“Republicans care a whole lot about election security these days. Fueled in part by the “Big Lie,” the baseless claim that there was widespread fraud in last year’s election, Republican lawmakers around the country have made an aggressive push to pass new laws to prevent what they saw as a nightmare scenario from happening again. While the motivation to improve election security is spurious, the ostensible goal isn’t — everyone would agree that a secure election is important for democracy. Experts say there’s one very effective way for state legislatures to make the voting process more secure: pass legislation to update voting machines. But instead of prioritizing this effort, many Republicans are instead focused on limiting voter access.”
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“The gold standard for voting security is hand-marked paper ballots, according to security experts. That’s because a paper ballot eliminates the risk of technical difficulties or certain kinds of malicious acts (think hacking) that could change or destroy your vote, and any concerns can be addressed with a recount. Because of that, most states currently use hand-marked paper ballots or have voting machines that generate paper records for verification.
But in six states — Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Jersey, Tennessee and Texas — some or all voters still cast ballots on machines that have no paper record whatsoever, according to data from Verified Voting. While there’s no evidence that these machines have ever been hacked during an election, it’s technically possible, and they’re also prone to all kinds of undesirable malfunctions, including losing votes. With no paper backup to audit, these machines are the kind of election security liability that politicians say they’re invested in fixing.
Yet according to FiveThirtyEight’s past reporting and additional calls I made for this story, in five of those six states there has been little or no effort in the past six months to prioritize updating machines with a system that includes a paper record.”
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“Instead, state legislatures have been flooding the docket with bills relating to the length of early voting periods, the placement of ballot drop boxes and whether volunteers can give voters waiting in line a bottle of water. Meanwhile, just a handful of bills about upgrading equipment — often without any funding attached — have trickled in, only to lose momentum and die before reaching a committee.”
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““Unfortunately, I think the idea of security has basically been an excuse to limit access,” said Lawrence Norden, director of the Brennan Center’s Election Reform Program. “If we really want to ensure that our elections are trustworthy and transparent, we can do that without limiting access.””
“a legal doctrine known as anti-commandeering, which has been upheld in five Supreme Court cases from 1842 to 2018. It holds that the federal government can’t require states and localities to participate in the enforcement of federal laws.”
“a future conflict is unlikely to go as smoothly for the US as Operation Praying Mantis did, mainly due to Iran’s military modernization and expansion.
Iran’s Navy has gotten larger and more capable, with more vessels able to launch anti-ship missiles and at least three Russian-built Kilo-class attack submarines in service.
Last year, an Iranian Navy exercise included an attack on a barge designed to look like a US aircraft carrier. In January, Iran unveiled the Makran, a “forward base ship” capable of carrying drones and helicopters.
The IRGCN has also been expanding its numbers and capabilities, including recent reports that it is building large missile-laden catamarans.
Iran’s sea mines remain potent, but the biggest threat comes from Iran’s missile arsenal, which is considerably larger and more advanced than it was in the 1980s.
In recent years, Iranian missiles have been used to attack Saudi oil facilities and civilian sites, as well as ships. In January 2020, Iranian cruise missiles hit US bases in Iraq, injuring over 100 service members.
Iran’s missiles failed to hit their targets during Operation Praying Mantis, but things could be very different in the future.”
“while our infrastructure could certainly be modernized and could use some maintenance, it’s not crumbling. According to the World Economic Forum, U.S. infrastructure is ranked No. 13 in the world—which, out of 141 countries, isn’t too shabby, especially when considering the enormous size of our country and the challenges that presents.
Yet as Washington Post columnist Charles Lane notes, it would be more accurate to bundle European nations together, since they share a significant amount of infrastructure, which would move the United States into fifth place.
Moreover, while the American Society of Civil Engineers’ 2021 report card gave the United States a C-, this is its best grade in two decades—meaning that the quality of roads, bridges, inland waterways, or ports has been improving each year, without a congressional rescue plan. This fact doesn’t quite fit the crumbling infrastructure narrative that politicians and the media like to tout.
Academics also refute the idea that infrastructure is crumbling. Reviewing a large body of research in a National Bureau of Economic Research paper, Wharton University economist Gilles Duranton and his co-authors state: “Perhaps our main conclusion is that, on average, U.S. transportation infrastructure does not seem to be in the dire state that politicians and pundits describe. We find that the quality of interstate highways has improved, the quality of bridges is stable, and the age of buses and subway cars is also about constant.””
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“in theory, government spending could lead to higher growth in the longer term. Unfortunately, legislators’ well-documented tendency to make decisions based on politics often leads them to favor projects that are outdated, expensive, and never profitable at the expense of private and profitable alternatives.”
“As CNN and other outlets have reported previously — and pro-impeachment Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-WA) confirmed in a statement in February — McCarthy spoke with Trump while the riots were still ongoing and pleaded with Trump to call his supporters off.
According to Herrera Beutler, Trump “initially repeated the falsehood that it was antifa that had breached the Capitol” on the call with McCarthy.
Subsequently, Herrera Beutler said in her February statement, “McCarthy refuted that and told the president that these were Trump supporters. That’s when, according to McCarthy, the president said: ‘Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.’”
Other Republicans have corroborated Trump’s state of mind as the attack was unfolding. According to Sen. Ben Sasse (R-NE), “Donald Trump was walking around the White House confused about why other people on his team weren’t as excited as he was as you had rioters pushing against Capitol Police trying to get into the building.”
If McCarthy is called upon to substantiate Herrera Beutler’s account of the McCarthy-Trump call for the commission, however, it would likely also put McCarthy in an awkward position politically.
That’s because McCarthy’s call with Trump — which reportedly took place as rioters were attempting to break through the minority leader’s office windows — is a reminder of the true severity of the January 6 attacks, and of Trump’s support for the mob, who he described as “very special” in a video later the same day. It’s also increasingly out of step with a Republican conference eager to downplay the insurrection and a former president who is hypersensitive to criticism — and it’s hard to imagine McCarthy looking forward to giving a faithful retelling of January 6 to a potential commission.”
“political news centered on Georgia, where the GOP governor signed a package of election “reforms” that some mainstream media outlets depict as “Jim Crow 2.0”. Those narratives do a disservice to the African Americans that Jim Crow laws actually victimized, but the legislation—a mix of good, bad, and awful—emanates from Donald Trump’s baseless allegations that election fraud robbed him of a second term.
A number of private executives, in the tech sector and old-line industries, criticized the new law. For instance, Major League Baseball responded by moving the All-Star Game out of Atlanta. Atlanta-based Delta Airlines and Coca-Cola criticized the legislation. Coke’s CEO, for instance, told CNBC that the law “does not promote principles we have stood for in Georgia around broad access to voting, around voter convenience, about ensuring election integrity.”
Republican officials, who have created a cottage industry out of blasting progressives for their cancel-culture habit of boycotting and shaming people who say and do things they don’t like, went into full cancel-culture mode and railed against corporations. The former president championed a boycott of Coca-Cola in zany press releases. One GOP lawmaker introduced a bill to strip Major League Baseball of its antitrust exemption, which is the type of thing one would expect from Warren.
Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (R–Ky.), who has never shied away from accepting corporate donations that advance his agenda, used the Georgia fracas to issue his own warnings to corporate America. “Our private sector must stop taking cues from the Outrage-Industrial Complex,” he said, noting that, “corporations will invite serious consequences if they become a vehicle for far-left mobs to hijack our country from outside the constitutional order.”
As I understand it, our constitutional order is based on the idea that American citizens—including corporate executives—have every right to express their opinions on political issues even if leading senators don’t like the positions they take. That Constitution allows businesses to operate wherever they choose—and do so without threats from federal officials more interested in fighting culture wars than protecting our freedoms.”
“Mitchell had never interrogated a terrorist. In fact, he had never interrogated anyone at all. His methods were not just cruel but bizarre. Abu Zubaydah was left naked and sleep-deprived as CIA officers blasted loud music into his cell. An interrogator playing the role of God would say “Tell me what you know?” only to leave the room every time Abu Zubaydah responded, “What do you want to know?” At one point, the CIA left a crayon in Abu Zubaydah cell, hoping he would spontaneously write down valuable information. Even other CIA officers on the ground were uncomfortable with these techniques. The pressure to torture came from the highest levels of the Bush administration.
Higher-ups eventually noticed that the information had stopped coming and gave Soufan permission to try his own methods. The torture stopped, and Abu Zubaydah began providing useful information again, leading to the arrest of wannabe bomber Jose Padilla.”
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“Abu Zubaydah was extensively tortured after that. His mental state deteriorated, and he lost an eye. The information he provided under torture did not stop a single terrorist plot, but the Bush administration used some of it to justify the invasion of Iraq. In 2005, CIA officers destroyed videotapes of Abu Zubaydah’s interrogation in order to cover their tracks. The following year, Abu Zubaydah was transferred to Guantanamo Bay, where he told a U.S. military tribunal that he had made false statements just to make the pain stop.”
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“Soufan managed to build a rapport with several detainees at Guantanamo Bay without torture. One prisoner—who knew bin Laden’s wife, it turns out—even promised to provide more information if the FBI allowed him to call his family. Soufan agreed, but the U.S. military officers at Guantanamo Bay refused. Those officials “wouldn’t let a detainee use a phone for a minute, which would have led to bin Laden,” Soufan writes, “but they didn’t mind disregarding the U.S. Constitution” with their harsh treatment of prisoners.
In September 2002, Pakistani forces handed militants Ramzi bin al-Shibh and Hassan bin Attash to the CIA. (Bin Attash is named only by a pseudonym in the book.) Soufan was given 45 minutes to interrogate them, against the wishes of CIA headquarters. Bin Attash knew that Soufan had previously treated suspects with kindness. Deciding to cooperate, he spilled the beans on Al Qaeda’s plot to blow up an oil tanker in Yemen.
The CIA refused to believe that bin Attash was telling the truth and transferred him to an unnamed country to be tortured. Al Qaeda blew up the MV Limburg off the coast of Yemen the next month, just as bin Attash had warned. The attack killed one, wounded 12, and caused an oil spill.
Soufan left the FBI in 2005. He testified against torture to the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2009 and remains an outspoken critic of the excesses of the war on terror.”
“The marijuana in that pipe was quite different from the black-market stuff I had smoked during college, when I could go through a whole bowl without experiencing the same effect. From my perspective, the Colorado cannabis was better, delivering a more pleasant experience in exchange for less effort and less exposure to combustion products. In that sense, it was also healthier.
Many politicians, by contrast, view stronger marijuana as ipso facto worse. Unimpressed by the minimization of respiratory hazards, they focus on contentious claims about the psychological impact of potent pot: It is more addictive, they say, or more likely to trigger psychotic reactions. They therefore want to legally restrict the potency of cannabis products sold by state-licensed retailers, which they claim will protect public health and safety.”
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“As long as consumers understand what they are getting, you might think, they can decide for themselves which products meet their tastes and preferences, and they can adjust their consumption accordingly: Just as drinkers tend to consume smaller volumes when they drink liquor than they do when they drink beer, cannabis consumers tend to stop when they achieve the effect they want, which means they take fewer puffs of stronger pot. But politicians who favor THC limits do not trust consumers to make those decisions.”
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“Vermont is the only state with a legal cap on THC content. Recreational stores have not opened there yet, but when they do they will not be allowed to sell flower that exceeds 30 percent THC or concentrates that exceed 60 percent.
A proposed limit in Florida, where marijuana is legal only for medical use, is far more onerous. It also would cap the THC content of concentrates at 60 percent, but it would limit flower to 10 percent. A bill to that effect was approved by a state House committee on a party-line vote last month; a similar Senate bill has not advanced yet.”
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“In Massachusetts, HD 2841 would likewise limit THC in flower to 10 percent”
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“A Montana bill described as “probably dead” would establish a 15 percent cap for all cannabis products.
In Colorado, state Rep. Yadira Caraveo (D–Adams County) this year wrote a bill that would have imposed the same 15-percent rule but shelved it in response to the uproar it provoked.”
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“Legislators who support such limits think potent pot appeals to many consumers, which is why they want to ban it. But if they are right, their proposals will invite a resurgence of the black market that legalization aims to displace.”
“What good is an AR-15 against an oppressive government armed with tanks and bombers? That’s the question gun owners often get asked, as if the destructive power of the modern state is a mic-drop argument against private weapons ownership. That might be a bit more convincing if resistance fighters didn’t repeatedly go up against well-armed troops with whatever weapons they can make or scavenge in hopes of gaining breathing room and forcing change. Sometimes, they even win, and their chances would undoubtedly be better if they had better tools at hand to begin with.”
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“Despite endorsement for resistance efforts from the pro-democracy shadow government facing off against the ruling junta, Reuters emphasized that a loosely organized group “[a]rmed with a few hunting guns made by village blacksmiths, catapults, some airguns and Molotov cocktails … were no match for forces hardened by decades of conflict and equipped with combat weapons.”
But, despite the paucity of their arms and training, the fighters gave government forces a day-long battle. They had to turn, at least for the time being, to makeshift weapons because the regime spent years trying to keep the population disarmed so that it wouldn’t have to face serious resistance.
“In Myanmar, civilians are not allowed to possess any firearms,” notes the University of Sydney’s GunPolicy.org.”