Former House Speaker Paul Ryan Emerges To Bash ‘Entertainer’ Politicians
Building an “entertainment brand” in Congress is bad for bipartisanship and forging policy, said Ryan. It “divides us.
Today's Liberal News
Qronicles of Anon: It’s all about saving the children—until actual children are killed
The Qronicles is a series that will collect some of the news, videos, and general mis/disinformation roiling around the conspiracy world of QAnon. You can cringe, you can laugh, but these folks are organizing and showing up at the polls!
This has been a hard week in America. They’re all hard weeks, but this one was particularly difficult.
U.K. Got Tough On Guns After 1996 Scotland School Attack; There Hasn’t Been One Since
Effective gun control “probably isn’t possible in America unless there are some dramatic changes,” said a Scottish dad who lost his 5-year-old daughter in the shooting.
Advocates say access to contraception will be the next battleground
This article was originally published at Prism.
Conservative lawmakers are targeting contraception access in the latest fight over reproductive rights. Legislators in states like Missouri, Louisiana, and Arizona have been vocal about challenging access to contraception like intrauterine devices (IUDs) and emergency contraception like Plan B, claiming that life begins at the moment of conception.
Connect! Unite! Act! If I were to die of gun violence, please, politicize my death
Welcome back to Connect! Unite! Act! This week was one filled with tragedy and heartbreak. In my lifetime I have been through this too many times. I cannot think of any stage in my life where I was not confronted with mass shootings. I wish I could say there was a great period in my youth where it did not happen. Even in my late forties, that just isn’t true.
Man Confronts Ted Cruz At Restaurant: ’19 Dead Kids, That’s On Your Hands’
The Texas man told HuffPost he believes the time for “civil discourse” is over in the face of so many mass shootings.
What Really Happens When Mercury Is in Retrograde
You’ve probably heard some version of the line, usually delivered with a sigh. Someone is having a crappy day. Or they’re in a weird mood. Or nothing seems to be going right, despite their best efforts. And they’ve laid the blame on Mercury, the smallest planet in our solar system, nearest to the sun. Everything is Mercury’s fault. The darn thing is in retrograde. And in fact, it’s happening right now.
Patriotic Songs for a Cruel Country
The nation has selected a new musical champion, and he sings with a twang. This week, American Idol crowned Noah Thompson, a scruffy-goateed 20-year-old construction worker from Kentucky, as its 20th season’s winner. On his debut single, “One Day Tonight,” Thompson imagines giving a girlfriend all that she pines for: a diamond ring, a fixer-upper in Denver, a honeymoon in Vegas.
The Sit-Up Is Over
When I think of a sit-up, my mind flashes immediately to the (carpeted, for some reason) floor of my elementary-school gym. Twice a week, our teachers marched us there for ritual humiliation and light calisthenics, and under the watchful gaze of a former football coach with a whistle perpetually dangling from his lips, we’d warm up with the moves we’d been told were the building blocks of physical fitness—jumping jacks, push-ups, toe touches, and, of course, sit-ups.
Gay Men Need a Specific Warning About Monkeypox
A disproportionate number of cases in the recent monkeypox outbreak have shown up among gay and bisexual men. And as public-health authorities investigate possible links to sexual or other close physical contact at a Pride event in the Canary Islands, a sauna in Madrid, and other gay venues in Europe, government officials are trying hard not to single out a group that endured terrible stigma at the height of America’s AIDS crisis.
The Ugly Truth About the Beautiful Game
The philosopher Roger Scruton once wrote that people become conservative as they experience loss; the sense of passing, of dying and death. Loss gives them a love of things as they are, a desire to hold, to protect, to conserve—even if all attempts to do so come too late.I thought of this recently when I found myself in the absurd situation of feeling sad that a multimillionaire French soccer player had decided against joining the world’s most successful club.
CMS turning attention to hospitals with Covid outbreaks
The nation’s hospital regulator is probing hospitals where patients were likely infected with Covid after a record spike in transmission this year.
Demand for monkeypox vaccine grows in U.S., European countries as virus cases climb
Governments warn against panicking, but they are planning for the worst outcome.
Pfizer, BioNTech report 80 percent efficacy of Covid-19 vaccine for youngest children
The companies plan to finish submitting data to the Food and Drug Administration this week.
State Democrats, abortion-rights activists ‘incredibly frustrated’ with federal inaction
Democratic inaction at the federal level could complicate the party’s efforts to run this fall as champions of reproductive rights.
Health official on monkeypox: ‘I feel like this is a virus we understand’
Ashish Jha said he doesn’t expect monkeypox will become a particularly big threat.
China’s fragility feeds the doom-mongers in Davos
Fêted at the World Economic Forum in 2017, Xi Jinping is now accused of torpedoing the global economy with his disastrous Zero Covid strategy.
RIP Davos Man, long live globalization
Open markets aren’t what they used to be. A more complicated, more regional economic system is reshaping the global order.
U.S. economy is in a ‘period of transition,’ White House economic adviser says
Despite high inflation, the U.S. is “moving from the strongest economic recovery in modern history to what can be a period of more stable and resilient growth,” Brian Deese said.
U.S. inflation hit 8.3% last month but slows from 40-year high
On a month-to-month basis, prices rose 0.3% from March to April, a still-elevated rate but the smallest increase in eight months.
Fed set to launch fresh assault on inflation in new era for economy
Rates this year could reach their highest levels since before the 2008 Wall Street crash if surging prices continue.
Patrick Cockburn Warns the West’s “Triumphalism” in Ukraine Could Prolong Conflict Indefinitely
As fighting continues in Ukraine, we speak with journalist Patrick Cockburn, who says Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is peddling a “vague triumphalism” which is “obscuring just how dangerous and how bad the situation has become.” His recent CounterPunch piece is headlined “London and Washington are Being Propelled by Hubris — Just as Putin was.
Defiant Kevin McCarthy Challenges Subpoena Authority Of Jan. 6 Committee
McCarthy’s attorney argues in letter that the committee cannot issue subpoenas to the lawmakers under House rules.
Defiant Kevin McCarthy Challenges Subpoena Authority Of Jan. 6 Committee
McCarthy’s attorney argues in letter that the committee cannot issue subpoenas to the lawmakers under House rules.
Georgia Probe Of Trump’s Demand To ‘Find’ Him Votes Expands: Now Weighing Racketeering Issues
With the primaries over, and Trump nemesis Brad Raffensperger victorious, Georgia’s Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is pulling out the stops.
Ukraine Update: Ukraine makes a move in Kherson, while things remain desperate in the east
Yesterday I wondered why Ukraine was so hell-bent on defending Severodonetsk, isolated on a deep salient surrounded on three sides and no natural barriers, when those forces could simply cross the river and hold out in a much more defensible Lysychansk. Retired Australian general Mick Ryan pondered the same today, noting that “the tactical and political necessity to hold out in Severodonetsk is questionable.
News Roundup: A tough week for a nation beset by corporate greed and guns
It is Friday. This week has been a brutal reminder of what divided opinions on “American exceptionalism” in our leadership class really are. Children were murdered this week in a way that otherwise only exists in countries being bombed by missiles. While the overwhelming majority of Americans are demanding that action be taken to make our country safer for children going to elementary schools, corporate gun lobby money is a more powerful master to conservative lawmakers.
Donald Trump’s Stiff Chant Of Uvalde Victims’ Names At NRA Rally Curdles Critics’ Blood
He ended his speech praising the National Rifle Association with his trademark “dance” step.
Report: 1 in 4 Asian American seniors reporting hate crimes during COVID-19 pandemic were assaulted
Elderly Asian Americans have been subject to increased violence since the start of the novel coronavirus pandemic, thanks to Donald Trump’s racist language about COVID-19 and the right-wing “news” media’s quick action in adopting and disseminating it themselves.
The Black child who touched Obama’s hair is graduating. His mom says all he wants is to be president
At a time when the world seems to be spinning off its axis with children and adults slaughtered by gunfire, a power-hungry dictator invading a country, and the rights of Americans being stripped away at every turn, it’s important to take a second to remember a few wonderful moments that are also happening.
One such moment dates back to 2009, when a 5-year-old got the chance to visit the White House and meet then-President Barack Obama. His name is Jacob Philadelphia.