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Category: Politics

Awful new details about the Durham probe demand a serious response

Awful new details about the Durham probe demand a serious response

Greg Sargent writes: Senate Democrats, prepare to investigate the investigations of the investigators. If this sounds likely to be mind-numbingly complicated, well, yes, it is. But there’s only one way to tackle this difficulty: head-on. The New York Times disclosed extraordinary new revelations this past week about prosecutor John Durham’s years-long quest to delegitimize the FBI investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. In 2019, this obsession of President Donald Trump was initiated by his attorney general, William P….

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Presidential classified document scandals should take down America’s secrecy industry

Presidential classified document scandals should take down America’s secrecy industry

David Dayen writes: Somewhere in Plains, Georgia, an aide or 98-year-old Jimmy Carter himself is rifling through old boxes, searching for any document from the late 1970s marked “classified.” I’m not sure what threats there are to the Republic from high-level information about Rhodesia or the Warsaw Pact slowly decomposing in a filing cabinet, but the National Archives is on the case, directing former presidents and vice presidents to scour their properties for any official secrets. (Carter has found classified…

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Sisi is driving Egypt off a cliff

Sisi is driving Egypt off a cliff

Mohammad Fadel writes: Twelve years have now passed since Egyptians bravely took to the streets demanding a right to govern themselves democratically. Some might quibble and claim that the protesters in the center of Cairo, and across so many other cities and towns in Egypt, were not demanding democracy, but something more tangible: “bread, freedom and social justice.” Nearly a decade ago, backers of Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s coup claimed the intervention of the military was necessary to preserve the “civic”…

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Israel strikes Iran amid international push to contain Tehran

Israel strikes Iran amid international push to contain Tehran

The Wall Street Journal reports: Israel carried out a drone strike targeting a defense compound in Iran, as the U.S. and Israel look for new ways to contain Tehran’s nuclear and military ambitions, according to U.S. officials and people familiar with the operation. Iranian officials said that the country’s air defenses had fended off an attempted attack by three small quadcopters targeting a munitions factory in the city of Isfahan, right next to a site belonging to the Iran Space…

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To fix its problems in Ukraine, Russia turns back to the architect of the war

To fix its problems in Ukraine, Russia turns back to the architect of the war

The New York Times reports: Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov, the architect of President Vladimir V. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, took over the day-to-day running of Russia’s war effort this month by convincing his boss that his predecessor was too passive, American and European officials say. But General Gerasimov’s turbocharged strategy is what led to Russia’s problems to begin with, and Moscow still does not have the troops, ammunition or equipment that military officials say it needs to mass the big…

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The narcissism of angry young men

The narcissism of angry young men

Tom Nichols writes: Some years ago, I got a call from an analyst at the National Counterterrorism Center. After yet another gruesome mass shooting (this time, it was Dylann Roof’s attack on a Bible-study group at a Black church in Charleston, South Carolina, that killed nine and wounded one), I had written an article about the young men who perpetrate such crimes. I suggested that an overview of these killers showed them, in general, to be young losers who failed…

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U.S. Air Force general predicts war with China in 2025

U.S. Air Force general predicts war with China in 2025

NBC News reports: A four-star Air Force general sent a memo on Friday to the officers he commands that predicts the U.S. will be at war with China in two years and tells them to get ready to prep by firing “a clip” at a target, and “aim for the head.” In the memo sent Friday and obtained by NBC News, Gen. Mike Minihan, head of Air Mobility Command, said, “I hope I am wrong. My gut tells me will…

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GOP national sales tax talk backfires, as Democrats see political gold

GOP national sales tax talk backfires, as Democrats see political gold

Politico reports: House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has backed his fellow Republicans into a corner with one of the promises he made to his far-right flank to land his job: opening the door to considering fringe legislation that would replace the income tax with a federal sales tax and abolish the IRS. Most GOP members appear determined to distance themselves as much as possible from the idea, and McCarthy himself said this week he doesn’t support the legislation. But Democrats aren’t…

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How California’s ambitious new climate plan could help speed energy transformation around the world

How California’s ambitious new climate plan could help speed energy transformation around the world

Electrifying trucks and cars and shifting to renewable energy are crucial for California’s zero-emissions future. Sergio Pitamitz / VWPics/Universal Images Group via Getty Images By Daniel Sperling, University of California, Davis California is embarking on an audacious new climate plan that aims to eliminate the state’s greenhouse gas footprint by 2045, and in the process, slash emissions far beyond its borders. The blueprint calls for massive transformations in industry, energy and transportation, as well as changes in institutions and human…

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Pro-Western Petr Pavel sweeps to landslide win in race for Czech presidency

Pro-Western Petr Pavel sweeps to landslide win in race for Czech presidency

The Guardian reports: Petr Pavel, a retired general and former senior Nato commander, has swept to the Czech presidency after a landslide victory over the former prime minister Andrej Babiš in an election overshadowed by rows over the war between Russia and Ukraine. With nearly all the votes counted, returns showed Pavel prevailing by the emphatic margin of 58.3% to 41.68%, the largest ever recorded in a Czech presidential poll and reflecting an advantage of more than 958,000 votes nationwide….

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Inside the extramarital affair and cash-fueled double life of Charles McGonigal

Inside the extramarital affair and cash-fueled double life of Charles McGonigal

Insider reports: One morning in October 2017, Allison Guerriero noticed something unusual on the floor of her boyfriend’s Park Slope, Brooklyn, apartment: a bag full of cash. There it was, lying next to his shoes, near the futon, the kind of bag that liquor stores give out. Inside were bundles of bills, big denominations bound up with rubber bands. It didn’t seem like something he should be carrying around. After all, her boyfriend, Charles F. McGonigal, held one of the…

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Tyre Nichols’s death is evidence that cosmetic change can’t excise the rot of American law enforcement

Tyre Nichols’s death is evidence that cosmetic change can’t excise the rot of American law enforcement

Zak Cheney-Rice writes: The crisis in Memphis is the latest lesson in how limited the most popular reforms are, including those that might have seemed like game-changers not so long ago. Body cameras may have given us visual evidence of Nichols’s deathly beating, but were no deterrent. The federal response is already assuming a familiar shape. “To deliver real change, we must have accountability when law enforcement officers violate their oaths,” wrote Biden on Thursday, years after the criminal convictions…

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In social-media exile, Trump has increasingly amplified extremism

In social-media exile, Trump has increasingly amplified extremism

The New York Times reports: In September, former President Donald J. Trump went on Truth Social, his social network, and shared an image of himself wearing a lapel pin in the form of the letter Q, along with a phrase closely associated with the QAnon conspiracy theory movement: “The storm is coming.” In doing so, Mr. Trump ensured that the message — first posted by a QAnon-aligned account — would be hugely amplified, visible to his more than four million…

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How pharmaceutical companies inflate prices on their best-selling drugs at the expense of patients and taxpayers

How pharmaceutical companies inflate prices on their best-selling drugs at the expense of patients and taxpayers

The New York Times reports: In 2016, a blockbuster drug called Humira was poised to become a lot less valuable. The key patent on the best-selling anti-inflammatory medication, used to treat conditions like arthritis, was expiring at the end of the year. Regulators had blessed a rival version of the drug, and more copycats were close behind. The onset of competition seemed likely to push down the medication’s $50,000-a-year list price. Instead, the opposite happened. Through its savvy but legal…

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Trump’s killing spree: The inside story of his race to execute every prisoner he could

Trump’s killing spree: The inside story of his race to execute every prisoner he could

Rolling Stone reports: In the final moments of Brandon Bernard’s life, before he was executed by lethal injection at a federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana, on Dec. 10, 2020, President Donald Trump picked up the phone to entertain a final plea for mercy on Bernard’s behalf. The call was not with Bernard’s family or his attorneys. Nor was it with representatives from the Justice Department’s Pardon Attorney office, who had recommended just days earlier that Trump spare Bernard’s life….

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Facebook was a cash cow for Trump. It could end up being a ‘bronze goose’

Facebook was a cash cow for Trump. It could end up being a ‘bronze goose’

Politico reports: Trump was suspended from Facebook for his role in inciting the Jan. 6 riot in early 2021. But the suspension wasn’t permanent and Meta, Facebook’s parent company, said earlier this week that it would be lifted soon. “President Trump should have never been banned, so getting back on this platform allows the campaign access to that universe once again,” Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement. “We are getting closer to the full spectrum of building…

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