Youth turnout exploded during the 2018 midterm elections under President Donald Trump. Then in 2020, energized opposition to Trump among young voters was critical to his defeat. And in the 2022 midterms, surging youth participation helped fend off the widely predicted “red wave.” Even some Republicans fear that expanding youth populations in swing states pose a long-term threat to the GOP.

New data supplied to me by the Harvard Youth Poll sheds light on the powerful undercurrents driving these developments. Young voters have shifted in a markedly progressive direction on multiple issues that are deeply important to them: Climate change, gun violence, economic inequality and LGBTQ+ rights.

– Greg Sargent at the Washington Post on the long term direction of younger voters.

Here's a graph which accompanies the article.

NOTE: This polling was done in March – well before the wildfires, air quality decline, and record high temperatures of this summer.

On all four issues mentioned in the article (LGBTQ+ rights, climate action, economic security, stricter gun regulation) the Republican Party has appalling records which only continue to worsen. If anything, the GOP has gotten increasingly homophobic, more closely aligned with the NRA, more in denial about climate change, and perpetually opposed to food assistance for those in need. And of course Republicans suck bigtime on reproductive freedom; Republicans are endangering US national security in an anti-abortion hissy fit.

The only way to defeat Republicans is to vote Democratic and to never miss an election. Don't be misled by some third party self-anointed savior. Vanity candidates from minor parties never win and are often found to be getting financial backing from Republican sources.

Register and vote. And remember that if you've moved since the last election then you need to register with your new address.

Be A Voter - Vote Save America

The Youth Vote Did It Before & Can Do It Again

The Youth Vote Did It Before & Can Do It Again

The Youth Vote Did It Before in 1973 & Can Do It Again This year The Youth vote did it before in 1973, and this new generation can do it again! Dear MoveOn member,  Take a moment to remember how you felt the moment news broke that six unelected extremist justices on the Supreme Court had ripped away our rights to access abortion and control our bodily autonomy. Remember the glee that spread…

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Not to be controversial this morning, but I have to say that seeing this dramatic increase in discourse on my social media feeds because of pride month is hilariously sad.

We are currently seeing a massive surge in transphobia and homophobia.

Republican governors are passing anti-trans bills, literally harming trans people to build support for their party. Trans youth are losing their healthcare and being banned from playing sports. LGBTQ+ teachers in certain states are at risk of losing their jobs. The supreme court stands to dismantle the legal right to medical privacy, abortion, and bodily autonomy literally any day now, with marriage equality likely to follow.

Conservatives in North Carolina are threatening pride organizations for planning to host a drag queen story hour event, while Texas Republicans are seeking to ban such events entirely. Montana has made it almost impossible for trans people to correct their birth certificates and in Florida (already home to a "don't say gay" law) they want to ban Medicaid coverage for gender affirming care for everyone regardless of age. Last month South Carolina banned trans kids from playing on teams that align with their gender identity and everyone has already forgotten about it, while Ohio may soon pass a similar bill that could also force a kid whose gender is questioned to have a pelvic exam in order to continue playing on a girl's sports team.

Do you know what Republicans don't care about? They don't care if "aces are inherently lgbt" and they don't care if "queer is a slur". They don't give a shit about the differences between bisexual and pansexual and they don't give a fuck how many letters belong in the acronym, and they especially don't give a shit about "kink at pride" discourse because they already believe that we are all sinful deviant perverted gr/oom/ers and no amount of engaging in respectability politics will ever convince them otherwise.

LGBT community discourse is so fucking disconnected from reality. Republicans are really trying to make it impossible for us to exist, I'm over here worrying that my state government will pass the bill that will make it legal for medical professionals to refuse to treat me due to their "conscience" because I'm queer and trans, and folks in my Instagram feed are having flag discourse. It's fucking surreal.

Republicans seek to override Ohio governor’s veto of trans rights bill | Ohio | The Guardian

The veto by DeWine, a Republican, marked a rare victory for LGBTQ+ advocates, who spent the past year battling a historic rise in anti-trans legislation and rhetoric across the United States.

Maria Bruno, policy director for Equality Ohio, said the governor’s veto was “a relief for Ohio’s transgender youth, parents, healthcare professionals and educators who can finally take a breath and get back to their lives”.

But that relief could be short-lived. Top Ohio Republicans, including the secretary of state, Frank LaRose, are now urging the state legislature to reverse the governor’s decision by overriding his veto.

A Florida Republican thinks the state’s “Don’t Say Gay” law doesn’t go far enough and wants to expand it.

The state’s anti-LGBTQ+ “Parental Rights in Education Law,” which was signed into law last year by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), bans the state’s schools from teaching about LGBTQ+ history and issues in grades K­­–3 and restricts the teaching of those issues “in a manner that is not age-appropriate” up to grade 12.

Earlier this week, state Rep. Adam Anderson (R) filed House Bill 1223, which would expand the law to ban “classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity” in pre-K through the eighth grade. It would also expand the law to apply to private and charter schools as well as public schools, and requires all public schools to acknowledge that “a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait and that it is false to ascribe to a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person’s sex.”

The bill would also require teachers to call students by pronouns that align with the sex they were assigned at birth.

In a statement, Anderson said that the bill “promotes parental rights, transparency, and state standards in Florida schools. It requires that lessons for Florida’s students are age-appropriate, focused on education, and free from sexualization and indoctrination.”

Equality Florida Public Policy Director Jon Harris Maurer responded to the bill in a statement on Tuesday.

“Don’t Say LGBTQ policies have already resulted in sweeping censorship, book banning, rainbow Safe Space stickers being peeled from classroom windows, districts refusing to recognize LGBTQ History Month, and LGBTQ families preparing to leave the state altogether,” Maurer said. “This legislation is about a fake moral panic, cooked up by Governor DeSantis to demonize LGBTQ people for his own political career.”

“Governor DeSantis and the lawmakers following him are hellbent on policing language, curriculum, and culture,” Maurer continued. “Free states don’t ban books or people.”

“The DeSantis regime isn’t satisfied with a hostile takeover of traditional public schools,” he said of the bill’s expansion to include private and charter schools. “They envision a future where LGBTQ families have no school choice to find dignity or respect.”

It’s widely assumed that Gov. DeSantis will run for President on his right-wing education platform. Presidential candidate Nikki Haley has said that Florida’s law doesn’t go far enough and Donald Trump suggested changing federal law to punish any teachers that discuss trans identity in the classroom.

Numerous medical and mental health studies and associations have found hat affirming the gender identities of trans youth reduces their mental anguish and suicidality.

"What about saying something you believe in, making those anthems from the fraternity house as important as sermons from barricades? Why, in a sense, did these punk initiates not take up the gauntlet thrown down by rebel rockers like The Clash, or translate 'Anarchy In The UK' into a north American setting? Speaking to Playboy's Charles Young in 1987, Adam Yauch touched on this issue.

"What most adults don't understand about most teenagers is that most teenagers are extremely conservative most of the time, even as they are engaging in obnoxious behavior designed to differentiate themselves from most adults. Most teenagers enjoy a heavily structured life, are threatened by deviations from the conforming norm and will ridicule those enamored of deviating from the conforming norm. In this way, most teenagers are exactly like most adults, the only difference being that teenagers piss their lives away in high school while adults piss their lives away in corporations. Most teenagers do, after all, grow up to be most adults."

Speaking as Licensed To Ill was about to top the American album charts, Yauch's right to pontificate seems not unreasonable. To those weaned on the all-out attack philosophies of the punk era, his views may seem profoundly distressing, but at least he could point to his success as vindication of his notions and his approach to his music. Even if this is all Licensed To Ill is - a reassuring shot of brattish obnoxiousness from a troupe of clever young men who've given it enough anti-establishment credibility to make their record appear dangerous to adults while remaining accessible and desirable to the sought-after teenage audience - it is still a considerable achievement. Some may even make claims for it being subversive. And a few people well placed to make such a judgment have made claims for its validity as art. Admittedly, Israel Horovitz could hardly be described as an impartial judge, but his comments to The Los Angeles Times are revealing.

"If people can't see the humor and satire in the record, I don't know what to say to them," Adrock's father said. "It's all so obvious. I think the thing that makes the record so good is that it shows a real understanding of people; maybe not an understanding of 49-year-olds, but certainly of 17-year-olds. I am delighted beyond description; it's like a kid taking over the family store."

Certainly, in defense of the album's nihilism, it can be argued that the record represents a startling warning to the political and social establishments that sought to have its makers hounded out of the public eye. If one is to try to understand the album in any serious sort of way, you have to consider its worth, as Horovitz Senior is hinting, as a piece of satirical social observation. What can we learn of adolescent America in 1986 from this record? Maybe not much we didn't already know; teenagers, as Yauch told Playboy, are often as reactionary and scared of change as their parents, and largely bored most of the time, play at being tough in front of their mates when in reality their insecurities prevent them from being assertive enough, and have given up on any hope that they have a meaningful influence on their society. It is surely not a mere coincidence that levels of apathy among first time voters in the United States and western Europe reached new peaks during these years. As governments in the USA and Britain, in particular, became convergent around a single political philosophy, with voter choice being limited to one of two parties (Republican and Democrat, Conservative and Labour) whose defining parameters all but vanished, it seemed as though a line had been drawn in the social sands. You were either part of the consensus and happy to participate in it, or you stood on the outside with no real hope of influencing events. Youth should be a time when your dreams and ideals are nurtured and encouraged, yet to so many young people growing up in the so-called industrialized west of the mid-to late-80s, ideals were all too often things you sacrificed for profit, dreams nothing more than the unattainable goals of hopeless romantics. It's little wonder so many people decided to take a turn away from the way things had been done before - and even a decision to step into a mental and philosophical void seemed like a tempting move compared to the other options available. So, in adopting these caricatures and living out this fantasy lifestyle, the Beasties were actually providing positive role models, by seemingly proving the validity of an imagination and demonstrating that it was possible to succeed on the older generation's terms - i.e. financially - by making a virtue of what they sought to take away from you.

This point was never fully appreciated at the time, though, and the rather more dubious parts of the band's package were allowed to overshadow the whole. It's interesting to note that similar mistakes of appreciation and perception are still being made: for example, most discussion of Be Here Now, the third album by Manchester rock band Oasis - routinely described through the mid-90s, like the Beasties before them, as "the bad boys of rock" - concentrated on its deficiencies or otherwise sonically and the band's failure to radically alter the formula of their earlier records. Yet in its lyrics, the album offers messages of hope and encouragement to dream and keep positive in the face of institutionalized apathy: "Say something, shout it from the rooftops off your head" (from 'It's Getting Better (Man!)') may well prove to be as defining a lyric to the present generation as Bob Dylan's 'Blowin' In The Wind' had been three decades earlier, precisely because of the song's helpless lack of specificity."

- Rhyming & Stealing: A History of the Beastie Boys by Angus Batey

You're good at sober analyses of political situations. Exactly how bad is the wave of anti-trans legislation and executive action going through red US states? AIUI there's several different things they are doing like restricting trans healthcare and banning LGBT books from schools. But we've yet to see how maximally prosecutors will try to enforce them, what the courts will say and how this will go down amongst the electorate?

The electorate is the easy part: if I understand the polling on this issue, they mostly don’t give a shit. This isn’t much comfort for trans people atm, but at least nobody is looking to ride a wave of anti trans bigotry into sweeping electoral success. It wasn’t always like this with lgbt issues—gay marriage bans used to be pretty successful at helping conservatives win elections.

Book bans are part of the perennial low-grade churn of American moral panics, and they’re bad, sure, but first amendment protections are strong in the US; banning books in schools is ultimately kind of a feckless move, because more severe bans just aren’t in the cards.

Missouri dropped its adult trans healthcare ban iirc bc it thought it couldn’t defend it in court; but bans on youth trans healthcare worry me more, bc teenagers having civil rights is well outside the overton window for some segments of the US population, and it bothers me when kids kill themselves. I do not know nearly enough about the legal landscape around this issue to say whether these actions will hold up to court challenges—certainly I cannot imagine SCOTUS coming to the rescue, but state courts matter a ton here.

All in al, I gotta say, the current wave of anti trans bigotry feels pretty bad! It sucks! Especially if you’re trans. Like gay people in the 90s and 00s, trans people are at least in the position of being randomly distributed throughout the population, making it more likely that, as more people come out, acceptance will grow broadly (and it has been growing, in line with LGBT acceptance generally). But trans people are fewer in number than gay, lesbian, or bisexual people, and as the example of the UK provides, the anti-trans backlash can be super toxic, and it’s already making ground in some supposedly liberal bastions like the New York Times, as many commentators have noted.

In the long run, I’m pretty sanguine—attitudes on these issues are heavily generational, and much more positive among Gen Z and millennials. But that’s not super useful in the short term, and I worry about the harm that will be done while this backlash is peaking. I am glad a lot of people have been pushing back, both against outright conservatives and also against mealy-mouthed concern trolling by supposed liberals on trans issues. Like gay rights, I think this can be partially settled as a political issue by demonstrating it is an electoral loser, because hope that this is (another) culture war issue that can stave off the decline of the Republican Party in its current form seems to be a major component of anti-trans state policy.

Happy birthday, Xiang Jingyu! (September 4, 1895)

An early leading woman in the Communist Party of China, Xiang Jingyu was born to a large family in Hunan Province. Xiang was heavily involved in the nationalist republican movement in her youth, agitating against Japanese influence in China. She participated in a work study program in France, and it was here that she first read the works of Marx and became invested in Marxism. Returning to China, in 1922 she joined the Communist Party, one of its first female members, and soon became the first woman in its Central Committee. As a prominent radical figure in the Chinese women's movement, Xiang endeavored to bring the larger movement under Communist Party influence. She led strikes and fought against sexist attitudes among other Party leaders. After the anti-Communist reaction began in the nationalist movement, Xiang was betrayed and killed while working in Wuhan in 1928.

Republicans think that their high profile homophobia can squeeze a few more votes out of their shrinking and aging base. But they are doing serious damage to themselves in the medium to long term with future voters.

The LGBTQ+ high school students and their allies will not forget for the rest of their voting lives the GOP “don’t say gay” laws, anti-trans persecution, and homophobic hate speech condoned by high ranking Republicans and their buddies in the rightwing media.  

About 1 in 4 high school students identifies as LGBTQ, according to a report the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released on Thursday, using data from 2021.

In 2021, 75.5 percent of high school students identified as heterosexual, the CDC’s Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS) found.

Among high school students, 12.2 percent identified as bisexual, 5.2 percent as questioning, 3.9 percent as other, 3.2 percent as gay or lesbian and 1.8 percent said they didn’t understand the question.

The CDC says the number of LGBTQ students went from 11 percent in 2015 to 26 percent in 2021.

Here is the Obama White House after the 2015 Supreme Court ruling on same sex marriage.

A President Ron “Don’t Say Gay” DeSantis would never allow that. More likely he would try to dismiss the Supreme Court for being too “woke”. The same is true of almost all the other GOP presidential candidates. The GOP is officially homophobic.

To preserve freedom and democracy in the US: Vote Blue No Matter Who. 🏳️‍🌈

Mira Lazine at LGBTQ Nation:

In its latest attack on transgender youth, lawmakers in Tennessee passed a bill to stop the nonexistent problem of adults kidnapping kids and taking them to other states for gender-affirming care.

The bill, S.B. 2782, was passed by the Tennessee House of Representatives on Thursday and is on its way to the governor’s desk. It amends a 2023 gender-affirming care ban, adding civil penalties for any adults who aid an unemancipated minor get out-of-state gender-affirming care without their parents’ consent. The bill passed along party lines 63-16 in the Tennessee House of Representatives and previously passed the state’s Senate 25-4. This would be the first state to pass a law of this kind, according to the Associated Press. S.B. 2782, is headed to the governor’s desk. Gov. Bill Lee (R) is expected to pass the legislation, as he previously advanced anti-LGBTQ+ bills, such as one that would allow LGBTQ+ foster children to be placed with foster parents who are opposed to LGBTQ+ rights. It was introduced by state Sen. Janice Bowling (R), who has been introducing anti-trans legislation since at least 2020, and contains exemptions for parents, guardians, those with the consent of parents and guardians, and common carriers like bus drivers, airline pilots, and ride share app drivers. An earlier version of S.B. 2782 reportedly had criminal penalties for adults; however, this was removed in committee. [...]

This type of legislation comes as a reaction to conspiracies that there is a ploy from transgender adults to kidnap kids and “turn” them transgender. A recent bill in Maine made headlines in the right-wing press for supposedly being a “transgender trafficking” bill. A recent bill in Maine made headlines in the right-wing press for supposedly being a “transgender trafficking” bill. The bill, L.D. 1735, makes Maine a safe state for trans people, protecting refugees from other states. Anti-trans advocates like Chaya Raichik (of Libs of TikTok) and Riley Gaines opposed this, arguing that it promoted the alleged kidnapping and trafficking of youth across state lines to give them gender-affirming surgery, something transgender youth almost never get. This culture of fear about children transitioning behind their parents’ backs has been promoted by anti-LGBTQ+ Republicans like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), who alleged that there are states that want to take kids away from their parents and make them transition. There is no evidence to support any of these assertions.

Tennessee passes anti-trans bill SB2782 that is based on the "transgender trafficking" myth spouted out by anti-trans extremists. The bill has several exemptions: parents, guardians, those with the consent of parents and guardians, and common carriers like bus drivers, airline pilots, and ride share app drivers.

This week North Carolina house representative Tricia Cotham, formerly a Democrat, switched parties. In the process, Republicans now gain a veto proof supermajority in both state chambers.

What this means is that Republicans effectively have full control over what bills are passed this term; even if Governor Cooper (a Democrat) vetos, they can overturn the veto and the bill will become law anyway.

And so Republicans have wasted no time, rushing to introduce as many anti-trans bills as possible ahead of the approaching deadlines to do so.

Among them are bans on gender affirming care for minors, a bill that would allow healthcare providers, institutions, or insurance companies to deny care or coverage based on their "conscience", and bans on trans youth participating in sports on teams that align with their gender identity.

There is also the potential for an abortion ban on the table.

The results of one representative changing parties will likely be felt in the months and years to come by countless marginalized people in the state of North Carolina--and in surrounding states; so many people in neighboring Southeastern states have had to rely on travelling to North Carolina to access reproductive healthcare, abortion care, and gender affirming care.

The ripple effects of this will be felt far and wide, for a long time to come.

Never let anyone convince you that the actions of one person cannot matter. And never underestimate the willingness of any person to betray their own professed values.

New Poll Shows Massive Backlash To Anti-LGBTQ School Policies

Over at Medium Erin Reed looks at new American polling that shows that the Republican Party's homophobic and transphobic policies are not connecting with the voters.

The great majority is not worried about "the woke". What they are worried about is topics like safety from gun violence, education quality, and providing mental healthcare in school.

So what about censorship? Erin writes:

The survey delved into specific policies enacted in conservative states, revealing broad public disapproval. Policies involving book bans and mandatory genital inspections for youth athletes in order to confirm their sex were especially unpopular, with 92% and 84% opposition, respectively. Additional measures, such as the prohibition of Advanced Placement African-American History, suspensions for teachers who show support for LGBTQ+ students, and bans on classroom discussions about sexual orientation and gender identity, also faced strong opposition—each garnering over 65% disapproval in the survey. Opposition was even widespread among parents, who opposed each of these policies.

Read Erin's article here.

The Navigator survey can be found here.

Illustration: Maria Petrishina

By Wednesday night, a sweeping anti-trans bill appeared dead in Kentucky as lawmakers debated whether it went too far. So it surprised Democrats, transgender activists, and their allies when Republicans managed to hold a committee vote, then rush the bill through approvals in both the state House and Senate the following day.

Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear isn’t expected to sign the bill, which passed mostly along party lines, into law, but the GOP has enough of a majority to override his veto.

People in the gallery were furious when the measure passed and yelled, “You’re all fucking pieces of shit!” at lawmakers on the floor, according to Courier Journal reporter Joe Sonka.

Democratic state Sen. Karen Berg, whose transgender son died by suicide in December, cried after the vote, Sonka reported. Berg had delivered powerful testimony as the bill was being debated.

“[This bill] is viewed as the single worst anti-LGBTQ legislation that has come out of a statehouse in this country,” she said during a floor debate.

“This is absolutely willful hate for a small group of people that are the weakest and most vulnerable,” she added.

The bill that passed this week expanded upon one that Republicans in Kentucky first introduced in February, which would have allowed students to misgender transgender students despite the detrimental impact it would have on trans youth.

The new version of the bill still allows trans students to be misgendered. But it goes much further: It also bans gender-affirming care, like puberty blockers or hormone therapy, for trans kids and requires doctors to begin detransitioning any of their trans patients who are children. It mandates that schools create policies that will not allow trans students to use the bathroom that matches their gender identity. It does not allow educators to discuss sexual orientation or gender identity in any grade and forbids discussion of human sexuality until sixth grade. After that, parental consent is required.

The Kentucky GOP’s last-minute push to advance the bill is following a disturbing nationwide trend. Hundreds of anti-LGBTQ bills have been introduced just this year in states dominated by Republicans as part of the broader culture war on trans Americans and the push for “parental rights” — a catchall term that centers the wishes of conservative white parents when shaping policies in public schools.

Gender-affirming care for minors is appropriate and not dangerous, according to the American Medical Association. And genuine mental health risks come with widespread discrimination and health care bans: Transgender youth are at higher risk for depression and suicide.

Instead of serving the most vulnerable among us, Berg said her fellow lawmakers ignored the science behind gender-affirming care for trans children and only rushed this bill for one reason.

“My child came up here 10 years ago,” she said on Thursday, referring to her son’s 2015 testimony against a bathroom bill in the Kentucky statehouse. “You had time to understand the science… this is absolute, willful, intentional hate.”

Wednesday, October 25, 2023

Meta Accused by States of Using Features to Lure Children to Instagram and Facebook (NYT) Meta was sued by more than three dozen states on Tuesday for knowingly using features on Instagram and Facebook to hook children to its platforms, even as the company said its social media sites were safe for young people. In their complaint, the states said Meta had “designed psychologically manipulative product features to induce young users’ compulsive and extended use” of platforms like Instagram. The company’s algorithms were designed to push children and teenagers into rabbit holes of toxic and harmful content, the states said, with features like “infinite scroll” and persistent alerts used to hook young users. The attorneys general also charged Meta with violating a federal children’s online privacy law, accusing it of unlawfully collecting “the personal data of its youngest users” without their parents’ permission. “Meta has harnessed powerful and unprecedented technologies to entice, engage, and ultimately ensnare youth and teens,” the states said in their 233-page lawsuit. “Its motive is profit.” It’s unusual for so many states to come together to sue a tech giant for consumer harms. The coordination shows states are prioritizing the issue of children and online safety and combining legal resources to fight Meta, just as states had previously done for cases against Big Tobacco and Big Pharma companies.

Republican search for new US House leader returns to square one (Reuters) Republicans, whose party infighting has paralyzed the U.S. House of Representatives for three weeks, tried on Monday to find consensus on a new speaker to lead the chamber and address funding needs for Israel, Ukraine and the federal government. Eight candidates to be speaker made their pitches to fellow Republicans at a 2-1/2 hour closed-door forum and answered questions about how they would handle the job. With a narrow majority of 221-212 in the House, it is not clear whether any Republican can get the votes needed to claim the speakership. The speaker position has this year been a flashpoint for factional strife between right-wing hardliners and more mainstream Republicans.

Day of bloodshed in southwest Mexico kills at least 19 people (AP) A local security secretary and 12 police officers were shot dead in Guerrero state Monday, authorities said, the worst episode in a day of violence across southwestern Mexico that killed at least 19 people. Officials are finding themselves increasingly endangered in the region, where several powerful drug cartels continue to fight for control. According to figures from Common Cause, 341 police officers have been killed in Mexico so far this year. In 2022, at least 403 were slain.

Rio gangsters torch at least 35 buses after Brazil crime boss killed (Reuters) Criminal groups set at least 35 buses on fire in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro on Monday, according to the industry group that represents bus companies, after police killed a crime boss in an operation. The attacks on buses came after a police operation that killed the nephew of the leader of the state’s largest militia, according to the police. Rio’s so-called militias, often composed of current and former police officers, have become one of the region’s largest security threats. Originally set up as self-defense forces for poor neighborhoods blighted by drug gangs, they have now metastasized into criminal outfits operating in multiple different rackets.

Argentine economy minister and right-wing populist look to runoff (AP) Argentina’s economy minister and the anti-establishment upstart he faces in a presidential runoff next month began competing Monday to shore up the moderate voters they need. Economy Minister Sergio Massa earned almost seven points more than chainsaw-wielding economist and freshman lawmaker Javier Milei in Sunday’s vote. Most polls had shown Massa slightly trailing, as voters had been expected to punish him for triple-digit inflation that has eaten away at purchasing power and boosted poverty. Massa focused his messaging on how Milei’s budget-slashing chainsaw would negatively affect citizens already struggling to make ends meet, showing his Peronist party’s power to mobilize Argentine voters.

A Glimpse Into Spain’s Future, Where Water Comes by Truck, Not Tap (NYT) It was 10 a.m. when the villagers, clutching empty plastic containers, lined up behind the tanker truck of drinking water. A cake shop owner arrived with four big jugs for his pastries. Workers from a retirement home carried two dozen bottles back on wheelchairs for their wards. And a mother of four loaded her trunk with fresh water to wash vegetables and cook pasta. Spain has been blighted by a long-running drought, caused by record-high temperatures in 2022, a string of heat waves in 2023, and almost three years of reduced rainfall. Throughout the country, reservoirs have been depleted; in the worst-affected areas, they are at less than 20 percent of their capacity. But few places on the continent have been as badly hit as tiny Pozoblanco, a village of about 18,000 in southern Spain, where the daily struggle for drinkable water has become a glimpse of what may lie ahead for parts of Europe where drought and extreme heat have become increasingly common.

Commando Raids Unnerving Russia in Crimea (NYT) Late one evening this month, two Ukrainian commandos eased into a side street in Kyiv in a battered SUV. Back from a dangerous nighttime assault on Russian positions in the Crimean Peninsula, they slipped into a sparsely furnished apartment where they sat at desks, weary and a little disheveled, and described their latest operation in matter-of-fact fashion. The two men had joined more than 30 others racing more than 100 miles across the western Black Sea on jet skis to attack critical Russian defense installations before making their getaway, the second Ukrainian amphibious raid in six weeks. The raids were part of a series of punishing attacks on Crimea by Ukrainian forces since midsummer that have succeeded in disabling some Russian air-defense systems and damaging naval repair yards at Sevastopol. Russia later moved 10 warships from Sevastopol on the west coast of Crimea to the port of Novorossiysk on the Russian mainland, though U.S. officials say it remains unclear whether the withdrawals were tied to security concerns or just a regular rotation. But there is no denying that attacks within Crimea are increasing, and may rise even further with the new ATACMS long-range missiles just delivered from the United States. “A dynamic, deep strike battle is underway,” British military intelligence said in a statement.

US renews warning it will defend Philippines after incidents with Chinese vessels in South China Sea (AP) The United States renewed a warning Monday that it would defend the Philippines in case of an armed attack under a 1951 treaty, after Chinese ships blocked and collided with two Filipino vessels off a contested shoal in the South China Sea. Philippine diplomats summoned a Chinese Embassy official in Manila on Monday for a strongly worded protest following Sunday’s collisions off Second Thomas Shoal. No injuries were reported but the encounters damaged a Philippine coast guard ship and a wooden-hulled supply boat operated by navy personnel, officials said. The Philippines and other neighbors of China have resisted Beijing’s sweeping territorial claims over virtually the entire South China Sea, and some, like Manila, have sought U.S. military support as incidents multiply.

Continued Escalation (NYT) Israel launched more than 400 strikes against alleged Hamas targets in Gaza overnight, killing dozens of militants, including three deputy commanders, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced on Tuesday. The assault followed another wave of Israeli strikes that the IDF claimed hit 320 militant targets in Gaza the day before. According to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, more than 700 Palestinians were killed during the overnight strikes—the highest 24-hour death toll since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7. If confirmed, that would bring the total number of Palestinians killed to almost 5,800 people, including around 2,360 children. Around 1,400 Israelis have been killed, and Hamas is holding more than 200 people hostage, having only released four people thus far. As strikes escalate and Israel prepares for a ground invasion, the United Nations is asking Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to allow more aid into Gaza. The World Health Organization (WHO) warned on Tuesday that nearly two-thirds of all health facilities in the Gaza Strip, including 12 out of 35 hospitals, are no longer functioning.

Developing World Sees Double Standard in West’s Actions in Gaza and Ukraine (NYT) For 20 months, the Biden administration has attempted to stake out the moral high ground against Russia, condemning its brutal war on Ukraine for indiscriminately killing civilians. The argument resonated in much of the West, but less so in other parts of the world, which viewed the war as more of a great-power conflict and declined to participate in sanctions or otherwise isolate Russia. Now, as Israel bombards the Gaza Strip, killing more than 4,300 people since Oct. 7, the Biden administration’s unwavering support risks creating new headwinds in its efforts to win over global public opinion. Israel’s attack on Gaza, its threats to mount a ground invasion and America’s tight embrace of its most important Mideast ally have prompted cries of hypocrisy. “Anywhere else, attacking civilian infrastructure and deliberately starving an entire population of food, water, basic necessities would be condemned, accountability would be enforced,” said King Abdullah. “International law loses all value if it is implemented selectively.” Palestinians have criticized Western capitals for not expressing outrage over the bombing of Gaza similar to their labeling of Russian missile attacks against Ukrainian cities and infrastructure as “barbaric” and “crimes against humanity.”

Israel prepares for months-long war (BBC) Israel’s military campaign in Gaza “may take a month, two or three”, its defence minister Yoav Gallant said on Sunday, adding the next stage of the war, a widely-expected ground invasion, would “come soon”. But Western leaders who’ve publicly embraced Israel’s right to defend itself are also sending messages, in public and private, about the need to “avoid rushing forward in rage”, explains our chief international correspondent Lyse Doucet. A pause could give more time to free more than 200 hostages held in Gaza, help foreign nationals to get out of the enclave, and let in more desperately needed aid. Humanitarian convoys are barely trickling into Gaza from Egypt while the situation on the ground is “catastrophic”, according to a Red Cross spokeswoman.

‘My daughters don’t understand that we cannot return.’ (BBC) Rushdi Abualouf of BBC News is in Gaza reporting on a conflict he cannot escape from. He has shared with us his personal experience, after he had to relocate his family four times in the past two weeks: Two days ago, my wife and children nearly died. They were about to leave for the day to meet me when an Israeli drone attack punched through the top floor of a four-storey building in Khan Younis, Gaza. My nine-year-old twin daughters ran out into the street screaming, separated from their mother, who was struck in the head by a piece of rubble.  My daughters have had to leave behind everything they love in Gaza City and head south—their school, their friends, their horse riding club, their favourite pizza shop. Both of them are constantly asking to go back there, to relative normality. They are begging to go back. They don’t understand that we cannot return.

Want to be sharper? Try golf or walking (Yahoo News) A new study of 25 healthy golfers age 65 and over found that playing 18 holes of golf or walking 3.7 miles significantly improved their immediate cognitive function. The research, which was published in BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine, underscores “the value of age-appropriate aerobic exercise,” said Julia Kettinen, the first author of the article and a doctoral researcher in sports and exercise medicine at the University of Eastern Finland. It seems that the walking element is key here: Research consistently shows that walking has enormous health benefits, from reducing risk of heart disease and dementia to improving the quality and duration of your sleep.

Conspiracy theorist and professional gadfly Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Monday that he will convert his vanity PR stunt into a third-party presidential campaign. Kennedy abandoned his Democratic primary bid after he made ignorant and racially tinged statements about COVID immunity, statements that caused his popularity among Democrats to plummet. Recognizing that he had no chance of disrupting the Democratic primary and could never earn a spot on the debate stage in the Republican primary, he took refuge in an independent third-party campaign.

          The development should give Democrats a measure of relief. Many Democrats were worried that Kennedy’s unnaturally youthful physique and famous name would siphon disillusioned voters away from Joe Biden. But as the Trump campaign has deduced, Kennedy is a bigger threat to conspiracy-prone, disgruntled GOP voters than Biden. Indeed, the RNC and the Trump campaign both attacked Kennedy after he announced his third-party campaign. The Trump campaign said,

Voters should not be deceived by anyone who pretends to have conservative values. [Kennedy’s campaign is] nothing more than a vanity project for a liberal Kennedy looking to cash in on his family’s name.

See Vanity Fair, Turns Out RFK Jr.’s Independent Bid Could Do Trump More Damage Than Biden. Per Vanity Fair,

Internal polling from the Trump campaign suggests that a Kennedy third-party bid would sap more votes from the ex-president than Biden in a general election matchup, according to a Semafor report published Friday. “It’s single digits, but it’s enough where it counts to make a difference,” a person familiar with the data told the outlet. The Trump campaign, in turn, is reportedly readying a messaging onslaught against Kennedy, who, despite being a member of the most iconic family in Democratic politics, is running as a pro-gun anti-vaxxer whose platform aligns much more closely with conservative populism than Biden’s progressive liberalism.

          And it can’t help RFK Jr. that his siblings issued a joint statement condemning his run for the presidency:

The decision of our brother Bobby to run as a third-party candidate against Joe Biden is dangerous to our country. Bobby might share the same name as our father, but he does not share the same values, vision or judgment. Today's announcement is deeply saddening for us. We denounce his candidacy and believe it to be perilous for our country.

          This development is less about RFK Jr. than it is about the Democratic tendency to exaggerate fears and assume the worst, especially where Joe Biden is concerned. When Kennedy was teasing his candidacy, Democrats were in a panic—a narrative that was amplified by a willing media. See, e.g., NYPost, RFK Jr. has the White House sweating, and rightly so.

          Kennedy’s reputation in the Democratic Party is already damaged after he said that COVID was bioengineered to be “ethnically targeted” and that Ashkenazi Jews were suspiciously immune. When the Trump campaign machine is done with Kennedy, he will likely drop out of the race entirely.

          I started the newsletter with this story because of another wave of Joe-Biden-is-too-old angst circulating among Democrats. Although I can’t pinpoint where the most recent angst originates, I received a half-dozen copies of an op-ed by David Brooks in NYTimes, Opinion | Can we talk about Joe Biden? (I am not going to waste one of my NYTimes gift subscriptions on this article.)

          On the one hand, Brooks is mainly sympathetic to Biden and concludes that Biden is the Democrat’s only choice. But in arriving at that conclusion, Brooks devotes a lot of NYTimes real estate to three tired premises: (a) Biden is old; (b) polling is bad for Biden; and (c) voters care about inflation more than any other issue. Those premises lead Brooks to this crescendo of handwringing:

Voters know both men very well at this point, so when I hear Democrats comforting themselves that people will flock to Biden if the alternative on the ballot is Trump, I worry they are kidding themselves.

          For a guy at the pinnacle of the opinion writer ecosphere, Brooks’ analysis is badly off-point. But rather than argue with Brooks, I will simply note that every special election in 2023 has been a national referendum on Joe Biden, and he has exceeded expectations at every opportunity. Brooks does not examine that critical fact because it undermines his analysis in two ways:

          First, “Biden” and “Trump” are surrogates and avatars for two different visions of America—authoritarian vs democratic, gun safety vs a heavily armed citizenry, reproductive liberty vs state-imposed religious regulation of women’s bodies, dignity vs discrimination against LGBTQ people, and environmental protection vs unregulated fossil fuels.  If Brooks doesn’t understand that point, he has been comatose since 2019 (at least).

          Second, Brooks simply assumes that Trump is a legitimate candidate who has not mounted a coup, incited an insurrection, unlawfully retained defense secrets, disclosed sensitive nuclear information to Russian diplomats and random guests at Mar-a-Lago, and been adjudged as a sexual abuser. Not to mention that Trump is teetering on bankruptcy as he defends 91 felony counts. Yet, to Brooks, Trump is just one of two major party candidates in the 2024 election.

          Never before in our history have we had a major presidential candidate under four criminal indictments as he runs for office and Brooks fails to mention that fact in his analysis of the election. Really?!? “But, but, but . . . inflation,” Brooks responds. Give me a break! I have more faith in the American people than does Brooks. I hope you do, too. Do not fall for facile, shallow journalism that sells American voters short.

          Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was supposed to destroy Biden’s campaign. He will now be lucky to escape with his standing in the anti-vaxxer community intact. As always, we can’t count on Republicans or independent candidates to defeat themselves, but let’s not talk ourselves into defeatism when we should be confident and hopeful.

[Robert B. Hubbell Newsletter]