Fifty-four unbound delegates in Pennsylvania may hold the fate of a Trump nomination in the palms of their hands, Jim Newell writes. “Given the tightness of the presidential race, Pennsylvania’s quirky Republican primary system affords the state’s delegates the most nominating leverage they’ve had in 40 years,” Newell reports. And those delegates are being fairly cagey about their candidate preferences. We may not know until they vote at the convention who they plan to support, but Newell guesses it might not be Trump.
Is the Kindle Oasis—Amazon’s new premium e-reader, aimed at people who really, really love books—going to take off, even though we all have phones and tablets and Kindle apps now? Will Oremus tours us through the new device, shrugs, and says: “If Amazon thinks there’s a market for a $290 e-reader, I wouldn’t bet against it.”
L.V. Anderson looks into “impostor syndrome,” an oft-self-diagnosed malady of women in the workplace, and finds that it might be more properly called “impostor phenomenon,” and it’s extremely common—among both men and women. “The popular understanding of impostor syndrome as a form of internalized sexism is a few decades behind the research,” Anderson finds. “[Pauline Rose] Clance and [Suzanne] Imes originally theorized that imposterism was a gendered phenomenon, but subsequent studies found no difference in self-reported impostor feelings among male and female college students, professors, and professionals.”
Science fairs, as they’re currently constructed, are an exercise in the reinforcement of privilege, Carl Zimmer argues for Stat. “It’s great to bring so much attention to kids doing science,” Zimmer writes. “But when you look over the projects that win the Google Science Fair and the Intel Science Talent Search these days, it’s clear that they’re mostly the products of very bright, motivated students lucky enough to work in university labs where they can take advantage of expertise and equipment.” For a kid without external support, a science fair experience is likely to unfold much differently.
For fun: Ruth Graham appreciates Beverly Cleary’s sweet, tender teenage novels, loving them for their squareness. “Who needs kissing scenes when you’ve got erotic passages like the one where Johnny walks right up to Jean’s desk in the sewing classroom, looks straight down at her, puts his hand on her elbow, leads her out to the hall in front of all her classmates, and then softly whispers, ‘Did I ever tell you you have a cute little nose?’ ” Graham asks. “The first time something like that happens to you, it’s as physically overwhelming as anything that comes along later.”
Swoon,
Rebecca