Today's Liberal News

Biden pledges big increase in funding, staffing to restore the IRS and crack down on rich tax cheats

In what is a ridiculously long overdue proposal, President Joe Biden is advocating doubling the size of the IRS, adding tens of thousands of new workers over the next decade in order to help achieve another of his goals: upping enforcement and getting tax scofflaws to pay up. That would come with an increase in funding to the IRS by $80 billion, and the return on that could be more than $700 billion in revenue in the next decade.

Some Jan. 6 insurrectionists want to blame Trump for their actions, but others balk at that strategy

The attorneys for the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers and other insurrectionists facing federal charges for their roles in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol have their work cut out for them, especially considering how their clients handed federal prosecutors all the evidence they needed, both on the day of the siege and on social media before and afterward. So it’s not a surprise that different lawyers for different clients are turning to wildly different strategies.

A Culture of Free Speech Protects Everyone

Last week, the journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones, who led The New York Times Magazine’s 1619 Project, was named the Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Faculty at its Hussman School of Journalism and Media recommended her for tenure too. But the university’s board of trustees didn’t approve the faculty recommendation. Instead, UNC appointed her to a five-year contract with the option of a tenure review.

Vaccine Lottery Tickets Are Sad, but Also Perfect

Every American state has laws requiring vaccination. If you want your children to attend kindergarten, you must vaccinate them against rubella. Most parents comply because they don’t want anyone going deaf from congenital rubella. And if that isn’t convincing enough, then there is the ominous threat of having to homeschool.But these laws have holes, and more people are going through them.

The Cancellation of Nikole Hannah-Jones

Earlier this week Nikole Hannah-Jones, the New York Times writer in charge of the 1619 Project, was denied a tenured professorship at the University of North Carolina’s journalism school. The faculty recommended her for a job, and a committee headed by a UNC trustee expressed doubts about her suitability. Other trustees reportedly said they would not approve her for tenure.

COVID-19 Vaccine Makers Are Looking Beyond the Spike Protein

In the race to build the world’s first round of coronavirus vaccines, the spike protein—the thorny knobs that adorn each of the pathogen’s particles—was our MVP. Spike is a key ingredient in virtually every one of our current pandemic-fighting shots; it has been repeatedly billed as essential for tickling out any immune response worth its salt. “People put all their eggs in the spike basket,” Juliet Morrison, a virologist at UC Riverside, told me.

Why Conservatives Want to Cancel the 1619 Project

Nikole Hannah-Jones is an award-winning Black journalist. She is also one of the developers of the 1619 Project, a journalistic examination of slavery’s role in shaping the American present. Last year, that work won her a Pulitzer Prize. Now it appears to have cost her a tenured chair at the University of North Carolina’s Hussman School of Journalism.

Above the Law? Review of Police Killing of Andrew Brown Jr. Demanded After DA Calls It Justified

We speak with Reverend William Barber, co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign and former head of the North Carolina NAACP, who is in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, to call for an expedited independent investigation into the police killing of Andrew Brown Jr., the 42-year-old Black father who was killed there last month by a bullet in the back of his head after seven deputies blocked him in his driveway while serving an arrest warrant.

“We Want Real Dignity and Freedom”: Gazans Welcome Ceasefire But Demand End of Siege & Occupation

In Gaza, thousands of people have taken to the streets to celebrate after Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire, ending Israel’s 11-day bombardment of the territory. At least 243 Palestinians, including 66 children, were killed in the airstrikes and bombings. Rockets fired from Gaza also killed 12 people in Israel. Raji Sourani, director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights in Gaza, welcomes the ceasefire but stresses Palestinians demand more than just the end of bombing.