Unfriended: The woman who worked for Facebook for two years before becoming a whistleblower about the company’s business practices testified before Congress yesterday that, “I’m here today because I believe Facebook’s products, harm children, stoke division, and weaken our democracy.”   Fraunces Haugen, …

  All over the world people were cut off from social and business connections. The outage revealed how dependent the world has become on big tech and social media.   Facebook said the cause was changes in its underlying internet infrastructure that coordinates …

Covid Nation: New cases of Covid-19 in the US have dropped more than a third since September 1st, 35 percent to be exact.   Worldwide, cases have dropped 30 percent since August.   The reason for the dip isn’t known. David Leonhardt writes …

After Hours: After passing a bill to keep the government running, the House stalled last night when liberal Democrats staged a revolt against President Biden’s $1 trillion infrastructure bill. The leadership plans to take it up again today.   The reason for the …

Hot Mess:  Congress needs to take some kind of action today to prevent a government shutdown at midnight when the authorization to spend money runs out.    And in a fascinating exercise of politics, the Presidency of Joe Biden may be on …

Crazy: Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff, told Senate investigators yesterday that House speaker Nancy Pelosi called him on January 8th, concerned about President Trump’s ability to launch nuclear weapons.   “She was concerned and made various personal …

Covid Nation: New cases of Covid-19 have dropped 18 percent over the past two weeks, giving encouragement that the summer surge may be coming to an end.   Deaths in that same period were up 23 percent, but deaths as you might …

Hostage Diplomacy: In a deal that removes a thorn from relations between the US and China, the  Justice Department agreed to release the detained Meng Wanzhou, the chief financial officer for Huawei Technologies, and allow her to return to China in exchange …

Covid Nation: The director of the Centers for Disease Control, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, overruled her own agency and endorsed Covid booster shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for frontline workers.    The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices had recommended boosters for tens …

Covid Nation: Covid-19 has now killed about as many Americans as the 1918-19 Spanish flu pandemic, about 675,000. The flu hit when the US population was about a third of what it is today.   As of this morning, Johns Hopkins University reports …