(All of the names in this piece have been changed. Well, except my own.)

I had just taken the helm as interim director of the neighborhood summer children’s swim team after an abrupt exit by the previous leader. It was late in the planning season and our swim team board had an immediate need to recruit assistant coaches; roles typically filled by high-school-aged residents in the neighborhood eager for a little extra summer cash and leadership experience to fill on eventual college applications. Time was tight. …

POLITICS

The GOP would have you believe that widespread election fraud is the reason for at least 250 newly proposed laws in 43 states socialized to curtail widespread election fraud. Voter impersonation, ballot petition fraud, registration fraud is wild. Illegal immigrants brought in by caravan by George Soros too, they claim (and debunked here).

And don’t forget the wild conspiracies about the dead voters — you know, because instead of “Brains!” the undead have an insatiable desire to “Vote Blue!” Jokes aside, officials did find a case of a dead person voting during the 2020 election. …

CONSUMER CHRONICLES

“We fail our customers today,” reads the first bullet in a slide from a Walmart planning deck to improve customer omnichannel experience, first obtained and reviewed by Insider.

That brutal honesty and transparency set the tone for their project, codenamed Project Glass, which aims to stop losing customers to online rival Amazon. Though some product teams rely solely on SWOT analysis created by management consultants, the presentation, developed with research from Walmart Labs, dispenses with that. Charts can be pretty, but a real turnaround for a failing operation requires a brutal assessment of the ugly truth.

This is precisely what…

There I sat, scrolling through my Facebook feed, scanning updates from friends, groups, and sponsored ads for monthly murder mystery boxes, beer mugs crafted from baseball bats, and useless crowdsourced products. I mean, who needs an AI-powered flight control system for paper airplanes — technology that’s so sophisticated it can fly a piece of lettuce? Wait, an artificial intelligence autopilot that’s so advanced it can fly romaine? That’s worthy of a bookmark.

As I scrolled past — and seriously considered the aeronautic marvel — Facebook’s recommendation section caught my eye. …

CULTURE

Former President Donald Trump is scheduled to speak today at the Conservative Political Action Conference, commonly known as CPAC, to close out a four-day medley of leading GOP keynote speakers. Earlier in the weekend, prominent Republican figures including Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Ted Cruz, Tom Cotton, and John Hawley spoke from the stage in hopes of appealing to Trump’s base live from an Orlando Hyatt hotel and streamed on Fox News.

When Trump takes the same stage for the final keynote, he is expected to continue the big lie about a mythical stolen election. …

CONSUMER CHRONICLES

On Thursday, Hasbro announced changes to the nearly 70-year-old Potato Head brand. The iconic toy consists of a plastic body and small holes where various accessories could be plugged to create limitless forms: A Mr. Potato Head with glasses, smiles, and varieties of footwear and hair among them. The brand, popularized in the Toy Story movie franchise, also announced a brand new toy pack that would allow children to mix and match their versions of modern families, which might consist of two moms or two dads.

This isn’t a story about gender neutral toys; you’ve already seen the headlines. This…

POLITICAL CULTURE

Yesterday, during a hearing about the January 6 Capitol riot, Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) revived a conspiracy theory from January, stating that “provocateurs” and “fake Trump protesters” were to blame for the violence, destruction, and death. His evidence, gleaned from an article authored by J. Michael Waller in The Federalist, a right-leaning online publication, classified these individuals as “Antifa or other leftist agitators” due to damning evidence he witnessed first-hand — young men wearing MAGA hats backward!

Johnson accepted these absurd notions, which flew in the face of actual testimony from law enforcement at the Capitol building that day. Capitol…

THAT’S NOT FUNNY

The following is an adaption of the classic fable “The Scorpion and the Frog,” as retold in an abridged timeline of the second impeachment of Donald Trump. In the lead roles are Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives from California, and Mitch McConnell, the Grim Reaper from Kentucky.

The scorpion asks for a lift

The scorpion approaches the lake but cannot swim across. “Carry me on your back,” the scorpion asks of a frog sitting nearby.

“But surely you’ll sting me. You’re a scorpion,” replies the frog.

“Now why would I do that?” asks the scorpion.

Nancy Pelosi: It’s now two days…