Today's Liberal News

Six White Mississippi “Goon Squad” Cops Get Lengthy Prison Sentences for Torturing Black Men

In Mississippi, six former sheriff’s deputies have been sentenced to between 10 and 40 years in prison for raiding a home and torturing, shooting and sexually abusing two Black men, Michael Jenkins and Eddie Parker, in January 2023. The six former deputies, all of whom are white, called themselves the “Goon Squad” and have been linked to at least four violent attacks on Black men since 2019. Two of the men attacked and tortured by the group subsequently died.

U.S. Said It Was Calling for a Gaza Ceasefire, But Its U.N. Resolution Didn’t Say That: Phyllis Bennis

At the U.N. Security Council, China and Russia have vetoed a U.S. draft resolution on the war in Gaza. The U.S. resolution appeared to call for a ceasefire, but it was written in a way to make the resolution unenforceable. Our guest Phyllis Bennis says this was mere “wordplay” and a “convoluted” attempt by the Biden administration to play both sides, as it comes under increasing internal and external criticism over its close relationship with Israel.

“Humanitarian Violence” in Gaza: Architect Eyal Weizman on Mapping Israel’s “Genocidal Campaign”

A new report by the research group Forensic Architecture counters Israel’s argument at the International Court of Justice that it followed humanitarian policies to safeguard civilian life in Gaza. South Africa argued in January before the ICJ that Israel was guilty of genocide during its war on Gaza. The report argues that what Israel says are humanitarian evacuations in Gaza actually amount to the forced displacement of Palestinians, which is a war crime.

Conspiracy Theories About the Moscow Attack Are Unnecessary

Updated at 2:05 p.m. ET on March 23, 2024
A decade ago, when foreign fighters were flowing into Syria, the Islamic State’s capital, Raqqa, became a sort of Epcot of global jihad: New arrivals from different nations clustered together in their national groups. If you were a recent arrival from France or just wanted to know where to get a croissant, you could visit a café full of French people and ask. Tens of thousands of foreign fighters came from places as distant as Chile and Japan.

Is the Biden-Netanyahu Relationship Rupturing?

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Republicans are on the offensive this week against what they say is Democrats’ lack of support for Israel following Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s recent criticism of Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Inner World of the Teen

This is an edition of The Wonder Reader, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a set of stories to spark your curiosity and fill you with delight. Sign up here to get it every Saturday morning.
Teens exist in the murky space between youth and maturity—and in decades past, when the teen babysitter was a staple of American life, adults seemed to understand that.

The Real Issue With Netflix’s 3 Body Problem

This story contains mild spoilers for Netflix’s 3 Body Problem.
In Cixin Liu’s novel The Three-Body Problem, a scientist being manipulated by an extraterrestrial force is told to look up at the sky one night and watch the universe “wink” at him. The effect—akin to stars blinking on and off in unison—won’t be visible to Miao Wang’s naked eye; he has to use special glasses to observe the cosmic microwave background radiation.

Why Trump Won’t Stop Suing the Media and Losing

Why would the most notoriously cash-strapped man in America waste money on frivolous lawsuits?
On Monday, Donald Trump—whose lawyers recently announced that he can’t come up with the money to post a $454 million bond in his civil fraud case—fired off yet another suit against a news organization that reported facts he didn’t like. The targets this time are ABC News and its anchor George Stephanopoulos, who Trump alleges defamed him by stating that Trump had been found liable for raping E.

“Humanitarian Violence” in Gaza: Architect Eyal Weizman on Mapping Israel’s “Genocidal Campaign”

A new report by the research group Forensic Architecture counters Israel’s argument at the International Court of Justice that it followed humanitarian policies to safeguard civilian life in Gaza. South Africa argued in January before the ICJ that Israel was guilty of genocide during its war on Gaza. The report argues that what Israel says are humanitarian evacuations in Gaza actually amount to the forced displacement of Palestinians, which is a war crime.

We’re All Just Fodder

It was always going to end this way. The truth about Kate Middleton’s absence is far less funny, whimsical, or salacious than the endless memes and conspiracy theories suggested. In a video recorded and broadcast by the BBC, the princess says she has cancer, and that she had retreated from the public eye to deal with her condition while attempting to shield her children from the spotlight. Instead, she had to contend with the internet giggling about whether she’d had a Brazilian butt lift.

How America Stopped Trusting the Experts

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In 2017, my Daily colleague Tom Nichols wrote a book titled The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why It Matters. Three years later, America underwent a crisis that stress-tested citizens’ and political leaders’ faith in experts—with alarming results.

I Hope You All Feel Terrible Now

Updated at 4:04 p.m ET on March 22, 2024
For many years, the most-complained-about cover of the British satirical magazine Private Eye was the one it published in the week after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, in 1997. At the time, many people in Britain were loudly revolted by the tabloid newspapers that had hounded Diana after her divorce from Charles, and by the paparazzi whose quest for profitable pictures of the princess ended in an underpass in Paris.

The Wrong Way to Study AI in College

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Earlier this week, my colleague Ian Bogost published a provocative article about a trend in higher education: the opening of distinct colleges of computing, akin to law schools. New programs at MIT, Cornell, and soon UC Berkeley follow an uptick in the number of students graduating with computer-science majors.

It’s Time to Give Up on Ending Social Media’s Misinformation Problem

If you don’t trust social media, you should know you’re not alone. Most people surveyed around the world feel the same—in fact, they’ve been saying so for a decade. There is clearly a problem with misinformation and hazardous speech on platforms such as Facebook and X. And before the end of its term this year, the Supreme Court may redefine how that problem is treated.

Six White Mississippi “Goon Squad” Cops Get Lengthy Prison Sentences for Torturing Black Men

In Mississippi, six former sheriff’s deputies have been sentenced to between 10 and 40 years in prison for raiding a home and torturing, shooting and sexually abusing two Black men, Michael Jenkins and Eddie Parker, in January 2023. The six former deputies, all of whom are white, called themselves the “Goon Squad” and have been linked to at least four violent attacks on Black men since 2019. Two of the men attacked and tortured by the group subsequently died.