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While the Tories’ dire record on green issues gets worse by the day, Keir Starmer’s pledges show an impressive commitmentIt’s been a long time coming, but at last it seems that voters who give a damn about the climate emergency will have a real choice at the next general election. While the Tories have fiddled, Labour has been putting together a pretty impressive pro-climate portfolio.The latest pledge to ban all new domestic oil and gas developments and cut off borrowing for fossil fuel-related projects sits in diametric opposition to Tory plans to suck as much oil and gas as possible out of the North Sea. And Labour’s goody bag of climate measures contains plenty more that environmentally informed voters can cheer.Bill McGuire is professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at UCL and author of Hothouse Earth: an Inhabitant’s Guide Continue reading...

Austria, France, Germany, Sweden and now Spain – the firewall between the mainstream and the far right is crumblingNormalisation is the process by which something unusual or extreme becomes part of the everyday. What once provoked horror and outrage soon barely registers. The way the presence of Donald Trump became a mere fact of political life is perhaps the most familiar example. But the normalisation of the far right is happening across the democratic world.Once Trump became “normal”, events that seemed even more extreme did too. A 2022 survey found that two in five Americans thought civil war was “at least somewhat likely” in the next decade. One political scientist speaks of the possibility of rightwing dictatorship in the US by 2030.Owen Jones is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

The committee voted 7-6 to allow debate by the full chamber with expected vote on passage today. Plus, the downfall of Elizabeth HolmesGood morning.The bipartisan debt ceiling deal brokered by Joe Biden and Kevin McCarthy passed an important hurdle yesterday evening, advancing to the full House of Representatives for debate and an expected vote on passage on Wednesday even amid opposition from far-right Republicans.What has been said about the deal? Members of the far-right House Freedom Caucus have balked at the deal. Chip Roy of Texas, who in January played a key role in securing the speakership for McCarthy after 15 rounds of voting, amid a rightwing rebellion, had perhaps the most pungent response. He said the debt ceiling deal was a “turd sandwich”, because it did not include spending cuts demanded by the hard right.What else has been said? Another rightwing firebrand, Thomas Massie of Kentucky, said he “anticipate[d] voting for” the bill, having said: “I think it’s important to keep in mind the debt limit bill itself does not spend money.” But comparative moderate, Nancy Mace of South Carolina, resorted to personal abuse of Biden when she tweeted: “Washington is broken. Republicans got outsmarted by a president who can’t find his pants. I’m voting no on the debt ceiling debacle because playing the DC game isn’t worth selling out our kids and grandkids.”Who is Reade and what did she say Biden did? Now 59, Reade was a staffer for Biden when he was a US senator from Delaware. In 2020, as Biden ran for the Democratic presidential nomination, she claimed that in 1993, in a Senate corridor, he pushed her against a wall and assaulted her. Biden has repeatedly denied the accusation. Continue reading...

Freedom caucus has attacked House leader Kevin McCarthy’s deal with Joe Biden to raise the debt ceiling before the default deadline of 5 JuneMembers of the hard-right House freedom caucus have attacked the proposed spending cuts in the debt ceiling bill as woefully inadequate, and vowed to oppose the legislation when it hits the floor.“We had the time to act, and this deal fails – fails completely,” Representative Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, chair of the freedom caucus, said on Tuesday. “We will do everything in our power to stop it and end it now.” Continue reading...

For all the talk around Nikola Jokić and Jimmy Butler ahead of the NBA finals, history shows reserves like Denver’s Bruce Brown and Miami’s Duncan Robinson could be the differenceBefore the 1982 NBA finals against the Los Angeles Lakers, Earl Cureton had no idea when he might play in the series. But instead of focusing on what he didn’t know, the backup forward-center for the Julius Erving-led Philadelphia 76ers focused on what he could. Stay ready, observe the game. Don’t lose sight of how to help, even in small doses. It doesn’t matter that you’re a reserve on the sidelines, Cureton told himself. Still, the experience was jarring; his first time in the league’s final series. The playoffs are a different animal compared to the regular season and the NBA finals are even more pressurized. Though this all swirled in Cureton’s mind some 40 years ago, the task remains the same for players today. Indeed, in this year’s NBA finals, players like Denver’s Bruce Brown Jr and Miami’s Duncan Robinson will undertake crucial roles coming off the bench for their squads. But what exactly does it take to excel as a backup in the league – especially in June?“Your mental focus is the most important thing you have to sharpen when it comes to the playoffs,” Cureton tells the Guardian. “With my situation [in Philly], I never knew when I was going in. And you never know what’s going to happen – foul trouble, injuries. You have to prepare yourself like you’re going to be out there every single game.” Continue reading...

One-off deals, such as the one with Jaguar Land Rover to produce electric batteries, won’t keep pace with the big industrial strategies of the US and EUThe UK government looks set to land a deal with Tata-owned Jaguar Land Rover, in which the company will construct an electric-vehicle battery plant in Somerset in exchange for about £500m in subsidies. Jaguar Land Rover had previously warned that Brexit tariff rules could make production in the UK inviable.This is not the only time ministers have been warned about the effects of Brexit on investment. Already, the UK’s decision to leave the EU is costing £100bn a year in output. Of more than 100 leading UK manufacturers, almost half have said their EU suppliers are growing more cautious about doing business in the UK.Mariana Mazzucato is professor in the economics of innovation and public value at University College London, and the founding director of the UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose Continue reading...

The rising incidence of wildfires means many Californians can no longer insure their property. It’s a sign of what’s ahead for the whole housing marketInsurance company documents aren’t exactly renowned for being riveting reading. This week, however, State Farm, the largest insurance firm in the US by premium volume, came out with an eyeball-grabbing update: it has stopped accepting new homeowner insurance applications in California.In a statement, the company said the decision was based on the heightened risk of natural disasters, such as wildfires, along with historic increases in construction costs. Continue reading...

Ex-president promises executive order revoking right enshrined in 14th amendment during anti-immigrant tirade on social mediaSpeaking 125 years after the US supreme court settled the issue of birthright citizenship, former president Donald Trump pledged once again to end it.If elected back to the White House next year, Trump said in a video posted to social media on Tuesday, he will on day one sign an executive order to ensure the children of undocumented migrants “will not receive automatic US citizenship”. Continue reading...

Nguyet Le, 63, ‘beat her hands bloody trying to escape’, according to the case that was filed by her four adult childrenAn Arby’s manager “beat her hands bloody trying to escape or get someone’s attention” before she died locked inside a freezer at one of the fast-food chain’s restaurants in Louisiana, court records said.The detail is contained in a lawsuit filed by family members of Nguyet Le, 63, against Arby’s and the owner of the store. Continue reading...

The prime minister is stubbornly attached to an outdated ideology, but has no plan for adapting to volatile timesEven if you don’t call it “price control” (and Downing Street would prefer that you don’t), asking supermarkets to limit the cost of basic goods is an extraordinary thing for a Conservative government to contemplate.It may not happen. If it does, it will be voluntary, say ministers – just a nudge to retailers, so they keep the cost of living down. Definitely not the sort of thing that was last attempted 50 years ago, under a weak Tory prime minister struggling to control inflation, while grappling with strikes and sliding towards election defeat. Nothing like that at all.Rafael Behr is a Guardian columnistRafael Behr will discuss his new book, Politics: A Survivor’s Guide, at a Guardian Live event on Monday 12 June. The event will be live in London and livestreamed. Book tickets here Continue reading...

The committee voted 7-6 to allow debate by the full chamber with expected vote on passage on WednesdayThe bipartisan debt ceiling deal brokered by Joe Biden and Kevin McCarthy passed an important hurdle Tuesday evening, advancing to the full House of Representatives for debate and an expected vote on passage on Wednesday even amid opposition from far-right Republicans.Earlier in the day, McCarthy, the Republican speaker of the US House, had insisted that supporting the debt ceiling deal would be “easy” for his party and it was likely to pass through Congress despite one prominent rightwinger’s verdict that the proposed agreement is a “turd sandwich”. Continue reading...

Mike Matson, the city mayor, said remains of two people may be within the rubble amid protests of city’s swift demolition plansFive people remain unaccounted for after part of an apartment building collapsed in Davenport, Iowa, over the weekend, officials said Tuesday.The remains of two people may be within the rubble, the city’s mayor, Mike Matson, said at a news conference, which came amid protests and criticism that the city was moving too quickly toward demolishing the building. The 116-year-old brick and steel structure, built as a hotel, had more recently been used as apartments and tenants had been allowed to remain even as bricks began falling from the building. Continue reading...

Court reverses earlier decision by Governor Gavin Newsom not to free woman convicted of killings of Leno and Rosemary LaBiancaA California appeals court said on Tuesday that Leslie Van Houten, who participated in two killings at the direction of cult leader Charles Manson in 1969, should be let out of prison on parole.The appellate court’s ruling reverses an earlier decision by Gavin Newsom, the state’s governor who rejected parole for Van Houten in 2020. She has been recommended for parole five times since 2016. All of those recommendations were rejected by Newsom or Jerry Brown, California’s former governor. Continue reading...

Former Senate staffer who made claim in 2020 appears on Russian media alongside convicted Russian agent in US Maria ButinaTara Reade, a former Senate staffer who in 2020 accused Joe Biden of sexual assault, said on Tuesday she had defected to Russia.“I’m still kind of in a daze a bit but I feel very good,” Reade told Sputnik, a Russian press outlet supportive of President Vladimir Putin, while sitting with Maria Butina, a convicted Russian agent jailed in the US but now a member of parliament in Russia. Continue reading...

The incident is the latest in a season of heightened tensions between Washington and Beijing this yearA Chinese fighter pilot performed an “unnecessarily aggressive maneuver” near an American surveillance aircraft operating over the South China Sea last week, according to US military.The incident – which the Pentagon says is part of a pattern of behavior by China – comes at a time of already heightened tensions between Washington and Beijing over issues including Taiwan and an alleged Chinese spy balloon that was shot down after traversing the United States earlier this year. Continue reading...

Committee debate comes amid opposition from both sides to agreement that would stave off a catastrophic defaultMembers of the House Freedom Caucus have said they will rethink the House speaker leadership if the debt ceiling agreement passes.During a Tuesday press conference outside of the Capitol, several House Freedom Caucus members spoke out against the Biden-McCarthy deal. Continue reading...

One of Bear River state park’s white heifers gave birth to a snowy calf, which is healthy and runs in circles called ‘zoomies’Staffers at the Bear River state park in south-west Wyoming welcomed four brown bison calves this spring and thought the birthing season was finished.But earlier this month, as staff visited the animals’ pasture, they saw a “little white ball of fluff”, park superintendent Tyfani Sager said. Continue reading...

The former first lady and lifelong mental health advocate, 95, lives with her ailing husband, Jimmy Carter, 98, in Plains, GeorgiaThe former US first lady Rosalynn Carter has dementia, her family announced on Tuesday.Carter, 95, lives in Plains, Georgia, with her husband, Jimmy Carter, the 98-year-old 39th president who has been in hospice care since February. Continue reading...

New overtime rules for goatherds could increase pay to $14,000 a month by next year – and companies say they cannot afford itHundreds of goats munch on long blades of yellow grass on a hillside next to a sprawling townhouse complex. They were hired to clear vegetation that could fuel wildfires as temperatures rise this summer.These voracious herbivores are in high demand to devour weeds and shrubs that have proliferated across California after a drought-busting winter of heavy rain and snow. Continue reading...

Never mind that the DWP itself found that some disabled people can’t afford food or heating, politicians and the media need scapegoatsFew things are ever really new. British politics – and the media ecosystem that maintains it – effectively regurgitates the same talking points on repeat, a kind of Groundhog Day where the key players may appear different but familiar destructive patterns are ever-present.It is exactly a decade since former chancellor George Osborne launched cuts to the benefits system totalling tens of billions of pounds, and with them, fuelled rhetoric so toxic that it caused an increase in hate crime towards disabled people. This was the era of Benefits Street and the Sun’s Beat the Cheat campaign, where it was quite normal for a national newspaper to invite readers to report their disabled neighbours to the benefit fraud hotline.Frances Ryan is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Lawmakers are scrambling to push through Biden-McCarthy deal by 5 June to avoid default disaster – what is the process?The United States has days before it runs out of time to pay its bills and avoid a first-ever national default. Washington lawmakers are scrambling to push through a deal that would temporarily suspend the US debt limit, averting a potential disaster for the domestic and global economy.The debt ceiling, which caps the amount of debt the US can hold, currently sits at $31.4tn. The US hit that limit in January. Since then, the treasury has taken “extraordinary measures” to prevent default. Continue reading...

Forty-five people in the state were accused of practicing witchcraft during the trials, and 11 were executedAfter almost 376 years, the bad spell that befell the innocent people accused of being witches during the US’s colonial period is over.Connecticut last week passed a resolution exonerating people tried and executed for witchcraft nearly four centuries after their so-called crimes. Continue reading...

Sweden’s pandemic postmortem is done and dusted, yet ours seems headed for the courts before it has even begunBritish politics has become a medieval battlefield across which the victors wander, seeking the twitching remains of Boris Johnson to harass and hack. The latest spat is over how much to reveal of his Downing Street behaviour during Covid. Lady Hallett, chair of the Covid inquiry, wants the unredacted WhatsApp messages between Johnson and 40 senior colleagues, along with unredacted diaries and 24 notebooks.Hallett thinks all material is potentially relevant for investigating, say, “the degree of attention given to the emergence of Covid-19 in early 2020 by the then prime minister”. The Cabinet Office strongly disagrees, citing privacy and disputing the relevance of much of the material. The eager Liberal Democrats claim that being kept in the dark is “yet another insult to bereaved families waiting for justice”.Simon Jenkins is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Motorists reported that a sign displayed the name of a white nationalist hate group and a far-right sloganAuthorities in Alabama are investigating how white supremacist messages appeared on a digital road sign along a highway busy with Memorial Day traffic.Motorists on Interstate 65 near Clanton called state troopers at lunchtime on Monday to report the words “Patriot Front” and “reclaim America” were flashing on an electronic sign, interspersed with messages warning of an upcoming roadwork zone, AL.com reported. Continue reading...

Governor makes remark to Fox News and predicts two White House terms should he defeat Trump for Republican nominationPredicting two terms in the White House should he defeat Donald Trump for the Republican presidential nomination next year, Ron DeSantis said he would go on to “destroy leftism in this country”.“I will be able to destroy leftism in this country and leave woke ideology in the dustbin of history,” the Florida governor told Fox News. Continue reading...

Six adults and three children hurt while over 20 mass shootings reported across US during holiday weekendNine people were injured when gunfire erupted along a beachside promenade in Hollywood, Florida, on Monday evening, sending people frantically running for cover along the crowded beach on Memorial Day.The nine people hurt included six adults and three children, according to Yanet Obarrio Sanchez, a spokesperson for Memorial Healthcare System. All of the victims were in stable condition, she said. Continue reading...

Shares in chip company rise on back of hopes for rising demand from artificial intelligence applicationsNvidia has become the first chipmaker to reach a $1tn valuation after its shares soared further on Tuesday on the back of an anticipated boom in demand for its products to meet the needs of artificial intelligence.Shares in the gaming and AI chip company rose 4.2% in early trading on Tuesday to pass the key milestone. Continue reading...

Artificial intelligence promises more leisure and creativity for workers. But at the same time, corporations are clamping down on unions and making plans to replace their expensive human employeesGoodbye humans, hello “Tessa”. The US-based National Eating Disorders Association (Neda) is making headlines after firing all its staff and replacing them with an AI-assisted chatbot called Tessa. This happened just four days after the six paid employees, who oversaw about 200 volunteers, successfully unionised. Coincidence? Oh, absolutely, Neda said; it was a long-anticipated change that had nothing to do with unionisation. A blogpost written by a helpline associate begs to differ and calls the move “union busting, plain and simple”.Is this a harbinger of things to come? Are we about to see millions of jobs wiped out as humans are replaced by AI assistants with female names? After stealing all of our jobs, are the Tessas of the world going to unionise and stage a digital takeover of Earth? Continue reading...

Black teen who was shot after going to the wrong address made his first major public appearance since attackA Kansas City teenager who survived being shot in the head after ringing the doorbell at a mistaken address participated in a Memorial Day walk and run to raise money for traumatic brain injury victims, marking his first major public appearance since the attack.Ralph Yarl, 17, did not speak publicly at Monday morning’s Going the Distance for Brain Injury gathering, where he walked 1.5 miles (2.4km) alongside his mother after weeks of therapy. But his mom, Cleo Nagbe, gave a speech to participants and talked to reporters about how he was recovering from the shooting. Continue reading...

Antony Blinken says he’s looking to ‘promote accountability’ for Ugandan officials who have violated rights of LGBTQ+ peopleThe US may restrict visas issued to Ugandan officials in its latest condemnation to the African country’s enactment of stringent – and highly controversial – anti-LGBTQ+ laws.Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, said that Joe Biden’s White House is “deeply troubled” by the Anti-Homosexuality Act, which was signed into law by Yoweri Museveni, Uganda’s president, on Monday. Blinken said that he was looking to “promote accountability” for Ugandan officials who have violated the rights of LGBTQ+ people, with possible measures including the curtailment of visas. Continue reading...

The president, Kais Saied, has turned our country into a dictatorship, while Europe looks the other way“Historic” – that is how Tunisia’s president, Kais Saied, described his meeting with Syria’s Bashar al-Assad on the eve of the Arab League summit in Jeddah earlier this month. Snaps of him standing alongside al-Assad and Egypt’s Abdel Fatah al-Sisi during the summit were widely shared around the region, signalling Tunisia’s return to the grand old club of Arab dictatorships.For all their internecine conflicts and rivalries, hidden and visible, Arab leaders are again united around one sacred goal: aborting their people’s aspirations for change. Muammar Gaddafi, Hosni Mubarak and Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali may no longer be on the stage, but their spirit lives on in a new generation.Soumaya Ghannoushi is a British-Tunisian writer and researcher specialising in the Middle East and north Africa Continue reading...

Miami’s undrafted Caleb Martin is emblematic of an eighth-seeded team who have continued to defy expectations on their way to the NBA finalsAs it turns out, there’s a simple reason that no NBA team has ever won a series after falling behind 0-3: the better-prepared unit is typically the one in front. So it went in the Eastern Conference finals where, after losing their last three games, the Miami Heat regrouped for Game 7 and blew out the Boston Celtics 103-84 on the road on Monday night. After fighting so hard to stay alive, the Celtics were finally burned by the return of the same bad habits that put them on the brink of elimination in the first place.“The hole we put ourselves in, it’s hard,” Celtics guard Malcolm Brogdon said after the game. “No one’s climbed out of that hole. It was the same tonight. We couldn’t climb out of the hole we created.” Continue reading...

Swift’s legion of fans may not approve of her rumoured new boyfriend, but she deserves to have a life of her ownTaylor Swift writes about new love like it’s a daydream: many of her best songs express the feeling with contented sighs and evocations of fairytale enchantment. But for a small and vocal subsection of her fanbase, news of the singer’s rumoured real-life relationship with a fellow musician has been nothing short of a nightmare.Since it was alleged that Swift is seeing Matty Healy, the frontman of the pop band The 1975, these fans have been up in arms, cancelling orders of Swift’s forthcoming album, posting lengthy reflections on Twitter justifying their attendance (or lack thereof) at Swift’s current tour, and launching a campaign – #SpeakUpNow – implicitly demanding that Swift break up with Healy. (Swift has not publicly acknowledged the relationship, but Healy has been seen at her concerts and the pair have been photographed together multiple times in recent weeks.) Continue reading...

Some in Congress question if they received enough concessions in bipartisan deal. Plus, Cop28 president accused of ‘greenwashing’Good morning.Political leaders appear bullish that they can sell a bipartisan compromise debt ceiling deal to enough centrist lawmakers – overcoming boisterous criticism from left and right – urgently enough to avert a first national default on the $31.4tn that the US owes creditors.What’s in the bill? The proposed legislation bill limits non-defense spending, temporarily expands work requirements for some food stamp recipients, and claws back some Covid-19 relief funds. It also cuts $20bn off $80bn in new IRS spending designed to curb tax avoidance.A complicated legal field. If a federal legal case against Texas materializes and moves all the way up to the US supreme court, it’s possible the US will have to revisit the question of who gets to control the border. Some say that’s exactly what Texas lawmakers in favor of state control of the border want. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Evan Corcoran said he was steered away from Trump’s office, where the FBI later found the most sensitive materialsDonald Trump’s lawyer tasked with searching for classified documents at Mar-a-Lago after the justice department issued a subpoena told associates that he was waved off from searching the former president’s office, where the FBI later found the most sensitive materials anywhere on the property.The lawyer, Evan Corcoran, recounted that several Trump aides had told him to search the storage room because that was where all the materials that had been brought from the White House at the end of Trump’s presidency ended up being deposited. Continue reading...

Four people on using the nostril-based antidote to opioid overdoses, newly approved for over-the-counter saleOver 100,000 Americans died of drug overdoses last year. Advocates say a vast number of them might still be alive if they’d had access to naloxone. Brandon Kilmer, a 24-year-old from Minneapolis, lost his brother to a fentanyl overdose in 2022. Now, he distributes a pack of Narcan to everyone he meets. “I don’t care if you’re a 17-year-old kid or an 80-year-old grandmother,” he said. “I want you to have it.”Naloxone, better known by the brand name Narcan, reverses overdoses by binding to the opioid receptors in the brain, blocking the effects of drugs such as fentanyl or heroin. Harm reduction workers say it should be as ubiquitous in Americans’ homes as dental floss or hand sanitizer, but not enough people have access to it. Continue reading...

Governor JB Pritzker expected to sign bill that would block state funding for public libraries and schools that ban booksGovernor JB Pritzker is expected to sign a bill that would make Illinois the first state to legislate to end book bans – by punishing publicly-funded institutions that attempt to censor in that way.A bill is on Pritzker’s desk after passing the state legislature that would block essential state funding for public libraries and public schools in Illinois that ban books. Continue reading...

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Eight person rescued Monday morning after part of six-story building collapsed but damaged structure remains unstableOfficials in Iowa are making plans to demolish a six-story apartment building a day after it partially collapsed, injuring at least one person and displacing countless residents and businesses.There were no confirmed fatalities and no known people still trapped the morning after the incident in the eastern Iowa city of Davenport. The damaged structure remains unstable, authorities said on Monday. Continue reading...

Some members of Congress question if they received enough concessions in Biden and McCarthy’s agreementUS political leaders appeared bullish on Monday that they can sell a bipartisan compromise debt ceiling deal to enough mainstream lawmakers – overcoming boisterous criticism from left and right – urgently enough to avert a first-ever national default on the $31.4tn the US owes creditors.Despite a lot of diplomacy and even arm-twisting still to come on Capitol Hill in the next few days, Joe Biden left the White House to head to Delaware on Monday afternoon smiling and teasing reporters as he took questions, while the first lady, Jill Biden, waited on the lawn. Continue reading...

Like the deal they crafted, the relationship the president and House speaker forged does not look pretty but appears to have gotten the job doneWhen Kevin McCarthy was struggling early this year to get enough votes from his own Republicans to become speaker of the House of Representatives, Democratic president Joe Biden called the prolonged saga a national embarrassment, then had a little fun.“I’ve got good news for you,” Biden said, pointing playfully at a reporter after a speech in Kentucky. “They just elected you speaker.” Continue reading...

When Cynthia Dearborn became her 75-year-old father’s caregiver, she knew little about what lay ahead. Two decades on, she shares the insights that helped her help him

Speaker Kevin McCarthy says the House will vote Wednesday on the deal he struck with the president – here are the details of the 99-page billDetails of the deal between Joe Biden and Kevin McCarthy take the form of a 99-page bill that would suspend the nation’s debt limit into 2025 in order to avoid an unprecedented federal default, which the White House said on Monday would be “catastrophic for the American people”, while limiting government spending.The Democratic president and Republican House speaker are trying to win over lawmakers to the plan in time to avert a default that would shake the global economy. But Congress will be scrutinizing and debating the legislation fiercely this week. Continue reading...

President says deal struck with Kevin McCarthy protects ‘historic economic recovery’ but it needs approval from a divided CongressJoe Biden has said a bipartisan deal to raise the $31.4tn US debt ceiling and avoid a default is ready to move to Congress and urged lawmakers to pass the agreement he struck with Kevin McCarthy.“This is a deal that’s good news for ... the American people,” the president said at the White House on Sunday night after a call with McCarthy to put the final touches to a tentative deal struck the previous day. “It takes the threat of catastrophic default off the table, protects our hard-earned and historic economic recovery,” he said. Continue reading...