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Among filmmakers, dread over money seemed to outweigh any sense of buzz. By the first weekend the lack of major sales had already become a central topic of conversation. As it happens, two of the best films in Sundance’s slate confronted the industry’s distribution crisis head-on.

Inaugurated in this second Trump term is a new mode of dominion in which, writes Vincent Bevins, “the implicit goal of military action is not to create a government, it is to destroy one. ” The nation-destroying model is more slapdash and more gratuitous than the American aggression we grew up with, its innovations familiar but somehow nastier.

Martha Stewart, Walter White, and Rodney Dangerfield walk into a bar. The bartender looks at Dangerfield, asks what he’s having. “Vodka soda, ” he replies. The bartender starts shoveling ice. “Double? ” he checks. “Course I am, ” says Dangerfield. “Dangerfield’s dead. ”

Vignettes from a mind on shore

The US-Israeli war against Iran, far from encouraging a popular uprising, has strengthened the regime’s grip and set back the cause of Iranian freedom indefinitely.

Deceptive job schemes and transnational networks are pulling Kenyans into Moscow’s war.

Malaysia becomes the first country to cancel its tariff deal with the White House.

Sightline Intelligence specializes in drone video processing and claims its AI targeting can separate civilians from militants.

Before the 2024 election, federal prosecutors were "full steam ahead" looking into how a prison gang in Puerto Rico gave drugs to inmates if they voted for a GOP gubernatorial candidate. After Trump’s election, the investigation evaporated.

As heat waves grow longer and deadlier, cities around the world are using elaborate drills to expose weaknesses before a real crisis strikes.

Ultraefficient heat pumps need to replace more than gas furnaces. They have to replace inefficient space heaters as well.

The Amazon is being drawn into financial systems that reshape how nature is valued, and how success is measured.

AI Productivity growth will underwhelm, not because the technology is weak, but because it creates a bottleneck that earlier digital tools largely avoided.

Trump’s latest gambit to reopen the Strait of Hormuz has inflamed the fragile cease-fire with Iran.

The award, for uncovering predatory state towing practices, marks ProPublica’s 9th Pulitzer; two additional investigations were named finalists.

If Gass entertained any escape fantasies, however, The Tunnel does not indulge them. It’s the big, the biggest, Man Alone in a House story. It’s an anti–systems novel, uninterested in conspiracist linkages, fantasias of historical causality, politics, even money; it’s got no reportage, no news. It’s a novel of minor academic failure but invites no pity or nostalgia — it’s the anti-Stoner, that’s for sure.

Four senators wrote letters to Experian and TransUnion, requesting information on the companies’ dispute handling processes after ProPublica revealed they have been dismissing more consumer complaints without providing help.

The Voting Rights Act is dead. The law, very likely the most consequential civil rights statute Congress has ever passed, died on April 29, 2026. It was

Ukraine and its partners are holding their breath to see what’s next for Patriot air defense missile deliveries.

The West ignores the warning signs in the Sahel at its own peril.