Today’s Big Story

Trump Starts Laying Plans

The president-elect turned to his top political aide to fill a key post managing the White House

President-elect Donald Trump on Thursday named Susie Wiles, the Florida strategist who has run his political operation for nearly four years, as his White House chief of staff for his incoming administration. It’s the first job announcement Trump has made since winning the election on Tuesday. And many credit Wiles as the key to his reelection—viewed as the person responsible for helping keep his third presidential campaign more disciplined.

“Susie Wiles just helped me achieve one of the greatest political victories in American history, and was an integral part of both my 2016 and 2020 successful campaigns,” Trump said in a statement Thursday evening that called Wiles “universally admired and respected.” She would be the first female White House chief of staff.

CNN reported that Wiles was considered the front-runner for the job, but had some reservations about the role and had expressed to Trump certain conditions before she accepted, a source said. At the top of the list was more control over who can reach the president in the Oval Office.

Meanwhile, Trump told NBC News on Thursday that one of his first priorities upon taking office in January would be to make the border “strong and powerful.” When questioned about his campaign promise of mass deportations, Trump said his administration would have “no choice” but to carry them out. As a candidate, Trump had repeatedly vowed to carry out the “largest deportation effort in American history.” Asked about the cost of his plan, he said, “It’s not a question of a price tag. It’s not—really, we have no choice.”

Even less sure are the highly-publicized tax cuts Trump proposed in loosely defined slogans over the course of his campaign. They will now face a fiscal reckoning in Washington. While Republicans are poised to control both chambers of Congress, opening a path for Trump’s plans, the party is now grappling with how far they can take another round of tax cuts.

It’s Popular But Proven Ineffective

And now the FDA is ready to ban the cold “remedy” phenylephrine

U.S. health officials proposed banning an ingredient used in popular oral decongestants, a step toward removing dozens of cold medicines from store shelves that are, essentially, ineffective. The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday proposed removing the ingredient, known as oral phenylephrine, from its list of approved over-the-counter ingredients after determining the drug doesn’t work at relieving stuffy noses.

The move brings the agency one step closer to getting products containing the ingredient pulled from the market. In issuing the proposal, the FDA also began seeking public comments. The FDA said it would give companies additional time to reformulate their products if the proposal was finalized. Scott Melville, chief executive of the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, a trade group representing companies that make over-the-counter drugs, told the New York Times that he was “disappointed” with the agency’s decision. He said that the FDA had backed phenylephrine for years and should continue to do so given many years of studies, not just new data that showed the ingredient didn’t work.

Getting the medication off the shelves has been a decades-long effort for Dr. Leslie Hendeles, a pharmacy professor emeritus at the University of Florida. He began raising concerns about the efficacy of the ingredient in the 1990s. It was added to cold and flu treatments as a stand-in for a more effective decongestant, pseudoephedrine, which was moved behind the counter after its use was noted in homegrown methamphetamine labs manufacturing illicit drugs.

New DNA Evidence Rewrites the Story of Pompeii

The legendary volcano disaster narrative takes a twist

When a volcanic eruption buried the ancient city of Pompeii, the last desperate moments of its citizens lives were preserved in stone for centuries. Observers see stories in the plaster casts later made of their bodies—a family of four, including a mother holding a child on her hip, or two sisters embracing as they die. But new DNA evidence suggests things were not as they seem—and these prevailing interpretations come from looking at the ancient world through modern eyes.

The provocative new study published Thursday in Current Biology reveals that long-standing interpretations of those infamous scenes are wrong. The long-presumed family buried at one house turn out to be four unrelated males. And one of the two sisters locked in a hug turns out to be a male. Scientists analyzed ancient DNA extracted from skeletal remains and pieced together fragments of five people’s identities, rewriting the romantic stories of who they were and how they were related.

An estimated 10% of Pompeii’s 20,000 or so inhabitants perished when Mount Vesuvius erupted. The first systematic excavations began only in 1748 and proceeded slowly until 1860, when the archaeologist Giuseppe Fiorelli was put in charge. It was Fiorelli who pioneered the technique for fashioning plaster casts. To date, 104 have been made.

A Weekend Pairing

‘Arcane’ + a Glass of Cabernet

I might not be the target audience but Arcane is back on Netflix for its second season, and I never heard of the show. But Hailee Steinfeld and Ella Purnell voice the animated action series as two sisters Vi and Jinx caught between a utopian city and its lesser counterpart Zaun.

That star power must contribute to the fact that the show is "far and away the most expensive animated series ever made." While the show has garnered accolades for its stunning visuals, riveting storytelling, and being a safe alternative to experiencing the lore of the League of Legends mythos without dealing with its players, the series also has the distinction of costing the streamer a cool 250 million dollars.

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