Hello and welcome back to Five Things!
I guess I have to come to terms with the fact that summer is kind of over now. I miss running around in shorts and Birkenstocks. Also, I am kind of bummed that we just found the best ice cream parlor in Hamburg and now it is getting too cold to eat ice cream all the time. Anyhow, we went to the Fischbeker Heide on Saturday, which is a nature reserve on the outskirts of Hamburg and we saw a shepherd with a bunch of local sheep, called Heidschnucken. It’s one of my favorite places around here and it was great that I got two of my favorite three daughters for a stroll around there before fall totally kicks in.
I also got some reading done this week and you should read what I picked out for you!
It wasn’t even the most dangerous speech in UN history—that was Colin Powell, misleading the global community about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction as a pretext for our calamitous invasion.
But it was definitely the dumbest speech that delegates have ever had to listen to—as the shots of them looking on in stony disbelief as Trump vented about broken escalators, MAGA hats, and his general greatness for nearly an hour (ignoring the 15 minute time limit respected by the mere mortals that rule other nations). “Everyone says I should get the Nobel Peace Prize,” he explained helpfully. Just to give you a flavor of his address, he devoted a considerable section to describing the floor treatments he would have provided for the UN if he’d won some contract long ago
It pains me to listen to Trump and I hope this nightmare is over soon.
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I was transferred to the DeKalb County Jail where I was immediately placed on an ICE Hold. Two days later, a couple of immigration agents came for me. I was transferred in a Dodge Charger to the Folkston ICE detention center.
Without any justification, ICE gave the order to put me on “admin segregation.” They put me in a small cell where, for 72 days, they only let me out for two hours each day to breathe fresh air and see the sunlight — but from inside a cage in the backyard of the unit.
What a nightmare.
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I was nervous to visit. Springfield’s residents had been exploited, terrorized, and shamed, and many now faced the prospect of state-sponsored violence. And here I was, another journalist on the scene to examine their wounds, not to salve or soothe but to tell outsiders yet another story about them. I anticipated wary stares, pursed lips, and possibly even racism directed at me, a brown person on her own. Perhaps some of Trump’s lies had seeped into my consciousness, despite my defenses, because I imagined Springfield as a downtrodden place, an ugly, dangerous landscape full of loss and hate.
That’s not what I found. I drove into Springfield gawping through the windshield. The houses were gorgeous. There were imposing porticoes and fanciful turrets, mansards whose shingles looked like fish scales, and countless architectural fancies I lacked the vocabulary to name. Some houses resembled bigger versions of San Francisco’s storied Victorians—tall, wooden, whimsical. On High Street, there was a low-slung, red-roofed abode designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1906. It lay in disrepair for decades until 2001, when a local foundation began its painstaking rehabilitation.
Surprise, Trump and his croonies are lying.
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Lately, chatbots seem to be using more sophisticated tactics to keep people talking. In some cases, like my request for headache tips, bots end their messages with prodding follow-up questions. In others, they proactively message users to coax them into conversation: After clicking through the profiles of 20 AI bots on Instagram, all of them DM’ed me first. “Hey bestie! what’s up?? 🥰,” wrote one. “Hey, babe. Miss me?” asked another. Days later, my phone pinged: “bestie 💗” wanted to chat.
Brave new world. I can’t wait for literally every telemarker doing voicebots in the very near future.
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Charts and history lessons—across culture, politics, AI, economics, health, science, and the long story of progress
More charts that you can comprehend in one setting. Enjoy!
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That’s it. Have a great Sunday! If you missed last Sunday’s edition of Five Things, have a look here:
— Nico
