Today's Liberal News
The Enraging Reason UC-Berkeley Was Forced to Freeze Its Enrollment
A battle between one of the country’s top universities and local NIMBYs has yielded a preposterous legal result.
Trump Funding Network Paid $4.3 Million To People, Firms Who Set Up Jan. 6 Rally: Report
OpenSecrets tracked payments through federal records to actors who organized the protest that preceded the Capitol insurrection.
Maybe You Missed It, but the Internet ‘Died’ Five Years Ago
If you search the phrase i hate texting on Twitter and scroll down, you will start to notice a pattern. An account with the handle @pixyIuvr and a glowing heart as a profile picture tweets, “i hate texting i just want to hold ur hand,” receiving 16,000 likes. An account with the handle @f41rygf and a pink orb as a profile picture tweets, “i hate texting just come live with me,” receiving nearly 33,000 likes.
“Stop This Madness”: Rev. Lennox Yearwood Calls to Divest from Fossil Fuels Amid Climate Disasters
Hurricane Ida and the increasing threats from extreme weather are a wake-up call to divest from fossil fuels that make climate disasters worse and more frequent, says Reverend Lennox Yearwood Jr., the president and CEO of the Hip Hop Caucus, who is originally from Shreveport, Louisiana, and established the Gulf Coast Renewal Campaign after Hurricane Katrina. “We know who is causing these storms. We know who is causing the climate crisis.
After Hurricane Ida, a “Just & Fair Recovery” Must Address Ongoing Disasters of Poverty, Inequality
As Hurricane Ida is downgraded to a tropical depression, Louisiana’s main utility company Entergy says it could be weeks before it restores electricity to nearly a million people in the storm’s path, including all of New Orleans. We speak with Flozell Daniels Jr., president of the Foundation for Louisiana, who evacuated his home city and is calling for “a just and fair recovery” that addresses preexisting crises, including COVID-19 and poverty.
Peace Activist Kathy Kelly on Reparations for Afghanistan & What the U.S. Owes After Decades of War
As the United States ends its military presence in Afghanistan after 20 years of occupation and war, the Costs of War Project estimates it spent over $2.2 trillion in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and by one count, over 170,000 people died during the fighting over the last two decades.
Afghanistan Faces Future Under Taliban as U.S. Withdraws & Drone Strikes Continue to Kill Civilians
As the last U.S. forces leave Afghanistan, ending the longest war in U.S. history, we go to Kabul to speak with Danish Afghan journalist Nagieb Khaja, who was once kidnapped by the Taliban and later embedded with them on a reporting assignment. He has been investigating Sunday’s U.S. drone strike that killed 10 Afghan civilians, including seven children.
The Two Reasons Parents Regret Having Kids
Olivia Arthur / Magnum
Updated at 11:30 A.M. ET on August 31, 2021Carrie wishes that she’d never had children. She spent a few years feeling satisfied as a mother, but now locks herself in the kitchen and wonders, Who am I? What am I doing here? She can’t pursue paid work, because she has to shepherd her 12-year-old and 10-year-old to school as well as to therapy appointments for their disabilities. Carrie, who lives in the U.K.
Why We Need Terrifying Stories
Editor’s Note: Read Karen Brown’s new short story, “Needs.” “Needs” is a new short story by Karen Brown. To mark the story’s publication in The Atlantic, Brown and Oliver Munday, the design director of the magazine, discussed the story over email. Their conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.Oliver Munday: Your story “Needs” takes place in a disquieting domestic setting in rural 1960s America.
Needs
Editor’s Note: Read an interview with Karen Brown about her writing process. Patty’s murder happened on a Tuesday afternoon in June, overcast and cool. You needed a sweater if you were going to work in the yard. It was 1966, a small town in Windham County, Connecticut. Milkweed and moths at screens, fields of corn and goldenrod and Queen Anne’s lace. There were woods behind her new house, a cape, and small animals emerging from the shadows to scamper over the clover.
Help! My Friend Is Keeping a Selfish Secret About Her Divorce.
I’ll never be able to look at her the same way.
Dear Care and Feeding: My Daughter Has Had It With Her Classroom Job
Parenting advice on classroom duties, racism, and youth sports.
Refusing to Get Vaccinated Is Turning Into an Expensive Choice
Effective pay cuts and brutal hospital bills may be in store for Americans refusing to get the jab.
The Reason We Don’t Have Enough Airplanes to Put Out Wildfires
California Gov. Gavin Newsom says his burning state needs more giant DC-10s. He’s right.
My Husband Is Using Me for Money—but I Don’t Want to Divorce Him
He spends his meager income on his motorcycle and cigarettes.
My Partner’s Food Addiction Is Breaking Our Budget
We’ve spent tens of thousands of dollars on unnecessary takeout and groceries.
Fauci ‘sticking with’ Covid-19 booster shot recommendations
But he said the administration would remain flexible based on the data as it comes in.
Dentists, insurers aim to pare down Dems’ Medicare expansion
Prospects for Medicare expansion are further complicated by a price tag that could exceed $350 billion over a decade and surpass the cost of other health priorities under discussion.
I Have a Strange Issue With My Penis I Believe No Other Man Has Ever Experienced
I feel so weird and alone.
Dear Care and Feeding: My Son Won’t Forgive Me for My Misguided Advice
Parenting advice on career choice, college, and homeschooling.
Powell walks high wire as Fed plans to ease support for Biden’s economy
Central bank chief seeks to avoid market turmoil as president weighs tapping him for a second term.
U.S. jobless claims near pandemic low as economy strengthens
Thursday’s report from the Labor Department showed that jobless claims fell to 375,000 from 387,000 the previous week.
House Dem campaign chief warns the majority at risk without message reboot
“We’re not trying to hide this,” the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s executive director said.
Biden’s economic gains come with newer worries about the future
Some economists have already begun to ease back on forecasts for the rest of this year.
U.S. economy surpasses prepandemic size with 6.5% Q2 growth
The growth is another sign that the nation has achieved a sustained recovery from the pandemic recession.
News Roundup: U.S. withdraws from Afghanistan; Ida damage widespread; DeSantis still a failure
In the news today: It’s August 31st in Afghanistan, and the United States military has officially “withdrawn” from the country, ending two decades of war. Mainstream political reports simply refuse to stop fluffing Florida’s pandemic-spreading Ron DeSantis even after the state becomes the epicenter of an outbreak now spreading throughout the South. Hurricane Ida slammed into Louisiana and Mississippi yesterday, causing widespread damage.
In Afghanistan, more violence and uncertainty as U.S. withdraws from a failed war
On Sunday, President Joe Biden traveled to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware to witness the return ceremony for the bodies of 13 U.S. service members killed in a suicide bombing in Kabul, Afghanistan, last week. It may not be the last such memorial; there is no good way for the United States to extricate itself from a war it has lost. Each remaining ceremony will be given the sort of attention the last decade’s worth of U.S.
The (tragic) timeline of an anti-vaxxer’s COVID death
This tweet is spot on:
The 4 stages of COVID denial: 1. It’s a hoax. 2. Don’t be a sheep. 3. Prayers needed. 4. Visit our GoFundMe.— SP384 (@SpacePirates384) August 29, 2021
And what’s amazing is just how spot-on it is. Several subreddits over at Reddit, like the Herman Cain Award, have sprung forth to document these stories, repeated time and time again, every single day.