Last night, Saturday Night Live returned to one of its singular successes—the jolly, always-grinning Halloween character David S. Pumpkins (played by Tom Hanks) from a breakout sketch in 2016—and gave him the honor of a second appearance. His return felt rare. Outside of the “Weekend Update” desk, recurring characters have been scant over the show’s past few seasons.
Tomorrow, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in two cases that could end America’s experiment with affirmative action in higher education.
A version of this article was originally published in Undark Magazine.On a late April afternoon, the Ngor Health Center in Dakar, Senegal, is serene. Sunlight spills through architectural gaps in the ceiling and lush plants line cream-colored corridors. In a patient waiting area on the second floor, a staff member gently rolls a ball back and forth with a toddler.
Sixty-six million years after the end of the world, I click purchase
on an emergency go bag from Amazon. When it arrives, I’ll use my teeth
to tear open the plastic, unzip the pack stitched by girls who look like me
but for their N95s, half a judgment day away, no evacuation plan in sight.
Another episode of the present tense, and I can’t stop thinking
about the timeline where the asteroid misses, Earth ruled eternally
by the car-hearted and walnut-brained.
This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.Good morning, and welcome back to The Daily’s new Sunday culture edition, in which one Atlantic writer reveals what’s keeping them entertained.
Polls show voters care more about the economy than abortion. Democrats in the Rust Belt state argue the two can’t be separated.
The departure of Michelle McMurry-Heath comes just as the Biden administration is poised to begin implementing key drug pricing provisions and the balance of power could shift in Congress.
The November measure comes as health care advocates at the state level grapple with how to help residents with the rising costs of health care now that it appears Congress will be unable to pass any significant reforms to address the issue.
The head of the federal public health agency is isolating at home with mild symptoms.
If the plan fails, the agency risks repeating the mistakes it made during the pandemic.
Covid vaccines’ inclusion on the schedules don’t constitute mandates.
Housing investment, though, plunged at a 26 percent annual pace, hammered by surging mortgage rates.
According to an NBC News poll released Sunday, 70 percent of registered voters expressed interest in the upcoming election as a “9” or “10” on a 10-point scale.
The budget gap shrank by half in fiscal 2022 as spending on pandemic programs expired and tax revenues surged.
The U.K. political drama will have ripple effects in the U.S.
We speak with Florida voting rights activist Desmond Meade about how Republicans like Governor Ron DeSantis are attempting to scare formerly incarcerated people with felony convictions from voting. DeSantis launched an election police force to arrest people on trumped-up voter fraud charges.
With Republicans set to make major gains in the November midterms, we speak with reporter Ari Berman, who says Republican control of the Legislature in Wisconsin is a preview of the damage the party could do if empowered in Washington. Berman’s latest piece for Mother Jones is titled “How Wisconsin Became the GOP’s Laboratory for Dismantling Democracy.
Former President Barack Obama is in Georgia Friday to campaign for Democrats in the closely watched Senate and gubernatorial races. This comes as Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer was caught on a hot mic Thursday saying the race between Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and Trump-backed anti-abortion Republican nominee Herschel Walker is “going downhill,” and recent polls show Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams is trailing Republican Governor Brian Kemp.
Public health experts in the United States are warning of a possible “tripledemic” of respiratory illness this winter: an increase in COVID cases, an early flu season and a surge in cases of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Hospitals in some parts of the U.S. are already seeing a surge in cases of RSV, which usually causes mild, cold-like symptoms but can be very serious for infants.
The former president questioned the Wisconsin Republican’s relatability with voters during a Milwaukee rally on Saturday.
“When you convince people that politicians are rigging elections, drink babies’ blood … you will get violence,” warned GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger.
Nancy Pelosi’s statement comes one day after a man broke into her San Francisco home and beat her husband Paul Pelosi with a hammer.
On Friday night, Ukraine launched an attack on the Crimean port of Sevastopol. Russian sources have reported that this attack included at least nine UAVs (drones) and seven UMV (automated boats). Ukrainian sources have called these claims ridiculous. But however it was achieved, there are reports of damage to a number of Russian naval vessels, including the Frigate Admiral Makarov.
Democrats have a secret weapon this election: you. More than 13,000 Daily Kos community members have come out of the woodwork this election cycle to volunteer with Vote Forward, writing “please vote” letters to Democratic-leaning voters in battleground races.
Together, the Daily Kos community has adopted over 750,000 voters—a 50% increase from the last midterm elections in 2018—who could make all the difference in this election.
“There is no place in a functioning democracy for anyone to resort to the use of terror,” said the head of the local League of Conservation Voters.
Advocates and bipartisan lawmakers in both the U.S. House and U.S. Senate have long urged that the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Latino (along with the American Women’s History Museum) be built on or near the National Mall. While lawmakers noted this importance in their historic legislation creating these museums, it’s still up to a board of trustees.
The warning came the same day a man broke into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s home and attacked her husband.
These days, Republicans seem to think they can govern via talking points, but sometimes their well-rehearsed excuses for failing to pass urgently needed legislation violently collide with reality.
Such was the case on Thursday when Missouri Gov. Mike Parson visited St. Louis police headquarters to throw up his hands and assure his gormless gaggle of gun fetishists (i.e.
Starbucks and Amazon are experimenting with a joint venture: combined Starbucks/Amazon stores. And the workers at the second such store to open are seeking to unionize.
“We’re unionizing at this Starbucks because we are doing Amazon work for Starbucks pay and we’re not given the proper resources to manage a store of this type in such a high volume area,” a worker said in a statement.
Updated at 2:40 p.m. ET on October 29, 2022In March 2020, a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives posted a video message addressed to two Democratic political candidates that issued a threatening challenge if they passed laws he did not like. Standing in his Capitol Hill office, Ken Buck of Colorado’s Fourth District gestured toward a rifle mounted on the wall.“I have a message for Joe Biden and Beto O’Rourke.