Pushed by pandemic, Amazon goes on a hiring spree without equal

Pushed by pandemic, Amazon goes on a hiring spree without equal

The New York Times reports: Amazon has embarked on an extraordinary hiring binge this year, vacuuming up an average of 1,400 new workers a day and solidifying its power as online shopping becomes more entrenched in the coronavirus pandemic. The hiring has taken place at Amazon’s headquarters in Seattle, at its hundreds of warehouses in rural communities and suburbs, and in countries such as India and Italy. Amazon added 427,300 employees between January and October, pushing its work force to…

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What complexity science says about what makes a winning team

What complexity science says about what makes a winning team

Jessica Flack and Cade Massey write: In Philip K Dick’s classic science fiction novel Ubik, one of the main characters, Runciter, is in charge of assembling a team of individuals called ‘inertials’. The hope is that they will counteract the power of ‘precogs’ and ‘telepaths’, recruited by corporations to carry out espionage and other nefarious activities. Each inertial is a superstar with a unique talent – but Runciter’s concern is their collective power. Interest in collective behaviour is not new….

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In Trump against Biden, Native American voters played a crucial role. It’s time to recognize that

In Trump against Biden, Native American voters played a crucial role. It’s time to recognize that

Julian Brave NoiseCat writes: On Election Night, CNN broadcast a table showing the results of an exit poll that broke the national electorate down into racial demographics. It read: White — 65 percent, Latino — 13 percent, Black — 12 percent, Something else — 6 percent, Asian — 3 percent. Almost immediately, that second-to-last category, “Something Else,” provoked an online uproar among the digital denizens of Indian Country. We were outraged that CNN had, rather clumsily, grouped the First Peoples…

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‘Voters, not lawyers, choose the president’: Appeals court shoots down Trump suit in Pennsylvania

‘Voters, not lawyers, choose the president’: Appeals court shoots down Trump suit in Pennsylvania

Politico reports: A federal appeals court panel forcefully rejected the Trump campaign’s effort to throw out millions of Pennsylvania ballots, declaring its allegations of misconduct meritless and its suggested remedies as “breathtaking” and undercut by a lack of evidence. “Voters, not lawyers, choose the President. Ballots, not briefs, decide elections,” Judge Stephanos Bibas — an appointee of President Donald Trump — wrote for the three-judge 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals panel composed entirely of GOP appointees. Bibas’ opinion, delivered just…

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Why did so many Americans vote for Trump?

Why did so many Americans vote for Trump?

Will Wilkinson writes: President Trump’s disastrous mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic probably cost him re-election. Yet it seems mind-boggling that he still won more votes than any incumbent president in American history despite his dereliction of responsibility at a time of a once-in-a-century health crisis and economic devastation. Why are President-elect Joe Biden’s margins so thin in the states that clinched his victory? And why did the president’s down-ticket enablers flourish in the turbulent, plague-torn conditions they helped bring about?…

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The inexorable rise of Jake Sullivan, Joe Biden’s national security adviser

The inexorable rise of Jake Sullivan, Joe Biden’s national security adviser

Politico reports: “You have to be kidding me.” Philippe Reines was sitting in a yurt in Mongolia during a trip with then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, sure that he’d finally done it: traveled to more countries than anyone else with Clinton as one of her top aides. And then Jake Sullivan strolled in. “He’d literally just been in Oman for secret peace talks with the Iranians, and he managed to make it to this remote part of Mongolia,” said Reines,…

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How the assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist can sabotage diplomacy and start a war

How the assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist can sabotage diplomacy and start a war

Trita Parsi writes: Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a key Iranian nuclear official, has been assassinated in Tehran. While it’s unclear as of this writing who is responsible, Israel has assassinated numerous Iranian nuclear scientists in the past, but had, until now, been unable to get to the highly protected Fakhrizadeh. Some Iranian reports claim it was a suicide attack, which would reduce the likelihood of Israeli operatives carrying out the attack, but the bullet holes in Fakhrizadeh’s car cast doubt on that….

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To the very end, Trump remains haunted by one word: loser

To the very end, Trump remains haunted by one word: loser

Dan Barry reports: In the now-distant Republican presidential primaries of 2016, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas handily won the Iowa caucuses. This was determined by a method that has lately come under attack but at the time was considered standard: elementary math. One of the losers in Iowa, the developer and television personality Donald J. Trump, soon accused Mr. Cruz of electoral theft. He fired off several inflammatory tweets, including this foreshadowing of our current democracy-testing moment: “Based on the…

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How Einstein reconciled religion to science

How Einstein reconciled religion to science

Brian Gallagher writes: Not long ago, I heard an echo of Albert Einstein’s religious views in the words of Elon Musk. Asked, at the close of a conversation with Axios, whether he believed in God, the CEO of both SpaceX and Tesla paused, looked away from his interlocutors for a brief second, and then said, in that mild South African accent, “I believe there’s some explanation for this universe, which you might call God.” Einstein did call it God. The…

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How the Covid-19 pandemic has been curtailed in Cherokee Nation: By ‘following the science’

How the Covid-19 pandemic has been curtailed in Cherokee Nation: By ‘following the science’

Usha Lee McFarling reports: While the United States flounders in its response to the coronavirus, another nation — one within our own borders — is faring much better. With a mask mandate in place since spring, free drive-through testing, hospitals well-stocked with PPE, and a small army of public health officers fully supported by their chief, the Cherokee Nation has been able to curtail its Covid-19 case and death rates even as those numbers surge in surrounding Oklahoma, where the…

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Doctors and nurses in the fight against Covid are suffering combat fatigue

Doctors and nurses in the fight against Covid are suffering combat fatigue

The New York Times reports: About 2 a.m. on a sweltering summer night, Dr. Orlando Garner awoke to the sound of a thud next to his baby daughter’s crib. He leapt out of bed to find his wife, Gabriela, passed out, her forehead hot with the same fever that had stricken him and his son, Orlando Jr., then 3, just hours before. Two days later, it would hit their infant daughter, Veronica. Nearly five months later, Dr. Garner, a critical…

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After admitting mistake, AstraZeneca faces difficult questions about its vaccine

After admitting mistake, AstraZeneca faces difficult questions about its vaccine

The New York Times reports: The announcement this week that a cheap, easy-to-make coronavirus vaccine appeared to be up to 90 percent effective was greeted with jubilation. “Get yourself a vaccaccino,” a British tabloid celebrated, noting that the vaccine, developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, costs less than a cup of coffee. But since unveiling the preliminary results, AstraZeneca has acknowledged a key mistake in the vaccine dosage received by some study participants, adding to questions about whether…

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Pope Francis: A crisis reveals what is in our hearts

Pope Francis: A crisis reveals what is in our hearts

Pope Francis writes: In this past year of change, my mind and heart have overflowed with people. People I think of and pray for, and sometimes cry with, people with names and faces, people who died without saying goodbye to those they loved, families in difficulty, even going hungry, because there’s no work. Sometimes, when you think globally, you can be paralyzed: There are so many places of apparently ceaseless conflict; there’s so much suffering and need. I find it…

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Supreme Court follows public health guidance in remote hearings but blocks limits on religious gatherings

Supreme Court follows public health guidance in remote hearings but blocks limits on religious gatherings

The Associated Press reports: The Supreme Court said Wednesday it will continue to hear arguments by telephone through at least January because of the coronavirus pandemic. The court’s announcement extended telephone arguments by a month. “The Court will continue to closely monitor public health guidance in determining plans for the February argument session,” the court said in a statement. Politico reports: The Supreme Court signaled a major shift in its approach to coronavirus-related restrictions late Wednesday, voting 5-4 to bar…

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