Monosodium glutamate. When you call it by its full name, it doesn't seem to cause nearly the same maladies as it does when referred to by its abbreviation, MSG. For decades, it's been linked to symptoms and side-effects ranging from headaches and numbness to dizziness and heart palpitations. But was the anti-MSG hype based on reality? "The concerns with MSG originated in 1968, when someone purporting to be a Chinese American physician, writing in The New England Journal of Medicine, described feeling generally ill after eating Chinese food, which he suggested could be because of MSG. Other researchers quickly produced studies that seemed to substantiate this claim, and MSG became a public-health villain. In the ’70s, the Chicago Tribune ran the headline 'Chinese Food Make You Crazy? MSG Is No. 1 Suspect.'" These and other related health concerns have long since been debunked. Not only is MSG safe, but as Yasmin Tayag explains in The Atlantic (Free Article), it may be the perfect flavor enhancer to help us lower our intake of a table staple that really is bad for us: Salt. MSG Is Finally Getting Its Revenge. 2Inmates Running AsylumAs Title 42 ends, we can expect more chaos at the border — and more chaos in the political response. The NYT (Free Article) has a good look at the root causes (largely ignored in the debate) that have led to the surge. What’s Driving Record Levels of Migration to the U.S. Border? In a nutshell: "While migration to the U.S. southern border has always fluctuated, the pandemic and the recession that followed hit Latin America harder than almost anywhere else in the world, plunging millions into hunger, destitution and despair. A generation of progress against extreme poverty was wiped out. Unemployment hit a two-decade high. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine choked off a key pipeline for grain and fertilizer, triggering a spike in food prices. Economic shocks were worsened by violence, as conflicts between armed groups festered in once relatively peaceful countries and raged in places long accustomed to the terror." 3Cable Nonsense NetworkCNN's townhall slash Maga rally with Donald Trump was a terrible idea poorly executed. The notion that the hour of familiar lies and a reintroduction to the DSM's greatest hits of mental disorders was newsworthy is laughable, self-serving hogwash. You don't need to waste any time watching it or reading outtakes (or CNN's follow-up efforts to explain why it had news value and went well). Charlie Sykes sums it up: "Critics had worried that giving the indicted, twice-impeached, coup-plotting, chronically lying sexual predator an unedited, live television forum might turn out badly. The reality, however, was far ghastlier: a sh*tshow for the ages, and a moment that captured the thorough degradation of both our politics and the media." 4Vision QuestHere's an idea: Turn off cable news networks trying to turn shoddy, boring, tired political messaging into riveting entertainment and watch content that intended to be entertaining from the outset. Here's a visual breakdown of Everything to know about the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest. (Check out the visual breakdown, ignore the mental one.) 5Extra, ExtraSuccession: "Collectively known as Los Chapitos, or 'the little Chapos,' the four siblings were once mocked by adversaries as entitled princelings more concerned with flashing their wealth on Instagram than the grubby work of moving tons of cocaine into the United States. Yet the brothers have resuscitated a drug empire teetering after their father was locked behind U.S. bars and diversified the business by embracing a new line of synthetic drugs." How El Chapo’s sons built a fentanyl empire poisoning America. 6Bottom of the NewsSlate has an interview with the author whose novel is rocketing up the amazon charts thanks to a tweet from someone called Bigolas Dickolas. As a fellow book author, I feel like I've been given the shaft. Get a copy of my 📕, Please Scream Inside Your Heart, or grab a 👕 in the Store.
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