Astronaut says losing mirror on spacewalk was 'real bummer'

The commander of the International Space Station said Monday that losing a mirror during last week’s otherwise successful spacewalk was “a real bummer.” NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy said he has no idea how the small mirror on his left sleeve came off. “I just happened to glance down and I saw this reflecting thing disappearing into the darkness, and that was the last I saw of it,” Cassidy said in an interview with The Associated Press.

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China enacts sweeping national security law seen as major blow to Hong Kong autonomy

"It's really the biggest crisis Hong Kong has faced in its modern history," said China-watcher Benedict Rogers.

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McEnany on the PDB: ‘The president does read’

At a press briefing on Tuesday, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said President Trump reads the President’s Daily Brief, and added that he is “the most informed person on planet earth when it comes to the threats that we face.”

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Man arrested over fatal shooting in Kentucky park at center of protests

"The man has been participating in the protest since the beginning and he had been arrested a couple of times in the past several weeks," Schroeder said. Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer said he was saddened by the incident. The park has been a focal point of protests against the death of Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old emergency medical technicinan who was killed in a hail of gunfire when drug investigators burst into her home in Louisville on March 13.

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The 10 Best Dino-Killing, Ice Spewing, Earth-Destroying Asteroids

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Putin unveils monument to fallen Red Army WWII soldiers

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his counterpart from Belarus on Tuesday unveiled a monument honoring the fallen Red Army soldiers who fought in one of the most bloody battles of World War II. Putin and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko traveled to the village of Khoroshevo, just outside Rzhev, about 200 kilometers (about 125 miles) northwest of Moscow for a somber ceremony that involved goose-stepping troops laying wreaths to the towering figure of a soldier. The battle of Rzhev, in which the Red Army launched a series of offensives in 1942-1943 to dislodge the Wermacht from its positions close to Moscow, involved enormous Soviet losses from persistent, poorly prepared attacks against well-fortified Nazi positions.

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Belgian king expresses deep regret for colonial past in Congo

Belgium's King Philippe expressed deep regret on Tuesday for the "suffering and humiliation" inflicted on the Democratic Republic of Congo during its 75 years under Belgian rule. Philippe's message in a letter to Congo President Felix Tshisekedi is the first such expression of regret for Belgium's colonial past by a reigning monarch, the royal palace said, although it stopped short of formally apologising. "I want to express my deepest regret for these past injuries, the pain of which is regularly revived by the discrimination that is still all too present in our societies," said the letter, released to mark the 60th anniversary of Congo's independence.

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Rand Paul again rips Dr. Anthony Fauci over coronavirus: 'We just need more optimism'

Paul criticized Fauci for a lack of "certitude" when it comes to advice on if kids should be allowed to go back to school in the fall amid COVID-19.

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The Texas Medical Center scrubbed data showing ICU beds at full capacity as the state's coronavirus cases spike

The medical center had no empty ICU beds by Thursday. Its ICU capacity is usually between 70% and 80% of its total stock.

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Trump's 'white power' retweet set off 'five-alarm fire' in White House

Aides couldn't immediately reach the president to get him to take down the offending tweet because he was on the course at his golf club and had put down his phone, officials said.

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Show HN: Program “Greppy”, a 2-wheeled robot, using a new robotics language https://ift.tt/2YN1zXV

Show HN: Program “Greppy”, a 2-wheeled robot, using a new robotics language https://ift.tt/2ZtsEya July 1, 2020 at 03:52AM

Cedarville University Trustees Resign as Board Reinstates President after Investigation

After the Cedarville University board of trustees voted to reinstate its president two board members resigned, citing concerns about an investigation into the president's hiring and firing of a faculty member.

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As coronavirus spreads to people under 40, it's making them sicker — and for longer — than once thought

Once assumed to be safe from the dangers of COVID-19, younger adults share their prolonged struggles with the disease.

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Mary Trump’s Tell-All Book Temporarily Blocked in Court

A judge on Tuesday granted Robert Trump a temporary restraining order halting the publication of Mary Trump’s upcoming tell-all, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man.The injunction marks the first, tentative win for President Donald Trump’s younger brother in his war to stop the publication of his niece’s memoir, which The Daily Beast revealed earlier this month would contain allegations embarrassing to the First Family. The Trump siblings have maintained that the book, to be published by Simon & Schuster, violates the confidentiality clause that Mary Trump signed off on in the settlement of family patriarch Fred Trump Sr.’s estate.Trump Brother Was in ICU Just Before Filing Suit Over Tell-AllRevealed: The Family Member Who Turned on Trump Robert Trump and his celebrity attorney Charles Harder made their first play to block the book in Queens Surrogate Court—but the judge junked the suit almost immediately, telling the elder Trumps to refile in state Supreme Court. They took the advice, and submitted a new request for a temporary restraining order in Robert Trump’s home turf of Dutchess County, in upstate New York.Their arguments seemed to at least somewhat persuade Judge Hal Greenwald, who ordered Mary Trump and Simon & Schuster to appear before him on July 10—and barred them from disseminating her book.A person familiar with the situation told The Daily Beast the court had declined Mary’s attorneys’ request for a public hearing.“Pending the hearing and determination of Petitioner Robert S. Trump’s within motion for a preliminary injunction, Mary L. Trump and Simon & Schuster, Inc., together with their respective members, officers, employees, servants, agents, attorneys, representatives and all other persons acting on behalf of or in concert with either or both of them, are hereby temporarily enjoined and restrained,” the jurist ordered. “From publishing, printing or distributing any book or any portions thereof including but not limited to the book entitled: ‘Too Much and Never Enough, How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man,’ in any medium containing descriptions or accounts of Mary L. Trump’s relationship with Robert S. Trump, Donald Trump, or Maryanne Trump Barry.”This decision is only preliminary, leaving the book’s ultimate fate up to a later decision on the merits of the lawsuit. Mary Trump’s attorney, Theadore Boutrous Jr., told The Daily Beast in a statement, “The trial court’s temporary restraining order is only temporary but it still is a prior restraint on core political speech that flatly violates the First Amendment. We will immediately appeal.” A person familiar with the matter told The Daily Beast the book, to be published by Simon and Schuster, is already on its third print run and the publishing giant is working to get the tome, which is currently Number Four on Amazon’s bestseller list, out to bookstores ahead of its July 28 release. A spokesman for Simon & Schuster, Adam Rothberg, said they were disappointed in the court’s decision. “We plan to immediately appeal this decision to the Appellate Division, and look forward to prevailing in this case based on well-established precedents regarding prior restraint,” he said. Harder said in a statement, “Robert Trump is very pleased with the New York Supreme Court’s injunction against Mary Trump and Simon & Schuster. The actions of Mary Trump and Simon & Schuster are truly reprehensible.  “We look forward to vigorously litigating this case, and will seek the maximum remedies available by law for the enormous damages caused by Mary Trump’s breach of contract and Simon & Schuster’s intentional interference with that contract. Short of corrective action to immediately cease their egregious conduct, we will pursue this case to the very end.”The Daily Beast first reported that Fred Trump Sr.’s granddaughter and Donald Trump’s niece had written a “harrowing and salacious” tell-all in which Mary would out herself as The New York Times’ primary source for their Trump tax investigation. 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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Woman shot in back while trying to steal man's Nazi flag, authorities say

The victim had been with friends at a nearby party when she apparently snatched one of the swastika flags displayed outside the man's home.

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'Enough': 1 killed in shooting in Seattle's protest zone

A 16-year-old boy was killed and and a younger teenager was wounded early Monday in Seattle's “occupied” protest zone — the second deadly shooting in the area that local officials have vowed to change after business complaints and criticism from President Donald Trump. The violence that came just over a week after another shooting in the zone left one person dead and another wounded was “dangerous and unacceptable" police Chief Carmen Best said. Demonstrators have occupied several blocks around the Seattle Police Department’s East Precinct and a park for about two weeks after police abandoned the precinct following standoffs and clashes with protesters calling for racial justice and an end to police brutality.

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Study finds asteroid impact, not volcanoes, made the Earth uninhabitable for dinosaurs: 'Only plausible explanation'

A new study found what happened to the Earth's dinosaurs. An asteroid strike blocking out the sun for years and causing permanent winters was cause.

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National parks – even Mount Rushmore – show that there's more than one kind of patriotism

July 4th will be quieter than usual this year, thanks to COVID-19. Many U.S. cities are canceling fireworks displays to avoid drawing large crowds that could promote the spread of coronavirus. But President Trump is planning to stage a celebration at Mount Rushmore National Memorial in South Dakota on July 3. It’s easy to see why an Independence Day event at a national memorial featuring the carved faces of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt would seem like a straightforward patriotic statement. But there’s controversy. Trump’s visit will be capped by fireworks for the first time in a decade, notwithstanding worries that pyrotechnics could ignite wildfires. And Native Americans are planning protests, adding Mount Rushmore to the list of monuments around the world that critics see as commemorating histories of racism, slavery and genocide and reinforcing white supremacy. As I show in my book, “Memorials Matter: Emotion, Environment, and Public Memory at American Historical Sites,” many venerated historical sites tell complicated stories. Even Mount Rushmore, which was designed explicitly to evoke national pride, can be a source of anger or shame rather than patriotic feeling. Twenty-first-century patriotism is a touchy subject, increasingly claimed by America’s conservative right. National Park Service sites like Mount Rushmore are public lands, meant to be appreciated by everyone, but they raise crucial questions about history, unity and love of country, especially during this election year. For me, and I suspect for many tourists, national memorials and monuments elicit conflicting feelings. There’s pride in our nation’s achievements, but also guilt, regret or anger over the costs of progress and the injustices that still exist. Patriotism, especially at sites of shame, can be unsettling – and I see this as a good thing. In my view, honestly confronting the darker parts of U.S. history as well as its best moments is vital for tourism, for patriotism and for the nation. Whose history?Patriotism has roots in the Latin “patriotia,” meaning “fellow countryman.” It’s common to feel patriotic pride in U.S. technological achievements or military strength. But Americans also glory in the diversity and beauty of our natural landscapes. That kind of patriotism, I think, has the potential to be more inclusive, less divisive and more socially and environmentally just. [Expertise in your inbox. Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter and get expert takes on today’s news, every day.]The physical environment at national memorials can inspire more than one kind of patriotism. At Mount Rushmore, tourists are invited to walk the Avenue of Flags, marvel at the labor required to carve four U.S. presidents’ faces out of granite, and applaud when rangers invite military veterans onstage during visitor programs. Patriotism centers on labor, progress and the “great men” the memorial credits with founding, expanding, preserving and unifying the U.S. But there are other perspectives. Viewed from the Peter Norbeck Overlook, a short drive from the main site, the presidents’ faces are tiny elements embedded in the expansive Black Hills region. Re-seeing the memorial in space and contextualizing it within a longer time scale can spark new emotions. The Black Hills are a sacred place for Lakota peoples that they never willingly relinquished. Viewing Mount Rushmore this way puts those rock faces in a broader ecological, historical and colonial context, and raises questions about history and justice. Sites of shameSites where visitors are meant to feel remorse challenge patriotism more directly. At Manzanar National Historic Site in California – one of 10 camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated during World War II – natural and textual cues prevent any easy patriotic reflexes. Reconstructed guard towers and barracks help visitors perceive the experience of being detained. I could imagine Japanese Americans’ shame as I entered claustrophobic buildings and touched the rough straw that filled makeshift mattresses. Many visitors doubtlessly associate mountains with adventure and freedom, but some incarcerees saw the nearby Sierra Nevada as barricades reinforcing the camp’s barbed wire fence. Rangers play up these emotional tensions on their tours. I saw one ranger position a group of schoolchildren atop what were once latrines, and ask them: “Will it happen again? We don’t know. We hope not. We have to stand up for what is right.” Instead of offering visitors a self-congratulatory sense of being a good citizen, Manzanar leaves them with unsettling questions and mixed feelings. Visitors to incarceration camps today might make connections to the U.S.-Mexico border, where detention centers corral people in unhealthy conditions, sometimes separating children from parents. Sites like Manzanar ask us to rethink who “counts” as an American and what unites us as human beings. Visiting and writing about these and other sites made me consider what it would take to disassociate patriotism from “America first”-style nationalism and recast it as collective pride in the United States’ diverse landscapes and peoples. Building a more inclusive patriotism means celebrating freedom in all forms – such as making Juneteenth a federal holiday – and commemorating the tragedies of our past in ways that promote justice in the present. Humble patriotismThis July 4th invites contemplation of what holds us together as a nation during a time of reckoning. I believe Americans should be willing to imagine how a public memorial could be offensive or traumatic. The National Park Service website claims that Mount Rushmore preserves a “rich heritage we all share,” but what happens when that heritage feels like hatred to some people? Growing momentum for removing statues of Confederate generals and other historical figures now understood to be racist, including the statue of Theodore Roosevelt in the front of New York City’s Museum of Natural History, tests the limits of national coherence. Understanding this momentum is not an issue of political correctness – it’s a matter of compassion.Greater clarity about value systems could help unite Americans across party lines. Psychologists have found striking differences between the moral frameworks that shape liberals’ and conservatives’ views. Conservatives generally prioritize purity, sanctity and loyalty, while liberals tend to value justice in the form of concerns about fairness and harm. In my view, patriotism could function as an emotional bridge between these moral foundations. My research suggests that visits to memorial sites are helpful for recognizing our interdependence with each other, as inhabitants of a common country. Places like Mount Rushmore are part of our collective past that raise important questions about what unites us today. I believe it’s our responsibility to approach these places, and each other, with both pride and humility. This is an updated version of an article originally published on June 26, 2019.This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * More than scenery: National parks preserve our history and culture * The twisted roots of U.S. land policy in the WestJennifer Ladino received funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities to support her book on national memorials.

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Tucker Carlson’s Journey From Coronavirus Alarm-Puller to COVID Truther

In early March, while President Donald Trump’s loudest allies at Fox News downplayed the coronavirus pandemic, with some claiming it was nothing more than an “impeachment scam” to destroy the president, Tucker Carlson received widespread—and usual, considering his notoriously far-right rhetoric—praise for calling out his colleagues and Trump for “minimizing” the impending danger.The Fox News primetime star continues to receive plaudits for reportedly convincing the president to finally take the crisis seriously. Days after that March 9 monologue, which was delivered shortly after Carlson privately spoke with Trump about the virus, the president publicly addressed the nation and his administration began pushing social-distancing guidelines.While Carlson sounding the alarm much earlier than his Fox News peers may have a had a positive impact (on his viewers, especially, as studies show his audience took protective measures before Trump confidant Sean Hannity’s), it didn’t take long for the right-wing TV host to shift gears and rage against social distancing, lockdowns, and any other measure implemented to slow the spread of the virus.Over the past two months, Carlson has devoted much of his coronavirus coverage to discrediting public-health experts, specifically top infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci, a member of the White House coronavirus task force. On top of telling his audience to stop listening to Fauci and other health officials, the Fox News star has repeatedly boosted a fellow contrarian, former New York Times reporter-turned-spy-novelist Alex Berenson, as an expert on the deadly virus.Less than a month after his much-lauded call to action on the virus, Carlson declared the crisis to be over—a claim that received far less attention from the mainstream press than his rogue stance against the president. Despite the United States having already experienced 13,000 deaths by that point, Carlson pointed to revised models showing lower expected deaths to call for the easing of stay-at-home orders, insisting that the “short-term crisis may have passed.”Since the Fox star’s assertion that the pandemic was essentially over and it was time to go back to business as usual, the nation has suffered roughly 115,000 more deaths and at least two million more confirmed cases.Carlson, in his quest to convince viewers that social distancing was futile and lockdowns were useless, began taking aim at Fauci almost immediately, framing the Medal of Freedom honoree as a power-hungry bureaucrat who had suddenly become the most powerful person in the world. Furthermore, the conservative talk-show host repeatedly portrayed the top doctor as incompetent and unknowledgeable about infectious diseases.One way Carlson often sharply criticized the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases was by highlighting his shifting opinions on the virus as more information became known about the disease. In particular, he hit Fauci for initially saying mask-wearing was unnecessary—a position the renowned immunologist quickly reversed, as have other health officials who initially worried that masks might instill a false sense of security.Tucker Carlson Wants to Have It Both Ways on CoronavirusAt one point in mid-May, following Sen. Rand Paul dressing down Fauci in a Senate hearing, Carlson applauded the pro-Trump Republican before delivering his own lengthy takedown of Fauci, arguing that the top doctor’s advice was “buffoon-level stuff,” later describing him as “the chief buffoon of the professional class.” Weeks prior, Carlson called it “national suicide” for Fauci to urge aggressive social-distancing restrictions.“We should never let someone like that run this country,” he fumed.Besides repeatedly dismissing social distancing, Carlson has also told his viewers that the virus is just not that deadly, even as the death toll continues to rise. In late April, for instance, Carlson pointed to some antibody studies—which have since largely been dismissed due to a large number of false-positive statistical errors—and the laughable claims made by a pair of California doctors who pushed for reopening by claiming the disease “just isn’t nearly as deadly as we thought it was.”The segment was steeped in so much disinformation on the disease that MSNBC host Chris Hayes, his direct 8 p.m. time slot competitor, directly called out Carlson for peddling “coronavirus trutherism” the next evening, picking apart the arguments put forth by the Fox star.“There is a reason many of the employees of Fox News, which is based in New York, are working from home right now,” Hayes pointedly stated. “At least someone there understands why it is important to continue to keep physical distance.”Weeks later, Carlson again pointed to antibody tests and cherry-picked surveys to claim the deadly virus was relatively tame.“We now know, thanks to widespread blood testing, that the virus isn't that deadly,” he said on May 21. “An enormous percentage of coronavirus infections produce mild symptoms or no symptoms at all, they're asymptomatic. The death toll is a tiny fraction of what we were told it would be.”Carlson, meanwhile, has also seemed more than willing to accept that the death toll—which is now approaching 130,000—is overinflated and possibly a hoax, despite overwhelming evidence showing it has likely been undercounted. Besides giving airtime to “COVID Contrarian” Berenson, who has repeatedly suggested the death toll is inflated or would remain low, he has also hosted Fox News senior political analyst Brit Hume to make those same claims. “Dr. Birx said tonight during the briefing at the White House that all deaths from anyone who died with coronavirus is counted as if the person died from coronavirus. Now, we all know that isn’t true,” Hume said on April 7 before relaying anecdotal evidence: “ I remember my own doctor telling me at one point when I was discussing prostate issues, he said about prostate cancer—I didn't have it, as it happened, but he said, ‘You know, a lot more people die with it than die from it.’”In recent weeks, amid nationwide unrest following the Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, Carlson has spent far more time demonizing the Black Lives Matter movement than covering the outbreak of new coronavirus cases, many of which are occurring in the states that rushed to reopen. When the Fox host did shift from fear-mongering about a race war to cover the virus, however, he actively minimized the damage of the pandemic while once again claiming lockdowns do not work.Just as multiple states began seeing a massive uptick in confirmed cases following relaxed restrictions and Memorial Day weekend celebrations, Carlson definitively declared social-distancing rules to be useless.“We do think it’s worth, for a minute, taking a pause to assess whether or not they were in fact lying to us about the coronavirus and our response to it,” he said on June 10, taking issue with media criticizing lockdown protests but praising police brutality demonstrations. “And the short answer to this is: Yes, they were definitely lying.”“As a matter of public health, we can say conclusively the lockdowns were not necessary. In fact, we can prove that and here’s the most powerful evidence: states that never locked down at all, states where people were allowed to live like Americans and not cower indoors alone, in the end turned out no worse than states that had mandatory quarantines, the state you probably live in,” Carlson continued. “The states that did lock down at first but were quick to reopen have not seen explosions of coronavirus cases.”Since making that proclamation, Florida, Texas and Arizona have all set single-day records for confirmed cases, and have reported newly overwhelmed hospitals and ICU capacity. Presented with Carlson's repeated claims that social distancing and stay-at-home orders have been unnecessary, Dr. Irwin Redlener, a Daily Beast contributor and director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University outright dismissed the TV host’s analysis.“Tucker Carson is one of the most fervent anti-science commentators on the airway,” the public-health activist told The Daily Beast. “He, like Sean Hannity, seems to relish in unwavering support for Donald Trump, no matter how outlandish, dishonest or ignorant the president’s statements or policies might be. I assume that Tucker is probably a bright guy, but his uncritical support of Trump is a dangerous disservice to his audience.”While Carlson has privately advised the president on several issues and is regularly cited by the president's Twitter account, he has also stood out among his Fox primetime peers in offering up criticism of Trump. Besides subtly calling the president out over his COVID-19 response, Carlson has also knocked the president for not being tough enough in dealing with the protests, arguing that it is placing him on a trajectory to lose.An analysis from Columbia University, meanwhile, has found that if the United States had implemented physical-distancing guidelines just one week earlier in March, as many as 36,000 American lives could have been saved.I Spent a Week Down the Right-Wing Media Rabbit Hole—and Was Mesmerized by ItAs Carlson has dismissed the expertise of epidemiologists and scientists, while boosting spy novelists and talking heads, he has occasionally sought the advice of actual medical professionals to provide pandemic analysis. One of the most frequent voices on his show in this respect has been Fox News medical contributor Dr. Marc Siegel.While the Fox News primetime star has blasted Fauci and others for their inaccurate predictions and so-called buffoonery, he doesn’t seem to have an issue with Siegel’s history of comically over-the-top projections and medical punditry that seemingly bends over backwards to please the Fox audience.For example, Siegel, who infamously said in March that the “worst-case” for coronavirus is that it “will be the flu,” told Carlson last month that “we're not going to have a big second wave,” citing the low number of cases in Australia. “That’s the southern hemisphere,” he said. “That’s essentially our November right now.”He would eventually walk back that claim on Carlson’s show days later, noting that Brazil—which is also in the southern hemisphere—was experiencing a huge surge in cases. And last week, Siegel lashed out at the European Union for possibly banning American visitors due to the latest rise in cases. “Could this be retaliatory? Possibly,” he huffed. “Could it be public health? Whatever it is, it is not the tone they sounded back in March, when they were horrified at our travel ban, at a time when thousands and thousands of cases were coming here.” And then the unmistakably Carlson-esque reactionary barb. “So I have a message for the European Union tonight: How about remembering what we did for you in the middle of the 20th century?”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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NYC mayor seeks $1 billion police cut amid City Hall protest

A week after a “defund the police” protest became a full-blown occupation outside City Hall, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Monday he has a plan for the New York City police department budget to be slashed by $1 billion. The mayor, a Democrat, declined to discuss the sources of what he called “savings” for the nation’s largest police department, saying at a news briefing that the cuts are still being negotiated with the City Council. Money would be deferred to the city's chronically underfunded public housing system and to youth programs, de Blasio said.

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First coronavirus cases found in sprawling migrant camp at U.S. border

Three asylum seekers have tested positive for coronavirus in a sprawling encampment steps from the U.S. border in Matamoros, Mexico, marking the first cases in a settlement that advocates have long viewed as vulnerable amid the pandemic. Global Response Management (GRM), a nonprofit providing medical services in the camp, said it is proactively testing and isolating all close contacts of the three migrants who tested positive. "We have 5 patients in isolation: 2 who are awaiting results of testing and 3 who have tested positive on antibody testing," GRM Executive Director Helen Perry told Reuters on Tuesday.

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Fauci says US death toll 'going to be very disturbing' and fears 100,000 daily cases

* Infectious disease expert says US ‘going in the wrong direction’ * ‘I’m very concerned. I’m not satisfied with what’s going on’Dr Anthony Fauci, the top US infectious disease expert, has said the country could see 100,000 new coronavirus cases daily unless action is taken to reverse the epidemic.Appearing before the Senate health, education, labor and pensions committee on Tuesday, Fauci warned that the US is “going in the wrong direction” over handling the coronavirus, and said the death toll “is going to be very disturbing”.He appeared a day after the White House insisted the outbreak had been reduced to “embers” but the principal deputy director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr Anne Schuchat, insisted: “This is really the beginning.”Speaking on Capitol Hill, Fauci was asked about the increase in new cases of coronavirus – the US last week reported 40,000 in one day – and whether the pandemic was under control.“The numbers speak for themselves,” he said. “I’m very concerned, I’m not satisfied with what’s going on, because we’re going in the wrong direction.“Clearly we’re not in total control.”Fauci said that without a more robust response, the daily number of cases could more than double.“I would not be surprised if we go up to 100,000 a day if this does not turn around,” he said. Fauci said he could not provide an estimated death toll, but said: “It is going to be very disturbing, I guarantee you that.”The stark warning came after Schuchat told the Journal of the American Medical Association: “What we hope is that we can take it seriously and slow the transmission. We have way too much virus across the country for that right now, so it’s very discouraging.”She added that there was “a lot of wishful thinking around the country” that the pandemic would be over by the summer.“We are not even beginning to be over this,” Schuchat said. “There are a lot of worrisome factors about the last week or so.“We’re not in the situation of New Zealand or Singapore or Korea, where a new case is rapidly identified and all the contacts are traced, and people are isolated who are sick, and people who are exposed are quarantined and they can keep things under control.”Testifying before the Senate committee, Fauci said he was “quite concerned about what we are seeing evolve right now in several states” which had moved quickly in attempts to return to normal.“They need to follow the guidelines that have been very carefully laid out with regard to [reopening] checkpoints. What we’ve seen in several states are different iterations of that, perhaps maybe in some, they’re going too quickly and skipping over some.”The US represents 4% of the world’s population, but accounts for 25% of all cases and deaths from Covid-19. The US has recorded more than 2.5m cases, with some states seeing record rises.On Monday, the governor of Arizona ordered bars, movie theaters, gyms and water parks to shut down for a month, weeks after reopening. Texas, Florida and California, all seeing rises in cases, have rolled back reopening efforts. Oregon and Kansas have ordered people to wear masks in public.Responding to widely shared images of people not following guidelines – including not wearing a mask and gathering in large groups – and especially young people, Fauci said better messaging was required.Fauci said: “We’ve got to get that message out that we are all in this together and if we’re going to contain this, we’ve gotta contain it together.”The Senate committee chair, the Republican Lamar Alexander, urged Trump to wear a mask and to depoliticize the topic. He said: “This small, life-saving practice has become part of the political debate that says, if you are for Trump you don’t wear a mask and if you are against Trump you do.”Alexander continued: “That’s why I’ve suggested that the president occasionally wear a mask. The president has plenty of admirers, they would follow his lead and it would help in this political debate; the stakes are too high for this to continue.”New daily cases are rising in 38 states, according to NPR’s pandemic tracker, but the White House continues its attempts to downplay the severity of Covid-19. At a briefing on Monday, press secretary Kayleigh McEnany ignored the surge.“The people who are being infected tend to be those – as Vice-President Pence has noted – half of those testing positive are under the age of 35. This means we’re catching people in their communities,” she said.She added: “We’re aware that there are embers that need to be put out.”Fauci said on Sunday the US was unlikely to achieve herd immunity to the coronavirus even with a vaccine, given a third of Americans say they would not receive it.“There is a general anti-science, anti-authority, anti-vaccine feeling among some people in this country – an alarmingly large percentage of people, relatively speaking,” Fauci said, adding that the government has “a lot of work to do” to educate people about vaccines.Even states where the rate of new infections has decreased are rethinking plans to allow businesses to reopen. New Jersey has postponed plans to allow indoor dining, while the governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, said he may reverse plans to allow restaurants and bars to reopen.Broadway theaters will remain closed until January 2021, an industry group said on Monday. Theaters had planned to reopen in September.

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The 20 Best Deals from REI’s Fourth of July Sale

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Trump was 'near-sadistic' in phone calls with female world leaders, according to CNN report on classified calls

Trump's conduct over the phone with world leaders posed a "danger to the national security of the United States," according to intel officials.

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Russia denies nuclear incident after international body detects isotopes

Russia said on Monday it had detected no sign of a radiation emergency, after an international body reported last week that sensors in Stockholm had picked up unusually high levels of radioactive isotopes produced by nuclear fission. The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), which monitors the world for evidence of nuclear weapons tests, said last week one of its stations scanning the air for radioactive particles had found unusual, although harmless, levels of caesium-134, caesium-137 and ruthenium-103. The isotopes were "certainly nuclear fission products, most likely from a civil source", it said.

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Supreme Court declines to hear border wall challenge

The Supreme Court is leaving in place a decision that rejected environmental groups' challenge to sections of wall the Trump administration is building along the U.S. border with Mexico. The high court on Monday declined to hear an appeal involving construction of 145 miles (233 kilometers) of steel-bollard walls along the border in Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas. The Center for Biological Diversity, the Animal Legal Defense Fund, Defenders of Wildlife, and the Southwest Environmental Center had challenged a federal law that allows the secretary of Homeland Security to waive any laws necessary to allow the quick construction of border fencing.

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The coronavirus is devastating communities of color. The Trump administration's top doctor blames 'structural racism' and shares his plans to take action.

Dr. Jerome Adams is preparing two calls to action — one on high blood pressure, the other on maternal mortality — to address racial health inequality.

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See This Odd Plane? Russia Tried to Build a Stealth 'F-35'. They Failed

The story of the ill-fated MiG 1.44.

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Minneapolis police chief, mayor launching policy changes

The Minneapolis police chief and mayor on Sunday began their push for sweeping policy changes with a new rule that prevents officers involved in using deadly force from reviewing body camera footage before completing an initial police report. The new standards come after a proposal by the Minneapolis City Council to dismantle the police force following the death of George Floyd, a handcuffed Black man who died after a white police officer pressed his knee on Floyd’s neck for nearly eight minutes.

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The first Boeing 737 Max recertification flight just landed, marking a new milestone for the troubled jet

Boeing and FAA officials were aboard the 737 Max as it made its first recertification flight, a major milestone for the troubled jet.

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Show HN: Android OCR-Keyboard https://ift.tt/2ZmuMI3

Show HN: Android OCR-Keyboard https://ift.tt/2NFihSv June 30, 2020 at 02:23AM

New York City mayor plans to cut $1bn from police budget

New York City mayor Bill de Blasio has proposed cutting $1bn (£814m) from the police force’s $6bn (£4.48bn) yearly budget, amid calls for reform.Mr de Blasio announced the plan during his daily City Hall press briefing on Monday, and said the proposed budget would help reform the New York City Police Department (NYPD).

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South Pole warming three times faster than rest of Earth: study

The South Pole has warmed three times faster than the rest of the planet in the last 30 years due to warmer tropical ocean temperatures, new research showed Monday. Antarctica's temperature varies widely according to season and region, and for years it had been thought that the South Pole had stayed cool even as the continent heated up. Researchers in New Zealand, Britain and the United States analysed 60 years of weather station data and used computer modelling to show what was causing the accelerated warming.

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Three men arrested for murder in case of missing California couple who vanished in 2017

Three men have been arrested for murder in the case of Audrey Moran and Jonathan Reynoso, who have been missing since 2017. Manuel Rios, of Coachella, Abraham Fregoso, of Indio, and Jesus Ruiz Jr., of Stockton, were taken into custody on Saturday, June 27, 2020, and booked in Riverside County Jail. The Riverside County Sheriff’s Office is investigating.

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China cuts Uighur births with IUDs, abortion, sterilization

The Chinese government is taking draconian measures to slash birth rates among Uighurs and other minorities as part of a sweeping campaign to curb its Muslim population, even as it encourages some of the country’s Han majority to have more children. While individual women have spoken out before about forced birth control, the practice is far more widespread and systematic than previously known, according to an AP investigation based on government statistics, state documents and interviews with 30 ex-detainees, family members and a former detention camp instructor. The campaign over the past four years in the far west region of Xinjiang is leading to what some experts are calling a form of “demographic genocide."

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Wildfire Spreading Rapidly on Traverse Mountain 'Started by Fireworks'

A large brush fire, estimated to have reached 150 to 200 acres, was “rapidly spreading” on Traverse Mountains near Lehi, Utah, on June 27, according to ABC4.

Utah Fire Info reported that the fire was “started by fireworks” and said “strong, gusty winds” were responsible for the rapid spread of the fire across the mountain side.

Lehi Community Emergency Response Team issued an evacuation order in a quarter mile radius in the city.

Video shows the fire burning on the mountain side from a residential area in the hills of the city of Lehi. Credit: Jeremy Roberts via Storyful

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Chinese coronavirus vaccine approved for use in country's military after clinical trials

China's military has approved a coronavirus vaccine developed by its own research staff and a Chinese biotech firm, it was announced on Monday. The vaccine was given the green light for use by troops after trials proved it was both safe and effective, said CanSino Biologics, the biotech firm involved. However, its use for the time being will be restricted to military personnel, who offer a tighter medical control group than the general public. The vaccine candidate, named Ad5-nCoV, was developed jointly by CanSino and the Beijing Institute of Biotechnology in the Academy of Military Medical Sciences. It has been in development since March. CanSino said the results showed the vaccine candidate has potential to prevent diseases caused by the coronavirus, which has killed half a million people globally. The company added that it was not yet possible to say if it could be a commercial success, which would depend on being able to produce the vaccine cheaply as well as safely.

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Trump accuses California Democrats of 'incredible stupidity' in row over John Wayne's white supremacy remarks

Donald Trump is accusing some Democratic officials of "incredible stupidity" for calling for actor John Wayne's name to be removed from an airport in California even after an interview resurfaced of "The Duke" embracing white supremacy.John Wayne Airport in southern California serves Orange County and Los Angeles. Mr Trump in January 2016, as a presidential candidate, held a special event at the John Wayne Birthplace Museum in Winterset, Iowa. He spoke at a lectern with a wax statue of the late actor behind him.

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Supreme Court makes it easier for president to fire CFPB head

In her scathing dissent, Justice Elena Kagan called the ruling the "civics class version of separation of powers."

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2 Oklahoma police officers shot, suspect taken into custody

Two police officers in Tulsa, Oklahoma, were shot and critically wounded on the city's east side Monday morning and police arrested the suspected gunman following a more than seven-hour search, authorities said. David Anthony Ware, 32, was arrested about 10:45 a.m., said Capt. Richard Meulenberg. The officers — Sgt. Craig Johnson and rookie officer Aurash Zarkeshan — remained in critical condition Monday afternoon and were “fighting for their lives,” said Police Chief Wendell Franklin.

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The A-12 Avenger Shows Why The Navy Needs A Long-Range Strike Aircraft

The Navy’s carrier air wings would have greatly benefited from an A-12-like capability had the program survived.

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Shipbuilding suppliers need more than market forces to stay afloat

Without deliberate action, the U.S. shipbuilding industry will become increasingly fragile.

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In pictures: Huge Nevada wildfire turns Las Vegas sky red

The fire in Mount Charleston, Nevada, engulfed about 5,000 acres (20 sq km) within an afternoon.

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Fact Check: Joe Biden's great-grandfather didn't own slaves, fight for Confederacy

There is no evidence to support the claim that former VP Joe Biden's great-grandfather owned slaves or fought for the Confederacy in the Civil War.

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Israel orders evangelical Christian media network God TV to take channel off air

“The channel does not appeal to the Christian population in Israel, but rather to the Jews,” Israel's broadcasting regulator said in a statement.

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Show HN: Headlime – Auto-generated headlines for your product or website https://ift.tt/2BOcB5Z

Show HN: Headlime – Auto-generated headlines for your product or website https://headlime.io/ June 29, 2020 at 07:07PM

US intercepts Russian warplanes off Alaska

US warplanes intercepted four Russian reconnaissance aircraft near Alaska on Saturday, US commanders said. The Russian Tu-142's came within 65 nautical miles south of Alaska's Aleutian island chain and "loitered" in the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) for eight hours. An ADIZ is a perimeter within which air traffic is monitored by the air forces of one or more friendly countries so they have extra time to react to hostile action.

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France pulls plug on country's oldest nuclear plant

France's oldest nuclear power plant will shut down on Tuesday after four decades in operation, to the delight of environmental activists who have long warned of contamination risks, but stoking worry for the local economy. Despite a pledge by then-president Francois Hollande just months after the Fukushima disaster to close Fessenheim -- on the Rhine river near France's eastern border with Germany and Switzerland -- it was not until 2018 that his successor Emmanuel Macron gave the final green light. Run by state-owned energy company EDF, one of Fessenheim's two reactors was disconnected in February.

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Mississippi moves to strip Confederate emblem from state flag

The southern state of Mississippi is the last in the US to feature the emblem on its flag.

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Biden campaign says 36% of senior staff are people of color

Joe Biden’s campaign says a little more than a third of its senior staff are people of color, sharing staff diversity data after facing pressure to answer questions on the issue. The campaign said that 36% of its senior staff are people of color, but did not disclose how much of its overall campaign staff are people of color. The Biden campaign released the data after the presumptive Democratic nominee was pressed at a forum on Asian American and Pacific Islander issues.

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Reporter Who Covered President Trump's Tulsa Rally Says He Tested Positive for COVID-19

Paul Monies told the AP that he covered the President's rally in Tulsa for around six hours

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Texas Republican lawmaker says he won't wear a mask on the House floor unless he tests positive for coronavirus

Rep. Louie Gohmert is among a group of Republican lawmakers including the president and vice president who have been photographed without a face mask.

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In 2017, Two Historic Accidents Shook The U.S. Navy (Here Is What They Learned)

Two deadly collisions involving U.S. Navy destroyers in June and August 2017 may have cost the lives of up to sixteen sailors, leading the Navy to declare a day-long operational pause to reflect upon its safety culture.

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US must free migrant children from detention, court says

A court in Los Angeles has ordered the release of more than 100 children held in United States family immigration detention because of the risk they could catch coronavirus in the facilities. Two of the country's three family detention centers have confirmed cases of the infection, district judge Dolly Gee said in her Friday ruling. The facilities risked spilling into a massive health crisis despite efforts by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency to lower the number of migrants in its custody, she added.

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Coronavirus updates: New US cases hit single-day record; as heat rises in places like Florida and Mexico, so do infections

The U.S. hit a single-day record. Texas, Florida closing bars amid surge in cases. The Trump administration is considering new approach to testing.

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Mississippi Lawmakers Vote to Remove Rebel Emblem From Flag

Mississippi lawmakers voted Sunday to surrender the Confederate battle emblem from their state flag, triggering raucous applause and cheers more than a century after white supremacist legislators adopted the design a generation after the South lost the Civil War.

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Trump signs executive order to punish vandalism against federal monuments

Details of the executive order were not immediately released, but Trump said earlier this week that the order would "reinforce" existing federal law.

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