This week I posted an updated ranking of the top 25 prospects in the minors and my second mock draft for 2015. I also held yet another Klawchat this week, still focusing on the draft.
And now, this week’s links… 
- A bipartisan editorial from Newt Gingrich and Van Jones calling for better treatment options for mentally ill nonviolent criminals. I couldn’t agree with this any more.
- Twitter finally grew a spine and banned serial rules violator Chuck C. Johnson, who outed a rape victim and still was allowed to remain on the service.
- Kansas has become a real political backwater, with their latest stunt the paternalistic $25 daily limit on welfare recipients’ withdrawals. The legislators supporting this awful law cite anecdotal evidence of waste rather than relying on research that gives the contrary conclusion.
- If you can’t accept the reality of climate change, perhaps the fear of the extinction of coffee will get to you? That BBC piece details some of the efforts to breed hardier coffee plants that can adapt to a warming planet.
- Still in denial? How about the loss of so much ice in Antarctica that it may be shifting the Earth’s gravitational field?
- Bill Gates talked to Vox about the inevitable global flu pandemic, with a lot of additional reporting on the how, why, and maybe what we can do about it.
- A funny take on helicopter versus free range parenting.
- A fair question on why there isn’t more media coverage of Atlanta Hawks guard Thabo Sefolosha missing the playoffs because he was attacked by NYPD officers. You’d think an assault on a famous person of color would at least get the media’s attention.
- Longread of the week: Atul Gawande, author of The Checklist Manifesto
