Julia Ritchey

I would like to manifest a column on the destruction of the East Wing, the diminished role of First Lady, a re-widening of the gender pay gap and women backsliding in all areas of civic life.

No AI data centers in my backyard! : The Indicator from Planet Money In the rush to power AI, data centers are popping up in small communities across the U.S. But a growing backlash against this build-out is pitting communities against developers over energy prices and...

The AI data center backlash is here, uniting left and right, blue and red, urban and rural, pretty much anyone with sentience. www.npr.org/2025/10/22/n...

Amazon Plans to Replace More Than Half a Million Jobs With Robots

"The documents contemplate avoiding using terms like “automation” and "A.I." ... and instead ... replace the word “robot” with “cobot,” which implies collaboration with humans."
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/21/t...

Nobel Prize winner lives here - Hendersonville Lightning Hendersonville, NC - The fastest name in news. Local News, Sports, Politics, Weather, etc.

Mom emailed me to let me know one of the Econ laureates lives in our hometown. Always a local angle. www.hendersonvillelightning.com/news/15540-n...

I haven't had the capacity to keep up with moderation lists for a bit, but this one is really obvious, so I'm stealing some energy from Future Me: a list for the extremely obvious wave of inauthentic accounts following today's newly-created US gov accounts

bsky.app/profile/did:...

It's balanced.

Another recession indicator: Local restaurant started running a $25 'Girl Dinner' special: ceasar salad, plate of truffle fries and a martini. Place was packed, barely got a table. Girl Dinner rules.

Opinion: Why I'm handing in my Pentagon press pass Tom Bowman has held his Pentagon press pass for 28 years. He says the Pentagon's new media policy makes it impossible to be a journalist, which means finding out what's really going on behind the scen...

"Why I'm handing in my Pentagon press pass" by Tom Bowman of NPR. www.npr.org/2025/10/14/g... Recommended.

A thing frequently forgotten or ignored is that journalism is one of the few professions people will die for. [Via @brianstelter.bsky.social ]

Got drinks with a contractor who helps train federal law enforcement hires tonight. They said new ICE agents with no experience are getting just 42 days of training before being sent out to make arrests. That's a fraction of the time it takes to be a cop.

Happy Friday. @npr.org has dropped EVEN MORE crop tops in the shop today! And restocked "Active Listener" sweatshirts. All proceeds go to supporting our member stations this month. shopnpr.org

It was Tybee all along.

The Planet Money Game: Test our prototype : Planet Money It’s here! It’s free to download and playtest! It’s the Planet Money game! (Download here.)Download and playtest the game go here Sign up for the 11/1 virtual AMA event and get updates about the gameS...

Planet Money is partnering with Exploding Kittens to make a board game! And you can test the prototype here. (I am in the picture below being very confused trying to play an earlier, worse prototype.) www.npr.org/2025/10/03/n...

Populist platform up for grabs to either party: Allow FSAs to cover routine self-care cosmetic procedures.

It is. Now we have to clamor for some tote bags.

NPR relaunched its shop today, Oct. 1, our first day without federal funding. All proceeds in October will go toward member stations. Some great new designs too! shopnpr.org

Regretting the decision to buy tix to see Aziz before learning about this Riyadh Comedy Festival. It is very hard to be an ethical consumer in a society of sell-outs.

Respecg is how they say respect in NZ.

We're about to lose a lot of foreign STEM workers : The Indicator from Planet Money Earlier this month, President Donald Trump announced a $100,000 fee on new H-1B visa petitioners. Today on the show, we talk to an economist about how much H-1B visa holders have contributed to US gro...

Respecg to my colleague @darianwoods.bsky.social, who shared his personal story about the H1B visa fallout last week. No one is getting through this administration unscathed. www.npr.org/2025/09/30/n...

This meeting could've been an email.

'HIM' was a solid parable on toxic masculinity and sports worship, but I wish Peele had ended it with him signing. More grim and more honest.

Not scientific, but her theory was that's it's an inexpensive, visual response to negative events and taking control of something when your personal circumstances feel out of control.

Full disclosure: I got bangs.

Asked my hair stylist for her recession indicators. She says 1) More people getting bangs, 2) Clients taking pics of products but not buying them, 3) Booking out longer between appointments. She thinks it's happening.

The economies for both remarkably strong.

In Gaza, money is falling apart : Planet Money Israel has been blocking the flow of physical money into Gaza since the start of the war. So whatever paper cash was in Gaza before the war, that’s all that’s been circulating. It’s now falling apart ...

NPR Planets Money: the money situation in Gaza. All the hoops one has to go thru to get money into Gaza, and what it can buy

Since the Israel-Hamas war began, no new shekels have entered Gaza. : Planet Money www.npr.org/2025/09/20/n...

I don't really like watching TVs on the tread unless it's this or AKC's Fastest Dogs.

Was on a tread at Planet Fitness yesterday with this race on one of the TVs and it was incredibly motivating. Sydney Mclaughlin-Levrone is dazzling to watch.

How is it not Friday.

I guess this is what passes for enlightenment when you go to Burning Man.

Think it was @justinwolfers.bsky.social who said on Marketplace this morning that Tim Cook and the tech CEOs don't even spend their time making or improving products because they are dancing for the King to stay in business. State capitalism, crony capitalism, whatever you call it, it's rotten.