Offering asides, recommended links, blogworthy quotations, and more, In Brief is the Northwest Progressive Institute's microblog of world, national, and local politics.
The Washington Post has taken note of the Pacific Northwest’s extreme weather, observing: “Portland hit 108, an all-time mark, and Seattle 102, a record for June. Loads of new records are anticipated Sunday in the Pacific Northwest as it turns even hotter.”
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Change the Ref: “This year, 3,044 members of the high school class of 2021 aren’t graduating due to gun violence. They are The Lost Class. Though their futures were stolen, they still have the potential to change the future of our country so that we never lose another class to gun violence again.”
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“The United States’ favorability rating grew at least 23 percentage points from last year in France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom, and a majority of respondents in all four view the country positively,” The Washington Post reported, summarizing findings from a new survey by Pew Research.
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“Why the halo around an idea that barely worked when it existed? The best way to pass legislation is to win more seats. If you believe in majority rule, forget about making converts: Assemble a majority and start ruling with it,” Jack Shafer writes.
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Washington Post columnist Geoffrey A. Fowler makes the case for iOS Bill of Rights, allowing iPhone owners to break free of Apple’s “walled garden”.
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“A new generation is confronting the region’s longstanding conflict in a very different context, with very different pressures, from their parents’ and grandparents’ generations,” The New York Times reports.
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Check out this a county-by-county visualization of the exact percentage of households connected at broadband speed in the United States of America, based on anonymized data made available from Microsoft.
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“The Court finds, based on the totality of the circumstances, that the NRA’s bankruptcy petition was not filed in good faith but instead was filed as an effort to gain an unfair litigation advantage in the New York Attorney General Enforcement Action and as an effort to avoid a regulatory scheme,” Judge Harlin Hale ruled.
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“A surge of attacks in one of Canada’s most multicultural cities during the pandemic is surfacing long-simmering racial tensions,” reports Bloomberg’s Natalie Obiko Pearson.
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The lawmaker has been charged with misdemeanor counts of first-degree official misconduct and second-degree criminal trespass, according to court documents.
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The New York Times reports that one researcher said the number of discarded drums far exceeded his expectations. “It was hard to wrap my head around the density of targets,” he said.
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“I’m surprised that tech bosses can still appear clueless about the reasons behind the questioning of their industry,” Shira Ovide writes.
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Climate research would get a massive boost if Congress agrees with the administration’s proposal to significantly bolster the agency’s funding. NOAA is one of America’s most important scientific agencies.
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Take a look at the images that will serve as the photographic representations of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris through the end of their current terms.
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“Exports of chocolate to Europe have turned into a nightmare of paperwork and delays, making fine British chocolate scarce in Europe,” The New York Times reports.
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Amazon has apologized to one of Congress’ most progressive leaders for a rude and false tweet that suggested reports about drivers relieving themselves in bottles were made up.
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Read a letter from hundreds of legal scholars (including several conservative scholars) calling on the United States Senate to decide whether Trump is guilty or not based on the actual evidence before the Senate.
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“Global ice loss has increased rapidly over the past two decades, and scientists are still underestimating just how much sea levels could rise, according to alarming new research published this month, ” The Washington Post reports.
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CNN has published a look back at the Trump error from its senior fact checker Daniel Dale, who got his start debunking Trump’s 2016 campaign claims.
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“By the time rioters ransacked the Capitol, the machinery of the left had already been primed to respond — prepared by months spent sketching out doomsday scenarios and mapping out responses, by countless hours of training exercises and reams of opinion research,” The New York Times reports.
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“Florida, in some freakish, horrible way, is the Trumpiest of states. This is the logical place for them to come,” Republican strategist Rick Wilson told The Washington Post.
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