The Christian Science Monitor won last week for my favorite news coverage. Amid all kinds of “pop goes the weasel” references as other outlets wrote up the shutdown of the Large Hadron Collider by a meddlesome mustelid, CSM told us that not only had this sort of thing happened before, but that CERN was certain it’s never been because of a Terminator scenario.
In November 2009, CERN said a baguette dropped by a bird was the cause of an electrical short that briefly shut down the collider.
In that case, the agency said the bird survived but “lost breakfast.” Asked whether the baguette had come from the future to sabotage the machine, CERN responded, “The possibility has been examined by theoretical physicists — considered unlikely as they feel baguettes will not play a part in future cultures.”
I’m not optimistic about a future that doesn’t include baguettes, but I guess that’s worth a debate. After all, the end of the republic has never looked better.
- Speaking of, Slate‘s weekend look at Donald Trump as baby boomer is definitely worth your time. (I know we’re all thinking about the tipping point toward tyranny anyway — and deconstructing it, as that piece merits.)
- I would honestly take Sarah Kendzior’s take on inequality almost any time over Andrew Sullivan’s, and her Quartz piece on the geography of the economic recovery says it all, in much less time with much more hard data.
- Anger is also having its moment in entertainment — specifically, female anger, as the Los Angeles Times so aptly points out. (Is it any wonder, in a world where this is one reason I won’t sign up for Uber?) See also: “Being a Girl: A Brief Personal History of Violence,” a December personal essay from The Belle Jar.)
- Meanwhile, the U.K. seems to be having a huge row about whether it’s worse to say something antisemitic or to be called out on saying something antisemitic. Eleanor Margolis pretty well sums up what it’s like to watch it all as a left-wing British Jew. You’ll also learn the awful truth about the origin of “suck it up.”
- There’s one good thing to look forward to this week, though: By the end of it, I will have seen Captain America: Civil War at last. Last month, Vulture wrote up an interesting piece on how the MCU cultivates and approaches its stable of directors, and how it’s likely you love their movies but don’t know any of their names.
