The Observer reports: The time to forgive and forget had passed, the grey-bearded man said in a heavy Bavarian growl, his back facing the turquoise Adriatic sea as he calmly gesticulated towards the camera. “Those people who bullied us, who locked us up”, he said, were about to face a reckoning in an “epochal upheaval” that would usher in a new judicial and political order. Change was imminent – a matter of weeks. “If everything goes to plan, we’ll do…
NBC News reports: Russia is now providing an “unprecedented level” of military and technical support to Iran in exchange for Tehran supplying weapons for the war in Ukraine, senior Biden administration officials say. As part of the enhanced partnership, Russia may be providing Iran with advanced military equipment and components, including helicopters and air defense systems. In the spring, Iranian pilots trained in Russia to fly the Sukhoi Su-35, a Russian fighter jet, which the officials say indicates Iran “may…
AFP reports: Iran was slapped with new sanctions Friday and activists called for fresh protests after the Islamic republic carried out its first execution over demonstrations that have shaken the regime for nearly three months. Mohsen Shekari, 23, was hanged Thursday after being convicted of “moharebeh” — or “enmity against God” — after what rights groups denounced as a show trial. The judiciary said Shekari was arrested after blocking a Tehran street and wounding a member of the Basij, a…
The Washington Post reports: Over two days in October, eight Russian cruise missiles screamed out of the sky and obliterated tens of millions of dollars’ worth of critical machinery at this city’s hulking coal-fired power plant. The attacks were designed to leave Ukraine cold and dark this winter. But they also deepened a financial crisis for the plant’s owner, Rinat Akhmetov, the country’s richest man. Akhmetov’s wealth has dived from $7.6 billion to $4.3 billion since Russia invaded Ukraine in…
Jonathan Chait writes: The biggest loser of the 2022 election other than Donald Trump was Kyrsten Sinema. The Arizona senator and now-former Democrat desperately needed Democrats, especially fellow senator Mark Kelly, to lose. Only such a setback would make the party desperate enough to tolerate her continued presence. Kelly’s reelection made it certain that Sinema would face, and lose, a primary challenge in two years. Sinema’s declaration of independence from the party is a ploy to avoid the primary and…
Susan Glasser writes: From his low-energy announcement speech at Mar-a-Lago to his dinner with the Hitler-praising Kanye West and the white supremacist Nick Fuentes, Trump has courted more controversy than votes since launching his bid in November. He has held no campaign rallies and hired no campaign manager. He has hosted a QAnon conspiracy theorist and helped raise money for the indicted insurrectionists of January 6th. More classified items have been found in his possession, and his Trump Organization was…
BBC News reports: Iran has announced the first execution of a protester convicted over the recent anti-government unrest. Mohsen Shekari was hanged on Thursday morning after being found guilty by a Revolutionary Court of “moharebeh” (enmity against God), state media said. He was accused of being a “rioter” who blocked a main road in Tehran in September and wounded a member of a paramilitary force with a machete. An activist said he was convicted after a “show trial without any…
Michael Weiss writes: “She’s on her way home after months of being unjustly detained in Russia, held in intolerable circumstances.” So President Biden announced Thursday from the Roosevelt Room of the White House, alerting the press to the news that Brittney Griner has finally been released from a Russian penal colony. Biden spoke next to Cherelle Griner, the American WNBA basketball player’s visibly affected wife. Following months of intense negotiations, the United States managed to secure Griner’s freedom in a…
The Washington Post reports: Prosecutors have urged a federal judge to hold Donald Trump’s office in contempt of court for failing to fully comply with a May subpoena to return all classified documents in his possession, according to people familiar with the matter — a sign of how contentious the private talks have become over whether the former president still holds any secret papers. In recent days, Justice Department lawyers have asked U.S. District Judge Beryl A. Howell to hold…
Quinta Jurecic writes: Midway through yesterday’s Supreme Court oral argument in Moore v. Harper, the case concerning the “independent state legislature” theory, Justice Elena Kagan took a moment to consider the stakes. “This is a theory with big consequences,” she noted. Kagan’s comment was a dry bit of understatement. Ever since the Supreme Court first agreed to hear the case, Moore has drawn alarm from across the political spectrum, with liberal activists and grandees of the conservative legal movement alike…
Too bad the U.S. Senate, acquitting Trump of impeachable insurrection, lacked the cojones that Peru’s Congress had on display when it dispatched President Castillo for similarly self-aggrandizing high crimes . . . https://t.co/yqHR4z2uiY — Laurence Tribe (@tribelaw) December 7, 2022 CNN reports: Dina Boluarte became Peru’s first female President on Wednesday, capping off a dramatic day which saw her predecessor arrested for the alleged crime of rebellion and impeached by lawmakers. Boluarte, the country’s former vice president, was sworn into…
The Wall Street Journal reports: China dropped many of its quarantine and testing requirements and curtailed the power of local officials to shut down entire city blocks, as the government accelerates plans to dismantle zero-Covid controls in the wake of nationwide protests. The speed of Beijing’s retreat from its pandemic regime suggests the country’s leaders are now more concerned about the damage those controls have caused to China’s economy than the risk of worsening Covid infections that surged to a…
Sarah Wesseler writes: Transportation is the largest source of greenhouse gases in the United States, and passenger vehicles — the cars most Americans rely on to meet their daily needs — account for more than half of transportation emissions. Conversations about reducing these emissions typically focus on electric vehicles. But increasingly, government officials across the country are aiming not just to get Americans into different kinds of cars, but to radically reduce the need to drive in the first place….
Ronald Brownstein writes: Senator Raphael Warnock’s win in yesterday’s Georgia Senate runoff capped a commanding show of strength by Democrats in the states that decided the 2020 race for the White House—and will likely pick the winner again in 2024. With Warnock’s victory over Republican Herschel Walker, Democrats have defeated every GOP Senate and gubernatorial candidate endorsed by Donald Trump this year in the five states that flipped from supporting him in 2016 to backing Joe Biden in 2020: Michigan,…
Reuters reports: A sister of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has condemned his crackdown on nationwide protests and called on the widely-feared Revolutionary Guards to lay down their weapons, according to a letter published by her France-based son. Iran has been gripped by unrest since the death of 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian woman Mahsa Amini in police custody on Sept 16., and is facing a three-day general strike movement which started on Monday. Badri Hosseini Khamenei, who lives in Iran…
The Washington Post reports: Democrats on a pair of congressional committees have launched an aggressive new effort to obtain information about whether Jared Kushner’s actions on U.S. policy in the Persian Gulf region as a senior White House adviser were influenced by the bailout of a property owned by his family business. Citing previously undisclosed emails and other documents related to former president Donald Trump’s son-in-law, the committees on Monday night sent letters to the State and Defense departments requesting…