Your Wednesday Evening Briefing |
Good evening. Here's the latest. |
 | | Nicole Craine for The New York Times |
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1. The brazen shooting deaths of eight people in the Atlanta area, including six women of Asian descent, have stirred outrage and fear in Asian-American communities across the country. |
The gunman told the police that he had a "sexual addiction" and had carried out the shootings at the massage parlors to eliminate his "temptation," the authorities said. He also said that he had frequented massage parlors in the past and the attacks were a form of vengeance, and denied racial motivation. All but one of the victims were women, the police said. |
State Representative Bee Nguyen, the first Vietnamese-American to serve in the Georgia House, told the A.P. that the shootings appeared to be at the "intersection of gender-based violence, misogyny and xenophobia." |
 | | Carolyn Kaster/Associated Press |
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2. A new U.S. government intelligence report warns about the rising threat of domestic terrorism, adding urgency to calls for more resources to fight homegrown extremism. |
President Biden requested the assessment shortly after taking office, in the wake of the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol. It comes on the heels of the arrests of four members of the far-right group the Proud Boys, who appeared in force in the Capitol attack. Prosecutors have now brought charges against a total of 13 members of the group, as identified in court papers. |
 | | Travis Dove for The New York Times |
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3. Advanced-stage cancers are surfacing that may be linked to fewer preventive screenings during the pandemic. |
By mid-June, the rates of screenings for breast, colon and cervical cancers were 29 percent to 36 percent lower than their prepandemic levels, according to one analysis. "The fear of Covid was more tangible than the fear of missing a screen that detected cancer," one doctor said. Above, Yvette Lowery, whose mammogram was delayed. She was later diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer. |
Scientists are also beginning to study whether coronavirus vaccines relieve lingering Covid-19 symptoms, after some patients have reported feeling much better after getting a shot. |
 | | Philip Cheung for The New York Times |
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4. Some 90 million stimulus payments — totaling about $242.2 billion — are landing in U.S. bank accounts today. |
An additional 150,000 payments should also arrive shortly in the form of paper checks, and more will go out in the coming weeks. The latest round of payments, in amounts up to $1,400, are the biggest yet and are open to more people. But some hassles encountered in past rounds could show up again, as could new ones. Here's what you need to know. |
 | | A. AGUILERA-CASTREJON ET AL., NATURE 2021 |
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5. Today in jaw-dropping news: Biologists grew mice embryos halfway to term in a mechanical womb, in what experts called a scientific breakthrough. |
Researchers in Israel grew the mouse embryos in glass vials inside incubators, floating in a special nutrient fluid. The work raises profound questions about whether other animals, even humans, should or could be cultured outside a living womb. |
In other news from the animal kingdom, new generations of the regent honeyeater, a critically endangered songbird, are failing to learn the tunes they need for courtship. It could lead to their extinction. |
 | | The New York Times |
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New research has found that nearly all American voters live in communities where they are unlikely to encounter people with different political views. Democrats and Republicans are effectively segregated from each other. |
The data raises questions about how lifestyle preferences have become aligned with politics, and how neighbors may influence one another. |
We also looked at a different kind of neighborhood data in New York City. The areas hit hardest by the coronavirus, largely Black and Latino neighborhoods, have the most eviction cases. |
 | | Jeffrey Rotman/Alamy |
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7. Protecting strategic zones in the world's oceans from fishing, drilling and mining could increase overall fish harvests and fight global warming, researchers found. |
A new study offers what is essentially an interactive road map for how nations can confront the interconnected crises of climate change and wildlife collapse at sea. Among the surprising findings: Trawling, the practice of dragging enormous nets along the ocean floor to catch fish, above in New England, releases as many carbon emissions each year as global aviation. |
Meanwhile, a town in the Outer Banks is struggling to find a solution for rising sea levels. Homeowners will probably face a tax increase of almost 50 percent to protect their homes, the only road into town and perhaps the community's very existence. |
 | | Keith Birmingham/The Orange County Register, via Associated Press |
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8. The coronavirus will be a persistent threat to upend March Madness. |
The men's college basketball tournament begins Thursday with 68 teams, and the women's competition, scheduled for Sunday, has 64 teams in its field. But that number could shrink quickly: If a team does not have five eligible players for a game, its opponent will automatically advance. Above, the U.S.C. team. |
 | | Rebecca Brown |
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9. Move over, Beanie Babies. Squishmallows are taking over. |
The bulbous and brightly colored plush toys have sparked a craze among children, teenagers and adults. Squishmallows, created in 2017, have exploded in popularity during the pandemic thanks to social media. Collectors say the stuffed animals have given them comfort in a painful year, and the manufacturer says sales have tripled in the past six months. |
There are more than 800 Squishmallow characters, and hunting for rare ones has become a popular pastime, with fans often taking to TikTok (or "SquishTok," as fans call it) to document their quests. And just like their Beanie Baby forefathers, Squishmallows are being resold for hundreds of dollars on the open market. |
 | | Left, Lauren Justice for The New York Times; right, Michelle V. Agins/The New York Times |
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10. And finally, a library book that was 23,000 days overdue. |
In 1957, Betty Diamond was a 10-year-old growing up in Whitestone, Queens, reading just about anything she could get her hands on. On July 10 of that year, she checked out "Ol' Paul, the Mighty Logger," a collection of Paul Bunyan tales. The due date came and went — and then kept on going. |
Betty said she had been "too ashamed to go to the library with an overdue book." So, "Ol' Paul" ended up staying with her as she grew up. After 63 years, she recently sent it back, along with a $500 donation to the Queens Public Library, which more than covered the late fees. |
"It just seems to me like such a statement of faith in humanity," she said, "just giving people books and believing they will return them." |
Have a page-turning night. |
Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern. |
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