Who is the Route 29 Batman? This guy.
washingtonpost.comThe little boy didn’t want to say goodbye, but his mom told him, “Batman needs to go fight the bad guys.” The little boy cried. “I want to go help him fight the bad guys,” he said. His mom said, “You need to go help your sister fight cancer.”
Estimated reading time: 7 min
Ten facts about guns and mass shootings in the United States
washingtonpost.com“The most striking features of the data are (1) how much more violent the U.S. is than other OECD countries (except possibly Estonia and Mexico, not shown here), and (2) the degree of change—and recently, decline—there has been in the U.S. time series considered by itself.”
Estimated reading time: 5 min
Pearls Before Breakfast
washingtonpost.comEach passerby had a quick choice to make, one familiar to commuters in any urban area where the occasional street performer is part of the cityscape: Do you stop and listen? Do you hurry past with a blend of guilt and irritation, aware of your cupidity but annoyed by the unbidden demand on your time and your wallet? Do you throw in a buck, just to be polite? Does your decision change if he's really bad? What if he's really good?
Estimated reading time: 31 min
The economics of video games
washingtonpost.comIn some ways, the economy of Eve Online is a libertarian experiment on a grand scale. There are few overarching rules. Labor markets quickly bounce back from recession because there’s no minimum wage. Players can voluntarily band together to create all sorts of innovative arrangements, including corporations, trade alliances and financial institutions.
Estimated reading time: 12 min
Serial Number A301256: The story of a gun
washingtonpost.comThe gun is useless now. It is tucked into a dirty plastic bag, which is stuffed inside a cardboard box, which is stored in the basement of the Prince George’s County Courthouse in Upper Marlboro. It is in the courthouse’s evidence vault, which used to be a jail cell, locked away. The room is musty. The door is solid. There are no windows and only one weak overhead light. But even in the dimness, it’s obvious the gun has been through a lot.
Estimated reading time: 3 min
My son is schizophrenic. The ‘reforms’ that I worked for have worsened his life.
washingtonpost.comPerhaps, even if Tim had gotten earlier, more effective and better integrated care, he still would have become homeless. But I don’t believe that. Tim is where he is today because of a host of public policy decisions we’ve made in this country. It took a nation to get Tim there. And it will take a national commitment to get him — and others like him — back.
Estimated reading time: 10 min
White House computers had floppy disk drives
washingtonpost.com“The White House CIO office had one data center and no redundancy,” he said, shortcomings that led to crashed e-mail servers and caused White House systems to be down about a quarter of the time in the administration’s first 40 days.
Estimated reading time: 1 min
Ex-Virginia executioner becomes opponent of death penalty
washingtonpost.comJerry Givens executed 62 people. His routine and conviction never wavered. He’d shave the person’s head, lay his hand on the bald pate and ask for God’s forgiveness for the condemned. Then, he would strap the person into Virginia’s electric chair.
Estimated reading time: 10 min
Afghan sprinter Tahmina Kohistani shows what’s possible for Muslim women
washingtonpost.comSuch a short distance, she thought. Just 100 more meters and it would all go away. The abuse: the men watching her train in Kabul, heckling her to go home, “to get behind the man;” the taxi driver who kicked her out of his cab when he found out she was training for the Olympics. One more sprint of less than 15 seconds, this time in front of 60,000 people who boomed with applause as her name was called over the stadium’s loudspeaker, and Kohistani would complete the longest of journeys for the shortest of races.
Estimated reading time: 3 min
Wisconsin recall shows labor isn't coming back. So what's next? #wonkbook
washingtonpost.comIf you step back, then, two things are happening simultaneously among the key interest groups in American politics. Labor is getting weaker. And corporations, in part due to Citizens United, are getting much stronger. The electoral effect of that is obvious: It favors Republicans. But the legislative effect is, perhaps, more significant: It favors corporate interests in Congress, as Democrats will have to be that much more solicitous of business demands in order to keep from being spent into oblivion.
Estimated reading time: 19 min
endonend recommended this story.
Quoted: Clint Eastwood explains some more about Tampa
washingtonpost.com“If somebody’s dumb enough to ask me to go to a political convention and say something, they’re gonna have to take what they get.”
Estimated reading time: 1 min
PatrickTuma recommended this story.
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