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      A Sharp Warning About Donald Trump

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      More from our inbox:About Taylor SwiftLess Polluting TrucksUnity in Canadian Hockey Illustration by Rebecca Chew/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “This Election Year Is Unlike Any Other” (editorial, Jan. 7):The editorial board deserves a monumental “thank you!” for spelling out in such detail how uniquely dangerous Donald Trump is. There was no misguided nod to both-sides-ism here. This was the full-throated condemnation of Donald Trump that the facts demand. The actions that Mr. Trump is openly pledging to carry out would create political and social disaster.Therefore, the editorial board needs to repeat this unvarnished message regularly, matching Mr. Trump’s constant repetition of his lies and provocations to violence.The editorial board must also include in future condemnations that the country cannot afford four years of climate inaction. Mr. Trump would give the fossil fuel industry a free hand and totally squander four years that are crucial to accelerate reductions in air pollution and carbon emissions, and create clean energy infrastructure across the nation.The horrendous results of a complete standstill in climate action that a Trump presidency guarantees are too horrific to imagine.Gary StewartLaguna Beach, Calif.To the Editor:Dire warnings about a second Trump term from The New York Times and other media outlets are being ignored at best and fueling the MAGA movement’s hunger to “own the libs” at worst.Many Americans are unfortunately tuned out and exhausted from politics thanks to Donald Trump’s wearing us down to a nub. The constant noise and slow-motion boil of disorder have left much of our nation cynically apathetic to the danger on the horizon.Whether this was by Mr. Trump’s design or just dumb luck is anyone’s guess. But this mix of chaos and civic ennui is his best ally.I predict that Mr. Trump will win and we all will be thrust back into the anarchy of his first term, but worse, as your paper warns.Miles KahnQueensTo the Editor:It’s time to move from opinion to action. It is not inevitable that Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee. We can all help to deny him the nomination by voting for whoever is polling most strongly against Mr. Trump at the time of the Republican primary.In New York, if you are not already a registered Republican, you can change your party affiliation easily.If you live elsewhere, the website PrimaryPivot has links to every state’s requirements. Some states allow any registered voter to cast a ballot in the Republican primary; others allow both Republicans and independents.We can certainly stop Mr. Trump in his tracks. Let’s do it.Helene PresskreischerNeedham, Mass.To the Editor:The no-holds-barred opinion pieces in your Jan. 7 paper — the editorial “This Election Year Is Unlike Any Other” and Maureen Dowd’s column, “Time to Conquer Hell” — acutely explicate Donald Trump’s flawed character and the potential dangers that would descend on the world if, God forbid, he is elected again to the presidency.The fact that after all the years we have endured his despicable public behavior and utterances there are still millions of Americans today who consider him appealing and fit for office, necessitating the publication of such opinion pieces, is mind-boggling and painfully demoralizing.Jim BellisKfar Vradim, IsraelAbout Taylor SwiftDuring the Eras Tour, Ms. Swift traps her past selves — including those from her “Lover” era — in glass closets.John Shearer/Getty Images for TAS Rights ManagementTo the Editor:Re “Look What We Made Taylor Swift Do,” by Anna Marks (Opinion guest essay, Jan. 7):I’m deeply disappointed with this article’s interrogation of Taylor Swift’s sexuality. Though it began with useful commentary on the evolution of L.G.B.T. rights in country music, it devolved into pointless speculation the moment it mentioned Taylor Swift. Her sexuality is no one’s business but her own — full stop.As Ms. Swift writes in the prologue to “1989 (Taylor’s Version)”: “If I only hung out with my female friends, people couldn’t sensationalize or sexualize that — right? I would learn later on that people could and people would.”Few of us would speculate so publicly about a friend’s sexuality out of respect for their privacy. I see no reason this courtesy should not be extended to celebrities, including but not limited to Taylor Swift.If Ms. Marks wants to interpret Ms. Swift’s music through a queer lens, then she should. After all, Ms. Swift’s talent lies in her ability to tell highly specific stories about her own life that we all relate to because of their universal themes. However, sharing her interpretation of Ms. Swift’s own sexuality has no intellectual value. She deserves better.Amanda WassermanNew YorkLess Polluting Trucks Jeffrey MilsteinTo the Editor:Re “Electrify All the Big, Noisy, Belching Trucks” (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, Dec. 30): Andrea Marpillero-Colomina is right to emphasize the need for a national framework to reduce emissions. She is also right to highlight the impact that pollution from all sources imposes on communities like Hunts Point in the Bronx. Where she errs, however, is minimizing reasonable concerns about electric vehicle infrastructure and ignoring the significant industry progress on emissions.In New York, 90 percent of communities rely exclusively on trucks to deliver goods of all kinds, including food and medicine, the delivery of which would be delayed and more expensive without a cohesive charging infrastructure. This isn’t just an inconvenience for our nation’s truck drivers; lack of chargers and alternative fueling stations will have significant supply chain impacts, ultimately affecting consumers’ wallets.Fortunately, real progress is being made ­— and has been for some time. Since 1974, clean diesel technology has already reduced pollutants by 99 percent, and 60 trucks today equal the output of one in 1988. The trucking industry is committed to reducing the environmental impacts of moving freight and continues to invest in clean technology, including electric vehicles.In other words, big, noisy, belching trucks are already a relic of yesteryear. Americans need and deserve real plans to build on that progress — not flashy rhetoric.Kendra HemsClifton Park, N.Y.The writer is president of the Trucking Association of New York.Unity in Canadian HockeyA display outside the Vidéotron Center teaches fans about the history of the Nordiques.Renaud Philippe for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Long-Gone Hockey Team Remains Symbol of Nationalist Pride” (Quebec Dispatch, Jan. 7), about the Quebec Nordiques:I am an Anglo Canadian Torontonian with some connection to the province of Quebec. My wife is from Montreal, and we visit her family there often. I love hockey and my Toronto Maple Leafs.I loathe the Montreal Canadiens, as I do the idea of separatism and the appalling anti-English bullying and lying of the politicians who support it. But I love the province, the people, the traditions, the cities, the beautiful countryside and wild terrain.I would love to see the Nordiques back in the National Hockey League. I want to see a resurgence in French Canadian hockey. It is probably the only thing I agree with Premier François Legault of Quebec about.I see it as good for Canadian culture, not just Québécois culture. Hockey unites us as a people.Nigel SmithToronto More

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      Chris Christie Says He and Bruce Springsteen Are on Better Terms

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      The former New Jersey governor idolizes Bruce Springsteen, but their political differences have led to frostiness. Now, according to Chris Christie, their relationship is “a good one.”Chris Christie has been to more than 150 Bruce Springsteen concerts, knows the words to every song and treasures the ticket stubs he has collected.But despite his unrequited love and near-obsessive fandom for his fellow New Jerseyan, Mr. Christie has found that his Republican politics have led to an often frosty relationship with Mr. Springsteen, who has supported Democrats in the past and hosted a podcast with former President Barack Obama.Now, though, Mr. Christie says he and his idol are on better terms.“It’s been a variable relationship over the years because we both have very passionate feelings about politics and we’re on different sides of the spectrum,” Mr. Christie said in an interview on Tuesday. “But of late, I think what we both recognized is that we’re both good husbands, good fathers and love our state, and as people, care a lot about what we do. So I’d say our relationship right now is a good one.”“Thunder Road”? Former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey spoke with The New York Times about his favorite Bruce Springsteen tune.Emily Rhyne for The New York TimesMr. Christie did not elaborate on their interactions. Representatives for Mr. Springsteen, who recently announced that he was postponing performances while he is treated for symptoms of peptic ulcer disease, declined to comment.Mr. Christie was spotted at multiple stops on Mr. Springsteen’s tour this summer, including on the side of the stage during his band’s three-show run at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey two weeks ago.Mr. Springsteen seems to be working on the relationship, too, according to Mr. Christie. The former governor also spoke Tuesday about a phone call he received from the musician after a concert in Brooklyn this year, after Mr. Springsteen spotted him in the pit during the concert.“I thought Bruce saw me during the show,” Mr. Christie told Steve Scully at a SiriusXM town hall event in New Hampshire. “And my wife thought I was crazy: ‘Oh yeah sure, Bruce smiled and waved to you.’”Mr. Christie went on, “We get in the car, we’re driving back to New Jersey, my cellphone rings at 11:45 at night.” He added: “So I answered the phone and I said, ‘Chris Christie,’ and he said, ‘Gov., it’s Bruce.’ And he said, ‘I saw you in the pit tonight.’”“And I went to my wife, I go: ‘I told you. I told you he saw me!’” Mr. Christie said at the town hall.Mr. Christie keeps the ticket stubs for Springsteen concerts he has attended.Juan Arredondo for The New York TimesEven though Mr. Christie has followed the rock star across their home state and the country — and can often identify a Springsteen song after hearing just a few opening bars — his political positions have kept him far from Mr. Springsteen’s inner circle.In 2011, when Mr. Christie was governor of New Jersey, Mr. Springsteen wrote an letter to the editor in The Asbury Park Press criticizing Mr. Christie’s proposed budget cuts. In 2012, Mr. Christie told The Atlantic that he had regularly been given the cold shoulder by Mr. Springsteen’s world.Yet Mr. Christie’s stewardship of the state after Hurricane Sandy led to a thaw, which Mr. Christie said at the time brought him to tears. At a later event, Mr. Christie seemed to make it official: “We’re friends.”That bond soon frayed. As Mr. Christie faced blistering national headlines in 2013 and 2014 over the scandal involving the closing of access lanes to the George Washington Bridge, Mr. Springsteen joined Jimmy Fallon on his late-night NBC talk show to perform a revised version of “Born to Run,” with some adjusted lyrics.“Someday, governor, I don’t know when, this will all end, but till then you’re killing the working man, who’s stuck in Gov. Chris Christie’s Fort Lee, New Jersey, traffic jam,” Mr. Springsteen and Mr. Fallon sang.Mr. Springsteen, left, and Jimmy Fallon spoofed Mr. Christie during a performance on Mr. Fallon’s late-night NBC talk show.Lloyd Bishop/NBCUniversal, via Getty ImagesStill, Mr. Christie remained a devoted Springsteen fan. After eight years as governor, he spent his first night as a regular citizen at Mr. Springsteen’s Broadway show, sitting in the second row, a treat from Mr. Christie’s wife.Though he has been careful not to overuse Mr. Springsteen’s music in his political campaigns, lest he invite more public criticism from the Boss, Mr. Christie recently put “Thunder Road” at the top of his campaign playlist, after Politico asked 2024 presidential candidates to provide their favorite songs.Mr. Christie noted in the interview on Tuesday that Politico had asked the candidates — with varying success — to list only one song per artist. Otherwise he would have chosen “a lot more” Springsteen songs, he said. “And unlike others, I followed the rules.”He spoke at some length about his relationship with “Thunder Road,” one of Mr. Springsteen’s biggest hits and the first song on his famed album “Born to Run,” revealing an optimistic side of the former New Jersey governor not often seen on the campaign trail, where he lays into the Republican front-runner, Donald J. Trump.“I think ‘Thunder Road’ is a song that is both realistic and hopeful,” Mr. Christie said. “The beginning of it, the piano intro, is so welcoming, and I smile every time I hear it. And so to me, any song that makes me smile every time I hear it, no matter what my mood is, it’s going to be one of my favorite songs.”He went on: “And I love the way he sings it. I love the lyrics and I love the way it makes me feel. It makes me feel like the world’s open to be welcomed for possibilities, for aspirations, for ambition. And I think that’s what Bruce was saying in 1975. Remember, that was a 25-year-old Bruce Springsteen writing that song. And it has that sense, hopefulness, in it.”Mr. Christie paid homage to Mr. Springsteen’s debut album, “Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.” with a banner at an election night party in 2013.Brooks Kraft LLC/Corbis, via Getty ImagesWhen asked about the climactic lyric in the song — “It’s a town full of losers, I’m pulling out of here to win” — Mr. Christie said he found another connection with Mr. Springsteen.“It’s part of what everybody at that age feels,” Mr. Christie said. “I’m going to get away from the things that are holding me down, and I’m going to go out there and make my place in the world. And I’ve heard Bruce joke from time to time that he wrote ‘Born to Run’ when he was 25 years old, and the guy who was ‘born to run’ is now raising his family and living out his adult life 15 minutes from where he grew up, so he wasn’t born to run too far. And I think it’s the same thing with me and New Jersey, too. No matter where else I go, that will always be home.”Even if the two men are friendlier now, Mr. Christie has acknowledged that there are limits.Asked at a recent event in New Hampshire if Mr. Springsteen would sing at his hypothetical inauguration, Mr. Christie demurred, saying: “Oh, that’s a lot to ask. I don’t know.”“He’s still a Democrat,” he said. More

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      A ‘Rubicon Moment’ for Donald Trump

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      More from our inbox:Affirmative Action: Help or Hindrance?A ‘New’ Beatles SongDonald Trump boarding a plane in Miami after making his court appearance. “I did everything right and they indicted me,” he said in a speech after his arraignment.Doug Mills/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Trump Thrives in a Broken System. He’ll Get Us There Soon,” by Thomas L. Friedman (column, June 14):Mr. Friedman is exactly right. We are approaching a most dangerous moment. Donald Trump will finally be tried in a federal court of law after being indicted. His lifetime of avoiding comeuppance for outrageous behavior is over.We have to believe that nobody — nobody meaning even an ex-president and possible future president — is above the law.Even though we will trust in the courts to carry out the legal process, a very serious monkey wrench has been thrown into the mix. Almost beyond belief, Judge Aileen M. Cannon has been randomly selected to preside over the court proceedings.Based on her strange and “creative” rulings in his favor several months ago related to the F.B.I.’s search of Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump has finally found a judge he dare not slander and demean, as he has consistently done in cases in which he has lost.We must hope that Judge Cannon will rise to a level that does not favor anyone in this case, and that perhaps she has learned from being overturned and severely chastised by a higher court.Mr. Trump has arrived at his Rubicon moment, and perhaps it could be his Waterloo as well.Harvey GlassmanBoynton Beach, Fla.To the Editor:I am in strong agreement with Thomas L. Friedman’s conclusion that Donald Trump’s thirst for absolute power represents “a dangerous moment” for our country. And yes, many Republican lawmakers who could have stopped him failed to do so.But Mr. Friedman didn’t mention the fact that 30 to 40 percent of our nation’s citizens have been completely brainwashed by Mr. Trump’s and his ardent supporters’ lies and propaganda. And it is this sizable part of America that continues to provide the oxygen for Mr. Trump’s burn-it-all-down approach to obtaining power.As long as these Americans continue to blindly support Mr. Trump, he will continue his selfish path to destruction of America’s democracy. Thus, the question is: How do the rest of us try to convince Trumpers of the peril that their support of Mr. Trump poses for our nation? And I am afraid that this is the crux of the Trump problem.Michael HadjiargyrouCenterport, N.Y.To the Editor:Re “Momentous Scene in Miami as Trump Pleads Not Guilty” (front page, June 14):Former President Donald Trump received a bizarrely warm welcome at a Cuban sandwich shop he popped into after pleading not guilty in response to the 37-count indictment. Embraces all around. “Food for everyone!”What struck me about Mr. Trump amid this sea of worshiping fans, as well as in his earlier court appearance in New York City on hush money charges: Not one family member accompanied him. No wife putting on a brave front, clutching her husband’s hand, however mortifying the circumstances, as they entered the courtroom. No daughter and son-in-law, always center stage in White House photos and his close aides for four years, standing by his side.Unlike so many Republican politicians who continue to offer support to a man whose criminal charges grow by the day, his family seems to have had little difficulty in abandoning him.Cathy BernardNew YorkTo the Editor:Charging the former president with espionage is absurd. Lower the political temperature a little, please. Our country is sick enough. Just consider Mar-a-Lago Mr. Trump’s presidential library.Antonia TamplinBronxTo the Editor:Re “Lock Him Up,” by Bret Stephens (column, June 14):OMG! I never agree with Mr. Stephens, though I enjoy his columns. Today I agree with him completely and unequivocally.I too have read the indictment (I am a lawyer and a former federal prosecutor). It is quite damning. Donald Trump admits that he has secret documents and that he has taken many steps not to return those documents.Do we have the rule of law in the United States? If so, Mr. Trump must be held accountable, and if found guilty, go to prison. That’s how it works.Yes, lock him up.Marc ChafetzWashingtonTo the Editor:Re “The G.O.P. Field Faces a Choice: Law and Order or Loyalty” (Political Memo, June 12):It is not just Republican candidates who must choose. The nature of the charges in Donald Trump’s indictment and the detailed facts set out there, coupled with the former president’s attacks on the special prosecutor and the Department of Justice, confront all of us with a choice.The nation is now divided into two camps: those who believe in the rule of law, and those who oppose it. There is no third alternative.Jonathan J. MargolisBrookline, Mass.Affirmative Action: Help or Hindrance?A protest against school desegregation in 1960. Bettmann Archive/Getty ImagesTo the Editor:“To Understand Affirmative Action Debates, Look to the Past,” by Randall Kennedy (Opinion guest essay, June 11), is unfair to many of us who oppose the current state of affirmative action because we believe that it harms the very people it intends to help.The Center for Equal Opportunity has studied the effects of preferential treatment in admission of Black and Hispanic students at some 80 colleges, law schools and medical schools. These students were, in too many cases, set up to fail.Black and Hispanic students admitted with substantially lower test scores than their white and Asian peers graduated at lower rates and, in medical schools, failed to pass qualifying exams that would allow them to continue their medical studies.For example, research by Richard Sander, a U.C.L.A. law professor, has shown that there would likely be more Black lawyers if race-neutral admissions applied at all law schools.In his most recent analysis, Mr. Sander has shown that Black students who attended law schools where their incoming LSAT scores matched those of their white peers were far more likely to pass the bar when they graduated — even if the schools they attended were less selective.Artificially inflating college admissions rates for Black and brown students who are ill prepared to compete on an equal footing with their white and Asian peers may make college administrators feel good, but it doesn’t solve the problems wrought by years of educational neglect and malpractice.Linda ChavezWashingtonThe writer is the chair of the Center for Equal Opportunity.A ‘New’ Beatles SongPaul McCartney in 2022.Mario Anzuoni/ReutersTo the Editor:Re “McCartney Says ‘Last’ Beatles Song Uses A.I.” (Business, June 14):You report that Paul McCartney “did not give the title of the song or offer any clues about its lyrics.”Possible titles:“I Wanna Hold Your Bandwidth.”“Don’t Let Me Download.”“Get Backup.”“Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Delete Key.”“A Hard Drive’s Night.”“I Am the Paywall.”David JelinekNew York More

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      Your Wednesday Briefing: A Dam Destroyed in Ukraine

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      Also, a victory for the Saudi-backed golf tour.A satellite image showing an overview of the damage from the Kakhovka dam.Planet Labs PBC, via Associated PressA major dam is destroyed in UkraineThe Kakhovka dam and electric plant in southern Ukraine was destroyed yesterday, sending torrents of water through the breach and forcing tens of thousands of people to evacuate.Russia and Ukraine blamed each other for the disaster, but it was not immediately clear who was responsible. Officials in Kyiv said Moscow’s forces had blown up the Russian-controlled dam on the Dnipro River in the predawn hours.More than 40,000 people could be in the path of flooding, a Ukrainian official said. Here’s a map of the damage.Downstream, residents described watching in horror as floodwaters swept past carrying trees and debris from washed-out houses. More than 1,300 people were evacuated, officials said, as conservationists warned of a huge and long-lasting environmental disaster. The waters are expected to peak today, an expert said.Satellite image is from before the flooding. | Sources: Planet Labs PBC; Institute for the Study of War; Google Maps | By The New York Times“People here are shocked,” said my colleague Marc Santora, who was in southern Ukraine. “They’ve gotten used to all sorts of Russian bombardment, all sorts of horrors, but this is just so much bigger in both magnitude and the repercussions that it is going to have across society.”The destruction of the dam came a day after U.S. officials said it appeared that a Ukrainian counteroffensive had begun. President Volodymyr Zelensky blamed “Russian terrorists.” The Kremlin’s spokesman said Ukraine had carried out a “sabotage” attack.A woman held her dogs inside her house, which was flooded after the Kakhovka dam blew up.Evgeniy Maloletka/Associated PressThe dam supplies water for drinking and agriculture, and to cool reactors and spent fuel at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, but the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog said there was “no immediate nuclear safety risk.”Analysis: The dam is far from the intensive fighting in the eastern Donetsk region. But its destruction could divert both sides’ resources from the counteroffensive.Other worries: The destruction could also wash away underground mines that Russian and Ukrainian forces planted on the banks of the Dnipro, creating new hazards in once-safe areas.LIV has been a target of fierce criticism, immense skepticism and bitter litigation.Adrian Dennis/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesSaudi-backed LIV Golf merges with PGA TourA bitter and costly rivalry for supremacy in men’s professional golf ended yesterday when the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, which is bankrolled by Saudi Arabia, announced a merger. The deal stunned the world of golf and was the Gulf kingdom’s biggest success yet in its ambitions to become a player in global sports.“It is hard to overstate how surprising this news is,” my colleague Kevin Draper writes. The PGA Tour and LIV have spent the past two years competing with and suing each other. Some in the PGA had sharply criticized LIV, both for dividing golf and for associating with Saudi Arabia and its poor human rights record. All lawsuits will now end between the formal rivals.Still, much remains unknown about the new golf company, which was created so quickly that it was announced before it even had a name. One thing is sure: LIV has gained a foothold that guarantees its outsize influence in the game’s future. The governor of the Saudi sovereign wealth fund will become the chairman of the new company.Background: LIV lured some of the world’s most prominent players, some with contracts said to be worth $200 million, and offered tournament prize funds that were the richest in golf history. Tiger Woods, who rebuffed a nine-figure offer from LIV, has denigrated the league’s approach to competition.Saudi ambitions: The kingdom’s wealth fund has bought a Premier League team and sponsors Formula 1 races. Saudi Arabia is also bidding to host soccer’s World Cup in 2030.The self-exiled British prince did not mince words.Alberto Pezzali/Associated PressHarry has his day in courtPrince Harry took the stand in a London court to accuse the Mirror newspaper group of hacking his cellphone over a decade ago. He spent five hours airing grievances against the tabloids.Harry said that some journalists “do have blood on their hands” and characterized their behavior as “utterly vile” and “criminal.” He said he had suffered “depression and paranoia” from the coverage. His testimony will continue today.The court appearance was, in many ways, another chapter in what has become a life of litigation: Harry and his wife, Meghan, are plaintiffs in no fewer than seven cases against the tabloids and other news media organizations. Harry has also filed claims against the Home Office related to the loss of his police protection while in Britain.THE LATEST NEWSAround the World“We are very quickly about to lose the Arctic summer sea-ice cover, basically independent of what we are doing,” a study author said.Markus Rex, Alfred Wegener Institute, via Associated PressThe first Arctic summer without sea ice could arrive as early as the 2030s, a new study found, about a decade earlier than scientists studying climate change had predicted.The World Bank warned of sluggish growth in the global economy this year and next, as rising interest rates slow spending and investment.U.S. authorities sued Coinbase, a major cryptocurrency trading platform, as part of a crackdown on the industry.Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey, entered the race to challenge Donald Trump to be the Republican Party’s presidential candidate.A Morning ReadA defensive fighting position from World War II that fell from the cliffs.Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesRising seas and coastal erosion are threatening D-Day sites on France’s beaches. Historians now wonder: Can memory be preserved if the landing sites of the Allied invasion disappear?“If I don’t have the site, I lose the history of what happened here,” a battle monument superintendent said. “You may as well stay at home on the couch and read a book.”Lives lived: Astrud Gilberto sang “The Girl From Ipanema” and helped popularize Brazilian bossa nova in the U.S. She died at 83.ARTS AND IDEASJennie, left, is a breakout star of “The Idol.” Eddy Chen/HBOFrom Blackpink to ‘The Idol’The first two episodes of HBO’s new drama “The Idol” were panned for their graphic sexual content. The network is leaning into the controversy: It’s marketing the star-studded series, about a pop star whose life takes a turn after a breakdown, as the “sleaziest love story in all of Hollywood.”Jennie of Blackpink, the blockbuster K-pop girl group, is making her acting debut as a backup dancer to the show’s aspiring idol, who is played by Lily-Rose Depp. On TikTok or Twitter, the number of posts critiquing the show is likely to match those commending Jennie’s performance.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookDavid Malosh for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews.Tomatoes, salmon and garlic butter make for a quick and tasty pasta dinner.What to ReadIn Dorothy Tse’s “Owlish,” set in a fictional city that stands in for Hong Kong, an adulterous professor doesn’t see the civic decay around him.What to Listen toJohn Mellencamp’s new album, “Orpheus Descending,” is a scornful look at America.FashionIf you’re packing shoes for travel, consider a “sleaker,” the dressy sneaker that works for both city strolls and country treks.HealthHow often should you wash your hair?Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and a clue: Extensively praise (five letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. See you tomorrow. — AmeliaP.S. Carl Hulse, our chief Washington correspondent, wrote about how covering the debt limit crisis required a combination of arcane knowledge and pure stamina.“The Daily” is on literacy education in the U.S.Did you enjoy this newsletter? Send us feedback at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      Seven Surprises

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      After a four-month book leave, I’m looking at what changed during that time.This is my first newsletter after a four-month book leave, and I want to try something a little different. As I prepared to come back, I spent time talking with Times colleagues and outside experts about how the world has changed while I was gone.Which news developments will have lasting import? What has been surprising? What do we know now that we didn’t before?As I was making the list, I realized that it would be worth sharing it with readers. It helps give some perspective to a dizzying news environment in which all of us struggle to distinguish between stories that are ephemeral and those with lasting significance. During a cynical time in American life, the list also offers a reminder that there has been good news along with the bad.In descending order of significance — and, yes, this ranking is subjective and weighted toward the U.S. — here are the seven biggest stories of the past few months.The list7. A.I. arrives. Artificial intelligence felt theoretical to many people until November, when OpenAI, a technology company in San Francisco, released ChatGPT. Since then, millions of Americans have experimented with the software or read some of its output.“ChatGPT is still young — only 2 months old! — and yet we’re already getting a glimpse of the many ways these A.I. chatbots could change our lives,” my colleague Kevin Roose says. Some of the implications seem scary: A.I. can write a solid college essay. Other implications are exciting: Surely, a computer can learn to write more comprehensible instructions for many household gadgets than is the norm today.6. A milder Covid winter. In each of the past two winters, the country endured a terrible surge of severe Covid illnesses, but not this winter.Chart shows a seven-day daily average. | Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human ServicesIt’s a sign that the virus has become endemic, with immunity from vaccinations and previous infections making the average Covid case less severe. If anything, the best-known Covid statistics on hospitalizations and deaths probably exaggerate its toll, because they count people who had incidental cases. Still, Covid is causing more damage than is necessary — both because many Americans remain unvaccinated and because Covid treatments are being underused, as German Lopez has explained.5. Milder inflation, too. The pace of consumer price increases has declined more in recent months than most economists expected. Why? The pandemic’s supply-chain disruptions have eased, and the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate increases are starting to have their intended effect. “Inflation is still very elevated, so it’s not mission accomplished for the Fed by any means,” said Jeanna Smialek, an economics correspondent based in Washington, “but we are finally headed in the right direction.”It remains unclear whether the Fed can engineer the soft landing — reducing inflation further without causing a recession — that is its goal. The strong job market captured in Friday’s employment report suggests that the economy may still be running hot enough to require significantly higher interest rates.4. Peak China? China’s ruling Communist Party has had a rough few months. It abruptly abandoned its zero-Covid policy in December, effectively acknowledging a huge failure (without actually acknowledging it). Weeks later, China released data showing that its population had peaked, which creates a major economic challenge. The number of workers relative to retirees will be declining for the foreseeable future.Of course, China has long been preparing for this challenge and has defied repeated predictions of looming decline in recent decades, my colleague Max Fisher points out. It would be a mistake to assume that decline has now begun. But Xi Jinping’s government will need to do a better job of managing the situation than it has of managing the pandemic.(The spy balloon isn’t hugely significant on its own, but it adds to the sense that Beijing’s competence has been exaggerated. Here’s the latest.)3. The final days of affirmative action. When the Supreme Court heard arguments about race-based affirmative action in October, the six Republican-appointed justices seemed ready to ban it. A ruling is expected by June.One big question is how colleges, the military and other organizations will try to replace the current programs. A focus of this newsletter in 2023 will be the future of class-based affirmative action. It is unquestionably legal, yet many colleges do relatively little to take into account economic class, as measured by income, wealth, neighborhood conditions and more. There are large racial gaps in those indicators.2. Russia’s miscalculation. The overall situation in Ukraine has remained similar since late last year: Russia controls parts of the east and the south, but far less than its strategic goals, and both sides are hoping for a breakthrough soon. Elsewhere, though, the war has shifted geopolitics.Japan and western Europe have been spooked enough by Russia’s invasion to increase their military spending after years of largely outsourcing military power to the U.S. If the trend continues, the global alliance of democracies will be strengthened. And the U.S. might be able to shift some of its own military spending to invest in technologies of the future.Donald Trump and Kari Lake during her campaign for governor of Arizona in 2022.Rebecca Noble for The New York Times1. Democracy won. The biggest surprise of the past four months to me was the defeat of nearly every major election denier who was on the ballot this year. “A critical segment of the electorate is not interested in Trumpism,” Nate Cohn, The Times’s chief political analyst, said.Nate estimated that Trump-aligned candidates performed about five percentage points worse than other Republicans, with the effects seeming to be largest in states where Trump tried to overturn the 2020 result, like Arizona and Pennsylvania. It happened even as many other conservative Republicans fared well.That is a big deal. A democracy can survive intense policy disagreements over taxes, government benefits, abortion, affirmative action and more. But if the true winner of a major election is prevented from taking office, a country is not really a democracy anymore.What’s missingI recognize this list omits several important subjects on which the big picture has not changed much lately. The planet keeps warming. The U.S. immigration system is a mess. Police violence has continued. Crime, though down slightly, is far above its pre-Covid levels. We will cover all these stories — and any promising solutions — in 2023.Give us feedback: What did I overlook, and what other stories do you want us to cover this year?RelatedCan you tell the difference between text written by A.I. and text written by a fourth grader? Play our game.I learned a lot from Ezra Klein’s recent podcast with Yuen Yuen Ang in which she described how Xi Jinping ended China’s era of reformist policy.Times photographers are documenting the war in Ukraine. See their latest work.THE LATEST NEWSTurkey EarthquakeSearching for survivors in Turkey today.Ilyas Akengin/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAn earthquake has killed more than 1,200 people in Syria and Turkey. The toll will almost certainly rise.The epicenter was in southern Turkey, as this map shows. The region was experiencing aftershocks.Syria, still scarred from its civil war, will be ill equipped to recover.PoliticsPresident Biden plans to call for bipartisanship tomorrow in his first State of the Union address since Republicans took the House.The Chinese balloon incident shows how little Washington and Beijing communicate, The Times’s David Sanger writes.Kamala Harris made history by becoming vice president, but she has struggled to define her role.The Koch network, an alliance of conservative donors, is preparing to get involved in the 2024 presidential primaries to fight Donald Trump.Other Big StoriesA raid by the Israeli Army in the West Bank killed at least five Palestinians. The army said it had been seeking to arrest gunmen accused of attempting an attack.Rather than banning ChatGPT to prevent cheating, some teachers are asking their students to think critically about advances in artificial intelligence.The chief executive of Goldman Sachs has a side gig as a D.J. He says it’s a hobby, but it could pose conflicts of interest.OpinionsGail Collins and Bret Stephens discuss tomorrow’s State of the Union.Many cystic fibrosis patients thought they wouldn’t live past 30. A new treatment has drastically changed life expectancy, Dr. Daniela Lamas writes.MORNING READSJill Kortleve, a midsize model, made her runway debut for Alexander McQueen in 2018.Melissa Schriek for The New York TimesSize 8 to 10: Midsize models are rarely cast in glossy brand campaigns. Why not?Mystery: He disappeared after going to Alaska in 1976. Now, a skull may provide answers.Metropolitan Diary: Spotting an ex across the subway tracks.Quiz time: Take the latest news quiz and share your score (the average was 9.5).Advice from Wirecutter: Warm up with a space heater.Lives Lived: Charles Kimbrough was nominated for an Emmy Award for portraying the comically rigid news anchor Jim Dial on the sitcom “Murphy Brown.” He died at 86.SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETICOn the move: The Nets traded Kyrie Irving, whose Nets run was marred by scandals, to the Dallas Mavericks. First and last? The announcers Greg Olsen and Kevin Burkhardt are calling their first Super Bowl together on Sunday. It could also be their last, because Tom Brady is joining the Fox booth soon.ARTS AND IDEAS Beyoncé accepting the award for best dance/electronic album.Valerie Macon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesHighlights from the GrammysBeyoncé made history last night: She now holds the record for the most Grammy wins. But she didn’t win any of the top prizes. Those went to Harry Styles, who won album of the year for “Harry’s House,” and to Lizzo, who won record of the year for “About Damn Time.”Other top prizes: Song of the year, which honors songwriting, went to Bonnie Raitt for “Just Like That.” Samara Joy, a jazz singer from the Bronx, won best new artist. (Here’s the full list.)The centerpiece: A joyous performance celebrated five decades of hip-hop. The Times’s Jon Caramanica called it “unexpectedly emotional.”Fashion: See Styles’s sparkling harlequin jumpsuit and other red carpet looks.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookChristopher Simpson for The New York TimesBarely salted chips, melted cheese and pickled jalapeños: Make classic nachos.Five Minutes …… that will make you love 21st-century jazz.What to Read“An Assassin in Utopia” links President James Garfield’s killer to an atmosphere of free love and religious fervor that gripped Oneida, N.Y., in the late 1800s.Now Time to PlayThe pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was mothball. Here is today’s puzzle.Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Glossy (five letters).And here’s today’s Wordle.Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — DavidP.S. King George VI died 71 years ago today. His daughter succeeded him, becoming Queen Elizabeth II.Here’s today’s front page.“The Daily” is about the Chinese balloon.Matthew Cullen, Lauren Hard, Lauren Jackson, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Tom Wright-Piersanti and Ashley Wu contributed to The Morning. You can reach the team at themorning@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      A History of Doo-Wop Emerges From Sandy Wreckage

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      Kenny Vance’s home in the Rockaways was damaged by the hurricane 10 years ago. But he was able to save some precious footage.Good morning. It’s Monday. Hurricane Sandy did billions of dollars’ worth of damage, but it didn’t destroy everything in its path. We’ll find out about a documentary that exists because Sandy didn’t ruin the raw footage. And we’ll take a last look at the campaigns and the candidates.Kenny Vance, standing on what was left of his house after Hurricane Sandy in 2012. Angel Franco/The New York TimesWe read a lot in the last couple of weeks about how Hurricane Sandy aimed its destructive power at vulnerable neighborhoods in 2012 and served as a wake-up call on climate change in New York City. My colleague Corey Kilgannon says the storm also figured, surprisingly, in a documentary about doo-wop by the singer and songwriter Kenny Vance. I asked Corey to explain:Kenny Vance idolized the early doo-wop groups he saw practicing and performing on street corners in Brooklyn in the 1950s. They influenced rock ’n’ roll when it was just beginning to blare out of radios into the eager ears of teenagers. He also remembers attending the frenetic shows at the Brooklyn Paramount Theater that offered acts from both genres.As an original member of Jay and the Americans, Vance sang on hits like “She Cried” in 1962 and opened for the Beatles and the Rolling Stones before their earliest performances in the United States. Later he was the music supervisor on films including “Animal House” and “American Hot Wax.”He also gathered and filmed interviews with New York City doo-wop legends.“Making a film was always in the back of my mind,” said Vance, 78, who kept the footage stored in his oceanfront house in the Rockaways in Queens.Assembling the footage was one of those things that was always on his agenda, but he never got around to it. And then, in 2012, Hurricane Sandy leveled Vance’s house, ruining everything inside.Or so he thought.Returning home to a soggy heap and sifting through his few remaining possessions, Vance figured the footage was ruined and his hopes for a film dashed.In the wreckage he spotted his desk on what was left of the second floor. He climbed up a ladder to it and pulled out one of the drawers. Inside, damp but salvageable, was a package of discs containing video files of his footage.Vance finally made time to make the film, and now, a decade after Sandy, the project is finished. “Heart & Soul,” the documentary that resulted, will have its premiere tonight as part of the Port Jefferson Documentary Series, on Long Island. The film will also be shown as part of the Dances With Films Festival in Manhattan next month.The film includes Vance’s interviews with members of groups like the Chantels, the Jive Five and Little Anthony and the Imperials.In one poignant segment in “Heart & Soul,” Vance talks with a schoolteacher in Harlem named Arlene Smith, in front of her students. They had no idea that she had been the lead singer for the Chantels, a group that had a hit in the late 1950s with “Maybe,” co-written by Smith and later recorded by Janis Joplin.Vance said he hoped the film would preserve the memory of groups whose prominence was often short-lived.“In the ’50s, these artists didn’t have entertainment lawyers, so they signed their lives away,” he said. “Even if you had a No. 1 record, without a follow-up hit, it’s over — you’re done. These days, you have one big song, you’re set for life.”WeatherA sunny day starts partly sunny, with temperatures near the mid-70s. The evening is mostly clear. Temps will drop to the mid-40s.ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKINGIn effect today. Suspended tomorrow (Election Day).The latest Metro newsDave Sanders for The New York TimesRepublicans vs. ‘Trumplicans’: Greenwich, Conn., has historically been a moderate conservative stronghold. But new hard-liners are on the attack, galvanized by the culture wars.5G towers come to the city: As the city upgrades to 5G wireless, the streetscape is changing. Not everyone was impressed when a 32-foot-tall 5G tower appeared on a Brooklyn street.Dog death in Prospect Park: Three months after a highly publicized attack left a dog dead, no arrests have been made, and the commanding officer of the precinct that includes the park said, “We may have dropped the ball.”How much do these New York jobs pay? Last week, most companies in New York City were required to include salary ranges on job postings. Take our quiz to see how well you can guess salaries on some only-in-New-York job openings.Presidents, past and present, rally for HochulAhmed Gaber for The New York TimesGov. Kathy Hochul once seemed to be on a glide path to a full term as governor. But issues that have Democrats steeling themselves against potential losses elsewhere — notably inflation and personal safety — have created unexpected turbulence.Her lead over the Republican in the race, Representative Lee Zeldin, has narrowed to single digits in recent polls. Zeldin has made inflation and crime his main themes. Hoping to win over moderate and independent voters who are open to change, he has also railed against one-party control of state government. The Democrats would surrender their veto-proof supermajority in the State Senate if they lose only one seat.Over the weekend Hochul seemed to be working to close an enthusiasm gap. President Biden appeared with her at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, N.Y., on Sunday. The president called her a governor who can “get things done” and said Election Day and the coming 2024 campaign would be “inflection points” for the next 20 years.That 11th-hour rally followed one in Brooklyn on Saturday with former President Bill Clinton, who urged Democrats to reject what he characterized as Zeldin’s fearmongering and macho bravado.Zeldin has been buoyed by the cosmetics heir Ronald Lauder, who has spent at least $11 million to help him win the governor’s mansion. Lauder said he was motivated by concerns about crime, which he worries is driving people from New York City. “You couldn’t pay me to get on the subway,” Lauder said, adding that he did not want his children and grandchildren “to have to go with bodyguards” (as he does).Lauder also complained that Hochul had not pushed harder to undo changes in the state’s bail law that barred prosecutors from seeking cash bail for less serious crimes.Another worry for Democrats is how they misplayed the redistricting process, which ended with a court-ordered redrawing of boundaries that could allow Republicans to flip a handful of House seats held by Democrats. Democrats hope to win the rematch between Representative Nicole Malliotakis, the Republican who won two years ago, and Max Rose, the Democrat whom she defeated. And Bridget Fleming, the Democratic candidate for the seat Zeldin is vacating on Long Island, has a significant fund-raising advantage over Nicholas LaLota, the Republican chief of staff of the Suffolk County Legislature.Letitia James, the state attorney general, is also running for re-election. She has made a name for herself nationally with investigations of former President Donald Trump, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the National Rifle Association. Those investigations have also made her a target — Trump, against the advice of several of his legal advisers, filed suit against her last week, saying she had waged a “relentless, pernicious, public and unapologetic crusade” against him. Cuomo, who resigned in 2021 after James oversaw an inquiry into sexual harassment claims, said in an ethics complaint he filed against her that said she had “her own politically motivated and self-interest-driven agenda.”James has long rebutted the idea that her work as attorney general was politically motivated. She said that not looking into evidence of wrongdoing by Trump or the N.R.A. would have been a “dereliction of my duty.”METROPOLITAN diarySardinesDear Diary:After a hot afternoon of walking in Manhattan, I returned to my car, which I had parked on the street. I had just gotten in when I was startled by a knock on the driver’s side window. Turning to look, I saw a man standing there.“Would you be vacating your space?” he asked. A woman I took to be his wife hung back shyly and murmured an apology.I explained that I was waiting for my husband to make his way across town and that he should be arriving soon.The man introduced himself and his wife, gave me his number and asked me to call once my husband arrived. He wanted to move his car from across the street. He offered to bring me a beer while we waited. It was an enticing offer, but I declined.As they walked off toward their place, the man called out over his shoulder, “Do you like sardines?”When my husband arrived 20 minutes later, I explained that I had to call the couple. He settled in, and a few minutes later the man appeared, asked my husband if he would like a beer and handed me two tins of sardines.They were, he said, “really good ones.”— Leslie SchulteIllustrated by Agnes Lee. Send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.Glad we could get together here. See you tomorrow. — J.B.P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here.Melissa Guerrero and Ed Shanahan contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team at nytoday@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      The Rising Tide of Global Sadness

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      Taylor Swift was quite the romantic when she burst on the scene in 2006. She sang about the ecstasies of young love and the heartbreak of it. But her mood has hardened as her star has risen. Her excellent new album, Midnights, plays upon a string of negative emotions — anxiety, restlessness, exhaustion and occasionally anger.“I don’t dress for women,” she sings at one point, “I don’t dress for men/Lately I’ve been dressing for revenge.”It turns out Swift is part of a larger trend. The researchers Charlotte Brand, Alberto Acerbi and Alex Mesoudi analyzed more than 150,000 pop songs released between 1965 and 2015. Over that time, the appearance of the word “love” in top-100 hits roughly halved. Meanwhile, the number of times such songs contained negative emotion words, like “hate” rose sharply.Pop music isn’t the only thing that has gotten a lot harsher. David Rozado, Ruth Hughes and Jamin Halberstadt analyzed 23 million headlines published between 2000 and 2019 by 47 different news outlets popular in the United States. The headlines, too, grew significantly more negative, with a greater proportion of headlines denoting anger, fear, disgust and sadness. Headlines in left-leaning media got a lot more negative, but headlines in right-leaning publications got even more negative than that.The negativity in the culture reflects the negativity in real life. The General Social Survey asks people to rate their happiness levels. Between 1990 and 2018 the share of Americans who put themselves in the lowest happiness category increased by more than 50 percent. And that was before the pandemic.The really bad news is abroad. Each year Gallup surveys roughly 150,000 people in over 140 countries about their emotional lives. Experiences of negative emotions — related to stress, sadness, anger, worry and physical pain — hit a record high last year.Gallup asks people in this survey to rate their lives on a scale from zero to 10, with zero meaning you’re living your worst possible life and 10 meaning you’re living your best. Sixteen years ago, only 1.6 percent of people worldwide rated their life as a zero. As of last year, the share of people reporting the worst possible lives has more than quadrupled. The unhappiest people are even unhappier. In 2006, the bottom fifth of the population gave themselves an average score of 2.5. Fifteen years later, that average score in the bottom quintile had dropped to 1.2.In an interview, Jon Clifton, the C.E.O. of Gallup, told me that in 2021 21 percent of the people in India gave themselves a zero rating. He said negative emotions are rising in India and China, Brazil and Mexico and many other nations. A lot of people are pretty miserable at work. In the most recent survey Gallup found that 20 percent of all people are thriving at work, 62 percent are indifferent on the job and 18 percent are miserable.Part of the problem is declining community. The polls imply that almost two billion people are so unhappy where they live they would not recommend their community to a friend. This is especially true in China and India.Part of the problem is hunger. In 2014, 22.6 percent of the world faced moderate or severe food insecurity. By 2020, 30.4 percent of the world did.Part of the problem is an increase in physical misery. In 2006, 30 percent of people who rated their lives the worst said they experienced daily pain. Last year, 45 percent of those people said they live with daily pain. Before the pandemic, the experience of living with pain increased across all age groups.A lot of those numbers surprised me. Places like China and India have gotten much richer. But development does not necessarily lead to gains in well-being, in part because development is often accompanied by widening inequality. This is one of the core points Clifton makes in his book “Blind Spot: The Global Rise of Unhappiness and How Leaders Missed It.” We conventionally use G.D.P. and other material measures to evaluate how nations are doing. But these are often deeply flawed measures of how actual people are experiencing their lives.Misery influences politics. James Carville famously said, “It’s the economy, stupid.” But that’s too narrow. Often it’s human flourishing, stupid, including community cohesion, a sense of being respected, social connection. George Ward of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has argued that subjective measures of well-being are more predictive of some election outcomes than economic measures. Measures of well-being dropped in Tunisia and Egypt before the Arab uprisings. Well-being dropped in Britain before the Brexit vote. Counties in the United States that saw the largest gain in voting Republican for president between the 2012 election and Donald Trump’s election in 2016 were also the counties where people rated their lives the worst.If misery levels keep rising, what can we expect in the future? Well, rising levels of populism for one. And second, greater civil unrest across the board. Clifton noted that according to the Global Peace Index, civic discontent — riots, strikes, anti-government demonstrations — increased by 244 percent from 2011 to 2019.We live in a world of widening emotional inequality. The top 20 percent of the world is experiencing highest level of happiness and well-being since Gallup began measuring these things. The bottom 20 percent is experiencing the worst. It’s a fundamentally unjust and unstable situation. The emotional health of the world is shattering.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Older Americans Fight to Make America Better

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      Neil Young and Joni Mitchell did more than go after Spotify for spreading Covid disinformation last week. They also, inadvertently, signaled what could turn out to be an extraordinarily important revival: of an older generation fully rejoining the fight for a working future.You could call it (with a wink!) codger power.We’ve seen this close up: over the last few months we’ve worked with others of our generation to start the group Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for progressive change. That’s no easy task. The baby boomers and the Silent Generation before them make up a huge share of the population — more nearly 75 million people, a larger population than France. And conventional wisdom (and a certain amount of data) holds that people become more conservative as they age, perhaps because they have more to protect.But as those musicians reminded us, these are no “normal” generations. We’re both in our 60s; in the 1960s and ’70s, our generation either bore witness to or participated in truly profound cultural, social and political transformations. Think of Neil Young singing “four dead in O-hi-o” in the weeks after Kent State, or Joni Mitchell singing “they paved paradise” after the first Earth Day. Perhaps we thought we’d won those fights. But now we emerge into older age with skills, resources, grandchildren — and a growing fear that we’re about to leave the world a worse place than we found it. So some of us are more than ready to turn things around.It’s not that there aren’t plenty of older Americans involved in the business of politics: We’ve perhaps never had more aged people in positions of power, with most of the highest offices in the nation occupied by septuagenarians and up, yet even with all their skills they can’t get anything done because of the country’s political divisions.But the daily business of politics — the inside game — is very different from the sort of political movements that helped change the world in the ’60s. Those we traditionally leave to the young, and indeed at the moment it’s young people who are making most of the difference, from the new civil rights movement exemplified by Black Lives Matter to the teenage ranks of the climate strikers. But we can’t assign tasks this large to high school students as extra homework; that’s neither fair nor practical.Instead, we need older people returning to the movement politics they helped invent. It’s true that the effort to embarrass Spotify over its contributions to the stupidification of our body politic hasn’t managed yet to make it change its policies yet. But the users of that streaming service skew young: slightly more than half are below the age of 35, and just under a fifth are 55 or older.Other important pressure points may play out differently. One of Third Act’s first campaigns, for instance, aims to take on the biggest banks in America for their continued funding of the fossil fuel industry even as the global temperature keeps climbing. Chase, Citi, Bank of America and Wells Fargo might want to take note, because (fairly or not) 70 percent of the country’s financial assets are in the hands of boomers and the Silent Generation, compared with just about 5 percent for millennials. More