After reaching an all-time high of $5.02 a gallon in June, the price of gas continues to decline in the US today. On Monday -- the fourth of July -- the national average price of a gallon of unleaded gas was $4.81, according to AAA. That's nearly 10 cents cheaper than last week, but still nearly 54% more expensive than last year at this time. California had the highest average price, at $6.24 for a gallon.
Part of it is due to a dip in demand: While total domestic gasoline stocks increased by 2.6 trillion barrels to 221.6 trillion barrels, Americans are using about 8.9 million barrels of gasoline a day, down from 9.11 million at the end of June 2021.
That imbalance means motorists will likely continue to see relief at the pump, AAA said.
To help things along, Sheetz lowered the price on Unleaded 88 to $3.99 a gallon through the end of the Fourth of July at its more than 650 locations in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia, Maryland, Ohio and North Carolina. The mid-Atlantic convenience store chain is also slashing the price of E85 gas to $3.49, though the high-ethanol mix is not compatible with all vehicles.
Bangkok Times
Thailand's hotels, businesses and private hospitals should refrain from offering big discounts to lure tourists and focus instead on raising the country's value as a premium travel destination, Deputy Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul said on Monday.
Thailand has received about 2 million foreign visitors in the first six months of this year, a steady revival after its tourism industry almost collapsed due to the pandemic and more than 18 months of complex and costly entry requirements.
"We cannot let people come to Thailand and stay because it's cheap," Mr Anutin said at the Thailand Moving Together event at Suvarnabhumi airport to promote tourism.
Al Jazeera
Kyiv, Ukraine – It wasn’t a knock, it was loud banging – at about 7:30 on a recent Saturday morning.
Taras opened the door of his two-bedroom apartment in Kreminna, a town in Ukraine’s southeastern Luhansk region that was taken over by Russia in late April, to see three gun-toting soldiers in camouflage.
“Do you have a garage on the corner?” the oldest of them, a redhead in his late 20s, asked Taras imperatively.
Without waiting for his answer, the soldier continued: “Open it up.”
He was talking about a group of three dozen garages built in the early 1980s, an area which had become an informal club, where men could have a drink, crack a joke and play backgammon or chess.
Al Jazeera
The US Department of State has said that independent investigators could “not reach a definitive conclusion” regarding the origin of the bullet that killed Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, but said Israeli military gunfire was “likely responsible” for her death.
“Ballistic experts determined the bullet was badly damaged, which prevented a clear conclusion,” the United States government said in a statement on Monday.
The US Security Coordinator, by summarising investigations by both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, also said on Monday that the detailed forensic analysis showed no reason to believe that the shooting was intentional.
Abu Akleh was shot in the head on May 11 while covering an Israeli army raid on the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, despite wearing a flak jacket and helmet clearly marked “PRESS”.
Duetsche Welle
Dutch farmers angry at government plans to slash emissions used tractors and trucks to blockade supermarket distribution centers on Monday.
Fishermen also blocked some ports in a show of support for farmers.
Their actions were part of ongoing protests against a government proposal to slash emissions of pollutants like nitrogen oxide and ammonia by 50% by 2030.
Provincial governments were given a year to draw up ways of making the cuts, which were expected to include buying out some farms with livestock that produce large amounts of ammonia.
Deutsche Welle
Aminata Toure made history when she was sworn in as minister in Germany's northernmost state of Schleswig-Holstein last week to become the first Afro-German to sit in state parliament.
A daughter of two refugees from Mali, Toure is now heading the state Ministry for Social Affairs.
The Green party politician told German media that she saw her role as "special" given the numerous messages she's received from people saying her appointment meant "a lot to them".
She will also take the opportunity to fight for equality and against right-wing extremism, the 29-year-old said.
These issues have been her hallmark since she was first voted into Schleswig-Holstein's state parliament in 2017.
Le Monde
New faces arrived, and a handful of regulars are still there, and others played a game of musical chairs. Less than a month and a half after putting together their first team, President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne carried out another governmental reshuffle on Monday, July 4, after the setbacks encountered at the legislative elections. The government must now adapt to the new balance of powers in the Assemblée Nationale, where the presidential camp has lost its absolute majority.
One of the main changes involves Olivier Véran. The former health minister, who took on the role of minister for relations with Parliament on May 20, has now been made government spokesman. The position is strategic. He takes over from Olivia Grégoire, who moves back to the Finance and Economy ministry where she will be responsible for artisans, trade, tourism and SMEs. Her performance in the role was criticized by members of the majority, but the president attempted to dress up the move as a promotion. Advisers point out that she will be responsible for a broader portfolio, previously covered by two ministers (Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne and Alain Griset) during Mr. Macron's first term. With his fast-talking style, Olivier Véran will have the heavy burden of conveying government policy to the media. The choice was justified by his ability to "reassure the French," as he demonstrated so well during the pandemic.
Le Monde
The world of research has an "immune" system of self-correction. If a published article is criticized to the point of finding errors plagiarism, or even falsifications or inventions of data, it can be withdrawn by the editor, often with a note explaining the reasons for the infamous "retracted" seal.
Does that mean that science is saved? Not quite. Several studies have already shown that even when articles are retracted, they are still cited as references by colleagues, ignoring the withdrawal. But that's not all. "The dissemination of retracted research can really hurt. False or incorrect findings can lead to medical maltreatment, for example. But this effect on professionals is not the only one, and we wanted to study for the first time what it is in the general public," explained Agnes Horvat, a professor at Northwestern University. With colleagues at the University of Michigan, she analyzed the presence of retracted articles in the press, social networks, blogs and reference sites such as Wikipedia. Their findings were published in the Proceedings of the American Academy of Sciences on June 14
For the first time in her life, Marine Corps Capt. Meleah Martin is refusing to wear American flag attire this Independence Day. Instead, she told her family that she will only wear pride colors and apparel. Not because she's unpatriotic – she's spent approximately 16 months deployed overseas as an F-18 pilot. But because she believes her constitutional rights are under attack.
Martin said it's been disheartening to witness liberties such as the right to protest or to cast a ballot come under attack in recent years. Those frustrations turned to devastation for her with the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, stripping away the constitutional right to an abortion. Martin hopes to someday start a family, but as someone who identifies as a lesbian, she's scared her right to marry and have children may also be in danger.