Weekend reads: 11 of the best premium syndicator pieces

US voters cast their ballots on election day. Photo / AP

Welcome to the weekend.

Settle down with a cuppa and catch up on some of the best content from our premium syndicators this week.

Happy reading.

A vote that flew in the face of fear itself

Struggling through one of the most devastating years in US history, a year of strife and suffering and loss, the nation's people responded with resolve on the first Tuesday of November. Together but apart, they voted.

Undaunted by a pandemic that worsens by the day, they showed up in the early-morning snow outside the clapboard town offices of Newbury, New Hampshire. Formed a shivering line into a gymnasium in Tobyhanna, Pennsylvania. Waited their turn in an elementary school in Louisville, Kentucky; a public housing complex in Houston; a recreation centre in Garden Grove, California; a bowling alley in Mandan, North Dakota.

They provided final punctuation to the 100 million votes already cast through mail-in ballots and in-person early voting, the crest to a tidal wave of turnout.

The New York Times looks at how on Election Day, anxiety was the great uniter, and motivator.

Riders made their way to the polls in Kayenta, Arizona, part of the Navajo Nation. Photo / Sharon Chischilly, The New York Times

In hunt for virus source, WHO let China take charge

On a cold weekend in mid-February, when the world still harboured false hope that the new coronavirus could be contained, a World Health Organisation team arrived in Beijing to study the outbreak and investigate a critical question: How did the virus jump from animals to humans?

What the team members did not know was that they would not be allowed to investigate the source at all.

The New York Times looks at how WHO may have sacrificed the best chance to unravel the virus's origins.

Workers move out the body of a Covid-19 victim in a hospital in Wuhan. Photo / Getty Images

The polls underestimated Trump - again. Nobody agrees on why

As the results rolled in Tuesday night, so did a strong sense of déjà vu. Pre election polls, it appeared, had been misleading once again.

No matter the result, it was already clear that the industry failed to fully account for the missteps that led it to underestimate Donald Trump's support four years ago. And it raises the question of whether the polling industry, which has become a national fixation in an era of data journalism and statistical forecasting, can survive yet another crisis of confidence.

The New York Times reports.

Workers in Detroit counted absentee ballots. Michigan was won by President Trump in 2016 after years of the state voting for Democratic candidates. Photo / Brittany Greeson, The New York Times

Her work once helped put them behind bars. Now she's defending them

Former top forensic scientist Sue Petricevic has traded in her lab coat for a barrister's gown to defend the people her work once helped to put behind bars.

After being a key expert witness for the Crown in horrific cases such as the 2001 RSA murders in Auckland, where she found killer William Bell's DNA on cigarette butts, and the 1996 hammer killing of Tania Furlan, in which she analysed blood spatter evidence, Petricevic says she's now finding the job of advocating for suspects more rewarding.

Petricevic talks to Donna Chisholm of the New Zealand Listener about her career shift.

Sue Petricevic has swapped her lab coat for a barrister's gown. Photo / Tony Nyberg, the New Zealand Listener

Life inside No 10: 'There's days when it's like Game of Thrones'

For the past two years Mark Sedwill was one of the most powerful men in the United Kingdom, advising the prime minister on affairs of state as the nation lurched from one crisis to another.

Not only did he have to deal with a country torn apart by Brexit and two very different prime ministers, but also a pandemic that left Boris Johnson battling for his life.

Sedwill tells The Times about life inside No 10.

Cabinet Secretary Mark Sedwill looks on as Prime Minister Boris Johnson chairs a meeting in July. Photo / Getty Images

How the Space Station became a base to launch humanity's future

On November 2, 2000, three astronauts docked at the International space station and began a four-and-a-half month stay in orbit.

Humans have been living off the planet ever since.

Initially derided as a poster child for government waste, the outpost in orbit is now seen as a linchpin for future economic activity in space.

On the 20th anniversary of the continuous occupation, The New York Times looks at the history of the ISS.

Stephen K. Robinson was anchored to the space station's Canadarm2 in 2005. Photo / NASA via The New York Times

Jane Clifton: Does Ardern's power come from her likeability?

It's beginning to look suspiciously as though New Zealanders really yearn for a sort of benign dictatorship.

Once again, we've gone for a voluntary one-party state – having soundly thrashed one of the minor parties we once elected for accountability and given the other one a hell of a fright.

Jane Clifton of the New Zealand Listener looks at how this election continues the Kiwi trend of choosing leaders based almost purely on how much we personally like them.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern. New Zealand has gone for a voluntary one-party state. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Inside the Nxivm sex cult and how the survivors escaped

To the outside world Nxivm was an exclusive wellbeing programme for the rich and famous. In reality it was a brutal and abusive sex cult.

Laura Pullman of The Times speaks to the men and women who escaped.

Barbara Bouchey is a former member of NXIVM, a brutal sex cult masquerading as a wellbeing retreat for the rich. Photo / Getty Images

Ten ways coronavirus crisis will shape world in long term

Covid-19 has had an immediate and massive impact. But how will it affect the longer term? That is far harder to tell.

What do we already know, after 10 months of Covid-19? We know that the world was ill-equipped to cope with a pandemic. It has caused about 1.1 million deaths worldwide, mostly among the elderly. Moreover, some countries have suppressed the disease far more successfully than others.

The Financial Times looks at the longer-term possibilities for the world as we continue to battle Covid-19.

Commuting may not go back to the pre-Covid status quo. Photo / Getty Images

The wine world's most elite circle has a sexual harassment problem

Master sommelier is the most prestigious title in American wine, and those who earn it instantly join the ranks of the highest-paid and most influential members of the profession.

Only 155 people have achieved the honour since the 1997 founding of the Americas chapter of the Court of Master Sommeliers, the examining body that confers the title on those who survive its gruelling, yearslong qualification process. Of those, 131 are men.

Many young women join the court's programme of mentorship and education in the hope of avoiding the sexist hazing that is notorious in the wine industry.

What they have encountered is very different.

Twenty-one women told The New York Times that they have been sexually harassed, manipulated or assaulted by male master sommeliers.

From left, Liz Mitchell, Jane Lopes, Victoria James and Courtney Schiessl say they experienced sexual harassment as candidates for the Court of Master Sommeliers. Photo / Kholood Eid, New York Times

Cardi B's WAP proves music's dirty secret: Censorship is good business

To an extent not seen in years, Cardi B's WAP has become something of a political lightning rod, decried by pearl-clutching commentators as being "vulgar".

Yet despite the song's uninhibited raunch, its popularity was partly earned from one of the music industry's oldest bugaboos: self-censorship.

The New York Times looks at how making clean versions of explicit songs means taking advantage of every possible revenue stream.

Songs with explicit lyrics fill streaming service playlists, but edited versions are still needed for radio, commercials and other outlets. Photo / Matt Chase, The New York Times