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.
|
Listen To This Story
 |
Stranded Astronauts Finally Have Return Date — and It’s Sooner Than Expected (Maria)
The author writes, “Stranded Starliner astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams finally have a return date to head back to Earth, and it’s a few weeks earlier than previously expected. NASA announced on Feb. 11 that the two astronauts, who hitched a ride to the International Space Station (ISS) on a Boeing Starliner spacecraft last June, will head home on a SpaceX Dragon capsule that will leave Earth with the ISS Crew-10 on Wednesday, March 12. After a few days’ handover period, Williams and Wilmore will leave the ISS with the rest of the Crew-9 mission, after having spent about 250 consecutive days in orbit.”
FBI Says It Found 2,400 New JFK Assassination Records (Reader Steve)
The author writes, “The FBI on Tuesday said it discovered 2,400 new records related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy as federal agencies work to comply with President Donald Trump’s executive order last month to release thousands of files. The FBI said it’s working to transfer the records to the National Archives and Records Administration to be included in the declassification process.”
Bolton: Trump Has Effectively Surrendered to Putin in Ukraine Negotiations (Reader Jim)
On CNN: “John Bolton, who served as national security adviser in President Donald Trump’s first administration, says that President Trump ‘effectively surrendered’ to Vladimir Putin in the lead up to negotiations over the fate of Ukraine.”
Tesla Is About to Get a Nice Big Handout as Musk Takes Over Government (Dana)
From The New Republic: “Elon Musk’s Tesla will receive one of the largest government contracts in 2025 to produce armored vehicles. Drop Site first reported Wednesday on the latest filing of the Department of State’s Procurement Forecast for the fiscal year 2025, which was revised as recently as December 23. The filing includes a massive contract for hundreds of millions of dollars to the Department of Government Efficiency czar’s automobile company for ‘Armored Tesla (production units).’ The contract is worth more than $100 million and has a cap of $500 million.”
The American Dream (Water Not Included) [Laura]
From The Lever: “For most of human history, a simple axiom for survival seemed to prevail: Don’t build houses where there is too little water. Amid dangerous droughts, Arizona officials recently enshrined that precept by limiting development in one of the country’s fastest-growing cities — a potential turning point for water policy in a region acutely threatened by climate change. But now real estate interests have launched a dark-money legal campaign to overturn the precedent-setting regulations. Their goal: promising rent-strapped locals the American Dream of affordable homeownership in areas where officials have found there is not enough groundwater to sustain new suburban development.”
Breakthrough as Oxford Scientists Achieve Teleportation With Quantum Supercomputer (Sean)
The author writes, “A major milestone in quantum computing has been achieved after researchers at the University of Oxford built a scalable quantum supercomputer capable of quantum teleportation. The breakthrough centers on the so-called scalability problem of quantum computing, with the researchers claiming it will allow the next-generation technology to be realized on an industry-disrupting level.”
