While the story of the Texas flooding tragedy and what went wrong is still unspooling, scientists said it provides another reminder that climate change can make extreme rainfall events even worse.
What they're saying: "[T]his kind of record-shattering rain (caused by slow-moving torrential thunderstorms) event is *precisely* that which is increasing the fastest in warming climate," UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain said in a longer social media thread.
The big picture: The world's richest man — who before his explosive fallout with President Trump said he'd do a lot less political spending moving forward — became a GOP mega-donor last year. Now, the billionaire seems intent on carving a new political path.
Mass surveillance. Pre-emptive military strikes in the Middle East. Shipping people to domestic and foreign prisons. Citing national security to hide information from the courts. Labeling people as "terrorists" as a political and legal strategy.
Why it matters: Donald Trump became president in part by running against the legacy of George W. Bush, the last Republican in the White House before him. But now Trump is supercharging many of the post-9/11 legal, tactical and political strategies Bush used.
The MAGA movement is reveling in the creativity, severity and accelerating force of President Trump's historic immigration crackdown.
Why it matters: Once-fringe tactics — an alligator-moated detention camp, deportations to war zones, denaturalization of immigrant citizens — are now being proudly embraced at the highest levels of the U.S. government.
It's not food, it's not chewing tobacco and it's not gum — though it might look like it when you see it — but it is becoming America's new addictive obsession.
Why it matters: Sales of Zyn nicotine pouches are soaring, prompting the tobacco company that makes them to scramble to boost U.S. production to meet demand.
For the first time since President Kennedy's assassination nearly 62 years ago, the CIA has tacitly admitted that an officer specializing in psychological warfare ran an operation that came into contact with Lee Harvey Oswald before the Dallas killing.
Why it matters: The disclosure Thursday — nestled in a batch of 40 documents concerning officer George Joannides — indicates the CIA lied for decades about his role in the Kennedy case before and after the assassination, according to experts on JFK's slaying.
