Issue June 10, 2016 - The Week Magazine (2024)

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in this issue

IN THIS ISSUEEditor’s letterBy all rights, I should be rooting for Gawker.com. I’ve spent my working life as an editor and reporter, and believe free speech is one of our most critical rights. But now that the snarky website is facing financial ruin because of a vendetta by tech billionaire Peter Thiel, whom it outed as gay nearly a decade ago (see Controversy), I find myself...conflicted. It would be terrible for my profession and for the country if powerful billionaires with axes to grind could sue publications into financial ruin for running legitimate news stories. But here’s the rub: I don’t consider Gawker’s outing of Thiel as journalism. Ditto for the video it aired of Hulk Hogan having sex. No public interest was served by these mean-spirited intrusions into private sex lives. None.Like…2 min

NEWSClinton on the defensive over email reportWhat happenedHillary Clinton continued to defend her use of a private email server during her tenure as secretary of state this week, following the release of a scathing report into the practice by the State Department inspector general. The report, which also criticized some of Clinton’s predecessors for using private email accounts while in office, contradicted the likely Democratic nominee’s repeated assertions that she hadn’t broken any rules. It found that she and her staff had neither sought nor received permission to use private email for official business, had violated her department’s record-keeping regulations, and had ignored warnings that hackers were targeting personal email accounts. Clinton’s correspondence would have been subject to freedom of information scrutiny had she used a State Department server; although she handed over 30,000 emails to…3 min

NEWSIt wasn’t all badHenry Heimlich, the 96-year-old surgeon who created the Heimlich maneuver, has demonstrated his namesake technique countless times over the years but only ever used it once in an emergency—until last week. That’s when Heimlich was eating lunch at the Cincinnati senior center where he lives and noticed a woman choking. Heimlich reached his arms around Patty Gill Ris, 87, and dislodged a piece of hamburger that was blocking her airway. “I waited to see if he needed any assistance,” said Perry Gaines, an employee at the center. “Of course he didn’t.”When Micah McDade made his way across the stage at his graduation from Okmulgee High School in Oklahoma last week, it was a walk he’ll never forget. The teen was born with cerebral palsy and has been confined to a…1 min

NEWSThe fierce fight to retake Fallujah from ISIS controlWhat happenedHumanitarian groups warned of an unfolding “human catastrophe” in Fallujah this week after Iraqi forces backed by U.S.-led airstrikes launched a long-awaited offensive to retake the city from ISIS, amid reports that the jihadist group was herding hundreds of civilians into the center of the city to use as human shields. Located 35 miles west of Baghdad, Fallujah has been in ISIS hands since January 2014, and along with Mosul is one of the militant group’s two remaining strongholds in Iraq. After pushing into the southern suburb of Nuaimiya, Iraqi troops delayed their assault in a bid to protect the 50,000 civilians still trapped in the city. ISIS fighters fought back ferociously, using tunnels, deploying snipers, and sending six explosives-laden cars that were destroyed before they reached their targets.…2 min

NEWSTrump lambastes media for questioning donationsWhat happenedDonald Trump launched a frontal attack on the press this week, bitterly berating journalists covering his presidential campaign for what he claimed was “dishonest” and unflattering scrutiny of his donations to veterans’ groups. For weeks, reporters have been pressing the presumptive GOP nominee and his aides to account for the whereabouts of $6 million in donations Trump claimed to have raised for veterans during a splashy telethonstyle fundraiser in Iowa in January—held the same night as a Fox News GOP debate that Trump boycotted. After repeatedly providing vague answers, Trump’s campaign called a press conference this week, at which the real-estate mogul stated that $5.6 million had been raised and read aloud all 41 groups that he said had received money. Several media outlets later confirmed, however, that at…2 min

NEWSMedia: A billionaire’s revenge on GawkerBillionaire Peter Thiel has just given every rich businessman “a dangerous blueprint” for subverting America’s free press, said Felix Salmon in Fusion.net.Thiel, an eccentric Silicon Valley entrepreneur who co-founded PayPal and was an early investor in Facebook, admitted last week he’s been funding a secret, decade-long legal war against Gawker Media. Back in 2007, Gawker outed Thiel, saying he “is totally gay.” Rather than suing the website himself, Thiel secretly bankrolled multiple lawsuits by other people who felt they’d been wronged by the aggressive website and its founder, Nick Denton. The biggest of these cases involved former pro wrestler Hulk Hogan, who sued for invasion of privacy after Gawker published footage of Hogan having sex with a friend’s wife. In March, a Florida jury awarded Hogan a stunning $140 million,…5 min

Issue June 10, 2016 - The Week Magazine (2024)

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