Kemp lost in court, and Gonzalez won the seat. In Florida last August, Gov. Ron DeSantis ousted Andrew Warren, the elected Democratic prosecutor in the district that includes Tampa, who had pledged not to prosecute offenses related to abortion or transgender health care. Changing the rules These actions upend a longstanding tradition of local control over criminal justice. In the 19th century, many states embraced local elections of prosecutors to ensure that they “reflect the priorities of local communities, rather than officials in the state capital,” according to one history. Criminal laws are largely enacted at the state level, and prosecutors, meant to be accountable to their communities, decide how to enforce them. Since prosecutors lack the resources to bring charges for every arrest, their discretion is a feature of the system. In the past, prosecutors usually used their discretion to act tough on crime. “Now you’re seeing a state effort to subvert the will of local voters who have elected prosecutors who use their discretion for a more compassionate and equitable system,” Marissa Roy, a lawyer for the Local Solutions Support Center, said. “It’s inherently undemocratic.” The new state bills In a few states, Republicans are considering legislation that would give them power to remove local prosecutors. Georgia legislators recently passed a bill that would create a commission with the power to remove prosecutors. It awaits Kemp’s signature. The Missouri House passed a bill to allow the governor to appoint a special prosecutor for violent crimes for five years. The bill was originally written to target St. Louis, where the elected city prosecutor, Kimberly Gardner, is a progressive Black Democrat. In Texas, dozens of such bills are in play. One, which passed the Texas Senate this week, would bar prosecutors from adopting policies that refrain from prosecuting a type of offense. Another would create a council dominated by political appointees that could refer prosecutors to a trial court to be dismissed for incompetence. Republican supporters of the legislation targeted five district attorneys, from large metropolitan areas, who said they would not prosecute certain offenses, including some related to abortion or transgender medical treatments for minors. When a new type of legislation pops up in different states, a national policy organization sometimes promotes it. That may be happening with these bills. Last July, a Heritage Foundation staff member met by video with Republican lawmakers about curbing prosecutors’ authority, according to a person familiar with the Texas bills. The legislation became a priority of the Texas House speaker and lieutenant governor. “The Heritage Foundation meets with a variety of people and organizations about public policy topics,” a spokeswoman said. Given the conservative momentum behind the bills, Roy expects to see more. “All of this is connected to the backlash to the movement for racial justice and criminal justice reform,” she said. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Politics The Tennessee representatives Justin Jones, left, and Justin Pearson before a vote to expel them.Jon Cherry for The New York Times Tennessee House Republicans voted to expel two Democrats who protested in the legislative chamber for stricter gun laws. For decades, Justice Clarence Thomas has taken luxury vacations funded by a Republican megadonor, ProPublica reported. The U.S. should have evacuated Americans and others from Afghanistan earlier at the end of the war in 2021, the Biden administration acknowledged. The Supreme Court ruled that a transgender girl in West Virginia could compete on girls’ sports teams at her middle school while her appeal moved forward. Separately, the Biden administration proposed a rule that would bar schools from categorically banning transgender athletes but that would leave room for individual exclusions. The I.R.S. is planning to improve its customer service and to crack down on wealthy tax evaders. Trump Indictment The judge in Donald Trump’s case asked him to refrain from making incendiary comments. Trump responded by going after the judge’s family. The new publisher of the National Enquirer says the tabloid no longer buys stories to bury them. The practice put the company at the center of Trump’s indictment. Other Big Stories Gaza City last night.Mohammed Abed/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Israeli jets struck southern Lebanon and Gaza overnight in response to an unusually heavy rocket barrage from militias in Lebanon. The violence ebbed after sunrise. New textbooks in India have purged parts of the country’s Muslim history that conflict with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist vision. Secret documents detailing American and NATO plans for building up the Ukrainian military have appeared on Twitter and Telegram. A French minister has posed (with her clothes on) in Playboy. Critics are questioning her choice of publication. “Refilled with love and titanium”: The actor Jeremy Renner described his recovery from a snow plow accident that broke 30 of his bones. Opinions Math and literature often seem like opposites. But whether it’s needing structure or searching for truth, they have a lot in common, Sarah Hart says. Economic competition, protectionism and even trade wars aren’t barriers to solving climate change; they’re assets, Robinson Meyer argues. The deaths of children — from guns, suicide and car crashes — are fueling America’s falling life expectancy, David Wallace-Wells writes. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS The classic Peeps.Christopher Payne for The New York Times Peeps: Visit the factory that makes the fluffy marshmallow chicks. Sonny Angel: These tiny dolls offer stress relief. Modern Love: Seduced by a charming chatbot. Advice from Wirecutter: Clean your phone. (It’s probably getting gross.) Lives Lived: Mimi Sheraton, the food writer and restaurant critic, was the first to wear a disguise to get a normal diner’s experience for her Times reviews and worked for many publications in a six-decade career. She died at 97. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC The Masters: After shooting a 2-over-par 74 yesterday, Tiger Woods — who is struggling with leg issues — is in danger of missing the cut. It was part of an exhilarating first round in Augusta, Ga. N.B.A.’s regular season closes: The top of the Eastern Conference is set, as the Bucks, Celtics, 76ers, Cavaliers, Knicks and Nets have clinched postseason spots. The Western Conference, though, is wide open. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Mario and Princess Peach.Nintendo/Nintendo and Universal Studios, via Associated Press The original ‘Mario’ movie “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” is now in theaters, and it faithfully recreates the colorful Mushroom Kingdom. Everything looks and sounds as it does in the games (except maybe Mario himself, who sounds an awful lot like Chris Pratt). Thirty years ago, the first big-screen adaptation of the video game series tossed aside the cartoonish setting in favor of a live-action, dystopian version of New York. The film was largely shot in an abandoned cement factory; sticky fungus was key to the plot. The movie was a flop. For The Times, Darryn King revisited that original film and the small but dedicated fan group who consider it a cult classic. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Linda Xiao for The New York Times Roasted radishes are juicy and sweet. What to Watch A new documentary about the director Alan Pakula has the feel of an A-list memorial service. Travel What to do for 36 hours in Tokyo. Late Night The hosts discussed Marjorie Taylor Greene’s visit to New York. News Quiz How well did you keep up with the headlines this week? Test your knowledge. Now Time to Play The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were diabolic and diabolical. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Useless stuff (four letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. P.S. The New York Times Presents is back on TV tonight with an episode about the hip-hop producer J Dilla, at 10 p.m. Eastern on FX and Hulu. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about migration. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 9, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 9, 2023 April 8, 2023 By Melissa Kirsch Good morning. Looking for new music recommendations? Introducing an antidote to the algorithm. María Jesús Contreras Modern mixtapes A few years ago, I finally got rid of the heavy pleather binders of CDs that were occupying valuable storage space in my closet. I’d fully committed to streaming music, I reasoned. If I wanted to hear a song, I’d find it online. Who even owned a CD player anymore? I miscalculated. I can locate most obscure tracks, but I can’t listen to the mix a friend made me of favorites from the Nigerian AM radio station he listened to as a child. The Rufus Wainwright compilation a boyfriend sent me when I was living abroad and feeling homesick in my 20s. The songs are out there, but the artifact is gone. I can access the raw materials, but not the thing itself. Once I become misty-eyed over the CDs I’ve loved and lost, I can go deep into longing for the shoe boxes of mixtapes gone forever, the inexorable marching of time, etc. I yank myself back: Mixtape nostalgia is an old pastime, sticking your tongue in the spot where the pulled tooth was. Here I am, in this moment, with the splendor of endless choice! It’s a gift! Right? As I write this, I’m listening to and loving Jana Horn, an artist new to me, whom I discovered via my colleague Lindsay Zoladz’s new newsletter, The Amplifier. The promise of The Amplifier is an alternative to the algorithm, personalized recommendations from a music critic who understands the paralysis of too many options. (Check out her list of songs that define her! A conceptual sibling of the likes/dislikes list I discussed a couple weeks ago.) A friend recently told me she had undertaken the project of digitizing her old mixtapes, and I kicked myself again for not keeping mine. But there’s a lightness, a figurative and literal spaciousness to clearing shelf space for new enthusiasms, new obsessions. I have room for Lindsey’s twice-weekly recs, for new college radio stations and forest sounds and poolside tunes and other digital phenomena. What are you listening to lately? Send me one song (just one!) that’s bringing you joy this spring, and I’ll compile them into a playlist, a human-curated, algorithm-free soundtrack to the new season. For more Sign up for The Amplifier. A fascinating essay on how the shuffle button has changed everything. “Despite the complaints of its critics, digital technology seems here to stay.” From 1985, “Invasion of the Compact Disks.” Live shows are back, but buying tickets has become a mess of high prices, complicated registrations and scalping, The Times’s Ben Sisario writes. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE WEEK IN CULTURE HBO You can bet on how “Succession” will end. Do you love Picasso or loathe him? Fifty years after his death, the Times critic Deborah Solomon reflects on her feelings toward him — with essays for both admirers and haters. Can you tell which of these photos is real? A storied British soccer team is having one of its most remarkable seasons. But its competitor is getting more attention, thanks to the documentary series “Welcome to Wrexham.” The Netflix series “Beef,” a dark comedy about a road-rage episode, is one of the best new shows of the past year, the Times critic James Poniewozik writes. The first trailer for “Barbie,” directed by Greta Gerwig, set the internet ablaze. “Shucked,” a musical about corn that opened on Broadway, pelts the audience with puns, dad jokes, one-liners and double entendres. The comedian Alex Edelman is bringing his one-man show, “Just for Us,” to Broadway this summer. A night of 1,000 Kates: Fans paid tribute to the singular Kate Bush. The former Times restaurant critic Mimi Sheraton was a true omnivore, deeply curious well beyond the dinner table. She died at 97. TikTok has outgrown its label as the “dance app.” But in the dance world, its influence is everywhere. Angela Gheorghiu, one of opera’s few remaining old-school divas, is returning to the Met in “Tosca.” See what’s on the “Paint” star Michaela Watkins’s phone. THE LATEST NEWS Mifepristone is the first pill in a two-drug medication abortion regimen.Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters A Texas judge issued a preliminary ruling invalidating F.D.A. approval of an abortion pill. But another judge quickly issued a decision that contradicted it. The judges’ conflicting orders created a legal standoff that will almost certainly escalate to the Supreme Court. Are abortion pills safe? Here’s the evidence. Classified documents that appear to contain U.S. national security secrets surfaced online. The U.S. generated job growth last month, but at a slowing rate that appeared to reflect the toll of rising interest rates. Critics viewed the ejection of two lawmakers from the Tennessee House as race-driven and pushed to return them to their seats. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas said he followed others’ advice when he decided not to disclose lavish gifts and travel from a wealthy conservative donor. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. CULTURE CALENDAR By Gilbert Cruz 🎬 “Renfield” (Friday): You would be forgiven for assuming that Nicolas Cage had previously played a vampire in multiple films. Technically, he has never played one (unless you consider his role in “Vampire’s Kiss” as canonically bloodsucking — whatever it is, it’s genuinely bananas). Until now. Here, he plays the real-deal Dracula, living in modern-day New Orleans, alongside his titular servant (Nicholas Hoult). 📺 “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” (Friday): Amazon is closing the book on its award-winning show about a female stand-up comedian (Rachel Brosnahan) in ’50s and ’60s New York City with this fifth and final season. If you want more Brosnahan, you can find her on Broadway starring alongside Oscar Isaac starting at the end of April. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT RECIPE OF THE WEEK Johnny Miller for The New York Times By Melissa Clark Chicken Breasts With Lemon Chicken seasoned with lemon is a classic, whether the bird is roasted whole or sautéed in parts. This beloved interpretation from Pierre Franey stars boneless, skinless chicken breasts that are quickly seared in a skillet and then coated in a tangy, easy pan sauce. The secret to its citrus intensity is using two teaspoons of grated lemon zest along with the juice. Some fresh or dried thyme, shallots and a little garlic round things out, while butter adds richness and helps carry the other flavors. You could serve the chicken as Franey suggests, with mashed potatoes with garlic and basil. But I think torn hunks from a crusty baguette would be effortlessly elegant — and just as appealing. REAL ESTATE An 1860 former schoolhouse.Annabel Taylor, Four Seasons Sotheby's International Realty What you get for $295,000: A converted 19th-century schoolhouse in Elizaville, N.Y.; a one-bedroom condo in Washington, D.C.; or a 1920 home in Peoria, Ill. The hunt: They had $350,000 and a dream to live together. Could they make it in Manhattan? Play our game. Year of disappointment: Many hoped the housing market would improve. It hasn’t. In the garden: Don’t forage for wild edible plants. Instead, welcome them into your garden. LIVING Francois Mori/Associated Press 2024 Olympics: Booking your trip to Paris already? Here’s what you need to know. Flash weddings: Ceremonies can come together in little more than a week. Hair oil: When a hair-care product favored by Black women became harder to find, attention turned to the influencers. Stress relief: Ashwagandha is the supplement of the moment. Brush, twice a day: Oral hygiene is crucial to your overall health. ADVICE FROM WIRECUTTER Check your bike helmet Prepping for your first spring bike ride? Examine your helmet. No, helmets don’t “expire” — the EPS foam under the shell can last for eons. (Just like foam coffee cups!) But if you’ve crashed while wearing your helmet — even if you don’t remember hitting your head — replace it. (Wirecutter has recommendations.) You can’t see whether the impact compressed the foam, and if it did, the foam is toast. Also, check the fit. If the straps tend to loosen or the padding inside has worn thin, your helmet won’t fit snugly, which means it can’t protect your head. — Christine Ryan GAME OF THE WEEKEND The Australian golfer Cameron Smith.Andrew Redington/Getty Images The Masters golf tournament: Last year, golf was ripped in two. LIV, an upstart league funded by Saudi Arabia, offered big-name players boatloads of money. The PGA Tour punished players who joined, and its members spent months sniping at their carpetbagging competitors. The drama comes to a head this weekend at one of golf’s most prestigious events, which includes players from both leagues. Everyone has been cordial so far, but make no mistake: Both leagues really want to win this one. For more A visual guide to Augusta National Golf Club’s most famous holes, which are named after flowers and plants that grow along the course. Untangling the web of LIV Golf, which has ties to the Saudi crown prince, U.S. consulting firms and the Trump family. NOW TIME TO PLAY The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were painkilling and planking. Here is today’s puzzle. Take the news quiz to see how well you followed this week’s headlines. Here’s today’s Wordle, and today’s Mini Crossword. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — Melissa Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 9, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 9, 2023 April 9, 2023 By Lauren Jackson Good morning. Tipping norms haven’t kept up with delivery apps and changes in how people buy food. Ariel Davis No protocol For delivery drivers, every shift is a game of gig economy roulette: Will customers tip? And if they do, how much? The answers determine their livelihoods. “It’s like gambling,” Brantley Bush, an Uber Eats driver, told my colleague Kellen Browning, a technology reporter. Kellen rode along with drivers in wealthy Los Angeles neighborhoods, pulling up to gated estates to deliver food to millionaires. Tips varied widely. Bush once received a $130 tip from Doc Rivers, the former Los Angeles Clippers coach. Some customers tipped nothing. There is no collective understanding of what we owe delivery drivers in tips. While established etiquette governs tipping in restaurants, a clear protocol is lacking for apps. This confusion is one reason for the wide variation in the tips delivery drivers receive. Let me explain. Undertipping on apps Tipping for food service used to be straightforward. We added around 20 percent to restaurant bills, dropped spare change in tip jars and had cash on hand for pizza deliveries and takeout. Tipping has not only been entrenched in American life but also formalized as part of the economy. The U.S. is unusual among developed countries in allowing tipped workers to make below the minimum wage, sometimes as low as $2.13 an hour. Delivery apps upended these norms in two ways. First, apps have changed the timing of a tip. Delivery services like Uber Eats and DoorDash ask people to tip when they order, unraveling the logic that a tip is compensation for good service. Customers now aren’t sure what they are paying workers for or how much they should give. Second, apps have transformed what was once an in-person exchange into a digital transaction. This depersonalizes the tip and can discourage generous tipping. While diners in restaurants can see the work of servers, apps obscure the work of delivery drivers. Customers may not meet the driver at all, given the option of no-contact delivery. “Drivers wonder why people aren’t tipping more,” Kellen told me. “They’ve realized most people aren’t thinking about the human element that goes into delivering their food.” The possibility of overtipping In the absence of clear norms for tipping on apps, many customers are picking the path of least resistance: the app’s suggested tip. This behavior gives power to technology companies to determine the gratuity. The size and placement of a tip button on an app can influence a customer’s selection or make it harder to opt out of a tip. If no tip screen appears, customers are less likely to seek it out. This exposes workers to wage fluctuation. These design choices don’t just affect workers; they’re also upending the customers’ experience. Digital payment platforms are prompting customers to tip in places where tipping didn’t previously exist, like supermarkets, mechanics’ garages and dog kennels. Now, many wonder: Should they tip for snacks at a convenience store? Is it rude to select “No tip” when buying groceries? No one seems to know, and new tipping guides offer directives. Brian X. Chen, a Times tech columnist, has described these design choices as coercive. He wrote that these types of tips may be investigated as part of the government’s crackdown on “junk fees,” extra costs that businesses profit from while adding little to no value. “Tipping has gotten out of control, and people are getting really frustrated,” Brian told me. “It’s a source of confusion that ultimately affects everyone, workers and customers alike.” Related: Read Kellen’s story on delivery drivers in Los Angeles. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT NEWS Leaked Pentagon Documents Newly leaked Pentagon documents on social media show how deeply the United States has penetrated Russia’s intelligence services. The source of the leak is still unknown. The material, which is from recent months, shows that the Russian war machine is in trouble, but suggests that the Ukrainian military is in a bad situation, too. The documents revealed secrets about America’s allies and enemies. Here’s what we know. Other Big Stories Ukrainian mothers and their children.Daniel Berehulak/The New York Times A group of Ukrainian mothers traveled 3,000 miles to recover their children from the authorities in Russian-occupied territory. The Biden administration is planning stringent auto pollution regulations to increase electric car sales. After a student protest, the dean of Stanford’s law school wrote a memo defending academic freedom. But protecting free speech can be complicated. “It’s not worth it … even for Bruce”: Buying concert tickets has become a frustrating experience that includes high prices, surcharges and scalping. After his indictment in New York, Donald Trump could face more serious charges in an election interference investigation in Georgia. “Saturday Night Live” compared Trump’s indictment to the persecution of Jesus, and Molly Shannon hosted. FROM OPINION Laura Kavanagh was supposed to shake up New York City’s Fire Department. Instead she’s facing a mutiny, Maureen Dowd writes. Frimet Goldberger makes the case for staying married to a spouse you cannot stand. Easter is a reminder that hope takes work, Esau McCaulley says. We imagine that the way politicians eat offers a window into who they are. Jessica Grose asks: Does it really? The Sunday question: Can Republicans fix their abortion problem? Swing voters will punish conservative candidates, as they did in Wisconsin last week, until the party endorses a more moderate position, like allowing abortions before 15 weeks, The Wall Street Journal’s Kimberley Strassel says. But compromising will be difficult because many Republican voters and politicians genuinely support strict bans, Times Opinion’s Michelle Goldberg writes. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS Gillian Morris, a software developer, traveled from San Juan to Madrid to freeze her eggs. Egg-freezing tourism: Faced with the high cost of the procedure, some women are going abroad for a better deal — and a vacation. Vows: Art was an easy topic. Defining their relationship was not. Sunday routine: The civil rights champion Donna Lieberman steps back from job pressures with a swim. Advice from Wirecutter: These are the best area rugs. Lives Lived: Benjamin Ferencz was the last surviving prosecutor of the Nuremberg trials. In addition to convicting Nazi war criminals, he crusaded for an international criminal court. Ferencz died at 103. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT BOOKS Yolande Mutale It’s a living: In Monica Brashears’s gothic debut novel, “House of Cotton,” a young woman finds work impersonating the dead. By the Book: Susanna Hoffs has a dollar bill signed by William S. Burroughs. Our editors’ picks: “Confidence,” a galloping scam-artist saga, and nine other books. Title search: Can you spot the hidden World War II novels? Times best sellers: “Outlive,” a look at aging and longevity, written by Peter Attia with Bill Gifford, is No. 1 on the hardcover nonfiction best-seller list. THE SUNDAY TIMES MAGAZINE Illustration by Tyler Comrie. Source photograph: Mike Segar/Reuters. On the cover: Fox News followed its viewers down a rabbit hole. The result was a lawsuit that threatens the network’s future. Recommendation: A kinder way to get rid of bugs. Poem: In Stacy Szymaszek’s “The Privilege of Thinking,” the city and the desert offer different visions of time. Read the full issue. THE WEEK AHEAD What to Watch For Today is Easter. President Biden will visit Northern Ireland on Tuesday to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement that ended three decades of conflict. The U.S. will release monthly inflation figures on Wednesday. Xi Jinping, China’s leader, will meet with his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, on Friday. The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival begins Friday. What to Cook This Week David Malosh for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Spring is a good time to break out of your cooking rut, Margaux Laskey writes in this week’s Five Weeknight Dishes newsletter. Carrot tart with ricotta and feta makes a great vegetarian entree for Easter dinner; a rosemary chicken ragù is popular among children; and sheet-pan miso chicken comes to life with radishes and lime. NOW TIME TO PLAY The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was enjoyment. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: U.R.L. letters (three letters). Take the news quiz, and here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. Read today’s front page. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 10, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 10, 2023 April 10, 2023 By David Leonhardt and Claire Moses Good morning. We tell you the story of Evan Gershkovich, an American reporter who has been imprisoned in Russia. Evan GershkovichThe Wall Street Journal, via Reuters ‘Putin’s hostage’ Evan Gershkovich has devoted his career to the power of bearing witness through on-the-ground reporting. When Gershkovich was in his mid-20s in 2017, he decided to move to Russia — and quit a job as a news assistant at The New York Times — so that he could report on the country where his parents had been born. He first joined the staff of The Moscow Times, an English-language newspaper, then the Agence France-Presse wire service and last year The Wall Street Journal. At one point, he slept in a tent for several nights in the Siberian woods to cover forest fires there. During the worst of the pandemic, he spent time in a Moscow hospital writing about medical students trying to treat a surge of patients. And a couple of weeks ago, Gershkovich traveled to the city of Yekaterinburg, near the Ural Mountains, to report on the Russian military. While he was there, the Russian authorities arrested him for espionage. They have imprisoned him at Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo jail. The Russian government has offered no evidence that Gershkovich is anything other than a journalist. Our colleague Michael Schwirtz, who has also reported in Russia, calls the charges absurd. They appear to be part of Vladimir Putin’s increasing crackdown on independent sources of information. If you read Gershkovich’s journalism — like his most recently published story, headlined “Russia’s Economy Is Starting to Come Undone” — you can imagine why Putin may not like it. We’re devoting today’s newsletter to Gershkovich — to keep sustained attention on his plight and to highlight the larger threat that it represents. Over the past decade, authoritarianism has been on the march, in Russia, China and elsewhere. Leaders in these countries have tried to establish a monopoly on information by jailing or even killing critics, journalists and human rights advocates. Jokes and meals Gershkovich, who grew up in New Jersey as the son of Soviet émigrés, chose to work as a reporter in Russia despite the knowledge that he was taking a risk by being there. “We all knew that working in Russia was risky,” said Anton Troianovski, The Times’s Moscow bureau chief, who left the country last year. “But the journalistic mission was incredibly important.” (Anton goes into more depth in this article.) “Evan did this work out of a love for Russia,” Valerie Hopkins, another Times correspondent, told us. “He found a way to love this country that has broken so many people’s hearts.” Valerie was still working from Moscow when Gershkovich was detained on March 29, and she left the country a short time later. Gershkovich’s colleagues and other reporters describe him as funny, generous and cheerfully competitive. He congratulates other journalists when they get a scoop — and enjoys getting his own. “His bright smile and loud chuckle made you want to be his friend,” Eliot Brown, a Journal reporter, has written. “He’s a magnet for friends, picking them up wherever he travels. He exudes a zest for life, a constant set of jokes and laughs that make you want to hang out more.” Joshua Yaffa of The New Yorker calls Gershkovich “funny, acerbic and kindhearted, not to mention a skilled chef.” He has also shown a dedication to helping the world understand Russia. “He was just really committed to telling the whole story, not just being in the comforts of Moscow but really getting out there,” our colleague Anton said, “and talking to people with different points of view, including Putin supporters.” Last month, Gershkovich published a story about a region in northwestern Russia where people continued to support the war despite the rising death toll. Gershkovich being escorted by officers from a Moscow court to a bus in March.Alexander Zemlianichenko/Associated Press An escalation Shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022, Putin’s government enacted a law that made critical coverage of the invasion punishable by up to 15 years in prison. In response, many Western media organizations temporarily suspended their work in Russia and pulled out their correspondents. Gershkovich was among those who left. But the government at first seemed to be using the law to target Russian journalists, producing Russian-language journalism, rather than foreigners. As a result, some reporters — including Gershkovich and our colleague Valerie — returned. “Western journalists seemed to have some kind of security that they would not be thrown in jail,” Anton said. Gershkovich’s arrest has ended that sense of security and suggests that Putin may be escalating his crackdown as the war continues to go badly for Russia. “Evan is Putin’s hostage,” Anton said. President Biden has called on Russia to release Gershkovich. Experts say that Russia is likely to put him on trial behind closed doors and that the outcome is predetermined. “This is going to be just a show,” Anton said. “They always get a guilty verdict.” In some previous cases, foreign political prisoners in Russia have remained locked up for extended periods. In others, Putin has been willing to release foreigners as part of a prisoner swap after they have been convicted. Experts say that Russian authorities are likely keeping Gershkovich in isolation, but they did allow his lawyers to visit him last week. A prison monitor who also visited reported that Gershkovich was reading “Life and Fate,” a novel about totalitarianism, written in the 1950s by an author born in present-day Ukraine. For more The arrest is further evidence of Putin’s brutality, The Times’s editorial board argues. Bret Stephens, an Opinion columnist, writes: “As for Gershkovich, the most fitting tribute we can pay him is to continue to report the truth about Russia, despite the risks.” The Journal published a profile of Gershkovich and made his work freely available. More than 300 reporters are being detained around the world, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. The group says that’s more than in previous years. The fight for two roads into Bakhmut has hit a stalemate, Ukraine says. The battle for the eastern city has lasted more than eight months. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Leaked Pentagon Documents Ukraine’s air defenses need a big influx of munitions to keep Russia from changing the course of the war, leaked Pentagon documents suggest. The latest leak differs from WikiLeaks and other breaches in the freshness of the documents and its potential for damage. Leak or hack? A coup for Russia or a ploy by the United States? Here’s a guide to the documents. Business and Tech Bitcoin mines devour, sell and sometimes turn off electricity, causing pollution and raising bills for people around them. Tesla is planning a factory in Shanghai to make batteries large enough to run factories or homes during a blackout. Other Big Stories El Salvador decimated its gangs, making the country safer. Critics say the price is eroded civil liberties and an increasingly autocratic police state. An imam was stabbed during early morning prayers at a mosque in Paterson, N.J. Worshipers subdued the assailant. New Mexico is losing a dialect of Spanish that’s spoken nowhere else. It has endured for 400 years in remote mountain villages. Ron DeSantis, Florida’s governor, is pushing the toughest immigration measures in the country, including penalties for those who help undocumented migrants. At least three California condors, an endangered species, have died from bird flu in Arizona since last month. Opinions Gail Collins and Bret Stephens discuss Justice Clarence Thomas’s junkets. The superrich have supersized carbon footprints. Tax their planet-warming yachts and private jets out of existence, Joe Fassler says. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS Brian Cox says he’s not like Logan Roy.Vincent Tullo for The New York Times “Succession”: This is how Brian Cox feels about that big Episode 3 twist. (Includes spoilers.) Mystery: A Swedish warship sank in 1628. It’s still yielding secrets. Metropolitan Diary: A stranger knocked an actor into a new career. A morning listen: How boygenius turns friendship into music. Quiz time: Take our latest news quiz and share your score (the average was 8.5). Advice from Wirecutter: Wash new towels before using them. Lives Lived: Nora Forster was a German-born publishing heiress and music promoter. She gained fame by marrying (and staying married to) Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols. Forster died at 80. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Jon Rahm after winning the Masters yesterday.Doug Mills/The New York Times Green jacket: Jon Rahm, 28, won the Masters, the second major win of his career. For now, he’s the world’s best golfer. A knee injury: The U.S. women’s national team forward Mal Swanson could miss the World Cup after tearing a tendon. She had scored seven goals in five games this year. A sideline altercation: Timberwolves center Rudy Gobert threw a punch at his teammate Kyle Anderson during yesterday’s game, prompting team officials to send Gobert home. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Madeleine Mantock and Ajani Cabey in “Hamnet.”Manuel Harlan The other Shakespeare Little is known about Anne Hathaway, the wife of William Shakespeare and mother to his three children — so little, that scholars believe her name might have actually been Agnes. This week, the Royal Shakespeare Company is debuting a production in Stratford-upon-Avon that is devoted to her side of the Shakespeare story. The play, adapted from Maggie O’Farrell’s novel “Hamnet,” centers on a version of Anne who brims with spirit and practical intelligence. “She’s so alive,” Madeleine Mantock, who plays her, said. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Andrew Purcell for The New York Times Roast asparagus stalks with olive oil and salty capers. What to Watch “How to Blow Up a Pipeline,” a book that proposed violent action in response to the climate crisis, has become a propulsive heist thriller. What to Read “Calling Ukraine,” a novel by Johannes Lichtman, combines an expatriate story and an office satire. Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was traumatic. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Deficiency (four letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. P.S. Wall Street Journal offices are showing support for Gershkovich: Twitter Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about the expulsion of two Tennessee House members. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 12, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 12, 2023 April 11, 2023 By German Lopez Good morning. Officials are worried that leaked documents could damage U.S. operations around the world. Ukrainian soldiers at the frontline in Bakhmut last week.Mauricio Lima for The New York Times As seen on social media The recently leaked U.S. military documents aren’t just an embarrassment for American officials. They are also likely to have more tangible consequences: Ukraine is changing its battle plans against Russia in response to the leak, CNN reported yesterday. Ukraine’s announcement is a sign of what makes this leak distinct from past ones, as my colleague David Sanger explained. Many of the leaks are weeks old, rather than months or years old, and describe secrets — involving Ukraine, Russia, South Korea, Israel and other countries — that are relevant to ongoing events. The leak sent U.S. officials scrambling to contain the fallout. They are trying to reassure intelligence officials from other countries that further leaks are unlikely. And the Justice Department and the F.B.I. are investigating the source of the disclosure. “We don’t know what else might be out there,” John Kirby, the National Security Council spokesman, said. It is not clear who leaked the documents or what their intentions were. The leak first appeared on gaming chat rooms and message boards, so it’s conceivable that a low-level official posted the documents online to settle an internet dispute, experts say. But it is also possible that Russia or another adversary acted with more serious, nefarious intentions. Today’s newsletter will explain the leak and why U.S. officials worry about its consequences for diplomacy and the battlefield in Ukraine. What leaked The documents appear to come from multiple sources, including briefings for the Joint Chiefs of Staff and updates from the C.I.A. Some are marked “top secret.” Many focus on the war in Ukraine. The information falls into three categories: Details about ongoing campaigns: The leaked documents describe Ukraine’s struggling air defenses and Western plans for Ukraine’s coming counteroffensive against Russia — details that could help Russia. For example, the leaked slides include maps of Ukrainian air defenses. Those defenses have deterred Russian planes from striking deep into Ukraine for much of the conflict, but the leak could help the Russian military bypass them. The documents also disclose information that the U.S. had obtained from its infiltration of Russia’s military intelligence service. Russia could use that information to try to discover American sources and to lock down its own operations to stop leaks to the U.S. Broader strategy: The documents also touch on more general assessments about the war in Ukraine, though little is new. For instance, they predict that neither Russia nor Ukraine will make progress this year in breaking the stalemate in Ukraine’s eastern region of Donbas. But U.S. officials openly share this view. “It gives you a sense of how some American officials are coming to the broader, public judgment that neither side is in a position to win in the coming year,” David said. Chatter about allies: Some of the most sensitive material in the leaks is about American allies. The documents claim that Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency, encouraged staff and civilians to participate in recent protests against the government. Israel’s government denied this claim. The documents also reveal the U.S. was listening in on conversations between South Korean officials over whether to help send Ukraine 330,000 rounds of ammunition, potentially in contradiction to South Korea’s stance against providing lethal weapons to nations at war. The South Korea leak comes at a particularly bad time — weeks before President Yoon Suk Yeol travels to Washington for a state dinner in his honor. “To have it laid out in detail that we’re listening in on his national security aides is more than a little embarrassing,” David said. A few details in the documents also seem to be false or doctored, such as overestimates of Ukrainian casualties in the war. It’s possible Russian officials or others altered the documents before posting, or reposting, them on social media platforms. The consequences Much of the leak’s repercussions will be felt in the short term. The U.S. may be forced to rework its spying operations. Ukraine is changing battle plans, and Russia could, too. Feeling burned from the leaks, some of America’s allies may be more guarded in sharing information. Over the long term, the effects will diminish. Ukraine will still move forward with its planned counteroffensive. The U.S. and its allies will continue supporting Ukraine. And America’s allies will continue sharing information, even if they need assurances first or are more cautious about the potential for leaks. In the past, U.S. officials have overstated the damage from leaks. After WikiLeaks published American diplomatic cables online in 2010, officials warned that the leaks could hurt national security and American diplomats’ ability to talk with allies. Similarly, officials claimed that Edward Snowden’s disclosures of National Security Agency documents in 2013 would permanently hinder America’s intelligence-gathering operations. Those predictions were overblown. The latest leak, and the many specifics it has exposed, show that American officials and spies can still reach deep into the highest levels of other countries’ governments. More on the leaks A large number of people had access to the leaked documents before they were published online. The leak evidently first appeared on Discord, a social media platform popular with gamers. Why are the documents still online? Social media platforms’ policies have gray areas and are inconsistently enforced. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Politics President Biden and Leo Varadkar, Ireland’s prime minister, at the White House last month.Al Drago for The New York Times President Biden is traveling to Northern Ireland today, where he will celebrate the 25th anniversary of a peace agreement that ended decades of violence. Republicans’ conservative base has pushed them to take an absolutist stance on abortion. Some in the party worry about turning off moderate voters. Nashville lawmakers reinstated Justin Jones, one of two Black Democrats expelled by a Republican supermajority last week. Gov. Kathy Hochul nominated Rowan Wilson to be New York’s top judge, after lawmakers rejected her first choice. Wilson would be the state’s first Black chief judge. The Economy Banks have become more cautious about lending, and that may hurt the economy. “No kind of warning or red flag”: With fraud on the rise, some banks are closing customers’ accounts with little explanation. International In China some young people are trading their white-collar jobs for manual labor, challenging stereotypes of success. Italy has rescued more than 2,000 migrants from rough seas since Friday, and was dispatching help for hundreds more. With Israel’s judicial overhaul paused, Benjamin Netanyahu reversed the firing of the defense minister who publicly called for him to pause it. Other Big Stories A gunman killed five of his co-workers at a bank in Louisville, Ky. The police killed the suspect at the scene. Hundreds of drug company executives condemned a judge’s ruling that invalidates an abortion pill’s F.D.A. approval. The mother of a 6-year-old who shot his teacher in January is facing charges of neglect and endangerment. The Dalai Lama apologized after a video showed him sticking out his tongue and asking a child to suck it. His office called his actions lighthearted. A Mississippi sheriff faces accusations of assaulting prisoners and covering up the attacks. Rutgers University faculty members went on strike. Opinions The ouster of two Black lawmakers in Tennessee shows how disenfranchisement and racial animus often go together in the South, Tressie McMillan Cottom argues. A Supreme Court justice resigned under pressure in 1969. The ethical questions surrounding Justice Clarence Thomas are more severe than in that case, Adam Cohen writes. Rwanda’s president has won international praise while undermining democracy, Anjan Sundaram writes. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS The Asian elephant Pang Pha grew up at the Berlin Zoo.Kaufmann et al., Current Biology Autodidact: This elephant taught herself to peel bananas. A 70-year-old mystery: Who attacked a violinist for the crime of playing Richard Strauss? That time of year: Is it a cold or is it allergies? Advice from Wirecutter: Buy these items once, and keep them for life. Lives Lived: Al Jaffee created Mad Magazine’s fold-in, giving readers a satirical double-take on what was going on in the news. Jaffee died at 102. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Aliyah Boston, right, and W.N.B.A. commissioner Cathy Engelbert.Adam Hunger/Associated Press Aliyah Boston goes No. 1: The South Carolina star was picked first overall by the Indiana Fever in last night’s W.N.B.A. Draft. Lakers’ confidence: LeBron James and his teammates will participate in the N.B.A. Play-In Tournament tonight. They think they can win the championship. A throwback technique: The Yankees are leading a stolen-base revolution in Major League Baseball with a 50-year-old strategy. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS A kiddush cup, stolen by Nazis in 1938.Jared Soares for The New York Times The return of stolen silver The Nazis’ looting of art owned by Jewish families has received a lot of attention. Less discussed has been the Nazis’ pervasive theft of everyday items like silver cups, candlesticks and teapots. Some German museums with such objects are trying to return them. The Bavarian National Museum in Munich recently sent a 19th-century kiddush cup to Steven Bergman, a retired executive in Maryland. Nazi officers had stolen it from his father, William Bergman, when they arrested him in 1938. “It’s astounding,” Steven Bergman said. “Every time I see the cup, it reminds me of my father.” PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Linda Xiao for The New York Times Enjoy this one-pan meal of fried eggs and potatoes any time of day. What to Watch Animated journeys, a basketball-themed high-school comedy and more: Stream these children’s movies. What to Read In “Nine Black Robes,” Joan Biskupic traces the rise of the Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority. Late Night Stephen Colbert discussed Justice Thomas. Now Time to Play NYT The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was unkempt. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: ___ queen (four letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — German P.S. The Times’s Telegram app account is now sharing stories from around the world. To follow, search for @nytimes on Telegram and hit “Follow” at the bottom of the screen. Or click here. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about Russia’s crackdown on dissent. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 13, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 13, 2023 April 12, 2023 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We explain the dueling rulings on abortion and what’s likely to happen next. Mifepristone and misoprostol tablets.Desiree Rios/The New York Times Mail fight The future of abortion — both the practice itself and the legal fight over it — will increasingly revolve around prescription drugs. That’s been evident for a while, and the dueling legal decisions last week about a commonly used abortion drug made it even clearer. In the end, the Supreme Court may need to resolve the dispute and decide whether the drug can continue to be used. With help from Times reporters who are covering the story, today’s newsletter will explain why medication abortion, as the practice is known, is growing so rapidly and what’s likely to happen next. ‘Existential crisis’ Medication abortion has become more common over the past decade and now accounts for more than half of legal abortions. Typically in the U.S., the treatment involves a combination of two drugs, mifepristone and misoprostol. The treatment has become more popular partly because many women prefer it to surgical abortion. They can take the drugs at home rather than at a hospital or doctor’s office, and the drugs are both highly effective and safe. Emergency rooms see more people suffering side effects from Tylenol, Christina Jewett, who covers the F.D.A. for The Times, pointed out. “This drug has been studied and scrutinized heavily for more than 20 years,” Christina told me. (This graphical review of the evidence is illuminating.) Since the Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade last year, 13 states have banned nearly all abortions, including medication abortions. But some women in those states have been able to get around the bans with a drug prescription. They can briefly travel to another state to receive the pills or can order them by mail (even illegally from an overseas provider, as some abortion-rights advocates have encouraged). The rise of medication abortion explains why overall abortion rates have not declined as much post-Roe as some people expected. Nationwide, the number of legal abortions per month was 7 percent lower in the final three months of last year than in the months immediately before the Supreme Court ruling, according to a report issued yesterday by the Society of Family Planning. Because the data does not include illegal abortions, the actual decline was likely smaller, my colleague Margot Sanger-Katz said. Both abortion supporters and opponents understand how important medication abortion has become. “The fact that pills can be mailed is an existential crisis for the anti-abortion movement,” Rachel Rebouché, the dean of Temple University’s law school, told The Associated Press. “It’s hard to police. It’s hard to track. It’s difficult to enforce.” The rulings Conservative judges have become bolder in recent years about trying to strike down laws they do not like, and Friday’s ruling against mifepristone was part of the trend. In it, Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a Donald Trump appointee in Texas, held that the F.D.A. had erred when it approved the drug in 2000. Some of Kacsmaryk’s reasoning seemed plausible on its face: He noted that the agency used a process intended for serious illnesses and argued that pregnancy was not an illness. Other parts of his ruling seemed at odds with reality: He claimed the drug was unsafe. Either way, it was a radical ruling. No court had previously overridden an F.D.A. approval of any drug. For that reason, even some conservatives criticized the decision. My colleague Adam Liptak wrote that the legal scholars he interviewed described Kacsmaryk’s decision as being of “poor quality” and “breathtaking sweep.” Jonathan Adler, a conservative law professor, and The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board also criticized the ruling. More than 400 pharmaceutical executives and investors condemned it as being “without regard for science or evidence” and dangerous to many future drug treatments. On the same day as Kacsmaryk’s decision, Thomas Rice — a federal judge in Washington State appointed by Barack Obama — issued an opposing ruling in a different case. Rice granted a request from the Democratic attorneys general of 17 states and Washington, D.C., that the F.D.A. not limit access to mifepristone in their jurisdictions. Rice’s ruling could effectively void Kacsmaryk’s ruling in those 18 states. Kacsmaryk placed a one-week delay on the implementation of his decision, to give an appeals court, based in New Orleans, time to review it. The outcome of the appeal may depend on whether the three judges randomly assigned to it happen to be conservative or liberal, but the New Orleans court isn’t likely to have the final word. The Supreme Court is. What’s next Many legal experts say they aren’t sure to what to expect. If the appeals court overturns Kacsmaryk’s decision, the case could simply end, at least for now. Or the Supreme Court could agree to hear the case and rule that the status quo remains in effect until it rules. In that situation, mifepristone would still be widely available in much of the country but not in the 13 states that virtually ban abortion. If Kacsmaryk’s ruling stands, the F.D.A. and the rest of the Biden administration would have to decide whether they wanted to defy it, using Rice’s ruling as justification. Alternately, doctors could decide to offer medication abortion using only misoprostol, as is common in Europe. The misoprostol-only approach is also safe and effective, although side effects, such as painful cramps, can be worse. (Here’s an explainer from Pam Belluck.) Abortion opponents understandably celebrated when the Supreme Court overruled Roe. But even in the new legal landscape, preventing abortion is more difficult than it was in 1973, when the court issued the Roe ruling. The U.S. courts have since made abortion less accessible, but scientific developments — namely the rise of abortion drugs — have pushed in the other direction. For more Democratic-led states are moving to stockpile abortion pills for an uncertain future. “Unborn human”: The Texas judge’s ruling is filled with language often used by activists. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Politics The new rules would be the nation’s most ambitious climate regulations to date.Maddie McGarvey for The New York Times The Biden administration will propose rules to ensure that two-thirds of new cars and a quarter of new heavy trucks sold in the U.S. by 2032 are all-electric. The government also proposed deep cuts to water allotments from the Colorado River that would reduce the supply to California, Arizona and Nevada. The Manhattan district attorney sued Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, an extraordinary step to keep Republican lawmakers from interfering in the Trump case. Mark Lamb, a Trump ally, said he planned to run for the Arizona seat held by Senator Kyrsten Sinema, the Democrat turned independent. U.S.-born children were separated from their immigrant parents at the border under the Trump administration. An eccentric, conservative billionaire is in the spotlight for his friendship with Justice Clarence Thomas. It involved lavish gifts and trips. Pentagon Documents Leak The documents appeared on a small social media community devoted to wow_mao, a YouTube figure who said he was an “internet micro-celebrity, and I’d like to keep it that way.” Opposition lawmakers in South Korea criticized the documents as evidence of U.S. spying. President Yoon Suk Yeol sought to downplay the disclosures. International Emmanuel Macron, France’s leader, has received scathing criticism from Western allies over his visit with Xi Jinping in China. Russia is trying to make it harder for men to evade a draft, heightening fears that another wave of conscription is coming. Utility workers risking their lives helped Ukraine’s energy grid survive repeated Russian bombings. Biden arrived in Northern Ireland to mark the 25th anniversary of a peace deal. The region has enjoyed peace, but not always prosperity. Other Big Stories The world economy looks increasingly likely to face a slowdown, the I.M.F. said, partly because rising interest rates could curtail bank lending. Troubles in the tech and entertainment industries have hurt California’s tax revenues. The gunman who killed five colleagues at a bank in Louisville this week bought his AR-15-style rifle legally. An auctioneer admitted helping to fake artworks that the Orlando Museum of Art displayed as paintings by Jean-Michel Basquiat. Opinions “The people of Tennessee and the nation witnessed a travesty against democracy last week,” writes Justin Pearson, who was expelled from the Tennessee State Assembly by Republican lawmakers. What happened to America? Times Opinion spoke with people in their 70s and 80s about the state of the country. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS Lee Tilghman, a former influencer.Amy Lombard for The New York Times Internet personality: Is there life after influencing? Spring cleaning: It has its roots in a dirtier time. Ask Well: Why does my neck look so much older than my face? Advice from Wirecutter: How to improve the sound of your headphones. Lives Lived: Kwame Brathwaite’s photographs of celebrities and ordinary people catalyzed the “Black is beautiful” movement of the 1960s and beyond. He died at 85. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Bruins add another: Last night, Boston picked up the final record of a magical year — the most points ever scored by an N.H.L. team in one season. N.B.A. play-in tournament: The Raptors play the Bulls and the Pelicans host the Thunder tonight. The teams are fighting for the last playoff spot in each conference. Women’s soccer: The Americans edged Ireland, 1-0, in a friendly thanks to Alana Cook’s incredible long-range goal. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Back-seat passengers in BMW’s i7 sedan.BMW Rolling supercomputers Car designs are prompting a new question: How much screen is too much screen? Screens have become integral to modern vehicles, combining traditional functions like audio displays with optional content like social media feeds. All those services can distract drivers, as can the screens’ increasing sizes and clunky interfaces. “Screens have their right of existence — they do a lot of things better than physical switches,” Klaus Busse, Maserati’s head of design, told The Times. “It’s just been pushed a little too far.” PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Christopher Testani for The New York Times Pasta with chopped pesto and peas has bright pops of flavor. Theater The musical satire “White Girl in Danger” is set in a fictional soap opera world. Late Night The hosts joked about the official end of the Covid era. Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was immediacy. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Burn slightly (four letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David P.S. The word “catfluencer” appeared for the first time in The Times recently, in an article about cats who film their own stunts. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about the Trump case. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 13, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 13, 2023 April 13, 2023 By German Lopez Good morning. The latest inflation data presents a mixed story for the economy. Consumer demand is shifting to services.Gabby Jones for The New York Times Down, but still high Inflation has come down from its historic highs, though not far enough to stop plaguing the economy just yet. That’s the takeaway from data released yesterday. First, the good news: Prices rose at their slowest pace in nearly two years, having climbed 5 percent in the 12 months that ended in March. The increase is still higher than the 2 percent annual rate that policymakers seek to keep the economy humming — but is down from a peak of 9 percent last summer. The bad news is that other measures — particularly indicators that exclude food and energy prices, which are known as core inflation — tell a more mixed story. In the chart below, you can see that core inflation is more stable than overall inflation and, for that reason, is less prone to misinterpretation. Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics | Chart shows year-over-year percentage change in the Consumer Price Index. | By The New York Times “We’re past peak inflation,” said my colleague Jeanna Smialek, who covers the Federal Reserve, America’s central bank. “But inflation is still pretty stubborn.” The mixed news suggests that the Fed’s recent moves have worked to tame inflation, but that more action is needed to get price increases down to sustainable levels. Today’s newsletter will break down the data and what the Fed might do next. Mixed picture There is an underlying story behind the numbers, starting a few years ago. Flush with money from Covid relief legislation and stuck at home during the pandemic, Americans bought more things they could use in their homes. So prices for goods — physical stuff like furniture and appliances — increased sharply over 2021. As the economy has recovered from the Covid shock and people have started to go out again, consumer demand is shifting to services — things you pay people to do, like make food for you at a restaurant or fly you across the country. Prices are rising accordingly, particularly across airlines, transportation and restaurants, as you can see in this chart: Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics | Chart shows percent change in prices between March 2022 and March 2023. | By The New York Times That trend is what policymakers are looking at now. It suggests consumer demand is still too high — first chasing limited goods and now chasing limited services, leading to increases in prices. There are some good signs for the prospect that inflation will fall further. The flood of cash that people got from the government during the pandemic is drying up, reducing consumer demand. The supply chain has largely untangled itself from the snarls of the earlier Covid days. The shock to oil and gas prices from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has eased. The Federal Reserve, in an effort to further restrain demand, has increased interest rates to make borrowing money more expensive. But there are also some potentially bad signs. American consumers are still spending a lot, taking advantage of higher wages and savings accumulated during the pandemic. The cartel of oil-producing countries, OPEC, is cutting its production to try to raise prices. The longer inflation persists, the more likely it is to become ingrained in the economy — making it more difficult to bring down further. “It’s not that inflation is going to take back off and spike again, but that we might not be able to fully stamp out what remains of it,” Jeanna said. What’s next Going forward, policymakers will probably try to take a balanced approach to match the mixed story. The Federal Reserve is likely to take more measured steps than it did last year. The central bank regularly increased rates by half a point or more for much of 2022, but it adopted a smaller quarter-point increase last month and is widely expected to repeat that step at its next meeting in May. There is a risk that the Fed does too little and inflation persists, as happened in 2021. But there is also a risk that the Fed goes too far and does unnecessary damage to the economy, as this newsletter has explained before. A strong economy can lead to faster price increases. But a weak economy can put a lot of people out of work. Policymakers are trying to find a sweet spot between those two extremes. The latest inflation data suggests that the country is getting there — that an end to rapidly rising prices is perhaps becoming visible now. But the data is not clear enough to rule out a mirage. More business news The Biden administration wants most new cars to be electric by 2032. (Related: How good for the planet is that big electric pickup?) China is pioneering batteries that use sodium, which could transform the industry. NPR will stop using Twitter after the social network labeled it “U.S. state-affiliated media.” Juul announced a $462 million settlement with states over the marketing of e-cigarettes to adolescents. Morale at Meta, Facebook’s parent company, is low, because of layoffs and concerns over Mark Zuckerberg’s vision. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Abortion Pill A federal appeals court said an abortion drug could temporarily remain available, but the judges blocked it from being mailed to patients. Overseas pharmacies are selling abortion pills to U.S. patients, and they stand to profit if the legal challenge succeeds. War in Ukraine A new batch of leaked U.S. documents shows the breadth of Russian government infighting and the reach of American spy agencies into Russian intelligence. Ukraine is pursuing a costly strategy to hold on to its shrinking corner of Bakhmut, even as allies question its rationale. Politics Justin PearsonJon Cherry for The New York Times Justin Pearson, the ousted Tennessee representative, will return to the state legislature with unanimous backing from Shelby County officials. Beyond Tennessee, single parties control many state legislatures, meaning lawmakers face few consequences for their conduct. Senator Dianne Feinstein has asked to step away from the Judiciary Committee while she recuperates from shingles. Federal investigators are asking witnesses whether Donald Trump showed off a map he took with him when he left office that contains sensitive intelligence information. Montana is close to outlawing TikTok, though officials acknowledged that a ban would be technologically tricky to enforce. In a decision with national implications, Oklahoma is considering whether to approve the nation’s first religious charter school. Other Big Stories Prince Harry will attend King Charles’s coronation in London next month without his wife, Meghan, or their children. When Cornell’s student assembly voted to require faculty to alert students about potentially upsetting educational materials, administrators pushed back. More than a foot of rain drenched Fort Lauderdale in Florida, shutting the airport. Opinions Lyndon Johnson was more of an antagonist to Martin Luther King Jr. than has been portrayed, Jonathan Eig and Jeanne Theoharis write. Compulsory substance abuse treatment has its critics, but it can save lives, David Sheff argues. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS The designer Karl Lagerfeld, the subject of a Met exhibition.Mark Graham for The New York Times First Monday in May: What we know so far about the Met Gala. Textbook mistake: The publisher was not smarter than a fifth grader. Industry recruitment: She helps people of color find their footing in the arts. Tiny love stories: Failed first dates and more tales of romance. Flexibility test: Can you touch your toes? Advice from Wirecutter: The best mouse for gaming. Lives Lived: Anne Perry was well into her career as a best-selling crime writer when her own murderous past was dramatized in a 1994 movie. She died at 84. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC N.B.A. eliminations: The Chicago Bulls knocked the Toronto Raptors out of the postseason and the Oklahoma City Thunder ousted the New Orleans Pelicans. Position switch: Bryce Harper, the baseball star, is still recovering from elbow surgery, but he has come up with a creative solution: a move to first base for the Philadelphia Phillies. Jeff Bezos steps aside: The Washington Commanders will have a new owner at some point, but it won’t be the Amazon founder. Bezos has officially taken his wallet and gone home. Jarred Kelenic arrives: Watch his 482-foot home run at Wrigley Field yesterday. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS The Branch Davidian compound.Netflix Reconsidering history In 1993, federal agents stormed a compound that was home to an armed religious sect, known as the Branch Davidians, outside Waco, Texas. The raid culminated in an inferno, broadcast on live television, in which 76 Davidians died, a third of them children. Three decades later, Americans are still divided on what happened, Chris Vognar writes in The Times: Was Waco an inexcusable episode of government overreach or the outcome of a dangerous cult’s fanaticism? Two new shows — “Waco: The Aftermath” on Showtime and “Waco: American Apocalypse,” a Netflix documentary series — are taking a second look. “We really wanted to explore the idea that maybe this didn’t happen because someone was evil,” said John Erick Dowdle, a creator of the drama, “but because humans are fallible and communication is difficult.” PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Michael Graydon & Nikole Herriott for The New York Times This ragù is unapologetically lamb-forward. What to Read “Minor Notes, Volume 1” is part of a series that aims to amplify the voices of lesser-known Black poets. What to Listen to The Times podcast “The Run-Up” investigates what Democrats’ change in the party’s primaries says about President Biden’s grip on power. Late Night “He is not a stable genius”: Jimmy Kimmel mocked Trump’s interview with Tucker Carlson. Now Time to Play Illustration by Eden Weingart The Times is introducing a new feature: Spelling Bee Buddy. It can help you solve the Bee when you get stuck, and analyze your play. The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was expunging. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: “What a shame!” (four letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — German P.S. The Times is inviting illustrators to share work with newsroom art directors. Apply by June 16. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about the leaked documents. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 14, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 14, 2023 April 14, 2023 Continue reading the main story SUPPORTED BY By David Leonhardt Good morning. With judges continuing to disagree, we look at the future of the abortion debate. The U.S. Capitol.Kenny Holston/The New York Times ‘In real jeopardy’ Will abortion be the issue that kills the filibuster? For now, the fight over federal abortion policy is occurring largely in the courts. Judges have issued opposing rulings over the past week related to mifepristone, a drug used in more than half of U.S. abortions today, and the Supreme Court will probably resolve the conflict in coming days or weeks. In the long term, however, court decisions are unlikely to have the final word over abortion policy. Legislation will. Judges merely interpret the law — sometimes aggressively, it’s true — but they cannot write new laws. Only legislators, in Congress and at the state level, can pass laws. The current legal battles over abortion make the point. Each of the court decisions of the past week has interpreted federal laws that affect the use of mifepristone. And Congress could make these cases largely irrelevant by passing a new law that clearly gave — or denied — women access to mifepristone and other drugs used in medication abortions. More court fights would no doubt follow, but they would revolve around different questions. A 2025 scenario The current Congress, of course, is not going to pass any sweeping abortion laws. Democrats control the Senate, Republicans control the House, and the two parties disagree on abortion policy. But the next time one party is in charge of both chambers as well as the White House, the pressure to pass abortion legislation will be immense. Both parties are already talking about what such a bill might include. For Republicans, it could be nationwide restrictions on abortion, perhaps similar to the laws that 13 states have enacted since the fall of Roe v. Wade last year. A less ambitious Republican bill might restrict the mailing of pills like mifepristone, making the current court case redundant. (The shipping of pills is an important issue to abortion opponents because the practice can allow people to circumvent state restrictions, as this Times story about international mail ordering explains.) For Democrats, a bill could do the opposite: protect the mailing of medications and create a national right to abortion that applies to at least the early stages of pregnancy. American politics is now so closely divided — with Democrats controlling 51 Senate seats — that neither party seems likely to hold the 60 seats necessary to override a filibuster anytime soon. Still, abortion has become sufficiently contested and salient that it could test the practice in a way no other issue recently has. A simple majority of senators can vote to end the filibuster, which is a Senate tradition and not part of the Constitution or any other law. Imagine a President Ron DeSantis taking office in 2025, with Republicans in control of Congress, and signing a national abortion ban that many conservatives consider a moral imperative. (Florida legislators yesterday passed one of the country’s most restrictive abortion laws, and DeSantis, the governor, has said he will sign it.) Or imagine if President Biden were to win re-election while the Democrats kept the Senate and retook the House. In that scenario, the politics of abortion would probably have played a role, given the popularity of at least some abortion access. In either case, the party in power would have the power to pass a sweeping abortion law — but only if the Senate scrapped or overhauled the filibuster. Many progressives have long favored ending the filibuster. They argue, accurately, that it stymies Democratic legislation much more often than it does Republican legislation. (I walked through the history in a previous newsletter.) The reason is simple: Conservatives tend to be happier with less government, while liberals often favor more. But the filibuster is not likely to die until the debate revolves around a concrete policy rather than theoretical ideas about Senate process. When the filibuster stands in the way of a change to American life that one party passionately supports, the practice will be endangered. Abortion looks increasingly like the issue that might one day fit that description. As Carl Hulse, The Times’s chief Washington correspondent, told me yesterday, “Pressure continues to mount to jettison the filibuster and the next time either party has the trifecta — White House, Senate, House — I expect the filibuster will be in real jeopardy.” Until then, the political battle will take place mostly in federal courts and at the state level. What’s next On Wednesday night, three Republican-appointed judges on an appeals court panel issued a ruling that would restrict access to mifepristone, but it has not yet gone into effect. Yesterday, a Democratic-appointed judge issued a contrary ruling, ordering the F.D.A. not to restrict access to the drug in certain states. The Justice Department has announced it will ask the Supreme Court to resolve the dispute. If the court agrees to do so, it will likely happen on a faster timetable than many other cases. “It will be on what critics call ‘the shadow docket,’ which means it won’t be a typical case where the court hears oral arguments,” said Abbie VanSickle, a Times reporter covering the courts. “It will happen quickly, although just how quickly is totally at the discretion of Scotus.” You can read the details in this Times story. Related: See where the likely 2024 presidential contenders stand on abortion. Continue reading the main story A MESSAGE FROM SHOWTIME 'Waco: The Aftermath' Michael Shannon leads a powerhouse ensemble cast, as an F.B.I. agent dealing with the fallout of the Waco siege. Limited series streaming now on Showtime. TRY IT FREE THE LATEST NEWS Pentagon Leak Outside the home of Jack Teixeira.Haley Willis/The New York Times The F.B.I. arrested a 21-year-old Massachusetts Air National Guardsman at his mother’s home in the leak of highly classified U.S. intelligence documents. The suspect, Jack Teixeira, was the administrator of a chat group called Thug Shaker Central, where the classified materials surfaced. President Biden sought to downplay the leaks, saying he wasn’t concerned about their disclosures. How could Teixeira have obtained these documents anyway? The leak has started a conversation about security clearances in the government. Politics Donald Trump was questioned under oath in a civil fraud lawsuit brought by Letitia James, the New York state attorney general, against him and three of his children. Justice Clarence Thomas and his relatives sold property to a billionaire friend who also funded lavish trips for him. Thomas never disclosed the deal. The young Black Democrats expelled from the Tennessee legislature have modeled themselves after civil rights leaders of the past. The illnesses of Senators Mitch McConnell and Dianne Feinstein have stalled action in the chamber at a critical time. A defamation case against Fox News that’s set to go to trial next week will address the limits of journalistic responsibility. Other Big Stories Despite cooling prices, economists are worried a recession is on the way — or that the Fed will cause one as it tries to rein in inflation. Resistance from manufacturers and consumers could complicate the Biden administration’s push to increase electric vehicle sales. To tackle climate change, we’ll need to electrify not only millions of cars, but also home heaters and stoves. Here’s how that could happen. An acquaintance was arrested in the stabbing death of the tech executive Bob Lee in San Francisco. Opinions We can fix our crumbling democracy by making it more representative, the political theorist Danielle Allen argues on “The Ezra Klein Show.” If President Biden wants to invest in clean electricity, he needs to make sure it’s as clean as advertised, Leah C. Stokes writes. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS Pineapple lily.Jenks Farmer Stinky flowers: Pineapple lilies are stunning, and they don’t all smell like rotten meat. New czar: “The rats are going to hate Kathy.” Are chatbots sentient? Maybe a little bit, according to one philosopher. Modern Love: How to fall out of love with yourself. Lives Lived: Mary Quant, the British designer known as the mother of the miniskirt, epitomized the style of the Swinging Sixties. She died at 93. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Washington Commanders: Dan Snyder agreed in principle to sell the football team for an N.F.L. record of $6 billion. Meet the likely new owner, Josh Harris. Tampa Bay Rays: The baseball team won their 13th game in a row. N.B.A. playoffs: The Los Angeles Lakers have struggled all season. Yet multiple coaches and executives see the No. 7 seed as a certain pick in Round 1 of the N.B.A. playoffs. Continue reading the main story A MESSAGE FROM SHOWTIME'Waco: The Aftermath' 'Waco: The Aftermath' Michael Shannon leads a powerhouse ensemble cast, as an F.B.I. agent dealing with the fallout of the Waco siege. Limited series streaming now on Showtime. TRY IT FREE ARTS AND IDEAS Nautical reference images in David Grann’s office.Vincent Tullo for The New York Times An 18th-century mutiny In 1742, a vessel washed up on the shore of Brazil. The 30 men aboard were survivors of the H.M.S. Wager, which had run aground almost 3,000 miles away along the Chilean coastline. Six months later, a second boat came ashore in Chile with three men who said that the others were dishonorable: “They were not heroes. They were mutineers.” A new book by the New Yorker writer David Grann focuses on the mysteries surrounding the shipwreck. Rather than trying to smooth over the survivors’ conflicting accounts, Grann lets readers puzzle over the contradictions. “This is a story about the disintegration of a floating civilization,” he told The Times. Related: Read The Times’s review. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook David Malosh for The New York Times This miso-honey chicken and asparagus is an easy sheet-pan meal. Travel Go beyond the Strip for 36 hours in Las Vegas. Late Night James Corden joked about Biden sitting at a tiny Irish desk. News Quiz How well did you follow the headlines this week? Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was wedlock. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Shade of blue (three letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David P.S. We are mourning the loss of our colleague Lisa Cowan, a Times editor who died yesterday. Lisa was a cheerful presence, a mentor and a key part of The Times’s nighttime news coverage. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about “The Phantom of the Opera” ending its run. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 16, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 16, 2023 April 15, 2023 By Melissa Kirsch Good morning. Tax Day is upon us. It’s a time of personal inventory, of looking back and taking account. María Jesús Contreras Happy returns April 15 has, to put it mildly, a terrible reputation. Tax Day (don’t freak out — you have until Tuesday to file) is a near universally dreaded occasion of financial self-scrutiny, a compulsory rite of adulthood whose rank in the boogeyman taxonomy includes root canals and D.M.V. visits. It sneaks in with the rest of the spring holidays, marring an otherwise celebratory season. Tax Day needs a new public relations representative. I’m not nominating myself for the role — I have received a phone call from my accountant that began “Are you sitting down?” — but I do have some ideas for rebranding. When Tax Day looms, I print my credit card statement from the previous year. Recently, as I set about examining my year in spending, I began to marvel at the document, at the organized way in which my very unorganized activities can be marshaled into some kind of order: Here are the restaurant meals you paid for (the lobster rolls we ate outside, the dinner in D.C. with my friend from college). Here’s what you bought (so much for decreasing reliance on retail behemoths). Here’s how much you spent on travel (that trip was a year ago?), on gas, on charitable giving. I found myself reading this spending statement with interest. It’s an emotionless album of debits to anyone else, but, like a logbook, it provoked a torrent of sensations in me. I wouldn’t go so far as to say reading my bank documents was fun, but it was enjoyable to look back on the year, to take stock. What I spent mapped in my memory to what I did and saw, where I went and whom I went with. There’s no other time when we go month by month, reviewing the year. In the waning days of December, perhaps, but, at least for me, that’s more of a general looking back than a detailed inventory. We’re one-fourth of the way through 2023, a logical time to take a pause. Why not make Tax Day slightly less unpleasant by taking the occasion as one of personal reckoning with the year that was? We lament years passing too quickly, our inability to account for them. By looking back closely at the days and their details, we can at least try to get a handle on how we’re spending our time. For more How to manage money stress before Tax Day. Here’s what experts say you should do with a tax refund. From Wirecutter: The best online software and when to hire a professional. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE WEEK IN CULTURE Prince Harry and King Charles III last year.Karwai Tang/WireImage Prince Harry will attend his father’s coronation next month. Here’s what you need to know. Mary Quant, who died at 93, was one of the best-known designers of the Swinging Sixties and defined styles of the era, including the miniskirt and hot pants. Taylor Swift fans were stunned by reports that the singer’s relationship with Joe Alwyn was over. “Harry Potter” will become a television series, and J.K. Rowling will be an executive producer of the show. Ariana Grande posted a video to her TikTok asking people to stop commenting on her weight. The video started a conversation about mental health, The Cut reports. “Shucked” is the first Broadway show in which the breakout star is a vegetable. Lady Gaga, Jon Batiste and Shonda Rhimes were among the luminaries named to the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities. “The Phantom of the Opera,” the longest-running Broadway show, will end its run this weekend. Its devoted followers are mourning. The Cannes Film Festival announced that movies by Wes Anderson and Todd Haynes will compete for the festival’s top prize this year. The white suit worn by Justin Jones, the Tennessee lawmaker expelled for a gun protest, has become a viral symbol, The Times’s fashion critic writes. Fedoras and fascinators: At the Easter Parade in Manhattan, many people came for the hats. Vivan Sundaram, an artist and activist widely credited with spearheading a transition in modern and contemporary Indian art, died at 79. Designers have reimagined chairs for Milan Design Week, a furniture fair. See some of the designs. THE LATEST NEWS Jack Teixeira, an Air National Guardsman, was taken into custody on Thursday.WCVB-TV, via Associated Press A 21-year-old member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard is facing two counts under the Espionage Act over the leaking of classified documents on a gaming chat server. The Supreme Court ruled that a common abortion pill would remain broadly available while the justices studied lower court rulings. Recent data suggests the economy is strong. Yet, for all the good news, economists remain worried a recession is coming. Four sons of the drug lord El Chapo face new charges in the U.S. related to the trafficking of fentanyl. Broadway theater owners are trying to block a casino proposal in Times Square that’s backed by Caesars and Jay-Z. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. CULTURE CALENDAR By Gilbert Cruz 🕹️ “Dredge” (Out now): In this indie game, available on every major platform, you play someone in a mysterious archipelago who must pilot a boat around to fish the waters. Pretty soon, in between meeting the often creepy inhabitants of the island towns, you start to pull up odd creatures and artifacts from the deep. With beautiful art and evocative sound design, “Dredge” is pretty chill and subtly terrifying. 📚 “The Wager” (Tuesday): David Grann, a staff writer at The New Yorker, is well lauded for his deeply researched narrative nonfiction, including “The Lost City of Z” and “Killers of the Flower Moon.” His latest book is about British sailors who were shipwrecked on a miserable island off the coast of Patagonia in the 1700s and then turned on one another in a vicious struggle for survival. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT RECIPE OF THE WEEK David Malosh for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. By Melissa Clark Crispy tofu with cashews and snap peas Yewande Komolafe is a revered tofu whisperer for those in the know, and her recipe for crispy tofu with cashews and snap peas is one of her most beloved. After a searing in a hot skillet, the tofu is topped with a velvety coconut sauce spiked with ginger, garlic and molasses, which adds depth. Lightly charred sugar snap peas give the dish color, along with a slight crunch that’s underscored by a chopped cashew garnish. If sugar snap peas aren’t available, feel free to substitute broccoli, green beans or asparagus. As the headnote promises, “if it’s fresh and green, it’ll work just fine.” REAL ESTATE Imani Keal estimates she has spent $10,000 upgrading her Washington rental.Kenny Holston/The New York Times Aesthetic apartments: These renters are redesigning their homes for social media and making thousands of dollars from brand deals. “Homegrown”: The television host Jamila Norman transforms backyards into productive gardens. She brought the same can-do spirit to updating her century-old house in Atlanta. Tiny home: He fit 250 plants into 350 square feet. What you get for $2.8 million in California: A 1903 Craftsman house in Los Angeles, a Mediterranean-style home in San Rafael or a midcentury-modern retreat in Cambria. The hunt: A first-time buyer wanted three bedrooms for $350,000 in Minneapolis. Which house did she pick? Play our game. LIVING On Air New Zealand, the Skycouch comes with pillows and a thin mattress pad.Air New Zealand Skycouch: Airlines are letting passengers book beds in the economy cabin. Ghosting friends: It can be just as painful as ghosting in dating. Unpredictable weather: Why the West got buried in snow this year but the East didn’t. Beginner workout: Kettlebells offer a low-impact, full-body workout. ADVICE FROM WIRECUTTER Spring pressure washing When it comes to getting cleaning outdoor areas for spring, nothing is quite as satisfying as using a pressure washer to, say, scour years of mildew off a piece of patio furniture. I have a small farm, so my needs are extreme: blasting cow manure off tractor wheels and spraying out the sheep waterer. But pressure washers are great for all sorts of outdoor chores, like rinsing the car or restoring the grill to its shining glory. The best models Wirecutter experts have tested are often electric, and some are even small enough to carry around with one hand. I can’t imagine this time of year without one. — Doug Mahoney GAME OF THE WEEKEND The Knicks’ Josh Hart, left, and Jalen Brunson.Evan Yu/Getty Images New York Knicks vs. Cleveland Cavaliers, N.B.A. playoffs: Both squads are looking for their first playoff series win in five years. Keep an eye on the clash between Knicks guard Jalen Brunson and Cavs guard Donovan Mitchell. In their last matchup, the pair combined for 90 points with 13 three-pointers. Once overlooked, Brunson has had by far the best year of his career, scoring 24 points per game and leading New York to its most regular-season wins in a decade. Mitchell, whom the Knicks sought but failed to acquire in the off-season, proved himself again this season to be a superstar, scoring 40 or more points in 13 games and earning his fourth consecutive All-Star nod. Game 1 is tonight at 6 p.m. Eastern on ESPN. For more The Miami Heat and the Minnesota Timberwolves picked up the final two playoff spots with wins last night. NOW TIME TO PLAY The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was genealogy. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy. Take the news quiz. Here’s today’s Wordle and today’s Mini Crossword. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — Melissa Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 17, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 17, 2023 April 16, 2023 By Mark Scheffler Good morning. How did The Times identify the suspect at the center of the Pentagon leak before the authorities announced his name? Jack Teixeira, an Air National Guardsman, in a photo posted on social media.Reuters A circling plane Even before U.S. officials announced Jack Teixeira as a suspect on Friday in the leaking of classified intelligence documents, my colleagues on the Visual Investigations team had learned of Teixeira’s identity. I asked Mark Scheffler, the editor of the team, to share the fascinating backstory with you today. — David Leonhardt The murky digital trail started with four items posed to Russian channels on the messaging app Telegram, each consisting of a photograph of a classified U.S. intelligence report. Aric Toler, a freelance reporter who works with us, noticed that several similar documents had also been posted elsewhere and figured that the original source of the leaks had to be somewhere other than Telegram. But he couldn’t find it. “I looked and looked,” Aric said. Then a tip came in. Somebody messaged him saying that similar material had appeared on the chat app Discord, in a channel dedicated to maps for the video game Minecraft. Aric found 10 documents there and contacted the host. The host insisted that he was not the leaker and sounded terrified. Like a lot of the people Aric encountered during the search, the host also seemed to be a teenager. He explained that he had gotten the documents from a chat group called wow_mao on Discord. There, a user named Lucca had posted more than 100 images of leaked documents. Aric then started livetweeting his research process, and people sent him private messages. He eventually learned that Lucca was part of another chat group — called Thug Shaker Central — where hundreds of documents seemed to have been uploaded. But Thug Shaker Central had vanished, deleted by its users when the leaks became public. At this point, a former member of Thug Shaker with the user name Vakhi contacted Aric. Lucca was not the original leaker, said Vakhi, who is 17 years old. Somebody known as O.G. was. The granite clue Two other Visual Investigations reporters — Christiaan Triebert and Malachy Browne — joined the effort at this point. Working with Aric, they heard from Vakhi that O.G. had started posting the documents to Thug Shaker last fall. O.G. worked at a military facility, Vakhi said, and the two of them had played video games together. The search was on for O.G.“Thug Shaker was gone, and his fellow gamers refused to identify O.G., but we had enough information to home in on who he might be,” Malachy said. “We looked at the games he played online, who he played them with and connected those dots.” On Steam, an app that sells video games and where users connect with other players, the reporters looked for Vakhi’s account and for the people to whom he was linked. Aric used a specialized site that scrapes and indexes Steam user data, allowing him to see user names that were associated with Vakhi and his contacts. The team figured that one of the people who had interacted with Vakhi might have been O.G. The reporters found a such person, with the original user name of jackdjdtex. On the account, they found a screenshot from a video game identifying a player as J Teixeira. The reporters then scoured Flickr, Instagram and other parts of the web for this mystery person. They found one photo of a Jack Teixeira in a military uniform, another of him smiling in the woods and another of him in the kitchen of his childhood home — standing near a brown-and-white-speckled granite countertop. On Wednesday, Christiaan and Malachy spoke to another Discord member who had downloaded a new trove of 27 photographs of leaked documents. In some of them, Christiaan and another member of our team, Riley Mellen, noticed that the surface on which the documents were sitting when they were photographed. It was a brown-and-white kitchen countertop. On Thursday, Haley Willis, another member of our team, and two colleagues arrived before dawn at the Teixeira home in North Dighton, Mass. “We saw who we believe might have been Jack driving into the driveway,” she said. “He saw us, we saw him and his car froze for a second in the driveway.” They approached the house. Jack’s stepfather, Thomas Dufault, a retired Air Force master sergeant, was there. Haley asked him if she could speak to Jack. “He’s not going to communicate with anybody except an attorney at this point,” the stepfather said. Soon, a plane circled overhead. It was clear the authorities were already on to him. Back in New York, we published our investigation. Later that morning, a SWAT team arrived at the house in Massachusetts. For more Aric Toler talked about the search on the Times podcast Hard Fork. Teixeira was obsessed with war and guns in high school. Ukrainians say the leaks confirm what they’ve been saying for months — they need more weapons. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT NEWS Sudan Fighting Smoke in Khartoum, Sudan.Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Tensions between military factions spiraled into a battle for control of Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, killing dozens of people. As of this morning, fighting was spreading beyond the capital. See maps and videos and follow our updates. The chaos has dashed hopes for democracy in Sudan. Here’s why the fighting matters. Politics Transgender rights has replaced same-sex marriage as a rallying cry for the religious right. “The science of reading”: A revolt over how children are taught to read is sweeping classrooms and statehouses. Other Big Stories A fertility clinic in Kyiv, Ukraine.Laetitia Vancon for The New York Times Ukrainian soldiers are freezing their sperm so that even if they die, their partners can still build their families. Investigators discovered a text message that offered a potential clue in the killing of tech founder Bob Lee. Here’s what we know about the case. CoolSculpting, a beauty treatment, promises to zap fat, but it has disfigured some patients. A small number of shoplifters are responsible for thousands of thefts in New York City. A woman emerged from a cave in Spain after spending 500 days in total isolation for an experiment, the BBC reports. On “Saturday Night Live,” Ana de Armas joked about how the first warm day of the year brings weirdness to the park. FROM OPINION “King Lear” is a critique of the gerontocracy, Maureen Dowd writes. In Washington, Donald Trump and Rupert Murdoch play aging kings. When true crime stretches the truth, it leaves victims and survivors behind, Sarah Weinman argues. The Sunday question: Was Biden to blame for the fall of Kabul? The Biden administration’s review of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan mostly pointed fingers at his predecessor. It’s a document of fake history, The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board writes, portraying Biden’s disastrous decisions as triumphs. But those choices were better than the alternatives, The Chicago Tribune’s Daniel DePetris argues. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS Derek Fox on Corach Rambler.Jon Super/Associated Press Grand National: Corach Rambler won the steeplechase, the most unpredictable horse race in the world. Horror stories: New Yorkers have found rats in toilets and beds. Bellyflops and booms: Watch SpaceX’s test launches — some more successful than others. Vows: A kitten advocate fell in love with a cat photographer. Sunday routine: A candle seller hugs her children while waiting for the elevator. Advice from Wirecutter: Use these tools to clean awkward spaces. Lives lived: Hedda Kleinfeld Schachter built the bridal superstore Kleinfeld’s with her husband, Jack, drawing women from all over the world. She died at 99. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT BOOKS What should I read next? The books editors at The Times hear that question a lot. And here’s their answer: 12 books you should be reading right now. The answers include a literary thriller, a gnarly piece of horror, a mesmerizing historical novel, a lavish fantasy and a real-life “Succession.” Brittney Griner: The basketball star is writing a memoir about her detention in Russia. By the Book: The historical novelist Charles Frazier thinks the classics are better later in life. Our editors’ picks: “Enter Ghost,” about one woman’s recovery from a breakup, and eight other books. Times best sellers: A new entry on the children’s picture book list features a cheerleading chicken that boosts readers’ self-esteem in “Woo Hoo! You’re Doing Great!” THE SUNDAY TIMES MAGAZINE On the cover: What is the future of work? Recommendation: Dogsitting for New York City’s elite is the best and worst job she has ever had. Return to office: Panicked chief executives are turning to consultants to help coax employees back into the office. Read the full issue. THE WEEK AHEAD What to Watch For A defamation trial against Fox News is scheduled to start tomorrow. The Boston Marathon is tomorrow. See the scream tunnel and the hills the runners will face. The N.H.L. Stanley Cup playoffs begin Monday. Tuesday is the deadline to file your taxes in the U.S. (Here’s what you need to know.) The Latin American Music Awards are on Thursday. Bad Bunny tops the list with 11 nominations. The Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr begins when Ramadan ends, with the sighting of the new moon later this week. What to Cook This Week Dane Tashima for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Erika Joyce Crispy, creamy, crunchy: They’re some of the best adjectives for food. This week, Emily Weinstein has some quick and easy recipes that will give you that delicate shattering sensation and that satisfaction. Try crispy coconut rice with tofu, this baked fish with tartar sauce or this ginger chicken with a crisp napa salad. NOW TIME TO PLAY The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were rowdily and wordily. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: “No worries” (five letters). Take the news quiz to see how well you followed the week’s headlines. Here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — David Here’s today’s front page. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 18, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 18, 2023 April 17, 2023 By German Lopez Good morning. A lawsuit against Fox News could help decide the boundaries of press freedom. Times Square.John Taggart for The New York Times A First Amendment case Starting tomorrow, Fox News is scheduled to be on trial. Dominion Voting Systems, which makes voting machines, is suing the cable news network for $1.6 billion. Dominion claims that Fox spread a false conspiracy theory that its machines were rigged against Donald Trump in the 2020 election. The trial had been set to start today, but the judge overseeing the case announced a one-day delay last night. Fox may be seeking to settle the case before a trial can begin, The Wall Street Journal reported. We have already seen some of the evidence for Dominion’s side. Texts and emails uncovered through the lawsuit show that several of Fox’s executives, hosts and producers privately doubted the claims against Dominion, which were promoted by Trump, but amplified them on the air anyway. Even with this evidence, Dominion may not have an easy time winning the case because of legal protections for media companies. Those protections were established by a 1964 Supreme Court ruling, New York Times v. Sullivan, based on the First Amendment’s safeguards for freedom of speech and the press. The ruling requires that defamation lawsuits by public figures against media companies prove “actual malice,” meaning that journalists must have known an allegation was false but broadcast it anyway or have acted so recklessly that they overlooked the facts. “It is an incredibly high bar to prove,” said my colleague Katie Robertson, who is covering the lawsuit. The case will test whether Fox’s brand of journalism — which includes a long record of spreading falsehoods (such as about where Barack Obama was born) — is legally vulnerable. Today’s newsletter will look at both sides of the case and its broader implications. What is Dominion’s argument? There is no doubt that Trump’s allegations against Dominion were false. The judge overseeing the case, Eric Davis of the Delaware Superior Court, has already ruled that Dominion won’t have to prove that the claims were wrong during the trial. Its task will be proving actual malice, as well as proving financial damage because of the coverage. To do that, Dominion will point to a trove of texts, emails and other documents showing that Fox News’s leaders and hosts doubted the claims against Dominion but aired them anyway. Referring to claims that Dominion’s software rigged the election, Tucker Carlson texted his producer, Alex Pfeiffer, that the idea was “absurd.” He also texted that Sidney Powell, one of Trump’s lawyers, was “lying.” Yet Carlson later argued on his show, “This is a real issue no matter who raises it or who tries to dismiss it out of hand as a conspiracy theory.” Why did Carlson do this? It seems the answer has to do with his audience. Carlson initially cast doubt on Powell’s claims on air, saying, “She never demonstrated that a single actual vote was moved illegitimately by software from one candidate to another. Not one.” His audience revolted, criticizing him for questioning a Trump ally. Carlson then walked back his public skepticism on air. It’s a recurring theme in the texts and emails. Fox’s leaders and hosts expressed doubt about the conspiracy theory in private, but they also raised concerns about “respecting our audience.” To avoid losing viewers to competitors like Newsmax, Fox hosts and producers seemingly chose to broadcast and support the claims by Trump and his allies. What is Fox News’s argument? Fox News previously argued that even though it knew the claims against Dominion were false, it had to cover them anyway because they were newsworthy. But Judge Davis has ruled that Fox won’t be able to make that argument in the trial. “Just because someone is newsworthy,” he said, referring to Trump and his lawyers, “doesn’t mean you can defame someone.” Without that argument, Fox has focused on others. The network argues that Dominion still needs to prove that Fox’s hosts — who ultimately decide what to air — knew the claims were false and broadcast them anyway. And Fox claims that at least some of the hosts genuinely believed the allegations and therefore were not intentionally defaming anyone. Mostly, though, Fox is relying on Dominion failing to clear the high legal standard established by New York Times v. Sullivan. Dominion, not Fox, has the burden of proof. Legal experts have said that Dominion’s case is stronger than most defamation lawsuits but that the company still may not win. “Proving this in a legal sense is more complicated than proving it in the court of public opinion,” said my colleague Jim Rutenberg, who wrote a Times Magazine article about the case. What are the implications? Fox News argues that if it loses, the case will do irreparable damage to press freedoms, opening all news outlets to lawsuits. “A free-flowing, robust American discourse depends on First Amendment protections for the press’ news gathering and reporting,” a network spokesperson said in a statement. Some legal experts argue the opposite, saying that a loss for Fox could bolster protections for the press. Fox’s actions in covering the 2020 election were so egregious, the argument goes, that any legal standard that protected them would be no standard at all: For First Amendment protections to endure, news organizations need to be held accountable for knowingly spreading false and damaging information. Sign up for our newsletter recapping the latest Fox-Dominion trial updates. For more: Dominion holds powerful sway in the U.S. elections industry. Read more about the company. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS International Smoke rising in Khartoum, Sudan.Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Fighting spread across Sudan, killing nearly 100 people. Rival generals are battling for control of Africa’s third-largest country. Three attackers in India killed a former politician and notorious criminal in front of police officers on live television. The European Union criticized bans by Poland and Hungary on Ukrainian grain imports. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is transforming NATO into a war-fighting alliance. Thousands of Orthodox Christians gathered in Kyiv to mark Holy Week, celebrating a relative calm in Ukraine’s capital. Gun Violence A shooting at a 16th birthday party in Alabama left four people dead and 28 others wounded. A homeowner in Missouri shot a Black teenager after he went to the wrong house to pick up his siblings, CNN reports. Noah Orona, a fourth grader, survived the massacre in Uvalde, Texas, last year by pretending to be dead. A year later, he is still slowly healing. Tech Google is rushing to change its search engine to compete with A.I.-powered rivals like Microsoft’s Bing. They faked it, but didn’t make it: Tech executives’ recent convictions indicate that the start-up world’s fast and loose culture actually has consequences. SpaceX is expected to launch Starship today, a rocket more powerful than any vehicle that has traveled to space before. Watch the launch. Other Big Stories Wildflowers in Lancaster, Calif.Alana Celii for The New York Times A succession of winter showers has brought spring flowers in abundance to California. Jim Jordan, a right-wing Ohio Republican, has gained visibility in Congress by picking fights. “The Phantom of the Opera” ended its 35-year Broadway run. The famous chandelier got a bow. Opinions Educational attainment is increasingly the best predictor of how Americans will vote, Doug Sosnik writes. Kevin McCarthy is struggling to convert Republicans’ strength as the minority party into success in the majority, Michelle Cottle writes. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS The Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, a book made in the early 1400s. Look close: The world’s most beautiful calendar. Metropolitan Diary: Saying “Thank you, door!” to every automatic door. BeReal: The social media app had its moment. But Gen Z appears to have moved on. Quiz time: Take our latest news quiz and share your score (the average was 8.8). Advice from Wirecutter: Our 100 top kitchen picks under $100. Lives Lived: Ahmad Jamal was a pianist who inspired generations of jazz musicians. He died at 92. SPORTS NEWS Canning Conveyor Company Boston Marathon: Eliud Kipchoge, the world’s fastest marathon runner, is racing in Boston today. The Times watched people trying to keep up with his pace. Injuries mar wins: Multiple N.B.A. stars suffered injuries during last night’s playoff slate, which featured three upsets. The Athletic writers assess how the teams will adjust. N.H.L. playoffs begin tonight: Boston is an overwhelming favorite. The Athletic picked its biggest competition: Edmonton, which employs the game’s best player. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Lofi Boy.Lofi Girl/Youtube Welcome, Lofi Boy Lofi Girl is a YouTube channel with more than 12 million subscribers that airs constant streams of lo-fi hip-hop music: ambient, usually lyricless tunes with relaxed beats. The style grew popular on YouTube in the 2010s, and listeners often play lo-fi music to relax or boost focus. As part of a campaign to promote the channel’s newest livestream, Lofi Girl herself — a Studio Ghibli-style animated character, writing at her desk — now has a friend: Lofi Boy. He lives across the street from her and plays computer games with a dog by his side. For more, read how lo-fi streams became a popular alternative to radio and Spotify. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Julia Gartland for The New York Times This farro with blistered tomatoes and pesto comes together quickly for a Monday meal. What to Watch Stream these science fiction movies about deadly viruses and a dying planet. Theater See a revival of the 1960 musical “Camelot,” written by Aaron Sorkin. Now Time to Play NYT The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were ambulate, ambulette and mutable. Here is today’s puzzle. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Tree with smooth gray bark (five letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. P.S. Hundreds of dogs, many golden retrievers, gathered to honor the recent death of the unofficial Boston Marathon dog. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about China and Taiwan. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 19, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 19, 2023 April 18, 2023 By David Leonhardt Good morning. There are more revelations about Clarence Thomas’s finances. We explain. The U.S. Supreme Court.Kenny Holston/The New York Times Undisclosed money Americans have long viewed the Supreme Court as more trustworthy and less nakedly political than other parts of the government. Or at least Americans used to feel that way. In 2002, 50 percent of adults said that they had a lot of confidence in the court, according to Gallup’s annual polls on major institutions. Last year, in the most recent version of the poll, only 25 percent gave that answer. Other institutions have also become less trusted over the past two decades, but the court’s decline has been especially acute. The Supreme Court is now less trusted than organized religion, organized labor or public schools, as this chart from my colleague Ashley Wu shows: Source: Gallup | By The New York Times The debate over Justice Clarence Thomas’s acceptance of gifts from a wealthy Republican donor — and Thomas’s failure to disclose them — is in some ways a political Rorschach test. Many liberals who already disliked Thomas are angry. Many conservatives who consider Thomas to be a great justice think the controversy is overblown. And given that justices have lifetime tenure, that the Supreme Court has a habit of protecting its own, and that Congress (which has the power to remove justices) is gridlocked, I don’t expect that this episode will lead to any direct consequences for Thomas. But it may have larger political consequences. Thomas has engaged in a yearslong pattern of behaving in ways that other justices, and many elected politicians, do not. He has misled the public multiple times about his finances (accidentally, he has said). His wife, Virginia, a conservative activist, has also acted in ways that affect the court’s credibility. She attended the Jan. 6 rally protesting the 2020 election result and has repeated Donald Trump’s false claims about that election. Outside legal experts aren’t the only ones worried about the court’s reputation these days. The justices are, too. John Roberts, the chief justice, has publicly argued that the court is not part of the country’s “polarized political environment.” Amy Coney Barrett gave a speech in which she said that she and her colleagues were not “a bunch of partisan hacks.” Thomas himself has said that the justices don’t decide cases based on “personal preference.” Thomas’s own behavior, however, has made it harder for the court to argue that it follows a loftier standard than either Congress or the executive branch does. Many officials in those branches probably would have suffered damage to their careers if they had repeatedly covered up — or failed to disclose — payments they had received. You have to wonder how Thomas’s colleagues, including his fellow conservatives, feel about the continuing revelations. In the rest of today’s newsletter, my colleague Lauren Jackson explains the situation, including the latest developments and less recent details. Yacht trips ProPublica has reported this month on two aspects of Thomas’s relationship with a real estate scion from Dallas named Harlan Crow, who has spent millions of dollars on Republican causes, including efforts to move the judiciary to the right. (Here is a Times profile of Crow, including details about an art collection that includes statues of dictators.) For more than 20 years, Thomas has accepted luxury gifts and trips from Crow. The Los Angeles Times reported on the gifts in 2004. After that story, Thomas continued to accept gifts but stopped disclosing them in the public forms that Supreme Court justices file annually. More recent gifts remained unknown until ProPublica’s reporting. Among them: Thomas has flown on Crow’s private jet and toured a volcanic Indonesian archipelago on his superyacht. Crow commissioned a portrait of himself and Thomas smoking cigars in Adirondack chairs. Crow also helped finance a documentary about Thomas and donated half a million dollars to Liberty Central, an advocacy group Virginia Thomas founded. Thomas has responded by saying that Crow is one of his “dearest friends.” He has also said he was following colleagues’ advice when he declined to disclose the gifts. Crow called the ProPublica report a “political hit job” by a group “funded by leftists.” Missing transaction The second set of revelations involve real estate that Crow bought from Thomas’s family. In 2014, Crow purchased the home where Thomas’s mother lives as well as two nearby vacant lots in Savannah, Ga., for $133,363. Thomas’s mother lives rent-free but is responsible for paying property taxes and insurance, CNN reported yesterday. In a statement, Crow said he purchased the house, where Thomas spent part of his childhood, to preserve it for a future museum. Thomas intends to amend his financial disclosure forms to reflect the 2014 deal. It joins a list of other transactions that he failed to disclose or that remain mysterious: Thomas failed to report $686,589 in income that his wife earned over five years from the Heritage Foundation as well as two years of her income from Hillsdale College, a Christian school in Michigan. Thomas acknowledged the error when he amended his filings in 2011. He has reported between $50,000 and $100,000 in annual income from a real estate company and for years referred to it by an outdated name on disclosure forms, as The Washington Post reported this weekend. Thomas did not report reimbursement for teaching at the University of Kansas and the University of Georgia several years ago. After an outside group, Fix the Court, pointed out the lack of disclosure, Thomas amended his filing. From 1998 through 2003, Thomas accepted $42,200 in gifts, making him the top gift recipient on the court at the time. The justice who accepted the next-highest amount was Sandra Day O’Connor, who received $5,825 in gifts. For more The Senate Judiciary Committee plans to hold a hearing about ethical standards on the Supreme Court. The U.S. and Israel are asking: How much power should courts have? Emily Bazelon explains in The Times Magazine. Late night hosts joked about Crow’s art collection full of dictators. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Politics Three boys from Guatemala who work full time in construction.Kirsten Luce for The New York Times The Biden administration ignored warnings that migrant children were being forced into work, a Times investigation found. Kevin McCarthy, the Republican House speaker, proposed to raise the debt ceiling for a year in exchange for spending cuts. Representative George Santos, the New York Republican who fabricated much of his biography, says he will run for re-election in 2024. Gun Violence An 84-year-old man was charged with shooting Ralph Yarl, a Black teenager who mistakenly came to his door in Kansas City, Mo. A man shot a 20-year-old white woman, Kaylin Gillis, after she accidentally pulled into his driveway in upstate New York, the police said. He was charged with murder. A grand jury in Ohio decided not to charge the police officers who shot to death Jayland Walker, a 25-year-old Black man, after an attempted traffic stop. International The Sudanese Army rejected a call for a humanitarian cease-fire in its battle with a rival paramilitary force. Combatants in the fighting have targeted U.S. and E.U. diplomatic officials, hospitals and aid groups. Vladimir Putin visited Ukraine’s Kherson region, the Kremlin said, close to the war’s front line. A Moscow court sentenced a prominent Putin critic to 25 years in prison. China said its economy grew 4.5 percent in the first three months of 2023, a sign it has started to recover after strict Covid rules ended. The United States is building a war crimes case against top Syrian officials after the execution of an American aid worker. Other Big Stories The F.B.I. charged two men with running a Chinese police outpost in New York City, one of more than 100 such outposts around the globe. The Ohio train derailment highlights the risks of transporting chemicals for making plastic. SpaceX called off a test launch of Starship, the most powerful rocket to date, because of a valve problem. The U.S. has new rules for its $7,500 electric vehicle credit. See which cars qualify. Opinions Ron DeSantis isn’t so much against the elite as he is looking to replace it with a more conservative one, Sam Adler-Bell argues. The era of the big original Broadway musical ended long before “Phantom of the Opera” did, Andrew Lloyd Webber writes. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS TikTok has helped feed the mania for the cookies.Amy Lombard for The New York Times Crumbl: They’re the fastest growing cookie company in America — and the most divisive. Personal finance: Can you save for your first home and your retirement? Arthritis: What you can do to avoid it (and treat it) as you age. Advice from Wirecutter: These are the best camping chairs. Lives Lived: Robert Trotman trained thousands of Black and Hispanic youths in competitive swimming in urban areas not known for the sport. He died at 82. SPORTS NEWS Boston Marathon: Two Kenyan runners won. Evans Chebet outpaced Eliud Kipchoge in the men’s race. Hellen Obiri took the women’s crown in only her second marathon. Times reporters covered the race while running it. Draymond Green: The Golden State basketball star earned a flagrant foul and an ejection for a stomp last night. Sacramento won 114-106, The Athletic reports. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS The Writers Guild of America West offices in Los Angeles.Andrew Cullen for The New York Times A looming Hollywood strike Hollywood writers have voted in favor of a strike, setting up a contract fight that could upend the entertainment industry if they don’t reach an agreement with major studios by May 1. The unions that represent TV and movie writers are seeking higher wages and royalties that better account for streaming services. If the two sides fail to reach a deal, the first shows to go off the air would likely be late-night talk shows — where scripts are turned around daily — followed by “Saturday Night Live” and soap operas. Studios have begun to stockpile scripts and are preparing new unscripted entertainment, like reality shows. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Christopher Simpson for The New York Times Salmon, gently roasted to a buttery medium-rare, stars in this make-ahead-friendly dish. What to See On the Metropolitan Museum’s rooftop, a new temple evokes the forms of ancient Egypt and the culture of South Central Los Angeles. Where to Go An adventure through Tanzania’s crater highlands, where wildlife abounds and volcanoes rumble under foot. Now Time to Play NYT The pangram(s) from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were graphing, harping and paragraphing. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Winter bug (three letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David P.S. In 1989, a man proposed on the front page of The Times. The couple is still together. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about the I.R.S. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 20, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 20, 2023 April 19, 2023 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We look at India’s looming status as the world’s most populous country and also give you the latest on the Fox News settlement. A train station in Mumbai, India.Atul Loke for The New York Times Rising and falling The United Nations released data this morning confirming that India will soon surpass China as the most populous country. When that happens, it will be the first time in centuries that China does not have the world’s largest population. The milestone is focusing attention on both India’s potential to become a global power and the significant challenges that it faces. My Times colleagues who are based in India will be writing about the subject frequently this year, and I want to use today’s newsletter to frame these issues. China’s economic and geopolitical rise over the past few decades has changed the world. If India can use its size — and China’s declining population — to catch up, the world would change again. The first Apple store China today is vastly richer than India, but that is a relatively recent phenomenon. In the late 1970s, India was more affluent (based on the most telling measure, economic output per person). Since then, the two countries have followed very different paths: Source: World Bank | Data is in current U.S. dollars. | By The New York Times What happened after the late 1970s? Under Deng Xiaoping, its ruler at the time, China began to open its economy to market forces and foreign investment. It moved away from the inefficiencies of state-run communism. But the government did so in a measured way, rather than fully embracing laissez-faire capitalism. China maintained trade protections that helped its companies grow: In exchange for allowing foreign companies to build factories, China restricted those companies’ ability to sell goods in China and required them to share technology with local companies. This mix of market capitalism and government regulation was the same one that other countries — including the United States, long ago — have used to industrialize. The strategy worked phenomenally well. Hundreds of millions of Chinese citizens moved from poor, rural areas to take factory jobs in cities. The resulting decline in poverty may be the largest in human history. India was never a communist country, but it did have a weak socialist-style economy in the 1970s suffering the aftereffects of British colonialism. And India was slower to modernize than China, as my colleagues Mujib Mashal and Alex Travelli — both based in Delhi — point out in a new story about the population milestone. “India started opening its quasi-socialist economy nearly a decade later,” Mujib and Alex write. “Its approach remained piecemeal, constrained by tricky coalition politics and the competing interests of industrialists, unions, farmers and factions across its social spectrum.” India’s lag allowed China to grab a first-mover advantage. By the 1990s, China’s manufacturing sector was developed enough to be much more efficient than India’s. Even though wages were somewhat lower in India, many foreign companies chose to locate in China. One factor was the Chinese government’s aggressive investments in roads, airports, rail networks and other infrastructure. Today, transit in China is often more advanced than in the United States. Transportation in India tends to be less convenient. India’s recent leaders, including Narendra Modi, the current prime minister, have absorbed this lesson and tried to catch up, spending large sums on infrastructure. They have made significant progress even though China remains far ahead, Mujib and Alex explain. “India’s time has arrived,” Modi recently said. (Related: Apple opened its first retail store in India yesterday.) India’s gender gap A second factor is education. China’s population has long been more educated than India’s, with higher literacy rates and larger shares of people completing grade school, high school and college. Education was one of the few economic successes of the brutal Mao Zedong era, from the late 1940s through mid-1970s. And educated people make for more productive workers, in both white-collar and blue-collar jobs, research has shown. Importantly, the Communist Party’s focus on learning included both girls and boys. India, by contrast, has large gender gaps in literacy and educational attainment. Source: World Bank | Data for India is through 2018. | By The New York Times These gaps contribute to employment gaps between men and women. Only about one-fifth of Indian women work in a formal job. “In terms of education, employment, digital access and various other parameters, girls and women do not have equal access to life-empowering tools and means as the boys and men have,” Poonam Muttreja, the executive director of the Population Foundation of India, a research group, told The Times. “This needs to change for India to truly reap the demographic dividend.” The “demographic dividend” is a reference to recent population trends in India: The country’s largest age group is people in the prime of their working lives. China’s population is aging rapidly, because of its longtime one-child policy, and declined last year for the first time since the 1960s (when Mao’s policies caused a famine). The World Bank projects China’s working-age population to fall to 600 million by 2050 and India’s to rise to 800 million. The demographic dividend gives India a chance to expand both its economy and its global influence. One big question is whether it can do so (as these charts show). A second question is what kind of country it will be. Indian leaders are proud of their country’s status as the world’s largest democracy, and India’s relations with the United States are better than with China. In the continuing global competition between democracies and autocracies, India could be a key player. But it’s still not clear exactly which side it will be on. I recommend reading the story by Mujib and Alex, which points out Modi’s continuing crackdown on dissent and embrace of strongman tactics. For more: China’s shrinking work force could hobble the global economy. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Fox Lawsuit Fox News agreed to settle a defamation lawsuit from Dominion Voting Systems over 2020 election misinformation. The network will pay $787 million. The outcome is a win for Dominion but lets Fox avoid potentially embarrassing testimony from Tucker Carlson Rupert Murdoch and others. The settlement is an implicit admission of wrongdoing by Fox, a rarity from the powerhouse in Republican politics. While other news outlets covered the settlement, Fox News hosts barely mentioned it. Smartmatic, another voting machine company, is still suing Fox, for $2.7 billion, explains Michelle Goldberg of Times Opinion. International Evan GershkovichNatalia Kolesnikova/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Evan Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter arrested in Russia, made his first court appearance. He seemed to be in good spirits, smiling at fellow journalists in the courtroom. Warplanes struck Sudan’s main international airport after a cease-fire unraveled. Here’s how the war started. China is preparing to expand its nuclear arsenal, potentially making it an atomic peer of the United States and Russia. A hospital fire in Beijing killed at least 29. Officials arrested a dozen people and said construction negligence may have started the blaze. Mexico uses the powerful spy tool Pegasus against both drug lords and human rights advocates — even after promising to stop. Other Big Stories The Supreme Court is expected to decide today whether an abortion pill will remain temporarily available while an appeal moves forward. The U.S. will spend $1 billion to keep Covid vaccines free for the uninsured when the shots move to the commercial market later this year. “People come to my door all the time. I don’t shoot them in the head.” Kansas City residents were outraged at the shooting of Ralph Yarl, a 16-year-old. At least three people who carried tiki torches during a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville in 2017 have been indicted. One woman helped Ron DeSantis rise to political fame before he abruptly banished her. Now she’s helping Donald Trump instead. A portion of a parking garage collapsed in Lower Manhattan, killing one person. Opinions Bidding farewell to her third and final heart, Amy Silverstein laments the life-threatening side-effects of organ transplants. Why are we so lonely? On “The Ezra Klein Show,” the writer Sheila Liming explores why we struggle to create community. The complete Times subscription. The Morning offers daily highlights from The Times — but for the complete Times experience, subscribe to All Access. MORNING READS Seaweed in Fort Lauderdale.Joe Raedle/Getty Images The blobs: Giant masses of seaweed are headed for Florida. This map shows where they are. Kids on planes: Who cleans up their mess, parents or airline workers? Twitter is fighting over it, The Washington Post reports. Netflix: The company is ending its DVD-by-mail business, after more than 5.2 billion rentals. Nap dress: The elevated nightgown won devoted fans during the pandemic. Now it comes in bridal styles. Advice from Wirecutter: Cheap(ish) ways to make your clothes look better and last longer. Lives Lived: Freddie Scappaticci led the internal security unit of the insurgent Irish Republican Army, though many believed him to be “Stakeknife” — the code name of a high-ranking British mole. He died at an unknown age. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Damar Hamlin: The Buffalo Bills safety who collapsed during a game was cleared to return to practice. Suspension: Draymond Green will miss Game 3 of the Warriors-Kings series, a loss for the defending champs, who are already down 0-2. Cruising: The New York Rangers won their playoff opener last night 5-1 over New Jersey. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Jean-Georges.Karsten Moran for The New York Times New York’s best restaurants These are the 100 best restaurants in New York City, as assembled by Pete Wells over a dozen years as a Times restaurant critic. The list includes fine dining mainstays like Le Bernardin and Jean-Georges. There are buzzy newcomers, including Semma and Zaab Zaab. And there are places where great food can be found for cheap: Tacos El Borrego in Queens, Hop Lee in Chinatown, Falafel Tanami in Brooklyn. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Linda Xiao for The New York Times. Food Stylists: Monica Pierini. This is the easiest chicken noodle soup. What to Listen to Is Danish pop the next K-pop? Tobias Rahim, a phenomenon in Denmark, wants the country’s music to be internationally famous. Late Night “I want my trial!” Stephen Colbert joked about the Fox settlement. Now Time to Play The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were eminently and imminently. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: With 5-Across, utterly exhausted (nine letters). And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David P.S. On this day in 1897, J.J. McDermott won the first Boston Marathon in 2:55:10 — a time good enough for roughly 2,700th place this year. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about the abortion pill. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 21, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 21, 2023 April 20, 2023 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We look at the costs of Dianne Feinstein’s absence to the Democratic Party’s agenda. First, a note to readers: If you rely on this newsletter to help you make sense of the world, I hope you’ll consider supporting Times journalism. Our subscribers make possible everything that we do. You can subscribe to All Access — which gives you everything from The Times’s news and opinion coverage, as well as from Games, Cooking, Wirecutter and The Athletic — here. Dianne Feinstein last year.Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times A stalled agenda President Biden and Senate Democrats have a numbers problem. With Republicans controlling the House — and showing little interest in bipartisan legislation there — the appointment of judges is one of the few ways that Biden can get something done on Capitol Hill: The Senate confirms federal judges, and the Democrats narrowly control the Senate. But Senator Dianne Feinstein’s failing health has frozen the Senate Judiciary Committee, the group that must consider any judicial nominees before the full Senate votes on them. Feinstein, who’s 89 and has represented California since 1992, has been ill with shingles since February. She has also been suffering from a deterioration in her short-term memory and her ability to hold conversations for more than a year. It is unclear when she will return to the Senate. Biden and other Democrats had hoped for the appointment of judges — both to federal trial courts (known as District Courts) and to appeals courts (known as Circuit Courts) — to be a major accomplishment this year. That plan is now in doubt because Democrats do not have the votes to confirm judges without Feinstein. Instead, about 20 Biden nominees are in limbo, and 9 percent of District Court and Circuit Court judgeships remain vacant. Among Biden’s unconfirmed nominees: Mónica Ramírez Almadani, a civil rights lawyer; Robert Kirsch, a former prosecutor who focused on white collar crime; and Kato Crews, an expert in labor law. Trump’s record Until recently, Republicans often put more emphasis on appointing judges than Democrats did. That focus has contributed to conservative policy victories, with federal courts stymying liberal policies on climate change, immigration and workers’ rights. The past few weeks have brought another such issue — abortion. Republican-appointed judges have issued rulings that would restrict the distribution of pills used to end pregnancies, an increasingly important part of abortion practice. The Supreme Court has paused the effect of those rulings through Friday while it considers the case. Donald Trump, with help from Mitch McConnell and other Senate Republicans, was especially aggressive about appointing judges. Trump appointed more federal judges in his four-year term than any other recent president did in his first term: Source: The Brookings Institution | Data includes trial and appeals courts, not the Supreme Court. | By The New York Times As a result, Republican appointees held most judgeships on both trial courts and appeals courts when Biden took office. Biden’s fast start to judicial appointments during his first two years narrowed the gap, though. Today, 51 percent of appeals courts judges were appointed by Republicans, 43 percent by Democrats and 6 percent of seats are vacant, according to Russell Wheeler of the Brookings Institution. To continue their progress, Democrats have tried to replace Feinstein on the Judiciary Committee, but Republicans blocked the switch this week. Without Feinstein, Democrats have lost their one-vote margin on the committee, causing it to deadlock on nominees rather than advancing them to the Senate floor. Some progressive activists argue that Democratic leaders should try to change Senate rules so that the filibuster could not block a change to the Judiciary Committee membership, but Democrats may not have the votes to pass that change, my colleague Annie Karni, who covers Congress, says. “Democrats are stuck,” Annie told me, “and they just hope she comes back soon.” The other solution for Democrats would be Feinstein’s resignation. In that case, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, a Democrat, would replace her, and he has pledged to name a Black woman to fill the seat. Either way, Feinstein has said she will not run for re-election next year, and three high-profile California politicians have announced their candidacies: Representatives Barbara Lee, Katie Porter and Adam Schiff. ‘About the nation’ Some Democrats have become increasingly bold about calling for Feinstein’s resignation or at least raising the subject: “If this goes on month after month after month, then she’s going to have to make a decision with her family and her friends about what her future holds,” Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Minnesota Democrat, said this week. “This isn’t just about California; it’s also about the nation.” “She has been an icon on issues of gun violence and women’s rights, but it has become painfully obvious to many of us in California that she is no longer able to fulfill her duties as she doesn’t have a clear return date,” Representative Ro Khanna, who represents Northern California, said last week. “Senator Feinstein is a remarkable American whose contributions to our country are immeasurable,” Representative Dean Phillips of Minnesota tweeted last week. “But I believe it’s now a dereliction of duty to remain in the Senate and a dereliction of duty for those who agree to remain quiet.” Other Democrats, including Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker, say that Feinstein has earned the right to remain and have suggested that the criticism of her is sexist. “I’ve never seen them go after a man who was sick in the Senate in that way,” Pelosi said. Feinstein’s defenders are certainly correct that sexism plays a big role in American politics. But the biggest distinguishing feature of the current situation isn’t Feinstein’s sex. She is not the first female member of Congress to serve while old or ill. What makes this case different are the consequences. No other aging member of Congress in decades, if not longer, has blocked one of his or her political party’s biggest priorities. But Democrats do not seem to have a solution to their problem. Related: Some Democrats have also called for an end to the “blue slip” process, which has given Republicans a veto over any Biden nominee to a trial-court judgeship in their home state. Read more here. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Politics The Supreme Court delayed a ruling on an abortion pill, keeping it available through Friday. Donald Trump and other Republicans are criticizing Ron DeSantis’s feud with Disney, saying he’s flouting pro-business and small government values. Members of Congress sold bank stocks as fears of bank failures grew. After the Fox settlement, attacks on legal protections for journalists are expected to continue. International The Ukrainian Army uses billboards to counteract propaganda.Daniel Berehulak/The New York Times Russian propaganda tells Ukrainians they are under attack from their own army. There are people in eastern Ukraine who believe it. Civilians in Sudan are attempting to flee the fighting there, but an uneven cease-fire has made their journey dangerous. A stampede for food aid in Yemen killed at least 78 people. Palestinians are on edge after a surge in attacks by Jewish settlers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Gun Violence Two shootings of people who came up to the wrong house have brought attention to state self-defense laws. Here’s where they apply. The suspects in both cases appeared in court, and a man pleaded not guilty in the shooting in Kansas City, Mo. Two Texas cheerleaders were shot after one tried to get into the wrong car after practice, NPR reports. Other Big Stories The F.D.A. authorized another round of Covid vaccine boosters for people 65 and older. New York City agreed to pay up to $53 million to people wrongly held in solitary confinement. A tornado killed at least two people in Oklahoma. Frank Ocean pulled out of Coachella, blaming a broken leg, after his first performance at the festival drew criticism. A fake hit that used artificial intelligence to copy the voices of Drake and The Weeknd shook the music world. Opinions Divisions in Taiwan show how China is inflicting damage on the island without firing a shot, Yingtai Lung writes. Mental health diagnoses can provide comfort, Emma Camp writes, but defining our identities around them can be limiting. MORNING READS The Las Campanas Observatory in the Chilean Andes.Marcos Zegers for The New York Times Stargazing: Astronomers love the Atacama Desert in Chile, because it’s exceptionally dry and dark. California potholes: Winter storms left so many that even Arnold Schwarzenegger patched one. Japan’s empty houses: Want to buy one for $25,000? Hitching a ride: An ultramarathoner was disqualified after hopping in a car for a couple of miles. Pink door: See the color that was ruled too bright for Scotland’s streets. Advice from Wirecutter: These are the best sandals. Lives Lived: Todd Haimes saved New York’s Roundabout Theater Company from bankruptcy and made it one of America’s largest nonprofit theaters. He died at 66. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC N.B.A. playoffs: Dillon Brooks called LeBron James “old” after the Grizzlies’ win over the Lakers last night. And Jamal Murray went off with a 40-point performance for a Nuggets win. An upset: The Florida Panthers topped the juggernaut Boston Bruins, 6-3, in the first round of the N.H.L. playoffs last night. Joint World Cup? The United States and Mexico are launching a shared bid for the 2027 Women’s World Cup. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Marissa Zappas, an independent perfumer in Brooklyn.Justin J Wee for The New York Times New noses The perfume industry has long relied on a small number of scents, like jasmine, rose or bergamot. Now, indie perfumers are imagining new possibilities, including scents that evoke birthday parties (with a note of latex), the supernatural or Jesus’ anointed feet. Marissa Zappas is one of the popular new perfumers. You can smell her work at the Museum of Sex in New York, where she captures the loss of innocence in a bright pink bedroom with a scent that smells sweet, floral … and a little bit like cat urine. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Kelly Marshall for The New York Times A rolex (a vegetable omelet, not the watch) is popular on the streets of Kampala, Uganda. The name may come from saying “rolled eggs” three times fast. Travel Visit the sun-splashed seaside city of Málaga, Spain, to rediscover Picasso. Late Night Jimmy Kimmel chided Fox News for not covering its settlement. Now Time to Play The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were lunched and unclenched. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find the remaining words. Here’s the Mini Crossword, Wordle and today’s Sudoku. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David P.S. Mae West and two producers were jailed for 10 days on obscenity charges related to their play “Sex,” The Times reported on the front page 96 years ago today. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about the Fox settlement. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 22, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 22, 2023 April 21, 2023 By German Lopez Good morning. A.I. does not have to be perfect or have human-level intelligence to be useful. OpenAI offices in San Francisco.Jim Wilson/The New York Times Saving time For most people, ChatGPT is more of a toy than a tool. You can ask it silly questions, but it’s not robust enough to write high-quality work memos or school essays. Yet the people behind artificial intelligence programs believe these systems will someday become a regular part of our lives, helping us in day-to-day routines. How? Some type of A.I. will usher in that reality not because it will be perfect or display human-level intelligence. It will simply perform a task better than people can now. We don’t yet know what that task or the piece of A.I. will be. Perhaps it will be a task that seems small but nonetheless takes up time, like writing an email response or organizing a schedule. Or it could be bigger, such as driving a car. Either way, the shift will be enough to get the public to widely adopt it. Phone cameras are a useful analogy. They typically take lower quality photographs than stand-alone cameras. But most people have embraced them because they are so convenient, packaged in devices most of us carry everywhere. That sort of usefulness is a much lower bar for A.I. to meet than creating the kind of all-knowing, all-doing A.I. depicted in science fiction. Then, widespread adoption could help A.I. rapidly improve further. The technology is built on data. And the more people use A.I., the more data developers can collect to adapt their programs. Today’s newsletter will look at how that future could start. Better, not perfect There is a pithy way to describe how technology progresses: It has to be better, not perfect. One example is A.I. that can code. People who don’t know how to code already use bots to produce full-fledged games, as my colleagues Francesca Paris and Larry Buchanan explained. And some professional programmers use A.I. to supplement their work. The current technology is imperfect. It can make mistakes, and it struggles with more complicated tasks or programs. But the same is true for human coders. “Humans are not perfect at many of the tasks they perform,” said Helen Toner, a director at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology. By this standard, coding bots do not have to be flawless to replace existing work. They merely have to save time. A human coder could then use that extra time to improve on the A.I.’s work, brainstorm other ideas for programs or do something else entirely. Unintended consequences A.I. outcomes won’t always be good. With phone cameras, people sacrifice photo quality for convenience. The trade-offs could be more consequential with artificial intelligence. Consider an A.I. that can write well. At first, the quality might fall short of writing you can do yourself. Still, like a coding A.I., it could give you time that you could use to sharpen the draft, focus on research or complete a different task. But this bot also might not care about some qualities that humans value. Perhaps it will spin out falsehoods that some writers won’t catch before publishing online. Or bad actors could use A.I. to create and distribute well-written disinformation more efficiently. In other words, what an A.I. does can fail to align with its creators’ or users’ goals. “It’s a very general technology that’s going to be used for so many things,” Katja Grace, an A.I. safety researcher, said. “So it’s much harder to anticipate all the ways that you might be training it to do something that could be harmful.” Here’s a real-world example: Ted Rall, a political cartoonist, recently asked ChatGPT to describe his relationship with Scott Stantis, another cartoonist. It falsely suggested Stantis had accused Rall of plagiarism in 2002 and that both of them had a public feud. None of this happened. But current A.I. technologies frequently produce these kinds of tall tales — what experts call hallucinations — when asked about real people or events. Experts aren’t sure why. One potential explanation is that these systems are primarily programmed to put out convincing, conversational writing, not to distinguish fact from fiction. As similar A.I. replaces human tasks or current technologies (such as search engines), the falsehoods could mislead many more people. Exponential growth A.I. is developing incredibly quickly. The computing power behind the technology has grown exponentially for decades, and experts expect it to continue doing so. As impressive as GPT-4 is, we could plausibly get A.I. programs that are many times as powerful in the span of years. This technology is developing so quickly that lawmakers and other regulators have been unable to keep up. More than 1,000 tech leaders and researchers recently called for a pause on A.I. development to establish safety standards. So far, there is no sign those calls have been heeded. Tech companies like Google and Microsoft have instead resisted internal dissent against releasing their A.I. programs and have pushed them out to the public as quickly as possible. For more Here are 35 ways people are using A.I. right now, including planning workouts and writing a wedding speech. A.I.’s potential impact is too sweeping for governments to take a hands-off approach, Ezra Klein argues in Times Opinion. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Politics President Biden is finalizing his plan to enter the 2024 race, with an announcement coming possibly as early as Tuesday. See who is running. The Supreme Court is expected to decide by tonight whether an abortion pill should remain widely available while an appeal moves forward. Mike Lindell, the MyPillow founder, offered $5 million to anyone who could disprove his election fraud claims. Arbitrators say he must pay a man who did so. International Mbajjwe Nimiro Wilson, 24, a gay man from Uganda.Brian Otieno for The New York Times “We will hunt you”: Some Ugandans are fleeing their homes before an anti-gay law threatening lifetime prison sentences takes effect. The Pentagon is sending U.S. troops to eastern Africa for a possible evacuation of the American Embassy in Sudan. Xi Jinping, China’s leader, has welcomed world leaders to Beijing in recent weeks — but has rebuffed and criticized the U.S. Britain’s deputy prime minister, Dominic Raab, resigned after a bullying investigation. Many Russian prisoners are H.I.V. positive. They were promised anti-viral medications if they agreed to fight in the war against Ukraine. Business BuzzFeed is shutting down its news division, which won a Pulitzer Prize in 2021. Twitter began removing verified check marks from accounts and charging a subscription fee for the symbol. Facebook agreed to pay $725 million in a settlement over user data. Anyone who had an account in the past 15 years can claim a share. Other Big Stories SpaceX’s Starship, a rocket set to carry humans to the moon in the coming years, exploded minutes into its test launch. Still, engineers say the test provided useful data. Prosecutors dropped charges against Alec Baldwin in the shooting death of a cinematographer on the set of the film “Rust.” In an armed nation, everyday errors like knocking on the wrong door can be deadly. The $787.5 million settlement that Fox News made with Dominion came together at the last minute. Drug dealers are mixing a tranquilizer for horses into fentanyl, with deadly results. A large container carrying $15 million in gold and valuables vanished from Toronto’s airport. Opinions The rise in anorexia in young girls is a sign they’re taking their pain out on themselves. We need to determine why, Pamela Paul argues. Whether microplastics have a damaging effect on our well-being is uncertain, Mark O’Connell writes, making it the perfect scapegoat for any malady. MORNING READS Maksud Agadjani, the owner of TraxNYC.Dar Yaskil for The New York Times Diamond district: In this small slice of New York, old-world jewelers and TikTok stars work side by side. Celestial spectacle: See the total solar eclipse over Western Australia. Polly wants a chat: Scientists let parrots call their parrot friends over video. Advice from Wirecutter: How to limit exposure to chemicals in cookware. Lives Lived: Loren Cameron was a photographer and activist whose groundbreaking portraits of himself and other transgender people inspired a generation. He died at 63. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Taunting and crotch shots: James Harden, the 76ers guard, and Nic Claxton, the Nets center, were both ejected from the N.B.A. playoff’s Game 3 in Brooklyn. See the flagrant fouls. The Oakland A’s: The baseball team said it had agreed to a land deal that could see the franchise move to Las Vegas by 2027. Ten-game ban: Max Scherzer, the Mets’ ace, was suspended after umpires found a sticky substance on his hand. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS Blackpink performing at Coachella.Frazer Harrison/Getty Images Pop in the desert Today is the start of the second weekend of Coachella, the California festival that has grown into one of the biggest annual events for pop music and celebrity sightings. Some highlights from the first weekend: Blackpink became the first K-pop act to headline the festival, delivering a 90-minute set that The Guardian described as a “high-octane stream of pop bangers.” The pop-punk band Blink-182 surprised fans with a reunion show, playing together for the first time in almost a decade. The most divisive performance came from Frank Ocean, who reimagined his songs in new styles. Variety called it “a near-disaster,” while The Los Angeles Times labeled it “an instant classic.” This weekend’s shows begin today, at noon Pacific time, and continue through Sunday night. You can watch live on Coachella’s YouTube page. Explore thousands of recipes from Cooking — and enjoy the full Times experience of News, Games, product reviews from Wirecutter and sports journalism from The Athletic — with an All Access subscription. To get it all for one rate, subscribe here. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times This avocado salad is simple and luscious. What to Watch “Carol” and “Glass Onion”: The 50 best movies on Netflix right now. Late Night The hosts mocked the SpaceX explosion. Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was phenomena. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. And here are the Mini Crossword, Wordle and today’s Sudoku. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — German P.S. The New York Times Games Spelling Bee is a Shorty Awards finalist and needs your votes to win. Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about the Pentagon leak. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 24, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 24, 2023 April 22, 2023 By Melissa Kirsch Good morning. The Morning’s springtime playlist provides an ideal soundtrack for a joyful season. María Jesús Contreras Mood music On weekends in springtime, when the warmer weather has yet to click into place, relaxing can be hard. It’s sunny, but for how long? Don’t ask questions, just get out there and get into it. The day is a wave and you need to catch it. The wools and downs, winter’s armor, are useless today. Today, when you’ll learn to get dressed again. The same thing every year, but every year it’s still a jolt. Don’t overthink it. Here’s some music to help. The playlist, a collaborative effort by readers of The Morning, is a big sprawling thing. It has more than 1,000 songs that have been bringing readers joy lately, more than 1,000 tracks that are “that song” for someone — the one they put on when they want to feel up, to feel better, to set the stage for a good day or to turn their mood around. The mix is multifarious, unpredictable, full of old favorites and new stuff you might love or might skip. Jimi Hendrix. Harry Styles. Bob Seger. De La Soul. The National. The Little River Band. Wet Leg. More than one Chumbawamba song. We weren’t able to include every song submitted, but at over 24 hours, the playlist is more than long enough to provide a soundtrack for your entire spring. Put it on while you’re making breakfast, while you’re running errands, while you’re on a long drive. The other evening, I got a meeting time wrong and arrived an hour early. I sat down in the sun. How long had it been since I found myself with a totally unscheduled hour in a strange place? I challenged myself to just sit and look, to resist the impulse to catch up on emails or distract myself with texting. The sun started to set, it got chilly, I didn’t have a jacket. I stayed outside anyway, appreciating that evening chill that is winter saying it’s not done with us yet. For more Break down spring cleaning into manageable chunks. Here are 22 works of fiction to read this spring. “A possible self can take you beyond daydreams, which are often fleeting and not necessarily grounded in reality.” If spring is a time of rebirth, why not a rebirth of your self? Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE WEEK IN CULTURE A church set in Montana, where Alec Baldwin resumed filming “Rust.”Todd Heisler/The New York Times Alec Baldwin returned to the set of “Rust” as the charges he faced in the shooting death of a cinematographer were dropped. Stars of the Netflix series “Beef” called a story of sexual assault by another actor on the show “undeniably hurtful.” He has said he made it up. By settling a defamation lawsuit, Fox News made clear it would keep its audience in a bubble at all costs, The Times’s James Poniewozik writes. After social media users panned Frank Ocean’s Coachella set and shared a fake hit from Drake and The Weeknd, The Ringer asked: What is artistry in the age of A.I.? Outside a stadium in Tampa, Fla., hundreds of Taylor Swift fans waited overnight in the rain for Eras Tour merch. The choreographer Benjamin Millepied remade “Carmen” to capture her essence and tell a modern story. (Read The Times’s review.) Naomi Watts and Elle Fanning: 40 female artists share the younger women who inspire them. A descendant of the painter Camille Pissarro teaches life drawing in New York. The future of social media is full of ads and influencers, Brian X. Chen writes. Book bans are rising rapidly in U.S. schools, driven largely by organized efforts and new legislation. A star of “Kokomo City,” a documentary about Black transgender sex workers that won awards at the Sundance Film Festival, was shot to death. A former member of the boy band Menudo said he was sexually assaulted by Jose Menendez, whose sons gave a similar rationale before they were convicted of killing him in the 1990s. The death of the singer Aaron Carter in November was ruled accidental: He drowned in his bathtub after taking sedatives and inhaling a spray cleaner, officials said. THE LATEST NEWS The Supreme Court.Shuran Huang for The New York Times The Supreme Court said that the abortion pill mifepristone would remain widely available for now while an appeal of a lower-court ruling moves forward. Here’s what to know about mifepristone and how it’s used. The suspect in the leaks of classified U.S. documents had been posting sensitive information online since soon after the start of the Ukraine war. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s debt legislation would only modestly change the nation’s debt trajectory and is also aimed at President Biden’s energy agenda. Representative George Santos’s former campaign treasurer used accounting practices on other campaigns that drew suspicion. The N.F.L. suspended three players indefinitely for betting on league games. Two others received more modest punishments for betting on other sports. CULTURE CALENDAR By Gilbert Cruz 🎬 “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” (Friday): A key text for many an adolescent girl is finally making it to the big screen after more than a half-century. But as Judy Blume herself admits, sometimes things are worth the wait. (A new documentary, “Judy Blume Forever,” is also streaming on Amazon Video.) 📺 “Perry Mason” (Monday): It has brought me joy to see Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys — one of my favorite on- and off-screen married couples — back on television after the finale of their great show “The Americans” five years ago. Russell plays the U.S. ambassador to Britain in the new Netflix series “The Diplomat.” And Rhys will end his second season in this reboot of the strong, but still under the radar, reboot of the classic TV legal drama. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT RECIPE OF THE WEEK Johnny Miller for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Susan Spungen. By Melissa Clark Yellow Sheet Cake With Chocolate Frosting It’s my birthday this week, so why not bake me a cake? Just kidding! But if you are on the lookout for the perfect yellow sheet cake with chocolate frosting, you can’t go wrong with Erin Jeanne McDowell’s recipe. I especially love the frosting, which somehow manages to be both deeply chocolaty and light. If you’d prefer a more classic layer cake, you can bake the batter in two 8-inch pans, and start checking them after 25 minutes. You can even bake and frost this cake a day ahead. Just store it in the fridge until ready to serve. It’s excellent both cold and at room temperature. Explore thousands of recipes from Cooking — and enjoy the full Times experience of News, Games, product reviews from Wirecutter and sports journalism from The Athletic — with an All Access subscription. To get it all for one rate, subscribe here. REAL ESTATE Aaron Leitz A mobile work space: What if your home office was a train? Container garden: There’s a design formula: a thriller, a filler and a spiller. What you get for $3 million: A circa 1718 house in Charleston, S.C.; a duplex penthouse in Hoboken, N.J.; or a Tudor Revival in Highland Park, Texas. The hunt: Looking to downsize, a pianist still needed enough space for a grand piano. Which home did he and his partner choose? Play our game. LIVING Halle Berry in loosely cascading waves.Aude Guerrucci/Reuters Crimp your hair: Rihanna and Zendaya are. Modern Love: A couples therapist who struggled with marital confrontation. Seasonal allergies: Why do some people develop them in adulthood? Travel: Spend 36 hours in Lisbon. Strep on the rise: How to minimize your risk. ADVICE FROM WIRECUTTER Deep-cleaning dust If the spring bloom gives you watery eyes, itchy skin or other seasonal allergy symptoms, a canister vacuum may bring some relief at home. Of all the options Wirecutter experts have tested, Miele’s — with tightly sealing bags and high-quality filters — were the strongest, deepest-cleaning and most reliable. If you suffer from particularly bad allergies or asthma, you can add a HEPA filter. Mine even helped capture dust mites that gave my daughter eczema. A relief for all. — Christine Cyr Clisset For step-by-step advice on how to keep your home squeaky clean, sign up for Wirecutter’s Clean Everything newsletter. GAME OF THE WEEKEND Warriors guard Stephen Curry shoots over Kings forward Domantas Sabonis, right.Cary Edmondson/USA TODAY Sports Sacramento Kings vs. Golden State Warriors, N.B.A. Playoffs: The Kings are in the playoffs for the first time in 17 years, while the Warriors’ stars — Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Draymond Green — have won four titles together. But the youthful Kings dominated the aging Warriors for the first two games. The Warriors won Game 3, thanks to Curry’s 36 points. Game 4 is crucial: If the Warriors lose, they face an elimination game on the road, where they have been dreadful all season. 3:30 p.m. Eastern tomorrow on ABC. For more “Light the beam!” A towering purple laser lights the sky over Sacramento after every Kings win. The Kings’ Mike Brown won coach of the year, and their point guard De’Aaron Fox won the inaugural clutch player of the year award. Domantas Sabonis, the Kings’ center, came up in the shadow of his Hall of Fame father, Arvydas. NOW TIME TO PLAY The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was virtual. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. Take the news quiz to see how well you followed this week’s headlines. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle and Sudoku. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — Melissa Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 24, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 24, 2023 April 23, 2023 By Matthew Cullen Good morning. One month into the baseball season, new rules have already had an impact on the game. Michael Waraksa More excitement America’s oldest professional sport looks different this year. For the first time in M.L.B.’s 148-year history, clocks in stadiums now count down between every pitch, forcing pitchers and batters into action. It’s a radical change for a sport defined by its leisurely pace — but one that league executives believed was necessary to grow baseball’s popularity. The sport has gradually become less central to American culture over the last 50 years or so, as football’s popularity has skyrocketed and other sources of entertainment — like video games and on-demand television — have become more available. Even dedicated fans have grumbled in recent years about games being longer and less exciting. To an extent, M.L.B. executives say they agree, and they believe that this year’s rule changes will help. So far, they are right. The changes — including the pitch clock and others meant to increase action — have led to much faster games with more hits, more stolen bases and less down time. Whether the changes will increase interest in baseball is another question. Today’s newsletter will explore how different this new version of baseball really is, with some charts from my colleague Ashley Wu. A quicker game When it comes to game duration — the amount of time between the first pitch and the last — M.L.B.’s new rules have been a smashing success. For decades, outings at the ballpark had been getting longer and longer. When Babe Ruth played in the 1920s, nine innings of play lasted less than two hours. Over time, as it became more common for at-bats to last longer, the average game time ticked up. It ultimately peaked at 3 hours 11 minutes in 2021. That trend has sharply reversed this year. Sources: Retrosheet; Baseball Reference | Data is through the first three weeks ofeach season. | By The New York Times During the first three weeks of this season, games lasted 2 hours 39 minutes on average — 29 fewer minutes than they did during the same time frame last year. That means at a typical game beginning at 7:05 p.m., fans are heading home around 9:45 p.m. instead of 10:15 p.m. It also means that all of the runs, hits, strikeouts and errors occur during a shorter period of time, making the game feel more action-packed. The time reduction can be mostly credited to the implementation of the pitch clock. Here’s how it works: After a pitcher receives the ball at the mound, a 15-second clock starts to count down (20 if a runner is on base). If the pitcher waits too long, the umpire calls a ball as a penalty; if the batter delays, the umpire calls a strike. The timer means that at-bats now move faster — though fans who are scrolling through social media or are in line for a hot dog are now more likely to miss something. “I felt like I was at warp speed,” New York Mets pitcher David Robertson said after his first appearance this year. More action The second, and more important, goal that baseball is trying to achieve with its new rules is to make the games more entertaining. The M.L.B. commissioner, Rob Manfred, told my colleague Michael Schmidt that baseball’s problems were at least partly a result of the sport’s recent obsession with analytics. Teams over the past two decades have raced for a statistical edge: They use more pitchers, and those pitchers throw faster, while batters have tuned their swings to hit the long ball — leading to more strikeouts and more home runs, but fewer balls hit in play. “Baseball changed,” Manfred said. “Fans wanted the game to look like the way it used to look like.” The sport’s new rules, including requirements about where certain defensive players can stand, were designed to increase the game’s action — and entertainment value — with more hits, more steals and more impressive defensive plays. Through the first three weeks of the year, the M.L.B. has gotten the result it hoped for: Runners are stealing more bases, runs are up and batting average has risen modestly compared with the same period last season. An increased leaguewide batting average, up to .247 from .231 last year, means that at-bats more often end with a hit now. Statistically, it’s a significant jump from last year’s historic low, though hits are still less common than they were in the mid-2000s. Sources: Retrosheet; Baseball Reference | Data is through the first three weeks ofeach season. | By The New York Times Though the changes have already had an impact, they still may not be enough to solve baseball’s troubles. Hitting a professionally thrown baseball has always been incredibly hard. In the modern era, when pitchers are stronger and more informed by data, it is only getting harder. “That’s the one thing that could really derail this,” my colleague Tyler Kepner, who covers baseball, told me. “Pitchers are only getting better, and I don’t know how they’re really going to limit strikeouts.” More baseball news Spit, grease and sandpaper: Baseball has a rich history of pitchers doctoring the ball. The Oakland Athletics announced a plan this week to move to Las Vegas. They would be the first M.L.B. team to relocate in almost 20 years. The Athletic ranked the best teams in the league so far, with the Tampa Bay Rays — who started the season 13-0 — in the top spot. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT NEWS International The U.S. military evacuated the American embassy in Khartoum as fighting escalated in Sudan. Other countries are also trying to get their diplomats out. For years, countries sought an advantage in mineral-rich Sudan by offering weapons. Their angling made war more likely. Volodymyr Zelensky banned Russian place names in Ukraine and made knowledge of Ukrainian language and history a requirement for citizenship. Weapons reinforcements from the West have fallen short of what Ukraine needs for its coming counteroffensive, leaked documents show. Washington A coal-fired power station in Georgia.Kendrick Brinson for The New York Times The E.P.A. is expected to announce federal limits on carbon emissions from power plants. The Sacklers, who own Purdue Pharma, gave millions in donations to an institution that advises the government on opioid policy. The Supreme Court’s ruling to keep an abortion pill available upheld, for now, a commitment to leave abortion to politics. Other Big Stories In Eastern Europe on Saturday.Irakli Gedenidze/Reuters A major meteor shower is peaking this weekend. Here’s how to watch it. Bed Bath & Beyond is filing for bankruptcy, seeking to sell its business while its stores remain open. A widow in Florida said her husband’s body was left in a drinks cooler after he died on a cruise. FROM OPINION We must challenge the misperception that a gun in the home makes people safer, Nicholas Kristof writes. Donald Trump’s Republican primary opponents won’t be able to beat him until they stop acting scared, Michelle Goldberg argues. Eating fewer animals is a good way to slow climate change, even if you don’t go vegan, says Peter Singer. “Abortion breaks God’s heart!” Damon Winter photographed the anti-abortion billboards all over Florida. See the images. MORNING READS Gold pieces found in the past few weeks.Jim Wilson/The New York Times Gold rush: California’s winter storms excited prospectors. Malnutrition: It’s one extreme risk of taking Ozempic. Vows: They moved in together three days after their first date. Sunday routine: A bar and restaurant owner tries to go to bed early. Advice from Wirecutter: Tools for getting work done on an iPad. Lives Lived: Barry Humphries was best known for playing Dame Edna Everage for almost seven decades. He died at 89. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT BOOKS “The Best Minds”: Jonathan Rosen’s book explores the life of his friend — a superachiever, schizophrenic and killer — and the health care system that failed him. Read an excerpt in The Atlantic. By the Book: “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” is the best book Judy Blume ever got as a gift. Our editors’ picks: “Saving Time,” Jenny Odell’s latest book about how clocks govern our lives, and eight other books. Times best sellers: “It. Goes. So. Fast.,” a memoir by Mary Louise Kelly, is a debut title on the hardcover nonfiction list. THE SUNDAY TIMES MAGAZINE Concept by Pablo Delcan. Photograph by Jamie Chung. On the cover: What was Twitter, anyway? Investigators: They documented the crime scene at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Eat: The secret to ordering the best thing on the menu. Read the full issue. THE WEEK AHEAD What to Watch For House Republicans plan to vote this week on their debt ceiling bill, which would raise the cap but cut I.R.S. funding and impose strict food stamp requirements. A civil trial is set to begin on Tuesday for a lawsuit from the writer E. Jean Carroll, who has accused Donald Trump of raping her in the 1990s. President Biden is expected to announce his bid for re-election as soon as Tuesday. The N.F.L. draft begins on Thursday. The Carolina Panthers have the first pick. The annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner will be held on Saturday. What to Cook This Week Linda Xiao for The New York Times It’s easy being green with the recipes in Emily Weinstein’s Five Weeknight Dishes newsletter. This honey-and-lemon glazed salmon bakes on a bed of basmati rice that’s been mixed with chopped dill. Eric Kim’s creamy asparagus pasta delivers subtle seaweed flavor. And garlic chicken with guasacaca sauce blends avocado and herbs in a delectable, bright green Venezuelan condiment. Explore thousands of recipes from Cooking — and enjoy the full Times experience of News, Games, product reviews from Wirecutter and sports journalism from The Athletic — with an All Access subscription. To get it all for one rate, subscribe here. NOW TIME TO PLAY The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was leitmotif. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. Take the news quiz to see how well you followed the week’s headlines. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle and Sudoku. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. Read today’s front page. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 25, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 25, 2023 April 24, 2023 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We use a debate between two Times columnists to shed light on the American economy. Austin, Texas.Brandon Thibodeaux for The New York Times Just keeps rolling My colleagues David Brooks and Paul Krugman have engaged in a running debate for much of their time as Times Opinion columnists, and I often find their exchanges illuminating. Their latest argument revolves around how strong the American economy really is. The Economist magazine sparked the debate with a recent cover story titled “Riding high: The lessons from America’s astonishing economic record.” Today, I’ll use the disagreement to pose two different questions — one that may challenge conservative readers of this newsletter and the other that may challenge liberal readers. G.D.P. or life expectancy? In David’s recent column, he endorsed The Economist’s sunny picture: “You can invent fables about how America is in economic decline. You can rail against ‘neoliberalism.’ But the American economy doesn’t care. It just keeps rolling on.” The standard measure of a nation’s economic performance is per capita gross domestic product — the value of the economy’s output divided by the size of the population. Over the past three decades, the U.S. has widened its lead over Europe and Japan: Source: World Bank | Data is adjusted for inflation. | By The New York Times Today, the U.S. still accounts for almost 25 percent of global output, nearly the same share as in 1990, even as China’s share has soared. The U.S. remains a uniquely dynamic society in some important ways, home to top universities, a thriving venture-capital industry, a stable government (most of the time) and a population comfortable with risk taking. Apple, Google, Tesla and OpenAI are all American companies. So are Moderna and Pfizer, key developers of the mRNA Covid vaccines. When it comes to economic innovation and productive might, no country can match the U.S. As Paul notes, however, G.D.P. does not measure a typical person’s standard of living. Per capita G.D.P. is an average, and an average can be distorted by outliers. The U.S. is highly unequal, which means that the wealthy take home a larger share of output than in other countries. Since 2000, per capita G.D.P. in the U.S. has risen 27 percent, but median household income has risen only 7 percent. Income for the top 0.1 percent of earners, by contrast, has jumped 41 percent. When you look at broad measures of well-being, the U.S. stops looking so good. We have the lowest life expectancy of any high-income country, a relatively recent development. Americans have uniquely poor access to health insurance and paid parental leave. Surveys show that Americans are deeply dissatisfied with the country’s direction. CNBC, describing the results of a survey it has been conducting since 2006, reported the following last week: “A record 69 percent of the public holds negative views about the economy both now and in the future, the highest percentage in the survey’s 17-year history.” Paul put it this way in his most recent newsletter: … it’s always important to bear in mind that G.D.P., at best, tells us how much a society can afford. It doesn’t tell us whether the money is well spent; high G.D.P. need not translate into a good quality of life. Individuals can be rich but miserable; so can countries. And there are good reasons to believe that America is using its economic growth badly. Conservatives sometimes respond to this data by trying to separate the economy from the rest of society. The former, they argue, is performing magnificently. The latter is beset by fraying social bonds and other ills. But I think it’s a mistake to imagine that the economy is somehow distinct from living standards. The unequal American economy continues to churn out an impressive array of goods and services while also failing to deliver rapidly improving living standards. And polls suggest that most people aren’t fooled. Voting with their feet So is the solution simply more government intervention in the economy — following the model of Europe and U.S. states that are run by Democrats? Not quite. Consider these facts, from another recent column of David’s: Between 2010 and 2020, the fastest-growing states were mostly red — places like Texas, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee and South Carolina. During the pandemic, that trend accelerated, and once again, most of the big population-gaining states are governed by Republicans. If you go back farther, you see decade after decade of migration toward the more conservative South. The Brookings Institution demographer William Frey has noted that in 1920, the Northeast and the Midwest accounted for 60 percent of America’s population. A century later, the Sun Belt accounts for 62 percent of the nation’s population. These days we are mostly a Sun Belt nation. I found some of the reader comments on that column to be jarring. They didn’t grapple with why so many Americans, including young families and immigrants, were moving to Republican-run states. These comments instead argued that blue America was better and red America was backward. “I, for one, will never live in a red state,” read the comment that has received the most endorsements from other readers. “Never have, never will.” Evidently, growing numbers of Americans feel differently. Red America offers less expensive housing partly because its zoning laws are less onerous. To over-generalize only somewhat, blue America believes in NIMBYism (“not in my backyard”), while red America is more comfortable with YIMBYism. Red America also reopened its schools more quickly during Covid, and long school closures appear to have been one of the biggest policy mistakes of the pandemic. The full picture is nuanced. The same laissez-faire, anti-regulation, low-tax instincts that make housing relatively affordable in Houston, Tampa, Fla., and Greenville, S.C., also contribute to high American inequality and stagnant quality of life — because some regulations are more conducive to human flourishing than others. The U.S. simultaneously has too much government and too little. That combination helps explain why our economy looks so good by some measures and so bad by others. For more Unemployment is low. Inflation is falling. But is a recession coming? The Times’s Ben Casselman offered a helpful overview of the current economy. Millennials are doing better financially than you might think, Jean Twenge argued in The Atlantic. Liberals have been hobbling government and the economy, Nicholas Bagley of the University of Michigan explained on Ezra Klein’s podcast. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS International The U.S. evacuated its diplomats in Sudan, starting an exodus of other countries’ officials. Chinese researchers stifled efforts to understand Covid by retracting studies and withholding data. China’s government proposed rules that would censor A.I. chatbots. War in Ukraine Valentyn, a Ukrainian soldier.Yousur Al-Hlou/The New York Times “I cry quietly”: Watch a Ukrainian soldier describe the war’s toll. Russian troops are forcibly relocating Ukrainian residents living in occupied areas, Ukraine said. Many Russian government employees have fallen in line behind Putin, even as other highly educated workers have fled the country. Politics President Biden has opened a back door for immigrants by expanding the use of humanitarian programs. Biden has won his party’s support despite questions about his age. He is expected to announce his re-election bid as early as tomorrow. Republicans are trying to keep abortion rights off the ballot, after those measures passed in many states last year. A University of Virginia alumnus attacked its diversity programs. Then the governor appointed him to its board. Other Big Stories The chief executive of NBCUniversal is leaving the company after an investigation into inappropriate workplace conduct. The shooting of Ralph Yarl, a Black 16-year-old, has forced Kansas City to look at its history of racism and segregation. A fire-breathing dragon prop at Disneyland actually caught on fire during a show. Opinions Gail Collins and Bret Stephens discuss Biden’s likely re-election bid. Republicans’ refusal to raise the debt ceiling tells our allies and our adversaries: America is divided and can’t be counted on, Hillary Clinton argues. Explore thousands of recipes from Cooking — and enjoy the full Times experience of News, Games, product reviews from Wirecutter and sports journalism from The Athletic — with an All Access subscription. To get it all for one rate, subscribe here. MORNING READS A cup that was seized from the Met.Metropolitan Museum of Art Ancient Greek cup: Did looters break it and then sell the fragments to hide that it was stolen? Wes Anderson: TikTok users are pretending to be in one of his films, Mashable reports. Scottish island: It is hard to get to, has zero amenities and costs $186,000, but buyers are lining up. News quiz: Take our latest quiz and share your score (the average was 8.8). Metropolitan Diary: A 24-hour layover lasts a lifetime. Advice from Wirecutter: Get your broken stuff fixed, free. Lives Lived: Bruce Haigh was an Australian diplomat who helped South Africans battle apartheid. He died at 77. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC “Chess pieces”: The Warriors won their N.B.A. playoff Game 4 against the Kings, 126-125. This is how Draymond Green and Steph Curry plotted their win. New sporting director: The U.S. Soccer Federation is set to hire Matt Crocker to shape the program ahead of the 2026 World Cup. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS A Picasso in Moscow.Natalia Kolesnikova/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images The art world at war Before Russia invaded Ukraine, the National Gallery in London and the Pushkin Museum in Moscow had been collaborating on a blockbuster exhibition, “After Impressionism,” which would have shared masterpieces by Van Gogh, Cézanne and Matisse. Instead, the two museums recently opened their own separate versions of the show. Museums in the West have held firm on cutting off Russian state institutions, Alex Marshall writes. Russia’s culture ministry has downplayed the isolation and turned inward, urging museums to promote “traditional Russian spiritual and moral values.” PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook David Malosh for The New York Times Make this kale and walnut pasta with pantry staples. What to Watch The best shows and movies coming to Netflix this month. Travel Use a price freeze to get a deal on airfare. Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was downloaded. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. A bonus: During last week’s Spelling Bees, fewer players found “hiragana” than any other word — except one. What was it? And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle and Sudoku. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. P.S. Here is The Morning’s Spring Playlist — songs that are bringing readers joy right now. And here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about Sudan. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 26, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 26, 2023 April 25, 2023 Continue reading the main story SUPPORTED BY GE Aerospace By German Lopez Good morning. Tucker Carlson is out at Fox News. Plus, President Biden announced his campaign for re-election. Tucker CarlsonLeigh Vogel for The New York Times Canceled For years, the Fox News host Tucker Carlson has faced criticisms of his amplification of racist and anti-immigrant ideas. But those issues seemed to have little to do with his demise. Instead, a growing list of controversies related to Carlson’s conduct on and off the air had begun to aggravate Fox News executives, and the network abruptly announced his departure yesterday. Network leaders and contributors had complained, and some quit, over Carlson’s misleading coverage of the Jan. 6 attacks, in which he depicted rioters as “mostly peaceful” onlookers. His coverage of 2020 election conspiracy theories was part of Dominion Voting Systems’ lawsuit against Fox, which the network settled last week. Carlson had also privately denigrated Fox executives, saying they had cost the network credibility by allowing it to call President Biden’s election victory, as The Washington Post reported. And a former producer recently accused Carlson in a lawsuit of overseeing a misogynistic and discriminatory workplace. Fox has disputed her claims. As one of the top hosts on the most watched cable news network, Carlson played an outsize role in conservative politics. Today’s newsletter will look at Carlson’s influence and what his exit means for Fox News. A big audience Carlson took over Fox News’s prized 8 p.m. slot in 2017 and increased its already-high ratings, quickly becoming a fixture on the right-wing network and in conservative politics. How? Carlson tapped into white viewers’ fears over the country’s changing racial demographics, which fueled Donald Trump’s rise in the 2016 election. He would regularly focus on the notion of the “great replacement,” a racist conspiracy theory that claims elites are importing supposedly obedient immigrants to disempower native-born Americans. In 2018, Carlson argued that hordes of immigrants were making America “poorer and dirtier.” Carlson often highlighted local news stories but twisted them to make broader claims about Americans losing control of their country. In one segment in 2017, he claimed “Gypsies” were causing chaos in a small Pennsylvania town, urinating and defecating in the streets. “The message of these segments was always the same: You and your way of life are under attack, and the people doing the attacking look different and have different values than you do,” my colleague Nicholas Confessore, who covered Carlson’s rise for The Times, told me yesterday. “Carlson reassured viewers that their discomfort was reasonable — that they didn’t have to feel bad about their fears and worries.” Carlson did so by embracing Trumpism but not Trump himself. The approach was partly personal. In private texts, Carlson said of Trump, “I hate him passionately.” It also helped Carlson differentiate himself from other Fox News hosts, Nicholas said. Because they aligned themselves closely with Trump, the hosts Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham would often have to come to his defense when Trump said something outrageous. Carlson tried to avoid those pitfalls by focusing on the underlying message instead of Trump as the public face of it. Fox’s predominantly white audience embraced Carlson’s approach, and he drew more than three million viewers a night, regularly making his show No. 1 or No. 2 at the network. And although accusations of bigotry and falsehoods prompted sponsors to flee Fox, Carlson’s show increased its ad revenue because its audience was so large. Carlson has not said what he’ll do next. But without that big audience, he probably won’t be as influential. Uncertain future Fox News said it would rotate hosts in its 8 p.m. slot until it could find a permanent replacement. At first glance, this seems bad for the network: Not only did it lose one of its biggest stars, but it has no replacement lined up. And the announcement comes at a time when Fox has already faced months of bad publicity, and it just agreed to a $787.5 million settlement over Dominion’s lawsuit. But Fox has overcome similar challenges with its hosts before. Carlson himself replaced Bill O’Reilly, who was once the network’s most popular host, and not only maintained O’Reilly’s ratings but at times surpassed them. That experience may have led Fox to believe that the network carries more sway over its viewers than individual hosts do. The former Fox executive Roger Ailes used to occasionally bench his prime time stars for a night to show them that the ratings stayed high when they were gone — demonstrating that it was Fox that made them big, Nicholas noted. “I suspect the audience loyalty to Fox is probably greater than the audience loyalty to any particular Fox star,” he added. For more A lack of premium advertisers in recent years had done little to hurt Carlson’s standing at Fox News. Trump and Carlson patched up their differences recently. CNN fired the host Don Lemon, who lost executives’ support after an uproar over a sexist comment he made on air. The departures of Carlson and Lemon mark the end of an era in media, The Times’s Jim Rutenberg writes. Jeff Shell, the chief executive of NBCUniversal, was fired after a news anchor lodged a sexual harassment complaint against him. Carlson’s departure is part of a Fox tradition in which abuse is tolerated until it’s inconvenient, Michelle Goldberg writes in Times Opinion. “Never put anything in an email”: Carlson’s dismissal represents a cautionary tale that Rupert Murdoch learned years ago, Bret Stephens writes in Times Opinion. Late night hosts joked about Carlson’s departure. Continue reading the main story A MESSAGE FROM GE Aerospace Invention is in the air In 2022 alone, nearly 3 billion people flew with our technology under wing. But the boundaries of more sustainable air travel exist to be pushed, and we’ll continue doing so with the mission to invent the future of flight, lift people up, and bring them home safely. Learn More THE LATEST NEWS Politics President Biden.Doug Mills/The New York Times Biden announced his re-election bid, setting up the possibility of a rematch with Donald Trump. Follow our updates. A jury will start hearing E. Jean Carroll’s allegation today that Trump raped her in a department store dressing room more than two decades ago. The North Dakota governor signed a bill banning abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, even in cases of rape or incest. The College Board will change its A.P. African American Studies course after scholars accused it of bending to political pressure and omitting key concepts. International Ukrainian recruits in the Kyiv region.Mauricio Lima for The New York Times Ukraine is preparing an offensive against Russian forces as soon as next month. If it fails, Ukraine could face pressure from the West to enter peace talks. Eastern European countries helped Ukraine by taking in its grain. Now, farmers are protesting. The Chinese government is trying to limit damage to its relationship with Europe after a diplomat questioned the sovereignty of post-Soviet nations like Ukraine. Civilians are fleeing Sudan after fighting between two rival generals continued, cutting through an attempted cease-fire. Other Big Stories First Republic Bank, which was battered in the recent banking crisis, has lost $102 billion in customer deposits — more than half of its holdings. A German magazine editor was fired after publishing a fake interview with the retired Formula 1 driver Michael Schumacher using quotes that had been generated by A.I. European regulators destroyed thousands of cans of Miller High Life, saying its slogan, “the Champagne of Beers,” violated E.U. rules around the use of “Champagne.” A 2-year-old boy whose body was found in the jaws of an alligator had been drowned by his father, the Florida police said. Young professionals may be paying a penalty for remote work: They’re getting less feedback. Opinions Addiction isn’t as simple as a lack of control, Maia Szalavitz argues. Understanding its effects could help make drug policy more useful. The Chinese government’s attempt to rewrite Hong Kong’s fight for independence is an act of repression, Louisa Lim argues. And here are columns by Maureen Dowd on Ron DeSantis and by Paul Krugman on NIMBYism. Subscribe Today To benefit from everything we offer — definitive news and analysis, plus award-winning recipes, games, product reviews and personalized sports journalism — subscribe to New York Times All Access with this introductory offer. MORNING READS Photographs by Kevin Winter/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management; Octavio Jones/TAS23, via Getty Images; Suzanne Cordeiro/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images; Omar Vega/TAS23, via Getty Images Taylor Swift: Why do female pop stars have to keep reinventing themselves through clothes? Chess addiction: There’s a campaign to get kids hooked. It’s working. Bed Bath & Beyond bankruptcy: Shoppers have until Wednesday to use their ubiquitous blue coupons. Ivana Trump: Why wont her New York townhouse sell? Health: Is there a cure for I.B.S.? Advice from Wirecutter: Upgrade your backyard. Lives Lived: Megan Terry was a prolific feminist playwright who wrote and directed a rock musical on the New York stage. She died at 90. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC An agreement, finally: The Packers traded Aaron Rodgers to the Jets. A stunner: Jimmy Butler scored 56 points in last night’s N.B.A. playoff win for the Heat. They are up 3-1 on the Bucks. An N.H.L. playoff miracle: The Toronto Maple Leafs won 5-4 in overtime last night. Even Leafs fans couldn’t believe what happened. Continue reading the main story A MESSAGE FROM GE Aerospace Invention is in the air In 2022 alone, nearly 3 billion people flew with our technology under wing. But the boundaries of more sustainable air travel exist to be pushed, and we’ll continue doing so with the mission to invent the future of flight, lift people up, and bring them home safely. Learn More ARTS AND IDEAS Ed SheeranHannah Mckay/Reuters A pop song on trial Did Ed Sheeran copy his Grammy-winning ballad “Thinking Out Loud” from Marvin Gaye’s soul classic “Let’s Get It On”? The question is at the center of a copyright trial that began yesterday in federal court in Manhattan. Because of a quirk of music copyrights, the case rests primarily on the songs’ chord progressions, which are nearly identical, as this video comparison shows. But Sheeran’s lawyers have argued that the chords are common in pop music — including in songs by artists who used them before Gaye and Ed Townsend, who collaborated with him on “Let’s Get It On,” did. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook The New York Times Homemade macaroni and cheese is a delight. What to Watch The best movies on Amazon Prime right now. What to Do Celebrate a rejection by throwing a party. Now Time to Play The pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was jocular. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku and Tiles. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — German P.S. Christina Goldbaum will be The Times’s new Afghanistan and Pakistan bureau chief. Here’s today’s front page. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 27, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 27, 2023 April 26, 2023 By David Leonhardt Good morning. As Biden starts his campaign, we ask why he doesn’t spend more time in the public eye. President BidenDoug Mills/The New York Times Minimizing conversation The biggest reason that many Democratic officials are nervous about President Biden’s age is not his ability to do the job in a second term. Strange as it may sound, the American government can function without a healthy president. The U.S. marched toward victory in World War II while Franklin Roosevelt was ailing in 1944 and 1945. Four decades later, the government managed its relationship with a teetering Soviet Union while Ronald Reagan’s mental capacities slipped. In each case, White House aides, Cabinet secretaries and military leaders performed well despite the lack of a fully engaged leader. The issue that makes many Democrats even more anxious than Biden’s second-term capabilities is whether his age will prevent him from winning a second term. If enough voters are turned off by the idea of a president who would turn 86 in office, Republicans might win full control of the federal government in 2024 — and Donald Trump might return to the White House. I know that it may seem crass for Democrats to worry more about partisan politics than the mental acuity of the country’s most powerful person. But it’s not entirely irrational. Today, I will look at the biggest question about Biden’s re-election campaign — which he formally announced yesterday — and how he might address that question. A gaffe machine At 80, Biden can be an unsteady public performer. He occasionally uses the wrong word or fails to summon a name. Some of these habits are not new, to be sure. Biden has a stutter, which can make it seem as if he can’t remember words when in fact he is struggling to enunciate them. He has also long been known for saying things that he probably shouldn’t. “Biden living up to his gaffe-prone reputation,” read a Times headline in 2008, when he was only 65. That same year, Slate magazine wrote, “He misspeaks so often, it’s hardly news — and hardly damaging.” But aging does seem to have exacerbated these issues. In the upcoming campaign, you can imagine that a verbal misstep could cause some swing voters to wonder whether Biden is up for a second term. These concerns help explain why polls show that roughly three-quarters of Democratic voters approve of Biden’s performance but slightly less than half want him to run for a second term. Of course, there would be a simple way for Biden to address the concerns: He could spend more time speaking in public now and demonstrate his vigor. Instead, he and his aides have chosen the opposite approach. The quiet strategy Biden has held fewer news conferences per year than any president since Reagan. Biden gave fewer interviews during his first two years in office than any president in even longer: Sources: The American Presidency Project; Martha Joynt Kumar | By The New York Times Michael Shear, a White House correspondent for The Times, says that Biden’s aides are unapologetic about avoiding interviews and news conferences. “They see these traditions as outdated and unimportant,” Michael told me. “They say that traditional media don’t have clout, and they think that there are many other ways that he can better present himself.” But Biden has not replaced media conversations with other means of engaging with the public. He does not hold regular town-hall meetings, for example. And the statistics on interviews in the chart above include Biden’s recent conversations with people other than journalists, like Drew Barrymore and Jason Bateman, both actors, and Manny MUA, a YouTube beauty expert. Biden’s strategy of minimizing unscripted public appearances suggests that his staff believes the risk often isn’t worth the reward. ‘Watch me’ Biden and his aides have said that his age is a legitimate issue for debate but that he has demonstrated he is up to the job. “The only thing I can say is, ‘Watch me,’” Biden likes to say. There certainly are reasons to think that Biden is up for both the substantive and performative parts of the job. He looked sharp during his State of the Union address this year, trading verbal volleys with congressional Republicans — and winning the exchange. I have spoken with Biden a couple of times since he was elected and found him to be sharp, able to discuss policy and politics in the same discursive style he had in prior years. He has also had a successful presidency by many measures. He passed a blizzard of legislation, including more bipartisan bills than almost anybody expected, and managed both the pandemic and the West’s pro-Ukraine alliance. Democrats fared much better in the midterms than during Barack Obama’s first term or Bill Clinton’s. As I’ve written before, Biden — unlike many other top Democrats, who have drifted to the left of most voters — seems to understand where public opinion really is: left of center on economic issues, more moderate on many social issues. I can imagine a scenario in which the age worries prove overblown. Maybe voters care less about Biden’s age than political pundits do and will re-elect him for the same reasons they elected him: He conveys an aura of moderation and competence when many other parts of the American political system do not. His opponent, whether it is Trump (who’s 76) or somebody else, seems likely to embody the Republican Party’s recent shift toward extremism. “The man has done a good job,” Elaine Kamarck, a political scientist and Democratic Party official recently said on The Run-Up, a Times politics podcast. “So everybody’s sort of saying, ‘Okay, yeah, he’s old. Big deal.’ There are advantages that come with age, as well as the downsides.” Still, a question looms: If Biden is as energetic and effective as his aides insist, why does he spend so little time publicly engaging with other people? More election news After announcing his re-election campaign, Biden gave a speech to union members in Pittsburgh, saying that he sees the world “through the eyes of the working people.” Biden has no immediate plans to hold large rallies in battleground states. Incumbency and abortion politics will probably help Democrats next year. But “the race looks close,” The Times’s Nate Cohn writes. Biden named his campaign manager: Julie Chávez Rodríguez, a White House official and a granddaughter of the labor icon Cesar Chávez. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT THE LATEST NEWS Business Tucker Carlson of Fox News and Don Lemon of CNN, who were fired on the same day, have hired the same lawyer. Anheuser-Busch put two executives on leave after a transgender influencer promoted Bud Light, placing the beer in the culture wars. Shares of First Republic Bank plunged by 50 percent after news of a recent wave of customer withdrawals. A Japanese start-up failed to become the first private company to successfully land on the moon. Its robotic spacecraft probably crashed onto the surface. New York City’s office market is struggling as more workers stay remote and interest rates rise. That could be a risk for the national economy. Politics Kevin McCarthy, the House speaker, may propose raising the debt limit in exchange for spending cuts today. Chief Justice John Roberts declined to testify before Congress about ethics concerns on the Supreme Court. South Korea’s president is visiting the White House today. Biden will promise to defend the country from nuclear weapons. Other Big Stories Harry Belafonte in 1957.Bob Henriques/Magnum Photos Harry Belafonte, the barrier-breaking singer and civil-rights leader, died at 96. U.S. regulators authorized the first treatment for a rare genetic form of A.L.S. The Taliban killed the leader of the Islamic State cell responsible for a deadly 2021 bombing at a Kabul airport. Many areas of the world haven’t yet experienced extreme heat. But those regions may be most at risk. Opinions Charles Blow recalls the Harry Belafonte speech that changed his life, when Belafonte asked: “Where are the radical thinkers?” Here are columns by Thomas Friedman on the 2024 election and Ross Douthat on Tucker Carlson. Subscribe Today To benefit from everything we offer — definitive news and analysis, plus award-winning recipes, games, product reviews and personalized sports journalism — subscribe to New York Times All Access with this introductory offer. MORNING READS Dr. Anthony Fauci.Philip Montgomery for The New York Times “Something clearly went wrong”: Anthony Fauci speaks at length about his handling of the pandemic. Brain studies: How a goldfish became a cyborg. Eye Opener: Most melatonin products are mislabeled. Lip treatment: These are four of the best beauty products — on sale. Advice from Wirecutter: Pick the best shower curtain. Lives Lived: Michael Denneny, an openly gay editor, was a founder of a magazine devoted to gay and lesbian writing. He died at 80. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC Favorites in the West: The Nuggets and Suns both advanced to the second round of the N.B.A. playoffs. Ice Trae: The Hawks survived a road elimination game against the Celtics thanks to Trae Young’s stunning game-winner. Worthy refund: Tottenham Hotspur players are reimbursing fans who made the trip to Newcastle to see their team go 5-0 down in the first 20 minutes of the match. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT ARTS AND IDEAS The Museum of Natural History.Peter Fisher for The New York Times A place of wonder Generations of children have visited the Museum of Natural History to stare at dinosaurs, stars, or the massive blue whale hanging from the ceiling. Now the museum is opening a new wing, made of curving concrete and evoking the canyons of the American West. The wing houses an insectarium and a butterfly conservatory, classrooms, laboratories and more. Michael Kimmelman, The Times’s architecture critic, predicts it will be an instant classic. “For a meaningful portion of its user base, the part that hasn’t yet finished middle school,” he writes, “I expect it will simply be, like so much else at the museum, awesome.” PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook David Malosh for The New York Times Make shrimp scampi with a garlic, white wine and butter sauce. On Comedy In “Baby J,” John Mulaney’s Netflix special, the comedian delivers material about addiction and what it means to be likable. Late Night The hosts reacted to Biden’s bid for re-election. Now Time to Play The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were balding, blading and dabbling. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku and Tiles. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David Correction: The David Brooks column quoted in Monday’s newsletter misstated the share of the U.S. population living in the 18 states that make up the Sun Belt. It is 52 percent, not 62 percent. P.S. Has affirmative action affected your access to higher learning or a job? Times reporters want to hear from you. Here’s today’s front page. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Continue reading the main story Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members phkrause Posted April 28, 2023 Author Members Share Posted April 28, 2023 April 27, 2023 Continue reading the main story SUPPORTED BY Masterworks By German Lopez Good morning. House Republicans are putting the economy at risk to push spending cuts. Kevin McCarthy, the House speaker.Kenny Holston/The New York Times Capital showdown Since they won a majority in the midterm elections, House Republicans have promised to use a debt-limit bill as leverage to achieve their policy priorities. But it was not until yesterday that they confirmed what those priorities are, passing legislation that they plan to use in debt-limit negotiations. The House approved the bill in a close vote, 217-215, with no Democratic support. The legislation, championed by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, would raise the limit on money the government can borrow through next year, reel back President Biden’s climate agenda and force sweeping, unspecified spending cuts. The bill is dead on arrival in the Senate, which Democrats control, and Biden has already said he would not sign it. But Republicans hope it will push Democrats to negotiate. “We lifted the debt limit; we’ve sent it to the Senate; we’ve done our job,” McCarthy said. The stakes are high. If the U.S. breaches the debt limit, it could be forced to default on its debts. A default could set off global economic calamity because U.S. debt, which underpins much of the financial system, would collapse in value (as I’ve explained before). The U.S. hit the debt limit in January, but the Treasury Department has used so-called extraordinary measures to keep the government from defaulting. Those measures will run out in the coming months. Republicans are leaning on the economic threat to try to force Democrats to negotiate. Today’s newsletter will look at why Republicans are pursuing this strategy and why Democrats see it as reckless. What Republicans want Republicans say the U.S. government has grown too large, that it spends too much and that its debt and deficits are unsustainable. More recently, Republicans have argued that spending cuts will ease inflation. Reducing spending would also give Republicans more leeway in the future to extend tax cuts passed under Donald Trump, which disproportionately benefited wealthy Americans. But Republicans have failed to act on a smaller-government vision when they have been in power. When they controlled the House, Senate and White House in 2017 and 2018, they increased federal spending and deficits. Pointing to that history, some liberals have argued that House Republicans are simply trying to undercut Biden even at the cost of damaging the economy. Republicans also face difficult politics. In the debt-limit showdown, they have promised to shield Social Security, Medicare and military spending from cuts. Those programs make up the bulk of federal spending. Without them, balancing the budget or even just reducing spending would require steep cuts to other policies, potentially including Medicaid, food stamps, border security and grants to local police departments. Some of those programs are popular, and slashing them could upset constituents who rely on them to make ends meet. The political reality has prompted Republicans to take smaller steps. Originally, McCarthy said he wanted to put the U.S. “on a path towards a balanced budget” within 10 years. His current proposal falls short of that goal. But it would cap some federal spending, reclaim unspent Covid relief funds, roll back the Biden administration’s efforts to boost clean energy, block student loan forgiveness and impose more stringent work requirements for food stamps and Medicaid. Why Democrats refuse Democrats have largely resisted negotiating over the debt limit. They have likened Republicans’ tactics to hostage taking, arguing that McCarthy and his allies are using the threat of economic catastrophe to force Biden to agree to draconian spending cuts. Democrats warn that negotiating would set a bad precedent — one that could ultimately hurt Republican administrations, too. Democrats could, for example, refuse to raise the debt limit to try to force a Republican president to agree to increase the minimum wage. But there is already precedent. Barack Obama’s administration negotiated with Republicans during similar debt-limit showdowns. Some Democrats, including then-Senator Biden, also voted against increasing the debt limit in 2006 to protest the costs of the Iraq war and tax cuts. Biden and his allies argue that it is time to break that cycle. They say they will negotiate with Republicans on spending after they increase the debt limit, but not before. This matches what other countries do. (Denmark is the only other country with a similar debt limit, but it raises its cap well in advance of reaching it.) Democrats also object to Republicans’ proposed cuts, which they say would particularly hurt poor and middle-class Americans. They also point out that some proposals, like reducing funding for the I.R.S., would increase the deficit. Still, Democrats may be forced to negotiate. As long as Republicans control the House, there may be no other way out of a potential economic crisis. For more The House legislation would raise the debt limit in exchange for cutting government spending nearly 14 percent over a decade. The vote was the first big test of McCarthy’s speakership. These are the four Republicans who opposed the bill. Here’s what’s in the bill. Continue reading the main story A MESSAGE FROM Masterworks This app delivered millions to investors in 2022 In the same year that everyday investors lost a whopping $350 billion, Masterworks had its best year ever. Their nine art sales returned $25.8 million to investors — a record amount. So, what did investors do with their cash? Charter a yacht in Ibiza? Finally close on that alpaca farm upstate? Maybe save a little? Naaah. Either way, Masterworks wants to do the same thing for you. To open your free, no-obligation account just click the link below. See disclosures: masterworks.com/cd Claim free account THE LATEST NEWS Politics Jack Teixeira, the National Guard airman accused of leaking classified files, has a history of racist and violent remarks, prosecutors say. Trump can’t stop Mike Pence from testifying to the Jan. 6 grand jury, a court ruled. The U.S. will give South Korea a central role in nuclear weapons strategy in any potential conflict with North Korea. Montana state lawmakers voted to bar a transgender legislator from the House floor for condemning a bill that would prohibit transitional care for minors. “I am here to try to get my life back”: E. Jean Carroll, who accuses Trump of raping her in the mid-1990s, told a chilling story on the stand. Many Americans say Biden’s age is a factor in the 2024 presidential race. But polls suggest it might not be so important by Election Day. Business Walt Disney World.Bryan R. Smith/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Disney sued Gov. Ron DeSantis, arguing that his fight with the company was retaliation for speaking out against a Florida education bill. On the eve of Fox News’s defamation trial, the discovery by some top executives of offensive texts sent by Tucker Carlson set off a crisis. British regulators rejected Microsoft’s plan to acquire the video game giant Activision Blizzard, potentially killing the largest consumer technology merger in decades. Other Big Stories China’s Xi Jinping and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky spoke by phone, their first known contact since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Pope Francis will allow women to vote at a meeting about the future of the Catholic Church. Children with autism are lending their voices to transit announcements. It’ll brighten your commute — listen here. Opinions Before seeking capital punishment for the Tree of Life synagogue shooter, prosecutors should consider that Judaism rejects the death penalty, Beth Kissileff, the wife of a survivor, argues. Walking is twice as risky for Black pedestrians as it is for white ones. Adam Paul Susaneck explains why. Here are columns by Charles Blow on Biden’s candidacy and by Pamela Paul on DVD delivery. Subscribe Today To benefit from everything we offer — definitive news and analysis, plus award-winning recipes, games, product reviews and personalized sports journalism — subscribe to New York Times All Access with this introductory offer. MORNING READS El Pintor’s pop-up book.Hugo Yu for The New York Times World War II: These children’s books are full of whimsy. The story behind them is one of heroism and tragedy. BabyGPT: Watch an A.I. learn to write. Stolen or original? Ed Sheeran is on trial, accused of borrowing from Marvin Gaye. Listen to famous songs in copyright cases. Gardening: A tool to cut your weeding time in half. Advice from Wirecutter: Pick the best instant camera. Lives Lived: Emily Meggett never measured ingredients or wrote down a recipe until she published a cookbook last year that became a best seller. She died at 90. SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETIC The Heat’s Jimmy Butler.Stacy Revere/Getty Images N.B.A. playoffs: The Miami Heat eliminated the top-seeded Milwaukee Bucks last night, in a shocking overtime win. The New York Knicks knocked out the Cleveland Cavaliers. N.F.L. draft: Coaches and executives weigh in on top picks in the draft, which begins tonight. Fallout at Colorado: Buffaloes head coach Deion Sanders has overseen an exodus since taking charge in Boulder. Continue reading the main story A MESSAGE FROM Masterworks This app delivered millions to investors in 2022 In the same year that everyday investors lost a whopping $350 billion, Masterworks had its best year ever. Their nine art sales returned $25.8 million to investors — a record amount. So, what did investors do with their cash? Charter a yacht in Ibiza? Finally close on that alpaca farm upstate? Maybe save a little? Naaah. Either way, Masterworks wants to do the same thing for you. To open your free, no-obligation account just click the link below. See disclosures: masterworks.com/cd Claim free account ARTS AND IDEAS Bowling and batting practice in Punjab State, India.Atul Loke for The New York Times A reason to dream In India, where cricket is by far the most popular sport, a women’s league arrived last month with a splash. Investors poured hundreds of millions of dollars into the league, delivering big paydays for the sport’s biggest female stars, and crowds swarmed the inaugural tournament. The Times’s Mujib Mashal visited Dharoki, a village in the wheat fields of the Punjab region, where the league’s success has inspired a generation of girls to dream of becoming cricket stars. PLAY, WATCH, EAT What to Cook David Malosh for The New York Times This marble cake is buttery and not too sweet. What to Listen To These podcasts about fashion examine the place of clothing in pop culture. What to Watch “Love & Death,” based on a true story, examines how a mother turned into a killer. Late Night Seth Meyers speculated about why Fox fired Carlson. Now Time to Play The pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were antioxidant, oxidant and oxidation. Here are today’s puzzle and the Bee Buddy, which helps you find remaining words. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku and Tiles. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — German P.S. The Athletic is publishing a book series. The first will rank the 100 best players in N.F.L. history. Here’s today’s front page. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Amy Fiscus News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lauren Hard Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause By the decree enforcing the institution of the papacy in violation of the law of God, our nation will disconnect herself fully from righteousness. When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near. {5T 451.1} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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