Saturday roundup

I will be better with regular updates! I've been once again embroiled in spiraling home repair/improvement projects.

Surprise! Eating meat is still bad for the planet.

Income inequality is always structural.

Pearlstein: The $786 million question: Does Steve Schwarzman — or anyone — deserve to make that much? https://t.co/ljRNloZWhX pic.twitter.com/Ld4i8nrSyW

— 🙀 (@rgbrb) January 6, 2019

It's true, I should have cut my mother off sooner; I didn't, for my dad. And I'm far from glad she's in her current state, but I'm very glad she's no longer in a position to constantly terrorize everyone around her.

Jill Filipovic is on fire here, but this, from McSweeney's, is *everything*:

Always read Robin Givhan, whether's she's fashion-reporting or rocking fashion sociology:

The hat has become a symbol of us vs. them, of exclusion and suspicion, of garrulous narcissism, of white male privilege, of violence and hate. For minorities and the disenfranchised, it can spark a kind of gut-level disgust that brings ancestral ghosts to the fore. Here, in 2019, their painful past is present.

The MAGA hat speaks to America’s greatness with lies of omission and contortion. To wear a MAGA hat is to wrap oneself in a Confederate flag. The look may be more modern and the fit more precise, but it’s just as woeful and ugly.

To wear the hat is to take on history and divisiveness. Because whatever personal meaning might be attached to the hat, the new broader cultural meaning overrides. It is too late to save the hat from this fate. And it’s too soon to try to reclaim it and give it new life.

On the topic of fashion criticism, see my thoughts on puffer jackets.

This was brought to my attn by someone who was offended by it, but I’d like to tell u why it doesn’t offend me (beyond the fact that it doesn’t critique women who choose puffercoats (I’m not one of those women, & it’s not bc I have “no self-esteem”). https://t.co/g3eqc1QaHK

— 🙀 (@rgbrb) January 7, 2019

WashPo discovered unrefined sunflower oil and I had thoughts (read the whole thread).

“Is here”? Now I get how Vietnamese people feel when Americans write about having “discovered” pho.

Also, $10? Even inadequate DC-area Russian stores have it for less than half that

Nutty, buttery, cold-pressed sunflower oil is here & ready to be tasted. https://t.co/fSCJbIUWfA

— 🙀 (@rgbrb) January 20, 2019

Have some periodic-table porn.

2019 is International Year of the Periodic Table, marking 150 years since Dmitry Mendeleev's Periodic System. This beautiful arrangement of the elements comes from May 1949's @LIFE magazine feature on The Atom. The full issue is here: https://t.co/Mv7pRIFT7d pic.twitter.com/gH4MF4bKQG

— Paul Coxon (@paulcoxon) January 1, 2019

Polar bear meets camera.