US edging closer to death milestone

The novel coronavirus has killed at least 957,948 people since last December, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP.

The United States is the worst-hit country with 199,268 deaths from 6,766,631 cases. At least 2,577,446 people have been declared recovered.

After the US, the hardest-hit countries are Brazil with 136,532 deaths from 4,528,240 cases, India with 86,752 deaths from 5,400,619 cases, Mexico with 73,258 deaths from 694,121 cases, and the United Kingdom with 41,759 deaths from 390,358 cases.

India registered 92,500 cases in the past 24 hours and is expected to surpass the United States as the pandemic’s worst hit country within weeks.

India’s recovery rate stands at about 80 per cent.

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At... ( подробнее )

‘This is war’: Fury erupts over US Supreme Court

Justice Ginsberg, an icon of progressive law, died at the age of 87 yesterday after a long battle with pancreatic cancer.

Her dying wish, revealed by her granddaughter Clara Spera, was that she “not be replaced until a new president is installed”.

But today, Mr Trump indicated he would push ahead with the nomination process immediately. He plans to name Justice Ginsberg’s potential successor next week.

“We were put in this position of power and importance to make decisions for the people who so proudly elected us, the most important of which has long been considered to be the selection of United States Supreme Court justices,” the President tweeted.

“We have this obligation, without delay!”

Under America’s judicial system, the President nominates Justices, and the Senate confirms them. Each Justice is appointed for life.

Should Mr Trump succeed in replacing Justice Ginsberg... ( подробнее )

Protesters gather outside Mitch McConnell’s home

The death of the progressive icon on Friday at the age of 87 has poured accelerant onto the already heated election battle, with US President Donald Trump and Republicans vowing to nominate a new conservative justice to decisively tip the balance of the nation’s highest court.

In a year already marred by riots and political violence, prominent left-wing voices have warned of further chaos.

“If they even TRY to replace RBG we burn the entire f***ing thing down,” former CNN anchor Reza Aslan tweeted, later saying a Senate vote would be held “over our dead bodies – literally”.

Freelance political reporter Laura Bassett, formerly of the Huffington Post, said if Mr McConnell “jams someone through, which he will, there will be riots”, adding in a clarifying tweet: “More, bigger riots.”

Republicans hold a 53-47 majority in the Senate and Mr McConnell, as Senate leader, controls when... ( подробнее )

‘Historic, life threatening’ hurricane Sally is set to smash the US coast

“It’s not going to be pretty,” said one forecaster.

Any hurricane is bad but authorities have grave concerns about Hurricane Sally due to its painfully slow progress, that could exacerbate its deadliness.

Sally is one of as many as five storms currently circulating in the northern Atlantic.

Late on Tuesday night US time (Wednesday afternoon in Australia) Hurricane Sally was sitting about 100 kilometres south of Mobile, Alabama, moving north through the Gulf of Mexico at a speed of just 4 kilometres an hour.

It is currently a category 1 storm but it is quickly worsening and could reach cat 3. There is the threat of tornadoes within the hurricane.

Winds of 150 km/h were recorded by an US air force reconnaissance aircraft, with gusts of 131 km/h at the eye wall as measured by a buoy in the Gulf reported the National Hurricane Centre (NHC). Already flooding is occurring in coastal areas.

It was only last month... ( подробнее )

‘It’ll start getting cooler’: Trump plays down climate change

The fires have burned millions of acres in California, Oregon and Washington since mid-August, and forced hundreds of thousands of people to evacuate their homes. The death toll stands at 33.

Today Mr Trump travelled to California, where he was briefed by Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom and other state officials. One of those officials was Natural Resources Secretary Wade Crowfoot.

“We’ve had temperatures explode this summer. You may have learned that we broke a record in the Death Valley, 130 degrees (fahrenheit, 54 degrees celsius). But even in greater LA, 120-plus degrees (49 degrees celsius),” Mr Crowfoot told the President.

“And we’re seeing this warming trend make our summers warmer, but also our winters warmer as well. But I think one area of mutual agreement and priority is vegetation management.

“But I think we want to work with you to really recognise the changing climate, and what it means to... ( подробнее )

Shocking wildfire picture causing hysteria

Firefighters continued to battled the state’s largest ever inferno overnight, as tens of thousands of people fled blazes up and down the US West Coast and officials warned the death toll could shoot up in coming days.

At least eight people have been confirmed dead in the past 24 hours across California, Oregon and Washington, but officials say some areas are still impossible to reach, meaning the number is likely to rise.

Amid the chaos, AP photographer Noah Berger captured a shot of a suspension bridge, that looks similar to San Francisco’s famous Golden Gate Bridge, surrounded by raging flames.

It was published in news outlets around the world, causing confusion among some that the city had been hit by the fires.

#SanFrancisco https://t.co/KId1YQmkt3— Tracey Spicer AM MAICD (@TraceySpicer) September 10, 2020

This is the Golden Gate Bridge. Still think climate change isn’t real? pic.twitter.com/j745hrk7JY— Prumbo... ( подробнее )

China based ABC, AFR journalists return to Australia

The final two Australian correspondents working in China, the ABC’s Bill Birtles and The Australian Financial Review’s Michael Smith have been rushed out of the country after local police demanded interviews with both journalists.

The pair had been questioned separately by China’s Ministry of State security after carrying out normal reporting duties, in what the AFR’s editor-in-chief has labelled “regrettable and disturbing”.

The ABC reports Birtles had spent four days sheltering in Australia’s embassy in Beijing, while Smith took refuge in Australia’s Shanghai consulate, as diplomats negotiated with Chinese officials to allow them to leave.

It’s understood Australian diplomats in Beijing cautioned Birtles to leave China last week, with officials from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade giving the same advice to the ABC.

The two Australian journalists were told by Chinese police... ( подробнее )

September 11 memorial flyover cancelled after backlash in New York City

New York City emergency management announced the flyover on Thursday evening, with a short notice message saying an F-18 jet would fly over the Hudson River and towards the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge at 3:30pm.

However it was met with swift backlash given the nature of the terror attack, that saw almost 3000 people die after two planes crashed into the World Trade Centre twin towers in 2001.

“Are you out of your mind? Cancel this immediately,” Staten Island Representative Max Rose demanded on Twitter.

Social media user Arlene Kaplan wrote “What? CANCEL THIS! This is insane and cruel to those of us who still suffer from PTSD when we hear a low-flying plane no matter where we are, yet alone flying down the Hudson River past the WTC!”

Victoria Brownworth said “This is the worst idea ever. Did you ask anyone who was in NYC on 9/11 — because every last one of them would tell you.”

RELATED: Photos... ( подробнее )

‘I did not choke her’

In a statement posted on Twitter, Aaron Coleman responded to a report published by The Intercept last week in which Taylor Passow, 21, recalled the alleged assault last year.

Ms Passow said they were sitting in a hot tub at an Airbnb in Kansas City last December when Mr Coleman brought up his interest in having a threesome.

According to Ms Passow, she told him she wasn’t interested but as a joke said maybe as a birthday present she could break up with him for one day and he could have one.

“He sat there for a few seconds, then he jumped on top of me, put his hands around my throat and started squeezing, and slapped me three times, and said, ‘I don’t know where the f**k you think you’re going’,” she told The Intercept.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 09-06-2020Statement from Democratic Party nominee Aaron Coleman of Kansas’ 37th District on relationship problems pic.twitter.com/THia6h7TA1— Aaron Cole... ( подробнее )

BLM protester drinks woman’s beer as diners harassed

A woman wearing a “Nazi Lives Don’t Matter” T-shirt has been filmed walking up and drinking an elderly woman’s beer from her table as protesters harassed outdoor diners on the weekend.

The unhygienic incident appears to have occurred outside the Mercato Italian restaurant in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on September 5, during a Black Lives Matter protest march to the county courthouse dubbed “Civil Saturday”.

Several videos of marchers harassing diners as they made their way along Penn Ave have been uploaded to social media, including one of a male cyclist being assaulted as he tries to make his way past the small group.

In one video, a man with a megaphone hurls insults at diners, calling them an “embarrassment”, while another man approaches the tables and verbally abuses the elderly couple, telling them “f**k the white people that built the system”.

PITTSBURGH PA pic.twitter.com/PxZGxpJIca—... ( подробнее )