Indholdsfortegnelse for November 18, 2022 i The Week Magazine

Donald Trump’s endorsement can get an extremist Republican onto the ballot, but it won’t necessarily get one elected. Trump’s support in the primaries, where only the most partisan voters bother to show up, helped propel full-MAGA election deniers—many of them political newcomers—into midterm races across the country. But a lot of them lost or underperformed, especially in swing states. In Georgia, for example, where Herschel Walker was running almost entirely on the strength of being a former football star and a current Trump golfing buddy, there’s going to be a runoff. In Pennsylvania, Trump’s pick Mehmet Oz, the celebrity doctor with no political experience, lost the governor’s race outright to Lt. Gov. John Fetterman. The former president was furious, New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman tweeted, and blamed Melania for…

What happened Still energized by anger over the overturning of Roe v. Wade last summer, voters this week approved measures enshrining the right to abortion access in three state constitutions and rejected proposals that would further curtail abortion in two conservative strongholds. California and Vermont residents overwhelmingly approved proposals to add explicit language to their constitutions protecting the right to reproductive choice. Voters in Michigan—where a court had already nullified a 1931 abortion ban that remained on the books—approved a similar constitutional change. Kentuckians rejected a constitutional amendment explicitly denying any right to abortion—a surprise result in a deeply conservative state where a trigger ban went into effect immediately after Roe’s June 24 repeal. In Montana, voters appeared to reject a “Born Alive” provision that would require health-care providers…

A Missouri company is selling bulletproof furniture to schools. Paul Alexander, founder of Executive Wood Products, says the firm’s custom-made lecterns contain steel interiors that can serve as shields against rounds from handguns, AR-15s, and even machine guns, but look like regular furniture. “I want the active shooter to think he can shoot through them,” says Alexander, “because that’s what saves lives.” Fully half of the fires in Portland, Ore., now originate in homeless camps. Firefighters dealt with more than 2,000 such fires last year, and still average about six per day. “We don’t mind going on dangerous calls—we’re here to do that,” said firefighter Capt. Mike McGowan. But “it’s fatiguing to go on the same type of call over and over, with no end in sight.” In other news…

Bono owes some of his drive to a classic conflict with his father, said Mariella Frostrup in The Sunday Times (U.K.). Bob Hewson was a Dublin-area postal worker with thwarted dreams of becoming an opera singer, and when Bono—born Paul David Hewson—suddenly lost his mother when he was 14, his remaining parent was anything but a comfort. “The house became a less safe space for both of us,” says Bono, now 62. “It’s as old as the elks. You’re just locking antlers.” Bono subconsciously blamed his dad for his mother’s death, and pursuing a musical career served as revenge—a chance to “become the tenor that he wished to be.” After U2 achieved superstardom, Bono wanted to make amends. At a 1985 concert in Houston, he introduced his father from…

Cher is trying to turn back time. The singer and actress, 76, confirmed last week that she’s dating music producer Alexander Edwards, 36, saying of their 40-year age difference, “Love doesn’t know math.” Cher said her new boyfriend treats her “like a queen” and has already met her family. (Her son, Chaz Bono, is 17 years older than Edwards.) “Haters are Gonna Hate,” Cher tweeted at fans questioning the May-December relationship. “I don’t give a *fk what anyone thinks.” Twice divorced, she is used to dating younger men, including Tom Cruise (16 years younger) and Bon Jovi bandmate Richie Sambora (13 years younger.) Edwards previously dated model Amber Rose, who accused Edwards of cheating on her with at least a dozen different women. Queen Elizabeth II formed an unlikely…

George Will The Washington Post While we were all distracted by the recent “avalanche of political news,” said George Will, President Biden provided alarming evidence that his mental faculties are slipping. He “should not seek another term.” In a recent meeting with progressive activists, Biden said his $426 billion student loan forgiveness edict came through “a law” he had “just signed,” and that it passed “by a vote or two.” This is not just another Biden gaffe. No law was passed, and Biden “unilaterally implemented the windfall” in an attempt to woo young voters. “It’s frightening” that Biden doesn’t know or remember that—and it’s not an isolated case. He recently said his son, Beau, died while serving in Iraq (he died six years later). The Washington Post’s fact-checker has awarded…

UGANDA Rachael Tugume Daily Maverick (South Africa) Be skeptical of the claim that African countries must be allowed to pollute in order to grow, said Rachael Tugume. With the latest U.N. climate summit underway, African governments are loudly arguing that just as the West burned coal and oil for decades, they, too, should get to exploit their resources and develop their economies. As a Ugandan farmer who lost her land to an oil pipeline, “I wonder whose socioeconomic transformation” they’re really talking about. I live in Hoima, where I grow cassava as a staple food and a cash crop. The $240 a year my field earns helps “meet my family’s basic needs” and “pay school fees for my two children.” But in 2019, the French corporation TotalEnergies, developer of the…

Younger heart attack patients recover faster if they’re in a happy marriage, new research suggests. Previous studies have found that psychological and social stress can impair recovery from cardiac problems, but this is the first to examine romantic issues. The researchers examined the recoveries of 1,593 partnered Americans ages 18 to 55, two-thirds of them women, who had recently suffered a heart attack. Some 40 percent of the women and 30 percent of the men in the study reported stressful marriages, and those who rated their marital stress as severe were 67 percent more likely to suffer chest pains than those who were happy in their relationship. They also had a 50 percent higher chance of being readmitted to the hospital. Lead author Cenjing Zhu, from the Yale School…

(Grove, $20) It runs only 95 pages, but “Claire Keegan’s beautiful new novella is no less likely to move you than any 400-page tome you’ll read this year,” said Alex Gilvarry in The New York Times. “A master class in child narration,” it’s told from the perspective of a nameless Irish girl sent to live with a childless couple for a summer while her busy mother carries yet another baby to term. As we watch the neglected girl blossom under the care of her lively foster parents, “Keegan makes us complicit in what her characters want, setting us up for utter heartbreak when they don’t get it.” If Keegan “has published anything that isn’t perfect, I haven’t seen it,” said Heller McAlpin in NPR.org. Foster, which arrives in the…

Liberation Day by George Saunders (Random House, $28) Reading George Saunders’ fiction “makes you want to try harder to be a better human,” said Barbara VanDenburgh in USA Today. The stories in his first new collection in nine years are often built upon surreal premises, such as a subterranean amusement park or human puppets controlled by their wealthy owners. Over and over, though, Saunders presses at the same questions: “What does it mean to be a good person? And how can you be one in a world that makes being good so very hard?” The Singularities by John Banville (Knopf, $29.50) In his latest novel, John Banville is “up to some fine mischief,” said Troy Jollimore in The Washington Post. A man just out of prison arrives at an…

3 First Aid Kit’s new album “makes you feel as though you’re driving down open highways under warm starry skies,” said Katie Colombus in The Arts Desk. Whereas the Swedish duo, sisters Johanna and Klara Söderberg, sounded heartbroken on 2018’s Ruins, they’ve “grown up and moved on.” This follow-up pushes their pop folk in a poppier direction, and it’s “defiant in its joy.” The standout track, “Angel,” is “a gorgeously upbeat lament to lost love,” said Phil Mongredien in The Guardian. It “recalls Fleetwood Mac at their most radio-friendly.” Here and there, the production choices “seem heavy-handed or anachronistic,” said John Amen in No Depression. “Schmaltzy” strings undermine the sultry “Nobody Knows,” and “airbrushed synths” detract from the alluring melody of “29 Palms Highway.” Even so, Palomino “contains its share…

Going undercover… The Stranger Sean Harris and Joel Edgerton are captivating in this new Australian thriller about a drifter in the outback and an undercover cop who must befriend him to execute an elaborate sting. Thomas Wright’s drama, based on a murder case that shook Australia, is initially confusing, but pays off. Netflix Destroyer Nicole Kidman broke out of her comfort zone to star in this 2018 thriller about an LAPD detective scarred by a botched early-career infiltration of a violent gang. Directed by Karyn Kusama (Girlfight), Kidman goes all in when her character gets a shot at redemption and revenge. $4 on demand Eastern Promises When a young Russian teen in London dies in childbirth, a midwife traces the tragedy to the Russian Mafia, unaware of a mole…

Since 1950, the average return for the S&P 500 in the 12 months after a midterm election is 15 percent, surprisingly with no down years. Stocks performed better in the six months following the election than in the six months preceding it 17 out of 19 times. And a split government has historically produced a roughly 13 percent annual return. USA Today Airbnb reported its best quarter ever amid a travel boom. The short-term rental platform’s net income rose 46 percent to $1.2 billion after 99.7 million “nights and experiences” bookings in the past three months, a 25 percent increase year-over-year. Skift The highest-earning dead celebrity this year was J.R.R. Tolkien, who earned $500 million after the Swedish video game company Embracer acquired Middle-earth Enterprises, which owns exclusive rights to…

As the economy grows more and more dependent on high-tech skills, workers without the right training are getting left behind. In courses of 15 weeks or less, Per Scholas (perscholas.org) offers tuition-free training for students hoping to enter careers that will improve lifelong prospects. The nonprofit organization partners with employers to ensure that its graduates are ready to step into jobs directly upon completing the program. Studies show that Per Scholas and similar job-training programs have enduring effects, leading to 11 percent to 40 percent increases in long-term earnings. Now operating in more than 20 cities, including Atlanta, New York, and Phoenix, Per Scholas also provides professional development up to two years after graduation and fosters racial diversity in the tech workforce. Each charity we feature has earned a…

Harry Cheadle The New Republic Capitalism is a dirty word for many of those who enjoy its spoils, said Harry Cheadle. Today, “it’s trendy to pose as an anti-capitalist.” New hires at one crypto company complained a few months back that they had little choice but to take their $300,000 job offers because they were living in a “fun capitalist hellscape.” It’s notably easy to bemoan the “capitalist hellscape” when “you are pulling in six figures for a job that consists of doing whatever in front of a computer.” Most of the educated white-collar workers who say “I am being ground between the gears of the capitalist machine” really just mean “I don’t like my job.” They are “expected to feel a certain amount of existential dread of climate change…

George Booth’s drawings buzzed with frenetic, uproarious chaos. In the hundreds of cartoons he created for The New Yorker, cats gleefully shredded upholstery, dishes piled up and overflowed sinks, and a bull terrier—the Booth dog—sat crankily through it all. Booth rendered his mix of the humdrum and the surreal with a pen so jittery that the New Yorker editors who reviewed his work in 1969 assumed he was elderly. But Booth, who had struggled for years to break into cartooning, refused to adapt his work to other people’s expectations. “Life is hard,” he often shouted facetiously, “and damned unfair!” A child of Great Depression–era Missouri, Booth “drew his first cartoon at age 3,” said the Associated Press, and “later was influenced by the slapstick comedy of the Marx Brothers…

Alaska Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s hopes for political revival appeared to fall flat this week, as the 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate trailed significantly in the race for Alaska’s at-large House seat when The Week went to press. The four-way race to replace GOP Rep. Don Young—who died in March at age 88 after holding the state’s lone House seat for 49 years—will be decided by ranked-choice voting, but Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola built a substantial early lead over Palin and Republican Nick Begich. Palin, 58, was endorsed by former President Trump and resurrected her “Drill, baby, drill” catchphrase. She faced criticism from Begich over resigning in 2009 in the middle of her term as governor. Peltola, of the native Yup’ik tribe, campaigned to preserve Young’s legacy after…

José Andrés is facing his most difficult cooking challenge yet, said Joshua Robinson in The Wall Street Journal. The Michelin-starred chef has spent much of the past 12 years deploying the resources from his nonprofit charitable organization, World Central Kitchen, to countries that have suffered disasters such as hurricanes and earthquakes. But serving meals amid the ongoing Russian bombardment of Ukraine is even more difficult. WCK began serving meals to Ukrainian refugees in Poland shortly after the Feb. 24 invasion; soon after, Andrés and his relief team entered Ukraine. Since then, the organization and its Ukrainian partners have served more 165 million meals. “We consider ourselves like the unofficial caterers of the event,” says Andrés. “We have 550 restaurants and thousands of chefs here in Ukraine.” The risks of…

Anne Applebaum The Atlantic Vladimir Putin’s primary weapon is fear, said Anne Applebaum, and the more the West is cowed by his blackmail, the greater the chance he gets his way on Ukraine. “A KGB officer who knows about the manipulation of emotions,” Putin intimidates Russians not through Lenin-style mass slaughter, but through poisonings, mysterious window falls, and imprisonment. To terrorize the West, Putin relies on increasingly overt nuclear threats. “Unsurprisingly, the anxiety created by these repeated threats has already shaped American and European policy toward Ukraine, exactly as it was supposed to do.” To avoid provoking Putin, Western leaders have limited the weapons sent to Ukraine—no F-16s, no modern tanks, no long-range missiles. If the West provided them, the war might end quickly, and many fewer Ukrainians would die.…

ITALY Carlo Bonini La Repubblica Prime Minister Georgia Meloni’s new far-right government didn’t wait long to pass its first freedom-killing law, said Carlo Bonini. In response to a rowdy, three-day rave held over Halloween in Modena, parliament immediately passed legislation it said would prohibit such drug-fueled dance parties. But the law goes further: It bans any gathering of 50 or more people who “arbitrarily invade other people’s land or buildings”—a definition so broad it is clearly intended to stop more than just raves. Italian police will now have wide discretionary power to clamp down on other kinds of gatherings, including university sit-ins and protests, and some activists say the anti-rave decree could be an even more potent tool for repression than the old Fascist-era ban on “seditious gatherings.” It’s particularly…

The Israeli election is “a gut punch,” said David Myers and Daniel Sokatch in the Los Angeles Times, especially for American Jews “who have committed much effort to supporting a progressive vision of Israel.” The conservative former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stormed back into power this week with a far-right coalition of anti-Arab racists that includes the Religious Zionist party, which garnered the third-largest vote share. That party is led by Itamar Ben-Gvir, “the avowed disciple” of the late, “hate-filled racist Meir Kahane.” Under this coalition, the Jewish state is likely to expand its “illegal and immoral occupation of Palestinian land.” Ben-Gvir is “a dangerous extremist” who has called for the deportation of Palestinians and other non-Jewish minorities, said Joshua Leifer in The New York Times. Young Israeli Jews…

(Knopf, $30) Ted Conover, “one of our great narrative journalists,” has opened another window into a little-understood world, said Jennifer Szalai in The New York Times. Four decades after his debut work about riding trains with hoboes, and nearly two since he wrote about his stint as a prison guard, the author offers readers a tour of a sparsely populated area in Colorado’s San Luis Valley, known as the prairie, where 5-acre plots can be purchased for as little as $5,000. The prairie attracts modern-day homesteaders looking to live off the grid, and most occupy trailers and quickly enough sort out the basics of survival, including procuring water and keeping rattlesnakes away. “Big sky is plentiful; so are the drugs.” Yet Conover pushed past the locals’ gun-backed insularity to…

“Siddhartha Mukherjee is one of those people who appears to have found a glitch to exploit in the space-time continuum,” said Stephanie Nolen in The New York Times. Besides being a writer, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of 2011’s The Emperor of All Maladies is a practicing oncologist, an associate professor at Columbia University, a cancer researcher, a father of two, and a trained vocalist who performs in a jazz fusion group. Still, he carved out time in the past several years to write his fourth book, another best-seller that continues his effort to examine all we know about the building blocks of life. His 2011 breakthrough work covered cancer. His next best-seller was about genes. This one is about cells—yet another subject he felt simply needed to be explored.…

3 “Every Smino album has been more expansive than the last, and Luv 4 Rent keeps that trend going,” said Andrew Sacher in the Brooklyn Vegan. The 31-year-old rapper and singer, who was born into a musical St. Louis family and raised on jazz, blues, and gospel, “has both a great voice and a strong vision.” His third LP “breaks down boundaries between the Midwest and the South,” swirling regional subgenres of Black American music into “a rich-sounding, multilayered mix of hip-hop, soul, and funk.” Smino often sounds like a handful of different vocalists as he flits within a song between percussive rap flows and one or more singing styles, said Heven Haile in Pitchfork. Though his lyrics are hit or miss, “he’s self-interrogative on this album,” revealing his discomfort…

Good week for: Investors who shorted Tesla, after CEO Elon Musk sold another $3.95 billion in Tesla shares to shore up his disastrous Twitter purchase. Tesla stock is down nearly 50 percent this year, and has lost $600 billion in market capitalization since its peak. Fantasies, after a struggling scuba diver off the coast of California was rescued by a group of women divers who dress as mermaids, complete with tails. “It was something out of a fairy tale, being saved by a mermaid,” said the saved diver, Javier Claramunt. Selling handsome, with the launch of Le Domaine, a line of skin-care products from actor Brad Pitt. In a review of the serum, the New York Post’s Brian Faas said that for its $385 price tag, “Brad Pitt should come…

Ottawa Prime Minister Justin Trudeau this week said that China was trying to undermine Canada’s democracy by playing “aggressive games” with electoral institutions. His remarks came a day after Canadian intelligence sources told Global News that Beijing had funneled money to preferred candidates in the 2019 election and had tried to place agents on the staffs of members of parliament. “Just when you think some allegations against China are exaggerated, you find that they’ve in fact been understated,” said David Mulroney, a former ambassador to China. “These represent a malicious, dangerous threat to our democracy.” Earlier this week, Trudeau ordered Chinese firms to sell their holdings in Canadian mining companies, citing national security. Lawmaker suspended for racist outburst Paris A French lawmaker who cried “Go back to Africa!” as…

Christina Applegate isn’t putting any smiley faces on the fact she has multiple sclerosis, said Alexis Soloski in The New York Times. For years, the Emmy-winning actress, now 50, tried to ignore the increasing numbness in her hands and feet, and trouble keeping her balance. But those problems only grew. In the summer of 2021, while filming the last season of the Netflix dramedy Dead to Me, Applegate was diagnosed with the autoimmune disease, which disrupts communication between the brain and body. Production halted and she began treatment. “Acceptance? No. I’m never going to accept this,” she said. “I’m pissed.” But she was determined to finish the third and final season of Dead to Me. Production resumed earlier this year, with Applegate using a wheelchair to arrive on set…

Tom Nichols The Atlantic “Resentment is perhaps the most powerful political force in the modern world,” said Tom Nichols. In a recent tweet, the Republican House Judiciary Committee celebrated three men: “Kanye. Elon. Trump.” It is deeply revealing these very disparate characters have become right-wing heroes, because what they have in common is their resentment of a dominant “elite” culture that “still refuses to grant them the respect they think is their due.” Kanye West, or Ye, is convinced his incredible genius is unappreciated, especially by the fashion world. “Trump has spent his life as the outer-borough mook with his nose pressed to the windows of midtown Manhattan,” frustrated he’s scorned by other successful people and can’t get positive coverage in The New York Times. The puerile Musk blew $44…

“There’s a reason nearly every authoritarian regime tries to legitimize itself by using false claims of democratic accountability and fraudulent elections. North Korea calls itself the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. It’s neither democratic nor a republic. The People’s Republic of China is no republic. Russia calls itself a ‘federation’ of ‘republics,’ but just ask the Chechens how voluntary that federation is. When Russia annexed four regions of Ukraine in September, it held rigged ‘referendums’ to give the seizures legitimacy. Why? If democracy is a corrupt ‘Western’ concept, why pretend what you’re doing is democratic?” Jonah Goldberg in The Dispatch…

UNITED KINGDOM Diarmaid Ferriter Irish Times How can we hope to bridge the divide between Catholics and Protestants if our children don’t get to know each other? asked Diarmaid Ferriter. Northern Ireland has been rocked with sectarian discord nearly continuously since it was created in 1921, and just last year violent riots paralyzed Derry and Belfast for days. Part of the problem is that our society is so segregated, and that begins in school, where Protestant and Catholic students are educated in separate parochial institutions. It didn’t have to be that way. An early law envisioned non-denominational education in Northern Ireland, but “both Catholic and Protestant church leaders voiced their trenchant opposition to any such sharing,” and the law was soon amended to give churches the right to control schools.…

COLOMBIA Yolanda Ruiz El Espectador Venezuela, our neighbor, has become an authoritarian dystopia where children go hungry and political dissidents rot in prison. Yet Colombia was right to restore relations, said Yolanda Ruiz. We cut ties with Venezuela in 2019, after President Iván Duque refused to recognize the rigged re-election of autocrat Nicolás Maduro, and the decision cost us dearly. Billions of dollars in trade dried up, and in the intervening years armed insurgent groups and drug gangs took control of the region along the 1,300-mile shared border, extorting migrants and terrorizing local residents. Colombia simply “could not continue with its longest and most lively border closed.” That’s why President Gustavo Petro, elected in June as the nation’s first left-wing president, is reversing course. He has reopened trade ties and…

The tip line Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin unveiled in January to let parents inform on teachers who promote “critical race theory” was quietly shuttered in September because of “little to no volume,” a spokeswoman for the governor admitted. An analysis of a sample of emails sent to the line revealed that they were mostly sent by a few dozen parents complaining about Covid policies and special education, with almost none about CRT.USA Today Alcohol-induced deaths, such as from liver disease and pancreatitis, soared 26 percent in the U.S. in the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to the CDC. There were 49,000 such deaths in 2020, and 52,000 in 2021, up from 39,000 in 2019.Associated Press Ten of the last 11 recessions started during Republican presidential administrations. Six of…

“Destroying rain forest for economic gain is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.”E.O. Wilson, quoted in the Montreal Gazette “Every great cause starts as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.”Philosopher Eric Hoffer, quoted in the Daily Reckoning (Australia) “The thing about democracy, beloveds, is that it is not neat, orderly, or quiet. It requires a certain relish for confusion.”Molly Ivins, quoted in El Defensor Chieftain “History’s what people are trying to hide from you, not what they’re trying to show you.”Hilary Mantel, quoted in The Wall Street Journal “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.”H.P. Lovecraft, quoted in the Business Standard (India) “If you’re going to be…

Ukraine loses some Starlink units A block of 1,300 Starlink satellite internet units suddenly went down across Ukraine last week “due to a lack of funding,” said Alex Marquardt and Sean Lyngaas in CNN.com. The terminals that Ukraine purchased in March “were used for combat-related operations.” SpaceX was charging Ukraine’s military $2,500 a month to keep the units connected, “pushing the total cost to almost $20 million by September.” Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense in October asked British counterparts “to pick up the $3.25 million monthly bill,” but the request was denied, and service was cut off. Starlink has been “a game-changing source of communication for Ukraine’s military” since Russia invaded, “but concerns have risen recently over the dependability.” Musk says that his company is getting paid for only 11,000…

Respiratory syncytial virus is one of the main causes of hospitalizations among newborns and young children in the U.S., and there’s no vaccine on the market. But that could soon change, reports USA Today. Six drug companies are currently developing vaccines or antibodies to treat RSV. And just last week, Pfizer announced success in trials of a vaccine given to pregnant mothers in the second or third trimester. The mothers passed the antibodies to their babies in utero, and once the babies were born, the vaccine was 82 percent effective at preventing severe illness up to three months of age, and nearly 70 percent effective at six months. Vaccinating the youngest babies is key, as RSV is much less severe in older children, and even older babies often have…

Lisa Unger is the best-selling author of Last Girl Ghosted, Confessions on the 7:45, and many other thrillers. Her latest novel, Secluded Cabin Sleeps Six, follows three couples during a getaway weekend that turns harrowing. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë (1847). I read this Gothic masterpiece too young to discern its layered commentary on feminism, class, and religion, but was transported into its whirlwind of mystery and romance, and the poignancy of Jane’s coming-of-age. A strong young heroine, a brooding lord, a Gothic mansion—teen catnip. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (1938). Rebecca made me want to write thrillers. It’s the foundation for a continuing theme in my work: the ordinary girl in extraordinary circumstances. A young woman spontaneously marries an older widower and moves to his estate in this…

3 Snarky Puppy’s latest live-in-the-studio musical excursion “showcases the group’s knack for crafting groove-based instrumental tracks rife with hooky melodies,” said Matt Collar in AllMusic. Known for fusing jazz, rock, and world music idioms, the four-time Grammy-winning ensemble aims to pay homage to its Dallas-area musical roots on this record, which evokes 1970s fusion but is also “incredibly funky.” The late funk keyboardist Bernard Wright, a Dallas icon, contributed a cosmic solo to “Take It!”—a standout track on what proves to be “one of Snarky Puppy’s most enjoyable albums to date.” But Empire Central “lacks a certain je ne sais quoi,” said Morgan Enos in Jazz Times. The band, now 19 members strong, typically makes up for its lack of emotional intimacy with “slamming grooves, technical wizardry, and abundant ear…

As always, be light of heart when you choose Thanksgiving wines, said Eric Asimov in The New York Times. Below are a red, a white, and an orange to consider. On the holiday, “wine is on the table to refresh, invigorate, and delight,” and these fit the bill. 2021 Broc Cellars La Boutanche ($22). Many zinfandels are too boozy for a long meal. Not this blend, which is sold in 1-liter bottles. It’s “made in a thirst-quenching style,” with “tart flavors of red fruit” and “smoky, spicy accents.” 2020 Empire Estate Dry Riesling ($20). This dry New York riesling is arguably too unique. Still, “who would tire of a wine so delicious, with earthy, stony flavors and an intriguing, pebbly texture?” 2020 Field Recordings Skins ($21).…

“Kansas City surprises people,” said William O’Connor in The Daily Beast. The Midwestern metropolis straddling the Missouri-Kansas border might make you think of barbecue, jazz clubs, and Chiefs football. But it’s also just a pretty city with a buoyant spirit, and “there’s an incredible amount to do,” as I’ve discovered while visiting once a year. I always stop in at the free Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, “inarguably one of the best art museums in the country,” with a massive collection that includes masterworks by Matisse, Caravaggio, Durer, and more. Even the National Museum of Toys and Miniatures exceeds expectations; in fact, it’s now “one of my new favorite museums, period.” I also love driving around the city’s suburbs just to glimpse “some of the most magnificent homes in the country.”…

Meta said this week it was cutting more than 11,000 employees, in the first major round of layoffs in the company’s history, said Kurt Wagner in Bloomberg. The reductions, which represent 13 percent of Meta’s workforce, come after “several quarters of disappointing earnings and a slide in revenue” combined with ballooning costs for CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s “speculative virtual-reality push called the metaverse.” Zuckerberg said the company would try to further reduce costs by reducing its office space, transitioning “some employees to desk sharing,” and extending a hiring freeze into 2023. Semiconductors: Nvidia makes chip for China market U.S. chipmaker Nvidia this week announced a new semiconductor designed specifically for China, said Jane Lanhee Lee in Reuters—a move aimed at sidestepping new regulations essentially banning the export of advanced microchips and…

First-time homebuyers priced out A home has never been this out of reach for first-time buyers, said Anna Bahney in CNN.com. “First-time buyers made up just 26 percent of all homebuyers in the year ending June 2022,” according to the National Association of Realtors, the lowest percentage in the survey’s 41-year history. The pandemic led to a supersurge in home prices as workers fled urban dwellings. Mortgage rates then started rising rapidly last spring, heaping more costs on potential buyers. It was rare for any buyer to pay less than asking price, the NAR found, “with 28 percent of buyers” paying over the listed amount. The lack of affordable properties bumped the average age of a first-time buyer up to 36, another all-time high. Americans turn to credit cards…

Patrick McGee and Ryan McMorrow Financial Times “The most profitable tech company operating in China is not a homegrown internet giant such as Alibaba or Tencent,” said Patrick McGee and Ryan McMorrow. It’s Apple. The iPhone-maker grew its operating profits in greater China—which includes Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, and mainland China—by 104 percent during the pandemic, to $31.2 billion in the past year. Such success has required a bargain with Beijing, which has let Apple “sail through President Xi Jinping’s crackdown on homegrown tech groups while reaping the rewards from U.S. sanctions.” Those sanctions, first imposed by the Trump administration, choked off Apple competitor Huawei’s access to key technology. Once considered a source of national pride, Huawei’s “market share in China collapsed in the second half of 2020,” plummeting from 29…

This week’s question: After a year of posting TikToks in which he pretended to be dead, a Kentucky restaurant manager was recently hired to play a corpse on CSI: Vegas. What should he title a motivational memoir about achieving his morbid dream? Last week’s contest: A 15-year-old tabby cat named Larry has outlasted four British prime ministers during his time living at 10 Downing Street. Please come up with an appropriately British-sounding honorific title for this stalwart feline-in-residence. THE WINNER: “Larry, Prince of Tails” Valerie Fisk, Worcester, Mass. SECOND PLACE: “Earl of Cheshire” George Strong, Plano, Texas THIRD PLACE: “Fur Highness” Evelyn Eman Delmar, Northbrook, Ill. For runners-up and complete contest rules, please go to theweek.com/contest. How to enter: Submissions should be emailed to contest@theweek.com. Please include your name,…