10 dead in CA shooting; Louisiana shooting wounds 12; more classified docs found in Biden home; Trump fined over suits; illegal boarder crossing reach high; Fed who investigated Trump arrested
Storm hits East; 23-year-old Ohio dog; Biden Chief of Staff resigns, predecessor named; Google to layoff 12,000; existing home sales fall again; Santos admits finally (after lying) he was in Drag
Good Tuesday morning (or Monday night)! Hope you had a great weekend!
My take: Too often as I write, Americans like to take sides on issues and incidents. I am unclear if we were raised by our parents to be black and white or if our culture of partisan cable media and social media has turned us all into fighters. Three stories this past week and weekend /today show how it is not accurate to ascribe leftist and rightist theories to all that happens in our communities, states, the country and the world. First we have the shootings of this past weekend. I too often hear that mass murder is always connected to politics. The right wants the guns and the left wants to ban the guns. The shootings in California and Louisiana show once again that mass shootings are most often tied to mental health or some personal grudge the shooter has. We may never know what motivated this man to do what he did Saturday night. He was Asian and he attacked members of his own community. The Louisiana shooting just hours later was a targeted attack. These shootings can not be tied in with politics. The second story is the additional (now the third group) of classified documents found at President Biden’s Delaware home. For weeks, Democrats pounded former President Trump for the cache of documents he held that had been designated Classified. Now three separate searches have turned up documents that were taken by Joe Biden following his Senate and Vice Presidential service. Once again, this shows us that these stories are not black and white. Investigations by two Special Prosecutors should tell us more. Until then, the talking heads and political pundits will do their best to support their team — nothing more than sport. The moral of the stories here are that none of us know everything to explain who is culpable and who is not and rooting for the home team is not always advisable as it may sling shot back at you. If that wasn't enough, today we learn that the FBI agent who led the Trump-Russia investigation has now been arrested for his own relationships in Russia and violated U.S. sanctions. It seems as though every time, an investigation on one side of the aisle commences, something happens on the other side of the aisle to discredit it. One final note. The Judge who fined former President Trump for his frivolous lawsuit (also referring to others) was correct to fine Trump. It immediately got him to drop another suit he has filed against the NY Attorney General. On the other hand, he fined him for a suit against Hillary Clinton and he by the way was appointed by former President Bill Clinton. If that is not a conflict of interest, I am not sure what is. Right move, wrong person.
Now to your “1 to…”
What we care about: Storm system threatens Northeast with heavy snow, rain:
The weather could impact the NFL playoff games in New York and California.
Can you believe it? Guinness World Records names 23-year-old Chihuahua mix from Ohio world's oldest living dog: Spike was 23 years and 43 days old as of Dec. 7, making him the world's oldest living dog.
Start with a smile: I’m an 82-year-old Walmart cashier and Navy Vet who can retire thanks to TikTok: An 82-year-old Navy veteran happily retired from his job as a Walmart cashier last week thanks to the power of TikTok. Rory McCarty said he was inspired to help the elderly employee — Warren “Butch” Marion, from Cumberland, Maryland — after seeing a TikTok about an elderly female Walmart employee who said she had to work at the retail chain to make ends meet. McCarty’s mission started in December when he uploaded a video of Marion hard at work and asked his 277,000 followers if they would help him retire. He then made a GoFundMe page for Marion with the goal of raising $100,000.
and another one: Food truck owner funds scholarships for students at his alma mater: Gabriel Lovett, owner of Tasty Love, is giving back to his local community.
and one more makes there: Dog who lost leg to cancer gets a prosthetic leg thanks to clever high schoolers: The students used a laser printer to create the prosthetic for the adorable golden retriever.
Breaking: Retired top FBI counterintelligence agent who led Trump-Russia probe arrested for own ties to Russian oligarch: Charles McGonigal charged with breaking US sanctions against Russia oligarch Oleg Deripaska, money laundering.
Breaking: 2 students killed in shooting at Des Moines school: Two students have died after a shooting at their Des Moines, Iowa, school on Monday, according to police.
Gunman kills 10, wounds 10 after Lunar New Year celebration in Monterey Park: A gunman killed 10 people and wounded 10 others inside a Monterey Park, California, ballroom dance club following a Lunar New Year celebration, setting off a manhunt for the suspect. The shooting occurred around 10:20 p.m. Saturday at the Star Dance Studio, located at 122 W. Garvey Avenue. Monterey Park is located several miles east of downtown Los Angeles in the San Gabriel Valley.
Ten people, five women and five men, were pronounced dead at the scene, Sheriff Robert Luna said at a news conference Sunday morning. The wounded were taken to hospitals with conditions ranging from stable to critical. The gunman, described only as an Asian male between 30 and 50 years old, fled the scene. The motive was still unknown.
Suspect in shooting at dance hall near Los Angeles is dead, sheriff says: A motive remains unclear in the attack in Southern California that killed 10 people and injured 10 others who had gathered for a Lunar New Year Festival.
Pulse-pounding moment shows hero grabbing Monterey mass shooter’s gun: Astonishing surveillance images show the moment a brave good Samaritan tackled California dance club mass shooter Huu Can Tran — grabbing his semi-automatic assault pistol even though he was certain he was about to die.
Brandon Tsay, 26, was seen brawling with the 72-year-old shooter as he burst into the Lai Lai Ballroom & Studio after already shooting dead 10 people and injuring as many others at a nearby dance hall in Monterey Park late Saturday. The computer coder told “Good Morning America” Monday that he thought nothing of hearing the ballroom door closing — until it was “instantly followed by the sound of a metal object clinking together.”
A dozen people wounded in early morning Louisiana nightclub shooting: The gunfire erupted an hour after the deadly, mass shooting in Monterey Park, California.
Additional classified items found in Biden's Delaware home during 13-hour Justice Department search, attorney says: The search was prompted by the White House, not the Justice Department, according to a White House official and a source familiar with the matter.
Dems: Biden should be ‘embarrassed’ by classified docs case.
Democrats push to eliminate the debt ceiling, allow unlimited government borrowing: Democrats say it's 'dangerous' for Republicans to demand spending cuts as a condition of raising the borrowing limit.
House GOP keeps up attacks on IRS with bill to abolish the agency: The Republican-controlled House has made the Internal Revenue Service a political target after Democrats bolstered the agency with new funding last year.
Within the first week of the new Congress, a dozen GOP lawmakers introduced a bill that would abolish the IRS altogether and replace the entire federal tax code with a national sales tax. Separately, the House voted to rescind nearly $80 billion in funding for the agency that Democrats approved last year – with many top Republicans repeating the misleading claim that the money will be used to hire 87,000 auditors.
Judge fines Trump, lawyer for ‘frivolous’ Clinton lawsuit: A Florida judge sanctioned former President Donald Trump and one of his attorneys, ordering them to pay nearly $1 million for filing what he said was a bogus lawsuit against Trump’s 2016 rival Hillary Clinton and others. In a blistering filing on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks accused Trump of a “pattern of abuse of the courts” for filing frivolous lawsuits for political purposes, which he said “undermines the rule of law” and “amounts to obstruction of justice.”
“Here, we are confronted with a lawsuit that should never have been filed, which was completely frivolous, both factually and legally, and which was brought in bad faith for an improper purpose,” he wrote. Citing Trump’s recent legal action against the Pulitzer Prize board, New York’s attorney general, big tech companies and CNN, he described Trump as “a prolific and sophisticated litigant” who uses the courts “to seek revenge on political adversaries.”
Trump drops lawsuit against N.Y. attorney general after judge's rebuke: Former President Trump withdrew his recent pending lawsuit against New York Attorney General Letitia James in a Florida court on Friday. The move comes the day after the federal judge overseeing the case blasted Trump and his attorneys for a "continuing pattern of misuse of the courts" and ordered them to pay nearly $1 million in sanctions. The blistering ruling from District Court Judge Donald Middlebrooks came as part of a separate lawsuit that Trump filed against Hillary Clinton. In the James lawsuit, Trump alleged the New York attorney general abused her position and embarked on a "war of intimidation and harassment" against him. Middlebrooks, in Thursday's sanctions order in the Clinton case, said his lawsuits against James, Twitter, and other entities were part of his "pattern of misusing the courts to serve political purposes." The judge also said he had previously urged Trump and his lawyers to reconsider James’ motion to dismiss the lawsuit because it had "all the telltale signs of being both vexatious and frivolous.”
Oath Keepers members found guilty of seditious conspiracy: Three members of the Oath Keepers and a fourth person associated with the far-right militia group were convicted of seditious conspiracy by a Washington, DC, jury on Monday for their role in the January 6, 2021, insurrection. The four men – Roberto Minuta, Joseph Hackett, David Moerschel and Edward Vallejo – were accused of plotting to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 electoral college victory, a conspiracy that culminated in the attack on the US Capitol.
Man who propped feet on Pelosi desk guilty in Jan. 6 case: An Arkansas man who propped his feet up on a desk in then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office during the U.S. Capitol riot was convicted on Monday of joining a mob's attack on the building two years ago. A jury unanimously convicted Richard “Bigo” Barnett on all eight counts in his indictment including felony charges of civil disorder and obstruction of an official proceeding. Barnett lounging at a desk in Pelosi's office made him one of the most memorable figures from the riot on Jan. 6, 2021, the day when Congress convened a joint session to certify President Joe Biden's electoral victory.
Illegal border crossings reach highest number since Biden took office: An increase in the number of people from Nicaragua and Cuba arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border last month led to the highest number of illegal border crossings in a given month recorded during President Biden’s administration. The surge in migrants came just before Biden unveiled a policy to curb illegal border crossings, telling migrants from Cuba, Nicaragua and Haiti to "not just show up at the border." More than 216,000 migrants were stopped at the southwest border in December, marking an 11% increase from the previous month, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Of those, 36%, or more than 77,000 people, were from Cuba or Nicaragua. Another 24%, or nearly 52,800 encounters, were from Mexico and northern Central America. That's a 6% drop from December 2021.
CIA director briefed Zelensky on US expectations for Russia’s battlefield planning: CIA Director Bill Burns briefed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv last week on the US’ expectations for Russia’s battlefield planning in the spring, according to a US official and two Ukrainian sources familiar with the meeting. The secret meeting comes as US officials are closely monitoring a potential Russian offensive in the coming months – and in the midst of a fraught debate between the US and its European allies over whether to send increasingly sophisticated and long-range weaponry to Ukraine. Western defense leaders are scheduled to meet Friday to discuss further weapons shipments to Ukraine.
FDA wants to simplify the use and updating of Covid-19 vaccines: The US Food and Drug Administration wants to simplify the Covid-19 vaccine process to look more like what happens with the flu vaccine, according to documents posted online on Monday. That could include streamlining the vaccine composition, immunization schedules and periodic updates of Covid-19 vaccines. The FDA said it expects to assess circulating strains of the virus that causes Covid-19 at least annually and decide in June which strains to select for the fall season, much like the process to update annual flu vaccines. Moving forward, the agency said, most people may need only one dose of the latest Covid-19 shot to restore protection, regardless of how many shots they have already received. Two doses may be needed for people who are very young and haven’t been exposed, or for the elderly or immune-compromised, according to the FDA’s briefing document for its vaccine advisers.
On 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, Kamala Harris urges federal abortion protections: Vice President Kamala Harris commemorated the 50th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision by imploring Americans to work to enshrine abortion rights into law. "For nearly 50 years, Americans relied on the rights that Roe protected," Harris said at a speech delivered in Tallahassee, Fla., on Sunday. "Today, however, on what would have been its 50th anniversary, we speak of the Roe decision in the past tense." The landmark Supreme Court decision on Jan. 22, 1973, guaranteed the constitutional right to an abortion for nearly half a century. The U.S. Supreme Court officially reversed Roe v. Wade in June, which immediately rolled back abortion rights in almost half of the states, and led to many more restrictions. In speaking in Florida, Harris, the nation's first female vice president, delivered a speech in a state which passed a 15-week abortion ban into law.
March for Life kicks off in Washington, setting the stage for new ideas: The annual anti-abortion gathering to protest Roe v. Wade is the first since the Supreme Court overturned the right to abortion.
Jeff Zients to replace Ron Klain as White House chief of staff: Jeff Zients, who ran President Joe Biden’s Covid-19 response effort and served in high-ranking roles in the Obama administration, is expected to replace Ron Klain as the next White House chief of staff, according to three people briefed on the matter.
Klain is expected to step down in the coming weeks.
What kind of chief of staff will Zients be? Look at his stint as Covid czar.: Biden asked Zients to spearhead a national campaign to stop Covid. Now he's giving him a bigger task.
DOJ reserves right to not cooperate with certain House GOP requests: It’s an early marker of how the Justice Department plans to navigate a Republican majority intent on aggressive oversight over the Biden administration.
Ron DeSantis government bans new advanced African American history course: Florida officials have blocked the introduction of a new advanced-level high school course that teaches African American history. Governor Ron DeSantis' administration said the proposed course "lacks educational value and is contrary to Florida law". The course is being rolled out in a pilot programme by the US College Board to 60 high schools across the country. Officials did not specify what law the course breaks. The Florida Department of Education outlined its intent to block the course in a 12 January letter to the College Board, writing that the course violates state law. "In the future, should the College Board be willing to come back to the table with lawful, historically accurate content, (the Department of Education) will always be willing to reopen the discussion," the letter said. The Advanced Placement (AP) African American studies course is the College Board's first new class since 2014. It is set to cover more than 400 years of African American history, touching on topics like literature, political science and geography.
George Santos on drag photos: ‘I had fun at a festival’.
Fox News weatherman says group of ‘kids’ beat him on NYC subway: Fox News Weatherman Adam Klotz on Sunday detailed an encounter on the New York City subway that left him with two black eyes, among other injuries. In a video posted to Instagram, Klotz claimed he was attacked by a group of teenagers on the New York City subway after watching a New York Giants game at a bar.
Son seeks $50 million from L.A. for dad's death from stun gun zaps: Lawyers for the 5-year-old son of a man who died after repeatedly being shocked by Los Angeles police with a stun gun following a traffic collision filed a $50 million claim Friday for damages against the city. The legal claim is required before Keenan Anderson's son and estate can sue LA police for wrongful death and civil rights violations for restraining him and shocking him six times with a Taser in less than a minute on Jan. 3. "If you Taser someone with 50,000 watts of electrical energy six times ... is there really any wonder that moments later his heart will begin to flutter?" attorney Carl Douglas said at a news conference. "Is there any wonder why four hours later his heart could no longer withstand the pressure from that Taser and gave up, leaving a 5-year-old boy in his wake?"
Al-Shabab: US air strike in Somalia 'kills 30 militants'.
USA advice Ukraine to postpone planned counteroffensive: Top leadership of the USA advises Ukraine to postpone the massive offensive on the Russian forces and only start it after getting the last portion of American armament and getting its troops trained to use it. Source: anonymous member of the administration of the US President, as reported by European Pravda with reference to Reuters
The anonymous source added that the USA and Ukraine only discuss any kind of counteroffensive only with guarantee that Ukrainians will at first give enough time to training on the new weapons, supplied by the American side.
China Covid: Celebrity deaths spark fears over death toll.
New Zealand’s Chris Hipkins vows to focus on inflation ‘pandemic’ and ‘fairer’ tax system: Incoming prime minister echoes Jacinda Ardern’s promise to cut back Labour’s agenda to focus on cost of living issues.
Israel’s Netanyahu fires Cabinet ally, heeding court ruling: Netanyahu told Aryeh Deri he was removing him from his post with “a heavy heart and great sorrow.”
Building collapse in Syrian city of Aleppo leaves 16 dead: A building collapsed in a neighborhood in Syria’s northern city of Aleppo early Sunday, killing at least 16 people, including one child, and injuring four others, state media reported.
The five-story building housing about 30 people is in the Sheikh Maksoud neighborhood under the control of the U.S.-backed Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces. It collapsed overnight, according to the report, after water leakages weakened the structure’s foundation. Dozens of firefighters, first responders and residents covered in debris and dust were searching through the rubble for the remaining residents with drills and a bulldozer.
China's new hyperloop train completes first test runs successfully: The train will be the world's fastest ground-based transport technology if the project goes as planned.
Visualizing the World’s top 25 Fleets of Combat tanks: The tank, an armored all-terrain fighting vehicle, revolutionized the way we fight when introduced during the First World War. Since then, despite some commentators predicting the end of the tank era, they remain a cornerstone of 21st century armies. Global Firepower has released their ranking of combat tank fleet sizes for 2023, which we’ve visualized in this infographic. The ranking includes main battle tanks, like the U.S. M1A2 Abrams or the German Leopard 2, but also more lightly-armed medium and light tanks, like Thailand’s Stingray. The numbers do not include armored personnel carriers or infantry fighting vehicles.
Google to lay off 12,000 people — read the memo CEO Sundar Pichai sent to staff: Sundar Pichai, Google’s CEO, said in an email sent to the company’s staff that the firm will lay off 12,000 employees. It comes after Amazon and Microsoft laid off a combined 28,000 people. Read the full memo Pichai sent out to staff.
Unionization rate hit all-time low in 2022 despite growth in overall members: The percentage of American workers who are members of a union fell to a new low in 2022 despite the total number of unionized workers increasing.
Driving the news: 10.1% of workers were unionized in 2022, down from 10.3% in 2021 and a high of 20.1% in 1983, the first year the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported comparable figures. Unions play a powerful role in the workforce, with advocates saying they advance worker rights while critics say they stymie progress. The workforce added 273,000 unionized jobs in 2022, up 1.9% from 2021.
But the number of total jobs increased by 5.3 million, a 3.9% jump, outpacing the growth in union roles.Several high-profile unionization efforts have fetched headlines in recent months, including the ongoing campaign to organize Starbucks locations and Amazon warehouses.
Existing home sales fell for the 11th consecutive month in December, hitting the slowest pace since November 2010: Homes sales ended the year at a seasonally adjusted, annualized pace of 4.02 million units, which was 34% lower than December 2021. It is the slowest pace since November 2010, when the nation was struggling through a housing crisis. Home sales have now fallen for 11 straight months, due to much higher mortgage rates.
Elon Musk takes the witness stand in court trial over his failed attempt to take Tesla private: Investors in the electric carmaker who say they lost money over Musk's "funding secured" tweets in 2018 now want the billionaire to pay up.
Elizabeth Holmes allegedly tried 'to flee the country' to Mexico after being convicted of fraud: Elizabeth Holmes was found guilty of conspiracy and fraud last January for claims made to investors and patients of her Silicon Valley blood-testing company, Theranos.
Over $600M in assets seized from FTX founder: Court filing.
This ‘Cryptoqueen’ scammed investors out of $4 billion, the FBI says: Then she boarded a plane and disappeared.
A burger chain switches to Coca-Cola: Pepsi fans are furious.
AI Chatbots now let you talk to historical figures like Shakespeare and Andy Warhol: As the use of AI chatbots increases, people are finding innovative ways to use this technology. And while there are legitimate concerns about how AI should be used, there are several sites showing that—when done correctly—a chatbot can provide a unique and enriching experience. The Hello History app and Character.ai website both provide this type of experience, by allowing users to engage in conversation with historical figures.
Enormous panorama of the Milky Way reveals billions of Celestial objects: The data for this massive survey was taken with the Dark Energy Camera, built by the US Department of Energy, at the NSF’s Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO) in Chile, a Program of NOIRLab. The camera has been previously used to examine the “galactic bulge” at the center of the Milky Way. NOIRLab, formally named the National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory, is the United States’ national center for ground-based, nighttime optical astronomy.
The final image, compressed below for the purposes of showing online, is built from 34 billion detections in 21,400 exposures, totaling 260 hours of open shutter time. In short, it’s a truly gargantuan photo.
90-year-old Woodcutter built his own Hobbit House where he lives in charming comfort (Look).
Time’s Up to halt operations: The Hollywood-based gender rights organization, founded in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal, will direct its remaining funds to the Time's Up Legal Defense Fund.
Kim Kardashian buys Princess Diana's Amethyst Cross for almost $200K: The late royal wore the piece of jewelry on multiple occasions, including to the 1987 Birthright charity gala.
Priscilla Presley eulogizes daughter Lisa Marie Presley at Graceland with poem written by granddaughter: A large crowd of family, friends and public mourners gathered Sunday in front of the famed Graceland estate in Memphis, Tennessee, for the memorial service of Lisa Marie Presley, the sole daughter of late singer Elvis Presley. Priscilla Presley, Lisa Marie Presley’s mother, spoke briefly and quietly, reading a poem and remarks from one of her granddaughters. “She knew it was close to the end. Survivor’s guilt, some would say, but a broken heart, is the doing of her death. Now she is home where she always belonged, but my heart is missing her love,” Priscilla Presley said on behalf of the grandchild.
“Our heart is broken,” Priscilla said. “Lisa, we all love you.”
Damar Hamlin provides Bills one bright spot on otherwise dark day: The end of an emotional year — punctuated by a particularly trying month — arrived for the Bills on Sunday. It arrived far too early, a premature ending to a season the Bills and their fiercely loyal Bills Mafia hoped and believed had much more magic left in it. The end result was one of bitter disappointment, a 27-10 loss to the Bengals in the AFC divisional-playoff game at Highmark Stadium that sends the Bengals — not the Bills — to the AFC Championship game against the Chiefs next Sunday.
It’s the coolest Rock Show in Ann Arbor. And almost everyone there is over 65: At the “Geezer Happy Hour,” the “silver tsunami” has been dancing for decades.
The 15 best cities in the United States: The best cities in the United States, according to Travel + Leisure readers, offer a welcoming mix of history, delicious food and drink, and attractions for the whole family.
Best food destinations — World: If eating, snacking, and more eating are at the heart of your itinerary, you’ll find some of the best local flavors in these top spots.
Have a great Tuesday!