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Category: Politics

Hackers at center of sprawling spy campaign turned SolarWinds’ dominance against it

Hackers at center of sprawling spy campaign turned SolarWinds’ dominance against it

Reuters reports: On an earnings call two months ago, SolarWinds Chief Executive Kevin Thompson touted how far the company had gone during his 11 years at the helm. There was not a database or an IT deployment model out there to which his Austin, Texas-based company did not provide some level of monitoring or management, he told analysts on the Oct. 27 call. “We don’t think anyone else in the market is really even close in terms of the breadth…

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How the ‘deep state’ scientists vilified by Trump helped him deliver an unprecedented achievement

How the ‘deep state’ scientists vilified by Trump helped him deliver an unprecedented achievement

The Washington Post reports: The timing of the hastily arranged White House “vaccine summit” last Tuesday bewildered many invitees. It was days before the authorization of the first coronavirus vaccine developed by Pfizer and German firm BioNTech — and nearly a week before millions of vaccine doses would be loaded onto trucks bound for every state in the nation. Wouldn’t those milestones and the mass vaccination effort that followed be what the White House would want to spotlight? That was…

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Trump tells allies he will run in 2024, but hints he may back out

Trump tells allies he will run in 2024, but hints he may back out

Politico reports: Donald Trump doesn’t need to run for president again. He just needs everyone to think he is. The president’s recent discussions with those around him reveal that he sees his White House comeback deliberations as a way to earn the commodity he needs most after leaving office: attention. The president has spent days calling a dozen or more allies to ask what they think he needs to do over the next two years to “stay part of the…

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Congressman cites Trump’s efforts to overturn election in announcing decision to quit GOP

Congressman cites Trump’s efforts to overturn election in announcing decision to quit GOP

CNN reports: In an exclusive interview, Rep. Paul Mitchell, Republican of Michigan, told CNN that his disgust and disappointment with President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the election have led him to request that the Clerk of the House change his party affiliation to “independent,” and to notify GOP leaders in a letter that he is withdrawing his “engagement and association with the Republican Party at both the national and state level.” “This party has to stand…

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CNN and MSNBC fret over post-Trump future

CNN and MSNBC fret over post-Trump future

The New York Times reports: CNN and MSNBC thrived during the Trump years, reaching new heights in ratings and revenue while devoting countless prime-time hours to criticizing a White House antagonist their viewers just could not quit. Now faced with a Trump-less future, top executives at the rival cable news networks have summoned star anchors and producers to private meetings in recent weeks, seeking answers to a pressing question: What’s next? People at both networks know that viewers who abhorred…

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DHS is third federal agency hacked in major Russian cyberespionage campaign

DHS is third federal agency hacked in major Russian cyberespionage campaign

The Washington Post reports: The Department of Homeland Security on Monday joined the list of known victims of a months-long, highly sophisticated digital spying operation by Russia whose damage remains uncertain but is presumed to be extensive, experts say. The list of victims of the cyberespionage, which already included the Treasury and Commerce departments, is expected to grow and to include more federal agencies and numerous private companies, said officials and others familiar with the matter, who spoke on the…

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Al Gore: Where I find hope

Al Gore: Where I find hope

Al Gore writes: This weekend marks two anniversaries that, for me, point a way forward through the accumulated wreckage of the past year. The first is personal. Twenty years ago, I ended my presidential campaign after the Supreme Court abruptly decided the 2000 election. As the incumbent vice president, my duty then turned to presiding over the tallying of Electoral College votes in Congress to elect my opponent. This process will unfold again on Monday as the college’s electors ratify…

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The end of a world of nation states

The end of a world of nation states

Jamie Bartlett writes: If you’d been born 1,500 years ago in southern Europe, you’d have been convinced that the Roman empire would last forever. It had, after all, been around for 1,000 years. And yet, following a period of economic and military decline, it fell apart. By 476 CE it was gone. To the people living under the mighty empire, these events must have been unthinkable. Just as they must have been for those living through the collapse of the…

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Wisconsin Supreme Court justices tell Trump lawyer his election suit ‘smacks of racism’

Wisconsin Supreme Court justices tell Trump lawyer his election suit ‘smacks of racism’

Adam Klasfeld writes: Outgoing President Donald Trump and his soon-to-be-former Vice President Mike Pence’s attempt to invalidate Wisconsin’s vote in only Milwaukee and Dane Counties appears to be racially motivated, two of the state’s Supreme Court justice remarked in a brutal Saturday hearing for the lame duck president. Trump’s attorney, James Troupis, had barely begun to address the high court when Justice Jill Karofsky noted that the attack focused on the two counties with the state’s largest number of Black…

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Historic D.C. Black churches attacked during pro-Trump rallies Saturday

Historic D.C. Black churches attacked during pro-Trump rallies Saturday

The Washington Post reports: A Black Lives Matter banner and sign were torn from two historic Black churches in downtown D.C. and destroyed during pro-Trump protests Saturday night. D.C. police said they are investigating the events as potential hate crimes. In one of the incidents, videos posted on Twitter show a group of people identified as Proud Boys marching with a Black Lives Matter banner held above their heads, then cheering as it is set on fire while chanting “f—…

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Trump unleashes an army of sore losers

Trump unleashes an army of sore losers

Politico reports: It’s been five weeks since the election, and he still hasn’t conceded. Alleging massive voter fraud, he’s demanded an audit of votes in populous Democratic strongholds. On Thursday, he sued the secretary of state. We’re talking here about Loren Culp, the unsuccessful Republican nominee for governor in Washington state, where he lost by more than 13 percentage points on Nov. 3. Like Donald Trump, Culp insists he’s the victim of a rigged election. Trump, it seems, isn’t the…

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Obama sat out the past four years and it shows

Obama sat out the past four years and it shows

Lili Loofbourow writes: Barack Obama is ready to come back into the spotlight. After four years spent mostly out of the public eye, right on the heels of Donald Trump’s defeat, the ex-president is suddenly everywhere. He’s on the Tonight Show weighing in on whether Chicago deep-dish or New York–style pizza is better. He’s slamming the Knicks on Desus & Mero and deep in conversation with Oprah on Apple TV+. He’s talking books with Michiko Kakutani in the New York…

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Russian government spies are behind a broad hacking campaign that has breached U.S. agencies and a top cyber firm

Russian government spies are behind a broad hacking campaign that has breached U.S. agencies and a top cyber firm

The Washington Post reports: The Russian government hackers who breached a top cybersecurity firm are behind a global espionage campaign that also compromised the Treasury and Commerce departments and other U.S. government agencies, according to people familiar with the matter. The FBI is investigating the campaign by a hacking group working for the Russian foreign intelligence service, SVR. The breaches have been taking place for months and may amount to an operation as long-running and significant as one that occurred…

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How dozens of judges across the political spectrum rejected Trump’s efforts to overturn the election

How dozens of judges across the political spectrum rejected Trump’s efforts to overturn the election

The Washington Post reports: They are both elected and appointed, selected by Democrats and Republicans alike. Some have served for decades — while others took the bench only months ago. One is a former high school teacher, another the first Native American woman appointed to a federal judgeship. A third worked for years for a Republican governor who has been a vocal supporter of President Trump. Since the November election, they have all ruled in court against Trump or one…

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Trump’s GOP lackeys have ‘all drunk the Kool Aid. It just hasn’t killed them yet’

Trump’s GOP lackeys have ‘all drunk the Kool Aid. It just hasn’t killed them yet’

The New York Times reports: The Supreme Court repudiation of President Trump’s desperate bid for a second term not only shredded his effort to overturn the will of voters: It also was a blunt rebuke to Republican leaders in Congress and the states who were willing to damage American democracy by embracing a partisan power grab over a free and fair election. The court’s decision on Friday night, an inflection point after weeks of legal flailing by Mr. Trump and…

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How Michael Anton’s ‘Flight 93 Election’ essay helped define the Trump era

How Michael Anton’s ‘Flight 93 Election’ essay helped define the Trump era

Jonathan Chait writes: In September 2016, Michael Anton wrote an essay for the right-wing Claremont Institute, “The Flight 93 Election,” making the case for Donald Trump’s election as a necessary gamble to stave off the destruction of conservatism. Anton then did a stint in Trump’s National Security Council, and last night was rewarded by the president with a posting to the National Board for Education Sciences. It was a fitting coda for Trump to single out the figure who most…

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