“How many times do I need to announce tax cuts or tell Palestinian activists to pound sand before you go back to the NDP?” Luke and the Panel (Ian MacIntyre, Nile Seguin and Jocelyn Geddie) talk about Buttongate, the state of the race and the Debates, and why the Notwithstanding Clause is the Pringles of […]
The post Mark Carney not sure what he has to do to alienate left-wing voters appeared first on The Beaverton.
EAST HANOVER, NJ—As part of the health secretary’s highly publicized pledge to determine the cause of the disorder in the next five months, a wild-eyed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reportedly shouted “Show me where autism is made!” Thursday while storming the Sour Patch Kid factory. “Attention Sour Patch Factory people: Give me the autism and no one gets hurt,” said the 71-year-old Cabinet member and vaccine skeptic, who cocked his gun and kicked down the door of the facility, grabbing workers, shooting bullets at conveyor belts, and kicking down enormous vats of bright colored gelatin before demanding to see the “head autism scientist” so he could kill him and “end autism forever.” “Enough! You can try to hide autism all you want, but I know it’s in here. I can smell it! I have searched high and low—at the Skittles factory, at the Warheads factory, and at the Nerds Gummy Clusters factory. But it ends today. Autism, prepare to eat lead!” At press time, Kennedy could be heard screaming “Oh no, the autism’s got me!” and begging a factory worker to put him out of his misery.
The post ‘Show Me Where You Make Autism!’ Shouts RFK Jr., Storming Sour Patch Kids Factory appeared first on The Onion.
OTTAWA – After being dropped from leaders’ debates in the upcoming Canadian election due to not having enough candidates in the race, the Green Party announced that, until they were allowed to participate again, they would keep adding co-leaders until they’d formed an army capable of crushing every other party on the goddamn debate stage. […]
The post Green Party threatens to keep adding co-leaders until they are allowed to participate in debates again appeared first on The Beaverton.
by The Beaverton Editorial Board There are times when journalists of principle must raise their voices to stand up for what is right. This is not one of those times. There are also times when a money-making operation masquerading as a fringe conspiracy theory website gets to admit FIVE WHOLE “journalists” to the scrums following […]
The post The Beaverton demands same debate invitation as The Rebel, even though we’re not as big a joke appeared first on The Beaverton.
1. There’s an innovative American automotive manufacturer being run by a total bigot.
2. In large swaths of the country, a marginalized community is banned from using certain bathrooms for no other reason than to make their lives miserable.
3. Marijuana is legal in some states but not others.
4. The US experiences widespread outbreaks of childhood diseases like measles, which many parents treat with homeopathic remedies.
5. It’s trendy to call your bar a “speakeasy.”
6. The US economy is controlled by a handful of cartoonishly wealthy business tycoons.
7. Though it used to be legal everywhere, abortion is now illegal in much of the country.
8. Elites are nervous after an anticapitalist of Italian descent perpetrates an elaborate act of violence in New York City as a protest against corporate greed.
9. Conservatives are drumming up fears of socialism to scare people into voting for them.
10. Americans are disillusioned by a costly war and a global pandemic.
11. The Yankees have a slugger hitting record-breaking numbers of home runs.
12. There is a spate of new laws designed to limit immigration from “undesirable” countries.
13. A popular form of entertainment involves listening to well-known personalities chat with one another; audiences tune in regularly via an audio-based entertainment platform.
14. Though the American economy has grown steadily, the growth hasn’t been felt evenly across the country; there’s a growing sense that something about the way modern society is set up just isn’t working for most Americans; combine that with growing xenophobia and white nationalism, both in the US and Europe, and you get the sense that the global social fabric is beginning to unravel in ways that could soon spiral into economic meltdown, world war, or both; you start to ask yourself, “Is catastrophic conflict an intractable part of human civilization? Are pluralistic societies doomed to periodically devolve into infighting? And does the moral arc of the universe actually bend towards justice, or is our species doomed to Sisyphean cycles of inequality that oscillate between bad and slightly less bad?”
15. Cocktails cost a fucking fortune.
Both: 1–15
The following guest post from Christina Moretta, Photo Curator and Acting San Francisco History Center Manager at San Francisco Public Library, is part of a series written by members of Internet Archive’s Community Webs program. Community Webs advances the capacity of community-focused memory organizations to build web and digital archives documenting local histories.
San Francisco History Center (SFHC) of the San Francisco Public Library (SFPL) is the official archive for the City and County of San Francisco. SFHC serves all library users and levels of interest, from the merely curious to those engaging in scholarly research. Because of the Center’s archival function, it also administers the archival collections of the James C. Hormel LGBTQIA Center.
Internet Archive has supported our work to preserve and provide access to San Francisco’s history in many ways. Since 2007, Internet Archive has hosted SFPL digitized content, including local documents and city directories. In 2017, SFPL became one of the first members of Internet Archive’s Community Webs program. This program has provided us with the tools we need to preserve local web-based content that will be important for future researchers investigating San Francisco’s history.
In 2023, the Community Webs program was awarded a grant from the National Historical Publication and Records Commission for the “Collaborative Access to Diverse Public Library Local History Collections” project. This grant supported the digitization of local history collections from libraries across the country, including SFPL. With this support, 23 bound volumes of a Chinese/English language newspaper East/West and 4 cartons of oral histories from the Paul Radin Papers were digitized by Internet Archive.
The East/West (Dong xi bao) newspaper was acquired the easy way – original subscription by the SFPL’s Periodical Department in the late 1960s. There are only a handful of institutions that have East/West in their holdings as microfilm only. SFHC has the complete run in paper format.
In late 1966, Gordon Lew and two Chinese newspaper colleagues, Kenneth Joe and Ken Wong, began the idea of East/West, a bilingual weekly newspaper published out of San Francisco’s Chinatown. The inaugural issue was in January 1967 and the newspaper ran for over twenty-two years with the last issue in September 1989. Lew became the publisher and editor, Joe worked in the Chinese section, and Wong was the principal writer in the English section. East/West was an important community newspaper, with extensive coverage of local Chinatown news, social activities, the work of Chinese American political figures, and international developments such as the normalization of China ties.
East/West was published in English and Chinese, and for many years, the two sections had approximately the same number of pages. The editorial and perhaps the main news article in the English section would be translated into Chinese. The Chinese section tended to focus more on culture, arts, and history, and it often reprinted articles from other sources. Advertisements filled both sections from the very beginning for local businesses and services. Most were community ads as the newspaper served non-profit organizations that arose in the wake of the Chinese American and Asian American empowerment movements of the 1960s and 1970s.
Researchers and scholars of 20th-century Chinese American communities in the United States will appreciate the online availability of this unique resource. Many important issues cropped up in Chinese America and Asian America starting in the late 1960s and these can be found in East/West from the community perspective. By being a bilingual publication, the newspaper captured and shared the voice of the community. In addition, San Francisco Chinese Americans had limited political power in the 1960s. East/West focused on emerging Chinese American political figures and urged the community to increase its voting and general political participation.
Browse East/West on archive.org
In 2003, the Paul Radin Papers were donated to the SFHC by Professor Luis S. Kemnitzer of San Francisco State University on behalf of Calvin Fast Wolf and Mary Sacharoff-Fast Wolf. Mary Wolf was a would-be biographer of Radin who had acquired original papers from her friend and Radin’s widow, Doris Woodward Radin, as well as colleagues.
Dr. Paul Radin (1883-1959) is considered to be one of the formative influences in contemporary anthropology and ethnography in the United States and Europe. The bulk of the Paul Radin Papers consists of surveys from Radin’s supervision of over 200 workers who interviewed ethnic groups in the San Francisco Bay Area for the State Emergency Relief Administration of California (SERA) over a period of nine months in 1934-1935. Known as SERA project 2-F2-98 (3-F2-145), its abstract was published in 1935 as The Survey of San Francisco’s Minorities: Its Purpose and Results. The stated purpose was a cultural survey to find employment for “white collar” unemployed workers on temporary relief. Radin’s focus was “to study the steps in the adjustment and assimilation of minority groups in San Francisco and Alameda counties.” Bypassing a typical questionnaire method, Radin instead had the amateur interviewers record anything and everything which the interviewees wished to say. The results appear in a narrative format—sometimes in the form of poetry and short stories—and encompass all manner of immigrant experiences. Survey materials include typed and handwritten interviews and research on ethnic groups. Some interviewers identify themselves, and their report appears in their own hand.
A portion of the Paul Radin Papers includes SERA worker Jon Y. Lee’s papers including material for The Golden Mountain. Lee was the son of Chinese immigrants who settled in Oakland, California. Radin hired Lee as a fieldworker to collect Chinatown traditions in Oakland, California. Today, Lee is recognized as the first Asian American to work professionally as a folklorist.
With this collection online, international scholars can now easily access narratives about the immigrant experience from their country/region to assist with their diaspora studies. The typed descriptions allow for OCR discovery and for one to gather more information on the San Francisco immigrant experience in the 1910s and 1920s.
Browse the Paul Radin Papers on archive.org
Internet Archive and Community Webs are thankful for the support from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission for Collaborative Access to Diverse Public Library Local History Collections, which will digitize and provide access to a diverse range of local history archives that represent the experiences of immigrant, indigenous, and African American communities throughout the United States.
“This and That” is an occasional series of paired observations. See past “This and That” posts here. – Ed.
Today: Saddles (as seen at the Dallas Art Fair)
Sula Bermúdez-Silverman, “centauride,” 2025, glass, gold leaf, found object, 45 1/4 x 18 1/2 x 15 inches. Courtesy the artist and Josh Lilley, London. Photo by Ben Westoby / Fine Art Documentation
Marshall K. Harris, “Riding into the Midnight Sun,” 2025, lenticular print, 48 x 49 inches. Edition: 5 of 10. William Campbell Gallery.
*************
No matter how original, innovative or crazy your idea, someone else is also working on that idea. Furthermore, they are using notation very similar to yours. – Bruce J. MacLennan
The post This and That: Sula Bermúdez-Silverman and Marshall K. Harris appeared first on Glasstire.
It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. If I opt out of team-building activities, I still have to work on those days
I work for a small nonprofit with about 25 employees. Recently, we have begun “employee engagement” activities, like visiting local attractions. These activities take place during work hours. We are not forced to participate, but if we choose not to, then we are expected to work while those who do want to participate are basically paid to hang out at a local attraction, restaurant, etc.
I don’t enjoy these kinds of group activities, but I’m not trying to keep anyone from going if they wish to. I don’t mind staying at work, but I am expected to cover for another employee (who always chooses to do the engagement activities) instead of being able to do my own work. Am I just a party pooper or is it weird for some employees to be paid to goof off while others are being paid to work? Am I wrong to think I shouldn’t have to cover for someone else when no other employee is expected to do that?
I don’t think it’s unreasonable. They’re offering these activities because they believe they serve an organizational purpose: team-building. If you prefer not to participate, you don’t have to (which is actually better than at some organizations, where you’d be expected to attend regardless) — but they’re not going to just give you a day off, because that doesn’t provide any value to the org.
That said, if covering for people who aren’t there means you have an unrealistic workload that day, you should talk with your manager about adjusting the expectations to match the staffing on those days. But if it’s more just about being annoyed by the principle of it, you should let it go.
2. My boss has hired my replacement but I’m not ready to leave
I am actively looking for a new job and communicated this intent to my bosses as we have an open communication relationship. As is their right, they started to look for my replacement, which they found and have since hired. I am still actively looking for a job and have given no notice of my intended departure date. What are the obligations to me of my current employer given that I have not quit my job and there is someone we are on-boarding right now for my job?
For a relationship with open communication, it doesn’t sound like there’s nearly enough communication going on! (Or at least not unless there’s been a lot more discussion of this than what’s in your letter.) You need to talk to your manager and you should do it right away. They may be assuming you’re leaving any day now … or they may assume it’ll be months and figure it’s fine for there to be overlap for that time … or they may be okay with a little overlap but at some point are going to expect you to set a clear end date or will do it for you.
When you alerted them that you were planning to leave, they may have jumped the gun — but this is also why it generally doesn’t make sense to alert your boss that you’re job-searching until you’re ready to give notice or at least have a very clear timeline in your head. Your manager should have clarified that with you before they hired a replacement! But it seems like they didn’t, so here we are. Now that this is in motion, they can set your ending date for any time they want, so talk with them ASAP and figure out a plan for what happens next. Be very clear that you don’t have any firm plans, had not intended to give formal notice, and don’t want to leave right away. Ideally they won’t respond to your early heads-up by pushing you out sooner than you want to go … but there’s a risk that’s in progress and so the sooner you figure it out, the better.
Related:
employee said she was leaving and has been replaced, but now doesn’t know when she is going to leave
3. How to implement a policy I don’t agree with
I am the deputy lead for my department. I manage 13 people directly, and two of those people are managers themselves, each with a team of three. The team works a hybrid schedule, with most people choosing to work from home once or twice a week. There are no set days; we have a lot of flexibility. All staff have laptops and other required equipment at home.
My company has a policy that when office PCs reach the end of their lifespan, they will not be replaced. Instead, staff will be given a docking station and are expected to use their work laptops at home and in the office. This policy was announced a couple of years ago, but this is a large company (~20,000 staff) and it seems my predecessor did not inform the team at the time as it didn’t impact them. Now I have been told that our office PCs are end of life and we will be getting docking stations soon.
My team are livid! For example, those with chronic health conditions can currently choose to work from home if their condition flares up. But if their laptop is in the office, they won’t be able to work from home. They have also questioned what happens during bad weather when they cannot get to the office, but cannot work from home because the laptop is in the office. I have raised this with the department manager and his answer was that they will have to take the laptops home each day and bring them back the next day if working in the office.
My team doesn’t want to carry laptops back and forth every day, especially those who walk or cycle. They have raised concerns about whether they are responsible for the equipment on their commute, what happens if it gets broken or stolen, and if they won’t be able to go out and socialize after work as they will be lugging a laptop around. I agree with all these concerns! I have raised them with the manager, who said that staff are responsible for keeping equipment safe. He also said this is company policy and we have to follow it.
How do I navigate this when I agree with my staff? What language can I use to say I hear you, I agree with you, but we have no choice? Or should I be taking a difference stance and projecting to the team that I agree wholeheartedly with this?
“I agree and I’ve made that argument, but unsuccessfully. So for now this is the policy and we do need to follow it.” You don’t need to pretend you disagree with them, but it’s also not helpful to contribute to people staying in a state of agitation about it. You want more of a middle ground — “it’s not what I would have chosen, but at this point we don’t have the ability to change it, so let’s figure out how to work within it.”
(That said, can you at least argue for keeping the PCs until they truly can’t be used anymore? I can’t tell if they’re removing them all when the docking stations arrive, but if they are, that might be a spot where you have room to change things.)
Related:
how managers should communicate decisions they don’t agree with
4. Fixing grammar and spelling mistakes
I’m a leader of a medium-sized team in technology in a large, corporate environment. We’re in the U.S. but for a lot of team members English is their second language. When I see spelling and grammar mistakes in presentations that I’m reviewing, is it better to quickly fix it myself (easy to do and quick, although not the point of why I’m reviewing as I’m more focused on the content) or leave a comment (which feels nitpicky and takes longer but maybe that will help them learn)? Or do nothing? I do not judge their performance based on what is clearly a language barrier, but I also want their writing to be clear and easy to understand for their audience.
The main job duties are not writing but in a large company, we make a lot of slides and more so as you move up in leadership.
It’s a judgment call. All else being equal, I’d fix it and leave a quick, matter-of-fact note about what you did (like “changed ’there’ to ’their’” or so forth) but if there will be a lot of those sorts of edits in a single document, I’d just fix them all and then include one note with feedback about any common patterns if you saw any and if it seems like it would be helpful.
If what you’re reviewing is in a format that allows for something like Track Changes, that’s ideal but not always possible.
5. Companies that don’t provide offer letters
I’m interviewing with multiple companies and received a verbal offer via phone call from one company. Typically, I’m used to this being followed up by a formal electronic offer letter. The hiring manager indicated that is not the case, and that the details of the phone call are the offer letter. I mentioned this to another employer who I’m in a last interview round with, and they informed me that this is how it’s done at their company as well.
I am very experienced in my field, and I can vouch for the legitimacy of these companies and interviewers. This is the first time I’m working without a formal offer letter since the early 2000s. Have standards changed?
Nope, there have always been companies that don’t send written offer letters. It seems strange when you’re used to getting them, but it’s always been a thing.
You can absolutely say, “Would it be possible to get the details of the offer — salary, benefits, title, and any other relevant information — in an email so I can look it over and be sure I’m getting all the details correct?” Alternately, you can write that email yourself and send it to them, framing it as, “I just want to summarize the details we’ve discussed.”
Related:
an employer told me they don’t provide written offers
The post I still have to work if I don’t attend team-building, boss has hired my replacement but I’m not ready to leave, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.
It’s the Thursday “ask the readers” question. Today we have two letters, one question. The first:
I’m a fed in a (relatively) safe job in a (relatively) safe agency, and while I’m hoping to stay, I am keeping an eye out for other opportunities. But as someone who went straight from academia to the federal government, I realized I don’t know where to look beyond places like LinkedIn or Indeed. I’m sure many job categories have their own niche places to look for job announcements, but how do you find out about them? Maybe people who are looking could say their desired job category in the comments and others could give tips on where to look? For instance, I’m looking at data science, with a focus on data governance.
And the second:
Several years ago — in May of 2017 — you had a post where you asked your readers to share their favorite niche job boards in their various fields. Since the world has evolved a bit in the years since then, would you consider doing an update to that post and seeing what readers are recommending in various fields at this point?
Yes, let’s do it again! What niche job boards do you use and recommend that are specific to your field? (For example, you might recommend I Need a Library Job, if you’re in libraries, or TraverseJobs for political jobs in D.C., and so forth.) Please share in the comments.
The post what niche job boards do you use to find job openings? appeared first on Ask a Manager.
CHICAGO—Stressing that the delicate subject should be broached sensitively and responsibly, parenting experts from the University of Chicago shared tips Thursday for talking to kids about being heir to the throne of a small European kingdom. “Discovering their royal birthright as a small European nation’s sovereign can be a rocky period in a child’s life, so it’s important that parents remind them that it’s perfectly normal to be surrounded by a scheming coterie of backstabbing advisors vying for their favor,” said researcher Helen Beauchamp, adding that children should be reassured that they can still be friends with their old classmates as they kill rival claimants to the throne and consolidate their power. “We suggest saving this discussion until your child is at least old enough to travel around the kingdom on their own, since kids can be embarrassed meeting their vassals with parents close at hand. Don’t be surprised if they act out by wearing sneakers to their debut ball, either. Learning that they will don the ancestral crown of a remote, mountainous kingdom can be overwhelming for a kid, and it’s vital that parents treat these royal scions with the empathy they deserve.” Beauchamp added that these conversations can also be a good opportunity to explain how the birds and the bees marry direct relatives to keep the royal bloodline pure.
The post Parenting Experts Share Tips For Talking To Kids About Being Heir To Throne Of Small European Kingdom appeared first on The Onion.
CHICAGO—Unsure what to make of the perk that came bundled with his recently purchased device, area man David Halstead reported Tuesday that his new iPad offered three months of something called Apple Deli+. “I just linked my iPad up to my Apple ID, and apparently my Meat Pass has been activated and I’ve been enrolled in whatever Apple Deli+ is until April,” a bewildered Halstead said as he warily pressed the Deli icon on his iPad’s home screen and his finger hesitated for just a moment over the app’s minimalist rendering of a sliced deli ham. “Huh. According to this, my Apple Deli+ membership includes 24/7 access to Apple’s sandwich geniuses as well as 250 ‘salami points.’ They’ve somehow already logged the prosciutto caprese I got for lunch, even though I wasn’t signed in yet. I guess the Find My Cold Cuts feature could be useful. And wow, they have a mustard in rose gold that’s actually really pretty. I still don’t know if I like being locked into the Apple meat ecosystem, but maybe 90 free days of this could be cool if I can figure out how to get some dill pickles and tuna salad out of it.” Sources confirmed that by the end of the day, Halstead had already forgotten about the recurring $12 charge that he will continue paying each month for the rest of his life.
The post New iPad Offers 3 Months Of Something Called Apple Deli+ appeared first on The Onion.
Since its construction in the late 18th century, this historic mansion has always been available to the highest bidder.
Reference #19827
The post Neoclassical Gem appeared first on The Onion.
Coachella, the annual music festival held at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, CA, has wrapped up the first of its two weekends. The Onion takes a look at the key facts and figures behind the event.
$300: For MDMA that turned out to be fucking sugar pills
4: Fresh deer carcasses specified in Lady Gaga’s rider
7: Couples breaking up on the Ferris wheel right now
1,197: iPhones dropped into port-a-potties
11 p.m.: Travis Scott’s bedtime
439: Times attendees incorrectly yelled “Hey, it’s Malcolm Gladwell!”
50%: Effort put into “woo” for Benson Boone
1: Desert somehow made even more uninhabitable
The post Coachella By The Numbers appeared first on The Onion.
NEW HAVEN, CT—Calling such concern for linguistic precision a clear indicator of a thriving country, a panel of historians from Yale University issued a statement Thursday announcing that quibbling over the exact definition of a concentration camp was a sign of a healthy society. “Studies of the past tell us that nitpicking the particular semantics of the term ‘concentration camp’ as they pertain to a place the government is actively sending people with no criminal history is highly associated with national stability,” said historian Kristen Boyd, who added that the more pedantic one’s reasoning for a facility not fully satisfying the criteria for a true concentration camp, the better that bodes for a country’s future. “Time and time again, history shows us that caveat-laden arguments about what is or isn’t a concentration camp only occur in countries with sound political systems. When people are splitting hairs over the specific methodology and intent behind mass detention and human rights abuses, that’s when you know you’re looking at a vibrant, civilized society. It’s as true today as it was a hundred years ago. Civilizations are healthier when citizens are raising trivial objections to the use of the term ‘concentration camp’ on the grounds that their neighbor’s rendition to an oversight-free mass prison still technically exists within a legal framework, at least on paper.” Boyd went on to state that blindly insisting that anyone who wound up in a concentration camp must have done something wrong to get there has historically always been a sign of a healthy conscience.
The post Historians: Quibbling Over Exact Definition Of Concentration Camp Sign Of Healthy Society appeared first on The Onion.
WASHINGTON—Completely mortified while watching the body part detach, Vice President JD Vance reportedly rushed Thursday to put his wife’s head back on after fumbling the second lady. “No, no, no, no!” cried out the 40-year-old vice president, who watched in shock and horror as Usha Vance’s head slipped from his grasp and tumbled onto the floor, bouncing off the leg of an end table before rolling underneath the sofa. “I was only trying to pick her up! Well, shit. It’s not too late, I can fix this. If it comes off, that must mean it can go back on.” At press time, the vice president was hoping no one at the state dinner would notice the duct tape on his wife’s neck.
The post JD Vance Rushes To Put Wife’s Head Back On After Fumbling Second Lady appeared first on The Onion.
A curio shop owner was arrested and charged for allegedly selling “genuine human remains” online, attempting to pass them off as “educational models.” What do you think?
“We only use 10% of our bones anyway.”
Ariel Bellemare, Coyote Herder
“I hope the bones get reunited with the people missing them.”
Lucas Moran, Trend Enforcer
“What was she supposed to do, give them away for free?”
Irwin Alderson, Burrito Swaddler
The post Woman Charged With Selling Human Bones On Facebook Marketplace appeared first on The Onion.
The post Nation Can’t Believe It On Harvard’s Side appeared first on The Onion.
You thought this morning was going well, didn’t you? You even got your kid to put on their shoes without a ten-minute existential crisis about sock seams. You were this close to making it out the door unscathed.
But you forgot one thing.
Me.
I am the zipper on this slightly-too-small, definitely-too-worn hand-me-down jacket, and I am your reckoning.
You try to pull me up—oh, silly, silly parents. I jam immediately. You yank harder—I resist. I am the fortress of defiance. You try to wiggle the teeth free. I laugh in your face.
And now? Now we play.
Your child is whining and squirming. Their patience? Nonexistent. And yet, I remain. Stuck. Permanent. A monument to your failure.
But wait, there is a new phase in this game.
They want to do it themselves. Their tiny hands grip me, their fingers fumbling and pulling in the least effective way possible. They are yanking side to side, tugging at an angle that defies both physics and reason. You gently try to guide them. They shriek in betrayal. This is your job, and you have gravely underestimated their zipping expertise.
Minutes pass. The zipper remains unmoved. Their frustration rises. Tears are forming. The clock is ticking. You can feel your soul leaving your body.
And then you break. You take over.
And now you are the enemy.
The wailing is instant. Full-body devastation. How dare you? How dare you rob them of their independence, their moment of triumph? They collapse to the floor, inconsolable. You try to reason with them, but your words mean nothing. The betrayal is too deep.
And I have found a new ally.
Oh, what’s that? You’re trying to get me unstuck by yanking and muttering “We don’t have time for this” through clenched teeth?
I feed off your frustration.
Your child is now sobbing. You almost got me free, but oh wait—now I’m even more tangled than before.
You try to decide whether to force me down and start over, or just shove your child out the door half-zipped, half-feral, fully betrayed by the gods of outerwear.
Or you could just give up and grab another jacket. But the only other option is that puffy coat they hate. Do you really want to start another war?
So we continue. You. Me. Your increasingly impatient child. The clock is ticking closer to doom.
You will lose this battle. You will be late. And you will, at some point, scream into the void, “Why won’t this piece of shit zip!”
And then?
Then I will be victorious.
Uh ... Excuse me there partner ... #CowboyWho
Brian X. Chen, in a column at The New York Times headlined “Why a Tariff-Inflated $2,000 iPhone Is Nothing to Fear”:
Don’t panic. Even if tariffs did cause the iPhone’s price to surge, we would have plenty of cheaper options, like buying last year’s phone model instead of the latest and greatest.
The most important lesson we can learn from the turmoil: The only consistent way to save money on tech is to use devices for as long as possible, which requires maintaining them as you would a car, and upgrading only when you must.
This whole angle is no surprise coming from the tech columnist whose advice to readers who think their aging phone cameras don’t perform well in low light is “Just use flash.” If phone prices go up because of Trump’s tariffs, all phone prices are going to go up, including those for older models, whether you’re buying new or used. There is no silver lining here. Spending more to get a years-old phone sucks too.
Take the iPhone 16 as an example. Its $800 price tag can easily inflate to $1,080, since you may also buy:
- An iPhone case for $50
- AirPods for $130
- 256 gigabytes of storage for $100
So if you buy things that aren’t an iPhone — like AirPods — the price of an iPhone goes up. Got it.
The anti-“big tech” bias here is so obvious. Don’t hold your breath waiting for a similar article in the Times about how it’s no big deal, nothing to worry about, if the price of cars doubles under these tariffs.
The whistleblower, Daniel Berulis, provided forensic evidence and internal documentation to Congress and the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, accusing DOGE of exfiltrating large volumes of confidential data and disabling various security monitoring systems used to scan for malicious behavior in NLRB’s networks, NPR first reported.
The user attempting to log in relied on a newly created DOGE email account and the attempts were “near real-time,” according to the Berulis disclosure. It’s not clear whether the user was actually in Russia because hackers often use techniques to remotely mask their true location.
The login attempts were blocked, but the person used a correct username and password, suggesting that adversaries may already be testing entry points potentially exposed by DOGE’s activities across the government.
The whistleblower’s disclosure was accompanied by a cover letter from his attorney, Andrew Bakaj of Whistleblower Aid, which said that, after he raised concerns internally about DOGE’s inroads into the agency, he received a physically taped threat on his door containing personal information and overhead photos of him walking his dog.
A DOGE spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment. DOGE, overseen by Elon Musk, is not an official government agency and was stood up as a reworking of the U.S. Digital Service at the start of the Trump administration to eliminate perceived federal spending waste.
The accusations from Berulis are not an isolated incident, NPR reported, citing an aide for the Democratic minority on the House Oversight Committee who said the panel is “in possession of multiple verifiable reports showing that DOGE has exfiltrated sensitive government data across agencies” for reasons that are unknown.
“This case has been particularly sensitive as it involves the possibility of sophisticated foreign intelligence gaining access to sensitive government systems, which is why we went to the Senate Intelligence Committee directly,” said Bakaj. Spokespeople for Sens. Tom Cotton, R-Ark. and Mark Warner, D-Va., the top lawmakers on the Senate panel, did not immediately return requests for comment.
The disclosures underscore the breadth of DOGE’s expansion across the federal landscape, and follow mounting legal challenges over its sweeping access to Americans’ financial and personal data. How that data is being protected, processed or used remains unclear.
Broader security and privacy concerns about DOGE have been compounded by the cost-cutting entity’s access to highly sensitive labor information and the potential conflict of interest posed by Elon Musk’s dual role in government and as chief of companies under active NLRB investigation, including SpaceX and Tesla. NLRB’s case systems contain data like union organizing activities, employee whistleblower identities, legal strategies and proprietary business information.
The whistleblower claims DOGE engineers used secretive and suspicious methods to pull sensitive information from the NLRB’s systems. They shut off security tools that track activity, deleted evidence of what they accessed and used software that made their work nearly invisible, Berulis alleged in filings.
A big spike in data leaving the agency followed, possibly through a technique that hides stolen data in normal-looking internet traffic, according to the disclosures. One engineer also appeared to be working on a tool designed to pull files from the agency’s internal case system. Security experts told NPR those tactics resemble the playbook of foreign hackers and not federal workers.
]]>The Trump administration plans to kill the free tax filing program operated by the Internal Revenue Service, the Associated Press reported today, citing two anonymous sources.
The IRS launched Direct File in a pilot for the 2024 tax filing season. It was available to taxpayers in 12 states last year and was available in 25 states this year. The program's website says the filing tool will be open until October 15 for people who obtained deadline extensions, but it hasn't been updated to account for the plan to end Direct File.
"The program had been in limbo since the start of the Trump administration as Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency have slashed their way through the federal government," the AP article said. "Musk posted in February on his social media site, X, that he had 'deleted' 18F, a government agency that worked on technology projects such as Direct File."
The Common Vulnerability and Exposures, or CVE, repository holds the answers to some of information security's most vital questions. Namely, which security issue are we talking about, exactly, and how does it work?
The 25-year-old CVE program, an essential part of global cybersecurity, is cited in nearly any discussion or response to a computer security issue, including Ars posts. CVE was at real risk of closure after its contract was set to expire on April 16. The nonprofit MITRE runs CVE and related programs (like Common Weakness Enumeration, or CWE) on a contract with the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS). A letter to CVE board members sent Tuesday by Yosry Barsoum, vice president of MITRE, gave notice of the potential halt to operations.
"If a break in service were to occur, we anticipate multiple impacts to CVE, including deterioration of national vulnerability databases and advisories, tool vendors, incident response operations, and all manner of critical infrastructure," Barsoum wrote.
Everyone looks to the stock market to figure out if we’re heading into a recession. Sure, it has some info—for example, the market right now would tell us we definitely are—but that’s not the only recession warning sign we should be on the lookout for. If you know where to train your eyes, you’ll realize recession indicators are all around us. For example, any of the following might be a red flashing light:
