Author: Lance Garrison
Last week Britain’s Parliament passed a law that seeks to redefine reality.The Safety of Rwanda Act declares Rwanda a “safe” country, regardless of the evidence to the contrary — and orders British courts to do the same. Its purpose is to allow the British government to finally, after two years, enact its policy to permanently deport asylum seekers to Rwanda.Some of the most vulnerable people in Britain will be rounded up, detained and then — in theory — flown some 4,000 miles to Rwanda’s capital, Kigali. What to do about people seeking asylum is one of the most complex policy…
Student protesters: I admire your empathy for Gazans, your concern for the world, your moral ambition to make a difference.But I worry about how peaceful protests have tipped into occupations of buildings, risks to commencements and what I see as undue tolerance of antisemitism, chaos, vandalism and extremism. I’m afraid the more aggressive actions may be hurting the Gazans you are trying to help.I’m shaped in my thinking by the Vietnam War protests of the 1960s. Students who protested then were right on the merits: The war was unwinnable and conducted in ways that were reckless and immoral.Yet those students…
On Monday, Vice President Kamala Harris appeared on “The Drew Barrymore Show,” and in a lighthearted moment, explained — as she did during the last presidential election cycle — that in her blended family, her stepchildren affectionately call her Momala.Barrymore responded that we all need “a tremendous hug” right now and told Harris, “We need you to be Momala of the country.”I don’t think Barrymore intended any harm, quite the opposite, and the vice president was magnanimous, taking the comment in stride and with good cheer. The studio audience applauded.But even gentle and oblivious stereotyping can be harmful, and it’s…
May 1, 2024 – You shouldn’t draw major conclusions about the safety of marijuana amid the recent announcement that federal regulators may reclassify the drug, experts are cautioningBut the move is expected to make it easier for scientists to study questions about safety and how well marijuana’s works as a medical treatment. One legal expert said it could change how the federal government views using medical marijuana by prescription in a state where medical usage is legal under state law. Right now, that is still considered illegal under federal law. “If you’re a patient in a state with a medical marijuana…
By restricting media access, the N.Y.P.D. prevented the public from knowing the full details of its campus raid.
Michael Ohlrogge has a theory about the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the agency that makes sure ordinary depositors don’t lose their money when their bank goes bust.Ohlrogge, an associate professor at New York University Law School, argues that when banks fail, the F.D.I.C. is not resolving them in the manner that is least costly to its Deposit Insurance Fund.If he’s right, then the F.D.I.C. is going against the explicit instructions of Congress, so this is kind of a big deal. My impression is that F.D.I.C. staffers believe they are complying with Congress’s instructions, so this is a case of two…
Overall, when you dig into the country-by-country data, many places seem to be registering increases in depression among teenagers, particularly among the countries of Western Europe and North America. But the trends are hard to disentangle from changes in diagnostic patterns and the medicalization of sadness, as Lucy Foulkes has argued, and the picture varies considerably from country to country. In Canada, for instance, surveys of teenagers’ well-being show a significant decline between 2015 and 2021, particularly among young women; in South Korea rates of depressive episodes among teenagers fell by 35 percent between 2006 and 2018.Because much of our…
To the Editor:Re “Will the Justices Hold Presidents to Account?,” by Jesse Wegman (Opinion, April 29):For someone like me who has been practicing law for more than 60 years, it is depressing to see the Supreme Court floundering around in the weeds of far-fetched hypotheticals, instead of following a basic rule of jurisprudence: Decide the case before you.When litigants bring their dispute before a court for resolution, their expectation is that the court will reach a decision based on the facts in their case, not on some hypotheticals bearing scant relevance to their situation.The indictment against Donald Trump includes detailed…
May 1, 2024 – Makenna was eager to get an appointment with a gynecologist after moving to a new city and getting what she thought might have been a yeast infection. Makenna, who asked to only be identified by her first name, settled on a male doctor who took her insurance, despite already feeling uncomfortable – as many women often are – with seeing a male gynecologist. What happened next left her bewildered and traumatized. Makenna, 28, said that during the exam, the doctor put on a pair of gloves, inserted his fingers into her, and then smelled them. After doing this, he…
This transcript was created using speech recognition software. While it has been reviewed by human transcribers, it may contain errors. Please review the episode audio before quoting from this transcript and email transcripts@nytimes.com with any questions.My name is Zeynep Tufekci. I’m a columnist at “The New York Times.” I’m also a professor at Princeton University, and I study science, society, and technology.[MUSIC PLAYING]Bird flu is circulating in the United States among poultry, and also among cows. And so far, there has been one known human case.Now, four years after COVID began, obviously, it’s really frightening to think that we could…