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

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Thursday
Dec092010

The Commentariat -- December 9

Reuters: "Another 17 U.S. billionaires, including Facebook co-founders Mark Zuckerberg and Dustin Moskovitz, have pledged to give away at least half their fortunes in a philanthropic campaign led by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates. A total of 57 billionaires now have joined The Giving Pledge, which was launched by Microsoft founder Gates and investor Buffett in June."

New York Times: " The Senate has turned down the attempt to move ahead with a defense bill that would repeal the ban on gay troops serving openly in the military. The vote was 57-40, three short of the 60 needed." Washington Post: "A Senate procedural vote to move forward with debate on a bill ending the military's 'don't ask, don't tell' law failed Thursday to earn the 60 votes necessary to proceed.... Senators fighting to end the ban said they would introduce a separate bill to end it. The bill will be cosponsored by Sens. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), and they said it will have bipartisan support." The Advocate story here. ...

... Ezra Klein: "The bill repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell didn't fail: The Senate did. The bill got 57 votes, not 49.... A procedural failsafe that's theoretically meant to protect the rights of minorities was just used to restrict the rights of minorities.... The diffusion of responsibility that comes from deciding law through complex parliamentary gamesmanship rather than simple majority-rules votes is the problem. What happened today is that a majority of the Senate voted for a bill that the majority of Americans support. The bill did not pass. Neither Harry Reid nor Susan Collins are ultimately responsible for that. The rules of the Senate are."

Ed Vogel of the Las Vegas Review-Journal: "Harry Reid won re-election because he got of a lot of Republican votes.

New York Times: "In a closed door caucus meeting on Thursday morning, House Democrats voted to reject the tax cut deal between the White House and Congressional Republicans 'as currently written.' The internal party vote is not necessarily binding on Speaker Nancy Pelosi ... as she decides whether to bring the measure to the floor.... With strong Republican support, the tax plan could easily pass the House with two-thirds or more of Democrats opposing it." Washington Post: "By voice vote, the rank-and-file Democrats passed a resolution that said the tax package should not come to the floor of the House for consideration." ...

     ... ** Reuters Update: "... Speaker Nancy Pelosi will not bring President Barack Obama's current proposed tax plan up for a vote in her chamber, an aide said on Thursday." ...

... David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "... many Congressional Democrats are furious both about the prospect of continuing the Bush-era tax cuts, even on the highest incomes, and about the way they were cut out of the negotiations. House Democrats on Thursday voted to block the bill from getting a vote unless changes were made. One change that Democrats are seeking is the extension of a Treasury grant program for renewable energy projects.... Supporters say the program has generated big growth in American clean energy industries. The program is set to expire on Dec. 31."

Setting Social Security up for a Fall. Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: "President Obama’s Treasury secretary and budget director met at the White House with members of his bipartisan debt-reduction commission Thursday morning and agreed that the administration should lead an effort in the coming year to press for the sort of long-term spending cuts and revenue increases that a commission majority recommended last week. Participants said the discussion centered on the need for a deficit-cutting agreement before mid-2011...."

Paul Krugman: because the good stuff in Obama's tax deal runs out in December 2011 & the Republican stuff runs to December 2012, "the tax cut deal makes Obama less likely to win in 2012.... Obama may be buying off the hostage-takers by … giving them more hostages." ...

... Dana Milbank: Congressional Democrats' rebellions against Obama's tax deal lasted about 24 hours. ...

... E. J. Dionne of the Washington Post: President Obama doesn't care about liberal people. ...

Republicans really did use the unemployed as hostages. It's disgusting. -- Chris Hayes, trans. by Steve Benen from the original Twitterese

We're talking about a party that is literally refusing to do anything other than fight tooth and nail to protect unpopular tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires, at the expense of middle-class families. -- Steve Benen, in his own words

CW: Bob Williams of TaxVox explains how the Obama-GOP deal is a huge boon for the rich but raises taxes on the working poor. "The agreement turns on its head [President Obama']s repeated argument that we need to give more to the poor and ask more of the wealthy. No wonder Democrats in Congress are mad." ...

... Austan Goolsbee on the Obama tax-cut deal. Funny, he doesn't mention raising taxes on the working poor:

Carol Lee & John Bresnahan of Politico: "With Capitol Hill increasingly hostile territory for President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden seems ready to take the place of the departed Rahm Emanuel as the one senior administration official who can deliver the White House’s position — good news or bad — to members and senators of both parties."

Brian Beutler of TPM: Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) holds DADT repeal hostage over stupid conditions. ...

... David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post: Harry Reid is bringing four test votes to the floor to demonstrate Republican obstruction of popular programs: "[1] A bill that would send $250 checks to Social Security recipients.... The Senate voted 53 to 45 - seven short of the needed 60 votes - on a measure to bring the bill to the floor for debate. [2] A bill that would require states to give police and firefighters' unions 'adequate' collective bargaining rights.... That proposal failed ... on a 55 to 43 vote. [3] The DREAM Act, a proposal that would provide a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants who came to this country as children and grew up to attend college or serve in the military.... [Thursday vote] [4] A bill that would provide long-term medical care for" 9/11 responders. Thursday vote.

Your Tax Dollars Wasted. Eric Lipton of the New York Times: for-profit colleges (i.e., fake on-line "universities") are raking in federal dollars under the post-9/11 GI Bill. "Some members [of Congress] say they want to place tighter limits on how much these colleges can collect in military benefits, a move certain federal officials say they would welcome.... The Department of Education [is] proposing regulations that would cut off federal aid to colleges whose graduates have extremely low loan repayment rates. Amid this debate, the industry’s powerful lobbying forces are pushing for even more...."

Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: "The Supreme Court sounded conflicted Wednesday about whether Arizona's attempt to revoke the licenses of businesses that knowingly employ illegal immigrants intrudes on federal law or complements it. The case pits Arizona against an unusual coalition of challengers that includes the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, civil rights groups, labor unions and the Obama administration. But that high-powered group faced a barrage of skeptical questions from the court's conservatives." ...

... Dahlia Lithwick has more.

Mideast Peace Process, Illustrated:

Ashlee Vance & Miguel Helft of the New York Times: "On Wednesday, anonymous hackers took aim at companies perceived to have harmed WikiLeaks.... MasterCard, Visa and PayPal, which had cut off people’s ability to donate money to WikiLeaks, were hit by attacks that tried to block access to the companies’ Web sites and services. To organize their efforts, the hackers have turned to sites like Facebook and Twitter. That has drawn these Web giants into the fray and created a precarious situation for them. ...

... Glenn Greenwald debates WikiLeaks critic-twins John Burns of the New York Times & Jamie Rubin, formerly of the State Department. Print & audio. ...

... The Letterman Files -- "David Letterman: Agent of Influence." Robert Booth of the Guardian: "Satellite broadcasts of the US TV shows Desperate Housewives and Late Show With David Letterman are doing more to persuade Saudi youth to reject violent jihad than hundreds of millions of dollars of US government propaganda, informants have told the American embassy in Jeddah. Broadcast ... on Saudi Arabia's MBC 4 channel, the shows are being allowed as part of the kingdom's 'war of ideas' against extremist elements." ...

... The New York Times' complete coverage of the latest WikiLeaks dumps is here. ...

... Jon Stewart struggles to characterize Julian Assange:

... Guardian: "Russia has suggested that Julian Assange should be awarded the Nobel peace prize, in an unexpected show of support from Moscow for the jailed WikiLeaks founder."

Justin Elliot of Salon: "Money-hungry" Newt uses Christmas, Pearl Harbor disaster, run for presidency -- whatever-- to hawk his wares. As an example, "In the past few days, Gingrich has been using his Twitter account to promote what he calls 'Gingrich Productions 12 Days of Xmas Presents.'"

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