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For the most accurate total walk time, select all that apply.

You are wearing sensible shoes -1 min

You are wearing heels +6 min

You are wearing heels (but you are Sarah Jessica Parker) -5 min

You are over 5′10″ -1 min

You are under 5′2″ and staging a protest against your long-legged friends +5 min

You get a CNN alert that starts with: “White House hits Harvard with…” +2 min

You’re having a main-character moment while listening to Rihanna’s “Bitch Better Have My Money” -2 min

You’re having a main-character moment while listening to the Beatles’ “The Long and Winding Road” +2 min

You’re having an unpaid non-union background extra moment +0 min

You are taking a phone call from your mom, and she has juicy hometown gossip +5 min

You are taking a phone call from your mom, and she wants to know what a Labubu is and where to buy one -1 min

- by Aeon Video

Watch at Aeon

After fleeing war-torn Liberia, an outsider artist creates haunting portraits while seeking asylum in the Netherlands

- Directed by Tal Amiran

Watch on Psyche

The Trump administration is seeking deals with more and more nations to hold deportees — now with the blessing of the Supreme Court.

The post Trump’s Global Gulag Search Expands to 53 Nations appeared first on The Intercept.

It can be awkward at first, but there are specific methods you can use to spark an enjoyable chat with just about anyone

- by Michael Yeomans

Read on Psyche

Smoke and dust from fires could block the sun, but that’s not necessarily a good thing

The post The Weird Cooling Effect of Wildfires appeared first on Nautilus.

A simple test can peek into ivory to detect deception

The post An Elephant’s Tusk Never Forgets appeared first on Nautilus.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves is publicly exploring a rollback of Labour’s inheritance tax surcharge on non‑doms’ worldwide assets, just two months after its April introduction. The Chancellor is apparently concerned that the rules will lead to an exodus of wealthy individuals from the UK. This U-turn comes as the Prime Minister desperately tries to contain a […]

“Through calculated chaos and spectacle, Trump distracts the media and public from the dangerous consequences of his agenda.” — Andrew Mitrovica, Al Jazeera

Well, he finally did it. Controversial business magnate Lex Luthor has surrounded Earth with LexCorp satellites, targeting their lethal laser beams at every head of state in the world. Unless Superman reveals his secret identity by midnight, Luthor will assassinate presidents and prime ministers, one by one. The world watches the clock in fear, questioning whether Superman will save us, terrified of who will be first.

In the face of this threat to worldwide order, I am here to tell you this: Do not worry about it.

It is just a distraction. It is fine.

Consider the timing. Isn’t it all a little convenient that he just happened to hatch a dastardly plot one week after a nefarious scheme?

Though it failed to achieve deterrence, Iran scored a significant political and psychological victory against Israel in June. Iran’s greatest achievement in its 12 day war with Israel was in reviving the Spider Web theory Hasan Nasrallah introduced after Israel’s 2000 withdrawal from southern Lebanon. During his speech proclaiming victory over the Israeli occupiers, the late Hezbollah General Secretary argued that because of its colonial nature, Jewish Israeli society would fracture under sustained military pressure, forcing serious concessions from its […]

The post Iran vs. Israel: return of the ‘Spider Web’ theory first appeared on The Grayzone.

The post Iran vs. Israel: return of the ‘Spider Web’ theory appeared first on The Grayzone.

The Misery Factory gets a bad wrap, especially among Millennials and Gen Z, but I’m not sure it’s warranted. It starts with a misunderstanding of what we do. Our slogan, “Ambition Without Vision,” begins to explain the type of work we’re tackling day after day. The core of our mission can be summed up by our passion associated with the three D’s: Dehousing the elderly, Defunding the arts, and Denouncing the orphans (lazy freeloaders).

Without our hard work, the National Endowment for the Arts could balloon to obscene numbers—even up to a ten thousandth of the Pentagon’s budget. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, worried about how much free music education children could be receiving if I don’t do my due diligence. Luckily, I am very good at my job.

Bill Essayli once warned January 6 prosecutions would “criminalize political differences.” Now he’s throwing the book at anti-ICE protesters.

The post Trump Appointee Prosecuting LA Protesters Defended Jan. 6 Suspects appeared first on The Intercept.

Sometime in the late 1980s, I was talking with a friend on my landline (the only kind of telephone we had then). We were discussing logistics for an upcoming demonstration against the Reagan administration’s support for the Contras fighting the elected government of Nicaragua. We agreed that, when our call was done, I’d call another friend, “Mary,” to update her on the plans. I hung up. But before I could make the call, my phone rang. “Hi, this is Mary,” my friend said. “Mary! I was just about to call you.” “But you did call me,” she said. “No, I didn’t. My phone just rang, and you were on the other end.” It was pretty creepy, but that was how... Read more

Source: How Will Your Data Be Deployed appeared first on TomDispatch.com.

Before I blew out all seventy-two candles on my birthday cake this year, I made a wish. I wished for something that had been gnawing at my soul ever since I first received my AARP card.

It was finally time to launch my political career.

But a sobering thought struck me. Am I perhaps too young to be taken seriously as a Democratic congressperson? I worry that the powers that be might take one look at my salt-and-pepper hair, only slightly elevated blood pressure, and spry body with both its original hips, and laugh me right out of the Capitol.

Could I even relate to the older members of the party? What if they make a reference to some TV show or song from the late sixties, when I’m more familiar with pop culture of the mid-seventies?

What if I declare my candidacy, only for Steny Hoyer to tell me, “Come back when you’ve got at least another decade of accumulated wisdom—or a pacemaker.”