Today's Liberal News
The Key to Fortnite’s Success
How Epic Games created its smash hit and shook up the video game industry.
What Colorado is getting right about reopening
While surrounding states see spike in virus, Colorado’s methodical approach is working.
Cheap steroid reduces Covid-19 deaths in large study
The drug would be the first known to reduce deaths in Covid-19 patients.
Nursing homes go unchecked as fatalities mount
About half of all facilities have yet to be inspected for procedures to stop the spread of coronavirus.
FDA ends emergency use of hydroxychloroquine for coronavirus
The agency now believes that the suggested dosing regimens “are unlikely to produce an antiviral effect,” FDA chief scientist Denise Hinton said in a letter.
Powell’s warning on pandemic clashes with Trump’s upbeat tweets
“Significant uncertainty remains about the timing and strength of the recovery,” Powell said.
Kudlow says $600 additional unemployment checks will end in July
He said that “almost all businesses” understand the $600 additional benefit is “a disincentive.
Fed sees need for more small business aid, citing ‘acute risks’ to survival
The central bank signaled that it would keep interest rates low through 2022.
Fed’s dire outlook: GDP seen shrinking by 6.5 percent this year
The country’s unemployment rate will drop to 9.3 percent by the end of the year, according to the Fed’s forecasts.
Goodbye, Columbus: Bree Newsome Bass on the Movement to Topple Racist Statues Across the Globe
As protesters worldwide continue to topple monuments to racists, colonizers and Confederates as part of the wave of demonstrations against racism and state violence, we speak to Bree Newsome Bass, artist and antiracist activist based in North Carolina, who five years ago was arrested at the state Capitol in South Carolina after scaling a 30-foot flagpole to remove the Confederate flag.
PG&E pleads guilty to 84 counts of manslaughter in the 2018 Camp Fire California wildfires
On Tuesday, California’s largest utility company, Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E), pleaded guilty to 84 counts of manslaughter related to the 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise, California. According to the BBC, in a Superior Court in California’s Butte County, Judge Michael Deems read all 84 victims’ names while PG&E chief executive Bill Johnson watched each victim’s image projected on a screen and vocally pleaded guilty to each count.
Bay Area ‘Boogaloo Bois’ charged with ambush of federal officers at anti-police protest
The “Boogaloo Boi” who shot a California sheriff’s deputy last week was officially charged Tuesday with the shootings of two federal officers in an ambush at an anti-police protest in Oakland a week before—and it turns out that he had an accomplice, who has also been charged. He met this accomplice on Facebook before plotting the shootings.
Rift increases between NYPD and prosecutors who have stopped ignoring police misconduct
New York City has been electing more and more prosecutors who want to reform law enforcement, ones who see the racial disparities in policing and in the (in)justice system and are doing something about it. Right now, that includes refusing to prosecute Black Lives Matter protesters who police arrested simply for being at the protests, and who weren’t violent and weren’t destroying property.
Justice Department Seeks Restraining Order Against John Bolton Over New Book
The DOJ seeks to block publication of the former national security adviser’s book, “The Room Where It Happened,” which it claims contains classified information.
Megachurch pastor tries to rebrand ‘white privilege’ as ‘white blessing’ gifted from slavery
Atlanta megachurch pastor Louie Giglio gave the obligatory apology Tuesday after attempting to repackage the phrase “white privilege” as a “white blessing” during a talk about race and religion. “We understand the curse that was slavery, white people do,” Giglio said Sunday during the conversation. “And we say that was bad. But we miss the blessing of slavery, that it actually built up the framework for the world that white people live in.
‘She fears risk of imminent death’: Detainee who sued for ICE release tests positive for COVID-19
This past March, Marisol Mendoza sued for release from Arizona’s Eloy Detention Center as the novel coronavirus pandemic was hitting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities, pleading that her medical condition made her particularly vulnerable to risk should she get sick. “Instead, in a 19 May ruling, a federal judge ordered ICE to improve her conditions and make them constitutional,” The Guardian reports.
Next testing debacle: The fall virus surge
There is no question that testing will remain a linchpin of the coronavirus response heading into the fall.
Welcome To The Mask Wars
Localities are moving in different directions on whether to require masks to slow the spread of COVID-19. It’s creating a national divide with deadly consequences.
‘That ’70s Show’ Actor Danny Masterson Charged With Raping 3 Women
He could face 45 years to life in state prison if found guilty.
Bolton Claims Trump Encouraged Xi To Build ‘Concentration Camps’ For Uighurs
In an excerpt of his new book, the former national security advisor details the president’s complicated relationship with the Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
The Atlantic Daily: John Bolton Speaks
Every weekday evening, our editors guide you through the biggest stories of the day, help you discover new ideas, and surprise you with moments of delight. Subscribe to get this delivered to your inbox.ANDREW HARRER / BLOOMBERG / GETTYJohn Bolton’s new book “plumbs the depth of Trump’s depravity,” David A. Graham writes.
John Bolton Plumbs the Depth of Trump’s Depravity
In June 2019, Donald Trump was desperate for a win—and he was willing to endorse Chinese concentration camps to get it.In the back half of his first term, Trump was feeling pinched. He’d escaped Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation without charges, but a Democratic House was making his life progressively more difficult and he hadn’t had a major political win in months. There were even warning signs for the economy.
Yes, You’re Hearing Way More Fireworks Than Usual
Thanks to the pandemic, we’re spending every day like it’s Independence Day this summer.
We’re Here, We’re Married, We’re Employed
The fifth anniversary of marriage equality—and the future of LGBTQ fights.
Bolton Claims Trump Asked China’s President For Favor To Boost Reelection Chances
The former national security adviser described a meeting last year between the two presidents in his forthcoming tell-all book.
Listen: The Empty Promise of Vitamins
Supplements claiming to “boost your immune system” have gotten new attention during the pandemic. On the podcast Social Distance, the staff writer James Hamblin explains why these claims are mostly nonsense (and have been for years), and the executive producer Katherine Wells asks him about vitamins.Listen to their conversation here:Subscribe to Social Distance on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or another podcast platform to receive new episodes as soon as they’re published.
The Long, Strange Journey of Da 5 Bloods
Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods is a vital work on an overlooked subject in American film: the experience of black veterans in the Vietnam War, a perspective largely lacking from Hollywood’s 50 years of output on that conflict. The movie follows a group of 60-something retirees, still mourning their leader Stormin’ Norman (played by Chadwick Boseman), who died in battle, as they return to Vietnam to recover his body and a cache of gold bars he was buried alongside.
Dear Care and Feeding: My Daughter’s Pleas for a Sibling Are Breaking My Heart
Parenting advice on sibling pleas, lawnmower danger, and boundaries with neighbors.