| Cities remove racist monuments before protesters can topple them Posted: 03 Jun 2020 02:11 PM PDT  As the protests following the death of George Floyd in some cities have turned to targeting racist iconography, officials are trying to preempt them.
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| As protests rock cities, Rand Paul holds up passage of anti-lynching bill Posted: 03 Jun 2020 02:31 PM PDT  Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., is holding up passage of an anti-lynching bill with broad bipartisan support — the latest delay in an effort to pass a federal law against lynching that goes back over a century.
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| Robert E Lee statue: Virginia governor announces removal of monument Posted: 04 Jun 2020 11:27 AM PDT  Virginia's governor says the monument to the Confederate general will be taken down in Richmond.
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| At least 39 injured in knife attack at China kindergarten Posted: 03 Jun 2020 10:31 PM PDT |
| Protests in Minneapolis turned violent: Officials first blamed outsiders, but that’s not what arrests show Posted: 04 Jun 2020 12:39 PM PDT  Minnesota officials originally said outside agitators, not local residents, were responsible for the violence and riots. Arrest data shows otherwise.
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| US suspends flights by Chinese airlines in new spat with Beijing Posted: 03 Jun 2020 05:04 PM PDT  Washington on Wednesday ordered the suspension of all flights by Chinese airlines into and out of the United States after Beijing failed to allow American carriers to resume services to China. The US action, which takes effect June 16 but could be implemented sooner if President Donald Trump orders it, applied to seven Chinese civilian carriers, although only four currently are running service to US cities including Air China and China Eastern Airlines, the Department of Transportation (DOT) said. US air carriers sharply reduced or suspended service to China amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
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| 10 Years Ago Today, SpaceX's Falcon 9 Blasted Off for the First Time Posted: 04 Jun 2020 07:36 AM PDT |
| The 2020 hurricane season already broke a record, and it's only day 3 Posted: 03 Jun 2020 03:50 PM PDT  Tropical Storm Cristobal, the earliest-ever third named storm in the Atlantic, has made landfall in Mexico and is turning toward the US Gulf Coast.
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| Counties in Florida, Iowa worry CDC as emerging coronavirus 'areas of concern' Posted: 03 Jun 2020 10:54 AM PDT  A document created by the CDC and reviewed by Yahoo News lists nine counties and one city with rising infection levels, many in states that have eased lockdown restrictions.
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| Airlines to drop service to 75 domestic airports Posted: 04 Jun 2020 09:00 AM PDT  Fifteen U.S. airlines were granted final government approval on Wednesday to temporarily halt service to 75 domestic airports as travel demand has been crushed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
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| Hong Kong: Tens of thousands defy ban to attend Tiananmen vigil Posted: 04 Jun 2020 09:09 AM PDT  It comes as lawmakers approve a controversial bill criminalising insulting China's national anthem.
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| Lawsuit aims to hold nebulous 'antifa' to blame for injuries Posted: 04 Jun 2020 04:12 PM PDT  A conservative writer from Portland, Oregon, filed a lawsuit Thursday against purported elements of the nebulous, far-left militant groups collectively known as antifa, days after President Donald Trump blamed those groups for inciting violence at protests over police killings of black people. The suit was filed on behalf of Andy Ngo, who is known for aggressively covering and video-recording demonstrators. "I am hoping that this marks a turning point, that militants belonging to a criminal movement can no longer depend on the anonymity ... to get away with their crimes," said Ngo, who previously was a writer with the online publication Quillette and now is with The Post Millennial.
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| Powerful video from 1986 resurfaces showing Biden’s passionate speech against apartheid Posted: 03 Jun 2020 09:54 AM PDT  A powerful video of then-Senator Joe Biden speaking about apartheid South Africa has resurfaced.The clip, taken from C-Span coverage of a Senate committee in 1986, shows Mr Biden passionately speaking out in support of the majority black population of South Africa, and against the oppressive apartheid regime.
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| In aftermath of George Floyd's death, San Diego police will 'immediately' end use of carotid restraint Posted: 03 Jun 2020 10:19 AM PDT  The San Diego Police Department, spurred by the outrage after George Floyd's death, has immediately banned a controversial neck restraint.
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| The trucker who drove through a crowd of protesters in Minneapolis was once arrested for domestic assault Posted: 03 Jun 2020 02:52 AM PDT  Bogdan Vechirko drove an empty tanker through a crowd of George Floyd protesters in Minneapolis on Sunday. No one was hurt.
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| Boris Johnson told Italy's prime minister the UK had been aiming for coronavirus herd immunity, new documentary reveals Posted: 03 Jun 2020 03:10 AM PDT  Italian health minister Pierpaolo Sileri said Johnson's early COVID-19 plan was pursuing herd immunity in an interview with Channel 4's Dispatches.
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| Cars Most Likely to Need a Transmission Replacement Posted: 04 Jun 2020 07:33 AM PDT  Drivers naturally become concerned about reliability as a car ages, since the risk of inconvenience and unexpected expenses rises while the miles rack up. Most modern cars can make it to 200,000 ...
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| Britain says nearly 30,000 COVID-19 tests sent to U.S. lab came back void Posted: 04 Jun 2020 06:33 AM PDT  Nearly 30,000 COVID-19 tests which Britain sent to a U.S. lab for processing came back void, Prime Minister Boris Johnson's spokesman said on Thursday, adding to a mounting pile of questions over the UK's testing regime. Johnson's spokesman said that "operational issues in our lab network" had meant that 67,000 tests were sent to the United States for processing.
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| Hawley Calls on U.S. Companies with Chinese Interests to Condemn CCP’s Actions in Hong Kong Posted: 04 Jun 2020 09:55 AM PDT  China hawk Josh Hawley (R., Mo.) wrote an "open letter" to American companies with business ties to China on Thursday, calling on them to publicly denounce the Chinese Communist Party's recent national security law that overrides Hong Kong's independence.As Hong Kongers protested on the 31st anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, Hawley warned that "the fate of Hong Kong hangs in the balance," saying that the new law — which was passed unilaterally by China's National People's Congress last month — will "mean the death of democracy in Hong Kong." Last month, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told Congress that the new law meant Hong Kong is effectively no longer "autonomous."Hawley called on U.S. firms to use their market power to speak out against the new legislation, and suggested they could withdraw from the Chinese market if the security law goes through."The CCP may not care about freedom, democracy, or any of the other things for which we, as Americans, have long stood and fought. But it does care about you," Hawley explained. "The CCP knows that its economic fortunes are still tied to your companies' participation in its markets. If it knows that you may retract that participation in response to the Hong Kong crackdown, then it may yet restrain itself. And some vestige of freedom – some glimmer of hope – might yet live on in that city. This is the power you hold."The Missouri Republican, who has been outspoken about Hong Kong and visited the island amid pro-democracy protests last year, called on companies to live up to their "obligation to put principle ahead of profit.""You are an American company first and foremost. And you have a responsibility to your nation – and indeed, to all free nations of the world – to speak up for what is right," Hawley wrote. "You have an obligation to put principle ahead of profit and to ensure that your actions do not enable the destruction of others' freedoms. Nowhere is this truer than in Hong Kong, the frontline of the fight against CCP imperialism."Hawley's letter comes after U.K.-based bank HSBC backed the CCP's new security measures, saying the company "respects and supports any laws that stabilize the social order in Hong Kong."
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| Esper, on thin ice with the White House, reverses decision on troop deployments Posted: 03 Jun 2020 07:25 AM PDT  The Pentagon chief irritated the president when he complained about deploying active-duty soldiers.
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| Magnitude 5.5 quake hits shaky California desert region Posted: 03 Jun 2020 06:54 PM PDT |
| Libya's government claims to have retaken Tripoli as Russian-backed rebel retreats Posted: 04 Jun 2020 03:05 AM PDT  Libya's internationally recognised government has claimed victory in the battle for control of the country's capital after more than a year of fighting. Turkish-backed forces fighting for the Tripoli-based Government of National Accord said on Thursday morning that they had retaken control of all of the Tripoli city administrative area as forces loyal to Gen Khalifa Haftar withdrew from the suburbs. Separately Reuters cited a source in Gen Haftar's Libyan National Army (LNA) saying that it would complete its withdrawal from the Tripoli districts of Ain Zara, Abu Salim and Qasr Ben Gashir on Thursday. The announcements came as both sides prepared to resume UN-brokered ceasefire talks in Geneva. Fayez-al Serraj, the prime minister of the GNA, was due to meet Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday to discuss how to consolidate their gains. Gen Haftar, who rules eastern and southern Libya in tandem with a parliament that split with the GNA in 2016, launched an assault on Tripoli in April 2019. The LNA, with backing from several foreign countries including the UAE, Egypt and Russia, succeeded in seizing the city's southern suburbs but became bogged in a war of attrition before it could reach the city centre. The tide of the war began to turn after Turkey intervened on the side of the GNA at the beginning of this year, deploying drones, air-defence systems, and thousands of Syrian fighters in support of Tripoli. GNA troops on Thursday recaptured the city's derelict international airport, a focal point of fighting over the past year. LNA troops are believed to be consolidating around the town of Tarhuna, southeast of Tripoli. Hundreds of Russian fighters, believed to be with the Kremlin-linked Wagner private military company, have been seen accompanying the LNA pull back. Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday that large numbers of Russian and Soviet made anti-personnel mines not previously recorded in Libya had been found planted in civilian areas abandoned by the LNA. "Any use of internationally banned landmines is unconscionable," said Steve Goose, arms division director at Human Rights Watch and chair of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines. "Those fighting in Tripoli should halt using landmines and start clearing them to avoid further harm to life and limb."
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| Sen. Lindsey Graham on stunning revelations from Rod Rosenstein's Senate testimony Posted: 03 Jun 2020 07:16 PM PDT  Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham joins Sean Hannity with insight on 'Hannity.'
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| New York police take seconds to restore reputation for brutality Posted: 04 Jun 2020 02:00 AM PDT  Driving vehicles into protesters demanding justice for George Floyd earned the backing of the mayor, but of few others * George Floyd killing – latest US updates * See all our George Floyd coverageIt doesn't take long to blow up a reputation. In the case of the New York police department, an institution with an already troubled history, the clip lasted all of 27 seconds.It showed an NYPD vehicle in Brooklyn lined up against a metal barricade behind which protesters were chanting during Saturday's demonstrations over the police killing of George Floyd. Projectiles were thrown on to the roof of the car, then suddenly a second police SUV drew up alongside and instead of stopping continued to plough straight into the crowd.Seconds later the first vehicle lurched forward, knocking the barrier over and with it propelling several protesters to the ground amid a harrowing chorus of shrieking.A 27-second video, now viewed more than 30m times, had quickly shredded years of effort to repair the deeply tarnished image of the NYPD. New York's "finest" were firmly cast in a role normally reserved for the security corps of petty dictators.The shocking video was compounded hours later when the mayor of New York, Bill de Blasio, spoke about the incident. A politician who won election in 2013 largely on a promise to reform the NYPD and scrap its racially discriminatory stop-and-frisk policy, astounded even his closest supporters when he defended the police.De Blasio said: "I do believe the NYPD has acted appropriately."Social media lit up. Was it appropriate to drive those two SUVs into the crowd? Was it appropriate for an NYPD officer forcibly to remove the coronavirus mask of a black protester whose arms were raised in the air, then pepper-spray his face?Was it appropriate for another officer to tell a protester to get off the street, then physically shove her several feet towards the curb where she landed on her head? Or that the police officers involved in the pepper spray incident had covered their badge numbers, presumably to avoid having to answer for their actions. Or to beat a nurse walking home from a shift at a hospital?The clashes between New York's police and its protesters have reverberated around the city. The largest police force in the US, with its $5.6bn annual budget and 36,000 uniformed officers under the leadership of one of the most progressive mayors in the country, has responded to demonstrations about police brutality with more police brutality.The Black, Latino and Asian Caucus of the city council, which makes up more than half of the legislative body, was swift and devastating in its criticism. In a statement, it said that the NYPD had acted "with aggression towards New Yorkers who vigorously and vociferously but nonetheless peacefully advocated for justice".Adrienne Adams, co-chair of the caucus, told the Guardian the NYPD had tried to suppress legitimate anger felt by African American and other minority communities following years of police abuse. "We cannot allow people who have kept people of color down for decades to say now that we don't have the right to display our outrage," she said.Though that sentiment applies nationwide, Adams believes New York stands out as having a "horrible history of police brutality". It was the NYPD that set the tone, she said, when Daniel Pantaleo, the officer implicated in the 2014 death by chokehold of Eric Garner in Staten Island, avoided prosecution."When nothing happened to the police officers who were responsible for the death of Eric Garner, New York set the blueprint for what happened to George Floyd," she said. "There's no penalty, no consequence, so it's OK."Adams's framing of the Garner killing could equally be applied to a long string of notorious episodes of police misconduct that preceded it. In 1997, Haitian immigrant Abner Louima was handcuffed by an NYPD officer and sexually assaulted with a broken broomstick.Two years later, Amadou Diallo was shot near his home in a hail of 41 bullets after officers mistook his wallet for a gun. In an echo of that event, an unarmed Sean Bell was shot 50 times in Queens on the morning of his wedding in 2006 – it took six years for the NYPD detective who opened the fusillade to be chucked off the force while nobody has ever been convicted of any crime.In the policing of protest, the NYPD also has a contentious track record. In 2004 it rounded up more than 1,800 peaceful protesters rallying outside the Republican National Convention during the re-election bid of George W Bush and herded them into overcrowded pens on Pier 57 in Manhattan. In 2011 it was similarly criticized for heavy-handed tactics during the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations.Cutting across all this, the force has consistently targeted its efforts on neighborhoods of the city with majority black or Latino populations, straying at times into overt racial profiling. Though stop and frisk has been reined back in recent years, the NYPD continues to heavily and disproportionately police those communities despite a historically low homicide rate.Despite this long legacy of overreach, the force continues to be systemically resistant to public oversight. Under Section 50-A of New York state law, the disciplinary files of police officers are largely held in secret, making the task of holding them accountable almost impossible.Jennvine Wong, a staff attorney at the Cop Accountability Project (CAP) within the Legal Aid Society, told the Guardian that there were currently more than 200 police officers still being employed by the NYPD on full pay who should have been considered for termination following reports of misconduct.Data collected by CAP shows that where cases of misconduct arise they often involve escalation of low-level encounters into aggressive confrontations – something officers are supposed to be trained not to do. The project is currently litigating the case of Tomas Medina who was put in a chokehold and Tasered in 2018 after police were called to a complaint about loud music being played.Eric Garner's fatal arrest was triggered by him allegedly selling single cigarettes.Although the use of chokeholds has been banned in New York, the project has found that between 2015 and 2018 the city settled 30 lawsuits involving NYPD use of the potentially lethal maneuver.Wong believes such endemic deployment of excessive force has spilled over into the NYPD's handling of the George Floyd protests. She was present at a peaceful protest in Brooklyn that suddenly turned volatile not because of the behavior of protesters but by a sudden change of tack on the part of the police."In a split second, the NYPD snapped and engaged in over-aggressive enforcement. They escalated it from 0 to 10 out of nowhere, arresting people and wielding their batons."If there has been unrestrained use of batons in the city, it would be with the full approval of Ed Mullins, the provocative president of one of the main police unions, the Sergeants Benevolent Association (SBA). He wrote to members urging "each and every one of you to report for duty with your helmet and baton and do not hesitate to utilize that equipment in securing your personal safety".The sister Police Benevolent Association of New York City has also spoken to its members in inflammatory terms about them being "under attack by violent, organized terrorists while New York City council and other politicians sit at home demanding we 'de-escalate'".There is no denying that the NYPD faces difficult challenges in the policing of mass protests, especially late at night when violent outbreaks have erupted as they did on Monday in Manhattan and the Bronx. Fires were started in the street and stores looted.For Eugene O'Donnell, a former NYPD officer and prosecutor in Brooklyn and Queens who is now a professor of police studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, Monday night's spectacle of looting along Fifth Avenue amounted to a collapse of policing in the city."This weekend, the job of police officer in New York became officially impossible when the police abolitionists won. They have created a model of zero tolerance towards force being used and any injuries being inflicted, and that's absurd."O'Donnell said the same pattern is repeating itself across America. "In city after city, the police were abolished this weekend. They stood back and watched as damage was inflicted that was irreversible."
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| They wanted to protest peacefully. Police responded with force. On the ground in Minneapolis. Posted: 03 Jun 2020 10:58 AM PDT  "We cannot back down now. We have come way too far. We are literally in the midst of history."
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| Researchers just retracted a massive study on whether a common malaria pill can help treat coronavirus Posted: 04 Jun 2020 12:00 PM PDT  Scientists had questioned the data used in the study, and researcher said they could "no longer vouch for the veracity of the primary data sources."
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| Welcome Home, Hong Kong Posted: 04 Jun 2020 10:30 AM PDT  London doesn't have the power to push the corrupt little junta in Beijing into being halfway decent to the people of Hong Kong, but Boris Johnson has a bold solution for almost half of those people: Come to the United Kingdom.Hong Kong is a former British territory, and about 3 million of its 7.5 million residents hold or are eligible for a limited kind of British passport (the "British national overseas" passport issued to those born in Hong Kong before the territory was relinquished to China in 1997) that entitles them to travel to the United Kingdom but not to permanently reside or work there. As Beijing prepares to implement in Hong Kong a robust version of the totalitarianism it practices everywhere else in China — in contravention of its agreement with the British requiring the Chinese government to honor Hong Kong's liberty and democracy — Johnson says that his government, bound by "our profound ties of history and friendship with the people of Hong Kong," will allow all of those 3 million Hong Kongers the option of coming to the United Kingdom with the British version of a green card (renewable legal residency and permission to work) and a path to full citizenship for those who desire it.This is an almost heroic proposal. It is also a smart one.The United Kingdom is an astonishingly inventive and productive nation, and it punches above its weight both economically and, especially, culturally. But Hong Kong has long practiced a kind of supercharged version of British economic liberalism, and its people are even more productive than the British, with a GDP per capita about 15 percent higher than the United Kingdom's. You don't have a rich, smart, productive country without rich, smart, productive people, and Johnson is proposing to roll out the red carpet for 3 million of them.Because of Brexit, Johnson often is numbered among the recently ascendant right-wing populists, but while his European counterparts (and, unhappily, many of his American counterparts) rail against immigration and immigrants, Johnson's government would welcome a new group of immigrants who would by themselves equal about 4.5 percent of the current U.K. population.During the Cold War, defectors from the Eastern bloc were symbols of the fundamental difference between the free world and the unfree world, and people of good will cheered when some daring person successfully made it over the Berlin Wall. But the men and women fleeing the brutality of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany could do so only because there was a West Berlin for them to run to. Boris Johnson proposes that the United Kingdom play that role for the people of Hong Kong who are being oppressed by a government that in too many ways practices an updated version of socialism as it actually existed only a few decades ago, as opposed to the socialism of 10,000 dorm-room philosophers.Beijing is infuriated. The Chinese government accuses the United Kingdom of "interfering in China's internal affairs." But Beijing is bound by the Sino–British Joint Declaration regarding the liberty of Hong Kong, so the U.K. is not crashing the party. Johnson's government does not have the force to change Beijing's internal affairs, but it does have the power to make 3 million Hong Kong residents external affairs.Washington does, too. Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) the Senate majority leader, already has suggested that the United States implement something like what Johnson's government is doing. "Our nation has a rich heritage of standing as a beacon of light and freedom, from refugees of war to those escaping the Iron Curtain," McConnell said. "We should exercise it again for the people of Hong Kong."Some of our neo-Malthusian friends will insist that there is no room in the United States for these immigrants, that we are all full up, that there aren't enough jobs to go around as it is. But consider this: In the 1940s, Hong Kong was one of the poorest places in the world, hungry, depopulated, and war-ravaged. With very little in the way of natural resources, and starting without a great deal of modern infrastructure, Hong Kong grew to become the wealthiest city in the world. If Hong Kong were an independent country (and why not? It works for Singapore), it would be one of the world's wealthiest, a little ahead of the United States and just a step behind Switzerland. The people of Hong Kong did that with very little other than liberty, the rule of law, and a reasonably good location as a port. Why shouldn't those people thrive in the United States, with its abundant blessings? They can expect to thrive in the United Kingdom.The loss of liberty in Hong Kong is a jolting, unwelcome reminder that history does not move in one direction only, toward progress and human flourishing. Perhaps the city cannot be saved, for now. But the British proposal is both an act of practical aid and a splendid gesture. For the moment, it may be that the best that can be done is for the free world to declare that the people of Hong Kong live where freedom lives.Welcome home.
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| 'Near impunity' for drug war killings in Philippines, U.N. says Posted: 03 Jun 2020 09:03 PM PDT  Tens of thousands of people in the Philippines may have been killed in the war on drugs since mid-2016 amid "near impunity" for police and incitement to violence by top officials, the United Nations said on Thursday. It said the drugs crackdown, launched by President Rodrigo Duterte after he won election on a platform of crushing crime, has been marked by police orders and high-level rhetoric that may have been interpreted as "permission to kill". In Manila, presidential spokesman Harry Roque said the "rehashed claims" of impunity were unfounded.
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| AP FACT CHECK: Trump denies tear gas use despite evidence Posted: 03 Jun 2020 05:11 PM PDT  President Donald Trump and some of his supporters are claiming authorities did not use tear gas against people in a crackdown outside the White House this week. Law enforcement officials shy away from describing crowd-dispersing chemical tools as tear gas; it evokes police gassing citizens or the horrors of war. Federal institutions such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense have listed tear gas as the common term for riot-control agents.
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| Amy Cooper: Central Park dog walker who called police on black man has pet returned Posted: 04 Jun 2020 01:01 PM PDT  Amy Cooper has got her dog back 10 days after she gave it up following a public outcry over her calling the police on a black man in Central Park.In a video of the 25 May incident, Cooper claimed in a phone call to police that bird watcher Christian Cooper was threatening her life - after he'd asked her to place a leash on her dog.
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| The overflowing police cells in New York: 'I was screaming at them that I couldn't breathe and they just laughed' Posted: 04 Jun 2020 02:11 AM PDT  When Nikko Lester was released from the NYPD's Central Booking station, he was so discombobulated he could not be sure what time of day it was. His face was bloodied, his nose bent out of shape. The 33-year-old from downtown Brooklyn did not know whether he sustained the injury from the police baton that had struck him during his arrest, the knee that then pinned him to the ground, or from the seizure that followed. The musician says he had been out peacefully protesting with friends the night before - his first ever march - when he was rushed by four officers, pushed to the pavement and handcuffed. "I kept saying over and over again, 'I didn't do anything, I didn't do anything.' There had been no provocation," he told the Telegraph. "They weren't in any mood to listen." And just like that, another black man in America became a statistic.
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| New U.S. ban on Chinese airlines hurts Chinese students who were already struggling to get home Posted: 04 Jun 2020 10:08 AM PDT  The DOT has now banned Chinese airlines from the U.S., an added burden for Chinese students already stuck here because of their own government's policies.
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| Amid Spreading George Floyd Protests in Europe, a Question: Do Black Lives Matter Less in France? Posted: 03 Jun 2020 10:38 AM PDT  PARIS—The crowd that gathered in front of the city's main courthouse demanded justice for a black man who'd died at the hands of the police. They chanted, "We Can't Breathe" and brandished signs and scrawled graffiti slogans from the Black Lives Matter movement. The police used tear gas to disperse the largely peaceful protesters, and then small groups of troublemakers broke off to smash windows, bust up ATMs, and burn trash bins. Politicians and commentators took to the airwaves the next morning to trade accusations about who was at fault for the violence.It was a scene straight out of the United States right now, except that it happened in Paris, and the 20,000 people who gathered here Tuesday were commemorating not only George Floyd, but France's own victim of police violence: Adama Traoré, a 24-year-old construction worker, died in a police station after being arrested in 2016."My little brother's last words were 'I can't breathe,'" his sister Assa Traoré told the crowd through a megaphone. "They could have taken him to a hospital. They could have tried to save him. They didn't. They killed my little brother.''Crowds have gathered in London, Berlin and Amsterdam these past days to protest Floyd's death at the hands, or to be more precise, the knee, of a Minneapolis policeman on May 25. But while Tuesday night's turnout in Paris certainly was amplified by events across the Atlantic, it was also a stark reminder that France has its own issues of racism and police violence.What America Can Learn From Europe's Black BlocsWatching events unfold in the U.S. brings a certain sense of déja vu to anyone in France. The same dormant grievances. The same spark setting off nationwide protests. The same largely peaceful gatherings of people that turn violent. The same disagreement over whether agitators or police are to blame for the degeneration. The same vandals who take advantage to destroy property and go home with the latest flat screen TV.It happened in 2018, when protests by the so-called Gilets Jaunes, or Yellow Vests, brought much of France to a standstill and led to historic monuments being trashed in central Paris amid accusations of police violence. It happened in 2005 when French ghettos burned for three weeks after two boys died trying to escape a police ID check. To a lesser degree, it's happened with labor protests in the years in between, including last year's against raising the retirement age.Police violence and racism have been the subject of many French films, including Les Miserables, last year's candidate for best foreign film at the Oscars.The French government has been quick to try to dispel any thought that France's situation is anything like that of the United States. Sibeth Ndiaye, the government's spokesperson, said Tuesday that events in France and America "aren't comparable" and insisted "there's no institutionalized state violence in France.'' Many French would disagree. Indeed, resentment of the police may well be much more widespread, and among more varied parts of the population, than in the United States.France doesn't break out statistics by race, and the police don't publish detailed statistics about their activities, making comparisons with the U.S. difficult. The lack of transparency is one reason journalist David Dufresne became known nationwide during the Gilets Jaunes protests for using his @davduf Twitter account to publish accusations of police violence. The numerous testimonies he received led to a book.The percentage of French who expressed confidence in the police dropped 8 points to 66 percent in this year's annual poll by an institute linked to the Sciences Po university in Paris. That's way below the level in Britain and Germany. Chloe Morin, a researcher with the Jean-Jaurès Foundation, said one result of the Gilets Jaunes protests is that dislike of the police, which used to be largely limited to visible minorities, is now shared by wide swaths of white France. "In the U.S., the bad relations are specific to certain places and certain populations,'' she told The Daily Beast. "In France, between the Gilets Jaunes, the ghettos, and now last year's pension protests, you have three groups who feel humiliated by the police.'' The Gilets Jaunes were largely white and rural. They initially blocked roundabouts across France to protest new taxes on gasoline, in their view imposed by an ecologically obsessed government that didn't understand that outside of Paris people actually have to drive. The protests spread across the country and turned violent when they were joined by groups unhappy with everything from purchasing power to President Emmanuel Macron's haughty style. Self-declared antifa and anarchist elements also joined in. The momentum of the movement only trailed off when Macron rolled back the gas tax and threw lots of money at various other grievances, and the pandemic lockdown seemed to put an definitive end to it. (The public health emergency was the reason police gave on Tuesday for breaking up the demonstration.)There was also an anti-immigrant element to some Gilets Jaunes, which explains why much of black and Arab France sat out the protests. France's so-called banlieues, immigrant-heavy suburbs and exurbs, have been largely calm since the 2005 riots, which led to then President Jacques Chirac declaring a state of emergency for the first time since the Algerian War.The cynical explanations about why the banlieues haven't exploded again, even though the job situation and relations with the police have not improved, is that the drug dealers and Islamist ideologues who often hold sway don't want any trouble. France's extensive social net has certainly helped as well. It hasn't been for lack of incidents. Traoré died in a police station after being tackled when he fled a police identity check. The police had come to arrest his brother, but Adama ran because he apparently didn't have his papers on him. Four years later, conflicting medical reports still haven't settled whether he died from the way he was treated by police or because of an underlying heart condition. "These images of Floyd horrified us, but what we denounce with such vehemence in the U.S. happens here in France, even worse,'' Adama's sister Assa said on BFMTV Tuesday. "In the U.S., the police were fired, here they received medals.'' 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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| The architect of Sweden's no-lockdown plan suggested the strategy was a mistake based on what we now know about the coronavirus Posted: 03 Jun 2020 06:21 AM PDT  State epidemiologist Anders Tegnell said if Sweden had had the knowledge it had today, its response would have likely been harsher.
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| New charges against Minneapolis policemen as protests continue Posted: 03 Jun 2020 03:18 AM PDT  Prosecutors on Wednesday leveled new criminal charges against four Minneapolis policemen implicated in the death of a black man pinned by his neck to the street during an arrest that sparked more than a week of nationwide protest and civil strife. The added murder charge filed against one officer already in custody and the arrest of three more accused of playing a role in the killing of George Floyd, 46, came as several nights of escalating unrest gave way to mostly peaceful protests. Thousands of demonstrators massed near the White House lit up their cellphone flashlights and sang along to the 1970s soul tune "Lean on Me," before resuming a chorus of anti-police chants.
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| Trump says national guard ‘cut through’ protests ‘like butter’ Posted: 04 Jun 2020 06:16 AM PDT 
Peaceful protesters marched through the streets of Washington, D.C. on Wednesday, continuing to demonstrate against police brutality toward people of color. They did so in the face of a threat from the White House to send the military to quell unrest after some demonstrations devolved into looting. And similar scenes nationwide: In Oakland, protesters drummed and burned the Republican president in effigy. Marchers in Boston chanted "no justice, no peace." Their message echoed in the streets of Detroit, Portland, Oregon, Fort Worth and Memphis. Even the sandy beaches of Encinitas saw surfers riding the waves for the cause. "This is what it's about, Black Lives Matter. No justice, no peace. And they're demonstrating peacefully. Very peacefully." On Wednesday, prosecutors elevated the charges Derek Chauvin, the now-fired police officer whose involvement with George Floyd's death galvanized the protests. He is now charged with second-degree murder. Three other former officers are also accused of abetting the murder. Meanwhile, criticisms that President Donald Trump is exacerbating tensions are mounting. "Right now I think the nation needs law and order." In an interview with the conservative television channel Newsmax, conducted by Trump's one-time press secretary on Wednesday, the president said his support for using the National Guard in Minneapolis worked to tamp down looting in that city, and that it could be done elsewhere. "Once they came in it was like a knife cutting butter. It was so easy. But we have other cities, they like to hold out. New York, is a disaster what's going on in New York. [FLASH] If they don't get it straightened out soon, I'll take care of it." As night fell in New York, a day of peaceful protests turned ugly. Protesters in Brooklyn defying a curfew said they were rushed by cops. Activists similarly defied curfews in Detroit, Washington and Oakland Wednesday night.
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| In 1985, A Nuclear Submarine Explosion Contaminated Russia's Far East Posted: 04 Jun 2020 02:30 PM PDT  The accident scene was heavily contaminated with radioactivity.
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| US says Alaska man laundered nearly $1B for Iran through UAE Posted: 04 Jun 2020 03:09 AM PDT |
| Trump tried to vote with wrong address while railing against voter fraud Posted: 03 Jun 2020 12:29 PM PDT  Records reviewed by the Post found the president had to resubmit his application, despite railing against the vote by mail processDonald Trump has been railing against vote by mail for the past few months – falsely citing the potential for voter fraud, which is extremely rare. As it turns out, the president himself bungled the system.Trump registered to vote in Florida last September under his White House address – 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, according to the Washington Post. But Florida does not allow people to register to vote without an in-state address, and one month later, Trump resubmitted his application with a Florida address and voted in the Republican primary.On his registration form, Trump told Florida officials his legal residence was in Washington DC but on another day also said he was a "bona fide resident" of Palm Beach, Florida, home to his Mar-a-Lago Club, according to the public records reviewed by the Post.Other voters have faced significant consequences for the same mistake. In fact, as some Democrats pointed out, the same issue is listed on White House website as voter fraud.> Beyond Trump's dangerous, dishonest claims of widespread voter fraud, it's really rich because the WH website uses the case of someone trying to vote at their second home as an example of voter fraud! https://t.co/syhg4fsehh pic.twitter.com/pEIyXy89Ck> > — American Bridge (@American_Bridge) June 3, 2020A city manager in Florida paid $5,000 in fines for putting the wrong address on her registration, as did a restaurateur in Palm Beach county. Florida Republicans also challenged state Democrats in 2018 in a vote-by-mail investigation, but the state found there was no fraud. Florida also tossed out thousands of mail-in ballots for supposedly having signatures that did not match original registration forms.Meanwhile, Democrats and some Republicans have called on states to ease vote-by-mail restrictions amid the pandemic. Tuesday's primary election showed people waiting in line for hours in cities such as Washington DC, some of whom had not received absentee ballots in time.If this happens in November, election officials fear the public could be at risk for contracting Covid-19, as some did in Florida and Wisconsin during elections earlier this year.
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| Your coronavirus need-to-know: Philly mayor tells residents to stop flushing face masks; Fauci talks schools reopening Posted: 04 Jun 2020 08:36 AM PDT  We are bringing you the top headlines on COVID-19 from the US and around the world.
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| Auschwitz Museum and Memorial appeals for emergency funding Posted: 04 Jun 2020 07:06 AM PDT  The Auschwitz Museum and Memorial in Poland has launched an emergency appeal for funding, saying it faces an "unprecedented situation" owing to the effects of the pandemic lockdown. The museum cares for, and runs educational programmes on, Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Nazi camp that claimed the lives of over a million people during its time as the epicentre of the Holocaust. But it has seen visitor numbers reduced to close to zero after it shut its doors on March 12 as much of Poland locked down to control the pandemic, depriving it of its primary source of funding. Last year 2,320,000 people visited the camp. "Over the last few months, we have found ourselves in an unprecedented situation," the museum said in a statement. "The budget planned for 2020 has collapsed. Nearly all substantive operations of the Museum have been limited. We have also reduced all investments to the necessary minimum.
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| New York's Cuomo, concerned about COVID-19 spread, asks protesters to get tested Posted: 04 Jun 2020 10:53 AM PDT  New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on Thursday said several days and nights of demonstrations in the state after the killing of George Floyd could accelerate the spread of the coronavirus, and urged protesters to get tested. "I'm not a nervous Nellie, I'm just looking at the numbers," said Cuomo, noting that an estimated 30,000 people have protested in the state. Officials in Chicago this week expressed similar concern, and asked protesters to quarantine themselves for 14 days.
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