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Why the Media Is Ignoring the Afghanistan Papers | The New Republic

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Why the Media Is Ignoring the Afghanistan Papers | The New Republic

The Afghanistan Papers are, in other words, a bombshell. Yet the report has received scant attention from the broader press. Neither NBC nor ABC covered the investigation in their nightly broadcasts this week. In other outlets, it has been buried beneath breathless reporting on the latest developments in the impeachment saga, Joe Biden’s purported pledge to serve only one term, and world leaders’ pathological envy of a 16-year-old girl.

The relentless news cycle that characterizes Donald Trump’s America surely deserves some blame: This isn’t the first time that a consequential news story has been buried under an avalanche of other news stories. But one major reason that the Afghanistan Papers have received so comparatively little coverage is that everyone is to blame, which means no one has much of an interest in keeping the story alive. There are no hearings, few press gaggles.

George W. Bush started the Afghanistan War and botched it in plenty of ways, not least by starting another war in Iraq. But Barack Obama, despite his obvious skepticism of the war effort, exacerbated Bush’s mistakes by bowing to the Washington foreign policy blob and authorizing a pointless troop surge. Now, although both Democrats and Donald Trump seem to be on the same page about getting the U.S. out of Afghanistan, there has been little progress with peace talks. The pattern across administrations is that any movement toward resolution is usually met with a slow slide back into the status quo, a.k.a. quagmire.

How the U.S. betrayed the Marshall Islands, kindling the next nuclear disaster – Los Angeles Times

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How the U.S. betrayed the Marshall Islands, kindling the next nuclear disaster – Los Angeles Times

Five thousand miles west of Los Angeles and 500 miles north of the equator, on a far-flung spit of white coral sand in the central Pacific, a massive, aging and weathered concrete dome bobs up and down with the tide.

Here in the Marshall Islands, Runit Dome holds more than 3.1 million cubic feet — or 35 Olympic-sized swimming pools — of U.S.-produced radioactive soil and debris, including lethal amounts of plutonium. Nowhere else has the United States saddled another country with so much of its nuclear waste, a product of its Cold War atomic testing program.

Wikipedia – Gestapo

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Wikipedia – Gestapo

I knew very little about the gestapo and how they operated in the Nazi state. They really weren't the all powerful force they were made out to be, mostly relying on the public to report traitors and so-called sexual deviants to their forces. With the term gestapo thrown around in American politics so much, it's interesting to learn more about these forces controlled by Hitler and directly responsible for implementing the holocaust.

Shoulder-Fired Weapons May Pose Brain Injury Risk To The Shooter, Army Finds

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Shoulder-Fired Weapons May Pose Brain Injury Risk To The Shooter, Army Finds

"During the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, military officials recognized that the blast wave from a roadside bomb could damage a person's brain without leaving any visible sign of injury. And in 2010, the Pentagon issued a memo outlining steps to improve care of troops exposed to these explosions."

"Since then, there's been growing evidence that blasts from weapons like the Carl Gustav recoilless rifle and the AT4 anti-tank weapon can also affect the brain."

"Sgt. John Wagley fires an AT4 anti-tank missile during a training session at Camp Fuji, in Japan. Studies find that some who fire these weapons repeatedly have short-term problems with memory and thinking. It's still not clear, scientists say, whether those temporary changes can lead to permanent deficits."

"If you're looking at a large anti-tank rocket that a soldier would carry on his or her shoulder, that's now a pretty large explosion β€” and it's happening right next to your head." Scharre says."