- U.S.The Guardian
Bolton: Trump claim he wasn’t told of Russia bounty report is 'not how system works’
Donald Trump's claim not to have been briefed about intelligence suggesting Russia paid Taliban-linked militants to kill US soldiers is “just not the way the system works”, former national security adviser John Bolton said on Sunday. Elsewhere, former Obama national security adviser Susan Rice said Bolton would have known about the bounties intelligence while he was in the role, which he left in September 2019, and would therefore have briefed Trump himself. I don't buy this story that he was never briefed,” Rice told NBC's Meet The Press.
- BusinessThe National Interest
Why U.S. F-35s, Stealth Bombers and Attack Drones Could Fail in a War
Fighter jets, stealth bombers, attack drones and air-traveling missiles all need to “operate at speed” in a fast-changing great power conflict era. When faced with fast, multi-frequency, long-range precision fire from enemy air defenses, air attackers simply must “operate at speed,” according to U.S. Air Forces, Europe Commander General Jeffrey Harrigian, who used the phrase in a discussion with The Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. Harrigian, who is also now the Commander of U.S. Air Forces Africa, ran much of the air campaign during Operation Inherent Resolve against ISIS; he offered a first-hand war perspective in a conversation with retired Lieutenant General David Deptula, Dean of the Mitchell Institute.
- U.S.USA TODAY
Judge grants bond to ex-Atlanta cop charged with murder in Rayshard Brooks shooting
ATLANTA – The former Atlanta police officer charged with fatally shooting Rayshard Brooks can be released on bond, a judge ruled Tuesday. Fulton County Judge Jane Barwick said she does not believe Garrett Rolfe is a flight risk or would intimidate witnesses. Barwick set Rolfe's bond at $500,000.
WorldAFPVirus pushes US hospitals to the brink, India hits record new cases
Officials at the epicenter of the worsening coronavirus crisis in the United States warned Sunday their hospitals were in danger of being overwhelmed by the upsurge, as India registered a record number of new cases. In signs of progress, Formula One returned with the season-opening Austrian Grand Prix held behind closed doors, while the Louvre museum in Paris will reopen on Monday after a 16-week shutdown. The US has struggled to respond to the devastation wrought by the virus, with its national death toll rising to near 130,000 out of 2.8 million confirmed cases, and many states hit by increasing infections after lockdowns were eased.
- U.S.The Telegraph
Epstein prosecutor who claimed Prince Andrew was not co-operating to give testimony next week
The prosecutor locked in a tussle to get Prince Andrew to give evidence about Jeffrey Epstein for much of this year will appear before a congressional committee this week, potentially throwing new light on the matter. Geoffrey Berman was the US attorney for the Southern District of New York, the unit leading the Epstein investigation, until last month when he was controversially sacked by the Trump administration for reasons that remain unclear. Mr Berman will appear before the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee on Thursday and is expected to face hours of questioning from members, offering an insight into his work and unexpected dismissal.
U.S.Yahoo News VideoPredominantly Black armed protesters march through Confederate memorial park in Georgia
A predominantly Black group of heavily armed protesters marched through Stone Mountain Park near Atlanta on Saturday, calling for removal of the giant Confederate rock carving at the site that civil rights activists consider a monument to racism.
- U.S.Associated Press
Frederick Douglass statue vandalized in Rochester park
A statue of abolitionist Frederick Douglass was ripped from its base in Rochester on the anniversary of one of his most famous speeches, delivered in that city in 1852. Police said the statue of Douglass was taken on Sunday from Maplewood Park, a site along the Underground Railroad where Douglas and Harriet Tubman helped shuttle slaves to freedom. In Rochester on July 5, 1852, Douglass gave the speech “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July,” in which he called the celebration of liberty a sham in a nation that enslaves and oppresses its Black citizens.
- U.S.NBC News
Florida surpasses 200,000 coronavirus cases
Florida surpassed 200,000 coronavirus cases as the state reported another 10,059 new positives on Sunday. The state has reported more than 10,000 new cases for a fourth straight day as the country sees another surge in the pandemic. Florida is among 11 states where numbers have spiked, at least doubling over the past two weeks.
- WorldBBC
Katsina: The motorcycle bandits terrorising northern Nigeria
Motorcycle-riding armed bandits operating out of abandoned forest reserves are ransacking communities in Nigeria's north-west. The groups are the latest to join Nigeria's lucrative kidnap for ransom industry, and are quite brazen in their operations. In the last decade more than 8,000 people have been killed in the states of Kebbi, Sokoto, Niger and Zamfara, according to the International Crisis Group.
- PoliticsUSA TODAY Opinion
Trump and Barr are making false claims about mail-in ballots to scare us out of voting
Nevertheless, last month, when he wasn't busy ineffectually trying to replace the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan with a Trump loyalist, Attorney General William Barr took out after voting by mail as rife with fraud. In this, he was echoing his master, President Trump. In an interview he gave to Fox News, the attorney general said voting by mail “opens the floodgates to fraud.
- U.S.The Guardian
‘They feel invincible’: how California’s coronavirus plan went wrong
People began to fixate on individual liberties without understanding that one of the most fundamental civil liberties in the US is the right to health Lee Riley In Orange county, where more than 15,000 people have been infected, health director Nichole Quick resigned in mid-June after being confronted with a banner depicting her as a Nazi, protests outside her house and personal threats. Quick had issued an order requiring residents to wear masks in public, which the county sheriff insisted he wouldn't enforce. After she became the third high-level health official in Orange county to quit, the county quickly reversed Quick's order – recommending, but not insisting that residents wear masks.
- U.S.Business Insider
Michael Cohen may have violated the terms of his prison release by eating out at a restaurant in Manhattan
The New York Post obtained photos showing Michael Cohen eating out at a Manhattan restaurant Thursday night. Cohen is currently serving a three-year sentence under home confinement, and eating out appears to be a violation of the conditions of his release from a federal prison camp. Business Insider reached out to the Bureau of Prisons for comment but did not immediately receive a response Saturday morning.
- U.S.USA TODAY
1 killed, 1 injured after car hits protesters on closed Seattle highway
A 27-year-old Seattle man was arrested Saturday after his white Jaguar struck two women during a protest along a closed stretch of Interstate 5 in downtown Seattle, killing one and critically injuring another, state police said. The driver, Dawit Kelete, of Seattle, was booked on two counts of vehicular assault and denied bail. Troopers did not know whether the incident was a targeted attack, but impairment was not considered a factor, Washington State Patrol Capt. Ron Mead said.
WorldAFPUS aircraft carriers conduct drills in South China Sea
Two US aircraft carriers have carried out drills in the South China Sea, a US Navy spokesman said Saturday, after the Pentagon expressed concerns over Chinese military exercises around a disputed archipelago. The USS Nimitz and USS Ronald Reagan conducted dual carrier operations in the waterway to "support a free and open Indo-Pacific," the spokesman said. The drills came as the Pentagon said it was "concerned" about Chinese military exercises in the South China Sea, warning the manoeuvres will "further destabilise" the region.
- WorldReuters
Constitutional changes are the 'right thing' for Russia: Putin
President Vladimir Putin said on Sunday constitutional amendments approved in a nationwide vote created the conditions for Russia's "progressive development" for decades to come. One of the changes approved in the week-long vote that ended on July 1 makes it possible for Putin to seek two more terms as president and, if re-elected, to stay in power until 2036. Other changes grant former presidents immunity from prosecution, enshrine a reference in the constitution to God, offer pensions protection and define marriage as a union of a man and a woman.
- WorldThe Telegraph
How not to do Covid: Kazakhstan first country in the world to fully return to lockdown
Kazakhstan will on Sunday become the first nation in the world to re-impose a country-wide lockdown after its easing in mid-May of largely successful measures to counter coronavirus sparked a surge in infections. The central Asian country, which borders Russia in the north-west and China in the east, appeared to have contained the disease after a two-month lockdown with just a few thousand confirmed Covid-19 cases. But Kazakhstan, home to 18 million, embraced its re-discovered freedoms with gusto.
- WorldThe National Interest
This Old Tank Helped Crush Saddam Hussein (It Was Meant to Crush Russia)
Though originally designed in the 1950s, the M60 was used in the Gulf War by the Marine Corps—and destroyed hundreds of Iraqi tanks. Main Battle Tank The M60 was intended to be the United States' first Main Battle Tank, which could meet operational requirements at both the tactical and strategic level. The MBT concept was designed to combine the firepower of a heavy tank with the mobility of what was then termed a medium tank.
- WorldBBC
The Grand Old Man of India who became Britain's first Asian MP
How was an Indian elected to the British Parliament in 1892? What relevance could this historical event have for us today? Dadabhai Naoroji (1825-1917) is an unfamiliar name these days.
- U.S.Associated Press
Trump's `strong wall' to block COVID-19 from China had holes
An analysis of Commerce Department travel entry records and private aviation data obtained by The Associated Press shows that nearly 8,000 Chinese nationals and foreign residents of Hong Kong and Macao entered the U.S. on more than 600 commercial and private flights in the first three months after the ban was imposed. When U.S. residents flying from mainland China arrived at U.S. airports, the system meant to flag and monitor them for the development of symptoms lost track of at least 1,600 people in just the first few days the ban went into effect, according to internal state government emails obtained by the AP.
- PoliticsCBS News
Biden evokes MLK and George Floyd in Fourth of July message
Evoking the names of Martin Luther King and George Floyd, Joe Biden said Saturday that the U.S. "never lived up" to its founding principle that "all men are created equal." In the Fourth of July video message, Biden said that even though America had fallen short of equality, the effort to live up to the nation's founding ideals continues. It survived the ravages of the Civil War, the dogs of Bull Connor, the assassination of Martin Luther King, and more than 200 years of systemic racism.
- U.S.Business Insider
A Kansas newspaper published a cartoon likening the state governor's compulsory face-mask order to the Holocaust
AP Photo/John Hanna Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly introduced an executive order on Friday, mandating most people in the state to wear face masks to protect against the coronavirus. That same day, local newspaper The Anderson County Review published a cartoon depicting Kelly in a mask emblazoned with a Star of David, before a scene appearing to show Jewish people being deported to Nazi concentration camps. The paper's owner, Dane Hicks, is the chairman of the Anderson County Republican Party.
- U.S.NBC News
Police clear officer who appeared to flash white power sign at Oregon protest
The Oregon State Police on Sunday cleared a trooper who appeared to make a white power symbol during a Black Lives Matter protest in Salem, Oregon, over the weekend. In a statement, authorities said the trooper made the gesture after seeing a skirmish during the event at the Oregon Capitol on Saturday. The officer then walks towards one of the counter-protesters and flashes the "OK" hand gesture, which is used among extremist circles to signal "white power," according to the Anti Defamation League.
PoliticsYahoo News VideoTrump sows division at Mount Rushmore speech as U.S. grapples with crises
President Trump made a direct appeal to disaffected white voters four months before Election Day.
- U.S.Reuters
Soaring U.S. coronavirus cases, hospitalizations overshadow July 4 celebrations
In the first four days of July alone, 15 states have reported record increases in new cases of COVID-19, which has infected nearly 3 million Americans and killed about 130,000, according to a Reuters tally. Florida's cases have risen by over 10,000 for three out of the last four days, including climbing by 10,059 on Sunday, surpassing the highest daily tally reported by any European country during the height of the coronavirus outbreak there. Cases are also soaring in Arizona, California and Texas and trending upwards in Midwest states that once had infections declining such as Iowa, Ohio and Michigan, according to a Reuters analysis of how much cases rose in the past two weeks compared with the prior two weeks.
- WorldThe Telegraph
Chinese city in Inner Mongolia issues bubonic plague warning
Authorities in a city in the Chinese region of Inner Mongolia issued a warning on Sunday, one day after a hospital reported a case of suspected bubonic plague. The health committee of the city of Bayan Nur issued the third-level alert, the second lowest in a four-level system. The alert forbids the hunting and eating of animals that could carry plague and asks the public to report any suspected cases of plague or fever with no clear causes, and to report any sick or dead marmots.
