|
Listen To This Story
 |
PICKS are stories from many sources, selected by our editors or recommended by our readers because they are important, surprising, troubling, enlightening, inspiring, or amusing. They appear on our site and in our daily newsletter. Please send suggested articles, videos, podcasts, etc. to picks@whowhatwhy.org.
3 Reasons California’s Drought Isn’t Really Over, Despite All the Rain (Maria)
The author writes, “Ask a water expert if California’s drought is finally done, and the answers sound something like this: ‘Yes and no.’ ‘Kind of.’ ‘Depends what you mean by drought.’ The state has been deluged by storms this winter, hit by 12 atmospheric rivers that have led to evacuation orders, rising rivers and broken levees. … But in California, water shortages aren’t just due to a lack of rain, and the state’s chronic water problems are far from over.”
Trump Asked Supporters to Take to the Streets. This Was the Sad Result. (Russ)
From The New Republic: “Let’s get you caught up on the pageantry of waiting outside a courthouse in New York City for Donald Trump to get arrested. There are police barricades. There are policemen. What there haven’t been, to speak of, are the protesters that Trump summoned to this spot — there are perhaps two at this point, though it’s hard to tell for sure. There are no Trump flags here, no signs, no bombastic speeches about God and country and freedom.”
Oklahoma Supreme Court Finds ‘Limited Right’ to Abortion in State Constitution (Dana)
From The Oklahoman: “The Oklahoma Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that the state constitution includes ‘an inherent right of a pregnant woman to terminate a pregnancy when necessary to save her life.’ The court struck down one law passed by the Legislature to criminalize abortions but left another in place and took no position on the broader question of whether there is a right to elective abortions, effectively upholding strict antiabortion measures in place since last year.”
These Men Fought White Supremacists and Got Sentenced to Over 200 Years (Michaela)
From Truthout: “How the criminal legal system slammed two Black men for standing up to white supremacist guards in an Indiana prison.”
This Is the Lightest Paint in the World (Sean)
The author writes, “In a paper published this month in Science Advances, [Debashis] Chanda’s lab demonstrated a first-of-its-kind paint based on structural color. They think it’s the lightest paint in the world — and they mean that both in terms of weight and temperature. The paint consists of tiny aluminum flakes dotted with even tinier aluminum nanoparticles. A raisin’s worth of the stuff could cover both the front and back of a door. It’s lightweight enough to potentially cut fuel usage in planes and cars that are coated with it. It doesn’t trap heat from sunlight like pigments do, and its constituents are less toxic than paints made with heavy metals like cadmium and cobalt.”
Honey Bee Colony Loss in the US Linked to Mites, Extreme Weather, Pesticides (Mili)
The author writes, “Honey bee colony loss across the United States over the last five years is primarily related to the presence of parasitic mites, nearby pesticides, and extreme weather events as well as challenges with overwintering, according to a new study. The study took advantage of novel statistical methods and is among the first to concurrently consider a variety of potential honey bee stressors at a national scale.”
3 Amateur Codebreakers Set Out to Decrypt Old Letters. They Uncovered Royal History (Al)
The author writes, “We can now learn more about one of the most controversial monarchs in European history, thanks to a trio of amateur cryptologists who unknowingly stumbled upon a treasure trove of long-lost letters by Mary, Queen of Scots and worked painstakingly to crack their code.”
