It’s been a tough few years for Huntington Beach, politically speaking. The beach town — Surf City, USA — is one of the few conservative bastions left in California,...
Former state lawmaker Troy Jackson won the Democratic nomination for Maine's U.S. Senate seat on Saturday, capping nearly three weeks of political drama following the collapse of Graham Platner's campaign.
A bipartisan bill to require artificial intelligence companies to maintain the ability to shut down their models was introduced following an OpenAI system going rogue during testing.
Prediction market Kalshi on Friday threatened legal action against Netflix unless the streaming giant agrees to take down a trailer for an upcoming documentary about prediction markets. In a cease-and-desist letter sent to Netflix on Friday, Kalshi’s head of litigation, Jovalin Dedaj, alleged that the trailer contains “false and misleading statements.” On Thursday, Netflix released...
Pop singer Katy Perry on Saturday criticized the unauthorized use of her music in the background of a White House TikTok video showing strikes on Iranian targets. The White House used her viral song “Firework” in the background of a video showing a missile blowing up a naval ship in Iran. It has garnered over...
Is it possible to build a big enough political coalition to prevent the election of a socialist mayor in an overwhelmingly Democratic city? That’s the test ahead of New York City voters in November. Early indications are that the answer is yes, but it won’t be easy. Zohran Mamdani won the Democratic mayoral nomination by […]
The perpetually too-online Rep. Nancy Mace, who represents South Carolina’s 1st Congressional District, has announced that she is running for the governorship of the Palmetto State. “This isn’t about playing defense, this is about going on offense for you — for your family, for your freedom, and for your future. … I wasn’t built to […]
When commercial transactions require consumers to adopt political ideologies to conduct business, everyone suffers — consumers, vendors, shareholders, and businesses alike. Stakeholder capitalism has long cloaked itself in the language of enlightened governance, promising to harmonize profit with social virtue and stakeholder well-being. Yet, on both sides of the Atlantic, citizens have begun to push […]
Politics has always been a scrappy arena — a relentless power struggle between two major parties, where one side inevitably tries to outmaneuver the other. It’s messy, competitive, and often cutthroat. Yet, for much of American history, most political players managed to operate within the bounds of decency, adhering to a shared sense of civility […]
Eighty years ago this month, the United States dropped nuclear bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, ushering in the Atomic Age and forever changing the world. For decades, the use of nuclear weapons has been controversial. But America’s decision, fateful as it was, saved lives and ended World War II. On August […]
In-N-Out stands above all competitors not only because of its quality but also because of its positive association with the state it calls home (Sorry, Texas, Whataburger just doesn’t compare). But that relationship is slowly dwindling, and the “In-N-Out” name might soon describe the chain’s time in California. In-N-Out was founded in California in 1948, becoming a West Coast […]
PITTSBURGH — It should come as no surprise that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent declined to be the next Federal Reserve chairman. Spend any time listening to Bessent talk, and it is clear he is laser-focused on one thing, something he can only accomplish in his current job: lifting America’s economy into a position where both […]
There’s usually a fun element to fictionalizing history. Imagine a world where Dwight Eisenhower shot Adolf Hitler to end World War II in place of the führer’s bunker suicide, or John Wilkes Booth being stopped by a good Samaritan who saved Abraham Lincoln’s life and allowed the 16th president to deliver on his promise of […]
In a surprise move, CBS is sunsetting The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Colbert’s show debuted following the retirement of David Letterman, who hosted Late Night on the network from 1993 to 2015. Much has been made of the cancellation, and naturally, CBS is taking a lot of arrows from those claiming the move is […]
Gallup’s annual surveys on the moral acceptability of various issues have produced largely predictable results, with social conservatives remaining in the minority on most measures. The findings were generally unremarkable, except on the question of polygamy, which stands out as a growing point of divergence among younger respondents. It remains the case that a strong […]
A while back, I told you about Specialist Grundle, the annoying soldier who deployed with us to Farah Province, Afghanistan, in 2004. He was furious about not having been promoted and compensated by claiming superior soldier ability and quoting useless weapons statistics. I was disgracefully overweight when I began my tour, but the extreme desert […]
I emailed a young colleague a few days ago to ask about an upcoming project. We were supposed to have a meeting to discuss it this week, but I hadn’t received any confirmation. It’s a delicate email to write. On the one hand, I’d like to get the project going as soon as possible. On […]
On a visit to Budapest in the 1930s, an unimpressed H.L. Mencken remarked that the former imperial capital had the feeling of “an empty ballroom.” Having been shorn of half its territory after World War I, Budapest’s grandeur was an awkward fit for a country of 8 million people caught between the rising totalitarian powers […]
Charmed as his life might be (stable and remunerative employment at a daily city newspaper!), it’s easy to feel sorry for Superman. Having been around for now the better part of a century, the blue unitard-wearing hero’s name has become almost metonymic with an idealized, impossible conception of “goodness” (see: everything from the ponderous 2010 […]
