Ancient fires, spurred by human activity, drove large mammals extinct, study suggests

Ancient fires, spurred by human activity, drove large mammals extinct, study suggests

The New York Times reports: Wildfires are getting worse. Parts of the United States, scientists say, are experiencing wildfires three times as often — and four times as big — as they were 20 years ago. This summer alone, smoke from Canadian blazes turned North American skies an unearthly orange, “fire whirls” were seen in the Mojave Desert and raging flames in Maui led to disaster. Records of the distant past can reveal what once drove increased fire activity and…

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The cases against Trump aren’t criminalizing politics. He and his allies are politicizing crime

The cases against Trump aren’t criminalizing politics. He and his allies are politicizing crime

Quinta Jurecic writes: Following each new indictment of Donald Trump, the former president and his allies have wasted no time in attacking the case. Their complaints have gravitated toward one idea in particular: the notion that prosecutors have charged Trump for engaging in the normal work of politics. The latest indictment, in Fulton County, Georgia, is “an example of this criminalization of politics,” commented Florida Governor Ron DeSantis—who’d made a similar comment last month about Special Counsel Jack Smith’s indictment…

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Documentary footage shows Roger Stone working to overturn 2020 election

Documentary footage shows Roger Stone working to overturn 2020 election

The Daily Beast reports: MSNBC’s The Beat aired exclusive footage Wednesday of Roger Stone working to overturn the 2020 presidential election—before the election had even been called for Joe Biden. The video, originally obtained by Danish filmmaker Christoffer Guldbrandsen for his 2023 documentary A Storm Foretold, shows Stone dictating to an associate on a laptop a strategy to thwart the will of the voters. “Although state officials in all 50 states must ultimately certify the results of the voting in…

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Fox executives are pouring cash into Joe Manchin’s campaign

Fox executives are pouring cash into Joe Manchin’s campaign

The Intercept reports: Since the 2020 presidential election, when Democrats emerged with a razor-thin majority in the Senate, Joe Manchin has been no stranger to his Republican colleagues: schmoozing with them on his houseboat, meeting to discuss concerns about President Joe Biden’s massive spending packages, and proving a consistent ally in derailing the aspirations of both Blue Dog Democrats and left-wing progressives. As the Democrats’ critical 51st vote, the West Virginia senator has repeatedly taken to Fox News to warn…

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Texas and others create ‘punitive’ barriers to EV transition

Texas and others create ‘punitive’ barriers to EV transition

Politico reports: Electric vehicle drivers in Texas have started to get some bad news in the mail. Starting in September, they’ll have to pay the state an extra $200 each year to register their climate-friendly cars and trucks. And if they want to buy a new EV, that will cost $400 upfront. State lawmakers imposed the new fee on EVs this spring to replace gasoline taxes lost to the switch to battery-powered vehicles. Supporters say it ensures every driver pays…

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Former senior FBI official pleads guilty to illegally assisting Putin ally

Former senior FBI official pleads guilty to illegally assisting Putin ally

The Washington Post reports: Former high-ranking FBI official Charles McGonigal pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court to conspiring to violate U.S. sanctions and to laundering money by secretly working on behalf of a Russian oligarch he had been tasked with investigating. The former chief of counterintelligence in the FBI’s New York City office, who was charged in January, settled his New York case with federal prosecutors by pleading guilty to one count in a superseding document used to override or…

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Shame makes people living in poverty more supportive of authoritarianism, study finds

Shame makes people living in poverty more supportive of authoritarianism, study finds

PsyPost reports: A series of three studies in Germany found that people living in poverty frequently experience exclusion from different aspects of society and devaluation leading to the feeling of shame. Such shame, in turn, increases their support for authoritarianism due to the promise that that they will be included in the society again authoritarian leaders typically make. The study was published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. Poverty is defined as a lack of the capability to live…

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The Global South’s views on Ukraine are more complex than you may think

The Global South’s views on Ukraine are more complex than you may think

Michael Karadjis writes: On July 19, South Africa announced that Russian President Vladimir Putin would not be attending the BRICS summit in Johannesburg in late August, ending speculation about whether South Africa would arrest him because of the warrant issued by the International Criminal Court. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will attend instead. The ICC warrant accuses Putin of illegally deporting thousands of Ukrainian children to Russia. Russia, like the United States, is not a signatory to the ICC, whereas…

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What the heck happened in Coffee County, Georgia?

What the heck happened in Coffee County, Georgia?

Anna Bower writes: Shortly before noon on Jan. 7, 2021, with the nation still reeling from the aftermath of the attempted insurrection in Washington, D.C., a Republican Party official ushers a computer forensics team into an elections office in far-away Coffee County, Georgia. According to a combination of court filings, depositions in subsequent litigation, and the indictment filed Monday evening in Fulton County, Georgia, the forensics team—a group of employees of an Atlanta-based firm called SullivanStrickler—has driven into the rural south Georgia…

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Will the Georgia case really put Trump and some of his co-defendants behind bars?

Will the Georgia case really put Trump and some of his co-defendants behind bars?

Kim Wehle writes: In the months leading up to this indictment, Trump’s lawyers tried mightily to kill this case, filing a 483-page motion seeking to have District Attorney Fani Willis removed and the report from the investigative grand jury (or “special” grand jury) that preceded the charging grand jury thrown out. The motion was denied, but the effort signaled that Trump may be especially worried about this case. He should be, for these reasons: First, Georgia’s RICO statute carries a…

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Special counsel obtained Trump DMs despite ‘momentous’ bid by Twitter to delay, unsealed filings show

Special counsel obtained Trump DMs despite ‘momentous’ bid by Twitter to delay, unsealed filings show

Politico reports: Special counsel Jack Smith obtained an extraordinary array of data from Twitter about Donald Trump’s account — from direct messages to draft tweets to location data — newly unsealed court filings reveal. But it took a bruising battle with Twitter’s attorneys in January and February — punctuated by a blistering analysis by a federal judge, who wondered whether Elon Musk was attempting to “cozy up” to the former president by resisting the special counsel’s demands — before prosecutors…

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Scott McAfee has been a judge six months. He is now assigned Trump’s Georgia case

Scott McAfee has been a judge six months. He is now assigned Trump’s Georgia case

The Wall Street Journal reports: Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee first put on his robes in February this year. About six months into his new gig, he was assigned to oversee perhaps the biggest case in Georgia history: the criminal indictment of former President Donald Trump and 18 others who prosecutors say organized efforts to overturn Joe Biden’s narrow 2020 victory in the state. McAfee, 34 years old, has spent much of his career as a prosecutor, first for the Fulton County district attorney and…

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Critics of ‘degrowth’ economics say it’s unworkable – but from an ecologist’s perspective, it’s inevitable

Critics of ‘degrowth’ economics say it’s unworkable – but from an ecologist’s perspective, it’s inevitable

Shutterstock/Matt Sheumack By Mike Joy, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington You may not have noticed, but earlier this month we passed Earth overshoot day, when humanity’s demands for ecological resources and services exceeded what our planet can regenerate annually. Many economists criticising the developing degrowth movement fail to appreciate this critical point of Earth’s biophysical limits. Ecologists on the other hand see the human economy as a subset of the biosphere. Their perspective highlights the urgency with…

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Canada’s raging fires have burned an area larger than Greece

Canada’s raging fires have burned an area larger than Greece

The Washington Post reports: Wildfires continue to rage in Canada, burning twice as much land as any previous season, an area equivalent to Alabama or nine Connecticuts. The blazes have charred nearly 33 million acres (13.3 million hectares) across the country, with hundreds of large fires still burning. The situation is not improving. Fires from coast-to-coast have stretched firefighting forces thin, requiring help from the Canadian military. Several massive conflagrations in the Northwest Territories have imperiled a number of towns…

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