At the urging of the correction officers union, the prison agency is restricting packages to private vendors that charge steep markups and have limited selections. On Monday, more than 6,000 people incarcerated in New York prisons lost their right to regularly receive care packages by mail or in person from family and friends. The state prison agency is piloting the new restrictions at eight prisons, with plans to expand them to the rest. Under the policy, family and friends are no longer allowed to bring their loved ones packages of food when they come to visit or to send them through the mail, and can’t send more than two non-food packages each year. Everything else must be purchased and sent through private companies willing to ship to prisons. Incarcerated people say the new restrictions will cut off a lifeline. “Am I going to be prevented from getting winter clothes if I get a book from my mom in the summer?” asked Jeremy Zielinski, currently incarcerated at Attica, in a phone call with New York Focus and Bolts.

It's exceedingly rare for highly paid technical workers to form unions. An Intel engineer says he wants to unionize hundreds of his colleagues working in Intel’s Hillsboro semiconductor factories, hoping to address long hours, pay disparities and job security. This week’s launch of the union drive coincides with Matt West’s campaign for the Democratic nomination for Oregon’s new 6th Congressional District. West, who has worked for Intel since 2015, said his effort began more than a year ago and will continue no matter how he fares in next week’s primary election. “If you can get a union here, I think the hope is we will see unions on all Intel campuses,” said West, who is on professional leave during his campaign. He’s planning a rally in Hillsboro on Wednesday afternoon with at least two of his Intel co-workers and representatives from other Oregon unions.

In early 2021, Elon Musk bestowed the landmark endorsement that, more than any other high-profile purchase, sent Bitcoin on a moonshot and clinched its status as a mainstream investment. Musk famously purchased $1.5 billion in the king of cryptocurrencies using spare cash on the EV maker’s balance sheet, a highly unorthodox move since most companies abhor putting their war chests at risk. In public statements, Musk and CFO Zach Kirkhorn expressed great pride in pioneering a new practice of wagering to make big money on dollars virtually every other enterprise just wants to keep safe. Kirkhorn declared on last year’s Q1 conference call that the purpose was to “get some return” on cash “not immediately being used for operations.” In a SEC filing weeks earlier, Kirkhorn went so far as adding a second title to his rank as CFO: “Master of Coin.” But so far, the grand experiment’s proved a bust. On the morning of May 11, Bitcoin dropped below $29,400, erasing all of Musk’s once-sumptuous gains, and though it rebounded later in the day, it’s now hovering near the break-even point. Let’s review how Musk’s bet took shareholders on a roller-coaster ride so wild that it left them dizzy not from awe but dread, yet went nowhere.

"I really think I'm allowed to stay here," I explained, in vain.

Artwork’s appearance fuels fears family will use return to power to further stifle efforts to recover ill-gotten wealth

New York, Washington and a number of other major cities have reported increases in violent crime since the start of the pandemic.

The popular rapper Young Thug was arrested in Atlanta on Monday, and faces a slew of accusations from Fulton County's district attorney, including that he was allegedly a founder and active leader of the violent Young Slime Life street gang. The 80-plus page indictment charges both Young Thug and another rapper, Gunna, with gang-related crimes, and includes more than 25 others who have allegedly participated in YSL gang activity. The New York Times reported that the lawyer for Young Thug, whose legal name is Jeffery Williams, said that YSL was not a street gang and claimed that the indictment was "baseless to include him." “Mr. Williams came from an incredible horrible upbringing, and he has conducted himself throughout his life in a way that is just to marvel at,” Attorney Brian Steel said.

Researchers from The Children's Hospital Westmead in Sydney, Australia released a study that confirmed not only how infants die from sudden infant death syndrome, but why.

Crypto markets are bottoming out and nothing’s immune, not even the potions critters use to breed in the Pokémon-style collectathon Axie Infinity. Called Smooth Love Potions, the currency has been trending down for some time now as players flood the market with it. For the first time in its history, however, it’s now worth less than a penny, even if you round up. “Axie Infinity’s SLP (Smooth Love Potion) utility currency went to zero! (approximately),” game developer Lars Doucet tweeted Thursday. “It’s now down to $0.004, rounding to the closest cent gives you $0.00.”

When now-Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) first ran in 2010, he had a zinger for his opponent, then-Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI). “I would like to ask Russ, ‘Have you ever witnessed a partial-birth abortion?'” Johnson said, attacking the liberal stalwart for supporting the right to a late-term abortion. It’s a throughline for Johnson, and for the conservative movement as a whole.

Biden appears to have squandered this opportunity. After wasting months of valuable Senate floor time, Biden announced last November that he would appoint former Trump official Derek Kan and former Obama official Dan Tangherlini to fill these two vacancies. Based on their professional backgrounds and testimony to the Senate last month, it is unlikely that either Kan or Tangherlini would push to fire DeJoy if confirmed to the board.

In a comedy first, the late actor-comedian self-shot a final hour of new stand-up to be released in the event of his death: "The material's fantastic … I hope people appreciate that he did this."

Science also reveals that Canadians like myself have comparatively pendulous and girthy dongs. I take no pleasure in reporting this.

Two historic towers are slated for demolition for no good reason. Pork returned to Congress this year, and Illinois had quite the haul. Among the earmarks for the state in the latest federal budget, Illinois legislators notched $450,000 for a YWCA domestic violence center, $1 million for a Chicago El station, $660,000 for a project to study climate change and agriculture … and one item meant not to build but to destroy: $52 million to tear down a pair of century-old, terracotta-clad skyscrapers in Downtown Chicago. That grant is the work of Sen. Dick Durbin, who scored the earmark to level a half-block of the Loop because the buildings there offer a dangerous vantage point onto the courthouse next door. At least, so says Durbin, the FBI, ATF, and the U.S. Marshalls Service, which have argued that the towers’ position on the same block as the Dirksen Federal Building creates “significant public safety vulnerabilities.” Never mind that the condemned towers were built in 1913 and 1915, and the courthouse in 1974, and all three have happily co-existed across 90 feet of sky ever since. Times have changed, and taxpayers are now set to fund what looks like an architectural, environmental, and economic debacle in the name of counterterrorism. It’s not even clear the plan makes sense from a security perspective. The widespread application of this standard—that a tall building near a courthouse is a security risk—would require rigging American downtowns with thousands of pounds of TNT to liberate American government buildings from their contexts. Some experts think the reasoning doesn’t hold up. “There’s more to this than just a building too close. Either they want the land to do something else or there’s a specific threat or there’s some politics,” said Randy Atlas, an architect with a specialty in security who has worked on courthouses. “Every metro downtown has a federal courthouse, often within 100 feet of an adjacent building.”

The crypto market's inevitable crash will pull America's politics in an even scarier direction.

Some staff at Sony Group Corp. are seething following an email Thursday from the head of PlayStation that urged employees to “respect differences of opinion” on abortion rights before entering into five detailed paragraphs about his two cats’ first birthday.

St. Luke's says there was a "concerted effort to disrupt" hospital business by trespassing at both the Meridian and Boise hospital campuses and false statements related to a child protective services case. According to the lawsuit, the hospital and its staff were also attacked online attacks related to the case. “It is important for us to stand up to the bullying, intimidation and disruption, and the self-serving and menacing actions of these individuals, for the protection of our employees and patients, and to ensure our ability to serve our community,” Chris Roth, president and CEO of St. Luke’s Health System, said. According to the suit, the defendants called on their supporters to protest at St. Luke’s Boise, forcing ambulances to divert and the hospital to warn doctors, nurses, and other employees not to enter or leave the building. “St. Luke’s has not been the only target of these individuals and believes that no one should be subject to such abuse. Inaction would signal this type of behavior is acceptable in our community. It is not,” Roth said.

The chorus of those wanting a weaker labor market is getting louder and louder. After the recent job numbers were released last week, Bank of America analysts said in a note they are essentially "rooting against the home team" and hope the numbers stop being so strong. As higher wages contribute to inflation, the Federal Reserve appears to agree. “Chair Powell keeps mentioning the relationship between the high level of job openings and wage/price inflation,” Nicholas Colas, co-founder of DataTrek, wrote in a newsletter on Tuesday. “He’s not talking to investors. He’s talking to corporate America, and his goal is to have companies essentially institute a hiring freeze and end the cycle of paying up for new hires.”

Memes, supercuts, and livestreams of the trial have taken over social platforms

The news comes as billionaire Elon Musk seeks to complete his $44 billion deal to buy the company and take it private.