Music: Ballaké Sissoko — ‘Kanou’ ft. Toumani Diabaté
Kremlin cronies compare alleged drone attack to 9/11
Julia Davis writes: Russian officials and state media breathlessly proclaimed that Ukraine launched an alleged drone strike on the Kremlin in an attempt to assassinate Russian President Vladimir Putin, who wasn’t even there. Anticipating that this incident will be perceived as Moscow’s false flag operation, the head of state-owned news channel RT, Margarita Simonyan, tweeted a short thread asserting that Russia would have done it more skillfully. She concluded, “No, it wasn’t us. Unfortunately.” Simonyan’s suspicions that Russia would be accused of staging the…
Russians seem very interested in my book about how dictatorships end
Alexander Baunov writes: It’s a little embarrassing. Normally, I write about various aspects of Russian politics — the basis of Vladimir Putin’s support, the Kremlin’s media strategy, Russia’s foreign policy. Now, to my surprise, I’m writing about something else: my own book. Three years in the making, the book came out at the end of January and quickly became a best seller across Russia. The first print run disappeared almost immediately, and since then, there have been three more. While…
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse speaks on the necessity for Supreme Court ethics reform
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), in his capacity as Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts, Oversight, Agency Action, and Federal Rights, co-led a hearing of the full Judiciary Committee entitled, “Supreme Court Ethics Reform.” The hearing explored the recent torrent of media reports detailing unethical conduct by Justices of the Supreme Court and legislative solutions to improve ethics, accountability, and transparency at the highest Court. Whitehouse’s Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency (SCERT) Act would require the…
Clarence Thomas had a child in private school. Harlan Crow paid the tuition
ProPublica reports: In 2008, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas decided to send his teenage grandnephew to Hidden Lake Academy, a private boarding school in the foothills of northern Georgia. The boy, Mark Martin, was far from home. For the previous decade, he had lived with the justice and his wife in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. Thomas had taken legal custody of Martin when he was 6 years old and had recently told an interviewer he was “raising him as…
In deposition played in court, Trump says stars often sexually assault women ‘unfortunately or fortunately’
Politico reports: In the deposition, conducted at Mar-a-Lago in October, [E. Jean Carroll’s attorney, Roberta] Kaplan asked Trump about the “Access Hollywood” tape, a recording from 2005 in which Trump can be heard saying, “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything,” adding: “Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything.” “Well, historically that’s true with stars,” Trump replied after watching a clip of his comments. When Kaplan pressed him on whether he stood…
The GOP megadonors with buyer’s remorse
Charlie Sykes writes: Peter Thiel is (allegedly) having second thoughts. The billionaire, right-wing megadonor reportedly has decided that he’s done bankrolling political candidates because Republicans are too focused on fighting cultural battles over abortion and transgender rights. If true, he’s not alone. Billionaire GOP donor Thomas Peterffy similarly told the Financial Times in April that he had qualms about Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ relentless crusade against abortion, drag queens and “woke” books. “I have put myself on hold,” he said. “Myself, and a bunch of friends, are holding our…
Our way of life is poisoning us
Mark O’Connell writes: There is plastic in our bodies; it’s in our lungs and in our bowels and in the blood that pulses through us. We can’t see it, and we can’t feel it, but it is there. It is there in the water we drink and the food we eat, and even in the air that we breathe. We don’t know, yet, what it’s doing to us, because we have only quite recently become aware of its presence; but since we have learned of it, it has become a…
Music: Ballaké Sissoko — ‘Djourou’ ft. Sona Jobarteh
‘Nothing with Russia is as it seems’
“Nothing with Russia is as it seems,” warns fmr. NATO deputy commander @RichardShirreff about the apparent drone strikes on the Kremlin. “Of course Russia would like to portray it is an attack on President Putin… it’s a way of causing division between” Ukraine and its allies. pic.twitter.com/uEQY0qo8iW — Christiane Amanpour (@amanpour) May 3, 2023 On Vladimir Solovyov's show, Biden was blamed for an alleged Kremlin drone attack, which is being used to justify pulling out of the grain deal, reneging…
E. Jean Carroll’s quest for justice and the carnage of Donald Trump’s misogyny
Molly Jong-Fast writes: Last week, my friend, 79-year-old writer E. Jean Carroll, began testifying in her civil case against the 45th president of the United States, Donald Trump. She was able to bring these accusations of rape to court because of a new New York state law, the Adult Survivors Act, which gave Carroll a yearlong window to sue despite her case being out of the statute of limitations. Governor Kathy Hochul signed the law in 2022; it’s hard to…
Elon Musk threatens to re-assign @NPR on Twitter to ‘another company’
NPR reports: Elon Musk has threatened to reassign NPR’s Twitter account to “another company.” In a series of emails sent to this reporter, Musk said he would transfer the network’s main account on Twitter, under the @NPR handle, to another organization or person. The idea shocked even longtime observers of Musk’s spur-of-the-moment and erratic leadership style. Handing over established accounts to third parties poses a serious risk of impersonation and could imperil a company’s reputation, said social media experts. “If…
Federal Trade Commission chair: We must regulate AI. Here’s how
Lina M. Khan, chair of the Federal Trade Commission, writes: It’s both exciting and unsettling to have a realistic conversation with a computer. Thanks to the rapid advance of generative artificial intelligence, many of us have now experienced this potentially revolutionary technology with vast implications for how people live, work and communicate around the world. The full extent of generative A.I.’s potential is still up for debate, but there’s little doubt it will be highly disruptive. The last time we found ourselves…
Carlson’s text that alarmed Fox leaders: ‘It’s not how white men fight’
The New York Times reports: A text message sent by Tucker Carlson that set off a panic at the highest levels of Fox on the eve of its billion-dollar defamation trial showed its most popular host sharing his private, inflammatory views about violence and race. The discovery of the message contributed to a chain of events that ultimately led to Mr. Carlson’s firing. In the message, sent to one of his producers in the hours after violent Trump supporters stormed…
New documents show how Sandra Day O’Connor helped George W. Bush win the 2000 election
CNN reports: Justice Sandra Day O’Connor provided the early framework that steered the outcome in the dispute over the 2000 presidential election and ensured George W. Bush would win the White House over Al Gore, Supreme Court documents released on Tuesday show. Memos found in the newly opened files of the late Justice John Paul Stevens offer a first-ever view of the behind-the-scenes negotiations on Bush v. Gore at the court. They also demonstrate the tension among the nine justices…
The oceans are missing their rivers
Erica Gies writes: Gazing out from the eighth floor of a hotel in Georgetown, Guyana, the broad expanse of the Atlantic Ocean was a muddy brown. Only a thin rim of blue on the horizon showed the ocean’s true color; the rest swirled with sediment emerging from the mouth of the Essequibo River. In a rhythm that’s pulsed through epochs, a river’s plume carries sediment and nutrients from the continental interior into the ocean, a major exchange of resources from…