Why I Won't Vote to Add Sweden and Finland to NATO … The Senate will soon vote on adding Sweden and Finland to NATO.  According to the terms of NATO's founding treaty, that means the United States would be obliged to defend both countries in the event of a military attack.  I intend to vote no.

Republicans Say Biden's Plan Taxes the Middle Class.  That's False. … Over the weekend, a congressional tax committee analyzed a portion of the tax Inflation Reduction Act Senator Joe Manchin struck with Senator Chuck Schumer and President Biden.  Republicans inaccurately claimed …

Why the Democrats Are Funding My Far-Right Opponent  —  They said Trump was a threat to democracy.  Now they are they propping up my MAGA challenger.  —  Tomorrow I'm facing off against John Gibbs in the Republican primary for Michigan's Third Congressional District.  The race is close.

The cautious calculation behind whether Fox will dump Trump  —  The symbiotic, mutually advantageous bond between Rupert Murdoch's media empire and Donald Trump has often been described as a romance or a love fest.  —  Now that the relationship looks as if it may be headed to divorce court …

Trump-backed conspiracy theorist makes charge for chief election position in Arizona  —  Mark Finchem — a poster child for election deniers following the 2020 election — is inching closer to becoming the chief election official in one of the most tightly divided battleground states in the country.

Nicholas Kristof Returns to The Times  —  The journalist who first started here in 1984 and began writing columns for us in 2001 returns to Times Opinion.  Read more in this note from Opinion Editor Kathleen Kingsbury.  —  In his “farewell” column before running for governor of Oregon …

Vast New Study Shows a Key to Reducing Poverty: More Friendships Between Rich and Poor  —  Over the last four decades, the financial circumstances into which children have been born have increasingly determined where they have ended up as adults.  But an expansive new study …

GOP Consultants: Stop Blaming Others For the Problems You Created  —  The New York Times ran a big story last week on how GOP online donations are down 12% even as GOP enthusiasm seems to be surging.  —  The consultant class of the GOP is pushing the mythology that Google and Apple are flagging …

Trans cheerleader, 25, is given assault citation after ‘choking out’ teammate, 17, who called her a ‘man with a penis’ at cheer camp as video taken afterwards shows attacker saying ‘I barely touched her’  — Averie Chanel Medlock, 25, was booted from the Ranger College cheerleading camp …

Why It's So Hard to Find an Affordable Apartment in New York  —  There simply aren't enough places to live, a crisis decades in the making and one that poses a threat to the city's continuing recovery.  —  A half a century ago, city planners warned that New York had the potential to swell into a “monster city” of 55 million people.

Michigan court ruling lets prosecutors file charges under 1931 abortion law  —  A court order that sought to bar enforcement of a dormant law criminalizing most abortions in Michigan does not apply to county prosecutors, the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled Monday.

Right-wing sheriffs are doing some really shady political organizing against the election system  —  The New York Times recently published a must-read investigation into right-wing activist efforts to organize county sheriffs for the purpose of challenging the electoral system based on 2020 election rigging disinformation.

An Oklahoma city's first openly gay mayor resigned.  Then came the fallout.  —  THE VILLAGE, Okla. — Adam Graham had been mayor less than a month when he saw them: Two police officers from the next city over, the wealthiest in Oklahoma, stopping a Black driver in his middle-class community.

The Bill Russell I Knew for 60 Years  —  Since I was 14, Bill Russell showed me how to be a better player—and a better man.  —  When I learned that my friend Bill Russell had died, I tweeted this response: “Bill Russell was the quintessential Big Man—not because of his height but because of the size of his heart.

Bumps, bipartisanship in long fight for semiconductor bill  —  WASHINGTON (AP) — Five weeks ago, senior Biden administration aides gathered for their regular Thursday morning meeting about passing a bill to revive the U.S. computer chip sector, worried that it could be in peril.

A former Kremlin adviser is hospitalized in Europe.  —  Anatoly Chubais, who resigned as a top Kremlin adviser shortly after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, was hospitalized on Sunday in a western European country in critical condition with the symptoms of a rare neurological disorder.

U.S. emergency crude stockpile falls to lowest in 37 years  —  The U.S.emergency crude oil stockpile fell by 4.6 million barrels last weekto its lowest level since May 1985, according to the Department of Energy on Monday.  —  Crude held in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) …

Pet Project: BLM Activist Shaun King Used Donor Funds To Buy $40k Thoroughbred Show Dog  —  Shaun King's social justice PAC is going to the dogs.  Literally.  —  Grassroots Law PAC, which the progressive grifter founded to elect soft-on-crime local officials, paid roughly $40,000 since December …

The Kamala Conundrum  —  Political news rarely gets much grimmer than it did for Joe Biden on July 26, when he was greeted by a surprise poll showing that, were he to run again in a contested primary in New Hampshire, he might command less than one-fifth of the vote.

Dollar-Store Dinners and Vats of Shampoo Help Families Cope With High Prices  —  With energy and grocery prices rising, many are cutting their spending on essentials  —  Behind Dollar General's Strategy to Dominate Rural America … More Americans are embracing frugality as they face rising prices at every turn.

Is “Inconceivable” Provable?  The Justice Department Needs More Than a Vizzini Charge to Prosecute Trump  —  Below is my column in the Hill on the ongoing federal grand jury investigation reportedly looking into January 6th and potential criminal charges against former president Donald Trump.

Deshaun Watson Suspended Six N.F.L. Games for Sexual Misconduct  —  The former Houston Texans quarterback who recently signed a $230 million guaranteed contract with the Cleveland Browns will not be fined, sources said.  —  Deshaun Watson, the Cleveland Browns quarterback accused …