THE SHOW NOTES: Katie Hobbs’ Press Secretary, The Topsy-Turvy Biden Economy, & Progressives Freak Out About Alvin Bragg
Welcome! Katie Hobbs’ press secretary tweeted the unthinkable.
OLD IS NEW: Why dumb phones are on the rise in the U.S. - CNBC
NEW: Ivy League Prices Are Pushing $90,000 a Year - Bloomberg (paywall)
DESANTIS: Ron DeSantis doesn’t text or email - SEMAFOR
OUTRAGE: The guy who tried to kill a Rand Paul staffer was released from prison the day before.
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Clip of the day:
New York Times Turns On Fauci
An opinion columnist for The New York Times wrote a shockingly direct column accusing Anthony Fauci of undermining the national conversation regarding the origins of COVID by overtly dismissing the lab leak theory. Here’s the paragraph that matters:
The near-certainty with which Dr. Fauci spoke publicly of zoonotic crossover is somewhat incongruous with his private communications from that time. He knew there was real debate — he was in the thick of it. In public, he leaned hard into animal crossover; behind the scenes, he wrote that “I do not know how this evolved” but warned that he was concerned about “distortions on social media” of Covid’s origins.
The DC Crime Problem
The U.S. attorney’s office in D.C. declined to prosecute 67% of individuals arrested by police last year who would’ve been tried in D.C. Superior Court. The shocking numbers come just one month after the district tried to overhaul its criminal code by reducing penalties for major crimes. This is from The Washington Post:
But even compared to a local prosecutor’s office, a 67 percent declination rate is high. For example, in Wayne County, Mich., which includes Detroit, the prosecutor’s office reported declining 33 percent of its cases last year. Prosecutors in Philadelphia declined 4 percent and prosecutors in Cook County, Ill., which includes Chicago, declined 14 percent, according to data from those offices.
The news comes after a Rand Paul staffer was viciously attacked over the weekend and Congresswoman Craig was assaulted in a D.C. elevator last month. The congresswoman was the assaulter’s 13th victim.
The Pokemon Story
A Pokemon player was disqualified from a tournament for not announcing his pronouns seriously enough. In short, the player stumbled over the wording of his pronouns and was disqualified from the event. Click through for the full story.
Four Economic Stories You Should Know
WSJ: A Tale of Two Housing Markets: Prices Fall in the West While the East Booms
Wolf Street: Tired of Getting Screwed by Banks, People Yank their Cash Out, Forcing Banks to Pay Higher Interest Rates.
CNBC: With 62% of Americans living paycheck to paycheck amid inflation, more people have a side job.
The Hill: Nearly half of parents with adult children still pay their bills
Metaverse Dud
The much-hyped Metaverse seems to be imploding as more companies begin to put projects on hold. Disney and Microsoft suspended their metaverse projects earlier this month while Facebook’s latest round of layoffs leaned heavily into their metaverse division. Virtual real estate has tanked as well. Here’s the paragraph that matters from The Wall Street Journal:
Meanwhile, the price for virtual real estate in some online worlds, where users can hang out as avatars, has cratered. The median sale price for land in Decentraland has declined almost 90% from a year ago, according to WeMeta, a site that tracks land sales in the metaverse.
The rest of the news: