Cut to the News
Cut through the clutter to today's top news
July 16, 2020
Good morning
Welcome to today's top news.
Leading the News . . .
Trump replaces campaign manager Parscale with deputy Bill Stepien . . . After weeks of speculation, President Trump Wednesday finally axed campaign manager Brad Parscale and replaced him with Bill Stepien, a former White House political director who managed Chris Christie’s
gubernatorial campaigns. “I am pleased to announce that Bill Stepien has been promoted to the role of Trump Campaign Manager,” Trump wrote on Facebook. Parscale is a digital guy who had a huge role doing data for the 2016 Trump campaign and will now do the same thing for the 2020 campaign. His fate was probably sealed after Trump was humiliated when a rally that was supposed to attract a packed house in Tulsa turned out to be a dud with far fewer attendees than the campaign had
predicted. Meantime, of course, Trump is trailing badly in the polls, losing some battleground states, and defending states like Texas and Georgia which he shouldn’t have to worry about. White House Dossier
CDC director says Northeast visitors may have spread cases in South . . . CDC director Robert Redfield says the current spike in COVID-19 infections in the South may have been caused by people from the Northeast traveling there for vacation and not due to states reopening too quickly. Addressing the alarming surge in coronavirus cases, Redfield said on Tuesday that infections in Sun Belt states
'simultaneously kind of popped' in the second week of June after reopening in various phases. Redfield compared it to the initial outbreak in the Northeast in March, which he says spread out to various states from epicenter New York. Daily Mail
Georgia Governor Kemp voids mask mandate in 15 cities and towns . . . Georgia's Gov. Brian Kemp voided face mask mandates in at least 15 local governments across the state Wednesday after the communities went ahead and defiantly adopted the orders. Kemp had earlier argued that Georgia's cities and counties had no power to order masks, while an increasing number of other states have required residents to wear facial coverings in public.
The Republican governor has instead been trying to encourage voluntary mask wearing. Daily Mail
Oklahoma Gov. Stitt is first governor to test positive . . . Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt announced Wednesday that he's the first governor in the United States to test positive for the coronavirus and that he is isolating at home but away from his family. Stitt, 48, his wife Sarah and children were tested Tuesday and the governor - who has backed one of the country's most aggressive reopening plans, resisted any statewide mandate on masks and rarely
wears one himself - was the only one who tested positive. Daily Mail
Florida teachers updating their wills . . . Teachers have begun drafting or updating their last wills and testaments as they prepare to return to work in a Florida school district. Andrea Clark, a teachers union representative in the St. Johns County School District said teachers have expressed their worries over exposure to the coronavirus as schools prepare to open on August 10. Florida has mandated that schools reopen in August,
after they were shuttered due to lockdowns aimed at containing the pandemic. Daily Mail
Health experts denounce Trump move sidelining CDC . . . A new Trump administration policy that bypasses the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for control of key coronavirus information is provoking outrage among public health experts. Under the policy, quietly announced late last week, hospitals are now required to report directly to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on the number of COVID-19 patients each
facility is treating, available beds and ventilators, and other data. The Hill
Llama antibodies could be the answer . . . Llamas may hold the answer, or at least one of the answers, to defeating COVID-19. Scientists at England’s Rosalind Franklin Institute have taken llama antibodies — typically smaller and “more simply structured” than human antibodies — to create an “antibody cocktail” specific to the potentially lethal disease, BBC News reported Monday. The team is eyeing animal trials for this summer and hoping to
begin clinical trials later in 2020. New York Daily News
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National Association of Police Organizations backs Trump . . . The National Association of Police Organizations (NAPO) endorsed President Trump’s reelection Wednesday, praising his “steadfast and very public support” for law enforcement. NAPO did not endorse a candidate in the 2016 election but endorsed former President Barack Obama and then-Vice President Joe Biden in both the 2008 and 2012 elections.
NAPO President Michael McHale said Trump's support is needed “during this time of unfair and inaccurate opprobrium being directed at our members by so many.” “We particularly value your directing the Attorney General to aggressively prosecute those who attack our officers,” McHale wrote in a letter. Fox News
White House distances from attack on Fauci . . . Days after anonymously disseminating a list of negative talking points about Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious-disease expert, the White House sought to distance itself from the anti-Fauci effort Wednesday by publicly chastising trade adviser Peter Navarro for writing a USA Today op-ed blasting the popular public health official. Trump chided Navarro on Wednesday for the opinion piece, which ran under the headline “Anthony Fauci has been wrong about everything I have interacted with him on,” and the White House released a statement saying the article
was unauthorized. Washington Post
Twitter accounts of Obama, Biden, and others hacked . . . After dozens of high-profile Twitter accounts were hacked Wednesday, the company said it had detected a “coordinated social engineering attack.” “We detected what we believe to be a coordinated social engineering attack by people who successfully targeted some of our employees with access to internal systems and tools,” Twitter support wrote in a statement. The hacks included Joe Biden, Barack Obama, Mike Bloomberg, Kanye West, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk. “We know they used
this access to take control of many highly-visible (including verified) accounts and Tweet on their behalf," Twitter said. The hackers posted tweets on accounts of politicians, celebrities, companies and others, offering to send $2,000 for every $1,000 sent to a bitcoin address. Fox
News
No one hacked my account. What am I, chopped liver?
Former Iranian hostage says Biden left him behind . . . A former Iranian hostage who was tortured by the oppressive regime slammed Joe Biden for abandoning him and other detainees while the Obama administration pursued the landmark nuclear deal with Tehran. Nizar Zakka, a Lebanese national who was detained in Iran from 2015 to 2019 on charges he spied for the United States, lashed out on Tuesday at Biden after the former vice president
accused President Donald Trump of treating Egyptian president Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi as his "favorite dictator." "With all due respect Mr. Biden, I don't think you are well-positioned to comment on this subject," Zakka tweeted. "I never comment on politics but this one was too much. You left us behind in Iran.
Remember? Tehran?" Washington Free Beacon
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Trump to send federal authorities into cities to break up "war zone" violence . . . President Trump is planning to direct federal law enforcement “help” for Democratic-run cities that have seen a rise in violence this summer, calling them “war zones.” In a meeting with Attorney General William Barr and other federal officials at the White House on Wednesday, the president said he’ll make a “very exciting” official
announcement next week. “The left-wing group of people that are running our cities are not doing the job that they’re supposed to be doing,” Mr. Trump said in the Oval Office, adding that he will soon announce “what we’re planning to do to help them.” Washington Times
Meantime, Biden releases national security plan to fight China with social workers.
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China becomes first major economy to return to growth . . . China has become the first major economy to return to growth since the coronavirus started sweeping across the world earlier this year. On Thursday, China said its economy grew 3.2% from a year earlier in the second quarter, as authorities benefited from an aggressive campaign to eradicate the virus within its borders. In sequential terms, China’s
second-quarter growth in gross domestic product represented a 11.5% rebound from the first three months of the year, according to data released by Beijing’s National Bureau of Statistics. Wall Street Journal
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Eviction looms for millions of Americans who can't afford the rent . . . Millions of Americans who have missed rent payments due to the coronavirus pandemic could be at risk of being evicted in the coming months unless government measures to protect them are extended, economists and housing experts say. Nearly 12 million adults live in households that missed their last rent payment, and 23 million have little or no
confidence in their ability to make the next one, according to weekly Census Bureau data. Wall Street Journal
People with $600 jobless benefits spent more than when they were working . . . Americans who received enhanced unemployment benefits due to the coronavirus pandemic spent more than when they were working, a study released on Thursday said, adding to concerns about a steep fall in spending when the emergency benefits expire. The $600 weekly supplement added to jobless benefits as part of the CARES Act helped unemployed households spend 10% more
after receiving benefits than they did before the pandemic, according to research by the JPMorgan Chase Institute. Reuters
Big Business bankruptcies just getting started, model says . . . The New York University professor who developed one of the best-known formulas for predicting corporate insolvencies has a warning for U.S. credit investors: this year’s spate of “mega” bankruptcies is just getting started. More than 30 American companies with liabilities exceeding $1 billion have already filed for Chapter 11 since the start of January, and that number is likely to
top 60 by year-end after businesses piled on debt during the pandemic, according to Edward Altman, creator of the Z-score. Bloomberg
Bosses prefer narcissists . . . Researchers at Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, have linked narcissistic personality traits to higher energy levels in the work place and were more well regarded by their supervisors. People with more narcissistic personality traits also tended to take leadership roles more readily than other workers, whether asked or not, according to the researchers, led by Huazhong University's Kong
Zhou. Daily Mail
But how does this affect me?
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Drug deaths reach record high . . . The annual U.S. drug death toll, a figure that has climbed relentlessly for decades, reached a record high in 2019 after muted signs of progress the previous year, according to preliminary data released Wednesday by the federal government. Nearly 72,000 people died in drug overdoses last year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated in its provisional count, up nearly
5% from 2018. Deaths have surged so much since the mid-1990s amid the opioid crisis. New York Daily News
North Carolina city votes to pay reparations . . . Officials in Asheville, North Carolina, have made an unprecedented pledge to pay reparations to black residents and their descendants as an apology for the city's historic role in slavery and discrimination. The Asheville City Council unanimously passed a resolution that aims to bolster the economic standing of the roughly 12,400 black people living in the city during a Zoom session on Tuesday
night. 'Hundreds of years of black blood spilled that basically fills the cup we drink from today,' said Councilman Keith Young. Daily Mail
Protestors got shipment of bats from car before Brooklyn Bridge brawl . . . Surveillance video from outside City Hall appears to show protesters receiving a small shipment of bats before anti-cops activists clashed with officers on the Brooklyn Bridge Wednesday morning. The delivery was made by a car parked on the street near City Hall, with one man seen retrieving six bats from the trunk, according to the footage provided by sources.
Police sources said the bats were delivered so the anti-cop activists could confront a “unity” rally proceeding over the Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan. New York Post
Study recommends no more than one drink a day . . . New government guidelines recommend no more than one drink per day for both men and women. Those findings, posted to Health.gov Wednesday, come during stressful times highlighted by a growing
pandemic. “As a nation, our collective health would be better if people generally drank less,” according to Boston University’s Dr. Timothy Naimi, who was one of the researchers on the report. The study found two drinks presented a higher risk of death due to alcohol related heart disease, cancer and car accidents that a single drink. New York Daily News
I guess we all knew two to three drinks a day was too good to be true.
Exercise may rejuvenate the brain . . . Exercise may help change exercisers’ brains in surprising ways, according to a new study of physical activity and brain health. The study, which included both mice and people, found that exercise prompts the liver to pump out a little-known protein, and that chemically upping the levels of that protein in out-of-shape, elderly animals rejuvenates their brains and memories. The findings raise provocative
questions about whether the brain benefits of exercise might someday be available in a capsule or syringe form — essentially “exercise in a pill.” New York Times
Soon after this study was published, Biden campaign officials were seen walking out of a sporting goods store with a treadmill.
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Cops wait for coroner only to find dead body is a sex doll . . . It seemed like a major for Allenhurst, a town of less than 700 people in southeast Georgia. A female body was spotted by the railroad tracks at around 2pm on Tuesday. Liberty County deputies gathered at the scene and waited for the coroner. It took a while before they realized the joke was on them: The corpse was actually a sex doll. Under department
policy, deputies can’t touch a dead body until the coroner arrives. Detectives said it was anatomically correct, with realistic features and was fully dressed. Daily Mail
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Keith Koffler
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