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China’s spies are waging an intensifying espionage offensive against the U.S.

China’s spies are waging an intensifying espionage offensive against the U.S.

Mike Giglio reports: In early 2017, Kevin Mallory was struggling financially. After years of drawing a government salary as a member of the military and as a CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency officer, he was behind on his mortgage and $230,000 in debt. Though he had, like many veteran intelligence officials, ventured into the private sector, where the pay can be considerably better, things still weren’t going well; his consulting business was floundering. Then, prosecutors said, he received a message…

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Universal emotions are the basis of our profound affinity with other animals

Universal emotions are the basis of our profound affinity with other animals

Stephen T Asma and Rami Gabriel: Charles Darwin closed his On the Origin of Species (1870) with a provocative promise that ‘light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history’. In his later books The Descent of Man (1871) and The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals (1872), Darwin shed some of that promised light, especially on the evolved emotional and cognitive capacities that humans shared with other mammals. In one scandalous passage, he demonstrated that…

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Bolsonaro ‘most detested’ leader as he neglects the Amazon, says Brazil’s former environment minister

Bolsonaro ‘most detested’ leader as he neglects the Amazon, says Brazil’s former environment minister

The Guardian reports: Jair Bolsonaro’s neglect of the Amazon has made him “the most despised and detested leader” on earth, Brazil’s former environment minister has claimed, as the far-right leader again rebuked French president Emmanuel Macron for challenging his environmental record. Rubens Ricupero warned Bolsonaro was wreaking havoc on both Brazil’s environment and its global standing, as Bolsonaro used Facebook to scold Macron’s “inappropriate and gratuitous attacks” over the Amazon fires and insult France’s first lady. “These people are lunatics,”…

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Network of Trump allies pursue vendetta against journalists and political opponents of the president

Network of Trump allies pursue vendetta against journalists and political opponents of the president

The New York Times reports: A loose network of conservative operatives allied with the White House is pursuing what they say will be an aggressive operation to discredit news organizations deemed hostile to President Trump by publicizing damaging information about journalists. It is the latest step in a long-running effort by Mr. Trump and his allies to undercut the influence of legitimate news reporting. Four people familiar with the operation described how it works, asserting that it has compiled dossiers…

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When the internet chases you from your home

When the internet chases you from your home

Sarah Jeong writes: On the night of Aug. 15, 2014, Zoë Quinn was out having a drink with some friends in San Francisco when her phone began to blow up with messages. Something was exploding on the internet — a strange, incoherent maelstrom of outrage that would take over her life. Ms. Quinn, a 27-year-old video game developer, lived in Boston and was in San Francisco only to visit, but the visit turned into exile. “I never went home from…

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Syria and the West’s shameful failure to act

Syria and the West’s shameful failure to act

An editorial in The Observer says: The crisis in Syria does not feature high on the agenda at this weekend’s G7 summit in Biarritz. The absence of two key players – Russia and Turkey – means any substantive initiatives are unlikely. Donald Trump has washed his hands of the conflict, although Pentagon chiefs are resisting his demand to withdraw all US forces. European leaders, beset by many other urgent problems, seem to prefer not to think about Syria at all….

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Nearly 900,000 asylum seekers living in limbo in EU, figures show

Nearly 900,000 asylum seekers living in limbo in EU, figures show

The Guardian reports: Close to 900,000 asylum seekers in the EU are waiting to have their claims processed, according to figures from the European statistics office. Women, men and unaccompanied children are living for years in uncertainty, with numbers of pending applications for international protection almost unchanged from two years ago when 1.1 million migrants were “stuck” in the continent. “Living in limbo is now the norm for those seeking protection,” said Karl Kopp of Pro Asyl, Germany’s largest pro-immigration…

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What does a traffic jam in Atlanta have to do with segregation? Quite a lot

What does a traffic jam in Atlanta have to do with segregation? Quite a lot

Kevin M. Kruse writes: Atlanta has some of the worst traffic in the United States. Drivers there average two hours each week mired in gridlock, hung up at countless spots, from the constantly clogged Georgia 400 to a complicated cluster of overpasses at Tom Moreland Interchange, better known as “Spaghetti Junction.” The Downtown Connector — a 12-to-14-lane megahighway that in theory connects the city’s north to its south — regularly has three-mile-long traffic jams that last four hours or more….

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Seattle has figured out how to end the war on drugs

Seattle has figured out how to end the war on drugs

Nicholas Kristof writes: On gritty streets where heroin, fentanyl and meth stride like Death Eaters, where for decades both drugs and the war on drugs have wrecked lives, the city of Seattle is pioneering a bold approach to narcotics that should be a model for America. Anyone caught here with a small amount of drugs — even heroin — isn’t typically prosecuted. Instead, that person is steered toward social services to get help. This model is becoming the consensus preference…

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Music: Arve Henriksen — ‘Height of the Reeds in the Wetlands’

Music: Arve Henriksen — ‘Height of the Reeds in the Wetlands’

    John Eyles writes: For the year 2017, Hull, a northern port on the east coast of England, was selected as the UK City of Culture. This led to the city commissioning or organising a series of artistic and cultural events throughout the year. One such event was the commissioned work “The Height of the Reeds” which celebrated the long seafaring relationship between Hull and Scandinavia. Composed by the Norwegians Arve Henriksen, Eivind Aarset and Jan Bang, for three…

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The Amazon fires are more dangerous than WMDs

The Amazon fires are more dangerous than WMDs

Franklin Foer writes: When Jair Bolosonaro won Brazil’s presidential election last year, having run on a platform of deforestation, David Wallace-Wells asked, “How much damage can one person do to the planet?” Bolsonaro didn’t pour lighter fluid to ignite the flames now ravishing the Amazon, but with his policies and rhetoric, he might as well have. The destruction he inspired—and allowed to rage with his days of stubborn unwillingness to douse the flames—has placed the planet at a hinge moment…

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Trump claims he has ‘absolute right’ to order U.S. companies out of China under 1977 law

Trump claims he has ‘absolute right’ to order U.S. companies out of China under 1977 law

CNN reports: President Donald Trump claimed he has the “absolute right” to “order” US companies to stop doing business with China that would involve using his broad executive authority in a new and unprecedented way under a 1977 law. On Friday, China unveiled a new round of retaliatory tariffs on about $75 billion worth of US goods, the latest escalation in an on-going trade war that’s putting a strain on the world’s two largest economies. In response, Trump wrote on…

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Iraqis, bristling over Israeli airstrike, renew call for U.S. troops to get out

Iraqis, bristling over Israeli airstrike, renew call for U.S. troops to get out

The Los Angeles Times reports: News that Israel was behind airstrikes in Iraq has reinvigorated calls to oust U.S. forces from the country. A U.S. official confirmed Friday that Israel had struck a base for the Hashd al Shaabi, an umbrella group of Shiite-dominated militias also known as the Popular Mobilization Forces, many with deep links to Iran. Two Iranian commanders were reported killed in the attack, which occurred in July. It was unclear whether Israel was behind three other…

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On the Irish border lanes of Fermanagh, the bad old days are returning

On the Irish border lanes of Fermanagh, the bad old days are returning

The Observer reports: Boris Johnson vowed to preserve peace in Northern Ireland during diplomatic forays to Germany and France last week, saying “under no circumstances” would the UK put checks and controls on the border. The prime minister’s reassurance did not reach the narrow lanes and hedgerows of County Fermanagh. Here it felt like the bad old days had already returned. A helicopter and surveillance aircraft criss-crossed grey skies over the village of Newtownbutler, while in the fields below police…

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How Britain has drifted towards a ‘no-deal Brexit’

How Britain has drifted towards a ‘no-deal Brexit’

Helen Lewis writes: Brexit isn’t what it used to be. In the months immediately after Britain voted to leave the European Union in 2016, two flavors were on offer—“hard” and “soft.” A soft Brexit generally meant leaving the bloc’s political structures but not its economic ones, such as the single market for goods and services. The hard version meant leaving those, too. Crucially, both versions would see Britain formally agree to a new relationship with the EU. “In the summer…

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