U.S.Yahoo NewsMinneapolis community leaders reflect on Chauvin verdict and the challenges ahead
The North Minneapolis community, in particular, has the highest concentration of Black residents in the city and was a “food desert,” activists say, even before the main grocery store in the area was burned down during last summer's protests over the killing of George Floyd. For many Twin Cities residents, Tuesday's guilty verdict epitomized the emotional whiplash of the last 10 years in which short-lived moments of hope give way to ever-present fears and frustrations. My stomach was tight as I [awaited] the verdict, and as soon as I heard [Chauvin] was guilty I felt like it dropped,” Minneapolis-based therapist Jamil Stamschror-Lott told Yahoo News.
WorldYahoo NewsIndia's COVID tsunami is the worst in the world. Why that should concern Americans.
In some parts of India, like Mumbai and New Delhi, as high as 1 in 3 or 1 in 4 people are testing positive, [and that's] actually, again, an underestimate. As a result, India's hospitals are completely full. There is now rationing of everything, including doctors, nurses, oxygen, beds, supplies.
WorldAxiosIsrael strikes back at Syria after Dimona nuclear reactor missile alert
The Israeli military struck back at Syria after a missile from the country triggered air raid sirens near the Dimona nuclear reactor as it landed in southern Israel, AFP reports. Why it matters: The exchange, which Syrian state media said wounded four of its soldiers, marked the biggest clashes between the two countries in years. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but Iranian troops and proxies operate in Syria and the incident indicates Iran's involvement, AP notes.
U.S.Fort Worth Star-TelegramTeen viciously beaten because he identified suspect in Fort Worth holdup, mother says
I am being told despite my son positively identifying this man via the snap video he posted _ that they don't have enough and don't know who the other 3 boys are,” McOmber said in a Facebook post. As his mother, you can probably imagine how hard this is. McOmber took to Facebook after waiting more than two weeks for arrests in the case, but no one was in custody for the assault on her son, who suffered a concussion, a broken nose, two black eyes and contusions across his arms and legs, she said.
U.S.National ReviewMa’Khia Bryant’s Neighbor Says Cops Had No Choice But to Shoot
Ma'Khia Bryant's neighbor Donovan Brinson said Tuesday that a video captured by his garage security camera led him to believe the Columbus police officer who shot Bryant had no other choice. Brinson watched the incident begin to unfold as he pulled into his driveway. “They were calling each other the B-word, so I figured it was just a girl fight,” he told The Columbus Dispatch.
U.S.Associated Press'He was guilty.' Extra juror in favor of Chauvin conviction
An alternate juror at the trial of Derek Chauvin said she agreed with the jury's decision to convict him in George Floyd's death, saying she saw Chauvin as the leader of officers at the scene and that he brushed off warnings by bystanders that Floyd was in danger. “I felt he was guilty,” Lisa Christensen said on “CBS This Morning” in a story aired Thursday. Christensen was one of two alternates dismissed by Judge Peter Cahill after Monday's closing arguments.
U.S.The WeekJoe Manchin lives on a boat in Washington — and protesters are reportedly headed there
Protesters evidently want all hands on deck in the push to make Washington, D.C. a state, and they're now headed to Sen. Joe Manchin's (D-W.Va.) nautical home. Advocates for D.C. statehood are planning a protest on Thursday, Politico reported, and they'll be gathering at Manchin's house ... boat. "Yes," Politico writes for those unfamiliar, "[Manchin] lives on a boat docked in the harbor when he's in Washington."
WorldAssociated PressRussia orders troops back after massive drills in Crimea
Russia's defense minister on Thursday ordered troops back to their permanent bases following massive drills in Crimea that involved dozens of navy ships, hundreds of warplanes and thousands of troops in a show of force amid tensions with Ukraine. After watching the drills, Russian Defense Minister Shoigu declared the maneuvers over and ordered the military to pull the troops taking part in maneuvers in Crimea and western Russia back to their permanent bases. “The troops have shown their defense capability and I decided to complete the drills in the South and Western military districts.”
U.S.CBS NewsAlternate juror in Chauvin trial on testimony that "really got to me"
She was known to the court as juror number 96, and even though she wasn't part of the deliberations, she came to a decision. "I felt he was guilty. They read the jury instructions to us in the courtroom briefly, but I didn't know it was going to be guilty on all counts but I would have said guilty," Christensen said.
WorldArchitectural DigestBookmark These 11 Places on HipCamp for Your Next Outdoor Retreat
A WiFi break? Yes, please Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest
PoliticsThe WeekGOP Sen. John Kennedy grilled Stacey Abrams on Georgia voting law, and Democrats are glad he did
In a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday, Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) asked Georgia voting rights advocate Stacey Abrams if she could list the specific things she objects to in Georgia's restrictive new voting law. "It's a long list," the Senate Democrats' Twitter account said, helping the exchange go viral on Wednesday. Kennedy and Abrams are both very smart lawyers who graduated at the top of their class at elite universities, MSNBC's Brian Williams noted Wednesday night, setting up the clip.
WorldAssociated PressBombing in hotel parking lot kills at least 4 in SW Pakistan
A powerful bomb exploded in the parking area of a luxury hotel in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta on Wednesday, killing at least four people and wounding at least nine others, police said. Footage on Pakistan news channels showed burning cars. Hours after the attack, the Pakistani Taliban in a statement claimed responsibility, saying it was a suicide attack.
ScienceReutersNASA extracts breathable oxygen from thin Martian air
NASA has logged another extraterrestrial first on its latest mission to Mars: converting carbon dioxide from the Martian atmosphere into pure, breathable oxygen, the U.S. space agency said on Wednesday. The unprecedented extraction of oxygen, literally out of thin air on Mars, was achieved Tuesday by an experimental device aboard Perseverance, a six-wheeled science rover that landed on the Red Planet Feb. 18 after a seven-month journey from Earth. In its first activation, the toaster-sized instrument dubbed MOXIE, short for Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment, produced about 5 grams of oxygen, equivalent to roughly 10 minutes' worth of breathing for an astronaut, NASA said.
WorldAssociated PressIndonesia looking for submarine that may be too deep to help
Indonesian navy ships searched Thursday for a submarine that likely sank too deep to retrieve, making survival chances for the 53 people on board slim. “Hopefully we can rescue them before the oxygen has run out” at 3 a.m. on Saturday, Indonesia's navy chief of staff, Adm. Yudo Margono, told reporters. The navy believes the submarine sank to a depth of 600-700 meters (2,000-2,300 feet), much deeper than its estimated collapse depth.
- PoliticsReuters Videos
Sen. Grassley: Business pressure over GA voting law 'economic terrorism'
The ranking Republican spoke at a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee entitled "Jim Crow 2021: The Latest Assault on the Right to Vote." The panel focused on efforts by Republicans in Georgia and elsewhere to implement new voting laws that critics say will limit voting access by African-Americans and other minorities that lead Democratic. Several large businesses, including Delta and Coca-Cola, criticized the law.
PoliticsBusiness InsiderTed Cruz says Biden's comments about the Derek Chauvin verdict are 'grounds for a mistrial'
Cruz said Tuesday that Biden's comments on Derek Chauvin provided potential grounds for a mistrial. Cruz said that Biden was providing "a possible basis on appeal to challenge any guilty conviction." President Joe Biden's comments about the trial of Derek Chauvin, the former police officer who was convicted of murdering George Floyd, provided potential "grounds for a mistrial," Sen. Ted Cruz said on Tuesday.
WorldThe TelegraphUp to 30 countries could be on ‘green’ list for early summer holidays
Holiday destinations in up to 30 countries – including Spain's Canary Islands, Portugal's Azores and Malta – could make the UK's green list for summer breaks from May 17. The destinations, which are dominated by islands, have high vaccination rates and low prevalence of Covid, putting them in a strong position for inclusion on the “green list,” according to government and industry sources. Grant Shapps, the Transport Secretary, signalled earlier this week that the Government's new traffic light ratings of countries would treat a nation's islands independently of any higher Covid rate or lower vaccination rate on the mainland.
BusinessBBCJack Dorsey and Elon Musk agree on bitcoin's green credentials
Tesla chief Elon Musk has agreed with Twitter boss Jack Dorsey, who has said that bitcoin "incentivises" renewable energy, despite experts warning otherwise. China, where more than two-thirds of power is from coal, accounts for more than 75% of bitcoin mining around the world. New sets of transactions are added to bitcoin's blockchain (the ledger that records the cryptocurrency's transactions) every 10 minutes by miners from around the world.
U.S.INSIDERDerek Chauvin is being held in solitary confinement at a maximum security prison with 280 other convicted murderers
Derek Chauvin is being held at the MCF-Oak Park Heights Administrative Control Unit. There are 280 convicted murderers at the facility, according to Department of Corrections data. Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer who killed George Floyd, is being held at the maximum security Minnesota Correctional Facility at Oak Park Heights, where Insider previously reported he is living apart from the general population of the prison in the Administrative Control Unit.
WorldBusiness InsiderUS troops in Syria seem to be getting hit with directed-energy attacks, and the Pentagon suspects Russia is doing it, report says
There have been suspected directed-energy attacks on US troops, Politico reported. The Defense Department has reportedly been investigating suspected attacks since last year. Troops appeared to be mysteriously falling ill in Syria, and the Pentagon suspects Russia.
U.S.AccuWeatherDashcam footage captures deadly pileup in whiteout conditions
Wintry weather made a brutal return to a large swath of the United States this week, bringingsome cases of record cold and snow. In Wisconsin, heavy snow and near whiteout conditions caused a deadly highway pileup Wednesday that was caught on a dashcam camera. The deadly crash on Interstate 41 was part of a disastrous day of driving in snowy Wisconsin.
- WorldWTVD – Raleigh/Durham
Man dead after being shot outside Brier Creek Barnes & Noble
The Wake County District Attorney's Office will not pursue charges at this time following a shooting outside of the Barnes and Noble at Brier Creek shopping center that killed a 32-year-old man back in March.
LifestyleArchitectural Digest12 Outdoor Furniture Sets for Living Alfresco
With warmer weather just around the corner, we're taking our home-design focus to the great outdoors Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest
CelebrityThe IndependentInstagram star cat Ponzu killed after owner ‘attacked’ in New York park
A cat with more than 30 million Instagram followers was killed in an alleged attack on its owner and Instagram chef, Chanan Aksornnan. Ms Askornnan, known as 'Chef Bao Bao', was walking Ponzu and four other pets with her boyfriend in Brooklyn's McCarren Park on 4 April. A boy tripped on Ponzu's leash, and then pulled on it, according to an account of the incident by Facebook user ChaRee Pim.
U.S.USA TODAY'God knows what happened': North Carolina deputy fatally shoots Black man, but police release few details
Leaders and protesters in a grieving North Carolina community want to know what happened Wednesday morning when a deputy executing a search warrant shot and killed a Black man. District Attorney Andrew Womble has promised "accurate answers and not fast answers" as state investigators probe why a Pasquotank County Sheriff's deputy fatally shot Andrew Brown Jr. at about 8:30 a.m. Wednesday in Elizabeth City. "The people of Elizabeth City ... they desire a right to know what took place this morning," Councilman Darius J. Horton said at an emergency meeting of the Elizabeth City council on Wednesday evening.
“High-speed rail is bold and attention-grabbing, but the scale of the project makes it near impossible.”
“While a long, slow train ride across the country can be a great thing, the US needs real high-speed rail too.”
“Liberals are right that America has a car problem — but it's commutes, not road trips, that suck.”
“Investments into a high-speed rail system wouldn’t just improve the railroads — automobile traffic could also see some relief.”
“Big cities that are reasonably close together is pretty much a prerequisite for high-speed rail.”