Amid crisis, Kazakhstan’s leader chose his path: embrace Putin

Amid crisis, Kazakhstan’s leader chose his path: embrace Putin

The New York Times reports: The embattled president of Kazakhstan has the pedigree of an international technocrat. The son of prominent intellectuals, he studied in Moscow at a premier academy for diplomats, and later worked in the Soviet Embassy in Beijing. He served as a key adviser to the strongman who ruled the oil-rich Central Asian country as a fief for nearly three decades — and then, in 2019, became his heir. The rise of Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to the presidency…

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Omicron isn’t mild for the health-care system

Omicron isn’t mild for the health-care system

Ed Yong writes: When a health-care system crumbles, this is what it looks like. Much of what’s wrong happens invisibly. At first, there’s just a lot of waiting. Emergency rooms get so full that “you’ll wait hours and hours, and you may not be able to get surgery when you need it,” Megan Ranney, an emergency physician in Rhode Island, told me. When patients are seen, they might not get the tests they need, because technicians or necessary chemicals are…

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‘Flurona’ is a great example of how misinformation blooms

‘Flurona’ is a great example of how misinformation blooms

Raghu Adiga writes: Earlier this week, Israeli media reported a person who was hospitalized with evidence of both seasonal flu and COVID at the same time. This unvaccinated and pregnant person had mild symptoms and was discharged without any complications. A person being infected with both the COVID-causing SARS-CoV2 virus and an influenza virus can happen; we just had one such person in our hospital last month whom we treated and discharged without a whole lot of fanfare. However, the…

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The forgotten role of religion in science writing

The forgotten role of religion in science writing

Adam Shapiro writes: It’s been nearly 30 years—a generation!—since professional science communication as a field began to seriously push back against what’s been called the knowledge deficit model (sometimes just called the “deficit model.”) (See “The Trust Fallacy,” July–August 2021.) That model describes a way of thinking about people’s understanding and acceptance of scientific knowledge, supposing that the greatest barrier to scientific literacy was a lack—or deficit—of information about a topic. If only people better understood evolution, the thinking went,…

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How democracy gradually gets eroded

How democracy gradually gets eroded

Security fences stand near the U.S. Capitol on January 5, 2022. Drew Angerer/Getty Images By Ken Hughes, University of Virginia Now that a full year has passed since the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol, the 2020 election and the republic, it’s evident that the attack never really ended. Instead, it spread out to other, less visible, more vulnerable targets. Donald Trump had hoped to reverse his election loss in a single, decisive, dramatic confrontation between his supporters and…

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Millions of Americans believe that violence against their political opponents can be justified

Millions of Americans believe that violence against their political opponents can be justified

The New York Times reports: Researchers led by Sean J. Westwood of Dartmouth College, in a paper titled “Current Research Overstates American Support for Political Violence,” argue that “documented support for political violence is illusory, a product of ambiguous questions, conflated definitions, and disengaged respondents.” Often, pollsters were just capturing people expressing their partisan tribalism. So in a new YouGov survey of 2,750 Americans conducted in November, a group of political scientists known as Bright Line Watch took another whack…

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Defusing the climate emergency depends on defusing the democracy emergency

Defusing the climate emergency depends on defusing the democracy emergency

Mark Hertsgaard writes: A year ago today, Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy were fleeing for their lives as a violent mob swarmed the halls of the US Capitol. With their personal safety at risk, the two most powerful Republicans on Capitol Hill at last stood up to Donald Trump. In a heated phone call, McCarthy, the House minority leader, fruitlessly implored the president to call off the mob. Senate majority leader McConnell later called the rioters “terrorists” and said Trump…

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Karl Rove: Republicans must be held accountable for the January 6 violence

Karl Rove: Republicans must be held accountable for the January 6 violence

Karl Rove writes: What if in early January 2017, Democrats similarly attired and armed [as Trump supporters were on January 6, 2021] had stormed the Capitol and attempted to keep Congress from receiving the Electoral College results for the 2016 presidential election? What if Democrats claimed that Donald Trump’s razor-thin victories in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin resulted from extensive voter fraud and should be rejected, despite having failed to establish in a single court that extensive fraud had actually occurred?…

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Trump’s ‘web of lies’ threatens U.S. democracy, says Biden

Trump’s ‘web of lies’ threatens U.S. democracy, says Biden

Reuters reports: President Joe Biden on Thursday accused his predecessor Donald Trump of spreading a “web of lies” to undermine U.S. democracy in a speech on the anniversary of the deadly Capitol attack by Trump supporters who tried to undo his 2020 election defeat. Speaking at the white-domed building where rioters smashed windows, assaulted police and sent lawmakers fleeing for their lives on Jan. 6, 2021, Biden said Trump’s false claims that the election was stolen from him through widespread…

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Whether to prosecute Trump is becoming the defining issue of Attorney General Garland’s tenure

Whether to prosecute Trump is becoming the defining issue of Attorney General Garland’s tenure

David Rohde writes: In hindsight, Donald Trump’s intentions could not appear clearer. During the final months of the 2020 Presidential race, he systematically conducted a disinformation campaign that convinced many of his supporters the election would be stolen by Democrats. After losing, he doubled down on those false claims and repeatedly pressured state election officials, Justice Department prosecutors, federal and state judges, members of Congress, and the Vice-President to overturn the results. After those efforts failed, he appeared at a…

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Who planted the January 6 Capitol Hill pipe bombs?

Who planted the January 6 Capitol Hill pipe bombs?

Elaine Godfrey writes: The security-camera footage is grainy and gray with no sound, like an old silent film. Night has fallen in Washington, and a person wearing a light-colored hoodie, a face mask, and Nike Air Max Speed Turf sneakers strides down the sidewalk along South Capitol Street carrying a backpack. The person stops and stands idly in front of a house while someone passes, walking their dog on a leash. The person continues on, sitting for a while on…

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Jimmy Carter: I fear for American democracy

Jimmy Carter: I fear for American democracy

Jimmy Carter writes: One year ago, a violent mob, guided by unscrupulous politicians, stormed the Capitol and almost succeeded in preventing the democratic transfer of power. All four of us former presidents condemned their actions and affirmed the legitimacy of the 2020 election. There followed a brief hope that the insurrection would shock the nation into addressing the toxic polarization that threatens our democracy. However, one year on, promoters of the lie that the election was stolen have taken over…

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McConnell cracks door open to Electoral Count Act reform

McConnell cracks door open to Electoral Count Act reform

Politico reports: Mitch McConnell is signaling he’s open to reforming the Electoral Count Act, one year after a mass of Republicans objected to certification of President Joe Biden’s win ahead of an attempted insurrection. Democrats are pursuing more sweeping election reforms and federalization of elections, but some lawmakers in both parties are also suggesting there may be more modest reforms that could pass on a bipartisan basis. Centrist Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema both endorsed pursuing work on…

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The ridiculous hypocrisy of Sean Hannity hiding behind ‘freedom of the press’

The ridiculous hypocrisy of Sean Hannity hiding behind ‘freedom of the press’

Margaret Sullivan writes: The House Jan. 6 committee asked this week that Fox News host Sean Hannity appear and answer investigators’ questions about his text messages to President Trump’s aides before, during and after the attack on the U.S. Capitol. The response from Hannity’s lawyer was every bit as predictable as it was laughable. “We remain very concerned about the constitutional implications especially as it relates to the First Amendment,” wrote Jay Sekulow, the Trump-team lawyer who represents Hannity. He…

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