Inspector general: Medicare chief broke rules on her publicity contracts
HHS watchdog finds Seema Verma mishandled millions of dollars in federal contracts that ultimately benefited friends, former Trump officials.
Today's Liberal News
How a Christian Summer Camp Ended Up With 82 Cases of COVID
“For us, the risk of COVID-19 versus the chance of the kids having more time with Jesus, it was hands down: the chance to have more of Jesus.
A Times Square Vendor on Watching the Pandemic Turn the Streets Ghostly
“There are no equals to this.
Schumer proposes $350B in aid to communities of color ahead of coronavirus talks
With only a few weeks until August recess, Democrats and Republicans remain far apart on key issues.
If You Want to Save the Economy, Stop the Pandemic
We’re economists, and our analysis suggests Congress is seriously underfunding efforts to combat Covid-19.
Treasury decides to stick with July 15 tax deadline
An extension would give taxpayers until Oct. 15 to file their returns, though they would still have to pay what they owe by July 15.
Top White House economist set to depart amid coronavirus recession
The acting chair of the CEA will leave Trump without another senior economist as discussions start about a new economic aid package.
Philadelphia Delays Unhoused Encampment Eviction as CDC Says “Let Them Remain” & Stop COVID Spread
As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says unhoused people living in encampments should be allowed to remain where they are to help stop the spread of COVID-19, we go to Philadelphia, where the mayor has postponed the eviction of an encampment planned for this morning. “The Philadelphia Housing Authority has about 5,000 vacant properties,” notes Sterling Johnson, an organizer with Black and Brown Workers Cooperative, who joins us from the camp.
Sonia Shah: “It’s Time to Tell a New Story About Coronavirus — Our Lives Depend on It”
The United States hit an all-time high of 75,600 new COVID cases Thursday — the largest number recorded in a single day since the pandemic began. Top U.S. infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci says the spike in cases resulted from states rushing to reopen their economies. We speak with investigative journalist Sonia Shah about the government’s failed response, the false idea that the virus is a “foreign incursion,” and “vaccine nationalism.
“This Is Trump’s War”: U.S.-Backed Saudi Bombing in Yemen Continues as Coronavirus Spreads
As the coronavirus spreads in Yemen, where the population already devastated by the world’s worst humanitarian crisis faces growing hunger and aid shortages, the Saudi-led, U.S.-backed coalition continues to drop bombs in the country. We speak to Yemeni scholar Shireen Al-Adeimi, who calls the ongoing crisis “Trump’s war.” “We’re seeing death rates that are just astronomical,” Al-Adeimi says.
“The Pandemic Could Get Much, Much Worse”: Is Another Lockdown the Only Way to Avoid Catastrophe?
As health experts warn the coronavirus is on the rise in 41 states, many governors are reimposing restrictions after attempts at opening up the economy, but President Trump wants schools open. We speak with public health historian John Barry, who warns “The Pandemic Could Get Much, Much Worse” if we don’t take bolder action now.
Trump Video ‘Had To Fall’ After Linkin Park Song Copyright Complaints
Jung Youth, who created the cover used in the video, slams “propaganda video.
Oregon Sues To Protect People From ‘Kidnap And False Arrest’ By Federal Troops
“Oregonians have the right to walk through downtown Portland,” states the suit, which accuses shadowy federal squads of violating citizens’ constitutional rights.
Reform advocate unseats incumbent prosecutor in Westchester County primary
On Thursday, more than three weeks after New York held its June 23 Democratic primary, Westchester County District Attorney Anthony Scarpino conceded defeat to progressive challenger Mimi Rocah. With 41,000 votes tabulated, Rocah, who is a former federal prosecutor, leads Scarpino 68-32. Westchester County is a reliably blue county in most contests and Rocah will be the heavy favorite in November against Republican Bruce Bendish, who lost to Scarpino 70-30 four years ago.
14 Hours Later, Trump Says He Is ‘Saddened’ By Lewis’ Death
President Donald Trump waited over 14 hours and played a round of golf before paying tribute to the late Rep. John Lewis.
Fox News guest says teachers union conspiring to close schools so they can ‘sexualize our children’
Fox News’ push right now is to have schools reopen, children go to school, teachers return to classrooms, and the world to pretend that the COVID-19 pandemic is just a bad case of the flu. That’s the angle being taken (and proven wrong time and again over the past few months), but the propaganda wing of the Republican Party has its marching orders and those orders are to drive their viewers off of a cliff.
Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Hoovered Up $400,000 In Campaign Funds In Just 2 Days, Records Reveal
“Bingo, donors’ money becomes Trump’s private money,” said Washington Post reporter David Fahrenthold.
Citizenship and colonization: A Q&A with the Black LGBTQIA+ Migrant Project’s Ola Osaze
July 9 was the anniversary of the ratification of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, “the linchpin of the current constitutional system” that allowed for birthright citizenship, granting citizenship to formerly enslaved people and promising equal protection of the laws. More than 150 years after these promises were made to African Americans, the country has yet to deliver on them.
Trump is playing shock doctrine with COVID-19, this week in the war on workers
One of the week’s big must-reads was How Trump is helping tycoons exploit the pandemic, by The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer. Specifically, Ronald Cameron, the owner of the massive poultry processing company Mountaire. Cameron is a major Trump donor, and he’s on a White House advisory board about the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
Donald Trump, Betsy DeVos and the GOP have no clue about the tsunami that is going to hit them
I don’t last too long in “closed” Facebook groups on community/local issues because usually the admins prohibit political discussion in these forums, on the sensible assumption that these would otherwise degenerate into vitriolic bloodbaths, permanently hampering or killing all discussion.
Homeland Security Official Defends Portland ‘Kidnappings’ Amid Calls For Investigation
Unidentified federal agents in military-style gear are jumping out of unmarked vans to detain protesters, according to videos and personal accounts.
The World John Lewis Helped Create
Updated at 5:38 p.m. ET on July 18, 2020.John Lewis believed in the American project and wanted to perfect it.On August 28, 1963, Lewis stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial before hundreds of thousands of people, but his mind was on those who could not be there.
John Lewis Was an American Founder
The Alabama that John Lewis was born into in 1940 was a one-party authoritarian state. Forty years before Lewis was born, the white elite of Alabama, panicked by a populist revolt of white and Black workers, shut Black men out of politics in a campaign of terror, fraud, murder, and, finally, disenfranchisement.“We had to do it. Unfortunately, I say it was a necessity. We could not help ourselves,” Alabama Governor William C. Oates confessed.
Sharks Attack 64 People a Year. I Was One of Them.
Fighting off a massive shark wasn’t the hardest part.
John Lewis: Photos From a Life Spent Getting Into Good Trouble
The civil-rights icon and longtime U.S. representative John Lewis died yesterday at the age of 80. Lewis began his life as the son of an Alabama sharecropper, and became active in the civil-rights movement while he was a student in Nashville, Tennessee. Lewis became nationally known after the March 7, 1965, “Bloody Sunday” march to Montgomery, Alabama, when he and dozens of other marchers were brutally beaten after crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge, in Selma, Alabama.
There Is So Much More Than the Nuclear Family, Even Now
It’s easy to get the impression that the majority of Americans are spending their days at home, isolated with their nuclear family. The idea of the family as the main source of care and refuge has dominated both media coverage and public-health messaging since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.
Why Low-Budget Horror Is Thriving This Summer
Only during a global pandemic would the biggest film in the U.S. be not a superhero blockbuster or a Fast and the Furious sequel, but a low-budget horror movie about a teenage boy in the suburbs doing battle with a witch living next door. Thanks to the coronavirus disrupting the usual summer release schedule, The Wretched now belongs to a tiny group of films that have topped the U.S. box office for five weekends in a row, including Titanic and Avatar.
