Here are some of the topics that have caught my attention as I’ve been browsing the internet:
Preply created a world map and explainer about how people around the country express their love—including on dates other than February 14.
“At Preply, we’ve explored how to say “I love you” in over 60 languages from around the world. So whether you’re planning a trip abroad or just want to surprise a loved one with a special message, you’ll never struggle to express your feelings again.
Valentine’s Day is a popular time of year for expressing love. However, it’s not just the language that can vary from country to country. Valentine’s day customs, traditions and even the date can vary around the world.”
IRS Says You Can File
In the February 9, 2023, edition of this newsletter, I noted that the IRS was advising people in California and 21 other states to wait to file their taxes. The delay was necessary because the agency still needed to decide whether to consider as taxable income the stimulus checks and rebates these states sent out last year.
The IRS has now given us its final answer. The payments are not taxable income. You may proceed with your filing.
The Washington Post’s Jacob Bogage reports, “Friday’s announcement means taxpayers in more than 20 states can now file their taxes. Residents of Alaska, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island will not have any taxes collected against state payments or tax refunds and do not need to report them on their returns, the agency said.
The IRS said the payments made by those states were “for the promotion of the general welfare or as a disaster relief payment,” and therefore are not federally taxable.”
To be clear, I am not offering tax filing advice in this newsletter. Please read the IRS guidance if you want to learn more.
As part of this announcement, the IRS also shared that thanks to the infusion of resources it received after the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, the agency is actually able to help the vast majority of taxpayers who contact it seeking advice.
Bobage writes: “According to a Treasury Department official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal data, the agency has answered 88.6 percent of its phone calls from the start of tax filing season through Feb. 4, up from the 13 percent of calls answered during the 2022 tax season and 11 percent the year before.
Factoring in callers who reached automated phone and chat support, 93.3 percent of taxpayers were able to reach IRS resources since the start of tax filing season through Feb. 4. Those automated tools are a major advancement for the outdated taxpayer services systems, allowing filers to obtain basic data without phoning IRS call centers.
The Inflation Reduction Act backed by President Biden and other prominent Democrats provided the IRS $80 billion in additional funding over 10 years to improve services and strengthen tax enforcement for high-income earners and corporations.
The tax agency invested in new technology and hired 5,000 workers to staff phones based on funding from that law, the official said.”
Providing a government agency with appropriate resources helps people get the services and support they need. I hope we can repeat this lesson.
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Learning About White Christian Nationalism
The Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and the Brookings Institution released the results of a survey that explains a bunch about our nation’s political dynamics. Here are some of the survey’s key findings from the PPRI/Brookings press release:
“A major new national survey conducted jointly by Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and the Brookings Institution finds nearly two-thirds of white evangelical Protestants qualify as either Christian nationalism adherents (29%) or sympathizers (35%), and more than half of Republicans are classified as adherents (21%) or sympathizers (33%). This is a marked contrast from the 1 in 10 Americans as a whole who adhere to the tenets of Christian nationalism and the 19% who are sympathetic.
The report sheds light on the threat Christian nationalism poses to American democracy, reveals the drivers of support for this worldview, and explores how these beliefs intersect with other ideologies such as anti-Black racism, anti-immigrant views, antisemitism, anti-Muslim attitudes, and patriarchal gender roles.
“Christian nationalism is a new term for a worldview that has been with us since the founding of our country — the idea that America is destined to be a promised land for European Christians,” says Robert P. Jones, Ph.D., president and founder of PRRI. “While most Americans today embrace pluralism and reject this anti-democratic claim, majorities of white evangelical Protestants and Republicans remain animated by this vision of a white Christian America.”
The report’s findings about the connections between Christian nationalism and other political ideologies show a strong correlation with the culture war battles stoked by former President Donald Trump and other Republicans who would like to take his spot as the leader of the GOP.
“Anti-Black racism, anti-immigrant views, antisemitic views, anti-Muslim views, and patriarchal views of gender roles are each positively associated with Christian nationalism.
- A majority of Christian nationalism adherents (57%) disagree that white supremacy is a major problem in the United States today, and 7 out of 10 reject the idea that past discrimination contributes to present-day hurdles for Black Americans.
- Seven in 10 (71%) Christian nationalism adherents embrace so-called “replacement theory,” the idea that immigrants are “invading our country and replacing our cultural and ethnic background.”
- Nearly a quarter of Christian nationalism adherents (23%) believe the stereotype that Jewish people in America hold too many positions of power, compared to just 9% of Christian nationalism rejecters. Christian nationalism adherents are more than three times as likely as rejecters to believe Jewish people are more loyal to Israel than America (44% vs. 13% respectively).
- Two-thirds (67%) of Christian nationalism adherents say we should prevent people from some majority Muslim countries from entering the United States, compared to only 29% of all Americans.
- Nearly 7 in 10 Christian nationalism adherents (69%) agree that the husband is the head of the household in “a truly Christian family,” and his wife submits to his leadership, compared to only 33% of all Americans.”
White protestant evangelicals were crucial for Trump’s successes in winning the 2016 Republican primary and the White House. Trump won nearly 80 percent of the white evangelical vote in the 2020 election. This PPRI survey shows that support holding strong. “Support for Donald Trump is also highly correlated with support for Christian nationalism. Less than a third of Americans hold a favorable view of the former president, yet more than 7 in 10 (71%) Christian nationalism adherents view him favorably.”
Former Vice President Mike Pence, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are among those trying to make inroads with this key group of voters. But I don’t see any indication yet that white evangelicals are willing to leave Trump as we enter the 2024 primary campaign. That’s one of the reasons I see Trump as the favorite to win the Republican nomination in 2024—if he is eligible to run.
At least some Democrats are paying attention. The Democratic National Committee last week adopted a resolution condemning white religious nationalism. I’m concerned, though, about the amount of digging I had to do to find the text of the resolution. White Christian nationalism and its determination to make our nation a theocracy is a serious problem. Hiding from it won’t make it go away.
Abortion, Every Day
Jessica Valenti at Abortion, Every Day recaps the news from across the country regarding reproductive freedom and sexual and reproductive health care.
Today she highlights the position Tennessee Right to Life has taken about a legislative effort to carve out a medical exception to that state’s forced-birth law. Valenti writes: “The state’s most powerful anti-abortion group doesn’t want hemorrhaging women to be able to get life-saving abortions. They don’t think a woman bleeding out constitutes an ‘objective’ need for care. I wonder, how much blood does a woman need to lose for Tennessee Right to Life to believe her doctor can help her? Are they going to put a number on it?”
Valenti also featured this great column by the Washington Post’s Alexandra Petri: “In another thrilling development in this best of all possible worlds, a ruling from a single Trump-appointed judge in Texas might undo the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of one of the two key drugs used in medication-based abortions and render it inaccessible nationwide. I hear you asking a question: Can a judge just do that? Just un-approve a drug? One that’s been tested and found extraordinarily safe over two whole decades?
Yes! This is a real possibility, because our legal system is working just the way it ought to work! In an ideal society, your rights and ability to access medicine and direct the course of your own life are guaranteed and unalterable — unless a Trump-appointed judge named Matt decides to say, “Nah.”
Popular Information’s Judd Legum provides a great explainer about what that judge named Matt seems likely to do in the abortion medication case on his docket. Legum also discusses how corporations are funding the efforts seeking a nationwide mifepristone ban while claiming to support their female employees.
“The brief filed by Fitch was signed by 21 other state attorneys general. All 21 are members of the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA), a key group devoted to electing Republican Attorneys General and keeping them in office.
RAGA, in turn, collects millions to support its efforts from major corporations. Among the major corporate supporters are several who have positioned themselves as champions of reproductive rights, pledging to pay for their employees’ abortion-related travel after Roe was overturned. That group includes Comcast (316K), AT&T (125K), T-Mobile (100K), Uber (50K), Mastercard (25K), and Bank of America (25K).”
Woman Convicted Based on Junk Science Has Appeal Rejected
Tasha Shelby has spent more than 20 years in prison after being convicted of murdering her stepson in a “shaken baby syndrome” case.
Scientists and lawyers have exposed shaken baby syndrome as junk science in recent years. But Shelby’s case reveals how difficult it is for potentially innocent people to see justice even as the evidence used to convict them is discredited.
Atlanta News First’s Andy Pierrotti reports:” Last year, [Shelby’s attorney Valena] Beety filed a petition for Tasha’s release after discovering the medical examiner – who first ruled the child’s death a homicide – changed the death certified to an accident 18 years later.
“I made a mistake on my conclusions and that given the information I have now, that the child died from hypoxic encephalopathy with herniation due to a seizure disorder,” said Dr. Leroy Riddick, the former Mississippi state medical examiner who testified at Shelby’s trial.
Robert Myers, a U.S. magistrate judge for the Southern District of Mississippi, denied Shelby’s request for release because it was not appealed in the year after her conviction, as typically required. “
That’s an unreasonable requirement. The death certificate no longer indicates a homicide, but a person is in prison for murder? There should be no time limit for addressing these situations.
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Quick Pitches
Media outlets may not cover the issue much these days, but the formula shortage continues with no end in sight. (Chabeli Carrazana, The 19th News)
Maggie Smith shares a glimpse into how she creates her poems in a post that examines the word choices she made while writing Poem Beginning with a Retweet. “The key is reading your work aloud as you write and revise. You can’t see the rhythm in a line or sentence, you have to hear it. You can’t always see where the music is happening—assonance, consonance, alliteration, rhyme—but your ear will know. Trust your ear.” (My Dear Life with Maggie Smith)
Joe Posnanski completed his countdown of the top 100 players in National Football League history. He puts Jerry Rice at the top of his list because the gap between him and the second-best wide receiver is much broader than such gaps at any other position. I was startled by the distance between Rice and second place in every career statistic: 5,403 more career yards than Larry Fitzgerald, 43 more career receiving touchdowns than Randy Moss, and 228 more first downs generated than Tony Gonzalez. “In addition, Rice had 117 more catches than anyone else, made first-team All-Pro more than anyone else, caught more playoff passes (151) for more playoff yards (2,245) than anyone else, and caught more Super Bowl passes (33) for more Super Bowl yards (589) than anyone else.” I’ve changed my mind. (Joe Posnanski, Joe Blogs Football 101)
Derek Thompson explores how we can use Super Bowl ads as an indicator of the state of our economy. “Advertising might be the art of fibbing responsibly, but marketing budgets can’t help but be honest: You either spend $7 million on a 30-second spot or you don’t. That’s why the biggest day in American sports, which is also the biggest day in American ads, is a useful measure of which firms and sectors believe themselves to be the future of the economy—and why it’s an excellent barometer for bubbles.” After all, as Next Draft’s Dave Pell observed, “The most telling cultural shift was that last year, Matt Damon was pushing crypto and this year, Ben Affleck was pushing donuts.“ (Derek Thompson, The Atlantic)
Texas State Board of Education members are pushing back against an effort to refer to slavery as “involuntary relocation” in the second-grade curriculum. (Brian Lopez, Texas Tribune)
Major League Baseball will see fewer instances of position players pitching after the adoption of new rules. I occasionally enjoy seeing a position player on the mound, but the practice has gotten out of hand. (Evan Altman, Cubs Insider)
Marc Maron’s new HBO comedy special, From Bleak to Dark, is outstanding. I had high hopes for this performance after listening to Maron talk on his WTF podcast about how he was putting this hour of comedy together while turning the country over the past year. As Esquire’s Abigail Covington writes, “Filmed two-ish years after the sudden death of Maron’s girlfriend, the writer and director Lynn Shelton, From Bleak to Dark shows just how transforming tragedy can be. This isn’t the same world-weary Marc Maron audiences know and love. Don’t get me wrong: he’s still a cynical curmudgeon. After all, the first thing he says after strutting onstage and thanking the audience for coming is, “I don’t want to be negative, but I don’t think anything is ever going to get better ever again.” But he’s more than that, too. He’s both lighter and darker, kinder and yet more caustic, and his jokes are more heartfelt and daring. This is a special about mortality delivered by a man forced to confront it.”
People underestimate just how fantastic Ichiro Suzuki was after coming to the United States from Japan.
MLB hits by a member of the 3000 hit club thru age 26. Scroll all the way down to number 30. No words for how good Ichiro was
— BaseballHistoryNut (@nut_history) 1:42 AM ∙ Feb 14, 2023
Now it’s just 11 days.
Beautiful views from Sloan Park today!
12 days until Spring Training baseball returns. 🌵 ⚾️ sloanpark.com
— Sloan Park Mesa (@SloanParkMesa) 12:53 AM ∙ Feb 14, 2023
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