onfocus

Google's default search deal with Apple is worth so much to the search giant that Google pays 36 percent of its search advertising revenue from Safari to keep its search engine set as the default in Apple's browser, Bloomberg reported.

Google pays a high price to be the default search option everywhere.

I can already hear the objections from the Times and its defenders: It’s not our job to make people care about things. Nonsense. Of course the news media plays a central role in determining what people think about. The choices they make about what topics to cover and how much to cover them send a clear signal to the American people about what is important; what is worth thinking about.

Based on the number of mentions, a single poll a year before an election is the most important thing to think about. The consequences of encouraging political violence, not as much.

Repetition is the most important element of communications, but you don’t hear President Biden hammering the theme of freedom, making it clear how close we are to the precipice of authoritarianism and spelling out what that will mean. As a result, many voters seem largely unaware that fundamental American freedoms are at stake.

Great article about why freedom is a much better message for democrats than the economy.

But yet the pundits have already pivoted from “Joe Biden is terrible and unpopular and should be ashamed of himself!” to “The Democrats just shockingly [not shockingly if you understand anything about America right now — Ed.] had yet another great election night, and for that Joe Biden should feel bad, because according to polls, which are the same as elections [No — Ed.], he is terrible and unpopular and should be ashamed of himself!”

Cathartic rant about media Trump thirst.

Given all of this, given Trump’s increasingly explicit rhetoric about shifting the chief executive position toward authoritarianism, it seems difficult to understand how he’s still running even with President Biden in early polling — or, in some cases leading him.

My guess on why: the US is a nation with a culture of violence and toxic masculinity and many people have abusive fathers as a model for how the world works. It’s hard to break free from the familiar systems we were raised with, but it’s important to try to create (and vote for) a better world.

Ohio voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to enshrine protections for reproductive health services, including abortion, in the state constitution — the latest in a post-Roe streak of ballot box wins for the abortion rights movement.

The finding out phase of letting the states decide. Turns out people want human rights like bodily autonomy.

Dubbed “Project 2025,” the group is developing a plan, to include draft executive orders, that would deploy the military domestically under the Insurrection Act, according to a person involved in those conversations and internal communications reviewed by The Washington Post. The law, last updated in 1871, authorizes the president to deploy the military for domestic law enforcement.

This is what fascism looks like. This is your regular plea from me to never willingly vote for a fascist. Democracy can be a mess but it’s preferable to boots stomping human faces forever.

“I’m gonna say to NIH scientists, God bless you all,” Kennedy said. “Thank you for public service. We’re going to give infectious disease a break for about eight years.”

On the bright side, voters don’t have to speculate that a vote for this guy is a vote against using science to make informed decisions. It’s painfully clear. And this is your regular plea from me to please vote for people who want to minimize infectious disease.

“We have never seen this level of destruction from an infectious illness before. It rendered the placenta unfit to carry out its duties,” said Dr. David Schwartz, a perinatal pathologist in private practice in Atlanta, who led the study. “These fetuses and newborns died from asphyxiation due to lack of oxygen.”

Covid is still a horror show. I’m just learning about this particular horror now. We don’t hear about it.

I’ve done my best to explain what’s going on with these terms, but they cover basically every single major feature of git which is definitely too much for a single blog post so it’s pretty patchy in some places.

I really like this approach to understanding something with confusing terminology—assume the audience has necessary context and just jump in and unpack the confusing parts without starting from zero. I learned some new git tricks from this.

It is, of course, possible that Johnson really has no bank accounts and just keeps all his money in sacks of cash hidden under his mattress. Another explanation could be that he has selective amnesia and has forgotten to disclose his assets for seven years. But several ethics experts offered another reason: Johnson is terrible at managing the money he makes and may be in massive debt.

Ethics for thee but not for me. If you haven't heard, the new speaker has some strange stuff going on. Third in line for the presidency.

Do No Harm has used its small slice of the Edelmans’ wealth to launch a successful campaign against health care services for trans Americans.

So frustrating that billionaires have more than they could ever need and still look around and say: now, how can I make people suffer?