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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Barbara Dane

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features folk singer Barbara Dane. Enjoy!

^{Barbara Dane - You Don´t Know Me}

"The answer to the question “Why is that terrible thing happening?” is usually “Because it makes some rich white guys wealthier” or “Because it helps shore up US planetary domination” or “Because Israel wants it,” and it’s often some combination of all three."

-- Caitlin Johnstone

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News and Opinion

It’s Obnoxious For Westerners To Criticize The Targets Of The Western Empire

I still find myself fuming at the way ostensibly well-informed individuals can stand right in the heart of the empire denouncing its targets, as we saw in the open letter that a group of left-wing western individuals addressed “to Iran’s political prisoners” framing Iran as a “source of oppression” equal to the US and its allies.

It’s crazy this even needs to be said, but if you are a westerner your ONLY job is to oppose the abuses of the western empire. Not Iran. Not China. Not Russia, Cuba or North Korea.

If you live in the US or one of its allied nations, then you live under the single most tyrannical and murderous power structure on earth, and that’s where your focus belongs. You do not have any legitimacy in squandering any of your energy and attention criticizing human rights abuses in empire-targeted nations while living under a globe-spanning empire that is fueled by a nonstop river of human blood. It is not okay for you to use your western privilege to attack the nations your own government is working to help absorb into the power structure you live under.

Whenever I say this online I’ll get some Trotskyist or anarchist babbling about the need to express “solidarity” with Iranian political prisoners or whatever, but whenever I press them on what actual, material benefit those expressions of “solidarity” bring to the people they’re meant to help, they can’t point to anything solid. Whereas I can point to some very obvious ways in which contributing to an imperial war propaganda campaign can help grease the wheels for real material actions which hurt actual Iranians.

I don't care who you are, if your "anti-imperialism" leads you to attack the same governments as the CIA and the US State Department, then you're just another imperialist.

It's so obnoxious and disgusting to be an American and accuse empire-targeted countries of tyranny. This is… https://t.co/QSWqiL1fVU

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) August 21, 2026

If you’re a westerner, you have an obligation to use your voice responsibly. If you are feeding into the latest “the people in the empire-targeted nation need liberation from their evil tyrannical government” war propaganda narrative with your expressions of “solidarity” and your blind insistence on treating all bad things as equally bad, then you are using your western voice irresponsibly, and you are morally culpable for the mass slaughter you help facilitate with your recklessness.

It’s not okay to be a citizen of the western empire and act like human rights abuses in an empire-targeted nation are of equal or comparable concern to the far more egregious abuses of your own leaders and their allies. It’s also not okay to be a fully grown adult and believe the use of force in empire-targeted governments is happening separately from their targeting by the empire, as though Iran would look the way it looks today if the US and Israel had not been working to collapse and control it for generations.

Iran has only survived the latest imperial onslaught because Tehran tightly controls what happens in that country. The only reason we didn’t see Xinjiang absorbed into the western power umbrella with the help of CIA-backed separatists is because Beijing waged a sweeping crackdown on the extremist factions who’d been launching attacks in the territory. The only reason North Korea has gone relatively unmolested by the western empire in recent years is because its government obtained nuclear weapons. It’s baby-brained analysis to pretend such things happen independently of the US and its allies working to take control of unabsorbed nations and force them into compliance with Washington’s capitalist world order.

The western empire therefore makes the world a crueler and more abusive place not only by its direct acts of cruelty and abuse, but by the way it forces its targets to choose between (A) annihilation and (B) using extreme amounts of force to retain their sovereignty. The empire we live under is responsible for the vast majority of the dysfunction and misery in our world, and yet you as a westerner want to spend your time yelling at Iran?

Office Hours 40- Three Cheers for "Hollow Anti-Imperialism"! w/Sina Rahmani

The only good reason I can imagine for a Jeffries meeting with Kushner is to personally deliver a subpoena for his testimony https://t.co/1NnYtpm3Kv

— Tim Miller (@Timodc) August 23, 2026

AIPAC Shakur is taking the term "traitor Democrat" to a new height:

Democrats incredulous over Hakeem Jeffries and Jared Kushner meeting

Democrats and other Donald Trump critics reacted incredulously to a New York Times report on Sunday that House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries met with Jared Kushner, the president’s influential son-in-law, to discuss possible areas of collaboration. The reported meeting comes months ahead of the November midterm elections in which Democrats are favored to retake the US House, a development that would make Jeffries speaker. If they are in the majority, Democrats are expected to use their oversight power to aggressively investigate the Trump administration, including self-enrichment by the president and his family.

There are longstanding conflict-of-interest concerns about the way Kushner has continued to make money from foreign nations as he works on foreign affairs, including conflicts in Ukraine, Iran and Gaza. Asked about the reported meeting, Jeffries said in a statement: “Throughout this Congress, Republicans have adopted a my-way-or-the-highway approach to governing that has failed the American people. To stop the madness, we have repeatedly made clear that an extremist approach will not work and will be met with forceful opposition. The American people want bold change and that’s what House Democrats will deliver. In every conversation that we have with the Trump administration, we will continue to make it explicitly clear that the affordability crisis is not a hoax and nothing short of transformational policy change is acceptable. We are fighting for an affordable America. The question is whether Republicans will join us.”

Nonetheless, among some who lamented the reported gathering was Tommy Vietor, previously an aide to former president Barack Obama and now a co-host of the left-leaning podcast Pod Save America. “Jared Kushner has no actual government job he just uses his family connections to get money from gulf autocrats and fund corrupt deals. The only way [Jeffries] should work with him is with demands for documents and subpoenas,” Vietor posted.

Jeffries UNDER FIRE For Secret Meeting w/ Kushner

He's not even hiding the fact that they all work for Israel.
NOT the American people. pic.twitter.com/XCiySsXHh4

— Aldo Chevy Nova (@mrfunnysmart) August 23, 2026

Bessent Launches 'ECONOMIC D-DAY' On Iran

Iran’s foreign minister calls threat of new US economic sanctions ‘desperate’

Iran’s foreign minister has dismissed the threat of a fresh round of US economic sanctions as a “desperate” ploy, even as its president acknowledged that the Iranian people are facing “many problems” amid Washington’s efforts to isolate and debilitate the country’s economy.

Last week, Donald Trump announced a new campaign to increase the pressure on the Iranian economy, calling it “the most crushing economic operation ever taken against any country”. The US Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, is expected to announce further punitive economic measures on Iran – which he has described as “the toughest sanctions in history” – on Monday.

Despite the threats, Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, insisted the country remained unbowed. “The fact that [US leaders] ‌have moved on from military operations … to bringing up the same old plans shows that they are desperate,” he said in a ‌video posted on Telegram on Sunday. “We have never been afraid. All of their actions – whether blockades or other military moves they have made – have failed, and this new issue of theirs will fail as well.” Araghchi urged Washington to speak to Iran respectfully to find “a ‌solution based on justice and honour.“

His defiant message came hours after Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said Trump had thrust his country into “a full-scale economic, military and security war”. The new leader of Iran’s top security body has warned its neighbours against joining new US efforts to squeeze Tehran’s economy, and threatened US commercial interests in the region, as Trump doubled down on his fanciful view that the strait of Hormuz was a new US territory.

Mohsen Rezaei, the hardline leader of Iran’s supreme national security council, told state television that Iran would target oil-shipping routes out of the Gulf – alternatives to the strait of Hormuz – if its neighbours joined what he called the “economic war” waged by the US. Those neighbours would be “considered an enemy” and “we will target their interests”, he said. Rezaei also claimed Iran had more cards to play in the war, saying it had “not yet attacked any American economic interests”. “So far, we have only targeted military bases, but if they want to impose economic sanctions on us, the United States has oil and economic companies around Iran and elsewhere, and we will strike them,” he said in the interview, which was broadcast on Saturday.

Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : "Economic D-Day," Should Trump Be President?

Axios has pants of fire ...

US Claimed 40 Tankers Exited Strait on Single Day, Tracking Agency Recorded Zero

Axios’ Barak Ravid reported speaking with three US officials who said that dozens of tankers carrying 16 million barrels of oil safely exited the Strait of Hormuz on Friday. Kpler, a global data and analytics platform that tracks physical commodity markets and shipping in real time, recorded zero barrels of oil exiting the Strait on that day.

The US officials speaking with Ravid said the oil left the waterway through the “southern corridor.” Last week, Axios reported speaking with two US officials who explained that over the past several weeks, the military has helped 15 to 20 vessels per day enter or exit the Persian Gulf by transiting the Strait of Hormuz near the Omani coast. One official claimed that the covert operations have increased the flow of oil out of the Gulf to half of the pre-war level, about ten million barrels per day.

“We have been controlling the southern lane of the Strait of Hormuz for two months now. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps can be a nuisance, but they don’t control the strait. We do,” one official said.

Col. Larry Wilkerson: Iran Abandons Defense Strategy as US Unleashes Economic Blitzkrieg

Alastair Crooke : Can Trump Raise the Stakes in Iran?

‘Palestine Is Being Erased Before Our Eyes’: 100 Former French, British Diplomats Say End Weapons Sales, Trade With Israel

While critics of the French and British governments say they are doing too little to confront the crimes and human rights violations of Israel against the Palestinian people, about 100 former diplomats of the two nations penned an open letter published over the weekend agreeing that much stronger actions must be taken to end the atrocities taking place in both the Gaza Strip and the Occupied West Bank.

Published in Le Monde on Saturday, the joint op-ed by the former UK and French ambassadors and foreign diplomats argues that because their two nations “played a decisive role in the shaping of the Middle East,” it is incumbent upon them to “make common cause over the region’s fundamental faultline: equal rights for Israelis and Palestinians”—a dynamic grossly lacking as Palestinians are starved and bombed in Gaza, with their rights endlessly under assault in the West Bank.

According to the letter:

In Gaza, two million Palestinians are kettled into 30% of their devastated land, hungry, lacking medicine and housing. Over 1,200 Palestinians have been killed since the so-called “ceasefire” of October 2025. In East Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank, Palestinian house demolitions and rampant settler violence—with the connivance of the Israeli army and police—amount to ethnic cleansing. Palestine is being erased before our eyes.

This policy of occupation and destruction extends to Lebanon—where many villages have been razed—and Syria. It is a stain on the conscience of humanity, requiring the UK and France to act.

While human rights groups have steadfastly demanded accountability for Israel—including tougher sanctions, suspension of trade agreements, a halt to weapons transfers, and enforcement of rulings by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and proceedings at the International Criminal Court—for its ongoing criminal behavior against the Palestinians, European governments, the United States, and other Western allies have resisted such calls.

While noting that much can be done to help Palestine become “a fully functioning democratic nation,” the letter from the former diplomats makes a call for seven specific actions designed to end Israeli impunity and bring the government back into compliance with international law. The policy recommendations directed at the UK and French governments are:

Uphold the decisions of the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court;

Suspend the EU-Israel Association Agreement and the UK-Israel Trade and Partnership Agreement for breach of human rights provisions;

Suspend arms transfers to and from Israel and all bilateral military cooperation;

Insist on unrestricted aid access to Gaza, led by UNRWA, other UN agencies and international NGOs, with consequences for non-compliance; access too for journalists, diplomats and parliamentarians;

Ban all trade with settlements, including goods, investment, insurance and other financial services;

Warn potential bidders for the red-line “E1” area [east of Jerusalem, in the occupied territories] or other settlement financing/construction that their interests in and with our countries will suffer;

Make it an offense for our citizens to buy property on stolen Palestinian land and remove charitable status from “charities” funding settlements.

Nicholas Hopton, a former UK ambassador to Iran, Qatar and Yemen and one of the letter’s signatories, said the language they used was not invented by the diplomats themselves.

“The words are not our own,” Hopton explained to Al Jazeera. “They are taken from the international legal bodies, the UN, those who have been observing from a neutral position and with expertise.”

What’s key to understand, said Peter Millett, a former British ambassador to Libya who also signed the letter, is that what the signatories are asking for “is action, not words.”

Foreign ministers of the France and Britia “over the last few months and years have issued statements of criticism, of condemnation and so forth,” Millett told Al-Jazeera, “but as the letter makes clear, this is the time now where we need to see action on trade, action on settlements, more support for aid to go into Gaza, and the ending of the arms trade.”

At the heart of the letter is the idea that world leaders, whether in Europe or elsewhere, must now act aggressively to bring the suffering of the Palestinians to an end and bring Israel’s violations and abuses to a halt.

"These proposals reflect our shared values—international law and equal rights—which are in our interest," the letter concludes. "Where there is no law, none of us is safe."

Is War Between Israel And Turkey Inevitable? w/ Vanessa Beeley

Norman Finkelstein & Jeremy Corbyn

Catching up from last week...

Israel Admits Firing on Hind Rajab’s Car & Ambulance

Israel admitted Wednesday that its forces fired on a car that was carrying 5-year-old Hind Rajab, who was killed by the IDF along with six members of her family as they were attempting to flee Gaza City on Jan. 29, 2024. Hind was the only survivor of an initial attack on the vehicle and was surrounded by six dead family members as she spent hours on the phone with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PCRS) pleading for help.

The PCRS waited until it had authorization from the Israeli military to dispatch an ambulance to the area and send it along a route provided by the IDF’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT). Despite the coordination with the IDF, once the two Palestinian paramedics arrived, they were fired on by Israeli tanks and killed.

Hind was still alive after the blast that killed the paramedics and was speaking on the phone with her mother, but the PCRS lost contact with her shortly after. Nearly two weeks later, after the IDF withdrew from the area, the body of Hind, her six family members, and the paramedics, Yousef Zeino and Ahmed al-Madhoun, were recovered.

Israel admitted that its forces fired on the car, which, according to Forensic Architecture, was riddled with 335 bullet holes, and the ambulance, when announcing it was launching a criminal probe into the killings. The IDF previously claimed its forces weren’t in the area during the attacks. It also initially denied coordinating with the PCRS to dispatch the ambulance.

“Following review of the findings and due to alleged failures in the coordination of the movement of the Palestine Red Crescent ambulance, it has been decided to initiate a criminal investigation of the incident by military police criminal investigation division,” the IDF said, according to The Guardian, which noted IDF investigations into the killing of Palestinians typically don’t lead to convictions.

Putin: Ukraine's Opened Pandora's Box /Lt Col Daniel Davis & Richard Sakwa

Russia withdraws ambassador to UK as Kremlin raises pressure over Ukraine support

Russia has withdrawn its ambassador to the UK, it has emerged, as the Kremlin continues to try to put pressure on Britain over its support for Ukraine. Andrey Kelin left last month after seven years in the diplomatic post, according to the Russian embassy in London. Tensions have since ratcheted up, with a warning by the embassy last week of “consequences” after it emerged Britain was supplying attack drones to Kyiv.

Russia’s online list of “senior diplomatic staff” in the UK now includes only Vasily A Tsyganov, chargé d’affaires at the embassy.

A gap between ambassadors was not unprecedented, said John Foreman, a former British defence attache in Moscow and Kyiv. But he said in a post on X, “The embassy’s strident ‘consequences’ statement this week and the huge deterioration of bilateral relations since 2018 and especially since the start of the war make me wonder if Moscow will permanently downgrade the relationship this time, by default by not replacing him.”

A spokesperson for the embassy said the Kremlin had concluded Kelin’s diplomatic mission on 21 July. “As for the state of Russia-UK relations across all areas, they have deteriorated to an unprecedentedly low level entirely on London’s initiative,” they added.

U.S.-Canada Trade Talks Collapse w/ Yves Engler

Trump lashes out after US-Canada talks devolve into trade war

Donald Trump has hit back at Canada after a breakdown in negotiations plunged the two countries into a trade war. In his first public comments since negotiations collapsed on Friday in Washington, the US president wrote on social media: “Canada wants the benefits of being a State, without being one!!!”

“They have also charged our great farmers, for many years, massive amounts of tariffs,” he added. “No more!!!” His comments came after the US imposed 50% tariffs on $20bn (£14.6bn) worth of Canadian goods, while Mark Carney, the country’s prime minister, has vowed to match them “dollar for dollar”. The US tariffs came into force on Saturday, ranging from hockey sticks to tongue depressors. Trade experts have predicted that the tariffs could result in some job losses, but the biggest impact is expected to be political, triggering fresh tension between the neighbours.

Both sides blamed the other for the breakdown in talks on Friday. Carney told Canadian journalists that the country was “at war” over trade with the US, after Trump “miscalculated” by escalating his tariff attack. “You’re at war when you’re attacked, and we got attacked,” the Canadian prime minister told reporters in Ottawa. “We cannot accept what they’ve offered and we will not give what they’ve asked.”

Jamieson Greer, the US trade representative, has said the US was compelled to act after a year of retaliatory measures by Canada. He told Fox & Friends Weekend: “We’ve said enough and so we’ve taken countermeasures. Our interest is in protecting American workers and protecting American supply chains.” Dan Kelly, president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, estimated that 40% of small Canadian exporters will be directly hit by the US tariffs, and that nearly one-third expect their revenues will drop by 50% or more as a result.

This year a poll by Globe and Mail newspaper found that only 9% of Canadians agreed that the US was a “trustworthy ally”, and that 51% of those polled had cancelled American trips in reaction to comments by Trump.

The lesson from Canada’s collapsed trade talks with the US: negotiation may be futile

The calamitous collapse of trade negotiations between Canada and the United States is a warning to nations worldwide that pursuing any kind of dialogue with the current US administration is doomed at the outset, according to observers who say this recent episode indicates seeking a fair deal is futile.

Andrea Lawlor, an associate professor of political science at McMaster University in Ontario, said: “No matter the closeness of the historical relationship, the American administration has signalled that it now prioritises its interests above those of some sort of global economic coordination or harmony. “It feels like these talks ‘failed’. However, I’m not sure there was really a success to be had.”

Donald Trump had initially announced the tariffs on 20 July,saying Canada had unfairly discriminated against American businesses. The core example provided by the White House is Canada’s bans on the sale of US alcohol in eight of its 10 provinces and all three territories. The removal of US spirits, wine and beer from shelves came into effect after Trump’s first round of tariffs, slapped on Canada in early 2025.

The premier of Manitoba, Wab Kinew, and his Nova Scotia counterpart, Tim Houston, confirmed this week that Carney had asked the provinces to return US alcohol to shelves in order to seal the trade deal. Kinew told reporters he believed Canada “should fight” Trump instead, and that “you can’t get a good deal with a bad person”. He encouraged Canadians to avoid buying US alcohol, even if the premiers agreed to put it back on shelves.

Sources told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that Canada’s former chief trade negotiator Steve Verheul had warned in the call that concessions now would only lead to further demands from the Americans down the road.

‘Tremendous Victory for the Rule of Law’: Trump-Rubio 75-Nation Visa Ban Struck Down

A federal judge in New York has ruled that President Donald Trump and the US State Department overstepped their authority when they suspended the processing of visa applications for people from 75 nations earlier this year, a move that critics at the time called a “travesty,” cruel, and counter to the rule of law.

US District Judge Jeannette Vargas, a Biden appointee, ruled Friday that the pause in visa applications—which Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio claimed was necessary to prevent immigrant visitors from freeloading on US taxpayer dollars—was “contrary to law and in excess of statutory authority.”

Diana Konate, deputy executive director for policy and advocacy at African Communities Together, which took part in the legal challenge, said the ruling was a “tremendous victory for the rule of law.”

“This unlawful and racist ban caused immeasurable harm, cruelly keeping families and loved ones apart,” Konate said. “Today, we are elated to tell our community members: this ban is no more.”

Vargas determined that the policy first announced by Rubio in January “runs afoul” of the Immigration and Nationality Act by mandating “the refusal of visas to eligible applicants without any basis in law.”

According to the Associated Press:

Vargas said the policy also undermines the congressional requirement that puts consular officers at the forefront of any visa decision.

“Congress imbued these officers with exclusive authority and discretion to determine if an immigrant is eligible for a visa based upon review of specific and detailed criteria set forth in the statute,” she wrote. “The Policy, which categorically prohibits the issuance of immigrant visas based upon the nationality of the applicant, represents a direct abrogation of this statutory scheme.”

The policy was challenged by two nonprofit organizations along with 11 individuals, including six whose family members had been refused visas. The remaining five are outside the country and had filed “employment-based petitions” to come to the United States.

The Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. (CLINIC), one of the other nonprofits behind the suit which led to the ruling, welcomed the decision in a statement on Saturday, calling it “an important victory for families who faced prolonged uncertainty and separation because of a policy that treated applicants differently based on their country of origin rather than their individual circumstances.”

Trump’s continued distrust in election integrity has experts eyeing his next move

A series of moves by Donald Trump’s administration to sow doubt in the integrity of US elections has intensified concern among voting experts – and sparked hope among election deniers – that it could declare a national emergency. The White House and US federal agencies have released a string of documents this summer – including disputed analyses of alleged voting by noncitzens and historical intelligence memos – stoking expectations that the US president could move to exert greater control over November’s US midterm elections.

Trump used a primetime television address in July to claim – again – that US elections were vulnerable to foreign manipulation, and repeat the lie that the 2020 presidential election, which he lost to Joe Biden, was stolen. Trump’s speech prompted Steve Bannon, his former political strategist, to predict the US president will declare a state of emergency on national security grounds to “protect” elections.

“Take your No 2 pencil out,” Bannon, a rightwing commentator, said on his War Room video podcast on 29 July. “It’s coming. It’s coming. Just block the last week of August out. It’s coming.”

While Trump and his allies could try to use a national emergency declaration to delegitimize results of November’s results, experts say such a declaration would not supersede the constitutional restrictions on executive power on election administration. No president has ever attempted to invoke an emergency to assert control over voting. Asked earlier this month by Wayne Allyn Root, a rightwing broadcaster, if he would “declare a national security emergency for elections”, Trump notably did not shoot down the idea. “Let me just say, stranger things have happened, OK?” the president told Real America’s Voice, a rightwing cable channel. “I’ll leave it at that.”

The administration is “trying to lay the groundwork to declare some sort of emergency to nationalize elections”, said Aria Branch, a partner at the Elias Law Group, who led a lawsuit blocking Trump’s previous executive orders on election administration. “I think the president is looking for any opportunity to do that.”

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Florida Democratic Senate nominee Angie Nixon faced a DSA platform gauntlet on Morning Joe, with hosts pressing her on “defunding police,” “abolishing prisons,” and “open borders.”

Nixon, who recently joined DSA, rejected all three characterizations. She said she supports law… pic.twitter.com/uwh1Lr1UPf

— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) August 19, 2026

The Deplorable Extremism of the ‘Moderates’

We’ve been hearing a lot of panicky warnings lately after Democratic primary voters chose socialists and other leftists instead of “moderates” in several major elections. The alarm bells got louder this month after Michigan’s progressive Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed defeated Rep. Haley Stevens — who was, The New York Times reported, “the moderate establishment-backed candidate.”

The soothing “moderate” label routinely goes to candidates like Stevens who’ve supported continual arming of Israel. She “benefited from about $62 million in advertising spending from half a dozen outside groups,” the Times noted. “Over half of that sum came from the super PAC arm of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the country’s most influential pro-Israel group.”

What’s so “moderate” about supporting genocide?

Politicians are also routinely dubbed “moderate” when they’re running interference for extreme income inequality and deadly healthcare inequities — helping to block popular policy options like tax hikes on the rich and Medicare for All, which is supported by three-quarters of Democrats.

In the real world, the so-called “moderates” are aligned with a status quo that continues to inflict widespread suffering and preventable death at home and abroad.

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Personal care products are awash in unlabeled toxic chemicals

Common personal care products widely contain unlabeled toxic chemicals, results from a new peer-reviewed study suggest. The testing of more than 110 items ranging from shampoo to baby lotions found evidence of unlabeled toxic chemicals in about 85%. Many contained multiple ingredients known to be carcinogens or health hazards, and even 26% of products labeled “eco”, “green” or “natural” contained at least one dangerous compound. The products averaged more than three times as many chemicals than were listed on labels.

It is unclear whether the products are intentionally adulterated, or unintentionally contaminated. Either way, the findings raise further questions about the safety of everyday goods already under scrutiny for their health risks, and the authors say the study highlights the need for stricter oversight, including mandatory testing.

Jenna Hua, a lead author with Million Marker, a San Francisco-based company that offers at-home testing for exposure to toxic chemicals, said researchers knew they would find some unlabeled chemicals, but were still “shocked” by the findings. “I spend my money, and I want to get a good product – why am I being lied to?” Hua asked.

Among the chemicals detected were hormone disruptors and carcinogens such as phthalates, parabens, Pfas and formaldehyde. Many of the same chemicals are sometimes intentionally added to personal care products, and are linked to cancer, neurological disease, reproductive harm and damage to developing children, among other issues. Personal care product chemicals can be absorbed into the body, studies in recent decades have found.

The 113 items tested were bought at major retailers, such as Target and Amazon. They include baby products, moisturizers, soaps, shampoos, toothpaste, feminine hygiene products, body washes, cleaning products and other everyday goods. Some ingredients may be added illegally, form due an unintended chemical reaction among ingredients or come from plastic packaging that often leaches compounds into the products, the authors wrote. The most widespread undisclosed toxicants fall under the umbrella term “fragrance” or “parfum” on products’ ingredient lists. “Fragrance” can include any of 1,200 hazardous chemicals, and the law does not require companies to be more specific.

Fast-moving wildfire in Reno, Nevada, forces tens of thousands to evacuate homes

A fast-moving Nevada wildfire exploded to more than 15,000 acres (6,000 hectares) on Sunday, pushing from the Sierra foothills toward the center of Reno and urging nearly 90,000 residents to evacuate as flames threatened neighborhoods and reached the edge of the University of Nevada campus.

The Hawk fire’s “GO NOW” evacuation zone had expanded to the edge of the university campus as strong, gusty winds, low humidity and dry vegetation fueled the blaze, according to Truckee Meadows Fire and Rescue in Reno. Of those urged to evacuate, 42,000 were under strict orders. An additional 45,000 people were in the evacuation warning zone, and encouraged to leave now and be prepared to stay away for several days to clear the roads for first-responders.

“If you have been told to evacuate, please don’t wait!” Hillary Schieve, Reno’s mayor, said in a statement posted on social media on Saturday night. “Structures have already been burned in this fire and your life is more important than a building. Evacuating before the fire arrives also allows our firefighters to focus their efforts on battling the blaze.”

Governor Joe Lombardo declared a state of emergency in Washoe county and mobilized the Nevada national guard. Two helicopter crews were deployed to support aerial firefighting operations, while 60 troops were assigned to help police safeguard evacuated neighborhoods. However winds were whipping the flames, complicating the fight.

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Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some of which defied fair-use abstraction.

Iran War: Bessent Effectively Admits New Ferocious Iran Sanctions Likely to Fizzle as Treasury Intervention Fails; More Evidence of US Military Impotence; Ansar Allah Makes Drone Strikes Into Saudi Arabia

War On Iran: – Iran’s Advantage

The New Cold War Intensifies

"Woke 1" and Democratic Party Deceit

US Meddling In Brazilian Elections

Jumpy bond markets make it clear: Trump risks driving US into debt crisis

‘Perfect Storm’ of Trump’s War and Super El Niño to Drive Food Prices Even Higher

The US has a plan to save the Colorado River. Experts say it won’t be enough to stop the crisis

Double jeopardy? Luigi Mangione state case unlikely to proceed, experts say

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A Little Night Music

Barbara Dane and the Chambers Brothers - You've Got to Reap What You Sow

Barbara Dane - I Don't Want Your Millions, Mister

Barbara Dane - Nine Hundred Miles

Barbara Dane - When You're Down And Out

Barbara Dane - Trouble in Mind

Barbara Dane - Bring Em Home

Barbara Dane and the Chambers Brothers - Freedom Is a Constant Struggle

Barbara Dane - Little Maggie

Barbara Dane & Lightnin' Hopkins - I'm Going Back, Baby (Back Behind the Sun)

Barbara Dane & Lightnin' Hopkins - Hold On

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