“Has anybody ever had a better two weeks?”
A senior Iranian cleric issued a fatwa against the U.S. president, who stated that the White House will host a UFC fight next year in celebration of the country’s semiquincentennial.
A weekly dispatch taking aim at the relentless absurdity of the 24-hour news cycle.
After twenty-seven hours, the U.S. Senate passed the legislation formerly named the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the title of which was changed after a New York senator argued that it violated the “Byrd Rule,”a provision concerning “the inclusion of extraneous matter” in reconciliation bills.1 2 “It is now called ‘the act,’” said the senator, “but it is really the ‘big ugly betrayal.’”3 “You people are awful!” a heckler shouted as senators debated the bill, which is estimated to see 20 million people lose health care coverage and to cut food assistance programming by $186 billion.4 5 6 “Oh my God, I just want to go home,” a Pennsylvania senator said on the first day of the so-called vote-a-rama. “I’ve already missed our entire trip to the beach.”7 An Alaskan senator urged her colleagues in the House of Representatives to vote “no” on the bill after voting “yes” herself, the Washington, D.C.-bound flights of several representatives were canceled because of inclement weather, an Illinois congressman completed what he predicted to be a fourteen-hour drive to the Capitol, and a South Carolina congresswoman arrived at Capitol Hill wearing pink polka-dot pajamas.8 9 10 11 The House democratic leader spoke for a record-breaking 8 hours and 33 minutes to delay the vote; and House Republicans heeded the president’s instruction to “Vote ‘YAY.’”12 13 It was reported that roughly half of voters expect the 887-page bill to harm them and their families.14 15 “Has anybody ever had a better two weeks?” asked the U.S. president the day before signing the bill into law.16 The Social Security Administration sent a laudatory email to Americans that falsely implied that the bill would usher in a tax cut on Social Security benefits.17 The former Department of Government Efficiency administrator Elon Musk announced that he was spearheading a new political party, and it was reported that the secretary of homeland security did not disclose $80,000 that she received from a nonprofit that promoted her political career when she was governor of South Dakota. A senior Iranian cleric issued a fatwa against the U.S. president, who stated that the White House will host a UFC fight next year in celebration of the country’s semiquincentennial.18 19 20 21
In central Texas, at least 100 people were declared dead and dozens more missing after heavy flooding lifted the Guadalupe River 26 feet in 45 minutes.22 23 Kerr County officials failed to issue evacuation orders to the children’s camps and other residents along the river, and a Kerr County judge said that emergency alert systems were costly and that the county’s taxpayers had “reeled” at the price and hadn’t wanted to pay for them.24 25 “Fake flooding,” wrote a congressional candidate in Georgia, who claimed that the weather was being manipulated.26 The website of the U.S. Global Change Research Program, which publishes reports on climate change, was removed from the internet by the Trump Administration; and the MethaneSAT, an $88-million Jeff Bezos–backed satellite that detects the release of methane from oil and gas production, went missing.27 28 North Korean officials launched an investigation into cruel punishments ordered by the government’s own enforcement body; the leader of the Russian Navy was killed near the Ukrainian border; and an 83-year-old former priest was arrested at a demonstration in the United Kingdom after displaying a sign in support of Palestine Action, an organization that was declared a “terror group” by the British government after its members spray-painted two military planes.29 30 31 32 33 34
An Australian flight was delayed after a snake was discovered onboard, a Sri Lankan man attempted to smuggle three live ball pythons in his underwear through an airport in Bangkok, and it was reported that Japanese airlines canceled flights after a dip in sales due to a 1999 manga book that predicted a catastrophe would unfold on the day of the scheduled departures.35 36 37 In India, an inebriated rickshaw driver drove his vehicle down a railway a few days after a drunk SUV driver drove her car down the same tracks.38 Choir singers who belonged to a Welsh cathedral reported that “several bottles of Prosecco would be gone through on a Sunday morning,” and that clergy invented an inappropriate drinking game. “Because Christ has seven last words,” one of the singers explained, “that somehow translated into seven shots of Christ.”39 —Megan Evershed
It’s too bad the Walensa, a real freedom fighter, is also an anti-Semite.
Is his Visa in order?