Top Items:
Tom Nichols / The Atlantic:
The Moral Collapse of J. D. Vance — What do we call a man who turns on everything he once claimed to believe? For a practitioner of petty and self-serving duplicity, we use “sellout” or “backstabber.” (Sometimes we impugn the animal kingdom and call him a rat, a skunk, or a weasel.)
Discussion:
Lawyers, Guns & Money
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Sean-Michael Pigeon / National Review:
For Democrats, Money Is Just a Number — Why stop at $3.5 trillion? Why not $5 trillion or $10 trillion? — The Democrats just unveiled a new $3.5 trillion spending package that, when combined with the $600 billion bipartisan proposal tentatively in place, adds up to a lot of money.
Discussion:
Politico, Washington Examiner, NPR, Talking Points Memo, Truthout and Slate
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NBC News:
Senate Democrats reveal $3.5 trillion plan to invest in health care, climate change and more
Senate Democrats reveal $3.5 trillion plan to invest in health care, climate change and more
Discussion:
Roll Call, Axios, Washington Examiner, The Daily Caller, Talking Points Memo, Daily Kos, The Moderate Voice, HotAir, Raw Story, Breitbart, UPI and Bloomberg
Natalie Fertig / Politico:
Schumer launches long-shot bid for legal weed
Schumer launches long-shot bid for legal weed
Discussion:
New York Times, ABC News, Washington Post, New York Times, The Hill, Washington Examiner, Daily Kos, Reason, The Daily Caller, Progress Pond, Political Wire and Althouse
Washington Post:
Senior Democrats prepare Medicare and climate initiatives as well as tax hikes on wealthy as details of $3.5 trillion budget deal emerge
Senior Democrats prepare Medicare and climate initiatives as well as tax hikes on wealthy as details of $3.5 trillion budget deal emerge
Discussion:
Salon, The Hill, Wall Street Journal, Associated Press, NPR, Daily Kos, The National Interest, Bloomberg, New York Times, CNBC, Common Dreams, Roll Call, Townhall and Political Wire
Kevin Roose / New York Times:
Inside Facebook's Data Wars — Executives at the social network have clashed over CrowdTangle, a Facebook-owned data tool that revealed users' high engagement levels with right-wing media sources. — One day in April, the people behind CrowdTangle, a data analytics tool owned by Facebook, learned that transparency had limits.
Discussion:
Gizmodo and Insider, more at Mediagazer »
Felicia Sonmez / Washington Post:
George W. Bush says ending U.S. military mission in Afghanistan is a mistake — Former president George W. Bush said he believes the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan is a mistake, in rare public remarks on the military intervention he launched nearly two decades ago.
Discussion:
Axios, DW.COM, NBC News, YouTube, HotAir, The National Interest, Insider, The Western Journal, Politico and Washington Times
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CNN:
Leon Panetta: The Afghanistan war lessons that we cannot forget
Leon Panetta: The Afghanistan war lessons that we cannot forget
Discussion:
Washington Examiner, Reason and Truthout
Ben Jacobs / New York Magazine:
Top U.S. General Said Trump Preached ‘Gospel of the Führer’ — General Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, likened Donald Trump's effort to hold on to power after the 2020 election to Adolf Hitler, saying the president was preaching “the gospel of the Führer” …
Discussion:
Insider
Washington Post:
Drug overdoses soared to a record 93,000 last year — Deaths from drug overdoses soared to more than 93,000 last year, a staggering record that reflects the coronavirus pandemic's toll on efforts to quell the crisis and the continued spread of the synthetic opioid fentanyl in the illegal narcotic supply …
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Mike Stobbe / Associated Press:
US overdose deaths hit record 93,000 in pandemic last year
US overdose deaths hit record 93,000 in pandemic last year
Discussion:
Politico, BuzzFeed News, NPR and National Review
Brett Kelman / The Tennessean:
Tennessee abandons vaccine outreach to minors — not just for COVID-19 — The Tennessee Department of Health will halt all adolescent vaccine outreach - not just for coronavirus, but all diseases - amid pressure from Republican state lawmakers, according to an internal report and agency emails obtained by the Tennessean.
Discussion:
The Hill, Talking Points Memo, WREG-TV, Bloomberg, The Daily Caller, Courthouse News Service, Common Dreams, Washington Post, Digby's Hullabaloo, Mediaite, Truthout, KRDO, Associated Press, CBS News, Daily Kos, WATE-TV, Raw Story, Bulwark+, Crooks and Liars, Joe.My.God., Insider, Twitchy, NPR, The Daily Beast, New York Times, Lawyers, Guns & Money, HotAir, Mercury News, BuzzFeed News and The Guardian
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Michael Kranish / Washington Post:
How Tucker Carlson became the voice of White grievance — Tucker Carlson huddled in a low-ceilinged dungeon that had served as a holding pen for Africans bound for enslavement in the United States. It was a July day in 2003 in Ghana, and Carlson stood alongside some of America's most prominent civil rights leaders.
Discussion:
Raw Story, Insider, POLITICUSUSA, No More Mister Nice Blog, Joe.My.God., Political Wire and Breaking News USA, more at Mediagazer »
Josh Kovensky / Talking Points Memo:
The Deeply Racist Dimensions To Ashli Babbitt's Martyrdom — “Who killed Ashli Babbitt?” — It's a question that, in recent weeks, has become a mainstream rallying cry among the MAGA crew after growing in volume for months on the far-right fringes. Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) has asked it repeatedly …
Discussion:
The Boston Globe
Detroit Free Press:
Michigan GOP executive who blamed Trump for election loss resigns leadership post — Dave Boucher Clara HendricksonDetroit Free Press — A Michigan Republican Party leader who faced grassroots pushback after saying the 2020 presidential election wasn't stolen and blaming ex-President Donald Trump …
Discussion:
Washington Post, The Hill, Forbes, Raw Story and Bridge Michigan
Tom Phillips / The Guardian:
Bolsonaro in hospital as hiccups persist for more than 10 days — President, 66, to be observed by doctors for next 48 hours — Speculation grows over health of Brazil's far-right leader — The Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro has been admitted to hospital complaining of abdominal pain …
Discussion:
CNN, Insider and The Uprising
Isaac Chotiner / New Yorker:
Robin DiAngelo Wants White Progressives to Look Inward — The author of “White Fragility” discusses her new book, “Nice Racism.” — In 2018, Robin DiAngelo, an academic and anti-racism consultant, published the surprise best-seller “White Fragility.” The book, which argues that white people tend …
Devlin Barrett / Washington Post:
FBI failed to pursue Nassar sex-abuse allegations, inspector general finds — The FBI failed to properly investigate sex-abuse allegations against Larry Nassar, the former doctor for USA Gymnastics and Michigan State University, according to a scathing report by the Justice Department's Inspector General …
Discussion:
Politico, Associated Press, The Daily Beast and Wall Street Journal
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Sam Ro / Axios:
Poll: 1.8 million Americans have turned down jobs due to unemployment benefits — About 1.8 million out-of-work Americans have turned down jobs because of the generosity of unemployment insurance benefits, according to Morning Consult poll results released Wednesday.
Discussion:
Washington Examiner, Morning Consult, New York Post, The National Interest and BizPac Review
Christina Maxouris / CNN:
‘We are seeing people passing quicker than before’: What hospitals look like in US Covid hot spots — (CNN)Dr. Sergio Segarra says when Covid-19 patient numbers in the Miami hospital he works in dipped below 20 last month, he began feeling optimistic. — “I remember seeing articles …
Discussion:
HotAir, Mercury News, NewsNation Now, TheGrio, WAPT and New York Post
Washington Post:
Trump Organization CFO has resigned from the trust that controls the company, documents show — Trump Organization executive Allen Weisselberg has resigned from a trust set up to control all of the company's assets — seemingly giving up his place at the top of the company's formal hierarchy …
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Lee Moran / HuffPost:
New Book Details Eric Trump ‘Flipped Out’ On Election Night
New Book Details Eric Trump ‘Flipped Out’ On Election Night
Discussion:
Vanity Fair, Raw Story, Truthout, Insider and Political Wire
Tahir Hamut Izgil / The Atlantic:
My Friends Were Sent to the Camps — If you took an Uber in Washington, D.C., a couple of years ago, there was a chance your driver was one of the greatest living Uyghur poets. Tahir Hamut Izgil arrived with his family in the United States in 2017, fleeing the Chinese government's merciless persecution of his people.
Reuters:
Cuban protests risk exacerbating COVID-19 spike - PAHO — Protests in Cuba will increase the risk of COVID-19 transmission because of an already high level of cases and the more contagious Delta variant, health officials said on Wednesday. — The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) …
Matt Johnson / WSB-TV:
‘He wished he had gotten the vaccine:’ Local man battling COVID-19 from ICU for months — GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — Blake Bargatze, 24, was the only one in his family to not get vaccinated and now he remains in a hospital ICU more than three months after contracting COVID-19, according to his family.
Discussion:
Raw Story
Jane C. Timm / NBC News:
More than 150 companies back update to Voting Rights Act — More than 150 companies, including PepsiCo, Amazon and Target, threw their support behind updating the Voting Rights Act in a letter released Wednesday. — The signatories, all U.S. employers, urged Congress to enact …
Discussion:
Washington Post, CNBC, One America News Network, The Guardian and IJR
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Joseph Cox / VICE:
Inside the Industry That Unmasks People At Scale — Unique IDs linked to phones are supposed to be anonymous. But there's an entire industry that links them to real people and their address. — Joseph Cox — Tech companies have repeatedly reassured the public that trackers used …
Noah Smith / Noahpinion:
Why Cuba is having an economic crisis — Three crises and a whole lot of bad policy decisions have driven hungry Cubans into the streets. — 6 hr ago — Cuba is in chaos. A wave of protest has been followed by internet blackouts, reports of shootings, lists of missing persons …
Discussion:
CBS News, New York Times, spectatorworld.com and CNN
The Daily Beast:
Inside Shepard Smith's Post-Fox News Crash on CNBC — The ex-Fox anchor's much-hyped new show has failed to bring in viewers and, per insiders, it has struggled with some internal turmoil, including “regular tantrums” from Smith. — Whether it's a poor time slot, behind-the-scenes squabbles …
Discussion:
Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Ace of Spades HQ and The Daily Caller, more at Mediagazer »
Robin Bravender / Insider:
Ex-Kamala Harris staffers have bad memories of a toxic culture in her past offices and are texting each other about it — Some former Harris staffers are feeling vindicated after reports of dysfunction in her office. — They're texting one another and having flashbacks about their time working for her.
Discussion:
Washington Free Beacon and Politico
Bryan Pietsch / Washington Post:
Family of five charged for allegedly storming the Capitol after tipster provides social media screenshots — For five people arrested this week after they were charged by federal prosecutors for allegedly storming the U.S. Capitol, the Jan. 6 insurrection appeared to be a family affair.
Discussion:
CTVNews
U.S. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: — WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, U.S. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) introduced the Travel Mask Mandate Repeal Act of 2021, legislation to prohibit the imposition of mask mandates on public transportation. U.S. Representative Andy Biggs (R-AZ-5) will be introducing companion legislation …
Discussion:
The Hill, The Daily Caller, The Western Journal, Joe.My.God., IJR and Fox News
Marc Caputo / Politico:
Florida Dems to Biden: Don't blow ‘golden opportunity’ on Cuba — MIAMI — Donald Trump and the GOP dominated Florida's elections last November in part due to the former president's hardline Latin America policy and rhetoric. — Now, in Cuba's historic uprisings, Florida Democrats …
Discussion:
Quillette, Vox, The Federalist, The Western Journal, The Dispatch and Political Wire
Samuel Kim / Washington Examiner:
Biden's civil rights nominee remains unapologetically divisive on Title IX — The Department of Education's former civil rights head Catherine Lhamon has not changed much over the past four years. — On Tuesday, the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee held a hearing …
Discussion:
help.senate.gov, Fox News, The American Independent, Reason, Real Clear Politics and The Federalist
Kyle Smith / National Review:
There Goes Biden's ‘Moderate’ Brand — President Biden's implicit promise to turn down the temperature and restore normal patterns of rhetoric to the presidency can no longer be taken seriously after yesterday's ridiculous episode of hyperventilation disguised as a speech.
Discussion:
Washington Examiner, Breitbart, HotAir and Newsbusters
Niraj Chokshi / New York Times:
Norwegian Cruise Line sues Florida over prohibition on vaccine requirements. — The fight over requiring vaccinations for travel is heating up. — Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings sued Florida's surgeon general on Tuesday, accusing the state of preventing it from “safely and soundly” …
Discussion:
CNN, Washington Post, Bangor Daily News, Gizmodo, NBC 6 South Florida, The Daily Caller, HotAir and WSVN-TV