Chronic problems with the Secret Service have been investigated for years, but a recent report revealed that understaffing at the protective agency might be even worse than many people realize. The Aug. 29 report claims that the Secret Service is in dire need of more snipers and sharpshooters and that if staffing levels do not improve, the public figures guarded by the agency could be at risk.

What does this report say?
The watchdog report was released by the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General. It found that the Secret Service's "counter sniper team is not staffed to meet mission requirements" and that the agency's current number of snipers is 73% below the necessary level. 

This team is "composed of highly trained, precision marksmen who provide long-range observation and tactical support during the Secret Service's protective operations," such as the marksman who killed President Donald Trump's would-be assassin in 2024. But the failure to properly staff this sniper team "could limit the Secret Service's ability to properly protect our nation's most senior leaders, risking injury or assassination," said the report. 

The agency consistently relies on "overtime and personnel from other Homeland Security agencies in order to have sufficient staffing," said The Hill. Throughout 2024, when security was ramped up for the presidential election, snipers "worked nearly 60,000 hours of overtime." At least some had "not completed the latest testing requirements yet were still used for coverage for events."

What is the bigger picture?
This report adds to the ongoing criticism of the modern Secret Service. The agency itself "agreed with the inspector general's assessment of the counter sniper team," said ABC News. 

Snipers who missed the "mandatory weapons training supported 47 of the 426 events (11%) attended by protectees" in 2024, said ABC News. Despite the staffing challenges, the Secret Service told the auditors that it was "unrealistic to seek to add the number of snipers the agency requires given the onerous recruiting and onboarding process," said Government Executive. 

The agency's counter snipers "cannot be directly hired for that role but must first serve as an agent for two years," said The Hill. This requirement was recently shortened to 18 months, but that "delay, as well as the prohibition on hiring military snipers, limits the pool of potential candidates."

An unread novel plucked from the feminist canon, a Labubu dangling from a tote bag, and an oat milk matcha — these are just some of the identifying features of the so-called performative male, said Ellie Violet Bramley in The Guardian. Although "likened to the poser of the 1990s" who flaunted their cultural superiority, the performative male's "posturing" has a more specific goal: "woo women they hope will be attracted by their feminist theatrics." 

'Gender is inherently a performance' 
The opposite of a performative male, the macho "gym bro," is an equally theatrical gender presentation, said Kyndall Cunningham on Vox. And "is it so bad to be 'performative' when gender is inherently a performance"? Yet we are in a "perpetual cycle of glorifying and later questioning the integrity" of men who dabble in feminine or queer aesthetics. 

That said, men who feel most comfortable presenting themselves as sensitive or "feminine" are often those who already have a surfeit of "masculine capital" and conventional attractiveness. Think singer Harry Styles baring his abs under a pink sequin vest or actor Timothée Chalamet's penchant for jewelry. 

'I'll take the faker' 
Dating apps have fostered a pervasive climate of suspicion that puts men in an "impossible position," said politics lecturer Alexander Stoffel at The Conversation. "There's no such thing as an 'authentic male,'" and judging performances of masculinity as if "every man with a tote bag is a con artist" is just another way to reinforce traditional gender stereotypes. 

Between a man "begrudgingly scanning the greatest feminist works in history for the sake of pretending" or one who doesn't bother at all, "I'll take the faker every time," said Syeda Khaula Saad at HuffPost. Going against the hypermasculine status quo, even if it's partly a facade, is still a hopeful act of resistance. Critics of the performative male are really mocking women's perceived gullibility, and that's "insulting." The average woman is perfectly capable of discerning between a "red flag and a man with a library card."

Activists call for the release of Israeli hostages seized by Hamas in the Oct. 7 attacks in a message to Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu on the beach opposite the U.S. Embassy branch office in Tel Aviv. Today marks their 700th day of captivity.
Jack Guez / AFP / Getty Images

Plenty of cookbooks have taught home cooks how to make jam; others have included recipes for cooking or baking with jam. In 2021, master preserver and pastry chef Camilla Wynne published "Jam Bake: Inspired Recipes for Creating and Baking with Preserves," which might be the first book to do both and each with sticky, enviable aplomb.

A (jam) river runs through it
Wynne knows that we sometimes want a baking project and other days crave a simple bake. To that end, she categorizes the books' baked goods according to a difficulty scale from one to three whisks. 

On the effortless end sits coffee cake, its streusel crown hearty with ground hazelnuts and the cake itself laced with raspberry or blackberry jam. Swing the whisk pendulum, and you land on Black Forest Puffs. A project indeed, they are a head-spinning reconsideration of Mallomars. 

Your fruit is cooked
Wynne provides store-bought jam substitutes for all the baked goods. They are handy in a pinch, sure, but she's a precise teacher. An adventure in jam-making is advisable.

She walks through the microbiology of jams, allaying botulism concerns. She demonstrates myriad ways to test if a jam is done, comparing the sheeting test to a love story "wherein we are looking for the jam to fall in love with the spatula." 

And, oh, the flavor combinations! Raspberry and lambic beer; coffee, date and pear; cherry Negroni, rhubarb and Amarena cherry — your toast will curtsey in your direction.