The Trump administration has proven to be without peer in terms of rolling out fresh outrages, and this week has been no exception. But let’s stay focused for now on the president’s continued attempts to undermine our electoral system – which continued with a fresh attack on vote-by-mail.

President Donald Trump’s executive order to limit mail ballots cuts a little deeper in Oregon, the state that pioneered vote-by-mail – a smashing success over the last quarter-century. Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield quickly joined a lawsuit filed by more than 20 other states over this week’s order, and provided a bit of legal analysis that even nonlawyers can follow: The U.S. Constitution, he said, is clear that states run elections, not the federal government. And you would think that would be the end of the matter, but we’ll see when the U.S. Supreme Court rules in the birthright citizenship case that was argued this week.

(Speaking of the Supreme Court, here’s my quote of the week, courtesy of Chief Justice John Roberts. Roberts was responding to an administration attorney who was arguing that changing times required a reassessment of the Constitution’s black-and-white claim that people born in the United States are U.S. citizens: “It’s a new world,” Roberts shot back. “It’s the same Constitution.”)

Speaking of resistance to the regime, Lizzy Acker at The Oregonian/OregonLive drew the short straw at the news organization and was forced to review Bruce Springsteen’s Friday night show at the Moda Center in Portland. She liked it. (I’m still not crazy about “Streets of Minneapolis,” though.)

If we lived in Canada, we could show our disdain for the regime by canceling our plans to vacation in the United States – and, apparently, many Canadians are doing just that, according to the Oregon Capital Chronicle. The downside is that this could be bad news for tourism this summer along the Oregon Coast. 

A final note this week about resistance to the regime: I have to confess a fondness for sneaky and subversive methods of protest, like this sticker I saw this week attached to a gas pump:

Meanwhile, as Americans file their tax returns, they’re getting a gander at the impact Trump’s tax-and-spending bill will have on the bottom lines. The Times says that the average tax refund is up this year – but the impacts on lower-income taxpayers are more mixed, considering that the bill also included cutbacks in programs that those taxpayers relied on, such as health insurance subsidies, food assistance and Medicaid. 

It’s not clear yet how much of those fatter refunds will be eaten away by higher gasoline prices, but maybe I’m complaining too much. 

“Project Hail Mary,” the science-fiction film with Ryan Gosling as an amnesiac scientist on a desperate deep space mission and the adorable rock alien that he befriends (Rocky, as he is called, will soon be at toy stores near you!) is the year’s biggest hit, closing in on $400 million worldwide at the box office. I haven’t seen it yet, but as I listened to the Andy Weir book it’s based on, I kept wondering about the accuracy of the science. As it turns out, The New York Times reports, not all the details are correct – after all, “fiction” is still half of the phrase “science fiction” – but the film gets a lot right. And scientists had particular praise for how the film depicts the process of science – the give-and-take, the theories, the experimentation. In a world where scientific literacy is waning, this is not a small thing.  

And neither was a 200-ton, nearly 70-foot-long blue whale that washed ashore, dead, in 2015 on a beach in southern Oregon. Now, more than a decade later, the bones of that whale are scheduled to be reassembled outside the Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport for what is certain to be an awe-inspiring display. Dana Tims, writing for the Lincoln Chronicle, has the details of the labor-intensive project. (You might have noticed this story in the Gazette-Times, but the version I’m linking to, from the online Chronicle, features more photos.) Also, a shout-out to Quintin Smith, who launched the Lincoln Chronicle back in 2019 and has built the nonprofit news site from scratch. I’m beginning to think these online local news sites might have real potential. 

The Associated Press reports that scientists have identified a likely culprit for the sea star wasting disease that has killed some 5 billion starfish in the last decade: A new study blames a type of bacteria that also has invaded shellfish. If you scroll down to the comments at the end of the story, however, you will see that many of these would-be scientists have a different theory, and blame the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan – all of which makes me think that “Project Hail Mary” really could do some good. 

The Poynter Institute’s Angela Fu reports that artificial intelligence company Nota is scrapping its news sites after (human) reporters noticed that they were filled with work plagiarized from other news sources. The idea, apparently, was to use AI to scour public records like press releases and videos of public meetings to generate content for so-called “news deserts” – areas without any source of reliable news. Worth noting: Among Nota’s clients is Lee Enterprises, the publisher of the Gazette-Times and the Democrat-Herald. 

This is surely a metaphor for our times: The hottest toy in the nation is the NeeDoh, a translucent and squishy $5.99 palm-sized item that you can squeeze to help relieve stress. And you can’t find one right now – the company that makes the item has experienced a “10-times surge in demand” that compelled it to pause production until later this year. So, to summarize: We’re stressed out because we can’t get our hands on an item that’s meant to relieve stress. 

I already have a squishy stress item on my desk, though – it’s a palm-sized squeezable replica of the world, courtesy of The Associated Press. Now that NeeDohs are hot, though, the world seems somehow inadequate.

Speaking of the world, though: Did you see this spectacular photo from Artemis II? Take a gander: It might, you know, be stress-relieving. 

That’s all for this weekend. Grab your favorite stress reducer – go easy on the booze and marijuana, though – and we’ll gather here next weekend.