Often what is recovered is no more than a pile of bones.

Agency heads who disagree with the DNI’s findings are free to submit dissenting views, but—again if his first term is anything to go by—Trumpov isn’t interested in such subtleties; he wants the consensus view only and, even then, boiled down to no more than a page or two.

For the leaders of today’s cultural industries, films, TV series, albums, even books seem to be no more than widgets on an algorithmic assembly line, as fungible as yards of textile or gauges of steel.

“Despite a period from the 1990s through the early 2000s when medical research suggested drinking red wine can be beneficial, no more than 25% of U.S. adults have ever seen drinking as good for one’s health.”

In the five non-pandemic seasons preceding last year, the difference in average road attendance between the top-ranked and second-ranked MLB team was no more than 3%.