Germany puts a stop to Nord Stream 2, a key Russian natural gas pipeline.  —  Germany halted certification of the pipeline linking the country to Russia in response to the Kremlin's recognition of two separatist regions in Ukraine.  —  Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Tuesday that Germany …

Putin's Endgame: Unravel the Post-Cold War Agreements That Humiliated Russia  —  Moscow's military forces threaten Ukraine, but the bigger prize is restoration of Russia's sphere of influence stretching through Eastern Europe  —  The world's attention is on eastern Ukraine, where Moscow's forces circle.

Rick Scott pushes own GOP agenda as McConnell holds off  —  Senate Republican leaders have no plans to release an alternative agenda as they try to win back the majority this fall.  So Rick Scott is pursuing his own plan.  —  The Florida Republican senator is devising a conservative blueprint …

Democrats tune out national news during Biden era  —  A new poll from Gallup and the Knight Foundation finds that younger Democrats are driving a huge decline in national news consumption in the U.S.  —  Why it matters: It marks the first time since the study began in early 2018 …

The Long Crusade of Clarence and Ginni Thomas  —  The Supreme Court justice and his wife battled for years for a more conservative America.  New reporting shows how far she was willing to go after Donald Trump's 2020 election loss.  —  The call to action was titled “Election Results and Legal Battles: What Now?”

Canadian truckers' COVID ‘freedom’ fight is absurd next to Ukraine's struggle with Russia  —  Canadian truckers are fighting for the right to shun a lifesaving vaccine while Ukrainians are fighting for their lives. … There's nothing like a real crisis to expose the folly of one that's fake …

San Francisco Shows Democrats Have a Seismic Challenge Ahead  —  The political earthquake that just occurred in San Francisco should be a dire warning to the national Democratic Party, because the same fault line stretches across the country and the tremors are only increasing.

When Boring People Turn Dangerous: Canada's Insane Power Grab  —  The Canadian government's decision to freeze bank accounts in the trucker protests is a mad leap toward bureaucratic dystopia  —  On Christmas Eve, 2018, New York Times writer Andrew Ross Sorkin published, “How Banks Unwittingly Finance Mass Shootings.”

Bob Beckel, former co-host of ‘The Five,’ dead at 73  —  The Democratic strategist was a founding co-host of the long-running Fox News show  —  Sean Hannity reflects on the life of Bob Beckel  —  Bob Beckel, a Democratic strategist and former co-host of “The Five,” has died at age 73.

Got a Covid Booster?  You Probably Won't Need Another for a Long Time  —  A flurry of new studies suggest that several parts of the immune system can mount a sustained, potent response to any coronavirus variant.  —  As people across the world grapple with the prospect of living …

Red states are remaking the civil liberties landscape  —  The bitter resistance to multiracial democracy  —  (CNN)From Florida, Georgia and Tennessee through Texas, South Dakota and Montana, Republican-controlled states are approving a torrent of culturally conservative hot-button legislation …