Today's Liberal News

Bill McKibben: Record Heat Wave in Europe Is Latest Warning That Action on Climate Can’t Wait

A scorching heat wave continues to fuel wildfires across southern Europe and parts of North Africa, resulting in hundreds of heat-related deaths and forcing thousands to evacuate their homes. The record-breaking temperatures come as Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia has effectively killed President Biden’s Build Back Better climate legislation after stringing Biden along for 18 months. “It’s appalling, but it’s not unexpected.

Bill McKibben: Egypt U.N. Climate Summit Must Demand Freedom for Jailed Activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah

We speak with climate author and activist Bill McKibben, who is pushing for the climate movement to demand the release of Egyptian prisoner and human rights activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah ahead of the next U.N. climate conference, which will be hosted in Egypt. McKibben says releasing El-Fattah to the U.K., which has agreed to house him, would be “the easiest of gestures” by Egypt, whose authoritarian leader met Saturday with President Biden.

Biden Fails to Hold Saudi Arabia Accountable for Khashoggi Murder. Now UAE Arrests His Lawyer.

President Biden met with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Friday, as the Saudis agreed to increase oil production as well as open their airspace to Israeli commercial flights. Biden says he told the crown prince he held him responsible for the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was a U.S. resident, though Biden’s claims were later contradicted by a top Saudi official.

Do Animals Dream?

This article was featured in One Story to Read Today, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a single must-read from The Atlantic, Monday through Friday. Sign up for it here.      The octopus is still, suspended upside down on the glass wall of her tank, just below water level. Her eyes are shut, her eight arms knotted snug behind her head, her pale-gray body gently pulsing. She is sleeping.

The War in Ukraine Is Dividing Lifelong Friends

Friends whom my parents haven’t seen in decades call every year for my birthday. Some have never met me. I was 2 when my family immigrated to Los Angeles from Chișinău, Moldova, in 1993. My whole life, I’ve watched my parents keep in close touch with friends who continued to live in former Soviet republics.

James Webb’s Role in Purge of LGBTQ+ NASA Workers Prompts Push to Name Telescope After Harriet Tubman

The release of the first images from NASA’s new flagship James Webb Space Telescope brought renewed attention to the controversy over naming the telescope after James Webb, who led NASA ahead of the Apollo moon landings in the 1960s. He also played a key role in purging LGBTQ+ people from NASA in what was known as the “lavender scare,” and before that at the State Department under President Truman.

A Look Back in Time: How NASA’s Webb Telescope Gives Humanity a Revolutionary New View of Cosmos

NASA released revolutionary new images of the cosmos this week that were taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, the largest and most powerful space observatory to date. Launched in 2021, the JWST was designed to study star and planet formation with exponentially more accuracy and detail than its predecessor, the Hubble Space Telescope. “We can actually essentially watch the formation of stars,” says astrophysicist Katie Mack.

“Reinfection Wave”: Ed Yong on BA.5 Omicron Variant Spread Amid Mask Mandate Rollbacks, Funding Cuts

COVID-19 cases are rising as the BA.5 Omicron variant puts more people in the hospital amid high rates of reinfection, which is the focus of a new piece by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ed Yong in The Atlantic that is headlined “Is BA.5 the ‘Reinfection Wave’?” Yong warns the premature rollback of protective policies, like mask mandates and public health funding, has left people more vulnerable to reinfection.

“Shameful”: Biden’s Trip to Saudi Arabia for More Oil Ignores Human Rights Abuses, Khashoggi Murder

President Biden is set to meet with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Friday as part of a four-day visit to restore key relationships and build security cooperation in the Middle East. Human rights activists are outraged that the U.S. is willing to support a leader responsible for human rights violations including in the brutal war in Yemen, the state-sanctioned killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi and more.

News Roundup: Cruz attacks same-sex marriage rights; California makes school meals free

It didn’t take long for the Supreme Court decision erasing federal abortion protections to become a Republican demand that the federal government criminalize abortion nationwide, but that’s only the beginning of the party’s fascist reimagining of what the country would be: Sen. Ted Cruz is among those who claim same-sex marriage rights should be next to go.

Trump lawyer who lost bid to kill American democracy calls Simone Biles and Joe Biden ‘losers’

Jenna Ellis is perhaps best known for conspicuously side-eyeing Rudy Giuliani as the last remnants of his eternal soul seeped from his sphincter into the blessed ether, leaving the dusty husk of Twiddle-Knobs Nosferatu behind to imperil Western democracy. She’s almost as well known for being part of the Trump legal effort that grievously embarrassed the ex-pr*sident—and the world’s most powerful democracy—with a series of feckless court challenges.

Dear Trump supporters, please make your fake antifa crimes more believable

In September 2020, a Minneapolis Trump supporter’s home was savagely attacked by antifa. Or possibly by BLM supporters. Or by Biden-supporting anarchists? In any event, somebody painted “Biden 2020 BLM (A)” on Denis Molla’s garage doors and set fire to his camper. That fire spread significantly, damaging other vehicles and his home.

Federal investigators have found the culprit and, surprise, they say it was Molla himself.

Longtime Trump enabler Paul Ryan was ‘sobbing’ during Capitol coup

A new book about the astonishing pusillanimity of the Republican Party reveals that former House speaker and vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan “found himself sobbing” during the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol. And that’s very sad for him—it really is. It’s also sad when dog owners leave their pooches in hot cars and kill them, which is kind of what the GOP as a whole has done with our country since Donald Trump slimed onto the scene in 2015.