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Russian security forces detained opposition leader Alexei Navalny on his return to the country, heightening a confrontation between the Kremlin and its most vocal critic after he recovered in Germany from a near-fatal poisoning attack last summer.

His followers, who had congregated at a different airport west of Moscow, were barred from entering the arrival area by dozens of security officials, many in riot gear, who swarmed the area.

Russia’s federal prison service said in a statement that Mr. Navalny, who has been on the agency’s “wanted list” since Dec. 29, was detained for repeated violations of his probation. Further measures would be determined by a court, the agency said. Until then, Mr. Navalny would remain in custody, officials said.

liberal astigmatism — our belief that history is a story of racial progress, and our faith in our own empathy — makes Eduardo Porter’s “American Poison” a tough read.

It is a learned, well-written but relentless survey of social science studies on the racial polarization, animosity and social fragmentation of American life.

Empathy seems to increase with social distance.

It’s not just lead that’s poisoning the water. It’s also politics.

Lead poisoning, low water pressure and contamination of water sources are widespread problems in Mexican cities. Aging, decaying infrastructure is the problem — in some cities, water infrastructure is more than 70 years old.

1) Maintaining water infrastructure = high financial cost and high political cost.

“If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood / Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs.”

Germany is recognized as the first to use chemical weapons on a mass scale, on April 22, 1915, at Ypres, Belgium, where 6,000 British and French troops succumbed

once again emerged as an issue after the massacre in Syria last month, in which the United States says nearly 1,500 people, men, women and children, were killed, many as they slept.

Did Flint, Michigan, Just Lead Poison Its Children? Doctors Think So.

In 2013, about 2 percent of tests had results over 5 micrograms per deciliter (the current “safe” cut-off level, above which steps to identify and mitigate the source of lead exposure are recommended).

About 4 percent of the later samples revealed elevated levels. Areas that yielded the highest blood levels had an increase in abnormal samples from 2.5 percent to 6.3 percent.

Putin ‘Probably Approved’ Litvinenko Poisoning, British Inquiry Says

The report could revive strains in relations between Britain and Russia, which were plunged into a chill reminiscent of the Cold War by the death of Mr. Litvinenko

a former K.G.B. officer turned critic of the Kremlin, concluded in a report released on Thursday that his murder “was probably approved” by President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and the head of the country’s spy service.

Britain Vows Retaliation if Russia Poisoned Former Spy

Calling Russia “a malign force around the world,” Britain’s foreign secretary on Tuesday vowed retaliation if investigators find that Moscow is behind the apparent poisoning of a former Russian intelligence officer and his daughter in southern England.

speaking in the House of Commons, he noted the widespread speculation that Russia was to blame and “the echoes of the death of Alexander Litvinenko in 2006.” Mr. Litvinenko, another former Russian agent, was fatally poisoned in London, and a British investigation concluded that he had been killed on orders from the Kremlin.

Conservationists and wildlife enthusiasts are mourning the case of six lions that have been found dead and dismembered in what is a suspected to be a poisoning in one of Uganda's most renowned national parks.

In a statement, the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) said the big cats were found Friday evening with "most of their bodies parts missing" in Queen Elizabeth National Park, their carcasses surrounded by the lifeless scavengers, "which points to possible poisoning of the lions." UWA said it was "saddened" by the grisly case, and it "cannot rule out illegal wildlife trafficking."

The discovery is a devastating blow that officials say can negatively impact the country's tourism sector, which is a top foreign exchange earner for Uganda. Nature tourism pours $1.6 billion into the economy each year.

Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny was nearly killed with a rare nerve agent before he recovered from a coma and went on to trick one of his apparent assassins into confessing to the details of the plot on tape.

Russia, under strongman Vladimir Putin's watch, has become a rogue regime apparently responsible, despite its loud denials, for a growing list of egregious crimes.

assassinations of political targets at home and abroad -- some with banned chemical weapons -- to Russia's ongoing invasion of neighboring Ukraine and a hacking campaign of unprecedented scope against the United States, and it's clear that Putin has become bolder and more dangerous than ever.

A woman suspected of sending a letter containing the poison ricin to President Donald Trump was arrested

CNN previously reported that law enforcement had intercepted a ricin package sent to Trump last week, according to two law enforcement officials, and that investigators were looking into the possibility that it came from Canada.

Two tests had been done to confirm the presence of ricin. All mail for the White House is sorted and screened at an offsite facility before reaching the White House.

The 59-year-old, well known from countless media appearances and for running focus groups that provide an insight into America’s political psyche, has also now chosen a less partisan path.

Having once worked for rightwing Republicans such as Pat Buchanan, Newt Gingrich and Rudy Giuliani, he no longer hesitates to condemn Donald Trump’s pernicious influence or fears the conservative media backlash.

You all have proven that there’s still a desire for substance in politics, not just slogans and soundbites, and thank God you haven’t completely embraced American politics because your elections are of substance rather than style.

Censorship was extremely rigorous in 18th-century France during the reign of Louis XV

remained within a small circle of friends who shared an interest in subversive writings

Voltaire asked his friend, the writer Nicolas-Claude Thiriot, to provide him with a handwritten copy of priest Jean Meslier’s dangerous philosophical will

“White people who are not privileged feel belittled. They feel stereotyped. They feel openly ridiculed and they are really, really angry because of what elite white people are doing to them,”

“Now, because of this poisonous dynamic among white people, guess who’s paying the price?”

“Working-class whites, whose claims to privilege rest on morality and hard work, stereotype black people by conflating hard living and race,” she notes. “Professional-class whites, whose claims to privilege rest on merit, stereotype black people as less competent than whites.”

Navalny had previously survived an assassination attempt by poisoning from the Russian government which it denies, and then recovered in a safe foreign country, so why would he go back to Russia?

Though necessary at that moment, our escape delivered something that dictators crave. They want to be feared, and nothing cements that more than running from them.

When news of Navalny's poisoning and evacuation from Russia broke, it drew support and empathy for his campaign of exposing Putin's misgovernance. Inadvertently, however, it also further instilled the fear of Putin into those who oppose him.

Lenin’s seizures in the hours and days before he died are a puzzle and perhaps historically significant. Severe seizures, Dr. Vinters said in an interview before the conference, are “quite unusual in a stroke patient.” But, he added, “almost any poison can cause seizures.”

Dr. Lurie concurred on Friday, telling the conference that poison was in his opinion the most likely immediate cause of Lenin’s death. The most likely perpetrator? Stalin, who saw Lenin as his main obstacle to taking over the Soviet Union and wanted to get rid of him.

Dr. Vinters believes that sky-high cholesterol leading to a stroke was the main cause of Lenin’s death. But he said there is one other puzzling aspect of the story. Although toxicology studies were done on others in Russia, there was an order that no toxicology be done on Lenin’s tissues.

Libya — the last country we bombed because its leader crossed a red line or was about to

worst political and economic crisis since the defeat of Qaddafi

example of a successful foreign military intervention, which should be repeated in Syria

All three researchers concluded that one of the biggest factors in both a happy life and a long life was having strong and healthy social connections. Beyond that, the people who tended to have "happy-well" outcomes were conscientious, emotionally healthy individuals who set and actively pursued goals; who incorporated strong social networks, exercise and "healthy" eating/drinking habits organically into their everyday lives; who were optimistic but not to the point of being careless or reckless; social enough to form strong networks, but not so social as to pursue unhealthy habits for peer approval; and who felt engaged and satisfied in their careers, marriages, and friendships.

the happiness of children in a household (aged 10 to 21, living at home) is significantly affected by the happiness of their mother--or, at least her happiness in terms of her marriage. Only 55 percent of children whose mothers reported that they were unhappy in their marriages said they were completely happy at home, versus 73 percent of those whose mothers reported being very happy in their marriages. The happiness of the fathers was less significant. 

For months, worried parents in Flint, Mich., arrived at their pediatricians’ offices in droves. Holding a toddler by the hand or an infant in their arms, they all have the same question: Are their children being poisoned?

To find out, all it takes is a prick of the finger, a small letting of blood. If tests come back positive, the potentially severe consequences are far more difficult to discern.

That’s how lead works. It leaves its mark quietly, with a virtually invisible trail. But years later, when a child shows signs of a learning disability or behavioral issues, lead’s prior presence in the bloodstream suddenly becomes inescapable.