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The Independent
Republican lawmaker calls for Kyle Rittenhouse, who is on trial for murder, to be elected to Congress
Anthony Sabatini’s comment sparks demands for his resignation
4h ago
LA Times
Op-Ed: In what moral universe does Biden require a Catholic task force when Trump got a free pass?
To pretend that there is anything approaching moral equivalency between Joe Biden and Donald Trump represents an appalling failure to exercise ethical judgment.
4h ago
Associated Press
AP Explains: The FBI is investigating Texas AG Ken Paxton
The FBI recently opened a criminal investigation into claims that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton abused his office to benefit a wealthy donor. The probe, which was confirmed to The Associated Press by two people with knowledge of it who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing, marks an escalation in the latest controversy to surround the high-profile Republican, who has spent years under indictment on unrelated state securities fraud charges. The FBI's interest in Texas' top law enforcement official arose from a rebellion by Paxton's top deputies, who accused him of breaking the law by using his office to help a wealthy donor with a troubled real estate empire who also hired a woman with whom the married Paxton allegedly had an affair.
2d ago
The Week
Gavin Newsom and family quarantine following COVID-19 exposure
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) and his family will quarantine for 14 days following an exposure to COVID-19. Newsom on Twitter said that three of his children were recently "exposed to an officer from the California Highway Patrol who had tested positive for COVID-19." The California Highway Patrol provides the governor and his family with security, according to the Los Angeles Times.Newsom said he and his wife had "no direct interaction with the officer" who tested positive for COVID-19, and his "entire family tested negative" for the coronavirus on Sunday. "However, consistent with local guidance, we will be quarantining for 14 days," Newsom said.The governor's office previously announced on Friday that one of Newsom's children would be quarantining after a classmate tested positive for COVID-19, the Los Angeles Times reports.News of Newsom's COVID-19 quarantine comes after the governor recently received criticism for attending a birthday party amid the pandemic. He apologized and called his decision to attend the party a "bad mistake," admitting, "The spirit of what I'm preaching all the time was contradicted. I need to preach and practice, not just preach." More stories from theweek.com Reporter Carl Bernstein names 21 GOP senators who 'repeatedly expressed extreme contempt for Trump' Biden is stealing the spotlight. Trump can't stand it. There's a very simple, extremely plausible reason Trump won't admit Biden won
2h ago
The Conversation
China beat the coronavirus with science and strong public health measures, not just with authoritarianism
I live in a democracy. But as Thanksgiving approaches, I find myself longing for the type of freedom I am seeing in China. People in China are able to move around freely right now. Many Americans may believe that the Chinese are able to enjoy this freedom because of China’s authoritarian regime. As a scholar of public health in China, I think the answers go beyond that.My research suggests that the control of the virus in China is not the result of authoritarian policy, but of a national prioritization of health. China learned a tough lesson with SARS, the first coronavirus pandemic of the 21st century. How China flattened its curveBarely less than a year ago, a novel coronavirus emerged in Wuhan, China, with 80,000 cases identified within three months, killing 3,000 people. In late January 2020, the Chinese government decided to lock down this city of 11 million people. All transportation to and from the city was stopped. Officials further locked down several other cities in Hubei Province, eventually quarantining over 50 million people.By the beginning of April, the Chinese government limited the spread of the virus to the point where they felt comfortable opening up Wuhan once again. Seven months later, China has confirmed 9,100 additional cases and recorded 1,407 more deaths due to the coronavirus. People in China travel, eat in restaurants and go into theaters, and kids go to school without much concern for their health. Juxtapose that to what we are experiencing in the U.S. To date, we have confirmed over 11 million cases, with the last 1 million recorded in just the last one week alone. In September and October, friends from China sent me pictures of food from all over the country as they traveled around to visit friends and family for the mid-autumn festival and then the seven-day National Day vacation week. I envied them then and envy them even more now as Americans prepare and wonder how we will celebrate Thanksgiving this year. What China learned from SARSWe Americans are told that the freedoms Chinese now enjoy come at the expense of being subject to a set of draconian public health policies that can be instituted only by an authoritarian government. But they also have the experience of living through a similar epidemic.SARS broke out in November of 2002 and ended in May of 2003, and China was anything but prepared for its emergence. It didn’t have the public health infrastructure in place to detect or control such a disease, and initially decided to prioritize politics and economy over health by covering up the epidemic. This didn’t work with such a virulent disease that started spreading around the world. After being forced to come to terms with SARS, China’s leaders eventually did enforce quarantine in Beijing and canceled the week-long May Day holiday of 2003. This helped to end the pandemic within a few short months, with minimal impact. SARS infected approximately 8,000 worldwide and killed about 800, 65% of which occurred in China and Hong Kong. The Chinese government learned from SARS the important role public health plays in protecting the nation. Following SARS, the government improved training of public health professionals and developed one of the most sophisticated disease surveillance systems in the world. While caught off guard for this next big coronavirus outbreak in December 2019, the country quickly mobilized its resources to bring the epidemic almost to a halt inside its borders within three months. What can the US learn from China?Knowing that there were no safe or proven treatments or an effective vaccine, China relied on proven nonpharmaceutical interventions to conquer the epidemic. First and foremost was containing the virus through controlling the sources of infection and blocking transmission. This was accomplished through early detection (testing), isolation, treatment and tracing the close contacts of any infected individual. This strategy was aided by the three field hospitals (fancang) the government built to isolate patients with mild to moderate symptoms from their families. Strict quarantine measures were also central to preventing the spread of this epidemic, as it was with the SARS epidemic in 2003. This was paired with compulsory mask-wearing, promotion of personal hygiene (hand-washing, home disinfection, ventilation), self-monitoring of body temperature, universal compulsory stay-at-home orders for all residents, and universal symptom surveys conducted by community workers and volunteers. What else could the US have done to be prepared?SARS exposed serious weaknesses in China’s public health system and prompted its government to reinvent its public health system. COVID-19 has exposed similar shortcomings in the U.S. public health system. To date, however, the current administration has taken the exact opposite approach, devastating our public health system. The Trump administration made major cuts to the budgets of the National Institutes of Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The last budget submitted by the Trump administration in February 2020, as the pandemic was beginning, called for an additional reduction of US$693 million to the CDC budget. This affected our ability to prepare for a pandemic outbreak. In the past, this preparation included international partnerships to help detect disease before it reached our shores. For example, the CDC built up partnerships with China following the SARS epidemic, to help contain the emergence of infectious disease coming from the region. At one point the CDC had 10 American experts working on the ground in China and 40 local Chinese staff, who mostly concentrated on infectious disease. Trump started slashing these positions shortly after taking office, and by the time COVID-19 broke out, those programs were whittled down to a skeleton staff of one or two. [Research into coronavirus and other news from science Subscribe to The Conversation’s new science newsletter.]The Declaration of Alma Ata guaranteed health for all, and not just health for people governed under a specific type of bureaucratic system. The U.S. has been, and can be, just as dedicated to protecting the health of its people as China under its authoritarian government. We demonstrated this during the Ebola epidemic, with the launch of a whole government effort coordinated by Ron Klain, who has been appointed White House chief of staff under President-elect Biden.This effort, which included a coordinated response with both African nations and China, improved preparedness within the U.S. and ultimately helped to save hundreds of thousands of lives around the world. A reduction in funding for our public health infrastructure, under the Trump administration, was a divestment in the health of the American people and should not have happened. A new administration that places public health at the helm, once again, will I hope prove to us that health is not just something that can be protected under an authoritarian government, but is in fact a right for all.This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Elanah Uretsky, Brandeis University.Read more: * Poor US pandemic response will reverberate in health care politics for years, health scholars warn * Experts agree that Trump’s coronavirus response was poor, but the US was ill-prepared in the first placeElanah Uretsky does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
2h ago
The Independent
Iowa congressman notorious for racist remarks asks Kamala Harris if she was descended from slave owners
Outgoing Republican Steve King has long history of offensive remarks
17h ago
National Review
Here Comes the Biden Blame Game
During the eight years that President Obama and his team managed the economy, Americans were regularly assured that the president’s Keynesian policies would deliver striking growth in the years ahead. The growth repeatedly failed to materialize, and what followed was a master class in blamesmanship. No matter how far into the Obama term we were, the disappointing growth was a “new normal”- not the result of President Obama’s high tax and heavy regulatory policies. It was all the fault of the Bush administration. In some sense, Bush was portrayed for the entire eight years as a comic book villain. His policies were so terrible that they were able to overwhelm the economy for years.Watching Vice President Biden prepare to be president gives one a strong feeling of déjà vu. Last week he called on Congress to pass Nancy Pelosi’s large and untargeted stimulus bill, chock-full of candy that is poison to Senate Republicans, such as a massive bailout for blue states. He added that it is going to be a “long dark winter” with the emphasis on long, and promised to return to his “Build Back Better” agenda of tax hikes and regulatory crackdowns as soon as possible.Before they storm the castle, perhaps the Biden team should make a list of their assets. The first asset is a strong economy. The COVID-19 pandemic recession likely ended in the third quarter of this year, when real GDP advanced a whopping 33.1 percent. The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow estimate for the fourth quarter suggests it will post growth around six percentage points. Combining the two, that means that the economy will about return to the level of GDP it posted right before the pandemic began, back when we had the strongest economy in generations. So the “back” part of the Biden slogan is superfluous, as the economy will likely be back before he takes office. As has been discussed at length in this space, that agenda doesn’t build at all, but rather subtracts from economic activity. So it doesn’t build, we are already back, and it’s worse than the status quo.The second asset is a vaccine. We are very close to the widespread availability of two enormously successful vaccines. More could well be on the way. Most Americans should be able to receive them by the spring. This means that the acceleration in the economy that is currently underway should, if we leave it alone, pick up steam as things head back to a post-pandemic normal.The third asset is a likely Republican-controlled Senate that has already shown that it is able to pass significant stimulus legislation. But it is not going to hand out cash to blue states willy nilly as the House Democrats have proposed.Which completes the setting. The economy is carrying enormous positive momentum into next year. Since the case load is spiking now, there is some chance that lockdowns will get worse before they get better. Firms around the country need to tread water for a few more months, after which they can return to normal. The risk is that there is a wave of bankruptcies between now and the late spring, that is set off by a return to widespread shutdowns. To face this risk, the administration needs to show it is serious about finding a compromise stimulus package, and cognizant that a promise of massive tax hikes next year is a negative for business sentiment. Businesses that are just hanging on with hope of a brighter future could well give up if that future includes a government that taxes away all their profits.Unfortunately, Vice President Biden has come out with exactly the opposite of this message. By sticking to the Pelosi bill, he fails to signal a willingness to compromise, suggesting to those holding out for another round of stimulus that they have little to hope for. And the future is dark as well, since the administration’s tax hikes are coming. In other words, he seems poised to fritter away all of the economic gains that the U.S. has achieved in the second half of this year. If the double-dip recession hits next year, Biden will remind us over and over that its Donald Trump’s fault. My guess is that he will find a way to mention Bush as well.
4h ago
Business Insider
Trump supporter charged with assault after breathing forcefully on protesters at the Virginia golf course where Trump was playing
Loudoun County Sheriff's Office charged Raymond Deskins after the incident outside Trump's Virginia golf course on Saturday.
3h ago
Associated Press
Man arrested in deadly attack at Nebraska Sonic restaurant
Authorities arrested a 23-year-old man in an attack at a Nebraska fast food restaurant in which two employees were shot and killed, two were wounded and officers responding to a report of a possible bomb inside a moving truck in the parking lot arrived to find the vehicle on fire. Roberto Carlos Silva Jr., of Omaha, was booked into Sarpy County jail early Sunday on suspicion of first-degree murder and first-degree arson in Saturday night's attack at a Sonic Drive-in restaurant in Bellevue, the Omaha World-Herald reported. In a news release early Sunday, Lt. Andy Jashinske said Bellevue police received a call at 9:23 p.m. Saturday about a possible bomb in a U-Haul truck parked outside of the restaurant in the Omaha suburb.
1d ago
INSIDER
AOC calls out Kyle Rittenhouse's $2 million bail release as 'protection of white supremacy'
"Does anyone believe Rittenhouse would be released if he were Muslim," AOC wrote on Twitter.
19h ago
The Week
Biden has reportedly chosen his U.N. ambassador, national security adviser
President-elect Joe Biden is expected to announce Linda Thomas-Greenfield as his nominee for ambassador to the United Nations and Jake Sullivan as his national security adviser, several people familiar with the matter told The Washington Post. Thomas-Greenfield spent 35 years in the Foreign Service, retiring in 2017. She served as assistant secretary of state for African affairs and was ambassador to Liberia during the Obama administration. She is now a senior counselor with the Albright Stonebridge advisory firm.Sullivan was one of Biden's national security advisers during his time as vice president and was also a deputy chief of staff to Hillary Clinton when she was secretary of state. Antony Blinken, Biden's reported pick to be his secretary of state nominee, also served as one of Biden's national security advisers while vice president.More stories from theweek.com Reporter Carl Bernstein names 21 GOP senators who 'repeatedly expressed extreme contempt for Trump' Biden is stealing the spotlight. Trump can't stand it. There's a very simple, extremely plausible reason Trump won't admit Biden won
10h ago
The Independent
Michigan attorney general looks at criminal charges for state officials who would overturn election results
Trump has personally reached out to several Republican officials regarding the results of the election
2d ago
Associated Press
Hong Kong’s Joshua Wong taken into custody after guilty plea
Prominent Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Joshua Wong and two other activists were taken into custody Monday after they pleaded guilty to charges related to a demonstration outside police headquarters during anti-government protests last year. Wong, together with fellow activists Ivan Lam and Agnes Chow, pleaded guilty to charges related to organizing, taking part in and inciting protesters to join an unauthorized protest outside police headquarters last June. “I am persuaded that neither prison bars, nor election ban, nor any other arbitrary powers would stop us from activism,” Wong said, ahead of the court hearing.
12h ago
Reuters
German states favour extending COVID-19 lockdown to boost Christmas prospects
Many of Germany's 16 federal states favour extending a partial shutdown meant to slow the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic and make family gatherings over Christmas possible, two state premiers said on Monday. Germany, which is governed by a conservative-Social Democratic coalition, imposed a month-long "lockdown-lite" from Nov. 2. "The November shutdown has brought something, the (infection) numbers are subdued but they remain high," Manuela Schwesig, premier of the northern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, told Deutschlandfunk (DLF) radio.
8h ago
Business Insider
Facebook is reportedly planning to woo Joe Biden by rolling out new vaccine and climate change features
Facebook will promote vaccine and climate change information in a bid to please the Biden administration, sources told the Financial Times.
4h ago
Reuters Videos
U.S. targets Chinese firms with 'military ties'
U.S. President Donald Trump is getting ready to amp up pressure on China with a new trade blacklist. A draft seen exclusively by Reuters lists 89 Chinese companies the Commerce Department says have ties to the military. It includes Commercial Aircraft Corp of China - or COMAC: a rising star with its sights set on Boeing and Airbus. Not all companies in the list are Chinese. Some are Russian. But the U.S. considers all of them "military end users". Being on the list means they can't buy some U.S. products - from aircraft engines to word processing software. The Commerce Department called the restrictions "vital for protecting U.S. national security interests." But there are fears that U.S. companies could end up getting hurt, too. It's a sensitive time for the American aerospace industry. Boeing had its 737 MAX cleared by U.S. regulators just last week. It's now seeking approval in China - the first nation to ban the MAX after two fatal crashes of the model. The list could also mean a hit for General Electric and Honeywell - both have ties to COMAC. According to the draft, U.S. companies will need a license to sell to anyone on the list. However, it also says that applications are more likely to be denied than granted.
4h ago
The Week
I was wrong about Mitt Romney
The Donald Trump phenomenon is purported to have divided friendships, families, and even marriages. I can attest to this fact in my own suburban Washington household, for this perhaps peculiar professional reason: It has occasioned my wife, the longtime sufferer of all my hot takes, to ask approximately one-thousand times whether I finally feel bad about all the mean things I said about Mitt Romney.The short answer is, yes!Romney, now the junior senator of Utah, has displayed rare courage and integrity throughout this hell-year. Alone among Republican senators (indeed, alone among any senator in history), he crossed party lines to vote to convict President Trump on the charge of abusing his power by pressuring a foreign government to interfere in our election. And — not alone, exactly, but hardly in plentiful company — he has forthrightly condemned the president for stonewalling the Biden transition and undermining our democracy.These actions have taken real guts. If I were wearing a cap, I would doff it; if I were to meet Romney in person, I would thank him. With this virtual pen in hand, I am applauding him.However: The long answer to the above question is … Heck no!Let me explain why I’m torn.First, it’s essential to remember how radically different our political landscape looked in the Before Times. The outright bigotry and racism of the 2016 Trump campaign had not yet been contemplated, let alone assimilated; for decades, those things were hinted at, dog-whistled, wink-winked — but they were not, in any overt sense, options on the menu given to Republican primary voters. Consequently, it needs to be said that it’s silly to retroactively credit figures in the party for not behaving that badly.So, what was it that bugged me so badly about mainstream, milquetoast Mitt?In 2007 and 2008, Romney, then the moderate one-term governor of Massachusetts (as well as the son of a famously moderate governor of Michigan) ran a primary campaign that was, I still maintain, preposterous. It was predicated on the notion that frontrunner John McCain (who, after a tumultuous summer in ’07, eventually won the GOP nomination) was too moderate. He compromised too often with Democrats (with Russ Feingold on campaign finance reform; with Ted Kennedy on immigration; with Joe Lieberman on climate change).I understand the imperatives of strategy in winning a primary, when you must appeal to the base before pivoting to the center. But — as I said then and will say again now — I refuse to listen to such an appeal from mainstream milquetoast Mitt. He did not play the Mr. Conservative act lightly; he played it, as he plays everything, stiffly. The act failed. It deserved to fail.Then came 2012. Romney was now something of a frontrunner. He had lost the 2008 primary — but so had McCain, badly, in the general election against President Obama. It was now, in the sequential custom of Republican politics, “Mitt Romney’s turn.” So now he was the one who had to beat back attempts to protect his right flank. Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Michele Bachmann, Rick Santorum, Mike Huckabee (am I forgetting anyone? It feels like I’m forgetting someone!) — they all took their shots at Romney; they all exposed weaknesses or wounded him; and they all, one after the other, failed as he had four years before.Without aid of Google, I remember calling Romney a “rancid imposter” (yikes!). With aid of Google, I see that I called his 2012 campaign “breathtakingly cynical, borderline nihilistic” (I hadn’t seen nothin’ yet!). I haven’t forgotten about the catastrophic 47 percent video. And I sure haven’t forgotten about the way Romney comported himself in the first innings of the Benghazi fiasco (reminder: He really was breathtakingly cynical).But, with the benefit of both hindsight and five years of Donald Trump, here’s what I’ve come to appreciate about Mitt Romney, a man of obvious high character and basic decency, that wasn’t clear to me then, but should have been: He was trying to hold together a party that was morally coming apart at the seams. Indeed, Romney could see for himself that it was thirsting for a demagogue very like Trump (whose endorsement, it must be noted, Romney accepted). “It’s very easy to excite the base with incendiary comments,” he said in February 2012. “We’ve seen throughout the campaign that if you’re willing to say really outrageous things that are accusatory and attacking President Obama that you’re going to jump up in the polls. You know, I’m not willing to light my hair on fire to try and get support. I am who I am.”It took guts to say that then. I didn’t acknowledge it at the time. I should have.When the notional threat of Trump became a reality in 2016, Romney, again, took a stand. In March of that fateful year, Romney warned against nominating a “con man, a fake.” Every word of the speech was born out by the reality of the Trump administration. Not just the bits about Trump’s warped character — but the red flags over Trump’s desire for a trade war and his embrace of prodigious debt.Of course, Romney being Romney, he sullied his righteous stand by agreeing to dine with Trump during the transition, under the guise of possibly being nominated for secretary of state. Predictably, Romney was humiliated. But that was the last time.Very much on his own shingle, Romney won a Senate seat in Utah. From there, he has become one of the bravest and most constructive voices in Republican politics. And while I may regret the excessive tone of some of my criticisms of Mitt Romney’s past, I can say that I look forward to applauding him more often in the future.“Sorry, Mitt”? Not quite.Instead: Go, Mitt, go!More stories from theweek.com Reporter Carl Bernstein names 21 GOP senators who 'repeatedly expressed extreme contempt for Trump' Biden is stealing the spotlight. Trump can't stand it. There's a very simple, extremely plausible reason Trump won't admit Biden won
4h ago
Associated Press
Turkey protests German search of Libya-bound Turkish ship
Turkey and Germany were at loggerheads on Monday after a German frigate enforcing an arms embargo against Libya intercepted a Turkish freighter in the Mediterranean sea and carried out what a senior Turkish official dismissed as an “illegal" search. Turkey said personnel from the German frigate Hamburg were flown by helicopter aboard the Libya-bound freighter Rosaline-A on Sunday to carry out an hours-long search without the captain or the Turkish government's permission to board. The captain and crew were forcibly searched and held in one part of the vessel as the German team searched the ship “by force,” the Turkish Foreign Ministry said.
2h ago
USA TODAY
Wisconsin police arrest 15-year-old boy for Mayfair Mall shooting, say 'bullets started flying' during altercation
While witnesses described the shooter as a white man in his 20s or 30s, Wauwatosa Police Chief Barry Weber said the suspect is an Hispanic teenager.
16h ago
The Telegraph
US national security adviser warns China not to use military force against Taiwan
The United States’ national security adviser has warned China not to use military force against Taiwan, a day after an unannounced visit to the democratic island by a two-star Navy admiral overseeing US military intelligence in the Asia-Pacific. Robert O’Brien cautioned Beijing while touring the Philippines and Vietnam, where he spoke to his counterparts about tackling China’s growing assertiveness in the South China Sea, a region of vital shipping routes where it has made multiple disputed territorial claims. The Chinese Communist Party also claims Taiwan, a democracy of 24 million, even though it has never ruled there. It has threatened to annex the island, and in recent months has stepped up military intimidation through air incursions and invasion simulations. “We have very close ties with Taiwan. The president has made it very clear that any attempt to cause Taiwan to unify with China with anything other than persuasion or democratic election, is something that would be extraordinarily consequential for the People’s Republic of China,” said Mr O’Brien. “I can’t imagine anything that would cause a greater backlash against China around the entire world if they attempted to use military force to coerce Taiwan,” he told reporters. The US does not have formal diplomatic ties with Taipei but it views Taiwan as a democratic ally in the strategic Indo-Pacific region. It is Taiwan’s biggest arms supplier. The Trump administration has beefed up support for Taiwan in recent months - approving several big weapons sales and dispatching senior officials, including Alex Azar, the US health secretary. This weekend Reuters reported that Rear Admiral Michael Studeman, the director of the J2, which oversees intelligence at the US military’s Indo-Pacific Command, had made a secretive visit. He is believed to be one of the most high-ranking US officers known to have visited Taipei in recent years. The increased US backing for Taiwan has riled China amid rising tensions between Washington and Beijing over the South China Sea, the crackdown on the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong and an ongoing trade dispute. On Monday, the Chinese foreign ministry hit back with a warning of its own, demanding the US “immediately stop” all official exchanges and military contacts with Taiwan and signalling that China would make “legitimate and necessary responses” without giving further details. “China firmly opposes official exchanges and military contacts between the US and Taiwan in any form. This position has been consistent and clear. We urge the US side to fully recognise the high sensitivity of the Taiwan issue,” said spokesman Zhao Lijian.
4h ago

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