Red, Blue and Broke

By GAIL COLLINS
NYT

Good news! The giant Palouse earthworm of the American plains is not extinct.

Nobody had seen a Palouse worm since the 1980s, but it appears they were around all the time, going about their business underground. As Jim Robbins reported in The Times, spunky scientists from the University of Idaho recently located two by burying electrodes that sent shock waves through the ground and encouraged the worms to shoot up to the surface.

Good work, University of Idaho scientists! We’re all happy to hear the giant Palouse earthworms are still with us. Even though it turns out that they’re actually not all that big.

I am telling you this because my actual topic today is state legislatures. We all know how hard it is to keep anyone’s attention when discussion veers off in this direction, so, yeah, I was going for a cheap thrill.

(More here.)