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Scheduling Note: NextDraft delivery will be sporadic over the next few days.
Doug Whitney isn’t living up to his potential. And that’s a good thing. “Before dawn on a March morning, Doug Whitney walked into a medical center 2,000 miles from home, about to transform from a mild-mannered, bespectacled retiree into a superhuman research subject. First, a doctor inserted a needle into his back to extract cerebral spinal fluid — ‘liquid gold,’ a research nurse called it for the valuable biological information it contains. Then, the nurse took a sample of his skin cells. After that came an injection of a radioactive tracer followed by a brain scan requiring him to lie still for 30 minutes with a thermoplastic mask over his face. Then, another tracer injection and another brain scan.” Doug Whitney has been getting poked and prodded for fourteen years. It’s not because of something he’s got. It’s because of something he’s somehow avoided. Whitney is part of the largest extended family to carry an Alzheimer’s-causing mutation. Basically, Whitney should have already died after suffering through years of one the world’s most devastating diseases. “’Nobody in history had ever dodged that bullet,’ Mr. Whitney said. But somehow, he has done just that.” If researchers can figure out how Doug Whitney has escaped what seemed to be his certain medical fate, it might offer important clues to helping others treat or prevent the scourge of Alzheimer’s. NYT (Gift Article): He Was Expected to Get Alzheimer’s 25 Years Ago. Why Hasn’t He?
2
Theatrical Troop
There are legal reasons why a president could deploy troops to American cities. But the current battle over this topic, playing out in courtrooms and the court of public opinion, is less of a debate about laws and more of a fight over reality. “The problem ... is that many Americans don’t believe the president’s claims. We look at pictures and videos out of Portland and we don’t see ‘war-ravaged’ anything. We look at news reports out of Chicago and see the principal violence coming from federal officers — not being directed toward them. To put the matter directly, there’s a factual dispute about whether resorting to the military is justified. As Judge Karin Immergut (a Trump appointee) put it sharply in the Portland case, in which she ruled over the weekend that there was no legal basis for sending in troops, the president is acting in a manner that is ‘untethered to the facts.’” (That seems to be going around these days.) Stephen I. Vladeck in the NYT (Gift Article): No, Trump Can’t Deploy Troops to Wherever He Wants. “That is what we, and more important the courts, face: a factual dispute more than a legal one.”
+ Texas national guard troops arrive in Chicago amid Trump’s crackdown
+ These cities aren’t war zones. But the administration is doing everything possible to change that. Using helicopters and chemical agents, immigration agents become increasingly aggressive in Chicago.
3
A Guy Walks into a Scroll Bar
“Millions of Americans — a third of U.S. adults — are pulled into a nearly infinite variety of niche corners by a recommendation system that we don’t know much about, making it difficult to understand how the constant scroll affects real people.” WaPo (Gift Article) analyzed more than 800 TikTokkers, from newbies to power users, to see how people get hooked. How TikTok keeps its users scrolling for hours a day. (I’m not a TikTok user. But this article warning of its addictive properties sort of makes me want to try it out.)
4
Berkeley’s Latest Top Dog
During last week’s football game against Duke, Cal players wore helmet decals featuring the number 59. The number celebrates the number of Nobel laureates that have been affiliated with the school’s Berkeley campus. Sadly, Duke won the game. Maybe Cal should have been more forward thinking and featured the number 60. Three scientists at US universities win Nobel Prize in physics for advancing quantum technology, including John Clarke, 83, who conducted his research at the University of California, Berkeley. (Go Bears.)
+ “Fred Ramsdell was parked at a campground in Montana on Monday afternoon after camping and hiking across the Rocky Mountains when his wife, Laura O’Neill, suddenly started shouting. He first thought that maybe she had seen a grizzly bear.” His off-the-grid vacation was interrupted by winning a Nobel Prize for research into the immune system. (None of today’s quantum technology winners were off the grid...)
5
Extra, Extra
Conversion Reversion: “Since at least a decade ago, a rare consensus has prevailed on a provocative issue for L.G.B.T.Q. people. Professional counseling aimed at changing the sexual orientations of gay teenagers, sometimes known as conversion therapy, was viewed as harmful and widely rejected.” Like so many other subjects about which we thought there was a consensus, there wasn’t. Or at least there isn’t anymore. NYT: A Debate Over ‘Conversion Therapy,’ Once Widely Condemned, Is Back. Which brings us to today’s SCOTUS hearing. “The Supreme Court on Tuesday appeared poised to back a free speech challenge to a Colorado law that bans conversion therapy aimed at young people questioning their sexual orientations or gender identities in a case likely to have national implications.”
+ The Hostage: Two years after the Oct 7 attacks, the NYT (Gift Article) catches up with Emily Damari, who was held captive in Gaza for 471 days. Freed From Hamas, but Not Captivity.
+ Surgeon General Agreement: “Never before have we issued a joint public warning like this. But the profound, immediate and unprecedented threat that Kennedy’s policies and positions pose to the nation’s health cannot be ignored.” WaPo (Gift Article): Six surgeons general: It’s our duty to warn the nation about RFK Jr.
+ Coin Toss: Another lede that manages to perfectly sum up our national moment. “The Trump administration on Monday defended its plan to mint a $1 coin bearing the image of President Trump despite the fact that an 1866 law dictates that only the deceased can appear on U.S. currency.”
+ Friend Zone: WSJ: Our Brains Evolved to Socialize—but Max Out at About 150 Friends. (I’ve always preferred to measure my social life in terms of subscribers.)
+ Lox Smith: “The oldest of three brothers, Mr. Zabar did not intend to go into the family business, which his parents, Louis and Lillian (Teit) Zabar, started in 1934 as the smoked-fish department of a Daitch supermarket on Broadway. Saul had visions of becoming a doctor. But when his father died in 1950 at 49, Saul left college and returned home to help out.” Saul Zabar, Smoked Fish Czar of Upper West Side, Dies at 97.
+ Box Out: America’s latest recession warning is a brown cardboard box.
6
Bottom of the News
“Claims about the benefits of cold-water immersion date back centuries. Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence and the third American president, wrote toward the end of his life about using a cold foot bath daily for 60 years. He also owned a book published in 1706 on the history of cold-water bathing. While evidence is building around the positive health effects of swimming in chilly water, bathing in ice or taking cold showers, scientific confirmation is still lacking.” Cold-water immersion may offer health benefits -- and also presents risks.
+ “Prosecuting attorneys say Whitley was found by police, as he was wearing the same True Religion underwear that was captured on camera during the alleged robbery.” (One more reason why your underwear probably shouldn’t be visible.)