Florida & Beyond, and All Opinions

In 2022, Amazon returns cost retailers about US$816 billion in lost sales. That’s nearly as much as the U.S. spent on public schools and almost twice the cost of returns in 2020.

A new dialect is taking shape in South Florida, a language variety that came about through sustained contact between Spanish and English speakers, particularly when speakers translated directly from Spanish.

The Espionage Act has historically been employed most often by law-and-order conservatives. But the biggest uptick in its use occurred during the Obama administration, which used it as the hammer of choice for national security leakers and whistleblowers.

On June 2, Judge Thomas Parker, a Trump-appointed federal district court judge in western Tennessee, ruled that Tennessee’s anti-drag “Adult Entertainment Act” violated the First Amendment’s free speech protection.

There is no evidence that shows news outlets are worse off because of Google, Facebook and other aggregators. If anything, evidence (and lots of it) shows that, overall, news outlets would be in worse shape without these digital platforms.

The claim that college students censor viewpoints with which they disagree is now common. Such cynical distortions dominate discussions of higher education today, misinform the public and threaten both democracy and higher education.

At home, at work and in civic spaces, it’s not uncommon to have conversations that make you question the intelligence and benevolence of your fellow human beings. When that argument fails to have the intended persuasive impact, people often grow frustrated, and disagreement becomes conflict. There’s a better way.

Contrary to misconceptions, exposing children to diverse gender identities and expressions supports their natural development. Further, it fosters inclusive and accepting communities and school environments, which is fundamental for developing well-adjusted adults.

The House vote on GOP Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s deal with Democratic President Joe Biden to suspend the debt ceiling through Jan. 1, 2025, successful passage was undoubtedly carried by centrists. The middle may be shrinking, but it still exists, and it is critical in a closely divided Congress.

Many Israelis fear that hard-line conservative ministers will roll back LGBTQ rights. And LGBTQ issues are a potent symbol of a chasm fueling debate over the judicial overhaul: secular and religious Israeli Jews’ very different visions of the Jewish state.

This week a group of well-known and reputable AI researchers signed a statement comparing the risk posed by artificial intelligence to pandemics and nuclear war. But its authors should probably be more specific and clarify their concerns.

The Paleo Diet urges us to mimic our prehistoric ancestors’ food choices. In practice, this means eschewing dairy products, cereals, pulses and processed sugar, and consuming vegetables, fruit, nuts, pasture-raised meat and wild-caught seafood instead. Clinical research has yet to substantiate its purported health benefits.

Martin Amis, pre-eminent novelist-critic of his generation, has died at the age of 73. His dazzling, pyrotechnic prose dominated the world of English writing from the mid-1970s through the fin de siècle.