David Wallace-Wells writes: Not all deaths are created equal. In February 2020, the world began to panic about the novel coronavirus, which killed 2714 people that month. This made the news. In the same month, around 800,000 people died from the effects of air pollution. That didn’t. Novelty counts for a lot. At the start of the pandemic, it was considered unseemly to make comparisons like these. But comparing the value of human lives is one thing the machine of…
Marianne Lavelle reports: It was 2 a.m. and the sun was shining, as it does day and night in mid-July in Norilsk, a Siberian city 200 miles north of the Arctic Circle. Igor Klyushin went to the bank of the river where he used to fish with his father for grayling, a sleek and dorsal-finned beauty known for its graceful leaps above the water surface. “A very merry fish,” Klyushin recalled. “It enjoys cold and clean, clean water.” He doubted…
The New York Times reports: Millions of ordinary people in Iran and Israel recently found themselves caught in the crossfire of a cyberwar between their countries. In Tehran, a dentist drove around for hours in search of gasoline, waiting in long lines at four gas stations only to come away empty. In Tel Aviv, a well-known broadcaster panicked as the intimate details of his sex life, and those of hundreds of thousands of others stolen from an L.G.B.T.Q. dating site,…
The Wall Street Journal reports: Undercover Taliban agents—often clean-shaven, dressed in jeans and sporting sunglasses—spent years infiltrating Afghan government ministries, universities, businesses and aid organizations. Then, as U.S. forces were completing their withdrawal in August, these operatives stepped out of the shadows in Kabul and other big cities across Afghanistan, surprising their neighbors and colleagues. Pulling their weapons from hiding, they helped the Taliban rapidly seize control from the inside. The pivotal role played by these clandestine cells is becoming…
vIdEo pRoDuCtIoN iS mY pAsSiOn pic.twitter.com/7ErBpus3kn — Jan Bobrowicz (@janbobrowicz) November 28, 2021 The Daily Beast reports: Former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn has embraced his position as a hero to QAnon conspiracy theorists. He took the QAnon oath, sold QAnon T-shirts, and even auctioned off a QAnon quilt. He appeared at a QAnon convention and signed books with a QAnon slogan. Some QAnon followers even believe that Flynn is “Q,” the mysterious figure behind QAnon. But a recording…
CNN reports: A moderate House Republican is firing off a warning shot at House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy as he caters to his right flank in a quest for the speaker’s gavel. “He’s taking the middle of the conference for granted,” the GOP lawmaker told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss internal conference dynamics. “McCarthy could have a bigger math problem with the moderates.” Specifically, the lawmaker said a number of moderates are upset with how McCarthy, of…
Gordon Brown writes: Despite the repeated warnings of health leaders, our failure to put vaccines into the arms of people in the developing world is now coming back to haunt us. We were forewarned – and yet here we are. In the absence of mass vaccination, Covid is not only spreading uninhibited among unprotected people but is mutating, with new variants emerging out of the poorest countries and now threatening to unleash themselves on even fully vaccinated people in the…
The New York Times reports: In poorer African nations, the cascade of travel closures triggered a wave of resentment among people who believed that the continent was yet again bearing the brunt of panicked policies from Western countries, which had failed to deliver vaccines and the resources needed to administer them. Richer countries, having already hoarded vaccines for much of 2021, were now penalizing parts of the world that they had starved of shots in the first place, scientists said….
Bloomberg reports: President Joe Biden’s choice to lead the Food and Drug Administration made millions of dollars from health and drug companies since his last stint in government, raising new questions about his ties to firms the agency oversees. Robert Califf was paid $2.7 million by Verily Life Sciences, the biomedical research organization operated by Alphabet Inc., and sits on the boards of two pharmaceutical companies, AmyriAD and Centessa Pharmaceuticals PLC. He also reported ties to 16 other research organizations…
CNN reports: Atlanta. Orlando. Las Vegas. Newtown. Parkland. San Bernardino. Ubiquitous gun violence in the United States has left few places unscathed over the decades. Still, many Americans hold their right to bear arms, enshrined in the US Constitution, as sacrosanct. But critics of the Second Amendment say that right threatens another: The right to life. America’s relationship to gun ownership is unique, and its gun culture is a global outlier. As the tally of gun-related deaths continue to grow…
Rep. Jared Golden writes: For years, Democrats have made promises to American voters: Elect us, and we will lower the cost of prescription drugs. Elect us, and we will expand access to affordable health care. Elect us, and we will strengthen labor laws to protect the rights of workers. Elect us, and we will deliver important, common-sense reform to make life better for people in the working middle class. Last week, we found out that Democratic party leaders also have…
The New York Times reports: Republicans are locking in newly gerrymandered maps for the legislatures in four battleground states that are set to secure the party’s control in the statehouse chambers over the next decade, fortifying the G.O.P. against even the most sweeping potential Democratic wave elections. In Texas, North Carolina, Ohio and Georgia, Republican state lawmakers have either created supermajorities capable of overriding a governor’s veto or whittled down competitive districts so significantly that Republicans’ advantage is virtually impenetrable…
Adam Serwer writes: The men who killed Ahmaud Arbery will not get away with it. Yet the most surprising aspect of the trial is not the verdict, but the fact that the trial happened at all. On Wednesday, a Georgia jury convicted Travis McMichael; his father, Gregory McMichael; and their friend William Bryan of felony offenses after the trio chased down and then shot Arbery in Brunswick, Georgia, in February of last year. The men claimed that they were attempting…
Juliette Kayyem writes: Perhaps you’ve figured this out already: The pandemic will not have a discrete end. The coronavirus will not raise a white flag. There will be no peace treaty, no parade, no announcement from the CDC that the United States is done worrying about COVID. You will not get closure. The signs remain too mixed. The virus continues to spread, even as widening vaccine eligibility, booster shots, and improved medical treatments limit the damage the virus can do….
Joshua Zeitz writes: In late 1863, President Abraham Lincoln unwittingly launched what would soon become a cherished American tradition. A well-wisher had sent a turkey to the White House for the first family’s holiday meal. When Lincoln’s son, Tad, begged his father to spare the bird’s life, the president — ever an indulgent parent — pulled out a piece of paper and wrote out a presidential pardon. Thus was a venerable presidential practice born. But the mood was not light…
France 24 reports: An Emirati general accused of torture was elected president of Interpol Thursday, the global police agency said, despite the concerns of human rights organisations and members of the European Parliament. “Mr Ahmed Nasser AL RAISI of the United Arab Emirates has been elected to the post of President (4-yr term),” Interpol said on Twitter. General Al-Raisi, head of the United Arab Emirates’ security forces, will take on a largely ceremonial and voluntary role. [Continue reading…] Reuters reports:…