Stan Lee on the American Idea

What Really Happened to Malaysia’s Missing Airplane

William Langewiesche

Five years ago, the flight vanished into the Indian Ocean. Officials on land know more about why than they dare to say.

1. The Disappearance

At 12:42 a.m. on the quiet, moonlit night of March 8, 2014, a Boeing 777-200ER operated by Malaysia Airlines took off from Kuala Lumpur and turned toward Beijing, climbing to its assigned cruising altitude of 35,000 feet. The designator for Malaysia Airlines is MH. The flight number was 370. Fariq Hamid, the first officer, was flying the airplane. He was 27 years old. This was a training flight for him, the last one; he would soon be fully certified. His trainer was the pilot in command, a man named Zaharie Ahmad Shah, who at 53 was one of the most senior captains at Malaysia Airlines. In Malaysian style, he was known by his first name, Zaharie. He was married and had three adult children. He lived in a gated development. He owned two houses. In his first house he had installed an elaborate Microsoft flight simulator.

A close-up of a spaniel's face. — James D. Morgan / Getty

Dogs’ Eyes Have Changed Since Humans Befriended Them

Haley Weiss

Two specialized muscles give them a range of expression that wolves’ eyes lack.

Dogs, more so than almost any other domesticated species, are desperate for human eye contact. When raised around people, they begin fighting for our attention when they’re as young as four weeks old. It’s hard for most people to resist a petulant flash of puppy-dog eyes—and according to a new study, that pull on the heartstrings might be exactly why dogs can give us those looks at all.

A paper published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that dogs’ faces are structured for complex expression in a way that wolves’ aren’t, thanks to a special pair of muscles framing their eyes. These muscles are responsible for that “adopt me” look that dogs can pull by raising their inner eyebrows. It’s the first biological evidence scientists have found that domesticated dogs might have evolved a specialized ability used expressly to communicate better with humans.

The Surreal End of an American College

Alia Wong

Small schools across the United States are facing budget short falls and low enrollment—leading some to shut down in the middle of students’ higher-education experience.

Updated at 12:34 p.m. on June 18, 2019

Like most other colleges across the country, Newbury College, a small, private liberal-arts school in Brookline, Massachusetts, held classes through the end of this past spring semester and then bid farewell to cap-and-gown-wearing seniors. But unlike almost every other college, those classes, and that farewell, were the school’s last: Newbury officially ceased operations at the end of May.

One of the first sources to publicly confirm the long-rumored closure was the president’s blog, where the news was shared last December. “It is with a heavy heart,” the school’s president, Joseph Chillo, wrote, “that I announce our intention to commence the closing of Newbury College, this institution we love so dearly.”

An illustration of a placenta — Ilbusca / Getty

A Breakthrough in the Mystery of Why Women Get So Many Autoimmune Diseases

Olga Khazan

Evolution might have played a trick on women’s immune systems.

About 65 million years ago, shortly after the time of the dinosaurs, a new critter popped up on the evolutionary scene. This “scampering animal,” as researchers described it, was likely small, ate bugs, and had a furry tail. It looked, according to artistic renderings, like an especially aggressive New York City rat. And it had a placenta, an organ that grows deep into the maternal body in order to nourish the fetus during pregnancy.

The rodentlike thing would become the common ancestor of the world’s placental mammals, with descendants that include whales, bats, dogs, and humans, among many other species. And today, the placenta might hold the key to one of the most enduring mysteries in human medicine: Why do women suffer much higher rates of autoimmune disease than men do?

Trump’s Sinister Assault on Truth

Peter Wehner

The president appears committed to destroying the very idea of facts.

Like many writers I know, I’ve had a passion for words for almost as long as I can remember. I’ve admired those who use words well, who have shaped my imagination and given voice to things I wanted to express but didn’t feel like I adequately could. That is why they have to be protected against assault and degradation.

At an early age I recognized their power to convey deep emotions and longings, knowledge and understanding, hopes and fears. “Words can be polluted even more dramatically and drastically than rivers and land and sea,” one of my favorite writers, Malcolm Muggeridge, once wrote. “Their misuse is our undoing.”

The Queasy Double Message of Taylor Swift’s ‘You Need to Calm Down’

Spencer Kornhaber

The singer’s pro-gay single strangely compares her struggles with fame to more dangerous kinds of persecution.

Since it debuted Friday, Taylor Swift’s “You Need to Calm Down” has bounced around in my head for exactly the reason a pop song should: the way it sounds. I like that the beat’s something a great beast might march to, slowly from one side to another, rumbling with each footfall. I like that the “oh-oh” swell of the chorus takes yummy harmonies, typically the key side dish in pop, and makes them the main course. I like the dry, silly way Swift drawls the strongest punch line of the track: “Like, damn … it’s 7 a.m.”

But I’ve also been fixated on—uncalmed by, and maybe even losing sleep over!—what the lyrics say. Shout along with this brain bender: “Shade never made anybody less gay!”

“You Need to Calm Down” is Swift’s grand LGBTQ-rights statement, released in the middle of Pride Month with all the precision of a bank’s new credit-card rollout. The song’s second verse takes on homophobic demonstrators: “Sunshine on the street at the parade / But you would rather be in the dark ages.” The video, released today, has a legion of queer celebs doing famously queer things such as sipping tea, performing in drag, and getting married in matching baby-blue tuxes. It closes with a plug to sign a petition for the passage of the Equality Act, which would ban discrimination based on sexual orientation and identity.

Kyle Kashuv Becomes a Symbol to Conservatives Who Say the Left Can’t Forgive

Ashley Fetters

The 18-year-old gun-rights activist and Parkland-shooting survivor is being touted by the right as the latest victim of “cancel culture.”

At 9 o’clock eastern time yesterday morning, Kyle Kashuv—a gun-rights activist and survivor of the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida—announced on Twitter that Harvard University had rescinded its offer of admission to him. One hour and 12 minutes later, Kashuv and his now-uncertain educational future had been officially declared victims of an overzealous progressive agenda that was either unwilling or unable to forgive.

“The progressive black balling of Kyle Kashuv is a reminder that there’s no concept of grace in the secular religion,” the conservative commentator Erick Erickson tweeted.

Erickson’s read on the situation turned out to be a popular one across social media. In the hours since Kashuv tweeted about Harvard’s decision, a number of conservative commentators and publications have weighed in. Many of them have situated Kashuv against the backdrop of what they perceive to be a larger problem on the left: “cancel culture.” When a public figure’s racist, sexist, or otherwise offensive behavior comes to light, widespread condemnation and calls to stop supporting that person tend to follow—especially on social media, where people often say that person is “canceled.” Some conservatives feel this shows an unwillingness to acknowledge a person’s growth and learning from mistakes.

How Harvard Should Handle the Kyle Kashuv Mess

Conor Friedersdorf

The university should pledge to take an outspoken conservative off the wait list.

After the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, many survivors became outspoken advocates of gun control. In contrast, Kyle Kashuv became an outspoken advocate of gun rights, appearing on Fox News and speaking at events to young conservatives.

He was set to attend Harvard after a gap year. But the university rescinded its offer, Kashuv announced yesterday, citing a controversy involving racial slurs.

“A few weeks ago, I was made aware of egregious and callous comments classmates and I made privately years ago—when I was 16 years old, months before the shooting—in an attempt to be as extreme and shocking as possible,” he explained on Twitter. “I immediately apologized.” Nevertheless, he said, “former peers & political opponents began contacting Harvard urging them to rescind me.” Upon learning of the controversy, Harvard asked him to explain himself. He replied with a letter that reiterated his previous apology and noted how much he has changed since surviving the massacre with his classmates.

A Resolution Condemning White Supremacy Causes Chaos at the Southern Baptist Convention

Emma Green

At its annual meeting, the evangelical denomination initially declined to consider a statement of its opposition to the alt-right.

Updated at 6:10 p.m. EST on June 14

The Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting turned chaotic in Phoenix this week over a resolution that condemned white supremacy and the alt-right. On Tuesday, leaders initially declined to consider the proposal submitted by a prominent black pastor in Texas, Dwight McKissic, and only changed course after a significant backlash. On Wednesday afternoon, the body passed a revised statement against the alt-right. But the drama over the resolution revealed deep tension lines within a denomination that was explicitly founded to support slavery.

A few weeks before the meeting was slated to start, McKissic published his draft resolution on a popular Southern Baptist blog called SBC Voices. The language was strong and pointed.

What If the Chaos Is Strategic?

Alexander Nazaryan

The storms that mark political life in Washington obscure the ruthlessly effective work happening across the federal government.

Of the many challenges facing anyone trying to understand Donald Trump’s presidency is the fact that it is maddeningly nonlinear, lurching several times each day between policy objectives that may be dictated by a Fox News anchor, a friend from Mar-a-Lago, or the prime minister of Norway. This was especially true in the first six months of his administration, when the chief political strategist Steve Bannon was at the height of his influence, while Reince Priebus wielded the chief of staff’s potentially awesome authority with all the gravitas of a substitute teacher.

Then, in the summer of 2017, Priebus was fired and Bannon pushed none-too-gently toward the door. Under Priebus’s replacement, John Kelly, the Trump presidency on some days seemed almost normal. Kelly and his staff put strict controls on the flow of information into the Oval Office while also ending the open-door policy that Priebus had been powerless to curb.