This piece started out as an attempt to get to the bottom of a clash over free speech and Southern manners and ended up a kind ode to feisty Southern grandmothers slate.com/news-and-pol...

The Waffle House teleportation story from last was obviously...odd, but imo a lot of people are missing just how *conventional* the FEMA guy's type of supernatural thinking has become in American evangelicalism slate.com/life/2026/04...

Very excited to share that we're launching a monthly newsletter @foreignpolicy.com to showcase our growing Books coverage, including criticism, excerpts, curated reading lists, and an international fiction column. Sign up for FP Bookshelf here:

Scott Hanson just said on Gold Zone that Hunter Hess (the free skier Trump called a loser) is 6-foot-9, "one of the tallest Olympians." U.S. Ski & Snowboard told [email protected] that Hess is actually 6-foot flat. 6-foot-9 is a typo in his Team USA bio!!! slate.com/culture/2026...

Even if you don't buy into reports of Nick Fuentes' influence, it's clear that his kind of white nationalist edgelord internet politics are taking over classrooms. The good news, experts say, is there are ways to help kids snap out of it—if you catch it early enough slate.com/news-and-pol...

Tucker Carlson just keeps getting worse. Now he's bought into the chemtrails conspiracy, which is (among every other problem with it) a climate-denial ploy slate.com/news-and-pol... by @mollyolmstead.bsky.social on @slate.com

Before the U.S. started shipping immigrants off to the terrifying Salvadoran mega-prison CECOT, YouTubers were touring it, trying on shackles and marveling at the security. Millions of people were introduced to CECOT this way—as a cool innovation in crime-fighting. slate.com/life/2025/04...

Religion aside: If Hegseth is pushed out, it'll be a blow to the growing power of conservative Calvinist "theobros." Hegseth attends a church in the small denomination co-founded by Doug Wilson, arguably the spiritual leader of theobros. religionnews.com/2024/05/31/t...

When writing this obit, I kept asking which parts of Pope Francis' legacy could be undone. Experts all said that policies could be rolled back but that Francis had changed things more fundamentally—the Latin American pope was the first to make the church truly global. slate.com/life/2025/04...

A bloody end for Pizzagate gunman Edgar Maddison Welch, who shot up Comet Ping Pong in 2016. Police say they shot him at a traffic stop over the weekend after he pulled a gun. www.charlotteobserver.com/news/local/c...

Some in the far-right internet are cheering Meta rolling back its fact-checking program & its content moderation, claiming Mark Zuckerberg "kissed the ring & bowed to Donald Trump" & was "bending the knee in our direction," along with being amazed it was "this easy" to get these changes announced.

In a Twitter/X Space last week, Brian Gamble — a board member of Michael Flynn's organization America's Future & a former CIO of Flynn & Patrick Byrne's organization The America Project — said that "it is going to take blood in the streets" in order to stop the supposed "Islamification" of the UK.

Let’s talk about a different aspect of Pete Hegseth: His views on religion and the military, and how the two intertwine. We have been reviewing his extensive writings and connections. Here is a closer look at some of what we’ve found. 1/11 www.nytimes.com/2024/12/05/u...

Looking to talk to some folks about religion and seed oils for a story.

I hate to crosspost, but masks are coming off and Fundamentalist Twitter is realizing that some folks who think America should be run as a Christian nation also have other thoughts that may or may not be almost verbatim Hitler quotes.

People for the American Way has drawn connections between Trump's AG pick and the dominionist New Apostolic Reformation. Also note that Lance Wallnau, prominent NAR leader, boasted in October about his interview with Linda McMahon (education secretary pick). www.peoplefor.org/rightwingwat...

The conservative women’s magazine Evie has released their new cover featuring Ballerina Farm. Evie has peddled health conspiracy theories & disinfo, patriarchal relationships, and anti-LGBTQ views under an aesthetic guise. It’s time to stop saying that tradwives aren’t political.

As I wrote this, people kept asking if Bannon is actually still relevant, since the Trump fallout. I really think so—he has sway over the MAGA types in Congress, and his allies (the kind of people he says "I love you" to on the show) are staffing up the next administration slate.com/news-and-pol...