| Trump says new FBI notes exonerate Michael Flynn, analysts say that's not the case Posted: 01 May 2020 01:16 PM PDT  Critics said Trump is distorting the contents of notes about an FBI interview in which Flynn apparently lied about talks with a Russian ambassador.
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| Afghan president, feuding rival reach 'tentative' agreement Posted: 01 May 2020 06:10 AM PDT  A bitter feud between Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and his rival Abdullah Abdullah appeared closer to resolution Friday after Abdullah said the two men had moved forward in talks. Abdullah previously served as Afghanistan's "chief executive" under a power-sharing deal with Ghani, but lost that post following last year's presidential elections that Ghani won amid claims of fraud. Instead of accepting defeat, Abdullah proclaimed himself president, a title he uses to this day, though the international community only recognises Ghani.
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| 'And then, boom': Outbreak shows shaky ground as Texas opens Posted: 30 Apr 2020 02:50 PM PDT  Barely a week ago, rural Lamar County could make a pretty good argument for Texas' reopening on Friday. The mayor of Paris, Texas — a pit stop for drivers passing through to snap a selfie with the city's miniaturized Eiffel Tower — had drive-thru virus testing in the works, just to give locals peace of mind. A courier drove 11 hours through the night to pick up testing kits and stores are second-guessing reopening as Lamar County becomes a cautionary tale of the fragility of Republican Gov. Greg Abbott's plan to get Texas back in business faster than many states.
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| Prison sentence for 'Hot Pockets' heiress delayed amid coronavirus Posted: 01 May 2020 01:44 PM PDT  Judge denies bid for house arrest but won't have surrender this month, as originally scheduled.
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| EU says it didn't bow to pressure from China to water down a critical coronavirus disinformation report, but not everyone's convinced Posted: 01 May 2020 12:35 AM PDT  Josep Borrell, the European Union's chief diplomat said: "There is no watering down of our findings." But some lawmakers aren't convinced.
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| Gov. Cuomo Is Blaming the New York Times for His Own Coronavirus Mistakes Posted: 30 Apr 2020 06:52 PM PDT  New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has an answer for critics who say the state didn't react to the novel coronavirus quickly enough: Blame The New York Times.Over the past several days, the governor has repeatedly used his press conferences to take shots at the self-described "Paper of Record," lumping the publication in with other official organizations that were slow to react to the spread of COVID-19."Where were all the experts?" Cuomo said during a press conference earlier this week. "Where was The New York Times? Where was The Wall Street Journal? Where was all the bugle blowers who should say, 'Be careful, there's a virus in China that may be in the United States.'"On Thursday, the governor got more specific. When asked about his response to critics who said other states were quicker to adopt measures to curb the spread of the virus, Cuomo instead said the paper's editorial writers should be blamed along with other organizations including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that supposedly did not sound the alarms early enough about the dangers of the virus."They didn't write an editorial saying I should close down until after I closed down, right?" he complained. "Where was The New York Times editorial board?" Cuomo continued moments later. "Everybody missed it. Governors don't do global pandemics, that's not in my job description."Either Cuomo didn't actually read the Times' coverage, or he has selective amnesia about the paper's articles and the recommendations in op-eds when contrasted with his own response. Beginning in mid-January, the Times has run multiple stories daily about the spread of the virus, tracing the pandemic from its initial outbreak in Wuhan, China, and chronicling scientists' warnings about the disease and the first cases and deaths in many countries. Later that month, the paper was running at least half a dozen increasingly alarming items per day about the spread of the virus, particularly in Asia, and its effects on global markets.At the time, some of the paper's opinion columnists had a message as well: The threat of the virus is real, and scientists need to be driving policy. In one column that ran on January 23, the same day Wuhan was sealed off from the rest of China by its government, Dr. Saad B. Omer, the director of the Yale Institute for Global Health, warned about the danger of the novel virus. He argued that politicians need to let scientists dictate policy on issues: "border screenings, travel restrictions and potential quarantine have major public health consequences, and they should be driven by science and emerging biological and epidemiological evidence.""We are once again faced with the outbreak of an emerging pathogen with potentially global implications," he wrote. "We don't know how bad it will get. But there is no excuse for not getting ready for the worst. We already know the consequences of inaction."In January, before there were any confirmed known cases in New York, the Times ran at least ten opinion pieces speculating about the dangers of the virus and how the U.S. should react. The editorial board itself warned about the risks of the virus on Jan. 28, saying the U.S. needed to heed the concerns of health experts. And by mid-February, the Times opinion section ran op-eds arguing how "the rapid—sometimes necessarily draconian—response of governments and health authorities has made a dent in transmission."In an email to The Daily Beast, the governor's senior adviser Rich Azzopardi reiterated Cuomo's claim that the paper's editorial board did not call for travel bans or a shutdown order until five days after the governor put New York on "pause.""For all of the Monday morning quarterbacking, it's important to acknowledge the role everyone played, and didn't play," he said. "No one is saying articles weren't written on the topic generally, but the point is, no one—not the experts, not the major health organizations, not the media who covered them, even The New York Times—were sounding the alarm on the potential for thousands of cases in the New York Metropolitan area before any testing confirmed a single case."While there were certainly mixed messages and little outright direction from the U.S. government, New York was still slower to react than other states and countries. Infectious disease experts and doctors urged the closing of schools for days before the state eventually announced such action (Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases said in late February that states should be prepared to close schools). The state government also dragged its feet as top health officials suggested that it was possible that many states would see stay-at-home measures. By the middle of the month, as New York attempted to mount a response to the virus, Cuomo was still feuding with New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, declaring, "There's not going to be any 'you must stay in your house' rule" (which he, in effect, reversed course on three days later when he put the state on "pause").And while Cuomo's public approval rating has jumped and he has become a media darling and Democratic Party hero, in the months after the Times' coverage, New York state still lagged behind some of the other localities affected by the coronavirus. Though the state's cases were growing, New York waited until after Washington and California had adopted widespread social-distancing measures to institute similar policies. In public statements, Cuomo attempted to reassure the public by proclaiming that the virus would not hit New York as particularly hard. "When you're saying, what happened in other countries versus what happened here, we don't even think it's going to be as bad as it was in other countries," Cuomo said in early March."New York City as a whole was late in social measures," the city's former deputy health commissioner Isaac B. Weisfuse said in a recent interview. "Any after-action review of the pandemic in New York City will focus on that issue. It has become the major issue in the transmission of the virus."Cuomo's complaints about the press have not, however, reached the level of pettiness displayed daily by President Donald Trump, who continues to use the pandemic as an opportunity to complain about media coverage of his administration. As The Daily Beast reported this week, the president even encouraged his friend and unofficial adviser, Fox News host Sean Hannity, to explore legal action against the paper for its critical coverage.And certainly Cuomo realizes the paper's editorial board and opinion section have become easy punching bags for public figures of all political persuasions.Over the past year several years, the paper's op-ed section has been admonished for serious errors and bizarre editorial decisions. The Times opinion section hired and quickly fired a tech columnist who had a public friendship with a neo-Nazi. Another op-ed columnist was widely ridiculed for tweeting that an American-born Olympic ice skater was an immigrant. Climate-change skeptic Bret Stephens has repeatedly generated controversy from his perch at the Times, from peddling arguments with whiffs of race-science to attempting to get a George Washington University professor reprimanded by his bosses for mean tweets. The editorial board's unprecedented endorsement of two Democratic presidential primary candidates (who both went on to lose without winning a single state) was also widely criticized for its lack of relevance or teeth in a crucial election year. The Times was also far from perfect on the issue of the virus. The opinion section has published several columns downplaying the severity of the virus or suggesting that the measures pushed by top global epidemiologists were useless. But the depth of reporting on the virus on the paper's news side, coupled with the warnings on the opinion side, do not make fair scapegoats for questions about the governor's response to the virus."Public health professionals will also need to work with political leaders to make hard decisions on if or when large events should be canceled, workers should be told to telecommute, schools should change the way they operate or schools should close," the Times opinion section warned in March, weeks before the governor put his state on "pause." Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Trump news: President claims to have saved 'thousands of lives' as he revises down predictions of death toll Posted: 01 May 2020 01:45 PM PDT  Donald Trump's new White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany held her first press briefing on Friday after more than 400 days without a scheduled press briefing by the Trump administration.The last briefing was held by Sarah Sanders in March 2019, though the president has held his own free-wheeling briefings through the coronavirus pandemic and reporters scramble to get statements during Oval Office visits.
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| A former bodyguard for Ellen DeGeneres said his experience with the host was 'kind of demeaning' Posted: 01 May 2020 10:37 AM PDT  The former security official said DeGeneres never said hello to him when he worked with the talk-show host at the 2014 Oscars.
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| Thousands of Americans to take part in biggest rent strike in decades Posted: 01 May 2020 02:00 AM PDT  * State leaders urged to cancel rent for duration of crisis * Nearly 4m Americans lost their jobs last week, figures showThousands of Americans plan to take part in a rent strike on Friday, calling for state leaders to cancel rent during the coronavirus crisis.Activists in New York, Pennsylvania and California are encouraging tenants to withhold rent, whether they are able to pay or not, to draw attention to the plight of those unable to pay.The protest is expected to represent the largest coordinated rent strike in America in decades, and comes as the labor department announced another 3.8 million people lost their jobs last week, with pressure growing on state leaders nationwide to increase their efforts on housing.More than 30 million Americans have filed for unemployment benefits in the past six weeks, as the coronavirus has caused widespread business closures. The New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is among those voicing support for the strikes, which are being coordinated by an array of housing groups."People aren't striking because they don't feel like paying rent, they're striking because they can't," Ocasio-Cortez said.In New York, more than 12,000 people have pledged to not pay their rent, and progressive state lawmakers have proposed legislation that would suspend or cancel rent payments for tenants who lost income due to the coronavirus. In March, New York's governor, Andrew Cuomo, suspended evictions for 90 days, in a move that prevents landlords from ousting tenants who cannot pay their rent.But critics say that merely postpones the problem."We need a suspension of rent and automatic forgiveness of any rent, mortgage or utility payment owed or accumulated during the length of this crisis," said Housing Justice for All, which campaigns to increase tenants' rights and to end homelessness in New York.Like Cuomo, Governor Gavin Newsom of California has barred evictions due to coronavirus hardship – tenants must provide proof their income has been affected by the pandemic – but stopped short of waiving individuals' rent payments. About 8,000 members of the Los Angeles Tenants Union are expected to withhold rent as of 1 May, while a similar movement is taking place in Philadelphia.If the estimates of New York City organizers prove accurate, the rent strike would be the largest there since the 1930s, when tenants in Harlem and the Lower East Side demanded lower rent. In Harlem, the protesters were predominantly African Americans, who protested against being charged higher rent than white tenants.
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| Pelosi Suggests Biden Does Not Need to ‘Directly’ Address Reade Allegation: ‘I’m Satisfied with How He Has Responded’ Posted: 30 Apr 2020 07:20 AM PDT  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) on Thursday dismissed the notion that vice president Joe Biden should "directly, publicly" respond to sexual-assault allegations made by his former Senate staffer, saying in an interview that she was "satisfied with how he has responded."Speaking to CNN, Pelosi defended Biden after she was asked if Biden should answer the allegation "head-on" and by "himself.""I'm satisfied with how he has responded," Pelosi said, adding she was "very proud to endorse him.""It's a matter that he has to deal with, but I am impressed with the people who worked for him at the time saying that they absolutely never heard one iota of information about this, nobody ever brought forth a claim or had anybody else tell them about such a claim," she stated.> Nancy Pelosi was asked on @CNN about the Biden sexual assault allegation and she defended him.> > "He's a person of great values, integrity, authenticity, imagination, and connection to the American people," Pelosi said, adding that she's "satisfied with how he has responded." pic.twitter.com/gaDt8Ki7oR> > -- Mike Brest (@MikeBrestDC) April 30, 2020While Biden's campaign has strongly denied the allegations of Biden's accuser, Tara Reade, the former vice president has not said anything publicly about the situation. The New York Times said Wednesday that talking points about the allegation that had been circulated by the campaign "inaccurately suggest" the paper concluded that Reade's claims were false.Reade has said that she complained about the incident to Biden staffers at the time, who have denied that she ever approached them. But last week, a 1993 clip from CNN's Larry King Live showed a woman calling in about "problems" her daughter had had with a U.S. senator. Reade, who had previously told The Intercept that such a tape existed, identified the woman as her mother. Earlier this week, one of Reade's former neighbors came forward and said Reade told her about details of the allegation in the mid-1990s.Biden's top female surrogates and prospective vice presidential candidates have also defended the former vice president. "I believe women deserve to be heard, and I believe that has happened here," former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams said on Tuesday, apparently referencing the campaign's talking points about the Times article.Reade has said that she has been surprised by the dismissals of her claims in the "MeToo" era. News surfaced Wednesday that a letter asking Biden to address Reade's claims was drafted by national women's advocacy groups, only for the letter to not be publicly released after the Biden campaign learned of it."I was just hoping to get a fair and equal treatment," Reade told National Review. "But because it's Joe Biden I've been silenced or smeared."
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| No arrests after black man shot dead while jogging Posted: 30 Apr 2020 02:06 PM PDT  Ahmaud Arbery's mother says she feels "very discouraged" by the investigation into her son's death.
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| 14 Baking Supplies for Your New Bread-Making Hobby Posted: 30 Apr 2020 07:40 AM PDT |
| Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin tells tells President Vladimir Putin he has the coronavirus Posted: 01 May 2020 06:48 AM PDT  Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin told President Vladimir Putin on Thursday that he had been diagnosed with the coronavirus and was temporarily stepping down to recover.
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| Trump's new press secretary pledges not to lie from podium Posted: 01 May 2020 05:27 AM PDT  President Donald Trump's new spokeswoman, Kayleigh McEnany, vowed Friday not to lie to reporters from the podium as she made her debut at the first White House briefing by a press secretary in more than a year. "I will never lie to you," McEnany told reporters. McEnany, who joined the White House last month, took the stage behind a podium that had quite literally been collecting cobwebs before the president began the practice of holding his own daily briefings because of the coronavirus.
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| 30 Easy Side Dishes For Lasagna Posted: 30 Apr 2020 11:46 AM PDT |
| Michigan governor extends coronavirus state of emergency until May 28 Posted: 30 Apr 2020 09:27 PM PDT  Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) on Thursday extended a coronavirus state of emergency declaration through May 28, saying "common sense and all of the scientific data tells us we're not out of the woods yet."The Republican-controlled state legislature did not approve her order to extend the declaration, which was set to expire on Friday. Whitmer continued the state of emergency by executive order, and GOP lawmakers are now planning on taking her to court over her exercise of state emergency powers, the Detroit Free Press reports. Whitmer said in a statement that by "refusing to extend the emergency and disaster declaration, Republican lawmakers are putting their heads in the sand and putting more lives and livelihoods at risk."There are now 41,379 confirmed COVID-19 cases in Michigan, with the death toll at 3,789. Conservative groups have complained that Whitmer's stay-at-home order is too strict, and on Thursday, dozens of demonstrators, some of them carrying rifles, entered Michigan's statehouse, calling on Whitmer to end the state of emergency. This was a "political rally," Whitmer said, and if participants become infected from COVID-19 because they didn't practicing social distancing, the stay-at-home order could last even longer.More stories from theweek.com The smoke-filled room that could oust Joe Biden 5 scathingly funny cartoons about Mike Pence's unmasked hospital visit If flu deaths were counted like COVID-19 deaths, the worst recent flu season evidently killed 15,620 Americans
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| Top E.U. Official Confirms China Objected to Coronavirus Report, Denies Revisions Were Result of Pressure Posted: 01 May 2020 07:23 AM PDT  The European Union's foreign policy chief admitted Thursday that China "expressed their concerns" over an EU report on Chinese disinformation regarding coronavirus, after allegations that his team had watered down their initial findings "to appease the Chinese Communist Party."Speaking to the European Parliament in Brussels, Josep Borrell denied that Beijing had coerced him to soften the report's verdict. Drafts of the report showed that language condemning China for "a global disinformation campaign" was removed, while an analyst in the EU administration warned her superiors of "self-censoring.""I can assure you that no changes had been introduced to the report published last week to align the concerns of a third party, in this case, China. There is no watering down of our findings. We have not bowed to anyone," he said.But Borrell admitted that it was "clear and evident" China was unhappy with the leaked report, first reported by the New York Times, stressing that the Chinese "expressed their concerns through the diplomatic channels."The admission did not satisfy some lawmakers. Thierry Mariani, a French politician, told Borrell that his team had been "caught with their hand in the cookie jar," while a Beligan member, Hilde Vautmans, demanded further answers. "Who interfered? Which Chinese official put pressure? At what level? What means of pressure?" she asked. "I think Europe needs to know that. Otherwise you're losing all credibility."Borrell did not go into details over his contact with China over the report. "The Chinese were not happy," he stated. "They were not happy at the beginning and they are still not happy now."
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| Black Georgia man chased and killed while jogging, mom says Posted: 01 May 2020 06:09 AM PDT  Gregory McMichael told police he saw Ahmaud Arbery run by and said he recognized him from recent break-ins.
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| Jordan ends historic arrangement with Israel as West Bank annexation tensions rise Posted: 30 Apr 2020 12:41 PM PDT  Jordan's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Ambassador Dhaifallah Al-Fayez, said the additional harvesting period "will end this evening."
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| President's 'So what?' as 5,000 die sparks fury in Brazil Posted: 01 May 2020 06:29 PM PDT  "So what?" said Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro on Tuesday when a journalist asked him about the fact that more than 5,000 Brazilians had died of the coronavirus. The far-right leader's off-the-cuff comment has been sparking anger ever since, with governors, politicians, healthcare professionals and media figures all weighing in to express their outrage at his lack of empathy. Bolsonaro is no stranger to controversy.
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| Unmasked Protesters Storm Huntington Beach After California Governor’s Closure Posted: 01 May 2020 05:18 PM PDT  Give them Vitamin D or give them death.Hundreds of demonstrators swarmed Huntington Beach, south of Los Angeles, on Friday to protest California Gov. Gavin Newsom's closure of the Golden State's sandy shores—an anti-lockdown display organized in part by the owner of a "health and wellness center."Reporters on the scene captured footage of banners for President Donald Trump's campaign, "Don't Tread on Me" flags, and homemade signs with slogans such as "Freedom is Essential." Overhead shots showed mounted cops corralling the demonstrators onto sidewalks and out of the road. It was clear that many protesters were not wearing masks that health officials say can help curb the spread of COVID-19.One of the organizers behind Friday's event is Vivienne Reign of an organization called "We Have Rights." She is also owner of the East Bay Health and Wellness Center and multiple companies marketing medical devices, corporate records show. Reign, however, refused to confirm her ties to the clinic, which specializes in chiropractic treatment and "regenerative medicine." In an interview hours before the protest began, Reign said she was not connected to Freedomworks, the right-of-center advocacy network which has backed other protests demanding shuttered states reopen, or to any groups bankrolled by libertarian billionaire Charles Koch, who has ties to Freedomworks.'Very, Very Scary': Officials Dumbfounded as Florida Beaches Reopen, 3 Days After Death SpikeShe claimed that We Have Rights had simply capitalized on the grassroots outrage Newsom provoked with his order, which he issued after crowds packed the coastline last weekend in defiance of the need for social distancing amid a global pandemic that has killed more than 2,000 Californians and another 60,000 Americans."'When that came out, people were pissed," she said, arguing the war with COVID-19 is effectively over, even though health experts say reopening could trigger a second wave. "The curve has essentially been beaten, so we decided we've gotta go do something about this."WeHaveRights.com, which calls itself without any backup "the biggest movement in California," was first registered just two weeks ago.Reign claimed her organization, which she characterized as an umbrella group encompassing multiple pro-reopening factions in California, has a wealthy benefactor—though she would not say who. "There's a lot of powerful people behind this, and we can get things done," she insisted.The East Bay Health and Wellness Center attracted criticism last year for marketing unproven stem cell injections as a treatment for joint pain.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| N Korea's Kim Jong Un appears in public amid health rumors Posted: 01 May 2020 02:49 PM PDT  North Korean leader Kim Jong Un made his first public appearance in 20 days as he celebrated the completion of a fertilizer factory near Pyongyang, state media said Saturday, ending an absence that had triggered global rumors that he may be seriously ill. The North's official Korean Central News Agency reported that Kim attended the ceremony Friday in Sunchon with other senior officials, including his sister Kim Yo Jong, who many analysts predict would take over if her brother is suddenly unable to rule.
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| Citing no evidence, Trump says he’s seen information that coronavirus originated in a Wuhan lab Posted: 30 Apr 2020 03:20 PM PDT  Without citing any evidence, President Trump said he's seen information that the coronavirus originated in a lab in Wuhan, China. When pressed by a reporter to back up his claim, Trump said he wasn't at liberty to do so.
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| People of black African origin three times more likely to die of coronavirus than white Britons, study finds Posted: 30 Apr 2020 12:31 PM PDT  People of black African origin are three times more likely to die of coronavirus in the UK than white Britons, analysis by the Institute of Fiscal Studies has shown. A report into the disproportionate Covid-19 death toll among black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) people in the UK found deaths among people of black Caribbean origin are 1.8 times those of white British people. Deaths among those of Pakistani heritage are 2.7 times as high, and black African fatalities three times higher. The higher tolls come after predictions that BAME groups should theoretically experience fewer deaths per capita than white Britons because of average age profiles. Although many BAME groups live in major cities such as London and Birmingham, which have higher overall coronavirus death rates, most are younger on average than the population as a whole – in theory making them less vulnerable to the virus.
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| Biden Has Ties to Univ. of Delaware Board Members Keeping His Archive Secret amid Reade Allegations Posted: 30 Apr 2020 05:15 AM PDT  Some members of the University of Delaware Board of Trustees, which has sole authority over Joe Biden's Senate archive, have close ties to the former vice president, Fox News reported.Calls to make the archive public have grown over the past week as former Biden staffer Tara Reade's allegations of sexual assault, which Reade says occurred in 1993 when Biden was a senator for Delaware, have garnered increasing media coverage. The Biden campaign has denied the allegations.Biden deposited his Senate archive at the University of Delaware in 2012. Initially, the university promised to open the archive two years after Biden's last day in public office. However, in April 2019 hours before Biden announced his presidential campaign, the university decided to keep the archive closed until December 31, 2019 or until Biden retires from public life.The chairman of the university's Board of Trustees is longtime Biden donor John Cochran. In 1996, Cochran bought Biden's home for $1.2 million, shortly after which Biden's son Hunter was hired by MBNA, where Cochran was vice chairman at the time.Board member Terri Kelly, former CEO of W.L. Gore & Associates, donated the maximum legal amount to the Biden presidential campaign in 2019. Carol Ammon, another board member, has given $10,000 to the campaign and related PAC's. Five additional board members have donated upwards of $1,000 to Biden and affiliated PAC's.While the Biden campaign has denied the allegations from Reade, Biden himself has not directly addressed the allegations, including at a virtual town hall on Tuesday on women's issues during which he received the endorsement of Hillary Clinton. Democratic politicians including Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams have up to now backed Biden."I think the [Democratic National Committee] is a sham and their silence around what happened to me as a Democratic staffer is unconscionable," Reade told National Review on Wednesday.
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| RPT-Trans woman sets herself on fire in Georgia as virus lockdown cuts income Posted: 01 May 2020 07:35 AM PDT |
| WHO investigates link between coronavirus and syndrome that affects young kids Posted: 30 Apr 2020 07:04 AM PDT  "We are urgently conducting a surveillance study in the United Kingdom to establish what is going on," said Dr. Adam Finn.
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| China journalist jailed as free-speech clampdown intensifies Posted: 01 May 2020 12:07 AM PDT  A journalist who had worked for some of China's most powerful propaganda outlets has been jailed for 15 years after being accused of attacking the ruling Communist Party, court documents showed. The sentence handed down on Chen Jieren is one of the harshest moves yet against free speech by China's government under President Xi Jinping, who has muzzled the press and ordered Chinese media outlets to serve the ruling Communist Party's interests. It comes as China faces international scrutiny over its handling of the coronavirus pandemic, including questions over whether authorities covered up crucial information that could have prevented it spreading globally.
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| Trump World Turns on the True COVID Villain: Surgical Masks Posted: 01 May 2020 04:19 PM PDT  Back in March, with Americans just a week into quarantine, Fox News host Laura Ingraham envisioned a way that the economy could reopen. Her plan relied on lots of masks. "Going back to most jobs after 15 days will require new protocols until this virus burns out—everyone within 6 feet of others MUST wear masks," Ingraham tweeted.As part of her pro-mask campaign, Ingraham tweeted instructions for Do It Yourself (DIY) masks, even urging her followers to make homemade masks out of their sheets. "Literally you can make these with cotton sheets," Ingraham wrote. "Again, we can be resourceful when necessary!" A month later, Ingraham has done a 180, becoming one of the right-wing media's most outspoken mask-haters. She's tweeted that widespread mask wearing would make everyone "like Antifa," the left-wing antifascist activists reviled on Fox. On Wednesday, she suggested on her show that widespread mask usage is some sort of plot to scare people."The masks, they're kind of a constant reminder," Ingraham said. "You see the mask and you think you're not safe, you are not back to normal — not even close." Such a conversion may seem peculiar on the surface. Who, after all, has an actual problem with face masks, especially in the midst of a pandemic. But Ingraham's conversion reflects something deeper about the nature of our current politics, in which social safety measures themselves can become emblems of partisan leanings. Once the potential tools of liberation from stay-at-home orders, Trump supporters now see masks as a hated carryover from those same orders. Talk radio host Rush Limbaugh, the recent recipient of a Presidential Medal of Freedom from Donald Trump, was an early mask paranoiac. On April 20, he promoted the idea, later picked up by Ingraham, that masks are totems of control."It is clear that the mask is a symbol of fear, and when you see various people suggesting that we may now have masks as part of our public lives for the rest of our lives?" Limbaugh said. "Uh, why?"For some conservatives, refusing to wear a mask has become just the latest way to thumb their noses at social distancing mandates. Talk radio host Dennis Prager said in a video that he refused to don one—and compared himself to Rosa Parks or dissident Germans in the Nazi era for his defiance.Anti-mask feelings in the GOP comes from the top, with Vice President Mike Pence flouting a Mayo Clinic rule this week mandating mask usage in a visit there. In early April, Trump said he was "choosing not to" wear a mask even as his health officials advised people to do so. (Trump's personal preferences, however, haven't stopped his campaign from a reported plan to sell Trump-branded masks). But the mask backlash has also spread to the party's rank-and-file at the anti-stay-at-home protests popping up across the country. After a Houston judge issued an order requiring mask usage in public, protesters rallied with signs bearing messages like "Don't Mask the Truth" and "Just Say No," illustrated with the crossed-out image of a mask. After a protest in Lansing, Michigan, on Thursday where armed protesters tried to force their way into the legislative chambers, organizer Jason Howland defended protesters who refused to wear masks, identifying mask usage as one of the issues they were rallying against. "If I'm gonna protest somebody, and I do it by the rules that they're laying down on me, I'm going to look pretty stupid by the end of the day," Howland told The Daily Beast. The coronavirus has sparked an explosion in conspiracy theories, from claims that Bill Gates is cooking up a dangerous vaccine to allegations that 5G towers are causing the virus. With masks, however, there doesn't appear to be a larger conspiracy theory driving the opposition. Instead, much of it appears to be based on the same desire to buck public health mandates that has driven people to rally with each other while standing much closer than the medically-advised distance of six feet.Masks have become a hot topic in state-specific "Reopen" Facebook groups, some of which have hundreds of thousands of members. Trump supporters fume about being kicked out of grocery stores for not wearing masks and vow to boycott businesses that require masks in the future. In the "Michiganders Against Excessive Quarantine" Facebook group, one poster compared the anti-mask campaign to feminists burning their bras."Time to burn the masks and gloves!!!!" the Facebook user wrote.Some of the broader anti-mask backlash has been caused by confusion over the CDC's evolution on the matter. After initially saying only Covid-19 patients and healthcare workers needed masks, the agency reversed itself in April, advising universal mask usage. The guidance had some skeptics in the medical community, with some health officials worrying that it would give people a false sense of security and potentially lead others to touch their faces with more frequency—both of which could lead to more coronavirus spread. But Trump's health team defended the mask policy on grounds that asymptomatic people infected with coronavirus were unknowingly spreading the disease and would be less likely to do so with a face covering. Vivienne Reign, the organizer of a set of reopen protests in California on Friday, said her group "We Have Rights" advised attendees only to "follow the CDC guidelines" — rather than spelling out a mask requirement. Reign cited the CDC reversal as a driving force behind confusion over the masks."It's really hard to keep up with what they want you to do," Reign said. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| United is boarding economy passengers first and business class last on all flights to promote social distancing Posted: 01 May 2020 08:06 AM PDT  Among the benefits for economy passengers: they will no longer have to endure the walk past first-class passengers in the exclusive cabin.
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| Michigan governor extends state of emergency amid protests Posted: 01 May 2020 06:58 AM PDT  Republicans have pushed back against some aspects of the Democratic governor's stay-at-home order and urged Gretchen Whitmer to restart parts of the state's economy soon.
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| 2,800 Indians are trying to evacuate the US, but they can't get flights home because of India's strict coronavirus lockdown Posted: 01 May 2020 08:38 AM PDT  More than 2,800 people have joined a Facebook group called "USA TO INDIA EVACUATION FLIGHTS," to discuss how they'll return home.
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| Prisoners in Iran 'disappearing', British inmate claims Posted: 01 May 2020 12:44 PM PDT  Prisoners with suspected coronavirus in Iran are "disappearing" due to illness or being given sleeping pills and sent back to crowded cells where the virus can easily spread, a British-Iranian father who is jailed on spying charges has claimed. Retired engineer Anoosheh Ashoori, 66, secretly recorded an audio diary detailing the chaotic conditions in Evin prison, Tehran, where he is serving a 10-year sentence for "spying for Israel", which he strongly denies. Several inmates have fallen ill due to suspected coronavirus, Mr Ashoori claims, adding that once a sick prisoner goes to the prison's medical centre, "he does not return… nobody knows any more about his fate." Another prisoner complained of Covid-19 symptoms but was not tested, he added. Instead, he was given sleeping pills and told by a prison doctor to "go back and rest" in a cell shared with 11 other men. Iran has been the epicentre of the coronavirus pandemic in the Middle East and has recorded more than 95,000 cases and 6,000 related deaths, although the official figures are heavily disputed. As a precaution in March, the Islamic Republic temporarily released thousands of prisoners from its over-crowded jails, including British-Iranian mother Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe who has been allowed to stay with her parents in Tehran while being monitored by an ankle tag. But other dual nationals accused of espionage, including Mr Ashoori and the British-Australian academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert, have remained behind bars in Evin, while other inmates are now returning following their temporary release. "It is just enough for one contaminated person to arrive and the rest will soon contract the virus," Mr Ashoori said in the diary, recorded last month [April] during phone calls to his wife, Sherry Izadi. Ms Izadi, from South London, today [Friday] criticised the Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab for a lack of action to release her husband, saying he had become "forgotten" since being arrested in August 2017 while visiting his family in Iran. "Every time I hear Dominic Raab talk about returning Britons who have been trapped on holiday by coronavirus, I wonder why he is not giving the same priority to those, like my husband, who are held unlawfully in a foreign prison", she said. "Other countries are doing deals to free their citizens, but the government that is showing the least action has to be the British. It's as if they have forgotten my husband exists." A Foreign Office spokesperson said: "We strongly urge Iran to reunite British-Iranian dual national Mr Ashoori with his family. Our Embassy in Tehran continues to request consular access and we have been supporting his family since being made aware of his detention. The treatment of all dual nationals detained in Iran is a priority and both the PM and Foreign Secretary have recently raised this issue with their Iranian counterparts."
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| Georgia businesses reopen to early success amid coronavirus pandemic Posted: 01 May 2020 08:51 AM PDT  Exactly one week since Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp began reopening the state's economy, small businesses shared early success stories as customers welcomed their return. But at what cost? Business owners say only time will tell.
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| Prominent Democratic women are standing by Joe Biden amid Tara Reade's sexual assault claim Posted: 01 May 2020 07:35 AM PDT  Some of Joe Biden's potential picks for a running mate have stood by him amid allegations of sexual assault by his former Senate staffer Tara Reade.
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| Fauci warns reopening states: 'You can't just leap over things' Posted: 30 Apr 2020 05:18 AM PDT  The infectious disease expert and coronavirus task force member was interviewed on NBC's "TODAY" show.
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| Syrians in Idlib protest opening of trade link with regime Posted: 01 May 2020 11:18 AM PDT  Maarat al-Naasan (Syria) (AFP) - Protests broke out across opposition-held parts of northwest Syria Friday against an al-Qaeda-linked jihadist group after it opened a trade crossing into regime territory, an AFP correspondent and a war monitor said. "Mass protests broke out in several towns and villages in the provinces of Idlib and Aleppo to denounce the practises of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham alliance" said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor. Led by Syria's former al-Qaeda affiliate, HTS and allied rebel groups dominate large swathes of Idlib province and slivers of neighbouring Aleppo.
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| Top CDC official says there's 'not a lot of science' to back-up theory that 'farting' spreads coronavirus Posted: 01 May 2020 10:54 AM PDT  Though coronavirus has been found in the fecal matter of some infected people, there's currently no evidence it can spread from feces to a person.
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| The Justice Department is apparently working with conservative Christian groups to fight COVID-19 policies Posted: 29 Apr 2020 09:50 PM PDT  Some churches and conservative Christian organizations are suing state and local governments for special exemptions to COVID-19 mitigation efforts, arguing that banning large gatherings violates their First Amendment rights. "They have been emboldened in recent days by increasing signs of support from a powerful ally: The Justice Department," The New York Times reports.Attorney General William Barr assigned to top Justice Department lawyers Monday to monitor state and local policies "and, if necessary, take action to correct" those that "could be violating the constitutional rights and civil liberties of individual citizens." Justice Department officials and Trump Cabinet members have also participated in private and conference calls with leaders of conservatives organizations challenging measures implemented to slow the spread of the deadly new coronavirus, the Times reports.The Justice Department has intervened formally in just one case so far, but conservative lawyers and activists hope the specter of DOJ involvement will be enough to persuade local leaders to create special carve-outs for churches. Tony Perkins, head of the Christian conservative Family Research Council, said he has pressed his case in calls with President Trump, HUD Secretary Ben Carson, and acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf. "At the end of this month, we'll be at 45 days since the president first issued his guidelines," Perkins said. "God only kept Moses on the mountain for 40 days."Conservative groups are suing not just Democratic governors like Michigan's Gretchen Whitmer but also Republicans like Greg Abbott of Texas, who exempted religious services from his executive order, saying they would follow social distancing guidelines voluntarily. "I'm unaware of a church that would want its constituents, its parishioners, to be exposed to COVID-19," Abbott explained March 31.The American Civil Liberties Union is also challenging some state and local COVID-19 mitigation measures, but not for churches protesting what the group sees as necessary and constitutional bans, ACLU chief Anthony Romero told the Times. "If DOJ challenges legitimate state orders on the COVID pandemic, Attorney General Barr will never be able to say that he believes in states' rights with a straight face." Read more at The New York Times.More stories from theweek.com 72-year-old British man becomes oldest person to row solo across the Atlantic Biden is the weakest major party nominee in recent history — but that might be the point If flu deaths were counted like COVID-19 deaths, the worst recent flu season evidently killed 15,620 Americans
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| Woman spots 12-foot-long alligator in South Carolina Posted: 01 May 2020 08:46 AM PDT  The woman was with her dog when she came across this giant beast.
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| Seagulls in Rome take to killing rats and pigeons as lockdown deprives them of food scraps Posted: 01 May 2020 07:41 AM PDT  Deprived of the juicy scraps left by bars and restaurants that they normally gorge on, Rome's notoriously aggressive seagulls have become cold-blooded killers. Two months into Italy's lockdown and with trattorias and cafes all closed, the big gulls are now killing rats and pigeons on the mean streets of the capital. "They are going back to being predators," said Bruno Cignini, a zoologist from the capital's Rome University Tor Vergata. "They are catching mostly pigeons but also swallows and black birds. They're also going after fish in the Tiber. Luckily, they are also eating rats. Animals are changing their habits as we change ours," he told Corriere della Sera newspaper. Rome's sharp-beaked gulls developed a taste for pigeon and rat in the past but the prey was usually dead – road kill left by the city's chaotic traffic. The gulls are now switching from pecking at carrion to killing. The species is known in Italian as the Royal Gull but in English as the Yellow-Legged Gull. Their bold behaviour and beady eyes are the stuff of legend in the capital.
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| Three Days in a Detroit Funeral Home Ravaged by the Coronavirus Posted: 01 May 2020 05:00 AM PDT  On April 29, Stephen Kemp arrived at his office just outside Detroit to a perplexing silence. Since COVID-19 hit the city, the phones at his…
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| 17 Hilarious Tweets From Parents During COVID-19 Quarantine Posted: 01 May 2020 04:49 PM PDT  A roundup of hilarious tweets from parents who are social distancing with their kiddos during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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