Each had been terrible
enough to himself
already, to that truestself, inside, as only he
could know it, so it
seemed it shouldmatter less what ways
in particular they’d been
terrible to each other,or even that they’d been
terrible at all.

Most mothers have never glued lashes to their daughters’ eyelids for pageants. They’ve never, as the moms on Toddlers & Tiaras have, gotten their children’s legs spray-tanned. They haven’t stood in the audience, cuing their kids’ routines with kissy faces and arm sweeps, hollering, “Get it, girl!” and “Sparkle, baby!”But they may have let their kids sit too long in front of the TV, faces slackened and minds empty.

During my last year as director of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), I was in Oregon, giving a presentation to a roomful of mental-health advocates, mostly family members of young people with a serious mental illness. During my tenure as the “nation’s psychiatrist,” the nickname for my role, I oversaw more than $20 billion for mental-health research, and I was eager to share evidence of the agency’s scientific success.

Photographs by Jean-Marc Caimi and Valentina PiccinniAs the world anxiously watches Ukraine’s borders, where Russia has amassed as many as 130,000 troops, the question on the minds of many is what Vladimir Putin wants, and what he’s willing to do to get it. The answer has immediate implications for the United States, Europe, and the NATO military alliance, whose potential expansion in Ukraine and the broader post-Soviet space is regarded by Moscow as a threat.

Earlier this week I asked, “What should be done about medical misinformation, if anything? Why?” I noted that one faction wants to take action against it while another wants institutions to stay viewpoint-neutral and allow all perspectives to be aired.Carol argues that the stakes are high:
Medical misinformation is contributing to America’s growing death toll, now passing 900,000. It’s a matter of life and death.

Oh, how I envy Liz Truss her opportunity! Oh, how I regret her utter failure to make use of it! For those who have never heard of her, Truss is the lightweight British foreign secretary who went to Moscow this week to tell her Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, that his country should not invade Ukraine. This trip was not a success.