Reading archive 2026-08-26

Karen Attiah Is Still Waiting for the Washington Post to Call: The former columnist says she hasn't heard from the paper since an arbitrator ordered it to rehire her.

Why it matters that Dolly Parton wasn’t a mother: With decades of philanthropy, she proved that parenting isn’t the only way to invest in generations of children.

Canada should be ready to cut electricity, critical minerals, Ontario's premier says

They’re about to enter college. But first, they have to learn sign language.: At Gallaudet University, a school for deaf and hard-of-hearing students, not everyone shows up knowing ASL. A program offers help.

The attack on Putin’s $20 billion pipeline can teach the U.S. about cards: Don’t underestimate countries like Ukraine. The Nord Stream sabotage shows why. - "Nord Stream, the world’s largest offshore pipeline system and Vladimir Putin’s flagship geopolitical project in Europe, took more than two decades to complete and cost nearly $20 billion. In September 2022, a handful of Ukrainians destroyed it with a rented yacht, commercially available diving equipment and four civilian divers armed with makeshift explosives."

Is Mojtaba Khamenei Dead?: The office of Iran’s supreme leader has fallen quiet, fueling uncertainty in a country with decisions to make.

The Qataris Gave Trump an Airplane. He Crippled Their Country in Return.: The tiny Gulf state is learning that the U.S. president doesn’t always keep his end of the deal. - "To understand this strange deal - so absurdly corrupt that there is nothing analogous in the history of the American executive branch - it's necessary to understand Qatar, the rare country with both the means and the disposition to even contemplate it. The Qataris don't have allies. They have investments. Their investments in American relationships are undoubtedly their most important, and they've provided billions of dollars of diplomatic and military-support services to the U.S. But at the same time they've been providing money to America's defense, they've also provided support to America's enemies.

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"The many U.S. intelligence officers, diplomats, and military veterans I spoke with consistently offered the same appraisal: It would be inaccurate to say that Qatar directly 'supports terrorism,' but the country's money and politics support an environment that helps terrorism and extremism flourish."

Reading archive 2026-08-25

Squeezed by tariffs and Iran war, farmers say they face a new crisis: The president’s policies are driving up prices for fertilizer, fuel and machinery. Meanwhile, a campaign to deliver emergency farm aid has stalled on Capitol Hill.

As U.S.-Canada tensions escalate, Republicans could face political consequences: The threat of higher prices for gas, cars, hockey sticks and more gave fresh life to Democratic arguments that the president is destabilizing the economy.

Canada announces retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products as trade war deepens: On Sept. 8, Canada will double tariffs on American steel and aluminum and impose new levies on about 700 other products in retaliation for U.S. tariffs that took effect Saturday.

Here’s what Sean Duffy’s reality show actually teaches us about America: The government’s YouTube series featuring the transportation secretary is slick, well-made and about the Duffys, not the nation.

This not-so-secret document is inspiring the left — and tripping up its candidates: The Democratic Socialists of America platform aims to upend the status quo. That can mean a bumpy ride for those trying to win in the short term.

Reading archive 2026-08-24

The White House Freak-Out Over Natalie Harp: The West Wing’s explosive response to a fleeting jab didn’t kill the story. It enabled days of coverage.

It’s Low-Calorie and Packed With Protein. Is It Healthy?: Welcome to the golden age of ultra-processed health foods.

Ossoff’s ‘Natalie’ Moment: The Georgia senator’s latest viral moment reveals much about Trump—and plenty about Ossoff himself.

A rare blue tree frog is drawing loads of spectators to a Virginia park: “Is he a prince in disguise?” Nature enthusiasts are flocking to Huntley Meadows Park in Alexandria to catch a glimpse of the unusual amphibian.

To get the national debt under control, start with the retirement state

Why we should stop eating lettuce, cyclospora or not: Lettuce makes us sick, wastes resources and has minimal nutritional value. Why are we still consuming it? - "So, on one side of the ledger we have 1.7 million annual cases of food poisoning, $3.7 billion and 3 billion pounds of rotting lettuce. On the other we have, basically, an excuse to kid yourself into eating blue cheese dressing."

Some Texas conservatives are breaking ranks and pledging to vote Democratic: Republicans who are angry at Gov. Greg Abbott’s refusal to block data centers are giving his Democratic challenger hope for an upset.

Secret White House bunker undercuts Trump’s ballroom lawsuit, ex-officials say: The White House already has a nuclear-proof facility buried deep underground and built in secret after 9/11.

Mount Pleasant residents say 'hell no' to trees of heaven: This invasive species is spreading through the District. Some residents are taking matters into their own hands.

D.C. Coating Roads To Help Cool City: District transportation officials are rolling out an experiment, treating stretches of roadway with a coating meant to reduce the air temperature.

In candid interviews, National Guard members speak out about D.C. deployment - "An estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that the D.C. deployment at its current level costs about $3 million per day. The Pentagon estimates extending the deployment until 2029 will cost an additional $1.4 billion. A total cost estimate by the nonpartisan watchdog Project on Government Oversight for the deployment is around $3.4 billion.

How one billionaire’s crusade against homelessness became Trump’s playbook: Long before Silicon Valley embraced Trump, Joe Lonsdale wanted to remake government and shift the nation’s approach to homelessness. Now, his friends in the White House are listening. - "He uses the term “boldness” so frequently that it might come off as a joke — or to critics, as a caricature of a tech billionaire drunk on his own Kool-Aid.

"But in Lonsdale’s growing influence, detractors see something more insidious: a powerful person interfering far beyond his purview. 

"'These guys don’t have interesting ideas; they have little-boy fantasies,' said Paul Barrett, a New York University professor and a former deputy director of the Center for Business and Human Rights at NYU Stern School of Business. 'These tech guys are part of an illiberal tradition that is truly corrosive. … [Lonsdale] wants to create an environment where his mythological meritocratic heroes can thrive and everyone else can go f--- themselves.'"

Nevada sues over federally mandated reduction in Colorado River water use: In the first legal challenge to a long-awaited federal plan to stabilize the dwindling Colorado River, Nevada alleges that federal officials violated the law and failed to consider the economic effects of the cuts.

Reading archive 20226-08-21

Maine farms contaminated with PFAS get new purpose: More than 60 Maine farms have been identified as having unsafe levels of PFAS chemicals in their soil and water, largely from municipal sludge spread on farms as fertilizer for decades.

More D.C. kindergarteners have vaccine exemptions

Update: NATO’s Operations Continue as Russia Escalates in Romania - "On July 30, a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile crashed in Poland. Days later, an explosive drone carrying Semtex and PETN was discovered at Germany’s Leipzig/Halle Airport, which U.S. intelligence attributed to Russia. Romania has had repeated drone incursions, including three Russian drones shot down in July, another drone shot down by a Spanish F-18 on August 16, and two more incidents today, including the drone carrying an explosive near the Neptun Deep gas project. Three days ago, what is suspected to be a Russian Banderol missile entered Moldova and exploded in a field. And earlier today, Finland reported another suspected Russian aircraft violating its airspace."

How a failed project could help solve the world’s biggest energy need: Former SpaceX engineers think a long-dormant nuclear reactor experiment is key to meeting the power needs of data centers.

Seeking to flip Senate, Democrats are running ads to criticize their own: Democrats seeking Senate seats in some swing states are taking aim at their party — and even supporting Republican policies.

CIA staff exodus leaves new retirees waiting months for benefits: The spy agency is swamped by what it calls an “unprecedented number” of retirements as the Trump administration aims to shrink its workforce. - "The CIA has a tradition of treating its retirees well, former officials said. Among the reasons: Angry ex-employees with heads full of secrets are a target for adversary intelligence services. 'We are creating a massive [counterintelligence] risk,' said the official who left last fall."

Ukraine Planned to Swarm Moscow Airports With AI-Guided Drones: The stalled operation, code-named “M&Ms,” sought to isolate Russian elites and force Vladimir Putin to negotiate a truce.

The ‘Resistance’ Won: The much-derided movement was right about Trump’s nature, and how to defeat him. - "What discredited resistance politics in liberal eyes is that it was closely associated with institutional procedures that were deemed to have ultimately failed to restrain Trump. Mueller's investigation ended anticlimactically. Neither impeachment drew enough Republican support to remove Trump from office. Somewhat similarly, conservatives have sometimes claimed that the Russia investigation and first impeachment helped Trump politically by drawing to his side Republicans who resented the overreach. 

"One Republican who doesn't seem to believe either of these arguments is Trump. The president has worked hard to ensure that no such humiliations recur during his second term, by stacking the Justice Department with loyalists, firing inspectors general en masse, purging the armed forces of "woke" officers, and generally eliminating any potential source of independence within the federal government. 

"Trump himself does not seem to think that the investigations that were avidly followed by resistance liberals did nothing to restrain his actions during his first term, or that they helped him shore up partisan support. And the absence of any such processes in his second term has not made Republicans in Congress feel freer to criticize the president. To the contrary, their fealty is more absolute than ever.

...

"Like the Republican critics of resistance politics, progressive ones depicted it as substituting legal tactics for electoral victories. Yet the resistance was never limited to cheering on Mueller or hoping to persuade Republicans to convict the president of high crimes and misdemeanors. Resistance themes inspired the Democrats' political message during Trump's first term. And that message landed. Democrats retook the House in the 2018 midterms, despite a hot economy, and then defeated Trump's reelection effort. Joe Biden, a link to a bygone era of civility and bipartisanship, ran in 2020 on a message of restoring the soul of America. He won. 

"Once in office, however, Biden ceded his domestic agenda to progressives who believed in Sanders's vision of transformational change. They believed that only overturning the neoliberal order, handing control of domestic policy to neo-Brandeisians and climate hawks, and giving unions almost every policy they demanded would allow Democrats to regain the trust of working-class voters. This theory, not the resistance, failed. Biden's support collapsed within his first year, and Kamala Harris's half-hearted efforts to distance herself from her unpopular boss were too little, too late."

An Unsettling Glimpse Into the GOP’s Future: James Fishback lost badly in Florida but showed that there’s support for bigotry among the young.

Donald Trump Effectively Just Told Iran to Get a Nuclear Weapon: He may also have blurted out classified information about North Korea.

Reading archive 2026-08-20

The End of the American Middle East: Iran and the Last Gasp of a Failed Order - "The American Middle East is finished. The regional order that has prevailed since 1991 has been one of the many casualties of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran. The American and Israeli failure to dislodge the regime in Tehran has proved the bankruptcy of decades of sanctions and violence. The inability of the United States to protect its Gulf allies from Iranian attacks or to keep the Strait of Hormuz open has fatally undermined the core security bargain that justified its network of military bases in the region. And Israel’s increasingly threatening posture and abandonment of any pretense of interest in reaching an accommodation with the Palestinians have ended Washington’s decades-long mission of bringing its Arab allies and Israel together into an enduring security partnership.

...

"The Trump administration, contemptuous of democracy and the rule of law at home and abroad, is not going to change that. It is difficult to imagine Trump, who vacillates wildly between strategies, designing a new regional order of any kind. But his successor will have a real chance to break with the status quo and craft a more coherent and more effective Middle East strategy. That starts with renouncing the use of military intervention as a first resort and ending the practice of diplomacy by airstrike. Washington’s priority should be defense, not offense. One way to make that intention clear is to forgo the restoration of damaged or destroyed U.S. military bases across the Gulf and focus instead on investments in intelligence sharing, missile defense systems for Gulf partners, and the preservation of freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz."

The Next Global Economic Crisis Could Be Made in China: How Overcapacity Ends - "China’s remarkable path of economic development over the last several decades has been made possible by a benign international environment in which other countries were eager to accept low-cost manufactured goods in exchange for efficient supply chains and consumer welfare. But that international environment has turned toxic. The political appetite for accepting the deindustrialization and critical dependencies that come with the flood of Chinese imports is finite and shrinking. As these trends continue, protectionism is likely to rise, cutting off Chinese manufacturers’ market access and thereby short-circuiting Beijing’s strategy, introduced in 2020, of 'dual circulation,' which promotes both domestic economic self-sufficiency and continued engagement in international markets."

Reading archive 2026-08-19

This little fish anchors the East Coast food web. A fight over it is brewing. Years of half measures and regulatory delays leave Atlantic menhaden potentially at risk. [ed. note: Canadian company with sham "American-owned" fishing fleet catches shit-ton of menhaden for processing in Virginia to ship to southeast Asia as, is destroying the Atlantic ecosystem]

Darline Graham stumbles over national security question in debate: Graham, facing a GOP Senate primary runoff, admits she’s “not that informed” on foreign policy, the specialty of her late brother, Lindsey Graham.

Six D.C. Police Employees Wanted for $441K in Overtime Fraud: They face charges of first-degree fraud and theft.

Reading archive 2026-08-18

Generative AI Is an Engineering Disaster: A shockingly inefficient trillion-dollar project - "Yet the returns are diminishing. The bigger an AI model is, the less it improves with each added parameter, and so it must be made bigger at a faster rate just to sustain steady progress. I asked a few AI researchers whether they could name any other real-world software that scales so poorly. None of them could think of any. Even outside the world of software, it's hard to find a comparable example, given that economy of scale is the principle that has made light bulbs, cars, and clothing so affordable. By economic and engineering measures, generative AI might be the worst technology ever deployed."

How the Smithsonian Could Fall: A president cracking down on museums is unusual—but so are the museums.

China’s Questionable Tech Strategy: Keeping out the world’s best tools promises to stymie innovation.

J. D. Vance’s Own Alien Abduction: The vice president has been replaced with a guy who’s just asking questions. - "Watching Vance's media appearances is uniquely painful. He lacks the authentic berserk of Kash Patel, or the pageant-queen polish of Karoline Leavitt, or his boss's unique corkscrew approach to conversation. Like Stephen Miller, Vance desperately wants to be funny and cool. Like Stephen Miller, he is neither. And that's before we get to the awkwardness of knowing that Vance-a Yale Law School graduate-has voluntarily lobotomized himself in the pursuit of power and attention. Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his dignity to be Donald Trump's lackey.

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"The other explanation for this hey-I-wonder approach is that Vance is dealing with the cognitive dissonance between his own self-image as a smart guy and the constant requirement to defend dumb and inconsistent actions by hallucinating that he is not really part of this administration, but instead a mere interested bystander. Vance treats the vice presidency the way that Instagram influencers approach a vacation in the Maldives: It only truly exists when converted into content. In one telling exchange, Vance said that he felt like he had 'made it' when he was satirized on South Park, rather than at his inauguration."

Priced out of D.C., young women found low rent with unlikely roommates

AIPAC has a new target to exert influence over Democrats: The organization’s super PAC poured nearly $2.5 million to boost Melissa Hernandez over Aisha Wahab in a California congressional race. - "AIPAC’s defenders have said the organization has faced unfair and outsize criticism compared to the other special interest groups that have spent on American elections." [ed. note: lol like who?]

The government’s Intel bet was even worse than expected: The equity stake has ballooned into an expansive, risky portfolio. - "The administration’s holdings are growing at breakneck speed. The running tally at the Cato Institute counts 31 government equity deals — spanning companies in steel, critical minerals, semiconductors, nuclear power, rocket motors and quantum computing — enacted by three different federal agencies acting under murky legal authority. The Commerce Department has based more than a dozen semiconductor and quantum computing deals on the Chips and Science Act, which does not expressly authorize federal shareholding. Some of the equity deals appear to have been coerced by the administration — or at least conditioned on the granting of a permit, subsidy or other government privilege. And more stakes are rumored to be on the way. In a single year, Washington went from one position to a diverse and questionable portfolio, with nary a vote from Congress or the American public."

Tesla’s true believers are starting to question their faith in Elon Musk: As Musk turns his focus to other ventures such as SpaceX, some of his biggest backers are wondering whether his car company has become an afterthought.

Russians pull billions from banks, fearing Kremlin will seize deposits for war: Russians are withdrawing billions, causing liquidity problems for banks and undermining the Kremlin’s ability to issue bonds to finance the fight in Ukraine.

Backlash in Michigan complicates Democrats’ road to retaking the Senate: The party’s chances may depend on Abdul El-Sayed, who beat Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s preferred candidate and has criticized his support for Israel.

White House attacks CNN reporter after Trump clash, invoking her children: The president shushed CNN’s Kristen Holmes in the Oval Office, and later an official White House account said her children would be “embarrassed” by her.

White House attacks CNN reporter after Trump clash, invoking her children: The president shushed CNN’s Kristen Holmes in the Oval Office, and later an official White House account said her children would be “embarrassed” by her.

What to know about Natalie Harp, the Trump aide whom Ossoff put in the spotlight: The president’s executive assistant was among a small group of people who secretly switched planes with Trump over a potential Iranian threat, as noted by Sen. Jon Ossoff.

Pentagon weighing smaller U.S. military presence in Gulf once Iran war ends: An analysis, which the Defense Department said was not yet a formal review, will help address whether to rebuild strike-battered bases, said people familiar with the matter.

So Far This Year, China Has Wasted Enough Clean Energy to Power Mexico

How melting Arctic ice has created a new Silk Road:  China plans to send container ships along Russia’s northern coast, reviving environmental concerns about the fragile polar region

See which native plants will thrive in your garden: Pick your state to get recommendations for species that help local butterflies, bees and birds.

The Cruelty Was Fine Until It Became Personal: Another Trump supporter is outraged after getting what he voted for.