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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington
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The baseline level of coronavirus cases needs to fall further before the U.S. can confidently resume normal activities, even as the vaccine rollout accelerates, Anthony Fauci said. ... “We’ve seen what happens when you pull back prematurely,” Fauci said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “We will be” victorious over the coronavirus, “but we’re not there yet.”
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has asked the state’s attorney general and chief appeals court judge to jointly appoint an independent lawyer to investigate claims that he sexually harassed at least two women who worked for him. The move came after legislative leaders assailed Cuomo’s plan to appoint a retired federal judge to conduct the probe.
With the floodgates set to open on another round of unemployment aid, states are being hammered with a new wave of fraud as they scramble to update security systems and block scammers who already have siphoned billions of dollars from pandemic-related jobless programs.
Many Republican lawmakers have criticized governors’ emergency restrictions since the start of the coronavirus outbreak. Now that most legislatures are back in session, a new type of pushback is taking root: misinformation. In their own comments or by inviting skeptics to testify at legislative hearings, some GOP state lawmakers are using their platform to promote false information about the virus, the steps needed to limit its spread and the vaccines that will pull the nation out of the pandemic. In some cases, the misstatements have faced swift backlash, even getting censored online. That’s raised tough questions about how aggressively to combat potentially dangerous misinformation from elected officials or during legislative hearings while protecting free speech and people’s access to government.
Taking the stage for the first time since leaving office, former President Donald Trump on Sunday called for Republican Party unity, even as he exacerbated intraparty divisions and trumpeted lies about the election in a speech that made clear he intends to remain a dominant political force. Speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference, where he was hailed as a returning hero, Trump blasted his successor, President Joe Biden, and tried to cement his status as the party’s undisputed leader despite his November loss.
When President Joe Biden made environmental protection a key element of his campaign, he promised to overhaul the federal office that investigates complaints from people in minority communities who believe they have been unfairly harmed by industrial pollution or waste disposal. Although the Environmental Protection Agency acknowledges that disadvantaged communities in America are disproportionately affected by pollution, hundreds of complaints sent to its civil rights office since the mid-1990s have only once resulted in a formal finding of discrimination. The situation has provoked criticism from the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, the EPA’s own Office of Inspector General and citizens who have filed complaints that sometimes languished for years – or decades.
Eight years after carving the heart out of a landmark voting rights law, the Supreme Court is looking at putting new limits on efforts to combat racial discrimination in voting. The justices are taking up a case about Arizona restrictions on ballot collection and another policy that penalizes voters who cast ballots in the wrong precinct. The high court’s consideration comes as Republican officials in the state and around the country have proposed more than 150 measures, following last year’s elections, to restrict voting access that civil rights groups say would disproportionately affect Black and Hispanic voters. A broad Supreme Court ruling would make it harder to fight those efforts in court.
“It is becoming the exception rather than the rule for persons to live their lives in the communities where they were born,” wrote Dick Slagle in The Spokesman-Review in 2002. “I consider myself fortunate, after eight decades, to be residing still in the place of my birth, the Okanogan Highlands of Northeast Washington.” Slagle stayed true to these words, dying in his longtime home near Republic, Washington, on Feb. 9. The 101-year-old left an impressive legacy of place-based conservation.
Infectious disease experts are expressing concern about Pope Francis’ upcoming trip to Iraq, given a sharp rise in coronavirus infections there, a fragile health care system and the unavoidable likelihood that Iraqis will crowd to see him. No one wants to tell Francis to call it off, and the Iraqi government has every interest in showing off its relative stability by welcoming the first pope to the birthplace of Abraham. The March 5-8 trip is expected to provide a spiritual boost to Iraq’s beleaguered Christians while furthering the Vatican’s bridge-building efforts with the Muslim world.
Just five of 18 investigations into police use of deadly force reviewed by the Washington state attorney general’s office met all the requirements of an independent investigation called for after the passage of a new police accountability law, according to a report released Friday. Attorney General Bob Ferguson in June ordered a review of all police deadly-force incidents in Washington since January 2020, when new rules called for under the voter-approved Initiative 940 went into effect. The review followed revelations, reported in the Seattle Times, that the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department failed to comply with the requirements of I-940 while investigating the suffocation death of Manuel Ellis while in Tacoma police custody.
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from 4W.pub
A publication for the next generation of feminists.
The American political left is increasingly diving headfirst into their own world of lies and fantasy and, unlike in the imaginary world of QAnon, real children are becoming actual victims.
I sit here in the middle of the COVID-19 global pandemic. I can’t see the virus. I haven’t gotten sick, but I know it’s real. I don’t want to catch it, so I take the necessary, science-informed precautions. I have a science education. I understand the scientific method that can be applied to physical, biological, and social inquiries. It isn’t infallible, but it’s the best process of discovery and truth-finding that we have. I believe that science and medicine are seeking the truth about this virus; and I believe that, unless there is political or economic interference, scientists and doctors will tell us what they learn to the best of their abilities. From my lockdown-world, I look out and I see large numbers of people believing wild ideas that go against facts and reality. I wonder if other invisible viruses have infected whole populations. A significant number of people have declared war on truth. Rationality and sanity are gone and have been replaced by dogmatic fantasies, political and social agendas, anger, and hate. As a result, there are serious consequences as lives, communities, and indeed, whole political systems, are threatened.
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