• If you have any interest at all in AI, I highly recommend this excellent podcast from Ezra Klein, where he talks with Demis Hassabis, Google DeepMind’s CEO, about Hassabis’ personal journey to AI and gets Hassabis’ perspective on its promises and perils.

• David French writes in the NYT about the legal perils besetting Trump and many of his fellow plotters; here’s an excerpt to which the electorate should pay close attention:

“We can’t ask for too much from any legal system. A code of laws is ultimately no substitute for moral norms. Our constitutional republic cannot last indefinitely in the face of misinformation, conspiracy and violence. It can remove the worst actors from positions of power and influence. But it cannot ultimately save us from ourselves. American legal institutions have responded to a historical crisis, but all its victories could still be temporary. Our nation can choose the law, or it can choose Trump. It cannot choose both.”

• Yet another superb essay by Linda Greenhouse in the NYT – “Look at What John Roberts and His Court Have Wrought Over 18 Years“.  An excerpt:

“My focus here on what these past 18 years have achieved has been on the court itself. But of course, the Supreme Court doesn’t stand alone. Powerful social and political movements swirl around it, carefully cultivating cases and serving them up to justices who themselves were propelled to their positions of great power by those movements. The Supreme Court now is this country’s ultimate political prize. That may not be apparent on a day-to-day or even a term-by-term basis. But from the perspective of 18 years, that conclusion is as unavoidable as it is frightening.”

• Kate Shaw writes in the NYT about how the current Supreme Court’s recent decisions are overly accommodating toward religion — I agree.

• David Wallace-Wells does a very good interview with outgoing CDC Director Rachel Walensky in the NYT.

• Definitely worth a read: Alexei Navalny’s essay in the Washington Post, communicated via his legal team.

• Once again advocating for these excellent science-based, rational, primarily medically-oriented Substack newsletters:

Kristen Panthagani’s You Can Know Things
and
Katelyn Jetelina’s Your Local Epidemiologist