Espionage isn’t the strongest case against Trump. It’s simpler than that

Espionage isn’t the strongest case against Trump. It’s simpler than that

Renato Mariotti writes: Former president Donald Trump’s stubborn refusal to return highly classified material forced the Justice Department’s hand, resulting in the execution of a search warrant at his residence. But while it is possible the DOJ merely wanted to retrieve and secure the material that Trump refused to give back to the government, if they decide to press forward with charges, their case looks quite strong. The government initially treated Trump with kid gloves when he took government property,…

Read More Read More

Presidential power to declassify information, explained

Presidential power to declassify information, explained

The New York Times reports: Former President Donald J. Trump’s claim that he had declassified all of the documents that the F.B.I. seized in the search of his Florida home last week — including those marked as top secret — has heightened interest in the scope of a president’s power to declassify information. On Friday, Mr. Trump’s office claimed that when he was president, he had a “standing order” that materials “removed from the Oval Office and taken to the…

Read More Read More

‘It’s madness’: Ukraine holds breath as Putin turns nuclear plant into frontline

‘It’s madness’: Ukraine holds breath as Putin turns nuclear plant into frontline

The Guardian reports: On one side of the Dnieper River is the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, visible in the haze. Six nuclear reactors and a cooling tower loom over a Soviet-built reservoir. On the opposite bank is Nikopol, a city in southern Ukraine known for its Cossack past and modern tube and metallurgical factories. The distance between them is seven kilometres. Or, measured in rocket terms, about 15 seconds: the time it takes for a Grad missile fired by Russian…

Read More Read More

China’s demographics spell decline not domination

China’s demographics spell decline not domination

Niall Ferguson writes: Is it only a matter of time before we all admit that the “post-American world” has arrived, and the “Chinese Century” has begun? Should we just throw in the towel and let China have Taiwan? Well, no. Because if you think we’ve got problems, I can assure you that those of America’s principal rival are worse. Much worse. And, unlike our problems, China’s do not have the solution that obviously exists for the US — namely immigration…

Read More Read More

Meet the teenager who helped push Florida toward cleaner energy

Meet the teenager who helped push Florida toward cleaner energy

NPR reports: For most of his 15 years, Levi Draheim led a beachy life on a barrier island on Florida’s east coast, swimming, surfing and sailing in the nearshore waves. He dreamed of someday becoming a marine biologist. But Levi’s world is changing. Warming temperatures led to widespread Sargassum seaweed and harmful algae blooms in the Atlantic Ocean and 156-mile Indian River Lagoon, which together encircle the island. The seaweed and algae blooms have left beaches stinking with rotting seaweed…

Read More Read More

Trump stole and hid classified docs, lied about FBI search, then tried to intimidate AG Garland

Trump stole and hid classified docs, lied about FBI search, then tried to intimidate AG Garland

Quite the buried lede >> Trump tried to intimidate the Attorney General, getting an aide to contact DOJ to send Garland a message: that "the country is on fire"—enraged by the search. Trump disclosed it! The guy is still tampering w/ investigations & obstructing justice! pic.twitter.com/ktgBt8c6TY — 🇺🇦Paula Chertok🗽🇺🇦 (@PaulaChertok) August 13, 2022 The New York Times reports: At least one lawyer for former President Donald J. Trump signed a written statement in June asserting that all material marked as…

Read More Read More

Trump loyalists have reacted to the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago with unhinged fury

Trump loyalists have reacted to the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago with unhinged fury

Peter Wehner writes: In a sane world, a partisan Republican reaction to the FBI’s search of former President Donald Trump’s Florida home on Monday would be something like this: We don’t believe Trump did anything wrong. We’re skeptical about the Department of Justice’s actions, but we’ll wait to see the evidence before we make any sweeping claims or definitive judgments. Unfortunately, the reaction online, in the right-wing media, and even among lawmakers has been far from sane. It’s been unhinged…

Read More Read More

As right-wing rhetoric escalates, so do threats and violence

As right-wing rhetoric escalates, so do threats and violence

The New York Times reports: The armed attack this week on an F.B.I. office in Ohio by a supporter of former President Donald J. Trump who was enraged by the bureau’s search of Mr. Trump’s private residence in Florida was one of the most disturbing episodes of right-wing political violence in recent months. But it was hardly the only one. In the year and a half since a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol, threats of political violence and actual attacks…

Read More Read More

What Amnesty got wrong in Ukraine and why I had to resign

What Amnesty got wrong in Ukraine and why I had to resign

Oksana Pokalchuk writes: On Aug. 4, Amnesty International issued a report that accused the Ukrainian army of violating the laws of war by placing military bases close to civilian infrastructure. The report triggered a wave of public outrage worldwide and across Ukraine. For me, the report’s deepest flaw was how it contradicted its main objective: Far from protecting civilians, it further endangered them by giving Russia a justification to continue its indiscriminate attacks. That’s why I resigned as head of…

Read More Read More

Bribery: Sinema took Wall Street money while killing tax on investors

Bribery: Sinema took Wall Street money while killing tax on investors

The Associated Press reports: Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, the Arizona Democrat who single-handedly thwarted her party’s longtime goal of raising taxes on wealthy investors, received nearly $1 million over the past year from private equity professionals, hedge fund managers and venture capitalists whose taxes would have increased under the plan. For years, Democrats have promised to raise taxes on such investors, who pay a significantly lower rate on their earnings than ordinary workers. But just as they closed in on that…

Read More Read More

Undersea internet cables can detect earthquakes — and may soon warn of tsunamis

Undersea internet cables can detect earthquakes — and may soon warn of tsunamis

Jeffrey Marlow writes: Somewhere beneath the Adriatic Sea, a rogue block of the African tectonic plate is burrowing under southern Europe, stretching Italy eastward by a few millimetres each year. On October 26, 2016, the stress triggered an earthquake in the Apennine Mountains, one in a series of quakes which toppled buildings in Italian towns. On the day of the tremor, Giuseppe Marra, a principal research scientist at the National Physical Laboratory in Teddington, England, was running an experiment that…

Read More Read More

Dark energy may come from giant cosmic voids

Dark energy may come from giant cosmic voids

Paul Sutter writes: Gigantic deserts of almost complete nothingness that make up most of the universe may be causing the expansion of the universe to speed up, new research suggests. That means these vast tracts of nothingness could explain dark energy, the mysterious force that seems to be flinging the universe apart. Zoom all the way out from the solar system and the Milky Way galaxy, and an interesting pattern emerges: the cosmic web, the largest pattern found in nature….

Read More Read More

Trump’s storage of classified documents renews questions about transfer of nuclear technology to Saudis

Trump’s storage of classified documents renews questions about transfer of nuclear technology to Saudis

Politico reports: A search warrant newly unsealed on Friday reveals that the FBI is investigating Donald Trump for a potential violation of the Espionage Act and removed classified documents from the former president’s Florida estate earlier this week. A receipt accompanying the search warrant, viewed by POLITICO in advance of its unsealing, shows that Trump possessed documents including a handwritten note; documents marked with “TS/SCI,” which indicates one of the highest levels of government classification; and another item labeled “Info…

Read More Read More

Situation at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant ‘very alarming,’ says nuclear watchdog

Situation at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant ‘very alarming,’ says nuclear watchdog

Politico reports: The situation at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant has deteriorated rapidly to the point of becoming “very alarming,” the chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) warned at a U.N. Security Council meeting in New York late Thursday. “These military actions near such a large nuclear facility could lead to very serious consequences,” said IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi. The plant was shelled on August 5, causing several explosions near the electrical switchboard and a power…

Read More Read More