Today's Liberal News

Olympics Photo of the Day: Celebrating a Winning Team Effort

Jamie Squire / Getty
It is an incredible moment when the support of a world-class team pays off and everyone can celebrate their moment of victory. This amazing shot captures the reactions of the gymnast Simone Biles and her teammates in the background, as Biles finishes her floor-exercise routine and they realize that Team USA will win the artistic-gymnastics women’s team final. Photographed on day four of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, at Bercy Arena.

Google Wins the Gold Medal for Worst Olympic Ad

Google is running a new commercial during the Olympics. It’s about a cute little girl—she’s a runner, and she loves Team USA’s Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, a world-record-holding track star who won two Olympic gold medals in 2021. The little girl wants to write her a letter. So Dad fires up an AI chatbot.
“Help my daughter write a letter telling Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone how inspiring she is,” he asks Google’s Gemini.

The Dangers of ‘Mother’ Worship

The word mother is strikingly similar in languages all across the world: From Swedish (mamma) to Swahili (mama), Czech (matka) to Chinese (mama), most use some combination of the same two sounds, m and ah, to refer to the female parent. This consistency across space and time makes physiological sense, the pioneering linguist Roman Jakobson explained. One of the easiest sounds for a baby to make is ah.

Venezuela: Maduro Claims Victory, Accuses Opposition of Coup Attempt Following Disputed Election

Protests erupted on Monday in Venezuela after sitting President Nicolás Maduro was declared the winner of Sunday’s presidential election despite the opposition’s accusations of election fraud. Maduro has countered by accusing the opposition of attempting to stage a fascist coup. We go to Caracas for an update from Venezuelanalysis reporter Andreína Chávez, who says the opposition’s claims are still unsubstantiated.

It’s Not Just “Childless Cat Ladies”: JD Vance Once Described Childless People as “Sociopathic”

New details have emerged about Republican vice-presidential nominee JD Vance’s past comments that continue to plague the Trump campaign, with the Ohio senator having made repeated remarks over the years denigrating people without children as “cat ladies” and “sociopaths.” We speak with ProPublica reporter Andy Kroll, who has reported on Vance and says he is “demonizing huge swaths of Americans” and embodies a “really extreme version of conservative politics.

Ziklag Exposed: Secretive Christian Nationalist Network Tries to Purge Voters in Battleground States

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump made headlines this week after suggesting the 2024 election could be the last U.S. election if he wins in November. We look at a secret organization of wealthy Christians called Ziklag that is backing Trump’s efforts by working to purge more than a million voters from the rolls in battleground states and mobilize Republican voters to back Trump.

Biden Proposes Major SCOTUS Reforms, Including Ending Lifetime Appointments & Enforcing Ethics Code

Just a month after the Supreme Court granted former President Donald Trump broad immunity from prosecution for crimes committed in office, President Joe Biden has laid out a plan to reform the court. On Monday, Biden called for 18-year term limits, an enforceable code of ethics and an end to presidential immunity, though he stopped short of supporting court expansion.

The Never Trumpers Are Clear on Their Goal

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
The choice of Donald Trump versus Kamala Harris is proving to be a remarkably easy one for the Never Trumpers who really meant never.
First, here are three new stories from The Atlantic:
The most revealing moment of a Trump rally
“This is the worst police-shooting video ever.

Olympics Photo of the Day: Inside the Barrel

Ben Thouard /AFP / Getty
Nearly 10,000 miles away from the Games in Paris, the 2024 Olympic surfing events are taking place in Teahupo’o, on the French Polynesian Island of Tahiti, where 48 surfers from 21 nations are competing in the men’s and women’s shortboard events. I’ve always loved surf photography—the incredible power and beauty of nature, combined with the daring, skill, and grace of the riders.

The Big War No One Wants in the Middle East

Saturday’s rocket strike on a football field in the Golan Heights was precisely the type of large-casualty event that many observers have feared could ignite an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah. After nine months of contained clashes, mostly along the Lebanon-Israel border, a rocket landed at dusk on Saturday in the Druze village of Majdel Shams and killed 12 young people.

Anxiety Is Like Exercise

Imagine that you just got a bad job evaluation, or learned that your suspicious mole really might be cancer. Your heart races, your chest tightens, your mouth is cottony dry and your skin damp with sweat—all classic physical symptoms of anxiety. Unless you’re one of the Alex Honnolds of the world, the sensation of anxiety is just about universal.
But the human body’s consistent response to anxiety actually masks two different psychological (and biological) phenomena.

Politico’s Ian Ward on the Thinkers and Groups Who Have Shaped JD Vance’s Unusual Worldview

We speak with Politico reporter Ian Ward about JD Vance, who has become a lightning rod for controversy since being picked by former President Donald Trump to be his running mate. Ward spent months with Vance earlier this year for a profile about the freshman Ohio senator and his political evolution from a “Never Trump” Republican to one of the MAGA movement’s most prominent voices.

“He’s a Weirdo”: Repro Rights Activist on JD Vance’s History of Sexism & White Nationalism

We speak with reproductive justice activist Renee Bracey Sherman about Ohio Senator JD Vance, whose history of sexist remarks has come under scrutiny since he was chosen to be Donald Trump’s running mate in the 2024 presidential election. Bracey Sherman says Vance’s attacks on women who do not have biological children and his promotion of a kind of “trad” lifestyle harkening back to 1950s norms show he is out of touch with modern families. “The short answer is he’s a weirdo.