Today's Liberal News

Barbara Ehrenreich Remembered: How She Covered Poverty & Started Economic Hardship Reporting Project

We continue to remember the life and legacy of writer and activist Barbara Ehrenreich, who died on September 1 at the age of 81, as we speak with her friend and colleague Alissa Quart, executive director of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, which Ehrenreich founded and which continues to support journalists who cover and embody the struggles of everyday people.

Ukraine Update: Taking stock of Ukraine’s advances … and Russia’s losses

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Remember when we’d sit here and talk, months on end, about Ukraine “shaping the battlefield” and dream of future counterattacks? We never lacked topics to discuss, but there was breathing room to explore topics in great depth. But I like this better! 

Mark Sumner tracked territorial changes this morning, and all I can add to that is “Ukraine has probably pushed further ahead.

Department of Justice will appeal the ruling granting Trump a ‘special master’ over stolen documents

The ruling from Judge Aileen Cannon, which grants Donald Trump an unprecedented “special master” and enjoins the Department of Justice from using the documents Trump stole in their criminal investigation, will be appealed. The ruling was always ridiculous and posed a threat to both the law and national security.

Now the Department of Justice (DOJ) has announced that it will appeal Cannon’s ruling to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Republicans don’t want to talk about the national security cost of Trump’s document theft

At this moment, thanks to a twisted ruling from a Trump-appointed judge, the Department of Justice can’t use the classified documents recovered from Mar-a-Lago in its ongoing criminal investigation. However, intelligence agencies are still working to respond to what was found in an unsecured store room, in a faux-leather cardboard box kept on a shelf in plain view, and in the drawers of Donald Trump’s desk.

The impact on national security is hard to overestimate.

Michigan Supreme Court orders board to place abortion protections, voting rights on November ballot

In a just-released ruling, the Michigan Supreme Court has ordered the Board of State Canvassers to certify for the ballot the Reproductive Freedom For All petition intended to enshrine abortion rights into the state constitution. “It is undisputed that there are sufficient signatures to warrant certification,” notes the court, while shooting down arguments over “sufficient space between certain words.

Advocates in angel wings shield LGBTQ event from 100 protesters yelling slurs in Utah

LGBTQ+ people and allies are absolutely everywhere—and that includes religious spaces and higher education. One example of this comes to us out of Brigham Young University (BYU), a school operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, based in Provo, Utah. You might remember we covered the brave story of graduate Jillian Orr, an openly bisexual woman who went viral for revealing the Pride flag under her commencement robes.

The Silent Sovereign

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.Queen Elizabeth II, who died today at age 96, was a “north star” for her subjects through seven decades of transformation. Our London-based staff writer Helen Lewis corresponded with me this afternoon about the late monarch’s singular legacy.

The Queen of the World

Queen Elizabeth II’s longevity alone places her in the pantheon of royal greats. At the time of her death, at Balmoral Castle today, she had served 70 years as Queen—the longest of any sovereign in the English monarchy’s 1,000-year history. But it is not simply her longevity that marks her for greatness, but her ability to stay relevant as the world changed around her.

The iPhone Isn’t Cool

I cradled my first iPhone like an egg after I bought it. The year was 2011; the season was winter. The ground was slushy, but I was too nervous to take the thing on the subway. It was an absolute luxury, by far the fanciest and, I felt, most fragile thing I owned—more Fabergé than farmstand.The precise model was the iPhone 4, which looked like an ice-cream sandwich from the side and felt about as sturdy.

“Attack Philanthropy”: Right-Wing Billionaire Fueled Climate Denial & Conservative Judges, Schools

New revelations about the secretive right-wing billionaire Barre Seid, who donated $1.6 billion to a conservative nonprofit run by Leonard Leo, known as Donald Trump’s “Supreme Court whisperer,” show he has also used his massive fortune to undermine climate science, fight Medicaid expansion and remake the higher education system in a conservative mold.

Famine by October? Somalia & East Africa Face Humanitarian Crisis Amid Climate Change, Ukraine War

We look at the devastating effects of climate change and global inequity in East Africa, and how many countries face drought and a looming famine, with guests in Mogadishu, Somalia, and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. “The current unprecedented drought, that is a result of four consecutive failed rainy seasons, with the fifth and the sixth projected to also be below average, is causing a huge food insecurity,” says Adam Abdelmoula, the U.N.’s humanitarian coordinator for Somalia.

Nuclear Experts: Demilitarized Zone at Zaporizhzhia Plant Needed to Avoid Chernobyl-Level Catastrophe

The International Atomic Energy Agency is calling for a safety and security protection zone to be immediately set up around the facility in order to avoid a nuclear disaster at Europe’s largest nuclear power plant. This week it released a long-awaited report urging Russia and Ukraine to create a demilitarized zone around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, after visiting it last week.