New York Magazine February 17 - March 2, 2020

1 In the latest issue, Melissa Dahl explored a scientific theory that argues we possess an infinite number of emotions, so long as we can name them (“Introducing: 78 More Feelings,” February 3–16). Dozens of writers identified new feelings for the magazine—from jealoushy to libido snap to Freundeschaden. Many readers responded to the article on Instagram and Twitter by coining their own new feelings, including: Malmiss: When you want to be missed by someone whom you also wish would leave you alone. —@courtneycollecting Shrediness: The thrill you get listening to a song and imagining you’re nailing the guitar solo. —@sampalmy Cuddlish: When you wanna cuddle for 2 mins but then stop to actually sleep. —@emilynhan FOBI: Fear of Being Included. I’m good. Leave me out. The energy it takes to…

HERE IS ONE starting point for contemplating a second Trump term: The Ukraine scandal only became a Trump scandal because Ukraine refused to submit to a pair of presidential demands that would have been fairly easy to satisfy. If Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky had merely announced that he was looking into a mysterious missing Democratic server and corruption by the Bidens, then the whole affair probably wouldn’t have become a Trump scandal at all. It would have become, to the American news-consuming public, a Biden scandal. Ukraine held off, though, for a very sensible reason. Ukrainians, analyzing American politics, calculated that Trump may not stay in office much beyond this year. It was a hedge against forever Trumpism. Trump’s favorable rating fell faster than any other president-elect’s in the history…

Trump is pursuing litigation that, if successful, would eliminate health insurance for approximately 20 million people overnight, according to an Urban Institute estimate. DYLAN SCOTT Trump’s proposed freeze on mandatory fuel-efficiency improvements will cost consumers about $460 billion in increased fuel costs, according to ‘Consumer Reports.’ MATTHEW YGLESIAS The Interior Department has finalized plans to shrink Bears Ears, a protected area of 1.3 million acres in Utah, by 85 percent. LAUREN KATZ More than 210,000 former students at for-profit colleges have asked the Education Department to cancel their loans because they were defrauded. Betsy DeVos’s department has said most of those students will still have to repay. LIBBY NELSON…

THERE WAS A TIME, not long ago, when it would have been unusual for Drake, the father of a 2-year-old, to post a photo of himself wearing a sweatshirt with the logo of Sierra Canyon, a private high school in the unfashionable outer reaches of the San Fernando Valley. There was also a time when one of the world’s most famous people announcing that he was tying his brand to a prep school would have been a defining moment in the lives of every teenager there. Not so at Sierra Canyon, which has recently become the most Instagrammed high school in America. “Honestly, I forgot that even happened,” said B. J. Boston, a senior who plays on the varsity basketball team, the Trailblazers—the reason for Drake’s interest. Boston is considered…

LAST FALL, Erik Mercer, a Maine social worker and psychotherapist, saw one of his senators, the Republican Susan Collins, while he was waiting for a plane in Washington, D.C. Mercer, a Democrat, had approached Collins on a plane once before, after the 2016 election, to thank her for a ferociously worded op-ed she had published before the election calling Donald Trump “unworthy of being our president” and declaring that she would not be voting for him. This time, he asked if he could sit next to her and then described the trouble he was having explaining to his children that the president was above the law, mentioning particularly the terrible things Trump says about women. Collins, he recalled, replied that she didn’t believe the president had said anything bad about…

I worked at various start-ups for eight years beginning in 2010, when I was in my early 20s. Then I quit and went freelance for a while. A year later, I returned to office life, this time at a different start-up. During my gap year, I had missed and yearned for a bunch of things, like health care and free knockoff Post-its and luxurious people-watching opportunities. (In 2016, I saw a co-worker pour herself a bowl of cornflakes, add milk, and microwave it for 90 seconds. I’ll think about this until the day I die.) One thing I did not miss about office life was the language. The language warped and mutated at a dizzying rate, so it was no surprise that a new term of art had emerged during…