Here are some of tonight’s stories:
- Haiti’s president was assassinated in a nighttime attack in his private residence.
- Japan declares COVID-related state of emergency that may impact Summer Olympics.
- COVID-19 deaths hit 4 million globally as nations rush to vaccinate their people. Meanwhile Texas Republicans vow to resist the Biden administration’s plan of a door-to-door vaccine drive.
- Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter are celebrating 75 years of marriage!
- Russian ransomware attack avoids hacking Russian-language computers.
- QAnon cultists are running for school boards across the U.S.
- Georgia bankruptcy filings reveal economic and racial differences; and Oregon pandemic job losses had a disproportionate impact on people of color, low-wage earners, and women.
- America used fewer fossil fuels in 2020 than it has in three decades, but the majority of U.S. employers want to diminish or end remote work options.
- Sixty years of climate change warnings were either missed or ignored.
- Erik Prince had a $10 billion plan to make weapons and create a private army in Ukraine.
Details and links to sources below the fold.
This is an open thread. Everyone is encouraged to share articles, stories, and tweets in your comments.
605,694 PEOPLE HAVE DIED FROM CORONAVIRUS IN THE U.S. 182.9 MILLION PEOPLE IN THE U.S. HAVE RECEIVED A VACCINATION DOSE
The Washington Post
Biden shifts to pitching his American Families Plan, emphasizing Democratic priorities
President Biden said Wednesday that his focus remains on his administration’s expansive efforts to invest in programs that touch many facets of American life, not just the bipartisan infrastructure agreement that has spent weeks in the spotlight. […]
“I’m here to make the case for the second critical part of my domestic agenda,” Biden told the crowd. “It’s a combination of parts of my American Jobs Plan that were essential and not included in the bipartisan infrastructure plan as well as my American Families Plan.” […]
White House officials signaled that Biden’s trip was an effort to allay concerns that the administration was too focused on the bipartisan agreement instead of the transformational changes he and other Democrats vowed to enact if given control of the White House and Congress.
Picture a desert battlefield, scarred by years of warfare. A retreating army scrambles to escape as its enemy advances. Dozens of small drones, indistinguishable from the quadcopters used by hobbyists and filmmakers, come buzzing down from the sky, using cameras to scan the terrain and onboard computers to decide on their own what looks like a target. Suddenly they begin divebombing trucks and individual soldiers, exploding on contact and causing even more panic and confusion.
This isn’t a science fiction imagining of what future wars might be like. It’s a real scene that played out last spring as soldiers loyal to the Libyan strongman Khalifa Hifter retreated from the Turkish-backed forces of the United Nations-recognized Libyan government. According to a U.N. group of weapons and legal experts appointed to document the conflict, drones that can operate without human control “hunted down” Hifter’s soldiers as they fled.
Miami Herald
Haiti President Jovenel Moïse assassinated in middle-of-the-night attack at his home
Haitian President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated and his wife wounded during an armed attack in the early hours Wednesday at their private residence above the hills of Port-au-Prince, plunging the Caribbean nation, already in the throes of a political crisis, into fresh uncertainty about its leadership.
Acting Prime Minister Claude Joseph, who first told his fellow Haitians about the president’s assassination, said he is in charge and that the country is now under martial law. […]
Hours after the assassination, Joseph declared martial law throughout Haiti, issuing an executive order.
Haiti’s first lady arrives in South Florida to be treated for gunshot wounds
First Lady Martine Moïse of Haiti was airlifted to South Florida to be treated for gunshot wounds Wednesday afternoon, hours after her husband, President Jovenel Moïse, was assassinated in an early morning attack in their home.
Martine Moïse arrived in Miami in the late afternoon and was taken to Jackson Health System’s Ryder Trauma Center. There was no immediate information about her condition. […]
Martine and Jovenel Moïse were childhood sweethearts and married in 1996. The couple has three children, Jomarlie, Joverlein and Jovenenel.
Reuters
Haiti police battle gunmen who killed president, amid fears of chaos
Haiti's security forces were locked in a fierce gun battle on Wednesday with assailants who assassinated President Jovenel Moise at his home overnight, plunging the already impoverished, violence-wracked nation deeper into chaos.
The police had killed four of the "mercenaries" and captured two more, Police General Director Leon Charles said in televised comments late on Wednesday, adding that security forces would not rest until they had all been dealt with.
"We blocked them en route as they left the scene of the crime," he said. "Since then, we have been battling with them."
"They will be killed or apprehended."
U.S. considers visas for vulnerable Afghan women after military exit
The Biden administration is considering offering an expedited visa path for vulnerable Afghans including women politicians, journalists, and activists who may become targets of the Taliban, U.S. officials say.
Rights groups have been asking the State Department and White House to add up to 2,000 visas specifically for vulnerable women and women's advocates to a developing policy plan to evacuate thousands Afghans after the U.S. military pullout this month. The current plan includes translators who worked with foreign forces.
One of the officials said the administration is looking not only at women who are under threat, but also men and minorities in high-risk professions.
Los Angeles Times
Will the Olympics be canceled due to Japanese state of emergency?
With COVID-19 cases hitting a two-month high in Tokyo, it comes as no surprise the Japanese government is expected to declare a new state of emergency that will run through the upcoming Summer Olympics.
It seems unlikely the new edict would stop the massive international competition from taking place, but it could force a ban on spectators from most venues.
“Infections in Tokyo are trending upward, and we will take every necessary measure to curb the spread of the coronavirus,” Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga told reporters.
Tokyo organizers have already barred foreign spectators with a current, quasi-state of emergency set to expire Sunday. The new edict might run through late August, encompassing the span of the Games from July 23 to Aug. 8.
With Delta variant spreading, how worried should fully vaccinated people be?
If you’re fully vaccinated, how worried should you be about the Delta variant of the coronavirus?
There is widespread scientific consensus that fully vaccinated people have an excellent chance of being protected from severe illness or death from any coronavirus strain, including Delta. In Los Angeles County, 99.8% of people who have died from the coronavirus since December have not been vaccinated.
But some health officials, including in Los Angeles County, are now raising questions about whether the Delta variant could be carried by vaccinated people, who then might transmit the virus to those who are unvaccinated.
San Francisco Chronicle
California drought: Bay Area, state hit 126-year lows for rainfall this year
California and the Bay Area experienced the driest rainy season on record, with average statewide precipitation reaching 126-year lows, according to Golden Gate Weather Services, a meteorological consulting firm.
The Bay Area got only 9.88 inches of rain this season, 39% of its normal amount of 25.28 inches, Golden Gate Weather Services said. That’s the least ever, going back to 1895.
California got 11.46 inches, or 49% of its normal 23.61 inches. That’s also the least ever.
Bay Area COVID deaths plunge to near zero, thanks to high vaccination rates
COVID-19 deaths have nearly bottomed out in the Bay Area, with an average of one new death reported a day for the nine-county region — the lowest number since the start of the pandemic and a dramatic drop from the winter surge, when nearly 70 people were dying every day.
The region reported no deaths Sunday through Tuesday, the first time three consecutive days have passed without a COVID fatality in more than 15 months. Deaths statewide have also dropped sharply, to about 20 a day from a peak of more than 500 in January.
Nationally, average daily deaths have declined to about 200, the fewest since late March 2020.
KMBC-TV — (ABC) Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City-region ICU nurse talks COVID-19 burnout as Missouri sees rise in cases
Almost 16 months into the pandemic, COVID-19 fatigue is real. For the nurses caring for new COVID-19 patients, many are feeling the burnout.
"We've kind of experienced a bit of a rollercoaster ride," said Kristin Sollars, an ICU nurse at St. Luke's Health System.
Nurses are seeing a rise in cases in Missouri, which leads the nation in new coronavirus cases per capita.
"It's scary. It's scary because it's been really hard. Its been really hard on frontline staff, it's been on hard on families," said Sollars.
She says many nurses were optimistic about how the pandemic was shifting during the spring. But says over the last few weeks as St. Luke's has taken in new COVID-19 patients from rural areas -- it's been tough to see the change.
"It's disheartening. It's hard to feel it coming again," said Sollars.
AP News
Global COVID-19 deaths hit 4 million amid rush to vaccinate
The global death toll from COVID-19 eclipsed 4 million Wednesday as the crisis increasingly becomes a race between the vaccine and the highly contagious delta variant.
The tally of lives lost over the past year and a half, as compiled from official sources by Johns Hopkins University, is about equal to the number of people killed in battle in all of the world’s wars since 1982, according to estimates from the Peace Research Institute Oslo.
The toll is three times the number of people killed in traffic accidents around the globe every year. It is about equal to the population of Los Angeles or the nation of Georgia. It is equivalent to more than half of Hong Kong or close to 50% of New York City.
Even then, it is widely believed to be an undercount because of overlooked cases or deliberate concealment.
Latest hack to test Biden’s vow for consequences for Russia
President Joe Biden said Wednesday he would “deliver” a message to Russian President Vladimir Putin about the latest ransomware attacks targeting American businesses, setting up a test of Biden’s ability to balance his pledge to respond firmly to cyber breaches with his goal of developing a stable relationship with Russia.
The administration faces few easy options for a ransomware threat that in recent months has emerged as a major national security challenge, with attacks from Russia-based gangs that have targeted vital infrastructure and extorted multimillion-dollar payments from victims.
The White House says the damage from the latest attack — affecting as many as 1,500 businesses worldwide — appeared minimal, though cybersecurity experts said information remained incomplete.
NBC News
Code in huge ransomware attack written to avoid computers that use Russian, says new report
The computer code behind the massive ransomware attack by the Russian-speaking hacking ring REvil was written so that the malware avoids systems that primarily use Russian or related languages, according to a new report by a cybersecurity firm.
It's long been known that some malicious software includes this feature, but the report by Trustwave SpiderLabs, obtained exclusively by NBC News, appears to be the first to publicly identify it as an element of the latest attack, which is believed to be the largest ransomware campaign ever.
"They don't want to annoy the local authorities, and they know they will be able to run their business much longer if they do it this way," said Ziv Mador, Trustwave SpiderLabs' vice president of security research.
QAnon's new 'plan'? Run for school board
[…] In the wake of Donald Trump's 2020 election defeat and the disappearance of the anonymous online account "Q" that once served as QAnon's inspiration, many people who spout QAnon’s false claims have hatched a new plan: run for school board or local office, spread the gospel of Q, but don’t call it QAnon.
It's a scene that has played out at other school boards and comes as many local meetings have emerged in recent months as cultural flashpoints in a broader battle over the perceived encroachment of race-conscious education — sometimes separately lumped together under the label critical race theory.
The News & Observer
Black student leaders call on UNC officials to listen to these safety and equity demands
UNC-Chapel Hill student leaders are again asking the university to make the campus safer for Black students, with eight specific actions that can be implemented for the fall semester.
Members of the Black Student Movement announced their top priorities at a press conference at the Sonja Haynes Center for Black Culture and History on Wednesday. The demands are focused on safety and equity.
“Blackness is not viewed by this university outside of a lens of profitability,” UNC-CH junior Julia Clark said. “Black students and Black faculty are systematically abused and exploited by the very institution profiting from their work.”
Top NC lawmaker rejects Nikole Hannah-Jones’ call for change to UNC board appointments
North Carolina’s House speaker says there’s no need to change how members are appointed to two of the most influential higher education boards in the state, despite journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones’ call for a change to the inherently political process.
Hannah-Jones was set to teach at UNC-Chapel Hill this year, but after months of controversy over the school’s failure to grant the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist tenure for a teaching position, UNC-CH’s Board of Trustees finally opted to reverse course. The board voted in June to grant Hannah-Jones tenure. […]
The Republican-controlled legislature appoints members to the Board of Governors, and both that board and lawmakers select members for the Board of Trustees, whose members do have have a say in hiring decisions.
NPR News
The Longest Presidential Marriage In U.S. History Turns 75 Today
They met when he was 3 and she was a day old. And on Wednesday, Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter are celebrating 75 years of marriage — the longest marriage in presidential history.
The pair grew up just three miles apart in Plains, Ga. Jimmy's mother was a nurse who helped care for Rosalynn.
In a town without too many boys, Rosalynn soon became best friends with Jimmy's younger sister. "I thought he was the most handsome young man I had ever seen," she wrote in her memoir, "First Lady from Plains."
Descendants Of Slaves Say This Proposed Grain Complex Will Destroy The Community
Joy Banner, 42, stands at the edge of her hometown of Wallace, La., looking over a field of sugar cane, the crop that her enslaved ancestors cut from dawn to dusk, that is now the planned site of a major industrial complex. Across the grassy river levee, the swift waters of the Mississippi bear cargo toward distant ports, as the river has done for generations.
"This property is where the proposed grain elevator site would be set up right next to us," she says. "As you can see, we would be living in the middle of this facility."
A bitter fight has broken out between the powerful backers of this major new grain terminal on the Mississippi River in south Louisiana and the historic Black community that has been here on the fence line for 150 years. Charges of environmental racism are coming from her and fellow descendants of enslaved people, who believe the silo complex is an existential threat to the community of Wallace.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Georgia bankruptcy filings reveal economic, racial differences
Over the last year, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has collected data from several thousand bankruptcies in Georgia as part of an effort to understand the economic impact of COVID-19 on Georgians. […]
Filers in predominately Black neighborhoods owed significantly more student loan debt than those in predominantly white neighborhoods. While filers in mostly white areas owed about 8% of their total debt as student loan debt, filers in mostly Black areas owed 14% — nearly double. […]
While average size of mortgage debt in white and Black neighborhoods was similar, the quality of those mortgages was not. In our data, one third of filers in mostly Black neighborhoods owed more on their homes than the home was worth. Just 21% of filers in mostly white neighborhoods faced the same situation.
John Lewis statue rises in Vine City’s new park
The Lewis brothers, as they generally are, were quiet.
Samuel and Henry Lewis, the younger brothers of the late John Lewis, just watched as dozens of people, including Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms and Ambassador Andrew Young, scrambled to get their photos taken in front of a massive statue of the congressman that harkened the opening of the new Rodney Cook Sr. Park in Vine City.
“All I can say is wow,” Henry Lewis finally said, looking at the crowd and then the statue.
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Mourners on Wednesday night blocked off the intersection where a Minneapolis police squad had crashed into and killed an innocent driver during a police pursuit the day before.
Using their cars, they barricaded the intersection from all sides, rejecting police requests to open up the intersection. One irate driver confronted the crowd, sending people running in a panic, and then left.
Cheryl Frazier said family and friends would remain at the site all night. The victim was her brother, Leneal Frazier, 40, of St. Paul. She said he was a father of six children, who range in age from 6 months to 22 years.
"We're gonna get through this," she said.
After the intersection was blockaded and as darkness fell, police brought in road closure signs, allowing the crowd to gather safely.
The Wichita Eagle
Kansas outperforms grim budget expectations, has highest ending balance on record
The state of Kansas overcame bleak expectations to collect 9.3% more tax revenue than expected in the 2021 budget year, the Department of Revenue reported Friday.
The $8.9 billion general revenue haul outperformed expectations by $758 million, leaving Kansas with its highest ending balance since at least 1980. The $1.9 billion in reserves represents a quarter of the spending financed by general taxes. […]
“Our efforts to rebuild our state’s economic foundation and strengthen our economy are paying off,” Gov. Laura Kelly said in a statement.
Business Insider
The Fed knows skyrocketing home prices are a problem but doesn't know what to do about it
Of the various items surging in price in 2021, homes are perhaps the most extraordinary. Price growth is the strongest it's been in more than 30 years. While demand remains elevated, builders have struggled to bring more supply to market. America's central bank played at least some role in this incredible price inflation.
The Fed's emergency policies dragged mortgage rates to record lows and helped spark the sharp increase in homebuying. But as prices climb to dizzying heights, some experts have called on the Fed to rein in its support. Officials at the Fed are tuned in to the problem, minutes from the Federal Open Market Committee's June meeting showed.
Several of the meeting's participants "saw benefits to reducing the pace" of the central bank's purchases of mortgage-backed securities, citing "valuation pressures in housing markets," the minutes said. They also suggested tapering MBS purchases earlier than Treasury purchases, a move that would counter the Fed's past signals.
Oregon Public Broadcasting News
Oregon economic report finds pandemic job losses hit women, people of color hardest
The pandemic eliminated one in seven jobs in Oregon — a devastating blow over the course of two months that hobbled an otherwise healthy economy.
Multiple sectors, from hospitality to retail to private education services, were hit particularly hard, resulting in uneven job losses and disproportionate impact on people of color, low-wage earners and women.
Those are the conclusions of a new report from the Oregon Employment Department, “Disparate Impacts of the Pandemic Recession in Oregon.” While the findings are no surprise to anyone who has followed economic news about the pandemic, the report offers more detail into this unprecedented economic upheaval than the state had done to date.
The Seattle Times
New railcars in the works for Washington state Amtrak trains
The popular Amtrak Cascades passenger trains that connect Oregon, Washington and B.C. are expected to receive 48 new railcars as part of a proposed $7.3 billion national spending plan announced Wednesday.
The new railcars, which would be built by Siemens Mobility in Sacramento, California, provide about 20% more space than existing types, said Ron Pate, director of rail, freight and ports for the Washington State Department of Transportation.
“We are excited for the new train sets. It’s going to be state of the art,” he said.
Houston Chronicle
'Not on my watch': Texas Republicans buck Biden's door-to-door vaccine drive
Some Texas Republicans are pushing back against President Joe Biden’s push for greater outreach to get more Americans to receive COVID-19 shots, as vaccination drives in states like Texas have stagnated.
“Not on my watch!” Attorney General Ken Paxton tweeted in response to the president’s comments on Tuesday that “we need to go community-by-community, neighborhood-by-neighborhood, and oft times door-to-door, literally knocking on doors.”
U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, a San Antonio Republican, on Wednesday directed a tweet at Biden with a play on the “Come and Take It” flag that shows an image of a syringe with the words “Come Inject It.” In a separate tweet, the congressman said he thought a door-to-door push would be unconstitutional, as such an approach was “only really contemplated in Constitution for the census.”
Gov. Abbott releases special session agenda heavy on hot-button issues
Twenty-four hours before the Texas Legislature was set to begin a special summer session, Gov. Greg Abbott on Wednesday called for lawmakers to tackle a slew of hot-button conservative priorities, including a package of Republican voting restrictions that Democrats managed to derail in dramatic fashion on the last day of the regular session in May.
Abbott, a Republican facing two conservative primary challengers next year, waited until the day before the special session that he had called to set the agenda for state lawmakers. He called on the GOP-led Legislature to tackle border security; so-called “social media censorship” of conservatives; additional restrictions on the teaching of critical race theory in schools; and barring transgender girls from playing on girls scholastic sports teams.
Most of the 11 priorities involved bills that failed to clear the Legislature during its regular session. Abbott called it “unfinished business to ensure that Texas remains the most exceptional state in America.”
The Verge
America used fewer fossil fuels in 2020 than it has in three decades
Americans gobbled up fewer fossil fuels in 2020 than they have in three decades, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA). Consumption of petroleum, natural gas, and coal dropped by 9 percent last year compared to 2019, the biggest annual decrease since the EIA started keeping track in 1949.
The COVID-19 pandemic was responsible for much of the fall as people stayed home to curb the spread of the virus and used less gas. In April 2020, oil prices nosedived below zero because there was so little demand. The US transportation sector alone used up 15 percent less energy in 2020 compared to the year before. Higher temperatures last winter also helped to cut energy demand for heating, according to the EIA. As a result, greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels plummeted to a near 40-year low.
That downward trend will have to continue in order to stave off the climate crisis.
Inc.
Survey: Nearly Half of Business Owners Say Remote Work Is Hurting Productivity
With employees working remotely, business owners say productivity is taking a hit.
In a survey of more than 1,000 U.S. business owners released last week by Digital.com, a Seattle-based review site focused on small businesses, 45 percent reported that their companies aren't getting as much done while their employees are working from home.
The survey further suggests employers disagree with research that finds people are equally or more productive while working from home: 39 percent of respondents said they would fire employees who refused to return to the office. Among companies that reported their employees were completely office-based before the pandemic, that figure rose to 44 percent.
MarketWatch
JPMorgan and Goldman are calling time on work from home. Their rivals are ready to pounce.
There is a growing divide on Wall Street: firms calling employees back and firms telling people they can work from home.
Titans like Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co.are taking a hard-line approach, beefing up in-person staff five days a week in New York even though it might mean losing talent. Rivals including Citigroup Inc. are touting flexibility, betting that a softer approach will help them poach top traders and deal makers.
While businesses across America are struggling with whether and how to have staff return full time, the issue has been particularly thorny at large U.S. banks…
The Oregonian
Oregon’s heat wave death toll grows to 116
Oregon’s death toll from the record-high temperatures during last week’s heat wave rose to 116 people, with Union County now the 10th county to report a death.
The number has climbed since Wednesday, when the Oregon Medical Examiner’s Office initially reported at least 63 deaths. On Friday, before the July Fourth weekend, the office reported 94 deaths, and on Tuesday the office said the number of victims had increased to 107.
The Guardian
Sixty years of climate change warnings: the signs that were missed (and ignored)
In August 1974, the CIA produced a study on “climatological research as it pertains to intelligence problems”. The diagnosis was dramatic. It warned of the emergence of a new era of weird weather, leading to political unrest and mass migration (which, in turn, would cause more unrest). The new era the agency imagined wasn’t necessarily one of hotter temperatures; the CIA had heard from scientists warning of global cooling as well as warming. But the direction in which the thermometer was travelling wasn’t their immediate concern; it was the political impact. They knew that the so-called “little ice age”, a series of cold snaps between, roughly, 1350 and 1850, had brought not only drought and famine, but also war – and so could these new climatic changes.
“The climate change began in 1960,” the report’s first page informs us, “but no one, including the climatologists, recognised it.” Crop failures in the Soviet Union and India in the early 1960s had been attributed to standard unlucky weather. The US shipped grain to India and the Soviets killed off livestock to eat, “and premier Nikita Khrushchev was quietly deposed”.
But, the report argued, the world ignored this warning, as the global population continued to grow and states made massive investments in energy, technology and medicine.
Meanwhile, the weird weather rolled on…
Extreme temperatures kill 5 million people a year with heat-related deaths rising, study finds
More than 5 million people die each year globally because of excessively hot or cold conditions, a 20-year study has found – and heat-related deaths are on the rise.
The study involving dozens of scientists around the world found that 9.4% of global deaths each year are attributable to heat or cold exposure, equivalent to 74 extra deaths per 100,000 people.
World ‘must step up preparations for extreme heat’
The world needs to step up preparations for extreme heat, which may be hitting faster and harder than previously forecast, a group of leading climate scientists have warned in the wake of freakishly high temperatures in Canada and the US.
Last week’s heat dome above British Columbia, Washington state and Portland, Oregon smashed daily temperature records by more than 5C (9F) in some places – a spike that would have been considered impossible two weeks ago, the experts said, prompting concerns the climate may have crossed a dangerous threshold.
A first analysis of the heatwave, released on Wednesday, found that human-caused climate change made the extreme weather at least 150 times more likely.
ProPublica
Campaign to Rein in Mega IRA Tax Shelters Gains Steam in Congress Following ProPublica Report
Two members of Congress who have long been responsible for shaping federal laws on retirement savings are considering major reforms after ProPublica exposed how the ultrawealthy are turning retirement accounts into gargantuan tax shelters.
Rep. Richard Neal, the Massachusetts Democrat who chairs the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, told ProPublica that he has directed the committee to draft a bill that “will stop IRAs from being exploited.”
The committee is considering “limiting the total amount of money that can be saved in tax-preferred retirement accounts,” Neal said in a written statement.
Time
Documents Reveal Erik Prince's $10 Billion Plan to Make Weapons and Create a Private Army in Ukraine
In the second night of his visit to Kyiv, Erik Prince had a dinner date on his agenda. A few of his Ukrainian associates had arranged to meet the American billionaire at the Vodka Grill that evening, Feb. 23, 2020…
Igor Novikov, who was then a top adviser to Ukraine’s President, remembers feeling a little nervous. He had done some reading about Blackwater, the private military company Prince had founded in 1997, and he knew about the massacre its troops had perpetrated during the U.S. war in Iraq. Coming face to face that night with the world’s most prominent soldier of fortune, Novikov remembers thinking: “What does this guy want from us?”
It soon became clear that Prince wanted a lot from Ukraine. According to interviews with close associates and confidential documents detailing his ambitions, Prince hoped to hire Ukraine’s combat veterans into a private military company.
BBC News
Taliban battle their way into western Afghan city
The Taliban briefly entered a key city in western Afghanistan as they pursue a rapid advance before Nato troops leave. The local governor told the BBC that government officials had been moved to a nearby army base as the militants moved towards the centre of Qala-e-Naw.
But local officials and the defence ministry later said the Taliban were dislodged from government buildings and troops had cleared most of the city. The Taliban is making gains in the country as the US and allies pull out.
The vast majority of remaining foreign forces in Afghanistan have left ahead of an 11 September deadline, leaving the Afghan military in sole charge of security.
South Africa's former president hands himself over to police
South Africa's former President Jacob Zuma has handed himself in to police to begin serving a jail sentence for contempt of court.
He travelled to a prison near to his home in KwaZulu-Natal province late on Wednesday, his foundation said.
Police had warned they were prepared to arrest the 79-year-old if he did not hand himself in by the end of the day. Mr Zuma was given a 15-month jail term last week after he failed to attend a corruption inquiry.
Deutsche Welle
Birds are dying in the United States and no one knows why
Across the United States, people have been finding dead birds. The birds appear to have been hit by a wave of mysterious illnesses since April.
Ornithologists (bird experts) say the dead or ailing aviators tend to have swollen eyes as well as neurological issues that seem to be causing the birds to lose balance.
"It’s not unusual to see birds with eye problems," says Jim Monsma, director and founder of the animal rescue center City Wildlife in Washington, D.C. […]
"We didn’t know at first we were dealing with an epidemic," Monsma says.
Kuwait arrests political critic for 'insulting the emir'
The poet accused the monarchy of violating the constitution and defying parliament on Twitter. Criticizing the royal family can be a criminal offense in the emirate. […]
Jamal al-Sayer, a prominent poet and political activist in the Gulf state of Kuwait tweeted on June 28: "Your highness (the emir) and your highness the crown prince, the situation has become unbearable. You have allowed the government to disrupt and violate the constitution, defying the parliament and the people's will."
Al Jazeera
Ship Ever Given that blocked Suez Canal released
The Ever Given, one of the world’s largest container ships, resumed its journey to leave the Suez Canal on Wednesday, 106 days after becoming wedged across a southern section of the waterway for nearly a week and disrupting global trade.
The development came after its Japanese owner, Shoei Kisen Kaisha Ltd, reached a settlement with canal authorities over a compensation amount following weeks of negotiations and a court standoff. […]
“We regret the impact that the voyage delay has had on those with cargo stuck onboard,” Shoei Kisen said in a statement.
Barrage of rockets fired at airbase housing US troops in Iraq
At least 14 rockets hit an airbase in western Iraq hosting US and other international forces on Wednesday, the latest in a series to tit-for-tat strikes with powerful Iran-aligned militias in the country.
Colonel Wayne Marotto, spokesman for the US-led coalition, said that Al-Assad Air Base in western Iraq was attacked early in the afternoon by 14 rockets that landed on the base and its perimeter, prompting the activation of defensive measures.
Politico
Biden targets children, spouses in visa crackdown on world’s villains
[…] Since taking office, the administration has eagerly embraced visa bans as a means to punish bad actors overseas for everything from alleged corruption to human rights abuses. And thanks to steps taken by Congress in recent years, the administration is better able to publicize what previously would have been confidential visa decisions. Under Biden, who has been in office less than six months, the State Department alone has announced visa penalties on more than a dozen occasions, affecting well over 100 people in countries ranging from Guatemala to Belarus.
What makes the visa bans extra potent, U.S. officials and analysts say, is that they can be — and often automatically are — applied to the primary target’s immediate family. As a result, officials hope would-be perpetrators will think twice about making a bad move if a spouse or a child could pay a price. The idea is to scare in particular the corrupt moneyed elites who are accustomed to the finer things.
“A lot of these higher-level people, they send their kids to Harvard, they buy property in Manhattan, they vacation in California,” said Gary Kalman, who directs the U.S. office of Transparency International. “They stole a lot of money, and they want to live a good life.”
CNN
Republican Rep. Chip Roy says he wants ‘18 more months of chaos and the inability to get stuff done’
Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas revealed in a video circulating online that he wants to jam Democrats’ legislative goals so Republicans can win the 2022 midterms. In the video posted by Democratic activist Lauren Windsor on Tuesday, Roy was asked specifically about infrastructure negotiations in Congress.
“The people who were working to cut the deal, by the way, were not your conservative warriors in the Senate. And so they’re cutting a deal, but then Biden, who came out and said, ‘We have a deal,’ allowed Pelosi to basically kind of step in and go, ‘Whoop, no you don’t.’ You’re only gonna get that deal if you have reconciliation with all this liberal garbage,” he can be heard saying in the video.
He added: “And then Biden said, ‘OK, yeah.’ And they kind of backed away from the deal. Then he kind of came back away from the veto threat, so nobody knows what anybody’s gonna do right now. That’s the thing. This is the problem. I actually say, thank the Lord. Eighteen more months of chaos and the inability to get stuff done. That’s what we want.”
Federal judge largely faults Air Force for 2017 Texas church shooting
A federal judge ruled Wednesday that the negligence of the United States government was mostly responsible for the 2017 mass shooting at a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, one of the deadliest mass shootings in recent history.
US District Judge Xavier Rodriguez for the Western District of Texas concluded the Air Force failed to exercise reasonable care when it didn’t submit the shooter’s criminal history to the FBI’s background check system, which increased the risk of physical harm to the general public.
“Moreover, the evidence shows that — had the Government done its job and properly reported Kelley’s information into the background check system — it is more likely than not that Kelley would have been deterred from carrying out the Church shooting,” the ruling stated. “For these reasons, the Government bears significant responsibility for the Plaintiffs’ harm.”
Bloomberg
Pelosi’s Husband Locked In $5.3 Million From Alphabet Options
Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, won big on Alphabet Inc. stock and added bets on Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc. in the weeks leading up to the House Judiciary Committee’s vote on antitrust legislation that seeks to severely limit how these companies organize and offer their products.
In a financial disclosure signed by Nancy Pelosi July 2, her husband reported exercising call options to acquire 4,000 shares of Alphabet, the parent company of Google, at a strike price of $1,200. The trade netted him a $4.8 million gain, and it’s risen to $5.3 million since then as the shares have jumped.
Biden to Meet With Civil Rights Groups to Discuss Voting Rights
President Joe Biden is scheduled to meet with civil rights groups at the White House on Thursday to discuss voting rights legislation that has stalled in Congress due to Republican opposition.
Biden is set to host leadership from groups including the NAACP, the National Urban League, and the National Action Network, to discuss how to advance the legislation, according to a person familiar with the plans, who asked not to be named discussing internal deliberations.
Also on Thursday, Vice President Kamala Harris -- who is spearheading the administration’s efforts on voting rights -- is scheduled to speak at Howard University, her alma mater, to launch an expansion of the Democratic National Committee’s “I Will Vote” campaign. That effort aims to fight voter suppression and flip Republican-held seats in the 2022 midterm elections, according to another person.
Delish
There’s A Reason Hot Dogs And Buns Don’t Come In Equal Count Packages
[…] According to the National Hot Dog Sausage Council, the reason why isn't as strange as you may think. The NHDSC—which was founded in 1994—explained the mismatch packaging is simply because of the way these things were sold back in the day. In fact, it wasn't until 1940 that we actually began seeing hot dogs packaged in packs of 10 (which is why you typically see in stores now!). So why are buns not in 10-packs too? The NHDSC says it's because of the way they are baked.
"Sandwich rolls, or hot dog buns, most often come eight to the pack because the buns are baked in clusters of four in pans designed to hold eight rolls," said the council: "While baking pans now come in configurations that allow baking 10 and even 12 at a time, the eight-roll pan remains the most popular."
Ars Technica
Bitcoin power plant is turning a 12,000-year-old glacial lake into a hot tub
The fossil fuel power plant that a private equity firm revived to mine bitcoin is at it again. Not content to just pollute the atmosphere in pursuit of a volatile crypto asset with little real-world utility, this experiment in free marketeering is also dumping tens of millions of gallons of hot water into glacial Seneca Lake in upstate New York.
“The lake is so warm you feel like you’re in a hot tub,” Abi Buddington, who lives near the Greenidge power plant, told NBC News. […]
Atlas, the firm that bought Greenidge has been ramping up its bitcoin mining aspirations over the last year and a half, installing thousands of mining rigs that have produced over 1,100 bitcoin as of February 2021. The company has plans to install thousands more rigs, ultimately using 85 MW of the station’s total 108 MW capacity.
Biden’s right-to-repair order could stop companies from blocking DIY fixes
After years of petitions and proposals, momentum is building in government to give consumers broader rights to repair products they own ranging from farm tractors to mobile phones.
In a press briefing yesterday, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Biden will issue an executive order directing the US Department of Agriculture to issue rules that, among other things, “give farmers the right to repair their own equipment how they like.”
The order will reportedly cover more than tractors. According to a Bloomberg report, Biden will urge the Federal Trade Commission to press computer and electronics manufacturers and defense contractors to offer additional leeway in how their devices are repaired.