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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Hank Ballard

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features r&b singer Hank Ballard. Enjoy!

^{Hank Ballard & the Midnighters - Work With Me Annie}

"The greatest threat to freedom is the absence of criticism."

-- Wole Soyinka

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News and Opinion

Ukraine’s Military Intelligence: Drone Attacks on Moscow Will ‘Increase in Scale’

After two drones targeted Moscow early Monday, a Ukrainian military intelligence spokesman warned such attacks on the Russian capital city will “continue and increase in scale” in a rare Ukrainian admission of responsibility for attacks inside Russia.

“The strikes on the key facilities of Russia’s security sector located in Moscow testify to the fact that the Putin regime is unable to fully control the sky even for the protection of the most important facilities,” spokesman Andriy Yusov told the Kyiv Post. “Obviously, this situation will continue and increase in scale.”

Russian authorities said the drones were downed with electronic warfare systems, but one struck a business center in Moscow, shattering the high-rise building’s windows. Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said there were no casualties in the attack. Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova called the drone attack an “act of international terrorism.”

Ukraine grain revenue gone. Latin America isolates EU

U.S. in no hurry to provide Ukraine with long-range missiles

The Biden administration is holding firm, for now at least, on its refusal to send long-range Army missiles to Ukraine despite mounting pressure from U.S. lawmakers and pleas from the government in Kyiv, according to U.S. officials.

Disappointment at the slow pace of Ukraine’s counteroffensive against entrenched Russian forces and a newly equivocal tone by President Biden have led to widespread speculation that the missiles will soon follow the path taken by other U.S. weapons systems that were first denied but ultimately approved during the 17 months of the war.

In late May, Biden appeared to alter his previously firm “no” on the possibility of ATACMS, the Army Tactical Missile System, saying for the first time that it was “still in play.” Two weeks later, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that he and Biden had spoken about the missiles at the NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, but that no decision had been made. ...

The Pentagon believes that Kyiv has other, more urgent needs than ATACMS, and worries that sending enough to Ukraine to make a difference on the battlefield would severely undercut U.S. readiness for other possible conflicts.

The number of ATACMS in American stockpiles is fixed, awaiting replacement with the next generation, longer-range Precision Strike Missile, called the Prism, for PrSM, which is expected to enter service by the end of this year, officials said. Lockheed Martin still manufactures 500 ATACMS each year, but all of that production is destined for sale to other countries.

RFK Jr SCHOOLS Sean Hannity On Ukraine Proxy War, NATO Provocation

Russia raises the maximum age of conscription as it seeks to replenish Ukraine forces

Russia’s parliament has voted to raise the maximum age at which men can be conscripted to 30 from 27, increasing the number of young men liable for a year of compulsory military service.

The bill comes as Moscow seeks to replenish its forces on the frontline in Ukraine without resorting to another mobilisation – a step the Kremlin took last September which proved unpopular.

“From January 1, 2024, citizens aged 18 to 30 will be called up for military service,” the lower house of parliament said after the bill was passed in a second and third reading.

The law also prohibits conscripts from leaving the country once the enlistment office has sent them their draft notice.

The bill still has to be approved by the upper chamber and signed into law by President Vladimir Putin, steps that are considered a formality.

Republicans Discuss Impeachment; Ru Kharkov Gains, Ukr Attacks Bakhmut, German Military Blames Ukr

Activists Demand U.S. End Korean War After 70 Years as Biden Admin Ramps Up "Nuclear Blackmail"

Republicans target abortion pill access as government shutdown threat looms

A Republican-backed spending bill threatens to end national access to mail-order abortion pills and cut billions from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap) that provides low-income families with food benefits.

The legislation is part of a spate of appropriations bills that lawmakers will debate this month, and which Congress must reach a decision on by the end of September in order to pass a budget for the 2024 fiscal year and avoid a federal shutdown. It was already approved by a House appropriations subcommittee in May, while being condemned by Democrats and causing internal rifts among Republicans. Republicans have added several provisions to the bill that would have wide-ranging effects on reproductive rights, health policy and benefits.

The food and agriculture spending bill is the latest front in the rightwing campaign against reproductive rights. In the year since the supreme court overturned Roe v Wade, Republicans have passed bills in more than a dozen states that ban or severely restrict abortion access. Ending access to mail-order pills that induce abortions would complicate and limit efforts from abortion rights groups and physicians to provide care for people in states with abortion bans.

Specifically, the bill would reverse a 2021 Food and Drug Administration policy that allowed people to get the abortion-inducing drug mifepristone – which can be used up to 10 weeks after conception – through the mail rather than via in-person visits to providers. The FDA had temporarily lifted restrictions on the drug during the Covid-19 pandemic, before later making those changes permanent. But the drug, which is widely used for abortion and can also be used for managing miscarriages, has been the center of legal challenges and rightwing attempts to prevent its use ever since. ...

The approaching fight over spending bills has echoes of the standoff over debt ceiling negotiations earlier this year, when Democrats accused Republicans of holding the government hostage in an attempt to exact sweeping cuts to federal programs. Hardline Republicans similarly pushed to shift their party towards far-right policies during those negotiations as well. Democrats are eager to prevent a government shutdown such as the one in 2018 during the Trump administration that left about 800,000 government workers without pay and lasted longer than any previous closure in US history.

UPS, Teamsters Reach HISTORIC Deal Avoiding Strike

UPS and Teamsters union announce tentative agreement, averting strike

The Teamsters union announced on Tuesday that its leadership had reached a tentative agreement with UPS, averting a strike that was set to begin on 1 August involving 340,000 workers. The national bargaining committee unanimously endorsed the five-year tentative agreement.

Highlights of the agreement include wage increases of $2.75 per hour for full-time and part-time workers this year and $7.50 more per hour over the length of the contract, and part-timers will see wage increases immediately of at least $21 an hour. The wage gains are double the gains from the previous five-year contract that was in effect from 2018, and a 48% increase for part-timers over the life of the contract. Full-timers will see their average top rate increase to $49 per hour.

The agreement also ends a two-tiered classification for drivers, provides part-timers with longevity raises, adds Martin Luther King Day as a paid holiday off, and ends forced overtime on off days.

US education department opens inquiry into Harvard’s legacy admission policies

The US Department of Education has opened an investigation into Harvard University’s policies on legacy admissions, which give an edge to applicants with family ties to alumni. Top colleges’ preferential treatment of children of alumni, who are often white, has been facing new scrutiny since the supreme court last month struck down the use of affirmative action as a tool to diversify college campuses.

The department notified Lawyers for Civil Rights, a non-profit based in Boston, on Monday that it was investigating the group’s claim that alleges the university “discriminates on the basis of race by using donor and legacy preferences in its undergraduate admissions process”.

An education department spokesperson confirmed that its office for civil rights has opened an investigation at Harvard and declined further comment.

The complaint was filed on 3 July on behalf of Black and Latino community groups in New England. The group argued that students with legacy ties are up to seven times more likely to be admitted to Harvard and can make up nearly a third of a class – and that about 70% are white. About 28% of the class of 2019 were legacy admissions with a parent or other relative who went to Harvard.

“Qualified and highly deserving applicants of color are harmed as a result, as admissions slots are given instead to the overwhelmingly white applicants who benefit from Harvard’s legacy and donor preferences,” the group said in a statement. “Even worse, this preferential treatment has nothing to do with an applicant’s merit. Instead, it is an unfair and unearned benefit that is conferred solely based on the family that the applicant is born into.”

New Witness to Malcolm X Assassination Says He Heard Police Ask If Killer Was "With Us"

Federal judge blocks Biden administration’s restrictive asylum rule

A federal judge on Tuesday blocked a rule that allows immigration authorities to deny asylum to migrants who arrive at the US-Mexico border without first applying online or seeking protection in a country they passed through.

But the judge delayed his ruling from taking effect immediately to give the Joe Biden White House time to appeal.

The order from judge Jon Tigar of California’s northern federal district takes away a key enforcement tool set in place by the Biden administration as coronavirus-based restrictions on asylum expired in May. The new rule imposes severe limitations on migrants seeking asylum but includes room for exceptions and does not apply to children traveling alone.

In an order that will not take effect for two weeks, Tigar wrote “the rule … cannot remain in place”, in part because it improperly presumes people who enter the country between legal border crossings are ineligible for asylum.

The justice department said it would seek to prevent the judge’s ruling from taking effect and maintained the rule was lawful.

Houston Cops Target Volunteers FEEDING THE HOMELESS!

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Georgia prosecutors eye criminal solicitation charges in Trump inquiry

The Fulton county district attorney investigating Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia in recent weeks has weighed several potential statutes under which to charge, including solicitation to commit election fraud and conspiracy to commit election fraud, according to two people briefed on the matter.

The move by the Fulton county district attorney, Fani Willis, to identify a list of potential charges marks a major juncture in the criminal investigation and suggests prosecutors are on course to ask a grand jury to return indictments next month.

Among the state election law charges that prosecutors were examining: criminal solicitation to commit election fraud and conspiracy to commit election fraud, as well as solicitation of a public or political officer to fail to perform their duties and solicitation to destroy, deface or remove ballots, the people said.

The district attorney is also seeking to charge at least some of the Trump operatives who were involved in accessing voting machines and copying sensitive election data in Coffee county, Georgia, in January 2021 with computer trespass crimes, the two people said.

The outcome of deliberations, as well as the manner in which the statutes might be enforced, remains unknown.

‘Anger and radicalization’: rising number of Americans say political violence is justified

The June federal indictment of Donald Trump is “radicalizing” support for the use of force on behalf of the former president and current presidential candidate, according to the author of a recent survey about threats to democracy. Meanwhile, on the other side of the aisle, support for violence to restore the federal right to an abortion has also increased over the last few months, researchers found, although there’s little indication that any organized groups support acting on this belief.

The Dangers to Democracy report indicates that a growing number of Americans support the use of political violence as the 2024 presidential campaign heats up and further indictments of Trump are probably imminent. “The indictment is radicalizing support for Trump, but that’s not the only source of radicalization,” said Robert Pape, a University of Chicago professor who led the research. “You’re seeing growing anger and radicalization on the left as well.”

The number of Americans who believe the use of force is justified to restore Trump to the White House increased by roughly 6 million in the last few months to an estimated 18 million people, according to the survey conducted by the university in late June and shared exclusively with the Guardian. Of those 18 million people, 68% believe that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump and 62% believe the prosecutions of Trump are intended to hurt his chances in 2024. An estimated 7% of Americans now believe violence could be necessary to restore Trump to the presidency, up from 4.5%, or 12 million people, in April. ...

Democrats, however, expressed support for political violence for a different purpose. The survey found support for the use of force to coerce members of Congress to “do the right thing” grew from 9% in January to 17% – an estimated 44 million Americans – at the end of June, with the sharpest rise among Democrats. Support for violence to restore the federal right to an abortion also increased during this time.

DeSantis RESPONDS To 'Slaves Developed Skills' Florida Education

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Gulf Stream could collapse as early as 2025

The Gulf Stream system could collapse as soon as 2025, a new study suggests. The shutting down of the vital ocean currents, called the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (Amoc) by scientists, would bring catastrophic climate impacts. Amoc was already known to be at its weakest in 1,600 years owing to global heating and researchers spotted warning signs of a tipping point in 2021.

The new analysis estimates a timescale for the collapse of between 2025 and 2095, with a central estimate of 2050, if global carbon emissions are not reduced. Evidence from past collapses indicate changes of temperature of 10C in a few decades, although these occurred during ice ages.

Other scientists said the assumptions about how a tipping point would play out and uncertainties in the underlying data are too large for a reliable estimate of the timing of the tipping point. But all said the prospect of an Amoc collapse was extremely concerning and should spur rapid cuts in carbon emissions.

Amoc carries warm ocean water northwards towards the pole where it cools and sinks, driving the Atlantic’s currents. But an influx of fresh water from the accelerating melting of Greenland’s ice cap and other sources is increasingly smothering the currents.

A collapse of Amoc would have disastrous consequences around the world, severely disrupting the rains that billions of people depend on for food in India, South America and west Africa. It would increase storms and drop temperatures in Europe, and lead to a rising sea level on the eastern coast of North America. It would also further endanger the Amazon rainforest and Antarctic ice sheets.

Hot-tub level: Florida ocean records 'unprecedent' temperatures

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Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

NATO & the Perilous Black Sea

Who Can Give Security Guarantees To Ukraine?

Biden lawyer clown world. Russia 2% GDP growth. Fires in Greece. White House dog stress.

Russian Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina and Head of “BRICS Bank” Throw Cold Water on BRICS Currency Project

Fighting Propaganda Is A Matter Of Survival: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

The US Press, Spooks & the Church Committee

The Strange Rehabilitation of Elliott Abrams

Leading liberal Zionist voices call for ending U.S. aid to Israel

The fan jacket: the Japanese innovation keeping workers cool in extreme heat

Matt Taibbi SLAMS Dems For Abandoning Free Speech At RFK Jr Hearing, MSM STILL Dismissing Lab Leak

Hunter Biden PLEA DEAL CRUMBLES, Lawyers BACK OUT After Future Immunity DENIED

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A Little Night Music

Hank Ballard & the Midnighters - The Hoochi Coochi Coo

Hank Ballard & the Midnighters - Let’s Go, Let’s Go, Let’s Go

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters - Finger Poppin Time

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters - Sexy Ways

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters - Annie Had A Baby

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters - The Twist

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters - Tore Up Over You

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters - The Continental Walk

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters - Do You Know How To Twist

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters - Look at the Little Sister

Hank Ballard & The Midnighters -Sugaree

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