Fences Not F-35s: Drone Attacks and the Illogic of Gulf Procurement
by David B. Roberts
When does a chain-link fence become a better air defense system than a fighter jet?
0:00 / 27:25 · Narrator Vindemiatrix
Daily edition
2026-08-04
Today's Crosscut
Why We Read
A college professor urging students to finish difficult novels and a century of critics dismissing cheap paperbacks reveal an old fight over whether reading should be hard work or pure escape.
College Professors Face an Emerging Challenge: We Know Students Are No Longer Reading Entire Books × The History of the Beach Read, From 19th-Century 'Moral Debasement' to BookTok
0:00 / 17:50 · Narrator Sulafat/Charon/Vindemiatrix
Future-gazing →
Behind the news →
Ceuta: the Videos and Rumours That Sparked Sudden Deadly Surge of Migrants Into Spain’s Enclave
by Akram Oubachir
How does a rumor on a phone convince sixty thousand people to rush a closed border?
0:00 / 8:57 · Narrator Charon
For the curious →
‘The War Leaked Into Every Lesson’: Learning Ukrainian in a Country Under Siege
by Charlotte Higgins
How do you learn a new language when its everyday words include drones and bomb shelters?
0:00 / 32:45 · Narrator Sulafat
Why We Should Learn to Embrace the Middlebrow
by Aaron Meskin & Jonathan Weinberg
What happens when an artist tries to make a masterpiece without leaving the crowd behind?
0:00 / 14:43 · Narrator Algieba
Smart escape →
Which Screen is the ‘Good Screen’ Now?
by Kaitlyn Tiffany
What happens to the private act of scrolling when it moves to the living room television?
0:00 / 8:23 · Narrator Gacrux