Breaking News Events

[homoe]

Ron Dicker·General Assignment Reporter, HuffPost


Former President Donald Trump hauled out his familiar catchphrases Tuesday to respond to reports that a special grand jury has been convened to hear evidence against the Trump Organization.

In a rambling statement on his blog, Trump managed to include “witch hunt,” “hoax” and “rigged.”

“This is a continuation of the greatest Witch Hunt in American history. It began the day I came down the escalator in Trump Tower, and it’s never stopped,” he wrote on his website.

[homoe]

Coronavirus: Yale doctor warns that upcoming Tokyo Olympics ‘looks like a superspreader event'.

As the number of COVID-19 cases surge in Japan, U.S. health officials warn against all travel to the country which is set to host the Olympic Games in two months.

Dr. David Katz, a preventive medicine specialist who founded and served as director of Yale University’s Yale-Griffin Prevention Research Center from 1998 to 2019, cautioned of a potential "superspreader event" given Japan’s high case count and slow vaccine rollout.

“From a public health perspective, given what's going on in Japan... this looks to me like a superspreader event,” Dr. Katz told Yahoo Finance Live. “If vulnerable people who are not immune come from all over the world and take the virus back, we could have outbreaks in many parts of the world again.”

Japan has reported more than 32,000 COVID-19 cases and 654 deaths in the last seven days, according to data from Johns Hopkins University, while just 2.3% of its population has been vaccinated so far.

[homoe]

The French Open, plus the three other Grand Slam tournaments, issued a joint statement Sunday announcing that world No. 2 Naomi Osaka has been fined $15,000 for skipping her media obligations following her Round 1 win against Patricia Maria Țig at Roland-Garros. Osaka was also warned about the consequences of continuing to skip media sessions, which could be a whole lot worse than a $15,000 fine.

Osaka said last week that she would not participate in any of her contractually mandated media obligations during the French Open due to mental health concerns.

I don't know who else has been following this story, but I am finding it very interesting!

With Oprah's new series "The Me You Don't See" and other attention being paid to mental issues recently, why aren't there more concerns about Osaka's claim's about facing the press during tournaments causing mental issues?

And as for the statement issued by the powers who be, The statement also emphasized that the rules are in place to ensure that "all players are treated exactly the same, no matter their stature, beliefs or achievement," and that the Grand Slams feel Osaka's media blackout gives her an "unfair advantage" over her competitors" I think it a bunch of malarkey!

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/naomi-o...160430281.html

[homoe]

Originally Posted by homoe

The French Open, plus the three other Grand Slam tournaments, issued a joint statement Sunday announcing that world No. 2 Naomi Osaka has been fined $15,000 for skipping her media obligations following her Round 1 win against Patricia Maria Țig at Roland-Garros. Osaka was also warned about the consequences of continuing to skip media sessions, which could be a whole lot worse than a $15,000 fine.

Osaka said last week that she would not participate in any of her contractually mandated media obligations during the French Open due to mental health concerns.

I don't know who else has been following this story, but I am finding it very interesting!

With Oprah's new series "The Me You Don't See" and other attention being paid to mental issues recently, why aren't there more concerns about Osaka's claim's about facing the press during tournaments causing mental issues?

And as for the statement issued by the powers who be, The statement also emphasized that the rules are in place to ensure that "all players are treated exactly the same, no matter their stature, beliefs or achievement," and that the Grand Slams feel Osaka's media blackout gives her an "unfair advantage" over her competitors" I think it a bunch of malarkey!

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/naomi-o...160430281.html

Maybe it's time to end these "contractually mandated media obligations"? Hopefully if others feel the same way they'll step up as well!

[homoe]

Originally Posted by homoe

The French Open, plus the three other Grand Slam tournaments, issued a joint statement Sunday announcing that world No. 2 Naomi Osaka has been fined $15,000 for skipping her media obligations following her Round 1 win against Patricia Maria Țig at Roland-Garros. Osaka was also warned about the consequences of continuing to skip media sessions, which could be a whole lot worse than a $15,000 fine.

Osaka said last week that she would not participate in any of her contractually mandated media obligations during the French Open due to mental health concerns.

I don't know who else has been following this story, but I am finding it very interesting!

With Oprah's new series "The Me You Don't See" and other attention being paid to mental issues recently, why aren't there more concerns about Osaka's claim's about facing the press during tournaments causing mental issues?

And as for the statement issued by the powers who be, The statement also emphasized that the rules are in place to ensure that "all players are treated exactly the same, no matter their stature, beliefs or achievement," and that the Grand Slams feel Osaka's media blackout gives her an "unfair advantage" over her competitors" I think it a bunch of malarkey!

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/naomi-o...160430281.html

Sorry, Oprah's series is The Me You Can't See.

[homoe]

Mental Health Awareness Month.

[homoe]

Originally Posted by homoe

The French Open, plus the three other Grand Slam tournaments, issued a joint statement Sunday announcing that world No. 2 Naomi Osaka has been fined $15,000 for skipping her media obligations following her Round 1 win against Patricia Maria Țig at Roland-Garros. Osaka was also warned about the consequences of continuing to skip media sessions, which could be a whole lot worse than a $15,000 fine.

Osaka said last week that she would not participate in any of her contractually mandated media obligations during the French Open due to mental health concerns.

I don't know who else has been following this story, but I am finding it very interesting!

With Oprah's new series "The Me You Don't See" and other attention being paid to mental issues recently, why aren't there more concerns about Osaka's claim's about facing the press during tournaments causing mental issues?

And as for the statement issued by the powers who be, The statement also emphasized that the rules are in place to ensure that "all players are treated exactly the same, no matter their stature, beliefs or achievement," and that the Grand Slams feel Osaka's media blackout gives her an "unfair advantage" over her competitors" I think it a bunch of malarkey!

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/naomi-o...160430281.html

Threatening and issuing fines, perhaps they could sit down and try listening?

[Gemme]

I hear what you are saying, homoe, but if it's a contractual obligation, then she knew when she signed the contract to compete that that is an expectation of her. She had time beforehand to devise a way to compromise. Also, reading the post she made cites three main reasons for her not wanting to do the media rounds.

1. She doesn't want to be asked the same questions over and over again.
2. She said that after a loss, it can beat a player down.
3. She doesn't wanted to be subjected to people that doubt her.

To address point two, she won so that reason doesn't apply to her at all, at least for the one that she's already missed. If she didn't want to be subjected to people that could doubt her, then she chose the wrong career. High performance level athletes in any sport all have fans and critics. It's part of the job. Hell, it's part of MY job and I'm as far away from being a professional athlete as you can get. As for point one, everyone in just about every sport has media junkets of some kind. Due to COVID, some have been adjusted for safety protocols, but they are being done.

My job comes with stress too but I can't just bail whenever I feel overwhelmed. I realize that that probably makes me seem callous but it's life and it's a KNOWN stressor for her chosen career, which she has been at for years now. She's had ample time to address it and/or deal with it.

Now, if they were chasing her down the road and creating dangerous situations like some paparazzi do, I'd totally get it. But she's refusing to sit down in a conference room and answer questions. Her coach and support staff could direct the reporters and let them know that certain subjects or questions are off limits. There are ways around it. There are also other athletes with mental health issues that have found ways to compensate and compromise. 35% of elite athletes deal with a mental health crisis (Data is from Athletes for Hope, an organization that aims to educate, encourage and assist athletes.). Why can't she take notes from them and find a way that benefits her?

In the end, it's her money to lose and if she wants to commit breach of contract, that's up to her but if she makes no effort to meet that contractual obligation in some way, then that's that.

[homoe]

As the controversy around Naomi Osaka’s press-conference boycott grew, Osaka’s sister Mari tried to explain the thinking behind the decision – only to later retract her comments with the words “I’m sorry Naomi I probably made the situation worse.”

Osaka has been threatened with a default from Roland Garros – and suspension from future grand slams – if she does not climb down from her stand, which she seems to have taken with no warning or consultation, as far as the tennis authorities are concerned.

When the four grand-slam events united on Sunday to put out a hardline statement, Osaka replied with a one-line tweet: “anger is a lack of understanding. change makes people uncomfortable”.

[GeorgiaMa'am]

Naomi Osaka has withdrawn from the French Open altogether. It seems that she was unable to resolve her mental health needs with the requirements of her contract with the federation. Osaka has also stated that she is going to "take some time away" from tennis, which has led sports commentators to assume that she will not be participating at Wimbledon either.

[homoe]

Originally Posted by GeorgiaMa'am

Naomi Osaka has withdrawn from the French Open altogether. It seems that she was unable to resolve her mental health needs with the requirements of her contract with the federation. Osaka has also stated that she is going to "take some time away" from tennis, which has led sports commentators to assume that she will not be participating at Wimbledon either.

Russell Wilson, Stephen Curry, Sue Bird, the list goes on and on who are supporting Naomi Osaka after French Open withdrawal...

[homoe]

Plenty of prominent athletes and other big names from the sports world rushed to social media to support Naomi Osaka after she withdrew from the French Open. Osaka announced on Twitter on Monday that she was pulling out of the event just days after she made the decision not to speak to reporters during the tournament.

“The truth is that I have suffered long bouts of depression since the U.S. Open in 2018 and I have had a really hard time coping with that,” she wrote in a statement, in part. “Anyone that knows me knows I’m introverted, and anyone that sees me at the tournaments will notice that I’m often wearing headphones as that helps dull my social anxiety … I’m gonna take some time away from the court now, but when the time is right I really want to work with the Tour to discuss ways we can make things better for the players, press and fans.”

French Tennis Federation president Gilles Moretton issued a statement after Osaka’s withdrawal, too, but declined to answer any questions from reporters while doing so.


OF course Moretton refused to answer questions! NOW he sits there with egg on his face.

[homoe]

Piers Morgan, the presenter who famously stormed off the set of “Good Morning Britain” after criticism from a co-host, faced furious backlash Monday after he wrote a column calling tennis star Naomi Osaka a “brat” for refusing to speak to media in order to protect her mental health.


https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/piers...004503542.html

[homoe]

For all the story's complexities, and for all the public still does not know about Osaka's health and the communication between her and tennis officials, psychologists say Osaka should be lauded for speaking openly about her mental health in a culture still skeptical of wounds it cannot see, for asserting boundaries to keep herself safe even at cost to her career, and for challenging her sport, the media and the public to rethink what we demand of athletes.

[homoe]

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill Tuesday that would bar transgender female athletes from playing on girls' and women's sports teams at public schools -- a move that LGBTQ advocates decried as particularly "unconscionable" on the first day of LGBTQ Pride Month.


https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/polit...nth/ar-AAKBHLL

[homoe]

The city of Chicago has filed separate lawsuits against Grubhub and DoorDash alleging the third-party delivery companies “engaged in deceptive practices to prey on its affiliated restaurants.” The lawsuits filed August 27, in Cook County circuit court, contain a multitude of allegations, including that the companies use bait-and-switch tactics to fool customers into thinking they’ll be paying lower fees compared to what they’re ultimately charged.

The DoorDash lawsuit also alleges that the company “used consumer tips to pay itself rather than its drivers.” There’s also the question of the Chicago Fee, the charge DoorDash added to compensate for the city’s pandemic-era fee cap. The city says DoorDash tried to make it seem like the Chicago Fee was being administered by the city, and even included a customer’s tweet from January in the lawsuit: “one thing about Chicago, they gon tax your ass LMAO.”

A DoorDash spokesperson says drivers get 100 percent of tips but had no comment on the Chicago Fee. Tipping was also the subject of a $2.5 million settlement after the Washington, D.C. attorney general investigated DoorDash in November 2020. At one point, DoorDash was using tips to subsidized wages for drivers, meaning employees wouldn’t earn more than their locked-in wages. DoorDash has since ended this practice.

[Kätzchen]

Manchin Poised to Profit From Mine Reclamation Funding He Championed

by Donald Shaw (Sept. 23rd, 2021)

Article link: https://prospect.org/power/manchin-p...ation-funding/


__________________________________.


Here is an excerpt from the article which tells you quite a bit about how the Manchin family in W. Virginia is benefitting from this and how Manchin has been actively working against our own democratic party and working against Climate Change goals our country needs to adopt to help save the planet.

I hope this news article goes viral and that Manchin is held accountable for his shady business tactics, both as a congressman and as a business owner.

Enersystems was founded by Sen. Manchin in 1988 and is now run by his son. Since joining the Senate, Manchin has been paid more than $4.5 million by the company in which he owns shares that he says in his most recent annual financial disclosure are worth between $1 million and $5 million. Last year, the company paid him nearly $500,000. AmBit’s Grant Town plant has been the only recipient of Enersystems’ coal sales to power plants since 2008, according to The Intercept’s review of U.S. Energy Information Agency and the Public Service Commission of West Virginia.

According to the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, as of 2020 there were at least 140,355 acres of unfunded AML problem areas in West Virginia. Cleaning up those sites would cost nearly $2 billion, according to the committee. The $11.3 billion in new AML project funding is currently sitting in the House, where Democratic leaders are pursuing a two-track approach that links the Senate’s infrastructure bill with passage of the reconciliation package of new spending and tax measures that is currently being developed.

Although cleaning up abandoned mine sites may be beneficial for the people who live near them, burning waste coal taken from the sites may also be worse for the air and human health than burning coal from traditional sources. The Grant Town plant produces more sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide per unit of energy output than any other coal plant in the state, according to Vice’s reporting on 2018 calculations from Jim Kotcon of the West Virginia Sierra Club.

“There’s no doubt that West Virginia needs the mineland reclamation funding that the senator is pushing for, reclaiming old sites,” Kotcon told Sludge. “The issue is that burning the gob creates pollution from the plant, which hopefully is better controlled than the spontaneous burning of gob piles, and it is not always clear that the land and streams really do see a net benefit. Add in the greenhouse gas emissions and increasing price competition from renewables, and we conclude that a land reclamation approach is preferable to burning the gob.”

While Manchin pushed forward this program from which he may profit, he has also worked to kill legislation that could harm his business and those of his donors in the fossil fuel industry. He is currently working to revise President Biden’s proposed clean electricity standard, currently being debated in Congress’ reconciliation package, that would require power companies to gradually increase their renewable energy sources until they are no longer emitting carbon dioxide. Under a $150 billion fund in the reconciliation bill, the government would pay companies that clean up their electricity supply and fine those that miss deadlines. Manchin recently said on CNN that power companies are already on course to renewable energy due to market forces and that the fund “makes no sense at all.” According to The New York Times, Manchin’s version is expected to have less ambitious clean energy standards and provide rewards to companies that build new natural gas powered-plants.

[PlatinumPearl]

The Ambassador Bridge—the international border crossing that links
Windsor, Ontario, and Detroit, Michigan, has been closed in both directions.

The Ambassador Bridge—the international border crossing that links Windsor, Ontario and Detroit, Michigan, has been closed in both directions due to the possible discovery of explosives in the area.

According to The Canadian Press, investigators say that the surrounding areas around the bridge have been evacuated.

Traffic remains open via the Windsor-Detroit Tunnel and the Blue Water Bridge.

An explosives unit is on the scene.



Source: The Post Millennial
Website: https://thepostmillennial.com/breaki...campaign=64474
Date: October 4, 2021

[homoe]

U.S. President Joe Biden said Wednesday his administration has helped broker an agreement for the Port of Los Angeles to become a 24-hour, seven-days-a-week operation, part of an effort to relieve supply chain bottlenecks and move stranded container ships that are driving prices higher for U.S. consumers. Biden called the commitment to become a 24/7 operation “a big first step in speeding up the movement of materials and goods through our supply chain.”
But he said the “rest of the private sector chain” now needs to step up, as well, to help goods move faster. Biden said some companies, such as Walmart at UPS, are already pledging to help relieve the supply chain issues. And he called on others to do the same.

Sidebar: I've just been curiously wondering how, if these ports didn't have enough workers before to handle a Mon - Friday workload, how this is going to pan out.

I have no doubt there is a bottleneck of goods getting out of and into the states from China, but I can't understand once the containers arrive why the
bottleneck!? They seem to blame a lack of labor among longshoremen and truck drivers. These are both well paying jobs so I don't see many fleeing from these positions UNLIKE restaurant wait staff & retail sales clerks which are notorious for low pay and well.... just crappy jobs in general.

.."Something Is Rotten in the State Of Denmark"

[cathexis]

Originally Posted by homoe

U.S. President Joe Biden said Wednesday his administration has helped broker an agreement for the Port of Los Angeles to become a 24-hour, seven-days-a-week operation, part of an effort to relieve supply chain bottlenecks and move stranded container ships that are driving prices higher for U.S. consumers. Biden called the commitment to become a 24/7 operation “a big first step in speeding up the movement of materials and goods through our supply chain.”
But he said the “rest of the private sector chain” now needs to step up, as well, to help goods move faster. Biden said some companies, such as Walmart at UPS, are already pledging to help relieve the supply chain issues. And he called on others to do the same.

Sidebar: I've just been curiously wondering how, if these ports didn't have enough workers before to handle a Mon - Friday workload, how this is going to pan out.

I have no doubt there is a bottleneck of goods getting out of and into the states from China, but I can't understand once the containers arrive why the
bottleneck!? They seem to blame a lack of labor among longshoremen and truck drivers. These are both well paying jobs so I don't see many fleeing from these positions UNLIKE restaurant wait staff & retail sales clerks which are notorious for low pay and well.... just crappy jobs in general.

.."Something Is Rotten in the State Of Denmark"

Bet Biden will strike-break as his Republican counterpart did. Remember the 1981 PATCO strike that Reagan broke on 8/5/1981. He utilized the military and fired the unionized air traffic controllers. That was the second insult to workers, the first was the treatment of President Jimmy Carter, number three insult was the coup d'tat he caused on Grenada. During the mid-late 20th Century, primarily the 1950s-80s, mostly during the Kennedy and Reagan eras, the US fought to rid the World of Communism so we've conquered several Caribbean island states and Central American countries.

Just a wee history lesson for those younger folks who may not remember this period of time.