Links for you. Science:
Louisiana’s deadly whooping cough outbreak is now its worst in 35 years
‘The Walls Are Collapsing’: The View From Inside NIH as Shutdown Looms (“Another source at NIH agreed and told me they were “all for a shutdown.” That’s in spite of the fact that their life would be substantially altered as a result. “A shut down would be very disruptive to my personal work and personal finances but we are so far beyond what is permissible in a functioning society and government,” they said.”)
Adding up the NIH R01s lost to Multi-Year Funding
Florida’s surgeon general said he didn’t calculate the costs of ending vaccine mandates in the state. But scientists have.
US death rate dropped back to pre-Covid levels in 2024, CDC report says
Errors and inconsistencies in quantitative results reported in Gonçalves et al., 2025 (this is the sweetener paper that has been in the news)
Other:
A new Nation’s Report Card shows drops in science, math and reading scores (for context, the decline in these scores began in 2017)
‘It’s Just a Mess:’ 23 People Explain How Tariffs Have Suddenly Ruined Their Hobby (Trump take hobby)
On Shutdowns, Get the Wording Right and Other Thoughts
Crime on Metro is down; new data shows increasing issues with bus, rail service
There Is No Third Door. The only alternative to “complicity” is withholding votes for lawbreaking.
Stop Calling It the Trump Era
Why I had to see Trump at the US Open with my own eyes
How JPMorgan Enabled the Crimes of Jeffrey Epstein
Comet Pizza-A-Lago
Trump Is a Weak and Failing President, and It’s Time to Say So
How To Forge A Progressive-Abundance Truce
Shutdown Politics: More on the choices facing Democrats.
The Next Democratic President Must Declare an Emergency. Forget ideological differences – Democrats need a leader who will act with authority.
The Big BLS Revision Isn’t a Conspiracy
HHS Asks All Employees to Start Using ChatGPT
On Trump’s Orders, Missouri Republicans Plan to Gerrymander a Black Lawmaker Out of Office
Fast food used to be a cheap meal option. Why has that changed?
MPD collaboration with ICE has turned traffic stops into a deportation pipeline
ICE agents in the Park Ave neighborhood spark large-scale protest
GOP Cries Censorship Over Spam Filters That Work
U.S. mines are literally throwing away critical minerals
Goodbye, meritocracy. Hello, Trump loyalty tests.
French hospitals told to prepare for war in Europe by next year in leaked Government letter
The untold saga of what happened when DOGE stormed Social Security
RFK Jr.’s Lies Stain the Republic
It’s AI all the way down as Google’s AI cites web pages written by AI
ICE lies about targeting schools
The Storm Hits the Art Market
Giorgio Armani: Farewell to the Visionary Designer/Businessman Who Lifted Italy into Fashion Leadership
The real reason Trump will never fire RFK Jr.
mikethemadbiologist
I’d advise taking that mining article with a small boulder of salt, although it has useful and interesting things to say about the current admin’s approach to renewables.
“Mining is a very old-fashioned industry,” said Samouei. “Who is going to take the risk?”
While the majority of facilities are using decades-old technology (or in some cases century-plus), the industry actively and aggressively researches new techniques, especially extraction and benefication methods.
Mine operation is severely constrained by economics. Operators know exactly what’s in their waste pile because they test it often. When the market shifts or a new tech becomes sufficiently characterized for planning, operators can project which component(s) could become profitable. As a bonus, the material is already removed from wherever it was and pulverized, so the waste pile is the *first* place operators look for another percent or two of profit.
Mines aren’t going to extract lithium from their waste unless and until the cost of doing so is meaningfully less than the price they can get for it. These are businesses, not charities.
If we want to change that, the simplest option is a subsidy or some other compensation. That’s the government paying to reduce the price of domestic critical minerals, although it is not without drawbacks. Another option is to wait until the price rises enough for extraction to be viable. Or I suppose to apply tariffs until that market condition applies.