A new terrorist threat

Fears that al Qaida’s offshoot in Yemen could be about to stage an audacious new terrorist attack led the U.S. this week to request that officials at more than a dozen foreign airports confiscate from passengers any electronic devices that cannot be switched on. The move came in response to intelligence reports that the terrorist group, Al Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), was trying to hide explosives in hollowed-out cellphones, tablets, and laptops, U.S. officials told The New York Times. Since 2009, al Qaida’s Yemen affiliate has attempted to blow up at least three planes using bombs carried onboard by passengers or stashed inside cargo. “Our job is to try to anticipate the next attack,” said Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, “not simply react to the last one.”

Israelis, Palestinians escalate their blood feud

In an escalating cycle of revenge, Palestinian militants rained rockets deep into Israel this week as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directed his military to “intensify even further” its airstrike assault on Gaza. The deadly confrontation was sparked by the discovery last week of three murdered Israeli kidnapping victims, and then a Palestinian teen killed by Israelis in an apparent revenge attack. When Israel responded to the murdered teens by attacking Hamas targets in Gaza, Palestinians launched a new wave of rocket attacks that struck deeper into Israel than ever before. This week two rockets hit Jerusalem, the first time Palestinian rockets have reached the city, and at least one was intercepted by the Iron Dome missile-defense system over Tel Aviv. Netanyahu warned that Hamas, the Islamist group that controls Gaza, would “pay a heavy price for firing at Israeli citizens.”

Why Liberals Should Applaud Obama

Paul Krugman- The New York Times

Why are liberals so disappointed with President Obama? asked Paul Krugman. “The prevailing media narrative” is that Obama’s presidency has fallen far short of “the extravagant hopes of 2008.” But presidents should be judged by their achievements, not by unrealistic fantasies, and by that standard, Obama’s presidency is a major success. Despite unhinged opposition from Republicans, Obama’s health-care reform law is now working well. Enrollments came in above projections, the number of uninsured Americans has dropped sharply, and additional insurance companies are jumping into the exchanges to compete for new customers—all great signs for the Affordable Care Act. Obama’s new emissions rules for power plants—“the most important environmental initiative since the Clean Air Act”—mark the first serious attempt to address climate change. Obama’s regulatory reforms of Wall Street have enraged the big banks—proof the new rules have teeth. Yes, many Americans “are disappointed that Obama didn’t manage to make our politics less bitter and polarized.” But how was that possible, when Republicans were determined to block him from day one? In the face of their relentless sabotage, Obama has moved the ball down the field. History’s verdict will be: “Yes, he could.”

Funny News Stories

Good week for...

Fantasy, after a married New Jersey mother of two who is obsessed with Bradley Cooper started living her life with a cardboard cutout of the actor, taking it wherever she goes. “While most of us don’t actually live our lives with movie stars,” said Danielle Davies, “many of us wish we did.”

Extreme foodies, after a Bangladeshi soccer fan in Brazil for the World Cup spent $7,000 to have his favorite curry delivered from a restaurant in England.

Puking diamonds, after a Wisconsin woman found her missing wedding ring in the unlikeliest of places: her dog’s vomit. Lois Matykowski lost the ring five years ago, but got it back when her dog, Tucker, gobbled down a Popsicle and promptly barfed.

Abortion clinics: Supreme Court strikes down a ‘buffer zone’

Whatever you think about abortion, said Jonathan Keim in NationalReview.com, last week saw a clear “victory for free speech.” In a case many thought would divide the justices, the Supreme Court voted unanimously to overturn a Massachusetts law that barred anti-abortion activists from entering a 35-foot “buffer zone” around the door of any abortion clinic. In particular, the justices found, the exclusion zone placed an undue burden on the free-speech rights of peaceful abortion opponents such as the plaintiff, Eleanor McCullen, a 77-year-old grandmother who politely offers leaflets to clinic visitors and asks them for a chance to explain her views. I’m a “committed supporter of a woman’s—increasingly imperiled—right to choose,” said Laurence H. Tribe in The New York Times, but even I think the court got this one right. It may sometimes make us uncomfortable, but the presence of “diverse views in our public spaces” is what this nation’s all about.

Health and Science News

How fighting changed our faces

Men may have evolved to take a punch in the face. That’s the conclusion of a radical new theory suggesting that our male ancestors developed more robust brows, jaws, cheeks, and molars for protection during fights over mates, food, and other resources. The conclusions are based on an examination of the facial structures of Australopithecus—the immediate predecessors of the human genus Homo—compared with those of apes and modern humans. “It turns out that the parts of the face that became stronger were the parts of the face that most frequently break when modern humans fight,” evolutionary biologist David Carrier tells LiveScience.com. The theory builds on earlier work suggesting that the modern hand—with its flexible thumb, squared palm, and shorter digits—was adapted for aggression. Researchers note that the ability to form a fist entered the fossil record about 4 million years ago, around the same time that males developed their thicker facial features.

Immigration: How reform died

“One year ago,” said Susan Page in USA Today, “Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake and fellow members of the bipartisan Gang of Eight watched as the immigration bill they helped negotiate swept the Senate to chants of ‘Yes, we can!’” The legislation, supported by business, religious, and law-enforcement groups, aimed to set 11 million undocumented immigrants on a path to citizenship. One year on, that bill is officially dead. Speaker John Boehner this week confirmed that House Republicans wouldn’t act on the Senate’s legislation, while President Obama vowed to use executive action to try to fix America’s broken immigration system on his own. Who’s to blame for the bill’s death? asked Lawrence Downes in NYTimes.com. “Republicans in the House.” Cowed by their Tea Party fringe, GOP moderates have found countless ways “to say no and do nothing.” Now, with the midterms looming and electioneering taking over, “an opportunity for once-in-a-generation reform is gone.”

It wasn’t all bad

When Robert Renning noticed that a nearby car had caught fire, he didn’t think twice about pulling over and approaching the burning SUV. When he got there, he saw that all of the doors had locked, trapping the driver, Michael Johannes. Renning sprang into action, wedging his fingers into the crease above the door and planting his foot for leverage. The 52-year-old managed to bend the locked door in half, shattering the glass. Johannes escaped with only minor cuts, but Renning humbly downplayed his Superman moment. “Somebody was in trouble,” he said. “You’re supposed to help each other out.”

Suing Obama: A bid to stop executive action

Republicans have decided to resolve their differences with President Obama “according to a time-honored American tradition,” said Dana Milbank in WashingtonPost .com. They’re taking him to court. Speaker John Boehner last week announced plans to introduce legislation that would let the House sue Obama for eroding “the power of the legislative branch” through his use of executive actions. Boehner is “right to stand up for the Constitution,” said Jonathan S. Tobin in CommentaryMagazine .com. During Obama’s “imperial presidency” he has unilaterally rewritten the Affordable Care Act at least 23 times, released terrorists from Guantánamo without notifying Congress, and overruled the House and Senate with executive orders on everything from immigration reform to coal plant emissions. This tyranny is exactly what our Constitution was designed to protect against: presidents who, choosing to enforce only the laws they like, are “little different from kings and queens.”

Supreme Court deals a blow to Obamacare

The Supreme Court struck down a key part of President Obama’s signature health-care law this week, ruling that family-owned businesses can invoke religious objections to avoid covering contraception in employees’ health plans. The 5–4 decision, which split the court along conservative-liberal lines, sided with two companies owned by Christian families: craft chain Hobby Lobby and cabinetmakers Conestoga. Both firms argued that the Affordable Care Act’s employer mandate, which compels large companies to provide workers with free birth control, was a “substantial burden” on their religious beliefs, because they consider intrauterine devices and the morning-after pill tantamount to abortion. The court accepted the argument, and ruled that the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which allows people to seek exemptions from federal laws that burden their religious practice, could be applied to for-profit firms. Writing for the majority, Justice Samuel Alito said the decision would only affect “closely held” companies—controlled by five or fewer individuals—and suggested that the government or insurers could pay for contraceptive coverage.

Health and science neews

The downside of being cool

Being popular as a teenager doesn’t mean smooth sailing as an adult. In fact, a new, decade-long study found that stereotypical “cool” teens are more likely to stumble socially and have drug and alcohol problems in their 20s. “We call it the high school reunion effect,” University of Virginia psychologist Joseph Allen tells CNN.com. “The student who was popular and was running with the fast crowd isn’t doing as great later on.” Researchers interviewed 184 seventh- and eighth-graders to identify the “social strivers”—those who date at a young age, have good-looking friends, and are defiant of authority. Researchers also spoke with the students’ parents and friends, then followed up with them at age 22 or 23. Compared with their peers, the adult strivers had 45 percent higher rates of alcohol and drug problems and 22 percent higher rates of criminal behavior. Their ability to have positive relationships was also 24 percent lower. It may be that as cool kids get older, behaviors that once impressed their friends don’t have the same effect. So they turn to increasingly extreme measures to get attention.

What’s new in tech

A simple way to connect

It may be a million-dollar app, but it sure doesn’t do much, said William Alden and Sydney Ember in NYTimes.com. Yo, a new offering from Mobli CEO Moshe Hogeg, lets users send the two-letter greeting in a text and audio message to friends just by tapping their name on a contact list. The app has already found a following among World Cup fans, with anyone who sends a Yo to “WORLDCUP” receiving a Yo notification each time a goal is scored. But the startup, which announced last week that it has raised over a million dollars in funding from angel investors, says the app has the potential for a broader impact, calling it “a lightweight, nonintrusive way to communicate.”

Walker: The GOP’s 2016 nominee?

After Mitt Romney’s crushing 2012 defeat, Republicans consoled themselves with the belief that they had a “deep bench” of future presidential candidates, said Jonathan Chait in NYMag.com. “Unfortunately, a large number of them appear to be criminals.” Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell is facing up to 30 years in prison on corruption charges. In New Jersey, Gov. Chris Christie is sweating out a major federal investigation over the George Washington Bridge scandal. Now Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, “possibly the new front-runner in the wake of Christie’s demise,” has been implicated in a scandal of his own. Last week, a federal judge unsealed documents showing that state prosecutors had investigated whether Walker directed “a criminal scheme” to circumvent campaign-finance laws during his recall election in 2012. So, who’s next on the Republican roster?

The IRS: Could Lerner’s emails really just evaporate?

Well, that didn’t go very well, said Michael Gerson in The Washington Post. IRS Commissioner John Koskinen was summoned before Congress this week to answer more questions about the agency’s targeting of conservative groups for extra scrutiny prior to the 2012 elections, and somehow managed to “destroy what is left of his agency’s credibility.” Under relentless questioning by incredulous Republican congressmen, Koskinen insisted the agency could not retrieve two years’ worth of lost emails to and from Lois Lerner, the official suspected of having singled out conservative groups for IRS scrutiny. Lerner’s hard drive, Koskinen said, had been destroyed, and all “backup tapes” had been erased. “It is not unusual for computers anywhere to fail,” he said, blaming Congress for budget cuts that forced the IRS to use antiquated computer systems. This stonewalling “tells us that Congress is sniffing down the right trail,” said Kimberley Strassel in WSJ.com. Are we really expected to believe that on June 13, 2011—10 days after congressional Republicans first wrote to the IRS about the targeting of conservatives—Lerner’s “hard-drive supposedly defied modernity and suffered total annihilation?”