Kevin Drum 🕸

With literally only a few minutes of work, I recently booked (a) high-speed phone data for a month outside the US, (b) travel insurance, (c) a car to LAX, (d) a flight to Prague via Helsinki, (e) an Uber to the hotel, (f) a cruise down the Danube, (g) a hotel in Vienna, (h) transit ...continue reading "The wonders of modern travel"

As you read this, Marian and I are over the Atlantic Ocean on the way home. It's goodbye to Austria. This is a gelateria store at Schwedenplatz on Sunday night. It's crowded because it was Pentecost and everyone had Monday off. It also happened to be the night I worked up the energy to haul ...continue reading "Lunchtime Photo"

Bob Somerby summarizes the hush money case against Donald Trump this way: To convict Donald Trump of a felony, the jury must find that he falsified business records (or directed that they be falsified) with “the intent to commit another crime.” But what is that "other crime"? Bob is unhappy that our press corps remains ...continue reading "What is Donald Trump’s “other crime”?"

Behold the latest deep dive from Axios about Joe Biden's economic troubles: Credit where it's due: the numbers are correct. But come on. Is it really plausible that Biden's big problem is that fast food prices are up 3.8% compared to wages? Biden has three problems, ranked from biggest to smallest: Fox News etc. have ...continue reading "Biden’s good news problem"

From the Washington Post: Long before Key Bridge collapse, Baltimore mariners warned of ‘ship strikes’ I wish news outlets would quit with this stuff. Every time a disaster of some kind takes place they manage to dredge up someone who warned about it. You know why? Because someone, somewhere has warned about every conceivable disaster ...continue reading "But there were warnings!"

More avian flu news: Bird flu H5N1 confirmed to infect another person • We have no idea how widespread human infections • We're barely looking • Its playing w fire - we should be doing everything absolutely possible to stop H5N1 from evolving to human-human transmissionhttps://t.co/exXbnZ4wSC — Michael Mina (@michaelmina_lab) May 22, 2024 I remain ...continue reading "Another person has tested positive for bird flu"

Alex Tabarrok links today to an old article by Robert Kuttner about a cure for the common cold: Now unfolding is the next pharma outrage. I’ve written about a miracle cold and cough medication called ambroxol. It is far superior to junk like Mucinex and Robitussin.... Ambroxol, which is highly effective, has been available in ...continue reading "Ambroxol is not a miracle drug"

Today is the 300th anniversary of the last time a total eclipse passed over Los Angeles, on May 22, 1724. There won't be another one for at least another thousand years, making a total drought of more than 1,300 years. That's a very long time to go without a total eclipse.

This is the Vienna city hall seen through a bloom of roses from the Volksgarten across the street. It's rose season right now and the Volksgarten is jammed with tiered rose bushes, most of them in memoriam of someone or another. Apparently that's a Viennese tradition.

Today the Washington Post writes: Having a decades-long marriage in Hollywood is rare, but.... I've heard this a million times, but always in the context of someone who has miraculously broken the mold. So is it even true that "Hollywood marriages" are unusually short? It turns out that it's hard to say. According to researcher ...continue reading "How long do Hollywood marriages last?"

In case you haven't gotten enough of Trump and his inexplicable desire to hold on to classified documents, today brings yet more news: Buried in the supporting documentation for one of the motions was a document that contained a new public revelation: Once Trump realized that security cameras at Mar-a-Lago could capture his employees moving ...continue reading "Trump tried to move classified docs away from security cameras"

The Guardian reports in a new poll that most Americans think the economy is in recession: This is insane. Even half of Democrats believe this nonsense. And it's not as if it's a close call, with the economy sort of flattish but technically not in recession. In fact, the economy is running so hot that ...continue reading "The economy is still running hot, hot, hot"

The New York Times reports today on the algebra wars, which arise from the fact that lots of Black kids are behind white kids in math skills: To close those gaps, New York City’s previous mayor, Bill de Blasio, adopted a goal embraced by many districts elsewhere. Every middle school would offer algebra, and principals ...continue reading "The algebra wars are pure insanity"

Here's some unexpected news. In late 2022 Twitter added a feature called Community Notes, which allows readers to add short remarks to posts they believe are either wrong or lack important context. If the note gets enough upvotes, it's attached to the tweet permanently. A team of researchers was curious about how well this worked ...continue reading "Twitter’s community notes work pretty well"

As you all know, Donald Trump took reams of classified documents with him when he left the White House and then repeatedly refused to turn them over when asked. Eventually the FBI searched his home and carted away boxes of stuff. But guess what? Even after that, Trump still managed to hold on to several ...continue reading "Even yet still more classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago"

These are the arches that hold up the flying buttresses at the Regensburg cathedral. It's about 700 years old.

Last week the US Trade Representative published a 4-year review of the tariffs levied on China by Donald Trump and continued by Joe Biden. There are a few things of note. First of all, imports from China that were subject to tariffs did indeed fall: As you can see, import of products from China that ...continue reading "So how are the China tariffs coming along?"

Donald Trump will not be testifying at his trial. That makes me sad.

A recent study has taken a broad look at the effect of internet use on personal well-being. It finds that, generally, both internet access and use make people happier and better off on a wide variety of social metrics. My first thought was, "Duh, richer people have better internet access and richer people are also ...continue reading "New study says internet access improves everything for (almost) everybody"

As you know, after 9/11 airlines were required to install hardened cockpit doors. But what if the door is open so the flight crew can get dinner or take a pee? Terrorists could then storm the cockpit. The answer is a secondary barrier, and now, two decades later, new legislation finally requires this. Better late ...continue reading "Should illegal immigrants be allowed to fly on airplanes?"