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Category: Politics

The legacy of the Order can be seen in the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers

The legacy of the Order can be seen in the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers

The New York Times reports: They robbed an armored car outside a sprawling Seattle shopping mall. They bombed a synagogue in Boise, Idaho, and within weeks assassinated a Jewish talk radio host in Denver. Then a month later, they plundered another armored car on a California highway in a spectacular daylight heist that netted more than $3.6 million. What initially seemed to F.B.I. agents like distant, disparate crimes turned out to be the opening salvos in a war against the…

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Giuliani’s legal trouble is Trump’s too

Giuliani’s legal trouble is Trump’s too

Renato Mariotti writes: You don’t need to be a lawyer to know that when federal agents knock on your door with a search warrant and seize your electronic devices, you’re in big trouble. Ever since that happened to former Donald Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani on Wednesday, he has tried to downplay the peril he is in, saying whatever evidence is on his phones proves that “the president and I…are innocent.” But it sure looks like he has a long legal…

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With citizens desperate for oxygen, India’s politicians deny there’s even a problem

With citizens desperate for oxygen, India’s politicians deny there’s even a problem

Reuters reports: A forum of scientific advisers set up by the government warned Indian officials in early March of a new and more contagious variant of the coronavirus taking hold in the country, five scientists who are part of the forum told Reuters. Despite the warning, four of the scientists said the federal government did not seek to impose major restrictions to stop the spread of the virus. Millions of largely unmasked people attended religious festivals and political rallies that…

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‘It’s all Taliban country now’: New militant checkpoints on key roadways choke off parts of Afghanistan

‘It’s all Taliban country now’: New militant checkpoints on key roadways choke off parts of Afghanistan

The Washington Post reports: Taliban checkpoints have proliferated across key parts of Afghanistan as U.S. forces have withdrawn over the past year, leaving Afghan towns and cities increasingly isolated and impeding the Afghan government’s ability to function. Dozens of temporary Taliban checkpoints now dot the main highways leading into and out of the Afghan capital, according to eight local officials, and more than 10 permanent outposts have been established by the militants along the country’s main north-south highway. Many of…

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Fierce foes, Iran and Saudi Arabia secretly explore defusing tensions

Fierce foes, Iran and Saudi Arabia secretly explore defusing tensions

The New York Times reports: In a prime-time television interview four years ago, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia dismissed the idea that his kingdom could somehow find an accommodation with its archrival, Iran. “How do we communicate?” he asked. “The mutual points that we can agree on with this regime are almost nonexistent.” Now, Prince Mohammed is finding those points as he embarks on a diplomatic effort to defuse tensions between the two regional powers that have…

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GOP seeks to empower poll watchers, raising intimidation worries

GOP seeks to empower poll watchers, raising intimidation worries

The New York Times reports: The red dot of a laser pointer circled downtown Houston on a map during a virtual training of poll watchers by the Harris County Republican Party. It highlighted densely populated, largely Black, Latino and Asian neighborhoods. “This is where the fraud is occurring,” a county Republican official said falsely in a leaked video of the training, which was held in March. A precinct chair in the northeastern, largely white suburbs of Houston, he said he…

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In rural America, fear more than politics shapes attitudes to Covid vaccine

In rural America, fear more than politics shapes attitudes to Covid vaccine

The New York Times reports: “So have you gotten the vaccine yet?” The question, a friendly greeting to Betty Smith, the pastor’s wife, lingered in the air as the four church women sat down for their regular Tuesday coffee and conversation at Ingle’s Market. Mrs. Smith hesitated, sensing a chilly blast of judgment from a never-mask, never-vax companion. She fumbled through a non-reply. Recalling the moment later, she sighed, “We were there to get to know each other better but…

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Manchin says he doesn’t support D.C. statehood bill, dealing advocates a major blow

Manchin says he doesn’t support D.C. statehood bill, dealing advocates a major blow

The Washington Post reports: Sen. Joe Manchin III told reporters in his home state of West Virginia on Friday morning that he does not support the bill to make D.C. the nation’s 51st state, according to audio provided by the Democrat’s office and a report from WVNews. Manchin, a key swing vote in the closely divided Senate, said he believes a constitutional amendment, rather than legislation, would be required to admit D.C. as a state. His stance deals a major…

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The plan to kill Osama bin Laden, as told by the people in the room

The plan to kill Osama bin Laden, as told by the people in the room

Garrett M. Graff writes: On the morning of May 1, 2011, most Americans had never heard of Abbottabad. By that night, the dusty midsize city near the mountains of northwest Pakistan was the center of the biggest story in the world. A team of U.S. Navy SEALs had just descended by helicopter on a high-walled mansion there in the dark of night, located the globe’s most hunted man and killed him. The effort to track and execute Osama bin Laden,…

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Has Tucker deposed Trump as the troller in chief?

Has Tucker deposed Trump as the troller in chief?

Jack Shafer writes: [W]ith Trump gone, [Tucker] Carlson has become the most audible mouth in the agitation-provocation space. Like Trump, he labors to produce the incendiary and infuriating to attract attention and the very commendations he found himself buried neck-high in after his monologue. He lives to generate outrage from Democrats and the hall monitors at Media Matters for America. Has the #firetuckercarlson hashtag started to trend on Twitter? From Carlson’s point of view, nothing could be better. Has Washington…

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‘We are witnessing a crime against humanity’: Arundhati Roy on India’s Covid catastrophe

‘We are witnessing a crime against humanity’: Arundhati Roy on India’s Covid catastrophe

Arundhati Roy writes: During a particularly polarising election campaign in the state of Uttar Pradesh in 2017, India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, waded into the fray to stir things up even further. From a public podium, he accused the state government – which was led by an opposition party – of pandering to the Muslim community by spending more on Muslim graveyards (kabristans) than on Hindu cremation grounds (shamshans). With his customary braying sneer, in which every taunt and barb…

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Biden gave the most ideologically ambitious speech of any Democratic president in generations

Biden gave the most ideologically ambitious speech of any Democratic president in generations

John Harris writes: President Joe Biden’s address to a joint session Congress was the most ambitious ideological statement made by any Democratic president in decades—couched in language that made it sound as if he wasn’t making an ideological argument at all. Make no mistake that he was. He called for trillions in new spending in a robust expansion of government’s role in multiple arenas of American life in ways that would have been impossible to contemplate in Barack Obama’s presidency….

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Can Democrats avoid a wipeout in 2022?

Can Democrats avoid a wipeout in 2022?

Ronald Brownstein writes: The good news for Democrats who watched Joe Biden unveil a historically ambitious agenda last night is that newly elected presidents have almost always passed some version of their core economic plan—particularly when their party controls both congressional chambers, as Biden’s does now. The bad news: Voters have almost always punished the president’s party in the next midterm election anyway. The last two times Democrats had unified control—with Bill Clinton in 1993–94 and Barack Obama in 2009–10—they…

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They went to D.C. on Jan. 6. Now they’re running for office

They went to D.C. on Jan. 6. Now they’re running for office

The Daily Beast reports: On Jan. 5, Charles Herbster claims, he was at Donald Trump’s Washington, D.C., hotel with the president’s two adult sons, discussing ways to pressure Congress out of certifying Joe Biden’s victory. On Jan. 6, he attended a pro-Trump rally that later led to an attack on the U.S. Capitol. On Monday, Herbster announced his candidacy for governor of Nebraska. Herbster, who has agricultural businesses in multiple states, is running on the same staunch pro-Trump lines that…

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U.S. Labor Secretary throws his support behind classifying gig workers as employees

U.S. Labor Secretary throws his support behind classifying gig workers as employees

Reuters reports: A lot of gig workers in the United States should be classified as “employees” who deserve work benefits, President Biden’s labor secretary said on Thursday, suggesting a shift in policy that is likely to raise costs for companies that depend on contractors such as Uber and Lyft. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh, a son of Irish immigrants and a former union member, has been expected to boost the Biden Administration’s efforts to expand workers’ protections and deliver a win…

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U.S. investigating possible mysterious directed energy attack near White House

U.S. investigating possible mysterious directed energy attack near White House

CNN reports: Federal agencies are investigating at least two possible incidents on US soil, including one near the White House in November of last year, that appear similar to mysterious, invisible attacks that have led to debilitating symptoms for dozens of US personnel abroad. Multiple sources familiar with the matter tell CNN that while the Pentagon and other agencies probing the matter have reached no clear conclusions on what happened, the fact that such an attack might have taken place…

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