WASHINGTON, D.C. — Asked to compare the U.S. to other modern, industrialized nations on a number of dimensions, Americans are most positive about individual freedoms and least positive about the U.S. healthcare system. Sixty-four percent of Americans say that U.S. freedoms are the best or above average, while just 27% say the same about the healthcare system. Majorities also say the U.S. compares favorably on quality of life and the ability of people to get ahead while less than half say their economic system and system of government are above average compared with other modern nations.

The healthcare system is the only one of the six items measured for which more say the U.S. is the worst or below average than say the U.S. is the best or above average.

These results, based on Gallup interviewing conducted Aug. 6-12, update an initial assessment from December 2012, just about a month after President Barack Obama won […]

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After a deluge of harassment and threats from the parents of classmates at her middle school in Achille, OK, the family of a transgender 7th grader named Maddie have announced they’re leaving the state entirely, and will be moving in with family in neighboring Texas to avoid the ongoing harassment.

“We actually moved here from Sherman hoping to have a fresh start for Maddie, because she was severely bullied there, and taunted to commit suicide, and assaulted in the bathroom,” Brandy Rose, Maddie’s mother, said on a crowdfunding page raising money to assist in the move. “Unfortunately, her fresh start did not last long.”

Twelve-year-old Maddie’s story first gained national prominence after reportsthat parents in a private Facebook group for the Achille Independent School District had been writing derogatory—and in some cases explicitly threatening—messages about her.

“The transgender is already using the girls bathroom,” one parent wrote, while another referred to Maddie as a “maggot.”

“If he wants to be a female make him a female,” a third person wrote. “A good sharp knife will do the job really quick.”

After […]

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There was great public outcry over the Trump administration’s separation of thousands of minor children from their immigrant parents, many of whom were legally pursuing asylum here in the United States when they were apprehended. The move has been widely condemned as inhumane and likely a violation of international law.

But less widely reported is the Trump administration’s targeting of the households in which close to five million U.S born children, who as American citizens reside with at least one parent who is undocumented. In New Jersey alone it is estimated that 185,580, or one-in-11 of the children that call New Jersey home, lives with at least one immediate family member who is undocumented making them vulnerable to deportation.

Since the start of President Trump’s multi-faceted immigration crackdown, local public health and law enforcement officials have raised concerns that immigrant communities fear of involvement with their agencies would have both public safety and public health ramifications well beyond the immigrant families.

Earlier this year “with no fanfare and little public notice, the Department of State has amended the Foreign Affairs manual to increase […]

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Microsoft said it had seized fake websites, linked to a Russian military intelligence unit, meant to trick people into thinking they were sites for Republican-leaning think tanks that have criticized President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.
CreditGulshan Khan/Agence France-Presse

BOSTON — The Russian military intelligence unit that sought to influence the 2016 election appears to have a new target: conservative American think tanks that have broken with President Trump and are seeking continued sanctions against Moscow, exposing oligarchs or pressing for human rights.

In a report scheduled for release on Tuesday, Microsoft Corporation said that it detected and seized websites that were created in recent weeks by hackers linked to the Russian unit formerly known as the G.R.U. The sites appeared meant to trick people into thinking they were clicking through links managed by the Hudson Institute and the International Republican Institute, but were secretly redirected to web pages created by the hackers to steal passwords and other credentials.

Microsoft also found websites imitating the United States Senate, […]

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Amtrak’s Sunset Limited at San Marcos, Tex.
Credit: Lyndon Henry

Astoundingly, the primary push for this appears to come, not from anti-Amtrak forces in the Capitol or White House, but from Amtrak’s newly revamped management itself. Indeed, as former Amtrak CEO Joe Boardman recently warned in a May 10 Railway Age commentary, efforts are under way “by Amtrak’s current leadership to dismantle our interconnected, intercity rail passenger network …”

Boardman’s warning dovetails with what I’ve been hearing from an array of other sources, including some with intimate knowledge of Amtrak’s internal dynamics (and whose anonymity I intend to protect). It’s now no secret that the administration of newly minted Amtrak CEO Richard Anderson (former Executive Chairman of Delta Airlines) has a pretty dismal future in mind for nationwide passenger rail connectivity, described by venerable rail journalist Don Phillips (in his own May 15 commentary) as “Anderson’s apparent plan to start killing Amtrak’s long-distance trains.”

Perhaps it’d be useful at this point to review some major reasons why long-distance […]

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