Good morning. Drop whatever you’re doing and go get your lifeguard license!! Actually wait – finish reading today’s DONUT, then go get your lifeguard license.

According to the American Lifeguard Association, about half of the nation’s ~300,000 public pools will be affected by a national lifeguard shortage this summer. Which is why we need YOU!

It seems like most lifeguard certification programs take about 40 hours, so you better get to it. The fate of the summer hangs in the balance.

Now get ready for some non-lifeguard-related NEWS.

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news takes 4.98 minutes to read.

"I keep on making what I can’t do yet in order to learn to be able to do it."

–Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890)

On Saturday, President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy reached an agreement on legislation that would raise the federal debt ceiling to avoid an impending default on US government debt.

The bipartisan deal, which still requires approval from both chambers of Congress, would raise the debt ceiling through January 2025 in exchange for spending cuts and other GOP-supported measures across a range of federal programs:

• Spending: Non-military spending would be kept roughly flat in 2024 and capped at a 1% increase in 2025, while military spending would remain unchanged (currently +3% for 2024).
• Welfare work requirements: US adults between the ages of 18 and 54 would be required to work to receive food stamps, up from the current top age of 49. The deal would also modify the formula used to calculate cash assistance for low-income US households.
• Covid aid: The deal would claw back roughly half of all unspent federal Covid aid money ($29 billion out of ~$60 billion).
• IRS funding: Congress would cut up to $21.4 billion of the $80 billion it previously allocated towards the IRS to boost tax enforcement and modernize its technology over the next decade.
• Energy reform: The deal would impose a two-year time limit on environmental reviews for large-scale energy and infrastructure projects, which currently take an average of 4.5 years.

👀 Looking ahead… If legislation to raise the debt ceiling isn’t passed by a hard deadline of June 15 (or a soft deadline of June 5), the US would default on its debt for the first time in history, per a new estimate from Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.

The House is scheduled to vote tomorrow on the new agreement, which has received pushback from some progressive Democrats and conservative Republicans. If passed, the measure would then head to the Senate for approval before President Biden can sign it into law.

🐋🇷🇺 A beluga whale previously suspected of spying for Russia resurfaced near Sweden on Sunday. The whale, nicknamed Hvladimir, was first sighted off the coast of Norway in 2019 wearing a harness fitted with a base for a small camera, with the words “Equipment St. Petersburg” printed on the strap. According to Norwegian officials, Hvladimir may have been trained by the Russian Navy for two main reasons: 1) he appears accustomed to humans, and 2) he’s spent the past four years swimming in waters that are geopolitically valuable for Moscow but hundreds of miles from the nearest beluga whale population.

🇹🇷 Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was re-elected for an unprecedented third five-year term. Erdogan won 52.1% of the vote compared to 47.9% for opposition leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu in Sunday’s runoff election, which came after all four initial candidates failed to win a majority in nationwide elections held earlier this month. Erdoğan, who previously served as Turkey’s PM for 12 years before he was elected to his current role in 2014, is the first three-time president since the Turkish Republic was established in 1923.

🇯🇵 The Japanese government reached a deal to beam solar energy from space as early as 2025. The new public-private partnership will build on a first-of-its-kind breakthrough in 2015, in which Japan’s space agency successfully beamed 1.8 kilowatts of power – or enough to boil an electric kettle – 170 feet through the air to a small wireless receiver. Japan is one of several nations currently working on space-based solar power projects, along with the US, UK, China, and Russia. If successful, these projects would be able to capture and transmit far more energy than grounded alternatives due to the absence of clouds, atmosphere, and nighttime in space.

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When it comes to gambling, you’ve probably heard that “the house always wins.” Well, casinos on the Las Vegas Strip have been doubling down on this sentiment in recent years, per a newly-published report by the WSJ, shifting the odds further in their favor for two widely-popular games: blackjack and roulette.

🃏 Blackjack: Players typically receive a 3:2 payout when they hit a “blackjack,” aka 21 on the first two cards. But roughly a decade ago, some Vegas casinos started paying out those hands using 6:5 odds instead.

• Today, 6:5 odds are found at more than two-thirds of all blackjack tables on the Strip, per gambling data company Vegas Advantage. On these tables, a $50 bet pays out $60 for hitting a blackjack – instead of the previous $75 payout for tables with 3:2 odds.

⚫🔴 Roulette: Casinos have historically used a roulette board with 18 red spaces, 18 black spaces, and two “zero” spaces (where nearly all bets are lost). But since 2016, the percentage of roulette tables on the Vegas Strip that use a format with three “zero” spaces has grown from ~5% to ~40%. And more zero spaces for the casino = less zeros in your pocket.

📸 Big picture: Per the WSJ, the new odds are part of a larger strategy by Vegas casinos to attract more upscale customers. And it appears to be working – casinos on the Vegas Strip raked in a record $8.3 billion in gambling revenue last year, representing a 25% increase over 2019 despite fewer total visitors.

First off, let’s be very clear – there will be no spoilers in this post about the series finale of Succession, which aired Sunday on the streamer formerly known as HBO Max, itself having been succeeded by its first-born, Max.

🔙 Origin story: Inspired by today’s real-life media dynasties – including, most notably, that of Rupert Murdoch – the show follows the family of Logan Roy, a billionaire who is reluctantly deciding which of his four kids will take over.

And since debuting in June 2018, Succession has become quite popular, boasting a viewership chart that would make a Silicon Valley investor salivate (up and to the right!!). Season one’s premiere was watched by ~580,000 viewers, while season two’s was seen by ~1.2 million people. Season four (the final season) opened to ~2.3 million viewers – or about 4x the audience size of season one.

• Succession was beloved by critics, too. The show was nominated for 48 Emmys and won 13, including two Outstanding Drama Series victories for its second and third seasons.

🔎 Zoom out: Succession’s influence can be felt in unexpected places. Take fashion, for instance – according to data from eBay, sales of Loro Piana brand clothes, a Kendall Roy favorite in season four, were up 70% from April to March of this year.

💬 Quoted… "[I] was unaware of the possibility that its content could be false.”

A New York attorney is facing potential sanctions after using ChatGPT to write a 10-page legal brief that cited more than half a dozen court decisions – all of which were completely made up.

• The attorney, who said he “greatly regrets” his actions, later shared screenshots of him asking ChatGPT whether the cases it cited were real, to which the chatbot responded “Yes.”

✈️ Stat of the Day: Prices of airline tickets from the US to Europe and from the US to Asia are significantly higher than before the pandemic, per new data from travel booking site Hopper, up over 50% and 70%, respectively. On the flip side, prices of domestic airline tickets in the US are currently 23% lower than in 2019.

🤯 Did You Know?... Eminem holds the record for world’s fastest rap verse, delivering 222 words within 30 seconds in the song Godzilla.

📖 Worth a Read: Beyond the ‘Matrix’ Theory of the Mind → (NY Times)

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• ☝️ You’re looking at images from Memorial Day celebrations across America yesterday, held to honor the sacrifice and courage of military personnel who died while serving our nation.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

• 💰 US markets closed up across the board on Friday (S&P: +1.3%; Dow: +1.0%; Nasdaq: +2.2%).
• 📈 US consumer spending increased by 0.8% in April, doubling analysts’ expectations of 0.4%, per Commerce Department data published Friday.
• 🤖 AI has been used at work by 85% of Americans, per a report released last week by Checkr.

SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

in partnership with Mana

• 🧜 The Little Mermaid earned $118 million in its domestic box office debut this weekend; that’s good for the fifth largest Memorial Day opening ever.
• ⛪🎥 Martin Scorcese met with Pope Francis over the weekend; Scorcese then announced he will start making a new film about Jesus.
• 🏀 The Miami Heat beat the Boston Celtics 103-84 yesterday in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals; the Heat will meet the Denver Nuggets in game one of the NBA Finals on June 1. | ⚾ The 2023 college baseball and softball World Series brackets were released yesterday.

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SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

in partnership with Pendulum

• 🧠 Elon Musk-led Neuralink said it has received FDA approval to conduct the first human clinical trials of its brain-implant technology.
• 🪐🌌 Roughly one-third of all planets orbiting a dwarf star in our galaxy – the most common type of star – are close enough to the star to possibly sustain life, totaling hundreds of millions of potentially habitable planets across the Milky Way, per a peer-reviewed study published yesterday in PNAS.
• 🚀 NASA's SLS rocket is $6 billion over budget and six years behind schedule, per a new audit from the space agency’s inspector general.

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MISCELLANEOUS

• 🏢 A six-story brick apartment building partially collapsed Sunday evening in Davenport, Iowa; eight people were rescued from the collapse; an unknown number are injured or missing, with police saying they found no other hits for people after searching for hours with K-9 units.
• 🇷🇺 Russia issued an arrest warrant on Sunday for Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) over his recent comments in support of Ukraine, though it only applies should Graham visit the country – which he’s already banned from doing.
• 🏛️ Texas AG Ken Paxton (R) was impeached by the GOP-led state House in a 121-23 vote on Saturday, after an investigative committee earlier in the week accused him of a "long-standing pattern of abuse of office and public trust"; Paxton is now suspended from office pending the outcome of a trial in the state Senate. (From the Left | From the Center | From the Right)

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On Friday, we covered identical new laws in Democrat-led California and Republican-led Florida that push back start times for all middle and high school students in the state.

❓ Our question to you: Would you be in favor of your state passing a law that mandates later start times for middle and high schools?

• 👍 Yes: 68%
• 👎 No: 19%
• 🤷 Unsure/other: 13%

Click here to read more of the best responses from Friday’s poll.

+Note on sample size: We received 12,663 votes and 1,154 longform responses.

The crowd went wild at New Jersey's Seton Hall University's commencement ceremony last week when Justin, a six-year-old labrador golden retriever mix, walked across the stage to receive his diploma. 

❤️ Star student... The service dog belongs to graduating senior Grace Mariani, who is in a wheelchair. Grace graduated with a bachelor's degree in education, and plans to start a teaching career with Justin by her side.

• After giving the diploma a good sniff, Justin gently took it in his mouth, tail wagging the whole time. 

Guess the definitions of the following Greek/Latin root words:

1. Ampl
2. Bar
3. Chore
4. Fiss
5. Lact

(keep scrolling for the answers)

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1. Ampl = Abundant (e.g., ample, amplification)
2. Bar = Pressure (barometer)
3. Chore = Relating to dance (choreography)
4. Fiss = Split (fissure, fission)
5. Lact = Milk (lactose)

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