Revived 'beer test' and China’s biotech push join a slate of cultural critiques

Commentary pieces note the return of the media’s “beer test” in a Nebraska Senate race, warn that China could dominate biotech supplies, and criticize progressive stances on nuns, foreign policy and energy.

Matt Taibbi jokes that the “beer test,” once a staple of campaign journalism, has reappeared in coverage of Dan Osborn’s independent Senate campaign in Nebraska, after disappearing when it became a proxy for moral judgments during the 2016 election. Bethany McLean warns that more than 40% of essential components for American medicines are imported from China, which now boasts a biotech pipeline nearly as extensive as the United States, raising fears of future weaponization.

In New York, the Department of Health threatens the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne with fines, license loss and possible imprisonment for maintaining gender-specific spaces and refusing to comply with state-mandated assisted-suicide assistance. The piece also ridicules progressive proposals on Israel-Gaza negotiations and Russian-Ukraine diplomacy, and argues that India and Indonesia are rejecting “green propaganda” in favor of expanding coal-based energy trade. Overall, the editorial ties together cultural, health-security and policy critiques of left-leaning positions.