Today's Liberal News

Are You Sure You’re Not Guilty of the ‘Millennial Pause’?

It took me two years to post my first TikTok. I’d press “Record,” mumble into the camera, and hastily hit delete before anyone could see just how awkward I was on video. I took the plunge only after practicing enough to eliminate any telltale signs that I was a near-30-year-old trying to be cool. Or so I thought.Apparently, I’m still guilty of the “Millennial pause.

Hotel Earth

Cornices overgrown with moss, the stoop
With nettles, flower beds
Hardly discernible beneath brambles and weeds—Next door was a place where drinks
Were sold, so I ordered
A glass of red wine. The Earth?For years it never changed, said the bartender.
Now kids won’t come around at night.
Doors close by themselvesAs if clouds were gathering—bang!
Footsteps climb the staircase, one, two—
I paid the tab.

The Problem With Being Too Cautious in Vaccine Trials

Late last month, the CDC confirmed that two young children had been diagnosed with monkeypox. Although almost all infections in the United States are associated with men who have sex with men, the virus is spreading rapidly and, through household exposure or other transmission routes, could soon turn up in other populations, such as infants, adolescents, and pregnant people (including their fetuses).

Hungary PM Viktor Orbán Addresses CPAC as American Right Embraces His Authoritarian Rule

We speak with international affairs scholar Kim Lane Scheppele on the rise and fall of Hungary’s constitutional democracy and how Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has gained popularity among the American right ahead of his speech today at the Conservative Political Action Conference. “Orbán presents, especially for the American right, a kind of irresistible combination of culture war issues,” says Scheppele.

Remember when Trump ordered an investigation of Brett Kavanaugh? Surprise! It was a total sham

We need a thorough, deep dive into the four-year-old allegations against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh if we’re ever to get to the bottom of what “boof” means. It would also be nice to know if the guy who voted to wrest reproductive rights away from every American with a womb is a concupiscent churl and serial sexual assaulter. But first things first.

State Rep. introduces amendment to anti-abortion bill that would ban erectile dysfunction drugs

Indiana state Rep. John L. Bartlett proposed an amendment Thursday to a bill as ludicrous as the anti-abortion bill the state is attempting to pass. The congressman suggested that if pregnancy was “an act of god,” then “impotency” must also be. Obviously, he was illustrating a point about bodily autonomy.

“We’re forcing young girls to mothers, but not forcing the men to be fathers,” Bartlett argues.

The Deepening Mystery of Kyrsten Sinema

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.Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona said that she’ll sign on to the Democrats’ climate bill—after advocating for a few adjustments that she apparently didn’t care to explain to anyone.But first, here are three new stories from The Atlantic.

Fish Oil Is Good! No, Bad! No, Good! No, Wait

At first, it was all very exciting. In 1971, a team of Danish researchers stationed on Greenland’s northwest coast found that a local Inuit community had remarkably low levels of diabetes and heart disease. The reason, the researchers surmised, was their high-marine-fat diet—in other words, fish oil. Incidence of heart disease, which once afflicted relatively few Americans, had shot up since the turn of the century, and here, seemingly, was a simple solution.