Robots have been useful aides to people on television since Lost in Space and The Jetsons. Now comes Sunny, an unwanted consolation gift presented to an American living in Kyoto when her Japanese husband and their son disappear in a plane crash. Rashida Jones stars in this excellent new comedy thriller series, playing an outsider whose husband apparently developed the annoyingly cheerful robot in secret. But now Sunny may be the best sidekick she can have if she's going to uncover the true fate of her loved ones. Wednesday, July 10, Apple TV+.

by Ruchir Sharma

"We are wandering in fog. And the precipice is closer than we think," said Bret Stephens in The New York Times. In Ruchir Sharma's "eye-opening" new book, the fund manager and Financial Times columnist makes "a convincing case" that the reason so many young Americans feel that capitalism is broken or rigged against them is that for most of the past half century, both of the country's political parties have been committed to easy money, expanding government spending during both downturns and recoveries. While the strategy sounds as if it would be good for regular folks, Sharma argues that government interventions have instead overwhelmingly benefited the wealthy, made housing unaffordable for the young, and created a stagnant economy that's ruled by its very richest corporations. Don't be distracted by today's high borrowing rates: They're only the medicine we've been forced to take after easy money "destroyed much of what used to make capitalism an engine of middle-class prosperity." 

One way to read Sharma is that contemporary capitalism's primary problem is that Western leaders have become "pathologically obsessed with mitigating risk," said Barton Swaim in The Wall Street Journal. "In the mid-1970s, the Federal Reserve began flooding the U.S. economy with money to ward off any hint of downturn, and Congress and regulators adopted the attitude that any big company looking wobbly had to be rescued." The bailout culture has only grown since, allowing large corporations to pour money into lobbying and other self-preservation tactics. Many people would argue that the ailments capitalism is suffering are the result of the neo-liberal policies that have been championed since the Reagan era, said Fareed Zakaria in CNN.com. Sharma's "terrific" book points out that Reagan increased government spending as a share of GDP, and that the only decline since occurred during the Clinton administration. 

Neither major party comes off well in Sharma's "invigorating" account, said George Will in The Washington Post. Presidents Kennedy and Johnson launched the easy money era by using tax cuts and a spending stimulus to goose an existing boom. Following 1987's Black Monday, Reagan appointee Alan Greenspan declared the Fed a ready source of liquid capital, clearing the way for four more decades of the same. And no one should expect 2024's Trump-Biden showdown to offer a way out of our addiction to a policy that's enriching the rich and strangling our economy. "Both would continue a bipartisan consensus that for decades has grown broader, deeper, and more culturally debilitating."

The legendary center fielder who electrified fans

"If there was a guy born to play baseball," said legendary fielder Ted Williams, "it was Willie Mays." In his 22 major-league seasons, most spent with the New York and then San Francisco Giants, Mays thrilled fans with his grace, speed, and dazzling skill in every aspect of the game: hitting, baserunning, fielding, and throwing out runners with his howitzer arm. Signed in 1951 from the Negro Leagues, the center fielder racked up 3,293 hits, hit 660 home runs, made 24 All-Star Games, and won 12 Gold Glove awards. Many players, fans, and sportswriters consider him the game's greatest player. Adding to his legend was the landmark play called The Catch — a seemingly miraculous over-the-shoulder snag he made while running with his back to home in the 1954 World Series. In addition to his staggering talent, Mays was beloved for his exuberance and showmanship: making waist-level "basket catches," wearing a small cap that flew off as he sped around the bases. "You have to entertain people," he said in 2006. "That's what I wanted to do all the time." 

Mays was born in Westfield, Ala., said The New York Times. His mother had been a "standout high school athlete," while his steelworker father played semipro baseball. Mays excelled in high school sports, and at 17 joined a Negro League team, the Birmingham Black Barons. He was soon spotted by a New York Giants scout, who told his bosses to "grab this kid." Signed at 19 for $4,000, Mays was sent north to play for the Triple-A Trenton Giants. There he heard "some of the racial taunts" hurled at Jackie Robinson, who'd broken baseball's color barrier three years earlier, said the San Francisco Chronicle. After hitting .477 in his second minor-league season, he was called up to New York. 

"He wasted no time in capturing accolades," said CNN.com. Mays was named Rookie of the Year, and helped the Giants reach the 1951 World Series. Drafted by the Army, he played two years on a military team during the Korean War, returning in 1954. It proved a banner year, said the Associated Press. Belting 41 homers, he led the Giants to the World Series against the Cleveland Indians, with "The Catch" — and his ensuing, preternatural throw all the way to second base from the center-field wall in the cavernous Polo Grounds — helping to decide Game 1 and sparking a four-game Giants sweep. Seen by millions through "the then-emerging medium of television," The Catch made Mays "one of the first Black athletes with mass media appeal." 

Beloved in New York — where he was dubbed the "Say Hey Kid" for his habit of addressing people with "hey" — Mays got a "wary reception" when the Giants moved to San Francisco in 1957, said The Washington Post. After he and his wife bought a home in a white neighborhood, a bottle with a hate message was thrown through a window. Mays "bore such indignities quietly," pushing back against those who criticized him "for not lending his voice and celebrity" to the fight for racial justice. "I can't stand on a soapbox and preach," he said. "It isn't my nature." 

Mays was traded to the New York Mets at age 41, said the San Jose Mercury News, and had two undistinguished seasons there. When the onetime model of grace belly flopped while running for a fly ball in the 1973 World Series, he became "a cautionary tale for athletes who play beyond their expiration date." Remaining "boyish into his 80s," he "became a fixture" at the Giants' Oracle Park, where "a statue depicting his powerful swing" greeted fans. In 2015, Barack Obama gave him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Through it all, Mays often spoke of his enduring love for the sport he shaped. "I just felt baseball was a beautiful game," he said. "I just wanted to play it forever, you know?"