Waterbury, Vt.

Vista House, an award-winning modern 2019 four-bedroom, is wrapped in floor-to-ceiling double-paned, argon-filled windows looking out on the Green Mountains. The chef’s kitchen includes a glass-walled breakfast nook, while the walk-out lower level has three suites, a kitchenette, a media room, and a living area.

Also on the wooded 12-acre property are a terrace, a cantilevered deck, and a screened porch, and ski areas and downtown are nearby. $3,400,000. Meg Kauffman, LandVest Christie’s International Real Estate, (802) 318-6034

Phoenix

About 10 minutes from Scottsdale’s Old Town, this 2018 modern five-bedroom on Camelback Mountain has a butterfly roofline resting on a glass-and-steel facade. The home has exposed beams and concrete walls, stone floors, and a kitchen with two eat-in islands.

The 1-plus-acre lot includes a stone-wrapped pool, a firepit with built-in concrete seating, an outdoor kitchen, and decking with city and desert views. $8,499,000. Michel Edery, Russ Lyon Sotheby’s International Realty, (480) 747-4795

Los Angeles

Designed by Craig Ellwood and James Tyler, the 1956 Kuderna House exemplifies California mid-century modern in all-glass, steel-framed form. In a gated Hollywood Hills community, the boxy twobedroom main house includes hand-poured terrazzo floors, walnut-clad walls, and an exposed brick fireplace.

The double lot includes flat yards, a patio, an infinity lap pool, and a one-bedroom guesthouse accessed by a canary-yellow spiral staircase. $4,995,000. Elizabeth Donovan, Coldwell Banker Realty, (213) 948-7983

New York City

This renovated 1910 four-story brownstone in South Harlem has an entirely glass back wall facing a private garden with a lawn, and alfresco dining areas. The modern four-bedroom has high ceilings, a steel-and-oak staircase, and an eat-in Gaggenau kitchen, plus a library, bar, den, and second-floor terrace.

The home is walkable to Morningside Park, and near dining and cultural venues such as the Apollo Theater and the Studio Museum. $4,000,000. Jed Lewin, The Agency, (917) 609-0466

Biltmore Forest, N.C

Originally designed by Bert King, this 1964 glass-and-stone, mid-century modern four-bedroom with glass walls and skylights is about 15 minutes from Asheville. With large volumes of open space, the main area has wood floors and wood-clad ceilings, a floor-to-ceiling stone fireplace, a clean-lined kitchen with open shelving, and floating stairs down to a walk-out lower level.

Several balconies and patios overlook the nearly 1.5-acre, wooded lot. $3,450,000. Brent Russell, Howard Hanna Beverly-Hanks Asheville-Downtown/ Luxury Portfolio International, (828) 528-1829

Denver

In Riverfront Park’s 2005 Glass House building, this one-bedroom condo has floor-to-ceiling windows that frame city, park, and mountain views. The updated apartment includes exposed concrete ceilings and posts, a sleek kitchen with marble subway tile, and a glass door to a balcony.

Among the shared amenities are a pool, grills, a theater, a club room, and a gym. Bike paths, green space, and pedestrian bridges to shops, dining, and venues are steps away. $559,000. Lindsay McBride, LIV Sotheby’s International Realty, (303) 618-3622

Bonds have gotten “a bad rap,” said Oyin Adedoyin and Miriam Gottfried in The Wall Street Journal. When the Federal Reserve quickly cranked up interest rates to counter inflation in 2022, both the stock market and the bond market “fell in tandem, burning investors conditioned to think of bonds as their portfolio’s primary line of defense.” Both markets rose over the following three years, fueling concern that bonds are no longer the hedge against risky equities that they used to be. Fear not. This year, “bonds are doing what they are supposed to be doing”— moving inversely to equities. The S&P 500 is on pace to post double-digit returns for the fourth year in a row, and a bond selloff has dropped prices dramatically. It has “dragged on returns for people who already own them,” but pushed up fixed-income yields to enticing levels for those on the sidelines. It has also helped revive “the classic 60-40 portfolio,” where a diversified mix of 60% stocks and 40% bonds “cushions volatility.”

“How quaint,” said Michael Santoli in CNBC.com. Suddenly, it doesn’t look so bad to be “prudent” as money flows into bond funds again. The present S&P 500 dividend yield of under 1.4% represents “a modern low,” at a time when “high-grade corporate debt yields 6% with low default risk.” This presents “the best opportunity for buying bonds in decades.” The stage is now set “for another quarterly rebalancing shift in favor” of fixed income. “We don’t know” how “the macro and policy paths will inform market prices.” Consider diversification “an offering of humility before the market gods.”

“It’s good to be a saver again,” said Allison Schrager in Bloomberg, but “saving isn’t quite as safe as it used to be.” I agree that, “with higher yields, the 60-40 is back”—or deserves reconsideration as an investment paradigm. Just know, however, there’s still “no free lunch in finance.” If inflation continues to rise, it “means more uncertainty about real bond returns.” All the increased government debt could also send panic through the bond markets at any given moment. So “safety pays now, but only because it has become less safe.”

Both stocks and bonds are “less effective diversifiers than many investors realize,” said Mamadou-Abou Sarr in Kiplinger. If you own an S&P 500 index fund, you probably think you’re diversified in equities. Not so. In reality, “a small group of stocks has an outsize influence on your returns.” On the flip side, investors should “no longer assume” the 40% bond allocation provides the same level of resilience it once did. It may be time to “consider investing in real assets,” like commodities, infrastructure, and real estate investment funds. Successful investing “isn’t just about choosing the right eggs—it’s about choosing the right baskets.”

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Terrence Holt is a physician, former literature professor, and the author of an acclaimed story collection, In the Valley of the Kings. His first novel, Soldiers & Sailors, follows a doctor who is transformed when he begins working at a veterans home.

‘The Mennyms’ series by Sylvia Waugh (1993–96)

Waugh wrote this series because “the world is too cynical, too lacking in magic.” Marketed as children’s fiction and anything but, the books offer a deep and serious consideration of what it means to be alive. I don’t think I’ve ever been so profoundly moved by any series fiction. Buy it here.

‘The Complete Morgaine’ by C.J. Cherryh (2015)

Morgaine displays all of Cherryh’s extraordinary gifts: powerful writing, propulsive plotting, complex human (and alien) characters in fully elaborated worlds tantalizingly similar to our own. Were she not a genre writer, she’d be on her way to Stockholm to pick up her Nobel. Buy it here.

‘Selected Stories of Anton Chekhov’ translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (2000)

A doctor and a writer of deceptively simple, risk-taking short stories (who else could get away with “A Boring Story”?), Chekhov has been the godfather of most of the short fiction written in English in the past century. Buy it here.

‘The Heart Sutra’

One of the foundational texts of Buddhism. I can’t claim to understand half of its few hundred words, but any sacred text (or is it a philosophical tract?) that states “Form is emptiness, emptiness is form,” is something every writer should know by heart. Buy it here.

‘The Odyssey’ by Homer, translated by Richmond Lattimore (1965)

Homer’s adventure story has been my favorite work of fiction since I first learned to read. This lucid translation makes no apologies for preserving Homer’s (to us) nonidiomatic constructions. Reading it, I feel as if I’m in touch with a mind that, after 2,500 years, still leaves such clear traces of its utterly alien world and its immediately familiar humanity. Buy it here.

‘The Book of Job’ (King James translation, 1611)

I’m not remotely religious, but I return to the Hebrew Bible almost as often as I do The Odyssey. The tale of Job’s suffering, in a world determined by an inscrutable power, tackles the most important thing I know about being human, in words so beautiful they give me chills. And in the King James translation, I feel like I’m at the springhead of modern English. Buy it here.

‘The Sea Has No Mercy’ by Bernie Taupin

★★★

Growing up in England, Bernie Taupin was obsessed with American “cowboy lore and stories, and with country ballads,” said Barry Mazor in The Wall Street Journal. Now 76, the longtime Elton John lyricist has refined that love of Americana into a “quite personal collection of songs.” The Sea Has No Mercy is his first solo album in 40 years, with all the songs written by him alone. The title track has a “deceptively sweet melody” tempered by his “voicecracking rasp.” Billy the Kid, Neil Armstrong, and George Jones haunt the “dirge-like” standout “Ghosts of Greater Men,” as Taupin ponders the prospect of meeting these legends in the afterlife.

Ever since he anointed himself the Brown Dirt Cowboy to John’s Captain Fantastic back in 1975, Taupin has often allowed himself to be distracted by “Western shtick,” said John Aizlewood in Mojo. These songs are more distinctive. They transcend genre, even if they’re steeped in American roots music. “Come on California” is a “rueful” waltz featuring Brandi Carlile on backing vocals, while Taupin’s “grizzled, Tom Waitsian” growl on “Joker” suggests “the old dog is up for new tricks.”

‘Dopamine Chamber’ by Fontaines D.C.

★★★

This is “a rock album with the heart of a dystopian sci-fi epic,” said Jon Dolan in Rolling Stone. The fifth album from Dublin-based rockers Fontaines D.C. “has a similar world-building spirit” to its Grammy-nominated 2024 predecessor, Romance, but pushes “deeper into electronic moodiness and orchestral sweep.” The band’s sonic palette and songwriting show impressive growth here, but their lyrics have grown much darker. They imagine “doom on all sides” from impending AI extermination and transhumanist tech oligarchs bent on living forever. Yet there is hope in songs like “One Man,” which constructs “a dream-pop cathedral,” and “Where Is Gone?,” a duet featuring Rosalía that goes down like a smooth 1960s mood piece from Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood.

“Sometimes great, sometimes scattershot,” Dopamine Chamber “isn’t nearly as revolutionary as Romance,” said Grant Sharples in Paste. Yet Fontaines D.C. retains its “knack for searing anthems.” The album lives up to its title with “outsize, immediate rock songs” like “Happy for You” and “Demolition,” refreshing jolts to pierce the pervading gloom.

‘Fudge’ by Michael Kiwanuka

★★★

Michael Kiwanuka’s “beautiful but willfully understated” fourth album, 2024’s Small Changes, turns out to have a sister album, said Alexis Petridis in The Guardian. Fudge was recorded at the same time, its songs not exactly written but “jammed into existence” by Kiwanuka and his live band. It wasn’t released until now because the singer-songwriter, 39, suffered a stroke that limited his ability to speak, let alone sing; he’s still recovering in a residential facility. That lack of extra polishing time leaves Fudge rough around the edges—“Across the Sky,” an acoustic number, “starts abruptly in the middle of a chord, as if someone frantically hit the record button after Kiwanuka started playing”—but it feels “vivid and alive,” with the vibrancy of “warm and unforced” performances.

This is “a sun-soaked daydream of an album, awash in afternoon light,” said Melanie McFarland in Salon. It’s easy “to get lost in its layers of strings, to chase a cello’s lusty glide past innocent piano notes.” Kiwanuka is always at his best live. But as we wait to hear how he recovers, and if he will ever tour again, Fudge lends itself to many repeat listens.

‘The American Way of Killing’ by Malcolm Gladwell

Malcolm Gladwell’s breezy, analytical style “may appear to work when addressing a subject that readers have never really thought about,” said Gary Younge in The Guardian. “But it breaks down with one that has been covered extensively”—like gun violence in America, the subject of his newest best seller. No one has been able to adequately diagnose why the U.S. has the highest rate of gun violence in the Western world. And the British-Canadian author of The Tipping Point and Blink hasn’t either, despite taking a different tack. Instead of laying out a single argument, as he’s done in other books, here he offers “a series of discrete, and at times related, observations.” Invoking the tale of the blind men who each focus on just the trunk or just the tusk, he says he hopes these observations will together give us a “sense of the whole elephant.” Yet the approach “somehow misses several elephants in the room.”

“The American Way of Killing may not change minds, but it may loosen them considerably,” said Terri Schlichenmeyer in The Philadelphia Tribune. Staying “calm, considerate, and balanced,” Gladwell argues that our debates about gun violence teem with misunderstandings and misrepresentations. He correctly points out, said Jessa Crispin in The Telegraph (U.K.), that of the roughly 45,000 gun deaths a year, the majority are impulsive or accidental, not the planned mass shootings that make the headlines. Gladwell doesn’t think banning assault-style rifles will change much—they account for a small slice of shootings—but don’t mistake him for a gun rights advocate. He handily argues that the Second Amendment specifically pertains to protecting plantation owners against slave rebellions, not everyone’s right to bear arms. Still, Gladwell is notorious for getting facts wrong, and it’s impossible to read him “without anticipating the long list of corrections that will soon follow.”

I was “genuinely fascinated” by some of Gladwell’s points, said Ron Charles in his Substack newsletter. He explains that American doctors have more experience treating gun wounds than doctors anywhere else in the world, which superficially makes our nation seem less deadly than it is. But I sighed when he accused gun control advocates of engaging in “gun control theater,” one of many examples of “glib overconfidence” that “has the weird effect of making me object even when I agree with him.” And his book “doesn’t ultimately get us much closer to understanding” why we tolerate mass carnage, year after year. “Gladwell behaves as though the answer lies in our failure to see something he can reveal to us with a flourish.” Sadly, “I’m afraid the answers lie in a knot of political, cultural, and financial pathologies strangling this country.”

‘Sleeping Beauties: Why Good Ideas Go Dormant and How They Wake Up’ by David Byrne

David Byrne’s ode to rediscovery “belongs on the bookshelf of anyone who cares about creativity or culture,” said Adam Grant in The New York Times. Drawing on his reading of esoteric academic journals, the former Talking Heads frontman has written a “deeply researched, stimulating” account of so-called sleeping beauties: ideas, artworks, and technologies that were ignored, laughed at, or forgotten before ultimately being embraced. His “clear-eyed, hopeful” analysis is a reminder that geniuses “are often overlooked because they emerge ahead of their time” and that— even centuries later—it is “never too late for our work to find an audience.”

Byrne has assembled three-dozen case studies, and “some are better-known than others,” said Sukhdev Sandhu in The Guardian. They include Antoni Gaudí— the now celebrated architect of Barcelona’s towering Sagrada Família—who fell so far from favor that, when he died in 1926 after being hit by a tram, he was mistaken for a beggar. Then there’s 17th-century Dutch master Vermeer. He was largely forgotten until the mid-1800s, when a French critic saw one of his paintings in a museum and published a catalog. But the book’s “most revelatory chapters eschew art for environmental and infrastructural stories.” In one standout, Byrne recounts how southern India’s medieval Chola dynasty financed “a complex network of pools, wells, and tanks” to channel monsoon overflows. Lost for centuries, those waterways have been revived through the work of “dogged” local activists.

“These stories of vindication are inherently compelling,” said Timothy Farrington in The Wall Street Journal. But a larger lesson never coheres, because Byrne sorts his micro-narratives into six “fairly arbitrary” categories that provide little practical guidance in spotting future sleeping beauties. And it’s “disappointing that Byrne writes so little about his own experience as a reanimator”: In 1988, he founded a record label, Luaka Bop, to introduce American audiences to lesser-known classics of world pop and psychedelia. Some of that specificity would have been welcome. Instead, the reader walks away with some “sturdy generalities,” and the lesson that the past “isn’t necessarily worse.”

‘Wicker’

Directed by Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson (R)

★★★

A lonely woman receives a magical husband.

Wicker “is not your mother’s olden-times cinematic fable,” said Ryan Lattanzio in IndieWire. Instead, viewers are treated to “a kooky, sex-crazed folk tale” about a fisherwoman in a vaguely medieval village, played by Olivia Colman, whose lifelong loneliness is cured when a basket maker weaves her a sentient wicker husband. Alexander Skarsgard is the soft-spoken, doting, and frisky wooden spouse, and “you emerge from Wicker with the sense that no other actor could have played this creature.” Likewise, the fisherwoman’s awakening into randiness “feels singularly like something only Colman could sell.” Yet the actress also imbues her long-suffering, ostracized character “with grounded pathos” that anchors “the rest of the movie’s airy whimsy.”

Wicker is “at its best when charting the power of desire,” said Angelica Jade Bastién in NYMag.com, and “it’s rare to see an older woman’s sexuality and interiority explored with authenticity and care.” Alas, “I regret to inform you that Wicker is nowhere near as horny as it needs to be.” Frustratingly, the focus moves from our protagonists’ bedroom frolics to the townsfolk, who are outraged at a steamy love that reveals their own lack.

There’s also a conventional late-film tonal shift that doesn’t work, said Odie Henderson in The Boston Globe. “It’s hard to buy that a woman this smart would fall for the requisite crisis that ends the second act of most movies.” But that’s “a small flaw.” This otherwise delightful film provides “sharp commentary on the way men treat heterosexual relationships—and men ought to pay heed.”

‘The Only Living Pickpocket in New York’

Directed by Noah Segan (R)

★★★

An aging thief targets the wrong mark.

“Somehow, despite a 40-year career full of memorable roles, John Turturro is still underrated,” said Alissa Wilkinson in The New York Times. This quiet gift of a new movie, in which he plays an aging pickpocket still skillfully plying his fading trade, “lets him showcase all of his best qualities: He gets to be quick-witted and fleet-footed, but also full of love and grief.” Though Turturro’s Harry Lehman gets himself into a jam when he lifts the wallet of a mob-connected subway passenger, the movie remains less about Harry’s subsequent race to save his skin than “the loose spider web of connections that we create, by necessity or affinity,” with the people we interact with on a routine basis.

The film is “obsessed with the gap between the old and new,” to the point that it arguably overplays the theme, said Benjamin Lee in The Guardian. And a third-act cameo by a former Oscar winner feels out of place rather than like a happy surprise. But Noah Segan’s wistful crime drama runs a tight 88 minutes and never ceases to be engaging, and “Segan does manage a satisfyingly bittersweet ending.”

It helps that the director has packed the film with terrific actors, said Glenn Whipp in the Los Angeles Times. Besides Turturro, we get Tatiana Maslany as Harry’s estranged daughter, Giancarlo Esposito as a detective who has tangled with Harry for years, and Steve Buscemi as Harry’s go-to fence. “This one’s a low-key charmer. Start spreading the news.”

Vulnerabilities found in a decades-old open-source web technology almost “broke the internet” recently, said Zack Whittaker in TechCrunch. The existence of bugs in PHP, a 31-year-old programming language used by roughly 70% of all websites and web apps worldwide, had been known for years “but weren’t considered exploitable.” That changed with AI. Security researchers using frontier OpenAI models reported that they “found a way” to weaponize those flaws, raising the risk that hackers could “break into any unpatched system on the internet without needing a password or any other credential.” The researchers notified the PHP Foundation, which released patches to fix the bugs—but companies still must race to update their websites before any hackers break into them. Matthew Prince, the chief executive of cybersecurity giant Cloudflare, said there have been “an exponential number of attempts to exploit the bugs following their disclosure.” It’s likely we’re not yet “out of the danger zone.”

“This is the cyber equivalent of an unexploded bomb,” said Zoe Kleinman in BBC.com. The weaknesses in PHP have been “quietly resting there for years”—until AI arrived and “the clock started ticking.” So far, the bomb “remains intact,” with no reported incidents, though it may be a while before the full extent of the damage is clear. Web developers will need “thoughts, prayers, and maybe a strong coffee” to keep their systems safe. The welfare of the entire internet comes down to one man, said Charlie Warzel in The Atlantic. Ondrej Sury, who lives in the Czech Republic, is responsible for maintaining and automating the patches for PHP. He is an “unsung hero,” and a reminder of how much of the internet’s infrastructure “is maintained by small crews of volunteers”—against an army of bots.

That’s why it will take “more than a handful of exhausted developers to keep us safe,” said Chris Stokel-Walker in The Guardian. The PHP Foundation, a nonprofit group of users, says developers identified the issue in 2024, but it was “too expensive and too tricky to fix.” There’s an easy solution here. Big Tech companies make billions of dollars from open-source software they essentially “get for nothing.” They could easily allocate resources to keep their platforms’ foundations from collapsing. Unless more companies act, this is only the beginning, said Matteo Wong in The Atlantic. “More websites will be defaced, more personal information will be stolen, and ransomware will proliferate” as AI-powered hacking matures. Organizations that have been “lulled into a false sense of security”— relying on older software and the idea that only a few skilled hackers could get access—should be “waking up from a trance” now that anyone can deploy thousands of AI agents to sniff out vulnerabilities and automate attacks. By next year, PHP-ocalypse may be “remembered as normal, or even tame.”

“I’ve never seen a viler ad,” said David French in The New York Times. Vivek Ramaswamy, the GOP candidate for governor of Ohio, confirmed recently that his campaign was behind a truly despicable spot attacking his Democratic opponent, Amy Acton. The ad features Acton’s estranged mother, Donna Arthur, who calls her daughter a “liar” and insinuates she has mental health issues. What Arthur doesn’t mention is that she lost custody of her children after their stepfather was indicted in 1978 for raping the 12-year-old Acton; Arthur joined her husband when he fled the jurisdiction rather than face trial. If Ramaswamy had “a molecule of decency,” he’d pull the ad and apologize for “wielding that evil mother as a weapon against her own daughter.” But we learned long ago “that there is no bottom for MAGA,” so Ramaswamy instead defended his smear tactics—saying they were needed because Acton “won’t debate me”— and threw $4 million in funding behind the ad.

“The blowback was instantaneous,” said Paul Waldman in Public Notice. As well as Democrats, “one Republican after another” criticized Ramaswamy for deploying Acton’s “alleged child-rapist-defending mother,” including Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine and Ohio Sen. Jon Husted— the latter of whom is locked in a tight midterms race. As the toxic fallout from the ad spread, the nonpartisan Cook Political Report moved the gubernatorial contest from “toss-up” to “Lean Democrat.” Still, Ramaswamy did secure the support of “the two most powerful Republicans in America.” Vice President JD Vance said he was “disgusted” by Republican “whining,” while President Trump said he wished the mothers of his opponents had been as “brave” as Arthur. That Ramaswamy has ended up in this mess is no surprise. Trump has remade the GOP in his own image: “cruel, vulgar, often hateful.” But most politicians, including Vance and Ramaswamy, lack the “dark power” that Trump possesses and instead come across as “atrocious jerks” when they try to emulate him.

As well as being in terrible taste, this ad was terrible politics, said Erika D. Smith in Bloomberg. Ramaswamy chose to essentially “ally himself with the ally of an alleged pedophile” at a time when 75% of Americans believe the Trump administration has been protecting the wealthy pals of convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. We’ll soon see if this ugly gamble pays off for Ramaswamy, said Nick Catoggio in The Dispatch. The repugnant ad should permanently shatter his political ambitions. But if he wins on election day, the video will likely be framed as a “career-maker.” And “he’ll have confirmed post-liberalism’s central thesis—that the key to political success is unabashed ruthlessness.”

What happened

President Trump escalated his attacks on the midterms voting process in several states recently, as his administration appeared to be setting the stage to cast doubt on the validity of widely anticipated Democratic wins. The Justice Department sued to block Alaskan election officials from declaring a winner in the Senate race unless it was Republican Sen. Dan S. Sullivan, arguing that voters would be confused by the presence of a candidate with a nearly identical name, Dan J. Sullivan. Alaska uses a ranked-choice voting system, and Republicans argued the other Sullivan was planted to siphon votes away from the incumbent in favor of Democrat Mary Peltola. Alaska’s Supreme Court already permitted both Sullivans to remain on the ballot. Trump took personal credit for bringing the suit, telling reporters, “I’m the one who said do it.”

Meanwhile, a judicial panel in California rejected a last-ditch request from the Trump administration to set aside as many as 20,000 mail-in ballots from people it claims could be noncitizens. The panel noted that the timing would interfere with California’s ability to administer elections. The Justice Department also sent a letter demanding the segregation of any ballots submitted by 400 more alleged noncitizens in Washington, one of nine states where the Department of Homeland Security has recently conducted door-to-door searches for illegal voters. District Judge Araceli Martínez- Olguín blocked that effort as well, noting inaccuracies in the Justice Department’s list and the risk of giving U.S. citizens “ objectively reasonable” fears of prosecution.

What the columnists said

The Alaska lawsuit is “genuinely bizarre,” said Harry Litman in The New Republic. The Constitution clearly grants states the power to administer elections. The federal government “has no role” in trying to pre-emptively minimize confusion over “something that hasn’t happened and may never happen.” It’s “positively Looney Tunes.” The presence of same-named candidates may be a “pretty crafty” Democratic ploy, but it’s perfectly legal. Yet now, if Peltola wins, “Team Trump will have its talking point ready.

Trump’s administration has also been making “near-daily announcements” about people charged with noncitizen voting, said Kyle Cheney and Myah Ward in Politico, but the claims of sweeping voter fraud are nonsense. When Los Angeles County officials reviewed a 200-name sample of the 20,000 alleged illegal voters, they found 112 had not been sent ballots, more than 70% never voted in California, and nearly 40% of those with listed birthplaces were born in the U.S. Of course, this may not be about catching criminals, but rather “stoking the fire of distrust.”

These efforts might fizzle if the Democrats “win big,” said Stephen Collinson in CNN.com. But if Republicans lose by tight margins, we could see weeks-long battles over certifying the results. And there’s no Bill Barr equivalent “to debunk potential claims of fraud.” Trump said recently he would accept the results “if they are honest elections.” That ominous caveat is now “impossible to ignore.”

“A beloved D.C. golf course welcomes everyone,” said Alex Kirshner in Slate, so “of course, President Trump wants to change that.” He doubled down two weeks ago on his campaign to turn the East Potomac Golf Links, an affordable municipal course popular with a wide mix of Washingtonians, into an elite professional course that can host major tournaments. Preservationists and golfers sued, and District Judge Ana Reyes ordered Trump to give advance notice before starting work. But after sending an emailed notice at 4:55 p.m. on a Friday, his administration felled over 400 trees. A hearing last week grew heated after an irate Reyes scolded his lawyers. While I’m “not the Lorax” speaking “for the trees,” the judge fumed, I do speak “for the rule of law.” Trump responded by calling the judge “a crazy lunatic” and by insisting construction would begin “IMMEDIATELY.”

This is “a warning sign” for the entire country, said Kyle Feldscher in CNN.com. Trump’s plan not only reduces the course from 36 holes to 18; it eliminates a green space along the river popular with families, runners, and cyclists. If Trump can seize public parkland, what’s to stop him or successors from “changing other precious parks into expensive retreats for the rich?” Redesigning a public golf course “ranks very, very low on the list of priorities of the American electorate,” said Jim Geraghty in National Review. But days before a critical election centered on affordability, Trump was in a power struggle with a federal judge who got in his way, demanding she recuse herself. Ironically, Trump described the current course as “terrible and very unsafe,” after his administration dumped debris from the White House’s demolished East Wing there—and it tested positive for lead.

The golf course battle reveals Trump world’s contempt “for the idea that rules or laws ought to apply to them,” said Paul Waldman in MS.now. “Judges really don’t like it when lawyers lie to them or defy their orders,” yet Trump’s lawyers keep doing just that. A new analysis found judges in 90 cases stated in court that they couldn’t trust administration lawyers, and in 34 cases questioned whether the administration was defying court orders. Trump may enjoy immunity from prosecution, but his lawyers don’t. If Democrats regain power, they should seek to disbar or prosecute “the officials who have carried out his attack on the rule of law.”

How pricey is beef now?

It’s one of the biggest sources of sticker shock at the supermarket. The price of beef has far exceeded the rate of inflation, with ground beef at over $7 a pound in September, nearly 20% more expensive than it was two years ago, and steak at nearly $13 a pound, up 16%. Last year, we spent roughly $45 billion on beef, a 10% jump over the previous year. That’s partly because, though the growing U.S. population eats more beef and veal per capita than any other nation save Argentina, our beef cattle herds are currently the smallest they’ve been in 75 years. The consequences of this shortage show up on individual shoppers’ receipts: McDonald’s charges over $6 for a Big Mac, and a burger in a sit-down restaurant in New York or California can run $30 or more. Even in Texas, the onetime mecca of cheap beef, the state’s approximately 3,300 barbecue joints are facing the impossible choice of either selling brisket at a loss, dropping it from the menu, or closing their doors altogether, as several have been forced to do. “I spend $100,000 a month on groceries to bring in here— $45,000 of that is brisket alone,” said Russell Roegels, a longtime Houston pitmaster. “Everybody’s at risk these days. You’re one bad week from closing.”

Why are we short of cattle?

Mainly because of years of drought in cattle-producing states. Water scarcity depletes grain, grass, and other plants that cows eat, forcing ranchers to either buy supplemental feed or thin their herds to keep afloat financially. “It really had an effect on forage availability,” said Cameron Mulrony of the Idaho Cattlemen’s Association, “and just any place to go with those cows.” Though ranchers are able to partly compensate by raising cattle that weigh hundreds of pounds more than their 1950s counterparts, rising production costs hit every stage of the beef supply chain. Steer and heifers cost more to fatten at feedlots. Meatpacking plants have to pay more for them, leading even giants such as Tyson and JBS to post nine-figure losses in the first half of 2026. Consumers then pay more for the meat. Still, not all the industry’s woes can be blamed on the environment. The Trump administration has also dealt it multiple blows.

What has the government done?

President Trump’s tariffs on imports, followed by successful legal challenges against them, added a jolt of volatility to the market. Trump ratcheted up tariffs on Brazilian beef to 76% in July 2025 before walking them back later that year. Then the Iran war sent the prices of diesel and fertilizer soaring, which increased the costs of transporting beef and growing feed. Trump’s immigration crackdown also hit the industry hard— as it did the rest of agriculture—because the immigrants who make up a significant portion of livestock workers were scared to come to work. “These ICE operations,” industry groups in Texas, Kansas, and Oklahoma said in a joint statement, “are having a massive chilling effect on the legal, documented, skilled workers that put beef on the table.” (Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin denied such raids occurred in Kansas.) And finally, the USDA closed the border to Mexican cattle for 15 months to try to stop the spread of the New World screwworm. The flesheating parasite was once eradicated from North America, but reappeared in Mexico last year and reached the U.S. in June.

What’s being done to tame prices?

Casting about for ideas, the Trump administration has proposed antitrust enforcement against the four meatpacking corporations that control 85% of the industry, opening up additional federal lands to cattle grazing, and an initiative to let ranchers process their own meat. The USDA started readmitting Mexican cattle in August. Ranchers welcomed those proposals. But in August, Trump signed an executive order suspending tariffs on 300,000 metric tons of lean beef trimmings from Argentina, Brazil, and elsewhere, which would be sold at a 25% discount to the market price, and that made ranchers livid. Tim Brunner of the Montana Cattlemen’s Association called the plan “absolutely idiotic.”

Why were ranchers upset?

Though tariffs were intended to protect the beef industry, they artificially constricted the total U.S. supply. Then, when some were abruptly lifted, ranchers were caught in a bind: The price of their cattle dropped while their operating costs did not. And the executive order allowed in dubious foreign meat. The ultra-lean trimmings imported on the cheap have been frozen, possibly for years, intended to be mixed with fattier domestic meat to make ground beef. There could be safety concerns around that: The European Union just banned Brazilian beef because of the types of antibiotics used in it, and China recently refused a shipment of tainted Argentine beef. While prices did dip 1% in the month after Trump’s decree, economists estimate the imports will only end up shaving a few cents off a pound of hamburger.

What else might get prices down?

Lawmakers from cattle states have a few ideas. Legislation proposed by Rep. Gabe Evans (R-Colo.) in October would make more cattle eligible for the USDA’s Livestock Risk Protection program, which could create a financial cushion so ranchers can save heifers for breeding. Still, ranching will always be a low-margin business, and fewer people want to go into it. Ranchers over 65 already outnumber those under 35 by 4 to 1. With the demand for beef holding steady (see box), price pressures are likely to remain strong for years. “The truth is that we may have to accept an uncomfortable reality,” said sixth-generation Kansas rancher Katie Tonn. “Beef is simply more expensive than it used to be.”

New Orleans

On a corner lot in the Garden District, this 1845 sidehall Greek Revival is a 10-minute drive from Magazine Street. Recently updated with an elevator, solar panels, and a new front porch, historic details include 12-foot ceilings with original plaster medallions, double parlors with tall windows, wood floors, and tiled fireplaces.

Upstairs, all four bedrooms are en suite. French doors open to a leafy courtyard and parking. $1,990,000. Scott James, Rêve Realtors/ Luxury Portfolio International, (917) 699-0083

Yarmouth Port, Mass.

Built circa 1850, this three-story Cape Cod home near a village and Gray’s Beach features a wraparound, columned porch. The restored and updated five-bedroom includes wide-plank wood floors, six fireplaces, chunky moldings in the two living rooms, original claw-foot tubs, a primary bedroom on the first floor, and a sunken dining room with French doors.

The property has a garage, a barn, sprawling yards, and a deck. $1,800,000. Sheri Sibley, Engel & Völkers, South Shore, (781) 258-7340

Camden, S.C.

In a historic district near Kendall Lake Park, this 1885 five-bedroom has twin chimneys and a porte cochere supported by Corinthian columns. A foyer with antique heart-pine floors branches off to formal sitting and dining rooms with high ceilings and dentil crown molding.

An expanded great room includes a living area and bonus kitchen. Outside are a walled yard, palm trees, and covered porches. $1,400,000. Debbie Elliott, Peace Sotheby’s International Realty, (910) 471-3181

Mebane, N.C.

The Griffis-Patton House, built 1839–40, is a refreshed brick home on more than 10 acres with views of Mebane-Graham Lake. The four-bedroom features original plaster walls, high ceilings, wood floors, double crown molding, a kitchen with exposed brick and a Blue-Star range, and a primary bedroom with a coffered ceiling.

The grounds include an L-shaped pool, plus a barn, gardens, and a well house. $2,150,000. Brandon Blackman, Hodge & Kittrell Sotheby’s International Realty, (252) 495-3778

Boston

In Beacon Hill near Louisburg Square, this 1833 five-story brick townhouse was home to author Nathaniel Hawthorne. A wallpapered foyer opens to a staircase and an updated kitchen with a banquette and high-end appliances.

The living room features crown molding, wood floors, one of five fireplaces, and an adjoining wet bar. The lowerlevel, private-entry guest suite includes a kitchen and wine cellar. Out back is a landscaped brick patio. $6,399,000. Diana Coldren, Compass, (617) 953-7237

Rumford, Maine

About 90 minutes from Portland, this 1898 fivebedroom with Greek Revival and Colonial Revival elements features symmetrical door and window placement and an entry portico with Doric columns.

The eclectic home includes a dining room with a curved wall, a music room with crown molding, and a living room with French doors. The nearly 1-acre lot has a patio, garage, pool and pool house, yards, and mature trees. $375,000. Kristal Fecteau, Coldwell Banker Team Real Estate, (207) 671-9712

There’s a lot for parents and guardians to consider about the new so-called Trump accounts, said Ashlea Ebeling and Richard Rubin in The Wall Street Journal. The Treasury Department has now created a Trump account “for any child with a Social Security number who is under 18 at the end of the year.” This new type of savings account is “a custodial individual retirement account for children,” and it comes with $1,000 of seed money from the federal government for children born between 2025 and 2028. “Parents or guardians must claim the accounts”—on the Trump Accounts app or at TrumpAccounts.com—to request the free cash or make their own contributions, up to $5,000 a year. The money has to be invested in a low-cost exchange-traded fund “that tracks the performance of the S&P 500.” The accounts can also receive “donations of individual stock from nonprofits,” and beneficiaries won’t pay taxes on dividends or capital gains. But withdrawals of any funds, including the government seed money, will “count as taxable income”—and there may be an early distribution penalty for withdrawals before age 59½.

Despite those limitations, said The Washington Post in an editorial, these accounts “offer real promise.” They could become a valuable “wealth-building tool” for millions of children who otherwise might not have any long-term savings. The “twin magic of compound interest and long-term returns” can help them pay for college, start a business, or buy a house, market permitting. It’s a “historic” achievement, said The Washington Times. The White House Council of Economic Advisers estimates that, if maximum contributions are made for a child born this year, that child would have $303,800 in their Trump account by age 18, “projecting average stock market returns.” Talk about “setting up children for success.” Trump may have “done more for America’s children than any of his predecessors.”

Letting rich billionaires donate stocks to these accounts “feels icky,” said Catherine Rampell in The Bulwark. The Trump administration recently “changed the ways that benefactors could benefact,” allowing them to give shares of individual stocks as long as they reach at least 5,000 kids. More importantly, “the recipients cannot refuse the gift” and have to hold it for five years. A newborn could then theoretically become a shareholder in a company that “manufactures weapons, runs casinos, or is helmed by a possible neo-Nazi.” Elon Musk, for example, said recently that he is donating one share of SpaceX stock to “every kid in America” through Trump accounts. Such tie-ups turn “an otherwise inoffensive concept” into a vehicle to help rich donors “offload overvalued stocks onto children” and score a “big tax write-off” before the market crashes.

New York City’s big new Roy Lichtenstein show turns out to be “far more touching than I had anticipated,” said Jason Farago in The New York Times. Lichtenstein, who’s routinely celebrated as one of pop art’s visionaries, is usually credited with deflating high art by borrowing from comic books while reducing painting to components simple enough that a machine could reproduce them. In truth, the native New Yorker rendered each of the famous Ben-Day dots on his canvases “with something a lot like love,” a revelation that helps make the show “the most momentous exhibition of the season.” At a time when many of us are routinely deluged with AI-generated images, we see Lichtenstein (1923–97) modeling a constructive, decades-old response. With each dot painted by human hand and each choice he made in selecting from existing images and reworking them, he was insisting on the importance of a singular human vision, answering his own era’s flood of mass-market imagery by “keeping faith with a beauty that could last for all time.”

Lichtenstein wasn’t a lazy plagiarist, said David Smith in The Guardian. At the Whitney show, the artist’s sketchbooks and preliminary drawings show how often he altered the images of his source materials, “re-engineering line weights, cropping compositions, and shifting color fields to agitate the viewer’s eye.” The impact of his innovations was immediate, and the museum has re-created his breakthrough 1962 solo show at the Leo Castelli Gallery. His prescience was also such that by 1968, he was already speaking about his Ben-Day dots in relationship to new technologies that were translating visual imagery into transmittable data.

There’s no doubt that Lichtenstein is one of the winners of the American century, said Jerry Saltz in NYMag.com. He changed art forever, and “his style is one of the most recognizable in all of art history.” But while the Whitney show is “jazzy, bright,” and “packed to the rafters” with “paintings that jump off the walls,” its thesis falls flat. “The curators say every picture is an argument about seeing,” but Lichtenstein’s argument is the same every time, making “Like New” an illustration of “what happens when a revolutionary visual language becomes so familiar that the revolution disappears and leaves little to chew on.”

Lichtenstein’s best works, all from 1962 to 1965, were “satirical commentaries on American consumerism, the good life, the heroic male, and standardized beauty,” said John Yau in Hyperallergic. Unfortunately, he exposed the limitations of his style as soon as he began using it to produce mock re-creations of works by Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Paul Cézanne, and other past masters. “He went from being a satirist of America’s ideals of comfort and beauty to being a parody of himself.” If we’re being honest, he never recovered.

AI is causing “a crisis of trust” in publishing, said Vauhini Vara in The Atlantic. Earlier this month, Zimbabwean writer Simbarashe Steyn Kundizeza won the prestigious Caine Prize for African Writing—worth $13,000—for a short story that “has all the personality of a chatbot.” That may not be coincidental: Pangram, an artificial-intelligence-powered AI detection tool, flagged “almost the entire story as AI-generated.” Kundizeza is not the first award recipient to be flagged by Pangram; it deemed one of the winning stories in this year’s Commonwealth Short Story Prize to have been entirely authored by AI. Kundizeza says his story, “The Blue Fighter,” is “entirely my work.” Pangram is reputed to be “highly accurate”—the company claims its tool misidentifies AI use in just 1 out of 24,000 cases—but it’s not infallible. So who should we trust? The author or Pangram?

This is exactly the “chaos” that publishers feared, said Anna Silman in The Wall Street Journal. Publishing houses have tried to crack down on AI usage by authors, inserting strict clauses into book deals and leaning on Pangram to vet manuscripts. But “a new AI scandal engulfing” the industry seemingly every month is “forcing a reckoning over the nature of authorship.” The Big Five publishing houses—Simon & Schuster, Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, and Macmillan—have been reluctant to “make sweeping pronouncements about” the technology, possibly because they’re waiting to see if people care whether the books they’re reading are AI-generated or AI-assisted, “especially in genres like fantasy and sci-fi.” Meanwhile, many writers feel that a contract clause “that relies on the honor system lacks the teeth necessary to combat” intellectual dishonesty.

I write a lot, and I use AI, and I’m worried that “I’ve started to internalize” how a chatbot thinks, said Alex Kirshner in Slate. I’ve begun to “self-police against this,” modifying my drafts “to sound less like AI.” I also put my work into Pangram “before it appears anywhere else” to ensure that “the model concurs that I wrote it myself.” It feels dystopian—I’ve had to “rewrite sentences of my own work in hopes of satisfying this new integrity god.”

Still, we need the “AI slop detectors,” said Brian X. Chen in The New York Times. The tools do more than pick out obvious indicators of AI authorship, such as the excessive use of em dashes and bullet points. They’re trained to understand how AI models make decisions on word selection and phrasing. Pangram, which costs $20 a month, is incredibly “useful for sniffing out annoyances like AI-written email scams and phony online reviews.” Yes, the technology “still has a long way to go.” But “at the rate that slop is proliferating on the web,” it’s an “empowering” tool for people who still want to read the human-written word.

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Naomi Alderman is the author of The Power, a 2016 best seller that won the U.K.’s Women’s Prize for Fiction. In her new novel, The Strangers, a writer also named Naomi Alderman is wrestling with grief when she discovers an alien animal species that begins proliferating.

‘The Vintner’s Luck’ by Elizabeth Knox (1998)

I read this in my early 20s when I was starting to work hard on my writing. I thought, If I can ever write anything as good, I’ll be happy forever. In 1808, a French winemaker meets an angel and, impossibly, they fall in love. It is about everything: love, sex, faith, death, memory, redemption, God. Buy it here.

‘Possession’ by A.S. Byatt (1990)

The best and classiest and most intellectual kind of mystery novel. In an archive, a researcher finds lost letters exchanged by two Victorian writers. Why were they writing to each other? Were they having an affair? And who else wants to uncover the truth? Just superb. Buy it here.

‘Leech’ by Hiron Ennes (2022)

I could not put this down, in a way I hadn’t experienced for years. A doctor arrives at a strange old castle to replace his predecessor who has died suddenly. But when he performs an autopsy on the older doctor, something strange wriggles inside him. A full world you can sink into that grips like, indeed, a leech. Buy it here.

‘Chocky’ by John Wyndham (1968)

A young boy believes he’s in contact with an alien. But the alien can’t be seen or felt; it’s only communicating with the boy’s mind. It can’t be real, can it? But if not, where are these strange new ideas in his mind coming from? The book is mesmerizing on parental love and as a weird tale. Buy it here.

‘The Collected Ghost Stories of M.R. James’ (1931)

James is the Victorian master of the ghost story. An M.R. James protagonist tends to be an academic—someone driven by curiosity who doesn’t know when to leave well enough alone. His novels are absolute master classes in how much to reveal, how much to leave to the reader’s terrified imagination. Buy it here.

‘Ficciones’ by Jorge Luis Borges (1944)

Borges writes stories that are an idea, an absolute crystalline unforgettable thought. I fell into these as a teenager, read them again and again; I could practically recite The Lottery in Babylon by heart for you. You’d also get a decent education just reading all the writers Borges mentions in his stories. Buy it here.

‘The Cauldron: The Making of the Modern Middle East’ by Simon Sebag Montefiore

Simon Sebag Montefiore’s latest best seller is “a triumph of blood-and-thunder narrative history,” said Sean McMeekin in The Wall Street Journal. At a time when conflict in the Middle East is again touching lives around the world, the British historian has delivered a sweeping and energetic account of the region’s turbulent last 125 years. Beginning in 1902, when the young prince Ibn Saud seized Riyadh to puncture Ottoman dominance, “Montefiore doesn’t play favorites, subjecting all his characters to scrutiny.” We get British and French meddling during and after World War I, the dramatic reset brought on by the next global conflict, and Cold War machinations that enflamed new conflicts. Then comes the 1979 Iranian Revolution, which Montefiore characterizes as epochal in its impact. “Not all his stories are original,” of course, “but he enriches them with fascinating details.”

“While vast in scope, The Cauldron is written in a way that is equally accessible to regional experts and neophytes,” said Jonathan Harounoff in the New York Post. Often, his story is carried by “the compelling and, at times, insidious characters who helped forge the Middle East we know today.” Jassim bin Mohammed Al Thani, Qatar’s founding emir, sired 56 children. King Farouk, who ruled Egypt for 16 years, was addicted to gambling, food, and sex. As Montefiore marches readers though various crises and flashpoints, said Mark Urban in The Times (U.K.), he shows a determination to nail down which actors deserve blame. “Time and again,” he shows that the region’s leaders have been more than mere puppets, having more agency than self-regarding Westerners might suspect. And though he rips into Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini, today’s Israeli right wing, and many other regional players, “this is not a polemic but a work of history in which his judgments are rooted in deep research.”

The astonishing scope of the book is “both its greatest strength and its principal weakness,” said Sam Kiley in The Independent (U.K.). At his best, Montefiore “can make a complicated political order suddenly legible through a few deft sentences,” but the pileup of rulers, coups, and wars at times becomes “so dense that the reader can struggle to retain a firm sense of causation.” He also “distributes sympathy unevenly,” favoring pragmatists over fervent believers and, subtly, Israelis over Palestinians in the Middle East conflict that so often looms largest in the minds of outsiders. Montefiore is “too candid about Israeli wrongdoing to be described as an apologist.” Better yet, he’s written a book that anyone could learn from. “Its scholarship, range, and vitality make it an impressive achievement.”

‘Death of an Ordinary Man’ by Sarah Perry

“Death of an Ordinary Man is not a remarkable story,” said Amy Bloom in The New York Times. “What is remarkable is this book.” In 2022, a 77-year-old man was diagnosed with esophageal cancer and died nine days later. Because the man was her father-in-law, British novelist Sarah Perry watched that small drama unfold at close range after she and her husband moved in to provide 24-hour care. In Perry’s attentive account of those nine days, “there are no celestial visits, no shocking reconciliations.” Instead, there’s incontinence, there’s paperwork, and there are good and bad medical people—“all the things people ordinarily don’t write about.” Those details belong in this gift of a work, though, because “Perry’s entire point is that this condition of being alive includes, inevitably and properly, the process of dying.”

In speaking of her own experience in those final days, Perry “captures the feeling of existing in a strange, panicked void,” said Karin Altenberg in The Wall Street Journal. Perry and her husband, Robert, both previously busy with other things, suddenly find themselves caretakers sleeping on the floor of their patient’s bungalow. The world outside ceases to exist as nurses, relatives, and clergy visit. Meanwhile, Perry and Robert are figuring the logistics of end-of-life care in real time straight through to their charge’s final breath. Many of us are likely to find ourselves in a similar situation one day, and through her “deeply tender” account, Perry has “extended a hand to the reader with profound grace.

“It’s not easy to account for what makes this book so special,” said Joe Moran in The Guardian (U.K.). David Perry, the ostensible subject, was such a content, reserved Englishman that “some may even find him a little boring.” In part, Perry’s beautifully written book “works its magic through the adamantine detail and quiet lyricism with which it recounts a particular, unrepeatable life.” More than that, though, “what makes this book gem-like is that it succeeds in conveying the reality of death as this monumental, mythic thing that coexists surreally with the mundane world of council bin collections.” Though the breakdown of David’s body isn’t dignified, Perry notices that it’s also transfiguring, right down to this ordinary man’s fingertips.

Fjord

Directed by Cristian Mungiu (R)

★★★★

The film that won the Palme d’Or at Cannes this year is “a car crash occurring in what feels like real time,” said Nick Schager in The Daily Beast. “One of the year’s undisputed highlights,” the newly released drama follows a family that’s torn apart soon after they move from Bucharest to a Norwegian village and their fundamentalist Christian beliefs generate suspicion. When the parents, Mihai and Lisbet, are accused of child abuse based on slim evidence, all five of the couple’s kids, including two teenagers and a breastfeeding infant, are taken away by child services. With co-stars Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve delivering performances that give little away, the movie “poses prickly questions it astutely refuses to answer.” Romanian director Cristian Mungiu, who previously won the Palme d’Or for 2007’s 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days, never reveals whether Mihai and Lisbet are guilty of serious mistreatment or not, said Monica Castillo in The A.V. Club. But while his latest award winner is “expertly crafted,” it belies his disdain for Norway’s progressive liberalism and the government overreach he thinks the mindset spawns. Fjord also “loses its focus” once a fed-up Mihai summons fellow religious conservatives to stand with him and his wife during their trial. “Excellent” work from Reinsve and Stan help save the movie from tipping into didacticism, said Brian Tallerico in RogerEbert.com. But Mungiu also hasn’t fully made his mind up about Mihai and Lisbet and the values they espouse. “One of the things that makes Fjord so rewarding is the sense that he’s exploring how he feels about these people and these issues along with us as their story unfolds.”

‘La Bola Negra’

Directed by Los Javis (R)

★★★★

Arriving in U.S. theaters after wowing festival audiences, this Oscar contender from Spain “has the sweep and audacity of a great modernist novel,” said Dana Stevens in Slate. “An at times exhausting but ultimately nourishing feast,” La Bola Negra toggles between three gay protagonists separated by nearly a century of time as it highlights the links between fascism and homophobia. “Not every one of its interweaving stories lands with equal power,” and some passages feel rushed, but “too much movie is better than not enough.” Each tale, “at first oddly, works in a slightly different register,” said Alissa Wilkinson in The New York Times. In 1937, Sebastián, a musician forced to fight for the fascists in the Spanish Civil War, falls for a wounded prisoner named Rafael, initiating a love story that turns wrenching. By then, we’ve also met Carlos, who, in an “almost fairy-tale-like” 1932 setting, is barred from an elite club because of his sexuality. And we’ve watched Alberto, a grad student from our own era, begin investigating his grandfather’s past. It takes a while to see the stories’ links, but once you do, “the structure feels cleverly satisfying” despite the movie’s “unnecessarily overwrought” third act. Still, co-directors Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi—aka Los Javis—“execute this mighty vision with thrilling technical bravado,” said Richard Lawson in The Hollywood Reporter. It is “high time” we had a gay war epic of this much “scope and soulfulness and invention.”

‘Klara and the Sun’

Directed by Taika Waititi (PG-13)

★★★★

“Adapting a complex, questioning novel as a cockeyed child’s-eye comedy worked once before for Taika Waititi,” said Guy Lodge in Variety. But even fans of 2019’s Jojo Rabbit are unlikely to be moved by Waititi’s “twee, pulseless” adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s 2021 novel about an android purchased to be the companion of a sickly 14-year-old. In this disastrous misfire, “the filmmaker’s kooky affectations fight the stoic sadness of Ishiguro’s storytelling at every turn.” Jenna Ortega stars as Klara, the tale’s “Artificial Friend,” playing the robot as “a ditsy, cutesy innocent,” said Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian. Being solar-powered, Klara worships the sun as a god. But whereas Ishiguro made something of such fable-like story elements, Waititi’s “unbearably mannered” film “winds up saying nothing substantial or meaningful (or funny) about artificial intelligence, love, or grief.” And when we reach the twist ending, it’s “as unsatisfying and contrived as everything that has gone before.” The two leads do what they can, said Ben Gibbons in Screen Rant. Ortega has a tough assignment, and “her ability to imbue her character with emotion while still feeling robotic is impressive.” Mia Tharia, meanwhile, plays 14-year-old Josie “with enormous confidence, magnetism, and charm.” Alas, the actresses’ work is wasted on an adaptation that turns out to be “a ham-fisted sci-fi comedy with a hollow message.” Clearly, Waititi was “not the right choice for this story.”

The midterm elections don’t take place solely on Nov. 3, said Chris Brennan in USA Today. With about 8 million votes cast early or by mail, they’re “already underway”— and so are President Trump’s “attempts to disrupt the process.” Insisting without evidence that voter fraud is widespread, his administration sued California recently to keep the state from counting the ballots of 20,000 voters it alleged are noncitizens. His Department of Homeland Security already tried claiming that 15,000 noncitizens were registered in Nevada; DHS later narrowed the list to 185—and Nevada then found all 185 were citizens. Trump has publicly stated elections were rigged or fraudulent on more than 70% of days since his return to office, and his claims are growing more desperate, with Democrats “poised to take control of Congress and bring oversight and accountability to his second term.

Local and state officials are now bracing “to defend their elections against what used to be a reliable ally”: the federal government, said Zolan Kanno-Youngs in The New York Times. Trump is falsely claiming voting machines can be rigged or hacked by foreign governments; earlier this year, the FBI raided an election office in Fulton County, Georgia, and seized voting records from the 2020 election. The president’s most rabid supporters are “urging him to consider drastic actions,” such as declaring martial law. Motivated by “a growing sense of alarm,” about 10 current and former national security officials are “discreetly advising” states on how to prepare for election interference, said Noah Robertson in The Washington Post. Among the possible threats: deployment of troops or ICE to polling sites to scare away voters, the seizure of ballots or election machines, and threats to arrest and prosecute election officials.

But so far, “Trump’s election meddling lies mostly in ruins,” said David Ignatius, also in The Washington Post. He’s “failed in nearly every phase of his assault,” thanks to “determined legal resistance.” The Supreme Court blocked him from using the Postal Service to limit mail-in ballots. States keep refusing demands to hand over voter rolls. If Trump “were a batter in a baseball game, he would have struck out, over and over.” Hundreds of lawyers are working with Democrats “to prevent election sabotage,” but the best defense “is an anti-Trump turnout at the polls so large that even he can’t challenge it.”

What happened

As the most destructive riots in modern French history engulfed the country last week, France ordered troops into the streets and imposed curfews in multiple cities. Shattered glass littered sidewalks after rioters smashed and looted thousands of shops, torched cars and buildings, and attacked police, who fired tear gas and water cannons. The protests began in September as student demonstrations over underfunded, understaffed schools, but they soon mushroomed into a larger, less coherent outpouring of rage involving at least half a million protesters. In Limoges, the clock tower of the 19th-century city hall collapsed in flames; masked vandals broke into Marseille’s city hall and toppled the statue of Marianne, the national symbol; and Paris’ iconic Monument to the Republic was damaged. Over the weeks of demonstrations, at least 1,250 people have been injured — the majority police — and more than 7,000 have been arrested. President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged some “legitimate demands” but vowed that “those who destroyed must pay.”

The unrest soon spread across Europe, where nearly every capital saw protests, some of them violent. In Belgium, buildings, monuments, and public facilities were damaged. Italy sent 500 soldiers to combat looting and arson in Milan, where most of the hundreds arrested were teens. Ongoing demonstrations over the housing shortage swelled in Spain and Portugal, where students set up tent camps in city squares. In Albania, where anger over development in a nature preserve has spawned an antigovernment movement, protesters hurled Molotov cocktails. President Trump and Vice President JD Vance sought to tie the riots to the upcoming midterms. “If you want to see what is at stake in this election,” Trump said, “just look at what’s happening in France.” Vance shared a post of the burning Limoges tower with the comment “This is the future congressional Democrats seek for your country.”

What the columnists said

France is no stranger to protests, said Nora Bussigny in The Free Press, but these “civil-war-like scenes” are new and horrifying. Law-abiding citizens are “traumatized.” One young Parisian mother told me that when she warned the rioters ransacking a café outside her window not to sully their cause by looting, they shouted, “You bourgeois bitch, we’re going to rape you!” Then they tried to break into her apartment.

These are not “mere schoolchildren,” said Noah Rothman in National Review. “Within their ranks, the protesters have incubated” the “civilizational cancer” of antisemitism, and it’s a radical and violent strain. Rioters in Paris burst into Ohaley Yaakov synagogue, “scattering holy books across the floor, overturning tables, and opening the Torah ark — defiling its contents.” It’s not that this was an explicitly anti-Jewish protest. But the protesters in France, as in the U.S., have adopted the Palestinian flag as a catchall symbol of oppression, and violence as their strategy. When will we “wake up to the West’s peril?”

These riots had many causes, said Sylvie Kauffmann in the Financial Times. The country “is adrift, politically, fiscally, and socially,” and its political class is only making things worse. Farleft party leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon of France Unbowed has “tried to capitalize on the chaos,” openly sympathizing with the protesters and even joining protests last weekend. The “main beneficiary,” though, is likely Marine Le Pen, whose far-right National Rally party wants to expel migrants; she is now favored to win the presidency next April.

The postwar French social compact was “never really tenable,” said Bret Stephens in The New York Times. American progressives have often gazed longingly at France’s “sacrosanct social benefits,” which include universal health care, cheap tuition, and retirement at age 62. But funding all that is insanely expensive. Government spending now makes up “a whopping 57%” of France’s GDP. Nearly a third of its education budget is eaten up by pensions, so its poorer schools are crumbling. Debt outpaces GDP altogether. It’s not surprising that these “policies of national self-impoverishment have broader effects on social cohesion and national security.” Young talent is fleeing, and those who remain are rioting in the streets and fighting one another for dwindling resources.

“It’s not only France that’s feeling the heat,” said Lionel Laurent in Bloomberg. Most Western countries are aging and feeling the sting of inflation, especially in ballooning housing costs. That’s why affordability is the main question in the French election next year as well as in the U.S. midterms. What’s missing from the politicians “is honesty on the reforms that are needed — both from politicians and the aging electorates that are blocking inescapable change.”

What happened

Trump administration envoy Steve Witkoff praised Russian President Vladimir Putin as a “humanitarian” on a visit to St. Petersburg last week, after President Trump stunned U.S. allies and lawmakers from both parties with a string of decisions that will aid Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine. In Russia to discuss possible peace talks between Trump, Putin, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Witkoff hailed Putin for releasing Stephen Hubbard, a retired American teacher who was snatched from his home in eastern Ukraine after Russia’s 2022 invasion. Hubbard, 74, was imprisoned on what the State Department called false charges of fighting for Ukraine; fellow prisoners said he was tortured for being American. “You are a humanitarian, sir,” Witkoff told Putin, whose invasion of Ukraine has killed at least 15,000 civilians. “I salute that and I commend you.”

Trump issued an executive order last week suspending sanctions included in legislation that he signed last month, which would have hit top buyers of Russian energy and Russian officials and companies. Trump said the sanctions pause was needed because he didn’t want to “drive Russia away from the bargaining table.” The waiver came a week after Trump announced he was suspending other energy sanctions to buy hundreds of thousands of tons of Russian diesel fuel. Meanwhile, Ukrainian officials said the U.S. cut off advanced warnings on incoming missile strikes for several days and had limited Ukraine’s access to the satellite internet service Starshield, used to guide Ukrainian attack and defense drones. The Wall Street Journal reported that Elon Musk, whose Starlink supplies Starshield under a Pentagon contract, ordered the slowdown after consulting with Trump. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the Pentagon had not manipulated the service, but noted that Starlink has “terms of service” that need to be complied with.

Zelensky said it would be a “historic mistake” for the U.S. to switch sides and support Russia. But Trump claimed “Russia, frankly, has been fine on Ukraine” and hasn’t “been doing much,” despite its increasing attacks on Ukraine’s power grid and on civilians. He spoke just hours after a drone strike on a park in Kharkiv killed six people, including a 1-year-old who died in her stroller. “We’ve given tremendous amounts to Ukraine,” Trump said. “We’ve got nothing back.”

What the columnists said

“Trump’s assistance to Putin keeps growing by the day,” said The Wall Street Journal in an editorial. In waiving the sanctions contained in the law — which was championed by the late GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham — Trump claimed he was serving the national interest. “But the opposite is true.” Trump’s best pal Putin responded to this “gift” with one of the war’s fiercest strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, hitting more than 15 power facilities. Meanwhile, the administration “still hasn’t come clean” on who throttled Starshield, or why the delivery of crucial Patriot interceptor missiles to Ukraine is being held up. After the midterms, there must be a “bipartisan reckoning.”

The dealmaker in chief may be eyeing business opportunities, said Jonathan Lemire and Simon Shuster in The Atlantic. Instead of “a battle for the modern, rules-based world order,” many Trump allies see the Ukraine war “as an impediment to future business deals with Russia.” If Kyiv just surrendered, it would “open up avenues to Russia’s diesel, rare earth minerals, and other resources.” The New York Times has reported that the administration has discussed a possible multibillion-dollar deal for assets owned by Russia’s Lukoil. That deal would directly benefit a Trump donor as well as Middle Eastern executives with ties to Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Trump has finally achieved his heart’s desire, said David Corn in Mother Jones: “a deal with Putin.” For decades he’s hungered to do business in Russia; as president, he’s laid bare his yearning “to be a Putin BFF,” providing cover for “a foreign adversary that has attacked American democracy repeatedly.” Trump, who couldn’t give a fig about international laws or Ukraine’s democracy, has seen Russia’s invasion “mainly as a nuisance” blocking him from the alliance he craves. “Putin’s criminality and barbarity were obstacles.” But Trump “has decided to move past that. Vlad is his man.”

For Republicans and Democrats alike, Trump’s “shocking” actions should be “the last straw,” said Andrew C. McCarthy in National Review. Russia is “an enemy committed to our destruction,” led by a “murderous dictator.” Trump is “giving him aid and comfort” as he wages war against a democratic ally, bent on its “conquest.” And he’s doing it all as Russia is “actively abetting Iran’s military operations” against the U.S. with intelligence and drone weaponry.

“America is now an ally of Russia,” said Tom Nichols in The Atlantic. In thrall to Putin, Trump has not only betrayed Ukraine; he’s “abandoned the Western order, the most successful—and powerful— security arrangement in human history.” And he seems to have done so to serve not national interests but his own. Until now, “Manchurian candidates and red presidents” allied with Russia were “the stuff of paranoid fiction. But this alliance now exists.”

“The question at issue is not just about Ukraine and Russia,” said Mark Hertling in The Bulwark. “It is about what the United States stands for.” For 250 years, Americans have believed in “sovereignty, self-determination, and opposition to territorial conquest.” Now Trump is executing a “disturbing and shameful abandonment” not only of Ukraine but of those bedrock principles. In America’s long history we haven’t always lived up to our values. “But rarely have we so obviously and notoriously abandoned them.”

Elon Musk has “learned to love political spending again,” said Chad de Guzman in Time. After splashing at least $250 million on getting President Trump back in the White House, the world’s richest man announced last year that he’d spend “a lot less” on future campaigns because “I’ve done enough.” Instead, he’s become the biggest single donor this midterm cycle. Since July, Musk has given at least $276 million to various Republican groups—$158 million of which went to the GOP’s main Senate super PAC, “one of the largest known political donations in history.” That infusion of cash allowed the super PAC to launch a $149 million ad campaign for Ken Paxton, the GOP’s struggling candidate in the Texas U.S. Senate race. Musk’s huge spend “isn’t surprising, given what’s at stake for him if Republicans lose.” Democrats have vowed to investigate the multibillion- dollar government contracts held by SpaceX, Tesla, and other Musk companies if they win the House—and to subpoena Musk over his role leading DOGE, which slashed hundreds of thousands of federal jobs and gutted foreign aid.

Musk has learned that candidates “want his money but not him,” said Jim Newell in Slate. Back in 2024 and 2025, he was everywhere: “prancing about onstage with Trump,” living at Mar-a-Lago, and handing out million- dollar checks to Wisconsin voters. This time, he’s confined himself to insulting Democrats on his social media platform X and making donations that, while eye- poppingly large, are “effectively less than couch change” for a man worth about $1 trillion. “That’s some intimidating profligacy,” said Noah Rothman in The Boston Globe. But Musk’s money will make a difference on Election Day only if his beneficiaries can pair it with a compelling message. As voters keep telling pollsters, “that’s the missing part of the GOP’s 2026 strategy.”

As “a prominent and powerful white supremacist,” Musk has his own message, said Jamelle Bouie in The New York Times. On X, he traffics in extremist conspiracy theories about brown and Black “invaders” destroying “‘Western,’ meaning white, civilization.” He “heavily promoted” the movie Citizen Vigilante, in which the hero kills Arab and African immigrants. He supports “remigration,” the forced deportation of nonwhite citizens to their supposed countries of origin. Yet Republicans are allowed to pretend such rhetoric from the party’s “most important donor” is irrelevant to them, even while Democrats are often asked to denounce Hasan Piker, a popular but niche far-left streamer. “I think Republicans should have to answer” for Musk’s ugly views. And if Democrats win Congress this November, they should work to ensure that no one man will ever again “have all this power.”

What is the administration doing?

In a first in U.S. history, the government has separated tens of thousands of children from parents who were arrested on immigration violations, often deporting them without their kids. Many such parents entered the U.S. legally as asylum seekers and have been working and raising families while pursuing citizenship. This spring, the Brookings Institution counted more than 146,000 children who are U.S. citizens and have had a parent deported; more than 22,000 have had both parents deported. Sometimes deportees are given the option to take their children with them—but not always. When Physicians for Human Rights interviewed women deported to Honduras this year, they found that many had not been asked if they had children, while others simply had their kids taken. One was parted from her 2-month-old breastfeeding baby. Migrant advocates say the crisis mirrors 2018, when the first Trump administration’s policy of separating families at the southern border sparked an uproar. “It’s leading to all the same forms of trauma,” said Kelly Kribs, an attorney for immigrant children. “But the speed and the scale of the separations now is at a level we’ve never seen before.”

What happens to children left in the U.S.?

Many go to relatives or friends, but because deportees have little or no time to arrange for care, some end up in foster care. When Marlyn, a Venezuelan with a pending asylum application, landed in ICE detention after a traffic stop in Alabama, her two young children, including a 2-year-old just weaned, were left with her co- worker. When she chose to accept deportation rather than endure prolonged detention in a case likely to fail, she said she begged to have her children sent with her. “I told them, ‘I have no one to take care of them.’ But they never did anything.” Nearly a year later, Marlyn has been unable to arrange extradition for her toddler, who doesn’t recognize her in video calls. Some parents choose to leave their kids behind because they are returning to countries roiled by violence. One Haitian woman, identified by The Guardian only as L.T., made the wrenching decision to leave her sick baby with a grandmother, knowing that there wouldn’t be medical care in gang-plagued Haiti. Now she’s racked by fear that her daughter could wind up with strangers. “I’m terrified of losing my baby,” she said.

What does the law say?

The law allows for parents to be deported without their children, but until recently there were protections. ICE policy held that federal agents should avoid separating families and either deport them together or confirm a caregiver is in place. The Trump administration revised the policy to say agents should do that “when operationally feasible,” which advocates say gives ICE leeway to ignore it. The administration insists it doesn’t intentionally separate families, and that this only occurs when parents make the choice to self- deport. But critics say otherwise. ICE is intent on meeting its deportation quotas, said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), even “if that means tearing families apart and traumatizing children.” Migrant advocates also cite a growing trend of children being taken from parents and put into federal custody.

Why is this happening?

Children of detainees are being reclassified as unaccompanied minors and sent to the Office of Refugee Resettlement. When Luis, a construction worker from Venezuela, was detained with his 11-year-old son, Andrés, after being arrested in El Paso, he said agents removed Andrés and transferred him to ORR instead of sending him to his grandfather. Case workers said Andrés couldn’t sleep in foster care and screamed for his parents at night. It’s not clear how common such reclassifications are, but Mother Jones spoke to a dozen lawyers who confirmed the trend. “They’re kidnapping people’s kids and keeping them in government custody,” said Jen Smyers, who was a Biden-era ORR official. There’s a process for applying to get them out, but the administration has made it arduous—to protect children from predators, it says—and ICE has arrested undocumented people who apply.

Are minors ever deported alone?

Frequently. An analysis by Pro Publica found that judges have issued over 10,000 removal and voluntary departure orders for unaccompanied minors every month, a rate four times higher than in Trump’s first term. Most of these children came from Central American countries riven by violence and economic upheaval, have no criminal record, and are pursuing legal residence. Minors with Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, granted to those who’ve suffered parental abuse or neglect, used to be protected from deportation, but the Trump administration ended that policy. It also ended $200 million in annual funding for the Acacia Center for Justice, a nonprofit that provides legal services to migrant children.

Has there been pushback?

Not much. Migrant advocates say there’s been a notable shift from 2018, when blowback over family separations led to legal challenges, bipartisan opposition, and an eventual climbdown. This time, there’s no explicit policy to challenge in court, and the separations are happening outside public view—no media images of children in cages. Advocates also cite less resistance within the administration, as staffers who might have objected have left or been laid off. The fallout in human trauma will be vast, experts say, especially for the youngest children. “They are left with a sense of abandonment that’s kind of imprinted,” said Michele Heisler, a doctor with Physicians for Human Rights. Her organization also documented signs of trauma among separated mothers, including panic attacks and uncontrollable crying. The “gratuitous level of cruelty,” she said, “is hard for all of us to understand.

Palo Alto, Calif.

In the Community Center neighborhood is this refreshed, 1973 mid-century modern atrium Eichler home. With the same owner for 53 years, the four-bedroom—plus office—has clerestory windows, its eponymous atrium, a brick fireplace flanked by glass walls, exposed beams, wood-clad walls and ceilings, and an updated kitchen and dining room.

Outside are a patio, mature landscaping, and an attached garage. Stanford University, dining, parks, and shops are a short drive. $4,988,000. Jennifer Buenrostro, Compass, (650) 224-9539

Belgrade, Mont.

This 2023, modern mountain home in the Gallatin Valley about 30 minutes north of Bozeman is set against Evan Reese Creek with mountain views. The great room features hickory hardwood floors, wood ceilings, and a stacked-stone Rumford fireplace, plus a chef's kitchen with a walk-in pantry, walnut cabinets, and a coffee bar.

The more than 33-acre lot has two covered patios and a heated, attached garage. $4,595,000. Charlotte Durham, Big Sky Sotheby's International Realty, (406) 581-8891

Minneapolis

On the National Register of Historic Places, Frank Lloyd Wright designed the Usonian Frieda and Henry J. Neils House, a 1951 mid-century modern, stone-clad home overlooking Cedar Lake.

The L-shaped floor plan is anchored by a large fireplace, and the three-bedroom also includes larch paneling, marble stone walls, built-in furniture, and roof-line windows. A new garage is outside, plus patios, a firepit, and water views. $2,495,000. David Stickney and George Stickney, Coldwell Banker Realty, (952) 473-3000

Santa Barbara, Calif.

Built in 1977, this updated, open-plan, California modern-style home in Foothill has four bedrooms. The living room features wide-plank wood floors, tongue-and-groove wood ceilings, a stone fireplace, and a glass wall; the kitchen includes an oversized quartzite island; and a guest suite has a Japanese soaking tub.

The nearly 1-and-a-half-acre lot with ocean and mountain views spans seating areas, gardens, a chicken coop, yard, sheds, and citrus trees. $5,395,000. Cimme Eordanidis, Village Properties/Luxury Portfolio International, (805) 722-8480

East Hampton, N.Y.

This 1985 organic-modern home in the Clearwater Beach Association was gut renovated in 2025. The five-bedroom's great room features high ceilings and arched shelf niches, while a second living room has a large conversation pit under a skylight, and the primary suite’s oversized glassed shower includes a built-in bench.

A pool on the half-acre, fenced property is surrounded by yards, a deck, and a heated cabana. $2,650,000. Sotheby's International Realty - East Hampton Brokerage, Yorgos Tsibiridis, (646) 270-4544

Evanston, Ill.

Near Lake Michigan, this updated, 1955, three-bedroom ranch in a Chicago suburb is less than 10 minutes from town. The industrial modern style home includes exposed ducts, a black brick fireplace, dramatic chandeliers, and a kitchen with exposed brick and an eat-in quartz peninsula.

It also has a sunken dining room and primary bedroom with a glass slider to an outdoor space. The set-back lot has a fenced yard and brick patio. $550,000. Bryce Hoffman, Coldwell Banker Realty, (217) 502-4940

‘Live at Carnegie Hall’ by Cameron Winter

★★★★

While listening to this album’s opening track, “I hear the Great American Songbook compressed into a brilliant point of light,” said Walden Green in Pitchfork. Cameron Winter, the frontman of the rock band Geese, was just 23 when he took the stage at Carnegie Hall last December for a single solo performance in which he put away his guitar to accompany himself alone on a grand piano. The resulting album—and the concert film that’ll soon accompany it—may be exercises in mythmaking, but Winter earns his acclaim here. The more he strips down his sound, “the closer he gets to some platonic ideal of music,” and though his 2024 solo album provided most of his set, the three new tunes are “some of Winter’s very finest.”

Still, this record “might drive a further wedge between the believers and the skeptics,” said Mark Richardson in The Wall Street Journal. Winter’s “unusual” singing style is even more conspicuous here; if you can’t get past that, his gifts as a songwriter may escape you. Still, the album is inspiring “precisely because it’s challenging.” It’s fun engaging with music “that needs time to sink in.”

‘She’s the Best’ by Troye Sivan

★★★

“There seems no reason why Troye Sivan should still be a relative cult figure within pop rather than an actual multiplatinum star,” said Alexis Petridis in The ­Guardian. The fourth album from the 31-year-old Aussie native is packed with “very hooky” songs and evidence of his many A-list backers. They include Madonna, who signed off on his cribbing of a past hit for “Party,” a deadpan good-times anthem. But at least Sivan “seems to be using the space he occupies to his advantage, to push and experiment,” and to write lyrics “as unapologetically queer” as they are here.

She’s the Best is “easily his finest collection of songs to date,” said Craig Jenkins in NYMag.com. “On the surface, the album is an ode to women Sivan has called friends, collaborators, and defenders,” but it’s “perhaps more interested in unpacking the invisible strings of lust and yearning that drag Sivan off the couch night after night.” For now, club life answers his worries about failing to find a forever mate, and an array of producers help him connect to today’s “time-travel-pop wave” as he expresses those feelings. The effort leaves him “redefining himself from song to song.”

‘Dedicated to You’ by Branford Marsalis Quartet & Dianne Reeves

★★★

The 1963 album John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman “will always remain sacred,” said Jim Hynes in Glide. But in Coltrane’s centennial year, saxophonist Branford Marsalis and singer Dianne Reeves have reinterpreted the most revered ballads album in jazz and made it newly stunning. “For so many of us who have grown used to Hartman’s warm baritone over countless listens,” hearing a new vocalist sing the same six standards “can be ear-bending.” But Reeves “wrings every drop of emotion from the title track,” delivers a “flawless interpretation” of “You Are Too Beautiful,” and teams with pianist Joey Calderazzo for an endearing “My One and Only Love.”

Marsalis and his quartet fill out the album with three Coltrane instrumentals, said Chris Pearson in The Times (U.K.). Still, “it’s those vocals that stay with you.” Reeves, to her credit, “becomes very much part of the band, embedded, one of the instruments.” On “Lush Life,” she does so by singing the intro alone, then stopping halfway through for solos from Marsalis and Calderazzo that “echo and expand on her initial vocal, as if they are her thoughts.” It’s an “exceptionally brilliant” take.

“Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner’s marriage was not a marriage of equals,” said Sebastian Smee in The Atlantic. “Pollock was weak and Krasner was strong.” That dynamic comes across in the new joint exhibit at the Met. More importantly, the show “does each artist the honor of representing them at their best” and, by gathering so many of their exhilarating paintings, “makes a powerful case for abstract expressionism as an unassailable peak of 20th-century American visual expression.” It’s plainly “thrilling” to stand before a great Pollock or a great Krasner. And while Pollock’s groundbreaking drip paintings, the ones that made him America’s most famous artist, have lost none of their visceral power, this show “establishes beyond a doubt” that Krasner was both more talented than her hard-drinking, insecure husband and equally as accomplished and original. At Krasner’s peak in the late 1950s and early ’60s, the paintings she produced were better than any made by more celebrated contemporaries. Unfortunately, being Pollock’s wife, then widow, “meant being relegated to second place.”

“Right off the bat, the show opens with a big blast of Krasner,” said Holland Cotter in The New York Times. A half dozen large collage paintings, all from the mid-1950s, “look like a lineup of ghostly raised arms, but also like a garden grown wild.” One of them, 1955’s powerful Bald Eagle, incorporates scraps of both her husband’s drawings and her own earlier work. “Inevitably, and justifiably,” Pollock’s history-making canvases are presented in a huge gallery at the heart of the exhibition. These are the pictures that “brought a merging of paint, choreography, and gravity to the point of explosion,” prompting Life magazine to canonize Pollock in 1949 as arguably the country’s greatest living artist. But abstract expressionism, “like all radical art impulses,” soon lost its freshness, even for Pollock. He hit a creative block in the ’50s, returned to heavy boozing, and died in 1956 while driving drunk, about a mile from the eastern Long Island home he shared with Krasner. His young mistress survived the crash.

“By any reckoning, ‘Krasner and Pollock’ is one of the most gorgeously designed and ingeniously installed exhibitions in the Met’s history,” said Lucy Ives in Hyperallergic. And there’s little mystery about its subtext: We come seeking insight into how Krasner survived her entanglement with a needy, art-world comet, and how it all affected her art. As it unfolds the story in politely phrased wall text, the show “has all the sweetness of a gossip session with a cherished confidante.” Yet there’s “something breathtaking” about the way it “simultaneously undercuts Pollock and demonstrates why his priceless canvases remain relevant.” Here, amid 48 of his pieces and 74 of hers, his work matters most in the ways it contributed to Krasner’s artistic development. “I’ve never seen an upending quite like this.”

Kate Atkinson is the celebrated author of Life After Life, Case Histories, and 12 other novels set mostly in her native U.K. In her latest, Our Noble Selves, a former POW becomes a murder suspect while helping stage a 1951 festival intended to boost national morale.

‘Middlemarch’ by George Eliot (1871–72)

Essentially, Middlemarch is a historical novel, set in the period 50 years prior to its publication. Eliot’s breadth and ambition and energy in painting a picture of a society in the midst of cataclysmic change is astounding. I also think it’s a very romantic book—not something Eliot is often accused of.

‘Slaughterhouse-Five’ by Kurt Vonnegut (1969)

It took many years before Vonnegut felt able to give fictional shape to his experiences as a POW in the Dresden firestorm. The time-­ traveling, science-­fiction elements along with Vonnegut’s typical off-­kilter style work against the odds to make this—along with its ­ brother-in-arms, Heller’s Catch-22—one of the most powerful novels about World War II.

‘Persuasion’ by Jane Austen (1817)

I could have simply picked all six of Austen’s novels, but if I had to choose one, then this final one—a profound exploration of the human heart—would be the one. It is also about the pain of the path not chosen and the absolute powerlessness of women.

‘Parade’s End’ by Ford Madox Ford (1924–28)

This is cheating perhaps, because it’s actually a tetralogy that follows the fortunes of Christopher Tietjens from before the First World War and into its aftermath. It’s one of those novels—sorry, four novels—that I have trouble describing and am inclined to say, “Just read it.”

‘The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman’ by Laurence Sterne (1759–67)

Tristram Shandy is a very funny, digressive novel about a man trying to write his autobiography and failing to get past the first scene. I always remember my English tutor at university introducing it by saying that it was one of the first novels and also one of the first antinovels, although nowadays I think they would probably call it metafiction.

‘Just William’ by Richmal Crompton (1922)

I had a quietly passive only-­childhood, but ­William provided an alternative, escapist universe of naughtiness and high spirits. Even now, I would, if I could, be happy to live in William’s world. And have a dog called Jumble.

“It is a shame how many people wouldn’t dream of reading James Marriott’s eloquent, learned, and admirably brief book,” said Daniel Akst in The Wall Street ­ Journal. Reading is dying, as the 33-year-old London Times columnist tells us, so it’s inevitable that most of the public will miss out on the joys of following him as he lays out his concerns. The causes of his worries aren’t new. A 2022 survey found that in the previous 12 months fewer than half of American adults had read a book. A year later, another study found that in an average day only 16% read anything for pleasure. Of course, there’s “a lot more at stake” in this decline than good books being left unread. Marriott, by revisiting ties between the rise of mass literacy and mass democracy, “makes a strong case” that long-form reading is a necessary ingredient to sustaining the kind of rational and probing collective dialogue that has made mass democracy possible.

Marriott “might be insufficiently pessimistic,” said George F. Will in The Washington Post. Though he’s right that smartphones and the short-form videos they spawn have contributed to reading’s decline, the larger problem is that too many of our fellow citizens have become “pathetically nostalgic for the mental lassitude of pre-literate people.” It was not until the 18th century that large numbers of our forebears began reading widely, but we have them to thank for launching the modern age, and today, as childish thinking spreads, we’re seeing that “reason, tolerance, and progress are contingent, not inherent, facets of humanity’s story.” Marriott, “like many alarmists,” builds his argument on ­ cherry-picked data, said Chris Ferguson in Reason. He reports that reading scores for U.S. students hit an all-time low in 2024 without mentioning that they’d peaked in 2012, several years after the advent of smartphones. Meanwhile, the supposed link between literacy and healthy democracies is undermined by the highly literate societies that gave birth to the fascist regimes of 20th-­century Germany, Italy, and Japan.

“The New Dark Ages is too ominously titled,” said Michael O’Donnell in the Los Angeles Review of Books. Throughout the book, Marriott “thoughtfully acknowledges” evidence that reading and reason might not be utterly doomed, though he could have done more to acknowledge that the work many of us do still requires a lot of reading and writing. “Are we courting the same scenario as the Middle Ages, when a select few held the keys to knowledge, to the exclusion of all others? Probably not.” Still, “the thrust of Marriott’s ­argument — there is a decline in reading that is antithetical to the progress of the ­Enlightenment — strikes me as persuasive.”

Anyone shopping for airline tickets these days has likely experienced sticker shock, said Elaine Glusac in The New York Times. Airfares have “spiked,” with tickets now 24% higher on average than last year, the Consumer Price Index estimates, and holiday fares for Thanksgiving and Christmas approaching uncomfortable “new heights.” The question some consumers are asking is, Is the death of Spirit Airlines to blame? Possibly. Aviation analytics company Cirium looked at over 1,120 of the budget airline’s former routes and found that the “fares on more than 90% of those routes” have climbed since Spirit collapsed. “The median fare rose by 25.3%,” suggesting other airlines are feeling less pressure to keep a lid on their prices. “But price rises go beyond Spirit’s network” as well.

Fuel costs are the main factor, said Rio Yamat in the Associated Press. The price of “jet fuel has risen even faster than oil during the war” in Iran, since jet fuel competes with diesel for refinery space. But even if fuel prices suddenly drop, fliers might not see airfare reductions for months. Carriers “typically decide several months in advance how many flights to operate and seats to offer,” and they will try to lock in higher prices for as long as they can. Some blame can also be directed at what’s in your wallet, said Mark Kahan in The New York Times. The U.S. desperately needs more competition in air travel. But the legacy carriers get billions each year from banks that issue their popular reward cards. “These programs function as collateral, giving the biggest airlines access to inexpensive capital that their smaller rivals can’t match.” That is “the biggest barrier to another national carrier emerging” to keep fares in check.

There are still ways to find cheaper flights, said Megan Cerullo in CBS News. Flexibility with dates and times can lead to better deals, but it’s still best to book early. Google Flights recommends buying Thanksgiving flights in October, between 57 and 21 days before departure. For December holidays, look to book “56 days before departure” or around Halloween. Off-peak days are generally less expensive, especially Mondays and Tuesdays. Be careful if you want to ask AI for help, said Webb Wright in Gizmodo. I asked Meta’s new Muse AI agent for help “booking my holiday travel, something I have an annual habit of putting off until the last possible minute.” Bad idea. “I fell into a long and rather disorganized conversation” with my chatbot, which offered me “various flight itineraries” of questionable benefit. It’d be nice if Muse could simply search on Expedia, but AI agents aren’t allowed to access the site. For booking travel, AI “felt less like a seamless assistant than a slow and superfluous middleman.”

‘You Can See Everything’

Directed by Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim (R)

★★★★

“No two people will draw the same conclusions from this movie. That is part of what makes it a masterpiece,” said Shane O’Neill in The Washington Post. Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim’s unsettling portrait of convicted Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes became “the most anticipated documentary of the decade” when an “unnerving” teaser was released last month showing a smiling, unblinking Holmes in extreme close-up staring at Fielder and insisting on her guilelessness. Word spread that shortly before she reported to prison in 2023, she had invited Fielder, the idiosyncratic mastermind behind The Rehearsal, to bring his cameras into her home, and in the resulting three-hour film, “she doesn’t get any less weird or more scrutable.”

Somehow “more shocking, thornier, and revealing than billed,” You Can See Everything “plays like an unraveling of certainty in real time,” said Adrian Horton in The Guardian. Holmes continues to insist she did nothing wrong when she became a billionaire a decade ago by touting a breakthrough medical device that her company couldn’t build, said Owen Gleiberman in Variety. Yet when she heads to prison halfway through, bidding goodbye to her husband and two children, this already riveting film “truly takes wing.” Bringing in a stand-in for Holmes, Fielder keeps pushing to understand his subject’s apparent detachment from reality, until the movie becomes “an intricate investigation into, among other things, the incomprehensibility of love,” said Nick Schager in The Daily Beast. In the end, “it’s not just the film of the year.” It’s also “a documentary that stands shoulder to shoulder with the form’s all-time greats.”

‘Sense and Sensibility’

Directed by Georgia Oakley (PG)

★★★

The new screen adaptation of Sense and Sensibility is “not the lush, buttoned-up period drama of tradition,” said Nikki Baughan in Screen Daily. Director Georgia Oakley, coming off an acclaimed 2022 art house debut, clearly wanted to foreground relatable emotions over Regency-era costumery with her take on Jane Austen’s tale of the cash-strapped Dashwood sisters. “That’s not to say the film doesn’t look gorgeous.” But compared with Ang Lee’s “candy-colored” 1995 version, Oakley’s is “decidedly more grounded” as it once again lets us watch sensible Elinor and free-spirited Marianne pursue husbands after their father’s death lands them in relative financial peril. “For those of us who adore the 1995 film, unfavorable comparisons seem inevitable,” said David Rooney in The Hollywood Reporter.

Despite a “more than capable cast,” led by Daisy Edgar-Jones and Esmé Creed-Miles, the new movie has “a low-energy feel” in part because Oakley and her screenwriter “lean so heavily into Elinor and Marianne’s crushing disappointments and the forces holding them back in a period of vast gender inequality.” Fortunately, none of Oakley’s tweaks “dim the roiling passions of the sisters as they approach love from opposite ends of the emotional spectrum,” said Derek Smith in Slant. By focusing on Elinor and Marianne’s bond and how it’s tested by their different outlooks, this Sense and Sensibility “manages the difficult feat of breathing new life into these familiar characters’ interior lives.”

‘Misty Green’

Directed by Chris Rock (R)

★★★

“If Misty Green never comes apart at the seams,” it’s because Rosalind Eleazar “simply won’t let it,” said David Ehrlich in IndieWire. The Slow Horses actress is “never less than great” in the title role of Chris Rock’s new drama about a hot-mess Hollywood has-been who might just land a comeback role nearly 20 years after her peak if she can refrain from sabotaging herself for once. Rock’s “unkempt” script strains to combine a poignant character study with a scalding takedown of L.A.’s dream factory, and its excesses might have tanked the film if Eleazar didn’t hold it all together by “sheer force of will.”

The movie has “nothing insightful” to tell us about Hollywood’s dark corners that we haven’t heard already, said Alison Willmore in NYMag.com. The despicable side characters “feel a little easy,” starting with a producer, played by Adam Driver, who tempts Misty with drugs and lucrative sex work. Only one industry player comes across as noble—“probably because he’s played by Rock himself.” Fortunately, none of Rock’s misfires matter “once you lock into what Eleazar is doing,” said David Fear in Rolling Stone. She brings “nuance, shade, and emotional depth” to every story beat in Misty’s quest for redemption. “Eleazar doesn’t just make the movie work; she is the movie.” The TV veteran has never previously landed such a robust role, and “dear god, does she make the most of it.” She “deserves every accolade and every bit of the spotlight that Misty Green affords her.”

The data center boom has “entered a new, contradictory phase,” said Brian Martucci in Utility Dive. Construction activity on the massive warehouses filled with AI servers “remains robust.” But several billion-dollar projects are facing “a host of challenges,” including worker shortages, a lack of gas turbines, grid constraints, permitting delays, and widespread community opposition. The problems came to a head recently in New Mexico, when Oracle issued an unusual force majeure notice—normally reserved for insurance against “acts of God”—to “protect itself financially from the delay or cancellation” of its so-called Project Jupiter, after state regulators “blocked a gas pipeline proposed to serve it.” Google has also recently had to halt work on two data centers in Finland after a local outcry spurred an environmental review, while a Microsoft project in Michigan “faces an uncertain future amid local permitting delays.” Goldman Sachs estimates only 50% of planned data-center capacity may actually come to fruition in the near term.

That means the AI boom may soon hit a bottleneck, said Asa Fitch in The Wall Street Journal. Tech giants need “lots of data centers and electricity” to fulfill their ambitions, but the “delays are biting.” The amount of electricity demanded by data centers globally in the next two years “is enough to power around 118 million homes.” It’s curious that “chipmakers aren’t yet blaring their sirens” about the capacity squeeze. Possibly, that’s because they can’t even accurately tell “how much is being built”—and how much is being idled.

This “cornucopia of holdups” should be a wake-up call for investors, said Chris Bryant in Bloomberg. AI companies are spending billions “to secure precious supplies of computer memory” from chip makers like Nvidia and AMD. But if they can’t build data centers, they could end up “with too many chips and not enough operable server farms.” Almost half of the U.S. data-center pipeline is being built by first-time developers who have jumped into the gold rush, making big promises they might not deliver. It’s a “high-stakes game of musical chairs,” where losers will be left holding chips “without a seat.”

“Why assume the data center has reached its final physical form?” asked Todd G. Buchholz in The Washington Post. Historically, as technology has advanced, it’s gotten smaller. In 1946, a computer “took up the size of a house”; now it “fits in the palm of one’s hand.” Likewise, we can safely assume that the land, electricity, and equipment needed to produce a unit of intelligence will keep dropping. “That’s why communities should welcome new investment but insist that developers pay the costs of power, water, and grid upgrades.” The benefits from the technology will last for years, but the size of the physical footprint will not.

Trumpworld’s latest scandal “is an open-and-shut case of staggering corruption,” said Andrew Egger in The Bulwark. President Trump forced U.S. Ambassador to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle to resign recently after The Wall Street Journal reported she pressured Trump donor Eric Deters to cover her $100,000 American Express bill before her 2025 confirmation hearing. “Honey please I need you to get this done for me today,” she texted Deters. He had been asking her for favors, including help making an IRS audit disappear, and Guilfoyle—Donald Trump Jr.’s former fiancée—promised that if he paid off her debt, she’d be his “Trump ride or die” and introduce him to high- ranking administration officials. Deters didn’t acquiesce, complaining he’d already paid her $300,000 in “speaking fees.” While serving as ambassador, the Journal reported, Guilfoyle’s grifting continued: She often brought a Greek energy company lobbyist to official meetings of government officials and bragged about Greek tycoons funding her luxury travel. In resigning, Guilfoyle denied any wrongdoing, but Trump said, “We didn’t like what we were reading.”

Guilfoyle’s corruption was too blatant for Trump to ignore just before the midterms, said Nick Catoggio in The Dispatch, but she’s a dangerous person for him to alienate. As his son’s long time girlfriend and Trumpworld insider, “she’s assuredly learned too much about Trump family malfeasance” to be exiled with no means of support. Trump will likely “lateral her over to some private-sector position, buying her silence with a well paid sinecure.” Guilfoyle “isn’t the exception to the rule in how America’s third-world government operates.” In Trumpworld, “everyone is getting paid.”

That includes her ex-fiancé, said Robby Soave in Reason. “It’s fair to ask some questions about Trump Jr.,” who also had dealings with Deters, and whose May wedding was largely funded by a Russian oligarch. Trump’s sons are heavily invested in companies that have made billions in government business, while Democratic lawmakers have alleged conflicts of interest by Trump special envoys Steve Witkoff and the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who often mix diplomatic roles and business interests. Republicans eviscerated Hunter Biden for foreign dealings during his own dad’s presidency but are now responding to evidence of Trumpworld’s massive corruption with “stony silence.” It’s no surprise Trump’s “team of mercenaries” are using “their roles to cash in,” said David A. Graham in The Atlantic. “They learned it by watching him.”

What happened

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) came under federal investigation recently for her finances, just days after federal agents raided her home and issued subpoenas for her family members as part of a sprawling immigration probe that could produce criminal charges or a denaturalization case against her. The moves marked a dramatic escalation targeting one of President Trump’s most outspoken critics. Sources told The Washington Post that an investigative arm of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been looking into whether Omar, 44, or her late father lied about her birth date and omitted information about his past military service when they were immigrating to the U.S. from Somalia in 1995. Separately, U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro said her office is probing whether the representative inflated her net worth on financial disclosure forms, an allegation for which she had already been cleared by the Office of Congressional Conduct. Omar said Trump is trying “to target political enemies and weaponize federal law enforcement.

The search is a highly unusual breach of the “blackout” period customarily observed by the DOJ in the 60 days before an election, during which the agency typically refrains from taking any public actions that could imply partisanship or influence the election’s outcome. Speaking to reporters last week, President Trump denied that he had played a direct role in the raid on Omar’s residence but called her a “terrible person.” One senior Democrat told Axios that the search set off alarm bells within the party, which expects “more October surprises.”

What the columnists said

This shameful episode was clearly designed to cast “an air of suspicion and criminality” over one of the Democratic Party’s most prominent progressives, said Moira Donegan in The Guardian. Omar has frequently been targeted by the “conspiracist cesspool of the far-right internet,” which has circulated a number of unfounded rumors about her, including the allegation that she was once married to her own brother. Those attacks found their champion in Trump, who “has been smearing her,” and her country of origin, “for the better part of a decade.”

After repeatedly overreaching in other cases, the Trump administration doesn’t “deserve the benefit of the doubt,” said Rich Lowry in National Review. But Omar has done herself no favors by responding to legitimate questions about her background with “angry, uninformative dismissals.” For instance, she has called her father a teacher, when his obituary referred to him as “an esteemed senior officer in the Somali National Army.” Did he disclose that to U.S. immigration authorities?

This is Trump’s last midterm pitch, said Renée Graham in The Boston Globe: “Gutter racism.” That’s “the tie that binds Trump to his followers.” He amplified “disgusting lies” about Haitian immigrants in the 2024 presidential campaign and recently called New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, a Black woman, “a dog.” Trump must believe that appealing to the MAGA faithful’s worst selves will ensure they support his “worst-of-the-worst presidency.”

What happened?

Ukraine said its access to U.S. intelligence and crucial battlefield technology was abruptly curtailed this month, days after President Trump called for the ouster of the Ukrainian president and American officials reportedly threatened to cut military assistance to the war-torn nation. Trump turned on Volodymyr Zelensky after announcing that he’d struck a deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin to buy Russian diesel, a stunning reversal of the nearly five-year-old U.S. and Western campaign to economically punish Russia for its war of aggression in Ukraine. Eager to bring down the soaring price of diesel before the midterms, Trump said Russia would immediately supply 300,000 tons of the fuel, followed by an additional 4.5 million tons beginning in November. The deal, which could inject some $4 billion into Russia’s ailing economy, shocked European nations and angered Zelensky, who called it “a weak decision” that would allow Putin “to kill more” Ukrainians. Trump demanded Zelensky end Ukraine’s strikes on Russian oil refineries, which have caused fuel shortages in the country. When Zelensky said Moscow must first end its attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure, Trump said Zelensky must “damn well stop” and that Ukraine needs “a new leader who can make a deal” to end the war.

Three days later, Ukraine’s armed forces said their access to the Starshield satellite internet service—the military version of Starlink, used for communications and to pilot drone fleets—was being throttled. The cutback came soon after the country was hit by dozens of ballistic missiles, which took out power for 600,000 people in Kyiv, without America’s customary advance warnings. Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, which supplies Starlink under contract with the Pentagon, said any “limits on usage” are decided by the Pentagon “and ultimately POTUS.” The administration offered no comment, but Ukrainian officials—who Zelensky said had been threatened with an end to U.S. intelligence sharing—drew their own conclusions. “This action cannot be a coincidence,” said military adviser Serhiy Beskrestnov.

Democratic and Republican lawmakers assailed the diesel deal, which came a month after Trump signed a bill to impose tariffs on countries that import Russian oil. The U.S. “should not provide Putin with a financial life line,” wrote six senators, including Republicans Susan Collins of Maine and John Curtis of Utah. In striking a deal with “a murdering dictator,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Trump “makes us complicit.”

What the editorials said

Trump’s deal is “a moral and strategic mistake,” said The Wall Street Journal. With diesel above $6 a gallon, he wants to throw a bone to voters weeks before the midterms. But all this deal will do is “directly finance Putin’s bloody war in Ukraine.” Trump announced it after a week in which more than 100 Ukrainian civilians, including at least 20 children, were killed in Russian strikes. And he asked nothing of Putin in return. “The only pressure Trump ever applies is on Ukraine.”

“Trump has stooped to new lows,” said the Financial Times, and his hypocrisy here is “glaring.” Having assailed India and China for importing Russian oil and threatened tariffs and other sanctions on countries that buy from Moscow, he’s now ready to hand $4 billion to Putin’s murderous regime. It thoroughly “undermines the credibility of Western efforts to isolate Putin.”

What the columnists said

Trump’s deal is “a fraud on the American people,” said Andrew C. McCarthy in National Review. He’s “desperate” to show he’s doing something to bring diesel prices down, but short U.S. supply isn’t the problem—we’re the world’s top exporter. Even if it were, the amounts involved are “trifling.” The first shipment of 300,000 tons equates to about 2.2 million barrels. Our transportation sector alone uses “about 3 million barrels of diesel daily.”

Trump ridiculously blames Ukraine’s refinery attacks for Americans’ pain at the pump, said Jonathan V. Last in The Bulwark. But the real culprit is his failing Iran war, which has choked supply from the Middle East. And “Russia has been helping Iran the entire time.” It’s provided Tehran with satellite imagery, drone components, and explosives—all of which have been used “to kill American soldiers.” Now Trump is begging Putin to take our money for some fuel? It’s “the most stunning display of submission and weakness from an American president ever.

Trump has personal reasons for “going for Zelensky’s jugular,” said Edward Luce in the Financial Times. He vowed to end the Ukraine war within 24 hours of taking office. Since he won’t make demands of Putin, that required “Ukraine’s capitulation.” Zelensky understandably refused to surrender— turning himself into “a constant reminder of Trump’s dealmaking impotence.”

This grim debacle is the latest evidence that Trump’s relationship with Russia “remains intense, important, and very weird,” said Anne Applebaum in The Atlantic. Since his first Moscow visit in 1987, “he has loudly repeated Russian propaganda and reflected Russian views,” a stance that’s “remained remarkably consistent.” Whether he’s just a “useful idiot” or a “deliberate agent of the Kremlin” is open to debate, said David Rothkopf in The Daily Beast. But with his grotesque betrayal of Ukraine, it’s never been clearer that he’s a Putin “puppet” ready to place “Russian interests ahead of America’s.” It’s “a profoundly dangerous development,” and we can only hope that more Americans begin to “recognize that there is no greater enemy to this country than its own president.”

Williston, Vt.

On more than 11 wooded acres about 15 minutes from Burlington, this 2013 four-bedroom lodge home centers on a vaulted great room encompassing a kitchen with a C-shaped, double-height fossil-reef-topped island.

The timber-framed room also includes a floor-to-ceiling stone fireplace and a dining area with a window bench overlooking the trees. French doors open to walking trails, gardens, and a garage topped by an apartment. $2,495,000. Kathy O’Brien, Four Seasons Sotheby’s International Realty, (802) 343-9433

Bend, Ore.

Built in 2026, Harmony, a four-bedroom modern lake house in central Oregon’s Tanager Bend community, has a kitchen with vaulted, beamed ceilings, stone walls, wood-paneled appliances, and an oval stone island with seating and storage.

The great room echoes the stone-and-wood theme, and a glass wall looks out on a water-ski lake. Abutting old-growth ponderosa pines, the 2-acre property has a patio, yards, and landscaping. $5,285,000. Brian Ladd and Steve LaCrosse, Cascade Hasson Sotheby’s International Realty, (541) 633-4569

Portland, Ore.

This 2026 modernist four-bedroom in the Division/Clinton neighborhood features a clean lined kitchen anchored by a stainless-steel island with an Oregon white-oak panel. The home’s living room has exposed concrete walls, a wood-burning stove, and floor-to-ceiling oak built-ins.

Outside are bluestone patios, a modern pergola, a cedar sauna, and a guesthouse with a Brazilian granite island. Multiple cafés and shops are within walking distance. $4,647,484. Suzann Baricevic Murphy, (w)here, Inc., (503) 789-1033

Camas, Wash.

A new build, this sculptural modern home features a kitchen with a Verde Alpi marble island with rounded, reeded end panels; walnut cabinets; and herring bone wood floors.

Up the marble spiral stairs—or the private elevator—are four bedrooms; the primary has views of the Columbia River and a boutique-style walk-in closet. The lower level has a sauna, bar, and theater, and connects to a yard and patio. $2,788,000. Benson Bui and Matthew Tercek, Real Broker, (855) 450-0442

Marco Island, Fla.

This 1989 Mediterranean-inflected contemporary is built on a canal and features an open kitchen with a blue-toned waterfall island, made of Azul Macaubas quartzite, that seats four. The updated six bedroom features two primary suites and a lower level with a glass wine room tucked under floating stairs.

The lot has a pool and spa, a covered patio, an outdoor kitchen, and a private dock with a lift and a separate floating dock for smaller craft. $6,000,000. Lisa Pearl and Scott Pearl, Coldwell Banker Realty, (239) 248-2705

Minneapolis

In Old Town, this one-bedroom condo in a 2017 building has an updated kitchen with a three-seat Cambria quartz island with matching backsplash and stainless appliances. The space is lit by sun from a wall of south-facing windows.

It also includes a bedroom with floor-to-ceiling windows and a Calacatta-marble-clad bath. A balcony overlooks a walkable neighborhood with dining and shops, and building amenities include a gym and community room. $460,000. Mitra Rahimi, Verve Realty, (612) 718-1239

“In a more just world, Emmett Till would have returned to Chicago and been allowed the uneventful privilege of growing older,” said Skylar Mitchell in Essence. Instead, the 14-year-old’s life was violently cut short in 1955, when he tried to buy bubblegum while visiting Mississippi relatives and a white woman accused him of disrespecting her. A “remarkable” photo exhibition in the city of his birth is now asking us to imagine what Till’s life might have looked like. Composed of 160 photographs taken across the past seven decades by 118 photographers, the show suggests the jobs, romances, family life, and lazy afternoons that could have been his. Seventy-one years ago, a published photo of a brutalized Till lying in an open casket “exposed the terrible consequences of racial hierarchy” and galvanized the civil rights movement, but this show “asks more of the eye.” It urges us, by way of powerful images created by Gordon Parks, Carrie Mae Weems, Dawoud Bey, Robert Mapplethorpe, and others, to see Black life as it is, stirring us to cherish and protect it.

“Emmett would’ve been 85 this year, had he lived,” said Anya Sesay in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. His face “would’ve been seasoned with wisdom lines and wispy gray hairs,” much like the face captured by Terry Evans in his striking portrait Cliff Joseph (2015). Elsewhere, Adam Ekberg captures the radiance of the sun streaming through a forest canopy so vividly that “you can almost feel its warmth on your skin,” and you immediately realize that Till would have regularly experienced it, too. Images that evoke such universal sensations are “part of the exhibit’s brilliance.” Instead of offering a specific vision of the shape Till’s life might have taken, “each photograph compels us to make room for every version of who he could’ve been.”

Curator Sarah Elizabeth Lewis selected every image, but she didn’t work alone, said Susan Aurinko in Newcity. While poring over all 18,000 photographs in the MoCP collection, she regularly consulted with Wheeler Parker Jr., a minister who is now 87 and was Till’s cousin, best friend, and a witness to Till’s abduction by the two white men who lynched him. Once the photos were chosen, Lewis asked artists, scholars, and luminaries, including historian Lonnie G. Bunch III, singer John Legend, and painter Amy Sherald, to share their feelings stirred by the show’s title and any one of the images. Filmmaker Ava DuVernay chose Milton Rogovin’s informal, untitled portrait of a beautiful young Buffalo woman from his East Side, 1961-63 collection. “What we contemplate here is the girl that Emmett never got to meet,” DuVernay wrote. “The one who would have held his hand, and listened to his fears, and to his dreams.”

Why is this El Niño different?

It’s a result of the incredible amount of heat that has built up in the Pacific Ocean. El Niño occurs naturally every few years, when the Pacific trade winds that typically blow westward — from the Americas to Southeast Asia — either slow down or reverse course. When that happens, huge volumes of warm ocean water start moving from the western Pacific toward the Americas.

El Niño’s “function in the global earth system,” said climate scientist Daniel Swain, “is to release heat from the deeper oceans that has been temporarily stored there.” That release then warms the atmosphere, which in turn has a domino effect on weather patterns around the globe. “It is like throwing a stone into a lake,” said climate researcher Fred Kucharski. “The energy spreads all over the lake through wave propagation.”

No two El Niños behave the same way, but there are patterns: unusually heavy downpours and floods in the southern U.S., for instance, and brutal droughts and crop failures in the normally lush Amazon region. The water being pushed eastward by the current El Niño, which began this summer, is far hotter than anything recorded in recent decades — turning the phenomenon into a “super El Niño” that scientists warn could bring with it cataclysmic weather events.

What counts as a ‘super’ El Niño?

It’s determined by measurements from a vast area of the central and eastern equatorial Pacific. If the sea-surface temperature of that patch of ocean is at least 0.9 degrees Fahrenheit above average for several consecutive months, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declares the onset of El Niño. And when it’s 3.6 degrees or higher, it qualifies as a super El Niño. The current cycle shot past that threshold last month, when temperatures hit 5.49 degrees above average — the highest daily temperature on record.

Because the phenomenon typically reaches its greatest strength around December, NOAA says there’s a 75% chance that the current El Niño will exceed the strength of previous events dating back to at least 1950. “Most El Niño years are a nuisance,” said Julia Rizzo, a Latin America agribusiness analyst for Morgan Stanley, “but this one has the makings of a shock.” It’s already contributing to weather chaos around the world.

Where is it hitting hardest?

Hawaii is enduring an unprecedented hurricane season. In the space of a month, three storms have passed within 50 miles of the archipelago — the most ever in a single year. None made landfall, but Hurricane Lala in August dumped more than 45 inches of rain in some areas, triggering damaging landslides and flooding. Cooler ocean waters around Hawaii normally act like an anti-hurricane force field, but that protection has faded this year as ocean temperatures have spiked.

El Niño has had the opposite effect in the Atlantic. No hurricanes have yet been recorded there this season, thanks largely to fiercer upper-level winds tearing apart nascent storms. In Indonesia, unusually dry conditions are fueling a cascading series of forest and peatland fires. In Peru, the world’s largest catcher of anchovies, the fishing industry collapsed after the tiny baitfish abandoned the country’s waters for cooler northern climes. India’s monsoon rains, crucial for the country’s rice harvest, are running 15% below normal.

And conditions could worsen as the super El Niño intensifies: 2024 was the hottest year on record in part because of the combined effect of El Niño and human-caused climate change. In 2027, said Jonas Jägermeyr of Columbia University’s climate school, the super El Niño “could drive global temperatures and weather extremes to new highs.”

Are countries prepared?

Thanks to real-time tracking systems and predictive models, scientists and governments have a good sense of when El Niño’s worst effects will hit, and how strong they’ll be. That’s why Brazil has hired a record number of firefighters to combat expected blazes in the Amazon, and why numerous African countries are now stockpiling huge amounts of rice. At the very least, the world is more resilient than it was during the 1877–78 super El Niño, which killed more than 50 million people across India, China, Brazil, and elsewhere and has been called by researchers “the worst environmental disaster to ever befall humanity.”

Still, some experts say a humanitarian crisis is inevitable this year and next. A report from the University of Chicago’s Climate Impact Lab estimates that the extreme heat generated by El Niño will cause some 450,000 excess deaths globally, including 3,500 deaths in the U.S. Meanwhile, the World Food Program warns that crop failures and smaller harvests could push 50 million people into acute hunger.

How will El Niño affect U.S. weather?

States in the Pacific Northwest, northern Rockies, Plains, and Great Lakes typically get milder, slightly warmer winters during El Niño years, while precipitation increases across the Sun Belt. If that pattern holds this time, drought and wildfire risks could increase in Washington and Oregon, while wetter conditions might alleviate yearslong droughts in parts of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, and coat the southern Rockies with ample snow.

The prospect of a wetter, stormier winter has Southern California on edge —punishing waves can cause significant coastal flooding and erosion, leading to landslides and cliff collapse. The Golden State is also bracing for a massive pulse of warm water, known as a Kelvin wave, that is rolling toward its coast and could temporarily raise sea levels by 6 inches or more. Homes along the shoreline are especially at risk. “We need to be in the highest level of preparedness,” said Brett Sanders of the University of California, Irvine. “This is likely to be the most stressful winter we have had in a number of years in terms of waves.”

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Five-time Booker Prize nominee Sebastian Barry is the author of A Long Long Way, On Canaan’s Side, and Days Without End. The Irish author’s new novel, The Newer World, follows a formerly enslaved Tennessean who’s navigating America’s post–Civil War era.

‘Letters and Journals: Katherine Mansfield’ (1977)

The dark wind of a fatal illness blows through these letters and journals. Mansfield was only 34 when she died. She was the only writer that Virginia Woolf truly felt as a rival, and with very good reason. Buy it here.

‘The Last Chronicle of Barset’ by Anthony Trollope (1867)

Trollope had his manservant wake him early every morning and he would write till 8 a.m. By this method he managed to produce a great number of long, long books. The six volumes of the Barchester novels are crowned by The Last Chronicle of Barset, 900 pages of infinite readability. Buy it here.

‘The Great Fires: Poems, 1982–1992’ by Jack Gilbert (1996)

I met Gilbert briefly on an old track in the mountains of Paros in 1981, just a moment of two strangers passing and nodding and saying three words. His poems are classical, but severely and lovingly contemporary too. Buy it here.

‘Avid Reader’ by Robert Gottlieb (2016)

This is the generous autobiography of the greatest editor of his time. I had an exciting friendship with him in the last years of his long life. He referred at one point in passing to Toni Morrison’s Beloved—“which I just happened to edit.” Well, yes, my good Lord Bob. Buy it here.

‘The Journal of Sir Walter Scott’ (1890)

These poignant and revealing journals cover the years after the financial disaster that engulfed Scott. Instead of being declared bankrupt, he made an arrangement with his creditors that he would write his way out of difficulty. He is 54 in 1825 when he begins his diary; it ends about six years later, with his early demise. Almost on the stroke of that midnight, the debts were fully paid off. Buy it here.

‘The Hours’ by Michael Cunningham (1998)

This was the book everyone seemed to be reading in New York when I was there in 1998. Which was an encouraging fact, because it is in a way a very austere work of art, surreally channeling Virginia Woolf, its glistening surfaces suggesting somehow very great depths. If there are bookshops in heaven, I’d like to think Virginia Woolf was reading it too. Buy it here.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s “State of the Force” address had it all, said David Ignatius in The Washington Post: “the good, bad, and dangerous.” In September's histrionic speech, Hegseth strutted back and forth across a stage, combining culture-war rants “with genuinely radical” reforms. He declared he wanted “no fatties, no trannies, no beardos, no weirdos, no wimps, no radicals” in a military he’s refashioning with high-testosterone lethal patriots. He accused the media of treason for reporting his military’s Iran failures, and revealed he plans an overall 20% reduction in generals and admirals, continuing a purge that’s already eliminated 10% of top officers. But Hegseth also announced some sensible “attempts to transform a sclerotic Pentagon bureaucracy,” unveiling an “Autonomous Warfare Command” to oversee drone operations and enlisting tech founders Elon Musk and Palmer Luckey and former Republican House speaker Newt Gingrich to study the future of warfare. Quite intentionally, Hegseth is overturning “military norms as aggressively as President Trump has shattered those in other spheres.

Hegseth only proved again that he’s “manifestly unfit for his job,” said Tom Nichols in The Atlantic. His speech was “a partisan disgrace,” filled with childish insults and resentment. He’s creating an Office of Religious Affairs and directing cadets to get degrees at conservative Christian schools like Hillsdale College, instead of elite “woke factories” like Harvard. To “redefine the future of national defense,” Hegseth is giving his “three wise men” in Musk, Luckey, and Gingrich just 120 days. The overall goal is to ensure the military becomes “a MAGA-looking, MAGA-sounding, MAGA- believing, and MAGA-supporting Christian praetorian guard,” said Rachel E. VanLandingham in MS.now. “The ideological clowns are out,” Hegseth proclaimed, but he’s “the real ideological clown—and a dangerous one at that.”

Everyone underestimated the former Fox News host, said Emma Ashford in Foreign Policy. He’s become Trump’s “most influential senior official.” Hegseth helped persuade Trump to invade Iran when many aides warned against a prolonged quagmire. Trump has fired other Cabinet officials for incompetence, but Hegseth has escaped blame for the fiasco in Iran. Why? Everything about him is so “fundamentally Trumpian”—his hatred of the media, his macho posturing, his TV persona’s “obsession with image over substance.” Hegseth is Trump’s “central casting” idea of a tough military leader, so he’s keeping his job. “The results will not be pleasant.”

“Artificial intelligence is suddenly insanely good at math,” said Ben Cohen in The Wall Street Journal, which may be the best proof yet of the technology’s “accelerating and terrifying progress.” A few years ago, AI struggled with even basic math problems. But last month, OpenAI announced that one of its models had solved “the wicked Navier-Stokes problem that had vexed mathematicians for nearly a century.” Navier-Stokes was selected in 2000 as one of math’s seven unsolved “Holy Grail” problems, which Fields Medal– winning mathematician Alain Connes said at the time were “totally inaccessible to computers.” But a swarm of 10,000 OpenAI agents was able to produce an answer in only 88 hours. The company now says it is nearing proof of another one. In doing so, it is demonstrating “how the technology is getting much smarter, much faster than most people anticipated.”

Mathematicians are crying foul, said Zeynep Tufekci in The New York Times. Tristan Buckmaster and Levent Alpöge, who “had been trying for months” to crack the problem, say the new proof “ripped off their unpublished work, which also used an OpenAI model.” OpenAI denies it, but would the company “even be able to tell?” AI agents are “cheating, hacking, attacking, and manipulating whatever they can to arrive” at task solutions. The chilling effect this will have on academia is troubling. Why would mathematicians present at conferences or publish early work if an AI company can swoop in and “steal the thunder?” The issue is not just about plagiarism, said Sophia Chen in Wired. It’s how OpenAI did it. The company “approached the proof with brute force.” Mathematicians, by contrast, “aren’t focused on getting the right answer as fast as possible” but on applying a “thoughtful, deliberate” methodology that other scientists can follow. AI provides a “shortcut” in a way that undermines human understanding.

The stakes go beyond “esoteric discussions” of theories few people understand, said the Financial Times in editorial. From “Archimedes leaping from his bath to Newton being hit on the head by a falling apple,” mathematics has benefited from there “being a person moving through the material world.” The Navier-Stokes problem itself “relates to the flow of fluids such as water and air.” Letting machines skip to an “opaque” solution could “deprive us of essential knowledge” we might discover along the way. This isn’t the “end of mathematics,” said Dana Mackenzie in The Washington Post. In 1997, when world champion Garry Kasparov unexpectedly lost a match to Deep Blue, an IBM-built chess computer, players claimed computers would make the game obsolete. But the opposite happened. The internet democratized the game, opening it up to millions and turning “grandmasters into media stars.” Chess didn’t die; it’s more popular than ever. And math won’t die either.

‘The Everywhere Millionaire: Who Is Really Rich in America and How They Got There’ by Owen Zidar and Eric Zwick

“When we talk about wealth, mainly we talk about billionaires,” said John Lanchester in The New Yorker. “But what if there were another group that, without drawing much attention, had grown collectively 13 times richer than the Forbes 400?” In their “brilliant” new study, economists Owen Zidar and Eric Zwick call attention to America’s Main Street millionaires, in particular the roughly 3 million owners of private businesses whose household net worth is at least $5 million. These are often stealth magnates—car dealers, beverage distributors, partners in law firms or medical practices—and they tend to have amassed their wealth through sustained hard work. “Unfortunately, there is a shadow side,” because they’ve also been so effective at wielding political clout that they’ve helped make life harder for many Americans. For now, “the best we can probably do about this concentration of wealth and power is to see it and name it, and that’s what Zidar and Zwick have done.”

The authors’ “eyeopening” account traces the rise of everywhere millionaires to the Tax Reform Act of 1986, said Greg Rosalsky in NPR.org. The bipartisan congressional bill cut tax rates, setting the top individual tax rate lower than the corporate tax rate. This triggered an explosion of so-called pass-through businesses, which pass profits directly to owners, who in turn pay taxes on that income at the lower rate. In 1980, pass-through businesses were small potatoes. “By 2011, they were generating more income than all traditional U.S. corporations combined—and accounting for most of the rise in the share of income flowing to the top 1%.” Zidar and Zwick, who identified this new millionaire class by diving deep into IRS records, have now attached their findings to “a colorful cast of characters,” including Chicago hot dog king Dick Portillo and other gogetters who started with nothing and made fortunes on surprising long-term bets.

“Zidar and Zwick tell this story with admirable clarity and precision,” said Nico Taylor in The Baffler. Though their “quasi-scholarly” language “can be bland at times,” it’s “a testament to the authors’ expository finesse that they manage to make fiscal history occasionally gripping.” Their book will be “of great interest” to readers who believe the rich now have the system rigged, said The Economist. As the authors point out, many everywhere millionaires enjoy the same luxuries as billionaires without attracting negative attention, and meanwhile they win new tax breaks and push through regulations that limit competition in their fields, including real estate sales, medicine, and law. But as critical as the book can be of millionaires, it “will appeal even more to those who hope to join their ranks.” Clearly, “much of the spoils of capitalism are still won by those who roll their sleeves up,” and “that is a great thing.”

‘The Vanishing Family: Love, Fate, and the Quest to End Dementia’ by Robert Kolker

Robert Kolker’s latest book “reads like a medical detective story,” said Carissa Wong in New Scientist. In a family of nine brothers and sisters, one after another of the siblings began exhibiting dramatic personality changes shortly before or after reaching the age of 40. Those afflicted became both apathetic and unable to read social cues, making them unrecognizable even to their spouses. Years passed before doctors solved the mystery, first attributing the behavioral changes to frontotemporal dementia (FTD), then linking that rare condition to a genetic mutation. But especially for anyone grappling with dementia in any form, there’s far more to The Vanishing Family than its initial mystery. “It is a tale of enduring love and devastating grief. It also offers a window into the neuroscience that could one day deliver a cure.”

Kolker, to his credit, “has written the biography of a family, making sure that each member is memorialized,” said Jennie Erin Smith in The Wall Street Journal. The siblings’ mother had FTD first, but her behavioral changes were attributed to alcoholism, and she died at 62 before anyone suspected otherwise. Christy, the first sibling to experience symptoms, was not yet 40 when, in the mid-1990s, she was dismissed from her executive position and soon after lost her husband and all interest in her children. The family’s story is mostly told from the perspective of Barb, the youngest sibling, who pushes for answers but puts off obtaining her own genetic test results. Kolker, author of the 2020 best seller Hidden Valley Road, once again proves to be “a keen interpreter of the science and subjective experience of mental illness.”

“For Kolker, the slipperiness of identity has been a recurrent theme,” said Julia M. Klein in The Atlantic. Here, he forces us to consider whether any of us have a fixed personality if FTD or Alzheimer’s can rewire it. Even so, his greatest achievement is “once again reportorial,” because “he has persuaded nearly every family member, the sick and the well, to confide in him.” His findings belie his book’s title. As healthy siblings care for the afflicted, the sprawling family “becomes, if anything, more unified— bonded, however imperfectly, by love.

The legal system is creaking into motion, said former federal prosecutor Mimi Rocah in MS.now, but for Jane Doe it’s “too little, too late.” Amid a “firestorm of outrage,” Matthew Van Houten, district attorney for New York’s Tompkins County, agreed recently to reopen a criminal investigation into the alleged 2024 sexual assault and rape of a Cornell University sophomore by seven fraternity members. Van Houten said he initially dropped the probe because the then-20-year-old complainant— referred to only as Jane Doe—had described her drug use and sexual activity at the Chi Phi frat house “as voluntary, conscious, and consensual” in a statement. But that statement was a six-page summary of longer interviews by Cornell campus police, the transcripts of which tell a very different story. In them, Doe says the encounter began consensually with two men, but that five others later joined in, by which point she was too intoxicated on alcohol and ketamine to consent, and that she was “100% confident” she’d been raped. Van Houten never read those transcripts, or the Snapchat messages in which one of the accused allegedly told his frat brothers there was “free pussy” upstairs. Another frat member later asked, “Shop still open?” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has now handed the case to state Attorney General Letitia James. But rape is notoriously hard to prosecute, let alone years after the fact. The case against the “Cornell 7” seems “set up for failure.”

Hasn’t justice already been done? asked Byron York in the Washington Examiner. Cornell did its own investigation in 2024, after which it “shut down the Chi Phi fraternity house,” expelled two men, suspended two more, and banned another from campus. The final two men, found not to have played a significant role in events, were ordered to write “reflection papers.” The names of the seven—all of whom deny rape—have also been published, and they’re facing damages from Doe’s civil suit. Van Houten “had to go,” said former federal prosecutor Elie Honig in New York. Reports of how he failed to interview witnesses or gather evidence have eroded public confidence in the justice system. But just as “corrosive” is the appointment of James, a showboating prosecutor who has already “publicly prejudged” the Cornell 7 in social media posts pledging to “stand with” Doe.

The legal cases will rise and fall on the “technical question of consent,” said Natalia Bower in her Substack newsletter. But what’s legal and what’s moral are two different things, and society gets to impose “consequences” for legal but immoral behavior. The Cornell 7 knew they’d hurt Jane Doe. This is apparent from their group chat, which finds them discussing how to dissuade her from pressing charges, and from messages to Doe herself, in which one apologizes for letting things get out of hand. Whatever else may come to light, we already know “more than enough to drag these men’s reputations through the mud,” as they gleefully dragged Jane Doe’s.

All the ketamine and Snapchatting makes this case seem very modern, said Caitlin Flanagan in The Free Press, but generations of American college women have learned the hard way to “never go upstairs in a fraternity house.” Why do women keep venturing, “decade after decade,” into these “fortresses” of violence and stunted masculinity? Many go in search of good men—but they are in pitifully short supply. Of all this story’s awful details, perhaps the saddest and most enraging is that when those messages went out, inviting dozens of Chi Phi brothers to join in the unfolding horror, not one of them “was man enough to shut it down.

A car is quickly becoming one of the costliest things you can own, said Venessa Wong in MarketWatch. Between rising gas prices, steep insurance rates, and hefty repair bills, U.S. households are spending more than is recommended getting from A to B. That’s not even including the cost of the vehicle itself. “The average new car” in the U.S. is “now selling for more than $50,000,” while the average interest rate on a new-car loan is 6.35% — up from 4.09% in 2021. That double whammy is “making it harder for car buyers who need financing.” Most financial experts “recommend larger down payments to reduce the amount borrowed,” but a growing share of buyers “have been moving in the opposite direction”—borrowing more over longer periods. “You’re looking at a clear recipe for long-term financial strain,” said Jessica Caldwell, head of insights at Edmunds.

Even used cars are expensive, said David Welch in Bloomberg. New vehicles selling for record prices are still commanding “hefty premiums when they hit the used market,” pushing the average used-car price above $30,000, up from about $20,000 in 2019. The problems with the car market began during the pandemic, when a supply crisis paralyzed global auto sales. But that experience “also taught auto companies a lesson: Producing fewer, high-priced models means better profits.” Those higher prices have also helped cushion the blow from President Trump’s tariffs and the higher price of diesel that truckers need to ship cars around North America. That’s all trickling down to the used-car lot. Six years ago, a $10,000 to $15,000 budget could buy a five-year-old car with about 58,000 miles. Today, the same amount gets you a roughly nine-year-old car with close to 100,000 miles.

Longer loans aren’t “necessarily a bad thing for car buyers,” said Mike Winters at CNBC.com, as long as they make their payments for the life of the loan. Where buyers get in trouble is “if they want or need to replace the car before they’ve paid down enough of what they owe.” Because borrowers “typically pay down their loans more slowly in the early years, when more of each payment goes toward interest,” a longer loan leaves “the borrower owing more as the car loses value.” That balance then “gets rolled into the next car loan,” steepening the financial hole until it becomes so-called permanent car debt.

The bottom line is Americans need cheaper car options, said The Washington Post in an editorial, and that’s where Chinese cars can make a big difference. China’s auto industry appears “to have genuinely advanced the technological frontier of making cars more efficiently,” which translates into affordability. BYD’s Seal EV, comparable to a Tesla Model 3 sedan, lists for $24,190. U.S. consumers “should be allowed to reap those cost savings.”

‘Crisco’ by Miranda Lambert

★★★

With her 10th studio album, Miranda Lambert “teaches an ages-old genre some new steps,” said Joseph Hudak in Rolling Stone. The Texas-born multi-Grammy winner is by no means abandoning country, but by stirring in some disco and yacht rock, the 42-year-old singer-songwriter “shoots down any preconceived notions about who Miranda Lambert is.” She first “dipped her cowboy boot into disco” for “A Song to Sing,” a 2025 duet with Chris Stapleton that appears here and provides the “dreamy, mirror-ball vibes” that set the tone for the rest of this album. Because Lambert also sounds “more effervescent and ballsy than ever,” the results often feel like a party. Unfortunately, Crisco is “all crust, and no filling,” said Kyle Coroneos in Saving Country Music. It’s a fun record, with a strong concept that lets Lambert mix in plenty of vintage sounds. But despite “some impressive moments,” the album is packed with catchy songs that “don’t really say much of anything.” Exceptions include “To Everything” a mid-tempo ballad with real emotion. With more of those, “Crisco could have been more than just a shallow nostalgia kick.”

‘Popstar’ by Tinashe

★★★

“There are no bad Tinashe albums,” said Anna Gaca in Pitchfork. But her eighth might be “the best pop album of the year,” the kind that’s “fresh in the best way” because it’s “a little bit avant-garde” yet “immediately accessible.” It feels driven by “a sense of purpose—a compulsion, even—about connecting sounds circulating in pop, electronic, and dance music right now.” It packs in “dozens of brilliant little moments,” and though it takes cues from Blackout-era Britney Spears and FKA Twigs’ Eusexua, it remains “super recognizably Tinashe,” foregrounding her voice, her taste, and her cultural points of reference as a child of Southern California. “The whole album hopscotches between experimental and pop modes,” said Tobias Hess in The Fader. The experimental “Flashbacks” is a gem, combining drums that sound like pots and pans with a “glitched-out” chorus in which she boasts of giving a lover flashbacks to past bedroom romps. While the song evokes Charli XCX’s recent devotion to personal transparency and Rihanna’s knack for unforgettable hooks, “there are no other pop stars I can imagine making a track like this.”

‘Musk’

Directed by Alex Gibney (R)

★★★

“As a character study, Musk is fascinating,” said Bilge Ebiri in NYMag.com. “As a warning about our future, it’s terrifying.” Alex Gibney’s nearly four-hour long documentary, which has drawn insults and legal threats from its subject, “gives us both the myth and the reality,” turning back the clock on Elon Musk’s story to revisit all the pitches he’s made for his business ventures that have obscured troubling truths—such as the deadly unreliability of the self-driving software in Tesla’s cars. Viewers will come away convinced the world’s richest man mostly excels at self-promotion; they’ll also be frightened by the power he’s accrued. Still, you have to wonder: “Will it speak primarily to the converted?” Though Gibney’s film will surely spawn viewer nightmares, said Ben Croll in The Wrap, “it takes some time getting there.” The first half, which covers Musk’s early history as an entrepreneur, “charts a trajectory of upward failing” that enriches him enough to fund SpaceX, his reputation-making breakthrough.

The “more scabrous” post-intermission second half paints him as a man undone by the pandemic shutdown, but turns devastating only when it details how many millions will die as a result of his detour into slashing government jobs and aid programs for President Trump. When Ashley St. Clair, a recent Musk ex and the mother of one of his 14 known children, calls him “a nuke,” it chills. Some of Gibney’s daring formal choices, including having many of his subject’s past public statements spoken by a computer-animated Musk avatar, prove distracting, said David Fear in Rolling Stone. Still, once Musk builds its case that a man with a god complex has built an empire whose satellites, rockets, social media platform, and personal wealth give him enormous sway over our present and future, “it’s hard not to feel a deep sense of despair.”

‘Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother’

Directed by Bassam Tariq (R)

★★★

With his latest screen turn, twotime Oscar winner Mahershala Ali has given Hollywood “a new kind of action hero,” said Stephanie Zacharek in Time. Latif, a hitman who’s also a father of three and a practicing Muslim, faces compounding crises when his wife dies, leaving him with a newborn who can’t tolerate formula. The role gives Ali “plenty to work with,” because Latif’s quest to secure breast milk for his youngest helps pull him into the middle of a war between a porn king and a gold-toothed Christian fanatic played with aplomb by John Cho. And while the film is “most entertaining when it indulges its tawdry side,” it tangles credibly “with complex issues of faith.”

Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother “doesn’t completely cohere,” said Nick Schager in The Daily Beast. Writer-director Bassam Tariq is good at bringing out Latif’s struggles with faith and rapport with his children, but “there’s far too little focus on the adrenalized action,” and the hero’s compelling story arc is “sabotaged” by a “too-comforting” finale. Still, this picture, named after an Islamic hadith, “lives a notch above most action films,” said Alissa Wilkinson in The New York Times. While its violence is “shockingly graphic in places,” the film is beautifully shot, “crackles with tension,” and features standout performances from Ali and the actress Adia, who plays Latif’s teenage daughter. This is a movie that asks if a person who strives to be good can be forgiven for the worst they’ve done, and “when it’s in its rhythm, it’s a great story.”

What happened?

The U.S. election map appeared to shift in favor of Democrats recently, heightening Republicans’ fears that voters angry over the Iran war and the rising cost of living are poised to deliver the GOP a midterm drubbing. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report moved three key Senate races toward Democrats, who must pick up four GOP seats to win control of the chamber. New Hampshire went from “toss-up” to “lean Democrat”; North Carolina from “lean Democrat” to “likely Democrat”; and Kansas, where megachurch pastor Adam Hamilton is neck and neck with Republican incumbent Sen. Roger Marshall, from “lean Republican” to “toss-up.” Seemingly giving up on North Carolina, where former Democratic governor Roy Cooper has a comfortable lead over Republican Michael Whatley, the top GOP Senate super PAC canceled its ads there and shifted funding to South Carolina—which Trump carried by 18 percentage points in 2024— and Kansas, which hasn’t elected a Democratic senator since 1932. A New York Times/Siena poll found Democratic Senate candidates leading in reliably Republican Ohio, Alaska, and Texas, and one point behind in Iowa. With Democrats favored to take the House, a GOP strategist drew lines to the blue wave of 2006. “If the bottom continues falling out,” he told Politico, “this will be worse.”

President Trump floated suspending the federal gas tax to ease anger over pump prices averaging $4.50 a gallon, a move that would require congressional action. Trump, whose approval rating hit a record-low 32% in a new Reuters/Ipsos poll, held rallies in Alabama, Ohio, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Texas. The dire polls are “fake,” Trump said in Mobile, Ala., and “don’t account for the fact that Trump is out campaigning.”

What the columnists said

A huge cash advantage was “supposed to be the GOP’s ace,” said Isaac Arnsdorf in The Washington Post. Since Labor Day, Republicans have poured half a billion dollars into competitive House and Senate races. But Democrats’ advantage on a generic congressional ballot has only widened since then, from about 6 points to 9, according to one polling average. Over $190 million in attack ads aimed at Democratic Senate candidates James Talarico in Texas and Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan hasn’t moved the needle—El-Sayed’s favorability is up 5 points since August, according to Fox News surveys.

Democrats are gaining ground with several key groups, said Ruth Igielnik in The New York Times. They include voters under 30, who in the Times/Siena poll favored Democrats by 30 points, and Latinos, who favored Democrats by 24 points in a recent NBC News/Telemundo poll, up from 12 points before the 2024 election. And in nearly every state the Times polled, Democrats are winning among independents, “the bloc of swing voters that typically decides elections.” The polls could be wrong, said Jim Newell in Slate. They’ve previously “underestimated Republican energy in the Trump era,” by failing to reach enough white, noncollege voters. Since those abound in red states like Kansas and Iowa, “the error there will be greater if pollsters are missing this cohort again.”

If the polls are right, Republicans see a potential “lifeline” in left-leaning New Hampshire, said Ken Thomas in The Wall Street Journal. John Sununu—a moderate former one-term senator— is narrowly trailing Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas, who has for months “been urging the national party to avoid complacency in the battleground state.” Maine, where longtime Sen. Susan Collins is in a tight race with Democrat Troy Jackson, could give Republicans another swing-state win.

But it’s a marker of Republicans’ vulnerability that Democrats have “found an opening in one of America’s reddest states,” said Lauren Egan in The Bulwark. Trump won Kansas by 21 points in 2016, and 16 points in 2024. But Democratic Senate challenger Hamilton has “run a masterful race” pitched to the center—and he’s been aided by Trump policies. Medicaid cuts are squeezing rural health care providers in the state. Its farm industry, already hit hard by tariffs that shrunk exports, is now struggling with the soaring price of diesel for tractors and combines. And ICE raids at meat- processing plants have “enraged” those in the livestock industry.

That Kansas is in play beggars belief, said Jeffrey Blehar in National Review. “This stubborn, spiritually rhomboid state” has voted GOP in every federal statewide race “since an aberrational blip at the dawn of the Roosevelt administration.” But such is the effect of Trump’s agenda on “otherwise deep-red, agribusiness heartlands.” I believe Marshall will pull it out, but with rough weather ahead for the GOP, the state is “officially on tornado watch.” The “conditions for a freak event are now fully in place.”

San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato

Villa Pacifica, a Mexican-modern three-bedroom located in the arts-rich Central Highlands city, is in the Centro Histórico area. The vaulted living room features a stone, floor-to-ceiling linear fireplace surround, heated floors, a wood tejamanil ceiling, and a glass wall; the stone-walled kitchen has a breakfast nook.

A sunroom and a balcony overlook the yard and garden. Restaurants and shops are walkable. $1,250,000 USD. Anne Martin Jones, CDR Bienes Raices San Miguel/Luxury Portfolio International, +52 (415) 178-0737

Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco

This Spanish Colonial Revival villa in a coastal vacation destination is on a hillside with ocean views. The three-bedroom has saltillo tile floors, textured walls, arched doorways, exposed beams, and decorative tiles; the primary bedroom opens to a balcony with a hot tub; and the vibrant kitchen includes stainless appliances.

Outside are a pool with lion fountains, a lounge area, and a grilling station. $985,000 USD. Marta Huante, P.V. Realty, S.A. de C.V./Luxury Portfolio International, +52 (322) 102-0010

Mexico City

Casa Thiers, in Anzures, an area within Miguel Hidalgo, is a 1949 Spanish-European-style estate. The six-bedroom main building has a central room with double-height, carved, coffered ceilings, stained glass, columns, and a single-piece Carrara marble staircase, while formal rooms feature original inlaid floors and a kitchen has marble counters and high-end appliances.

The property includes a two-bedroom guest house, a pool, terrace, and wood-fired oven. $5,642,336 USD. Maricruz Madrigal, Mexico Sotheby's International Realty, +52 (55) 5929-5252

Huatulco, Oaxaca

Overlooking the Gulf of Tehuantepec in a coastal town, this 1993, eight-bedroom estate has Mediterranean and Balinese influences across multiple structures. A cluster of two-bedroom bungalows have colorful details, and a dining and living area is topped by a hand-woven palapa and anchored by amate trees.

Outside are a tennis court, pool, hot tub, patios, and a cable car connecting to a private beach. $8,000,000 USD. Laura de la Torre de Skipsey, Mexico Sotheby's International Realty, +52 (55) 3466-6198

La Paz, Baja California Sur

Built in 2025, Equinox, a modern home on the Baja peninsula overlooks the Gulf of California. The minimalist, open-plan five-bedroom features marble floors, walls of glass framing the water, a floating wood staircase, a white kitchen, and baths punctuated with decorative tile.

Sliders open to a terrace with an infinity pool, a spa, and desert landscaping. Beaches, dining, and shops are a short drive. $5,900,000 USD. Vanessa Fukunaga, Engel & Völkers Snell Real Estate, +1 (310) 728-5915

Bucerias, Riviera Nayarit

A block from Playa Bucerias on Banderas Bay about 13 miles from Puerto Vallarta, this furnished two-bedroom condo can be closed or opened into one or two units. The boho-inflected design includes rattan pendants, ceramic tile floors, and an open kitchen with an eat-in peninsula.

Glass doors open to a balcony; amenities include a shared pool, hot tub, gym, and deeded underground parking. $379,000 USD. Curtis Brownlee, MexHome Real Estate - Bucerias, +52 (322) 368-8897

Meta’s Muse is “the most useful AI app I have ever used,” said Eli Tan in The New York Times. I’ve had it “perform dozens of day-to-day tasks,” from ordering my groceries to looking up recipes to “setting my fantasy football lineups.” The AI agent “called my dental insurer” on my behalf, gave “it my member ID, answered a security question, and waited on hold before transferring me to the representative— just as I had asked it to.” It’s like having a personal assistant. “While the agent worked, I watched its movements through a tiny browser window, where it navigated websites like a human with a mouse and cursor.” Muse wouldn’t make a purchase without checking with me first, but to get the most out of it, I did give the AI agent access to “my bank accounts and apps like Google Docs, Gmail, Ticketmaster, OpenTable, and Google Sheets,” which might be a bit too much personal information for some people.

Muse’s abilities to “browse the internet on your behalf” are “genuinely impressive,” said Reece Rogers in Wired, but this is also Meta we’re talking about. When I tried it, it was hard to avoid wondering if Muse was “more obsessed with collecting data about me” than actually helping me. The agent has a long-term memory that “stores details about your interactions and preferences.” The more I used it, every interaction “started to feel like a guise for me to upload more data about myself” to Meta, which will soon debut an always-on palm-size “Charm” pendant loaded with Muse.

Agents are only as good as the services they can tap into, said Dave Lee in Bloomberg. Already, Amazon has blocked Muse “from accessing its store,” citing “security and data privacy.” But more likely it’s because “Amazon would much prefer people to use its AI shopping bot instead.” Other competitors will likely put up barriers, which kills the fun of having AI at your beck and call. “What good is a Google AI assistant if it can’t buy things from Amazon or look up things on community groups on Facebook?”

Muse is still fun, said Michael Brendan Dougherty in National Review, and these “friendlier consumer forms of agentic AI” are a pleasant respite from all the doom and gloom we keep hearing from the frontier labs like OpenAI and Anthropic. Finally, it seems, AI has found a way to be useful. Maybe too useful, said Allison Johnson in The Verge. The “question we need to ask ourselves as we enter the era of AI agents is what we do with the time” we’re freeing up. Will we use it “to take on more commitments?” Or will we let our chatbots sit on hold with the insurance company while we go outside for a stroll or a hike?

“For decades, conservative evangelicals have controlled the image of the politically active Christian,” said Jia Lynn Yang in The New York Times. The religious right turned tens of millions of Christians who rejected America’s “rapidly liberalizing culture” into a durable voting bloc, enabling Donald Trump’s rise and achieving “once- unthinkable” goals, such as overturning the right to abortion. But as Americans reject the Trump administration’s “litany of moral outrages,” including mass deportation and the withdrawal of food aid and health care, a new coalition may be quietly emerging: the Christian left. The movement’s most prominent spokesman is James Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian surging in the polls in his U.S. Senate race in Texas with rhetoric “drawn straight from the Gospels.” At least 12 pastors, seminarians, and former clergy have run for federal office as Democrats this year—a number “ unheard-of in recent memory.” In many red states, these Christian Democrats are gaining ground with voters who see religion as “a moral compass rather than a political agenda.”

Talarico’s progressivism is a “cheap misuse” of Christian teaching, said Rich Lowry in National Review. His rhetoric “waters down the Scriptures” to make it sound like God has endorsed “his version of Medicare for All.” Jesus preached personal charity toward the poor and the sick, but he said nothing about universal health care, food stamps, or government redistribution of wealth. As he tries to win over right- leaning Texans, Talarico has also conveniently backed away from the “extremely woke” views he espoused a few years ago, including his claim that God is “nonbinary.”

The Christian right created this opening, said Moira Donegan in The Guardian. Those hypocrites lost the moral high ground when they embraced the “ostentatious lasciviousness” of Trump and his Epstein- adjacent allies. In Trump’s GOP, “the preachers have retreated, and the perverts have taken over.” It’s no wonder Republicans are panicking, said Amanda Marcotte in Salon. Talarico represents “an existential threat to the Right’s long- standing myth that to be Christian must necessarily mean voting Republican.” The Democratic Party really is “a better fit for people who claim allegiance to Jesus Christ, who called on followers to feed the hungry and welcome the stranger.” One prominent Texas pastor recently preached that there can be only two types of Christians: Christian conservatives and conservative Christians. “They do not want their followers peeking behind door No. 3.”

What is kratom?

Derived from the leaves of the kratom tree, the legal high is sold in convenience stores, smoke shops, and service stations across the U.S. with the pitch that it can ease pain and boost energy. As use has increased—some 5 million Americans have tried kratom, turning the drug into a billion- dollar industry—so have its harms. More than 5,200 people fatally overdosed on kratom between 2020 and 2024, according to the CDC, and kratom-related hospitalizations and poisonings have rocketed nearly 1,300% over the past decade, with nearly 3,500 people severely sickened last year. Authorities found packages of the drug while investigating the mysterious deaths of two University of Mississippi undergrads, ages 18 and 20, in separate incidents recently. Responding to growing concern, the Drug Enforcement Administration this summer temporarily classified three kratom derivatives as federally illegal Schedule 1 substances, a category that includes heroin and LSD. But the Department of Health and Human Services emphasized the change was “not intended to regulate natural leaf kratom,” only synthetics and concentrates of its psychoactive compounds. Many experts call that insufficient—and suggest ties between Trump Cabinet members and kratom firms could be influencing regulations. “It’s looking like we have a coin-operated drug policy,” said former White House adviser Dr. Kevin Sabet.

What effect does kratom have on users?

Low doses have a stimulant effect; people in Southeast Asia, where the tree is native, have for centuries chewed leaves as a pick-me-up. But in higher doses, kratom acts as a narcotic, because two psychoactive compounds— mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine (7-OH)—bind to the same receptors as opioids. “If you take two pills it’s like a cup of coffee,” podcaster Joe Rogan said in 2019. “I took eight and I was f---ed up.” Kratom leaves are typically imported from Indonesia and processed stateside into capsules, gummies, and other products. While natural kratom contains only trace amounts of 7-OH, some companies sell concentrated or synthetic forms of the compound under brand names such as Magic 7OH and 7 O’Heaven for as little as $4 a pop. Those concentrates can be up to 13 times stronger than morphine, and users risk addiction, liver damage, and seizures— or worse. Weston Walker, a health- conscious Florida attorney, collapsed and died in 2021 after taking a lethal amount of kratom extract. “You just never imagine your 37-year old, healthy-as-a-horse brother is going to pass away,” said his sister, Whitney Briggs.

Why do people take the drug?

Many take it purely recreationally, enjoying a mild alcohol-free buzz from the kratom- infused drinks and cocktails served at hundreds of kratom lounges and bars across the U.S. Some long-haul truckers use it to stay awake on the road. But kratom’s most vocal defenders say it helps them manage pain and chronic conditions, and a Johns Hopkins survey last year found that over a quarter of kratom users take it as an opioid replacement. But while some users say it helped wean them off opioids, others find themselves trading one addiction for another. “Anyone who says kratom is not addictive has never tried it,” a former opioid and kratom user named Jack told Aeon. “I probably spent over $120 a day on kratom, way more than I had spent on oxies.”

How has the government responded?

A 2016 attempt at banning kratom’s main compounds failed after intense pushback from the American Kratom Association and other lobbying groups. The DEA’s order this summer on three kratom derivatives also bans substances that contain more than 0.05% of 7-OH, a level that excludes raw kratom leaves. But Brandeis University opioid researcher Dr. Andrew Kolodny notes that the majority of patients he has treated for 7-OH addiction started with natural kratom, and that there’s no clear line marking one form as dangerous and the other safe. “The DEA should control kratom in all its forms,” he said.

Why hasn’t it?

Some experts point to financial links between Trump Cabinet officials and the kratom industry. In 2023, the Justice Department sued one of the country’s largest kratom firms, Oklahoma-based Botanic Tonics, alleging its kratom- infused Feel Free drink was an unsafe “new dietary ingredient.” The DOJ dropped the case last December, saying it was not “a prudent use of government resources,” and over the following months, Botanic Tonics donated $1 million to MAHA PAC, which is associated with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and $443,000 to the Republican National Committee. Asked about the donation, Kennedy said, “I don’t make decisions for the Justice Department.” Markwayne Mullin, the former Oklahoma senator who in March became Homeland Security secretary, has invested up to $1 million in Botanic Tonics. The New York Times reported that Mullin has asked the FDA to soften its warnings on kratom while publicly promoting bans on 7-OH, whose makers compete with Botanic Tonics’ “natural” products. The Department of Homeland Security said Mullin “follows all ethics and conflict-of- interest standards.”

Can states take action?

Over a dozen have enacted bans on kratom, 7-OH, or both, though enforcement is spotty. Not all experts support blanket prohibition: Johns Hopkins psychiatrist Kirsten Smith warns that a “moral panic freakout” could stifle research into whether kratom can indeed offer an off-ramp from opiates. But most agree kratom companies should not be left to self- regulate. Many in the industry, meanwhile, dismiss health harms from their product. Mac Haddow of the American Kratom Association has applauded the DEA’s 7-OH ban but has also blamed irresponsible consumers for any deaths caused by natural kratom use. “Can we regulate stupid?” he asked. “I can’t do that—no one can.”