Decades ago, my friend Jeff O'Keefe created a great commercialpredicting the future of retail shopping. The ad shows a guy walking through the aisles of a market filling his jacket with various items. When he gets to the exit, a store security guard stops him and says, "Excuse me sir, you forgot your receipt." For years, the ad seemed quite prophetic as the tech to make "just walk out" purchasing became available—and we've even seen a version of it deployed in Amazon Go stores. What few of us predicted was that buying things from thousands of terrestrial stores would actually become harder as time passed. That's because so much merchandise is now behind lock and key. "The practice has since metastasized to so many kinds of products in so many more stores—big-box discounters, beauty retailers, chain pharmacies—that it’s become routine to discover entire aisles transformed into untouchable product galleries armored in plexiglass. The whole thing has a whiff of pawnshop, which might actually be unfair to pawnshops. They, at least, have someone ready and waiting to take things out of lockup. To understand how we got to this demoralizing retail reality, we have to go back to the Great Shoplifting Freak-Out of 2021." It's never been quite clear how bad the shoplifting crisis really got. It's more clear that the imprisoning of products on locked-down shelves is not working out. And as offline shopping becomes more of a pain, online shopping just gets easier and easier. Amanda Mull in Bloomberg (Gift Article): Retailers Locked Up Their Products—and Broke Shopping in America. Maybe my friend Jeff should put his old ad behind a paywall. At least irony is still grab and go.

2

Give Truth to Allies

During a time when we see America’s finest athletes performing on the world stage, we also got to heartily celebrate the work of America’s finest diplomats whose tireless work around the globe just paid off big time. Yes, as with any deal, there were trade-offs. And Putin provided a troubling reminder that hostage-taking by rogue states can provide leverage. But the scenes at the Joint Base Andrews in Maryland were just great; for those released, for their families, for the people who worked to get this deal done, and for the rest of us. NYT: A Triumphant Biden Welcomes 3 Freed Americans Home.

+ Evan Gershkovich’s most tireless advocate to secure his release: his mother.

+ If you missed it yesterday from the WSJ: Inside the Secret Negotiations to Free Evan Gershkovich.

+ An amazing detail from the other side of the swap. "A family of Russian sleeper agents flown to Moscow in the biggest East-West prisoner swap since the Cold War were so deep under cover that their children found out they were Russians only after the flight took off ... The children asked their parents yesterday who it was that was meeting them (in Moscow). They didn't even know who Putin was."

+ When it comes to actual news (especially good news), I try to avoid spreading the hogwash from the MAGA crowd. But I'll make an exception because this is probably the most hilarious, desperate, and pathetic statement issued on any topic in the history of both statements and topics. JD Vance on the released American prisoners: "We have to ask ourselves, why are they coming home? And I think it’s because bad guys all over the world recognize Donald Trump’s about to be back in office, so they’re cleaning house. That’s a good thing, and I think it’s a testament to Donald Trump’s strength."

+ And that Olympic surfing competition photo just got some competition.

3

Five Ring Circus

"Three years after withdrawing from the team final of the Tokyo Olympics because of a mental block, a move that prompted critics to call her a loser, a quitter and un-American, Simone Biles on Thursday proved to the world — and to herself — that she was unstoppable." NYT (Gift Article): For Simone Biles, a Long Road Back Is Paved in Gold. Biles reinforced her GOAT status in the gym, and then won the internet. 'I love my black job': Simone Biles appears to take a jab at Trump after Olympic win. (I guess you'd call this a DEI Higher.)

+ Biles wasn't the only great story among the women's all-round gymnastics medalists. "At her lowest point Suni Lee wasn’t thinking about going back to the Olympics. Just getting out of bed in the morning was hard enough. After a year and a half of uncertainty and depression while battling a pair of career-threatening kidney ailments that led to a weight gain of 45lb on her 5ft frame and kept her out of the gym for months at a time, the Tokyo Olympic all-around champion was ready to call it quits." Update: She didn't.

+ And... "One of 8 children raised by a single mother, Rebeca Andrade grew up in a favela in the outskirts of Guarulhos, São Paulo ... Rebeca’s mother, who worked as a maid, couldn’t always afford to pay for her daughter’s bus ticket to the gym. Andrade and her older brother began to walk for 2 hours each way to get to her gym on days when their mother couldn’t afford a bus ticket." How a bunk bed acrobat from a favela in Brazil became the #2 female gymnast in the world.

+ "Filomenaleonisa Iakopo, the 18-year-old from American Samoa who runs a national record of 12.78sec in heat two. A little cluster of volcanic islands and atolls in the south Pacific, the 77 generously-forested square miles of American Samoa do not currently possess a running track." These are the slowest fastest women on Earth. And they have a story to tell.

+ "To make a name for yourself in the Olympics you either need to perform incredible athletic feats – or really like muffins. That last one really only applies to Henrik Christiansen, a Norwegian swimmer whose love of the chocolate muffins in the Olympic Village has taken on a life of its own."

+ "Track fans might remember Ellis as the runner who found herself stuck in a porta potty at the U.S. track trials, in a semi-panic as she banged on the door for 10 minutes trying to grab someone’s attention, worried that her Olympic hopes were swirling away." Kendall Ellis rides porta potty mishap to a deal with a toilet paper company, and a trip to Olympics. (I've panicked and raced toward a bathroom thousands of times in my life. But I've never panicked and raced to get out of one.)

4

Weekend Whats

What to Movie: Out in theaters and now available on some streaming services, Touch "follows one man's emotional journey to find his first love who disappeared 50 years ago, before his time runs out." It's a really nice movie and it has scenes in some of my favorites countries.

+ What to Hear: I've mentioned this album in passing but it deserves a weekend what all its own and then some. Pearl Jam's latest album Dark Matter is just remarkably good.

+ What to Wear: It's election season and ND readers are dressing for success. Get your gear in the NextDraft store. The Comma-La and Pro Democracy shirts and hoodies are selling fast.

5

Extra, Extra

Cut Short: "The report will likely add to worries from some economists that the Federal Reserve has waited too long to cut interest rates in its bid to stamp out inflation." U.S. unemployment rate ticks up to 4.3% amid signs of broader economic slowdown. The market is not happy. Meanwhile, Intel is laying off over 15,000 employees and will stop ‘non-essential work.'

+ Dinner Roles: "For the first time in years, people's grocery hauls are getting bigger. And many are choosing to splurge a bit at the supermarket over going out to eat, prompting fast-food and other chains to step up deals and meal combos." Inflation math is changing America's dinner plans.

+ Venezuela Vent: The US secretary of state has said there was "overwhelming evidence" Venezuela's opposition won the recent presidential election.

+ Cairo-ing Machine: "Five days before Donald Trump became president in January 2017, a manager at a bank branch in Cairo received an unusual letter from an organization linked to the Egyptian intelligence service. It asked the bank to 'kindly withdraw' nearly $10 million from the organization’s account — all in cash." More great (even though it probably won't make a difference) investigative reporting about potential corruption in the most corrupt administration ever. Also a preview of what's to come if Trump isn't defeated. WaPo (Gift Article): $10M cash withdrawal drove secret probe into whether Trump took money from Egypt.

+ Sasquatch, Listen, and Learn: "As a thirty-six-year-old progressive, I was an outlier in this crowd. But, like many, I was a believer." The Paris Review: At the Great Florida Bigfoot Conference.

6

Feel Good Friday

FDA approves blood test to screen for colon cancer.

+ A suicide prevention volunteer who has stopped 469 people from jumping off a bridge in China over the past 21 years has been dubbed the Angel of Nanjing.

+ Afghan Sisters Escape The Taliban To Achieve Olympic Dreams.

+ A spinal injury killed Adriana Ruano's dream as a gymnast. She just won Guatemala's first Olympic gold medal as a shooter.

+ Metro Transit driver gives passenger shoes off her feet.

+ Man runs into Park Fire evacuation zone to save stranded puppies.