Author: Lance Garrison
May 10, 2024 — Cow udders have the same receptors for flu viruses as humans and birds, raising concerns that cows could become “mixing vessels” that help the bird flu virus spread between people.That’s according to new research conducted by scientists at the University of Copenhagen and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis and published as a preprint study in bioRxiv.The scientists examined samples of brain, respiratory, and mammary gland tissue taken from a small number of cows and a calf. They stained the tissues and put it under the microscope to see what kind of receptors would be found. They discovered that…
At a May 1 rally in Waukesha, Wis., Donald Trump said that when he was president “we had no inflation,” and that now “we have record horrible inflation” that is “getting worse.” All three of those claims are, of course, incorrect. Trump also described inflation as “a country buster” that destroyed Germany, presumably referring to the hyperinflation of 1923, which was the year of Adolf Hitler’s failed beer-hall putsch.Even for Trump, who loves to work up a crowd, that’s too far.President Biden does have an inflation problem, but it’s not a Weimar Germany kind of problem. Economists expect that when…
To the Editor:Re “A Home Buying Prohibition Rattles Chinese Nationals in Florida” (news article, May 7):The excellent reporting by Amy Qin and Patricia Mazzei shows why State Representative David Borrero, a Miami-area Republican, is wrong in claiming that national security interests take precedence over discrimination claims.Time and again, we see how this false dichotomy is used to justify civil rights violations against Asian Americans. This was the case in major touch points throughout our history, from the Japanese American incarceration during World War II to the Justice Department’s now defunct China Initiative, which led to the increased faulty targeting, profiling…
Listen to and follow ‘Matter of Opinion’Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTubeDonald Trump is searching for a running mate, and his list of potential candidates is getting smaller and smaller. This week, the hosts discuss whether Trump is considering other qualities beyond loyalty, and they debate what his eventual choice could mean for the future of Trumpism in the Republican Party.Plus, Michelle wants to worm her way into candidate medical records.(A full transcript of this audio essay will be available within 24 hours of publication in the audio player above.)Recommended in this episode:Thoughts? Email us at matterofopinion@nytimes.com.Follow…
She is empathic but not overbearing, affectionate but not treacly, wise but not smug, concerned but not anxious. She is the mother who knows danger but never checks in on a child for the wrong reason.The Better Mother is, by definition, a better mother than I am.She can be a total stranger spotted at the museum or a familiar face at a birthday party. Either way, she is a natural star in the play for which you haven’t quite memorized your lines.Most mothers — and fathers — probably have a personal vision of their own competition, depending on one’s skill…
Produced by ‘The Ezra Klein Show’Drug policy feels very unsettled right now. The war on drugs was a failure. But so far, the war on the war on drugs hasn’t entirely been a success, either. Take Oregon. In 2020, it became the first state in the nation to decriminalize hard drugs. It was a paradigm shift — treating drug-users as patients rather than criminals — and advocates hoped it would be a model for the nation. But then there was a surge in overdoses and public backlash over open-air drug use. And last month, Oregon’s governor signed a law restoring…
In a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland this week, the Republican senator Josh Hawley demanded a federal investigation into dark money groups subsidizing “pro-terrorist student organizations” holding anti-Israel protests on college campuses. He cited Politico reporting linking big liberal philanthropies to some pro-Palestinian organizers. Open Society Foundations, for example, founded by the oft-demonized George Soros, has given grants to the anti-Zionist Jewish Voice for Peace, which has an active university presence. Hawley noted that an I.R.S. ruling denies tax-exempt status to organizations that encourage their members to commit civil disobedience, calling nonprofit funding for the groups behind the anti-Israel…
We don’t yet know if H5N1 bird flu will spill over from animals to infect a large number of humans. Based on the few cases of transmission so far, the World Health Organization has expressed concerns that infection in humans “can cause severe disease with a high mortality rate.”But already it has wrought devastation upon so many lives. The deaths of millions of birds and mammals around the globe in the last few years directly and indirectly from this outbreak should be enough to spur urgent action to stop the spread of the virus, as well as remind us of…
In the folk wisdom of recent American politics, Donald Trump is a figure of herculean invulnerability to traditional scandal. What lands as a crippling blow to most politicians leaves nary a scratch on Trump, who effortlessly deflected the slings and arrows of the 2016 presidential campaign and paid no discernible price for the “Access Hollywood” tape, his racism or his general incoherence.As the tribune of a discontented, “forgotten” people, this folk wisdom goes, Trump draws strength from efforts to hold him accountable. To try to halt Trump’s march is to make him more popular, and more powerful, than he was…
Lack of authenticity is not the reason. Its score was written by white men but so were the scores of “Purlie” and “Dreamgirls.” A lack of flash may have been a factor: “The Wiz” and “Dreamgirls” are spectacles, as much about costumes and dancing as how they sound. But “Purlie” is about a few people in a couple of rooms talking about problems, just like “Raisin.”A likely reason “Raisin” isn’t much revived is a sense that a play as important as Lorraine Hansberry’s should be preserved as it was, that setting it to music is intrusive or at least unnecessary.…