Politics
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POINT: Biden impeachment inquiry is a shameless attempt at political retribution
The impeachment inquiry House Republicans have launched against President Joe Biden is a transparent, shameless and embarrassingly weak attempt at political retribution.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has launched the probe not because it has merit but because the most extreme members of his party demanded it to damage Biden’s re-election ...Read more

Kaitlyn Buss: Michigan's AG undermines her own case against 'false electors'
In a casual conversation with liberal organizations last week, Attorney General Dana Nessel possibly undermined the cases she has brought against the 16 Republicans who signed a false certificate after the 2020 presidential election to challenge President Joe Biden’s victory.
“These are people who have been brainwashed,” Nessel said to ...Read more

Patricia Murphy: The Greene New Deal: She's in charge
If you want to know if the government is going to shut down on Sept. 30, there’s no need to bother asking House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. He doesn’t know. Without being able to control his caucus, McCarthy’s guess is as good as yours or mine.
Instead, you’d be best served to ask U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Georgia Republican who...Read more

COUNTERPOINT: The impeachment to end them all
Our nation faced only two presidential impeachments during its first 222 years. Suddenly, in 2021, President Donald Trump was impeached for the second time, and now we’re facing a third impeachment in four short years. This flurry of impeachment activity requires us to ask: Is President Joe Biden facing impeachment because he deserves it or ...Read more

George Skelton: California Democrats misfired by passing proposed tax on guns and ammo
Aiming for more gun safety, the California Legislature fired away with hits and misses in its recently concluded annual session.
The misses are attracting the most attention.
My No. 1 example of a bad miss was the bill the Legislature passed to impose a new 11% state excise tax on firearm and ammunition sales. Again, the ruling Democrats' ...Read more

Editorial: Hard-right Republicans might shut down the government. That could trash Yosemite
An ill-conceived federal government shutdown could soon be imposed on America by hard-right members of the House of Representatives.
The House, led by Bakersfield Republican Kevin McCarthy, has 435 members. At least 52 of them are members of the so-called Freedom Caucus, a far-right group that seeks to impeach President Biden and cut federal ...Read more

Editorial: Chief Moore and other bail reform critics are wrong. Cash bail should not be a form of punishment
People arrested for felonies are generally held on money bail. That means that they either pay a preset amount and then go home, or go to jail for several days to await their first court hearing.
Testifying in August in a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of money bail, Los Angeles Police Chief Michel Moore said the value of this system...Read more

Robin Abcarian: What does it take to keep regular bodies on Paris runways?
Three of my favorite things came together as I read Erin Zhurkin's debut novel, "Plus-Size in Paris."
First, having lived in Pau, in the Pyrenees, and Paris for two very important years of my life — at 12 with my family and 20 as a university student — j'adore la France.
Second, one of the most enjoyable times of my professional life was ...Read more

Commentary: Is it time for a federal judge to put a gag order on Donald Trump?
It’s been clear for some time that U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan will jail Donald Trump for contempt or impose other severe penalties for his behavior only if he leaves her no choice. Based on the former president’s response to the Justice Department’s motion for a limited gag order in the Jan. 6 case, it seems that’s exactly what ...Read more

Commentary: The rate hikes will continue until government spending improves
The Federal Reserve’s rapid interest rate hikes over the last year have caused credit to become more expensive for consumers and businesses. The monthly mortgage payment on a median price home has more than doubled since January 2021 and credit-card interest rates are at a record high.
Worse, the economy is stuck with these high interest ...Read more

Commentary: On the India-Canada spat, the US is between a rock and a hard place
As perverse as it may sound, state-sponsored assassinations overseas are nothing new in the dirty world of international relations.
Israel has conducted targeted killings against terrorists in multiple countries; in 2010, a team of Mossad agents tracked a senior Hamas commander to his hotel room in Dubai and killed him, possibly by suffocation....Read more

Lisa Jarvis: Social media is just one online habit hurting teens
Last spring, my tween was begging for more independence, starting with being allowed to walk home from school alone. The mile-plus walk involves crossing a few busy streets. I was hesitant; she doesn’t have a phone, so she had no way to contact me if something went wrong. But we practiced a few times (with me trailing her a block behind) to be...Read more

Commentary: Americans trust Amazon more than the federal government
For the past three years the American public has trusted Amazon and Google more than the federal government. Despite that higher level of trust, the federal government is suing Google and Amazon.
According to new data from the Center for Growth and Opportunity, almost half of voting Amercians trust Google (42%) and Amazon (46%) with their data,...Read more

Commentary: Federal funding for child care is about to fall off a cliff. Why that's a disaster
On Saturday, $39 billion in federal child-care funds made available through the American Rescue Plan Act are set to expire. As a result, close to 3.2 million children could lose their spots in early education programs. Congress can solve this problem. So far, however, it has declined to do so, starting with deciding not to pass the Build Back ...Read more

Commentary: Google has been force-feeding us ads. Now one big antitrust case could change the internet forever
The feds are coming after Google. In January, the Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit alleging that the technology giant monopolized the lucrative space of digital advertising. A sure-to-be exhaustive trial underway in the U.S. District Court in Washington is expected to last until November.
The lawsuit focuses on three key players...Read more

Michael Hiltzik: Right-wing judges are on a mission to stop the FDA from warning consumers about snake oil
To anyone who has paid even a modicum of serious attention to COVID-19 and its treatment, ivermectin is the zombiest of zombie drugs.
Used to treat parasitic diseases in animals and humans, the drug became a darling of anti-vaccination activists and conspiracy-mongers, who pushed it as a treatment for the pandemic disease and claimed it was ...Read more

Editorial: Rat poison almost killed P-22. We can save more lions and other wildlife if we ban rodenticides
When research scientists tracking P-22, the late beloved lion of Griffith Park, went to change the batteries in his GPS collar in 2014, they found him suffering from mange, a parasitic disease of the skin and hair that is connected to rodenticide poisoning.
Blood tests would later show that P-22 had two rodenticides in his system, one of which ...Read more

Liam Denning: Automakers, it won't hurt to share that buyback bounty
Stock buybacks are the perfect target for the United Auto Workers. The freest of free cash flow, they may as well be a billboard saying: “So many dollars, we don’t what to do with them!” In the minds of many, they also look like giveaways to the very wealthiest who own many of the stocks being bought, and carry a whiff of financial ...Read more

Editorial: AI could help with retail theft. But at what cost?
It’s no secret that retail theft has skyrocketed since the pandemic. We’ve all seen the alarming videos of criminal gangs attacking stores, cleaning out shelves and walking off with no apparent consequences.
This year, U.S. merchants expect to report a stunning $100 billion in losses — a big increase over pre-pandemic levels. At the same ...Read more

Commentary: Yes, there was global warming in prehistoric times. But nothing in millions of years compares with what we see today
“The climate is always changing!” So goes a popular refrain from climate deniers who continue to claim that there’s nothing special about this particular moment. There is no climate crisis, they say, because the Earth has survived dramatic warming before.
Republican presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy recently exemplified misconceptions ...Read more