A boyfriend just going through the motions. A spouse worn into the rut of habit. A jetlagged traveler’s message of exhaustion-fraught longing. A suppressed kiss, unwelcome or badly timed. These were some of the interpretations that reverberated in my brain after I viewed a weird digital-art trifle by the Emoji Mashup Bot, a popular but defunct Twitter account that combined the parts of two emoji into new, surprising, and astonishingly resonant compositions.
In Hernan Diaz’s short story “The Generation,” published last fall in The Atlantic, a crew of semi-amnesiac humans are on a years-long journey to another planet. They are the residue of Earth, which has become a relic in every sense of the word: fragile, faded, mythical. In the cramped space shuttle, the narrator fantasizes about mundane wonders such as dirt, fire, birds, fish, and fresh air.
Twenty-four volunteer rescue workers connected to the group Emergency Response Centre International face trial for human smuggling in Greece for giving life-saving assistance to thousands of migrants, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East, fleeing violence, poverty and persecution. A European Parliament report described the trial as Europe’s “largest case of criminalization of solidarity.” We’re joined by New Yorker staff writer Alexis Okeowo.
Former Argentine prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo, who served as deputy prosecutor in Argentina’s Trial of the Juntas and later as the first prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, is portrayed in the film “Argentina, 1985,” which won the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture in a Non-English Language this week.
We speak with director Santiago Mitre about “Argentina, 1985,” his dramatization of the Trial of the Juntas, when a civilian court prosecuted Argentina’s former military leaders for brutal crimes committed during the U.S.-backed right-wing military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983. The film just won a Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture in a Non-English Language and is also shortlisted for an Oscar for best international film.
Republicans condemned violence against anti-abortion groups and reaffirmed protections for infants born after botched abortions. Neither measure is likely to move in the Senate.
The emerging strategy could further limit the Biden administration’s already limited policy.
New or expanded health care clinics are starting to bring more people into small towns after the fall of Roe v. Wade.
People close to Yellen said she had considered leaving for family reasons and because the Treasury job is highly political — and would become more so with Republicans in control of the House.
Even with last month’s further easing of inflation, the Federal Reserve plans to keep raising interest rates.
We speak with one of the 7,000 nurses on strike now in New York City at two hospital systems that account for more than a quarter of all hospital beds in the city, and a journalist who has documented how hospital CEOs are boosting their own pay by millions of dollars while slashing charity care. The strike began Monday after nurses failed to reach a new contract agreement with Mount Sinai Hospital and Montefiore Medical Center, with higher wages and better staffing among their main demands.
The former House speaker has some bad news for the ex-president.
“The GOP regards paying taxes not as a way of supporting the nation, but as an obligation to be avoided,” noted an editorial in The Charlotte Observer.
Critics have been complaining about certain lawmakers’ cigar “hotboxing.
A new subvariant of SARS-CoV-2 is rapidly taking over in the U.S.—the most transmissible that has ever been detected. It’s called XBB.1.5, in reference to its status as a hybrid of two prior strains of Omicron, BA.2.10.1 and BA.2.75. It’s also called “Kraken.”Not by everyone, though. The nickname Kraken was ginned up by an informal group of scientists on Twitter and has caught on at some—but only some—major news outlets.
Ronna McDaniel saw her earnings jump in 2020 after initially making $123,000 when Trump picked her in 2017. She is now seeking a fourth two-year term.
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.After declining to renew the contract of an adjunct professor, the president of Hamline University issued a statement that underscores the need to defend academic freedom in American universities.But first, here are three new stories from The Atlantic.
When I moved from small-town Oregon to Paris’s 11th arrondissement last summer, the city seemed like a poem in gray: cobblestones, seven-story buildings, the steely waters of the Seine. But soon I started noticing the green woven in with the gray. Some of it was almost hidden, tucked inside the city’s large blocks, behind the apartment buildings lining the streets.
During a 2016 tea party meeting, Mark Green told an audience that he didn’t want public school students in Tennessee to learn about the Islamic faith.
This past summer, I marked a personal milestone: 40 years since moving to Israel.The summer of 1982 was one of the lowest points in Israeli history. All of the ambivalence over Israel that would divide the Jewish people in the coming decades began to coalesce then, when Israel was fighting a war in Lebanon that large parts of the Israeli public regarded as unnecessary and deceitful.I had joined an Israel that was, for the first time, bitterly divided over the perception of threat.
In California, at least 19 people have died as storms continue to batter the region, leading to widespread flooding, mudslides and power outages. The National Weather Service says large portions of Central California have received over half their annual normal precipitation in just the past two weeks — and more rain is coming. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says 34 million Californians are under a flood watch.
We speak with journalist Lynzy Billing, whose investigation for ProPublica details how CIA-backed death squads, known as Zero Units, have yet to be held accountable for killing hundreds of civilians during the U.S. War in Afghanistan. The Afghan units, which were routinely accompanied by U.S. soldiers, became feared throughout rural Afghanistan for their brutal night raids, often descending upon villagers from helicopters and carrying out summary executions before disappearing.
We go to Kabul to speak with Jan Egeland of the Norwegian Refugee Council about the deteriorating security situation in Afghanistan, where at least five people died Wednesday in a suicide bombing near the Foreign Ministry. The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack. Meanwhile, pressure is growing on the ruling Taliban to reverse bans on women attending university or working with nongovernmental organizations.
The Biden administration is forwarding lists of senior facilities with zero people vaccinated to state regulators for review and possible penalties.
Fed officials are signaling that they’re determined to keep their vise-like grip on the economy through the end of 2023.
HHS has frustrated some doctors by requiring them to send patients test results before they have a chance to explain them.
People close to Yellen said she had considered leaving for family reasons and because the Treasury job is highly political — and would become more so with Republicans in control of the House.
Even with last month’s further easing of inflation, the Federal Reserve plans to keep raising interest rates.
We speak with civil rights leader Ben Jealous about his new memoir, “Never Forget Our People Were Always Free,” which examines his long career as an activist and organizer, and growing up the son of a white father and a Black mother. He discusses the lessons he drew from his mother, Ann Todd Jealous, and his grandmother, Mamie Todd, about the racism they experienced in their lifetimes.
As ceremonies mark the 100th anniversary of when a white mob attacked and burned down the Black town of Rosewood, Florida, we look at the largely untold story of how a racist mob murdered at least six Black residents and forced the rest of the town to flee. Many eyewitnesses said the true death toll was far higher.