The Daily

The C.I.A. sent a short but explosive message last week to all of its stations and bases around the world.

The cable, which said dozens of sources had been arrested, killed or turned against the United States, highlights the struggle the agency is having as it works to recruit spies around the world. How did this deterioration occur?

Guest: Julian E. Barnes, a national security reporter for The New York Times. 

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Background reading: 

• Counterintelligence officials said in a top secret cable to all stations and bases around the world that too many of the people it recruits from other countries to spy for the U.S. are being lost.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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The coronavirus seems to be in retreat in the United States, with the number of cases across the country down about 25 percent compared with a couple of weeks ago. Hospitalizations and deaths are also falling.

So, what stage are we in with the pandemic? And how will developments such as a new antiviral treatment and the availability of booster shots affect things?

Guest: Apoorva Mandavilli, a science and global health reporter for The New York Times. 

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Background reading: 

• The authorization for booster shots applies to groups of people in the United States fully vaccinated with the Pfizer vaccine, but about 45 percent of the country’s fully inoculated people received Moderna or Johnson & Johnson doses.
• Merck said it would seek authorization for molnupiravir, an antiviral pill that the company says is effective against Covid. Experts said such treatments could be a powerful tool against the virus.
• Despite a fall in new cases, hospitalizations and deaths, public health officials said the pandemic remained a potent threat.

For more information on today’s episode, visit 

nytimes.com/thedaily

. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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The Senate testimony of Frances Haugen on Tuesday was an eagerly awaited event.

Last month, Ms. Haugen, a former Facebook product manager, leaked internal company documents to The Wall Street Journal that exposed the social media giant’s inner workings.

How will Ms. Haugen’s insights shape the future of internet regulation?

Guest: Sheera Frenkel, a technology reporter for The New York Times. 

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Background reading: 

• Ms. Haugen told how Facebook deliberately made efforts to keep users — including children — hooked to its service.
• Here are other key takeaways from her testimony.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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The latest term of the U.S. Supreme Court will include blockbuster cases on two of the most contentious topics in American life: abortion and gun rights.

The cases come at a time when the court has a majority of Republican appointees and as it battles accusations of politicization.

Why is the public perception of the court so important? And how deeply could the coming rulings affect the fabric of American society?

Guest: Adam Liptak, a reporter covering the United States Supreme Court for The New York Times. 

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Background reading: 

• The Supreme Court’s highly charged docket will test the leadership of Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who has said that he prefers to guide the court toward consensus and incrementalism.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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Ivermectin is a drug that emerged in the 1970s, used mainly for deworming horses and other livestock.

But during the pandemic, it has been falsely lauded in some corners as a kind of miracle cure for the coronavirus.

What is fueling the demand for a drug that the medical establishment has begged people not to take?

Guest: Emma Goldberg, a writer for The New York Times. 

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Background reading: 

• Public health warnings against using the anti-parasitic ivermectin as a treatment for Covid-19 appear to have made little progress in stemming its popularity in parts of the United States.
• Veterinarians, ranchers and farmers say they are struggling with the effects of the surging demand for the drug.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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Jon Mooallem, the author of today’s Sunday Read, had a bad pandemic.

“I began having my own personal hard time,” he writes. “The details aren’t important. Let’s just say, I felt as if I were moldering in place.”

Then, The New York Times Magazine offered him the opportunity to fly somewhere for its travel issue — at that point he had spent 17 months parenting two demanding children. So, he asked: “What if I drove to Spokane?” Jon had been curious about it for years.

Spokane, Wash., is the birthplace of Father’s Day, the hometown of Bing Crosby and a city with a sequence of wide, rocky waterfalls pouring through its center like a Cubist boulevard.

“I also knew that Spokane was a city with a history of minor-league baseball that stretched back more than a hundred years,” Jon writes. “A minor-league game felt like a manageable, belated step into the mid-pandemic lifestyle that people were calling post-pandemic life.”

This story was written and narrated by Jon Mooallem. To hear more audio stories from publications like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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This episode contains strong language.

A month ago, Texas adopted a divisive law which effectively banned abortions in the state. Despite a number of legal challenges, the law has survived and is having an impact across state lines. 

Trust Women is abortion clinic in Oklahoma just three hours north of Dallas — one of the closest clinics Texas women can go to. 

On the day the Texas law came into effect, “it was like a light had been flipped,” said one of the workers who staffs the clinic’s phone lines. “We had everyone’s line lit up for almost eight hours straight.” 

We visit Trust Women and speak to workers and patients about the real-world impact of the most restrictive abortion law in the country. 

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Background reading: 

• The new Texas law prohibits abortions after about six weeks, a very early stage of pregnancy. Many women are now traveling out of state for the procedure.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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The first year of a Congress is usually the best time for a president to put forward any sort of ambitious policy. For President Biden, whose control of Congress is fragile, the urgency is particularly intense.

But now members of his own party are threatening to block one big part of his agenda — his $1 trillion infrastructure plan — in the name of protecting an even bigger part.

We speak to Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington State, the chairwoman of the  Progressive Caucus, about why she is willing to vote no on the infrastructure bill.

Guest: Emily Cochrane, a correspondent covering Congress for The New York Times; and Representative Pramila Jayapal, the chairwoman of the Progressive Caucus.  

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Background reading: 

• Democrats prepared legislation on Wednesday to avert a government shutdown, but they were desperately trying to salvage President Biden’s domestic agenda as conservative-leaning holdouts dug in against an ambitious $3.5 trillion bill that carries many of the party’s top priorities.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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Britney Spears is one of the biggest celebrities on the planet — she makes millions of dollars performing, selling perfumes and appearing on television. At the same time, however, her life is heavily controlled by a conservatorship, which she has been living under for 13 years. 

Soon, a court will decide whether to remove Mr. Spears as conservator or terminate the conservatorship altogether. 

We explore the details of Ms. Spears’s conservatorship, the security apparatus that has surrounded it and its future. 

Guest: Liz Day, a reporter and supervising producer for the documentary television show, “The New York Times Presents.” 

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Background reading: 

• A former employee of the security team hired by Ms. Spears’s father gave the most detailed account yet of the singer’s life under 13 years of conservatorship.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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This episode contains strong language.

Brig. Gen. Khoshal Sadat, a former Afghan deputy minister for security, has held some of the highest ranks in the Afghan security forces and government. 

From the moment Afghanistan fell to the Taliban, the United States has put much of the blame of Afghan security forces — a force that President Biden said gave up without a fight.

“The reality is that we’re not cowards,” said General Sadat. “We did not lay our arms, we would not lay our arms based on military pressure.”

We speak to General Sadat about growing up under the Taliban, his career in the military and the future of Afghanistan. 

Guest: Brig. Gen. Khoshal Sadat, a former Afghan deputy minister for security.

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Background reading: 

• When General Sadat became the highest-ranking police official in Afghanistan, he tried to overhaul the country’s police with the American way of war. Read a profile of him from 2019. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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