The Week Magazine

It was the culmination of a decades-long movement fueled by religious fervor. In 1919, an America with a fondness for drink nonetheless adopted a constitutional amendment banning the “manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors.” Prohibition immediately divided the country, and gave rise to sophisticated bootleg operations, smuggling, speakeasies, and the growth of organized crime. With public support waning after 13 tumultuous years, Congress abandoned the great dry experiment in 1933. It was not the first, nor the last, time governments have failed to prohibit a substance or behavior for which there is great public demand. When there is a want, there is always a way. Banning abortion will be even more difficult than booze. Abortion will remain legal in roughly half the states, and state borders are permeable. Medications that…

What happened Russian President Vladimir Putin marked Russia’s Victory Day with a somber, muted speech this week, defying expectations that he would use the nation’s biggest patriotic holiday to escalate the Ukraine war or claim victory. Putin failed to even mention the word “Ukraine” in the address, in which he cast the war as a “preemptive response” to aggression from Ukrainian “torturers, death squads, and Nazis.” Speaking before a massive military parade in Moscow’s Red Square, Putin made no call to expand military conscription to bolster Russia’s depleted forces, nor did he telegraph any strategy shifts. The speech came as the 11-week-old war settled into a grinding, bloody slog, with no significant progress on either side as the Russians attempt to take the eastern Donbas region and extend their control along…

What happened As the country marked the grim milestone of 1 million Covid deaths, the Biden administration warned this week that a new wave could infect nearly a third of Americans. Cases shot up more than 50 percent nationwide over the past two weeks, and hospitalizations rose nearly 20 percent. The Omicron subvariant BA2.12.1, an offshoot of BA.2 that is 25 percent more contagious, now accounts for nearly 43 percent of new infections, and it could explode in the fall. Covid czar Ashish Jha warned that a late-2022 surge could infect 100 million people. Data from last winter’s Omicron wave, meanwhile, suggest that some 42 percent of deaths in January and February were among vaccinated people, mostly elderly. Still, the death rate overall among the vaccinated was seven times lower than…

In 1958, Mort Block wrote a love song for Susan, his future wife, while serving as a petty officer in the Navy. Some 60 years later, Block pulled the lyrics from a drawer and his grandson, Matt, urged him share the song online. The 82-year-old agreed to record and release “My Love” with a group of professional jazz musicians and vocalist Benny Benack III. The ballad has now gone viral on TikTok. “Susan and I couldn’t believe it when we listened to it for the first time,” Block said. “It took us right back to the day we met.” In his free time during the pandemic, high-schooler Benjamin Choi managed to develop a mind-controlled prosthetic arm from scratch in his parents’ basement. The 17-year-old Virginian built prototypes with his sister’s $75…

Republicans are like the “barking dog catching the car,” said George Skelton in the Los Angeles Times. After almost five decades of trying to overturn Roe v. Wade, they finally are close to success—but they may get “run over.” Why? Because if the Supreme Court goes ahead with removing women’s right to an abortion, it will be a “political gift” for Democrats in November’s midterms. Until now, many women, particularly those born long after the 1973 Roe decision, “have taken their reproductive rights for granted.” That’s something young women in particular won’t be doing anymore. As GOP consultant Mike Madrid said, “There isn’t a single Republican consultant of any credibility who thinks this is good for the party, because it’s not.” Polls taken after the leak of the court’s draft…

Good week for: Queen Elizabeth II, after the British royal became the third-longest-reigning monarch in world history. The 96-year-old, who has ruled for more than 70 years, will soon move into the No. 2 slot, behind only King Louis XIV of France, who ruled for 72 years. Someone who’s very rich, after Andy Warhol’s 1964 painting Shot Sage Blue Marilyn sold for $195 million to an unknown buyer at auction. The iconic portrait of Monroe against a rich blue background is now the most expensive work by a U.S. artist ever sold at auction. Winging it, after the pilot of a private plane became incapacitated and a passenger with no flying experience safely landed the aircraft in Palm Beach, Fla. “Try to hold the wings level and see if you can start descending,”…