Milton Glaser and Carl Reiner, and so it goes.
"An unstable massive star has suddenly vanished from view, and astronomers aren't sure if it collapsed into a black hole or is playing peek-a-boo behind galactic dust."
"On the night of July 4, the full moon will pass through part of Earth’s shadow, creating a lunar eclipse that will be visible across North America and South America. This will be the first lunar eclipse visible from this part of the world since 2019. People in some places in Africa and western Europe will also be able to see part of the eclipse." It's just a penumbral eclipse, but they're still pretty cool.
"Flying snakes like Chrysopelea paradisi, the paradise tree snake, normally live in the trees of South and Southeast Asia. There, they cruise along tree branches and, sometimes, to get to the ground or another tree, they'll launch themselves into the air and glide down at an angle." They don't so much fly as fall gracefully and glide.
"Back in March, the Food and Drug Administration took the unprecedented step of allowing COVID antibody tests to flood the market without review. The tests were billed as a critical tool to assess where the virus had spread and who might have immunity… Over the course of a three-month investigation, 60 Minutes has learned that federal officials knew many of the antibody tests were seriously flawed but continued to allow them to be sold anyway." Whispers, all the tests are crap. If any of the testing we have (both RNA and antibody) comes above the minimum of 75% accuracy for both the test kit and how it's administered, I will be shocked.
"At least 16 states have paused or rolled back their reopening plans in response to a surge in new coronavirus infections, but some health officials say the spread of the virus will still be difficult to control." We're still in the first wave of infections.
"The coronavirus is spreading too rapidly and too broadly for the U.S. to get it under control as some other countries have, Dr. Anne Schuchat, principal deputy director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Monday." Who had "throw in the towel" on their 2020 Bingo Card?
(Theme to Jaws) "Summer has just begun, but health officials are already warning Americans that the fall and winter months ahead will likely be challenging. Once flu season begins, the U.S. will have to worry about not one, but two contagious viruses."
"WHO head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the virus would infect many more people if governments did not start to implement the right policies." Anybody think that will happen, especially here in the US?
On the expense of just trying to get a COVID-19" test. Note, she never did get tested. Single-payer.
"Travelers from a list of 15 nations will be allowed entry to the European Union starting Wednesday, but the United States is not on the list."
And there out on the horizon… "A new strain of flu that has the potential to become a pandemic has been identified in China by scientists… It emerged recently and is carried by pigs, but can infect humans, they say… The researchers are concerned that it could mutate further so that it can spread easily from person to person, and trigger a global outbreak." In truth there is usually one or more viruses like this.
"China's new national security legislation for Hong Kong was written and passed behind closed doors, without the consultation of the city's local government or legislature. It reportedly came into force on June 30, potentially rewriting the city's legal system -- despite the fact the overwhelming majority of residents have no idea of what precisely it will entail."
"… GOP members of the House Intelligence Committee have skipped all but one of the panel's proceedings, public and private, since before Congress went into its coronavirus-lockdown in early March. And that impasse shows no signs of ending, even as the panel takes up issues like China, Covid-19 and the annual intelligence policy bill." They've taken their little red ball and gone home. But then, they really never wanted to govern anyway. and I doubt they're really concerned about security and more worried that there will be a video record of the meetings instead of just note takers.
"In hundreds of highly classified phone calls with foreign heads of state, President Donald Trump was so consistently unprepared for discussion of serious issues, so often outplayed in his conversations with powerful leaders like Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Erdogan, and so abusive to leaders of America's principal allies, that the calls helped convince some senior US officials -- including his former secretaries of state and defense, two national security advisers and his longest-serving chief of staff -- that the President himself posed a danger to the national security of the United States, according to White House and intelligence officials intimately familiar with the contents of the conversations." This is my shocked face.
"But a US official familiar with the latest information told CNN on Monday that intelligence about the Russian bounty was included in the President's Daily Briefing (PDB) sometime in the spring. The written document includes the intelligence communities' most important and urgent information. On Monday night, the New York Times reported that the information was included in a written briefing to the President in late February." We all know the president does not read the daily briefing. But that is no excuse for him.
"President Donald Trump's White House can never, ever, get its story straight on Russia."
"Presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden told potential donors to his campaign that his administration would end most of President Donald Trump’s multitrillion-dollar tax cuts – even though 'a lot of you may not like that.'… Biden’s warning to his backers came as the candidate laid out an ambitious suite of policy goals during a virtual campaign fundraiser on Monday." Taxes are going to have to go up. But you know what, those rich people have an awful lot of money, so that's where we should look first. Expect the GOP to start the argument with, "We all have to share the burden" (with a consumption tax, or raising all tax brackets the same percentage). Nope, the rich made out with every tax cut since Reagan. They can handle the vast majority of the increase.
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