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Abdul El-Sayed and his wife Sarah Jukaku at campaign event
Further

Two Different America's (Sic)

Hoo boy. With the approach of what bleakly promises to be "the super-Islamophobic midterms," the Bigot-In-Chief is letting his racist freak flag fly by attacking Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, whose smarts, strength, hotness, accomplished wife and Michigan win clearly terrify him. Cue charges of "communist," "man of hate," and, probs soon, AI slop featuring suicide vests. Meanwhile, El-Sayed, a far sharper tool in the shed, has embraced the charge they represent "(two) America’s": The ads write themselves.

Planet MAGA, of course, is already so delusional Trump just boasted of his "Great Poll Numbers," which now sit at rock-bottom lows of 38% to 33%. For a bunch of hacks led by a fragile narcissist who's never seen a scapegoat he didn't relish, the fantastical goes hand-in-stubby-hand with the fear-mongering: vandals in the Reflecting Pool, domestic terrorists at No Kings, migrant caravans, lunatic Bolsheviks, weird names or just brown-or-black skinned success, more terrifying to many of these losers than any threat of extremism. Enter, in peril, the high-achieving epidemiologist, health official, author and "Muslim boogeyman" El-Sayed. “Expect them to throw the whole bigoted kitchen sink at El-Sayed," says Mehdi Hasan. "This will be the anti-Zohran Mamdani campaign on anti-Muslim steroids."

Unsurprisingly, it began in earnest the minute the good doctor won Michigan's against-the-odds primary against establishment Dem Haley Stevens. He'll face off against GOP Rep. and racist ijiot Mike Rogers, who of course has rushed to call the U.S.-born-and-bred El-Sayed "anti-American" and - pulling the same juvenile "Barack Hussein Obama" crap to undermine his legitimacy - to use his full, scary, def-not-in-Kansas-anymore name Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed. But Abdulrahman, who doesn't suffer fools gladly, has brutally pushed back. "With a name like mine, I never thought running for office would be possible," he said at a campaign event. But if "Mike" wants to focus on his 11-letter (a lot!) first name, he just wanted to remind him, "If you don’t know how to say it, keep the name out of your damn mouth.”

In moronic lockstep, MAGA's bigots, brown shirts and zealots have followed suit with "cartoonishly Islamophobic attacks." They use his full name and say he's a "socialist," which they can't define but anyway he isn't. Anti-trans goon Nancy Mace charges, “Every single Muslim holding public office (is) a Trojan Horse and a threat to national security and our republic," and woe is us when "our granddaughters are wearing burkas to school." Vapid scumbag JD calls him a "crazy" guy who doesn't want Trump's rip-off, oligarch-run "prosperous economy" and flings "personal insults" at Vance's family, though hours later Trump attacked El-Sayed's wife, who is U.S.-born and thus not an alleged Einstein Visa immigrant third wife who somehow after 30 years here can still barely speak English. Maybe it was an Epstein Visa?

As usual, Trump has eagerly led the racist, vulgar charge. Along with a communist man of hate, he's also called El-Sayed a "jihadist" from a rigged, "strictly Third World" state who's "full of shit." It turns out El-Sayed is also "the absolute best at casually burning Trump to the fucking ground": Asked about the barb, El-Sayed snapped back, “At least I don’t let mine go in the middle of the Oval Office." And as with another smart, quick, non-white guy who's way above his pay grade and lives rent-free in his wee puerile mind, he likes to sneeringly recite, often stumbling, the full, scary name of a guy who this time actually would be the first Muslim U.S. senator. Presumably, the ketchup really hit the White House walls last weekend when El-Sayed said he'd had "a really good conversation" with Obama about "what we need to do to win."

Above all, the bigot for all seasons pivots to the trope of anyone Arabic - El-Sayed's parents immigrated from Egypt - being anti-Semitic. "He doesn't love Jewish people," babbles Trump. "He hates them with a passion that burns in his heart." In fact, El-Sayed has plainly, repeatedly said he opposes not Jews but Israel's genocidal policies, AIPAC and the dark U.S. money that abets both: "I believe in equal rights to peace, dignity and self-determination for all people." That call for equality under the law has nothing to do with anti-Semitism, notes Peter Beinart; cognizant of history. he also warns that a political party or ideology willing to be "nakedly bigoted" toward any group of people, in this case Muslims, in order to maintain power would, if the politics were to shift, "do the same thing to Jews in a heartbeat."

Obviously, such subtlety is beyond the dim-witted likes of Trump and his MAGA zombies, who alone could look at Dr. El-Sayed and his (one) wife Dr. Sarah Jukaku, a psychiatrist whose parents emigrated here from India, and see a threat. Both are U.S.-born-and- raised doctors with undergrad degrees from University of Michigan, where they met, and advanced degrees from Columbia and Oxford. In his book Healing Politics, El-Sayed offers a rigorous framework for understanding systemic medical and political failure, and building conditions for lasting healing. He also calls Jukaku his “rock" and praises the "quiet confidence" that led her to work with people confronting pain. "I struggled to learn who I was,” he wrote of their earlier selves. “Sarah did not. She danced with her emotions. I wrestled with mine." The couple has two daughters.

No wonder, then, a needy, hollow rapist, con-man, bully and aspiring tinpot dictator, routinely raking in billions while kids go hungry and stuffed into a cheap tux for his fellow billionaire felons, posted a photo of himself with his tacky, mail-order, call-girl wife in a tight dress with "redacted Epstein files written all over it" - both smirking, "We're richer and be better than you and just ignore our vile name appearing in those pedo files thousands of times" - alongside the other couple, warmly smiling after a pancake breakfast in a diner, El Sayed in a t-shirt, Jukaku in a hijab so she must be a terrorist (though Trump, suspect, is wearing a cat.) The caption for the side-by-side pics, which only the spectacularly tone-deaf Trump could remotely imagine as a mic-drop: "Two VERY DIFFERENT America’s (sic).” Umm. Sure.

Kudos to El-Sayed, prince among men, who didn't even stoop to pick the low-hanging fruit of Trump's "grammatical shitbaggery" - one comment: "What a maroon" - emblematic of a proudly semi-literate GOP somehow come to power in our debased America without understanding how apostrophes work. Instead, El-Sayed went for the meat of the matter. "Yeah, he's right," he told CNN. Swiftly, he embraced the campaign-ready concept of two Americas: "Trump's vision, the one you're living in right now (in) which your overlords are two people who don’t like each other, but join in the interest of making billions of dollars off of you...Or two people who genuinely love each other, enjoyed some pancakes together, and want to come together to build the kind of America where they can raise a family and know that family is going to have the good things."

Those "good things" - health care, good jobs, clean air and water, a relatively level playing field to replace gross inequality, a country where people can live peaceably together "with their sisters and brothers" - are what he and his wife want for their kids, and he wisely gauges most of the rest of us do too. And no, he says, rebutting GOP charges, it's not "radical" to believe people should be able to afford groceries, have health care, partake in free elections. Also, he and his wife actually "like each other," he adds; as to the couple in the "very different" America, "From what I've heard, it's a bit of a rocky road." As mid-terms loom. “They are going to try to paint me as a certain thing, (but) America is a lot bigger than (these) very small people make it out to be," he says. "They all think we won't step up and fight...We fight for each other."

@abdulelsayed

They all think we won't step up and fight... They think they're the biggest, baddest bully on the playground... That they're going to show up and we're going to run away...

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A researcher analyses ocean temperatures and oxygen levels
News

'It Is a Warning': Super El Niño Pushed Ocean Temps to Hottest on Record for July

Last month's average global ocean surface temperature was the hottest ever recorded in the month of July, fueled in part by uniquely intense, fossil fuel-driven El Niño conditions that have wreaked deadly havoc around the world this summer.

The European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said Monday that last month—which ranked as the second warmest July on record—"saw exceptionally high temperatures for the month across a large portion of the tropical Pacific, an area where El Niño conditions are present and forecast to further strengthen in the coming months." Average global sea surface temperatures (SSTs) were 20.96°C last month, surpassing the July 2023 record of 20.89°C.

"Around Europe, SSTs reached record highs for July along the Atlantic coast and western Mediterranean, associated with widespread strong or severe marine heatwave conditions," C3S said.

Brian O'Donnell, director of the Campaign for Nature, said the latest Copernicus data "is more than another climate milestone; it is a warning that the natural systems we depend on are being pushed closer to their limits."

"Governments have become very good at documenting these records. Now they need to become much better at safeguarding the forests, wetlands, and oceans that help regulate the climate and protect communities from the impacts of warming world," said O'Donnell. "With land and ocean temperatures across Europe breaching records, governments should be investing far more and delivering on their global commitment to protect at least 30% of land and ocean by 2030."

The new analysis was released as western Europe and other regions faced deadly heat, wildfires, drought, and other extreme weather as the international community, including the US and other leading polluters, fails to rein in fossil fuel use—and as oil and gas giants reap record profits.

“Our leaders’ response has to be swifter and stronger than El Niño," Anne Jellema, executive director of the environmental group 350.org, said Monday. "We already know that global heating is supercharging extreme weather damage, and the public wants polluters to pay for it. With Big Oil’s earnings skyrocketing while a global food crisis looms, now is the time to act. The only way to stave off a humanitarian disaster is to make those causing it pay upfront—before even more damage is done.”

Scientists have characterized this year's El Niño, which officially began on June 11, as historically strong and dangerous, earning it the informal "Super El Niño" label.

The Washington Post reported Monday that the 2026 El Niño is "on track to become the strongest ever recorded, with cascading effects on global climate peaking late this year and into next."

"El Niño’s effects have already been felt around the planet," the Post observed. "The higher frequency of heat domes worldwide, the nonstop temperature records in Peru and deadly storms in Chile can all be linked to this pattern. As can the destructive typhoons in the western Pacific Ocean and the relative calm of the Atlantic hurricane season so far."

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned in remarks to reporters last month that El Niño is no longer just "on our doorstep."

"It is inside the house—and turning up the heat," said Guterres. "We have already endured a summer of extremes—record-shattering heat domes, apocalyptic wildfires raging in Spain, France, and far beyond. Thousands of lives lost in the scorching conditions.”

“But according to the latest science," he added, "this is only a warm-up act."

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US-ECONOMY-EMPLOYMENT
News

'Trump Is Tanking the US Economy': Dismal Report Shows 23,000 Jobs Lost, Slowing Wage Growth

Federal data released Friday shows the US economy shed 23,000 jobs last month, but one analyst said that figure was "only the beginning of the bad news" for the country's job market under the leadership of President Donald Trump.

"This is a bleak jobs report," said Heather Long, the chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union, noting that the unemployment rate fell slightly in July—but primarily because more people left the labor force—and year-over-year hourly wage growth slowed to 3.2%, not keeping up with inflation.

Breyon Williams, the Groundwork Collaborative's top economist, said in response to the new Labor Department numbers that "regardless of having a job or not, everyone is paying high prices from Trump’s chaotic tariffs and war with Iran."

"Today’s report shows a patchwork economy that is fraying at the seams," said Williams. "Trump’s economic mismanagement has injected so much uncertainty into the economy that employers are not confident enough to add more people, but also have not initiated massive layoffs, creating a frozen job market where those with jobs are afraid to leave them and those without are stuck on the sidelines."

Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) wrote on social media that "Trump is tanking the US economy."

In addition to the loss of 23,000 jobs last month—far worse than forecasters' expectation of an increase of 80,000 jobs—the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) revised job growth downward for both May and June. BLS said job growth in May was actually 20,000 (down from the earlier estimate of 57,000), and job growth in June was 63,000 (down from 129,000). The healthcare sector has accounted for a disproportionate share of US employment growth this year.

"This economy is running on fumes," said Angela Hanks, a former Labor Department official who now works as chief of policy programs at The Century Foundation. "However the White House tries to spin these numbers, their talking points ring hollow for people who are actually experiencing Trump’s weak economy."

White House spin efforts began almost immediately after the release of the new figures.

Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, claimed during a Fox Business appearance that the dismal job numbers were a testament to the success of Trump's mass deportation campaign, even though the largest job losses in July occurred in state and local government.

"Because we have a tight border and because we've been deporting folks who aren't citizens, then that puts downward pressure on what the sort of breakeven job number is," said Hassett.

Speaking to reporters outside the White House, Hassett also blamed the "end of the World Cup," which "meant that a lot of hospitality workers were then laid off."

"Is this the ‘Golden Age’ that Donald Trump and JD Vance keep talking about?" asked Kendall Witmer, the Democratic National Committee's rapid response director, following publication of the BLS report. "Trump’s disastrous economic agenda has caused irreparable damage to the job market, as layoffs mount and it’s nearly impossible to find a job."

"Working families are already drowning under the weight of skyrocketing costs on everyday goods like groceries, gas, and healthcare, and their paychecks aren’t keeping up," said Witmer. "Americans are barely keeping their heads above water—and Trump can’t even be bothered to care."

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Francesca Hong
News

After Narrow Defeat, Hong 'Fully' Backs Crowley for Wisconsin Governor

Francesca Hong on Wednesday unequivocally endorsed David Crowley in Wisconsin's gubernatorial contest following her razor-close loss in the Democratic primary, a show of unity in the face of the Republican Party's extremist nominee, Trump-endorsed US Rep. Tom Tiffany.

"Congratulations to David Crowley and his team," said Hong, a grassroots candidate who lost by less than one percentage point despite a massive fundraising disadvantage. "I fully support him and look forward to working with him to defeat Congressman Tiffany in November."

Hong said she is "overwhelmingly proud" of her campaign and emphasized that her run "was not about getting one person into office."

"It is about building a movement for permanent affordability and a government that puts working people first," said Hong. "Our movement is strong, and the work isn't done."

Crowley, the Milwaukee County executive who suspended his campaign in early July only to reenter the primary less than a month ago with the support of outgoing Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, echoed Hong's call for party unity to defeat the GOP in November.

“Every one of us has something much bigger to unite around,” Crowley said at a press conference on Wednesday. “And that is keeping MAGA extremism from bringing the chaos we see in Washington into our neighborhoods right here in the state of Wisconsin. From the very first day I announced this campaign, I said the real threat wasn’t any of my primary opponents. The real opponent has always been Tom Tiffany. That remains true today.”

Of the more than 311,000 Wisconsinites who voted for Hong on Tuesday, Crowley said, "I look forward to earning their support."

“We may not agree on every policy," said Crowley. "We may not use the same labels, but we all want safe communities, strong schools, affordable health care, good-paying jobs, and a brighter future for all of our children."

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Lawsuit Filed Against 'Blatantly Corrupt' Trump Scheme to Charge for Early Access to Market-Moving Social Posts
News

Lawsuit Filed Against 'Blatantly Corrupt' Trump Scheme to Charge for Early Access to Market-Moving Social Posts

A lawsuit filed on Wednesday is challenging the legality of Truth API, a recently unveiled initiative to allow Wall Street firms to pay up to $100,000 per month in exchange for early access to potentially market-moving social media posts from President Donald Trump.

The complaint, filed by the Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) and The Intercept, alleges Truth API violates the US Constitution's First Amendment by granting insiders special access to the president's announcements.

The scheme also violates the Constitution's Fifth Amendment by "charging unreasonable sums that cannot be justified to offset the cost" of receiving the benefit of information from the president, the complaint states.

The lawsuit describes Truth API as "profoundly corrupt," given that "the president stands to gain financially by giving 'market-moving' government information to those who are willing and able to pay his personal company."

In establishing the plaintiffs' standing, the complaint argues that The Intercept is being put at a competitive disadvantage by the scheme, given that the news outlet is "both unable and unwilling to subscribe" to it, even though it risks "losing out on timely news to competing organizations."

Ben Muessig, editor-in-chief of The Intercept, accused the president of "trying to enrich himself by privatizing government information that he has no right to sell," while vowing that "we won't let that stand."

David Bralow, chief legal officer for The Intercept, said that "nothing could be more antithetical to the free, independent press than the president charging for early access to his public announcements," emphasizing that "public information belongs to the public."

Seth Stern, chief of advocacy at FPF, said Truth API "is so blatantly corrupt and unconstitutional that it would have been hard to even fathom just a few years ago."

"Trump’s crooked scheme is particularly outrageous," Stern added, "because, as documented by our Trump Anti-Press Social Media Tracker, he frequently uses his Truth Social account to berate journalists and even to announce his plans to sue them and criminally investigate them. Then, he makes them wait in line behind paying customers to find out about it unless they’re willing to subsidize the platform he uses to attack them."

The Intercept and the FPF are being represented in the case by attorneys from Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), the Yale Law School Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic, the Public Integrity Project, and Altshuler Berzon LLP.

Nikhel Sus, chief counsel at CREW, said his organization was "proud to represent our clients in their effort to end this corrupt and unconstitutional scheme" because "all Americans are entitled to timely access to their president’s public statements, not just those willing to pay the president’s company $100,000 a month."

Truth API has also drawn the attention of Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), ranking member of the US House Judiciary Committee, who announced a probe into the initiative last month, describing it as an "insider-information scheme" that "will enable Wall Street to profit from the president’s frequent market-moving posts on major businesses."

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A child stands among the rubble after Israeli authorities demolished his family's home
News

At UN Security Council, Officials Say Israeli Settler Violence Has Brought West Bank to 'Breaking Point'

Home demolitions by Israeli forces; attacks on healthcare infrastructure, homes, and schools; mass displacement of Palestinians; and the expansion of illegal settlements across the West Bank have brought the occupied Palestinian territory to "the breaking point," said a top humanitarian official at the United Nations Security Council Tuesday, calling for a "coordinated international effort" to end the violent Israeli occupation.

At a meeting on the situation in the territory, Ramiz Alakbarov, the UN special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, addressed the council as families in the town of Qusra, northern Nablus, were facing days of attacks by Israeli settlers.

That violence exemplified what the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem called an escalating "ethnic cleansing" operation that Israel's military allows.

As B'Tselem said Wednesday, settlers had established an illegal outpost in the yards of two Palestinian families' homes, “forcing the families out and taking over their homes," and the US-backed Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had done nothing to protect the Palestinian residents.

“Israeli ethnic cleansing in the West Bank is accelerating and expanding in full view of everyone,” Yuli Novak, president of B'Tselem, told Anadolu Agency, adding that the settlers' seizure of the Palestinian homes was “not an isolated incident."

Breaking the Silence, an organization run by former IDF members who oppose the occupation, explained how settlers, with the backing of the military, essentially blockade individual homes as a method of driving Palestinians out.

"Violent settlers may do the 'dirty work' of daily terror against Palestinian men, women, and children, but neither this terror nor ethnic cleansing would be possible without the army’s support," said the group. "Village after village, house after house. It keeps happening because it is policy."

At the Security Council meeting, Alakbarov said Israeli forces have killed 76 Palestinians, including 18 children, in the West Bank in 2026 so far, while children make up nearly half of the 3,800 Palestinians who have been displaced by settler attacks, demolitions, and evictions.

"One hundred and twenty-seven Palestinian communities have experienced full or partial displacement since January 2023, including 47 that have been entirely displaced, affecting more than 6,390 Palestinians," said Alakbarov. "Settler violence has reached unprecedented levels. So far this year the UN has documented more than 1,430 incidents involving Israeli settlers that resulted in casualties, property damage, or both, affecting approximately 260 Palestinian communities. Many incidents occurred in the presence of Israeli forces."

As Alakbarov spoke Tuesday, the World Health Organization warned that the West Bank has also seen an uptick in violence against healthcare infrastructure, with Israeli carrying out 83 attacks on healthcare transport such as ambulances and 11 attacks on medical centers and facilities, injuring at least 33 people and killing four. July saw a surge in healthcare attacks—a hallmark of Israel's assault on Gaza that began in 2023—with 37 strikes on infrastructure.

Settler attacks were once mainly concentrated in Area C, which comprises about 60% of the West Bank and is under Israeli control.

But Alakbarov said settlers are increasingly waging violence against Palestinians in Areas A and B, which are under the administration of the Palestinian Authority.

“The future of the region is at stake,” the UN permanent observer for the state of Palestine, Riyad Mansour, told the Security Council. “International will cannot bow before the colonial whims of the Israeli government.”

Israeli officials in recent months have advanced and approved about 12,360 housing units in settlements across the West Bank this year, with the Security Cabinet signing off on 13 new settlements in the central part of the territory last month. The move further isolates East Jerusalem, which Palestinians consider the capital of a future Palestinian state, from the rest of the West Bank.

Last year Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also signed an agreement to develop 3,400 new units in the E1 settlement, which would also cut off access to East Jerusalem. The prime minister said as he approved the deal, "There will be no Palestinian state."

The approvals of more settlement housing this year and the escalation in IDF-sanctioned violence against Palestinian communities across the West Bank "are interconnected steps, not isolated developments,” Alakbarov said Tuesday.

"The situation in the West Bank must be treated as an emergency requiring urgent action," he said. "The concern is not only the continued expansion of settlements, but the speed and systematic manner in which new facts are being created on the ground. New outposts are established, often with state support, and can be retroactively authorized or incorporated into the wider settlement system. From these outposts, settler violence and intimidation have driven the displacement of Palestinian communities."

He added that the spread of settler outposts in agricultural and grazing areas is "deeply troubling."

"Requiring only a small number of settlers, they enable control over vast areas of land," said Alakbarov. "Israeli monitoring organizations report that agricultural and pastoral outposts now exercise effective control over close to 20% of the West Bank."

Israeli forces also arrested 23 Palestinians on Tuesday, including two children, days after a large-scale operation at Qalandia refugee camp resulted in the detentions of more than 60 people.

Hannah Sulieman, deputy executive director of the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), emphasized that 355 Palestinian children are currently being detained in Israeli military prisons—"the highest number in eight years."

The arrests and the violence mean that for children and their families in the West Bank, "the fundamental spaces of childhood—the home, the classroom, the street, the community—are becoming increasingly unsafe," said Sulieman.

“Children in the West Bank have the same rights as children everywhere,” she said. "To live, to learn, to be protected, and to imagine a future beyond violence and fear."

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