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Secret Service says the dog ate their texts

Secret Service says the dog ate their texts

The Washington Post reports: The U.S. Secret Service has determined it has no new texts to provide Congress relevant to its Jan. 6 investigation, and that any other texts its agents exchanged around the time of the 2021 attack on the Capitol were purged, according to a senior official briefed on the matter. Also, the National Archives on Tuesday sought more information on “the potential unauthorized deletion” of agency text messages. The U.S. government’s chief record-keeper asked the Secret Service…

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Why are Democrats spending millions to boost the far-right fringe?

Why are Democrats spending millions to boost the far-right fringe?

Brian Beutler writes: Three simple facts will form the backdrop of the November midterms, and taken together, they are difficult to fully reconcile: First, Democrats are serious underdogs and may be defeated in a wave as devastating as the ones that wiped them out in 1994 and 2010. Second, Donald Trump, the undisputed leader of the Republican Party, has endorsed a slate of G.O.P. primary candidates who are unfit to hold public office in a democracy. Third, Democrats want to…

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These maps show how excessively hot it is in Europe and the U.S.

These maps show how excessively hot it is in Europe and the U.S.

The Washington Post reports: A historic and deadly heat wave has been scorching western Europe, killing hundreds in Spain and Portugal. Temperatures spiked to 115 degrees on the Iberian Peninsula amid bone-dry conditions, fueling wildfires and displacing thousands of people in France. The mercury topped 100 degrees (38 Celsius) in Britain on Monday and is expected to surge higher Tuesday. For the first time, the U.K. Met Office has issued a red warning for heat, its most extreme alert. The…

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Ukraine invites allies to check on their weapons donations

Ukraine invites allies to check on their weapons donations

Politico reports: Ukraine has created a temporary special commission to monitor the flow of billions of dollars in Western weapons into the country. It’s in response to what Kyiv says is a Russian smear campaign to whip up concern in the West about its ability to effectively handle and monitor the arms. “To date, more than a dozen international partners have provided Ukraine with various types of weapons that are already being used at the front. However, Russian propaganda, in…

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Workers in the West have indeed been repressed – but not by immigrants

Workers in the West have indeed been repressed – but not by immigrants

John Rapley writes: One summer evening in 2015, a deranged young man entered a Black church in Charleston, South Carolina. After spending nearly an hour with the assembled prayer group, he began screaming that they were ‘rapists’ who were ‘taking over our country’, and proceeded to spray them with bullets. When he left the church, nine innocents, some of whom had tragically prayed for him, lay dead. Within days, photos surfaced on the internet showing the killer wrapped in the…

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The U.S. plan to avoid extreme climate change is running out of time

The U.S. plan to avoid extreme climate change is running out of time

The Washington Post reports: In 101 months, the United States will have achieved President Biden’s most important climate promise — or it will have fallen short. Right now it is seriously falling short, and for each month that passes, it becomes harder to succeed until at some point — perhaps very soon — it will become virtually impossible. That’s true for the United States, and also true for the planet, as nearly 200 nations strive to tackle climate change with…

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Humanity faces ‘collective suicide’ over climate crisis, warns UN chief

Humanity faces ‘collective suicide’ over climate crisis, warns UN chief

The Guardian reports: Wildfires and heatwaves wreaking havoc across swathes of the globe show humanity facing “collective suicide”, the UN secretary general has warned, as governments around the world scramble to protect people from the impacts of extreme heat. António Guterres told ministers from 40 countries meeting to discuss the climate crisis on Monday: “Half of humanity is in the danger zone, from floods, droughts, extreme storms and wildfires. No nation is immune. Yet we continue to feed our fossil…

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The climate crisis cannot be tackled with incrementalism

The climate crisis cannot be tackled with incrementalism

George Monbiot writes: Can we talk about it now? I mean the subject most of the media and most of the political class has been avoiding for so long. You know, the only subject that ultimately counts – the survival of life on Earth. Everyone knows, however carefully they avoid the topic, that, beside it, all the topics filling the front pages and obsessing the pundits are dust. Even the Times editors still publishing columns denying climate science know it….

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Sustainable cities made from mud

Sustainable cities made from mud

BBC Future Planet reports: In Yemen’s ancient walled city of Sana’a mud skyscrapers soar high into the sky. The towering structures are built entirely out of rammed earth and decorated with striking geometric patterns. The earthen buildings blend into the nearby ochre-coloured mountains. Sana’a’s mud architecture is so unique that the city has been recognised as a Unesco World Heritage site. “As an outstanding example of a homogeneous architectural ensemble reflecting the spatial characteristics of the early years of Islam,…

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Why Putin thinks he’s winning

Why Putin thinks he’s winning

Tatiana Stanovaya writes: We are used to thinking that Mr. Putin sees the West as a hostile force that aims to destroy Russia. But I believe that for Mr. Putin there are two Wests: a bad one and a good one. The “bad West” is represented by the traditional political elites that currently rule Western countries: Mr. Putin appears to see them as narrow-minded slaves of their electorates who overlook genuine national interests and are incapable of strategic thinking. The…

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Statues perpetuate the myths of the ‘Great Man’ school of history

Statues perpetuate the myths of the ‘Great Man’ school of history

  On Sunday 7th June 2020, sparked by the horrific murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, protestors marching to support the Black Lives Matter movement in Bristol tore down the statue of slave trader Edward Colston and threw it in the city’s harbour. This dramatic action thrust the city onto the global stage and put it at the forefront of an ongoing and bitter culture war. David Olusoga OBE is a historian, writer, broadcaster, presenter and film-maker from Newcastle-upon-Tyne, now…

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Trump tells team he needs to be president again to save himself from criminal probes

Trump tells team he needs to be president again to save himself from criminal probes

Rolling Stone reports: When Donald Trump formally declares his 2024 candidacy, he won’t just be running for another term in the White House. He’ll be running away from legal troubles, possible criminal charges, and even the specter of prison time. In recent months, Trump has made clear to associates that the legal protections of occupying the Oval Office are front-of-mind for him, four people with knowledge of the situation tell Rolling Stone. Trump has “spoken about how when you are…

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Putin is already at war with Europe

Putin is already at war with Europe

Simon Tisdall writes: Time to wake up and smell the cordite. Like shockwaves from an exploding missile, Vladimir Putin’s war on Europe’s edge is rapidly rolling westwards, blasting its way through the front doors of homes, businesses and workplaces from Berlin to Birmingham. Its fallout seeds a toxic rain of instability, hardship and fear. The idea the Ukraine conflict could be confined to Ukraine – Nato’s politically convenient grand delusion – and that western sanctions and arms supplies would stop…

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Obstructionist in Chief, Joe Manchin, cares about nothing more than his own grip on power

Obstructionist in Chief, Joe Manchin, cares about nothing more than his own grip on power

The Wall Street Journal reports: The Biden administration’s international tax agenda suffered a setback when Sen. Joe Manchin rejected a 15% minimum tax on multinational companies this past week, dimming prospects of turning last year’s global tax agreement into reality. Biden administration officials had planned to use Democratic fiscal legislation to enact the U.S. piece of the deal struck last year by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and more than 130 other countries. They wanted quick action to set a 15%…

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