According to a new poll from Vox and Data for Progress, a majority of likely voters — 64 percent — would back more coronavirus relief, even if it means approving it via budget reconciliation, rather than the standard process for advancing most bills.

Republicans [.] want Biden to give in to their wishes in the name of bipartisanship. Should he?

No, no, 1.9 trillion times, no…the G.O.P. proposal is grotesquely inadequate for a nation still ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic.

It’s one thing for Biden to find it convenient if Republicans simply embrace his plan so he can claim bipartisan support, but the true test will come if he actually gives way on some of his liberal priorities and offers some real compromises to follow through on his promise of unity.

As an occupied population, Palestinians are conferred a series of protections under the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949. Aside from protections for health, hygiene, and other living conditions, the convention specifies that no agreement between the parties supersedes its protections while occupation continues.

Israel is under no legal obligation to hand its vaccine to other authorities… But Israel is an “occupier,” cry the pundits. Also not exactly true. Israel evacuated Gaza more than a dozen years ago. It allowed the establishment of a Palestinian Authority almost thirty years ago. That the Palestinians who live in certain territories are not fully free to do as they wish is undeniable. But calling Israel an “occupier” is mostly used more as a slogan than a nuanced description of a complicated situation.

Claims that Israel is responsible for Palestinian vaccinations in the West Bank due to obligations outlined in the Fourth Geneva Convention – which deals with humanitarian protections for civilians in conflict zones – are incorrect. In international law, old legal frameworks are superseded by newer ones. Upon the signing of the Oslo Accords, the Fourth Geneva Convention ceased to apply to the West Bank, and Oslo became the new legal framework by which Israel and the Palestinians had to abide.

Fortunately the vaccines being given do seem to work against new variants. But the longer the pandemic continues, including in countries where mass vaccination may take until 2024 or later, the more new variants are likely to emerge, possibly requiring adjustments to vaccines to keep them current.

Though many questions remain, one plausible explanation is that people who have already been infected by the virus are getting sick—and not mildly so. That possibility has been long feared throughout the pandemic, yet not previously seen on any significant scale.

…now we have a game of “cat and mouse,” said virus expert Ravi Gupta, between the virus and the vaccine… This process is going to cost the world a great deal of money — and take time, Gupta added. “I don’t think there’s going to be a single solution that just comes along in 2021 that says, ‘That’s it, we’re done.’ The coronavirus is going to cause a long-term disruption.”

What happened on Jan. 6 had nothing to do with fences or barriers or bad security infrastructure at the Capitol. It was a human failure, not an infrastructure failure.

More needs to be done to protect the Capitol complex, but the failure of Capitol security leaders to plan for the predictable terrorist attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, does not justify closing the complex from the public, to whom it belongs.

What the fence is: an unfortunate but necessary… What the fence is not: an affront to freedom akin to some of history’s most formidable barriers, including the Berlin Wall.

The effort to recall California’s Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom is growing, and his allies and Democrats are taking notice. This will be the sixth recall attempt against Newsom, now two years into his first term. But organizers and Republicans in the state say it’s the most serious effort yet due to outrage over his COVID restrictions, slowdowns in vaccine distribution, mounting homelessness and unemployment fraud.

If it qualifies — look for his supporters to point out that some of the alternatives who could line up to take his place will be at the far ends of the political spectrum. A lot of California voters might soon be singing to the tune of “Stuck in the Middle with You,” a 70’s one-hit wonder by Stealers Wheel.

Voters are extremely upset about [the “French Laundry” scandal]… It’s optics, but it’s even deeper than that. Everybody has sacrificed so much. We’ve been, by and large, locked in our houses for the better part of a year. And to see the governor flippantly ignoring his own rules hit a nerve.

Her defenders say Suu Kyi may not have felt she could push the military on human rights without destabilizing this fragile power sharing between civilians and the military. So she didn’t push—and yet she still got detained and toppled.

Myanmar’s democratic transition in the years following 2009 was a near-miracle. To see it so callously rolled back is a tragedy, a sign that the army is nervous about giving up its power and privileges to rowdy civilian rule, as in neighbouring Thailand.

Article 417 of the constitution justifies the coup, allowing the military to take power if a state of emergency threatens the sovereignty or unity of the country. The military considers itself to be in the right. However, the coup amounts to the improbable principle of the military having to abolish democracy in order to save it.

And so, how much power is the military ultimately willing to give up? The unmistakable answer: none.