Overnight News Digest, aka OND, is a community feature here at Daily Kos. Each editor selects news stories on a wide range of topics.
The OND community was founded by Magnifico.
Welcome to all, join us in the comment section to share a news articles and jump into the community chat. News is not required to pull up a chair and chat, just be kind to ceiling cat.
Firefighters make small headway on Los Alamos blaze
By Zelie Pollon
A New Mexico wildfire raged largely unchecked for a fourth day near one of the nation's top nuclear arms production plants on Wednesday, but firefighters finally gained some ground in corralling the flames.
The so-called Las Conchas Fire has scorched at least 90,000 acres of pine-covered mountain slopes in the Santa Fe National Forest since erupting on Sunday and continued to lap at outskirts of the sprawling Los Alamos National Laboratory.
But newly reinforced ground crews managed by Wednesday to carve containment lines around 3 percent of the fire's perimeter on its eastern flank, marking the first headway they have made against a blaze, authorities said.
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Judge: Prison Can Forcibly Drug Tucson Suspect
NPR
A judge ruled Wednesday that prison officials can forcibly give the Tucson shooting rampage suspect anti-psychotic drugs in a bid to make him mentally fit for trial.
U.S. District Judge Larry Burns' decision came after Jared Lee Loughner's attorneys filed an emergency request last week to prevent any forced medication of their client without approval from a judge. The judge said he did not want to second guess doctor's at the federal prison in Springfield, Mo., who determined that Jared Loughner was a danger.
Defense attorneys said Loughner had been forcibly medicated since June 21.
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Health care for Camp Lejeune veterans clears Senate hurdle
By Barbara Barrett
Thousands of Marine veterans and family members across the country who once lived at Camp Lejeune, N.C., Marine base may be closer to getting health care for illnesses suffered because of decades of water contamination on the base.
A key Senate committee on Wednesday approved legislation to provide the health care — giving hope to advocates who have been lobbying on the issue for years.
But many hurdles remain: The bill still must go through the full Senate and a debt-weary House of Representatives. And though the Obama White House hasn't taken a position on the bill, the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs both oppose it.
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Dozens of US cities line up to contest 2010 census
By HOPE YEN
With jobs and federal aid at stake, U.S. cities are lining up to contest their 2010 census counts as too low. A decade ago, there were 1,200 challenges filed by cities, towns and counties. The U.S. Conference of Mayors is predicting a big jump in that number, due in part to tighter budgets that make local officials more sensitive to potential drop-offs in federal money for Medicaid and other programs.
Nearly $450 billion in federal aid is distributed to states based on population each year, or roughly $1,500 per person.
Cities have two years to contest their counts under the Census Bureau's appeals process, which began this month.
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California man pleads guilty to creating fake Army unit
Reuters
A California man who conned Chinese immigrants into joining his fake U.S. Army unit was sentenced on Wednesday to three years in prison after he pleaded guilty to counterfeiting and other charges.
Yupeng Deng gave himself the title "Supreme Commander" when he was running his fictitious unit, and he promised recruits their time in his squad was a path to U.S. citizenship.
A Chinese national from the Los Angeles suburb of El Monte, Deng convinced over 200 Chinese nationals from around the United States to join, and charged them initiation fees ranging from $300 to $450.
He was arrested in April following an investigation by the FBI and the Defense Criminal Investigative Service.
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Michele Bachmann Says John Quincy Adams Was 'One Of Our Founding Fathers,' Flubs Slavery Remarks
HuffPo
During an appearance on ABC's "Good Morning America" on Tuesday, Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann was given an opportunity to set the record straight with regard to comments she made earlier this year lauding the nation's Founding Fathers for working "tirelessly until slavery was no more in the United States.”
ABC's George Stephanopoulos asked the conservative congresswoman to address the statement, noting that many of the country's Founding Fathers, including Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, in fact had slaves and that slavery wasn't abolished until the Civil War.
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Five myths about the American flag
By Marc Leepson
Americans love our flag. We display it at concerts and stadiums to celebrate, and at times of national tragedy to show our resolve. We have our schoolchildren pledge allegiance to it; we have consecrated it in our national anthem; we have a holiday to honor it — Tuesday, in fact. Yet the iconography and history of the American flag, especially its early history, are infused with myth and misrepresentation. Here are five of the most prevalent myths....
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Exclusive: U.S. to resume formal Muslim Brotherhood contacts
By Arshad Mohammed
The United States has decided to resume formal contacts with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, a senior U.S. official said on Wednesday, in a step that reflects the Islamist group's growing political weight but that is almost certain to upset Israel and its U.S. backers.
"The political landscape in Egypt has changed, and is changing," said the senior official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "It is in our interests to engage with all of the parties that are competing for parliament or the presidency."
The official sought to portray the shift as a subtle evolution rather than a dramatic change in Washington's stance toward the Brotherhood, a group founded in 1928 that seeks to promote its conservative vision of Islam in society.
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Afghan Taliban sends message with hotel attack
By Laura King and Aimal Yaqubi, Los Angeles Times
Nazeer Amiri, an ex-cop out for a leisurely late dinner with friends at a hilltop hotel, could hardly believe his eyes.
Insurgents had burst into the lushly landscaped complex in Kabul, spraying bullets and setting off bombs. Amiri had already seen several bloodied diners crumple to the ground. Afghan police arrived, and he frantically shouted at them to shoot the assailants.
"They ran away and left us there!" he recounted, still incredulous after the nearly all-night siege ended early Wednesday, leaving at least 19 attackers and victims dead. "I saw some of the security forces flee with their weapons. I was begging them to give me their guns, so I could shoot back."
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French journalists freed in Afghanistan
Angelique Chrisafis
Two French television journalists held hostage in Afghanistan since December 2009 have been freed, the Elysée Palace has confirmed.
Hervé Ghesquière and Stéphane Taponier of the state TV channel France 3 were kidnapped with three Afghan associates in the mountains of Kapisa, east of Kabul, while working on a documentary about the protection and reconstruction of a road near the Pakistan border.
Held for 18 months by the Taliban, their detention was the longest hostage saga involving French journalists since the 1980s Lebanon hostage crisis. Ghesquière, 47, and Taponier, 46, a cameraman, are experienced war journalists whose work had ranged from the Balkans conflict and Western Sahara to Afghanistan.
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