Plunge Worthy

Hey Friends,

Good morning to everyone except all the bees who tunneled into my home from my front porch – and especially to the one who stung me.

It was a revenge stinging. It started when I went to war against the occupiers.

First, I brought bee-killing poison sprayed from 20 feet away.

Then I brought a shop vac, sucking hordes of buzzing intruders directly into bee hell. But the swarm was legion, and the battle persisted. I had only succeeded at making the swarm into martyrs.

They spent the ensuing ceasefire rebuilding their army, and when I returned with a hose to soak their base, they bested me.

Bees: 1. – Daniel: 0.

It was then that I called professional help.

Let's get to The News.

Hot Takes

This 32nd Week of 2024

The Plunge

On Monday, the stock market reacted to a negative jobs report, taking its largest dip in two years. Immediately, the media faced its latest Hunter Biden's Laptop moment and considered whether it would be better to slow the news cycle for the greater good or stoke panic for clicks.

The media chose clicks.

The news immediately warned of falling skies. Stocks were down in the U.S., Europe, and Asia, and retirees worried they should move their investments to a combination of Ikea Swedish meatballs, cryptocurrency, and Sean "Puffy" Combs businesses. Some financial experts advise investors to "buy the dip," which refers to "cheese dip," because even when government cheese isn't worth much, snacks perform well in a recession.

Economists tell investors not to worry. They also stress that a shaky stock market could trigger a "circuit breaker," causing the market to melt down like a two-year-old being forced to eat his carrots while everyone else is eating cake and that families may see their life savings evaporate in moments, never to recover again.

The headlines and live updates cycled through the close of the market until trading showed signs of recovery the next day, after which staff headline writers were able to return to their prior assignment of workshopping headlines about JD Vance's eyeliner. As of yesterday, the market has recovered nearly all gains over the last month. (more)

Harris, Shapiro

I'm not just Joshin' ya when I say I typed this headline on Monday at 10:00 AM because I was almost sure he would be the Harris ticket VP choice and wanted to get ahead on the news before it was made. I was obviously right wrong.

Harris chose Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate. He rose to the top of the list after going viral for calling the Trump campaign policies "just plain weird." The clincher was the realization that Tim himself was extraordinarily normal. The Democrat party is neither overwhelmed nor underwhelmed. They are simply whelmed to have someone so normal on the ballot in November.

Tim is so normal that his most successful campaign speech was him screaming on a theme park ride while wearing Member's Mark jeans and a cell phone clipped to his belt. He's so normal that to him, dressing for success means buying a new pair of Nike Monarch dad shoes and pulling his socks up extra high. Furthermore, he's so normal that when a cop writes him a ticket, and Tim pays with cash, and the cop asks him if he needs change.

Some say that the vice presidential pick has little to do with the success of the campaign, but the media coverage for both sides suggests otherwise. In the case of Tim Walz, if the Harris campaign is a bowl of cereal, he's the milk. (more)

Google Bing

Google acted illegally by building a monopoly, according to a federal judge's ruling. The company, who disagrees with the ruling, says there is plenty of competition, and that consumers can google things on other search engines too.

For the Justice Department, this has been a key case. Over the last few years since the case began, Justice Department staff have developed countless briefs in Google Docs, spent hundreds of hours on Google Meet, and exchanged countless G-Chats to coordinate on the case.

I researched the case by using Bing to google some additional information about the case and found the ruling. In his ruling. Judge Amit Mehta (who is not related to the tech giant Meta) said, "Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly.” results which Bing seemed surprisingly eager to return on my search query. The experience of using Bing was fairly Windows-y, which is to say, mostly bad. But I found the story just the same, and it was my choice of how. If you wish, you can read more here without using either search engine: (more)

Not Very Little Debbie

That favorite lunch lady from the 1980s turned tropical storm has gained steam and dumped all of her problems on us in the form of historic rains and sob stories across the southeast. She picked up steam as she made landfall in Virginia yesterday. Follow the storm here.

1.2.3 and to the Fo

If you haven't watched the Olympics, you’ve missed one of the best Snoop Dogg shows of all time. He lent his attitude to the viewers of world sports to do what he does best, being incredibly high and getting funky on the mic like an old batch of collard greens.

His friend, who is equal parts felon and swimsuit model, Martha Stewart, joined him to watch the equestrian events, where they watched the show horse 'Gin and Juice' dance like a steed with his mind on his money and his money on his mind. (more)

That's it for this week.

Remember: The Lorem Ipsum is better with friends. And if you need time alone, share a longer issue to keep them busy for longer.

Have a great weekend!