PoliticsYahoo NewsScott Atlas, the perfect Trump official, steps down
Dr. Scott Atlas, the controversial White House coronavirus adviser, left federal employ much the same way he entered it: with an appearance on Fox News. It was the Stanford neuroradiologist's interviews on President Trump's former favorite source of information that led to his August appointment to a position for which he seemed to have little experience. After resigning, Atlas spoke to Fox News primetime host Tucker Carlson, casting himself as a victim of conventional wisdom.
PoliticsBusiness InsiderBiden told this immigrant rights activist 'vote for Trump' in a blunt exchange. He voted for Biden but is ready to push him hard on immigration reform.
In November 2019, on the campaign trail in South Carolina, then-candidate Joe Biden was asked a question by immigrant rights activist Carlos Rojas Rodriguez and an immigrant community member. A tense back-and-forth ensued, with Rodriguez and Silvia criticizing the Obama administration's record on deportations and calling for a moratorium on deportations if Biden was elected. Biden disagreed and told Rodriguez, "You should go vote for Trump."
WorldAssociated PressEx-Hong Kong lawmaker asks Europe to provide 'safe haven'
A Hong Kong pro-democracy activist who is visiting Denmark urged European nations on Wednesday to allow protesters in Hong Kong "a safe haven from the terror” of China's Communist Party. “The situation in Hong Kong is getting worse by the day and it is important that the world knows that Hong Kong is no longer a free city,” Ted Hui said in an email to The Associated Press. Britain has extended residency rights for up to 3 million Hong Kongers eligible for British National Overseas passports, allowing them to live and work there for five years.
WorldReutersMiddleman matters: Behind Indian protests against Modi farm reforms
Undeterred by the harsh winter of India's capital, its toxic air and surging coronavirus cases, Sukhbinder Singh is among tens of thousands of farmers camped out in protest on the city's outskirts, along with tractors, trailers, SUVs and food trucks. The farmers say they have enough flour, potatoes and other provisions to stay put for six months if Prime Minister Narendra Modi does not meet their demand: a repeal of new laws that he has described as the biggest farm reforms in the country in decades and trade analysts have hailed as a booster shot for the world food market. The sea of unmasked people at the heavily barricaded protest site on the main highway into northern Delhi is the biggest challenge Modi has faced from India's politically powerful farmers since he took office six years ago, and is a chink in his otherwise immense personal popularity.
PoliticsThe Daily BeastProject Veritas’ CNN Sting Uncovers Explosive News That Tucker Carlson Is Racist
All day, Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe has been hyping the huge revelations the group would be releasing from their latest stunt. In a dramatic video posted Tuesday morning, the conservative activist could be seen unmuting himself and informing CNN chief Jeff Zucker, “We've been listening to your CNN calls for basically two months and recording everything. Just wanted to ask you some questions, if you have a minute.
- PoliticsChristian Science Monitor
What a Biden focus on ‘American values’ means for ties with Russia
During his time as deputy secretary of state at the end of the Obama administration, Antony Blinken became known as the values guy – constantly underscoring in staff meetings, Washington speeches, and while traveling abroad how American values of democracy and human rights are at the core of U.S. foreign policy and global leadership. “We are not the leader of first choice because we're always right, or because we're universally liked, or because we can dictate outcomes,” Mr. Blinken said in a June 2015 speech at the Center for a New American Security in Washington.
- U.S.Associated Press
Alabama sets February execution date for man in 1991 killing
Alabama on Tuesday set a February execution date for a man convicting of the 1991 killing of a woman abducted near an automatic teller machine and later found shot in a cemetery. The Alabama Supreme Court ordered that 51-year-old Willie B. Smith III be put to death on Feb. 11 for the shotgun slaying of Sharma Ruth Johnson. Prosecutors said Smith abducted Johnson at gunpoint in October 1991 as she waited to use an ATM machine in Birmingham, forced her into the trunk of a car and withdrew $80 using her bank card.
PoliticsThe IndependentTrump news - live: President ‘confirms 2024 run’ as George official accuses him of inspiring violence
Attorney General William Barr revealed the Department of Justice has been investigating allegations of voter fraud but has not uncovered evidence of enough to have changed the results of the US presidential election. It comes as the campaign of Donald Trump filed its long-promised lawsuit in Wisconsin in an attempt to invalidate hundreds of thousands of absentee ballots in two Democrat-leaning counties. Trump himself, meanwhile, appeared at a White House Christmas event on Tuesday night in which he appeared to confirm, for the first time in public, that he will run again in 2024.
LifestyleArchitectural Digest10 Remote Airbnbs As Stunning As They Are Secluded
From a private island to a tiny Vermont tree house Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest
WorldReutersStorms, coronavirus and drought spread hunger to millions in Central America
With measures to contain the coronavirus cutting off supplementary income for many, the number of people who suffer from severe food shortages has sharply increased across rural areas of Guatemala and Honduras. In Guatemala, the problem is particularly severe. Even before the storms hit, some 3.7 million people - or more than a fifth of the population - were already suffering high levels of acute food insecurity, according to a report prepared for a United Nations hunger tracking body by the government's Food and Nutritional Security Secretariat.
PoliticsAssociated PressUS Supreme Court asked to block Biden win in Pennsylvania
Republicans attempting to undo President-elect Joe Biden's victory in Pennsylvania asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday to take up their lawsuit, three days after it was thrown out by the highest court in the battleground state. In the request to the U.S. Supreme Court, Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Kelly of northwestern Pennsylvania and the other plaintiffs are asking the court to prevent the state from certifying any contests from the Nov. 3 election, and undo any certifications already made, such as Biden's victory. They maintain that Pennsylvania's expansive vote-by-mail law is unconstitutional because it required a constitutional amendment to authorize its provisions.
WorldAssociated PressTurkish Cypriot leader wants new direction for Cyprus talks
Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar said Tuesday efforts to resolve Cyprus' ethnic division should start fresh and aim to achieve a two-state deal, because decades of negotiations for a federation-based agreement have got nowhere. Tatar said a regional “new state of affairs” that takes into account the discovery of significant gas deposits off Cyprus creates the need for a two-state accord, under which equally sovereign Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots can live “side by side.” The Greek Cypriots reject the two-state idea.
PoliticsThe Daily BeastThis Trump Crony Is Trying to Overturn the Election. His Own Group Has Thrown in the Towel.
Adam Laxalt, the co-chair of the Trump campaign in Nevada, is fighting ferociously against his state's decision to reward its six electoral votes to President-elect Joe Biden, alleging widespread voter fraud and hyping litigation to overturn Biden's victory. But a nonprofit ethics and transparency group affiliated with Laxalt, Nevada's former attorney general, has already conceded Biden's victory and is looking ahead to the new administration. It's become clear that we're going to be having a Biden team and a Biden administration in 2021,” said Caitlin Sutherland, the executive director of Americans for Public Trust, in an interview on Tuesday.
ScienceAssociated PressChina spacecraft lands on moon to bring rocks back to Earth
A Chinese spacecraft sent to return lunar rocks to Earth collected its first samples Wednesday after landing on the moon, the government announced, adding to a string of successes for Beijing's increasingly ambitious space program. The Chang'e 5 probe touched down shortly after 11 p.m. (1500 GMT) on Tuesday after descending from an orbiter, the China National Space Administration said. The probe, launched Nov. 24 from the tropical southern island of Hainan, is the latest venture by a Chinese space program that sent its first astronaut into orbit in 2003, has a spacecraft en route to Mars and aims eventually to land a human on the moon.
- NewsReuters Videos
Mother accused of holding son captive for decades
A grim discovery has been made in Stockholm, Sweden: A man in his forties found wounded in an apartment -- and may have been held captive there by his own mother for nearly 30 years. The mother -- a 70-year-old woman whom neighbors thought lived alone -- has been arrested. The man was reportedly found by a relative on Sunday (November 29).
PoliticsThe IndependentDoctor left stunned and ‘disappointed’ after Trump uses his image to falsely suggest Covid is a ‘scam’
A doctor in Nevada said he was left stunned after President Donald Trump helped turn his message of support for hospital workers “into something that it was never meant to be” in a new interview. Dr Jacob Keeperman, an ICU physician in Reno, told the Washington Post he was “disappointed” and “completely caught off guard” when the president retweeted a post featuring misinformation — and his selfie — on Tuesday. The doctor had posted a photo of himself to Twitter standing inside of a newly-created hospital wing with 1,500 beds to treat patients infected with the novel coronavirus that has so far killed nearly 270,000 Americans nationwide.
ScienceBBCA68a: World's biggest iceberg is fraying at the edges
But on Sunday, Planet finally got a beautiful acquisition right over the tip of A68a's "ice finger" (the berg has the shape of a hand with its index finger outstretched, as if pointing). This movie from the high-orbiting American weather satellite Goes-16 was processed by Dr Simon Proud from Oxford University and the UK's National Centre for Earth Observation (Credit: NOAA/Simon Proud/NCEO) "The detail of some of the cracks running across the berg are really clear and will be the main controls of the larger bits that break off," explained the British Antarctic Survey's Dr Andrew Fleming, who's examined the new picture.
WorldReutersIsrael edges towards early election amid Netanyahu-Gantz feud
Israel edged closer on Wednesday towards a fourth national election in two years after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's main governing partner, Benny Gantz, backed an opposition move to dissolve parliament. Parliament gave preliminary approval to a dissolution bill, but the legislation needs to pass three as yet unscheduled votes to become law, giving Netanyahu and Gantz, the defence minister, more time to work out differences over a national budget. The coalition crisis could plunge Israel into more political uncertainty as it prepares for a new U.S. administration led by Joe Biden, deals with the coronavirus pandemic and awaits Iran's next moves after the assassination of its top nuclear scientist last week, a killing that Tehran blamed on Israel.
WorldAssociated PressOAS head urges international prosecutor to act on Venezuela
The leadership of a broad coalition of Western Hemisphere nations on Wednesday accused the International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor of failing to take swift action on allegations that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's government committed crimes against humanity. The General Secretariat of the Organization of American States said in a report that ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda's failure to open a formal investigation into Venezuela is “stunning” and “inexplicable.” The leadership of the 35-member body said the slow pace of the ICC's review of Venezuela's situation has emboldened Maduro's government to commit more crimes believing that it can act with total impunity.
U.S.The IndependentOklahoma governor orders day of prayer for Covid but no mask mandate
As the spread of Covid-19 continues to accelerate across the United States, residents in Oklahoma have been asked to take part in a prayer day by the state's Republican governor, Kevin Stitt. In an announcement, Mr Stitt said Oklahomans should pray to God amid the pandemic, which has seen some 200,000 people in the state contract the coronavirus, and almost 2,000 lose their lives. The day of prayer has been planned for Thursday, with churches and other places of worship due to host those who take part.
WorldReutersIran watchdog passes law on hardening nuclear stance, halting U.N. inspections
Iran's Guardian Council watchdog body approved a law on Wednesday that obliges the government to halt U.N. inspections of its nuclear sites and step up uranium enrichment beyond the limit set under Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal if sanctions are not eased in two months. In retaliation for the killing last week of Iran's top nuclear scientist, which Tehran has blamed on Israel, Iran's hardline-dominated parliament on Tuesday approved the bill with a strong majority that will harden Iran's nuclear stance. The Guardian Council is charged with ensuring draft laws do not contradict Shi'ite Islamic laws or Iran's constitution.
WorldAssociated PressNew Zealand joins Australia in denouncing China's tweet
New Zealand has joined Australia in denouncing a graphic tweet posted by a Chinese official that shows a fake image of a grinning Australian soldier holding a bloodied knife to a child's throat. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Tuesday that New Zealand has voiced its concerns directly with Chinese authorities. This is an image that wasn't factual.
PoliticsBusiness InsiderMitch McConnell for the first time appears to accept Biden's election victory over Trump
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday for the first time appeared to accept President-elect Joe Biden's win over President Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election. "I think we all know that after the first of the year, there's likely to be a discussion about some additional package of some size next year, depending upon what the new administration wants to pursue," McConnell said. McConnell had previously held off on acknowledging Biden's win, instead saying that Trump had a right to pursue legal challenges.
WorldReutersPutin says opposing forces in Belarus need to resolve crisis via talks
Russian President Vladimir Putin urged political forces in Belarus on Wednesday to try to resolve their differences through dialogue, and also said the ex-Soviet republic, a close Moscow ally, was facing unprecedented meddling by external forces. Belarus has been rocked by mass protests since an Aug. 9 presidential election which veteran incumbent Alexander Lukashenko said he won - an assertion contested by his opponents, who say the vote was rigged and want him to quit. Russia's backing is seen as vital for Lukashenko's chances of staying in power and its statements are closely scrutinised for changes in tone or any sign that Moscow could be pushing for some kind of managed power transition.
WorldAssociated PressIran's president opposes bill that would boost enrichment
Iran's President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday expressed his opposition to a bill approved by parliament the previous day to suspend U.N. inspections and boost uranium enrichment, saying it would be “harmful” to diplomatic efforts aimed at restoring the 2015 nuclear deal and easing U.S. sanctions. The tug-of-war over the bill, which gained momentum after the killing of a prominent Iranian nuclear scientist last month, reflects the rivalry between Rouhani, a relative moderate, and hard-line lawmakers who dominate parliament and favor a more confrontational approach to the West. The bill would suspend U.N. inspections and require the government to resume enriching uranium to 20% if European nations fail to provide relief from crippling U.S. sanctions on the country's oil and banking sectors.
“This metastasizing debt crisis has had tremendous social costs. An entire generation has been set back.”
“It is not the government’s job to step in and rescue those who took on more debt than their future incomes would support.”
“Many student-borrowers need relief, but well-off borrowers who are thriving — thanks to their college degrees — do not.”
“It will stimulate the lagging economy. And though not everyone will directly benefit, the country as a whole will improve.”
“Canceling student debt would cost billions of dollars each year and would exacerbate, not lessen, economic inequalities.”