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John Roberts has been working to neuter the Voting Rights Act since the beginning of his career

John Roberts has been working to neuter the Voting Rights Act since the beginning of his career

David Daley writes: In 1982, when the Voting Rights Act was up for reauthorization, the Reagan Justice Department had a goal: preserve the VRA in name only, while rendering it unenforceable in practice. A young John Roberts was the architect of that campaign. He may soon get to finish what he started. Last month, at the oral argument in Louisiana v. Callais, a majority of the conservative justices seemed to signal their willingness to forbid any use of race data…

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The goal of AI development is ownership of the means of thinking

The goal of AI development is ownership of the means of thinking

Matthew B. Crawford writes: As near as one can tell, the business rationale for artificial intelligence rests on the hope that it will substitute for human judgment and discretion. Given the role of big data in training AI systems, and the enormous concentrations of capital they require to develop, the AI revolution will extend the logic of oligopoly into cognition. What appears to be at stake, ultimately, is ownership of the means of thinking. This will have implications for class…

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‘I didn’t vote for this’: DOGE cuts for public lands are waking a sleeping political giant in Montana

‘I didn’t vote for this’: DOGE cuts for public lands are waking a sleeping political giant in Montana

Cassidy Randall writes: The road to the tiny hamlet of Marion in northwest Montana is lined with the thick trees of the Flathead National Forest, with modern homesteads of trailers and modest homes dotting clearings here and there. Outside a timber frame café called the Hilltop Hitching Post, one of the only gathering spots for Marion’s population of less than 1,200, hunter Terry Zink pulled up in a dusty, well-used F-150 pickup and got out wearing a camo jacket against…

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People are ditching a life led on screens for the real thing

People are ditching a life led on screens for the real thing

John Harris writes: If 2025 has had any kind of defining cultural theme, it perhaps boils down to people’s increasing sense that a life completely beholden to screens is no life at all. To this, add two connected trends: a drop in millions of people’s use of social media, and a rising yearning for experiences that are more authentic. This is not, just to be clear, any kind of suggestion that we are about to reject digital technology and wind…

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How ‘brain cleaning’ while we sleep may lower our risk of dementia

How ‘brain cleaning’ while we sleep may lower our risk of dementia

nopparit/Getty By Julia Chapman, Macquarie University; Camilla Hoyos, Macquarie University, and Craig Phillips, Macquarie University The brain has its own waste disposal system – known as the glymphatic system – that’s thought to be more active when we sleep. But disrupted sleep might hinder this waste disposal system and slow the clearance of waste products or toxins from the brain. And researchers are proposing a build-up of these toxins due to lost sleep could increase someone’s risk of dementia. There…

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Intoxicated by their wealth, power, and insularity, the billionaires are unprepared for a societal backlash

Intoxicated by their wealth, power, and insularity, the billionaires are unprepared for a societal backlash

Michael Hirschorn writes: An ever-more-stratified scale of luxury allows the staggeringly rich to avoid coming into contact with even the merely wealthy, let alone the rest of the world, “to glide through a rarefied realm unencumbered by the inconveniences of ordinary life,” as The Wall Street Journal reported. Chuck Collins, who gave away his family fortune and who now investigates inequality, describes it this way: “Wealth is a disconnection drug that keeps people apart from one another and from building…

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Wall Street sees AI bubble coming and is betting on what pops it

Wall Street sees AI bubble coming and is betting on what pops it

Bloomberg reports: It’s been three years since OpenAI set off euphoria over artificial intelligence with the release of ChatGPT. And while the money is still pouring in, so are the doubts about whether the good times can last. From a recent selloff in the shares of Nvidia Corp., to Oracle Corp.’s plunge after reporting mounting spending on AI, to souring sentiment around a network of companies exposed to OpenAI, signs of skepticism are increasing. Looking to 2026, the debate among…

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Germany’s Chancellor Merz compares Putin to Hitler: ‘He won’t stop’

Germany’s Chancellor Merz compares Putin to Hitler: ‘He won’t stop’

Politico reports: Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz compared Russian President Vladimir Putin to Adolf Hitler in a speech Saturday evening, warning that the Kremlin leader’s ambitions won’t stop with Ukraine. “Just as the Sudetenland was not enough in 1938, Putin will not stop,” Merz said, referring to a part of Czechoslovakia that the Allies ceded to the Nazi leader with an agreement. Hitler continued his expansion into Europe after that. “If Ukraine falls, he won’t stop there,” Merz said, referring to…

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Cuba denounces U.S. seizure of oil tanker off Venezuela’s coast as ‘piracy’

Cuba denounces U.S. seizure of oil tanker off Venezuela’s coast as ‘piracy’

The Guardian reports: Cuban officials have denounced the US seizure of the Skipper oil tanker off Venezuela’s coast on Wednesday, calling it an “act of piracy and maritime terrorism” as well as a “serious violation of international law” that hurts the Caribbean island nation and its people. “This action is part of the US escalation aimed at hampering Venezuela’s legitimate right to freely use and trade its natural resources with other nations, including the supplies of hydrocarbons to Cuba,” the…

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American contractors vie to rebuild Gaza, with ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ team in the lead

American contractors vie to rebuild Gaza, with ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ team in the lead

The Guardian reports: Trump administration insiders and well-connected Republican businesses have been jostling to dominate pending humanitarian aid and reconstruction logistics in the shattered Gaza Strip, according to sources and documents reviewed by the Guardian. With three-quarters of Gaza’s structures damaged or destroyed by two years of Israeli strikes, the rebuilding effort to come – estimated at $70bn by the United Nations – could be a rich prize for companies that specialize in construction, demolition, transportation and logistics. But there’s…

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Praise for Syrian-Australian man who tackled Bondi Beach shooter

Praise for Syrian-Australian man who tackled Bondi Beach shooter

Middle East Eye reports: Praise has flowed in for a Syrian-Australian businessman who tackled the Bondi Beach gunman during his rampage at a Hanukkah event on Saturday that left at least 11 dead. Ahmed al-Ahmed, a 43-year-old fruit shop owner from Idlib in northern Syria, was shot twice while confronting the attacker but managed to grab the shotgun off him and aimed it at the shooter as he retreated. Video showed Ahmed ducking behind a car before jumping at the…

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White-supremacist influencer, Nick Fuentes, is laying the groundwork to go even bigger

White-supremacist influencer, Nick Fuentes, is laying the groundwork to go even bigger

Ali Breland writes: Before each episode of America First With Nicholas J. Fuentes begins, a surreal mix of images and video clips runs, like a screen saver, for an unpredictable and seemingly eternal amount of time. Gentle plains of swaying grass, trickling streams, and the show’s logo flash across the screen. EDM kicks in. Psychedelic depictions of Christian imagery, including Jesus’s crucifixion, come and go. So do snippets of Fuentes talking about, among other things, borders, drag queens, and his…

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New Yorkers band together to protect street vendors from ICE

New Yorkers band together to protect street vendors from ICE

The Guardian reports: On a December day when temperatures dipped below 20 degrees, Street Vendor Project staff walked along a busy commercial street in the Bronx, handing out “know your rights” information to vendors selling fruits and vegetables. Several vendors mentioned they were scared after watching videos of immigration raids across the city. “We used to go around helping vendors apply for permits so they wouldn’t get fined,” said Eric Nava-Pérez, Street Vendor Project’s Spanish-speaking member organizer. “But now, we’re…

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Federal grand jury indicts Cincinnati ICE officer for sexually assaulting immigrants under his care

Federal grand jury indicts Cincinnati ICE officer for sexually assaulting immigrants under his care

CityBeat reports: A former Cincinnati-based officer with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency was indicted Dec. 8 for allegedly sexually assaulting detained immigrants under his care. Documents from the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of Ohio show that Andrew Golobic, 51, was arrested Dec. 7 for allegedly coercing sex from vulnerable immigrants. Golobic was an ICE officer between 2006 and 2020, operating from the agency’s office in Blue Ash. A federal grand jury charged Golobic with…

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