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In 2014, 3.4 million Americans lived within a mile of a mass shooting. By 2023 it was over 40 million

In 2014, 3.4 million Americans lived within a mile of a mass shooting. By 2023 it was over 40 million

CNN reports: For millions of Americans, mass shootings are hitting as close as one mile to home. Almost 42 million Americans – over one-eighth of the US population – are estimated to have lived within one mile of a mass shooting since 2014, according to an original CNN analysis of data from the Gun Violence Archive (GVA) and US Census Bureau. Mass shootings are happening both more frequently and in an increasing number of cities and towns across the country….

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NH attorney general ‘carefully reviewing’ arguments that could keep Trump off state’s ballot

NH attorney general ‘carefully reviewing’ arguments that could keep Trump off state’s ballot

Politico reports: The New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office is “carefully reviewing the legal issues involved” in a long-shot effort by some Republicans in the state to keep former President Donald Trump off the ballot in 2024, the office announced on Tuesday. Bryant “Corky” Messner — an attorney and prominent Republican who ran on Trump’s endorsement as the state’s 2020 U.S. Senate nominee — has publicly questioned Trump’s eligibility to run for president, citing Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. The…

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Judge Cannon seems to be preparing to kneecap Trump’s Florida documents case

Judge Cannon seems to be preparing to kneecap Trump’s Florida documents case

Liz Dye writes: Last year, Judge Aileen Cannon tried valiantly to derail the Justice Department’s investigation of Donald Trump’s retention of classified documents at his Florida country club. The unanimous conclusion among court watchers was that Judge Cannon, who was confirmed after Trump had already lost the 2020 election, put both thumbs and all eight fingers on the scale for the man who nominated her to the federal bench. She was only stopped by the intervention of the 11th Circuit,…

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‘It’s affirmative action for the rich.’ Five legacy students confront their privilege

‘It’s affirmative action for the rich.’ Five legacy students confront their privilege

  A lot of people have recently weighed in on legacy admissions, the preferential treatment given to the children of alumni in the college application process: President Biden. Members of Congress. Supreme Court justices. Officials at numerous colleges — some defending the practice, others calling to ditch it. The Education Department even opened a civil rights investigation last month into Harvard University’s legacy admissions policy. But what about the students who have benefited from the practice themselves, and were accepted…

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Hope is scarce in Syria’s ‘postwar’ reality

Hope is scarce in Syria’s ‘postwar’ reality

Layla Maghribi writes: “Have you seen the TikTok reels?” I groaned at the question a friend posed a few days before I traveled to Damascus. I had caught glimpses of the social media content created by certain traveler-influencer types but had largely avoided them to keep good humor. But as my first visit to my mother’s country in a few years approached, and I contemplated how I would perceive it, I found myself tempted to have a look at what…

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Did Iran have a role in triggering the suspension of Rob Malley’s security clearance?

Did Iran have a role in triggering the suspension of Rob Malley’s security clearance?

Politico reports: Republican lawmakers are calling for the State Department to probe how the Tehran Times, an Iranian state-run media outlet, obtained a purported memo informing U.S. Special Envoy for Iran Rob Malley that his security clearance was suspended. House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Mike McCaul (R-Texas), said Monday in a statement that Foggy Bottom “needs to do a top to bottom security review, because I am concerned they have a leak.” McCaul also touched on concerns that the Tehran…

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A basic form of numeracy is shared by countless creatures

A basic form of numeracy is shared by countless creatures

Brian Butterworth writes: You might think of counting as something that people do involving the words one, two, three and so on. But we don’t require the use of these words to enumerate a collection of objects. Indeed, some languages do not have long lists of counting words. In studies of children who speak languages with a smaller set of such words (eg, words for one, two, few and many), such as the Indigenous Australian language Warlpiri, my colleagues and I found that they were at least as accurate…

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Is the application of the Fourteenth Amendment just a fantasy?

Is the application of the Fourteenth Amendment just a fantasy?

David Frum writes: The Fourteenth Amendment won’t save us from Donald Trump. Eminent jurists are promising that it will. They argue that language in the Fourteenth Amendment, adopted after the Civil War, should debar the coup-plotting ex-president from appearing on a ballot for any office ever again. Their learning is undisputed. Their conclusions are another story. The project to disqualify Trump from running for president is misguided and dangerous. It won’t work. If it somehow could work, it would create…

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Conservative groups draw up plan to dismantle the U.S. government and replace it with Trump’s vision

Conservative groups draw up plan to dismantle the U.S. government and replace it with Trump’s vision

The Associated Press reports: With more than a year to go before the 2024 election, a constellation of conservative organizations is preparing for a possible second White House term for Donald Trump, recruiting thousands of Americans to come to Washington on a mission to dismantle the federal government and replace it with a vision closer to his own. Led by the long-established Heritage Foundation think tank and fueled by former Trump administration officials, the far-reaching effort is essentially a government-in-waiting…

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A shutdown wouldn’t halt Trump’s trials, so Republicans seek to rein in his prosecutors

A shutdown wouldn’t halt Trump’s trials, so Republicans seek to rein in his prosecutors

NBC News reports: Four criminal indictments of Donald Trump have ignited his followers and spurred his House Republican allies to try to use the upcoming government funding deadline of Sept. 30 as leverage to undermine the prosecutions. The bad news for them: A government shutdown wouldn’t halt the criminal proceedings against the former president. Trump’s indictments in New York and Georgia would not be affected, while his federal indictments — for allegedly mishandling classified documents and for his role in…

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Trump’s March trial date in D.C. is not budging, no matter what he tries

Trump’s March trial date in D.C. is not budging, no matter what he tries

Robert Katzberg writes: Donald Trump’s first lawyer and reviled early mentor, Roy Cohn, famously observed: “Don’t tell me what the law is, tell me who the judge is.” While Cohn was reportedly referring to the corruption then existing in the New York state judiciary, the quote only minimally overstates the courtroom reality even in today’s most ethical and respected courts of law—who the judge is generally is key to the outcome. That insight was reinforced this morning in when Judge…

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The Christian home-schooler who made ‘parental rights’ a GOP rallying cry

The Christian home-schooler who made ‘parental rights’ a GOP rallying cry

The Washington Post reports: The message Michael Farris had come to deliver was a simple one: The time to act was now. For decades, Farris — a conservative Christian lawyer who is the most influential leader of the modern home-schooling movement — had toiled at the margins of American politics. His arguments about the harms of public education and the divinely endowed rights of parents had left many unconvinced. Now, speaking on a confidential conference call to a secretive group…

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Overuse is draining and damaging aquifers nationwide

Overuse is draining and damaging aquifers nationwide

The New York Times reports: Groundwater loss is hurting breadbasket states like Kansas, where the major aquifer beneath 2.6 million acres of land can no longer support industrial-scale agriculture. Corn yields have plummeted. If that decline were to spread, it could threaten America’s status as a food superpower. Fifteen hundred miles to the east, in New York State, overpumping is threatening drinking-water wells on Long Island, birthplace of the modern American suburb and home to working class towns as well…

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Prescriptions for fruits and vegetables can improve the health of people with diabetes and other ailments, new study finds

Prescriptions for fruits and vegetables can improve the health of people with diabetes and other ailments, new study finds

“Food is medicine” programs recognize the vital importance of fresh produce in a person’s overall health. fcafotodigital/E+ via Getty Images By Kurt Hager, UMass Chan Medical School and Fang Fang Zhang, Tufts University The health of people with diabetes, hypertension and obesity improved when they could get free fruits and vegetables with a prescription from their doctors and other health professionals. We found that these patients’ blood sugar levels, blood pressure and weight improved in our new study published in…

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