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Daily Bafflements

• Over at In These Times, Baffler senior editor Chris Lehmann reviews Dinesh D’Souza’s latest book, Stealing America: What My Experience with Criminal Gangs Taught Me About Obama, Hillary and the Democratic Party. “The book, for all its righteous indictment of left-wing larceny, can only be read sympathetically as a desperate cry for help,” Lehmann concludes. Maybe we should throw him a bone and “bring a stop to this tortured psychic display by offering D’Souza a high-rolling gig as a Democratic lobbyist—or better yet, a PAC bundler.”

• Today in the journalism world: Gawker announced it intends to undertake a major strategic shift, changing their area of focus from media and New York, to politics. That means shuttering a number of smaller sites—such as Valleywag—and, of course, layoffs. The announcements comes after the company recently came under more fire for its treatment of women, spurred largely by an essay published on Matter by former staff writer Danya Evans on how the company had failed its female employees. “There are no women in Denton’s vision of an ideal Gawker.com,” she wrote. It’s unclear whether that’s an issue that extends beyond Denton, since “when no stories by women were held out for praise in an introductory memo from now-official executive editor John Cook, many felt like they were absent from his vision of an ideal Gawker Media as well.” 

• It’s like Uber, but for “disrupting the world of camels and cabs.” No, seriously, just ban Tom Friedman already. Barring that, you can create your own Tom Friedman-esque column with this “disruptive” generator. 

• Facebook hates us