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Intel report warns that violent far-right extremists ‘are routinely using peaceful protests as means of cover’

Intel report warns that violent far-right extremists ‘are routinely using peaceful protests as means of cover’

Politico reports: The Trump administration is warning law enforcement and public safety officials that a far-right extremist movement known as “boogaloo” may be setting its sights on the nation’s capital. On Monday, the National Capital Region Threat Intelligence Consortium (NTIC), a fusion center for Washington, D.C. that provides support to federal national security and law enforcement agencies, warned in an intelligence assessment that “the District is likely an attractive target for violent adherents of the boogaloo ideology due to the…

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Slave resistance brought about the end of slavery

Slave resistance brought about the end of slavery

Jamelle Bouie writes: Neither Abraham Lincoln nor the Republican Party freed the slaves. They helped set freedom in motion and eventually codified it into law with the 13th Amendment, but they were not themselves responsible for the end of slavery. They were not the ones who brought about its final destruction. Who freed the slaves? The slaves freed the slaves. “Slave resistance,” as the historian Manisha Sinha points out in “The Slave’s Cause: A History of Abolition,” “lay at the…

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During Floyd protests, media industry reckons with long history of collaboration with law enforcement

During Floyd protests, media industry reckons with long history of collaboration with law enforcement

Actors Dennis Franz and Jimmy Smits on the set of ‘NYPD Blue.’ Mitchell Gerber/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images By Carol A. Stabile, University of Oregon In a recent interview, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison was asked why it’s so difficult to prosecute cases against police officers. “Just think about all the cop shows you may have watched in your life,” he replied. “We’re just inundated with this cultural message that these people will do the right thing.” While two of those…

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Coronavirus cases rise sharply in prisons even as they plateau nationwide

Coronavirus cases rise sharply in prisons even as they plateau nationwide

The New York Times reports: Cases of the coronavirus in prisons and jails across the United States have soared in recent weeks, even as the overall daily infection rate in the nation has remained relatively flat. The number of prison inmates known to be infected has doubled during the past month to more than 68,000. Prison deaths tied to the coronavirus have also risen, by 73 percent since mid-May. By now, the five largest known clusters of the virus in…

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In Tulsa, Trump invites his followers inside a coronavirus petri dish

In Tulsa, Trump invites his followers inside a coronavirus petri dish

Virginia Heffernan writes: President Trump’s zeal for rally mode is rising almost as steeply as coronavirus cases in Tulsa, Okla., where his campaign plans to hold a little get-together on Saturday. The weather in Tulsa is expected to be muggy and nearly 90 degrees, with a high chance of thunder and lightning. You don’t say. “Bad idea” doesn’t begin to capture how reckless and vicious it is to pack an arena on a steamy night with thousands of rambunctious hotheads…

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Drinking water: Trump administration drops planned limit for toxin that damages infant brains

Drinking water: Trump administration drops planned limit for toxin that damages infant brains

The Associated Press reports: The Trump administration on Thursday rejected imposing federal drinking-water limits for a chemical used in fireworks and other explosives and linked to brain damage in newborns, opting to override Obama administration findings that the neurotoxin was contaminating the drinking water of millions of Americans. The contaminant is perchlorate, a component in rocket fuel, ammunition and other explosives, including fireworks. The Associated Press found one high-profile example of that on Thursday, reviewing a 2016 U.S. Geological Survey…

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The invisible world of airborne particles

The invisible world of airborne particles

The New York Times reports: When Linsey Marr’s son started attending day care 12 years ago, she noticed that he kept getting sick with the sniffles and other minor illnesses. But unlike most parents, Dr. Marr, an aerosol scientist at Virginia Tech, tried to figure out why. “When I’d pick him up, I’d find out that more than half the kids in the room were sick too,” said Dr. Marr. “I was really curious, and wondered, if it was spreading…

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On a roll: Supreme Court rejects Trump bid to end young immigrants’ protections

On a roll: Supreme Court rejects Trump bid to end young immigrants’ protections

The Associated Press reports: The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected President Donald Trump’s effort to end legal protections for 650,000 young immigrants, the second stunning election-season rebuke from the court in a week after its ruling that it’s illegal to fire people because they’re gay or transgender. Immigrants who are part of the 8-year-old Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program will retain their protection from deportation and their authorization to work in the United States — safe almost certainly at…

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Bad for America: Trump promotes divisions in an unhappy country

Bad for America: Trump promotes divisions in an unhappy country

The Associated Press reports: Americans are deeply unhappy about the state of their country — and a majority think President Donald Trump is exacerbating tensions in a moment of national crisis, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. With less than five months until Election Day, the survey offers few bright spots for a president confronting a historic pandemic, a sharp economic decline and national outrage over police brutality against black people. Most…

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Banned by Facebook: Trump campaign ad employed pro-fascist symbol in attack on antifa

Banned by Facebook: Trump campaign ad employed pro-fascist symbol in attack on antifa

CNN reports: Facebook on Thursday said it had taken action against ads run by President Trump’s re-election campaign for breaching its policies on hate. The ads, which attacked what the Trump campaign described as “Dangerous MOBS of far-left groups,” featured an upside-down triangle. The Anti-Defamation League said Thursday the triangle “is practically identical to that used by the Nazi regime to classify political prisoners in concentration camps.” “We removed these posts and ads for violating our policy against organized hate….

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Bolton: Trump’s not ‘fit for office,’ doesn’t have ‘competence to carry out the job’

Bolton: Trump’s not ‘fit for office,’ doesn’t have ‘competence to carry out the job’

ABC News reports: President Donald Trump is not “fit for office” and doesn’t have “the competence to carry out the job,” his former national security adviser John Bolton told ABC News in an exclusive interview. In an explosive new book about his 17 months at the White House, Bolton characterizes Trump as “stunningly uninformed,” ignorant of basic facts and easily manipulated by foreign adversaries. But his assessment that Trump is not “fit” to be president is among the most stunning…

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Rising Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations underscore the long road ahead

Rising Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations underscore the long road ahead

STAT reports: The U.S. is now confronting what public health experts have been warning about but many in the public had not absorbed: the coronavirus pandemic will be with us for many months, and lapses in vigilance will lead to more sickness and death. The country as a whole is tacking on about 20,000 new Covid-19 cases to its 2.1 million infection tally each day, a clip that’s been steady for weeks, according to STAT’s Covid-19 Tracker. But cases are…

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Emissions are surging back as countries and states reopen

Emissions are surging back as countries and states reopen

The New York Times reports: After a drastic decline this spring, global greenhouse gas emissions are now rebounding sharply, scientists reported, as countries relax their coronavirus lockdowns and traffic surges back onto roads. It’s a stark reminder that even as the pandemic rages, the world is still far from getting global warming under control. In early April, daily fossil fuel emissions worldwide were roughly 17 percent lower than they were in 2019, as governments ordered people to stay home, employees…

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Elite CIA unit that developed hacking tools failed to secure its own systems, allowing massive leak

Elite CIA unit that developed hacking tools failed to secure its own systems, allowing massive leak

The Washington Post reports: The theft of top-secret computer hacking tools from the CIA in 2016 was the result of a workplace culture in which the agency’s elite computer hackers “prioritized building cyber weapons at the expense of securing their own systems,” according to an internal report prepared for then-director Mike Pompeo as well as his deputy, Gina Haspel, now the director. The breach — allegedly committed by a CIA employee — was discovered a year after it happened, when…

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