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from The Spokesman-Review
Newspaper in Spokane, Washington
COVID-19 is just as prevalent in the community now as it was during the winter wave, and cases will likely keep rising for the next month, according to a new state Department of Health report. Over the last month, case counts have increased sharply in most counties and in all age groups, the report says.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a strong and unusual warning on Saturday: “You are not a horse. You are not a cow. Seriously, y’all. Stop it.” On Friday, Mississippi’s health department issued a warning that more than 70% of recent calls to the state’s poison center came after people took ivermectin bought at livestock supply centers. The FDA was reacting to alarms from Mississippi, the state with the worst outbreak in the U.S., that people have been taking ivermectin to treat or prevent COVID-19. The drug is often used against parasites in livestock. .... An FDA warning said that ivermectin “is not an anti-viral” and that “taking large doses of this drug is dangerous and can cause serious harm.” Although most often used in animals, the FDA said the drug has been approved in smaller doses in humans to treat two conditions caused by parasitic worms.
Crews were digging in and burning out fire lines amid fears that another round of high winds on Saturday will bring renewed fury to a Northern California wildfire. ... The Caldor Fire in the northern Sierra Nevada already destroyed dozens of homes, and authorities on Friday closed down a 46-mile stretch of Interstate 50, the main route between the state capital of Sacramento and Lake Tahoe on the Nevada state line.
Across the country, anti-vaccine and anti-mask demonstrations are taking scary and violent turns, and educators, medical professionals and public figures have been stunned at the level at which they have been vilified for even stating their opinion. And they have been terrified over how far protesters will go in confronting leaders outside their homes and in their workplaces.
Across the U.S., religious figures, doctors, public officials and other community leaders are trying to help people circumvent COVID-19 precautions. While proponents of these workarounds say they are looking out for children’s health and parents’ rights, others say such stratagems are dishonest and irresponsible and could undermine efforts to beat back the highly contagious delta variant.
More than 20,000 wildland firefighters are battling some 100 large wildfires in the U.S West. Their goal is “containment,” meaning a fuel break has been built around the entire fire using natural barriers or human-made lines, often created with bulldozers or ground crews with hand tools. Estimated containment dates for some wildfires now burning aren’t until October or November. ... Actually putting out these large fires, or labeling them “controlled,” will require cold weather combined with rain or snow, weeks away for many states.
President Joe Biden is facing a summer slump, with Americans taking a notably less positive view of his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and his job approval rating ticking down. A new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that 54% of Americans approve of Biden’s job performance, down slightly from 59% last month. While that’s still a relatively solid rating for a president during his first year in office, particularly given the nation’s deep political polarization, it’s a worrying sign for Biden as he faces the greatest domestic and foreign policy challenges of his presidency so far.
President Joe Biden made up his mind about Afghanistan months — really years — ago. For more than a decade, Biden advocated for an end to American involvement in Afghanistan. But he did so as something of an outsider, a senator whose ultimate power came in the form of a single vote on Capitol Hill or a vice president who advised another president. But authority over America’s longest war finally fell into Biden’s hands this year and he insisted that the U.S. withdraw from Afghanistan, settling on an Aug. 31 deadline. And despite the rapid collapse of the Afghan government, spurring a humanitarian crisis and searing criticism at home and from traditional allies, he was resolute, at times defiant. He took responsibility and in turns leveled blame at his predecessor.
Southern Democrats aim to export Georgia’s 2020 success
Stacey Abrams spent years telling donors that Democrats could win in Georgia if they would provide the money to build a statewide political operation. In 2020, Georgia finally delivered its 16 presidential electoral votes to a Democrat, Joe Biden, and sent two Democrats to the U.S. Senate.
Stacey Abrams spent years telling donors that Democrats could win in Georgia if they would provide the money to build a statewide political operation. In 2020, Georgia finally delivered its 16 presidential electoral votes to a Democrat, Joe Biden, and sent two Democrats to the U.S. Senate. Other Southern states are now trying to follow, and Georgia is eager to help. The Georgia Democratic Party is combining forces with other state parties in the region for joint fundraising appeals, aiming to help those states make earlier-than-usual investments in voter registration and field organizing going into the 2022 midterms. Abrams’ Fair Fight organization, which has raised more than $100 million since its inception after her 2018 loss in the Georgia governor’s race, is readying for another round of spending as well.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson, a famed civil rights leader and two-time presidential candidate, and his wife have been hospitalized after testing positive for COVID-19, according to a statement Saturday. Jesse Jackson, 79, is vaccinated against the virus and received his first dose in January during a publicized event as he urged others to receive the inoculation as soon as possible. He and his wife, 77, are being treated at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago.
Potential Islamic State threats against Americans in Afghanistan are forcing the U.S. military to develop new ways to get evacuees to the airport in Kabul, a senior U.S. official said Saturday, adding a new complication to the already chaotic efforts to get people out of the country after its swift fall to the Taliban. The official said small groups of Americans and possibly other civilians will be given specific instructions on what to do, including movement to transit points where they can be gathered up by the military. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations.
A high-ranking Roman Catholic cardinal who was hospitalized after contracting COVID-19 is off a ventilator and is being moved out of intensive care, according to officials at a Wisconsin shrine that he founded. Cardinal Raymond Burke was to return to a regular hospital room Saturday at an undisclosed location, the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in La Crosse said in a statement. Burke, 73, one of the Catholic Church’s most outspoken conservatives and a vaccine skeptic, had been sedated and on a ventilator following his tweet Aug. 10 that he had contracted the coronavirus.
For senior military and Pentagon leaders, this week’s news was profoundly personal. The photos and videos pouring out of Afghanistan hit a nerve, and triggered searingly vivid flashbacks to battles fought, troops lost and tears shed during their own deployments there. And in a response shaped by their memories and experiences in the war, they urged troops to check in on their buddies, talk to each other and seek help and solace if they need it. The top two Pentagon leaders made it clear that the scenes unfolding in Afghanistan, as citizens frantically tried to get out of the country and escape the new Taliban rule, were tough for them to watch. And they knew that the visions of Afghans struggling to get on flights — so desperate that some clung to an aircraft as it lifted off — were painful for troops to see.
Bishop Thomas Daly of the Catholic Diocese of Spokane announced this week that he does not plan to enforce a vaccination mandate for teachers and staff members in Catholic schools, an apparent violation of Gov. Jay Inslee’s recent teacher vaccination mandate. “While we encourage vaccination,” Daly said in a statement issued Thursday, “we do not intend on violating the consciences of our Catholic school teachers nor do we intend on vouching for another person’s conscience.” The statement suggests Daly plans to violate Inslee’s order issued on Wednesday: “Employees in all private, public, and charter schools must be vaccinated by October 18th.”
From above, the new border wall separating Turkey from Iran looks like a white snake winding through the barren hills. So far it only covers a third of the 335-mile border, leaving plenty of gaps for migrants to slip across in the dead of night. Traffic on this key migration route from central Asia to Europe has remained relatively stable compared to previous years. But European countries, as well as Turkey, fear the sudden return of Taliban rule in Afghanistan could change that. Haunted by a 2015 migration crisis fueled by the Syrian war, European leaders desperately want to avoid another large-scale influx of refugees and migrants from Afghanistan. Except for those who helped Western forces in the country’s two-decade war, the message to Afghans considering fleeing to Europe is: If you must leave, go to neighboring countries, but don’t come here. “It must be our goal to keep the majority of the people in the region,” Austrian Interior Minister Karl Nehammer said this week, echoing what many European leaders say.
Russian police on Saturday detained several journalists who protested authorities’ decision to label a top independent TV channel as a “foreign agent.” The journalists held individual pickets outside the main headquarters of the country’s top domestic security agency, the FSB, on Moscow’s Lubyanka Square.
Thousands marched Saturday in cities across France to protest the COVID-19 health pass that is now required to access restaurants and cafes, cultural venues, sports arenas and long-distance travel. For a sixth straight Saturday, opponents denounced what they see as a restriction of their freedom. Many criticized the measure, claiming the French government was implicitly making vaccines obligatory. In Paris, four demonstrations were organized by different groups and over 200 protests were taking place elsewhere in French cities and towns. Last week more than 200,000 marchers turned out. The pass shows that people are fully vaccinated, have had a recent negative test or proof of a recent COVID-19 recovery. The law authorizing it also made vaccinations mandatory for French health workers by Sept. 15.
The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople has arrived on a visit to Ukraine to attend festivities marking the 30th anniversary of its declaration of independence. On Saturday, Patriarch Batholomew I and the leader of the new Orthodox Church of Ukraine, Metropolitan Epiphanius I, together conducted a lithurgy in Kyiv’s St. Michael’s Cathedral.
China will now allow couples to legally have a third child as it seeks to hold off a demographic crisis that could threaten its hopes of increased prosperity and global influence. The ceremonial legislature on Friday amended the Population and Family Planning Law as part of a decades-long effort by the ruling Communist Party to dictate the size of families in keeping with political directives. It comes just six years after the last change.
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