Wednesday, July 22, 2020
Portland protests: US federal agents 'will not retreat', Chad Wolf says
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53489995
Speaking during a press conference on Tuesday, Mr Wolf said federal
law enforcement officers in Portland were only targeting and arresting
demonstrators who had been identified as being involved in "criminal
activity".
U.S. Homeland Security confirms three units sent paramilitary officers to Portland
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-race-protests-agents/us-homeland-security-confirms-three-units-sent-paramilitary-officers-to-portland-idUSKCN24M2RL
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border
Protection arm confirmed on Tuesday it has deployed officers from three
paramilitary-style units to join a federal crackdown on protests against
police violence in Portland, Oregon.
Trump blasts Beijing in public, but privately Trump org imports tons of Chinese goods
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/21/politics/trump-org-china-imports/index.html
President Donald Trump has cast himself as tough on China
and promised that his trade negotiations with Beijing would
economically benefit everyday Americans, even as Trump-owned properties
have continued to contribute to the trade deficit with the country he
rails about.
Since
September of last year, Trump properties in the US have imported more
than eight tons of goods from China, CNN has learned by reviewing US
customs data compiled by ImportGenius, which tracks information
companies are legally bound to provide to US customs when they import
goods to the US. The imports have arrived to decorate his properties
while the President has sought to dress down China.
More than six tons of tables were delivered to Trump International Hotel in New York last fall. On the same day, Trump tweeted, "We are doing very well in our negotiations with China."
Tuesday, July 21, 2020
Coronavirus vaccine: When will we have one?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-51665497
When will we have a coronavirus vaccine?
A
vaccine would normally take years, if not decades, to develop.
Researchers hope to achieve the same amount of work in only a few
months.
Most experts think a vaccine is likely to become widely
available by mid-2021, about 12-18 months after the new virus, known
officially as Sars-CoV-2, first emerged.
That would be a huge scientific feat and there are no guarantees it will work.
Four
coronaviruses already circulate in human beings. They cause common cold
symptoms and we don't have vaccines for any of them.
John Bolton says there's 'disagreement' between Israel and US on sovereignty plan
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/283919
In an interview with Galei Tzahal’s Efi Triger which was
released Tuesday morning, Bolton said that Kushner opposes unilateral
actions by Israel, including the application of sovereignty in parts of
Judea and Samaria.
“I think there’s obviously a disagreement. Jared is still trying to
sustain his peace plan and he’s worried about unilateral action or
American recognition of unilateral action. Personally, I would go ahead
and do it.”
Bolton added that he will not be backing either Trump or Joe Biden in
the upcoming presidential election, and said that the election season
is an “optimal time” for Israel to move forward with its “own national
security interest”.
“I’m not advocating the election of Joe Biden. For me, in November,
I’m going to write-in the name of a third person. It’s not a happy
election for me.”
“I think the next few months are an optimal time for Israel to act in its own national security interests.”
Federal agents, local streets: A ‘red flag’ in Oregon
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) —
Federal law enforcement officers’ actions at protests in Oregon’s
largest city, done without local authorities’ consent, are raising the
prospect of a constitutional crisis — one that could escalate as weeks
of demonstrations find renewed focus in clashes with camouflaged,
unidentified agents outside Portland’s U.S. courthouse.
Trump says the US has 'the best mortality rate' in the world. That's not true
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/20/politics/donald-trump-coronavirus-mortality-rate-intl/index.html
During a meandering and occasionally hostile interview with Fox News
on Sunday, President Donald Trump made a very bold claim: that the
United States has the lowest mortality rate from Covid-19 anywhere in
the world.
"I heard
we have one of the lowest, maybe the lowest, mortality rate anywhere in
the world," Trump told "Fox News Sunday" host Chris Wallace. "Do you
have the numbers please? I heard we had the best mortality rate," he
added to White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, who was
off-camera.
When McEnany
returned with a piece of paper, Trump turned on Wallace. "Number one low
mortality rate," he said, attacking Wallace for reporting "fake news"
in the process. "You said we had the worst mortality rate in the world,
and we have the best."
But the President's claim is not true. And it's not even close.
The US in fact has one of the highest death rates
from the coronavirus of any country, and is worse than several
badly-hit countries like Brazil, Mexico and Russia, according to data
collected by Johns Hopkins University
According to Wallace, Trump also waved a graph showing a slightly different metric to tout his claim -- the case-fatality rate.
This
is simply a country's number of confirmed deaths divided by its number
of confirmed cases. It's a more problematic measure because it depends
heavily on how much testing a country is or is not doing. A country that
has consistently tested its general population will have a very low
case-fatality rate, while a country that tests only sick people in
hospitals will have a very high one.
Nonetheless,
the US still ranks in the top 60 countries worldwide by this measure,
according to JHU, around the same as Brazil and Peru and worse than
dozens of other nations.
In other words, there is no measure by which Trump's claim that the US has "the best" mortality rate is true.
I took a closer look at the cognitive test Trump claims to have aced
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jul/21/donald-trump-cognitive-test-closer-look
The test is called the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), and was
created by the neurologist Dr Ziad Nasreddine in 1996. Talking to
MarketWatch on Monday, Nasreddine stressed that the test “is supposed to
be easy for someone who has no cognitive impairment”, stressing that
“this is not an IQ test or the level of how a person is extremely
skilled or not. The test is supposed to help physicians detect early
signs of Alzheimer’s.”
Fact check: Trump's dishonest '911' ad fear-mongers about Biden
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/21/politics/fact-check-trump-ad-biden-police-911/index.html
President Donald Trump's campaign has released another TV ad that dishonestly tries to raise fears about former Vice President Joe Biden's views on policing.
The ad released Monday, the latest in a series of similarly
fear-mongering ads from the Trump campaign, suggests that a Biden
presidency would result in 911 calls from senior citizens going
unanswered.
That is just nonsense.
Biden has not proposed anything that
could result in 911 calls no longer being answered. He has repeatedly
and explicitly opposed the idea of "defunding the police," and he has proposed
a $300 million increase in federal funding for community policing.
Biden has not specifically weighed in on a proposal for a 50% cut to
Seattle's police budget, which the ad insinuates he supports.
The ad relies on a single Biden comment to a progressive activist during a video chat
earlier this month, in which Biden suggested he was "yes, absolutely"
open to redirecting some police funding toward social services, mental
health counseling and affordable housing.
We'll
lay out the context for that comment below. But even if you interpret
Biden's "yes, absolutely" in a way that is charitable to the Trump
campaign, nothing Biden has said comes close to justifying the Trump
campaign's terrifying vision of a Biden presidency.
But, again, there was no call from Biden
to slash police budgets to the extent that there would be nobody
working at a 911 dispatch center.
Rand Paul: 'No place' for feds 'rounding people up at will' in Portland
Sen. Rand Paul
(R-Ky.) on Monday spoke out against federal officers “rounding people
up at will” in Portland, Ore., saying the handling of unrest there
should be left to local law enforcement.
“We cannot give up liberty for security. Local law enforcement can and should be handling these situations in our cities but there is no place for federal troops or unidentified federal agents rounding people up at will,” Paul tweeted Monday.
“We cannot give up liberty for security. Local law enforcement can and should be handling these situations in our cities but there is no place for federal troops or unidentified federal agents rounding people up at will,” Paul tweeted Monday.
Fox's Napolitano rips 'unconstitutional' Trump crackdown on Portland: 'Just plain wrong'
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/508205-foxs-napolitano-rips-unconstitutional-trump-crackdown-on-portland-just-plain
Andrew Napolitano
slammed the Trump administration for sending federal law enforcement to
Portland in response to violent protests in Oregon's largest city, with
the Fox News senior judicial analyst calling the move
"unconstitutional" and "just plain wrong."
Democrats seek probe into ‘secret police force’ in Oregon
https://www.ft.com/content/c2066705-b769-4dff-80c2-2ccb82711486
Senior Democratic lawmakers have called for inquiries into the Trump administration’s use of federal law enforcement officers to quell protests in Oregon, saying the administration did not have “unfettered authority” to crack down on peaceful demonstrations.
The request from Jerry Nadler, the chairman of the House judiciary committee, and Carolyn Maloney, who chairs the House oversight committee, came after local officials in Oregon accused the Trump administration of using unlawful and “abhorrent” tactics in Portland, the state’s largest city.
“This is a matter of utmost urgency. Citizens are concerned that the administration has deployed a secret police force, not to investigate crimes but to intimidate individuals it views as political adversaries, and that the use of these tactics will proliferate throughout the country,” Mr Nadler and Ms Maloney stated.
"They're kidnapping people": "Trump's secret police" snatch Portland protesters into unmarked vans
salon
Democratic leaders in Oregon called on the Trump administration to withdraw federal forces from Portland after footage emerged of camouflaged federal officers snatching protesters off the streets and detaining them in unmarked minivans.
Democratic leaders in Oregon called on the Trump administration to withdraw federal forces from Portland after footage emerged of camouflaged federal officers snatching protesters off the streets and detaining them in unmarked minivans.
Officers from the U.S. Marshals Special Operations Group and Custom and Border Protection's Border Patrol Tactical Unit have been deployed to protect federal property in Portland amid ongoing protests since July 14, according to Oregon Public Broadcasting. But the officials have also detained protesters who are not near federal property, the outlet reported, and it is unclear if all of the detained individuals were involved in alleged criminal activity.
Trump’s Legal Justification for the Abduction of Portland Protesters Is Absurd
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/07/trump-legal-justification-portland-secret-police.html
Over the weekend, a group of Portland, Oregon, moms confronted
federal officers who had fired tear gas at them and other peaceful
protesters on Saturday outside of a federal courthouse. The escalation
of the Portland protests came as unidentified federal officers in
paramilitary uniforms were caught on tape abducting protesters and as
President Donald Trump announced
on Monday that he might send “more federal law enforcement” to cities
“run by liberal Democrats” to replicate the Portland tactics against
protesters, including efforts to “grab them, a lot of people in jail.”
On Monday, it was reported
that the Department of Homeland Security would be sending 150 federal
agents to Chicago this week with an unspecified mandate. The apparent
legal justification for the abduction of protesters is weak, and it
should be vigorously challenged in the courts before Trump can export
these tactics to other cities for use against citizens exercising their
First Amendment rights.
Trump pounding at defund the police, but Biden is an elusive target
https://www.foxnews.com/media/trump-pounding-at-defund-the-police-but-biden-is-an-elusive-target
Things would be so much easier for the Trump campaign if Joe Biden was in favor of defunding the police.
But
the president and his team are determined to tie every out-there
left-wing position around their opponent’s neck, brushing aise his
denials.
But Biden is a fascinating case study. While he’s certainly more
liberal than any past Democratic standard-bearer of the modern era, he’s
largely avoided embracing the most controversial proposals from the
Bernie/AOC wing of the party. Biden has said repeatedly he doesn’t
support defunding the police, he didn’t back the Green New Deal and
refused to support Medicare for All, drawing flak from the woke
progressives.
But President Trump took a very different tack in the Chris Wallace interview that aired Sunday.
“Biden wants to defund the police,” Trump said.
“No he, sir, he does not,” Wallace countered.
“Look,”
Trump said. “He signed a charter with Bernie Sanders; I will get that
one...Did you read the charter that he agreed to with...”
“It says nothing about defunding the police,” Wallace said.
“Oh really? It says abolish, it says -- let’s go. Get me the charter, please.”
An aide brought the document, and Wallace was right--it did not address taking money away from police departments.
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