Las Vegas has long been known as Sin City for its 24/7 access to all kinds of indecencies.
America is quickly becoming Sin Nation. Or, as President Trump put it while discussing prediction markets in the Oval Office last month: "The whole world, unfortunately, has become somewhat of a casino."
Why it matters: Once-forbidden vices — weed, gambling and porn — are no longer confined to back alleys or the desert.
They're ubiquitous, digital and spreading at a pace that has outstripped the country's social and regulatory guardrails.
Governments didn't turn a blind eye to most of this behavior. They encouraged it. We're scaling sin in real time.
This shift in American governance, both at the national and local levels, didn't play out all at once — or get kick-started by a singular moment. It happened in a thousand small ones, one app launch and regulatory retreat at a time.
New York Times columnist Ross Douthat made sense of our "more immoral society" this way: "As our laws have become less moralistic and more libertarian, addictive behaviors have increased."
Substacker Derek Thompson points out that in a 2023 Wall Street Journal poll, Americans said patriotism, religion, having children and community all mattered less to them than in years prior. The only metric that mattered more? Money.
The biggest factors that ushered in our more addicted, money-hungry America:
1. Smoking weed. Not long ago, you might've gone to jail for using pot, much less selling it. Now, it's legal for a vast swath of Americans and serves as a primary tax engine for nearly half the country.
24 states plus D.C. have legalized recreational marijuana, with 40 states allowing medical use.
The Trump administration ordered the reclassification of medical marijuana as a Schedule III drug last month, moving it from alongside heroin and ecstasy to the same category as steroids and ketamine.
States have collected nearly $25 billion in cannabis tax revenue since the first legal sales began in 2014, according to the Marijuana Policy Project — with 2024 alone setting a record at $4.4 billion. California topped $1 billion by itself.
2. Betting. There's no reason to visit a sportsbook when you have one in your pocket. That lack of friction is destroying the lives — and arguably the morality — of countless young Americans, even as it fills state coffers.
More than half of American men ages 18-49 have an account with an online sportsbook, per a Siena poll out last month. 63% of bettors said they'd bet $100 or more in one day. 31% reported having someone express concern about their sports betting, up from 23% last year.
A UCLA study found bankruptcy rates and debt collection amounts rose in states that legalized sports betting — with young men in low-income areas hit hardest.
Prediction markets have raised the stakes beyond sports. They're not technically gambling — that's what their founders say, even as the public and some state prosecutors disagree. But their purview goes far beyond prop bets: You can now put money on chaos and destruction, gamifying the outcome of war. The money at stake is huge: April saw a 1,200% year-over-year increase in trading volume for Polymarket and Kalshi combined, per The Wall Street Journal.
3. Porn — and its AI-generated shadow. Online pornography was already ubiquitous before AI. Now, deepfake technology has created an entirely new category of harm that barely existed two years ago.
The average age of first exposure to online pornography is now 12, with 15% of kids first seeing it at 10 or younger, according to a Common Sense Media survey of 1,300+ teens.
AI is making it worse: Deepfake files online exploded from 500,000 in 2023 to an estimated 8 million by the end of last year, with up to 98% being nonconsensual, according to cybersecurity firm DeepStrike.
Trump signed the TAKE IT DOWN Act last year, criminalizing the posting of nonconsensual intimate images, including AI deepfakes. But the law can't keep pace with the scale: A company named in a recent lawsuit claims to create 1,000 AI-generated "influencers" per week.
The big picture: This is what happens when all three of the tectonic shifts we've told you about — in governance, in the post-news era, in the age of AI — collide at once.
AI is supercharging the supply, creating deepfakes at a pace no law can match. Our shattered information ecosystem means there's no common authority left to set norms or apply social pressure. The government, rather than policing the line, has become the cashier.
Each shift alone would strain our culture. Together, they've created Sin Nation.
What's next: There's potential for political agreement that some portion of America's scaling of sin might have been too much, too fast.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) posted on X in March: "Pervasive gambling is not good for society. It turns life into a casino, traps people in addiction & debt, surges domestic violence, and fosters manipulation."
Sweeping changes that congressional Republicans made to the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid are starting to take effect, fueling an election-year blame game over coverage losses.
Why it matters: A rise in the uninsured rate will put more stress on the health system and ratchet up concerns about health costs in an election year where affordability is voters' biggest concern.
Driving the news: The changes are hitting home, with about 1.2 million fewer people signed up for ACA coverage compared with a year ago, following Congress' refusal to extend enhanced subsidies.
Nebraska this month also became the first state to impose new work requirements on Medicaid recipients who enrolled under the ACA expansion.
By the numbers: Wakely Consulting Group found that 14% of enrollees did not pay their first ACA premium in January. It estimated that 2026 enrollment will end up being 17% to 26% lower than last year.
Insurers in some states are reporting drops in enrollment as high as 20% to 30%, while other states are stepping in to offer additional financial help to limit the losses, according to an insurance industry source.
What they're saying: "We don't have full data yet but all signs point to a substantial drop in enrollment with the expiration of the enhanced premium subsidies," said Larry Levitt, executive vice president for health policy at KFF, estimating "several million" fewer enrollees.
The coverage losses already are seeping into campaign messaging ahead of the midterm elections as Democrats try to flip control of the House.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee took aim at Rep. Nick Begich (R-Alaska) last week for voting against extending the enhanced ACA tax credits, saying premiums have risen 58% on average.
It similarly targeted Colorado GOP Reps. Jeff Crank and Gabe Evans for their votes to cut Medicaid in last year's Republican tax-and-spending bill and refusal to extend ACA subsidies.
Other ads in competitive House districts predict a "health care crisis" unleashed by the cuts will cost GOP incumbents their seats.
"Simply extending taxpayer subsidies deeper into the same broken system does not lower the actual cost of care," said a Begich spokesperson, adding the congressman wants to "address the underlying drivers of health care costs," paired with subsidies.
"Citizenship verification and work requirements for able-bodied adults with no dependents or elderly parents in their care will only strengthen and sustain Medicaid for the long term," said a Crank spokesperson.
Between the lines: The ACA's Medicaid expansion could be an ongoing story through Election Day as more states implement work requirements ahead of a Jan. 1 deadline.
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimated that 20,000 people in Nebraska could lose coverage from the work requirements, or nearly 30% of the state's Medicaid expansion population.
Advocates worry many people are in fact working but unaware of the new rules, or unable to verify that they are fulfilling the requirements.
"It's really that red tape that's the problem, and it's what causes people to lose coverage," said Sarah Maresh, health care access program director at Nebraska Appleseed, a nonprofit involved in access to health care.
The other side: Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen (R) said the requirements will "help Nebraskans achieve greater self-sufficiency through employment," when he announced his state would put the rules in effect more than half a year before the deadline.
"Working not only provides purpose but helps people become active, productive members of their communities."
Reality check: Even with the dropoff in ACA marketplaces, signups are higher than they have been in many previous years.
23.1 million people signed up for 2026. That is down from the record high of 24.3 million in 2025 — though the number is expected to fall by several million as people drop out due to higher premiums.
But enrollment will likely still be well above the numbers from before the enhanced subsidies were first passed in 2021, when there were around 12 million enrollees.
"Once people get coverage, there's a certain momentum, and they try to keep it even if their premiums go up," Levitt said.
A spokesperson for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services pointed to anti-fraud efforts as an explanation for lower sign-up numbers.
2026 signups were "only slightly below 2025 levels" and the drop could reflect "addressing unauthorized or fraudulent enrollments," as well as identifying individuals who may have been enrolled in multiple forms of coverage, the spokesperson said.
Republicans argued during the debate over extending the enhanced subsidies that they were wasteful spending that benefited insurance companies.
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., when pressed on the lapse during recent congressional testimony, noted that original ACA subsidies remain in place. He said 87% of ACA enrollees are paying less than $96 a month.
While the miner said bitcoin remains its operational foundation, first-quarter results point to a company increasingly built around power, data centers and AI demand.
The AI firm says investors should assume indirect access to its private shares is invalid, and transfers of its stock or interests in its stock will not be recognized.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer vowed to continue in office as he met with cabinet members. Dozens of Labour Party lawmakers had urged him to step down after heavy losses in local elections.
A federal program that pays airlines to operate in small and rural communities could have its budget cut in half, leaving parts of the country with no flight options.
Israel sent Iron Dome anti-missile batteries and personnel to operate them to the United Arab Emirates to defend the country during the Iran war, the U.S. ambassador to the country said Tuesday.
Most Americans see China as one of the United States' biggest rivals or adversaries, but largely as an economic threat, according to a new Chicago Council/NPR/Ipsos poll.
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