Kenneth Thompson, 95, must submit a social security or driver’s license number, which wasn’t required in the 1940sA 95-year-old second world war veteran twice denied an absentee ballot under a restrictive Texas voting law has attracted support from prominent figures including Beto O’Rourke, a voting rights campaigner and former presidential candidate now running for Texas governor.Kenneth Thompson, who served in the US army in Europe, told Click2Houston, a Harris county news outlet, he had voted in every election since he was 21 and even remembered paying a 50-cent poll tax in the 1950s. Continue reading...
She may be in the news for running around New York with Covid, but it’s worth remembering how she spread another sort of virus: rightwing populismHelp! I am writing from beleaguered New York City which, on top of dealing with giant rats, a nasty nor’easter, and the surreal “swagger’”of a Bitcoin-obsessed mayor, is also battling a Palinvasion. Sarah Palin, the former governor of Alaska, has spent the past week running around the city eating at multiple fancy restaurants despite the fact that she has tested positive for Covid-19. Palin, who isn’t vaccinated and has said “it’ll be over my dead body that I’ll have to get a shot,” has now become something of a public health hazard: New Yorkers are being told to go get themselves tested if they’ve been anywhere near her.Arwa Mahdawi’s new book, Strong Female Lead, is available for order Continue reading...
by Associated Press in Nashville, Tennessee on (#5VJ7Z)
Nine officers fired on Landon Eastep, who was holding a box cutter and is estimated to have been shot 30 timesThe Nashville police chief has stripped an officer of policing authority after he fired the final two shots to end a fatal interstate highway standoff in which nine officers opened fire on a man holding a box cutter.During the encounter on Thursday, officers exhorted Landon Eastep to surrender while they kept their guns drawn. They fatally shot him when he pulled a shiny object from his pocket and pointed it as if ready to shoot. It was not a gun. Continue reading...
The commission made a list of recommendations ‘to correct historical wrongs in the area’For more than a year, officials in a northern California coastal town have been debating whether they should rename.This week, the commission examining the issue said that, for now, the Fort Bragg name is here to stay. But the effort highlights the challenges that come as cities, schools and parks across the US reconsider controversial placenames with racist histories. Continue reading...
The proposal would end all voting by mail and allow legislature to reject election results, part of nationwide rightwing effort to overturn electionsArizona Republicans have introduced a bill that would impose significant new voting restrictions and allow the state legislature to reject election results.The measure would require the state legislature to convene after primary and general elections to review the ballot counting process and “shall accept or reject the election results”. Continue reading...
People on field during show, many of whom are trained dancers, participate in nearly two weeks of rehearsals but aren’t paidIt’s an annual tradition as ingrained as throwing Gatorade on the winning coach: the moment when the Super Bowl half-time performer takes to the stage and the football field is filled with “fans” cheering them on.The Los Angeles Times reported last week that those audience members are in fact hundreds of unpaid “volunteers” who participate in nearly two weeks of rehearsals ahead of the Super Bowl, many of whom are trained dancers recruited from the same agency that represents the paid dancers on the halftime show stage. Continue reading...
Calls mount for release of full Senate report on the US torture of Abu Zubaydah to counter a narrative too many Americans still believe – that torture worksOn the morning of 6 October the nine justices of the US supreme court filed into their wood-paneled courtroom in Washington to hear arguments in a dispute between the US government and Abu Zubaydah, a Guantánamo prisoner who has been held incommunicado and without charge for the past 20 years.A government lawyer addressed the panel, arguing on grounds of “state secrets” that Zubaydah should be blocked from calling two CIA contractors to testify about the brutal interrogations they put him through at a hidden black site in Poland. Within minutes of his opening remarks, the lawyer was interrupted by Amy Coney Barrett, one of the rightwing justices appointed to the court by Donald Trump. Continue reading...
Abu Zubaydah has been held by the US without charge for the past 20 years. His own words and images depict the relentless, round-the-clock, prolonged and illegal abuse he has sufferedAbu Zubaydah, the Guantánamo prisoner who has been held by the US without charge for the past 20 years, kept notes of the torture to which he was subjected by the CIA between his arrest in 2002 and his transfer to Guantánamo four years later. In personal discussions with his attorneys, and in his own writings and drawings from inside Guantánamo, the detainee recalled in harrowing detail the torture techniques applied to him at secret CIA black sites in Thailand, Poland and other countries. In one month alone, August 2002, he was put through the barbaric water torture known as waterboarding 83 times. In his account he referred to the method, a form of controlled drowning, as the “water bed”.The notes were first published in How America Tortures by the Center for Policy and Research at Seton Hall Law School where one of Zubaydah’s lawyers Mark Denbeaux is professor emeritus. Here is an edited version of that account of the torture Zubaydah endured, in his own words and drawings. Continue reading...
The Hall of Fame tailback and miscast heel who lit up the NFL in the 1980s sets the record straight on a career that saw him underheralded on the field and misunderstood off of itEarlier this month Antonio Brown made what might be the most dramatic exit in sports history, stripping down and stalking off the field in the middle of an NFL game, as his defending champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers were rallying against the lowly New York Jets on the road.Eric Dickerson could never. Continue reading...
The Neil Young and Joe Rogan row may be the final straw for some, but many music lovers like me are in a dilemmaIt was September 2009, and I was anxiously waiting to head off to university. My friends had already all left and my small home town in Wales felt even more claustrophobic than before. It was also the month I downloaded a relatively new music streaming service called Spotify. I was immediately in heaven. I’d sneaked in just before they ended a free sign-up offer and so, for precisely zero pounds, I suddenly had access to a musical library that had previously been unthinkable.
Joe Biden visited the site where one of Pittsburgh’s major car bridges collapsed hours before speaking about it in an infrastructure schedule speech in Pennsylvania, on Friday.At about 7am, the 477ft-long bridge on Forbes Avenue caved in, leaving a mass of concrete rubble and twisted metal as a visual metaphor for America’s crumbling infrastructure.At least 10 people were injured, three taken to hospital, and a bus and several cars left stranded in the wreckage
by Martin Pengelly in New York and agencies on (#5VHRR)
Actor and activist says ‘dog’s ass would make a better governor’ after State of the State speech stunt goes viralBette Midler had harsh words for the governor of West Virginia after he showed his dog’s backside at the end of his State of the State speech, in a bizarre rejoinder to the actor, singer and activist.Responding on Thursday to a tweet in which Midler called West Virginia “poor, illiterate and strung out”, the Republican Jim Justice said she could kiss his dog’s “hiney”. Continue reading...
Avenatti, acting as his own lawyer, asked Daniels about stories she has told about living in New Orleans in 2019At his fraud trial in New York on Friday, the attorney Michael Avenatti sought to portray his former client Stormy Daniels as someone who might be delusional, questioning the adult film-maker and actor about her belief she was once haunted by ghosts.For a second day, Avenatti, acting as his own lawyer, cross-examined Daniels about allegations he stole $300,000 she was supposed to get for writing a tell-all book about a sexual tryst with Donald Trump which he denies. Continue reading...
At least 10 injured and a bus and several cars left stranded in wreckage after 477ft-long bridge on Forbes Avenue caved inIt would be hard to imagine a more dramatic way to illustrate the need for investment in US infrastructure that Joe Biden spoke about in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on Friday.Hours before his visit and just four miles from where the president was scheduled to speak, one of Pittsburgh’s major car bridges collapsed. Continue reading...
Residents in north-east and mid-Atlantic regions braced for blizzard conditions as officials issue travel warningsResidents and officials across the US north-east and mid-Atlantic regions were bracing on Friday for a powerful winter storm expected to produce blizzard conditions into Saturday.Heavy snow and strong winds were forecast to begin in parts of the Carolinas and Appalachia on Friday evening, according to the National Weather Service. The system will then intensify and bring snowy conditions up the east coast to New England, where forecasters warned of localized snowfall totals of up to 20in and wind gusts of 50 to 60mph. Continue reading...
House committee seeks to determine whether Trump White House was behind plan to send false certificates to CongressThe House select committee investigating the Capitol attack on Friday issued subpoenas to lead participants in an audacious scheme to send fake Trump slates of electors to Congress.The development comes as the panel seeks to learn whether the plan was coordinated by the Trump White House. Continue reading...
Remains of at least 20 members believed to have been killed in the Indian Island Massacre of 1860 will be returned by UCBThe most vulnerable members of the Wiyot Tribe were asleep the morning of 26 February 1860, when a band of white men slipped into their northern California villages under darkness and slaughtered them.Many of the children, women and elderly slain in what became known as the Indian Island Massacre, had their eternal rest disturbed when their graves were dug up and their skeletons and the artifacts buried with them placed in a museum. Continue reading...
Nine of world’s 10 richest billionaires see wealth dented as rising interest rates spur sell-off of ‘stay at home’ stocksThe world’s richest billionaires have lost more than $50bn (£37bn) this week as their fortunes – mostly held in technology companies – dropped in a “white knuckle” rout on tech shares.Elon Musk, the wealthiest person on the planet, saw his fortune fall by $25.8bn in a single day on Thursday, according to the latest data available, as shares in his electric car company, Tesla, fell 11% to their lowest since October. Continue reading...
Even 50 years later, the killings in Derry in 1972 cast a long shadow over Britain’s policies in Northern IrelandFor many on both sides of the Irish Sea, the killing of 14 unarmed civil rights demonstrators by members of the British army’s Parachute Regiment on Bloody Sunday in 1972 remains the defining outrage of Northern Ireland’s 30-year Troubles. It was certainly the most politically damaging to Britain. The shootings, which took place in Derry’s Bogside district 50 years ago on Sunday, shocked these islands and the world. They still do and they still should. Bloody Sunday was not the only senseless act of violence during the Troubles. Many more killings were carried out during those 30 years by paramilitary groups from both sides than by the security forces (and more than five times as many in the case of the IRA). But the shootings in Derry made the Northern Ireland crisis deepen dramatically, led to a steep escalation of violence, caused a boost in IRA recruitment and did huge reputational harm to Britain, its Northern Ireland policy and its institutions.Almost as bad as Bloody Sunday itself was the official attempt to cover up what happened, and the lies that were consistently told, including at the highest level of government and in the first judicial inquiry that was announced days after the killings. In the end it would take nearly 40 years before the UK government acknowledged the truth about 30 January 1972 and apologised, after Lord Saville’s inquiry found in 2010 that none of the casualties were posing a threat or doing anything that would justify shooting them. Even now, many aspects of Bloody Sunday remain sources of dispute, in particular the failure to pursue individual soldiers through prosecutions. Continue reading...
Family ‘in shock’ as police department says Landon Eastep was agitated and carrying a box cutter on highwayAt least nine law enforcement officers fatally shot a man walking on an interstate highway in Nashville on Thursday, in the latest use of deadly police force in the US that has left the man’s family “in shock”.The 37-year-old man, named as Landon Eastep, was agitated and carrying a box cutter in his left hand, a Metro Nashville police department spokesman, Don Aaron, said. The agency said Eastep was walking along the highway before he was shot. Continue reading...
Verdict on same day as deadline to decide whether British businessman can be extradited to US to face proceedingsHewlett-Packard has won its six-year civil fraud case against Mike Lynch, the man once hailed as Britain’s answer to Bill Gates, after a high court judge ruled that he duped the US firm into paying £8.2bn for his software firm Autonomy.Lynch, who was on Friday waiting to find out if he could be extradited to the US to face a separate criminal trial, was found to have defrauded HP by manipulating Autonomy’s accounts to inflate the value of the company. He has always denied the accusation and said on Friday that he would appeal. Continue reading...
Two-year-old, gray and white farm cat made an impression on Jill Biden during a campaign stop in Pennsylvania in 2020The newest member of the Biden team has arrived at the White House: a long-promised pet cat for the first family.The two-year-old, green-eyed, gray and white farm cat caught Jill Biden’s eye when she jumped on stage and interrupted a speech the first lady was giving during the 2020 presidential campaign. Continue reading...
Home Depot co-founder Ken Langone, author of I Love Capitalism!, said of the Democratic senator: ‘Thank God for Joe Manchin’A billionaire Republican donor and Trump supporter donated the maximum allowed amount to Joe Manchin after the West Virginia Democrat sank Joe Biden’s signature domestic spending plan.The Build Back Better plan sought to boost health and social care, and to help combat the climate crisis, at a price tag of $1.75tn. Continue reading...
The streaming service’s decision to back the controversial podcast shows it might have lost its wayNeil Young this week issued Spotify with a blunt ultimatum: it’s me or Joe Rogan. The Canadian-American musician criticised its exclusive hosting of the Joe Rogan Experience podcast in a letter to his manager and record label published online, which asked his music be removed from the streaming service. Spotify chose Rogan, removing Young’s entire back catalogue.
In the past half century, North America has lost a fourth of its birds. Earth is now a coalmine, and every wild bird is a canaryWhen the poet Mary Oliver wrote “Instructions for living a life,” she reminded us: “Pay attention. Be astounded. Tell about it.”This past autumn, wildlife officials announced that a bird, a male bar-tailed godwit, flew nonstop across the Pacific Ocean 8,100 miles from Alaska to Australia in just under 10 days. Fitted with a small solar-powered satellite tag, the godwit achieved “a land bird flight record”. But of course godwits have been doing this for centuries. Come next April-May, all things well, determined godwits will make the trip in reverse, bound for Alaska to nest and raise their young.Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
Matthew Reeves, 43, put to death after divided US supreme court rejects claim that intellectual disability cost him chance of alternative execution methodAlabama executed an inmate by lethal injection for a 1996 murder on Thursday evening after a divided US supreme court sided with the state and rejected defense claims the man had an intellectual disability that cost him a chance to choose a less “torturous”, yet untried, execution method.Matthew Reeves, 43, was put to death at Holman prison after the court lifted a lower court order that had prevented corrections workers from executing the prisoner. He was pronounced dead at 9.24pm CST, the state attorney general, Steve Marshall, said in a statement. Continue reading...
Extensive planning and tangible action by the far-right militia group’s members provide ‘strong grounds’ for case, experts sayLater this year the founder of the far-right Oath Keepers militia and nine alleged co-conspirators will be the first to face trial on seditious conspiracy charges related to the insurrection at the US Capitol.The charges are significant because they allege that the January 6 attack went beyond disorderly conduct and assaults on law enforcement, instead constituting an organized and violent attempt to stop the democratic transfer of power. Continue reading...
Music is still synonymous with romance – just ask West Elm Caleb. But dating apps reduce it to data points, and a digital playlist is no match for the mixtapes of oldThe way culture works today, you will either know everything there is to know about West Elm Caleb or nothing. For the uninitiated, he is a 20-something New Yorker who works at a furniture store and gained online infamy for his poor dating behaviour. A group of women who had met Caleb via dating apps and then connected with each other on TikTok have accused him of ignoring messages, recycling lines, sleeping with one shortly before going on a date with another and sending unsolicited nudes.After 15m views of the #westelmcaleb hashtag on TikTok, the facts of the situation are unclear and the ethics murkier still. I do, however, feel qualified to comment on one element: Caleb’s seduction playlist on Spotify. One of the claims against Caleb was that he sent at least two women the same playlist, each believing it to have been personalised; it’s now being circulated to inform our collective arbitration of his conduct. Continue reading...
Charges were brought in 2016 against London-based Gavin Black and New York colleague Matthew ConnollyA US court has overturned the conviction of two former Deutsche Bank traders for allegedly rigging the London Interbank Offered Rate (Libor).A three-judge panel from the second US circuit court of appeals in Manhattan ruled the US government “failed to show that any of the trader-influenced submissions were false, fraudulent or misleading”. Continue reading...
The temperature is forecast to be well below freezing when the teams kick off on Sunday. But how much that will affect the result is debatableForewarned is forearmed and clearly, at some stage in late November, Gregg Berhalter and US Soccer sat down, ran the tape, looked through the Edmonton squalls and saw in the frozen Mexican faces all the warning they needed.In truth they could have saved themselves 90 minutes and read the French advice. Just 19 words of it. “To survive the Canadian winter, one needs a body of brass, eyes of glass, and blood made of brandy.” Continue reading...
Kevin Dugar claimed his innocence for years. A letter he received while incarcerated changed everythingKevin Dugar got a letter from his brother.It was fall 2013, and Kevin hadn’t seen his identical twin Karl in years – they were both serving time in different Illinois prisons. A murder conviction all but guaranteed Kevin, 36, would remain incarcerated well into his 70s. Continue reading...
After one of the most entertaining divisional rounds in NFL history, there are just four teams remaining. Which two will come out on top?Following last weekend’s slate of thrillers, what does the NFL do for an encore this time around? Sunday’s two championship games have a lot to live up to but there are more than enough storylines swirling around the four remaining teams to ensure plenty of fireworks (quite literally when it comes to the Chiefs). Continue reading...
Luntz spent years sampling opinion for Republicans before a stroke changed his outlook: ‘I’m not afraid any more, so you will hear me criticise people I never would have two years ago’When he suffered a stroke, Frank Luntz blamed it on the anger and tension coursing through him after decades of inhaling America’s toxic political culture. The country’s best-known pollster found himself hospitalised for nearly a week with dangerously high blood pressure.Two years later, Luntz regards the experience as a turning point. “That completely changed my outlook,” he says. “The loudness of my voice has changed. The speed in which I speak is changed. I’m slower and I’m quieter and I think about what I say. It’s not that I’m trying to be careful, it’s that I really analyse stuff that comes out.” Continue reading...
Palin, who is unvaccinated, was spotted at multiple city restaurants in violation of state and CDC health guidanceSarah Palin, the former Republican vice-presidential candidate, has continued to dine out at New York City restaurants despite testing positive for Covid-19.The ex-Alaska governor, who is not vaccinated, was spotted on Wednesday eating outdoors at the upper east side restaurant Elio’s after testing positive for the illness, according to photos published by Mediaite. Palin had dined at the same restaurant on Saturday night, where she was seen eating indoors in violation of city rules requiring proof of vaccination for indoor dining. Continue reading...
by Gloria Oladipo in New York and agencies on (#5VG8Y)
Lawyer is accused of diverting $300,000 of a book advance but adult film star says she never agreed to pay more than $100Stormy Daniels and Michael Avenatti, two former friends once united in a mission to take down ex-president Donald Trump, were reunited in a federal courtroom in New York on Thursday – but facing off as enemies.The adult film actor and producer told a jury in the criminal case against Avenatti, her former lawyer, that he “stole from me and lied to me”. Continue reading...
Killings took place two weeks apart but neither received national coverage, prompting questions about whose stories are toldThree recent killings in the Los Angeles area have put the spotlight on the disparate impact of American gun violence on Black women and the lack of attention their stories receive, as the country reckons with some of the most intense spates of gun violence in years.Both killings took place on weekends, a mere two weeks apart. On 8 January, California officials found the body of Tioni Theus, a 16-year-old girl who was found shot at a busy onramp of the 110 freeway. On 23 January, sisters Breahna Stines and Marneysha Hamilton were among four people shot dead during a mass shooting at a birthday party in Inglewood. Continue reading...
Government Accountability Office says ‘persistent deficiencies’ at HHS have hindered response to public health emergenciesThe US government’s main health agency is failing to meet its responsibilities for leading the national response to public health emergencies – including the coronavirus pandemic – extreme weather disasters and even potential bioterrorist attacks, a federal watchdog said Thursday.The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office said it is designating the Health and Human Services Department’s leadership and coordination of public health emergencies as a “high risk” area for the government. Continue reading...
Discovery brings total to five, but search for survivors will be suspended if new discoveries are not made, says US coast guardThe US coast guard said it would call off the search for survivors at sunset on Thursday if no new discoveries were made following a boat capsizing off the Florida coast at the weekend with 40 people on board.Four more bodies had been discovered, bringing the total to five, Capt Jo-Ann Burdian, commander of the coast guard’s Miami sector, said in a press conference on Thursday. Continue reading...
Ron Johnson doesn’t believe the state should give help to parents – but he’s very keen to stop a woman’s right to chooseRon Johnson, the US senator for hot takes, famed for such hits as “[the Capitol riot] seemed like a peaceful protest to me” and “mouthwash has been proven to kill the coronavirus”, is at it again. On Wednesday, Johnson, the senior Republican senator from Wisconsin, told local news station WKBT: “People decide to have families and become parents. That’s something they need to consider when they make that choice.”He continued: “I’ve never really felt it was society’s responsibility to take care of other people’s children.” Continue reading...
Speaking at a press briefing alongside outgoing Justice Stephen Breyer, US President Joe Biden pledges to nominate the first black woman to the supreme court. Biden applauded Breyer’s work on the supreme court over the past 27 years, and pledged to nominate someone who would follow in his footsteps
US president announced plans for court at White House event marking retirement of Justice Stephen BreyerJoe Biden intends to announce his nominee to become the first Black woman to sit on the US supreme court by the end of February, the president said on Thursday at a formal White House event to mark the retirement of the liberal-leaning justice Stephen Breyer.Lauding the retiring justice as a “beacon of wisdom” and a “model public servant at a time of great division in this country”, Biden pledged to replace him with someone worthy of Breyer’s “legacy of excellence and decency”. He said the nominee would have “extraordinary qualifications, character, experience and integrity, and that person will be the first Black woman ever nominated to the United States supreme court.” Continue reading...
Justice Stephen Breyer’s retirement allows Biden to make history by appointing its first Black womanThe liberal supreme court justice Stephen Breyer is retiring and Joe Biden has said he will stand by a previous promise to nominate a Black woman to America’s highest legal body.At 83 years old, Breyer is the oldest justice of the court and his retirement will give Biden his first seat to fill on the supreme court, which is currently conservative-leaning by six to three. Replacing Breyer won’t allow Biden to change that dynamic but it does allow him to ensure the liberal contingent is not reduced further and make history by appointing its first Black woman. Continue reading...
Steep dive in crypto market resulted in final bid of about $170,000 – $80,000 short of the starting bid thresholdWhat do Melania Trump’s wide-brimmed white hat, a painting of her wearing the hat and an NFT of an animated version of the hat have in common?They were all put up for auction by the former first lady – and as of early Wednesday, failed to rake in the target price of a $250,000 opening bid. Continue reading...
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