Post by mhbruin on May 15, 2022 9:18:05 GMT -8
US Vaccine Data - We Have Now Administered 581 Million Shots (Population 333 Million)
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California Precipitation (Updated Tuesday May 10)
We had some rain up north this week.
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You Aren't Going to Solve the Water Problem With a Shorter Shower. It's Just a Drop in the Bucket.
Government officials are also focusing on the wrong approach. They say voluntary residential water cuts are not the solution, and that restrictions should be mandated for businesses and industries that use the vast majority of the state’s water.
“Corporate water abuse has to be addressed or no other measures will matter,” said Jessica Gable, a spokesperson for Food & Water Watch.
“The perception in California right now is it’s no secret any longer that drought is linked with climate change,” Gable told CNN. “But there has been no effort to curtail the industries that are using the most water, which are coincidentally the industries that are also sending out the most emissions that are fueling the climate crisis.”
But community advocates say residents wonder whether big water users are also faced with the same pressure and painful decisions to conserve – namely, agriculture that requires a large amount of water (things like almonds, alfalfa, avocado and tomatoes) or fracking, where tens of millions of gallons of water can be used to frack a single fossil fuel well.
Cutting back on residential water use is like telling people recycling could save the planet. While it’s a meaningful action, it’s not going to make a dent in the crisis at large.
“It’s also kind of a little bit demeaning to blame residential use for these crises,” Starbuck told CNN. “It’s just a small sliver of the overall consumption. It’s a much bigger problem, and we really need to start bringing in these big industries that are guzzling water during this time of drought.”
Who's Using the Water?
More than nine million acres of farmland in California are irrigated, representing roughly 80% of all water used for businesses and homes. Today, farm production and food processing generate about 2% of California’s gross state product, down from about 5% in the early 1960s.
Total urban water use has been falling even as the population grows. Even before the latest drought, per capita water use had declined significantly—from 231 gallons per day in 1990 to 180 gallons per day in 2010—reflecting substantial efforts to reduce water use through pricing incentives and mandatory installation of water-saving technologies like low-flow toilets and shower heads.
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My Mood Ring is Missing and I Don't Know How I Feel About That
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Today's Worst Person in the World Nominees
No Exceptions
Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts of Nebraska said Sunday that he will call a special session of his state’s legislature to pass a total ban on abortion if the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade this term.
“Nebraska is a pro-life state. I believe life begins at conception,” Ricketts told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union.” “If Roe v. Wade, which is a horrible constitutional decision, gets overturned by the Supreme Court, which we’re hopeful of, here in Nebraska, we’re going to take further steps to protect those unborn babies.”
“Including in the case of rape or incest?” Bash asked. To which the governor replied: “They’re still babies, too. Yes.”
SCOTUS' Miscarriage of Justice Creates Problems For Actual Miscarriages
Roughly ten to twenty per cent of known pregnancies end in miscarriage. Yet none of the state bans overtly differentiate between the management of miscarriage and abortion, which share the same objective: to empty the uterus. The two procedures also employ the same tools and techniques, depending on the stage of the pregnancy and the health of the pregnant person: medication or dilation and curettage (D. & C.) for early abortions; and dilation and evacuation (D. & E.) or induced labor for later abortions. (In his draft opinion reversing Roe, Justice Samuel Alito refers to D. & E. as “a barbaric practice.”) Although the two sets of care are near-identical in their mechanics, “when someone is starting to bleed, their cervix is open, their water breaks—that’s not an induced abortion,” Ghazaleh Moayedi, an ob-gyn and complex family-planning specialist in Dallas, said. “This is not a person who comes to you and says, ‘I want to end this pregnancy.’ This is a person who is saying, ‘I am having a pregnancy complication, and I need you to help me.’ ”
That cry for help often goes unheeded in the presence of a fetal heartbeat, even if the demise of the pregnancy is inevitable. In 2015, the A.C.L.U. filed suit on behalf of a Michigan woman, Tamesha Means, against the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, the body that writes the religious and ethical directives that must be followed by Catholic hospitals, which, as of 2016, accounted for about fifteen per cent of acute-care hospitals nationwide. The directives state that abortion is “never permitted,” barring “a proportionately serious pathological condition of a pregnant woman.” Means’s water broke at eighteen weeks, but she was sent home from a Catholic hospital, Mercy Health Partners, mid-miscarriage—twice—despite excruciating pain and possible infection. (The suit was dismissed on appeal, in 2016, partly for reasons of jurisdiction, although the court acknowledged that Means “suffered physical and mental pain, emotional injuries, a riskier delivery, [and] shock and emotional trauma.”) A report found that Means was one of five women in a seventeen-month period who suffered prolonged, dangerous miscarriages while under the care of doctors at Mercy Health Partners.
Several physicians told me that hesitation to provide emergency-miscarriage care is not peculiar to Catholic or other religious institutions. Even in states where abortion rights are broadly intact, many hospital systems do not permit terminations for any reason; patients in need must be transferred elsewhere. Heuser, who serves as a consultant for general ob-gyns across her hospital system in Salt Lake City, told me, “I have got calls from the E.R., saying, ‘This patient is bleeding, but there’s still a heartbeat—I don’t know what to do.’ And I have had to say, ‘You are allowed to treat the patient. You need to save the patient. This is a medical emergency.’ If you hem and haw because you aren’t sure about the law or the rules—that’s dangerous for patients.”
You Can't Keep a Good Woman Down ... But They Sure As Hell Are Trying To.
The Supreme Court’s expected reversal of Roe v. Wade and the abortion rights it provides threatens to roll back the economic and educational advances made by American women in the last 49 years.
Abortion rights have improved women’s ability to attain higher education. They’ve led to increased lifetime earnings. And they’ve given women more long-term financial stability.
The Supreme Court is well aware of these gains. A group of 154 economists and researchers highlighted them in a brief to the court as part of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Program case, which looks at abortion restrictions enacted in Mississippi. But the court apparently plans to overlook these gains ― and turn them back ― in a ruling anticipated in June that would end the constitutional right to an abortion.
The discussion around reproductive rights is often framed as part of a “culture war” between religious conservatives and secular liberals over nonmaterial concerns. A leaked draft majority opinion in the case, written by Justice Samuel Alito, largely focuses on a (dubious) history of abortion law in an attempt to show that legal abortion is not “deeply rooted” in the country’s “history and tradition” in his argument for overturning the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
But as Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen noted earlier this week, the right to have an abortion is also an economic issue.
The evidence of women’s economic gains following the national legalization of abortion in 1973 can be found in the economists’ friend-of-the-court (amicus curae) brief filed with the Supreme Court in the Dobbs case. The brief describes the findings of causal inference studies conducted since the Roe decision to show the positive economic effects the decision had on women’s lives.
“Studies show that in addition to impacting births, abortion legalization has had a significant impact on women’s wages and educational attainment, with impacts most strongly felt by Black women,” the brief states.
A Close Call
A "Pedo Grifter" is What??
After critics pummeled Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) for nonsensically blaming the “usual pedo grifters” for America’s infant formula shortage, her office reportedly insisted that is not what she meant at all.
A spokesperson for the extremist lawmaker said she wasn’t blaming “pedophile” grifters, but intended “pedo” to mean “children,” writer and activist Parker Malloy reported Saturday — which still makes no sense.
“Pedo” or pedophile is a well-known dogwhistle to QAnon conspiracy theorists who are baselessy convinced “pedo” Democrats are running an international child sex-trafficking operation.
...
The unidentified caller asks who the “usual pedo grifters” are that Stefanik refers to in her tweet.
“First off, this is her personal Twitter. Just have to note that,” the staffer responds, pointing out that the office had received a number of calls about the issue. “And No. 2, ‘pedo’ is not short for ‘pedophile, it is ‘pedo,’ as in ‘children.’”
“So these are people who are grifting their children?” asks the confused caller. “How are they grifting their children? Or are they children who are grifting?”
The person responds: “No, not children who are grifting ... people who are grifting on behalf of children.”
Maybe American Women Didn't Want to See Her Face
A miffed Melania Trump spoke in an interview of the “obvious” “bias,” apparently political, of people in charge of Vogue magazine that kept her off the cover while she was first lady.
“They’re biased, and they have likes and dislikes, and it’s so obvious,” she told Fox News’ Pete Hegseth Friday in her first interview since leaving the White House. “I think American people and everyone see it. It was their decision,” Trump said.
She was responding to Hegseth’s observation that Jill Biden, Michelle Obama, and Hillary Clinton all appeared on the cover of Vogue when their husbands were in the White House.
Kamala Harris was on the cover before she became vice president.
Trump insisted she had “much more important things to do (What important things?) — and I did in the White House — than being on the cover of Vogue.”
A Pox on All Their Houses!
The Philadelphia Inquirer announced Friday it would not endorse any Republican candidates in the Pennsylvania GOP Senate or gubernatorial primaries.
The newspaper’s editorial board said it took “no pleasure” in the move — calling it instead “a sad state of affairs.”
“With abortion rights at stake and right-leaning candidates who can’t agree on who won the 2020 election, The Inquirer Editorial Board has chosen not to endorse a Republican for senate or governor,” it revealed.
The board has historically managed to find “points of agreement” with Republican candidates they don’t necessarily support wholesale, it wrote.
But the unwillingness of most of the GOP hopefuls to accept Joe Biden’s 2020 election win, and their determination to roll back abortion rights, has cost them the paper’s backing.
The "Hot Mess" Will Probably Be Back for Another Term. He Put the "Mad" Back in "Madison".
In little more than a year in Congress, Rep. Madison Cawthorn, R-N.C., has become famous in political circles. On Tuesday, that could cost him his job.
"He's a hot mess," Susan Newman, 53, a teacher from nearby Laurel Park who voted for Cawthorn two years ago, said in the parking lot of an Ingles grocery store. "I really don’t see him doing anything in the district — and he just keeps getting in trouble."
That sentiment, echoed by several voters here who spoke to NBC News, suggests Cawthorn is in danger of getting the boot in Tuesday's hotly contested Republican primary for the 11th District seat.
But the 26-year-old first-term lawmaker has a lot going for him: the advantages of incumbency, the support of former President Donald Trump and a field of rivals so crowded that it may be hard for any one of them to beat him.
Political insiders here say it's Cawthorn's race to lose — but if he does, it will be his own fault.
That's in part because of a striking pattern of unusual behavior: speeding without a valid driver’s license; taking a firearm through security at an airport; wearing lingerie in photos; appearing in a video in which a staffer pantomimes a grab for his groin; gyrating naked on top of another man in bed; accusing un-named lawmakers of inhaling cocaine and inviting him to an orgy; promoting a cryptocurrency in ways that prompted critics to claim he engaged in insider trading; and calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy “a thug.”
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Today's Best Person in the World Nominees
No Rides for Racists
Winning on the Battlefield and On the Eurovision Stage
A Good Guy With a Gun Tried to Stop a Bad Guy With a Gun
A security guard killed while exchanging gunfire with a mass shooter during Saturday’s attack at a Buffalo, New York, supermarket is being recognized as a selfless hero who gave up his life to save others.
“He went down fighting. He came in, he went towards the gunfire, he went towards the fight,” Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said of retired Buffalo police officer Aaron Salter Jr. in an interview with ABC News’ “This Week” on Sunday.
“He shot the individual but because of his armor plating vest it had no effect on him and unfortunately the suspect returned fire and he succumbed to his injuries. Like I said, he was a beloved member and we’re sure he saved lives yesterday,” said Gramaglia.
WTF Can He Do with a Sociology Degree? How Will He Earn a Living?
Steph Curry will officially be a college graduate, earning a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology.
He won't be attending Davidson College's commencement ceremonies this weekend, though.
Curry and the Golden State Warriors advanced last week to the Western Conference Finals, which begin Wednesday.
From NFL plays to college sports scores, all the top sports news you need to know every day.
"Davidson College looks forward to an opportunity on campus in the future when we can present his diploma," the school said in a statement posted on social media.
Davidson provided additional details, saying Curry was one semester shy of graduating when he enrolled for the past spring semester. The two-time NBA MVP worked with two members of the Davidson faculty, one at Stanford University and another from the University of California-Santa Cruz to complete his degree.
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Invasions Have Consequences
Day 81
Fighting
“Russia has now likely suffered losses of one third of the ground combat force it committed in February,” the UK’s defence ministry said.
British military intelligence said Russia’s offensive in the Donbas “has lost momentum and fallen significantly behind schedule” with a dramatic acceleration unlikely over the next 30 days.
Four missile attacks hit military infrastructure in Yavoriv in western Ukraine near the Polish border, Lviv region’s Governor Maxim Kozitsky said.
Russia, rejecting Ukraine’s claim to have set alight a modern navy logistics ship in the Black Sea, showed photos of what it said was the Vsevolod Bobrov with no signs of damage.
Refugees from bombed-out Mariupol spoke of devastation as they reached Ukrainian-controlled Zaporizhzhia in a large convoy of vehicles after waiting days for Russian troops to let them leave.
Russia’s defence ministry said its forces hit Ukrainian command posts, ammunition depots, and other military equipment in several regions, including the Donbas, killing at least 100 Ukrainian “nationalists”.
Diplomacy
Top NATO diplomats meet in Berlin to discuss providing further support to Ukraine.
G7 foreign ministers vowed to reinforce Russia’s economic and political isolation, continue supplying weapons to Ukraine, and work to ease global food shortages stemming from the war.
Russia’s ambassador to the US, Anatoly Antonov, said the country’s diplomats in Washington are being threatened with violence.
Germany has taken all preparations for a quick ratification process should Finland and Sweden decide to apply for NATO membership, Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said.
US Senate Republican minority leader Mitch McConnell and a delegation of GOP senators met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv and expressed their solidarity for Ukraine.INTERACTIVE Russia-Ukraine map Who controls what in Donbas DAY 81
NATO
NATO’s Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoana expressed confidence that Turkey’s concerns over Finland and Sweden joining NATO could be addressed, after Ankara said it had not shut the door to their entry.
Croatia’s foreign minister said talks between Turkey, Finland and Sweden were on the right track.
Sweden’s ruling Social Democrats were poised to come out in favour joining NATO, paving the way for an application soon after and abandoning decades of military non-alignment.
Geoana said Russia’s military advance in Ukraine appears to be faltering and he expressed hope that Kyiv can win the war.
Ukraine wining the Eurovision Song Contest showed the immense public support for the country in its battle against Russia, Geoana said.
The Next Counter-Offensive Has Begun on the Izyum Salient
Several sources claim the latest Ukrainian assault is coming down from Chuhuiv (top arrow).
If Chuhuiv is the the source of the counter-offensive, it would likely travel that main highway southeast toward Izyium, rather than east toward Kupiansk. Russia has moved a great deal of combat power to Shevchenkove, between Chuhuiv and Kupiansk, to protect its critical supply depot from any Ukrainian advance. Getting through those two cities would be expensive to Ukraine in military resources and lives. And there’s no need, as we’ve can now so clearly see with Ukraine’s push toward Izyum itself.
In short, if Ukraine collapses that Izyum pocket, there is no longer a need for Russia to maintain operations in either Kupiansk or Vovchansk—the two logistical hubs feeding the war machine in the Izyum salient. After a week of debating “Kupiansk vs Vovchansk,” it turns out that the best answer is “C: Take away the reason for both.”
Our Tax Dollars at Work
Their Tax Dollars Are Not At Work
The separatist city of Donetsk is having serious problems with their drinking water supply. But they can’t do anything about it because they’ve conscripted the people who used to maintain it.
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COVID Isn't Exactly Over, But ...
North Korea?
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Editorial: What Will Some in the Media Get Wrong About the Buffalo Grocery Store Shooting
1) The shooter is not a kid. He is 18-years-old, and can legally buy guns. We increasingly try young black killers as adults. This man certainly qualifies.
2) He is not a lone wolf. He is a member of a loosely knit goup of organizations and "news" organizations doing their best to propagate white supremacism and white replacement theories. They are doing their best to radicalize white Americans, just as much as ISIS and Al Qaeda. If this were a Muslim man, they same "news" people would be blaming all of Islam as a violent, terrorist religion.
3) He is not mentally disturbed. He subscribes to a hateful philosophy you can hear daily by TucKKKer and Laura Ingraham.
This is a white, probably Christian terrorist. He has been radicalized by a massive white terrorist network. This isn't a confused kid. He's a front-line soldier in an organized assault on minorities.
It's Called Fascism
Or As This Guy Puts It
We have a major problem with the kind of people who are precipitating the vast majority of these incidents. Far from being lone wolves, these terrorists- almost exclusively young white men- are radicalized online in chat rooms and on websites that take a sick pleasure in abetting future acts of violence, doing everything they can to train and equip people to kill.
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Who's Flying This Thing?
The United States is facing its worst pilot shortage in recent memory, forcing airlines to cut flights just as travelers are returning after more than two years of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The crisis has the industry scrambling for solutions.
At least one lawmaker is said to be considering legislation that could raise the federally-mandated retirement age for airline pilots from 65 to 67 or higher to extend aviators’ time in the skies.
A regional airline proposed reducing flight-hour requirements before joining a U.S. carrier, and airlines are rethinking training programs to lower the barrier to entry. Earlier this year, Delta Air Lines joined other big carriers in dropping a four-year degree from its pilot hiring requirements.
Several U.S. airlines, including Frontier, are recruiting some pilots from Australia. American Airlines is selling bus tickets for some short routes.
But some airline executives warn the shortage could take years to solve.
“The pilot shortage for the industry is real, and most airlines are simply not going to be able to realize their capacity plans because there simply aren’t enough pilots, at least not for the next five-plus years,” United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said on a quarterly earnings call in April.
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Who Won the Week?
Lisa Cook, who was confirmed by the Senate and becomes the first Black woman on the Federal Reserve's board of governors
Dr. Anthony Fauci, who received wild applause when he got his honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Michigan and spoke of the dangers of "the normalization of untruths"
President Biden: unveils affordable broadband for low-income people; vows to whip inflation; gets thumbs-ups during visit with Illinois farmers; signs FDR-style Lend-Lease Act to speed Ukraine aid
The Nashville Public Library, for responding to right-wing censorship threats by distributing “I read banned books” library cards
Susan Collins' neighbors, for causing the deadbeat Maine senator to call the cops because they expressed displeasure with her flip-flop on abortion with chalk art
The Pulitzer winners, including WaPost coverage of Jan. 6, the journalists of Ukraine, and NYT for spotlighting the pattern of cops killing citizens during routine traffic stops
Judge J. Layne Smith, for telling Florida dictator Ron DeSantis to take his racist district maps and stick 'em where the sun don't shine
Ukraine, for ruining Putin's May 9 victory party, crushing a Russki river crossing attempt, and welcoming First Lady Jill Biden and the U.S. staff of the newly-re-opened U.S. Embassy
Jen Psaki, who held her final briefing as White House press secretary after bringing truth and class back to the position after 4 years of Trump-era gaslighting stooges
Passenger with no piloting experience Darren Harrison, who grabbed the controls and, with a Florida control tower's help, landed the Cessna he was in after the pilot passed out
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New Cases 7-Day Average | Deaths 7-Day Average | New Hospitalizations 7-Day Average | |
| May 13 | 87,831 | 266 | |
| May 12 | 87,382 | 272 | 2,731 |
| May 11 | 84,778 | 272 | 2,652 |
| May 10 | 78,236 | 326 | 2,629 |
| May 9 | 74,712 | 323 | 2,597 |
| May 8 | 66,564 | 323 | 2,510 |
| May 7 | 67,561 | 335 | 2,310 |
| May 6 | 68,807 | 340 | 2,396 |
| May 5 | 67,263 | 341 | 2.363 |
| May 4 | 64,780 | 334 | 2,267 |
| May 3 | 61,712 | 325 | 2,219 |
| May 2 | 60,410 | 318 | 2.214 |
| May 1 | 57,020 | 307 | 2,072 |
| Apr 30 | 56,581 | 310 | 1,882 |
| Apr 29 | 56,166 | 308 | 1,946 |
| Apr 28 | 54,696 | 311 | 1,955 |
| Apr 27 | 53,133 | 334 | 1,941 |
| Apr 26 | 48,692 | 299 | 1,889 |
| Apr 25 | 47,407 | 330 | 1,840 |
| Apr 24 | 44,416 | 314 | 1,779 |
| Apr 23 | 45,413 | 315 | 1,629 |
| Apr 22 | 44,308 | 311 | 1,642 |
| Apr 21 | 40,744 | 346 | 1,647 |
| Apr 20 | 42,604 | 375 | 1,609 |
| Apr 19 | 40,985 | 385 | 1,582 |
| Apr 18 | 37,132 | 380 | 1,564 |
| Apr 17 | 35,212 | 373 | 1,542 |
| Apr 16 | 34,972 | 379 | 1,532 |
| Apr 15 | 34,778 | 399 | 1,510 |
| Apr 14 | 35,475 | 446 | 1,490 |
| Apr 13 | 31,391 | 409 | 1,477 |
| Apr 12 | 29,401 | 452 | 1,463 |
| Apr 11 | 30,208 | 483 | 1.447 |
| Apr 10 | 28,927 | 500 | 1,443 |
| Feb 16, 2021 | 78,292 |
| At Least One Dose | Fully Vaccinated | % of Vaccinated W/ Boosters | |
| % of Total Population | 77.7% | 66.3% | 45.9% |
| % of Population 5+ | 82.6% | 70.4% | |
| % of Population 12+ | 87.4% | 74.7% | 47.7% |
| % of Population 18+ | 89.1% | 76.2% | 49.5% |
| % of Population 65+ | 95.0% | 90.4% | 68.8% |
California Precipitation (Updated Tuesday May 10)
We had some rain up north this week.
| Percent of Average for this Date | Last Week | 2 Weeks Ago | 4 Weeks Ago | |
| Northern Sierra Precipitation | 80% (75%) | 80% (74%) | 81% (74%) | 73% (63% of full season average) |
| San Joaquin Precipitation | 65% (61%) | 66% (61%) | 67% (61%) | 65% (57%) |
| Tulare Basin Precipitation | 61% (57%) | 61% (57%) | 62% (57%) | 61% (53%) |
| Snow Water Content - North | 29% | |||
| Snow Water Content - Central | 26% | |||
| Snow Water Content - South | 9% |
You Aren't Going to Solve the Water Problem With a Shorter Shower. It's Just a Drop in the Bucket.
Government officials are also focusing on the wrong approach. They say voluntary residential water cuts are not the solution, and that restrictions should be mandated for businesses and industries that use the vast majority of the state’s water.
“Corporate water abuse has to be addressed or no other measures will matter,” said Jessica Gable, a spokesperson for Food & Water Watch.
“The perception in California right now is it’s no secret any longer that drought is linked with climate change,” Gable told CNN. “But there has been no effort to curtail the industries that are using the most water, which are coincidentally the industries that are also sending out the most emissions that are fueling the climate crisis.”
But community advocates say residents wonder whether big water users are also faced with the same pressure and painful decisions to conserve – namely, agriculture that requires a large amount of water (things like almonds, alfalfa, avocado and tomatoes) or fracking, where tens of millions of gallons of water can be used to frack a single fossil fuel well.
Cutting back on residential water use is like telling people recycling could save the planet. While it’s a meaningful action, it’s not going to make a dent in the crisis at large.
“It’s also kind of a little bit demeaning to blame residential use for these crises,” Starbuck told CNN. “It’s just a small sliver of the overall consumption. It’s a much bigger problem, and we really need to start bringing in these big industries that are guzzling water during this time of drought.”
Who's Using the Water?
More than nine million acres of farmland in California are irrigated, representing roughly 80% of all water used for businesses and homes. Today, farm production and food processing generate about 2% of California’s gross state product, down from about 5% in the early 1960s.
Total urban water use has been falling even as the population grows. Even before the latest drought, per capita water use had declined significantly—from 231 gallons per day in 1990 to 180 gallons per day in 2010—reflecting substantial efforts to reduce water use through pricing incentives and mandatory installation of water-saving technologies like low-flow toilets and shower heads.
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My Mood Ring is Missing and I Don't Know How I Feel About That
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Today's Worst Person in the World Nominees
No Exceptions
Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts of Nebraska said Sunday that he will call a special session of his state’s legislature to pass a total ban on abortion if the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade this term.
“Nebraska is a pro-life state. I believe life begins at conception,” Ricketts told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union.” “If Roe v. Wade, which is a horrible constitutional decision, gets overturned by the Supreme Court, which we’re hopeful of, here in Nebraska, we’re going to take further steps to protect those unborn babies.”
“Including in the case of rape or incest?” Bash asked. To which the governor replied: “They’re still babies, too. Yes.”
SCOTUS' Miscarriage of Justice Creates Problems For Actual Miscarriages
Roughly ten to twenty per cent of known pregnancies end in miscarriage. Yet none of the state bans overtly differentiate between the management of miscarriage and abortion, which share the same objective: to empty the uterus. The two procedures also employ the same tools and techniques, depending on the stage of the pregnancy and the health of the pregnant person: medication or dilation and curettage (D. & C.) for early abortions; and dilation and evacuation (D. & E.) or induced labor for later abortions. (In his draft opinion reversing Roe, Justice Samuel Alito refers to D. & E. as “a barbaric practice.”) Although the two sets of care are near-identical in their mechanics, “when someone is starting to bleed, their cervix is open, their water breaks—that’s not an induced abortion,” Ghazaleh Moayedi, an ob-gyn and complex family-planning specialist in Dallas, said. “This is not a person who comes to you and says, ‘I want to end this pregnancy.’ This is a person who is saying, ‘I am having a pregnancy complication, and I need you to help me.’ ”
That cry for help often goes unheeded in the presence of a fetal heartbeat, even if the demise of the pregnancy is inevitable. In 2015, the A.C.L.U. filed suit on behalf of a Michigan woman, Tamesha Means, against the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, the body that writes the religious and ethical directives that must be followed by Catholic hospitals, which, as of 2016, accounted for about fifteen per cent of acute-care hospitals nationwide. The directives state that abortion is “never permitted,” barring “a proportionately serious pathological condition of a pregnant woman.” Means’s water broke at eighteen weeks, but she was sent home from a Catholic hospital, Mercy Health Partners, mid-miscarriage—twice—despite excruciating pain and possible infection. (The suit was dismissed on appeal, in 2016, partly for reasons of jurisdiction, although the court acknowledged that Means “suffered physical and mental pain, emotional injuries, a riskier delivery, [and] shock and emotional trauma.”) A report found that Means was one of five women in a seventeen-month period who suffered prolonged, dangerous miscarriages while under the care of doctors at Mercy Health Partners.
Several physicians told me that hesitation to provide emergency-miscarriage care is not peculiar to Catholic or other religious institutions. Even in states where abortion rights are broadly intact, many hospital systems do not permit terminations for any reason; patients in need must be transferred elsewhere. Heuser, who serves as a consultant for general ob-gyns across her hospital system in Salt Lake City, told me, “I have got calls from the E.R., saying, ‘This patient is bleeding, but there’s still a heartbeat—I don’t know what to do.’ And I have had to say, ‘You are allowed to treat the patient. You need to save the patient. This is a medical emergency.’ If you hem and haw because you aren’t sure about the law or the rules—that’s dangerous for patients.”
You Can't Keep a Good Woman Down ... But They Sure As Hell Are Trying To.
The Supreme Court’s expected reversal of Roe v. Wade and the abortion rights it provides threatens to roll back the economic and educational advances made by American women in the last 49 years.
Abortion rights have improved women’s ability to attain higher education. They’ve led to increased lifetime earnings. And they’ve given women more long-term financial stability.
The Supreme Court is well aware of these gains. A group of 154 economists and researchers highlighted them in a brief to the court as part of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Program case, which looks at abortion restrictions enacted in Mississippi. But the court apparently plans to overlook these gains ― and turn them back ― in a ruling anticipated in June that would end the constitutional right to an abortion.
The discussion around reproductive rights is often framed as part of a “culture war” between religious conservatives and secular liberals over nonmaterial concerns. A leaked draft majority opinion in the case, written by Justice Samuel Alito, largely focuses on a (dubious) history of abortion law in an attempt to show that legal abortion is not “deeply rooted” in the country’s “history and tradition” in his argument for overturning the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
But as Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen noted earlier this week, the right to have an abortion is also an economic issue.
The evidence of women’s economic gains following the national legalization of abortion in 1973 can be found in the economists’ friend-of-the-court (amicus curae) brief filed with the Supreme Court in the Dobbs case. The brief describes the findings of causal inference studies conducted since the Roe decision to show the positive economic effects the decision had on women’s lives.
“Studies show that in addition to impacting births, abortion legalization has had a significant impact on women’s wages and educational attainment, with impacts most strongly felt by Black women,” the brief states.
A Close Call
A "Pedo Grifter" is What??
After critics pummeled Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) for nonsensically blaming the “usual pedo grifters” for America’s infant formula shortage, her office reportedly insisted that is not what she meant at all.
A spokesperson for the extremist lawmaker said she wasn’t blaming “pedophile” grifters, but intended “pedo” to mean “children,” writer and activist Parker Malloy reported Saturday — which still makes no sense.
“Pedo” or pedophile is a well-known dogwhistle to QAnon conspiracy theorists who are baselessy convinced “pedo” Democrats are running an international child sex-trafficking operation.
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The unidentified caller asks who the “usual pedo grifters” are that Stefanik refers to in her tweet.
“First off, this is her personal Twitter. Just have to note that,” the staffer responds, pointing out that the office had received a number of calls about the issue. “And No. 2, ‘pedo’ is not short for ‘pedophile, it is ‘pedo,’ as in ‘children.’”
“So these are people who are grifting their children?” asks the confused caller. “How are they grifting their children? Or are they children who are grifting?”
The person responds: “No, not children who are grifting ... people who are grifting on behalf of children.”
Maybe American Women Didn't Want to See Her Face
A miffed Melania Trump spoke in an interview of the “obvious” “bias,” apparently political, of people in charge of Vogue magazine that kept her off the cover while she was first lady.
“They’re biased, and they have likes and dislikes, and it’s so obvious,” she told Fox News’ Pete Hegseth Friday in her first interview since leaving the White House. “I think American people and everyone see it. It was their decision,” Trump said.
She was responding to Hegseth’s observation that Jill Biden, Michelle Obama, and Hillary Clinton all appeared on the cover of Vogue when their husbands were in the White House.
Kamala Harris was on the cover before she became vice president.
Trump insisted she had “much more important things to do (What important things?) — and I did in the White House — than being on the cover of Vogue.”
A Pox on All Their Houses!
The Philadelphia Inquirer announced Friday it would not endorse any Republican candidates in the Pennsylvania GOP Senate or gubernatorial primaries.
The newspaper’s editorial board said it took “no pleasure” in the move — calling it instead “a sad state of affairs.”
“With abortion rights at stake and right-leaning candidates who can’t agree on who won the 2020 election, The Inquirer Editorial Board has chosen not to endorse a Republican for senate or governor,” it revealed.
The board has historically managed to find “points of agreement” with Republican candidates they don’t necessarily support wholesale, it wrote.
But the unwillingness of most of the GOP hopefuls to accept Joe Biden’s 2020 election win, and their determination to roll back abortion rights, has cost them the paper’s backing.
The "Hot Mess" Will Probably Be Back for Another Term. He Put the "Mad" Back in "Madison".
In little more than a year in Congress, Rep. Madison Cawthorn, R-N.C., has become famous in political circles. On Tuesday, that could cost him his job.
"He's a hot mess," Susan Newman, 53, a teacher from nearby Laurel Park who voted for Cawthorn two years ago, said in the parking lot of an Ingles grocery store. "I really don’t see him doing anything in the district — and he just keeps getting in trouble."
That sentiment, echoed by several voters here who spoke to NBC News, suggests Cawthorn is in danger of getting the boot in Tuesday's hotly contested Republican primary for the 11th District seat.
But the 26-year-old first-term lawmaker has a lot going for him: the advantages of incumbency, the support of former President Donald Trump and a field of rivals so crowded that it may be hard for any one of them to beat him.
Political insiders here say it's Cawthorn's race to lose — but if he does, it will be his own fault.
That's in part because of a striking pattern of unusual behavior: speeding without a valid driver’s license; taking a firearm through security at an airport; wearing lingerie in photos; appearing in a video in which a staffer pantomimes a grab for his groin; gyrating naked on top of another man in bed; accusing un-named lawmakers of inhaling cocaine and inviting him to an orgy; promoting a cryptocurrency in ways that prompted critics to claim he engaged in insider trading; and calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy “a thug.”
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Today's Best Person in the World Nominees
No Rides for Racists
Winning on the Battlefield and On the Eurovision Stage
A Good Guy With a Gun Tried to Stop a Bad Guy With a Gun
A security guard killed while exchanging gunfire with a mass shooter during Saturday’s attack at a Buffalo, New York, supermarket is being recognized as a selfless hero who gave up his life to save others.
“He went down fighting. He came in, he went towards the gunfire, he went towards the fight,” Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said of retired Buffalo police officer Aaron Salter Jr. in an interview with ABC News’ “This Week” on Sunday.
“He shot the individual but because of his armor plating vest it had no effect on him and unfortunately the suspect returned fire and he succumbed to his injuries. Like I said, he was a beloved member and we’re sure he saved lives yesterday,” said Gramaglia.
WTF Can He Do with a Sociology Degree? How Will He Earn a Living?
Steph Curry will officially be a college graduate, earning a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology.
He won't be attending Davidson College's commencement ceremonies this weekend, though.
Curry and the Golden State Warriors advanced last week to the Western Conference Finals, which begin Wednesday.
From NFL plays to college sports scores, all the top sports news you need to know every day.
"Davidson College looks forward to an opportunity on campus in the future when we can present his diploma," the school said in a statement posted on social media.
Davidson provided additional details, saying Curry was one semester shy of graduating when he enrolled for the past spring semester. The two-time NBA MVP worked with two members of the Davidson faculty, one at Stanford University and another from the University of California-Santa Cruz to complete his degree.
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Invasions Have Consequences
Day 81
Fighting
“Russia has now likely suffered losses of one third of the ground combat force it committed in February,” the UK’s defence ministry said.
British military intelligence said Russia’s offensive in the Donbas “has lost momentum and fallen significantly behind schedule” with a dramatic acceleration unlikely over the next 30 days.
Four missile attacks hit military infrastructure in Yavoriv in western Ukraine near the Polish border, Lviv region’s Governor Maxim Kozitsky said.
Russia, rejecting Ukraine’s claim to have set alight a modern navy logistics ship in the Black Sea, showed photos of what it said was the Vsevolod Bobrov with no signs of damage.
Refugees from bombed-out Mariupol spoke of devastation as they reached Ukrainian-controlled Zaporizhzhia in a large convoy of vehicles after waiting days for Russian troops to let them leave.
Russia’s defence ministry said its forces hit Ukrainian command posts, ammunition depots, and other military equipment in several regions, including the Donbas, killing at least 100 Ukrainian “nationalists”.
Diplomacy
Top NATO diplomats meet in Berlin to discuss providing further support to Ukraine.
G7 foreign ministers vowed to reinforce Russia’s economic and political isolation, continue supplying weapons to Ukraine, and work to ease global food shortages stemming from the war.
Russia’s ambassador to the US, Anatoly Antonov, said the country’s diplomats in Washington are being threatened with violence.
Germany has taken all preparations for a quick ratification process should Finland and Sweden decide to apply for NATO membership, Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said.
US Senate Republican minority leader Mitch McConnell and a delegation of GOP senators met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv and expressed their solidarity for Ukraine.INTERACTIVE Russia-Ukraine map Who controls what in Donbas DAY 81
NATO
NATO’s Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoana expressed confidence that Turkey’s concerns over Finland and Sweden joining NATO could be addressed, after Ankara said it had not shut the door to their entry.
Croatia’s foreign minister said talks between Turkey, Finland and Sweden were on the right track.
Sweden’s ruling Social Democrats were poised to come out in favour joining NATO, paving the way for an application soon after and abandoning decades of military non-alignment.
Geoana said Russia’s military advance in Ukraine appears to be faltering and he expressed hope that Kyiv can win the war.
Ukraine wining the Eurovision Song Contest showed the immense public support for the country in its battle against Russia, Geoana said.
The Next Counter-Offensive Has Begun on the Izyum Salient
Several sources claim the latest Ukrainian assault is coming down from Chuhuiv (top arrow).
If Chuhuiv is the the source of the counter-offensive, it would likely travel that main highway southeast toward Izyium, rather than east toward Kupiansk. Russia has moved a great deal of combat power to Shevchenkove, between Chuhuiv and Kupiansk, to protect its critical supply depot from any Ukrainian advance. Getting through those two cities would be expensive to Ukraine in military resources and lives. And there’s no need, as we’ve can now so clearly see with Ukraine’s push toward Izyum itself.
In short, if Ukraine collapses that Izyum pocket, there is no longer a need for Russia to maintain operations in either Kupiansk or Vovchansk—the two logistical hubs feeding the war machine in the Izyum salient. After a week of debating “Kupiansk vs Vovchansk,” it turns out that the best answer is “C: Take away the reason for both.”
Our Tax Dollars at Work
Their Tax Dollars Are Not At Work
The separatist city of Donetsk is having serious problems with their drinking water supply. But they can’t do anything about it because they’ve conscripted the people who used to maintain it.
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COVID Isn't Exactly Over, But ...
North Korea?
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Editorial: What Will Some in the Media Get Wrong About the Buffalo Grocery Store Shooting
1) The shooter is not a kid. He is 18-years-old, and can legally buy guns. We increasingly try young black killers as adults. This man certainly qualifies.
2) He is not a lone wolf. He is a member of a loosely knit goup of organizations and "news" organizations doing their best to propagate white supremacism and white replacement theories. They are doing their best to radicalize white Americans, just as much as ISIS and Al Qaeda. If this were a Muslim man, they same "news" people would be blaming all of Islam as a violent, terrorist religion.
3) He is not mentally disturbed. He subscribes to a hateful philosophy you can hear daily by TucKKKer and Laura Ingraham.
This is a white, probably Christian terrorist. He has been radicalized by a massive white terrorist network. This isn't a confused kid. He's a front-line soldier in an organized assault on minorities.
It's Called Fascism
Or As This Guy Puts It
We have a major problem with the kind of people who are precipitating the vast majority of these incidents. Far from being lone wolves, these terrorists- almost exclusively young white men- are radicalized online in chat rooms and on websites that take a sick pleasure in abetting future acts of violence, doing everything they can to train and equip people to kill.
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Who's Flying This Thing?
The United States is facing its worst pilot shortage in recent memory, forcing airlines to cut flights just as travelers are returning after more than two years of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The crisis has the industry scrambling for solutions.
At least one lawmaker is said to be considering legislation that could raise the federally-mandated retirement age for airline pilots from 65 to 67 or higher to extend aviators’ time in the skies.
A regional airline proposed reducing flight-hour requirements before joining a U.S. carrier, and airlines are rethinking training programs to lower the barrier to entry. Earlier this year, Delta Air Lines joined other big carriers in dropping a four-year degree from its pilot hiring requirements.
Several U.S. airlines, including Frontier, are recruiting some pilots from Australia. American Airlines is selling bus tickets for some short routes.
But some airline executives warn the shortage could take years to solve.
“The pilot shortage for the industry is real, and most airlines are simply not going to be able to realize their capacity plans because there simply aren’t enough pilots, at least not for the next five-plus years,” United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said on a quarterly earnings call in April.
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Who Won the Week?
Lisa Cook, who was confirmed by the Senate and becomes the first Black woman on the Federal Reserve's board of governors
Dr. Anthony Fauci, who received wild applause when he got his honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Michigan and spoke of the dangers of "the normalization of untruths"
President Biden: unveils affordable broadband for low-income people; vows to whip inflation; gets thumbs-ups during visit with Illinois farmers; signs FDR-style Lend-Lease Act to speed Ukraine aid
The Nashville Public Library, for responding to right-wing censorship threats by distributing “I read banned books” library cards
Susan Collins' neighbors, for causing the deadbeat Maine senator to call the cops because they expressed displeasure with her flip-flop on abortion with chalk art
The Pulitzer winners, including WaPost coverage of Jan. 6, the journalists of Ukraine, and NYT for spotlighting the pattern of cops killing citizens during routine traffic stops
Judge J. Layne Smith, for telling Florida dictator Ron DeSantis to take his racist district maps and stick 'em where the sun don't shine
Ukraine, for ruining Putin's May 9 victory party, crushing a Russki river crossing attempt, and welcoming First Lady Jill Biden and the U.S. staff of the newly-re-opened U.S. Embassy
Jen Psaki, who held her final briefing as White House press secretary after bringing truth and class back to the position after 4 years of Trump-era gaslighting stooges
Passenger with no piloting experience Darren Harrison, who grabbed the controls and, with a Florida control tower's help, landed the Cessna he was in after the pilot passed out
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