Your Weekend Briefing
Toyin Falola
Joe Biden, Coronavirus Surge, Thanksgiving
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Toyin Falola
From:
The New York Times <nytd...@nytimes.com>
Date: Sunday, November 15, 2020 at 5:41 AM
To: Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu>
Subject: Your Weekend Briefing
Coronavirus Surge, 2020 Election, the Masters
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Toyin Falola
Begin forwarded message:
From: The New York Times <nytd...@nytimes.com>
Date: November 22, 2020 at 5:35:18 AM CST
To: Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu>
Subject: Your Weekend Briefing
November 22, 2020
By Remy Tumin and Judith Levitt
Welcome to the Weekend Briefing. We’re covering the coronavirus as the U.S. heads into a holiday week, the presidential transition and the Group of 20 summit.
Scott McIntyre for The New York Times
1. The U.S. is heading into a make-or-break holiday week.
The country passed 12 million cases, adding one million new cases in the past week alone. New daily cases are approaching 200,000: On Friday, the country recorded more than 198,500, a record.
At least 255,000 Americans have died of the coronavirus, and hospitalizations rose beyond 82,000. Above, a memorial in Miami for virus victims.
Public health officials are urging Americans to avoid travel for Thanksgiving and to celebrate only with members of their immediate households.
If you are gathering with others for the holiday, a negative test doesn’t mean you should skip other measures, like quarantining, wearing masks and social distancing.
For many Americans, including the woman known as “Thanksgiving Grandma,” this will be the first Thanksgiving without a loved one at the table. Wanda Dench became internet famous when a misdirected text landed a stranger at her holiday table. Ms. Dench’s husband died from the coronavirus in April.
Chandan Khanna/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
2. A pharmaceutical giant and an upstart biotech firm are the front-runners in the race to create a vaccine. They were up against more than the virus.
At play were not just commercial rivalries and scientific challenges between Pfizer and Moderna, but an ambitious plan to put the federal government in the middle of the effort, and President Trump’s bet that a vaccine would secure his re-election.
Pfizer’s vaccine is now being reviewed by the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use and Moderna’s may not be far behind. The first Americans could get a vaccine by the middle of December.
Separately, the F.D.A. granted emergency authorization for the Regeneron antibody treatment given to Mr. Trump after he was diagnosed with Covid-19.
Christopher Aluka Berry/Reuters
3. The next three weeks are a moment of truth for the Republican Party.
As election officials in contested states certify President-elect Joe Biden’s victory, verifying that the vote count is accurate and complete, G.O.P. officials from state capitols to Congress will be forced to choose between the will of voters and the will of one man: President Trump.
In pushing his false claims to the limit and forcing Republicans into acquiescence or silence, Mr. Trump has revealed the fragility of the electoral system — and shaken it. Above, supporters of the president in Atlanta on Saturday.
Mr. Trump’s attempt to subvert the election results appears to be growing more futile by the day: Georgia became the first contested state on Friday to certify its vote for Mr. Biden. Michigan lawmakers said they would honor the outcome of the state’s election process after a White House meeting on Friday. The state’s deadline for certification is Monday.
And as Mr. Trump brazenly seeks to delay the certification of the election, he is also mounting a similarly audacious bid to keep control of the Republican National Committee even after he leaves office.
Erin Schaff/The New York Times
4. The Trump administration is using its last weeks to lock in many of the president’s policies and interfere with President-elect Joe Biden’s agenda.
Top officials are racing against the clock to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, secure oil drilling leases in Alaska, punish China, carry out executions and thwart any plans that Mr. Biden may have to reestablish the Iran nuclear deal. In some cases, Mr. Trump’s government plans to act just days — or even hours — before Mr. Biden is inaugurated on Jan. 20.
But even as Mr. Trump refuses to accept the reality of his loss, the rest of the world — and Mr. Biden — is moving on. Everyone from world leaders to business executives have called the president-elect to congratulate him.
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Fayez Nureldine/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
5. Fighting the pandemic and its global economic impact dominated the Group of 20 summit, which began on Saturday and continues today.
Heads of state of the world’s richest countries and the European Union spoke about the battle against the coronavirus and potential debt relief for poor countries hit hard by the pandemic.
President Trump briefly participated in the summit from the White House, but skipped the event on pandemic preparedness and instead headed to his Virginia country club for a round of golf.
The virus reduced the annual summit to a giant webinar, transforming an event that was supposed to allow Saudi Arabia to play host to the world’s great powers and depriving Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the country’s de facto ruler, of reviving his international reputation.
6. Do these people look real?
They may look familiar, but they don’t exist. We built an A.I. system to create fake faces like the ones used to fool people on Facebook, Amazon and even Tinder.
The technology that makes them is improving at a startling pace thanks to a new type of artificial intelligence called a generative adversarial network. In essence, you feed a computer program a bunch of photos of real people. It studies them and tries to comes up with its own photos, while another part of the system tries to detect which of them are fake.
But just like humans, the programs can be deeply flawed. See for yourself.
Daryl Marshke/University of Michigan
7. An apology 52 years in the making.
Lynn Conway was one of IBM’s most promising young computer engineers, but after confiding to supervisors in 1968 that she was transgender, they fired her. Last month, Ms. Conway, pictured in 2018, was called into a virtual meeting with IBM employees.
Diane Gherson, IBM’s senior vice president of human resources, told Ms. Conway that although the company now offered help and support to “transitioning employees,” no amount of progress could make up for the treatment she had received decades ago.
Ms. Conway, 82, was then given a lifetime achievement award for her “pioneering work” in computers. “It was so unexpected,” Ms. Conway said. “It was stunning.”
Michael Dwyer/Associated Press
8. Thanksgiving: Ready, set, don’t go (but do cook).
With coronavirus cases raging across the U.S., the safest choice this Thanksgiving is to spend it with the people you live with. Here are ideas from across The Times for how to keep it small, safe and fun:
- Digitally reimagine the holiday, from meal prep to after-dinner activities.
- Food shopping just got more complicated. We asked the experts for advice.
- If you do gather, stay small, take it outdoors or open the windows, mask up and wash your hands. Here are some precautions to take.
- Melissa Clark shows you how to make Thanksgiving with one pot and one pan, for a small-scale feast that packs in the classics. For more cooking ideas, here are great recipes that only require five ingredients and 17 recipes for a small dinner.
In this year like no other, we want to know what makes you grateful. Tell us in six words.
Ksenia Kuleshova for The New York Times
9. Music to get us through.
At the fearful height of the pandemic in April, Simon Gronowski, an 89-year-old Holocaust survivor, began playing jazz tunes on his piano from his apartment window in Brussels, bringing relief to his besieged neighbors throughout the lockdown that lasted into late May.
“Music is a means of communication, of connection,” said Mr. Gronowski, who taught himself how to play the piano as a teenager after escaping the Nazis. Piano was a way for him to connect with his sister who had died in Auschwitz.
Throughout the summer and into the fall, live jazz has become a near-constant presence across New York City. The makeshift outdoor shows have been therapeutic for musicians and fans alike.
Tailyr Irvine for The New York Times
10. And finally, take in these stories at your leisure.
Rethinking the Thanksgiving myth. The fashion of Princess Diana. The cutthroat market for N95 masks. These stories and more await in The Weekender.
For more ideas on what to read, watch and listen to, our editors suggest these 12 new books, a new flower competition show, and new music from Miley Cyrus. And to mark an extraordinary year, we asked contemporary American poets and photographers to define 2020 in vision and verse.
Have you been keeping up with the headlines? Test your knowledge with our news quiz. And here’s the front page of our Sunday paper, the Sunday Review from Opinion and our crossword puzzles.
Have a safe and healthy week.
Your Weekend Briefing is published Sundays at 6 a.m. Eastern.
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Toyin Falola
Begin forwarded message:
From: The New York Times <nytd...@nytimes.com>
Date: November 29, 2020 at 5:40:28 AM CST
To: Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu>
Subject: Your Weekend Briefing
Reply-To: nytd...@nytimes.com
November 29, 2020
By Remy Tumin and Shelby Knowles
Welcome to the Weekend Briefing. We’re covering record-breaking coronavirus numbers, a look at President-elect Joe Biden’s cabinet and how to replicate the Hope Diamond.
Christopher Lee for The New York Times
1. The numbers of coronavirus-related deaths are at their highest levels since the spring.
On April 15, 2,752 people in the U.S. died from Covid-19, more than on any other day of the pandemic. On Wednesday, 2,300 deaths were reported nationwide — the highest toll since May. The pandemic has now claimed more than 264,800 lives in the country.
While the deaths during the spring peak were concentrated in a handful of states, they are now scattered widely across the entire nation, and there is hardly a community that has not been affected. Above, a Covid patient in Houston last week.
“We are at risk of repeating what happened in April,” one expert said of the death toll. “I shudder to imagine what things might be like in two weeks.”
The record-breaking swell of virus infections — four million in November alone — is pushing U.S. hospitals to a breaking point. Severe staffing and bed shortages are crippling efforts to provide adequate care for patients.
Anna Moneymaker for The New York Times
2. Lists of top contenders for President-elect Joe Biden’s cabinet are flooding Washington — and drawing fire from all sides.
As Mr. Biden fills out the rest of his team in the days and weeks ahead, the task will force him to navigate tricky currents of ideology, gender, racial identity, party affiliation, friendship, competence, personal background and past employment. Here are his choices so far.
Some of the president-elect’s choices for top posts, including Antony Blinken, Mr. Biden’s pick to be his secretary of state, have done work for undisclosed corporate clients and aided a fund that invests in government contractors. The Biden team’s links to these entities are presenting the incoming administration with its first test of transparency and ethics.
Emily Elconin for The New York Times
3. A few Republicans in key states blocked President Trump’s push to overturn the vote. They told us about resisting their party, and what it cost them.
Republicans in Washington may have indulged Mr. Trump’s baseless assertions of voter fraud, but at the state and local levels, party officials played a critical role in fending off the mounting pressure from their own to back his agenda.
“I’ve got a pretty thick skin, but it’s hard not to feel shook by it all,” said Tina Barton, the Republican clerk in Rochester Hills, Mich. Above, supporters of Mr. Trump in Lansing, Mich., last week.
The election painted a different picture in statehouse races, where Democrats suffered crushing blows across the country. Party officials are awakening to the reality that voters may have delivered a one-time verdict on Mr. Trump that does not equal ongoing support for center-left policies.
Abedin Taherkenareh/EPA, via Shutterstock
4. The killing of Iran’s top nuclear scientist raised fears of an escalation in violent retribution.
Iran’s leaders threatened on Saturday to retaliate over the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, pledging to continue the work of the man who American and Israeli officials believe was the architect of a secretive nuclear weapons program. Intelligence officials say there is little doubt that Israel was behind the killing, and the Israelis have done nothing to dispel that view. Above, protests in Tehran.
While the killing of Mr. Fakhrizadeh is likely to impede Iran’s military ambitions, its real purpose may have been to prevent President-elect Joe Biden from reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, our national security correspondent writes in an analysis.
Mr. Fakhrizadeh’s killing was the latest in a decade-long pattern of mysterious sabotage that has afflicted the Islamic Republic. Never, however, has Iran endured a spate of covert attacks quite like in 2020.
Sumy Sadurni/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
5. Entrenched leaders in several East African countries are using the coronavirus as a pretext to strengthen their grip on power and clamp down on dissent.
Many countries that traditionally serve as watchdogs are preoccupied with the pandemic and domestic concerns, leading to less international attention and outcry than usual. But the repercussions have been felt in elections in Tanzania, Ethiopia and especially in Uganda, where Bobi Wine, above, has faced violent intimidation and jail time for challenging President Yoweri Museveni, who has ruled the country with an iron grip since 1986.
Separately, Ethiopia claimed victory in its conflict with the restive region of Tigray after a daylong series of artillery strikes against the regional capital. With communications shut off, there was no way to independently confirm its claim.
Andrea Mantovani for The New York Times
6. For the global economy, the road back to normalcy will be a long one.
With the U.S. suffering its most rampant virus surges yet, and with major nations in Europe again under lockdown (pictured above in Paris), prospects remain grim for a meaningful worldwide recovery before the middle of next year, and far longer in some economies. Substantial job growth could take longer still.
In the U.S., jobless claims jumped by 78,000 last week to nearly 828,000 — a big change from the increase of 18,000 the week before. Among the worst-performing major economies is India: Its economy contracted 7.5 percent in the three months before September.
Stephanie Keith for The New York Times
7. Despite the economic downturn, one show must go on: New York City’s holiday window displays.
Tourism may be down, and changes have been made to accommodate social distancing so onlookers don’t get too close, but the sparkle remains. The Bergdorf Goodman windows are both bolder and simpler, designed to be “read” even from across the street. Macy’s windows, above, are devoted to thanking essential workers. The Saks windows depict holiday rituals in New York City.
The displays are a “light,” said Tony Spring, the chief executive of Bloomingdale’s, at “the end of a very difficult year.”
If you’re staying at home, here are the best seasonal mainstays, like “The Nutcracker” and Handel’s “Messiah,” reimagined for online viewing.
“The Death of General Wolfe” (1770), Benjamin West
8. What does history look like — and whose narrative prevails?
Our art critic Jason Farago examines the creative, historical liberties that the painter Benjamin West took in “The Death of General Wolfe” (1770), above. The work depicts a British general at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, outside Quebec City, in the Seven Years’ War, also known as the French and Indian War.
The battle was a turning point in a war that would end with the British takeover of French colonies from Quebec to Florida. West mixed real history, mythmaking, British boosterism and New World melodrama in the painting — the first by an American artist to gain international attention. The vision stands at the origin of a rewriting of New World history that endured in both the U.S. and Canada for centuries, Jason writes.
John Bigelow Taylor and Dianne Dubler
9. The world’s most glamorous quarantine project.
While some of us have been binge-watching Netflix and peering anxiously at our sourdough, John Hatleberg has been working on replicas of the Hope Diamond, a luminous blue 45.52-carat stone, and its earlier incarnations that date to the 17th century, for the Smithsonian.
Mr. Hatleberg strives to ensure that his replicas have the exact same angles and color as their inspiration. That required seven trips to a laboratory for gems in Rochester, Minn., where experts coated and recoated the replica (made of synthetic material) using a thick level of precious metals to match the lush blue of the Hope.
For something a little more manageable at home, try pressing flowers.
Pool photo by Ian Volger
10. And finally, cozy up with some great reads.
Russia’s “road of bones.” A personal essay about miscarriage by Meghan, Duchess of Sussex. How to digital detox. Take a look at our wide-ranging journalism in The Weekender.
Our editors also suggest these 12 new books, recipes to tackle Thanksgiving leftovers and a crafting competition show.
Here’s the front page of our Sunday paper, the Sunday Review from Opinion and our crossword puzzles. The news quiz is off this weekend.
Have a light week.
Your Weekend Briefing is published Sundays at 6 a.m. Eastern.
Did a friend forward you the briefing? You can sign up here.
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Toyin Falola
Coronavirus Surge, Georgia, Candice Bergen
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Toyin Falola
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Toyin Falola
Begin forwarded message:
From: The New York Times <nytd...@nytimes.com>
Date: December 20, 2020 at 5:49:18 AM CST
To: Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu>
Subject: Your Weekend Briefing
Reply-To: nytd...@nytimes.com
December 20, 2020
Welcome to the Weekend Briefing. We’re covering the state of the virus ahead of Christmas, the latest stimulus developments and how to say cheers to the New Year.
Go Nakamura for The New York Times
1. A season typically defined by joy is increasingly defined by grief.
The pandemic continued its deadly ascent in America this week, shattering once-unthinkable numbers: a single-day caseload of more than 251,000 new coronavirus infections, 1 million new ones in just five days and more than 3,600 deaths in a single day. The national death toll soared past 300,000 this week. Above, a drive-through testing site in Houston.
Holiday gatherings — and how much they can spread the virus — could be crucial in determining whether coronavirus cases surge even higher over the next month. Just look at Thanksgiving.
On the other side of the Atlantic, the U.K. imposed a strict lockdown on London and most of England’s southeast, banning Christmas-season gatherings beyond individual households. The decision came after the government got new evidence of a fast-spreading variant of the virus, which Prime Minister Boris Johnson asserted was as much as 70 percent more transmissible than previous versions.
Total infections around the world have now topped 76 million.
Ariana Drehsler for The New York Times
2. More than 128,000 people in the U.S. received a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine this week as the country began the largest vaccination campaign in history. Monica Escopete, a registered nurse in Apple Valley, Calif., above, got her first of two shots.
And more are on the way. Federal regulators authorized Moderna’s vaccine for emergency use. It’s easier to store and handle than Pfizer’s, speeding access to more parts of the U.S. Inoculations with the Moderna vaccine could start Monday.
At least 14 states are getting fewer doses of the Pfizer vaccine in the near term because the federal government said it miscalculated how many doses could be shipped.
Stefani Reynolds for The New York Times
3. Senators reached an agreement on a final Republican sticking point in stimulus talks, a major step toward passing a $900 billion aid package.
Working against a Sunday-night deadline to avoid a government shutdown, Republicans agreed to narrow an effort to curb the Federal Reserve’s emergency lending powers.
Lawmakers have been racing to complete an emergency plan to rush $600 direct payments, unemployment benefits and food and rental assistance to millions of Americans, as well as relief to businesses and funds for vaccine distribution.
Millions of Americans are out of work and at risk of losing their homes — and they are running out of time and patience.
President Trump was largely absent amid the vaccine breakthroughs and economic relief talks in the last week, one of the most consequential of his tenure. Mr. Trump’s behavior — acting as a bystander while other leaders answered a crisis and simultaneously raging at Republicans who have inched away from him — may be a preview of his post-presidency.
Oliver Contreras for The New York Times
4. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Russia was “pretty clearly” behind the largest cybersecurity breach Washington has ever seen.
The comment, made almost as an aside to a conservative radio show host, was the first time the Trump administration went on the record to blame the Kremlin for the recent hacking that infiltrated dozens of government and private systems.
But because President Trump has 30 days left in office, national security officials say the U.S. response will likely fall to President-elect Joe Biden. That became even more clear when Mr. Trump insisted on Twitter that “everything is well under control” and suggested that it might have been China rather than Russia that carried out the hack.
And given the intensity of the attack, it may be months before Mr. Biden can trust the systems that run much of Washington.
Hilary Swift for The New York Times
5. We took a close look at how President-elect Joe Biden’s emerging administration will shape U.S. policy for the next few years.
His nominees are designed to be an extension of his own centrist ideology but with a greater focus on the plight of working-class Americans, a new sense of urgency about climate change and a deeper empathy about the issues of racial justice that he has said persuaded him to run for the presidency a third time.
And who will be chosen to fill Vice President-elect Kamala Harris’s Senate seat? The question is a battle between Black and Latino representation in California.
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Valery Sharifulin/Tass, via Getty Images
6. An internal Times review found that “Caliphate,” an award-winning podcast that sought to shed light on the Islamic State terrorist group, did not meet the standards for Times journalism.
The review found that “Caliphate” gave too much credence to the false or exaggerated accounts of one of its main subjects, Shehroze Chaudhry, a resident of Canada who said he had assumed the name Abu Huzayfah as a member of the Islamic State. The Times started its review after Canadian authorities arrested Mr. Chaudhry in September and charged him with perpetrating a terrorist hoax.
The podcast had two main problems, said Dean Baquet, The Times’s executive editor: the newspaper’s failure to assign an editor well versed in terrorism to keep a close watch on the series; and the “Caliphate” team’s lack of skepticism and rigor in its reporting on Mr. Chaudhry.
Mr. Baquet said the blame fell on the newsroom’s leaders, including himself.
Erinn Springer for The New York Times
7. Tomorrow is the winter solstice in the Northern Hemisphere, the longest, darkest night of a long, dark year.
This winter’s darkness is as literal as it is metaphorical, with the catastrophic toll of Covid-19, and fear and dread for what is to come. But as our faith and politics reporter writes, it also serves as a reminder that for millenniums, “humans have turned to rituals and stories to remind one another of hope and deeper truths.”
There is some solace for the darkness: On Monday night, Jupiter and Saturn will almost kiss in the night sky, appearing as one bright planet. The last time they came this visibly close to each other was in the year 1226. Go out and look southwest in the hour after sunset.
For those looking for greater meaning, “this is the end of an era and the beginning of a new one,” said the astrologer Chani Nicholas.
Yorzinski, Biology Letters, 2020
8. This grackle is not wearing a sports fan’s beer helmet. It’s a custom-built tool for the study of blinking in birds.
A sensory ecologist had been wondering how animals balance their need to blink with their need to get visual information. So she worked with a company that builds eye-tracking equipment to make a custom bird-size headpiece and found that the grackles she studied spent less time blinking during the riskiest parts of a flight.
And in October, researchers reported that the already perplexing platypus glows a psychedelic blue-green color under black light. Since then, others have begun their own investigations, mostly in Australian mammals. Now we may be dealing with glowing Tasmanian devils, echidnas and wombats.
Ed Alcock for The New York Times
9. Time to pop the bubbly.
“It’s been a dismal year,” our wine critic Eric Asimov writes, “but let’s look at the bright side: It’s nearly over.” That means bubbles can still feel right to mark the occasion, so Eric picked 10 sparkling wines — from Champagne and elsewhere — well worth drinking at multiple price points.
Simply emblazoning “Champagne” on a label is no guarantee of quality. But if you’re committed to the region, Eric created this guide to finding the best Champagne for you, including 10 excellent big houses, 10 small grower-producers — and a glossary (so you can sound like you know what you’re talking about).
Dina Litovsky for The New York Times
10. And finally, an assortment of great reads.
Scenes of a pandemic Christmas, like the one above in New York City. How Russia wins the climate crisis. A $200,000 sushi dinner. These stories and more top the latest edition of The Weekender.
Our editors also suggest these 11 new books, “Total Control” on Sundance Now as well as other TV picks and the latest Modern Love about accepting sincerity after years of disappointment.
Have you been keeping up with the headlines? Test your knowledge with our news quiz. And here’s the front page of our Sunday paper, the Sunday Review from Opinion and our crossword puzzles.
Have a festive week.
Your Weekend Briefing is published Sundays at 6:30 a.m. Eastern.
Did a friend forward you the briefing? You can sign up here.
What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at brie...@nytimes.com.
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Toyin Falola
Welcome to the Weekend Briefing. We’re covering unemployment benefits that are running out for millions of Americans, the investigation of the Christmas Day explosion in Nashville and the beloved hangouts that closed during the pandemic.
John Sommers II/Getty Images
1. Unemployment benefits have lapsed for millions of Americans because President Trump has not signed a $900 billion pandemic relief bill.
The bill, passed by Congress as part of a larger spending package, would allow people to collect aid until March and revive supplemental benefits of $300 a week on top of the basic relief check. Above, outside a center in Kentucky that offers help to file unemployment claims.
But Mr. Trump, who is pushing for larger direct payments to Americans, has given no indication that he plans to sign the bill. So the existing benefits ended on Saturday, affecting an estimated 12 million people.
Because the president has refused to sign the bill, the U.S. now also faces a looming government shutdown on Tuesday and the expiration of a moratorium on evictions at the end of the year.
President-elect Joe Biden on Saturday said, “This abdication of responsibility has devastating consequences.”
Vladimir Simicek/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
2. The European Union’s vaccination campaign began today, but some of the bloc’s 27 countries got a head start.
A 101-year-old woman in a nursing home in eastern Germany became the country’s first recipient of the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine on Saturday, when Hungary and Slovakia also began inoculating people. Scientists say the vaccine should work against the new, potentially more infectious variant found in Britain and a handful of other countries.
In the United States, where vaccinations began two weeks ago, new surveys show that the portion of people saying they are likely or certain to take the vaccine has grown to more than 60 percent from about 50 percent this summer, and in one poll, to 73 percent — a figure that approaches what some public health experts say would create herd immunity.
Scientists will continue to study how they can stop the spread of the virus and will try to determine whether vaccinated people, despite being much less likely to develop severe Covid-19, may still be able to infect others.
Mark Humphrey/Associated Press
3. An explosion in Nashville left three people hospitalized, the city shaken and investigators mystified.
At least 41 businesses were damaged when an R.V. exploded in the city’s downtown on Christmas morning. Federal agents said on Saturday that they did not know who carried out the explosion or why — or even whether a person had been inside the vehicle when it exploded.
Before the blast, a message blared from the R.V., warning that a bomb would detonate within 15 minutes and then counting down, with music, the police said. Here’s what to know about the case.
Andrew Testa for The New York Times
4. The Brexit deal is done. Sort of.
Britain will leave the European Union on Jan. 1, but its exit is only the beginning of an unpredictable experiment in how to unstitch commercial relations across Europe.
The trade deal, reached on Christmas Eve, smooths the flow of goods across British borders. But it leaves financial firms without the biggest benefit of E.U. membership: the ability to easily offer services across the region from a single base. That loss is especially painful for Britain, which ran a surplus of 18 billion pounds, or $24 billion, on trade in financial and other services with the European Union in 2019.
Lawmakers in Britain and Europe are preparing to vote on the deal in the coming days.
Alan Cowell, a longtime Times correspondent, wrote about the Brexit fight and how the chaos last week of trucks stuck on highways in Britain because of new coronavirus restrictions, above, seemed to offer a foretaste of what life outside the European Union might mean.
Fried Chicken Studios
5. A Pittsburgh hot dog shop, a famous Cambridge dive bar and a vibrant Filipino restaurant in Los Angeles: All are among the casualties of 2020.
Across the United States, thousands of businesses have closed during the pandemic, but the demise of so many beloved hangouts cuts especially deep. Above, Ma’am Sir opened in 2018 to rave reviews for its signature Filipino dishes, like sizzling pork sisig and oxtail kare-kare.
They were local landmarks — watering holes, shops and haunts that weathered recessions and world wars, only to succumb to the economic ravages of the coronavirus. This is their obituary.
Nicole Craine for The New York Times
6. The myth of a stolen election lives on in a new attack on voting rights.
President Trump failed to get any traction in courts with his baseless claims of manipulated voting and insistence on recounts, as in Georgia, above, but he has given new momentum to the movement to limit ballot access.
Georgia’s Republican legislators have discussed toughening state rules on voting by mail and on voter identification. In Pennsylvania, Republican lawmakers were considering reversing moves that had made it easier to vote absentee, and their counterparts in Wisconsin were considering tighter restrictions for mail voting, as well as for early voting.
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via YouTube
7. A citizen journalist who posted videos from Wuhan, China, is set to go on trial on Monday.
Zhang Zhan, a 37-year-old former lawyer, reported on the lockdown in Wuhan. She was arrested and faces accusations of spreading lies in the first known trial of a chronicler of China’s coronavirus crisis. Three other citizen journalists have disappeared from Wuhan.
A tide of new coronavirus cases in Africa is raising alarm in countries that, over all, appear to fare far better than those in Europe or the Americas.
And Japan, Spain and France have found small numbers of infections from the U.K. variant of the virus, most linked to travelers from Britain.
Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times
8. The stock market will not quit.
Even though the pandemic has killed more than 330,000 people in the United States, put millions out of work and shuttered businesses across the country, the market is now tipping into outright euphoria.
While the stock market ended with a small loss this past week, the S&P 500, Dow Jones industrial average and Nasdaq are just shy of record highs. Many investors, even those leery of growing signs of overconfidence, say it’s reasonable to expect stocks to continue to climb.
Lor’s Little Bakeshop
9. Sheep stew or chocolate bomb, anyone?
A shop excavated this month in Pompeii provides fresh clues about the eating habits of the ancient city’s population. Archaeologists uncovered jars that appeared to contain two dishes: a pork and fish combination, and a concoction involving snails, fish and sheep, perhaps a soup or stew. Further analysis is expected to determine whether vegetables were part of the ancient recipe.
Speaking of eruptions, if you’d rather stick with modern cuisine, try a hot chocolate bomb, above.
They’re big truffle-like treats, filled with marshmallows and candy — and, for the grown-up diner, alcohol — that are designed to dissolve dramatically in warm milk.
“You’re not sure when the explosion will happen,” said a fan of the slow-mo chocolate deluge. “You wait in anticipation. And then, when it does, there’s joy.”
Franck Robichon/EPA, via Shutterstock
10. And finally, read your way into 2021.
The troubled release of Cyberpunk 2077, the mystery of Chartreuse and George Clooney on his new movie and Donald Trump: These stories and more are our latest edition of The Weekender.
Our editors also suggest these eight new books, the new Pixar movie “Soul” as well as other picks from our Watching newsletter, and these seven podcasts that offer comfort and connection.
The news quiz is off this week, but here’s the front page of our Sunday paper, the Sunday Review from Opinion and our crossword puzzles.
Have a great week.
Your Weekend Briefing is published Sundays at 6:30 a.m. Eastern.
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Toyin Falola
From: The New York Times <nytd...@nytimes.com>
Date: January 3, 2021 at 5:32:44 AM CST
To: Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu>
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January 3, 2021
Welcome to the Weekend Briefing. We’re covering the Georgia Senate races, a new vaccine protocol in Britain and a look ahead at winter TV.
Audra Melton for The New York Times
1. 2020 may be over, but election season is not.
Control of the Senate — and with it, the fate of President-elect Joe Biden’s agenda — will be determined on Tuesday as voters in Georgia head to the polls in twin Senate runoff elections. Both the Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff need to defeat the Republican incumbents Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue for Democratic control of the chamber. Above, early voting in Marietta, Ga.
While polls suggest that the state’s crucial Senate seats are up for grabs, Republicans have grown worried about strong turnout in Democratic areas and mixed messages from President Trump, who baselessly called the Senate races “illegal and invalid.”
Congress meets on Wednesday to certify Mr. Biden’s victory. Twelve Republicans, including Senators Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley and Marsha Blackburn, plan to back a futile attempt to overturn Mr. Biden’s win by voting “no,” defying the results of a fair and free election. Vice President Mike Pence, who also serves as the presiding officer of the Senate, signaled his support.
The last-ditch effort comes after another failed litigation attempt. A judge dismissed a lawsuit that aimed to pressure Mr. Pence to overturn the election results.
Erin Schaff/The New York Times
2. The 116th Congress will end today much as it began: filled with anticipation yet bitterly divided.
Even with a few legislative accomplishments, partisan gridlock forced lawmakers to punt on their hopes that this Congress could be the one to do difficult things. Here are some of the moments that defined the 116th Congress. The 117th Congress will be sworn in today.
There was at least one element of change on Capitol Hill: The politics of debt are shifting, driven by populism and the pandemic. As public support for more generous relief has increased, some Republicans who once scolded about fiscal austerity are now embracing government spending.
Separately, the homes of Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, and Nancy Pelosi, the House majority leader, were vandalized over the weekend.
Alexey Nikolsky/Sputnik, via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
3. As U.S. officials learn more about the recent hacking by Russian agents, alarm is growing over just how spectacularly America’s defenses failed.
While officials are still trying to understand whether what the Russians pulled off was simply an espionage operation or something more sinister, it’s clear the breach of upward of 250 federal agencies and businesses was far broader than first believed.
Intentions behind the attack remain unknown. Some analysts say the Russians may be trying to demonstrate their cyberarsenal to gain leverage against President-elect Joe Biden before nuclear arms talks. Above, President Vladimir Putin of Russia last month.
Joshua Bright for The New York Times
4. Researchers are scrambling to learn why some coronavirus patients lose their sense of smell and taste. Some experts fear huge numbers of people may lose them permanently.
Once a rare diagnosis, a loss of smell and taste is often the first — and sometimes only — symptom of the coronavirus. Most patients regain their senses, usually within weeks. But for a minority of people like Michele Miller, above, the loss persists, putting them at risk for nutritional deficits and unintended weight loss.
And in California, Los Angeles County, already in the throes of a devastating surge in coronavirus cases after Thanksgiving travel and gatherings, is being hit with a spike from Christmas festivities.
Erika P. Rodriguez for The New York Times
5. Desperate to control a new variant of the coronavirus, Britain quietly changed vaccination procedures to allow for a mix-and-match regimen.
If a second dose of the vaccine a patient originally received isn’t available, or if the manufacturer of the first shot isn’t known, another coronavirus vaccine may be substituted, health officials said. The new guidance contradicts guidelines in the U.S., where regulators noted that the authorized coronavirus vaccines “are not interchangeable.”
Meanwhile, the U.S. is falling behind in its vaccination campaign because federal officials left much of the planning to overstretched local health officials and hospitals, like the one in Puerto Rico, above. “We’ve taken the people with the least amount of resources and capacity,” one expert said, “and asked them to do the hardest part of the vaccination.”
Subscribers help make Times journalism possible. To support our efforts, please consider subscribing today.
Parwiz/Reuters
6. Assassins in Afghanistan are killing civil servants, media figures, rights workers and security force members. But no one has taken responsibility.
The Afghan government would not provide the exact number of assassinations recorded in the country last year, but The Times has documented the deaths of at least 136 civilians and 168 security force members in such killings, worse than any other year of the war in the past two decades. Above, the coffin of the journalist Malalai Maiwand in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, last month.
Most officials believe that the Taliban are behind the attacks, but others fear that factions are using chaos as a cover to settle scores, in an echo of Afghanistan’s past civil war. The killings are a worrying sign of how much remains uncertain as the U.S. prepares to withdraw troops from the country.
Sima Diab for The New York Times
7. Ancient pharaohs rowed the Nile. Now Egyptians have rediscovered the practice, finding a new perspective on the river that shaped their country.
The Nile birthed Egyptian civilization thousands of years ago, and still sustains it. But few Cairenes have ever seen the body of water itself because restaurants, private clubs and cruises have hidden much of the Nile from all but those who can pay.
During a year with limited travel possibilities, our World Through a Lens series offered Times readers a weekly escape. Here are some of the highlights.
Nic Alegre, Courtesy Teton Gravity Research Photo
8. Kai Jones skis way out of bounds.
The 14-year-old can be found vaulting off the sheer face of a boulder as he executes double back-flips and other tricks ready-made to go viral. He is already a pro and emblematic of freeskiing’s growth. (Yes, his mom gets a little nervous.)
In more traditional arenas, our college sports reporter looked at how a season of chaos will end with a powerhouse matchup. Alabama and Ohio State took different paths to the Jan. 11 national championship game, with twists that showed how much college football wanted its biggest stage to feel familiar.
Lauren Fleishman for The New York Times
9. Just when you thought you’d run out of streaming options, here comes 2021.
For Vanessa Kirby’s first lead in a film, the actress wanted a character as challenging as many of those she’s played onstage. She found it in “Pieces of a Woman” as Martha, a pregnant woman whose home birth goes horribly wrong.
Ms. Kirby wanted to portray the labor as authentically as possible. “That was terrifying, because I didn’t want to let women down,” she said. The film debuts Jan. 7 on Netflix.
TV rolls ahead on a mostly steady course this winter, our critic writes. He’s made a list of 21 new and returning shows for your consideration.
Ryan Christopher Jones for The New York Times
10. And finally, catch up on some great journalism.
Chasing a runaway llama. The album Steve Earle never wanted to make. Your positive moments from 2020. These are a few of the highlights from The Weekender.
Our critics suggest these 9 new books and a quirky new comedy from the makers of “Bob’s Burgers”; they also rounded up 11 movies, TV shows, performances, music albums and exhibits they are looking forward to in 2021.
How well did you keep up with 2020? Test your knowledge with our end-of-year news quiz. And here’s the front page of our Sunday paper, the Sunday Review from Opinion and our crossword puzzles.
Here’s to a fresh start this week.
Your Weekend Briefing is published Sundays at 6:30 a.m. Eastern.
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Welcome to the Weekend Briefing. We’re covering the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump, the housing crisis in the U.S. and a preview of the Super Bowl.
Pete Marovich for The New York Times
1. Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial begins.
House impeachment managers are preparing to prosecute the former president on the charge of “incitement of an insurrection” for inflaming the mob that attacked the Capitol last month. Opening arguments begin Tuesday.
Prosecutors plan to mount a fast-paced, cinematic case in which they’ll argue that Mr. Trump was “singularly responsible” for the Jan. 6 attack and a broader attack on democracy that showed he would do anything to “reassert his grip on power” if he were allowed to seek election again.
Mr. Trump’s lawyers have denied that he incited the assault on the Capitol and will argue that the Senate has no power to try a former president. Mr. Trump’s words to supporters, they say, are protected by his First Amendment right to free speech. (More than 100 leading constitutional lawyers called that claim “legally frivolous.”)
Mr. Trump has refused to testify. Members of both parties are hoping for a speedy trial, possibly completed within a week.
A guilty verdict would require at least 17 Republicans to join all 50 Democrats in voting to convict. Here’s where every senator stands.
Guillermo Arias/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
2. Thousands of migrants are arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Many are hoping to benefit from President Biden’s pledge for a more compassionate immigration policy — and indeed, Border Patrol agents have already released hundreds of migrant families into the country. Above, a protest in Tijuana the day before Mr. Biden’s inauguration last month.
Migrants still hoping to enter from the Mexican side during the pandemic could create a backlash for Mr. Biden. They are trying to enter not just by land: Record numbers are risking everything on the open ocean.
Separately, Mr. Biden said he would bar Donald Trump from receiving the intelligence briefings traditionally given to former presidents, citing his “erratic behavior.”
Sarahbeth Maney for The New York Times
3. There was a U.S. housing crisis long before the pandemic. Now it’s worse.
A study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia showed that tenants who lost jobs during the Covid-19 crisis had amassed $11 billion in rental arrears; a broader measure estimated that as of January, renters owed $53 billion in missed rent, utility payments and late fees.
President Biden said the rental assistance in his $1.9 trillion relief plan was essential to keeping people from “being thrown out in the street.” But the aid might miss the most desperate, like Angelica Gabriel and Felix Cesario, above, who are improvising by moving into even more crowded homes, pairing up with friends and family, or taking in subtenants.
Democrats will begin drafting the wording of the aid package in the coming week and aim to speed it through the House by the end of the month.
The New York Times
4. Cautious optimism: The worst of the current wave of coronavirus infections seems to be behind us.
The seven-day rolling average of new cases in the U.S. is trending down in almost every part of the country. Still, that number is 104 percent higher than the summer peak on July 25, when the seven-day average was 66,784.
At the same time, the number of coronavirus tests administered daily in the U.S. has been trending downward for more than two weeks, raising the possibility that testing has reached a ceiling or that the ramping up of vaccine distribution is fostering complacency.
One thing is certain: The scramble for inoculations is getting intense, with “vaccine hunters” crossing state lines in quest of a shot.
John Lamparski/Getty Images
5. Litigation represents a new front in the war against misinformation.
Fox Business canceled its highest-rated show, “Lou Dobbs Tonight,” on Friday after its host was sued as part of a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit by Smartmatic, a voting systems company. On Tuesday, the pro-Trump cable channel Newsmax cut off a guest’s rant about rigged voting machines.
The use of defamation suits has also raised questions about how to police a news media that counts on First Amendment protections. But one liberal lawyer said, “It’s gotten to the point where the problem is so bad right now there’s virtually no other way to do it.”
This newsletter is free, but you can go deeper into the stories we highlight each morning with a subscription to The Times. Please consider becoming a subscriber today.
The New York Times
6. The new reality in Myanmar includes arrests, beatings by mysterious thugs and communications blackouts. But civil disobedience defiantly persists.
On Saturday, thousands of people in hard hats and face masks marched in Yangon, the largest rallies since the coup on Monday that ousted the civilian leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. But the world could not watch. Live social-media feeds of the protests were abruptly shut off.
Subtler forms of protests have appeared: Balloons showed support for Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, and cities have resounded with the clanging of pots and pans, a traditional send-off for the devil.
We’re also watching Haiti, where the opposition is demanding that President Jovenel Moïse step down today, as his five-year term ends. He maintains that because an interim government occupied the first year of his term, he should stay in office for another year.
Jamie Squire/Getty Images, Rob Carr/Getty Images
7. The biggest event in American sports comes down to a battle of the ages.
Tom Brady, 43, will lead the Tampa Bay Buccaneers against Patrick Mahomes, 25, and the Kansas City Chiefs. Brady, seemingly defying nature, will be the oldest player to participate in a Super Bowl in any position. This will be his 10th championship game.
Brady and Mahomes are brilliant quarterbacks with very different approaches. We evaluate their key differences. But in the end, here’s why our Sports desk thinks the Chiefs will win.
Kickoff for Super Bowl LV is at 6:30 p.m. Eastern. Here’s everything you need to know.
- Public health experts are urging everyone to take precautions against the coronavirus when watching the big game. We have tips.
- The year’s biggest TV advertising day will include nods to a difficult time — and Dolly Parton. Ms. Parton’s working woman’s anthem “9 to 5” has been reimagined as an ad for Squarespace extolling hustle culture. It isn’t quite as empowering as the original.
- If you’re looking to up your chicken wing game, here are 17 Super Bowl recipes for the tiniest tailgate (a subscription to NYT Cooking may be required).
Filippa Trozelli
8. “Bridgerton” is just the cherry on top for fans of period clothing.
Shonda Rhimes’s racially diverse Netflix series has ignited new interest in Regency fashions. But a global community of hobbyists has been designing, making and wearing clothing from the 19th century and earlier for many years. Social media has only widened the conversation.
“You can’t really understand history until you’ve worn it,” said Filippa Trozelli, an antique jewelry appraiser in Stockholm who is pictured above in hot pink. “You get a whole different understanding.”
Frédéric Soltan/Corbis, via Getty Images
9. Ten thousand years ago or more, people started painting the walls of these caves near Bhopal, India, above.
In March, visiting scientists spotted something else: what looks an awful lot like an imprint of a 550-million-year-old fossil from the first bloom of complex life on Earth.
Even if it’s just another example of cave art, that, too, could prove to be remarkable — a trace from the dawn of life nearly overwritten by the dawn of human creativity.
Going further back in time: Scientists are now able to recreate precisely the journeys of Earth’s tectonic plates over the last billion years of its history, modeling the migration of continents.
Karsten Moran for The New York Times
10. And finally, make time for some great reads.
The charming marriage of the actor and singer Mandy Patinkin and Kathryn Grody. How humans have made the ocean a noisy place for marine life. The downside to life in a supertall tower. These and more await you in The Weekender.
Our editors also suggest these 10 new books, “Selena + Chef” and other TV programs, new music from Cardi B and more.
Did you follow the news this week? Test your knowledge with our news quiz. And here’s the front page of our Sunday paper, the Sunday Review from Opinion and our crossword puzzles.
The East Coast has another snowstorm heading its way today. Wherever you are, have a temperate week.
Your Weekend Briefing is published Sundays at 6:30 a.m. Eastern.
Did a friend forward you the briefing? You can sign up here.
What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at brie...@nytimes.com.
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