Biden’s billion-dollar testing plan could struggle with a winter reality
The White House announced last week that it would spend $1 billion to increase access to at-home tests.
Today's Liberal News
Wall Street’s wild party in jeopardy as Fed threatens aid cutoff
The central bank plans to begin yanking back assistance to the economy as early as next month, and many Fed officials are open to increasing interest rates next year.
Americans’ fortunes soared during the pandemic. Some lawmakers see lasting lessons.
Key aspects of the economy are doing better than before the pandemic, which supporters say shows how government spending can help.
Why Biden isn’t hitting the panic button on the debt ceiling — yet
With the deadline looming, the White House is starting to ramp up pressure on Republicans.
Fed signals plan to pull back economic support even as virus looms
The central bank said it’s making progress toward its goals of averaging 2 percent inflation over time and reaching maximum employment.
Biden hails ‘strong’ economic recovery despite disappointing jobs numbers
Biden laid blame for the sluggish growth of U.S. jobs on the “impact of the Delta variant” of the coronavirus.
As CIA Warns China “Most Important” Threat to U.S., Is Biden Pursuing a “New Cold War”?
We look at growing tensions between China and Taiwan as China’s military said Monday it had conducted beach landing and assault drills in the province across from Taiwan. Taiwan’s president responded on Sunday saying Taiwan would not bow to pressure from China. This comes as The Wall Street Journal has revealed a small team of U.S.
Iraqi Journalist: Amid Low Election Turnout, “Iraq’s Streets Littered with the Memories of Our Dead”
Voter turnout at the fifth parliamentary election in Iraq hit an all-time low, with many Iraqis refusing to vote as widespread faith in the democratic process and politics falters. Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who has been a vocal opponent of foreign invasion, won the most seats. He has also been accused of kidnapping and killing his critics.
Anti-Mask Alaska State Senator Gets COVID-19, Touts Unproven Treatments
Sen. Lora Reinbold was banned from Alaska Airlines earlier this year for refusing to comply with its mask policy.
News Roundup: Abbott and McConnell find their limits; world supply chains bend again
In the news today: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott tried yet another anti-Biden, anti-pandemic-reality stunt this week, barring employers from requiring vaccinations for their workers. It didn’t work: The state’s largest employers are ignoring him in favor of employee safety (and the federal mandate they are required to comply with). Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell has long had near-total control of his caucus, but that status is in jeopardy as the party adopts full-on Trumpism.
Lindsey Graham issues ludicrous alert about Brazilian ‘terrorists’ with ‘Gucci bags’ flooding border
What? Forty thousand Brazilian fashionistas are keen to move to Connecticut, and Republicans want to stop them? Why? That’s the best news I’ve heard in months! Where, exactly, are they crossing? I’d like to meet them. Maybe they can help me get into some of the A-list clubs I’d normally have no chance of setting foot in because I smell like Kirkland jeans and Prell and have a head the size of an Igloo cooler.
Pro-Trump Virginia candidate believes sea level rise can be fixed with bathtub physics
A Trump-loving Republican candidate for state legislature in Virginia has some interesting thoughts on climate change. Replace the word “interesting” with “painfully ludicrous” and add some sarcastic quotation marks around “thoughts.” Scott Pio is running for state rep. against incumbent Democratic Del David Reid in Loudoun County’s District 32.
Biden pledged to end for-profit detention. So why is a closed private prison reopening as ICE jail?
Joe Biden’s criminal justice reform platform pledged to “end the federal government’s use of private prisons,” saying that if he were to be elected president, he would “make clear that the federal government should not use private facilities for any detention, including detention of undocumented immigrants.
Alaska GOP lawmakers demand pharmacists fill ivermectin scripts for COVID-19 ‘no questions asked’
While Alaska leads the country in COVID-19 cases, the state’s Republican lawmakers continue to talk out of both sides of their mouths. On the one hand, they remain steadfast in their calls to forgo mask and vaccine mandates. On the other, they’re demanding easier access to unproven and unauthorized medicines such as ivermectin to treat the virus they’re downplaying.
Trump Says Republicans Won’t Vote If The GOP Doesn’t Repeat His Election Lies
The former president’s strategy of questioning the integrity of the 2020 election didn’t work out so well for Republicans in Georgia and in the U.S. Senate.
Social spending fight may claim progressives’ Medicare expansion
Progressives are closing ranks behind Medicare expansion because it represents the best chance of getting a sliver of their “Medicare for All” vision into law.
Katie Couric Edited Out Controversial Comments By RBG On Kneeling Protests: Book
In her new book, the journalist reveals she held back remarks by Ruth Bader Ginsburg on athletes kneeling in protest during the anthem to “protect” the late justice.
Republicans Stand By While Trump Defends Capitol Riot
“Anybody who’s got the approval rating of 91% of the Republicans in Iowa, you surely wouldn’t be stupid enough to turn down that help,” Chuck Grassley said.
Trump May Get Away With Obstruction Of Congress. Again.
He was impeached on that count in 2019 for his actions in the Ukraine probe but not removed by the Senate. Now he is trying to block the Jan. 6 probe.
We Accidentally Solved the Flu. Now What?
Perhaps the oddest consolation prize of America’s crushing, protracted battle with the coronavirus is the knowledge that flu season, as we’ve long known it, does not have to exist.It’s easy to think of the flu as an immutable fact of winter life, more inconvenience than calamity. But each year, on average, it sickens roughly 30 million Americans and kills more than 30,000 (though the numbers vary widely season to season).
NIH study: Moderna, Pfizer shots are most effective Covid boosters
People who originally received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine benefited significantly more from a messenger RNA booster than a second J&J dose.
Ridley Scott’s New Film Plays a Masterly Trick
The Last Duel introduces Jean de Carrouges (played by Matt Damon), its ostensible hero, with the gritty fanfare expected from a Ridley Scott epic. Much like the valiant former Roman general Maximus of Gladiator or the stouthearted Crusader Balian of Kingdom of Heaven, Jean proudly charges into battle, sword in hand, hacking at the enemy with no regard for his own life.
When the Place You Live Becomes Unlivable
“New Orleans is the only ship I’d go down with,” my friend Ben wrote on Facebook in the hours before Hurricane Ida upended southeast Louisiana. He rode out the storm in the city—“hunkering down,” in standard hurricane parlance. Anxious but safe, I read his post at a splash pad in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
Jon Gruden Just Put It in Writing
Updated at 12:04 p.m. ET on October 13, 2021Jon Gruden’s resignation as head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders is just the beginning of a long-overdue reckoning for the NFL, and it underscores the basic problem: The NFL is full of Jon Grudens.Gruden made racist, homophobic, and misogynistic comments in emails for nearly a decade, but he was forced out only when some of those reprehensible statements became public.
“Missing in Brooks County”: Thousands of Migrants Denied Due Process at Border Have Died in Desert
We continue to look at the humanitarian crisis along the border, where more people are dying trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border than ever before, as President Biden has increased funding for border enforcement and militarization even as he vowed not to expand Trump’s border wall. We go to Brooks County in South Texas, which has recorded at least 98 migrant deaths so far this year, nearly triple the number from 2020.
Family Searching for Migrant Father Who Went Missing in Texas Desert as Border Deaths Hit Record
Armando Alejo Hernández went missing in the desert after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border in May of 2021, but not before sending several last audio messages to his eldest son describing the difficult terrain and asking for help. “He wasn’t feeling so good, and he was out of water and food,” says Hernández’s 17-year-old son Derek. “The group got ahead, and then he lost the group.
As Covid trends down, Fauci warns not to ‘declare victory’
“If you look at the history of the surges and the diminutions in cases over a period of time, they can bounce back,” the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director said.
A global fight looms over Kratom, a possible opioid alternative
The U.S. government has twice tried to classify kratom as a controlled substance, but public outcry and pushback from Congress thwarted those efforts.
Wall Street’s wild party in jeopardy as Fed threatens aid cutoff
The central bank plans to begin yanking back assistance to the economy as early as next month, and many Fed officials are open to increasing interest rates next year.
Americans’ fortunes soared during the pandemic. Some lawmakers see lasting lessons.
Key aspects of the economy are doing better than before the pandemic, which supporters say shows how government spending can help.