- WorldReuters
UPDATE 2-Putin: ready for Trump talks but U.S. elections could complicate ties
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday he was ready to hold talks with Donald Trump if that was what his U.S. counterpart wanted, but added that Trump's re-election campaign could complicate U.S.-Russia relations. Trump has said he expects to meet Putin at a G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, next week, though Moscow has so far said it has yet to receive a formal invitation for such talks. U.S.-Russia ties remain strained by everything from Syria to Ukraine and Venezuela, as well as by allegations of Russian interference in U.S. politics, which Moscow denies.
- NewsAssociated Press
Woman whose dead babies were found in home cleared of murder
A Massachusetts woman who lived in a squalid, vermin-infested home where authorities found the remains of three babies was cleared Thursday of second-degree murder, but was convicted of lesser charges. Judge Janet Kenton-Walker said prosecutors did not prove that 35-year-old Erika Murray caused the death of one of the babies whom she had been charged with killing and hiding in her home filled with rodents, dead animals, dirty diapers and trash. Kenton-Walker called the case "senseless" and "tragic," but said she had to be guided by the evidence rather than her emotions.
- BusinessBloomberg
NRA Suspends Two Leaders Amid Accusations of Coup Attempt
The NRA confirmed Thursday that it had suspended Chris Cox, the lobbying chief who was viewed widely as a future leader of the group, and his deputy chief of staff, Scott Christman. The moves came after Oliver North, the former NRA board president, was ousted from the organization in April after it accused him of leading an attempted coup against Wayne LaPierre, the executive vice president of the NRA who has long served as the organization's leader. North alleged that LaPierre used the group to enrich himself.
- NewsUSA TODAY
Huge great white shark surprises stunned New Jersey fishermen
NEPTUNE, N.J. – A party of sport fishermen had a rare brush with a huge great white shark Monday off the coast of New Jersey. In an encounter that was very similar to a scene from the 1975 blockbuster "Jaws," the shark came right up to the stern of the boat and grabbed a bag of ground up fish bait called chum. The once-in-a-lifetime experience was caught on video and has shark researchers buzzing.
- NewsYahoo News
9/11 responder who appeared with Jon Stewart on Capitol Hill is now in hospice care
A cancer-stricken 9/11 first responder who testified alongside Jon Stewart at last week's House Judiciary Committee hearing on reauthorizing the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund is now in hospice care. Lou Alvarez, a 53-year-old former NYPD bomb squad detective who appeared with other first responders at the Capitol, said in a Facebook post Wednesday that doctors informed him that his condition had worsened and there is “nothing else” they can do for him. Alvarez, who has colorectal cancer, told the House subcommittee on June 11 that he agreed to testify despite having his 69th round of chemotherapy scheduled for the next day.
WorldAFPIran shoots down US drone as tensions soar
Iran shot down a US spy drone Thursday near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, with the two sides at odds whether it was in Iranian or international airspace, in the latest incident stoking tensions between the arch-foes. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said the "US-made Global Hawk surveillance drone" was hit with a missile "after violating Iranian air space" over the waters of Hormozgan province. The Pentagon confirmed a US surveillance drone was shot down by Iranian forces, but it insisted the unmanned aircraft was in international airspace.
- NewsThe National Interest
The Stealth Sniper: The F-22 Raptor Has a New Job
Robert Beckhusen Technology, Americas And that means bad news for America's enemies. The flying branch only bought 187 operational Raptors — out of an original goal of 381. The F-22 also won't fly into the 2060s without upgrades.
- NewsAssociated Press
St. Louis abortion clinic to defy state over pelvic exam
Missouri's only abortion clinic, already facing the threat of losing its license, says it will defy the state by refusing to perform a required pelvic examination days before an abortion. Calling the exam requirement "disrespectful and dehumanizing," a Planned Parenthood spokeswoman confirmed that as of Thursday the St. Louis clinic no longer performs it during a consultation at least 72 hours before an abortion. Doctors do perform a pelvic exam at the time of the procedure.
- NewsUSA TODAY
Interested in TSA PreCheck? It might soon be cheaper and easier to sign up
The Transportation Security Administration is weighing a variety of options, including a new fee structure and mobile enrollment, to attract more travelers to its PreCheck program. "We want to get people into the program and so we'd like to make it easier,'' TSA Acting Deputy Administrator Patricia Cogswell said in an interview with USA TODAY in Chicago this week. "And that means not only make it easier for them to sign up, but also if they just want to try it out, they don't have to feel like, 'Oh, I spent five years worth of my money.
- PoliticsPolitico
'The biggest joke in politics': Trump campaign chief disses 2020 polling
The manager of Donald Trump's reelection campaign declared modern polling “the biggest joke in politics” — perpetuating an effort by the president and his allies to downplay the significance of recent surveys showing him lagging behind several Democratic 2020 rivals. The country is too complex now just to call a couple hundred people and ask them what they think. There are so many ways and different people that are going to show up to vote now,” Brad Parscale, Trump's campaign chief, told CBS News in an interview taped Tuesday.
- NewsThe Independent
Man decapitates roommate’s dog because she owed him rent money, police say
A man beheaded his roommate's dog as she was moving out of their shared house because of a financial dispute, officials said on Tuesday. Jose Vega Meza, a 21-year-old living in a suburb outside of Phoenix, Arizona, has been arrested over suspicion of mutilating the animal. He told investigators he killed the dog over the weekend because his roommate owed rent money to his mother, who owns the home in the city of Buckeye, according to police.
- BusinessReuters
Airbus demands chance to bid for IAG's surprise Boeing 737 MAX order
Airbus called on Thursday for a chance to compete for a blockbuster plane order by British Airways owner IAG, which stunned industry executives at this week's Paris Airshow by ordering 200 of Boeing's grounded 737 MAX. Airbus announced a new version of its best-selling A321 with close to 240 orders and commitments in Paris, only to see its grip on IAG's European short-haul networks damaged by the Boeing deal which analysts said shores up the embattled 737 MAX. Boeing's top-selling aircraft has been taken out of service worldwide since an Ethiopian Airlines 737 MAX crashed in March, five months after a Lion Air 737 MAX plunged into the sea off Indonesia.
- WorldBloomberg
Echoing Beijing, Duterte’s Government Now Calls Boat Collision an ‘Accident’
The Philippine government has fallen in with Beijing's explanation that a Chinese vessel didn't intentionally hit a Filipino boat in the South China Sea on June 9. Philippine Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana on Wednesday described the incident as "just an accident," adding the Chinese vessel may have left after hitting and sinking a Philippine boat with 22 fishermen out of fear of being “besieged” by other boats near Reed Bank. Maybe the other side didn't mean to brush against our boat,” Lorenzana said at a televised briefing in Manila on Wednesday.
- PoliticsYahoo News
Candidates reveal their — very slightly — embarrassing moments to the Times
Presidential candidates are thrown all sorts of hardball questions about their positions, policies and past. In a recent set of video interviews, the New York Times had tough questions for 21 Democratic presidential candidates, but one was fairly innocent: When was the last time you were embarrassed? Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., was ready with an anecdote that was both embarrassing and endearing.
WorldAFPAs Gulf tensions rise, Israel's Netanyahu warns 'enemies'
With tensions rising between Israel's ally the US and its archfoe Iran, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned the Jewish state's enemies not to test it Wednesday, his office said. "I hear our neighbours from the north, south and east threatening our destruction," Netanyahu said in a statement released by his office after he observed a large-scale military excercise in the north of the country. "I say to our enemies: The Israeli army has very great destructive power.
- NewsThe National Interest
Could This Old School Gun Be Better than a Glock?
Gun News Daily Security, Americas Is the . Special back? Truth be told I tend to shy away from comparing any revolver cartridge to any semi-auto handgun cartridge.
- WorldAssociated Press
Egypt: UN office tries to politicize Morsi's courtroom death
Egypt said Wednesday that the U.N. human rights office was trying to politicize the death of former Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi, who collapsed inside a Cairo courtroom during his trial this week. Morsi, Egypt's first democratically elected president who hailed from the now outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group, was buried under heavy security early on Tuesday, a day after his dramatic collapse and death inside a Cairo courtroom. Rupert Colville, spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, called Tuesday for a "prompt, impartial, thorough and transparent investigation" into Morsi's death on Monday.
PoliticsFOX News VideosDrone expert says downed US aircraft wouldn't have been flying over Iran
Former Army intelligence and special operations soldier Brett Velicovich explains why the BAMS-D shot down by Iran wouldn't have been operating in their airspace.
- LifestyleArchitectural Digest
The 17 Most Beautiful Highways for Road Trips
From South Africa's oceanfront Chapman's Peak Drive to the Atlantic Road connecting tiny archipelagos in Norway, AD covers the most breathtaking road trips Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest
- PoliticsThe Daily Beast
Trump to Hannity: You’re ‘Not Really’ a Patriot, You Just Want ‘Great Ratings’
Sean Hannity's full interview with President Trump is above. A night after Fox News ran President Trump's 2020 re-election “kickoff” rally uninterrupted in primetime, Fox News host Sean Hannity handed over almost the entirety of his show to a phone interview with the president. Discussing Trump's penchant for using Twitter, Hannity noted that many people would like for Trump to “turn off the switch,” prompting the president to say he uses social media to circumvent the media.
NewsUSA TODAY$1 billion worth of cocaine seized in record Philadelphia bust, feds say
PHILADELPHIA - Federal authorities intercepted a record 16.5 tons of cocaine onboard a ship at the port of Philadelphia Tuesday afternoon, officials said. The drugs have a street value of $1 billion, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. It's a record seizure for the Eastern District — one of the nation's largest districts, encompassing 4,700 square miles within nine counties.
- BusinessTime
'Sully' Sullenberger Tells Congress Deadly Boeing 737 Max Crashes 'Should Never Have Happened'
Retired airline captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, the pilot best known for safely landing a disabled plane on the Hudson River in 2009, told Congress on Wednesday that a pair of recent Boeing 737 Max jetliner crashes “should never have happened”—and possibly could have been avoided with better safety processes and pilot training. “These crashes are demonstrable evidence that our current system of aircraft design and certification has failed us,” Sullenberger said during a U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure hearing. The two Boeing 737 Max crashes—one in Indonesia last October and one in Ethiopia in March—appear to be related to an automated system that causes the plane's nose to point down if it senses the aircraft's pitch is dangerously high, according to investigators.
- PoliticsYahoo News
Joe Biden on racist colleague: 'He never called me boy'
Joe Biden dismissed criticism from “the new New Left” wing of his party that his approach to politics is “old-fashioned” by fondly recalling his experience of “civility” in the Senate as he served with two segregationist senators. Democratic presidential candidate Biden, 76, speaking at a fundraiser in New York City Tuesday evening, waxed nostalgic for the times of political fellowship when he was a senator in the 1970s and 1980s, contrasting it to today when political rivals are considered “the enemy.
- WorldReuters
Iran talking to Russia and China in case EU nuclear deal efforts fail: TASS
Iran is in talks with Russia and China on a possible settlement mechanism in case discussions with EU over a nuclear deal fail, the Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security council, Ali Shamkhani, said, according to Russia's TASS news agency. Tehran said in May it would reduce compliance with the nuclear pact it agreed with China, Russia and other world powers in 2015, in protest at the United States' decision to unilaterally pull out of the agreement and reimpose sanctions last year. Iran added that it would start enriching uranium at a higher level unless other European signatories to the deal protected its economy from the U.S. sanctions within 60 days.
- BusinessThe National Interest
Hypersonic Weapons Are Almost Here (And They Will Change War Forever)
A new technological competition has begun, one in which America's rivals, particularly Russia and China, may be ahead. In comparison, commercial aircraft fly at around Mach 1 while some military jets can push themselves to around Mach 3, but only for a short time. There are two basic types of hypersonic weapons: super-fast cruise missiles, and boost-glide vehicles that are mounted on ballistic missiles.
