Japanese manufacturers' confidence sank in the second quarter to levels not seen since the 2009 global financial crisis, underscoring the damage the coronavirus pandemic inflicted on the export-reliant economy.
A plan to allow supporters back into football matches in Rio de Janeiro from July 10 could be canceled if authorities cannot guarantee the safety of fans and officials, the city's mayor said on Tuesday.
Hong Kong marks the 23rd anniversary of its handover to China on Wednesday under the glare of a new national security law imposed by Beijing, with protests banned and the city's cherished freedoms looking increasingly fragile.
Emmanuel Adebayor has left Olimpia after less than five months at the club due to complications thrown up by the new coronavirus, the Paraguayan side said on Tuesday.
Asian stocks were set for a bumpy start to the second half of the year on Wednesday as optimism about a global economic recovery from the pandemic jousted with signs in the United States the health crisis may not yet be past its peak.
A plan to allow supporters back into football matches in Rio de Janeiro from July 10 could be canceled if authorities cannot guarantee the safety of fans and officials, the city's mayor said on Tuesday.
Emmanuel Adebayor has left Olimpia after less than five months at the club due to complications thrown up by the new coronavirus, the Paraguayan side said on Tuesday.
Hong Kong marks the 23rd anniversary of its handover to China on Wednesday under the glare of a new national security law imposed by Beijing, with protests banned and the city's cherished freedoms looking increasingly fragile.
Hong Kong marks the 23rd anniversary of its handover to China on Wednesday under the glare of a new national security law imposed by Beijing, with protests banned and the city's cherished freedoms looking increasingly fragile.
ISTANBUL: Turkey will try the 20 suspects in the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi – including two former aides to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman – in absentia on Friday (Jul 3), his fiancee told AFP on Tuesday. Khashoggi, 59, a Riyadh critic commentator who wrote for The ...
A plan to allow supporters back into football matches in Rio de Janeiro from July 10 could be canceled if authorities cannot guarantee the safety of fans and officials, the city's mayor said on Tuesday.
Emmanuel Adebayor has left Olimpia after less than five months at the club due to complications thrown up by the new coronavirus, the Paraguayan side said on Tuesday.
Hundreds of Facebook profiles said to be part of a “violent anti-government network” linked to the loose-knit “boogaloo” movement have been permanently deleted, the latest in a wave of mass bans targeting the political right.
Some 220 accounts, 106 groups and 28 pages were scrubbed from Facebook on Tuesday, the company said in a statement, alleging they were tied to a “dangerous organization” that had carried out real acts of violence. Ninety-five accounts on Facebook-owned Instagram also got the boot.
“This violent network is banned from having a presence on our platform and we will remove content praising, supporting or representing it,” Facebook said in announcing the decision.
Acts of real-world violence and our investigations into them are what led us to identify and designate this distinct network.
The accounts in question were “actively promoting violence against civilians, law enforcement and government officials,” the company went on, adding that they had worked to recruit others within the “broader boogaloo movement,” a loosely organized group of activists who see civil conflict as inevitable and prepare for a coming societal collapse. Though the movement – largely based online and heavily steeped in meme culture – has been widely tarred as “far-right” and “extremist,” its members have an eclectic range of views, including libertarians and conservatives as well as more militant nationalists and even neo-Nazis.
While Facebook cited no specific examples of real-world violence from the group – which derives its name from a 1984 breakdancing flick, ‘Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo’ – a number of alleged members have been accused of carrying out attacks on police and conspiring to destroy government property amid ongoing protests over the law enforcement killing of George Floyd, among other things. Direct affiliation to the group has not been clear in all cases, however.
The Facebook bans come amid a renewed push to cleanse social media platforms of conservatives and those right-of-center, with similar purges on Monday targeting pro-Trump accounts on Twitch and Reddit, as well as a number of other right-leaning figures on YouTube. Such mass-bans have become commonplace in recent years, at times appearing coordinated across different platforms.
Facebook drew heated criticism following the deletions, with a number of netizens asking why Antifa-linked accounts – a decentralized grouping of radical leftists who often engage in violent ‘direct action’ at protests – still had not seen a similar purge.
Why don’t they move the hundreds of #Antifa pages? 💁🏻♂️ Facebook removes hundreds of boogaloo accounts for ‘promoting violence’ in coordinated takedown https://t.co/vCn91jJmTo
While Facebook claimed to distinguish between the wider boogaloo movement and particular individuals inciting violence, keyword-based algorithmic bans appear to have already swept up unrelated accounts – perhaps a harbinger of things to come. One user who said he had never heard of the group was nonetheless caught up in the purge, stating he merely belonged to a Facebook group that parodied the same film title.
Yeah, well, it looks like @Facebook's algorithm did a bad job at implementing this ban. I've never heard of this group, and yet they purged my account with no warning for being part of a five-year-old group devoted to... no joke... LARPing. "LARPing 2: Electric Boogaloo." Sad.
US President Donald Trump’s plan to draw down the US contingent in Germany has been set in motion, with the Pentagon saying that 9,500 troops out of 34,500 stationed there will be removed pending consultations with allies.
“The Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff briefed the President yesterday on plans to redeploy 9,500 troops from Germany,” Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said in a statement on Tuesday, noting that the proposal had already been approved.
The plan to scale back the US military presence in Germany was made public by Trump earlier this month. He did not reveal the timeline for the withdrawal, and it was not immediately clear where they would be heading. The US contingent in Germany is expected to be slashed by 9,500 troops, meaning that Washington will still have a sizable 25,000-strong presence there.
Trump said that the pullout was in response to Berlin falling short of meeting a 2 percent GDP threshold in NATO defense spending, which was agreed back under the Obama administration. Although only eight countries so far have met the target, Trump directed his anger at Berlin, calling it “delinquent” in its payments to NATO and arguing that the country owes “billions” to the US-led military alliance.
While Trump’s critics used the looming withdrawal to pounce on the Republican president, accusing him of pandering to Russia, Trump has pointed out that while “some” of the released forces “will be coming home,” the rest will be redeployed to “other places.”
Although Hoffman did not mention where the troops would be “redeployed,” saying only that the plan “will also enhance Russian deterrence, strengthen NATO” and “reassure Allies,” the most likely destination is believed to be Poland, which has already expressed interest in hosting the US troops.
During a recent visit to Washington, Polish President Andrzej Duda said that Warsaw asked the US to not remove the troops from Europe at all, instead relocating them to Poland to fend off “Russian aggression.” Trump agreed that Poland indeed “would be one” of the places in Europe where the US troops would be heading, but that some would “come home.”
There have been few details about the timeline and the scenario of the removal, with the Pentagon promising to provide “timely updates to potentially affected personnel, their families and communities as planning progresses.”
With uncertainty reigning over the future of the German contingent, there has been growing opposition to the plan in Congress, not just from the Democrats but from Trump’s own party. Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-Texas), ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee, said Tuesday that he expects an amendment to be introduced in the committee to stall the drawdown.
In a separate move, a bipartisan group of lawmakers led by Senator Mitt Romney (R-Utah) prepared an amendment that, if passed, would see the funds earmarked for the redeployment to be frozen until the secretary of defense “verifies” to Congress that the pullout would not hurt NATO, US military operations or the personnel.
Hoffman said that the Pentagon will be “briefing this plan to the congressional defense committees in the coming weeks,” before reaching out to NATO allies.
Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan sent heavy machinery to remove concrete barricades around the CHOP ‘autonomous zone’ and called for a probe of a council member, after protesters showed up outside her residence.
Under the cover of rain on Tuesday, vehicles operated by city workers removed the barricades set up around the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest (CHOP, formerly known as CHAZ), an area spanning several blocks of downtown Seattle under control of protesters – including Black Lives Matter, Antifa and anarchists – since early June.
#BREAKING: Seattle Police just showed here at #CHOP with SDOT.
Unlike Friday’s attempt to dismantle the barricades, which ended with city workers retreating after a two-hour standoff, there were no protesters physically blocking the machinery this time. Instead, they moved furniture, bins and other objects into the street afterward, according to KIRO-TV reporter Deedee Sun.
CHOP protesters objected to the removal because “barricades save lives,” Sun reported, noting that they objected to their original deployment by the city two weeks prior. Critics of CHOP had also been opposed, saying the city was basically aiding and abetting the rioters.
Mayor Durkan had initially approved of the “autonomous zone” centered around the abandoned East Precinct police station, calling it a “summer of love” and proof of Seattle’s “democracy.” Then two African-American men were killed, and two more critically injured, in a series of shootings a week apart.
The proverbial last straw, however, seems to have been the appearance of protesters outside of Durkan’s residence. Noting that her address has been kept confidential since she was a US attorney in Seattle during the Obama administration, Durkan accused the protesters of putting “families and children at risk."
The stunt led the mayor to denounce Councilmember Kshama Sawant, a socialist who has joined forces with the protesters. Durkan has now asked the council to investigate Sawant over allowing protesters into City Hall earlier this month, encouraging the occupation of the East Precinct to begin with, and finally leading the protesters to Durkan’s residence.
Sawant responded by admitting that she “marched, rallied, and organized” with the local community – including her office staff – in the name of racial, environmental and economic justice, accusing Durkan of having “utterly failed working people and communities of color in this city.”
She further accused the mayor of being a “corporate politician desperately looking to distract from her failures of leadership and politically bankrupt administration,” having once been a progressive ally. Sawant echoed the demands of the protesters to reverse “racist gentrification,” de-fund the city police, and fund the Green New Deal instead.
Just remember: As Durkan calls out Sawant, as Sawant calls out Durkan, as Sawant and Gonzalez deflect blame for violence in #CHOP, as the city tells people to leave CHOP but doesn't make them ...
CHOP/CHAZ was initially described as a peaceful protest against police brutality over the death of George Floyd in Minnesota. It has resulted in two homicides in under a month so far; that’s how many were recorded in the entire Capitol Hill neighborhood in all of 2019.
Seattle councilmembers say we should reject any claim #CHOP plays a role in the recent violence seen on Capitol Hill. Here's some perspective. @SeattlePD crime stats point to 2 homicides in Cap Hill in all of 2019. There have been 2 homicides in Cap Hill the past 10 days #Q13FOXpic.twitter.com/CbwIC6ir6y
Mexican airline Aeromexico said on Tuesday it had begun a voluntary process of restructuring under Chapter 11 proceedings but was sticking to its goals of boosting operations in the coming weeks.
ISTANBUL: Turkey will try the 20 suspects in the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi – including two former aides to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman – in absentia on Friday (Jul 3), his fiancee told AFP on Tuesday. Khashoggi, 59, a Riyadh critic commentator who wrote for The ...
The European Union hopes to reach a deal this year on a law to make its climate targets irreversible, the bloc's energy chief said on Tuesday, amid concerns that talks between countries could drag into 2021.
Ryanair expects to fly more than 4.5 million passengers in July as it returns to a more regular schedule with 40per cent of its usual capacity for the peak summer month, it said on Wednesday.
Mexican airline Aeromexico said on Tuesday it had begun a voluntary process of restructuring under Chapter 11 proceedings but was sticking to its goals of boosting operations in the coming weeks.
ISTANBUL: Turkey will try the 20 suspects in the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi – including two former aides to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman – in absentia on Friday (Jul 3), his fiancee told AFP on Tuesday. Khashoggi, 59, a Riyadh critic commentator who wrote for The ...
The European Union hopes to reach a deal this year on a law to make its climate targets irreversible, the bloc's energy chief said on Tuesday, amid concerns that talks between countries could drag into 2021.
Ryanair expects to fly more than 4.5 million passengers in July as it returns to a more regular schedule with 40per cent of its usual capacity for the peak summer month, it said on Wednesday.
MEXICO CITY: Mexico has arrested a man linked to the suspected massacre of 43 students who went missing in 2014 in Guerrero state, a government source told AFP on Monday (Jun 29). The students' disappearance became a symbol of the gruesome violence blighting the country, as well as - many claimed ...
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti on Monday announced he was taking a "hard pause" on when movie theaters in the city can reopen, citing an increase in coronavirus cases.
WELLINGTON: The annual APEC summit of Asia-Pacific leaders will be virtual next year to avoid travel risks associated with the global coronavirus pandemic, 2021 hosts New Zealand said Tuesday (Jun 30). Foreign Minister Winston Peters said holding the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit online ...
China's factory activity expanded at a faster pace in June, beating expectations, as the economy continues to recover after the government lifted strict lockdowns and ramped up investment, but weak global demand is likely to be a drag on growth.
Social media site Reddit on Monday shut down r/The_Donald, a forum which long served as a popular online home base for fans of President Donald Trump, saying it violated the site's hate speech rules.
The Formula One season roars into action at the Austrian Grand Prix in Spielberg this weekend with "military-like", coronavirus-busting sanitary regulations.
WELLINGTON: The annual APEC summit of Asia-Pacific leaders will be virtual next year to avoid travel risks associated with the global coronavirus pandemic, 2021 hosts New Zealand said Tuesday (Jun 30). Foreign Minister Winston Peters said holding the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit online ...
Social media site Reddit on Monday shut down r/The_Donald, a forum which long served as a popular online home base for fans of President Donald Trump, saying it violated the site's hate speech rules.
Filmmaker Christopher Nolan has stoked rage online after it emerged that he doesn’t allow actors to use chairs on his sets. Apparently running out of stars to denounce, cancel-happy netizens did not take the news sitting down.
The director’s name came up during a webchat for Variety’s ‘Actors on Actors’ on Monday, in which stars Anne Hathaway and Hugh Jackman discussed the style of various filmmakers, eventually coming to rules on set, with Hathaway noting that Nolan allows neither phones nor chairs.
“Chris also doesn’t allow chairs. I worked with him twice,” she said. “His reasoning is, if you have chairs, people will sit, and if they’re sitting, they’re not working.”
I mean, he has these incredible movies in terms of scope and ambition and technical prowess and emotion. It always arrives at the end under schedule and under budget. I think he’s onto something with the chair thing.
For every idiot that thinks the Christopher Nolan-chairs story is a thing, witness Hugh Jackman, who played the lead in a Nolan film, expressing surprise at this ‘revelation’. https://t.co/LzbOqrBb2j
Though Hathaway gave a nod to the director’s methods – while Jackman, who has also worked with Nolan, appeared outright surprised to hear about the chair ban – netizens rushed to the actors’ rescue, dubbing Nolan an “ableist” and even a “racist” for good measure.
So not only is Nolan a racist with his whitewashed, Dunkirk movie. But he's also an ableist with his no chair rules. Fuck that man. https://t.co/wPWf7zaKWt
Not only does Christopher Nolan want you to risk your life to see #Tenet in theaters because he's a greedo, he bans chairs from his sets for cruel & arbitrary reasons.https://t.co/tW8GVwWxYK
— Matthew Catania #SaveLodge49 (@MattTheCatania) June 29, 2020
“Think about how this affects the people he works with. How it limits the range of people who can work with him,” one critic said, while another suggested“Christopher Nolan won't hire you if you have any type of physical disability. Got it.”
Skeptics soon showed up to rain on the parade, however, with some in the film industry arguing Nolan’s point about chairs on set is “kinda true.”
“People laughing at the fact that Christopher Nolan doesn’t allow chairs on sets because people won’t work, but as someone who works in the industry it’s kinda true... I’ve seen a lot of people who just sit down and sit on their phones,”said filmmaker Rebecca Winkler.
Others noted that the outrage was blown far out of proportion, questioning why anyone would be up in arms that “stars are treated like every other working class Joe.” Some even cast doubt on the claim itself, arguing Nolan does not, in fact, maintain a standing rule on chairs.
Lol people are reading WAY too much into this. Nolan does allow chairs on set and people are sitting all the time, even in his most recent movies.
— Logically Preston ❼ (@PrestonTheSnack) June 29, 2020
man the worst y’all got is that the man doesn’t allow chairs on set ? shoot if I had the opportunity, i’d still work in one of Nolan’s pictures any day
Of course, as always, given such an opportunity the internet did not fail to deliver on the memes, many envisioning Nolan flying into a rage at the mere sight of a seat.
Safe-haven currencies were on the back foot on Tuesday as hopes of an economic turnaround boosted stock prices while sterling was under pressure after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson promised a "Rooseveltian" boost to public spending.
Alphabet Inc's Google said on Monday that it had removed search ads that charged users searching for voting information large fees for voter registration or harvested their personal data.
SINGAPORE: The stage is set for Nomination Day, when Singapore residents will find out who is standing in their constituency and what the hot seats will be this General Election. Aspiring candidates must submit their nomination papers at one of nine schools assigned for the purpose before noon on ...
Asian markets were poised to follow Wall Street's firm lead on Tuesday as the sentiment boost from upbeat U.S. data outweighed the threat of rising COVID-19 infections in the world's largest economy.
Safe-haven currencies were on the back foot on Tuesday as hopes of an economic turnaround boosted stock prices while sterling was under pressure after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson promised a "Rooseveltian" boost to public spending.
Alphabet Inc's Google said on Monday that it had removed search ads that charged users searching for voting information large fees for voter registration or harvested their personal data.
SINGAPORE: The stage is set for Nomination Day, when Singapore residents will find out who is standing in their constituency and what the hot seats will be this General Election. Aspiring candidates must submit their nomination papers at one of nine schools assigned for the purpose before noon on ...
Asian markets were poised to follow Wall Street's firm lead on Tuesday as the sentiment boost from upbeat U.S. data outweighed the threat of rising COVID-19 infections in the world's largest economy.
The New York Times story accusing Russia of offering bounties for killing US troops in Afghanistan relied on unconfirmed intelligence from an ongoing investigation, which is now impossible to finish, a congressman has revealed.
“The blood is on their hands,” Rep. Jim Banks (R-Indiana) tweeted on Monday, after attending a briefing with top intelligence officials at the White House. The Times, he said, “used unconfirmed intel in an ONGOING investigation into targeted killing of American soldiers in order to smear the President.”
The real scandal: We’ll likely never know the truth… Because the @nytimes used unconfirmed intel in an ONGOING investigation into targeted killing of American soldiers in order to smear the President. The blood is on their hands.
Banks, who sits on the House Armed Services Committee as well as its Subcommittee on Intelligence, Emerging Threats and Capabilities – presumably the reason he was invited to the briefing – said it was now “impossible to finish the investigation” due to the story, and all because the Times “will do anything to damage” President Donald Trump, even if it means compromising national security.
The story, which appeared in the Times on Friday evening, relied on anonymous sources claiming that Trump had been briefed in March about a Russian spy unit offering bounties for the death of US troops in Afghanistan to the Taliban or “armed criminal elements closely associated” with them.
Trump denied this, and denounced the story as “probably just another phony Times hit job, just like their failed Russia Hoax.”
Indeed, it took no time at all for Trump’s critics to accuse him of being “Putin’s puppet” or “colluding” with Russia – same as they have for the past four years, through the evidence-free ‘Russiagate’ conspiracy theory.
Banks even brought that up in his Twitter thread, condemning “many in the media and Congress” for rushing to judgment and urging Americans to “treat anonymously sourced [Times] stories about Russia [with] skepticism.”
As if to prove his point, Banks received a flood of replies from online #Resistance activists accusing him of treason, being in the pay of Russia, and repeating Russiagate talking points.
Even though the Times story was filled with qualifiers such as “assessed” and “believed to” and “linked,” its basic claim was quickly adopted as established fact by other US media outlets, from the Washington Post and CNN onward.
That Moscow denied the whole thing as absolutely preposterous and pointed out it sounded tailor-made to derail the US withdrawal from a 19-year war in Afghanistan only made them believe it more. Nor was there any skepticism about the revelation that the story about the bounties was at least in part based on “confessions” of Afghan prisoners, presumably under torture.
Earlier on Monday, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany was barraged with questions not about the veracity of the Times report, but on why Trump hasn’t acted on the briefing he allegedly received. Her explanation that he was never briefed because the allegations amounted to unverified intelligence – just as Banks said – was met with indignation from reporters.
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WASHINGTON, DC: Researchers in China have discovered a new type of swine flu that is capable of triggering a pandemic, according to a study published on Monday (Jun 29) in the US science journal PNAS. Named G4, it is genetically descended from the H1N1 strain that caused a pandemic in 2009. It ...
The federal court of Canada on Monday dismissed a plea by drugmakers challenging the Canadian government's new regulations aimed at lowering prices of patented drugs that could potentially lead them to lose billions over a decade.
WASHINGTON, DC: Researchers in China have discovered a new type of swine flu that is capable of triggering a pandemic, according to a study published on Monday (Jun 29) in the US science journal PNAS. Named G4, it is genetically descended from the H1N1 strain that caused a pandemic in 2009. It ...
The federal court of Canada on Monday dismissed a plea by drugmakers challenging the Canadian government's new regulations aimed at lowering prices of patented drugs that could potentially lead them to lose billions over a decade.
With its coronavirus outbreak defeated, Taiwan hosted one of the few pride marches around the world on Sunday as the island's LGTBQ community and their supporters took to the streets.
Japan's SoftBank Group Corp said on Monday it will repurchase up to 200 billion yen (US$1.9 billion) of its domestic unsecured corporate bonds from June 30 to July 17, part of its plan to pay down debt.
With its coronavirus outbreak defeated, Taiwan hosted one of the few pride marches around the world on Sunday as the island's LGTBQ community and their supporters took to the streets.
Each night that Nha Vy steps proudly on stage in her traditional Vietnamese ao dai, or sometimes mini dress and heels, memories grow fainter of the taunts she endured as a transgender woman in her rural village.
LONDON: Prime Minister Boris Johnson will set out plans for a 10-year rebuilding programme for schools in England on Monday (Jun 29), part of government efforts to help Britain "bounce back" from the coronavirus crisis. Johnson, whose popularity has flagged over his government's handling of the ...
JACKSON: Lawmakers in Mississippi voted on Sunday (Jun 28) to remove the Confederate battle standard from the state flag, after nationwide protests drew renewed attention to symbols of the United States' racist past. The measure passed with a 91-23 majority vote in the House of Representatives ...
Real Madrid's Karim Benzema produced an audacious back-heeled assist for Casemiro to score as they beat Espanyol 1-0 away on Sunday to capitalise on Barcelona's slip-up a day earlier and move two points clear at the top of La Liga.
Third-placed Inter Milan scored twice in the last six minutes through Stefan De Vrij and Alessandro Bastoni to snatch a 2-1 win at Parma in Serie A on Sunday despite a subdued display.
The scenes of thousands of people marching in Chicago in a joint Pride and Black Lives Matter parade have raised some questions about double standards in reporting and enforcing social distancing rules amid Covid-19 pandemic.
Even though officially Chicago's annual Pride Parade has been canceled due to Covid-19 concerns, massive crowds nevertheless gathered on Sunday in the Lakeview neighborhood and marched Uptown to “reclaim Pride.”
I thought the media said mass gatherings were going to kill us all? “Murder,” they said.... https://t.co/kVqqbxt0ik
Aerial footage of the packed event has drawn much criticism from those opposing the harsh lockdown measures, and the apparent double standards in enforcing them. Local authorities and mainstream media were blasted for closing their eyes or even ‘encouraging’ particular gatherings, while painting the rest as a dangerous breach of social distancing.
Perhaps people are opposed to prolonging covid lockdowns because elected officials don’t consistently enforce their own rules pic.twitter.com/t2S29DkINB
Some tried to ridicule the critics, however, insisting that the law-abiding participants of the march were all wearing masks, and arguing that the risk of contracting the virus outdoors is much lower.
Maaaaaaybe it’s because there’s little to no evidence protests spread the virus because most people wore masks and it was outside and people are mad because the virus is spreading in southern states where people are dining indoors and refusing to wear masks
Crowded mass protests against racism and police brutality sparked in hundreds of cities by the death of George Floyd have probably played some role in the recent jump in cases, with demonstrators largely defying social distancing guidelines.
Media coverage of the rise in infections, however, has focused almost exclusively on those gathering at bars and beaches (as well as Trump rallies and anti-lockdown protests), while virtually ignoring the massive BLM marches as a potential factor.
Yup- it's the world's first first WOKE virus.
It was killing more black people than white a few weeks ago, but then it found out that blacks have been subject to years of systematic racism, so it stopped infecting them altogether.
Even the scientists agree on that!!
Though some of the recent increases may be explained by ramped-up screenings for the virus, some health experts have cautioned that a boost in testing does not account for the full spike, arguing that outbreaks are, in fact, accelerating.
Amazing investigative journalism: 7 days after Trumps 9k rally, you can point to increased COVID cases from it. 3 weeks post protests involving 100s of k’s in multiple cities and you can find no evidence there is any increase in COVID from them.
To date, the virus has killed over 125,000 people in the US, roughly a quarter of the global death toll of 500,000, and there are fears that the spike in new infections could undo a falling trend in fatalities.
Real Madrid's Karim Benzema produced an audacious back-heeled assist for Casemiro to score as they beat Espanyol 1-0 away on Sunday to capitalise on Barcelona's slip-up a day earlier and move two points clear at the top of La Liga.
Each night that Nha Vy steps proudly on stage in her traditional Vietnamese ao dai, or sometimes mini dress and heels, memories grow fainter of the taunts she endured as a transgender woman in her rural village.
Third-placed Inter Milan scored twice in the last six minutes through Stefan De Vrij and Alessandro Bastoni to snatch a 2-1 win at Parma in Serie A on Sunday despite a subdued display.
Japan's SoftBank Group Corp said on Monday it will repurchase up to 200 billion yen (US$1.9 billion) of its domestic unsecured corporate bonds from June 30 to July 17, part of its plan to pay down debt.
LONDON: Prime Minister Boris Johnson will set out plans for a 10-year rebuilding programme for schools in England on Monday (Jun 29), part of government efforts to help Britain "bounce back" from the coronavirus crisis. Johnson, whose popularity has flagged over his government's handling of the ...
JACKSON: Lawmakers in Mississippi voted on Sunday (Jun 28) to remove the Confederate battle standard from the state flag, after nationwide protests drew renewed attention to symbols of the United States' racist past. The measure passed with a 91-23 majority vote in the House of Representatives ...
Real Madrid's Karim Benzema produced an audacious back-heeled assist for Casemiro to score as they beat Espanyol 1-0 away on Sunday to capitalise on Barcelona's slip-up a day earlier and move two points clear at the top of La Liga.
Each night that Nha Vy steps proudly on stage in her traditional Vietnamese ao dai, or sometimes mini dress and heels, memories grow fainter of the taunts she endured as a transgender woman in her rural village.
Third-placed Inter Milan scored twice in the last six minutes through Stefan De Vrij and Alessandro Bastoni to snatch a 2-1 win at Parma in Serie A on Sunday despite a subdued display.
Japan's SoftBank Group Corp said on Monday it will repurchase up to 200 billion yen (US$1.9 billion) of its domestic unsecured corporate bonds from June 30 to July 17, part of its plan to pay down debt.
LONDON: Prime Minister Boris Johnson will set out plans for a 10-year rebuilding programme for schools in England on Monday (Jun 29), part of government efforts to help Britain "bounce back" from the coronavirus crisis. Johnson, whose popularity has flagged over his government's handling of the ...
JACKSON: Lawmakers in Mississippi voted on Sunday (Jun 28) to remove the Confederate battle standard from the state flag, after nationwide protests drew renewed attention to symbols of the United States' racist past. The measure passed with a 91-23 majority vote in the House of Representatives ...
Real Madrid's Karim Benzema produced an audacious back-heeled assist for Casemiro to score as they beat Espanyol 1-0 away on Sunday to capitalise on Barcelona's slip-up a day earlier and move two points clear at the top of La Liga.
Third-placed Inter Milan scored twice in the last six minutes through Stefan De Vrij and Alessandro Bastoni to snatch a 2-1 win at Parma in Serie A on Sunday despite a subdued display.
In its drive to debunk the latest Trump-fact, the Washington Post has published an exposé saying that not all, but just 17 out of 20 most dangerous US cities are Democrat-run. Readers weren’t impressed by the desperate nitpicking.
The newspaper ran a long piece digging into Donald Trump’s remarks in which the president noted a correlation between party affiliation of mayors and city “danger” levels, claiming that the entire Top-20 are run by the Democrats.
“Every one of them is Democrat run. Twenty out of 20. The 20 worst, the 20 most dangerous are Democrat run,” Trump said on Thursday. Admitting it was not entirely clear what exactly Trump meant by the “most dangerous,” the newspaper turned to FBI statistics on violent crime, trying to challenge his claim.
And indeed, according to the charts, ‘only’ 17 out of 20 cities with the highest number of crimes are run by Democrats – while one is actually administered by a Republican! In per capita terms, Trump’s remark turned out to be even more accurate (or less inaccurate?), with only one out of twenty cities being run by an independent mayor.
For tweet embedding purposes, here is the graph cited in The Washington Post's report titled: “Trump keeps claiming that the most dangerous cities in America are all run by Democrats. They aren’t.” pic.twitter.com/FeAskhbnDM
While the figures have somewhat defeated the very purpose of the exposé, the Washington Post still pushed through with its narrative explaining why the Dem mayors are not to blame. Hidden behind the paywall, the article explained that urban areas are universally known to have higher crime rates, while at the same time, the population of the US cities also has shown a strong pro-Democrat sentiment, thus the amount of Democratic community leaders cannot be surprising.
While the headline of the article is ‘technically’ accurate, it did not stop a wave of online mockery that followed. Many took jabs at both the newspaper and the author of the piece for spectacularly failing at proving their own point.
They show graphs that completely destroy the argument they tried to make.
— Send in the Psychos (@Crimson__Edge) June 27, 2020
Still, some jokingly commended the WaPo’s effort in delivering yet another anti-Trump piece no matter what.
It was almost like they realized it was a face plant, but “hey we put in a lot of time into this, it would be a waste just to toss it in the bin.... run it!”
— 🇺🇸 Banana Republican 😐 (@JustScottNJ) June 27, 2020
Snopes level bs. "Trump claimed all violent cities were run by Dems, but our research showed that it was only 95%, not 100; thus, the President perpetuates lies"
Fact-checking and nitpicking Trump’s statements has long been one of the favorite hobbies of mainstream pundits. However, while looking into what a politician actually has to say is definitely worthwhile, most Trump ‘fact-checkers’ are seemingly driven by a burning desire to debunk his every statement.
Such an approach routinely yields embarrassing and borderline absurd results, as the eagle-eyed critics often waste time on ‘debunking’ obvious jokes. Last week, Twitter flagged a Trump-posted meme video about ‘racist toddler’, that featured a mock CNN chyron, as a piece of “manipulated media,” causing lots of amusement for the online crowd.
More serious fact-checking frequently yields embarrassing results as well. This Monday, The New York Times ‘caught’ the President saying that the “murder rate in Baltimore and Detroit is higher than El Salvador, Guatemala or even Afghanistan.” The fact checkers discovered that El Salvador actually has higher crime rates – only proving his point on rampant crime in some of US cities.
BEIJING: Global coronavirus cases neared 10 million on Sunday (Jun 28), according to a Reuters tally, marking a major milestone in the spread of the respiratory disease that has so far killed almost half a million people in seven months. The figure is roughly double the number of severe influenza ...
BEIJING: Global coronavirus cases neared 10 million on Sunday (Jun 28), according to a Reuters tally, marking a major milestone in the spread of the respiratory disease that has so far killed almost half a million people in seven months. The figure is roughly double the number of severe influenza ...
YANGON: Thousands of villagers have fled their homes in Myanmar’s Rakhine state after a local administrator warned dozens of village leaders that the army planned “clearance operations” against insurgents, a lawmaker and a humanitarian group said. But a government spokesman said late on Saturday ...
Princeton University said Saturday it was removing the name of president Woodrow Wilson from its public policy school and a residential college, calling the former US leader a racist.
Atletico Madrid beat Alaves 2-1 at home on Saturday in La Liga to maintain their superb run of form since the season resumed, recording a fourth consecutive win to further tighten their hold on third place.
Why make something yourself when you can get a bot to do it? A Russian art design studio has been using an AI neural network to create logos for more than a year – all the while keeping its customers in the dark.
In 2018, the Artemy Lebedev Studio unveiled a cheap service for small brands – a logo for just 100,000 rubles ($1,432). “Express Design” turned out to be a popular option for small-budget businesses and even two well-known Russian bloggers, Ruslan Usachev and Yuri Khovansky.
Unknown to the clients, the “Express Design” service was actually a futuristic experiment: the studio had developed “artificial design intelligence” to create unique logos and was trying it out in practice. A fake designer persona dubbed Nikolay Ironov was created, supplied with a portfolio page.
“All clients were unaware that their designs were being created by a machine. All of Nikolay Ironov’s work was approved by clients and then released to huge audiences,” a statement on the studio website has revealed.
Artemy Lebedev is Russia’s arguably most well-known, if at times controversial, graphic designer. In recent years, his studio created the Russian Premier League logo and the Moscow Metro map. Those were created by living, breathing humans as far as we know.
How long till government agencies start sporting logos created by robots? If 2020 is any indication, we shouldn’t be too surprised if it’s already in the works.
Princeton University said Saturday it was removing the name of president Woodrow Wilson from its public policy school and a residential college, calling the former US leader a racist.
YANGON: Thousands of villagers have fled their homes in Myanmar’s Rakhine state after a local administrator warned dozens of village leaders that the army planned “clearance operations” against insurgents, a lawmaker and a humanitarian group said. But a government spokesman said late on Saturday ...
BLANTYRE, Malawi: Malawi's opposition leader Lazarus Chakwera won this week's presidential election re-run with 58.57 per cent of the vote, the electoral commission said Saturday. It was a dramatic reversal of fortune for the incumbent, Peter Mutharika, whose victory in the May 2019 election was ...
BLANTYRE, Malawi: Malawi's new President Lazarus Chakwera is a former evangelical preacher who says he ventured into politics in answer to God's call. "One day God spoke to my heart, and God was not saying I'm pulling you out of ministry, God was saying I'm extending your ministry so that you are ...
Atletico Madrid beat Alaves 2-1 at home on Saturday in La Liga to maintain their superb run of form since the season resumed, recording a fourth consecutive win to further tighten their hold on third place.
Princeton University said Saturday it was removing the name of president Woodrow Wilson from its public policy school and a residential college, calling the former US leader a racist.
YANGON: Thousands of villagers have fled their homes in Myanmar’s Rakhine state after a local administrator warned dozens of village leaders that the army planned “clearance operations” against insurgents, a lawmaker and a humanitarian group said. But a government spokesman said late on Saturday ...
BLANTYRE, Malawi: Malawi's opposition leader Lazarus Chakwera won this week's presidential election re-run with 58.57 per cent of the vote, the electoral commission said Saturday. It was a dramatic reversal of fortune for the incumbent, Peter Mutharika, whose victory in the May 2019 election was ...
BLANTYRE, Malawi: Malawi's new President Lazarus Chakwera is a former evangelical preacher who says he ventured into politics in answer to God's call. "One day God spoke to my heart, and God was not saying I'm pulling you out of ministry, God was saying I'm extending your ministry so that you are ...
Atletico Madrid beat Alaves 2-1 at home on Saturday in La Liga to maintain their superb run of form since the season resumed, recording a fourth consecutive win to further tighten their hold on third place.
Atletico Madrid beat Alaves 2-1 at home on Saturday in La Liga to maintain their superb run of form since the season resumed, recording a fourth consecutive win to further tighten their hold on third place.
Football Ferns goalkeeper Erin Nayler is hoping New Zealand winning the right to co-host the 2023 Women's World Cup will mean a lot more home matches over the next couple of years.
Conservative commentator Jack Posobiec has been harassed, branded a Nazi and chased away by a crowd of protesters, who gathered in Washington, DC dead set to tear down a statue of Abraham Lincoln.
Posobiec attended Friday’s demonstration calling for the removal of the Emancipation Monument in DC, live streaming the event to followers online. But once spotted in the crowd, the pundit was surrounded by hostile activists, who demanded he leave the protest.
More video of violent black bloc militants attacking @JackPosobiec in D.C. They dumped liquid all over him, hit him and tried to steal his phone. pic.twitter.com/DCrOq8ZUtB
Footage of the encounter shared on social media shows demonstrators getting physical with Posobiec, with one helmeted activist apparently trying to steal his cell phone as he was escorted away from Lincoln Park. At some point, he was also doused with an unknown liquid.
As Jack was surrounded, some of the rally participants disagreed about whether they should be blocking him, which led to a brief fight among the activists. pic.twitter.com/1adJWzo822
The pundit was harassed for several blocks after leaving the main protest area, eventually flanked by security personnel who evacuated him to safety. Once he was gone, protesters continued a standoff with police, with one pushed the ground after becoming aggressive with an officer.
He even got in the way of the police, attempted to shove them and even blocked the police vehicle while telling it to leave with Jack onboard. He appeared to lead the other Antifa insurgents by being as belligerent as possible. pic.twitter.com/0luldORYsx
Following the incident, Posobiec said he had filed a police report and intends to press charges, though against whom was left unclear.
Antifa insurgent attempts to silence an elderly black man who is trying to prevent the mob from tearing down the Emancipation Memorial in DC. This makes me so angry. pic.twitter.com/NeIxwIGhxv
Earlier on Friday, a black tour guide who came to the event as a counter-protester – chastising the crowd for wanting to tear down the Lincoln statue without knowing its history – was also hounded by activists. Though one protester apparently tried to mediate the dispute, another is seen tearing a megaphone out of the tour guide’s hands.
A black man opposes the woke white Black Lives Matter protesters who want to tear down the Emancipation Memorial in DC.
“Y’all don’t even know the history of this statue, but you want to tear it down!”
Here are activists at the Emancipation Memorial harassing @JackPosobiec as Don Folden, a DC tour guide, leads him away from the rally. pic.twitter.com/WwOCPMlnJE
Mainland China reported on Saturday the highest number of new coronavirus cases in four days, driven by a COVID-19 resurgence in the Chinese capital of Beijing.
Football Ferns goalkeeper Erin Nayler is hoping New Zealand winning the right to co-host the 2023 Women's World Cup will mean a lot more home matches over the next couple of years.
Mainland China reported on Saturday the highest number of new coronavirus cases in four days, driven by a COVID-19 resurgence in the Chinese capital of Beijing.
Football Ferns goalkeeper Erin Nayler is hoping New Zealand winning the right to co-host the 2023 Women's World Cup will mean a lot more home matches over the next couple of years.
Football Ferns goalkeeper Erin Nayler is hoping New Zealand winning the right to co-host the 2023 Women's World Cup will mean a lot more home matches over the next couple of years.
Former VP Dick Cheney hit trending status online after appearing in a photo urging the use of face masks, earning praise from the anti-Trump #Resistance as critics recalled his infamous ‘hunting accident’ and lies about Iraqi WMD.
The hawkish ex-vice president was seen in an image shared by his daughter, Liz – a GOP rep from Wyoming – on Friday, declaring “Dick Cheney says WEAR A MASK,” followed by the hashtag “real men wear masks.” The moralizing tweet was quickly met with mockery, many netizens finding it impossible not to mention Cheney’s 2006 hunting mishap, which saw the VP blast Texas attorney Harry Whittington in the face with a shotgun.
If anyone knows the importance of protecting your face, it's Dick Cheney https://t.co/LanBXirO8V
While Whittington, then 78-years-old, survived the shooting and both he and Cheney maintain it was an accident, the incident has become something of a legend in popular culture, producing a litany of ‘Dick Cheney will shoot you in the face’ jokes at the time – which were brought back in force on Friday.
In some quarters, Cheney’s mask stunt was met with approval, with a number of netizens insisting anyone who refuses to wear a face covering is “actually a worse human” than the former VP. The GOP-led Lincoln Project, part of a constellation of conservative ‘NeverTrump’ organizations, also welcomed Cheney into the #Resistance, apparently seeing the mask as a political symbol.
If you don't wear one, you are actually a worse human than Dick Cheney.
— The Third Physical Distancer of the Apocalypse (@john_cross_) June 26, 2020
Imagine being a worse person than Dick Cheney. Yeah, that would be Mike Pence. https://t.co/Ieej5DXnA7
— The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) June 26, 2020
Cheney’s detractors soon shot back, however, noting the former VP’s role in launching the disastrous 2003 invasion of Iraq, which according to some estimates consigned over 1 million Iraqis to death. Deeming Cheney responsible for a “war of aggression, kidnapping, torture and extrajudicial executions,” critics argued the hollow gesture – wearing a piece of fabric over his face – could not absolve “war crimes.”
Dick Cheney is responsible for more than a million deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan. https://t.co/dTYV2VE2xB
Dick Cheney is a war criminal who should be behind bars at The Hague for committing genocide in #Iraq and making millions off the destruction of an entire nation. https://t.co/Oa0PHsAF1b
Dick Cheney can wear a mask at his trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including war of aggression, kidnapping, torture and extrajudicial executions. What a monster. https://t.co/I4GKd9ydYe
A raucous group of partygoers were seen standing off with riot police in London after officers tried to disband a street gathering, some throwing bottles at cops in the third consecutive night of clashes over illegal parties.
Chaotic scenes appeared in footage on social media on Friday, showing police decked out in riot gear as they tried to clear several block parties in London, which in some areas became violent when partiers refused to leave. Police helicopters have reportedly been deployed amid the unrest.
After an event in West Kilburn was broken up, the majority of its attendees are thought to have joined another separate party elsewhere in the city. Following reports of a “large gathering” in Newham, meanwhile, police said they dispersed the crowd, but discovered an illegal firearm in the process. The weapon was “immediately seized” and the suspect arrested.
London has been beset by a spate of similar unlicensed events, seeing scuffles break out between police and revelers for three nights in a row this week.
Officers now moving in to try to disperse them in Riverton Close, Maida Vale in west London, officers having bottles and bricks thrown at them. pic.twitter.com/3gXEoaa9Q8
Earlier on Friday, the city’s police chief, Cressida Dick, denounced the gatherings as “utterly unacceptable,” stating that both the illegal parties and ongoing Black Lives Matter protests had left some 140 officers injured in clashes.
SINGAPORE: Former Workers' Party (WP) secretary-general Low Thia Khiang on Friday (Jun 26) said it was "unlikely" he would make a political comeback in the future. This follows the announcement made by the party on Thursday that Mr Low would not contest the upcoming General Election. In an ...
SINGAPORE: Former Workers' Party (WP) secretary-general Low Thia Khiang on Friday (Jun 26) said it was "unlikely" he would make a political comeback in the future. This follows the announcement made by the party on Thursday that Mr Low would not contest the upcoming General Election. In an ...
NEW YORK: Phil Mickelson, making his first US PGA Tour start since turning 50, fired a seven-under-par 63 on Friday (Jun 26) to seize the lead in the Travelers Championship in Connecticut. The five-time major winner was the star of a marquee group that also featured world number one Rory McIlroy ...
Aleksey Burkov, an IT freelancer from St. Petersburg, has been handed down a nine-year sentence in the US on charges of cyber fraud. The man spent more than four years in Israeli prisons after an arrest on Washington’s request.
American prosecutors sought 15 years in prison for Burkov who pleaded guilty for involvement in cyber-attacks and computer network fraud. They accused him of organizing a “cybercrime forum” for criminals of all sorts, allowing them to obtain stolen data, hacking services and malware as well as cut shady deals with each other.
Another website also organized by Burkov, according to the prosecutors, was selling more than 150,000 stolen credit card numbers, mostly taken from US financial institutions. The damage his action dealt to the US allegedly amounted to $20 million.
Burkov cut a deal with the investigators back in January and pleaded guilty to two out of five counts he was initially charged with. If found guilty of all the charges, he could have been sentenced to up to 80 years behind bars.
Calling himself a cyber security specialist and repeatedly denying all the charges at first, Burkov was arrested by Israeli authorities back in 2015 on an international warrant issued by the US. Speaking with RT last October, he said he had been “hijacked” and brought into custody after spending a holiday in Israel with his girlfriend, something that he described as a “standard US scheme.”
After that, he spent more than four years in Israeli prisons, with no access to healthcare or regular visits from his lawyers. Russia also filed an extradition request for Burkov and reportedly considered swapping him for Naama Issachar, a 25-year-old Israeli-American who was sentenced to seven years in prison in Russia on drug trafficking charges.
Israeli authorities were apparently reluctant to consider such a possibility and the question was never officially raised in bilateral talks. Eventually, Issachar was pardoned by President Vladimir Putin for “humanitarian reasons” in January 2020, after spending about 10 months behind bars. Burkov had been extradited by Israel to the US more than two months prior.
The Russian will have to spend three more years in a US prison, as the four years he already spent behind bars in Israel will count as part of his sentence. The judge also ordered him to serve his sentence in the DC area to facilitate some “future discussions” with his lawyer, for reasons the court did not consider necessary to explain to the broader public.
The Russian military has published a video showing the moment a Su-30 fighter jet intercepted a group of US spy planes over the Black Sea on Friday.
The Aerospace Force scrambled a Su-30 to escort three American planes away from the nation’s southern border, the Russian Ministry of Defense said in a statement to the media, adding that the incident unfolded over neutral waters.
The American planes were identified as a R-8A Poseidon patrol aircraft, an RC-135 strategic reconnaissance jet, and a KC-135 refueling plane. The group immediately changed the direction of its flight away from the Russian border when it realized their presence had been detected, the ministry said.
The MoD stressed that the interceptor followed international rules and kept a safe distance from the group – something the US military has claimed the Russians have been failing to observe when dealing with their nosy aircraft in the past.
The incident comes at a time of increased US activity near Russia’s borders. Only last week, it was reported that a Su-27 was forced to intercept a US Air Force B-52H strategic bomber over the Baltic Sea.
Russia has an extensive Black Sea coastline, running from Crimea all the way down to Sochi. Both Alaska and the US East Coast are roughly 8,000 km (5,000 miles) away, on the other side of the world.
NEW YORK: Phil Mickelson, making his first US PGA Tour start since turning 50, fired a seven-under-par 63 on Friday (Jun 26) to seize the lead in the Travelers Championship in Connecticut. The five-time major winner was the star of a marquee group that also featured world number one Rory McIlroy ...
NEW YORK: Phil Mickelson, making his first US PGA Tour start since turning 50, fired a seven-under-par 63 on Friday (Jun 26) to seize the lead in the Travelers Championship in Connecticut. The five-time major winner was the star of a marquee group that also featured world number one Rory McIlroy ...
NEW YORK: Phil Mickelson, making his first US PGA Tour start since turning 50, fired a seven-under-par 63 on Friday (Jun 26) to seize the lead in the Travelers Championship in Connecticut. The five-time major winner was the star of a marquee group that also featured world number one Rory McIlroy ...
REUTERS: The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) said on Friday it was blindsided by a U.S. report that was riddled with misleading information and inaccuracies and which threatened to cut its funding. In a strong rebuke to the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) report to the U ...
Formula One teams will operate in bubbles within bubbles when the season starts behind closed doors in Austria next week after being stalled since March due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
LONDON: Huawei said on Thursday (Jun 25) it will invest $1.2 billion in a chip research and manufacturing centre in Britain that has been strongly opposed by the United States. The privately-held Chinese technology giant said it received planning permission in Cambridge, eastern England, to erect ...
