GOP blows off Trump's bid to oust McConnell  —  Former President Donald Trump has hit a wall in his efforts to oust Mitch McConnell as GOP leader.  —  Despite months of attacks, the Trump-led campaign to depose the Senate minority leader has resulted in firm pledges from just two Republican candidates …

Trump accused of ‘vile anti-Semitism’ for saying American Jews ‘no longer love or care about Israel’ because of Biden, Obama and the ‘Jewish people’ who run the New York Times  — Trump has claimed that Jews in America ‘no longer love Israel,’ and that evangelical Christians love it more

Trump Rioter Who Attacked Cops With Fire Extinguisher Gets Longest Jan. 6 Sentence Yet  —  Capitol rioter Robert Scott Palmer, known to online sleuths as #FloridaFlagJacket, was arrested by the FBI 12 days after he was named in a HuffPost story.  —  A Florida man who attacked law enforcement officers …

South Africa Hospitalization Rate Plunges in Omicron Wave  — Cases remain high compared with previous Covid waves  — Omicron infections may have peaked in epicenter Gauteng  —  South Africa delivered some positive news on the omicron coronavirus variant on Friday …

A glimmer of hope on Joe Manchin and voting rights?  —  By now, you'd be forgiven for concluding the chances of Sen. Joe Manchin III supporting a filibuster carve-out to pass democracy protections are somewhere between nonexistent and extremely nonexistent.  —  The West Virginia Democrat …

House oversight committee releases report detailing efforts of Trump administration officials to ‘undermine’ Covid-19 efforts in US  —  (CNN)Trump administration officials made “deliberate efforts to undermine the nation's coronavirus response for political purposes,” a House oversight committee led …

The world as we know it is ending.  Why are we still at work?  —  From the pandemic to climate change, Americans are still expected to work no matter what happens.  —  For a moment in early 2020, it seemed like we might get a break from capitalism.  —  A novel coronavirus was sweeping the globe …

‘No evidence’ Omicron is less severe than Delta, say UK researchers  —  Imperial College study warns of elevated reinfection risk but notes ‘very limited’ data on hospitalisations  —  There is at present “no evidence” that the Omicron coronavirus variant is any less severe than the Delta strain …

New York Times fires ‘Wirecutter’ editor accused of leaving profane voicemails for gun rights group  —  Erin Marquis, a staffer for the popular product-review site, had also lashed out at a gun-rights organization on Twitter.  —  The New York Times has fired an editor for Wirecutter …

Judge Overturns Purdue Pharma's Opioid Settlement  —  The ruling said the company's owners, members of the Sackler family, could not receive protection from civil lawsuits in return for a $4.5 billion contribution.  —  A federal judge on Thursday evening unraveled a painstakingly negotiated …

Kanye West's ‘Independent’ Campaign Was Secretly Run by GOP Elites  —  The campaign took steps, experts say, to mask its connections to GOP operatives.  That could violate federal election laws.  —  New documents show Kanye West's doomed White House campaign—styled as an “independent” …

I Canceled My Birthday Party Because of Omicron  —  I turn 40 today, and I was planning to have a party.  The Delta surge made me nervous about it.  The arrival of Omicron made me cancel it.  —  The plan was to have an extended house party, with a couple dozen people popping by over the weekend.

Herschel Walker's campaign falsely claimed he graduated from college  —  Republican Herschel Walker's campaign deleted a false claim that he graduated from the University of Georgia hours after it was posted on a website promoting his U.S. Senate bid.  —  The former football star's campaign removed …

“Corrosive Communities”: How A Facebook Fight Over Wind Power Predicts the Future of Local Politics in America  —  Bad vibrations abound.  Many of them are obvious: We can sense them, measure the damage they do, try to counteract or avoid them.  Others exist in a range outside the limit of normal human perception.

Manchin's child tax credit stance draws criticism back home  —  WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Joe Manchin's reluctance to endorse the Biden administration's expanded child tax credit program is rippling through his home state of West Virginia.  —  Manchin, a moderate Democrat …

PFIZER AND BIONTECH PROVIDE UPDATE ON ONGOING STUDIES OF COVID-19 VACCINE  —  NEW YORK and MAINZ, GERMANY, DECEMBER 17, 2021 — Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) and  —  BioNTech SE (Nasdaq: BNTX) today shared that following a routine review by the external independent Data Monitoring Committee (DMC) …

Russia Lays Out Demands for a Sweeping New Security Deal With NATO  —  The proposal, coming as Russia masses troops on the border with Ukraine, was directed at the United States and Ukraine's other Western allies.  —  KYIV, Ukraine — Russia outlined on Friday its demands for a sweeping …

Texas AG Paxton's $2.2M voter fraud unit closed three cases in 2021.  GOP lawmakers still boosted its budget.  —  Texas Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton has been one of former President Donald Trump's most reliable allies in spreading the myth of widespread voter fraud …

Josh Mandel, Candidate for GOP Nomination for Senate, On The 2020 Election and President Biden's Legitimacy  —  Former Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel joined me this morning:  —  Audio:  —  12-17hhs-mandel  —  Transcript:  —  HH: Josh Mandel, former state treasurer in Ohio, is running for Senate in Ohio.

Children exposed to covid can safely stay in class with in-school testing, CDC says … Students who have been exposed to the coronavirus can safely continue in-person learning if they are regularly tested for the virus at school, avoiding disruptive at-home quarantines, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday.

Special Report: Amazon partnered with China propaganda arm  —  Amazon.com Inc was marketing a collection of President Xi Jinping's speeches and writings on its Chinese website about two years ago, when Beijing delivered an edict, according to two people familiar with the incident.

Influential Judge Deals Blow to Biden's Employer Vaccine Mandate  —  The Biden administration's employer vaccine mandate took a beating this week from one of the nation's top judges, a major win for red states and conservative groups fighting it in court.  —  Chief Judge Jeffrey Sutton …