Good morning. Summertime has arrived and, as the great St. Louis poet Nelly once said, “it’s gettin’ hot in herre.”

For others, these are “the dog days of summer.” But why? Sure, our pooches get way too hot in the sun – but the phrase actually refers to the period from July 3 to August 11, when Sirius, also known as the dog star and part of the Canis Major constellation, rises and sets in sync with the sun.

Now, NEWS.

P.S. We'll be off celebrating the long Fourth of July weekend, and shall make our triumphant return into your inbox this upcoming Thursday. Till then, enjoy yourselves and remember – always wear sunscreen!

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news takes 4.96 minutes to read.

"The longer we dwell on our misfortunes, the greater is their power to harm us."

–Voltaire (1694-1778)

Yesterday, the Supreme Court issued a pair of rulings that struck down affirmative action programs at Harvard and the University of North Carolina (UNC).

• The conservative-majority Court ruled 6-3 along ideological lines in the UNC case, and 6-2 in the Harvard dispute, as Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson recused herself.

Together, the rulings mean that US colleges and universities can no longer explicitly consider a prospective student’s race in their admissions process. And they effectively overturn a 2003 SCOTUS ruling saying admissions offices could consider race because schools had a compelling interest in maintaining diverse campuses.

⚖️ The arguments: In both of yesterday’s rulings, the Court sided with conservative nonprofit Students for Fair Admissions, which alleged the universities’ affirmative action programs illegally discriminated against white and Asian-American applicants by giving a boost to applicants from underrepresented racial groups.

• In the majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts said both schools’ programs violate the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause because they “lack sufficiently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race, unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereotyping, and lack meaningful end points."
• In the main dissenting opinion, Justice Sonia Sotomayor argued the exact opposite – that banning such programs violates the Equal Protection Clause by further entrenching centuries of racial inequality in education, saying America first needs to address existing race-based disparities prior to declaring race as irrelevant under the law.

📅🎓 On a separate note: The Supreme Court is expected to rule on the legality of President Biden’s plan to forgive $10,000 to $20,000 in federal student-loan debt for all borrowers sometime later today, right before the Court breaks for summer recess.

📊 Flash poll: Do you agree with the Supreme Court’s decision to end affirmative action in college admissions?

Yes

No

Unsure/other

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🇳🇴⛰️ Norway’s Hornelen mountain, aka Europe’s highest sea cliff, recently opened three new climbing routes. The trio of “via ferrata” routes – a term used to describe mountainside paths comprised of strategically-placed steel cables and ladders – take climbers up to 2,820 feet above the Frøysjøen strait. The Hornelen mountain is infamous in Norse mythology as a gathering place for witches, and is also thought to have been scaled by Norway’s King Olaf I around the year 1,000 AD.

🇫🇷 The French government deployed 40,000 police officers yesterday, as major cities experienced a third straight night of protests. French officials said more than 100 protesters were arrested across the country last night, adding to the ~150 demonstrators arrested on Wednesday night. Bystander video footage shows protesters setting fire to police stations, town halls, schools, and cars across multiple cities. The public unrest began on Tuesday after French police fatally shot 17-year-old Nahel M. while he was driving away from a traffic stop.

🇨🇳🎈 The Chinese spy balloon that floated over North America earlier this year reportedly used American tech to spy on the US (*Alanis Morissette plays*). A government analysis of the balloon, which was shot down by an American fighter jet over the Atlantic in February, found it was equipped with commercially available US gear alongside more specialized Chinese equipment and sensors. This info is derived from multiple reports citing US officials familiar with the matter, who say the balloon was designed to collect photos, video, and other information to transmit back to China. However, a Pentagon spokesperson yesterday said the agency’s assessment is that the balloon had not collected any intelligence while flying over the US.

Today is projected to be the busiest day at US airports since before the Covid pandemic, with an estimated 2.8 million travelers.

And if the past week of mass flight delays and cancellations – 20,000 and 5,000, respectively – is any indication, it’s also gearing up to be a record day for high tempers and levels of irritation.

✈️ Driving the problem... A combination of bad weather and staffing shortages, which have airlines and the FAA pointing fingers of blame at each other like the famous Spider-Man meme.

• Scott Kirby, CEO of United Airlines, which has had the most cancellations, blamed FAA staffing issues. Which has some merit. A recent audit of the FAA found that 77% of critical air traffic control towers are staffed below the agency’s 85% threshold. And some facilities, like New York and Miami, are staffed so low it “poses a risk to the continuity of air traffic operations.”
• Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, on the other hand, pointed right back at United in TV interviews this week. Which also has some merit. The WSJ reports the carrier’s own internal systems only exacerbated problems, with flight attendants having to wait hours on hold to receive new flight assignments.

⛈💨📡 Issues are expected to continue. Smoke from Canadian wildfires and thunderstorms in the Midwest could pose a challenge for air travel this weekend, per the National Weather Service. And that’s not all. Beginning Saturday, a new 5G service is expected to cause more delays and cancellations, since planes without updated equipment might experience interference from wireless transmissions.

If the threat of AI was a Marvel villain, it’d have to be Ultron. Which would make the news organizations currently considering forming a coalition to deal with AI… The Avengers?

According to a report published yesterday, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal parent company News Corp, Vox Media, and other publications are in talks to partner up, a tough thing for competitors (and Avengers) to do. But when the threat is great enough – in this case, existential risk of not just the news industry, but the planet – the Avengers must assemble.

Topping the list of the publishers’ concerns:

• Content scraping: The AI models are trained on articles and images published by these news organizations, which, according to some executives, is a breach of intellectual property.
• Leapfrogging the news: AI-search engines deliver news information directly to the user, bypassing the need to visit the original publication’s website. The publishers argue they should be paid for access to this content.

📰🤖 Zoom out: News publishers aren’t the only ones feeling the impact of AI-generated content. Earlier this week, Amazon Kindle’s bestsellers list in the young adult romance category was filled with nonsensical AI-generated content, including such “classics” as when the three attacks and Apricot bar code architecture.

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💬 Quoted… “[GPT-4] does a pretty good job of saying dumb things that are somewhat funny.”

In a fitting reversal, robodialer telemarketers’ phone calls are now being answered by… AI-chatbots.

• That’s thanks to Roger Anderson, who created Jolly Roger, an AI system that tries to keep telemarketers on the phone for as long as possible by sounding both interested and confused. Jolly Roger customers can choose between various AI personalities, including Salty Sally and Whiskey Jack.

⚾️📺 Stat of the Day: Everybody wants (to watch) some…college baseball. According to ESPN, the 2023 College World Series was the most-watched in the network’s history. The three-game series averaged 2.86 million viewers, up ~75% from last year.

🤯 Did You Know?.... “Rooster Sauce,” aka sriracha sauce, aka the undisputed GOAT of condiments, is currently selling for over $70/bottle on eBay. Persistent chili supply disruptions due to droughts in Mexico are causing continued shortages of the good-on-literally-anything sauce for the second consecutive year.

📖 Worth a Read: A Reporter’s Tweet Moved NBA Draft Odds. He Also Works for a Gambling Company → (WSJ)

• ☝️ You’re looking at some of the nominees on the shortlist for the annual Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition, now in its 15th year.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

in partnership with Chartr

• 💰 US markets closed mixed across the board yesterday (S&P: +0.5%; Dow: +0.8%; Nasdaq: -0.003%).
• 🛒 Overstock.com announced plans to rebrand under the Bed Bath & Beyond name after acquiring the bankrupt retailer’s brand, IP, and customer database for $21 million.
• 👟 Nike reported quarterly earnings results yesterday that topped Wall Street expectations for revenue, but fell short on profit.

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SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

in partnership with DeLo-xx

• ⚾ NY Yankees pitcher Domingo Germán threw the 24th perfect game in MLB history on Wednesday night against the Oakland A’s; it’s the first perfect game since Félix Hernández threw one in 2012. | 🗳️ The 2023 All-Star Game starters were unveiled yesterday by the MLB.
• 🏈 Three NFL players were suspended indefinitely for betting on NFL games during the 2022 season; a fourth player, Titans OL Nicholas Petit-Frere, was suspended six games for betting on non-NFL sports while on team premises.
• 🏥 Madonna postponed her upcoming “Celebration” tour after being hospitalized this week with a bacterial infection; she’s now back home resting, per multiple sources. | 🎤 Rapper Travis Scott won't face criminal charges for his role in a crowd surge that killed ten people at the Astroworld festival in 2021.

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SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

• 〰️🔭 An international team of scientists recently discovered what they say is the first-ever observation of gravitational waves caused by the motion of black holes; the waves are reportedly proof of Einstein’s theory that supermassive objects cause ripples throughout spacetime as they move.
• 💊 The FDA has approved a new daily oral drug from Pfizer aimed at treating alopecia, after a new randomized, double-blind clinical trial found it reversed hair loss in nearly a quarter of patients.
• 🌌 The IceCube Neutrino Observatory unveiled a first-of-its-kind image of our Milky Way galaxy as seen by ghost-like messenger particles called neutrinos.

MISCELLANEOUS

• 🌁🔥 More than 100 million Americans were under an air quality advisory yesterday due to smoke from ongoing Canadian wildfires; poor air quality is expected to linger across northern states for the next few days.
• 📱 Federal prosecutors arrested three men yesterday and charged them with insider trading relating to a deal to take Truth Social, the social media company owned by former President Trump, public via SPAC.
• ⚖️ A former sheriff’s deputy who failed to confront the gunman at a Parkland, FL, school shooting five years ago was found not guilty of child neglect and culpable negligence yesterday.

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Cliff Brush loves to cycle. The biker has been hitting the roads for over ten years around his Florida home – and Brodie Brush, his 75-pound Goldendoodle, loves to cycle, too. 

🐶🚲 Hitting the road... Around three years ago, Cliff noticed Brodie getting excited whenever he would pull out his bike. He took him on one quick joy ride around the block, and the pup was hooked. 

• Now, the duo enjoys bike rides every week. Brodie fits in a special dog backpack, looking sporty in his goggles the entire time⬆️. 

🚴‍♂️ Stiff competition: While Cliff doesn't consider himself a serious or competitive cyclist, he jokes, “I’ll beat anybody in the 80-pound-dog-on-your-back division.”

Note: an earlier version of this story ran on August 19, 2022. Our Positive DONUT writer Kailyn is currently deep in 50-hour/week rehearsals for another slate of upcoming live shows in Europe (which is taking a lot of her focus).

The DONUT’s weekly news quiz is back. In just two minutes or less, see how your news superpowers stack up against our team.

Below are three lists of ingredients. All you have to do is give us the completed dish they make.

☝️ Recipe #1:

• Vegetable shortening
• Flour
• Sugar
• Baking powder
• Salt
• Cream cheese
• Eggs
• Vanilla extract
• Powdered sugar

✌️ Recipe #2:

• Pork
• Asian pear
• Garlic
• Green onion
• Soy sauce
• Sugar
• Rice syrup/honey
• Gochujang
• Black pepper
• Yellow onion

3️⃣ Recipe #3:

• Sucked sweet corn
• Butter
• Bay leaf
• Salt
• Mayo
• Ancho chiles
• Limes
• Queso fresco
• Cilantro leaves
• Mexican crema
• Cholula hot sauce

(keep scrolling for the answers)

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☝️ Recipe #1: Philly fluff cake

✌️ Recipe #2: Jeyuk bokkeum (aka spicy pork bulgogi)

3️⃣ Recipe #3: Esquites (aka Mexican street corn salad)