Today's Liberal News

How Not to Cover a Bank Run

Updated at 10:12pm on March 13, 2023.On September 17, 2008, the Financial Times reporter John Authers decided to run to the bank. In his Citi account was a recently deposited check from the sale of his London apartment. If the big banks melted down, which felt like a distinct possibility among his Wall Street sources, he would lose most of his money, because the federal deposit-insurance limit at the time was $100,000.

Silicon Valley Is Losing Its Luster

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.Last Friday, California regulators shut down Silicon Valley Bank—a prominent lender for start-ups and venture-capital firms—marking the largest American bank failure since the 2008 financial crisis.

The Surprising Truth About Seasonal Depression

Since Sunday’s daylight saving, many of us are feeling new excitement for spring after months of being beaten down by a frigid winter. Right? Or at least that’s the prevailing narrative across a large part of the country—that we suffer through the doldrums of winter and the payoff is a glorious lead-up to summer’s main event.

The Alaska Oil Project Will Be Obsolete Before It’s Finished

If the world turned off the tap of fossil fuels tomorrow, all hell would break loose. Something like 30 percent of global electricity and 9 percent of transport would still be running; billions of people would be stuck at home in the dark.That’s why, even though world leaders now talk constantly about transitioning away from fossil fuels, they also fret about ensuring a supply of oil and gas for next week, next month, and next year.

What Social Media Is Doing to Finance

Financial panics are nothing new. But the strange little panic we’re enduring—one that started last week with a massive bank run causing the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and that continued this morning with big sell-offs in the stocks of other regional banks—is arguably the first one in which social media, and particularly Twitter, has been a major player. And if the past few days are any indication, that does not bode well for the next major financial crisis.

East Palestine Toxic Train Crash Shows Plastics Industry Toll on Planet. Will U.S. Ban Vinyl Chloride?

Five weeks after the Norfolk Southern toxic train derailment and so-called controlled burn that blanketed the town with a toxic brew of at least six hazardous chemicals and gases, senators grilled the CEO of Norfolk Southern over the company’s toxic train derailment. The company has evaded calls to cover healthcare costs as residents continue to report headaches, coughing, fatigue, irritation and burning of the skin.

Climate & Indigenous Activists Decry Biden’s Approval of Willow Oil Drilling Project in Arctic

The Biden administration has approved a massive oil and gas development in Alaska known as the Willow project, despite widespread opposition from environmental and conservation groups that argue Willow will amount to a carbon bomb. The administration also announced Sunday it will ban future oil and gas leasing for 3 million acres of federal waters in the Arctic Ocean and will limit drilling in a further 13 million acres in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska’s North Slope.

China’s Middle East Deal: Iran & Saudi Arabia Reestablish Relations as U.S. Watches from Sidelines

Iran and Saudi Arabia have agreed to reestablish diplomatic relations after seven years and reopen their respective embassies within months, in a deal brokered Friday by China and signed in Beijing. The rapprochement between the two rivals is the latest sign of China’s growing presence in world affairs and waning U.S. influence in the Middle East amid a shift in focus to Ukraine and the Pacific region.

Rep. Barbara Lee on Cutting the Military Budget, Abortion Rights & Why She’s Running for Senate

As President Biden proposes his new budget, which expands military spending, as well as social services, we speak with Democratic Congressmember Barbara Lee, co-chair of the Defense Spending Reduction Caucus. She recently reintroduced the People Over Pentagon Act to cut $100 billion from the Pentagon budget and reallocate funds to overlooked priorities like healthcare and education.

Historian Alfred McCoy: As Tensions Rise over Taiwan, U.S. & China “Edging Ever Closer” to War

U.S. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines is calling China the “most consequential threat” to U.S. national security. Meanwhile, the Chinese parliament has unanimously voted to give Xi Jinping a third five-year term as president. On Monday, Xi directly accused the United States of suppressing China’s development, stating, “Western countries — led by the U.S. — have implemented all-round containment, encirclement and suppression against us.

Opposition Grows to Atlanta “Cop City” as More Forest Defenders Charged with Domestic Terrorism

Prosecutors in Atlanta have charged 23 forest defenders with “domestic terrorism” after their arrests late Sunday at a festival near the site of Cop City, a massive police training facility being built in the Weelaunee Forest. The arrests followed clashes between police and protesters on Sunday afternoon and came less than two months after Atlanta police shot and killed Manuel “Tortuguita” Terán, a 26-year-old environmental defender.

The Inevitable Victory of Everything Everywhere All at Once

There was a moment in the middle of tonight’s Oscar ceremony when I started getting concerned text messages from friends. Their line of inquiry was the same: Was All Quiet on the Western Front about to pull a big upset for Best Picture? The German World War I film, distributed by Netflix, had racked up a slew of technical wins, and a ceremony that had begun with a burst of joyous energy seemed headed in a more fusty, old-fashioned direction.

‘This Is the American Dream’

The Oscars have a lot to navigate this year, between their ongoing struggles to increase diversity and atone for last year’s most shocking moment. But the 95th ceremony began with two powerful wins, which in turn delivered two powerful speeches. Ke Huy Quan and Jamie Lee Curtis—both nominated for the first time—won Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress, respectively, for their work in Everything Everywhere All at Once.

What’s Missing From the Grand Finale of The Last of Us

This story contains spoilers for the entire first season of The Last of Us.Video-game adaptations used to be defined by how much they could ignore their source material. A Super Mario Bros. movie couldn’t actually be about cartoon Italians jumping on mushrooms with eyes, so it became a battle against leather-clad lizards in an industrial dystopia. The Street Fighter game is about, well, fighting in the street, but the movie is a G.I. Joe rip-off with far-flung action sequences.

Nancy Pelosi: ‘Follow the Money’

House Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi’s message at the annual South by Southwest festival could be summarized in three words: Follow the money.Pelosi uttered that specific phrase—and similar versions of it—several times during her interview with Evan Smith, a contributing writer at The Atlantic, as part of the magazine’s Future of Democracy summit this morning in Austin, Texas.