| Why some Kenyans still deny coronavirus exists Posted: 19 Jul 2020 04:40 PM PDT  Kenya has had more than 11,000 cases of Covid-19 and 200 deaths, yet many don't take it seriously.
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| Blast kills 5, wounds dozens in rebel-held north Syria Posted: 19 Jul 2020 01:00 PM PDT |
| AP FACT CHECK: Trump's bends facts on virus, Biden, economy Posted: 19 Jul 2020 12:11 PM PDT  President Donald Trump clung to the false notion that the coronavirus will just "disappear," made incorrect claims about a top government expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, and again insisted that Americans are getting all the COVID-19 tests they need — all in a television interview Sunday where his answers fell short on the facts. While Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease official, said in January and February that Americans need not panic about a virus threat at the time, he also said the situation was "evolving" and that public health officials were taking the threat seriously. "Right now the risk is still low, but this could change, I've said that many times," Fauci told NBC on Feb. 29.
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| Facing uncertain fall, schools make flexible reopening plans Posted: 19 Jul 2020 11:05 AM PDT  Administrators in the Parkway school district in suburban St. Louis spent the summer break crafting a flexible reopening plan, with options that include full-time classroom learning, full-time online instruction and a hybrid system. It's a good thing because the dangers of the coronavirus are so uncertain that district officials are reluctant to make predictions about the fall semester, which begins in only five weeks. Confirmed coronavirus infections in Missouri's hardest-hit city waned in June, but they are now spiking, along with hospitalizations.
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| Cyprus: Virus-infected migrants may be crossing into south Posted: 19 Jul 2020 09:41 AM PDT  Asylum-seekers infected with coronavirus could be seeping through the porous cease-fire line in the ethnically divided Mediterranean island of Cyprus, the country's health minister warned Sunday. Minister Constantinos Ioannou pointed to "a problem" after a number of migrants who recently crossed from the breakaway north to seek asylum in the internationally recognized south have tested positive for COVID-19. Ioannou said the government had ordered two months ago that all migrants undergo testing for COVID-19 before they enter reception centers.
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| Roger Stone calls Black radio host 'Negro' in interview Posted: 19 Jul 2020 08:22 AM PDT  Roger Stone, a political operative whose 40-month prison sentence was commuted this month by President Donald Trump, his longtime friend, called a Los Angeles-based Black radio host a "Negro" on the air during a contentious interview. The exchange occurred on Saturday's Mo'Kelly Show, whose host — Morris O'Kelly — grilled Stone on his conviction for lying to Congress, tampering with witnesses and obstructing the House investigation into whether Trump's campaign colluded with Russia to win the 2016 election. O'Kelly on his program's website said "Stone could have reached for any pejorative, but unfortunately went there," adding that "Stone offered an unfiltered, unvarnished one-sentence expression of how he saw the journalist interviewing him."
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| How the coronavirus spread through one immigration facility Posted: 19 Jul 2020 08:22 AM PDT  Gregory Arnold walked into the warden's office April 1 as the novel coronavirus ripped through one of the largest immigration detention centers in the United States. Arnold told Warden Christopher LaRose that he was 60 years old and lived with an asthmatic son. "Well, you can't wear the mask because we don't want to scare the employees and we don't want to scare the inmates and detainees," Arnold recalls the warden saying.
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| Arizona's rugged individualism poses barrier to mask rules Posted: 19 Jul 2020 08:01 AM PDT |
| Trump not ready to commit to election results if he loses Posted: 19 Jul 2020 07:31 AM PDT  President Donald Trump is refusing to publicly commit to accepting the results of the upcoming White House election, recalling a similar threat he made weeks before the 2016 vote, as he scoffs at polls showing him lagging behind Democrat Joe Biden. Trump says it's too early to make such an ironclad guarantee. Trump also hammered the Pentagon brass for favoring renaming bases that honor Confederate military leaders — a drive for change spurred by the national debate about race after George Floyd's death.
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| Coronavirus: Zimbabwe arrests 100,000 for 'violations' of measures Posted: 19 Jul 2020 07:19 AM PDT  Police say people violated the measures but critics say the government is targeting the opposition.
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| 10 things you need to know today: July 19, 2020 Posted: 19 Jul 2020 06:49 AM PDT |
| Fatalities in eastern Turkey migrant boat sinking rise to 56 Posted: 19 Jul 2020 06:48 AM PDT  Turkish media said Sunday that search-and-rescue teams recovered two more bodies from a boat that sank last month while ferrying dozens of migrants across a lake in eastern Turkey. The boat was reported missing in stormy weather on June 27. Authorities estimated it was carrying between 55 and 60 migrants when it went down.
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| In French Guiana, virus exposes inequality, colonial legacy Posted: 19 Jul 2020 06:30 AM PDT |
| As pandemic surges, election officials seek poll workers Posted: 19 Jul 2020 05:03 AM PDT |
| Europe’s ‘Hamilton Moment’ Is a Flop. That’s Fine. Posted: 19 Jul 2020 05:00 AM PDT  (Bloomberg Opinion) -- Europe is boring. That is a great achievement.Throughout the 20th century, Europe mass-produced history, most of it disastrous. The two most destructive wars in history began in Europe over obscure questions such as the governance of Bosnia-Herzegovina and the ownership of Gdansk (now in Poland, then the "free city" of Danzig). The most dangerous location in the Cold War was not Cuba but Berlin. If World War III had broken out, Europe would have been its principal battlefield. And let's not forget that the most dangerous ideologies of the modern age — communism and fascism — were both of European origin.So the fact that this weekend's news is of a meeting in Brussels of 27 European leaders to discuss a bond-financed scheme to aid recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, while not terribly exciting, is really a cause for congratulation. Even if the meeting's inconclusive.The fact that, despite an initial wobble between Feb. 26 and March 14, the European nations didn't revert to sauve qui peut — every man for himself — as the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 swept through northern Italy is another reason to be cheerful. And the fact that, in most European countries, right-wing populists have declined in popularity in 2020 is a huge relief for the continent's political centrists.Americans have reason to be grateful for European stability. The European Union is the biggest market for U.S. exports. Despite widespread fears of a crisis of globalization, cross-border flows of capital between the U.S. and the EU remain substantial. Until this year, European cities such as Paris and Florence were among Americans' favorite overseas destinations.Europeans like to give the EU credit for the fact Europe is no longer the world's number one battlefield, but Americans understand that it has been the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the presence of U.S. troops that have really kept the peace. They are rightly proud of that achievement.Yet, at the same time, Americans don't really understand Europe. President Donald Trump's view is not mainstream, to be sure. "We're in tremendous economic competition, including Europe, which has never treated us well," he said at a press conference last week. "The European Union was formed in order to take advantage of the United States … I know that, and they know I know that, but other presidents had no idea."Most Americans also have no such idea. They are just happy that young Americans have not had to die in droves over Europe's quarrels as they did in 1918 and 1942-45. And if Trump was alluding to the issue of NATO burden-sharing, U.S. presidents since Richard Nixon have been complaining that Europeans don't pay their fair share.The American elite misunderstands Europe in a different way. The working assumption has long been that the EU is essentially a first draft of a United States of Europe. They therefore interpret European politics by analogy, as the Chicago-born, Oxford-based political philosopher Larry Siedentop did in his 2001 book "Democracy in Europe." The American Republic, he wrote, "provides the crucial point of reference for the attempt to create a European federal state today. Any evaluation of the prospects of that enterprise should begin with American federalism."The latest example of this misconception is the claim that in contemplating an ambitious 750 billion euro European Recovery Fund this weekend, Europe's leaders are having their very own "Hamilton Moment."The deal, wrote the economist Anatole Kaletsky when it was first proposed by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron in May, "might one day be remembered as the European Union's 'Hamiltonian moment,' comparable to the 1790 agreement between Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson on public borrowing, which helped to turn the United States, a confederation with little central government, into a genuine political federation.""What is required is a policy leap guided by the Hamiltonian experiences at the birth of the American republic," argued Pierpaolo Barbieri and Shahin Vallee in Foreign Affairs. That means "a common budgetary authority with democratic legitimacy … a truer, historically informed federal framework, not a patched-up union."The Hamilton Moment idea has caught on more because of the popularity of Lin-Manuel Miranda's musical than because commentators have a deep knowledge of what exactly Hamilton achieved as the first U.S. Treasury secretary. "We need to handle our financial situation," declares Miranda's Hamilton. "Are we a nation of states? What's the state of our nation?"To give Miranda his due, he does a far better job of translating the early financial history of the republic into rap verse than I had any reason to expect when I went to see the show in 2016: THOMAS JEFFERSON But Hamilton forgets his plan would have the government assume state's debts. Now, place your bets as to who that benefits: the very seat of government where Hamilton sits … HAMILTON If we assume the debts, the union gets A new line of credit, a financial diuretic. How do you not get it? If we're aggressive and competitive The union gets a boost. You'd rather give it a sedative?Still, it's worth reverting to Ron Chernow's biography, on which Miranda's musical was largely based, as well as to the leading historian of early American finance, Richard Sylla, to get the details right.Hamilton himself was a serious student of financial history, and had drawn the correct conclusion that the U.S., heavily indebted after winning its War of Independence, needed to "restore public credit" by establishing a consolidated public debt, consisting mostly of long-dated bonds, on the British model.At this point in its history, the U.S. was not much better off financially than a banana republic. Total liabilities were $54 million in national debt, coupled with $25 million in state debt. Around $12 million of the total was owed to foreigners, mainly the French government and Dutch investors. The face value of the debt was equivalent to around 40% of estimated gross domestic product. But so uncertain was the new republic's future that by 1789 American bonds were trading as low as 15 cents on the dollar. (Think Argentina, except Argentine bonds are currently trading at close to 50 cents on the dollar.)In his seminal Report on Public Credit of January 1790, Hamilton proposed that "an assumption of the debts of the particular states by the union and a like provision for them as for those of the union will be a measure of sound policy and substantial justice." In other words, the bonds issued by the states would become part of a restructured federal debt.The terms Hamilton envisaged for domestic bondholders were less attractive than for foreign creditors, who were paid in full, but the outcome was a win both for speculators who'd bought at the lows and the creditworthiness of the U.S. government.Fans of the musical will remember that the only way Hamilton could get his debt plan through Congress was by agreeing — in "The Room Where It Happens" — to the proposal of Jefferson and James Madison that the future capital of the U.S. should be on the Potomac River, not the Hudson. ("The immigrant emerges with unprecedented financial power … The Virginians emerge with the nation's capital.")To New York investors, Hamilton looked like a genius. Bonds that had traded at 15 cents on the dollar in 1789 reached par in 1791, and 120% of par in early 1792, just before the first American bond-market crash knocked 20 per cent off the price in the space of two months. (In May 1792, when the New York State government enacted a law to end speculation in the streets, brokers agreed to meet under a buttonwood tree in Wall Street — the birthplace of the New York Stock Exchange.)But there was much more to Hamilton's grand design than just a debt consolidation. He always saw the collection of significant federal tax revenue as a necessary corollary. In Federalist 30, he had described the power of taxation as "an indispensable ingredient in every constitution." Without it, under the Articles of Confederation, the U.S. government had "gradually dwindled into a state of decay, approaching nearly to annihilation."It was equally important in Hamilton's eyes to establish a sinking fund to earmark revenues for debt repayment, a Bank of the United States modeled on the Bank of England, and a new U.S. dollar based on a bimetallic (gold and silver) standard — to say nothing of his ambitious plans for the economic development of the North American continent.In the South, and particularly to his political rivals, Hamilton looked like a villain. The debt deal appeared to benefit some states more than others. It seemed to replicate the British financial system, notoriously a vehicle for political corruption as well as imperial power. And the new excise tax was so unpopular that it precipitated an armed insurgency, the Whiskey Rebellion of 1791-94.It's no exaggeration to say, as Chernow does, that the origins of the American two-party system lie in the controversy over Hamilton's debt restructuring, even if the original political schism was between Republicans and Federalists.Now that we've got the U.S. history straight, we can see just how little of it applies to Europe today. First and foremost, there is not even the glimmer of a chance that the debts of the 27 member states will be consolidated or even slightly "mutualized." The highest of these (that of Greece) stood at 177% of GDP on the eve of the Covid-19 pandemic, with Italy at 135% and Portugal at 118%. Put differently, Italy accounted for 22.2% of all EU-27 debt, more than France (22%) and Germany (19%). And the European Recovery Fund does very little to solve the problem of Italian debt sustainability.Second, whereas the charter of Hamilton's Bank of the United States expired in 1811 and a second version was destroyed by Andrew Jackson — leaving the U.S. without a central bank until the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 — the European Central Bank came into existence more than 20 years ago, long before serious thought was given to the question of member states' debts. Some of us predicted at the time that a monetary union without a fiscal union would inevitably lead to a crisis. We were right.Third, Hamilton's ultimate ambition was to propel American economic growth. But that is one thing that has been in short supply since the creation of the European Monetary Union. The latest International Monetary Fund projections for EU growth this year are grim: the euro area is projected to contract by -10.2%, compared with -8.0% for the U.S. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's projections are similar. The EU may have brought Covid-19 under control more rapidly than the U.S., but it simply cannot match the scale of U.S. monetary and fiscal relief measures. For example, there are already grumbles from Bundesbank president Jens Weidmann about the scale of ECB purchases of Italian bonds. This year the Fed's balance sheet has grown roughly twice as much as the ECB's has.Fourth, it is a near certainty that every step the EU takes to expand its tax base will be fiercely resisted, and not only by the so-called "frugal four" (Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden), the countries least enthusiastic about the European Recovery Fund.Fifth, the populists are not losing everywhere. Just look at which countries will be among the principal beneficiaries of the recovery fund, if it is approved. Hungary, whose prime minister, Viktor Orban, is the bete noire of West European liberals, will receive gross support equivalent to 10.4% of GDP. Poland, where the Law and Justice Party's Andrzej Duda was re-elected president last weekend, could receive 12.2% of GDP. This is remarkable, considering how few deaths from Covid-19 these two countries have suffered.Meanwhile, the popularity of the EU in Italy continues to decline. It is not helped by the lingering memory that, when things were really bad in early March, France and Germany each ordered a national export ban for protective medical equipment. The right-wing populist Lega may be losing supporters, but it is losing them to the even more right-wing Fratelli d'Italia. The pandemic has made the immigration issue go away. But it will be back.It has been a delusion not only of Americans but also of the most ardent pro-Europeans that the ultimate destination of the EU is to be the USE. In reality, as the British historian Alan Milward argued three decades ago in "The European Rescue of the Nation-State," and as Princeton's Andrew Moravcsik showed in 1998's "The Choice for Europe," the primary driver of European integration has always been the self-interest of the nation-states. For that reason, moves in the direction of federalism nearly always backfire.Alexander Hamilton had a talent for making enemies, but he never did anything as foolish as the European leaders on whose watch Brexit was approved four years ago. The equivalent disaster in the 1790s would have been if Virginians had voted for "Vexit" from the U.S. (They finally did, of course, in 1861.)It is still astonishing to me, as someone who opposed Brexit, that the continental Europeans — in particular Merkel and her then-finance minister, Wolfgang Schaeuble — so underestimated the probability of a "Leave" vote in 2016 that they offered British Prime Minister David Cameron next to no concessions on the key issue of free movement of people.They may console themselves that Britain's departure makes the path down the federalist road easier, as the U.K. was always the most vocal opponent of steps toward "ever-closer union." Yet the damage to the European project of losing one of the top seven economies in the world, one of the key members of Anglosphere's Five Eyes intelligence network, and one of the top two international financial centers, is incalculable.This is not to predict an imminent collapse of the EU, another erroneous notion that is popular among Wall Street types, who — like nearly all the leading American economists — were convinced the euro area would collapse at the time of the 2012 Greek debt crisis. When Merkel refers to Europe as a "community of fate" and when Macron calls the European Recovery Fund decision a "moment of truth," they are being as sincere as elected politicians ever are.The EU will last much longer than its critics expect. I expect that it will continue to exist long after populist governments have established a veto position on the Council of Ministers, and long after the inevitable Italian debt crisis. There is a historical precedent for such a shadowy afterlife, but it is not that of the U.S. It is the Holy Roman Empire, which had long been moribund when Napoleon finally swept it away in 1806.That was just two years after Aaron Burr mortally wounded Alexander Hamilton at Weehawken, New Jersey. The difference is that there is no musical about the Holy Roman Empire, just as there will be no rap version of the European Recovery Fund negotiations. They are, let's face it, too boring.This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Niall Ferguson is the Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He was previously a professor of history at Harvard, New York University and Oxford. He is the founder and managing director of Greenmantle LLC, a New York-based advisory firm.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| How the Black Lives Matter generation remembers John Lewis Posted: 19 Jul 2020 04:59 AM PDT  Of all the ways that John Lewis influenced American life and politics, his indelible impact on young people may be among the most enduring. From student activist to elder statesman, Lewis continually encouraged the nation's youth to start "good trouble" — and modeled just how to do that. Lewis, the Black civil rights icon who some called the "conscience of Congress," died Friday.
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| Iran's top court halts death sentence of young protesters Posted: 19 Jul 2020 04:58 AM PDT |
| Police contracts can stand in the way of accountability Posted: 19 Jul 2020 04:58 AM PDT |
| Iran FM visits Baghdad ahead of Iraq PM trip to Saudi Arabia Posted: 19 Jul 2020 04:53 AM PDT  Iran's foreign minister on Sunday stressed that Iran-Iraq relations would not be "shaken" ahead of the Iraqi prime minister's planned visit this week to Saudi Arabia, Iran's regional rival. Several hours after Mohammad Javad Zarif landed in Baghdad, three mortars struck near the U.S. Embassy in the heavily fortified Green Zone without causing any losses, according two security officials.
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| Japan rocket carrying UAE Mars probe ready for Monday launch Posted: 19 Jul 2020 03:59 AM PDT  A Japanese H-IIA rocket carrying a United Arab Emirates Mars spacecraft has been placed on the launch pad for Monday's scheduled liftoff for the Arab world's first interplanetary mission, officials said Sunday. The launch of the orbiter — named "Amal" in Arabic, or "Hope" — from Tanegashima Space Center on a small southern Japanese island was initially scheduled for this past Wednesday, but was delayed due to bad weather in the region. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, the provider of the H-IIA rocket, announced Sunday that the launch would proceed at 6:58 a.m. Monday (2158 GMT Sunday).
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| The postwar ‘we’ Posted: 19 Jul 2020 03:00 AM PDT |
| Letters to the Editor: Roger Stone's commutation is more of the same from the Republican Party Posted: 19 Jul 2020 03:00 AM PDT  President George H.W. Bush abused his power in pardoning six people in the Iran-Contra affair. Roger Stone's commutation by Trump is nothing new.
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| China's growing belligerence Posted: 19 Jul 2020 02:40 AM PDT  China has been throwing its weight around from Hong Kong to India. Why the new aggression? Here's everything you need to know: What is China doing? In the past few months, Beijing has exploited the U.S.'s and the world's preoccupation with the coronavirus pandemic to assert China's hegemony throughout Asia. It has threatened or sunk boats from Vietnam, the Philippines, Japan, and Malaysia, and flown fighter jets into Taiwanese airspace eight times. It instigated a skirmish with India in the Himalayas that killed dozens, the worst such fighting along the disputed border in decades. "It's a quite deliberate Chinese strategy to try to maximize what they perceive as being a moment of distraction," said Peter Jennings of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. Beijing has also been emboldened by Trump's "America First" isolationism, Jennings said. In passing a draconian security law for Hong Kong, Beijing shredded all pretense that it would keep its pledge to respect the former British colony's "one country, two systems" arrangement, or Hong Kongers' right to free speech. Its domestic oppression of its mostly Muslim Uighur minority became more gruesome with the recent revelation of a campaign to prevent Uighur births through forced birth control and abortion.How is China's military involved? Chinese Coast Guard vessels have been muscling into other countries' territorial waters all over the South China Sea, a body of water China claims as its sole domain even though nine other countries also border it. In April, the Chinese rammed and sank a Vietnamese fishing boat, harassed Malaysian and Philippine ships, and declared that lands long claimed by the Philippines — including the Spratly Islands, Scarborough Shoal, and Fiery Cross Reef — were now Chinese districts. In June, it menaced Taiwan with bombers and fighter jets in Taiwanese airspace, a rare occurrence before this year. But the military isn't China's only tool: It is also exerting its economic might and its soft power.How is Beijing doing that? When Australia asked for an international investigation into how the coronavirus spread from Wuhan to the world, China's wrath was swift. It hit Australia with a shocking 80 percent tariff on barley and a ban on beef imports, and launched a huge cyberattack on all levels of Australian government. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers in Australia and the U.S. have raised concerns about the growing penetration of the United Front, an arm of the Chinese government that sponsors Chinese cultural and educational groups all over the world. In Canada, for example, the Front mobilized Chinese groups to buy up masks and gloves in the early days of the pandemic and send them to China. Chinese President Xi Jinping calls the Front one of China's three "magic weapons," along with the Communist Party and armed struggle.What is the global response? Other countries are enacting sanctions and reorienting their military strategies to confront the Chinese threat. The Philippines, which under President Rodrigo Duterte had been openly anti-American and deferential to China, has just changed course, deciding not to go through with a planned withdrawal from a military treaty with the U.S. Australia unveiled new military spending of $186 billion over the next 10 years, with a focus on deterring China itself rather than supporting U.S. missions. Britain is following suit. "We need to work out how we will deal with a China that economically, technically, and militarily is going to surpass the U.S. within our lifetimes," said Tobias Ellwood, head of Parliament's defense committee.What has the U.S. done? President Trump has reversed his early praise of Xi on the coronavirus response, now blaming China for "worldwide killing." In May, his administration canceled visas for Chinese grad students with links to the Communist Party. More recently, the Pentagon sent three aircraft carriers to the region and conducted huge exercises in the South China Sea involving dozens of ships and hundreds of warplanes. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has criticized Beijing for "aggressive expansionism." Congress passed the Uighur Human Rights Policy Act, which sanctions specific Chinese officials responsible for "gross human rights violations," and it is planning to spend an additional $7 billion over two years to boost Pacific forces.Will that deter China? No. International criticism of China over the pandemic and Chinese aggression has only produced more swaggering defiance from Beijing, which believes it will soon surpass the U.S. as the world's great superpower. "Xi Jinping's attitude now is that he can't fail," said Taiwanese defense analyst Huang Chung-ting. Xi is also emboldened by what he sees as a vacuum in American leadership. Chinese officials have openly cheered for Trump's re-election, saying that he is not only a weak leader but also, through his incessant tweeting, "easy to read" and therefore "the best choice in an opponent for negotiations." Trump spurns alliances, so he won't lead an international effort to rein in Beijing, and he is openly indifferent to human rights abuses. Beijing knows, Chinese specialist Minxin Pei told The Atlantic, that "Trump can be persuaded if the price is right."Steamrolling Hong Kong The national security law that Beijing imposed on Hong Kong in late June effectively destroys freedom of expression and the rule of law in the territory. It threatens with life in jail those who engage in secession, subversion, and "collusion with foreign forces" — an offense so vague that it could include texting a foreigner or working with any international organization. Those charged with such crimes could be sent for trial to mainland China, where the conviction rate is 99.9 percent. Already, hundreds of protesters have been arrested under the law. Taiwan, which broke away from Communist China in 1949 but which China still claims, fears a military invasion. The Taiwanese are alarmed by the fact that the new security law asserts "universal jurisdiction," meaning anyone in any country can theoretically be prosecuted for criticizing Beijing. China has already accused Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen of a "separatist plot" for speaking at a democracy forum. "Our sense of fear has increased," said Taiwanese lawmaker Chen Po-wei. "Because of China's nature, there is a high possibility of conflict."This article was first published in the latest issue of The Week magazine. If you want to read more like it, you can try six risk-free issues of the magazine here.More stories from theweek.com 7 ferociously funny cartoons about Trump's fight with Fauci Portland mayor says protests 'blew up like a powder keg' only after federal agents arrived 3 of the most combative moments from Trump's interview with Chris Wallace
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| Kuwait's ruler, 91, undergoes a 'successful' surgery Posted: 19 Jul 2020 01:22 AM PDT  Kuwait's 91-year-old ruler underwent a "successful" surgery Sunday that required the oil-rich nation's crown prince to be temporarily empowered to serve in his place, its state-run news agency reported. Kuwait has yet to elaborate what required Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Sabah to seek a previously unannounced medical treatment beginning Saturday. The state-run KUNA news agency had described Sheikh Sabah's hospitalization Saturday as "medical checks," citing a statement from the country's royal court.
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| EU recovery summit could end with no deal, says Merkel Posted: 19 Jul 2020 12:44 AM PDT  Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel warned that EU leaders may fail to reach an agreement on Sunday on a huge post-virus recovery plan for the shattered European economy. Arriving for the third and what she said was probably the "decisive" day of an extraordinary European summit, Merkel said the 27 leaders had "many positions" on the size of the fund, on rules for accessing it and on tying it to respect for the rule of law. Merkel was due to join French President Emmanuel Macron and the president of the European Council, summit host Charles Michel, to prepare a new offer to break the logjam after Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and his "Frugal Five" allies blocked a deal.
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| UN agency: US-sought tanker 'hijacked' off UAE now in Iran Posted: 19 Jul 2020 12:16 AM PDT  A United Nations agency acknowledged Sunday that a U.S.-sought oil tanker "hijacked" off the coast of the United Arab Emirates after allegedly smuggling Iranian crude oil is back in Iranian waters. The International Labor Organization said that the MT Gulf Sky was hijacked July 5, citing its captain. "The vessel was taken to Iran," the ILO said.
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| Syrians vote for new parliament amid measures against virus Posted: 19 Jul 2020 12:09 AM PDT  Syrians headed to polling stations in government-held parts of the war-torn country on Sunday to elect a new parliament amid strict health measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. The vote is the third to take place in Syria since the conflict began in March 2011. This year's vote follows a new wave of U.S. sanctions that came into effect last month and a campaign to fight corruption that saw a wealthy cousin of President Bashar Assad come under pressure to pay back tens of millions of dollars to the state.
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| House leaders 'alarmed' federal officers policing protests Posted: 18 Jul 2020 11:46 PM PDT  Top leaders in the U.S. House said Sunday they were "alarmed" by the Trump administration's tactics against protesters in Portland, Oregon, and other cities, including Washington, D.C., and called on federal inspectors general investigate. "This is a matter of utmost urgency," wrote House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-New York, Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson, D-Mississippi, and Oversight and Reform Committee Chairwoman Carolyn B. Maloney, D-New York, in a letter to the inspectors general of Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security. The Democratic lawmakers are seeking an investigation "into the use of federal law enforcement agencies by the Attorney General and the Acting Secretary of Homeland Security to suppress First Amendment protected activities in Washington, D.C., Portland, and other communities across the United States."
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| Netanyahu's graft trial resumes amid Israeli virus anger Posted: 18 Jul 2020 11:14 PM PDT |
| Donald Trump has unified America – against him Posted: 18 Jul 2020 10:00 PM PDT  The president's assault on decency has created an emerging coalition, across boundaries of race, class and partisan politics Donald Trump is on the verge of accomplishing what no American president has ever achieved – a truly multi-racial, multi-class, bipartisan political coalition so encompassing it could realign US politics for years to come.Unfortunately for Trump, that coalition has come into existence to prevent him from having another term in office.Start with race. Rather than fuel his base, Trump's hostility toward people protesting the police killing of George Floyd and systemic racism has pulled millions of white Americans closer to black Americans. More than half of whites now say they agree with the ideas expressed by the Black Lives Matter movement, and more white people support than oppose protests against police brutality. To a remarkable degree, the protests themselves have been biracial.As John Lewis, the great civil rights hero who died on Friday, said last month near where Trump and William Barr, the attorney general, had set federal police in riot gear and wielding tear gas on peaceful protesters, "Mr President, the American people … have a right to protest. You cannot stop the people with all of the forces that you may have at your command."> Even many former Trump voters are appalled by Trump's racism, as well as his overall moral squalorEven many former Trump voters are appalled by Trump's racism, as well as his overall moral squalor. According to a recent New York Times/Sienna College poll, more than 80% of people who voted for Trump in 2016 but won't back him again in 2020 think he "doesn't behave the way a president ought to act" – a view shared by 75% of registered voters across battleground states which will make all the difference in November.A second big unifier has been Trump's attacks on our system of government. Americans don't particularly like or trust government but almost all feel some loyalty toward the constitution and the principle that no person is above the law.Trump's politicization of the justice department, attacks on the rule of law, requests to other nations to help dig up dirt on his political opponents, and evident love of dictators – especially Vladimir Putin – have played badly even among diehard conservatives.Refugees from the pre-Trump GOP along with "Never Trumper" Republicans who rejected him from the start are teaming up with groups such as Republican Voters Against Trump, Republicans for the Rule of Law, the Lincoln Project and 43 Alumni for Biden, which comprises former officials of George W Bush's (the 43rd president) administration. The Lincoln Project has produced dozens of hard-hitting anti-Trump ads, many running on Fox News.The third big unifier has been Trump's catastrophic mishandling of the pandemic. Many who might have forgiven his personality defects and authoritarian impulses can't abide his bungling of a public health crisis that threatens their lives and loved ones.In a poll released last week, 62% said Trump was "hurting rather than helping" efforts to combat Covid-19. Fully 78% of those who supported him in 2016 but won't vote for him again disapprove of his handling of the pandemic. Voters in swing states like Texas, Florida and Arizona – now feeling the brunt of the virus – are telling pollsters they won't vote for Trump.Although the reasons for joining the anti-Trump coalition have little to do with Joe Biden, Trump's presumed challenger, the Democrat may still become a transformational president. That's less because of his inherent skills than because Trump has readied America for transformation.The tempting analogy is to the election of 1932, in the midst of another set of crises. The public barely knew Franklin D Roosevelt, whom critics called an aristocrat without a coherent theory of how to end the Great Depression. But after four years of Herbert Hoover, America was so desperate for coherent leadership it was eager to support FDR and follow wherever he led.There are still more than 100 days until election day, and many things could derail the emerging anti-Trump coalition: impediments to voting during the pandemic, foreign hacking into election machines, Republican efforts to suppress votes, quirks of the electoral college, Trumpian dirty tricks and his likely challenge to any electoral loss.Yet even now, the breadth of the anti-Trump coalition is a remarkable testament to Donald Trump's capacity to inspire disgust. * Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His new book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a columnist for Guardian US
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| Congress confronts new virus crisis rescue as pandemic grows Posted: 18 Jul 2020 09:28 PM PDT  It stands as the biggest economic rescue in U.S. history, the $2.2 trillion coronavirus relief bill swiftly approved by Congress in the spring. With COVID-19 cases hitting alarming new highs and the death roll rising, the pandemic's devastating cycle is happening all over again, leaving Congress little choice but to engineer another costly rescue. Businesses are shutting down, schools cannot fully reopen and jobs are disappearing, all while federal emergency aid expires.
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| Oregon sues feds over Portland protests as unrest continues Posted: 18 Jul 2020 05:32 PM PDT  Oregon's attorney general is seeking an order to stop federal agents from arresting people in Portland as the city continues to be convulsed by nightly protests that have gone on for seven weeks and have now pitted local officials against the Trump administration. Federal agents, some wearing camouflage and some wearing dark Homeland Security uniforms, used tear gas at least twice to break up crowds late Friday night, The Oregonian/OregonLive reported. Demonstrations against systemic racism and police brutality have happened every day in Oregon's largest city since Minneapolis police killed George Floyd on May 25.
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| Fund groups urge UK to back EU green finance rules Posted: 18 Jul 2020 05:00 PM PDT |
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