Welcome to Up for Debate. Each week, Conor Friedersdorf rounds up timely conversations and solicits reader responses to one thought-provoking question. Later, he publishes some thoughtful replies. Sign up for the newsletter here.Last week I asked readers to react to the hit song “Rich Men North of Richmond” by Oliver Anthony.Replies have been edited for length and clarity.
In the world of high school, every day is a battle. Recently, one of the most intimidating foes is the air. “School air,” as they call it on social media, is the latest way to explain the universal feeling of not looking your best at school. It smudges your makeup. It gives you awful hair days. It makes you look “dull” and “bad.”But it might not be so much of a problem if you watch the right videos.
This summer, I set out to write about Vivek Ramaswamy because I thought that his public-speaking skills set him apart from his GOP presidential rivals. Whereas most candidates were struggling to find their lane, Ramaswamy knew exactly what he was offering: a message that seemed to be libertarian at its core, paired with views that were consistent with more extreme corners of the right. Ramaswamy’s team agreed to participate in the profile.
Next Monday, Judge Tanya Chutkan is expected to decide the date of Donald Trump’s federal criminal trial for his attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election. The two parties’ proposed dates are ages apart: Special Counsel Jack Smith has requested January 2024, and Trump has asked for more than two years later than that. Yesterday, Smith submitted a brief response to Trump’s filing. Both sides contend that their suggested schedule is what normal order requires.
Ecuadorian voters have overwhelmingly supported a ban on future oil extraction in a biodiverse section of the Amazon’s Yasuní National Park — a historic referendum result that will protect Indigenous Yasuní land from development.
As a two-day BRICS summit gets underway in South Africa, we speak with author and analyst Vijay Prashad about whether the bloc — which comprises Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — can meaningfully challenge U.S. and Western domination in world affairs by building an alternative forum for countries of the Global South.
Former President Donald Trump has agreed to turn himself in to authorities in Georgia on Thursday to face 13 felony charges related to his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. His bail is set at $200,000. Trump has now been indicted four times this year, even as he continues to dominate the Republican field for the 2024 presidential nomination.
As former President Donald Trump prepares to surrender in Atlanta on Thursday to face charges related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, we speak with journalist George Chidi, who has documented the inhumane conditions inside the Fulton County Jail, where Trump will appear before a judge. “A lot of people are getting killed” inside the jail, says Chidi.
Bipartisan legislation aims to get more Americans into high-deductible insurance, but perils would remain.
The administration doesn’t expect to finalize contracts with pharmacies distributing the vaccine to the uninsured until mid-October, weeks after the shot is made widely available.
The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals largely sided with groups challenging policies making the drugs more accessible
“Our economy is the lowest it’s been.
The Biden administration has hit hard the president’s economic policy, known as “Bidenomics,” amid falling inflation, steady job growth and diminished talk of a forthcoming recession.
The president made a big bet on owning the economy. His team says give it time.
The Florida governor has made a name for himself with the fights he’s picked.
The Smithsonian has formed a task force to address the massive collection of human remains held by its museums, which includes 255 human brains that were removed primarily from dead Black and Indigenous people, as well as other people of color, without the consent or knowledge of their families. The so-called racial brain collection was revealed by a Washington Post investigation.
Critics agree: This was a doggone stupid move by the Republican National Committee.
More than 800 people are still missing after the catastrophic wildfire that decimated Lahaina.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis ordered the ex-president and 18 co-defendants in the election scheme case to turn themselves in before noon Friday.
This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.Rao’s sauce is worth billions of dollars—at least according to Campbell Soup, which just acquired its parent company. The sauce’s high price point may be key to its success.
The timing gap prompted concerns from public health experts, who fear that it would further complicate the fall vaccination campaign.
The settlements resolve a long-running criminal probe of the generic pharmaceutical industry dating to 2014.
Donald Trump’s bond has been set at $200,000 in the Georgia case accusing the former president of illegally scheming to overturn his 2020 election loss.
This article contains spoilers for the ending of Oldboy.Many movies with notorious twist endings—such as The Sixth Sense or The Usual Suspects—face a steep challenge on rewatch. The impact of the finale evaporates, or is at least blunted, by the viewer’s knowledge of what’s coming. A second viewing is largely an exercise in detecting the breadcrumbs leading to the big surprise.
The Texas senator inadvertently showed that trusting any image you see on the internet can get you into hot water.
You may remember the syllabus. Handed out on the first day of class, it was a revered and simple artifact that would outline the plan of a college course. It was a pragmatic document, covering contact information, required books, meeting times, and a schedule. But it was also a symbolic one, representing the educational part of the college experience in a few dense and hopeful pages.That version of the syllabus is gone.
Sign up for Kaitlyn and Lizzie’s newsletter here.Lizzie: One night several years ago, Kaitlyn and I and a group of other friends ended up at a party in the South Street Seaport. It was at the apartment of someone none of us knew, and I can’t say for sure how we got there. We were excited to see what kinds of people lived in this gift-shop neighborhood, and what their apartment would look like.
In Canada, the province of British Columbia has declared a state of emergency where entire towns have been burned to the ground in the country’s worst wildfire season ever. Evacuation orders are in place for more than 35,000 people, and 30,000 more have been told to be prepared to evacuate. Nearly all 20,000 residents have already left the city of Yellowknife, the capital of Canada’s Northwest Territories.
BRICS — the five-country bloc of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — is holding a monumental summit in Johannesburg this week where the group will discuss a number of major issues, including expanding membership and how to improve financial cooperation. Over 40 countries have expressed interest in joining BRICS, and 23 countries have formally applied to join the bloc, including Saudi Arabia, Iran, United Arab Emirates, Argentina, Indonesia, Egypt and Ethiopia.
