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Friday, September 18, 2026

The app, which Szydlowski calls "Zuckoff," a tawdry portmanteau, has garnered 5,000 users since its launch on Apple's App Store last month. read more


Anthropic has quietly set up a laboratory to do physical biology work as it pushes its artificial-intelligence ambitions into the world of drug science.


"Mr. President, some of your immigration enforcement efforts have gone too far," Florida Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar said in a campaign video. read more


Thursday, September 17, 2026

Survivors appalled nobody will tell them if they're in Epstein's CSAM collection. read more


Merriam-Webster.com has added 1,400 new words and definitions to its dictionary, reflecting the widespread use of updated and evolving language and "offering a window into the world today," the company announced. "The new entries reflect words and meanings that have demonstrated widespread use over time," a statement from Merriam-Webster read in part.


Comments

Measles Cases and Outbreaks
www.cdc.gov

... As of September 17, 2026, 3,471 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States in 2026. ...

For the full year of 2025, a total of 2,289 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States. ...


... and those are CDC numbers ...


US Postal Service Chief Told Associates He Wants to Quit, Sources Say
www.usnews.com

... The head of the U.S. Postal Service has told confidants that he is deeply discouraged by his job and wants to resign, according to four people familiar with his thinking, as the agency comes under scrutiny over financial losses and President Donald Trump's effort to tighten rules on mail-in voting.

Postmaster General David Steiner, who took office in July 2025 after the White House forced out his predecessor, has expressed frustration over a lack of help from the White House and Congress in addressing the mail service's long-running financial woes, the people said. ...


@#34 ... Don't give up hope. Trump has a lot of "all things Trump" on his plate. ...

Urgent motion filed to stop carving of Trump's name into US Institute of Peace building
www.politico.com

... Ousted board members of the U.S. Institute of Peace are asking a federal court to block the imminent carving of President Donald Trump's name on the headquarters of the nonpartisan institution he sought to dismantle shortly after taking office.

Members of the board who were removed by the administration filed an emergency motion Thursday in Washington in a dispute that has echoes of Trump's effort to place his name on the Kennedy Center.

The motion was filed as an emergency petition, alleging that a contractor has already been selected to carve Trump's name into the Constitution Avenue headquarters that the administration sought to shutter as part of the Elon Musk-led DOGE effort to shrink the government. ...


Kennedy tells anti-vaccine activists they have a friend in Trump's White House
apnews.com

... Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. gave the keynote address Thursday at a conference of an anti-vaccine activist group he once chaired, telling the hundreds in attendance that they had a friend in President Donald Trump's White House.

It was Kennedy's first time appearing at the Children's Health Defense conference since he became secretary. Kennedy took leave from the group when he launched his bid to become president in 2023, but his speech Thursday served as a sort of homecoming, offering him a platform from which to hail the administration's steps to scale back vaccine guidance and reassure the activists in attendance that he was working to turn their priorities into policy.

"Let me be clear: You have a strong and steadfast friend in the White House. We've accomplished in 19 months things that would have seemed unthinkable two years ago," he said. ...


Related ...

Judge gives Blanche deadline, warns of possible contempt charges over Epstein files
thehill.com

... A federal judge gave Attorney General Todd Blanche a deadline to comply with court orders Wednesday regarding the release of certain information in the Epstein files, threatening contempt charges for failure to comply.

U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan stated in a Wednesday opinion that Blanche and his office were not following court orders concerning redactions in requested documentation related to the activities of the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell.

He gave the Department of Justice (DOJ) until Sept. 24 to provide the records or explain to the court why its orders were not "clear and unambiguous" " finding the attorney general's argument against the records' release to be "without merit."

Sullivan noted in his opinion that "a civil contempt finding at this juncture would be premature" but did not rule out the possibility if the deadline is not met. ...


More from the article ...

... Among the new entries are words stemming from social media and the meme culture it inspires. They include:

- - - Looksmaxxing: the practice of taking one or more sometimes extreme or dangerous measures intended to increase one's physical attractiveness

- - - Parasocial: relating to or involving a one-sided emotional connection with someone (especially a celebrity or fictional character) whom one does not know personally

- - - Rickroll: to trick (someone) into hearing the song "Never Gonna Give You Up" by English singer Rick Astley

"Among the new entries, social media culture provides the well-defined looksmaxxing, the unrequited parasocial, the ever-dangerous Rickroll (that link is harmless, we promise), and for some investors the potentially more dangerous meme coin. Congratulations to promposal for getting picked, and to letterboxing for a new digital sense to go with its 19th-century pastime," according to the statement.

Other additions include cultural phenomena:

- - - Cuffing season: a time of the year when people who are not married or in a relationship begin looking for a short-term romantic partner to spend the colder months of the year with

- - - Yacht rock: a style of soft rock music originating in the 1970s and 1980s

- - - Crashout: A: a mental or emotional breakdown, B: an emotional outburst or tantrum

- - - Sunday scaries: feelings of anxiety or sadness that arise on Sunday from the knowledge that the weekend is almost over

- - - Copium: avoidance, denial, or minimization (as of a bad situation, problem, outcome, etc.) imagined as a narcotic

- - - Mandela Effect: the experience of many people having the same false memory (coined by researcher Fiona Broome, who remembered the prison death of former South African President Nelson Mandela, though that didn't happen.)

In 2025, Merriam-Webster named "slop" its word of the year. ...



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