Today's Liberal News

Edward Snowden, Glenn Greenwald & Chris Hedges on NSA Leaks, Assange & Protecting a Free Internet

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists Glenn Greenwald and Chris Hedges discuss mass surveillance, government secrecy, internet freedom and U.S. attempts to extradite and prosecute WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. They spoke together on a panel moderated by Amy Goodman at the virtual War on Terror Film Festival after a screening of “Citizenfour” — the Oscar-winning documentary about Snowden by Laura Poitras.

Pentagon Clamps Down on Extremism & White Supremacy After Dozens of Jan. 6 Rioters Had Military Ties

The Pentagon has announced new rules to slow the spread of extremism in the military, one of which will discipline soldiers for liking or resharing white nationalist and other extremist content on social media. The Pentagon announcement comes just two weeks before the first anniversary of the January 6 insurrection, where more than 80 of the 700 individuals charged with the attack had ties to the U.S. military.

“It’s a Win for Us”: Striking Kellogg’s Workers Get Raises, Improved Benefits & Avoid Two-Tier System

In a major victory for labor rights, 1,400 unionized Kellogg’s workers have ended their nearly three-month strike across four states after approving a new contract that provides a wage increase and enhanced benefits for all. The prior agreement that Kellogg’s tried to bargain only offered wage increases and improved benefits to longtime workers, whereas the new agreement ensures newer workers have a guaranteed option to receive the same improvements.

Tea Party Redux: How the Koch Network Funds and Fuels the Anti-Lockdown Movement

A new report titled “How The Koch Network Hijacked The War On COVID” reveals how a right-wing network linked to billionaire Charles Koch has played a key role in fighting public health measures during the pandemic, including mask and vaccine mandates, contact tracing and lockdowns. The groups include the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER), Donors Trust, the Hoover Institution and Hillsdale College.

No One Is Safe Until Everyone Is Safe: Oxfam on Vaccine Equity & Taking On Moderna

Oxfam America has accused Moderna of misleading its investors about an ongoing dispute over whether it needs to share vaccine patent rights with the U.S. government. Oxfam filed a shareholders complaint against Moderna with the Securities and Exchange Commission over the company’s resistance to recognizing the role played by three scientists with the National Institutes of Health in developing the vaccine.

Right-wing radio clown who promised to quit over employer’s vax mandate is still on the job

Yeah, Donald Trump also said we’d never see him again if he lost to Joe Biden. We all know how that turned out. After all, Trump is never really gone—as long we remember him. We see his eternal light and essence in every irregular, half-priced Grocery Outlet yam. Every time a bully farts on a weaker kid’s head, he is there—in spirit—gently guiding the bully’s sphincter.

The religious right and its leaders are desperate for power, even at the cost of the innocent

When the history books reflect on Donald Trump’s presidency, the religious right’s unflinching support of him will surely get a lot of ink. Trump promised the religious right everything it wanted and then some—particularly conservative federal judges and Supreme Court justices who would roll back abortion and marriage equality.

It is obvious why the religious right supported Trump.

FDA permanently allows abortion pill by mail, but local challenges persist in Republican-led states

by Alexandra Martinez

This article was originally published at Prism

Last week, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced it would remove restrictions on medication abortions and permanently allow people to receive abortion pills by mail—a reprieve from the abortion care crisis playing out in the Supreme Court. The decision affirms the safety of medication abortions and ensures an alternative to procedural abortions where there are repressive state laws.

The wealthy given outrageous incentives to colonize Puerto Rico while native residents suffer

Four years after Hurricane Maria, many of Puerto Rico’s residents are still suffering. The electrical grid still hasn’t been fully repaired; thousands of homes have yet to be fixed; and everywhere, deteriorating buildings are still in use, from schools to health care facilities. Yet that’s not the case for all of the island’s residents. There is a community south of San Juan with posh new shopping centers, built next to abandoned buildings.

Gay preacher dressed in drag for children’s sermon about joy. Guess how the congregation reacted?

Here at Daily Kos, we recently covered the frustrating story of a preacher being pushed out of his church in Evansville, Indiana, after participating in an uplifting, inclusive drag program as part of the HBO series We’re Here. As part of the show, Pastor Craig Duke performed in drag and described himself as an ally to LGBTQ+ people and thought the outreach and inclusion could be meaningful for the congregation, including his child, who he said is pansexual. All lovely.

The Gospel of Donald Trump Jr.

Donald Trump Jr. is both intensely unappealing and uninteresting. He combines in his person corruption, ineptitude, and banality. He is perpetually aggrieved; obsessed with trolling the left; a crude, one-dimensional figure who has done a remarkably good job of keeping from public view any redeeming qualities he might have.There’s a case to be made that he’s worth ignoring, except for this: Don Jr.

About It

Despite losing the dining table to it
for weeks, our family stays
with the puzzle, teetering plates
upon knees before the television
and then returning to the soft symphony
of shifting the oneness of a cardboard shape
into the satisfied oneness of another,
over and over, the thousand little clicks
of pleasure:—More than that
if you count how, from time to time,
someone will recognize the need
to undo what we took for perfection
but what, in fact, was silently stalling
the possibility of se

You Have No Idea How Hard It Is to Get a Hamster Drunk

The heaviest drinkers in the animal kingdom are punier than you might expect. Elephants, for example, are massive, but they are relative lightweights—they lack a gene for alcohol metabolism. Humans actually rank pretty highly, thanks to our ancestors’ propensity for picking fermented fruit off the ground. But to find the real champs, you have to think smaller.Think hoarder.Think hamster.

Omicron Is Pushing America Into Soft Lockdown

“I do not see a scenario for any kind of shutdown,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio declared this week, as parts of New York were in fact shutting down all around him. Broadway canceled show after show. Restaurants closed their kitchens. De Blasio’s successor, Eric Adams, who will take office January 1, nixed his inauguration gala. There has been no March 2020–style universal shutdown, but New York is not back anymore, baby.

The Next Disaster Coming to the Great Plains

GARDEN CITY, Kan.—A century after the Dust Bowl, another environmental catastrophe is coming to the High Plains of western Kansas. The signs are subtle but unequivocal: dry riverbeds, fields of sand, the sound of irrigation motors straining to pump from dwindling aquifers.