US lawmakers agree to issue stimulus payments of $600 and distribute a federal unemployment benefit of $300 for 11 weeks. / The New York Times, The Washington Post

Moderna’s Covid vaccine begins rolling out. / Reuters

The CDC says that adults 75 and older, as well as frontline essential workers, be designated the next group to be vaccinated. / STAT

We should know in June whether the vaccine prevents asymptomatic infections, or if we need to continue wearing masks. / DukeHealth

Coronavirus infections and deaths in the US are skyrocketing heading into Christmas week. / CNN

Related: More than a million people passed through security checkpoints at US airports on both Friday and Saturday. / The Hill

Multiple European countries ban passenger air travel from the UK, for fear of a new strain of the coronavirus that is up to 70% more transmissible than other variants. / Quartz, BBC News

Do you need to worry about mutant viruses at the moment? Not really. / Those Nerdy Girls

How China’s “army of paid internet trolls” helped censor the coronavirus. / ProPublica

The load of invisible labor is especially high for women during the holidays, particularly during a pandemic. / The 19th 

See also: “Do Celebrities Know What Sexism Is?” / Jezebel

A white lady calls the police on her Black neighbors. Six months later, they still share a property line. / New York Magazine

A Black woman is leading Bermuda for the first time in the island's history. / Motivation.Africa

The United States takes Sudan off its list of “state sponsors of terrorism” after 27 years. / Reuters

Putin praises the Russian intelligence agency that was implicated in the massive US government hack. / The Week

President Trump has been thinking of naming conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell to be a special counsel overseeing an investigation of voter fraud. Advisors are freaked. / The New York Times, Twitter

A statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was removed from the US Capitol. / The Hill

An oral history of the world’s biggest coupon, Bed Bath & Beyond’s “Big Blue” mailer. / The New York Times

Related/unrelated: “Slack Is the Right Tool for the Wrong Way to Work.” / The New Yorker

How Instagrammy cookware got so popular. / Vox

Nisha Chattal rounds up all of the best recipes she cooked this year. / Nisha’s Internet Tote Bag

Photographer spotlight: New York’s Courtney Sofiah Yates. / BOOOOOOOM

And in case you forgot, as we learned back in May, social distancing can be cute when it involves stuffed capybaras. / Spoon & Tamago

Headline of the week: “The Obsessive Life and Mysterious Death of the Fisherman Who Discovered the Loch Ness Monster.” / Narratively