Ukraine Puts Putin’s Playbook to the Test

For many, the logic seemed unassailable: Giving poor families money would measurably improve the lives of their children. And so, a few years ago, social scientists set out to test whether that assumption was right. The results of the experiment have shocked them.

For many Americans, the government’s monthly jobs number was a pretty dull statistic — until a few days ago, when President Trump angrily fired the person responsible for producing it, the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Now, from Washington to Wall Street, many people are wondering whether you can still trust federal statistics if the president is willing to just get rid of people who give him facts he doesn’t like. On this episode, Ben Casselman joins The Daily to discuss how the government’s economic data suddenly turned into a national drama.

In a dramatic act of protest on Sunday, Democratic members of the Texas House of Representatives began to flee the state. It is a last-ditch attempt to stop President Trump and Texas Republicans from adopting an aggressively redrawn congressional map that would eliminate Democratic seats — and could help lock in a Republican majority in next year’s elections. Shane Goldmacher, a Times political correspondent, explains this new chapter in the era of unvarnished partisan warfare.

“Am I in trouble?” “Am I secretly bad?” These are questions Meg Josephson, a therapist and author, grew up asking herself. She was constantly trying to anticipate other people’s needs, worried that she was letting other people down. And it wasn’t until she found herself standing in the aisle of a Bed Bath & Beyond, trying to remember her favorite color, that she realized her desire to please everyone was eroding her sense of self. On this episode of Modern Love, Josephson talks about how that realization led her to confront her tumultuous childhood, and what it took to stop “people pleasing.” She then reads the Modern Love essay “My Three Years as a Beloved Daughter” by Erin Brown, about a woman who found a type of love in her best friend’s parents that she had never experienced before, and what that taught her about her own parents. Josephson’s book, “Are You Mad At Me?,” is available Aug. 5, 2025. For more Modern Love, search for the show wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Wednesday.

As the images of starving Palestinian children continue to come out of Gaza and aid groups have confirmed a rising number of deaths from malnutrition, there has been a new round of international outrage, including from Israel’s own allies. Emmanuelle Elbaz-Phelps, an independent Israeli journalist, discusses whether any of the outcry is resonating with Israeli society.