Music: Bokanté — ‘Limyè’
Study finds nearly one-in-five Americans believe QAnon conspiracy theories
Chuck Todd, Mark Murray and Carrie Dann write: Washington, we have a problem — politically, informationally and societally — when 15 percent of Americans agree with the QAnon statement that the U.S. government, media and financial worlds “are controlled by a group of Satan-worshipping pedophiles who run a global child sex trafficking operation.” Or when 20 percent agree with this statement: “There is a storm coming soon that will sweep away the elites in power and restore the rightful leaders.”…
Democrats are running out of time
Ronald Brownstein writes: Anxiety is growing among a broad range of civil-rights, democracy-reform, and liberal groups over whether Democrats are responding with enough urgency to the accelerating Republican efforts to both suppress voting and potentially overturn future Democratic election victories. With the congressional calendar dominated by President Joe Biden’s multitrillion-dollar spending proposals, these activists are expressing concern that neither the administration nor Democratic congressional leaders are raising sufficient alarms about the threats to voting rights proliferating in red states, or…
The GOP is far from being finished with its post-election reckoning
Politico reports: It’s been less than two weeks since South Carolina Republicans rejected Lin Wood’s Q-Anon-inspired run for state party chair. In Arizona, the GOP is still consumed with infighting over a farcical review of November election results. Now comes Nevada, where open warfare has broken out in recent days between state and local party officials over a pro-Trump insurgency involving far-right activists with ties to the Proud Boys. More than six months after the November election, the forces unleashed…
Despite pandemic economic shutdown, global warming continues to accelerate
NPR reports: The average temperature on Earth is now consistently 1 degree Celsius hotter than it was in the late 1800s, and that temperature will keep rising toward the critical 1.5-degree Celsius benchmark over the next five years, according to a new report from the World Meteorological Organization. Scientists warn that humans must keep the average annual global temperature from lingering at or above 1.5 degrees Celsius to avoid the most catastrophic and long-term effects of climate change. Those include…
Even without definitive proof, the lab-leak theory is a call for action
Daniel Engber writes: Last summer, Michael Imperiale, a University of Michigan virologist and 10-year member of the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, published an essay on the need to “rethink” some basic research-safety practices in light of the coronavirus pandemic. But he and his co-author—another biosecurity-board veteran—did want to make one thing clear: There was no reason to believe that sloppy or malicious science had had anything to do with the outbreak of the SARS-CoV-2 virus; to suggest otherwise…
Had Covid (or been vaccinated)? You’ll probably make antibodies for a lifetime
Nature reports: Many people who have been infected with SARS-CoV-2 will probably make antibodies against the virus for most of their lives. So suggest researchers who have identified long-lived antibody-producing cells in the bone marrow of people who have recovered from COVID-19. The study provides evidence that immunity triggered by SARS-CoV-2 infection will be extraordinarily long-lasting. Adding to the good news, “the implications are that vaccines will have the same durable effect,” says Menno van Zelm, an immunologist at Monash…
As American forces retreat, the Taliban advances across Afghanistan
The New York Times reports: Ammunition was depleted inside the bedraggled outposts in Laghman Province. Food was scarce. Some police officers hadn’t been paid in five months. Then, just as American troops began leaving the country in early May, Taliban fighters besieged seven rural Afghan military outposts across the wheat fields and onion patches of the province, in eastern Afghanistan. The insurgents enlisted village elders to visit the outposts bearing a message: Surrender or die. By mid-month, security forces had…
Music: Banda Magda — ‘Thiamandi’
The Wuhan lab leak question: A disused Chinese mine takes center stage
The Wall Street Journal reports: On the outskirts of a village deep in the mountains of southwest China, a lone surveillance camera peers down toward a disused copper mine smothered in dense bamboo. As night approaches, bats swoop overhead. This is the subterranean home of the closest known virus on Earth to the one that causes Covid-19. It is also now a touchpoint for escalating calls for a more thorough probe into whether the pandemic could have stemmed from a…
Biden: Intelligence community split on Covid-19 origin
Politico reports: President Joe Biden said Wednesday that the U.S intelligence community is split between two origin theories for the Covid-19 pandemic. In a statement Wednesday, Biden notably did not detail the two theories between which the intelligence community is split. The president’s statement did note that he had ordered a review of the pandemic’s origins, “including whether it emerged from human contact with an infected animal or from a laboratory accident,” but did not say whether either of those…
How do we know that Covid isn’t a bioweapon?
Since the revival of the lab-leak theory will once again enliven conspiracy theorists, it’s worth being reminded why it’s wildly implausible that SARS-CoV-2 was created in the Wuhan Institute of Virology as a biological weapon. (Also keep in mind that the possibility that the virus accidentally leaked from the lab does not contradict the still widely held view that it originated in the wild.) Last July, Ruby Prosser Scully wrote: [C]reating this virus in a lab and knowing that it…
Trump teams up with Gingrich to put a contract on America
Politico reports: With an eye toward winning back the House and Senate in the 2022 midterm elections, former President Donald Trump has begun crafting a policy agenda outlining a MAGA doctrine for the party. His template is the 1994 “Contract with America,” a legislative agenda released ahead of the midterm elections in the middle of President Bill Clinton’s first term. And, as a cherry on top, he’s teaming up with its main architect — Gingrich — to do it. In…
Israeli police round up Palestinian protesters outside global spotlight
The Intercept reports: Palestinian activists urged the world not to look away from their struggle for freedom and equality following the ceasefire in Gaza, as Israeli police began rounding up Palestinian citizens of Israel who took part in demonstrations described as riots by the authorities. At least 74 Palestinians were detained by Monday afternoon, in the first hours of what Israel’s police force is calling “Operation Law and Order.” Palestinian rights groups called the planned arrest of up to 500…
Lukashenko’s bogus ‘Hamas’ email
Michael Weiss reports: Newlines, in collaboration with the Dossier Center, has exclusively obtained the original bomb threat email Alexander Lukashenko now claims was sent by the Palestinian militant group Hamas, allegedly prompting his order to land a Ryanair jet carrying a dissident journalist in Minsk. But timestamps show that the email was sent 24 minutes after Belarusian authorities told the pilot and crew that they were transporting an explosive device as well as passengers. “Allahu Akbar” runs the subject line…
Shell ordered to deepen carbon cuts in landmark Dutch climate case
Reuters reports: A Dutch court ordered Royal Dutch Shell to drastically deepen planned greenhouse gas emission cuts on Wednesday, in a landmark ruling that could trigger legal action against energy companies around the world. Shell said it was “disappointed” and plans to appeal the ruling, which comes amid rising pressure on energy companies from investors, activists and governments to shift away from fossil fuels and rapidly ramp up investment in renewables. Judge Larisa Alwin read out a ruling at a…