A high-stakes plan to indict Afghan drug lords and insurgency leaders on criminal conspiracy charges ran afoul of the Obama team. Five years later, it remains buried under Trump. By Josh Meyer.

F-35 versus A-10 fly-off designed to mislead? We take a look. By Dan Grazier.

Last year, [2016] the US state department said it had uncovered a fake embassy in Accra that had been issuing a stream of forged visas. The story went viral – but all was not as it seemed. By Yepoka Yeebo. (Nov. 28, 2017)

Trump appointees are (reportedly) refusing to release a blockbuster EPA report — because industry lobbyists asked them not to. By Eric Levitz.

Eliminating the bill was a top priority for Trump. So why did any Dems vote for it? By Matt Taibbi.

Mexico’s new president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said he would pursue friend and foe alike in a crackdown on corruption after voters handed him a powerful mandate for government with a landslide election victory on Sunday.

The study, which was published in April, reveals that in countries with more women in political office, corruption is significantly lower. Let's be clear: this does not mean that women are more trustworthy or less likely to take a bribe than men. It also doesn't mean that they make better politicians.

The Haditha massacre was one of the most horrific incidents of the Iraq War. This is the true story of why none of the perpetrators were brought to justice. By Adam Linehan.

Ten years after the meltdown, Congress moves to loosen rules again. What could go wrong? By Lee Fang.

The Environmental Protection Agency is barring The Associated Press, CNN and the environmental-focused news organization E&E from a national summit on harmful water contaminants.

Despite voters, Congress has yet another debate on whether climate change is real. By John Timmer.

A surprising thing happened on Wednesday: The Senate did something good. A Rhett Jones.

Far from the top-secret, covert intelligence asset the FBI has depicted him as, Stefan Halper is a long-time, well-known CIA operative with ties to the Bush family and a shady past. By Glenn Greenwald.

It seems clear that whoever hired Black Cube—in an effort to discredit me and former Obama administration officials—favored the US’s withdrawal from the Iran deal. If a foreign private intelligence agency was hired to help change a vital aspect of US foreign policy, with global consequences, it is a matter of urgent public interest to discover who ordered the operation and who paid for it. Congress has a responsibility to investigate. If the Trump administration was involved in a Nixonian campaign to justify its disastrous policy-making, we deserve to know. By Trita Parsi.

The case for and against national Democrats intervening in primaries. By Ella Nilsen.

Many Democrats would rather not talk about this. By Jonathan Lai, Holly Otterbein.

Rep. James Bridenstine’s nomination is already controversial. Evidence of self-dealing won’t help matters. By Nick Schwellenbach, Adam Zagorin.

Nancy Pelosi:: “Trump has no issue with rewarding those who lie under oath " [The irony apparently lost on her.] By Dylan Scott.

The Specials

Why must we choose between the worst president of our lifetimes and a rapacious corporate enterprise, asks political analyst and author Thomas Frank.