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August 23, 2012 | | Huge Problem Christian groups may have remained loyal to Todd Akin, but Mitt Romney has lost the support some of his key allies: anti-abortion activists. Grassroots groups like Personhood USA are incensed at Romney’s claim that he wouldn’t ban abortion for victims of rape—and of Romney’s rejection of Akin. The Daily Beast’s Michelle Goldberg on how Akin is trying to turn that fury into fundraising dollars. WAY OF LIFE Say goodbye to the middle class—or at least, that’s what a majority of Americans believe. The U.S. middle class is shrinking—and more Americans don’t believe they will achieve that way of life—according to a study released on Wednesday by the Pew Research Center. Only 51 percent of all adults are considered middle class, down from 61 percent in 1971, but the study did find that part of the shrinkage came from more people joining the upper classes, which now represent 20 percent of the nation, up from 14 percent in 1971. But those aren't all of the gains: the lower-income group rose to 29 percent of all adults, up from 25 percent in 1971. SYRIA Fighting continued in Damascus on Thursday, with reports of shelling. As the 17-month crackdown continues, a generation of traumatized kids have been scarred by the fighting. The Daily Beast’s Mike Giglio on the kids paying the real price of the conflict. HE’LL BE THERE! United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced on Wednesday that he will attend a summit in Tehran next month with 120 other officials—dealing a blow to the U.S. and Israel’s plan to isolate Iran as that nation as threatened to increase its nuclear program. Also attending the Nonaligned Movement summit will be Egypt, a country that has long been estranged from Iran. The Nonaligned Movement is a group formed during the Cold War meant to unite nations that felt marginalized by the U.S., including North Korea and Sudan. Iran’s hosting of the conference this year is a coincidence—the summit’s host rotate from year to year—but Iran is using it as an opportunity to pursue an anti-American narrative. EXTRADICTION Could Julian Assange be a bit paranoid? Despite his conviction that the United States is on a “witch-hunt” against him, sources within the U.S. government say they have no charges against him. Obama’s administration has said that the WikiLeaks mastermind’s fate is up to Britain, Sweden and Ecuador. Sources tell Reuters that the chances of Assange being pressed with criminal charges from the U.S. are low. Britain, on the other hand, is trying to fulfill an extradition notice to send Assange back to Sweden to be questioned in a sexual abuse case, despite Ecuador recently granting his asylum. Assange is making “wild assertions about us, when, in fact, his issue with the government of the United Kingdom has to do with whether he's going to go ... face justice in Sweden for something that has nothing to do with WikiLeaks,” said a U.S. State Department spokeswoman. | | 
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