Society

The Napa Legal Institute released its second annual Faith and Freedom Index last month, which essentially scores states on how easy it is for faith-based non-profit organizations to operate within them. Coming in at the top of states that “over-burden and are even hostile towards faith-based nonprofits” are Massachusetts, Michigan and Washington, while Alabama and Indiana topped the list of states with “robust protections for faith-based nonprofits that their less-free neighbors could learn from.

Conservative commentator and 1776 Project PAC founder Ryan Girdusky found his punditry gig at CNN to be short-lived after the network kicked him off air Monday for making a joke about Hezbollah’s exploding pagers. Girdusky was sparring with two progressive co-panelists, Ashley Allison and Mehdi Hasan, on CNN Newsnight over whether Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden could be reasonably equated to the 1939 Nazi rally at the same venue. Girdusky asserted that Democrats were smearing Trump’s supporters by accusing them of attending a Nazi rally, to which Hasan replied, “If you don’t want to be called Nazis, stop doing — stop saying,” presumably meaning to end that sentence with “Nazi things.

The non-endorsement is the new endorsement! Hot on the heels of the Los Angeles Times’s decision not to endorse a candidate in the presidential race, a controversial call made by the paper's owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong that has been met with multiple staff resignations, the Washington Post is following suit. A statement published Friday reads: "The Washington Post will not be making an endorsement of a presidential candidate in this election. Nor in any future presidential election. We are returning to our roots of not endorsing presidential candidates." Public statements from leading Post personalities have been aghast. Columnist Karen Attiah tweeted, "Jesus Christ." Then, an hour later, "..." Then an hour later still, "What an absolute stab in the back.

Technological revolutions can only change the world when the new technology becomes cheap enough for it to be widely applied. Just ask Elon Musk. The rocket age began with Germany’s V-2 in 1944, but the single-use technology was so expensive that it required state resources to utilize. Then, last Sunday, SpaceX’s Starship rocket booster, the most powerful ever launched, returned from space and was secured by its gantry for reuse. Thus it became, in the words of the New York Times, “more like a jetliner than a rocket.” It is estimated that reusable rockets will reduce the cost per pound of launching things into space by at least an order of magnitude and a new space age can now begin.

For years, in the absence of a Spanish-speaking, right-leaning news channel, discussions about the need for Fox en Español have been prevalent. With the Hispanic electorate becoming the second-largest voting bloc in the country — one that is more swayable than the black voting bloc — politicos have been pitching the idea for a while. Investors, however, weren’t always convinced. Now though, things have changed. Fox News Media announced last week that they will release a daily one-hour-long Spanish-language program entitled Fox Noticias on October 15. The show, which will air on Fox Deportes, the longest-running Spanish-language sports network, will air every weekday at 4 p.m. ET.

Once upon a time, in a land faraway, CBS was called the “Tiffany Network.” The network’s glittering jewel was its news division. This is the story of that division’s decline and fall, driven by partisan goals and leftist ideology. CBS News gained its fame in the 1940s, under the leadership of Edward R. Murrow, who not only painted a vivid word-picture of London during the Blitz, but also recruited the best broadcast journalists in the business. For decades, they formed the core of CBS News, first on radio and then on television. That tradition continued through the 1960s, when tens of millions of Americans turned to Walter Cronkite for an honest report of the day’s news. If the newscast included editorial comments, as it sometimes did, they were offered by Eric Sevareid.

Someone call the disinformation police! Left-wing conspiracy theories and attempts to manipulate the media are spiraling out of control ahead of the 2024 election. From tall tales about former president Donald Trump staging his own assassination attempt to the lower-stakes speculation that Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance is wearing guyliner, “BlueAnon” has reemerged in a big way. BlueAnon is a blanket term coined by some conservatives to describe liberal and left-wing conspiracy theories. It intentionally rhymes with QAnon, the arguably better-known right-wing conspiracy, and mostly arose in response to what many regard as the Russian collusion hoax, the idea that Trump colluded with the Russian government to win the 2016 presidential election.

Astute readers might know of the sale process The Spectator has been going through for the past several months. At long last, The Spectator has found a new owner — Sir Paul Marshall, the proprietor of UnHerd in the UK. The sale price of $131 million is a testament to the value and importance of The Spectator brand and everything it stands for. The US edition of The Spectator was established in 2018, with our monthly print edition appearing in 2019 — and we've grown every year since. First edited by Freddy Gray, the publication has made an indelible mark on matters of politics, arts and culture. We're excited by what our new future holds and look forward to new investments across our entire operation.

Dyson isn’t the first brand that comes to mind when you’re thinking about buying a pair of Bluetooth headphones. You likely don’t even know they make Bluetooth headphones. And if you do, it’s because their first pair, last year’s Dyson Zone, were the first critically panned headphones released in years. In his review, tech YouTuber MKBHD called them “the dumbest product I’ve ever reviewed.” For the unfamiliar, the Zone has fans and air filters in each earcup, which — through a magnetically attachable mouth visor — filters the air you breathe. But it can’t filter out Covid, is less effective than an N95 mask and using it ruins the Zone’s sound quality, as you’re blasting fast-moving fans right beside your ears.

In the middle of one of the craziest news cycles of my lifetime, I attempted to take a few days off from mainlining X, the drug formerly known as Twitter. (Big mistake. Huge!) My life felt unmanageable and I needed a detox. It was post-Trump assassination attempt, post-Hulk Hogan ripping off his shirt at the RNC, post-Biden withdrawing from the presidential race in what was essentially a tweeted-out Notes apology. It was also just barely post-Kamala being tapped as heiress to the throne — though she had yet to be endorsed by Obama or Nancy Pelosi. Things seemed somewhat settled — and I opted to tune the online world out and touch grass. When I logged out, the Democrats were still somewhat in disarray. There was talk of a Trump landslide.