AOC lowers expectations on Medicare for All, admitting Sanders 'can't wave a magic wand' to pass it

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said Thursday that if Sen. Bernie Sanders were elected president, he still might not be able to get Medicare for All, his signature health plan, passed in Congress. “A president can't wave a magic wand and pass any legislation they want,” Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., told HuffPost this week. While Ocasio-Cortez rarely tempers expectations when championing ideas like Medicare for All and the Green New Deal to fight climate change she helped author, she went on to suggest that under a President Sanders, a “compromise” might emerge on health care, even though she still considers Sanders's bill the gold standard.

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  The Case Against A 'Medicare For All' Litmus Test, Courtesy of Ocasio-Cortez

  HuffPost
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  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Has Cheeky Response To Critics Of Her 'Drag Race' Guest Spot

  HuffPost

Is that Harriet Tubman on a bank debit card, throwing a Wakanda salute?

A new debit card from the nation's largest black-owned bank with an image of Harriet Tubman throwing a gesture that bears striking resemblance to one from the movie "Black Panther" drew criticism and expressions of disbelief on social media. The famed abolitionist and political activist is shown with fists crossed over her chest, which some saw as a gesture from the Marvel blockbuster movie "Black Panther" about the fictional African country Wakanda. Bank officials said the gesture is not from the movie, but rather the sign for "love" in American Sign Language.

DNC announces qualifications for South Carolina debate

The Democratic National Committee has announced the qualifications for the 10th 2020 Democratic Party presidential debate in Charleston, South Carolina on February 25 hosted by CBS News. Similar to the qualifications for the February 19 Nevada debate, candidates seeking to participate will need to meet either a polling or delegate threshold to take part in the event co-hosted by the Congressional Black Caucus Institute. To qualify using the delegate threshold, Democratic presidential hopefuls must have been allocated at least one pledged delegate to the National Democratic Convention from either Iowa, New Hampshire or Nevada.

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  Reid says Biden will do well in diverse Nevada's caucuses

  Associated Press
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  South Carolina lawmakers suggest Biden may be taking black voters in the state for granted

  The Week

Former employee says he heard Bloomberg ask a female co-worker if she was going to 'kill it' after announcing her pregnancy

A former employee of  Michael Bloomberg corroborated an accusation that the business mogul told a woman to "kill it" after she announced her pregnancy, according to The Washington Post. Bloomberg, now a Democratic presidential candidate, has faced repeated faced accusations of directing sexist and crude comments to women at his company, Bloomberg LP, and previously denied that he told this to a female employee. "He talked kind of crudely about women all the time," the former employee told The Washington Post.

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  Michael Bloomberg's employees created a book purportedly full of his offensive quotes. Here it is.

  INSIDER
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  Michael Bloomberg Allegedly Told New Mom To Find 'Some Black' For A Nanny

  HuffPost

Assistant principal accused of raping student avoids jail

An assistant principal charged with raping a 16-year-old student in Missouri has avoided jail time by accepting an Alford plea, which allows her to assert innocence while acknowledging the evidence proves her guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

Inside the Family's Manhattan Apartment

undefined Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest

Diamond Princess passenger describes watching 'bizarre' process of U.S. coronavirus evacuation

While the U.S. begins the process of evacuating American passengers under quarantine due to coronavirus aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship, a passenger who chose to remain on the ship detailed what the evacuation looks like from the inside. Matthew Smith, a passenger aboard the ship, previously told USA TODAY he and his wife Katherine were not planning to take the charter flight back to the United States because they believed the "way they are handling this is not safe." On Sunday, he shared details of what the plan looked like for passengers as the evacuation began.

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  Coronavirus updates: Americans begin evacuation from cruise ship quarantined in Japan

  NBC News
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  Princess Cruises outlines plan for end of coronavirus quarantine as US evacuates Americans

  USA TODAY

Just Ask This Russian Submarine: The Cuban Missile Crisis Nearly Ended The World

Key point: Two officers gave the order to prepare a nuclear weapon for launch... It is commonly accepted that the world has never come closer to nuclear war than during the Cuban Missile Crisis, when the United States confronted Soviet Union over its deployment of ballistic nuclear missiles to Cuba. In fact, that decision was nearly taken out of Khrushchev and Kennedy's hands by a group of men in the throes of dehydration and CO2 poisoning as they sat in a malfunctioning submarine surrounded by U.S. destroyers, unable to consult with Moscow.

Man declared incompetent in San Francisco pier killing case

A Mexican man who was acquitted of killing a woman on a San Francisco pier in a case that became a national flashpoint was found incompetent to stand trial Friday on federal gun charges. U.S. District Court Judge Vince Chhabria said in a court order that a psychiatric evaluator had concluded Jose Inez Garcia-Zarate was not competent to stand trial “because of mental illness that is not presently being treated." Chhabria said he would meet with lawyers from both sides next week to discuss the next steps.

6-year-old girl was committed to mental health facility without parent consent

A 6-year-old Florida girl was committed for two days to a mental health facility without her mother's consent after allegedly throwing a temper tantrum at school, an attorney for the family said. The child was allegedly given anti-psychotic medications at the center, also without the permission of her mother, Martina Falk. Falk's lawyer, Reganel Reeves, said a mental health counselor was called to the school because Nadia was reportedly having a tantrum and throwing chairs.

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  6-year-old forced to leave school asked cop, "Am I going to jail?"

  CBS News
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  Bodycam video shows 6-year-old girl taken to mental health facility

  ABC News Videos

Rocket attack hits near US embassy in Iraq capital: militaries

Multiple rockets hit an Iraqi base hosting American troops near the US embassy early Sunday, the latest in a flurry of attacks against US assets in the country. Iraq's military said three Katyusha rockets hit inside the Green Zone, the high-security enclave where the US mission and Union III are located, as well as Iraqi government buildings, United Nations offices and other embassies. A fourth rocket hit a logistics base in a different neighbourhood operated by the Hashed al-Shaabi, a military network officially incorporated into the Iraqi state, the Iraqi military said.

The coronavirus could cripple China's economy for longer than Wall Street wants to believe

The coronavirus is still spreading throughout China, but all over Wall Street, a consensus about the virus' economic influence is already solidifying. The thinking goes like this: China will slowly get back to work by the end of the first quarter. Investors will stay fairly steady throughout this period knowing that coronavirus will result only in a temporary knock on corporate profits and general economic activity.

‘Photographer’ Drugged New Mom, Planned to Steal Baby, Cops Say

It began with an offer on Facebook group for the mothers of newborns: An aspiring photographer wanted to take pictures of babies for free to build her portfolio. Investigators said they have collected evidence that the 38-year-old “photographer,” Juliette Parker, had a plan to steal a baby and raise it as her own. On Friday afternoon, detectives from the Pierce County Sheriff's Department arrested Parker, who has also gone by the names Juliette Noel and Juliette Gains, and her 16-year-old daughter.

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  Washington Woman, Teen Daughter Arrested in Alleged Plot to Steal Baby, Authorities Say

  KCPQ - Tacoma
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  Woman poses as newborn photographer in plot to steal baby, say police

  The Independent

Biden admits South Carolina may be make-or-break for campaign

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden suggested on Sunday that winning South Carolina's primary was of the utmost importance for continuing his beleaguered campaign. Biden was asked by NBC's Chuck Todd on “Meet the Press” whether South Carolina was the former vice president's last chance to make up ground in the 2020 race after suffering lopsided losses in Iowa and New Hampshire, “Well, I think I have to do really well in it, but right,” Biden said. Biden added that then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton endured a string of primary losses in 1992 before picking up his first win, saying that upcoming delegate-rich states with demographics that are favorable to him will help make him the front-...

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  Reid says Biden will do well in diverse Nevada's caucuses

  Associated Press
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  DNC announces debate qualification threshold for South Carolina

  NBC News

Coronavirus panic could be the endangered pangolin's new threat

The pangolin, once called "the most trafficked mammal in the world," is facing another threat over its potential link to the coronavirus. Scientists working around the clock to save the species worry that Chinese researchers who labeled pangolins as the possible origin of the outbreak may be stoking public fear and damaging conservation efforts. Bill Zeigler, a top researcher at the Brookfield Zoo's Chicago Zoological Society, shared his concerns over what accepting the research without proper support could do to the public's perception of the endangered scaly mammal.

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  World Pangolin Day: What To Know About The Animal Possibly Linked To Coronavirus

  Travel+Leisure
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  How love for an endangered animal inspired a new wave of coronavirus racism

  NBC News

Hitler's Submarines Almost Launched A Missile Attack On America

Key point: Most Allied commanders were skeptical that there was a genuine threat to the continental United States—save for certain leaders of the U.S. Navy. In the closing weeks of World War II in Europe, American intelligence determined that a detachment of German submarines had been dispatched to launch a cruise missile attack on the East Coast of the United States. The U.S. Navy deployed forty-six ships and dozens of aircraft to annihilate the incoming submarine wolf pack.

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  This U.S. Nuclear Submarine Smashed Into an Underwater Mountain (And Survived)

  The National Interest
• 
  Just Ask This Russian Submarine: The Cuban Missile Crisis Nearly Ended The World

  The National Interest

American from cruise ship docked in Cambodia tests positive in Malaysia for coronavirus

KUALA LUMPUR/SIHANOUKVILLE, Cambodia (Reuters) - An 83-year-old American passenger from a cruise ship that docked in Cambodia after being shunned by other countries has tested positive for the new coronavirus after being tested in Malaysia, health authorities said on Saturday. The woman was the first passenger from the MS Westerdam, operated by Carnival Corp unit Holland America Inc, to test positive for the virus. The passengers were tested regularly on board and Cambodia also tested 20 once it docked.

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  Cambodia gets more praise for allowing cruise ship to dock

  Associated Press
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  American woman from cruise ship tests positive again for coronavirus in Malaysia

  Reuters

Classmates rally, help release woman from immigration detention

High school students at a Chicago suburb welcomed back a classmate who spent four months in an immigrant detention center as she battles possible deportation to Honduras. Students and staff from Crystal Lake Central High School raised over $10,000 on GoFundMe to pay for their classmate Meydi Guzman's release and subsequent legal fees to fight her immigration case. Guzman, 18, a senior, fled Honduras with her father, Fabio Guzman-Reyes, two years ago seeking U.S. asylum after gang members sexually assaulted Guzman, according to her attorneys, Kevin Bruning and Nathan Reyes.

Questions over fate of Saudi crew in Yemen jet crash

The fate of the crew of a Saudi warplane that crashed in Yemen remained uncertain Sunday after Iran-linked Huthi rebels claimed to have shot down the aircraft. The Riyadh-led military coalition fighting the rebels said the two officers ejected from the plane before it crashed in northern Al-Jawf province Friday but that the rebels opened fire at them "in violation of international humanitarian law". "The joint forces command of the Coalition holds the terrorist Huthi militia responsible for the lives and wellbeing of the Tornado air crew," the coalition said in a statement released by the official Saudi Press Agency late Saturday.

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  Saudi fighter jet crashes in Yemen, rebels say they downed it

  AFP
• Despite Yemen violence spike, Saudi says talks with Houthis progressing

  Reuters

Pete Buttigieg said he's 'not going to take lectures on family values from the likes of Rush Limbaugh,' after the conservative personality made comments about his sexuality

Reuters/Brian C. Frank Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg responded to conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh's comments about his sexuality bashing his campaign. Speaking on CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday morning, Buttigieg said he isn't going to take "lectures on family values" from Limbaugh. The controversial radio host, who has been married four times and divorced three, described the first openly gay candidate in a major presidential campaign as "a gay guy, 37 years old, loves kissing his husband on debate stages."

Experts weigh in on how coronavirus may, or may not, run rampant in US in coming months

Also worth noting is that more than 7,000 patients diagnosed with the virus have recovered, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. On Thursday, the 15th U.S. case of coronavirus was confirmed by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) after a patient returned from China to Texas earlier this week. "The patient is among a group of people under a federal quarantine order at JBSA-Lackland in Texas because of their recent return to the U.S. on a State Department-chartered flight that arrived on February 7, 2020," the CDC wrote in a press release.

Germany wants another crack at a EU mission in the Strait of Hormuz

MUNICH – German defense minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer on Saturday proposed a European Union-led naval protection mission for the Strait of Hormuz, piggy-backing on a French initiative already underway. The proposal follows Berlin's expression of political support for the French navy, which last month began patrolling the volatile waterway, a critical chokepoint for oil shipments out of the Persian Gulf. Germany's backing is largely symbolic, however, as there no promises of ships or aircraft on the table.