Daily Bafflements

• Uber and Lyft are on a “lobbying blitz” to fight safety and insurance regulations, says Valleywag.

• In case you missed it, the British Embassy celebrated the 200th anniversary of the Brits burning the White House with a cake, sparklers, a day at the pool, and a tweet that amused no one.

• From Ando Arike in Harper’s back in 2010, both newly and always relevant: “The Soft-Kill Solution,” a piece about “the future (and past) of non-lethal weaponry deployed against civilian populations.” (Via Longform.)

• “No one is going to talk openly and say, ‘Oh, we’re not making low-income students a priority.’ But enrollment management is so sophisticated that they know pretty clearly how much each student would cost.” Real talk on the balance between poor and rich kids in higher education admissions from the New York Times. At “elite colleges,” only 11 percent of students now come from families with incomes in the bottom 40 percent. (Via Mina Kimes.)