Democrats could have voted to eliminate the debt ceiling between the fall elections and January, when Republicans took control of the House, or they could have voted to provide the government with sufficient borrowing capacity until the next congressional elections in 2024. Instead, they chose this confrontation. Mr. Biden last fall labeled proposals to eliminate the debt ceiling ‘irresponsible.’

Having a baby in the last 12 months is associated with an increased chance of being in medical debt by nearly 50 percent.

The days when Sweden and Finland can — in principle, at least — work for alternatives are numbered. That is, for the UN Treaty on nuclear abolition and the UN goals of general and complete disarmament, any alternative policy concepts like common security, human security, a strong UN etc. They won’t be able to serve as mediators, and no NATO member can pay anything but lip service to such noble goals. NATO is not a liberal institution that promotes alternatives; it’s a juggernaut that eradicates them.

President Biden and Attorney General Garland have no reason to defend the nonsense which is the debt ceiling, besides a vague sense of formality and tradition driven by elite political etiquette that Republicans have long since abandoned. The media needs to quit deferring to the debt ceiling’s political theater and engage more with the essentially uncontroverted legal experts pointing out that it cannot be implemented in a constitutional manner.

We are outraged, though sadly not surprised, that this ultra-right-wing Supreme Court would choose to decimate long-standing common-sense protections for sensitive wetlands throughout the country. Wetlands play an integral role in protecting downstream waterways and reducing flooding — which will only worsen as climate change makes extreme weather more frequent. Today’s decision rejects this established science in favor of corporate developers’ profiteering.

“When we invest so heavily in militarism at home and abroad, we deprive our own communities and people of solutions to problems that pose immediate security threats,” said co-author Lindsay Koshgarian, Program Director of the National Priorities Project. “We underfund programs to end poverty, provide affordable housing, bolster public education, and protect clean air and water at our peril. Spending on militarism takes up the majority of the federal discretionary budget, and it has grown faster than all other spending. If we keep up these patterns, we are hurtling toward a future where we can’t afford the basics of a…

El-Tayyab, said: “I’m very concerned that the administration is adding all these conditions to a full U.S. military exit and a Saudi-Houthi deal. I’m worried that they’d use the idea that we need to have a perfect inclusive peace as a precondition to lifting the blockade. … Yemenis should be allowed to chart their own future. It increasingly seems like the Biden administration would rather slow down diplomatic progress instead of finally just ending the Saudi-Houthi conflict.”

Resident doctors are on strike at Elmhurst Hospital in Queens. This is the first doctors’ strike in New York City in 33 years.

For much of the past week, former Pakistani Prime Minster Imran Khan’s house in Lahore has been surrounded by armed police, and the Rangers — a repressive force straddling the police and Army but under civilian control — have been on standby. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court has ruled that Khan should not be arrested, but he doubts he will stay out of jail for long. The entire leadership of his party, the PTI [Pakistan Movement for Justice], is currently behind bars. A state crackdown is in full swing.

Shortages of critical medicines––including amoxicillin, the generic antibiotic––are harming pediatric patients, their families, and their providers.