Abbreviated Pundit Round-up

Jumping Jesus Christ on a Pogo, after the incoming Vice President sent out a Merry Christmas to all post on his Truth Social platform, he unleashed another one to the "Radical Left Lunatics." Hey, that's us! We are radical for wanting a viable healthcare plan in this country and not wanting our children buried in crippling student debt for a lifetime.

“Russian companies are using bitcoin to evade Western sanctions, thanks to a new law, the country’s Finance Minister Anton Siluanov confirmed in a television interview,” Axios reports. “Russia’s economy has been hampered by difficulties in making and receiving international payments, even with countries like China that don’t use the U. S.

Charlie Sykes: “America’s politicians have an age problem, and the issue seems especially acute among congressional Democrats. The prevalence of older politicians can arguably make the elected class less relevant to younger voters and make it more difficult for new voices to rise in politics. But at its core, this is an issue of honesty: Didn’t the American people have a right to know that Biden was struggling?

The staff of Mother Jones is, once again, rounding up the heroes and monsters of the past year. Importantly, this is a completely non-exhaustive and subjective list, giving our reporters a chance to write about something that brought joy or discontent. Enjoy. For those of us who would be described in HR packets at progressive workplaces as “gender nonconforming” or “of non-normative gender presentation,” it can sometimes be really hard to get a haircut. The places where one might get one are usually gender-segregated zones, where cisgender people go for what one might call gender-affirming care—that is, cosmetic care toward redeclaring their man- or womanhood. Still, enough gender studies papers have been written about the barbershop as a masculine space and the hair salon as the center of an all-women’s social world.

The staff of Mother Jones is, once again, rounding up the heroes and monsters of the past year. Importantly, this is a completely non-exhaustive and subjective list, giving our reporters a chance to write about something that brought joy or discontent. Enjoy. When was the 2024 presidential election really lost? Maybe you’d argue (though I would not) that it was the rubber-stamp nominating process for Vice President Kamala Harris.

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Dozens of rare animals including tigers, lions, and cheetahs are dying as bird flu infiltrates zoos, with potentially “grave implications” for endangered species, researchers have warned. As a growing number of zoos report animal deaths, scientists are concerned that infected wild birds landing in enclosures could be spreading it among captive animals.