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Antarctica just hit a record low in sea ice — by a lot

Antarctica just hit a record low in sea ice — by a lot

The Washington Post reports: Sea ice levels around Antarctica just registered a record low — and by a wide margin — as winter comes to a close, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC). This significant milestone adds worry that Antarctic sea ice may be entering a state of decline brought on by climate change. Sign up for the Climate Coach newsletter and get advice for life on our changing planet, in your inbox every Tuesday and…

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Techno-fixes to climate change aren’t living up to the hype

Techno-fixes to climate change aren’t living up to the hype

The Verge reports: An updated road map for combating climate change pours cold water on the idea that unproven technologies can play a major role in averting disaster. Today, the International Energy Agency (IEA) updated its road map for the energy sector to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. It doubles down on the need to swiftly switch to renewable energy while minimizing the use of technologies that are still largely in demonstration and prototype phase today, including carbon…

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Under India’s pressure, Facebook let propaganda and hate speech thrive

Under India’s pressure, Facebook let propaganda and hate speech thrive

The Washington Post reports: Nearly three years ago, Facebook’s propaganda hunters uncovered a vast social media influence operation that used hundreds of fake accounts to praise the Indian army’s crackdown in the restive border region of Kashmir and accuse Kashmiri journalists of separatism and sedition. What they found next was explosive: The network was operated by the Indian army’s Chinar Corps, a storied unit garrisoned in the Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley, the heart of Indian Kashmir and one of the most…

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Judge rules Donald Trump defrauded banks, insurers while building real estate empire

Judge rules Donald Trump defrauded banks, insurers while building real estate empire

The Associated Press reports: A judge ruled Tuesday that Donald Trump committed fraud for years while building the real estate empire that catapulted him to fame and the White House. Judge Arthur Engoron, ruling in a civil lawsuit brought by New York’s attorney general, found that the former president and his company deceived banks, insurers and others by massively overvaluing his assets and exaggerating his net worth on paperwork used in making deals and securing financing. Engoron ordered that some…

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Trump’s lawyers urge judge to reject proposed gag order while Trump shows off a Glock

Trump’s lawyers urge judge to reject proposed gag order while Trump shows off a Glock

Politico reports: Donald Trump’s lawyers said Monday that a gag order proposed by prosecutors would unconstitutionally silence him during key months of the 2024 presidential campaign, urging a federal judge in Washington, D.C. to reject the proposed limits. In a 25-page filing that mirrored some of Trump’s own heated political rhetoric, Trump’s attorneys said the former president’s attacks on potential witnesses, special counsel Jack Smith and even U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan herself are protected by the First Amendment…

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The sick, racist message behind why Trump chose that particular gun store

The sick, racist message behind why Trump chose that particular gun store

The New Republic reports: During a campaign trip to South Carolina, Donald Trump took some time to visit the gun store that sold weapons to the racist Jacksonville, Florida, mass shooter. Trump visited Palmetto State Armory on Monday, where he admired a handgun engraved and decorated in his honor. He repeatedly said he wanted to buy a gun there—which would be a violation of federal law given his many indictments. A lot of the media has focused on whether Trump…

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Ralph Nader, fearing Trump and the GOP’s embrace of fascism, offers to help Joe Biden win

Ralph Nader, fearing Trump and the GOP’s embrace of fascism, offers to help Joe Biden win

The Washington Post reports: The liberal activist Ralph Nader still remembers nearly the exact words Joe Biden used to banish him from the U.S. Senate 23 years ago, after Nader’s Green Party presidential bid in 2000 won 97,000 votes in Florida. “Ralph Nader is not going to be welcome anywhere near the corridors,” then-senator Biden had declared, blaming the consumer advocate for Democrat Al Gore’s defeat to Republican George W. Bush. So began Nader’s long exile from Democratic Capitol Hill…

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Supreme Court delivers knockout blow to Alabama GOP in one-sentence ruling

Supreme Court delivers knockout blow to Alabama GOP in one-sentence ruling

The New Republic reports: The Supreme Court on Tuesday slapped down Alabama Republicans’ latest attempt to use a congressional district map that only includes one majority-Black district, delivering a major blow in just one sentence. This is the Supreme Court’s second such ruling in three months. Earlier this summer, the court struck down a similar GOP-drawn congressional map and ordered Alabama to add a second majority-Black district. But Alabama Republicans dug in their heels and approved a similarly problematic congressional…

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100 Jewish leaders call out Elon Musk for promoting antisemitism

100 Jewish leaders call out Elon Musk for promoting antisemitism

CBS News reports: A group of 100 Jewish leaders, including some prominent rabbis and academics, released a public letter criticizing X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, and its owner Elon Musk for enabling a “new stage of antisemetic discourse.” According to the letter, the group’s concerns began with Musk’s takeover of the site in October 2022. Musk has been criticized for allowing previously banned users back onto the platform, including Andrew Tate, Kanye West and some notorious…

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The five most eye-opening lines in the antitrust lawsuit against Amazon

The five most eye-opening lines in the antitrust lawsuit against Amazon

Politico reports: A heavily redacted, 172-page lawsuit reveals how Amazon allegedly orchestrated a long-running campaign to muscle out competitors from the online retail space by financially squeezing merchants who rely on its platform. It’s a landmark case that will cement the legacy of FTC Chair Lina Khan, who first gained public attention going after Amazon. It’s also a key pillar in the Biden administration’s push to curb the alleged monopoly power of the nation’s largest tech companies. “There is immediate…

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Trump floats the idea of executing Joint Chiefs chairman Milley

Trump floats the idea of executing Joint Chiefs chairman Milley

Brian Klaas writes: Late Friday night, the former president of the United States—and a leading candidate to be the next president—insinuated that America’s top general deserves to be put to death. That extraordinary sentence would be unthinkable in any other rich democracy. But Donald Trump, on his social-media network, Truth Social, wrote that Mark Milley’s phone call to reassure China in the aftermath of the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021, was “an act so egregious that, in…

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How America’s war devastated Afghanistan’s environment

How America’s war devastated Afghanistan’s environment

Lynzy Billing writes: Birds dip between low branches that hang over glittering brooks along the drive from Jalalabad heading south toward the Achin district of Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province. Then, the landscape changes, as lush fields give way to barren land. Up ahead, Achin is located among a rise of rocky mountains that line the border with Pakistan, a region pounded by American bombs since the beginning of the war. Laborers line the roadside, dusted with the white talc they have…

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Giant fracking is threatening America’s fragile aquifers

Giant fracking is threatening America’s fragile aquifers

The New York Times reports: Along a parched stretch of La Salle County, Texas, workers last year dug some 700 feet deep into the ground, seeking freshwater. Millions of gallons of it. The water wouldn’t supply homes or irrigate farms. It was being used by the petroleum giant BP to frack for fossil fuels. The water would be mixed with sand and toxic chemicals and pumped right back underground — forcing oil and gas from the bedrock. It was a…

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China is all about sovereignty. So why not Ukraine’s?

China is all about sovereignty. So why not Ukraine’s?

Michael Schuman writes: By Beijing’s reckoning, the U.S.-led global order is in turmoil, and a Washington in decline has no answers to the world’s mounting problems. Fortunately for the future of humanity, however, the Chinese leader Xi Jinping does. He would like to replace Washington’s “rules-based” world order with a framework of his own—one whose most sacred principle is national sovereignty, or the right of states to govern themselves, free from outside interference. In the world Xi envisions, nations will…

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