🦠 Vanity Fair and ProPublica had this big article over the weekend about the origins of COVID-19 and the “lab leak” theory – IE, that COVID-19 originated from the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China and escaped into the wild by accident. Which… it’s possible, but most of the reputable scientists I see talking about it think it’s unlikely, and that COVID-19 had a natural origin – came from critters at the farmers market in Wuhan. Either way, the Vanity Fair/ProPublica article seems… a bit dodgy, to be honest. A lot of it feels weaselly to me, and apparently they managed to misquote at least one contributor to the article, making him sound like he might agree with their article instead of directly disagreeing and also warning them not to misquote him. Dunno, don’t love this article. Feels untrustworthy.
🐦 Lots of fun Twitter drama over the weekend, too. Elon certainly seems to have had a weekend of it, at any rate. First he tweeted a crappy conspiracy theory about Paul Pelosi at Hillary Clinton, then he got roasted for it, then he deleted it, then he got roasted for it again by his fanboys for “caving to the left” or whatever. Meanwhile, he floated making verification checkmarks – those blue checks some people and organizations on Twitter have to prove they’re the real person/organization – a kind of subscription service. That is, to keep your check you’d have to sign up for Twitter Blue, a paid service. He floated charging $5 a month for the check, then $20. I can’t think of anything cringier than paying money for a checkmark which has been basically meaningless for years now, and which will become even more meaningless and laughable by charging for it.
🍊 Apparently the GOP is expecting a Trump indictment after election day. And I really, really hope they’re right to do so. There must be consequences – serious consequences – for what Trump did. He must pay the price, and the price must be prison time. I don’t believe we can continue to be America if we don’t hold Trump accountable for his crimes.
-fin-
Notes & Thoughts 