Weekly Review
House Republicans led by the Freedom Caucus twice blocked consideration of a military spending bill, bringing the federal government days away from a shutdown.1 A draft motion to strip Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy of his position was found on a changing table in a House bathroom, and McCarthy, who had earlier dared his Republican opposition to “move the fucking motion,” sent his caucus home.2 3 “Most of what Congress does is not good for the American people,” said Republican Bob Good. “Most of what we do as a Congress is totally unjustified.”4 “If those jagoffs in the House stop trying to shut our government down … then I will save democracy by wearing a suit on the Senate floor next week,” posted Democratic Senator John Fetterman, who often appears in a hoodie and shorts, on X.5 The Consumer Product Safety Commission released We’re Safety Now Haven’t We: Volume 1, a seven-song album featuring hip-hop, EDM, and K-pop tracks about common dangers. “So be careful, ow ow/Every time you’re around/I have to check the smoke detector/So you don’t burn down the house,” a reggaeton artist sang about home fire safety.6 “Humanity has opened the gates of hell,” said United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, speaking about climate change at the UN’s 78th General Assembly in New York, where leaders and diplomats from 145 countries gathered to discuss climate change and other global issues.7 8 Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an told reporters that the multihued decorations at the assembly, installed to represent the UN’s sustainability goals, upset him because they were “LGBT colors.”9
India passed legislation reserving one-third of the seats in state legislatures and the lower house of Parliament for women and was accused by Canada’s prime minister, Justin Trudeau, of killing a Sikh separatist in British Columbia, a charge that its Ministry of External Affairs called “absurd and motivated.”10 11 12 A Uighur scholar who disappeared in 2017 was reported to have been sentenced to life incarceration in China, and an Indonesian TikTok star was sentenced to two years in prison for eating pork rinds.13 14 A 9/11 defendant was ruled unfit for trial due to severe mental health issues caused by torture inflicted by the CIA, and the Venezuelan government deployed 11,000 police officers and soldiers to reassert authority at a prison where inmates had built a nightclub, a swimming pool, and a small zoo.15 16 It was reported that as many as 8,900 migrants were being arrested each day at the United States’s southern border, and a Venezuelan accompanied by a pet squirrel named Niko made an appointment to request asylum.17 18 A report revealed that Elon Musk lied when he claimed that no monkeys had been harmed by his experimental Neuralink brain implants, and lawyers who successfully sued the board of Tesla for excess pay requested that a judge approve their fees of over $10,000 per hour.19 20 Authors including Jodi Picoult and George R. R. Martin sued Open AI over the use of their texts in the training of ChatGPT, and in response to concerns about AI-generated works, Amazon limited self-publishers from releasing more than three books a day.21 22 A Danish artist was ordered to repay nearly 500,000 kroner to a museum to which he had submitted two blank canvases in a project called “Take the Money and Run.” “The work is that I have taken their money,” the artist previously said.23
The city of Palm Springs agreed to revise a proposed AIDS memorial sculpture that was criticized for resembling an anus.24 Eighty-three thousand cases of Kraft Singles were recalled because of a gagging risk.25 It was reported that Chinese women were using stickers with images of belly buttons to lengthen the appearance of their legs.26 A Napa County man who had been attacked with a knife by a trespasser reportedly pulled it out of his back and used it to stab his assailant, and an Indianapolis woman who was trying to stab a dog for eating her chicken sandwich wounded her 1-year-old niece instead.27 28 A Florida man who repeatedly fired his rifle in the air to celebrate Ron DeSantis’s signing of a permitless carry law before being shot several times by police was arrested, and a rape suspect who tried to fake his own death was reportedly caught because he was still wearing an ankle monitor.29 30 Ohio doctors were accused of propping up the corpse of a woman who had died after a surgical mishap to make her look alive for when her family visited, and the screenwriter of Weekend at Bernie’s died at 81.31 32 A Cornish vicar came under fire for installing a bar in a 600-year-old church.33 “Alcohol is a tradition. We all like to drink. Just let us drink,” said a University of Louisiana sophomore in response to a reminder email about campus tailgate rules.34 An Australian tested local regulations by naming her son Methamphetamine Rules. “He’s a very chill child,” the mother said. “So not anything like a meth user.”35 —Jon Edelman
