Is there some new TikTok challenge I’m not aware of? Twice this week I’ve seen the car stopped ahead of me take a left on a red light. (Might not make sense to Brits.)

Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, Business, and Debt:

Sam Bankman-Fried Sentenced to 25 Years

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced Thursday to 25 years in prison for fraud tied to the collapse of his digital exchange, capping his meteoric rise and fall.
Less than two years ago, Bankman-Fried was the crypto king. The moptop millennial hobnobbed with heads of state, soaked up Caribbean views from his $30 million penthouse and vowed to use his wealth to better humanity.

The Descent of Elon Musk

He’s a social media star, a multi-billionaire with his own social network, and he owns a 20.5 percent stake in the world’s most valuable car company by market cap. He knows — or can easily get in touch with — almost anybody in the world, and has the means to start or incubate any venture under the sun.
Yet with the world at his fingertips, Musk seems joyless, marinating in misery, surrounded by an air of existential bleakness…
Lemon's interview is fascinating for many reasons, chief of which is that Elon Musk sounds really, really stupid. The supposed real-life Tony Stark is ineloquent, stumbling through his answers with the verbal agility of somebody that just woke up…
Having trained over a hundred different startup founders of varying ages and stages, I have never seen somebody so ineloquent. Musk doesn't just seem incapable of dealing with criticism — he seems incapable of cogent, in-depth responses, leaning on a brittle, surface-level understanding of almost everything he talks about.

Coronavirus News, Analysis, and Opinion:

New Data: Long COVID Cases Surge

Politics:

Zelenskyy speaks with Johnson as House considers possible paths to Ukraine aid

A ship crashed into a Baltimore bridge and demolished the lies about immigration

Fears grow over Comstock Act, Justices Thomas, Alito

The law wasn’t enforceable while Roe v. Wade was on the books, and it hasn’t been applied in nearly a century. But now that Roe has been overturned, anti-abortion activists see an opening.

Biden to roll back Trump’s expansion of short-term health insurance plans

The Biden administration is curtailing short-term health insurance plans, which it calls “junk insurance” that can leave patients contending with big medical bills…
Short-term plans do not have to adhere to Obamacare’s consumer protections. For instance, they are not required to provide comprehensive coverage, and they can discriminate against people with preexisting conditions.

Second Attempt to Recall Wisconsin’s Speaker Launched

An organizer of a recall effort against Wisconsin’s Assembly speaker has launched a second recall effort now that the first one is on pace to fail without enough signatures and allegations of widespread fraud.

Crime Is Down Despite Trump’s Claims

FBI statistics released this year suggested a steep drop in crime across the country last year. It’s a similar story across major cities, with violent crime down year over year in Chicago, New York and Washington, D.C.

Evan Gershkovich has spent a year behind bars.

Kentucky Moves to Block Governor from Filling Senate Seat

Kentucky lawmakers gave final approval Thursday to a bill stripping the state’s Democratic governor of any role in picking someone to occupy a U.S. Senate seat if a vacancy occurred in the home state of 82-year-old Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell.

Failure Clouds Glenn Youngkin’s Legacy

No Virginia governor has come into office with a deeper dealmaking background than Glenn Youngkin, who as former co-chief executive of the Carlyle Group made a fortune acquiring and merging companies around the globe.
But as the Republican chief executive of a purple state, Youngkin has struggled to translate that business acumen into political success — or even economic development success, with the demise Wednesday of his much-touted plan to bring the Washington Wizards and Capitals to Alexandria.