‘Cohen torched Trump.’ Recapping yesterday’s testimony from Donald Trump’s ex-lawyer, Michael Cohen, Politico says the question now is whether the jury in Trump’s criminal trial will believe Cohen.
■ You can follow live updates today here on what Stephen Colbert succinctly calls Trump’s “‘faking business records to cover up bangin’ a porn star’ trial.”
Strictly personal. Pre-sale begins today for a useful book to which your Square columnist has contributed a bit: Everybody Needs an Editor: The Essential Guide to Clear and Effective Writing.
■ Cohen’s statements included this: “What I was doing, I was doing at the direction of and for the benefit of Mr. Trump.”
■ Law professor Joyce Vance: “In other words, Trump knew. He always knew.”
■ Read a transcript of yesterday’s key moments.
■ The Onion: “Trump Reflexively Asks Michael Cohen To Silence Michael Cohen.”
Overkill. A nationwide AP investigation concludes that, in hundreds of deaths where police used force meant to stop someone without killing them, cops violated well-known guidelines for safe restraint.
■ That includes cases of officers injecting sedatives into people under arrest.
Loretto larceny. A former executive of Chicago’s scandal-scarred Loretto Hospital has been arrested on charges of helping to embezzle almost half a million dollars from the institution.
■ She was nabbed in Houston after boarding a private jet bound for Dubai.
■ Chicago City Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin’s been fined $10,000 for firing whistleblowers on her payroll.
Heaven forbid! A Republican member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission complains that a new rule expanding transmission of renewable energy to the electrical grid is a gift to solar and wind power operators.
■ The world set a record in 2023: 30% of all electricity came from clean energy sources.
■ Citing, among other things, the Biden administration’s commitment to a clean-energy economy, historian Heather Cox Richardson declares Democrats “America’s cheerleaders.”
AI’s huge leap. ChatGPT’s new GPT-4o is amazing the tech world …
■ … even as it displays creepily advanced emotional sensitivity and voice capabilities that evoke the 2013 movie Her.
■ It’s free for all—but, so far, just via web browser.
Jeopardy! branches out. It’s going to launch a pop-culture-centered version on Amazon’s Prime Video.
■ Comcast says it’ll offer customers a bargain-priced bundle: Netflix, Peacock and Apple TV+.
■ How many of these broadcast TV shows getting canceled have you ever watched?
Chicago Public Square mailbag. A reader who prefers not to be named writes of yesterday’s edition: “I found your reference to the Duke commencement disappointing. … It would have been appropriate to put in your citation the context that ‘dozens’ out of 7,000 graduates walked out” on Jerry Seinfeld’s commencement speech.
■ Here’s video.
‘It takes a lot of ego to fill that blank space, day after day, year in and year out, and a lot of humility to realize it doesn’t matter to anyone else a fraction as much as it matters to you.’ Columnist Neil Steinberg has just a little sympathy for a California newspaper columnist “unceremoniously sacked” after 55 years.
■ Square’s counsel to any columnist cut loose: Just keep doing it (2022 link) …
■ … you know, like Eric Zorn.
■ But Rudy Giuliani? Give it a rest.
■ Here’s a taste: Next time you find yourself writing “I think,” don’t.
■ Back in 2015, co-author Melissa Harris made a strong case for just one space—not two—after a period.
■ Mike Braden made this edition better.