Liquid assets
“We’re now finding out exactly how far the Court will let [Republicans] go” in once again making democracy a “racial entitlement” in America. / The Atlantic [$]
Trump officials claim they don’t need approval for their massive arch in DC because Congress passed a plan in 1925 for a similarly sized bridge that was never built. / The Washington Post [$]
Former federal employees say the dismantling of USAID, which had a system in place for Ebola detection and reporting, likely hindered the response to the recent outbreak in Congo. / NBC News
“Trump’s first impeachment preceded his 2020 election defeat. It is impossible and indeed, irresponsible to suggest it did not influence the election outcome.” Don’t doom, vote. / Need to Know
Researchers find some of the natural food colorings MAHA promotes are associated with increased risk of diabetes and cancer. / The Wall Street Journal [$]
A week before the FDA opened the door to flavored vapes, Reynolds American donated $5 million to a Trump-backed super PAC. / The New York Times [$]
Behind the scenes on the long road to the launch of Direct File, which nearly survived DOGE until the tax prep industry apparently got its way. / Defector
See also: According to an internal memo, Intuit plans to lay off around 3,000 employees in its shift to AI. / Reuters
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Right before ChatGPT launched, 11% of litigants in federal cases chose to represent themselves in court—it’s now 17%. / The Washington Post [$]
The “comically bad” dataset used to train a clinical model for early stroke detection: “George Clooney, Angelina Jolie and Daniel Craig all appear more than once.” / Retraction Watch
Rounding up literature’s recent AI controversies, including a maybe-AI-written Commonwealth Short Story Prize winner and Olga Tokarczuk’s clarification on how she uses AI. / The New York Times [$]
The UK Children’s Laureate wants the government to prioritize children’s reading for pleasure rather than for academic advancement. / The Guardian
“Write a description of your bed after you have slept in it.” On weird writing advice and Lucy Ives’s new book of prompts. / The New Yorker
Disney shuttered FiveThirtyEight last year and has now nuked the site’s archives, which live on at the Internet Archive—here’s a searchable list of its pages. / FlowingData, fivethirtyeightindex
“In the cool nights of our hometown of Taybeh when I was a child, the Black Hawk inhabited my thoughts alongside other predators.” Darkness is a military asset. / Places Journal
An explanation of the Living Wage for Musicians Act currently with the House Judiciary Committee, and the grassroots effort to compel Congress to act. / Dada Drummer Almanach
Seven-foot-four basketball star Victor Wembanyama prepared for this postseason by training as a Shaolin monk. / ESPN
Recipes for mixing bottled waters to recreate the water profiles of cities known for coffee, tea, baking, and more. / Water Dictionary