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White House task force report says 18 states in coronavirus ‘red zone’ should roll back reopening

White House task force report says 18 states in coronavirus ‘red zone’ should roll back reopening

CNN reports: An unpublished document prepared for the White House coronavirus task force and obtained by the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit newsroom, recommends that 18 states in the coronavirus “red zone” for cases should roll back reopening measures amid surging cases. The “red zone” is defined in the 359-page report as “those core-based statistical areas (CBSAs) and counties that during the last week reported both new cases above 100 per 100,000 population, and a diagnostic test positivity result…

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Colorado’s police now have a legal incentive to think before they act

Colorado’s police now have a legal incentive to think before they act

The Atlantic reports: In Loveland, Colorado—the nation’s self-proclaimed “Sweetheart City,” about an hour’s drive north of Denver—a young police officer paused earlier this month as he was arresting a pregnant woman who had outstanding warrants. Should he handcuff her, the officer asked his supervisors, or, under a new Colorado policing law, would that now be considered excessive force? To officers like Rob Pride, a Loveland patrol sergeant who relayed that example to me last week, that kind of hesitation is…

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White supremacy was her world. Then she left

White supremacy was her world. Then she left

Seyward Darby writes: Hate always exists, but it surges during periods of social upheaval, offering racist explanations for seismic change. The Ku Klux Klan formed after the Civil War and reached its zenith in the 1920s, in an expanding, diversifying country. “Its allures were manifold,” the historian Linda Gordon writes of the Klan. “They included the rewards of being an insider, of belonging to a community, of expressing and acting on resentments, of participating in drama, of feeling religiously and…

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Netanyahu’s annexation plan turning into fiasco

Netanyahu’s annexation plan turning into fiasco

Al Monitor reports: “Right now, I put the chances of Israeli annexation of any part of the West Bank at low to nonexistent,” a top Israeli security official told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity. “There are too many conditions and circumstances that have to occur and ripen before that can happen.” The first condition is a green light from Washington, which is currently nowhere in sight. US President Donald Trump appears to have lost interest in the issue he so…

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How the first Americans made their way from Siberia to Patagonia

How the first Americans made their way from Siberia to Patagonia

Gillen D’Arcy Wood writes: In the summer of 1977, on a field trip in northern Patagonia, the American archaeologist Tom Dillehay made a stunning discovery. Digging by a creek in a nondescript scrubland called Monte Verde, in southern Chile, he came upon the remains of an ancient camp. A full excavation uncovered the trace wooden foundations of no fewer than 12 huts, plus one larger structure designed for tool manufacture and perhaps as an infirmary. In the large hut, Dillehay…

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CDC says U.S. could get coronavirus under control in one to two months if everyone wears a mask

CDC says U.S. could get coronavirus under control in one to two months if everyone wears a mask

CNBC reports: The United States could get the coronavirus pandemic under control in one to two months if every American wore a mask, a top Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official said Tuesday. “The time is now,” Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the CDC, said during an interview with the Journal of the American Medical Association’s Dr. Howard Bauchner. “I think if we could get everybody to wear a mask right now I think in four, six, eight weeks…

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Love is medicine for fear

Love is medicine for fear

Arthur C. Brooks writes: We are living in a time of fear. The coronavirus pandemic has threatened our lives, health, and economy in ways most Americans have never experienced. We have no idea what the future will bring. According to the American Psychological Association’s annual “Stress in America” survey, the percentage of people in the U.S. who say that “the future of our nation is a significant source of stress” rose to 83 percent in June 2020, up from 63…

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Coronavirus data has already disappeared after Trump administration shifted control from CDC

Coronavirus data has already disappeared after Trump administration shifted control from CDC

CNBC reports: Previously public data has already disappeared from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s website after the Trump administration quietly shifted control of the information to the Department of Health and Human Services. Since the pandemic began, the CDC regularly published data on availability of hospital beds and intensive care units across the country. But Ryan Panchadsaram, who helps run a data-tracking site called Covid Exit Strategy, said that when he tried to collect the data from the…

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Trump weakens environmental law to speed up permits for pipelines and other infrastructure

Trump weakens environmental law to speed up permits for pipelines and other infrastructure

CNBC reports: President Donald Trump on Wednesday finalized a rollback to the country’s landmark environmental law, the National Environmental Policy Act, by speeding up approval for federal projects like pipelines, highways and power plants. NEPA was signed into law by President Richard Nixon 50 years ago and requires federal agencies to consider the environmental consequences of infrastructure projects before they are approved. The law has also been vital in allowing communities to weigh in on how such projects impact climate…

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‘Outright lies’: Voting misinformation flourishes on Facebook

‘Outright lies’: Voting misinformation flourishes on Facebook

By Ryan McCarthy, ProPublica, July 16, 2020 On April 3, Terrence K. Williams, a politically conservative actor and comedian who’s been praised by President Donald Trump, assured his nearly 3 million followers on Facebook that Democrats would light ballots on fire or throw them away. Wearing a red “Keep America Great” hat, Williams declared, “If you mail in your vote, your vote will be in Barack Obama’s fireplace.” The video has been viewed more than 350,000 times. On May 8,…

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Coronavirus responses highlight how humans are hardwired to dismiss facts that don’t fit their worldview

Coronavirus responses highlight how humans are hardwired to dismiss facts that don’t fit their worldview

The more politicized an issue, the harder it is for people to absorb contradictory evidence. Drew Angerer/Getty Images News via Getty Images By Adrian Bardon, Wake Forest University Bemoaning uneven individual and state compliance with public health recommendations, top U.S. COVID-19 adviser Anthony Fauci recently blamed the country’s ineffective pandemic response on an American “anti-science bias.” He called this bias “inconceivable,” because “science is truth.” Fauci compared those discounting the importance of masks and social distancing to “anti-vaxxers” in their…

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Is the Saudi government plotting against another U.S.-based critic?

Is the Saudi government plotting against another U.S.-based critic?

Dexter Filkins reports: In early May, officials with the C.I.A. reached out to Ali Soufan, a former F.B.I. agent who served as a lead investigator in the months before the September 11th attacks, to say they had learned that Al Qaeda militants were plotting against him. The officials asked Soufan not to disclose many details, but, he told me, “The information was specific enough that they felt that they had to inform me.” Two weeks later, Soufan, who lives in…

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Methane rises to highest level on record

Methane rises to highest level on record

The Guardian reports: Animal farming and fossil fuels have driven global emissions of the potent greenhouse gas methane to the highest level on record, putting the world on track for dangerously increased heat levels of 3C to 4C. Since 2000 discharges of the odourless, colourless gas have risen by more than 50m tonnes a year, equivalent to 350m cars or double the total emissions of Germany or France, according to the latest Methane Budget study by a global team of…

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In historic move, Asheville, North Carolina approves reparations for Black residents

In historic move, Asheville, North Carolina approves reparations for Black residents

Asheville Citizen Times reports: In an extraordinary move, the Asheville City Council has apologized for the North Carolina city’s historic role in slavery, discrimination and denial of basic liberties to Black residents and voted to provide reparations to them and their descendants. The 7-0 vote came the night of July 14. “Hundreds of years of Black blood spilled that basically fills the cup we drink from today,” said Councilman Keith Young, one of two African American members of the body…

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