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Category: Politics

Shocking opposition victory throws Pakistan into chaos

Shocking opposition victory throws Pakistan into chaos

The New York Times reports: The party of the imprisoned former prime minister of Pakistan, Imran Khan, won the most seats in parliamentary elections this week, delivering a strong rebuke to the country’s powerful generals and throwing the political system into chaos. While military leaders had hoped the election would put an end to the political turmoil that has consumed the country since Mr. Khan’s ouster in 2022, it has instead plunged it into an even deeper crisis, analysts said….

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If reasonable people disengage from politics, the zealots win

If reasonable people disengage from politics, the zealots win

Conor Friedersdorf writes: “Divisive,” “corrupt,” and “messy.” That’s how Americans described the state of our politics when asked to do so by Pew last year. Other popular answers included “polarized” and “dysfunctional.” Those of us who feel that way may be tempted to tune out this election year. To participate in politics is to encounter many otherwise lovely people at their most upset, angry, and uncharitable. To withdraw from it is, for many, to avoid stress, annoyance, and maybe even…

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What the Israeli public doesn’t see

What the Israeli public doesn’t see

Jewish Currents reports: On January 29th, The Nightly News with Michal Rabinovitch—which airs on Israel’s public broadcaster, known as Kan—ran a series of stories that were broadly representative of the channel’s programming over the past few months. A story about diplomatic progress toward a prisoner swap between Israel and Hamas was followed by a report on the rockets launched into Israel’s interior from the Gazan city of Khan Younis; the segment included video from inside Hamas tunnels and footage captured…

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Is Joe Biden uniquely indifferent to Palestinian suffering?

Is Joe Biden uniquely indifferent to Palestinian suffering?

Yousef Munayyer writes: Last September, I found myself trying to understand something about President Biden’s behavior that just didn’t make sense to me. Why did it seem like he was bending over backward for Benjamin Netanyahu, even when Biden’s domestic political interests and America’s national interests were not being served by Netanyahu’s decisions? I concluded at the time that the only possible explanation was that Biden was personally being ideologically driven by a commitment to Zionism. All of this was…

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Under Gaza’s shadow, Syria faces a new welter of conflict

Under Gaza’s shadow, Syria faces a new welter of conflict

Paulo Pinheiro, Hanny Megally and Lynn Welchman write: The scale and ferocity of the conflict in Gaza and the unspeakable suffering of its civilians have rightly provoked the world’s outrage. But in Syria, a steep escalation of violence that has forced the flight of tens of thousands more people in what remains the world’s largest displacement crisis is taking place largely unnoticed outside the region. Syria, too, desperately needs a halt to the violence. But instead, the more than 12-year-long…

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Big Pharma spends billions more on executives and stockholders than on R&D

Big Pharma spends billions more on executives and stockholders than on R&D

Ars Technica reports: When big pharmaceutical companies are confronted over their exorbitant pricing of prescription drugs in the US, they often retreat to two well-worn arguments: One, that the high drug prices cover costs of researching and developing new drugs, a risky and expensive endeavor, and two, that middle managers—pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), to be specific—are actually the ones price gouging Americans. Both of these arguments faced substantial blows in a hearing Thursday held by the Senate Committee on Health,…

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The real ‘Robert Hur report.’ How the Special Counsel report has been misinterpreted

The real ‘Robert Hur report.’ How the Special Counsel report has been misinterpreted

Andrew Weissmann and Ryan Goodman write: The Special Counsel Robert Hur report has been grossly mischaracterized by the press. The report finds that the evidence of a knowing, willful violation of the criminal laws is wanting. Indeed, the report, on page 6, notes that there are “innocent explanations” that Hur “cannot refute.” That is but one of myriad examples we outline in great detail below of the report repeatedly finding a lack of proof. And those findings mean, in DOJ-speak,…

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Evangelicals’ Trump worship looks more like QAnon every day

Evangelicals’ Trump worship looks more like QAnon every day

Ron Filipowski writes: I have watched every Donald Trump rally, interview, and speech since he left the White House in Jan. 2021. It’s certainly been interesting to observe the evolution of his political messaging over that time—as he went from desperately trying to resuscitate his political image and career in 2021 following the Jan. 6 attack, to reclaiming his role of Republican kingmaker through his use of primary endorsements in 2022, to crafting his rally speeches and policy positions in…

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IDF moves closer to Rafah offensive despite ‘bloodbath’ warning

IDF moves closer to Rafah offensive despite ‘bloodbath’ warning

The Guardian reports: Israel has moved closer to a full-scale ground offensive against the southern Gaza city of Rafah, as Benjamin Netayahu ordered military leaders to present a plan to evacuate civilians from the area. Despite warnings from a senior aid official that an assault on Rafah – where about 1.3 million displaced Palestinians are sheltering – would lead to a “bloodbath”, and the UN urging against forced mass displacement, Israel appeared determined to push ahead. “It is impossible to…

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UNRWA staff accused by Israel sacked without evidence, chief admits

UNRWA staff accused by Israel sacked without evidence, chief admits

The Guardian reports: The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees has said he followed “reverse due process” in sacking nine staff members accused by Israel of being involved in Hamas’s 7 October attacks. Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA’s commissioner general, said he did not probe Israel’s claims against the employees before dismissing them and launching an investigation. At a press conference in Jerusalem, Lazzarini was asked if he had looked into whether there was any evidence against the employees and…

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Age isn’t just a number. It’s a profound and growing problem for Biden

Age isn’t just a number. It’s a profound and growing problem for Biden

Politico reports: Special counsel Robert Hur jolted the presidential campaign Thursday with a withering assessment of Joe Biden’s mental acuity, drawing the president’s biggest political liability firmly into the public conversation. While Biden’s age is a major concern for voters in polling, top Democrats have danced around the issue, keeping their concerns mostly private. But Hur’s description of Biden, 81, in an official report as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory” may force a new reckoning for the…

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Tucker Carlson — Putin’s useful idiot or his co-conspirator?

Tucker Carlson — Putin’s useful idiot or his co-conspirator?

Oliver Darcy writes: It’s evident now why Vladimir Putin granted an interview to Tucker Carlson. Over the course of the more than two-hour sit-down, the former Fox News host turned online commentator largely refrained from challenging the Russian authoritarian, whose brutal war on Ukraine has led to the needless deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Those expecting a hard-hitting face-off will have surely walked away sorely disappointed by the long-winded and rambling interview, in which Tucker himself at times…

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Climatologist Michael Mann wins defamation case. What this means for scientists

Climatologist Michael Mann wins defamation case. What this means for scientists

Nature reports: US climate scientist Michael Mann has prevailed in a lawsuit that accused two conservative commentators of defamation for challenging his research and comparing him to a convicted child molester. A jury awarded Mann, who is based at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, more than US$1 million in a landmark case that legal observers see as a warning to those who attack scientists working in controversial fields, including climate science and public health. “It’s perfectly legitimate to criticize…

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Israel escalates Rafah bombardment as U.S. warns of a ‘disaster’

Israel escalates Rafah bombardment as U.S. warns of a ‘disaster’

Al Jazeera reports: Israeli forces bombed areas in the southern border city of Rafah, where more than half of Gaza’s internally displaced population is sheltering, as the United States warned that a military push into the city could be a “disaster”. Aid agencies have warned of a humanitarian catastrophe if Israel follows through on its threat to enter Rafah, where people are desperate for shelter and one of the last remaining areas of the Gaza Strip into which its troops…

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UNRWA donors suspended funding without seeing any evidence supporting Israel’s claims

UNRWA donors suspended funding without seeing any evidence supporting Israel’s claims

CBC reports: The government of Canada did not see any evidence backing up Israel’s claim that staff employed by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) colluded with Hamas before suspending funding to the agency, CBC News has learned. Government sources tell CBC that Israel still has not shared evidence with Canada to substantiate its claim that 12 employees of UNRWA were involved in some capacity in the October 7 attack on Israel by Hamas and the affiliated group…

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Israel’s cultural genocide is destroying Gaza’s very memory

Israel’s cultural genocide is destroying Gaza’s very memory

Ahmad Ibsais writes: Growing up in the diaspora, I clung to the stories of Palestine I heard from my parents and grandparents. They gave me the undying belief that Palestinians would one day be free because we are a people rooted in resilience, culture, language, and one another. Part of resisting the 76 years of brutal Israeli occupation is passing on these stories. Some were told by my mother when making dishes like maklouba, which was always served with “Sahtain!,”…

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