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There Aren’t Any Good NFL Teams This Year

“How about parity in the NFL?” a man says to another man as they sit on a park bench and watch the traffic in the distance. “Yes, parity,” the second man says. How can he put the love he feels for his friend into words? He can't. So he talks instead about how every team in the AFC East is 3-3. Full story

The Presidential Debate Moderators Are Pathetic Cowards

The people in charge of picking the questions didn't ask about drug legalization, abortion, same sex marriage, or domestic surveillance. It's enough to make you want to light up a joint with your same-sex partner and ignore the debates completely. Full story

Voting for President Is Meaningless but Fun

If you live in Ohio or Florida or Virginia, maybe your vote will count. The rest of us can do all the thought experiments we want and study the issues assiduously until we’re hallucinating from lack of sleep and our vote isn’t going to be any more meaningful. Full story

Meet the Filmmakers Who Are Excavating the Former Dutch Colonial ‘Empire’

The pair spent two years traveling to seven countries to document the remnants of colonialism and found the descendants of Indonesian slaves in Cape Town, South Africa, who sang loves songs in old Dutch dialect; war re-enactors in Java who dressed in Dutch Waffen SS uniforms; and… Full story

Humanity’s Beta Versions

People view evolution as linear incremental improvements. But the truth is much messier. For example, 2 million years ago there were multiple species of Homo existing in the same region of Africa. It was one giant Homo party, if you will. Full story

The Debate, Decoded

What’s more important than what they said is what the candidates meant and who they were talking to. I've translated a few key quotes below for those of you who don't speak fluent Candidate. Full story

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Why Aren't There Football Coaching Grad School Programs?

Coaches learn their extremely difficult, demanding, horrifically time-consuming jobs as they go along, picking up knowledge as they work. Why don’t NFL coaches just go to grad school to study football? Full story

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Is It OK to Watch Young Men Get Paralyzed on Live TV?

I’m not going to stop watching football, but how do you excuse watching something as obviously evil as the NFL? Is it like eating processed meat or buying shoes made with slave labor—do you just not think about it? I guess that’s what you do. Shit. Full story

Go Ahead, Throw Your Vote Away

I talked to Gary Johnson, the Libertarian Party's anti-war, pro-gay marriage, pro-choice, anti-tax, anti-Fed, pro-pot, pro-gun, anti-government candidate and the guy I'll probably vote for. Full story

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Let’s Just Turn the Refs into Lasers

By 2030, I want the games to be officiated by motion sensors and nanobots. And the cheerleaders should be replaced by 3-D holographic .gifs that summarize the most important news stories of the day. And the players will mostly be lizards. Anyway, on to picking games. Full story