The Ledes

Thursday, July 3, 2025

CNBC: “Job growth proved better than expected in June, as the labor market showed surprising resilience and likely taking a July interest rate cut off the table. Nonfarm payrolls increased a seasonally adjusted 147,000 for the month, higher than the estimate for 110,000 and just above the upwardly revised 144,000 in May, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday. April’s tally also saw a small upward revision, now at 158,000 following an 11,000 increase.... Though the jobless rates fell [to 4.1%], it was due largely to a decrease in those working or looking for jobs.”

Washington Post: “A warehouse storing fireworks in Northern California exploded on Tuesday, leaving seven people missing and two injured as explosions continued into Wednesday evening, officials said. Dramatic video footage captured by KCRA 3 News, a Sacramento broadcaster, showed smoke pouring from the building’s roof before a massive explosion created a fireball that seemed to engulf much of the warehouse, accompanied by an echoing boom. Hundreds of fireworks appeared to be going off and were sparkling within the smoke. Photos of the aftermath showed multiple destroyed buildings and a large area covered in gray ash.” ~~~

The Wires
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The Ledes

Wednesday, July 2, 2025

New York Times: “The Rev. Jimmy Swaggart, who emerged from the backwoods of Louisiana to become a television evangelist with global reach, preaching about an eternal struggle between good and evil and warning of the temptations of the flesh, a theme that played out in his own life in a sex scandal, died on July 1. He was 90.” ~~~

     ~~~ For another sort of obituary, see Akhilleus' commentary near the end of yesterday's thread.

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INAUGURATION 2029

Commencement ceremonies are joyous occasions, and Steve Carell made sure that was true this past weekend (mid-June) at Northwestern's commencement:

~~~ Carell's entire commencement speech was hilarious. The audio and video here isn't great, but I laughed till I cried.

CNN did a live telecast Saturday night (June 7) of the Broadway play "Good Night, and Good Luck," written by George Clooney and Grant Heslov, about legendary newsman Edward R. Murrow's effort to hold to account Sen. Joe McCarthy, "the junior senator from Wisconsin." Clooney plays Murrow. Here's Murrow himself with his famous take on McCarthy & McCarthyism, brief remarks that especially resonate today: ~~~

     ~~~ This article lists ways you still can watch the play. 

New York Times: “The New York Times Company has agreed to license its editorial content to Amazon for use in the tech giant’s artificial intelligence platforms, the company said on Thursday. The multiyear agreement 'will bring Times editorial content to a variety of Amazon customer experiences,' the news organization said in a statement. Besides news articles, the agreement encompasses material from NYT Cooking, The Times’s food and recipe site, and The Athletic, which focuses on sports. This is The Times’s first licensing arrangement with a focus on generative A.I. technology. In 2023, The Times sued OpenAI and its partner, Microsoft, for copyright infringement, accusing the tech companies of using millions of articles published by The Times to train automated chatbots without any kind of compensation. OpenAI and Microsoft have rejected those accusations.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I have no idea what this means for "the Amazon customer experience." Does it mean that if I don't have a NYT subscription but do have Amazon Prime I can read NYT content? And where, exactly, would I find that content? I don't know. I don't know.

Washington Post reporters asked three AI image generators what a beautiful woman looks like. "The Post found that they steer users toward a startlingly narrow vision of attractiveness. Prompted to show a 'beautiful woman,' all three tools generated thin women, without exception.... Her body looks like Barbie — slim hips, impossible waist, round breasts.... Just 2 percent of the images showed visible signs of aging. More than a third of the images had medium skin tones. But only nine percent had dark skin tones. Asked to show 'normal women,' the tools produced images that remained overwhelmingly thin.... However bias originates, The Post’s analysis found that popular image tools struggle to render realistic images of women outside the Western ideal." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: The reporters seem to think they are calling out the AI programs for being unrealistic. But there's a lot about the "beautiful women" images they miss. I find these omissions remarkably sexist. For one thing, the reporters seem to think AI is a magical "thing" that self-generates. It isn't. It's programmed. It's programmed by boys, many of them incels who have little or no experience or insights beyond comic books and Internet porn of how to gauge female "beauty." As a result, the AI-generated women look like cartoons; that is, a lot like an air-brushed photo of Kristi Noem: globs of every kind of dark eye makeup, Scandinavian nose, Botox lips, slathered-on skin concealer/toner/etc. makeup, long dark hair and the aforementioned impossible Barbie body shape, including huge, round plastic breasts. 

New York Times: “George Clooney’s Broadway debut, 'Good Night, and Good Luck,' has been one of the sensations of the 2024-25 theater season, breaking box office records and drawing packed houses of audiences eager to see the popular movie star in a timely drama about the importance of an independent press. Now the play will become much more widely available: CNN is planning a live broadcast of the penultimate performance, on June 7 at 7 p.m. Eastern. The performance will be preceded and followed by coverage of, and discussion about, the show and the state of journalism.”

No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing in any other way, nor will we proceed with force against him, or send others to do so, except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land. -- Magna Carta ~~~

~~~ New York Times: “Bought for $27.50 after World War II, the faint, water stained manuscript in the library of Harvard Law School had attracted relatively little attention since it arrived there in 1946. That is about to change. Two British academics, one of whom happened on the manuscript by chance, have discovered that it is an original 1300 version — not a copy, as long thought — of Magna Carta, the medieval document that helped establish some of the world’s most cherished liberties. It is one of just seven such documents from that date still in existence.... A 710-year-old version of Magna Carta was sold in 2007 for $21.3 million.... First issued in 1215, it put into writing a set of concessions won by rebellious barons from a recalcitrant King John of England — or Bad King John, as he became known in folklore. He later revoked the charter, but his son, Henry III, issued amended versions, the last one in 1225, and Henry’s son, Edward I, in turn confirmed the 1225 version in 1297 and again in 1300.”

NPR lists all of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize winners. Poynter lists the prizes awarded in journalism as well as the finalists in these categories.

 

Contact Marie

Email Marie at constantweader@gmail.com

Page Links
Sunday
Dec192010

The Commentariat -- December 20

Here's the page NASA sent me to for the lunar eclipse tonight & tomorrow a.m. AND here's an informative AP story.

Richard Cohen, in a New York Times op-ed, provides a primer on the winter solstice.

Check out the Neighborhood. The New York Times posts interactive maps that allow you to "browse local data from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey, based on samples from 2005 to 2009," that map four topics: (1) race & ethnicity, (2) income, (3) housing & families & (4) education. The Times warns, "Because these figures are based on samples, they are subject to a margin of error, particularly in places with a low population, and are best regarded as estimates."

** "Top Secret America." Dana Priest & William Arkin of the Washington Post: "... The United States is assembling a vast domestic intelligence apparatus to collect information about Americans, using the FBI, local police, state homeland security offices and military criminal investigators.... The government's goal is to have every state and local law enforcement agency in the country feed information to Washington to buttress the work of the FBI, which is in charge of terrorism investigations in the United States." This page links to other "Top Secret America" stories, published in July 2010. Here's a brief video, which ends with an interactive map locating intelligence agency sites.

John Harwood of the New York Times posts a brief interview of Harry Reid. ...

... Hateful Anti-American Schmucks. Ryan Grim: Two Amigos John McCain & Lindsey Graham take revenge on DADT repeal by rounding up votes against the New START treaty.

Ben Evans of the AP: "For a guy who insists that federal bureaucrats make too much money, incoming House Majority Leader Eric Cantor sure doesn't mind handing out handsome government raises of his own. Cantor, the Virginia Republican who has led the GOP charge this year to freeze federal salaries, has boosted his congressional office's payroll by 81 percent since coming to Congress in 2001.... Cantor and other GOP leaders are now pledging to cut their budgets by 5 percent when they take over the House in January.... Overall, congressional payroll expenses have climbed much faster than the civilian federal work force costs that lawmakers are now clamoring to freeze. Many of the most vocal federal critics have overseen growth that rivals or outstrips the executive branch's...."

Elisabeth Bumiller of the New York Times: "In the wake of the Senate vote to end the 17-year-old [DADT] policy..., military officials said they did not yet have a timetable for putting the change into effect. President Obama is expected to sign the bill early this week.... Under the terms of the legislation that passed the Senate on Saturday and the House earlier last week, the Defense Department will not carry out the repeal until [Defense Secretary] Gates, Mr. Obama and Adm. Mike Mullen ... 'certify' that the military is ready to make the change. After that, the legislation requires a 60-day period before the change takes place." ...

... Robert Burns of the AP: "Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Amos, who had argued against the policy change, said in a statement Sunday the Corps 'will step out smartly to faithfully implement this new policy' and that he would 'personally lead this effort, thus ensuring the respect and dignity due all Marines.'" ...

... Matthew Cooper of the National Journal: "Like African Americans and women, gays will likely find military service a springboard to other rights.... It's probably instructive that the Dream Act failed the same day the 'don't ask, don't tell' repeal passed. The Dream Act would have, among other things, given illegal immigrants who served in the military a path to citizenship.... Were it to pass it wouldn't be at all surprising if it turned out to be the opening of a much larger path to legalization. Such is the power of being able to serve in the armed forces." ...

... Mark Thompson of Time on the integration of women & gays into the military. "In another 11 years, we'll wonder just how 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' ever became the law of the land, and why it was allowed to stand for 17 years and ruin the careers of nearly 14,000 people." ...

... CW: I don't find Walter Shapiro's hypothoses too convincing, but his question wants answering: "Why are liberals winning the culture wars and losing the tax battle? Shapiro blames Hollywood &/or suggests, more plausibly, that "the American people are, at their core, libertarians -- suspicious of both the taxman and the government's attempts to regulate social behavior." ...

... AND Now for the View from the Right on DADT Repeal. Kyle of People for the American Way's "Right Wing Watch" posts extended excerpts from some of the usual suspects: the Family Research Council, the American Family Association, etc. Kyle notes that "judging by the early statements ..., this vote is literally going to mean the end of America."

Peter Walsten of the Washington Post: "In the wake of President Obama's tax-cut deal with Republicans, the White House is moving quickly to mend its strained relationship with the Democratic base, reassuring liberal groups, black leaders and labor union officials who opposed the tax compromise that Obama has not abandoned them."

Paul Krugman: "Free-market fundamentalists have been wrong about everything — yet they now dominate the political scene more thoroughly than ever."

Don Lee of the Los Angeles Times: "Perhaps the most sacred of all the sacred cows in the tax code, the home mortgage deduction has long been seen as crucial to a major element of the American dream — owning your own home.... But nearly a century after coming into existence, the mortgage deduction may face a day of reckoning. Although out of the spotlight while the lame-duck Congress thrashes to an end, the mortgage deduction issue is likely to resurface next year when the new Congress — including a lot more deficit-hawk Republicans — takes over."

There Are No Violins Tiny Enough. Nelson Schwartz & Susanne Craig of the New York Times: "Bonus season is fast approaching on Wall Street, but this year the talk ... is about a new club that no one wants to join: the Zeros... [who] are facing ... an annual bonus of ... nothing.... As a result of the 2008 financial crisis, Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs and banks like Citigroup raised base pay substantially in 2009 and 2010.... Even though employees will receive roughly the same amount of money, the psychological blow of not getting a bonus is substantial, especially in a Wall Street culture that has long equated success and prestige with bonus size."

Justices Sandra Day O'Connor & John Paul Stevens. Newsweek photo.** Justice Sandra Day O'Connor interviews Justice John Paul Stevens in Newsweek. Neither thinks highly of the Citizens United ruling. (Stevens dissented; O'Connor had left the Court before the case came before it.) ...

... Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: the Supreme Court faces the death penalty. CW: okay, maybe that's poorly-worded, but Barnes' article about how the Court decides on whether to grant or deny certiorari in death-penalty cases is interesting.

Republican Takeover of the South, Cont'd. AP: "Another prominent Louisiana Democrat has officially switched his party affiliation to the GOP, giving Republicans a majority control of the state House for the first time since Reconstruction." Via Ben Smith.

A History Lesson. David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post on the 20th Amendment, which was supposed to end lame-duck Congressional sessions. (CW: the history lesson really begins on page 2 -- the Post no longer lets me link to a single page. You can click on "print" to read the whole article on one page.) Here's an interactive timeline of lame-duck sessions, beginning in 1920.

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