Updated at 5:55 p.m. ET on August 31, 2024
Donald Trump’s appearance last night at Moms for Liberty’s annual gathering was intended as a classic campaign stop—a chance for the candidate to preen in front of a friendly audience.
And this audience certainly was friendly. At this week’s “Joyful Warriors” summit in Washington, D.C.

Alex Slitz / Getty
Sheetal Devi of Team India competes against Mariana Zuniga of Team Chile (not pictured) during the Women’s Individual Compound Open 1/8 Elimination Match 49 on day three of the Paris 2024 Summer Paralympic Games at Esplanade Des Invalides on August 31. Devi, now 17 years old, was born without arms. In 2021, she was encouraged by members of the Indian army to take up archery and soon won two gold medals at the 2022 Asian Para Games.

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With just over two months to go in the presidential election, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are campaigning for voters in crucial swing states.

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There’s a moment, toward the end of a parent’s trip to drop their child off at college, when it feels like the world is changing. Many describe the joy and loss that mingle in those five minutes walking back to the car.

This article was originally published by Undark Magazine.
About three years ago, Soumya Rangarajan struggled day after day with exhaustion, headaches, and heart palpitations. As a frontline hospital doctor during the coronavirus pandemic, she first attributed her symptoms to the demands of an unprecedented health-care crisis.
But a social-media post got Rangarajan thinking about the possibility that she might actually be the victim of something more mundane: an iron deficiency.

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Kamala Harris has now completed her first major television interview as the Democratic standard-bearer: perhaps the most feverishly anticipated, campaign-defining, existentially urgent interrogation ever conducted in the English language, or any language, in recent memory.

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Year three of AI college is about to begin, and instructors across the country still seem to have no clue how to handle the technology: no good way to stop students from using ChatGPT to write essays, and no clear way to instruct students on how AI might enhance their work.

Emilio Morenatti / AP
The Paralympic athlete Arjola Dedaj of Team Italy competes in the women’s long jump T11, at Stade de France, wearing a butterfly-shaped blindfold, during the 2024 Paralympics on August 30, 2024. The T11 class is for runners with near-total visual impairment, and all competitors wear full blindfolds. The long jumpers rely on guides to help them with audio cues as they approach the takeoff board.

While killing time recently, I was scrolling through my phone and learned that a childhood friend had gone out for pizza. Two guys from my high school are now roommates (nice to see they are still in touch!). And a friend of my brother’s had gotten tickets for a Cubs game.
I saw all of this on Venmo. The popular payment app is primarily a way for people to send one another money, maybe with an informative or amusing description. But it has also long had a peculiar social feature.

Donald Trump frequently warns that wind turbines are killing birds. Last night in Wisconsin, he raised a new and opposite concern: They’re leading to fewer hogs being killed.
At a town-hall event, a young man asked the former president about the cost of meat, and he replied with a meandering answer that somehow connected wind farms to a decrease in bacon consumption. As with a lot of Trump quotations, you have to read or watch it at full length to even attempt to follow it.