| People of color account for majority of coronavirus infections, new CDC study says Posted: 16 Jun 2020 02:48 PM PDT  African-Americans and Latinos are vastly overrepresented when it comes to coronavirus infections, according to an analysis released by the Centers for Disease Control on Monday morning.
|
| What happened when Black Lives Matter came to a notorious KKK town in Texas Posted: 17 Jun 2020 04:33 PM PDT  The town of Vidor, in east Texas, has a reputation. It's the kind of reputation that causes its residents to pause when someone asks where they're from.For years it was known as a sundown town — a place where non-whites were threatened with violence if they stayed after dark, and where they were barred from living through intimidation and discriminatory practices. It has a long history of Ku Klux Klan activity, and was once described by a local magazine as "the most hate-filled town in Texas."
|
| Six ways to make sure Joe Biden wins and Donald Trump loses in the November election Posted: 18 Jun 2020 02:00 AM PDT  There has never been a period as chaotic as this one. The pressure on our political system is enormous, but we can end this Trumpian nightmare.
|
| A 'higher than usual' number of Atlanta police officers call out after former colleague charged with murder over the killing of Rayshard Brooks Posted: 17 Jun 2020 07:43 PM PDT  The Atlanta Police Department said it was experiencing a "higher than usual" number of call outs Wednesday night.
|
| Turkey plans more military bases in north Iraq after offensive: official Posted: 18 Jun 2020 12:41 AM PDT  Turkey plans to set up more temporary military bases in northern Iraq after stepping up its strikes against Kurdish militants there, a senior Turkish official told Reuters, saying the effort would ensure border security. Ankara launched two separate operations in northern Iraq against the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) on Sunday and Tuesday, in response to what it said was an increase in militant attacks on Turkish army bases along the border between the countries.
|
| Fists, stones and clubs: China and India's brutal high altitude, low-tech battle Posted: 17 Jun 2020 07:35 AM PDT  India and China's militaries have some of the world's most sophisticated modern weaponry, but their deadliest scrap in over 50 years was fought using fists, rocks wrapped in barbed wire and clubs studded with nails. Colonel Babu was seriously injured.
|
| The US wants to kill part of an 8,000 mile-long undersea cable linking Hong Kong with LA over China spying fears Posted: 18 Jun 2020 02:17 AM PDT  A DOJ committee is worried a cable connecting the US with Hong Kong could be vulnerable to hacking by the Chinese government.
|
| FAA explains why it's taking so long to fix the grounded Boeing 737 jetliner Posted: 17 Jun 2020 01:26 PM PDT  It's been over a year since the jet that figured in two crashes was last flown. On Wednesday, FAA chief Stephen Dickson gave the Senate an update.
|
| Jean Kennedy Smith, last surviving sibling of President Kennedy, dies at 92 Posted: 18 Jun 2020 07:40 AM PDT  As U.S. ambassador to Ireland, Jean Kennedy Smith played a role in the Northern Ireland peace process.
|
| The emerging face of COVID: Younger patients, more cases, but fewer deaths Posted: 18 Jun 2020 08:52 AM PDT  Case counts are climbing in more than 20 states. But so far COVID-19 death counts have not been climbing along with them. Is that because patients are starting to skew younger?
|
| Sex offender shoves 92-year-old woman to ground in New York Posted: 17 Jun 2020 03:51 AM PDT  A convicted New York sex offender has been arrested after shoving a 92-year-old woman to the ground.In a New York Police Department (NYPD) video uploaded on Monday night, the Manhattan woman can be seen walking down Third Avenue before she is shoved, and knocks her head.
|
| 'Scurrilous arguments': Michael Flynn's lawyer tells judge he must dismiss criminal case Posted: 17 Jun 2020 10:50 AM PDT  Trump's former national security adviser is the victim of "assassination by political prosecution," the attorney said.
|
| 23 Affordable Indoor Planters We Love Posted: 17 Jun 2020 11:27 AM PDT |
| Atlanta police department morale "is down ten-fold," mayor says Posted: 18 Jun 2020 04:31 AM PDT  Eight officers have resigned from the Atlanta Police Department this month.
|
| Zimbabwe hikes government salaries 50% as nurses picket for pay in dollars Posted: 17 Jun 2020 11:18 AM PDT |
| Iran navy test-fires new cruise missiles Posted: 18 Jun 2020 03:19 AM PDT  Iran test-fired a "new generation" of cruise missiles Thursday, the navy said, in the first such military exercises since 19 sailors were killed last month in a friendly fire incident. The armed forces' website published pictures of the drill in the Gulf of Oman showing missiles being fired from a warship and the back of a truck, and a vessel exploding out at sea. A video released by state television on its website said some of the missiles were based on "older platforms that have been updated".
|
| China shuts schools and cancels flights as Beijing reports an 'extremely grave' surge in new coronavirus cases Posted: 18 Jun 2020 03:32 AM PDT  Beijing had reported no locally transmitted cases for 57 consecutive days until a flurry of cases emerged last week,
|
| Modi responds after Chinese troop incident kills 20 Posted: 17 Jun 2020 05:34 AM PDT 
According to Indian officials no shots were fired, but soldiers were hit with clubs and stones during a brawl that erupted between the two sides in the remote Galwan Valley, high in the mountains where India's Ladakh region borders China's Aksai Chin to the east. Modi said Indian soldiers died fighting during the hand-to-hand battle. India's foreign ministry said there had been casualties on both sides, but China has not disclosed any casualties so far. Modi has also called for an all-party meeting on Friday (June 19) to discuss the situation after the confrontation between the nuclear-armed neighbors.
|
| 'He was trying to breathe': Mom of Oklahoma man who died in cop custody finds new footage hard to watch Posted: 17 Jun 2020 11:34 AM PDT  Derrick Elliott Olie Scott died in police custody in May, 2019. Scott's mother wants charges to be brought against officers.
|
| ‘Something’s wrong with Donald Trump’: New ad from Republican group that drove president into a fury questions his health Posted: 17 Jun 2020 05:47 AM PDT  Days after he was shown struggling to descend a gentle ramp at the West Point graduation ceremony, Donald Trump has been hit with a new attack ad drawing attention to what it says is evidence of his poor and declining health.The 45-second video comes from the Lincoln Project, a group formed by longtime Republican campaign strategists who view the president's re-election as a risk to the future of the US.
|
| Summer is bringing a new wave of coronavirus hotspots. See how the map is changing. Posted: 17 Jun 2020 12:55 PM PDT  NBC News is following COVID-19 case numbers states and territories in the U.S. This data will be updated daily.
|
| Chinese fighter jets buzz Taiwan again, stoking tensions Posted: 18 Jun 2020 12:07 AM PDT  Chinese air force aircraft approached Taiwan on Thursday for the fifth time in 10 days, before being warned away by Taiwanese fighters, the island's air force said, in a further ratcheting up of tensions across the sensitive Taiwan Strait. The Chinese J-10 and J-11 fighter aircraft flew into the southwestern part of Taiwan's air defence identification zone in the morning, Taiwan's air force said in a statement. Taiwanese fighters, which regularly patrol the air space around the Chinese-claimed island, warned the Chinese aircraft over the radio, whereupon they left Taiwan's air defence zone, it added, without giving further details.
|
| Hundreds of Chinese troops reportedly hunted down dozens of Indian soldiers and beat them with batons wrapped in barbed wire Posted: 17 Jun 2020 10:44 AM PDT  The deadly fight on Monday evening reportedly took place on a narrow ridge, in the dark, roughly 14,000 feet above sea level.
|
| Cops’ Most Deranged Lies and Bizarre Claims About the Protests Posted: 18 Jun 2020 01:03 AM PDT  Protesters are not filling ice cream containers with concrete. Shake Shack employees are not putting bleach in milkshakes. And buses full of anti-fascists are not about to descend on a small town near you.That's just what police are saying.As protests over racial justice and police brutality unfold across the country, police departments are taking to social media to tell their side of the story. The trouble is, they're frequently wrong—and sometimes so wildly so that it begs the question of why they even bother.Christopher Slobogin, director of Vanderbilt University's criminal justice program, said cops can be mistaken, just like everyone. But sometimes police lie because they view themselves as in opposition to criminals, who also lie."It's possible that police concoct lies because even though they know what they're saying isn't true, they believe the lie is in service of a greater good," Slobogin told The Daily Beast. "If cops are convinced that, overall, they're in the right, what's a little lying here and there? I think that's human nature, not just cops. But the problem, the cops have the power, they have the weapons, and people in authority tend to believe them."New York Cops Beat Protesters for Crime of Being ThereWhat follows is a smattering of the most impactful, egregious, or just plain weird fibs, panicky projections, falsehoods, or exaggerations about protests to come from cops, their spokespeople, and their unions in recent weeks. Dairy DisinfoThe New York City Police Benevolent Association, which represents city police officers, claimed this week that workers at Shake Shack had put a bleach-like substance in officers' milkshakes. The PBA—which joined a similar claim made by the Detectives' Endowment Association—cited no evidence, aside from officers' apparent gastrointestinal distress after they purchased Shake Shack's notoriously heavy drinks while on the job. An official NYPD investigation quickly cleared Shake Shack workers of wrongdoing. No Concrete ProofNew York City police also claimed internally this month that protesters were filling ice cream containers with concrete—presumably to throw at cops as projectile weapons—and leaving them at a construction site. Twitter users quickly noted that, not only was the concrete in coffee cups instead of ice cream containers, but that mixing concrete samples in coffee cups is standard practice for construction workers. The cups were even labeled with workers' notes on the concrete composition. The construction site where the cups were apparently recovered even had a permit for concrete work. Phantom Brick PilesIn Brooklyn, NYPD hyped up a rumor about protesters gathering brick piles to throw during protests. "This is what our cops are up against," NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea tweeted, parroting the rumor, which has also been promoted by President Donald Trump. "Organized looters, strategically placing caches of bricks & rocks at locations throughout NYC." Reporting by The Daily Beast and other outlets cast doubt on those claims, pointing out that they were near a construction site, and nowhere near protests. Time TravelOn Monday, New York City's Sergeants Benevolent Association (another police union) tweeted a video of protesters running through a Brooklyn street and throwing things at a cop car. "This was tonight," the SBA tweeted, "Flatbush Ave Brooklyn." The tweet also implied that a program that discourages unnecessary arrests was responsible for the chaos. In fact, there was no chaos that night in Brooklyn. The video was from May, and that area of Flatbush Avenue had long been calm, reporters covering the protests noted. Murder BusIn Columbus, Ohio, police tweeted evidence of what they said was a clear violent scheme: a bus full of rocks, clubs, and a meat cleaver. "There was a suspicion of supplying riot equipment to rioters," Columbus Police tweeted. "Charges pending." In fact, Columbus Alive reported, police had stumbled across a colorfully painted circus bus. The frightened circus troupe told the outlet that the "clubs" were juggling clubs, the rocks were crystals, and the meat cleaver was pulled from the troupe's cooking utensils. "Yeah, there's a hatchet on the bus—with a bunch of wood sitting next to a wood-burning stove," the bus's owner said, noting that the vehicle was literally his house. Technically Tear GasU.S. Park Police offered an oft-changing explanation for firing irritants at protesters in Washington D.C.'s Lafayette Park in order to clear it for a Trump photoshoot in early June. Police initially denied using "tear gas" in a statement, then walked that back, claiming that, technically, the projectiles were "smoke canisters and pepper balls." Nevertheless, reporters for D.C.'s WUSA9 recovered tear gas casings from the scene—and as Vox noted, "tear gas" can be a broad term, sometimes referring to the pepper projectiles Park Police admitted to using. Attorney General William Barr also falsely claimed that pepper spray "is not a chemical irritant. It's not chemical." The Washington Post's fact-checking department awarded the claim "four Pinnochios," which is the maximum number of Pinnochios. A Bad TripPolice in Buffalo, New York, became the focus of national ire after they were filmed pushing a 75-year-old man to the ground, causing him to lose consciousness and bleed from the head. But before the video went viral, Buffalo Police offered a different characterization of the incident. "During [a] skirmish involving protestors, one person was injured when he tripped & fell," police said in a statement. The video would later reveal that the man was alone when he calmly approached officers. He has a fractured skull and is still unable to walk, his lawyer said this week. Small Biz ShakedownAfter protesters took over a six-block area in Seattle, the city's police claimed—without evidence—that the activists were extorting businesses in the area. Police appeared to walk back that claim several days later, after the local business association and prominent businesses in the area said they'd seen no indication of the alleged protection racket. Some businesses even said they were volunteering with the protests. The Antifa ExpressMultiple police departments have promoted a hoax about anti-fascists coming to their towns by the busload to wreak havoc. In Oregon, Curry County Sheriff John Ward shared a Facebook post warning that "3 buss loads of ANTIFA protestors are making their way from Douglas County headed for Coquille then to Coos Bay." Hundreds of locals reportedly stood outside with guns overnight awaiting the menace that never came.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.
|
| Nine People Shot in Minneapolis as Post-Riot Unrest Continues Posted: 17 Jun 2020 04:35 PM PDT  Nine people were shot in Minneapolis on Tuesday evening amid a spate of violence following the death of George Floyd, the Star Tribune reported.Shootings have risen sharply in the city over three weeks of unrest after Floyd, an African American man, was killed by Minneapolis police officers. Since May 26, 66 people have been shot in the city, comprising 45 percent of all shooting victims in Minneapolis for this year.The Tuesday shootings follow an incident on Sunday in which seven people were shot during a bar fight. One of the victims of the bar shooting has since died. No arrests have been made in any of the recent shootings.It does not appear that the shootings are connected to protests over Floyd's death. Those protests turned violent in some instances, with rioters setting fire to Minneapolis's third police precinct building as well as numerous businesses.The Minneapolis City Council has estimated that damages to buildings from the riots amount to at least $55 million. However, the council warned that the damages could be much higher, and Mayor Jacob Frey has said damages could reach "hundreds of millions of dollars."Floyd's death has driven calls by Black Lives Matter activists to defund police departments. Representative Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.), whose district encompasses Minneapolis, has supported calls to defund the Minneapolis police, calling the department "beyond repair." Mayor Frey has resisted the push to dismantle the city's police department, although the Minneapolis City Council has signed a pledge to dismantle the department.
|
| Garrett Rolfe, the officer charged with killing Rayshard Brooks, was accused of covering up a police shooting of a Black man in 2015 Posted: 18 Jun 2020 02:38 AM PDT  Former Atlanta police officer Garrett Rolfe faces 11 charges in connection to the June 12 fatal shooting of Rayshard Brooks.
|
| 'Career criminal' arrested over 100 times accused of attacking 92-year-old woman Posted: 17 Jun 2020 07:57 PM PDT  Raymond Arroyo breaks down this week's Seen and Unseen on 'The Ingraham Angle.'
|
| Five reasons an arsenal plane isn’t the best choice for rebalancing America’s long-range strike forces Posted: 18 Jun 2020 04:57 AM PDT  There are two basic approaches to conducting long-range strikes. Today's force does not have the right balance.
|
| Cuomo: U.S. government making "historic mistake" on virus advice Posted: 17 Jun 2020 10:41 AM PDT  He announced Tuesday the U.S. Open will be held in New York City this summer, without fans.
|
| New Zealand tightens gun laws further in response to mass shooting Posted: 17 Jun 2020 11:27 PM PDT |
| Galwan Valley: Image appears to show nail-studded rods used in India-China brawl Posted: 18 Jun 2020 07:32 AM PDT  A picture shared widely on social media in India purportedly shows nail-studded rods used by Chinese.
|
| Assad's British wife and 38 others hit by US sanctions as Trump tries to squeeze regime Posted: 17 Jun 2020 09:12 AM PDT  Syrian president Bashar al-Assad's British wife and dozens of members of his inner circle were on Wednesday hit with US sanctions, as the Trump administration heaped pressure on the beleaguered regime. Asma al-Assad, who was born and grew up in the UK, was designated for the first time by the US government, which described her as "one of Syria's most notorious war profiteers." The sanctions came into force on Wednesday under the Caesar Act - legislation which has been years in the making and named after a Syrian defector who documented horrific human rights abuses carried out by the regime. The first batch of designations target 39 people or entities with ties to the government, including Assad's sister Bushra, brother and military commander Maher, as well as other members of the extended family, senior military leaders and business executives. Many of them were already subject to US sanctions, but the new penalties also target non-Syrians who do business with them in an attempt to discourage foreign investment in the country. Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State, said the designations represent "the beginning of what will be a sustained campaign of economic and political pressure to deny the Assad regime revenue and support it uses to wage war and commit mass atrocities against the Syrian people."
|
| Melissa Zarda Fought for Her Gay Brother at the Supreme Court—and Won a Landmark LGBTQ Rights Victory Posted: 16 Jun 2020 02:14 PM PDT  On Tuesday, Melissa Zarda was dealing with two things at home in Kansas City, Missouri: the loud barking and mischief of her new foster puppy Winnie, a cattle dog/pitbull mix, while—above the din—relishing the hard-fought, historic victory she had just won in the Supreme Court in the memory of her beloved, deceased brother Donald.His was one of three cases featuring LGBTQ people fired for their sexual orientation or gender identity that SCOTUS yesterday ruled, 6-3, were illegal under the sex discrimination provisions of Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The ruling—embracing the cases of gay men Zarda and Gerald Bostock and trans woman Aimee Stephens—has been hailed as one of the most significant in recent years, setting the protection of LGBTQ people from workplace discrimination in legal precedent.The Supreme Court's Historic LGBTQ Ruling Is Now a Valuable Legal Weapon Against BigotryMelissa took on the case after Donald died in a base jumping accident in Switzerland in October 2014."Don would be extremely happy and overjoyed by the decision," Melissa told The Daily Beast. "I can see his face right now, I can see it so well, it's like he is almost here. His face is absolutely beaming, and he had a smile bigger than any room anyway. He could light up a room. It's been an amazing journey. I'm so glad he stood up. I'm so glad that Gerald stood up. I'm so glad that Aimee stood up. I'm just so pleased we're here, talking about this right now.""On a grander scale this case wasn't just about Don," Melissa said. "Don knew that too. I know this will impact millions of people for the good. To have Don's memory and legacy on the right side of history like that is incredible."Leading up to the publication of Monday's decision, "I was nervous and scared," Melissa said. "When you get used to all this bad news, you think, 'OK, another one is coming,' Maybe, when the decision was announced, it made me that much happier because I couldn't quite believe it." Her husband, Matt Cathlina, had been more optimistic, reminding Melissa of how positive she had left the Supreme Court the day the case was heard last October. "Our team did so good, they were so skilled," Melissa said. "I knew we definitely had a chance.""I woke up knowing it could be that Monday, but didn't have any idea. I was refreshing the Supreme Court website over and over and not seeing anything. I was getting nervous." Melissa went for a walk, came back, refreshed it more, and the site crashed, "meaning something big had probably happened."Melissa wrote to the ACLU legal team, who wrote back that she, Don, the LGBTQ campaigners, had won."I was overjoyed, my heart was racing, pounding," Melissa said. "I think I was smiling and crying at the same time. I was doing 10 things at once: texting, crying, smiling, and laughing—it was like a shot of adrenalin. What's happening with the country is so tragic and awful, we needed this shot of good news desperately right now."She shared the news with Bill Moore, Don's surviving partner, who teamed up with Melissa in leading the case, with legal backing from the ACLU alongside lawyer Greg Antollino and Pam Karlan of the Stanford Law School Supreme Court Litigation Clinic. Melissa also messaged her and Don's mother Shirley, sister Kim, Matt, and their extended group of family and supporters. "It's amazing, there are no words for how happy we are with this decision," Melissa, a graphic designer, said. "So many LGBTQ friends and family members are so relieved that they will be safe from discrimination in the workplace, especially now when the economy isn't well and unemployment is so high."Shirley, Melissa and Don's mom, didn't understand "what a huge scale this was" until she saw the many articles about the case and TV news segments. "She is beyond excited," said Melissa. "She is telling everyone she can. She is a proud mom. She was always an advocate for Don. This was so important to her. It has also brought up a lot of memories and emotion for her. She still struggles with Don's death and his not being here.""We have this euphoric happiness, but also a bittersweet sadness that he is not here to enjoy it with us. It's hard, but also good news at a time when we need good news."When it came to the ruling, Melissa was "pleased it was 6-3 and not closer. I was pleased that Gorsuch wrote the decision, and that he understood. I disagreed with Alito, saying this was legislating. For me, it couldn't be clearer that this was the right interpretation of Title VII. It seemed as plain as day."* * *As The Daily Beast previously reported, Donald Zarda was fired in 2010 from his job as a skydiver with Long Island company Altitude Express after coming out to a customer. The trial court found that Title VII did not cover sexual orientation. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit reversed that holding, claiming that sexual orientation discrimination was a subset of sex discrimination. Like the funeral firm that employed Aimee Stephens, Altitude Express took the case to the Supreme Court—and lost. An "incredibly smart" young boy, Donald was always intrigued by airplanes and air travel, Melissa told The Daily Beast last year. Both his mother and father had pilot licenses. As an adult he spent a lot of time skydiving with friends and others who shared his passion. Melissa is scared of heights, and "a huge regret" was that she never jumped with her brother. He was warm, generous, and loving as a brother, and loved sharing his professional passion with others.Donald's family was immediately supportive after he came out. "It was almost not an event," said Melissa. He did so in his mid-20s. "I don't think he was delaying telling us for any other reason than he was busy traveling the world and skydiving. He was not around that much."He went back to school to get a degree in aviation-related management and administration. "Anything that involved being in the air was all he cared about."His death had been devastating. "Even years later the emotion tied up with it is still that intense," Melissa said last year. "He kept our family together. We're still tight, but he was such a force. It has been a devastating loss, unbelievably hard."Donald felt strongly that he was a victim of homophobia. "He absolutely was a fighter," Melissa said. "He could not stand anything unfair. He felt he had been discriminated against, and was immediately prepared to fight. He knew it was wrong, and he was going after it. He wanted to stand up, in case it happened to anyone else.""Don was devastated when he was fired," Melissa told The Daily Beast after the SCOTUS decision. "His job and career and skydiving meant the world to him. He was afraid of what would happen after has fired. It was hard to get work elsewhere, and he worried he would be looked at as a troublemaker.""He was confused and upset. He would call us, and we would console him and do our best to be there for him and support him. I would say this weighed very heavily on him in the last years of his life. Skydiving had been everything to him, and then this case became everything to him."* * *In the wake of their Supreme Court victory, Melissa does not know yet if the family will pursue the case directly with Altitude Express. "We've barely had a chance to get any sleep. It's good to bask in this victory and how wonderful it is, but if we wanted to focus our energy on what comes next there is so much work that needs to be done in getting the Equality Act passed. It's sitting in Congress, when people are still being discriminated against in housing, education, health care, and credit. There is still a lot of work to do."Donald would not have expected the case to go this far, Melissa said. "He would have been very surprised, but happy everything turned out the way it did."Melissa said she was "ashamed" that before her brother's experience she was "totally ignorant of the scale of discrimination out there. I couldn't relate. When Don first called about what had had happened, I said, 'Well, that's illegal, duh.' I had no idea. I said, 'We know that's illegal. You need to do something about that.'"Like many people, Melissa thought that surely anti-LGBTQ discrimination was already outlawed. The Supreme Court case highlighted how far the law has fallen behind social and cultural evolution. The stories sent to her by LGBTQ people who had been fired for their sexual orientation and gender identity "opened" Melissa's eyes further, she said. "I am so grateful for that," Melissa said. "I can't pretend to know what they have been through. But I want to listen and be there for them and do what I can to help them. The case has definitely made me see outside of my bubble a little bit. It's been a good perspective shift, and really heartwarming to get support from so many strangers."Melissa noted that the vast majority of Americans believe that LGBTQ people should be protected from discrimination, as revealed in a CBS News poll, "so the Supreme Court decision was a long time coming and overdue."Melissa plans to work on helping make the Equality Act law, as well as volunteering for other causes such as Black Lives Matter and animal rescue."Too many people out there suffer discrimination," Melissa said. "This is America, 2020. Nobody should be discriminated against."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.
|
| Meet The USS Wasp: America's 'Leftover' Carrier That Was A Total Disaster Posted: 17 Jun 2020 07:00 PM PDT  Wasp was not a terrible aircraft carrier, but she had enough shortcomings to succumb to battle damage in September 1942
|
| Atlanta Police Walk Out over Murder Charge as Mayor Admits Morale is ‘Down Tenfold’ Posted: 18 Jun 2020 05:56 AM PDT  A number of Atlanta police officers did not show up for their Wednesday-night shifts in protest of murder charges brought against a former officer who shot and killed Rayshard Brooks after he resisted arrest.Hours after Fulton County district attorney Paul L. Howard said officer Garrett Rolfe would be charged with felony murder, Atlanta police union spokesman Vince Champion told NBC News that officers had decided to walk off the job and go silent on radios to protest the decision."This is not an organized thing, it's not a blue flu, it's not a strike, it's nothing like that. What it actually is, is officers protesting that they've had enough and they don't want to deal with it any longer," he said.In an interview with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Champion added that "there are officers saying they are not going to leave the precinct unless to help another officer. Some are walking off and sitting in their personal vehicles."The Atlanta Police Department released a statement after Champion's comments, calling claims that officers were walking off the job "inaccurate.""The department is experiencing a higher than usual number of call outs with the incoming shift," the police explained. "We have enough resources to maintain operations & remain able to respond to incidents."> Earlier suggestions that multiple officers from each zone had walked off the job were inaccurate. The department is experiencing a higher than usual number of call outs with the incoming shift. We have enough resources to maintain operations & remain able to respond to incidents.> > -- Atlanta Police Department (@Atlanta_Police) June 18, 2020But Atlanta police scanner traffic conflicted with the statement. "We are not answering 911 calls right now due to personnel issues," a police dispatcher said Wednesday.In announcing the charges against Rolfe on Wednesday, Howard said that the Atlanta Police Department's initial account of events — that Rolfe shot Brooks because he appeared ready to fire a taser that had been wrestled from one of the officers — was inaccurate."We concluded that Mr. Brooks was running away at the time that the shot was fired," the district attorney said. Howard also told reporters that the taser had already been discharged twice, rendering it unusable, and said the officers would have known that.Howard added that Rolfe's former partner Devin Brosnan, who was also at the scene where Brooks was shot, would testify against his former partner. Howard said that after Brooks was shot in the back by Rolfe while fleeing arrest, Rolfe kicked him and Brosnan stood on his shoulders."There is an Atlanta policy that requires that the officers have to provide timely medical attention to Mr. Brooks, to anyone who is injured," Howard said. "But after Mr. Brooks was shot, for a period of two minutes and 12 seconds, there was no medical attention applies to Mr. Brooks."But Brosnan's attorney Don Samuel denied Howard's account of events, saying his client had not agreed to be the state's witness and did nothing wrong."The decision to initiate charges by the Fulton County DA's office is irrational, unethical and obviously based on factors which should have nothing to do with the proper administration of justice," Samuel said in a statement.Howard, who said his office was able to bring charges after reviewing eight videos of the incident, is locked in a reelection battle and faces multiple civil sexual-harassment lawsuits and is being criminally investigated by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for funneling nonprofit funds to boost his salary.Following the announcement of charges, the GBI — which is conducting a separate investigation of the shooting — said it was "not aware of today's press conference before it was conducted" and was "not consulted on the charges filed by the District Attorney."> Despite today's occurrence, the GBI will complete its mission of completing an impartial and thorough investigation of this incident and we will submit the file, once completed, to the Fulton County District Attorney's Office. (2/2)> > Full statement ⬇️:https://t.co/Cfnboi9DCu> > -- GA Bureau of Investigation (@GBI_GA) June 17, 2020In an interview on CNN Wednesday night, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms warned that police morale "is down ten-fold.""This has been a very tough few weeks in Atlanta and with the tragedy of Mr. Brooks, and then on top of that the excessive force charges that were brought against the officers involved with the college students," Bottoms explained. "There's a lot happening in our city, and the police officers are receiving the brunt of it quite frankly."> Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms says morale in her city's police department "is down ten-fold" amid reports officers are calling in sick tonight.> > "We expect our officers will keep their commitment to our communities," she added. https://t.co/yHd6ZAY3vs pic.twitter.com/XsrvktkItX> > -- Cuomo Prime Time (@CuomoPrimeTime) June 18, 2020
|
| Violent counter-protesters mobbed a small-town BLM demonstration in Ohio amid false rumors of antifa Posted: 16 Jun 2020 12:32 PM PDT  A small demonstration against racism in Bethel, Ohio, turned violent when hundreds counter-protesters arrived after learning of the event online.
|
| US fighters have rushed to intercept 8 Russian bombers approaching Alaska in the past week Posted: 17 Jun 2020 09:37 AM PDT  Russian military aircraft have penetrated NORAD air defense identification zones eight times this year, the commander said.
|
| In Bid to Beat Russia and China, US Military Unveils New Space Strategy Posted: 17 Jun 2020 01:53 PM PDT  The DoD unveiled its Defense Space Strategy designed to "serve as the roadmap to advance our nation's military space power."
|
| AccuWeather's 2020 US summer forecast Posted: 16 Jun 2020 05:00 PM PDT  What will the weather be like this summer? Find out in AccuWeather's 2020 summer forecast.
|
| Trump says U.S. will not lock down again amid rising coronavirus cases Posted: 17 Jun 2020 07:18 PM PDT |
| Top Democrats Are Trying to Stop This Man From Becoming the Next Ocasio-Cortez Posted: 17 Jun 2020 11:52 AM PDT  Two years ago, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, then a young, untested democratic socialist, pulled off a shocking upset by defeating the No. 4 House Democrat, Rep. Joseph Crowley. The primary result was a visceral warning to Democratic leadership that it had better quickly reckon with the push for progressive change, and not underestimate the candidates behind it.The Democratic establishment has apparently heeded that lesson.As the June 23 primary nears in New York, another long-tenured Democrat, Eliot L. Engel, is being threatened by a young progressive challenger, Jamaal Bowman. The race has become a focal point for the party's directional battle, with money and marquee endorsements flying around in recent days.The latest big-name endorsements came in a span of 16 hours: On Monday afternoon, Hillary Clinton, making her first endorsement of any Democratic incumbent facing a primary in 2020, backed Engel; the following morning, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts endorsed Bowman.Engel, 73, seems to be the party's most vulnerable incumbent in the nation at the moment, a potential victim of its emboldened left wing, which has grown impatient with the establishment politics that Engel seems to represent.Engel, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, is a Democratic stalwart, a faithful practitioner of old-school Washington politics, rising in committee ranks and bringing home perks for his diverse and overwhelmingly Democratic district at New York City's northern border.Mustachioed and bespectacled, Engel's most famous trait may be his punctuality: He prides himself on arriving early to each and every State of the Union, to secure a seat to shake the president's hand -- a tradition that he has halted in opposition to President Donald Trump. But in a political landscape upended by the coronavirus and the national reckoning on race and policing, Engel's press-the-flesh approach is at risk of seeming like an anachronism.Bowman, 44, has the support of Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Ocasio-Cortez, the generational tent poles of progressive Democrats, as well as liberal groups like the Working Families Party and political action committees like the Justice Democrats, which jointly pledged to spend more than $500,000 to oust Engel.Warren, the former presidential candidate and possible vice-presidential contender, said on Tuesday that Bowman was "exactly the kind of person we need in Congress fighting for big, structural change."Engel has widespread support from senior House Democrats, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi; James E. Clyburn, the House majority whip; and Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democratic Caucus chairman. On Wednesday, he was endorsed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York.But Engel has not exactly helped his cause. In early June, at a news conference in the Bronx devoted to Black Lives Matter, he was caught on microphone suggesting that he was only there because of his contested race. "If I didn't have a primary," he said, "I wouldn't care."Even party veterans cringed. "This is like hanging a sign from your neck saying, 'I've been in office too long,' " tweeted David Axelrod, the Democratic strategist.Asked about the comment, Engel did not address it directly but said that he had "wanted people to know how I feel because I feel so strongly about what happened" in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd by the police in Minneapolis."In looking back, I see now that two weeks later that my words have detracted from the protests because they've been taken out of context," he said. "And I want to use my voice to refocus on the fact black lives matter. And they do."Both Engel and Bowman have embraced many of the positions championed by Ocasio-Cortez, who represents a neighboring district in the Bronx and Queens, including the Green New Deal and Medicare for All.Engel's campaign website also cites support for increased funding of public education, $100 billion in new housing, and comprehensive immigration reform. But his opponents have zeroed in on several hawkish positions he took, including rejecting the Iran nuclear deal in 2015 and supporting the invasion of Iraq more than a decade before."You know, I'm pretty progressive myself," Engel said in an interview last week from his home in the Bronx. "I have a progressive record down the line for many years in Congress and I'm proud of my record."Despite the recent successes of some progressive insurgents, it is still extraordinarily difficult to unseat a congressional incumbent in a primary; this year, only two have fallen, each under unusual circumstances.In Illinois, Rep. Dan Lipinski, a conservative Democrat who had broken with his party on abortion rights and health care, lost to Marie Newman in a rematch in March; in Iowa, Rep. Steve King, a Republican with a history of racist remarks, lost to Randy Feenstra, a state senator.Bowman is hoping that a different sort of circumstances may catapult him to victory.The coronavirus outbreak and civil unrest after Floyd's killing complicated the campaign for both candidates, forcing the cancellation of in-person events and fundraisers. But they also gave Bowman, who is African-American, a conducive environment to stress the need for change in arenas like criminal justice and health care.Bowman was recruited by Justice Democrats after education activists in New York suggested he could be a potent candidate with a compelling life story: a childhood in public housing in New York City, followed by years as an educator, culminating with the founding of a middle school in the Bronx, the Cornerstone Academy for Social Action, where he was the founding principal.Bowman began this campaign last June, with several other challengers, including a lawyer, Chris Fink; Sammy Ravelo, a retired police lieutenant; and Andom Ghebreghiorgis, who dropped out earlier this month and endorsed Bowman, solidifying his support among progressives."We've anchored our race in fighting for racial and economic justice from the very beginning," Bowman said in an interview. "And what COVID and now these protests are revealing is, to the rest of the country, is how broken our system is."The dueling crises also provided Bowman with a powerful talking point accusing Engel of not spending enough time in the district, which includes the northern Bronx and portions of southern Westchester County, a mix of well-to-do neighborhoods like Riverdale and poorer areas.Bowman has repeatedly attacked Engel's staying at a home he owns in Maryland during long stretches of the coronavirus virus outbreak, as well as for much of his time in Washington."He doesn't live in our community," Bowman said in one online testimonial. "I live in our struggles."This argument seems to befuddle Engel, who said he bought the Maryland home after he was first elected in 1988 and had two small children at the time."I work in Washington and he's going to deny me a place to sleep?" Engel said, adding, "You can't stay on the, sleep on the, streets."As the race has intensified, Engel has also fought back, pointing out that election records show that Bowman did not vote in 2012, even as Barack Obama -- still the lodestar of many Democratic voters -- sought a second term. Bowman insists that he remembers voting in Manhattan that year, saying "there must be a problem with the records.""Do you think I wouldn't vote for the first black president?" he said.Engel also highlighted how Bowman only registered as a Democrat in 2018; he was previously registered in the Independence Party. "So he's not really a Democrat," Engel said.Voters in the district have been inundated with mailers and phone calls on behalf of both candidates, who have already spent a combined $2 million on the race, and will likely spend more in the closing days. As of June 3, Engel still had more than $800,000 in hand, compared with Bowman's $345,000.In Hastings-on-Hudson in Westchester, Jim Cullen, 57, a self-described moderate Democrat, said he would vote for the incumbent, though he knew his wife and son would vote for Bowman, saying it was good to "preserve the institutional integrity of the Democratic Party at a time when it's under tremendous pressure."But Olivia Lovejoy, 40, said she was ready to embrace Bowman's message."I'm thinking we need change," said Lovejoy, a customer service representative, adding that Bowman's candidacy gave her cause for optimism. "I feel hopeful."For his part, Engel seemed well aware of the tentative nature of his political perch."I never forget for even one moment that this is the people's seat," he said. "And not my seat."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company
|
| Concrete barriers installed around Lee statue in Virginia Posted: 16 Jun 2020 11:45 PM PDT  Concrete barriers were installed Wednesday morning around the statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee that has been ordered to be removed from a prominent avenue in Virginia's capital city, hours after demonstrators tore down a different Confederate monument. Crews in Richmond began installing what appeared to be about 3-foot-tall (1-meter-tall) cement blocks along the sidewalk surrounding the statue on Monument Avenue, according to video obtained by news outlets. Gov. Ralph Northam announced earlier this month that the statue would be removed and placed in storage while its future was determined.
|
| Carlos Lehder: Pablo Escobar's crime partner freed from US jail Posted: 17 Jun 2020 04:07 AM PDT  Carlos Lehder, who co-founded the Medellín cartel and was captured in 1987, will live in Germany.
|
| The Atlanta police officer who shot Rayshard Brooks was reprimanded for using a firearm in 2017 Posted: 16 Jun 2020 10:23 AM PDT  Ex-officer Garrett Rolfe had been with Atlanta police for nearly seven years. He faced 12 investigations and was exonerated in nine of them.
|
| California is Right to Reopen—The Coronavirus Stats and Science Support It Posted: 16 Jun 2020 04:00 PM PDT  These infection fatality rates are remarkably low and are similar to the fatality rate for the seasonal flu.
|
| The U.S. Is Catching Up With China in AI Adoption, Kai-Fu Lee Says Posted: 17 Jun 2020 02:28 AM PDT  Lee—the chairman and CEO of Sinovation Ventures—spoke at a TIME100 Talks focusing on the Asia-Pacific region
|
No comments:
Post a Comment