Today's Liberal News

19 Readers on Donald Trump’s Legal Future

This is an edition of Up for Debate, a newsletter by Conor Friedersdorf. On Wednesdays, he 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 about Donald Trump’s legal problems, noting that some observers worry about prosecuting a former president while others insist that no one is above the law in America.

House of the Dragon Is Cruel, Messy, and Fascinating

This story contains spoilers for Episode 2 of House of the Dragon.The opening credits of Game of Thrones famously offer a dynamic bird’s-eye trip around a pulsing map of George R. R. Martin’s fantasy world. The sequence serves partly as a practical guide to a sprawling universe.

CA Gov. Newsom Threatens to Veto Farmworker Union Bill as He Buys $14.5M Vineyard in Napa Valley

Hundreds of farmworkers concluded a 24-day march to Sacramento spanning 335 miles to demand California Governor Gavin Newsom support legislation that would make it easier for farmworkers to cast their ballots in union elections by mail. Newsom has threatened to veto the bill, which would keep farmworkers safe from employer retaliation, explains Teresa Romero, president of the United Farm Workers, the labor union that helped organize the march.

Ex-Agent: FBI Has Long History of Abuse, But Trump Probe Shows Better, “More Effective” Path for Agency

The Justice Department has released a redacted version of the affidavit used by the FBI to raid former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. The affidavit revealed authorities were concerned Trump still had possession of top-secret documents that could have compromised U.S. intelligence sources and methods, and said there was “probable cause to believe that evidence of obstruction was found.

“Climate Apartheid”: Pakistan, Contributing Less Than 1% of Global Emissions, Ravaged by Floods

Pakistan has declared a national emergency as massive floods continue to devastate the country, displacing 33 million people and bringing the death toll to over 1,000 since June. We speak with Shah Meer Baloch, Islamabad-based reporter for The Guardian, who describes how the floods have swept away homes, roads and bridges in what Baloch and Pakistan’s top climate official have called a serious “climate catastrophe.

Trigger Laws Make Abortion Off Limits for Millions; Patients Face “Intolerable” Risk & Uncertainty

Millions of pregnant people in the United States have now lost access to abortion in their state since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Anti-abortion “trigger laws” have gone into effect in numerous states across the country, including Texas, where it became a felony to perform an abortion starting Thursday,​​ punishable by up to life in prison. We speak to Dr.

Who Is Barre Seid? Secretive Tycoon Gives Record $1.6 Billion to Fund GOP Takeover of the Courts

We speak with one of the reporters who this week exposed the secretive Chicago industrial mogul who has quietly given $1.6 billion to the architect of the right-wing takeover of the courts — the largest known political advocacy donation in U.S. history. The donor is Barre Seid, who donated all of his shares in his electronics company, Tripp Lite, to the nonprofit group run by Leonard Leo, who helped select former President Trump’s conservative Supreme Court nominees.

Ukraine Update: Russia fields its new volunteer battalion, and it’s … it’s just weird

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Starting in July, we started hearing about Russia working hard to sign up new volunteers, offering hefty signing bonuses appealing to a Russian culture of deep indebtedness. Big monthly paychecks were designed to draw in desperate recruits from Russia’s most impoverished, neglected regions.  

In a normal army, in a normal war, those recruits would spend several months training, then be integrated as replacements in existing units.

Intelligence agencies fear that Trump has been leaking information on U.S. spies overseas

In what may be the most shocking story to emerge from the entire Mar-a-Lago document scandal, The New York Times is reporting that officials at intelligence agencies fear that among the classified information Donald Trump stole was details on U.S. assets embedded in foreign countries. The names, locations, and even the existence of such assets is among the most guarded secrets of the nation.

GOTV: How YOU can do something about the news

As we all know very well already, we have an election of immense significance on Nov. 8, a mere 74 days from now. The best antidote to worry and dread over the outcome, and the best way to guarantee a big, beautiful blue Democratic wave once again? ACTION. And do we ever have the opportunities for ACTION on our Get Out the Vote page, newly linked through the site footer.

‘Dooming another generation of Americans’: The crisis of exposure to toxic materials

The trick about conspiracy theories is they’re built from a kernel of truth. Anti-vaccine theories are a good example—a lack of trust about what our bodies are exposed to helped create fertile soil for anti-vaccine theories to grow. America’s federal government has earned its distrust, and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) played its part in aiding and creating the space for conspiracy theories to flourish by failing to protect Americans from toxic materials.

Museum

Better than the minivan you slept
a winter in, American Legionparking lot, siphoning gas for heat,
but not much better. Cinder-blockapartment building on Homestead,
a couple miles from mom’s. Got inthrough the window. Waded through
the cans and bedding. Left it openfor the smell. Tried not to look
at the stain. Tried to be respectfullike in a museum. Stood so long
in front of your dresser, my brothertouched my elbow. Everything
we touch, you touched. Your socks.Your coat.

The Ballad of Downward Mobility

In the summers of my youth, the rooms were always air-conditioned. This machine-cooled air came not from window units, which were a relic of the cities, but from central systems that chilled every inch of living space to an Alaskan 67 degrees. The air seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. It had no warm spots, no eddies, no pockets of humidity.