In a nation at war with itself, one town in Virginia tries a cup of civility

In a nation at war with itself, one town in Virginia tries a cup of civility

The Associated Press reports: When Maureen Donnelly Morris came from nearby Leesburg to open her café in Lovettsville, she got a warm welcome. Neighbors rallied to her aid. Divisions ripping at their town and their country were set aside. America’s thunderous rage felt distant. They sank posts for her parking signs. They brought solar lights for the cheery space outdoors, sharpened her bagel-slicing blades and contributed plants, all to herald what would become the town’s social hub and civil common…

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Coming soon to this coal county in Kentucky: Solar, in a big way

Coming soon to this coal county in Kentucky: Solar, in a big way

The New York Times reports: For a mountain that’s had its top blown off, the old Martiki coal mine is looking especially winsome these days. With its vast stretches of emerald grass dotted with hay bales and ringed with blue-tinged peaks, and the wild horses and cattle that roam there, it looks less like a shuttered strip mine and more like an ad for organic milk. The mountain is poised for another transformation. Hundreds of acres are set to be…

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The plot against American democracy that isn’t taught in schools

The plot against American democracy that isn’t taught in schools

Jonathan M. Katz writes: Smedley Butler knew a coup when he smelled one. He had been involved in many himself. He had overthrown governments and protected “friendly” client ones around the world on behalf of some of the same U.S. bankers, lawyers, and businessmen apparently now looking for his help. For 33 years and four months Butler had been a United States Marine, a veteran of nearly every overseas conflict back to the war against Spain in 1898. Respected by…

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Lost perspective? Try this linguistic trick to reset your view

Lost perspective? Try this linguistic trick to reset your view

Ariana Orvell writes: In the 2nd century CE, in the sunset of his life, the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius began recording meditations on how he had lived. The questions he asked himself are the same ones many of us find ourselves asking today: how does a person live a meaningful life? How does one find resilience in the face of suffering? What does it mean to be happy? Aurelius did not intend for Meditations to be read by others, allowing…

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Every day is January 6 now

Every day is January 6 now

An editorial in the New York Times says: One year after from the smoke and broken glass, the mock gallows and the very real bloodshed of that awful day, it is tempting to look back and imagine that we can, in fact, simply look back. To imagine that what happened on Jan. 6, 2021 — a deadly riot at the seat of American government, incited by a defeated president amid a last-ditch effort to thwart the transfer of power to…

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Joe Biden’s year of hoping dangerously

Joe Biden’s year of hoping dangerously

Susan B. Glasser writes: The best thing you can say about 2021 is that it will soon be over. A year that started with an insurrection at the Capitol is ending with more than eight hundred thousand Americans dead in the Covid pandemic, as a contagious new variant, Omicron, produces the biggest wave of cases yet. Inflation is the highest it has been in decades. The twenty-year U.S. war in Afghanistan concluded with an embarrassing and botched American retreat. The…

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A year after a seditious insurrection, why won’t federal prosecutors treat it that way?

A year after a seditious insurrection, why won’t federal prosecutors treat it that way?

Kimberly Atkins Stohr writes: The insurrectionists were inside the US Capitol building, waving flags, shouting demands and targeting lawmakers with deadly threats in a politically-motivated revolt. The damage from the siege, which shocked the nation, is still visible in the House chamber. The perpetrators of that attack and their accomplices were charged and convicted of, among other crimes, seditious conspiracy. That federal statute criminalizes plots to overthrow the government or to forcefully “prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any…

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Omicron doesn’t infect the lungs very well, animal studies find

Omicron doesn’t infect the lungs very well, animal studies find

The New York Times reports: A spate of new studies on lab animals and human tissues are providing the first indication of why the Omicron variant causes milder disease than previous versions of the coronavirus. In studies on mice and hamsters, Omicron produced less damaging infections, often limited largely to the upper airway: the nose, throat and windpipe. The variant did much less harm to the lungs, where previous variants would often cause scarring and serious breathing difficulty. “It’s fair…

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Who won in Afghanistan? Private contractors

Who won in Afghanistan? Private contractors

The Wall Street Journal reports: The U.S. lost its 20-year campaign to transform Afghanistan. Many contractors won big. Those who benefited from the outpouring of government money range from major weapons manufacturers to entrepreneurs. A California businessman running a bar in Kyrgyzstan started a fuel business that brought in billions in revenue. A young Afghan translator transformed a deal to provide forces with bed sheets into a business empire including a TV station and a domestic airline. Two Army National…

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China harvests masses of data on Western targets, documents show

China harvests masses of data on Western targets, documents show

The Washington Post reports: China is turning a major part of its internal Internet data surveillance network outward, mining Western social media, including Facebook and Twitter, to equip its government agencies, military and police with information on foreign targets, according to a Washington Post review of hundreds of Chinese bidding documents, contracts and company filings. China maintains a countrywide network of government data surveillance services — called public opinion analysis software — that were developed over the past decade and…

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Why so many democracies are floundering

Why so many democracies are floundering

Richard H. Pildes writes: We pay too little attention to delivering effective government as a critical democratic value. We are familiar with the threats posed by democratic backsliding and the rise of illiberal forces in several democracies, including the United States. But the most pervasive and perhaps deepest challenge facing virtually all Western democracies today is the political fragmentation of democratic politics. Political fragmentation is the dispersion of political power into so many different hands and centers of power that…

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‘Slow-motion insurrection’: How Republicans seize election power

‘Slow-motion insurrection’: How Republicans seize election power

The Associated Press reports: In the weeks leading up to the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, a handful of Americans — well-known politicians, obscure local bureaucrats — stood up to block then-President Donald Trump’s unprecedented attempt to overturn a free and fair vote of the American people. In the year since, Trump-aligned Republicans have worked to clear the path for next time. In battleground states and beyond, Republicans are taking hold of the once-overlooked machinery of…

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After the wars in Iraq, ‘everything living is dying’

After the wars in Iraq, ‘everything living is dying’

Lynzy Billing reports: As far back as 2005, the United Nations had estimated that Iraq was already littered with several thousand contaminated sites. Five years later, an investigation by The Times, a London-based newspaper, suggested that the U.S. military had generated some 11 million pounds of toxic waste and abandoned it in Iraq. Today, the country remains awash in hazardous materials, such as depleted uranium and dioxin, which have polluted the soil and water. And extractive industries like the KAR…

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Beyond case counts: What Omicron is teaching us

Beyond case counts: What Omicron is teaching us

STAT reports: The Omicron wave in the United States is upon us. If you were fortunate enough to tune out from Covid-19 news over the holidays, you’re coming back to startling reports about record high case counts and, in some places, increases in hospitalizations. The wave will crest, of course; the question is when. For now, experts say, the country still has a ways to go to get through the Omicron surge. Below, STAT outlines what Omicron is already teaching…

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