Browsed by
Category: Politics

The Supreme Court has played a leading role in undermining democracy

The Supreme Court has played a leading role in undermining democracy

The New York Times reports: If Republicans succeed in pulling off an aggressively partisan gerrymander of congressional districts in Texas, they will owe the Supreme Court a debt of gratitude. In the two decades Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. has led the Supreme Court, the justices have reshaped American elections not just by letting state lawmakers like those in Texas draw voting maps warped by politics, but also by gutting the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and amplifying the…

Read More Read More

Palantir and other companies aiding Trump’s immigration crackdown see ‘extraordinary’ revenues

Palantir and other companies aiding Trump’s immigration crackdown see ‘extraordinary’ revenues

The Guardian reports: The tech, surveillance and private prison providers arming Donald Trump’s massive expansion and weaponization of immigration enforcement are running a victory lap after reporting their latest financial results. Palantir, the tech firm, and Geo Group and CoreCivic, the private prison and surveillance companies, said this week that they brought in more money than Wall Street expected them to, thanks to the administration’s crackdown on immigrants. “Well, as usual, I’ve been cautioned to be a little modest about…

Read More Read More

The secret tactics behind Stop the Steal and other right-wing disinformation campaigns

The secret tactics behind Stop the Steal and other right-wing disinformation campaigns

Caroline Orr Bueno writes: A sophisticated strategy is playing out in plain sight that few outside of digital war rooms truly understand or even notice. It doesn’t require hacking servers or bribing tech executives. It doesn’t even break any rules. It simply requires understanding exactly how algorithms work — and turning them into accomplices. I call this tactic the Feedback Loop Coup. Last week, I introduced the concept of Reverse Algorithmic Capture — a tactic used to force platforms to rewrite their…

Read More Read More

Intellectual humility is linked to less political and religious polarization across the board

Intellectual humility is linked to less political and religious polarization across the board

PsyPost reports: A new study published in The Journal of Positive Psychology indicates that people who score higher in intellectual humility tend to show less political and religious polarization — regardless of whether they are Republican, Democrat, Christian, or atheist. This link held across different measures, including both self-reported attitudes and behavioral indicators of hostility toward ideological outgroups, and often remained significant even after accounting for the strength of a person’s beliefs. Intellectual humility refers to the recognition that one’s…

Read More Read More

This is what the British government calls ‘terrorism’

This is what the British government calls ‘terrorism’

The Guardian reports: More than 450 people have been arrested in central London at the largest demonstration relating to Palestine Action since the group was proscribed as a terrorist organisation. The Metropolitan police said they had drawn officers from other forces to help form a “significant policing presence” in the capital before the planned event, which was anticipated to result in large numbers of people being detained. By Saturday afternoon, hundreds of people had gathered in Parliament Square for a…

Read More Read More

The uncomfortable fact about the stock market’s historic run is that no one is sure why it’s happening

The uncomfortable fact about the stock market’s historic run is that no one is sure why it’s happening

Rogé Karma writes: Can anything stop the stock market? The U.S. economy recently weathered the worst pandemic in 100 years, the worst inflation in 40 years, and the highest interest rates in 20 years. Yet from 2019 through 2024, the S&P 500 grew by an average of nearly 20 percent a year, about double its historical average rate. Despite President Donald Trump’s erratic economic policies, which include the highest tariffs since the 19th century, the market is already up by…

Read More Read More

Hegseth promotes abolition of women’s voting rights

Hegseth promotes abolition of women’s voting rights

The Associated Press reports: The man who oversees the nation’s military reposted a video about a Christian nationalist church that included various pastors saying women should no longer be allowed to vote. The extraordinary repost on X from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, made Thursday night, illustrates his deep and personal connection to a Christian nationalist pastor with extreme views on the role of religion and women. In the post, Hegseth commented on an almost seven-minute-long report by CNN examining Doug…

Read More Read More

Crypto’s richest man, Changpeng Zhao, campaigns for a pardon

Crypto’s richest man, Changpeng Zhao, campaigns for a pardon

The New York Times reports: In 2023, as Changpeng Zhao, the founder of the giant cryptocurrency exchange Binance, prepared to plead guilty to U.S. money-laundering violations, he fashioned a crash course for himself on clemency politics, reading books about business tycoons who had received pardons, including Marc Rich and Michael Milken. Two years later, Mr. Zhao, a Chinese-born billionaire, is out of prison and mounting a pardon campaign of his own, backed by a sophisticated influence operation worthy of those…

Read More Read More

As electric bills rise, evidence mounts that data centers share blame

As electric bills rise, evidence mounts that data centers share blame

The Associated Press reports: Amid rising electric bills, states are under pressure to insulate regular household and business ratepayers from the costs of feeding Big Tech’s energy-hungry data centers. It’s not clear that any state has a solution and the actual effect of data centers on electricity bills is difficult to pin down. Some critics question whether states have the spine to take a hard line against tech behemoths like Microsoft, Google, Amazon and Meta. But more than a dozen…

Read More Read More

Will the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund, Norway’s, divest from Israel?

Will the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund, Norway’s, divest from Israel?

+972 reports: In 1990, Norway established the Oil Fund, a long-term investment vehicle to manage the country’s growing oil and gas revenues. Formally known as the Government Pension Fund Global, its primary aims were to safeguard these revenues for future generations and to protect the Norwegian economy, increasingly reliant on oil, from global market volatility. Managed by Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM) with operational independence under the central bank, the Oil Fund invests globally in equities, real estate, government bonds,…

Read More Read More

Germany halts export to Israel of arms that could be used in Gaza as global outcry grows

Germany halts export to Israel of arms that could be used in Gaza as global outcry grows

The Guardian reports: The German chancellor has indicated a significant shift in Berlin’s staunch support for Israel by stopping the export of military equipment that could be used in Gaza, as international partners condemned Israeli plans to take control of Gaza City. Friedrich Merz issued a sharply worded statement signalling the reversal after several weeks of openly criticising Israel’s “unclear” policy goals in Gaza and the unfolding humanitarian disaster there but stopping short of concrete consequences in policy. The German…

Read More Read More

New wave of Palestinian popular struggle takes root

New wave of Palestinian popular struggle takes root

+972 reports: In recent weeks, Palestinian grassroots mobilization has gathered remarkable momentum, particularly within the 1948 territories and the occupied West Bank. This surge reflects a growing effort to reconnect with a reinvigorated wave of global solidarity that has persisted, and even expanded, despite severe crackdowns on pro-Palestinian movements across the United States and much of Europe. All signs suggest that this momentum will continue to grow, potentially building toward a broader popular uprising, one capable of pushing back against…

Read More Read More

A legal standoff in Texas

A legal standoff in Texas

Anna Bower writes: A bitter political and legal battle is unfolding in Texas. On Sunday, more than 51 Democrats in the Texas House of Representatives fled the state in an effort to block Republican attempts to re-draw the state’s congressional map ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. Hours later, Gov. Greg Abbott threatened to remove the absent lawmakers from office if they didn’t return for a scheduled floor debate by 3 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 4. In response, the Democrats invoked a…

Read More Read More

The Trump regime wants to go ‘all in’ on AI. There are big risks

The Trump regime wants to go ‘all in’ on AI. There are big risks

Science News reports: Under a newly released action plan for artificial intelligence, the technology will be integrated into U.S. government functions. The plan, announced July 23, is another step in the Trump administration’s push for an “AI-first strategy.” In July, for instance, the U.S. Department of Defense handed out $200 million contracts to Anthropic, Google, OpenAI and xAI. Elon Musk’s xAI announced “Grok for Government,” where federal agencies can purchase AI products through the General Services Administration. And all that…

Read More Read More

‘He’s the best thing that’s happened to us’: How neo-Nazis and other white extremists have been empowered by Trump

‘He’s the best thing that’s happened to us’: How neo-Nazis and other white extremists have been empowered by Trump

Reuters reports: Wearing cargo shorts, flip-flops and a baseball cap shading his eyes from the sun, Dalton Henry Stout blends in easily in rural America. Except for the insignia on his hat. It bears the skull and crossbones of the infamous “Death’s Head” SS units that oversaw Nazi Germany’s concentration camps – and the initials “AFN,” short for Aryan Freedom Network, the neo-Nazi group Stout leads with his partner. From a modest ranch house in Texas, the couple oversee a…

Read More Read More

Netanyahu aims to fully control Gaza despite warnings of mass death

Netanyahu aims to fully control Gaza despite warnings of mass death

The Guardian reports: Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that Israel intends to take military control of all of Gaza in defiance of warnings that such a move would lead to countless more Palestinian deaths, further mass displacement and endanger Israeli hostages still held in the territory. Before a security cabinet meeting to discuss Gaza’s future, the Israeli prime minister insisted that Israel does not want to ultimately govern the territory and would hand over that responsibility to friendly Arab nations….

Read More Read More