Dick Cheney Was Lying About Torture  —  The Senate report confirms it doesn't work.  As those of us on the inside knew.  —  It's official: torture doesn't work.  Waterboarding Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of 9/11, did not in fact “produce the intelligence that allowed us to get Osama bin Laden …

How The New Republic Lost Its Place  —  The strangest thing about the calamity that last week struck my old magazine, The New Republic, is this: It wasn't about politics.  When I was coming of age in the 1980s and 1990s, TNR was known for its intramural ideological brawls.

Sharp Racial Divisions in Reactions to Brown, Garner Decisions  —  Many Blacks Expect Police-Minority Relations to Worsen  —  The public has very different reactions to the recent grand jury decisions in two police-related deaths that have sparked protests in cities across the country.

Republicans clash on reversing nuclear option in Senate  —  Republicans are split over whether to change the Senate's rules to allow filibusters on executive and judicial nominations.  —  As they head into a conference meeting on Tuesday, some Republicans say it's time to undo a wrong committed …

Lena Dunham's publisher says her alleged rapist “Barry” wasn't actually named Barry  —  Lena Dunham in a scene from the HBO series “Girls.”  (JoJo Whilden/HBO via AP)  —  As I noted last week, Lena Dunham's memoir describes her having sex with someone named Barry, whom she labels as Oberlin's “resident conservative.”

The Plan to Get Climate-Change Denial Into Schools  —  “As the amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases increase, the Earth warms.  Scientists warn that climate change, caused by this warming, will pose challenges to society.”  —  That language—featured in a fifth-grade Texas …

McConnell Pushes Campaign Finance Changes  —  An effort to ease limits on spending by party committees was among the late lingering issues as negotiations continued on legislation to keep the government funded past Thursday.  —  Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has championed the change …

Approval Ratings Hit 5-Year High for GOP  —  Republicans are enjoying a five-year peak in popularity after their wins in the midterm elections, according to a new Bloomberg Politics poll, while President Barack Obama struggles with his lowest job approval rating, at 39 percent.

Fed Aims to Signal Shift on Low Rates  —  Central Bank Could Drop ‘Considerable Time’ Phrasing in Policy Statement  —  Federal Reserve officials are seriously considering an important shift in tone at their policy meeting next week: dropping an assurance that short-term interest rates …

MoveOn.org Looks to Nudge Elizabeth Warren Into 2016 Presidential Race  —  WASHINGTON — Some Democrats are “Ready for Hillary.”  MoveOn.org is ready for Elizabeth Warren.  —  The liberal group is poised to spend $1 million on a campaign to draft Senator Warren, the Massachusetts Democrat …

When rape matters, and when it doesn't: Column  —  In the eyes of the media, all rapes are equal.  But some rapes are more equal than others.  —  Rape is a terrible crime and deserves the harshest punishment and condemnation.  Yet, in the public sphere, all rapes are not created equal.

De Blasio: Giuliani ‘Fundamentally Misunderstands the Reality’ of Race  —  The New York mayor today addressed the week in protests, and experience with his own son.  —  New York Mayor Bill de Blasio on Sunday admonished former Mayor Rudy Giuliani for his repeated recent comments that …

Applying ‘Broken Windows’ to the Police  —  In poorer neighborhoods, overly aggressive officers are too often a source of community anxiety.  Their misbehavior contributes to disorder.  —  One of the most influential policing concepts of our era, the broken-windows theory …