The Mile High Snub

Colorado Kicks Trump Off Ballot, A Tree With a Message

Donald Trump has been kicked out of the mile high club. In a 4-3 decision, the Colorado Supreme Court has ruled that Trump is ineligible to be on the ballot in the state under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. "The decision from a court whose justices were all appointed by Democratic governors marks the first time in history that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment has been used to disqualify a presidential candidate." For now, the decision is stayed, giving the Supreme Court time to weigh in on the matter. Will this be the court decision that finally takes America to that Grand Junction where history drops a Boulder on Trump's campaign, providing the kick in the Crested Butte and the punch in the Rocky Mountain oysters that makes Trumpism Telluride off into the sunset, maybe all the way to Aspenitentiary, as democracy's Aurora rises once again? Don't get your Castle Rocks off just yet. I don't want to predict how this SCOTUS will rule, but I wouldn't be surprised to find Clarence Thomas out shopping for a new RV over Christmas break. There's not much doubt Trump incited an insurrection (we all saw it with our own eyes). The bigger question is whether the 14th Amendment applies to someone running for president. The even bigger issue is whether we want courts to save America from a lying, criming, insurrecting, Hitler-quoting monster that somehow still holds sway over his enablers and his base, or whether we want to trust that there are enough sane voters to get the job done. The idea that this is even a serious contest is enough to make me want to get Rocky Mountain high from now until the election.

+ "The Colorado Supreme Court harshly condemned Trump personally. It ruled him an insurrectionist, in effect a traitor. It joined his name to the roster of the Confederate rebels whom the authors of the Fourteenth Amendment wanted to ban from politics. And at the same time, that court offered emancipation from Trump to Trump’s party." David Frum in The Atlantic (Gift Article): The Colorado Supreme Court Just Gave Republicans a Chance to Save Themselves. (The ink wasn't even dry on this article before Team Enabler started defending Trump and falling into line...)

+ Why 14th Amendment bars Trump from office: A constitutional law scholar explains principle behind Colorado Supreme Court ruling. In Slate, Lawrence Lessig explains why the 14 Amendment actually doesn't do that at all. The Supreme Court Must Unanimously Strike Down Trump’s Ballot Removal. Once you're done reading the analysis, you might want to shift your focus to the 21st Amendment, because you're gonna need a drink.

2

The Heat of the Byte

The world has a lot of computer servers putting out a lot of data ... and a lot of heat. As AI takes hold, we'll need more and more massive data centers. In some cases, in addition to powering applications, they're heating homes. Consider the Danish city of Odense. "Since 2020, Meta’s hyperscale data center—spanning 50,000 square meters on an industrial estate on the edge of the city—has been pushing warm air generated by its servers into the district heating network under Odense. That heat is then dispersed through 100,000 households hooked up to the system, with Meta providing enough heat to cover roughly 11,000." What Happens When Facebook Heats Your Home. (I don't need Facebook to heat my home. My family and I push our personal devices hard enough to keep us in undershirts all winter...)

3

This Rings True

"For centuries, Bigelow 224 stretched sunward while history unfolded below. The tree witnessed the rise of industrialization and the devastation of Native communities. It watched Arizona become the nation’s 48th state in 1912. Generations lived and died, wars were lost and won, humans walked on the moon and transformed Earth. Still, the tree has survived." After 2023, Bigelow 224 is telling a new story. "It is a silent distress signal sent by one of Earth’s most enduring organisms. A warning written in wood." Sarah Kaplan in WaPo (Gift Article): Written In The Wood.

4

Conan and the Barbarians

"I didn’t know anything about him. So my reaction to Conan behind that desk was similar to everyone’s reaction, which was, 'Why is this guy here? Who will be the real host?'" That's David Letterman in this GQ Oral History of Conan O'Brien's Wild First Year.

5

Extra, Extra

+ Fat Chance: "The US has reached an agreement to secure the release of six wrongfully detained Americans and four other Americans held in Venezuela ... The deal will also include the extradition of Leonard Francis, the former military contractor known as 'Fat Leonard' who orchestrated the largest corruption scandal in US Navy history."

+ Meditator Tots: "Mindfulness meditation is an interesting example of this phenomenon. The number of Americans who’ve tried meditation has tripled since 2012, which, on the surface at least, seems like a great thing. And in many ways, it is a great thing: Mindfulness meditation encourages people to cultivate a deeper connection with themselves and the world. But has the mainstreaming of mindfulness come at a cost to the practice itself?" Vox: How mindfulness went mainstream. (Mindfulness and meditation have been growing because we've been driving ourselves crazy with devices. The irony of our time is that we now meditate with an app on our iPhone.)

+ One Waymo Street: "Waymo analyzed 7.13 million fully driverless miles in three cities — Phoenix, Los Angeles, and San Francisco — and compared the data to human driving benchmarks to determine whether its cars were involved in fewer injuring-causing and police-reported crashes ... The conclusion? Waymo’s driverless cars were 6.7 times less likely than human drivers to be involved a crash resulting in an injury." (Over time, self-driving cars will become much safer than human driven ones. But there's still going to be something hard to take about getting run over by an autonomous machine.)

+ Divided Nations: "I hear no-one demanding of Hamas that it stop hiding behind civilians, lay down its arms and surrender. This would be over tomorrow if that happened." That's Antony Blinken arguing that calls (from the UN and elsewhere) for a ceasefire in Gaza should include demands on Hamas, not just Israel. Here's the latest from CNN, BBC, and Times of Israel.

+ Eating Away at Illness: "Participants gather in a glass-walled partition off the hospital cafeteria for over 25 classes a month, which range from medically tailored programs for specific patient groups to educating Boston Medical Center staff to support their own wellness." At a hospital’s teaching kitchen, patients get a taste of food as medicine.

+ Omahi Mahi: "Utterback delivers his monologue near the finale of a 2o-course dinner at Ota, his high-end omakase counter that serves eight customers a night, max. For one final course, the chef hands diners what he jokingly calls 'prairie tuna.' It’s a slice of wagyu strip loin, lightly torched, topped with sea urchin butter and golden osetra caviar." WaPo (Gift Article): One of America’s best sushi restaurants is in Omaha. Yes, Omaha.

+ Sports (Shifting) Center: Variety is out with a list of the top 100 shows of all time. Commence arguing.

6

Bottom of the News

"Everyone in bro podcast land is clamoring about nose breathing, of all things. And believe it or not, experts say there’s a reason why thisof all things is filtering through the zeitgeist: the schnoz is resoundingly the best way to breathe." This Was the Year of Breathing Through Our Noses.

+ "It may be the season of loving and giving, but doctors have warned against embracing this spirit too enthusiastically – at least where sexual relations are concerned. They have discovered that the Christmas period is associated with a significantly increased risk of penile fractures." (It's not often that one can argue that Hanukkah is superior to Christmas, so I'm going to embrace the moment.)