Another week, another list of things I have feelings about that no one asked for. Let’s get into it.
The Cubs Couldn’t Pull It Out
I want to be mad. I really do. But I can’t quite get there.
The Cubs went into St. Louis this week and did the most Cubs thing imaginable: they walloped the Cardinals 7-3, then walloped them again 10-2, and I let myself believe. I let the little flame of hope flicker back to life like an idiot who’s watched this movie a hundred times and still cries at the ending. Then Wednesday happened. A 3-2 loss to close out the series, the kind of game where you can feel the exact inning it slipped away. Couldn’t pull it out.
But you know what? We held in there. Two out of three on the road against a division rival isn’t nothing, and I refuse to let one deflating finale erase two good nights. That’s the deal you sign up for as a Cubs fan — you bank the wins, you mourn the losses, and you show up again tomorrow like it’s your job. Because apparently it is.
Meanwhile, Caleb Williams Is Built Different Now
Over on the football side of my ever-suffering heart, Bears training camp opened this week and Caleb Williams showed up looking like a different guy. He says he’s dropped somewhere in the 10-15 pound range this offseason — down from playing at around 226 last year to somewhere in the low 210s now — and he’s crediting the usual suspects: eating cleaner, cutting off the kitchen after 7 p.m., and actually prioritizing sleep instead of whatever quarterbacks normally do at 1 a.m.
I’ll be honest, “better sleep and no snacking after dinner” is not exactly a revolutionary training regimen, it’s just what my doctor has been telling me for years and I’ve been ignoring. But if it means Caleb’s quicker in the pocket and Bears fans get to watch a lighter, faster, more well-rested version of the guy who just led this team to 11 wins and a playoff appearance, I will gladly let a 24-year-old millionaire teach me about sleep hygiene. We take our life lessons where we can get them around here.
Okay, Let’s Talk About the Economy for a Second
I promised comical and poignant, so here’s the poignant part.
Heading into the last election, the economy was consistently at or near the top of the list of things voters said mattered most to their vote — nearly a third of voters nationally called it their number one issue, and it ran even higher among the people who ended up voting for Trump, with roughly half of his supporters naming it their top concern. The pitch was simple: prices are too high, fix it.
So how’s that going? The honest answer is: mixed, and not in the way anyone was promised. Inflation has actually cooled a bit lately — it came in at 3.5% for the 12 months ending in June, down from a rough patch that hit 4.2% in May after the ceasefire with Iran fell apart and gas prices spiked past $4 a gallon. That’s real, recent relief. But zoom out and the picture gets less flattering: inflation was running at 3.0% in the year before Trump took office, which means, even with the recent cooldown, prices are still climbing faster than they were when he was sworn in. Unemployment has ticked up to 4.2%, job growth has slowed, and consumer sentiment hit a record low back in May before clawing back a little. Wages have grown a bit faster than inflation for regular workers, so it’s not all bad news — it’s just not the “fixed” that a lot of people were voting for.
Basically: it’s complicated, it’s a little better than it was two months ago, and it’s still worse than it was two years ago. Very on-brand for 2026.
Meanwhile, in Washington: The Fauci-Paul Grudge Match Hits the Fifth Amendment
If you want to feel something more complicated than “the Cubs lost a close one,” this week gave us a real doozy. Dr. Anthony Fauci sat in front of Rand Paul’s Senate committee on Wednesday and, when the questions started, pled the Fifth. On everything. Not “I don’t recall.” Not “let me check my notes.” Straight to the Fifth Amendment, across the board.
This is the latest chapter in a fight Paul and Fauci have been having since basically 2021, and “vendetta” isn’t an unfair word for it — even Fauci’s own lawyers have called it a “years-long public crusade.” Paul’s office spent the weekend before the hearing dumping over a thousand pages of Fauci’s private pandemic-era diary entries online (took them down, then reposted with redactions — because nothing says “credible investigation” like editing your evidence mid-release), and Health Secretary RFK Jr., no stranger to Fauci beef of his own, says he’s the one who found the files on government servers and handed them to Paul.
Here’s where I have to slow down and be straight with you, because it’d be easy to just say “Paul’s making stuff up” and it wouldn’t be fully true. Some of what he’s alleging has real backing: the NIH did fund coronavirus research in Wuhan through a nonprofit called EcoHealth Alliance, a Republican-led House subcommittee concluded in 2024 that a lab leak was the most likely origin of COVID, and the FBI agrees. The CIA shifted to “lab leak, likely” last year too — though only with “low confidence.” What’s genuinely unresolved is the rest of it: four other U.S. intelligence agencies and the National Intelligence Council still think natural origin is more likely, and virologists like Tulane’s Robert Garry say there’s no hard evidence anyone actually had a precursor virus close enough to SARS-CoV-2 to engineer it. Fauci’s defense has always been narrower than “nothing happened” — it’s that the NIH-funded work didn’t meet the government’s formal definition of “gain-of-function,” which is a very DC hair to split, but it’s a real one.
So: is this a legitimate, still-unsettled scientific question that deserves oversight? Yes. Is it also very clearly personal at this point, between two guys who’ve been sniping at each other in hearing rooms for five years? Also yes. Paul now says there’s a “very real chance” Fauci gets prosecuted; Fauci says Paul has an “obsession” and has made “slanderous” comments about him. Nobody left in this fight is a neutral party, including, if I’m honest, me.
One thing I do want to correct, though: I keep seeing “the President ordered the lockdowns” thrown around, and it’s not quite right. The actual stay-at-home orders — the ones that shut your gym and your kid’s school — came from governors, state by state, starting with California in March 2020. What came out of the Trump White House was the “15 Days to Slow the Spread” guidance, a recommendation, not a federal mandate. Did it all happen on a president’s watch, with federal sign-off and money behind it? Sure. Did it probably save lives? My gut says yes — but I’ll be honest with you, the actual research is more split than my gut is, with real studies landing on very different numbers for how many lives lockdowns saved versus what they cost. It’s not the slam dunk either side wants it to be, and I’d rather tell you that than pretend otherwise.
Anyway. Deep breath. Let’s talk about something simpler, like a man in a spider costume.
And Now, the Fun Part: Spider-Man Swings Back In
Palate cleanser time. Spider-Man: Brand New Day opens in theaters tomorrow, and I am, against my own better judgment about superhero fatigue, genuinely excited. Tom Holland’s back, Zendaya’s back, and early tracking has this thing pacing for one of the biggest opening weekends in franchise history — we’re talking numbers that could rival No Way Home.
Realistically, between the Cubs, the Bears, and just generally being a person with a schedule, I might not make it to a theater until next week. But I will get there, and when I do, I promise a full, deeply unqualified review.
Until then — go Cubs, go Bears, go save some money because apparently we all still need to.
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