As recently as two and a half weeks ago, New York Governor Kathy Hochul was bragging about her conviction to stand up to “set in their ways” drivers in order to implement a congestion-pricing plan that would improve New Yorkers’ lives and save them a lot of time stuck in traffic. Yesterday, Hochul suddenly announced that the program would be “paused indefinitely.
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This week, two influential spreaders of Donald Trump’s Big Lie faced trouble. These aren’t the first glitches in the conspiracy-theory universe.
First, here are three new stories from The Atlantic:
The cars always win.
This is an edition of Time-Travel Thursdays, a journey through The Atlantic’s archives to contextualize the present and surface delightful treasures. Sign up here.
Somehow, Neil Postman saw it coming. His 1985 book, Amusing Ourselves to Death, predicted that people would become so consumed by entertainment that they would be rendered unable to have serious discussions about serious issues. Postman was worried about television; he didn’t live to see social media kick those fears into hyperdrive.
We speak with Congressmember Jamaal Bowman of New York, one of the top targets for pro-Israel groups seeking to oust lawmakers who have led calls for a ceasefire in Gaza. Bowman is a former Bronx middle school principal who won his seat in 2020 before becoming a member of the so-called Squad of progressives in Congress.
At the start of Elizabeth Hobson’s career as an ecologist, she knew to stick to one rule: Never anthropomorphize the animals you study.
For plenty of people, assigning human characteristics to another living creature feels natural enough that we do it as a matter of course. But to many scientists who study animal behavior, anthropomorphism is a cardinal sin, and suggesting that a researcher has tiptoed in that direction is tantamount to saying they’ve resorted to uninformed speculation.
A new documentary, Where Olive Trees Weep, explores Palestinian loss, trauma and the fight for justice over decades of life under Israeli occupation. We speak with two people featured in the film: Ashira Darwish, a Palestinian journalist and therapist, and Dr. Gabor Maté, an acclaimed Hungarian Canadian physician whose work focuses on addiction and trauma.
An Israeli airstrike on a U.N. school in central Gaza has killed at least 40 people, including 14 children, according to local authorities. Nearly 80 Palestinians were also wounded in Thursday’s predawn strike that hit the al-Sardi School run by UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees. The Israeli military says it was targeting militants operating in the school, but provided no evidence to back up its claims.
The Biden administration is in court defending a federal law it argues protects emergency abortions. In practice, the statute has offered only limited help.
Advisers to the Food and Drug Administration said using ecstasy to boost therapy for people with post-traumatic stress disorder was not effective.
Lawmakers and the VA hope ecstasy can help treat veterans with PTSD, but there’s reason for doubt.
The government’s former top infectious disease official said he didn’t suppress the debate over the coronavirus’ origin.
Republicans and Democrats have condemned a longtime Fauci adviser and a scientist who received millions from his agency.
The president is getting more micro in his economic sales pitch as the landscape loses its luster.
Friday’s government report showed that last month’s hiring gain was down sharply from the blockbuster increase of 315,000 in March.
Biden and Trump are both campaigning on warped economic statistics, cherry-picking weird data from the Covid crisis.
More than 15,000 Palestinian children have been killed over the past eight months of Israel’s assault on Gaza, and Palestinian officials are warning over 3,500 children are at risk of death due to starvation. “The trauma is unimaginable,” says Janti Soeripto, the president and CEO of Save the Children US, who is calling for a ceasefire, the protection of humanitarian workers and the allowance of aid into the besieged territory. “Over these past couple of weeks, it has even gotten worse.
Driving into New York City is a special kind of skill, requiring patience, cutthroat merging, and, sometimes, a willingness to navigate the backstreets of New Jersey. Driving in New York City, and especially in Manhattan, is also a skill, requiring the same patience and cutthroat merging, along with a willingness to pay upwards of $50 a day to park. People do it every day, but of all the places in the United States, Manhattan is perhaps the most hostile to driving.
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.
Free trials are convenient for consumers—and expedient for companies. But how much of the subscription business relies on people simply forgetting to cancel?
First, here are three new stories from The Atlantic:
The most consequential TV show in history
NASA finally has an alternative to SpaceX.
OpenAI appears to be in the midst of a months-long revolt from within. The latest flash point came yesterday, when a group of 11 current and former employees—plus two from other firms—issued a public letter declaring that leading AI companies are not to be trusted. “The companies are behaving in a way that is really not in the public interest,” William Saunders, a signatory who, like several others on the letter, left OpenAI earlier this year, told me.
Democrats hope Republicans who voted against the legislation pay a political price in November.
“People will die if doctors misdiagnose patients.” This is true as far as it goes. But the recent news that prompted Elon Musk to share this observation on X was not precisely about medical errors. It was about what he might call the “woke mind virus.” A story by Aaron Sibarium in The Washington Free Beacon had revealed complaints that UCLA’s medical school was admitting applicants partly based on race—a practice that has long been outlawed in California public schools.
The day after former President Donald Trump was convicted of 34 felonies, I sat down for a focus group with nine voters from across the country who voted for him twice and don’t want to vote for him again. They are not, however, all committed to voting for President Joe Biden instead.
[Quinta Jurecic: Trump, defeated]
These are the “double haters”: the chunk of voters who are dissatisfied with both candidates, and are trying to decide which one is less bad.
President Biden has issued one of the most restrictive immigration policies ever declared under a recent Democratic administration. It will temporarily shut down the U.S.-Mexico border, deny asylum to most migrants who do not cross into the U.S. via ports of entry, and limit total asylum requests at the southern border to no more than 2,500 per day.
The website of the Columbia Law Review was taken down by its board of directors on Monday after student editors refused a request from the board to halt the publication of an academic article written by Palestinian human rights lawyer Rabea Eghbariah titled “Toward Nakba as a Legal Concept.” The article argues for the Nakba to be developed as a unique legal framework, related to but distinct from other processes defined under modern international law, including apartheid and genocide.
Israeli forces began an escalated offensive in central Gaza today, with at least 75 people killed by airstrikes in the past 24 hours, as Israeli bombardment and shelling continue in the north and south, as well. “There is no safe place in Gaza,” says 19-year-old Helmi Hirez, who has been repeatedly displaced since October. Hirez was forced to flee from the north, where 14 members of his family were killed in an airstrike on his home in Gaza City.
The government’s former top infectious disease official said he didn’t suppress the debate over the coronavirus’ origin.
Republicans and Democrats have condemned a longtime Fauci adviser and a scientist who received millions from his agency.
The “Project 2025” blueprint includes proposals to require coverage of natural family planning methods and remove requirements that insurance cover certain emergency contraception.
The president is getting more micro in his economic sales pitch as the landscape loses its luster.
Friday’s government report showed that last month’s hiring gain was down sharply from the blockbuster increase of 315,000 in March.