Blackbeard

A federal judge blocked most of a law championed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) that strictly limited transgender health care for adults and banned it completely for children.

In his decision, U.S. District Judge Robert L. Hinkle rejected a common mantra of the DeSantis administration, saying that “gender identity is real,” and that the state cannot deny transgender individuals treatment.

“Florida has adopted a statute and rules that ban gender-affirming care for minors even when medically appropriate,” Hinkle wrote. “The ban is unconstitutional.”

More efficient manufacturing, falling battery costs and intense competition are lowering sticker prices for battery-powered models to within striking distance of gasoline cars.

For much of the last four years, automakers and their dealers had so few cars to sell — and demand was so strong — that they could command high prices. Those days are over, and hefty discounts are starting a comeback.

During the coronavirus pandemic, auto production was slowed first by factory closings and then by a global shortage of computer chips and other parts that lasted for years.

With few vehicles in showrooms, automakers and dealers were able to scrap most sales incentives, leaving consumers to pay full price. Some dealers added thousands of dollars to the manufacturer’s suggested retail price, and people started buying and flipping in-demand cars for a profit.

But with chip supplies back to healthy levels, auto production has rebounded and dealer inventories are growing. At the same time, higher interest rates have dampened demand for vehicles. As a result, many automakers are scrambling to keep sales rolling.

Netanyahu reportedly met this month with three foreign policy envoys working with former president and current presidential candidate Donald Trump — who could yet win the election despite being convicted Thursday on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in his New York state hush money case.

Netanyahu, who benefited immensely from Trump’s first term, is arguably hoping for a similar dividend in the event of a second. In the interim, he has openly rejected the Biden administration’s hopes for the Palestinian Authority to take the lead in the postwar administration of Gaza, and he and his allies have shown no interest in even engaging in the White House on reviving pathways for a Palestinian state. And contrary to the Biden administration’s wishes, Netanyahu may soon act on a Republican invitation to address a joint session of Congress.

It’s not just Netanyahu who is waiting for Trump. The evidence is more clear that Russian President Vladimir Putin is holding out for a Trump victory, which would probably help the Kremlin consolidate its illegal conquests of Ukrainian territory. My colleagues reported last month that Trump and his inner circle have outlined the terms of a potential settlement between Moscow and Kyiv that they would attempt to usher in if in power. “Trump’s proposal consists of pushing Ukraine to cede Crimea and the Donbas border region to Russia, according to people who discussed it with Trump or his advisers and spoke on the condition of anonymity because those conversations were confidential,” they reported.

Such a move would fracture the transatlantic coalition built up in support of Ukraine’s resistance to Russian invasion. It would cement the Republican turn away from Europe’s security at a time when Western resolve around Ukraine is flagging. And it would be yet another sign of Trump’s conspicuous affection the strongman in the Kremlin.

None of this is to claim that younger voters in general are not more to the left on most issues than their older counterparts. They are. But there is a difference between being more progressive than other voters — and progressive as a blanket characterization. As this data clearly shows, that characterization is not accurate and might explain how these voters could become politically untethered from their relative liberalism as they are pressed by economic trends and the swirl of current events.

Will young voters’ liberal but nuanced views on issues lead them to stick with the Democrats, as they have during the past few cycles? Or will they start to break from the party this year and embrace alternatives?

Essentially, today’s 213-member Democratic caucus breaks down into a few categories, the largest of which are traditionally liberal lawmakers who come from cities or inner suburbs and are comfortable with incremental victories in helping the working class. There are dozens of moderates who are more friendly toward business but believe in socially liberal values.

And there are dozens of far-left liberals, hailing from the progressive caucus or the small-knit “Squad,” who have clashed with leaders for not pushing for a more purely liberal agenda. This group has been on the rise over the past half decade, both at the ballot box and inside the caucus.

But now, at this stage of the primary calendar, this wing is facing tough political headwinds.

We care about freedom from hunger, unemployment and poverty — and, as FDR emphasized, freedom from fear. People with just enough to get by don’t have freedom — they do what they must to survive. And we need to focus on giving more people the freedom to live up to their potential, to flourish and to be creative. An agenda that would increase the number of children growing up in poverty or parents worrying about how they are going to pay for health care — necessary for the most basic freedom, the freedom to live — is not a freedom agenda.

Champions of the neoliberal order, moreover, too often fail to recognize that one person’s freedom is another’s unfreedom — or, as Isaiah Berlin put it, freedom for the wolves has often meant death to the sheep. Freedom to carry a gun may mean death to those who are gunned down in the mass killings that have become an almost daily occurrence in the United States. Freedom not to be vaccinated or wear masks may mean others lose the freedom to live.

There are trade-offs, and trade-offs are the bread and butter of economics. The climate crisis shows that we have not gone far enough in regulating pollution; giving more freedom to corporations to pollute reduces the freedom of the rest of us to live a healthy life — and in the case of those with asthma, even the freedom to live. Freeing bankers from what they claimed to be excessively burdensome regulations put the rest of us at risk of a downturn potentially as bad as the Great Depression of the 1930s when the banking system imploded in 2008.

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