“Every dog is entitled to one bite.”
In her native Slovenia, a life-size sculpture of the first lady of the United States was sawed off at the ankles and carried away after a previous one had been set afire.
A weekly dispatch taking aim at the relentless absurdity of the 24-hour news cycle.
Israeli air strikes killed more than 50 in the Gaza Strip, including 36 people who had been sheltering in a school; Doctors Without Borders called Israel’s aid allowance into the Gaza Strip “ridiculously inadequate”; Israeli soldiers fired at a diplomatic delegation visiting the occupied West Bank; and the prime minister of Israel said that the United Kingdom, France, and Canada, each of which had criticized Israel’s military escalation in Gaza, were on “the wrong side of history.”1 2 3 4 5 Two hundred and twenty cryptocurrency executives, influencers, and a former NBA player spent a collective $148 million to attend a black-tie gala hosted by the U.S. president to promote his cryptocurrency business; the U.S. Treasury announced a plan to halt the minting of pennies; and the Pentagon announced that it had accepted a “megajet,” valued between $200 and $400 million, from Qatar’s government to be used for presidential travel.6 7 8 The 46th U.S. president’s personal office announced that he had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer; a Democratic congressman in Virginia died of esophageal cancer, marking the third death of sitting Democratic congresspeople in the past three months; and the five-time Grammy Award–winning musician Billy Joel canceled all his future concerts after being diagnosed with a rare brain condition.9 10 11 12 13 14 The pope’s eldest brother was photographed with the U.S. president in the Oval Office; and in a meeting with the president of South Africa, the U.S. president falsely claimed that the country had been perpetrating a white genocide.15 16 17 A commencement speaker at Smith College returned her honorary degree after revealing she had plagiarized her speech; graduates of Columbia University burned and tore up their diplomas in protest of the university’s persecution of pro-Palestine student activists; the Muppet Kermit the Frog delivered a speech at the University of Maryland graduation; the U.S. president warned West Point graduates to stay away from “trophy wives”; and the University at Buffalo announced that a baby who had crossed the stage in cap and gown had “not earned enough credits to receive a diploma.”18 19 20 21 22
In her native Slovenia, a life-size sculpture of the first lady of the United States was sawed off at the ankles and carried away after a previous one had been set afire; and in Slovenia’s capital, 36,000 signatures were collected in favor of reducing kindergarten classroom size.23 24 It was reported that the Department of Government Efficiency is employing Elon Musk’s generative AI chatbot to analyze data in the federal government, a Chicago newspaper admitted to publishing an AI-generated list of summer reading recommendations composed of fake books, a new version of ChatGPT was found to circumvent instructions to shut itself down, and an AI model threatened to reveal the affair of one of its engineers in an effort to avoid being replaced by another AI system.25 26 27 28 Japan’s minister of agriculture resigned after admitting that he never had to purchase rice because his supporters would gift him the grain, the newest head of the U.S. Social Security Administration admitted during a town hall that he had to look his job up on the internet after he received the offer, and a former morgue manager at Harvard University confessed to his role in a nationwide network of people who buy and sell human remains.29 30 31 In Australia, a kangaroo attempted to drown a man in floodwaters, and an outgoing member of an Australian state parliament concluded his valedictory speech by drinking beer out of his shoe.32 33
In Gloucester, England, a man was airlifted to the hospital with injuries sustained while competing in an annual cheese chase; the British government announced the rollout of chemical castration for sex offenders; and the National Football League at its spring meeting failed to pass a ban on the “tush push” maneuver.34 35 36 It was reported that a Seattle parking lot that had been established as a homeless RV encampment by a local non-profit organization would be converted into a three-story pickleball complex.37 A man balanced 96 spoons on his body in order to break the world record, which he himself had set two years prior, and a television anchor in New York delivered the morning’s news hours after her water broke.38 39 In Texas, a man sued a fast food company for damages amounting up to $1 million after his request for no onions on his burger was ignored; and in Canada, a tribunal ruled that a woman was not entitled to nearly $5,000 in compensation after a dog had bitten her.40 41 “Every dog,” according to the tribunal’s decision, “is entitled to one bite.”42 —Gus O’Connor
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