| Trump goes mostly dark in TV advertising fight with Biden Posted: 31 Aug 2020 05:39 PM PDT  President Donald Trump has pulled most of his advertising from TV over the past week, ceding the airwaves to Democratic rival Joe Biden, who is currently outspending him by more than 10-to-1, advertising data shows. The move comes as Trump's campaign has burned through money almost as fast as it has taken it in. During the month of August, Biden doubled what Trump spent, dropping about $80 million in states that included key battlegrounds such as Wisconsin, Florida, Pennsylvania and Michigan, according to data from the ad tracking firm Kantar/CMAG.
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| The New Uighurs? Mongolians Protest as China Moves to Erase Local Culture Posted: 01 Sep 2020 02:02 AM PDT  HONG KONG—Students, teachers, parents, and others are staging protests in Inner Mongolia, a semi-autonomous region in northern China, by surrounding police stations and gathering outside schools. Thousands are congregating in rare displays of open defiance of governmental orders.These demonstrations were sparked by the Chinese government's directive issued in the summer to broaden the footprint of Mandarin Chinese in state-compiled textbooks and classroom instruction within the region, displacing the Mongolian language in academic environments and daily usage.From Sept. 1 onward, the authorities will shift public elementary and middle schools' language of instruction to Chinese, specifically for three courses—language and literature, history, as well as morality and law (which includes political and ideological indoctrination). The change will be rolled out in phases, eventually keeping just mathematics and art classes in the region's dominant native tongue.On anonymous parent said teaching everything in a second language would make it more difficult for children to learn in school. "As Mongolians—myself and other parents—we are not willing to watch our mother tongue be gradually replaced by another language. Sure, we study Chinese, from a young age so that's not an issue," they told the Voice of America Mandarin service.Ethnic Mongolians who reside in China see this as a step to erase an important part of their culture. Some see it as forced homogeneity directed at their youngsters, much like what is happening in Tibet and Xinjiang, where the Chinese government has strict rules that limit the public displays and practices related to each region's cultural identity. It's all part of the Chinese central government's objective to impose cultural and linguistic homogeneity on one of the world's largest and most diverse nations. As new policies are rolled out to bring this closer to fruition, the many cultures of more than one hundred million people are slowly expunged.The snapback came right before the start of the academic year. High school pupils, many wearing their school uniforms—blue and white track jackets with loose-fitting blue pants, worn by public school students all over the country—formed crowds and chanted, "Mongolian is our mother tongue! We are Mongolian until death!"The gatherings were peaceful. As of Tuesday, police officers were on site mostly to observe the protests.> ӨвөрмонголЭхХэлээХамгаалахТэмцэл > Жирэм, Хүрээ хошуунд, эцэг эхчүүд хүүхдүүдээ сургуулиас нь гаргаж авч байгаа байдал. pic.twitter.com/KM0wPVKWXQ> > — Enkhochir Khuvisgalt (@Khereid_Mongol) August 30, 2020Since the July announcement that schools in Inner Mongolia would phase out Mongolian language instruction, 4,200 petitions have circulated by ethnic Mongols in China against the policy, according to Made in China Journal, a quarterly publication that covers the socioeconomic changes in the country.In some cases, names are added to the petitions in circular formation so as not to create a hierarchy on paper, preventing the authorities from singling out one person as an organizer within the opposition. This method has historical precedence: regional resistance groups and secret societies in the 19th and 20th centuries applied this arrangement so that ringleaders could not be identified and captured.> While China forces the Chinese language onto students in Inner Mongolia, Mongolian elders write back in protest. pic.twitter.com/u7032oyBSF> > — Ungerni Khooloi (@Nicholastrad) August 31, 2020The regional education bureau of Inner Mongolia issued a statement on Monday to soothe the concerns of parents and students, saying, "The current bilingual education system has not changed." But people in the region point out that television, radio, and other forms of media are already broadcast in Mandarin Chinese, and that their own language is largely absent in massively distributed media. While families generally speak Mongolian at home, paring it back from schools will diminish the language's usage by ethnic Mongols who live in China.Language schools in five other provinces are also reducing their usage of local languages and dialects, replacing the curriculums with Mandarin Chinese instruction according to the government's new rules.Online posts about reactions to this policy, especially protests and petitions, are being censored. Videos of the demonstrations in Inner Mongolia have been scrubbed from Weibo, a domestic platform that functions like Twitter, as well as other social media sites. In late August, the only Mongolian language social network, Bainu, was taken offline by the Chinese government.The People's Republic of China propagates a myth of social harmony where the Han Chinese majority (more than 91 percent of the population) lives alongside 55 minorities. During the annual gathering of the country's rubber-stamp parliament, known as the National People's Congress, delegates from non-Han regions wear their traditional attire to stand out from the sea of black suits worn by most bureaucrats. Oftentimes, the lives and cultures of minorities are reduced to folksongs and dances, paving over the tensions caused by the Chinese authorities' demands for uniformity.This is particularly true in Xinjiang, a Muslim-majority region where up to a million Uyghurs are in "thought transformation" camps at any given moment. People who are trapped in these high-security locations spend hours each day rehearsing musical and dance programs, which are then performed for visiting journalists as "proof" that individuals are "transformed" or "reformed," and can be integrated into the Chinese fabric of society.In these camps, language instruction plays an important role too. A leaked 2017 memo that was penned by an official who was at the time in charge of the region's security included this directive: "Make remedial Mandarin studies the top priority."This type of linguistic engineering is not new in China. The Chinese Communist Party governs by uniformity, mainly addressing ideological and economic matters, not so much social and cultural factors. Part of the idea is that people can be unified—or more easily kept under control—if they speak, hear, and read a single, flattened language, one that removes cultural intricacies and distinctions, breaking connections within regional pockets to channel direct links to the party's own organs.The policy in Inner Mongolia is, on paper, meant to foster stronger economic inclusion in an impoverished area within China. But the fact is that locals see its implementation as a slight—and a continuation of Han Chinese incursion into their culture. Many feel that their traditions are being dismantled in the name of poverty reduction, and few ethnic Mongolians have benefited from mining booms in an area that is nearly twice the size of Texas. Instead, state-run enterprises have reaped most of the profits.Now, the people of Inner Mongolia wonder if even their own language may be fading away too.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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| A transgender woman died while in custody on Rikers Island after she couldn't afford $500 bail. NYC just agreed to pay her family $5.9 million. Posted: 31 Aug 2020 11:56 PM PDT  Layleen Polanco had an epileptic seizure while being held in isolation at Rikers Island in 2019. A report identified several systemic failures.
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| With peak of hurricane season almost here, forecasters watch four areas for tropical development Posted: 31 Aug 2020 10:46 AM PDT  The most active day of the hurricane season is around Sept. 10. As the season's peak nears, forecasters are watching four areas for development.
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| Navy E-2C Hawkeye Crew Found Safe After Plane Crashes in Virginia Posted: 31 Aug 2020 04:58 PM PDT  Two pilots and two crewmembers safely bailed out of a Navy E-2C Hawkeye aircraft before it crashed north of Norfolk.
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| Soldier who made ‘vile’ Holocaust joke to 3 million TikTok followers punished, Army says Posted: 31 Aug 2020 04:48 PM PDT  "He wrote: 'For legal reasons this is a joke.' ... Would he look into the eyes of Survivors liberated by @USArmy and tell them this?" the Auschwitz Memorial Museum said in a tweet.
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| The Lincoln Project spins an ad out of NBA coach Doc Rivers' lament on fear, love, race, and the RNC Posted: 30 Aug 2020 08:40 PM PDT  The NBA went on strike for a couple of days last week in response to the police shooting of yet another unarmed Black American, Jacob Blake. Los Angeles Clippers coach Doc Rivers put the shooting into a broader political context on Tuesday, and The Lincoln Project turned his comments into a political ad released Sunday. But they didn't do much, just adding some background music and images from the Republican National Convention and America in 2020 and letting Rivers do all the talking."It's just so sad, just watching the Republican convention, and they're spewing this fear," Rivers said. "Donald Trump and all of them, talking about fear. We're the ones getting killed, we're the ones getting shot. All you do is keep hearing about fear. It's amazing to me why we keep loving this country and this country does not love us back.""You don't need to be black to be outraged," Rivers said, and The Lincoln Project highlighted. "You need to be American and outraged."More stories from theweek.com Amazon gets FAA approval for its drones to deliver packages Witnesses, police, and reporters piece together what happened in the fatal Kenosha protest shootings Trump bizarrely claims people 'in the dark shadows' are secretly controlling Joe Biden
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| Letters to the Editor: Louis DeJoy can slow down delivery, but he can't stop the mail Posted: 01 Sep 2020 03:00 AM PDT  A former Postal Service worker says employees are on the job 24 hours a day moving mail around the country.
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| Sheriffs slam governor's plan to curb Portland violence Posted: 31 Aug 2020 09:32 PM PDT  A plan by the governor of Oregon to use sheriff's deputies from surrounding counties to help patrol Portland following the deadly shooting of a right-wing Trump supporter was sharply criticized by law enforcement officials who said it wouldn't end the "cycle of violence" in the city that's approaching 100 consecutive nights of often-violent Black Lives Matter protests. Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, announced the plan Sunday to temporarily use deputies from two counties, as well as Oregon State Police troopers, to help Portland police as the liberal city struggles to regain its footing in the glare of the national spotlight.
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| A grieving daughter in Wuhan is suing China, saying its early cover-up of COVID-19 killed her father. In response, the authorities intimidated her family. Posted: 01 Sep 2020 05:13 AM PDT  Zhao Lei told Sky News "I think the government covered up some facts," meaning continued life as normal, leading to her father's infection and death.
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| Black Lives Matter is just tip of iceberg. Economic gain, worker protections, voting also key Posted: 30 Aug 2020 07:05 PM PDT  'My work is about uprooting structural racism from every aspect of our society — our economy, our government and our communities.'
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| Are US cities seeing a surge in violent crime as Trump claims? Posted: 01 Sep 2020 07:54 AM PDT  President Trump sends federal agents to some US cities to tackle crime, but is there really a spike?
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| The right-wing group Patriot Prayer, associated with a man killed in the Portland protests, has a history of provoking left-wing groups: 'This was just a matter of time' Posted: 31 Aug 2020 10:31 AM PDT  An Anti-Defamation League researcher fears that Aaron Danielson's killing will spur more bloodshed between right- and left-wing groups.
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| Biden on protests: ‘These are not images of some imagined Joe Biden America in the future, these are images of Donald Trump’s America today’ Posted: 31 Aug 2020 11:44 AM PDT  Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden on Monday challenged the Republican talking point that people will not be safe in the United States with Biden as president.
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| 'This elevates it to angry': Doctors say CDC, FDA missteps cross the line into politics Posted: 01 Sep 2020 08:44 AM PDT  "If you don't trust the agencies that are telling you to do this, then you don't have your key weapons to fight against a pandemic," one doctor said.
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| 75-year-old Buffalo man shoved by police speaks out on incident after month in hospital Posted: 01 Sep 2020 09:11 AM PDT  Martin Gugino, 75, was shoved to the ground by Buffalo police in June, and the incident drew wide criticism. Now Gugino tells his side.
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| Driver speeds off after beating 69-year-old to death in a road rage fury, MO cops say Posted: 01 Sep 2020 07:35 AM PDT  "You don't do that to another person."
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| Texas sues over plans to send mail ballot applications Posted: 31 Aug 2020 03:59 PM PDT  The fight over mail balloting in Texas, one of the few states not allowing more people to vote by mail in November, grew Monday when the state sued to stop more than 2 million registered voters around Houston from receiving applications to submit their ballots by mail. Harris County this month announced plans to send all registered voters the application, regardless of whether they qualify to vote by mail — which is generally restricted in Texas to voters who are 65 or older, disabled or will be outside the county on Election Day. Several states have loosened mail voting restrictions this year because of COVID-19 concerns, most recently New York.
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| 'Antifa hunter' gets 3 years in prison for online racist threats Posted: 31 Aug 2020 01:54 PM PDT  A Florida man who called himself "the Antifa hunter" as he began an online campaign to terrorize and harass people who opposed his white supremacist ideology was sentenced on Monday to more than three years in prison.
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| Leaked email reveals CVS district leader instructed pharmacy staff not to tell patients their medications were filled by someone who tested positive for COVID-19 Posted: 31 Aug 2020 11:00 AM PDT  A CVS technician said a district leader threatened to fire staff if they told patients their medications were filled by a COVID-positive worker.
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| Melania Trump's former friend says she's working with 3 prosecutors investigating 2017 inauguration Posted: 31 Aug 2020 05:30 PM PDT  Stephanie Winston Wolkoff was friends with first lady Melania Trump for more than a decade, and while she briefly served in the White House as an adviser, she is now spending her time working with "three different prosecutors" who are looking into whether any financial crimes were committed during the planning and execution of President Trump's 2017 inauguration.Winston Wolkoff writes about her relationship with the Trump family in her new book, Melania and Me: The Rise and Fall of My Friendship with the First Lady, out Tuesday. In an interview with ABC News that aired Monday, Winston Wolkoff said she is working with the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Southern District of New York and the attorneys general in New Jersey and Washington, D.C. as they probe the inauguration. "It's taken over my life," she added.The inaugural committee spent a record $104 million on Trump's inauguration. In 2018, The New York Times reported that Winston Wolkoff's event-planning firm received more than $26 million from the committee; she told ABC News most of the money was transferred to another company that produced multiple inaugural events. This article turned her into "the cover girl for the inauguration shenanigans," she said, and when she appealed to Trump for help, the first lady refused to help Winston Wolkoff clear her name.Trump's spokesperson told the Times she had "no involvement" with the inaugural committee and "had no knowledge of how funds were spent." This, Winston Wolkoff writes in her book, was "complete and utter horses--t." Winston Wolkoff said Trump personally approved several pricey expenditures, including $130,000 Tiffany crystal bowls that were given to inaugural dinner guests. Winston Wolkoff told ABC News that after the inauguration, she took a close look at the bills, and was shocked when she saw "a tree you could buy for $10 was $1,000, or a stage that would cost $100,000 was $1 million." Read more about the extravagant inauguration and Winston Wolkoff's roll in it at ABC News.More stories from theweek.com Game of Thrones creators to adapt The Three-Body Problem book series Fauci shoots down false claim only 6 percent of coronavirus deaths are legitimate: 'They are real deaths from COVID-19' Witnesses, police, and reporters piece together what happened in the fatal Kenosha protest shootings
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| Worth the wait: Yellowstone’s Giantess Geyser erupts for first time in six years Posted: 30 Aug 2020 11:48 AM PDT  Giantess is one of the biggest geysers in the national park, and typically explodes between twice and six times a year In these troubled times there comes a point where we all need to let off steam.For this huge geyser in Yellowstone park, the moment was now and the eruption was spectacular, after a six-year wait.But, for the rest of us, watching this natural phenomenon is strangely meditative and beautifully distracting from much of the bad news around, despite the violent geothermal forces propelling it.Giantess Geyser spouted for the first time in more than six years in Yellowstone National Park, which straddles part of Wyoming and a little of Montana, on 25 August, according to the US National Park Service (NPS)."She" has more typically erupted between twice and six times a year in the past, according to the NPS website, and blasts a spout up to 200ft high."The surrounding area may shake from underground steam explosions just before the initial water and/or steam eruptions," the NPS website adds.Giantess is one of the biggest geysers in the park, alongside phenomena such as the super-tall Steamboat geyser, the largest active geyser in the world, and the park's most famous, Old Faithful, renowned for its punctual regularity as it soars from the ground about 20 times a day.Colorful hot spring features in the park include the blue-hued Morning Glory Pool and the psychedelic Grand Prismatic spring, as well as whiffy, sulfurous bubblers and roiling natural pots of scalding hot water fizzing out of the rocks.The features are among more than 10,000 hot springs and geysers in the park, a Unesco world heritage site.
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| FBI worried that Ring doorbells are spying on police Posted: 01 Sep 2020 05:39 AM PDT  Someone under investigation was said to be able to "covertly monitor law enforcement activity".
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| 2 dead as Mauritius oil spill clean-up boats collide Posted: 01 Sep 2020 04:06 AM PDT  The prime minister of Mauritius said Tuesday two sailors were dead and two others missing after a tugboat assisting in a major oil spill clean-up off the Indian Ocean island collided with a barge.
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| Schools are more segregated than 30 years ago. Here's what's driving the change. Posted: 31 Aug 2020 05:18 AM PDT  School integration programs once broke down barriers. Today, white and Black students in cities like Minneapolis are growing up apart.
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| GOP attack video using disabled activist in doctored footage is deleted Posted: 31 Aug 2020 08:12 AM PDT  Rep. Steve Scalise's government Twitter account posted the manipulated video in an attempt to push the false claim that Joe Biden wants to defund the police.
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| Zimbabwe says foreign white farmers can apply to get back seized land Posted: 31 Aug 2020 10:38 AM PDT |
| The Trump administration's mission to wall off the Chinese internet has officially killed a US-Hong Kong undersea cable project from Facebook and Google Posted: 01 Sep 2020 05:00 AM PDT  A DOJ committee formally recommended in July that the Hong Kong part of the network be iced on national security grounds.
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| State police return to Portland after protest shooting; Trump defends Kyle Rittenhouse ahead of Kenosha visit Posted: 31 Aug 2020 06:37 PM PDT  Oregon Gov. Kate Brown announced a plan to curb violence in Portland following a fatal shooting and clashes between Trump supporters and protesters.
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| Prashant Bhushan: India finds an unlikely hero in lawyer-activist Posted: 31 Aug 2020 07:23 PM PDT  Prashant Bhushan refused to apologise to the Supreme Court and got a symbolic one-rupee fine.
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| Hamas says deal reached to calm violence with Israel Posted: 31 Aug 2020 12:42 PM PDT  Gaza's Hamas rulers said Monday they have reached an agreement through international mediators to end the latest round of cross-border violence with Israel. Under the deal, Hamas is to halt the launches of explosives-laden balloons and rocket fire into Israel, while Israel said it will ease a blockade that has been tightened in recent weeks. The Israeli restrictions have worsened living conditions in Gaza at a time when it is coping with a new coronavirus outbreak.
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| Riot Declared in Portland after Mob Shows Up at Mayor Wheeler’s Residence Posted: 01 Sep 2020 05:42 AM PDT  Portland Police declared a riot Monday evening after about 200 demonstrators marched to Mayor Ted Wheeler's residence to demand that he resign.Police reported that an "arson fire" was started in the area. Rioters also broke windows and attempted to set a store on the ground floor of the Democratic mayor's condominium building on fire."It was critical to secure the area to allow firefighters to respond to this dangerous situation," police said.Oregon State Police were also sent to Portland on Monday after a weekend of violence that saw one pro-Trump demonstrator fatally shot as Black Lives Matter protesters clashed with Trump supporters downtown.Democratic Governor Kate Brown on Sunday announced a plan to quell the nightly violence while still allowing peaceful protests, saying state police troopers and officers from several surrounding areas will be called in to assist Portland's police force. Meanwhile, the FBI and federal prosecutors will commit more resources to prosecute criminal offenses that arise from the demonstrations, she said."We all must come together—elected officials, community leaders, all of us—to stop the cycle of violence," Brown said in a statement. "But this is only the first step. Real change will come from the hard work to achieve racial justice."A pro-Trump demonstrator was shot and killed Saturday night during clashes in Portland between Black Lives Matter protesters and a caravan of Trump supporters who drove trucks through the downtown streets. The man wore a hat with the logo for the right-wing group Patriot Prayer. The male suspect reportedly under investigation for the fatal shooting declared his allegiance to Antifa on social media before the incident."Every Oregonian has the right to freely express their views without fear of deadly violence. I will not allow Patriot Prayer and armed white supremacists to bring more bloodshed to our streets," Brown said. "Time and again, from Charlottesville to Kenosha to Portland, we have seen the tragic outcome when armed right-wing vigilantes take matters into their own hands."Protests and rioting have been ongoing in Portland for more than 90 days since the police custody death of George Floyd in May.
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| Scientists see downsides to top COVID-19 vaccines from Russia, China Posted: 31 Aug 2020 03:10 AM PDT  High-profile COVID-19 vaccines developed in Russia and China share a potential shortcoming: They are based on a common cold virus that many people have been exposed to, potentially limiting their effectiveness, some experts say. CanSino Biologics' <6185.HK> vaccine, approved for military use in China, is a modified form of adenovirus type 5, or Ad5. The company is in talks to get emergency approval in several countries before completing large-scale trials, the Wall Street Journal reported last week.
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| Zoom's stock soars as it reports blockbuster earnings with 355% revenue growth Posted: 31 Aug 2020 01:26 PM PDT  Zoom once again beat Wall Street expectations, blowing past estimates and reporting 355% revenue growth year-over-year.
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| If Trump refuses to accept defeat in November, the republic will survive intact, as it has 5 out of 6 times in the past Posted: 01 Sep 2020 05:28 AM PDT  During the 2016 presidential campaign, then-candidate Donald Trump refused to promise to accept the results of the election. Likewise, in 2020, his continued assault on the reliability and legitimacy of mail-in voting has laid the groundwork for challenging a loss on the basis of voter fraud. He has also refused to promise to observe the 2020 results.This has led some to worry that a contested election would severely undermine faith in American democracy.Yet the United States has a long history of such contested elections. With one exception, they have not badly damaged the American political system.That contested 1860 election – which sparked the Civil War – happened in a unique context. As a political scientist who studies elections, I believe that, should President Trump – or less likely, Joe Biden – contest the results of the November election, American democracy will survive. Legitimacy and peaceful transitionsMost contested presidential elections have not posed threats to the legitimacy of government. Legitimacy, or the collective acknowledgment that government has a right to rule, is essential to a democracy. In a legitimate system, unpopular policies are largely accepted because citizens believe that government has the right to make them. For example, a citizen may despise taxes but still admit that they are lawful. Illegitimate systems, which are not supported by citizens, can collapse or descend into revolution. In democracies, elections generate legitimacy because citizens contribute to the selection of leadership.In the past, contested elections have not badly damaged the fabric of democracy because the rules for handling such disputes exist and have been followed. While politicians and citizens alike have howled about the unfairness of loss, they accepted these losses. Contested elections and continuityIn 1800, both Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr received the same number of votes in the Electoral College. Because no candidate won a clear majority of Electoral votes, the House of Representatives followed the Constitution and convened a special session to resolve the impasse by a vote. It took 36 ballots to give Jefferson the victory, which was widely accepted. In 1824, Andrew Jackson won a plurality of the popular and electoral vote against John Quincy Adams and two other candidates, but failed to win the necessary majority in the Electoral College. The House, again following the procedure set in the Constitution, selected Adams as the winner over Jackson.The 1876 election between Rutherford B. Hayes and Samuel Tilden was contested because several Southern states failed to clearly certify a winner. This was resolved through inter-party negotiation conducted by an Electoral Commission established by Congress. While Hayes would become president, concessions were given to the South that effectively ended Reconstruction.The contest between Democrat John F. Kennedy and Republican Richard Nixon in 1960 was rife with allegations of voter fraud, and Nixon supporters pressed for aggressive recounts in many states. In the end, Nixon begrudgingly accepted the decision rather than drag the country through civil discord during the intense U.S.-Soviet tensions of the Cold War. Finally, in 2000, GOP candidate George W. Bush and Democratic candidate Al Gore tangled over disputed ballots in Florida. The Supreme Court terminated a recount effort and Gore publicly conceded, recognizing the legitimacy of Bush's victory by saying, "While I strongly disagree with the Court's decision, I accept it."In each case, the losing side was unhappy with the result of the election. But in each case, the loser accepted the legally derived result, and the American democratic political system persisted. The system collapsesThe election of 1860 was a different story. After Abraham Lincoln defeated three other candidates, Southern states simply refused to accept the results. They viewed the selection of a president who would not protect slavery as illegitimate and ignored the election's results. It was only through the profoundly bloody Civil War that the United States remained intact. The dispute over the legitimacy of this election, based in fundamental differences between the North and South, cost 600,000 American lives. What is the difference between the political collapse of 1860 and the continuity of other contested elections? In all cases, citizens were politically divided and elections were hotly contested. What makes 1860 stand out so clearly is that the country was divided over the moral question of slavery, and this division followed geographic lines that enabled a revolution to form. Further, the Confederacy was reasonably unified across class lines. While the America of today is certainly divided, the distribution of political beliefs is far more dispersed and complex than the ideological cohesion of the Confederacy. [Insight, in your inbox each day. You can get it with The Conversation's email newsletter.] Rule of lawHistory suggests, then, that even if Trump or Biden contest the election, the results would not be catastrophic. The Constitution is clear on what would happen: First, the president cannot simply declare an election invalid. Second, voting irregularities could be investigated by the states, who are responsible for managing the integrity of their electoral processes. This seems unlikely to change any reported results, as voter fraud is extraordinarily rare. The next step could be an appeal to the Supreme Court or suits against the states. To overturn any state's initial selection, evidence of a miscount or voter fraud would have to be strongly established. If these attempts to contest the election fail, on Inauguration Day, the elected president would lawfully assume the office. Any remaining ongoing contestation would be moot after this point, as the president would have full legal authority to exercise the powers of his office, and could not be removed short of impeachment. While the result of the 2020 election is sure to make many citizens unhappy, I believe rule of law will endure. The powerful historical, social, and geographic forces that produced the total failure of 1860 simply are not present.Correction: This story has been corrected to give the proper date for the contested election between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr. It was in 1800.This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * 'Stolen' elections open wounds that may never heal * Putin's interference in US elections undermines faith in American democracyAlexander Cohen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
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| Cheng Lei: Australian anchor on Chinese TV detained in China Posted: 31 Aug 2020 01:18 PM PDT  Cheng Lei, an Australian citizen, worked as a news presenter for government-run CGTN in Beijing.
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| '2020 has been rough, but yesterday was Supreme': Ruth Bader Ginsburg officiates couple's wedding Posted: 01 Sep 2020 05:39 AM PDT  "2020 has been rough, but yesterday was Supreme," the bride, Barb Solish, said in a tweet along with a photo of Ginsburg presiding over the ceremony.
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| 102 out of 175 people arrested in Kenosha after the Jacob Blake shooting have been out-of-towners, police say Posted: 01 Sep 2020 03:09 AM PDT  Police figures appear to substantiate claims that much of the damage to Kenosha, Wisconsin, is not caused by the people who live there.
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| Ethiopia seeks US clarification on reported aid cut over dam Posted: 31 Aug 2020 05:53 AM PDT |
| Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says new coronavirus relief bill 'hopefully' coming next week Posted: 01 Sep 2020 05:43 AM PDT  Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Monday that the Trump administration and Senate Republicans have been discussing a possible revamp of coronavirus relief measures. The new bill will "hopefully" be unveiled next week, Mnuchin said.
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| EU calls for dialogue with Turkey, end to tensions in east Mediterranean Posted: 31 Aug 2020 03:27 AM PDT  The European Union's executive called on Monday for dialogue with Turkey and demanded that Ankara refrains from unilateral steps that stoke tensions in eastern Mediterranean. Should dialogue not bear fruit, a spokesman for the European Commission told a briefing on Monday, the EU has already moved toward sanctions.
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| House Democrats say postmaster Louis DeJoy has ignored their document requests Posted: 31 Aug 2020 11:11 AM PDT  House Democrats say Postmaster General Louis DeJoy is giving them the cold shoulder.When DeJoy testified for the House Oversight Committee last week, many congressmembers requested documents regarding the changes he has overseen at the United States Postal Service. But DeJoy apparently hasn't followed up, prompting Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), the committee chair, to say Monday she'd soon be subpoenaing DeJoy for those documents.> New: @OversightDems say they will subpoena Louis DeJoy for withholding key documents about USPS mail delays from Congress. He has not provided a single additional document since testifying on August 24 https://t.co/dS4Q52mPPx pic.twitter.com/apaDYfqSPw> > — Ari Berman (@AriBerman) August 31, 2020Reports of delays and mismanagement within the postal service have gone up under DeJoy's watch, and Republicans have tried to block funding for the USPS to try and fix those problems. Democrats say it's because the Trump megadonor is trying to further a long-held conservative goal of phasing out the post office for private business. Trump has also admitted that he is withholding funding from the USPS because without it, "you can't have universal mail-in voting."More stories from theweek.com Game of Thrones creators to adapt The Three-Body Problem book series Fauci shoots down false claim only 6 percent of coronavirus deaths are legitimate: 'They are real deaths from COVID-19' Witnesses, police, and reporters piece together what happened in the fatal Kenosha protest shootings
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| Doctors alarmed as FDA floats 'emergency use' of COVID-19 vaccine, bypassing trials Posted: 01 Sep 2020 08:31 AM PDT  "It's a lesser review, it's a lower-quality review, and when you're talking about vaccinating a large chunk of the American population, that's not acceptable," said one vaccine expert.
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