Events

The Washington Post's Karen Attiah imagines how an American newspaper would cover the protests in Minnesota if it used the same tropes as typically found in Western articles on politics elsewhere: The country has been rocked by several viral videos depicting extrajudicial executions of black ethnic minorities by state security forces. Uprisings erupted in the northern city of Minneapolis after a video circulated online of the killing of a black man, George Floyd, after being attacked by a security force...

The city has started adding traffic controls to side streets in an effort to encourage outdoor recreation and social distancing: Earlier this week, officials said at least six streets are expected to be closed to through traffic and opened to the public. The move comes after weeks of transportation advocates asking the city to open up streets to pedestrians, giving them more room to walk, jog and ride bikes so they can safely social distance while outside during the pandemic. Advocates have long called...

As CNN reporter Omar Jimenez and his crew asked riot police where they would like them to move early this morning, the police abruptly arrested the group: Minnesota Governor Tim Walz spoke with CNN president Jeffrey Zucker shortly after: Mr. Walz told Mr. Zucker that the arrest was “inadvertent” and “unacceptable,” according to CNN’s account of the call. By about 6:30 a.m. local time, the crew had been released and was back on television. “Everyone, to their credit, was pretty cordial,” Mr. Jimenez said...

President Trump today signed an executive order that will likely have no legal effect and could very well backfire on him, directing the Federal Communications Commission to revisit Section 230 of the Communication Decency Act: Under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, online companies have broad immunity from liability for content created by their users. But the draft of the executive order, which refers to what it calls “selective censoring,” would allow the Commerce Department to try to...

This morning, the Labor Department reported 2.1 million new unemployment claims, bringing the total to almost 41 million since the pandemic hit the US. As horrifying as that number is, I actually wanted to highlight two articles that appeared today. The first, by Trump biographer Tony Schwartz in Medium, warns us that having a psychopathic president makes November's election "a true Armageddon:" The trait that most distinguishes psychopaths is the utter absence of conscience — the capacity to lie...

We hit a new milestone today. So, to put things in perspective, here are the number of Americans who have died from: European genocide of Native Americans (1492-1900), ~25 million over 500 years Motor vehicle accidents (1899-2018), 3.8 million over 119 years Firearms (intentional or accidental, 1968-2018), ~1.4 million over 50 years Civil War (1861-1865), 755,000 over 48 months Influenza pandemic (1918-1919), 675,000 over 15 months World War II (1941-1945), 418,500 over 45 months World War I...

The most powerful man in the world threw a hissy fit yesterday when Twitter finally—finally!—slapped a misinformation warning on one of his lies: President Donald Trump on Wednesday threatened social media companies with new regulation or even shuttering a day after Twitter added fact checks to two of his tweets. The president can’t unilaterally regulate or close the companies, which would require action by Congress or the Federal Communications Commission. But that didn't stop Trump from angrily...

It's a little comforting to realize that we've only dealt with Covid-19 social distancing rules about 5% as long as we dealt with World War II (1,345 days from 7 December 1941 to 13 August 1945). It's still a grind. In the news today: Seasonal Chicago residents Monty and Rose Plover have laid four eggs on Montrose Beach, and will hopefully have four chicks around June 17th. There's a guy in North Side neighborhood Edgewater who posts a dad joke in his window every day. The Economist says "farewell for...

I'm still plowing through all the CDs I bought over the years, now up to #55 which I got in November 1988. It's a 1957 recording of the Robert Shaw Chorale performing various Christmas carols. (Remember, remember, I got it in November.) This comes between Billy Joel's Piano Man and Glenn Gould performing Bach's Inventions and Sinfonias. Then I'll get Simon & Garfunkel, Mozart, William Byrd, and Haydn. At least part of this strangeness comes from my experience as a music major during my first year at...

If the initial reports prove correct, the fatal crash of Pakistan International Airlines flight 8303 on Friday may have resulted from the pilots missing a key line-item in their landing checklist: On May 24th 2020 Pakistan's media quote a CAA official speaking on condition of anonymity that the aircraft made two attempts to land. During the first approach it appears the landing gear was still retracted when the aircraft neared the runway, the pilot had not indicated any anomaly or emergency, emergency...