The Sunday — January 12

This is the Tangle Sunday Edition, a brief roundup of our independent politics coverage plus some extra features for your Sunday morning reading. 

What the right is doodling.

What the left is doodling.

Reader essay.

Right after the election, Rafe Gomez wrote to us with some observations he wanted to share about the election. Generally speaking, we haven’t provided a platform for election commentary in our reader essays, but Rafe had an interesting angle: As the CEO of a marketing firm, he saw the election as two candidates selling a vision for the country and of themselves. He also said that Donald Trump broke the cardinal rule of selling during his campaign, what that rule is, and why it didn’t matter to Trump’s customers — the American voters. You can read the full piece here.

Have a personal story or local issue you want to write about? Pitch us! Fill out this form or reply to this email, and we’ll get back to you if we’re hooked.

Reader review.

In this section, we like to feature two comments from the same edition that critique our coverage in two different ways. Isaac made a pretty big statement in our edition looking back at our 2024 coverage by saying that Israel does appear to be guilty of genocide in Gaza. Two readers responded with two different perspectives.

Galina Medvedev wanted to ensure the focus still remained on Hamas:

"Yes, you were right about people getting angry about your Israel genocide part. Too much can be said, [but I] will touch only one point. You cited world organizations accusing Israel of genocide, then you wrote: ‘Yet the combined evidence these aid groups, international organizations, and journalists present, however biased you may think the packaging is, is difficult to dispute.’

I have a few questions. Am I right that Hamas is the officially elected government in Gaza? Is it the responsibility of any government to take care of their people? Did Hamas take care? … Who ambushed humanitarian convoys stealing international help from civilians, and putting them at the edge of hunger? Israel? Who sells this stolen food to their own population to buy more rockets (they still buy rockets)? Israel? And now back to all this international organizations — how many of them accused Hamas of genocide against it's own people? Are you still taking this organizations seriously? ‘difficult to dispute’?"

Aviel Goodman said that criticism of Israel’s government can coexist with support of Israel:

“As our impressions and judgments of Israel develop, let us remain mindful of the distinction between the nation of Israel and Israel's current government. In a speech in 1901, Mark Twain defined patriotism as ‘supporting your country all the time and your government when it deserves it.’ Condemning the right-wing government of Binyamin Netanyahu is not inconsistent with supporting the nation of Israel. The two perspectives are not mutually exclusive. To the contrary, even setting aside this government's conduct of the war against Gaza, Netanyahu's government has done enormous damage to Israel: its functioning, its reputation, and its spirit.”

Monday, January 6.

The New Orleans attack. In the early hours of New Year’s Day, a man drove a pickup truck into a crowd on New Orleans’s Bourbon Street, killing 14 people and injuring 35 others. Additionally, the attacker reportedly planted multiple improvised explosive devices in the area, but they did not detonate. Investigators said the suspect appears to have been inspired by ISIS, a U.S.-designated terrorist group, and was flying an ISIS flag from the truck's rear bumper during the attack. The attacker was killed in a shootout with the police.

Our take: “Some have said this attack either is or is not terrorism, but it’s still too early to say and may not be particularly clarifying either way. Instead we should be talking about apparent patterns: the ISIS threat is still real, veterans have been getting radicalized, and our borders are still porous. Overall, domestic terrorism has clearly become a larger threat to security than foreign terrorism.”

Reader Survey: 

Tuesday, January 7.

The H-1B visa debate. In recent weeks, the H-1B visa program has prompted vigorous discussion about the U.S. immigration system, foreign workers, and the tech industry. The debate has proved divisive among supporters of President-elect Donald Trump and has sparked disagreement on the left. Most notably, tech entrepreneurs like Elon Musk voiced strong support for H-1B visas to help them access skilled international talent, while proponents of restrictionist immigration policies and progressives like Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) argued that the incoming Trump administration should scale back or eliminate the program. 

Our take: “Some have said this attack either is or is not terrorism, but it’s still too early to say and may not be particularly clarifying either way. Instead we should be talking about apparent patterns: the ISIS threat is still real, veterans have been getting radicalized, and our borders are still porous. Overall, domestic terrorism has clearly become a larger threat to security than foreign terrorism.”

Reader Survey:

Wednesday, January 8.

Content moderation changes at Meta. On Tuesday, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that the company will end its fact-checking program across Instagram, Facebook and Threads, instead instituting a feature similar to X’s “Community Notes,” which crowdsources content reviews. The company will also relax limitations on controversial topics, like immigration and gender identity, and will allow for more political content to appear on users’ feeds. Furthermore, Zuckerberg announced that Meta will work with President-elect Donald Trump to combat censorship across the world. 

Our take: “I generally support moderation that relies on community over authority, like a “community notes” feature. While I welcome Zuckerberg making these changes, his political motivation is obvious — and I worry about corporations working closely with government. Fighting misinformation is hard, and no Facebook policy will solve it by itself; it starts and ends with all of us.”

Reader Survey:

Thursday, January 9.

Jimmy Carter’s legacy. On December 29, Jimmy Carter, the 39th president of the United States, passed away at age 100. Carter served one term after defeating Gerald Ford in the 1976 election, then lost his re-election bid to Ronald Reagan. Carter’s administration faced several distinct challenges, including double-digit inflation, energy shortages, and the Iran hostage crisis. His post-presidency was associated with humanitarian works and efforts to address global conflicts. 

Our take: “Carter’s legacy isn't black and white. He wasn't simply a failed president, and he wasn't simply a model citizen. He was both, and more than either of those simple descriptions can capture. We can learn a lot from his mistakes, his successes, and most of all his vision of what a great country and a great citizen really is.”

Reader Survey:

Friday, January 10.

To start off the new year, we looked back on predictions we made throughout 2024 and graded our work. Read part one here and part two here. 

Recommended reading.

“Over the past decade, Netflix, which first emerged as a destroyer of video stores, has developed a powerful business model to conquer television, only to unleash its strange and destructive power on the cinema. In doing so, it has brought Hollywood to the brink of irrelevance. Because Netflix doesn’t just survive when no one is watching — it thrives.”

Tracing Netflix’s trajectory from its roots in dissatisfaction with Blockbuster to its modern state, Will Tavlin makes a compelling case for the company’s pivot to online streaming as the driving force behind the death of traditional notions of success in filmmaking. Read his piece here. 

On the channels.

INSTAGRAM: This week Vice President Kamala Harris presided over a joint session of Congress that certified her election loss and President-elect Trump’s victory. We showed her announce the results of the election in an Instagram reel here.

PODCAST: In our first Sunday podcast since returning from break, Isaac and Ari talked about the Los Angeles wildfires and Trump’s comments on Greenland and the Panama Canal, but only after a surprisingly robust conversation about the Amish. Then, the two answered some trivia questions about our headlines before a healthy dose of grievances. You can listen to the episode  here.

BONUS: A popular Washington Post cartoonist has resigned after she said her cartoon was rejected this week for its depiction of Post owner Jeff Bezos (and others) kneeling to President-elect Trump.⁠ We cover the controversy in an Instagram post here.

Tweet of the week.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was in the news a lot this week after his decision to resign as his party’s leader. Much of the commentary focused on Trudeau’s tenure and legacy, but X user @postjawline alerted the world to a truly surreal “party trick” he used in his early days in politics that may have foreshadowed his eventual fall.

Tangle’s favorites.

This week, our team came across some fantastic visualizations that tell the story of different current events in informative and visually intriguing ways. Check them out below.

Infotainment.

The end of the year can offer a much needed opportunity to turn the page for many people, but we’re guessing few people had more of a desire to welcome 2025 than Belgian ultra runner Hilde Dosogne, 55, who ran a marathon every day in 2024 (yes, including the leap day on February 29). That’s… a lot of running. Here are some numbers behind the feet — er, feat:

• 9,596. The approximate number of miles Dosogne ran in 2024. 
• 150. The previous world record for the number of consecutive days running a marathon for a female runner (held by Erchana Murray-Bartlett of Australia).
• 6.2. Dosogne’s typical pace, in miles per hour, on her marathon runs.
• $62,438. The amount Dosogne raised for breast cancer research funding during her year of marathon running. 

Ask the readers.

Last week, JT asked readers for their strategy for making it through the gray January days.

Since we chose her answer, we gave Janelle the opportunity to ask our readers a question in today’s newsletter.

You can let us know your thoughts by replying to this email or through this form.

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