Health experts: Contact tracing at Super Bowl events "extremely difficult"

Public health leaders in Tampa Bay are calling attention to just how difficult contact tracing will be surrounding the Super Bowl and other events.

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  • Prince Harry tells Oprah he worried history would repeat itself

    Prince Harry, who shocked Britain last year when he and his wife Meghan stepped back from royal duties, told U.S. interviewer Oprah Winfrey that he had worried about history repeating itself, according to excerpts released on Sunday. The CBS broadcast network released two brief clips from Winfrey's interview of the couple, which is scheduled to air on March 7. "My biggest concern was history repeating itself," Harry said, apparently referring to his mother Princess Diana, who was hounded by the British press and died at age 36 in a car crash in Paris after her divorce from Prince Charles.

  • Prince Harry: Split from royal life 'unbelievably tough'

    Prince Harry says the process of separating from royal life has been very difficult for him and his wife, Meghan. In an interview with Oprah Winfrey, Harry invoked the memory of his late mother, Princess Diana, who had to find her way alone after she and Prince Charles divorced. Diana was shown in a photo holding toddler Harry as he made the comments.

  • Minneapolis approved funding to hire social media influencers to spread information about ex cop Derek Chauvin's trial

    Minneapolis is hiring social media influencers to spread information about the trial of the cop, Derek Chauvin, who knelt on George Floyd's neck.

  • Archaeologists uncover ancient ceremonial carriage near Pompeii

    Archaeologists have unearthed a unique ancient-Roman ceremonial carriage from a villa just outside Pompeii, the city buried in a volcanic eruption in 79 AD. The almost perfectly preserved four-wheeled carriage made of iron, bronze and tin was found near the stables of an ancient villa at Civita Giuliana, around 700 metres (yards) north of the walls of ancient Pompeii. Massimo Osanna, the outgoing director of the Pompeii archaeological site, said the carriage was the first of its kind discovered in the area, which had so far yielded functional vehicles used for transport and work, but not for ceremonies.

  • Israeli police break up Purim celebrations

    Drawn from the biblical Book of Esther's account of how the Jews were spared genocide in ancient Persia, Purim is commemorated with the wearing of all kinds of fancy dress costumes, donating food for feasts - and drinking to excess.But this year, Israel, which began emerging from its third national lockdown on Feb. 21, reimposed night curfews for the long Purim weekend and limited access to Jerusalem.Purim parties were banned, with fines for anyone hosting them. That led to spontaneous street parties in Tel Aviv. Police commander Ziv Saguy said they were giving out 200 fines an hour.Long traffic jams formed on the road to Jerusalem as police tried to stop large groups of reaching the holy city for the festival. Some people ditched their vehicles and walked up the highway instead.Some ultra-Orthodox have also defied state-ordered closures of schools and synagogues, touching off clashes with police.

  • Fauci Fires Back at Kristi Noem Saying He’s ‘Wrong’: ‘The Numbers Don’t Lie’

    SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty ImagesBiden’s chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci hit back at South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s harsh criticism of him on Sunday, saying her comments about him at this weekend’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) were “not very helpful” and “unfortunate.”Noem, who has received praise from conservatives for largely ignoring coronavirus restrictions and guidelines, got a standing ovation from the CPAC crowd when she boasted about ignoring the medical advice of experts and called out Fauci for supposedly being “wrong.” Appearing on CBS News’ Face the Nation, Fauci was asked if that sentiment was an impediment to the nation’s recovery.Kristi Noem Under Scrutiny for Using State Plane to Fly to NRA, Turning Points Meet-Ups“It’s unfortunate but it’s not really helpful because sometimes you think things are going well and just take a look at the numbers, they don’t lie,” he said. During an interview with Noem on the same program, anchor Margaret Brennan grilled the Republican governor and potential 2024 presidential candidate on her state’s poor performance with the deadly virus.“So for your state, you have, if you look at starting in July, which was after that spring peak, you have the highest death rate in cumulative COVID deaths per million in the country,” Brennan said, adding: “I know you’re conservative and you care about the sanctity of life. So how can you justify making decisions that put the health of your constituents at risk?”Noem, meanwhile, brushed off the question, instead telling Brennan that “those are questions that you should be asking every other governor in this country as well.”FAUCI REACTS: Dr. Anthony Fauci responds to @govkristinoem's criticism at #CPAC that the veteran medical expert is "wrong" on hospital capacity and #COVID19 caseloads: "It's unfortunate but it's not really helpful… just take a look at the numbers they don't lie." pic.twitter.com/y9Xz30lsr0— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) February 28, 2021 Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

  • Vegas is betting on Trump announcing his 2024 reelection bid during highly-anticipated CPAC speech

    Trump is expected to use his Florida speech to talk about the future of the Republican Party and the conservative movement.

  • Trump at CPAC Shows Why He Doesn’t Need a New Party

    Elijah Nouvelage/GettyHe was a one-term “loser.” He helped lose his party the White House, the Senate, and the House. He left office with a domestic body count in the hundreds of thousands, and an economy in the toilet.Just last month, he instigated a deadly riot on Capitol Hill that endangered the lives of senior members of his own party, as he sat back and smirked from the comfort and safety of the West Wing. And his administration ended in such a historically disastrous state of his own making that fellow leaders in the Republican Party were directly blaming him for the deaths and anti-democratic mob violence, and some of his former senior advisers were openly accusing him of attempting to stage a coup or pleading with him to disappear to Florida “and stay” there.But that was a whole month ago. On Sunday, former President Donald Trump re-emerged at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), held this year in his new home base of Florida, where he was greeted as the beloved, unequivocal leader in the GOP. Whatever blood there was on the 45th U.S. president’s hands, the Republican Party and conservative movement had already done their best to rinse it all away. And they were more than happy to try.“Actually you know, [the Democrats] just lost the White House,” Trump said—obviously incorrectly—on stage early Sunday evening. “Who knows? I might decide to beat them for a third time,” he added, dangling a potential 2024 presidential run.Much of the former president’s CPAC speech was a lazy, predictable retread of grievance and his perennial whining. “They’re the biggest fakers there are,” he alleged, bashing his enemies in the press. “Never let [Democrats and the Biden administration] take the credit” for the coronavirus vaccines, Trump said, regurgitating his concerns dating back to November that a President Joe Biden would get credit for ending the COVID-19 crisis in the United States. He again took his shots at foes like Dr. Anthony Fauci and Biden, yet again accusing the latter of having mental difficulties.Trump harangued trans women for competing in sports as women. He kept peppering his speech with lies that he triumphed in the 2020 election. He used those lies to call on Republicans to enact more and more restrictions on legitimate voting, and did so to rapturous applause from the audience. He repeatedly trashed the U.S. Supreme Court—which has a sizable conservative majority of his presidency’s creation—for lacking the “courage” to obliterate democracy at his behest last year. He baselessly alleged that the Democratic Party was trying to bring on “communism.” He bleated over and over about “cancel culture” and Big Tech. He rattled off a list of Republican lawmakers (Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney, Adam Kinzinger, and so on…) whom he found insufficiently subservient to him and his ego.And he had the nerve to claim that “Trumpism” means “no riots in the streets.”In the days of the conference prior to Trump’s address, the content and mood of the annual gathering reflected the sentiment pervading the national GOP, its base of voters, Republican honchos in Washington, D.C., state parties, and the influential hubs of conservative media: that this twice impeached president, as well as Trumpism, are the dominant present and future of American conservatism. And for this, they’re enthusiastically frontloading many of Trump’s policy and messaging priorities.For instance, much of this year’s CPAC was devoted to pushing Trump’s lie that he actually won the 2020 presidential contest against Biden, an election Trump clearly lost. That lie fueled Trump and Republicans’ months-long legal crusade during the presidential transition period to groundlessly throw out countless votes in key states, in a failed effort to overturn the will and decision of the electorate. Top Trump allies publicly flirted with the concept of martial law, and other authoritarian power-grabbing ideas that thankfully went nowhere, despite Trump’s sustained attempts. This broad push culminated in the bloody Jan. 6 riot.And yet various major players in the Republican Party still refuse to admit publicly that Biden won, and Trump himself has privately said he’d prefer the candidates and primary challengers he supports in the future to publicly back the Big Lie—both rhetorically and in the writing of laws and crackdowns on voting—to his satisfaction.And as Trump charts the path of his post-presidency, he’s keen on snuffing out dissent to the devotion to his cult of personality that is now the most integral element of his party. In recent weeks, the former president, tucked away at his Palm Beach club of Mar-a-Lago, has repeatedly complained about several prominent Republicans who had crossed him (even mildly) over the Jan. 6 riot, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Nikki Haley, Trump’s one-time ambassador to the United Nations. Trump has told multiple confidants that if Haley runs for the presidency in 2024, he wants to ensure she is crushed and humiliated in the GOP primary, according to three people familiar with the matter.This despite Haley’s attempts earlier this month to execute some damage control and to reconnect with Trump. Even others who have more aggressively sought to crawl back to Trump following the riot haven’t been spared the ex-president’s suspicions or trash talk. A month ago, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) visited Trump in Florida, on a mission to preserve party unity, as they gear up for the 2022 midterm elections. Prior to that he’d already jumped on the phone with Donald Trump Jr., solidifying his deference to the Trump brand and family, ahead of the former president’s second Senate impeachment trial.Still, in recent days Trump has privately told some of those close to him that he’s not sure if he can trust McCarthy in the long run, two of the sources said. One of the things that Trump has griped about during his post-presidency is McCarthy’s public acknowledgement that Biden indeed won the election, following weeks of McCarthy cheering on or excusing Trump’s months-long endeavor to cling to power.But at CPAC on Sunday night, the ex-president and current leader of the Republican Party had the courtesy to, for now at least, take one tactic for keeping the GOP in line off the table. “I am not starting a new party,” Trump said on stage, affirming his continued support for the party that once made him leader of the free world.And why should he? The party and movement keep showing him, again and again, since Biden’s inauguration that the GOP remains a willing and wholly owned subsidiary of the Trump brand name.And soon after he left the stage, Trump’s political operation was back to doing what it does best: milking his supporters for big money, often by deceptive means. “Pres. Trump: Did you miss me? I just finished my CPAC speech! My team’s handing me the 1ST donor list in 1 HR. Can I count on you? Donate,” the Trump team texted supporters on Sunday evening.During the 2020 campaign, the Trump campaign would often ask supporters to donate, alleging that doing so could give small-dollar donors a chance at getting their names in front of an appreciative Trump. Several sources familiar with the practice say that this was so often done with absolutely zero intention of bothering Trump with any lists of his faceless fans’ names.Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

  • Lawmaker breaks down confronting Ercot officials over death of boy in Texas freeze

    CEO of energy supplier said ‘I don’t believe I would’ do anything differently, despite deaths

  • Lady Gaga's bulldogs returned

    Lady Gaga's two bulldogs, stolen in a violent abduction that wounded the dog walker, were safely returned on Friday. Koji and Gustav were reunited with the singers' representatives, the Los Angeles Police Department said. They were turned over by a woman, unharmed, hours after the Oscar-winning singer issued a plea on social media to bring them home. On Twitter, Gaga said, quote, "My heart is sick and I am praying my family will be whole again with an act of kindness," and offered to pay US$500,000 for their safe return. A woman who authorities have not publicly identified brought the dogs to the station.It was not immediately clear how she obtained the dogs, or whether she will collect the reward. On Wednesday, Gaga's pet caretaker Ryan Fisher was shot in a residential area in Hollywood, when he was walking the celebrity's three bulldogs. Two were kidnapped, while the third escaped, and was later found by the police. Gaga praised Fisher for risking his life and called him "a hero." Fisher is expected to make a full recovery, his family told celebrity website TMZ on Friday.

  • The 'larger-than-life' statue of Donald Trump at CPAC was made in Mexico

    "We are going to defend our workers, protect our jobs and finally put America first," Trump said in April 2020.

  • Covid ‘likely to get worse again’ as new variants spread, Biden warns

    ‘The current improvement could reverse’, says president of rising infections

  • Thailand starts COVID-19 vaccination campaign

    Thailand kicked off its COVID-19 inoculation campaign on Sunday, with cabinet ministers, health officials and medical professionals among the first in the queue to receive vaccinations. The first doses of vaccine, developed by China's Sinovac Biotech, were given to Deputy Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, who is also the health minister, among others at an infectious diseases institute on the outskirts of Bangkok. "I hope that the vaccination will result in people being safe from the spread of COVID-19 and it allows Thailand to return to normalcy as soon as possible," Anutin told reporters afterwards.

  • Saudi Arabia says it intercepts missile attack over capital

    Saudi Arabia said Saturday it intercepted a missile attack over its capital and bomb-laden drones targeting a southern province, the latest in a series of airborne assaults it has blamed on Yemen’s rebel Houthis. The Saudi-led military coalition fighting in Yemen’s yearslong war announced the Iran-allied Houthis had launched a ballistic missile toward Riyadh and three booby-trapped drones toward the province of Jizan, with a fourth toward another southwestern city and other drones being monitored.

  • Police clash with anti-government protesters in Bangkok

    Protesters threw bottles at police and marched right up to a barricade of shipping containers and barbed wire at the entrance to the base of the 1st Infantry Regiment in Bangkok, one of several army units that government of Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha transferred to the king's control in 2019.The Thai youth-led political movement rose up last year to demand Prayuth's resignation and broke taboos by calling for reforms of the monarchy.Public criticism of the king is illegal in Thailand, with insults to the monarchy punishable by up to 15 years in prison under the country's strict lese majeste law.

  • CPAC Speaker Angela Stanton King Promotes QAnon From Stage

    NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP via Getty ImagesA speaker at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) promoted the QAnon conspiracy theory from the event’s main stage on Sunday, shortly before Donald Trump was scheduled to appear at the conservative movement’s premiere annual event. Former congressional candidate Angela Stanton King, who has frequently boosted the conspiracy theory on social media, called for an investigation into whether QAnon’s bizarre claims about a cabal of cannibal-pedophiles controlling the world and a mysterious figure named Q giving hidden messages to Trump supporters are real.“Let’s address it,” King said. “So we know in this election, there were some things going on in regards to the conspiracy theories with Q, right? And I think, me as a person, before I ever got into the conservative movement, I’ve always been an advocate even if it’s for abused children or it’s for those people that are incarcerated. So I think that any allegations coming forward in regards to any type of abuse when it comes to children deserves to be investigated, it deserves to be made aware of.”The CPAC crowd applauded King’s call for an investigation into the claims made by QAnon believers, which include allegations that Democratic Party leaders and Hollywood celebrities sexually abuse children and drink their blood to stay young. QAnon supporters believe in a moment called “The Storm,” in which they anticipate Trump will order mass arrests or executions of his political opponents.QAnon Incited Her to Kidnap Her Son and Then Hid Her From the Law“I think that, you know, once we find out, you know, whether this is true or not, then we can move on, but we at least have to be able to address it,” King said, claiming that the media had tried to “cancel” her for her beliefs in QAnon.CPAC speaker Angela Stanton-King is straight up promoting QAnon pic.twitter.com/BLGyeqajes— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 28, 2021 King, who served two years in prison over an auto-theft ring and was pardoned by Trump in 2020, once stormed out of an interview after being confronted over her support for QAnon. A positive mention of QAnon from the CPAC stage marks another inroad into the GOP for the conspiracy theory, which has been linked to murders and other crimes. A number of QAnon believers took leading roles in the U.S. Capitol riot, breaking into the building and menacing police officers.The FBI considers the conspiracy theory, which has also been praised in the past by newly elected Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Lauren Boebert (R-CO), as a potential source of domestic terrorism.The CPAC panel King appeared on was already embroiled in controversy, after scheduled speaker “Young Pharaoh” was dropped from the program over tweets attacking Jewish people.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

  • Iran condemns U.S. strikes in Syria, denies attacks in Iraq

    Iran on Saturday condemned U.S. air strikes against Iran-backed militias in Syria, and denied responsibility for rocket attacks on U.S. targets in Iraq that prompted Friday's strikes. Washington said its strikes on positions of the Iran-backed Kataib Hezbollah paramilitary group along the Iraq border were in response to the rocket attacks on U.S. targets in Iraq.

  • Republican congressman appears at white nationalist conference whose founder called Capitol riot ‘awesome’

    Only elected GOP official to attend alternative far-right conference said afterwards: ‘I denounce when we talk about white racism’

  • Arrival of 'sticky bombs' in Indian Kashmir sets off alarm bells

    Security forces battling a decades-long insurgency in Indian-controlled Kashmir are alarmed by the recent arrival in the disputed region of small, magnetic bombs that have wreaked havoc in Afghanistan. "Sticky bombs", which can be attached to vehicles and detonated remotely, have been seized during raids in recent months in the federally administered region of Jammu and Kashmir, three senior security officials told Reuters. "These are small IEDs and quite powerful," said Kashmir Valley police chief Vijay Kumar, referring to improvised explosive devices.

  • CPAC stage is shaped like a Nordic rune used on some Nazi uniforms

    After Twitter users noted the similarities, the CPAC organizer said the "stage design conspiracies are outrageous and slanderous."