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Category: Politics

Major labor unions urge Biden to halt military aid to Israel

Major labor unions urge Biden to halt military aid to Israel

The Hill reports: A group of major labor unions pushed President Biden in a letter Tuesday to stop military aid to Israel as it continues to wage its war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. “We believe that immediately cutting US military aid to the Israeli government is necessary to bring about a peaceful resolution to this conflict,” the letter reads. Signatories include the United Auto Workers (UAW), the American Postal Workers Union (APWU), the International Union of Painters and…

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Netanyahu’s visit to the U.S. could be crucial to a ceasefire deal. But does he actually want one?

Netanyahu’s visit to the U.S. could be crucial to a ceasefire deal. But does he actually want one?

CNN reports: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu landed in Washington on Monday to far less fanfare than he would have expected just a day earlier. His highly-anticipated visit – chock-full of meetings with top US officials and a prized address to Congress – will now undoubtedly be overshadowed by US President Joe Biden’s stunning decision to drop out of the presidential race. But as detailed ceasefire negotiations aimed at turning a framework agreement into a final deal stretch into their…

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China challenges West on Gaza by offering Palestinians a new platform

China challenges West on Gaza by offering Palestinians a new platform

Middle East Eye reports: As 14 Palestinian leaders lined up for a photograph in Beijing on Tuesday, they each made sure to shake hands afterwards with one man: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi. Tuesday’s Palestinian unity talks, where an agreement for a post-war Gaza framework was signed, were an opportunity for China to provide a rival platform to Israel and its western allies on the future of Palestine and the Middle East. “China’s major goal is to gain consent and…

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WHO ‘extremely worried’ about possible Gaza polio outbreak

WHO ‘extremely worried’ about possible Gaza polio outbreak

BBC News reports: The World Health Organization is “extremely worried” about the possibility of an outbreak of the highly infectious polio virus in Gaza after traces were found in wastewater. Dr Ayadil Saparbekov, head of the WHO’s team in the Palestinian territories, told reporters a risk assessment was being implemented and that in the meantime health workers were providing protection advice to Gaza’s 2.3 million population. But, he added, it would be “very difficult” for people to follow it, given…

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The prosecutor versus the felon

The prosecutor versus the felon

CNN reports: Kamala Harris has spent much more of her life as a prosecutor than as a senator or vice president – and that is exactly how she is now going to run against Donald Trump. In sessions that were quietly underway at the Naval Observatory even before Joe Biden’s disastrous debate, Harris and her inner circle had already landed on the plan to look past whoever Trump picked as his running mate and focus almost exclusively on the former…

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Kamala Harris replacing Joe Biden is not antidemocratic

Kamala Harris replacing Joe Biden is not antidemocratic

Richard L Hasen writes: With news of President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential race, some Republicans are claiming he cannot be removed from the presidential ballot in November and that in any case it is undemocratic to do so. The first claim is legally unsupported and the second one is ludicrous. I fully expect the Democrats’ legitimate nominees for president and vice president to be listed on the ballot in November. Let’s start with the legal issue. The premise…

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A GOP campaign that had been optimized to beat Joe Biden must now be reinvented

A GOP campaign that had been optimized to beat Joe Biden must now be reinvented

Tim Alberta writes: Republicans I spoke with today, some of them still hungover from celebrating what felt to many like a victory-night celebration in Milwaukee, registered shock at the news of Biden’s departure. Party officials had left town believing the race was all but over. Now they were confronting the reality of reimagining a campaign—one that had been optimized, in every way, to defeat Biden—against a new and unknown challenger. “So, we are forced to spend time and money on…

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Biden was finally convinced he couldn’t win

Biden was finally convinced he couldn’t win

Politico reports: Early Saturday, Biden told senior aides it was “full steam ahead” for the campaign. But by later that evening, he had changed his mind following a long discussion with his two closest aides. Steve Ricchetti, who’s been with Biden since his days in the Senate, drove to see the president at his house on the Delaware shore on Friday. Mike Donilon arrived on Saturday. The two men, both of whom had been by Biden’s side during key decisions…

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Project 2025 poses far-reaching threats to science

Project 2025 poses far-reaching threats to science

Scientific American reports: Project 2025, the sweeping right-wing blueprint for a new kind of U.S. presidency, would sabotage science-based policies that address climate change, the environment, abortion, health care access, technology and education. It would impose religious and conservative ideology on the federal civil service to such an extent that Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has, dubiously, tried to distance himself from the plan. But in 2022 Trump said the Heritage Foundation—the think tank that authored Project 2025—would “lay the…

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RFK Jr explores opportunities for serving Trump

RFK Jr explores opportunities for serving Trump

The Washington Post reports: Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. held talks this month with former president Donald Trump about endorsing his campaign and taking a job in a second Trump administration, overseeing a portfolio of health and medical issues, according to four people familiar with the matter. The discussions, which began hours after the attempted assassination of Trump at a rally on July 13, did not result in an agreement amid concerns in Trump’s orbit about the complications…

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The people who feed America are going hungry

The people who feed America are going hungry

Grist reports: Standing knee-deep in an emerald expanse, a row of trees offering respite from the sweltering heat, Rosa Morales diligently relocates chipilín, a Central American legume, from one bed of soil to another. The 34-year-old has been coming to the Campesinos’ Garden run by the Farmworker Association of Florida in Apopka for the last six months, taking home a bit of produce each time she visits. The small plot that hugs a soccer field and community center is an…

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Democratic elites were slow to admit what voters already knew

Democratic elites were slow to admit what voters already knew

Ezra Klein writes: President Biden and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez agree on this much: It is the elites who are trying to take Biden down, ignoring the sentiments of legions of Democratic voters. But when I started arguing in February that his age would mortally wound his candidacy, it didn’t feel that way to me. I saw the elites propping him up, ignoring the sentiments of legions of Democratic voters. Who’s right? Maybe we both are. In any system, elites are…

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Biden’s continued candidacy was an insult to the intelligence of American voters

Biden’s continued candidacy was an insult to the intelligence of American voters

Helen Lewis writes: Allow me to summarize the response from outside America to the news that President Joe Biden is not running for reelection: Thank God. Here in Britain, the most common reaction in the minutes after the news broke was sheer relief. Relief that Donald Trump will not be allowed an easy path to a second term. Relief that the Democrats will put forward a candidate who is able to bear a full campaign schedule—defending the party’s record and…

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Anne Applebaum: ‘Often, for autocrats, the second time in power is worse’

Anne Applebaum: ‘Often, for autocrats, the second time in power is worse’

Tim Adams writes: A couple of years ago, in the Atlantic magazine, journalist Anne Applebaum wrote an era-defining cover story called “The Bad Guys Are Winning”. Her argument was not only that democratic institutions were in decline across the world, but that there was a new version of old threats to them: rogue states and dictatorships were increasingly linked not by ideology, as in the cold war, but by powerful currents of criminal and mercenary interest, often enabled by western…

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Tech broligarchs are lining up to court Trump. And Vance is one more link in the chain

Tech broligarchs are lining up to court Trump. And Vance is one more link in the chain

Carole Cadwalladr writes: Less than a month after Donald Trump was elected president in November 2016, he invited the cream of Silicon Valley’s tech elite to a meeting at his transition team’s headquarters at Trump Tower. It was an awkward affair. Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg, Google’s Larry Page and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos had facial expressions that ranged from a semi-rictus grin to full tech-mogul-in-a-hostage-situation. But then, in a sense they were. There was a new sheriff in town – and none…

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What impact could the latest ICJ ruling on Israel have?

What impact could the latest ICJ ruling on Israel have?

  Illegal Israeli settlements have been steadily expanding in Palestinian territories for years. Now the UN’s top court says it’s time for Israel to stop, reverse course, and repair the damages. The International Court of Justice has ruled Israel’s occupation is unlawful and is fueling a surge in violence. However, the court’s findings are not legally binding — and the Israeli government has ignored previous decisions. So, will the ICJ’s advisory opinion have any practical implications?