Today's Liberal News

The Joe Manchin of the House is going down (but only with your help)

Did you hear the news from Oregon? Rep. Kurt Schrader, a Blue Dog Democrat who sided with Big Pharma, is likely to lose his primary to a progressive Democratic challenger.

This is a good sign for the rising, progressive wing of the Democratic Party, and for Jessica Cisneros’ chances on Tuesday.

We can win Tuesday’s primary in South Texas, where Rep. Henry Cuellar is the last anti-choice House Democrat—the only one who voted no on codifying Roe v. Wade.

Something’s Up With Harry Styles’s Vibe

So much music exists to provoke bold emotions—ecstasy, amazement, deep blues. Other music conjures pastel feelings, soft and in-between. For example, much of Harry Styles’s third album, Harry’s House, imparts the mild joy that one might get from completing a list of chores. Some songs spark the regret of failing to book the ideal dinner reservation. Over multiple listens, another sensation, like faint indigestion, may occur: concern.

Ngũgĩ in America

A few years ago, heart surgery forced Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, the Kenyan writer and perennial Nobel shortlister, to give up driving. He misses it. He misses getting behind the wheel for a few hours with no end point in mind, randomly exploring the roads. “Like writing a story,” he said.So when I offered to visit and take him for an afternoon drive, he accepted.

Motherhood’s Impossible, All-Consuming Demands

The short story “Go, Team,” by Samantha Hunt, traces a series of conversations within a group of mothers after a woman disappears into the woods during a children’s soccer game. They aren’t sure if the vanished woman is a mom, though they wonder if she might be. But even when it’s only suspected, motherhood is such an all-consuming identity that the possibility suffuses every element of their discussion.

A Second Chance at Friendship

Each installment of “The Friendship Files” features a conversation between The Atlantic’s Julie Beck and two or more friends, exploring the history and significance of their relationship.This week she talks with two men who first met while doing national military service in Singapore. They didn’t talk much then. More than a year later, they reconnected online, took a hike together, and found that they clicked really quickly.

After Which Failed Pregnancy Should I Have Been Imprisoned? Rep. Lucy McBath on Reproductive Rights

During a meeting of the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, Democratic Congressmember Lucy McBath of Georgia shared her personal story about accessing reproductive care after experiencing a stillbirth. In doing so, she pointed out how anti-abortion politicians and legislators fail to see the medical necessity of abortion in instances such as hers. “We can be the nation that rolls back the clock, that rolls back the rights of women, and that strips them of their very liberty.

Amy Littlefield on Oklahoma’s New Total Abortion Ban & the Long Fight Ahead After Roe Falls

After a leaked Supreme Court draft opinion revealed the intention to overturn Roe v. Wade, abortion has increasingly become a state issue, with conservative states criminalizing the procedure. Oklahoma approved a bill on Thursday that outlaws almost all abortions beginning at fertilization. The measure is modeled after a Texas ban that encourages private citizens to sue abortion providers and people who assist in abortions.

Buffalo: India Walton on the Racist Massacre & Community’s Need for Gun Control, Good Jobs, Housing

As Buffalo, New York, mourns the loss of the 10 people killed Saturday in a racist rampage at a local grocery store in the heart of the city’s African American community, we get an update from longtime community activist and former mayoral candidate India Walton about the lack of attention to the structural issues that made the Black community vulnerable and the ineffectiveness of police.

Lessons for Buffalo? Meet the Activist Who Sued the White Supremacists Behind Charlottesville & Won

The Buffalo shooter wrote racist screeds online before targeting and killing people in a majority-Black neighborhood. We look at the incident’s similarities to other white supremacist killings, particularly the deadly 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Amy Spitalnick is the executive director of Integrity First for America, a nonprofit organization that successfully sued the white supremacist organizers of Unite the Right.

Battle of Donbas: Dramatic Interview from Ukrainian-Held Severodonetsk as Missiles Rain Down

In a rare interview from the frontlines of the Russian invasion, we speak with American journalist Billy Nessen in the Ukrainian city of Severodonetsk. It is the easternmost city still held by Ukrainian forces after almost three months of war. He says Russian troops have devastated the city with heavy shelling. The interview with Nessen was interrupted when a shell landed in the building next door. Nessen speaks about the Ukrainian resistance, the Azov Battalion and more, including the U.S.

News Roundup: Justice asks for Jan. 6 transcripts; expanding the Supreme Court

In the news today: More movement in the probe of the Jan. 6 insurrection, with the Justice Department now asking for copies of what the House congressional committee has pried out of witnesses. Calls to expand the Supreme Court keep growing. Oh, and a professional anti-abortion activist told Congress under oath that our electrical grid was powered by burning fetuses. So yeah, it does seem like civilization is on its last legs here.

Ukraine update: Cutting through the fog to get some sense of what’s happening at Staryi Saltiv

I’ve written before about the danger of basing any interpretation of what’s happening on the ground on the data from NASA’s FIRMS instruments. A collection of orbiting spectrographs and infrared sensors are not a substitute of any sort for reports on the ground. They can’t distinguish artillery from a forest fire, can’t tell what the source of any fire might be, and absolutely can’t fit all those little colored squares into any kind of narrative.