Democrats win Santos seat

Plus lukewarm inflation data and Jon Stewart's big return [View this email in your browser]( [Brand Logo]( Democrats get a boost, inflation cools slightly and Jon Stewart roars back   Good morning, Today is the rare confluence of Valentine's Day and Ash Wednesday, celebrations of love and mortality, respectively. Maybe the festivals aren't so incongruous. The ashes are meant to remind people they will someday die and return to dust — but it also means that today they are alive. Valentine's Day has a 'carpe diem' flare to it as well: You may love a person 364 other days a year, but today you tell them. If you celebrate. Peter Weber The Week Digital     Today's POLITICS story Democrats flip Santos seat, GOP impeaches Mayorkas What happened? Former Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.) won Tuesday's special election to replace ousted Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) in New York's 3rd Congressional District. Suozzi beat Republican Mazi Pilip by about 8 points in the suburban Queens-Long Island district. Hours before polls closed, the House voted 214-213 to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, with three Republicans and all Democrats present voting no. Who said what? "This race was fought amid a closely divided electorate, much like our whole country," Suozzi said. "We won because we addressed the issues and we found a way to bind our divisions." The commentary Tuesday's vote was 2o24's "first high-profile test" of each party's "messages on abortion, the economy and, above all, immigration," The Washington Post said. Republicans hit Suozzi hard on border security, but he defused it with hardline migration policy and slamming Pilip for opposing the bipartisan Senate bill that offered solutions. Suozzi's victory "gave Democrats a badly needed dose of election-year optimism," but it also "turned on hard-to-replicate local issues," The New York Times said. Voters "avenged a year of humiliation" by Santos, the GOP "serial fabulist who made the district a national laughingstock," and a snowstorm favored early-voting Democrats. What next? When Suozzi is seated, Republicans will have a two-vote margin of victory, meaning the Mayorkas impeachment would have failed for a second time.     Today's BUSINESS story Inflation had a lukewarm January What happened?Consumer prices rose 3.1% in January compared with a year earlier, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Tuesday. That's an improvement over December's 3.4% inflation rate but hotter than the 2.9% economists had been expecting. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 closed down about 1.4% on the news. Who said what? Inflation has "declined by two thirds from its peak, but we know there's still work to do to lower costs," President Joe Biden said in a statement. The commentary The markets "flashed red" because they are "impatient" for inflation to fall enough for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates, The Washington Post said. It doesn't matter much to the "broader economy, or even to investors," if the Fed "starts cutting rates in June instead of May," Aaron Back said in The Wall Street Journal. "The overall outlook for the U.S. economy — of surprising resilience in growth in jobs, paired with cooling inflation — remains unchanged." What next? "A March cut is completely off the agenda," Seema Shah at Principal Asset Management told The New York Times. "But May could still be in play if economic activity plays ball."   Advertisement by Betterment [Betterment is the automated investing app that puts your money to work](   Today's ENTERTAINMENT Story Jon Stewart's 'promising' Daily Show return What happened? Jon Stewart's one-night-a-week return to host The Daily Show drew 1.85 million viewers across Paramount's channels Monday night, including 930,000 on Comedy Central, Nielson said Tuesday. That's the most viewers since 2018. The commentary Stewart's "signature moves — blunt satire, facial grimaces, incisive use of video and some occasional lectures — were all intact" in his "promising" return, David Bauder said at The Associated Press. It "felt electric," and Stewart was "strikingly unchanged" — including his "signature 'plague on both your houses' approach to political commentary," Lili Loofbourow said at The Washington Post. His opening salvo, that Joe Biden and Donald Trump both "are super, super old," was "low-hanging fruit," James Poniewozik said at The New York Times. But it served notice that while "you may have spent years wishing that Stewart would come back to dunk on your antagonists," he will also "joke about things you wish he wouldn't." What next? Stewart will host Monday nights through the 2024 election. He established quickly that he "didn't want to be captive to his most vehement viewers' expectations," Poniewozik said. "We'll see going forward if he's willing to tell them what he really thinks, even at the risk that they might agree with him."     On this day February 14, 1849 President James K. Polk becomes the first sitting U.S. president to have his photograph taken. Polk sat in New York City for the portrait, taken by photographer Matthew Brady. There is some evidence that President William Henry Harrison may have been photographed before this, but that photo has never been found.     TODAY’S newspaperS ['Snow alone']( It may be frigid in the Northeast, but "the cold truth for Valentine's Day" is that Philadelphia is "a city of singles," the Philadelphia Daily News says on Wednesday's front page. It's not just Philly, The Wall Street Journal reports. "More people are unattached" across the U.S. — and "that's good for Valentine's Day." ► [See the newspaper front pages](     It's not all bad Tai chi, a gentle Chinese martial art, is more effective at lowering high blood pressure than aerobic exercise, a new study has found. Researchers in China divided 342 people with high blood pressure into two groups, with one practicing tai chi and the other doing aerobic exercise such as jogging or cycling. Measured at six and 12 months, the tai chi group's average blood pressure dropped by 7.1 points, while the aerobic group's fell by only 4.61 points.   Advertisement by Betterment [Betterment is the automated investing app that puts your money to work](   Under the radar [The demise of Greyhound bus stations is a problem]( Intercity buses were once the preeminent travel method in the United States, and there is one company that dominated the space: Greyhound Lines. And while the company still serves 2,300 destinations across North America, there has been a clear decline in Greyhound bus stations. The aftereffects of Covid-19 are at least partially to blame. The pandemic, with its "social-distancing imperatives and calls for fresh, circulated air, decimated the industry," said National Geographic. However, the true culprit is a combination of several factors, including "high operating costs [and] government underfunding," said CNN. And while the Greyhound buses themselves "offer power, Wi-Fi and free movies to laptop-toting riders," said NPR, this has not helped the bus stations, which are often in states of dilapidation. A key factor in the decline of the bus stations is Greyhound's decision to sell an increasing number of them to investment groups. In 2022, Twenty Lake Holdings bought 33 Greyhound stations for $140 million, then began "putting a portion of its property up for sale," said NPR. The erasure of Greyhound's once-boundless station network is troublesome. Many of Greyhound's customers "rely on buses for essential travel during emergencies or in areas without alternative transit options," said National Geographic. The solution is "for the public sector to establish a central hub for intercity travel that also connects to the local transit system," Joseph Schwieterman, a DePaul University bus travel expert, told Governing magazine. But if stations continue to shutter, "low-income groups, immigrants and travelers with mobility impairments will take it on the chin and feel the worst of it."     Tall tale Marked for marriage … Anytime Sara Graham wants to remember how her fiancé, Joe Murray, proposed, all she has to do is look at his thigh. Murray went to a tattoo parlor in England and had a cartoon version of the couple inked on his skin, along with the words "Marry me then …" with "yes" and "no" boxes below. In his proposal, Murray dropped his pants and popped the question. Graham said yes and used the tattoo gun to check off the corresponding box.     Later today Whatever holidays you mark today — or don't — you can always take a second to remember what you have. And as the days get longer, you might also think of the things you want to do with your valuable time. If you're open to ideas, today's Evening Review profiles seven unusual museums in cities you may already want to visit. Thanks for reading, Peter     Morning Report was written and edited by Catherine Garcia, Justin Klawans, Harold Maass and Peter Weber, with illustrations by Stephen Kelly and Julia Wytrazek. Image credits, from top: Jeenah Moon / Bloomberg via Getty Images; Frederic J. Brown / AFP via Getty Images; Michael Greenberg / CBS via Getty Images ; Eileen T. Meslar / Chicago Tribune / Tribune News Service via Getty Images   © Future US, Inc • [theweek.com]( [Unsubscribe from this newsletter]( [Privacy Policy]( The Week is published by Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, New York, NY, 10036.