Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Magnifico, annetteboardman, Besame and jck. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Interceptor 7, Man Oh Man, wader, Neon Vincent, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
CNN
The US just topped 6 million coronavirus cases in about 7 months. What happens next is up to you, Birx says.
But there's a bit of good news: "As a nation, we are clearly doing better now on the last day of August than we were on the first day of August," said Dr. Ashish Jha, director of the Harvard Global Health Institute.
"(Daily) cases have come down. Deaths are starting to decline. Hospitalizations are down. This is good news, and it's largely because of smart policies in Texas and Arizona and Florida around masking and closing bars," Jha said.
"But there are still parts of the country where things are both bad and even getting worse. In the Dakotas, in Kansas and other states, we still see a lot of cases. And as a nation, we're still seeing a lot of cases of coronavirus. So progress, but we have a long way to go."
C/NET
A tweet sent Friday from Chadwick Boseman's Twitter account announcing the actor's death and heralding his perseverance and fighting spirit is now the most-liked tweet ever.
"A tribute fit for a king," Twitter's official account said Saturday in announcing the record. "WakandaForever"
The record-breaking tweet from Boseman's account, sent Friday night at 7:11 p.m. PT, includes a black and white photo of the Black Panther star wearing a broad, radiant grin, with equally smiling eyes. Along with the picture is a statement from Boseman's family sharing that he'd passed away after battling colon cancer for four years.
The actor died Friday at age 43 in his Los Angeles home alongside his wife and other members of his family, Boseman's publicist, Nicki Fioravante, told the Associated Press.
ESPN
Legendary Georgetown coach John Thompson Jr., known simply as "Big John" throughout college basketball, has died at age 78.
Thompson, who led Georgetown to the 1984 national championship, built the program into a juggernaut, taking the Hoyas to three Final Fours in the 1980s while also winning seven Big East titles and leading the 1988 United States national team to a bronze medal in the Olympics.
"We are heartbroken to share the news of the passing of our father, John Thompson, Jr," the Thompson family said in a statement released by Georgetown. "Our father was an inspiration to many and devoted his life to developing young people not simply on, but most importantly, off the basketball court. He is revered as a historic shepherd of the sport, dedicated to the welfare of his community above all else.
BBC
US presidential candidate Joe Biden has accused Donald Trump of being a "weak" and "toxic" leader who has "fomented" violence in the country.
Speaking in the battleground state of Pennsylvania, Mr Biden said the US was facing multiple crises, which "under Donald Trump, keep multiplying".
The Democrat's comments came amid sharp tensions between the rival candidates over unrest in US cities.
Mr Trump has made "law and order" a major theme of his campaign.
The two candidates have in recent days been trading insults over clashes in Portland, Oregon. A man linked to a right-wing group was shot dead there on Saturday, as elsewhere in the city a pro-Trump rally clashed with Black Lives Matter protesters.
Portland has become a flashpoint for demonstrations against police brutality and racism since the police killing of African-American man George Floyd in Minneapolis on 25 May triggered a wave of national and international outrage.
Mr Trump is set to visit the city of Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Tuesday amid anger there over the police shooting of black man Jacob Blake.
BBC
The first commercial flight from Israel to the United Arab Emirates has landed, a major step in normalising relations after the announcement of a peace deal.
The El Al airliner made the three-hour trip, carrying a delegation of Israeli and US officials.
The flight was allowed to cross Saudi Arabian airspace, normally blocked to Israeli air traffic.
The UAE has become only the third Arab country in the Middle East to recognise Israel since its founding in 1948.
On Saturday, the UAE repealed a law boycotting Israel which had been in place since 1972, and earlier this month the two countries opened direct telephone services for the first time.
The agreement to normalise relations - brokered by the US - was made public in a surprise announcement on 13 August.
NPR
A man was fatally shot during a night of confrontations between Trump supporters and counterprotesters in Portland, Ore., on Saturday, the latest high-profile incident in a city that has seen nightly demonstrations for three consecutive months. On Sunday, city leaders denounced the violence while President Trump criticized their ability to contain it.
Hundreds of cars participating in a pro-Trump caravan made their way through the city starting late in the afternoon, clashing sporadically with counterprotesters along the route.
Police say they are investigating a shooting that took place shortly before 9 p.m. local time as a homicide.
"It is still early in this investigation, and I ask everyone to give the detectives time to do their important work before drawing conclusions about what took place," Police Chief Chuck Lovell said in a statement. "This violence is completely unacceptable and we are working diligently to find and apprehend the individual or individuals responsible."
NPR
A group of veteran journalists for the Voice of America delivered a letter of protest Monday denouncing their parent agency's new CEO, Michael Pack, and alleging Pack's remarks in a recent interview prove he has a damaging agenda for the international broadcasters he oversees.
Pack's comments and decisions "endanger the personal security of VOA reporters at home and abroad, as well as threatening to harm U.S. national security objectives," the letter to VOA Acting Director Elez Biberaj read.
The protest was triggered by Pack's interview with the conservative and pro-Trump website The Federalist but came after a long line of sweeping changes and purges at the federally funded networks overseen by Pack, an appointee of President Trump.
During the half-hour conversation, Pack joked with The Federalist's host, senior editor Chris Bedford, about deporting his own employees and forcing them to adopt unsafe workplace practices that could expose them to COVID-19. Pack said the agency was ripe for espionage and possibly rife with spies.
"It's a great place to put a foreign spy," Pack said, citing what he contended were severe security lapses by previous leadership.
NPR
In Orange, Texas, just across the Sabine River from Louisiana, a line of cars hundreds deep snakes along a highway shoulder and into a parking lot. A local supermarket has set up an aid distribution center in the hot sun and humidity. Families are packed in their cars, waiting to get the basics: ice, water, a hot meal.
Hurricane Laura is the first major test of whether the Gulf Coast is prepared to handle two disasters at once. Coronavirus case numbers in Southwest Louisiana were already spiking at an alarming rate. Then a Category 4 hurricane came ashore.
While Laura spared Houston and New Orleans, more than 600,000 homes were in the path of the storm, which caused widespread power outages and disrupted the water system.
Reuters
(Reuters) - Oregon state police were poised on Monday to return to Portland after a fatal shooting this weekend, as clashes escalated between an armed right-wing group and protesters demanding racial justice and police reforms.
Governor Kate Brown, a Democrat, released a plan Sunday night in response to violence that she said was stoked by an armed right-wing group called Patriot Prayer. In addition to bringing in state police, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Attorney would commit more resources to prosecuting criminal offenders.
“Every Oregonian has the right to freely express their views without fear of deadly violence. I will not allow Patriot Prayer and armed white supremacists to bring more bloodshed to our streets,” Brown said in a statement.
Protests have roiled downtown Portland every night for more than three months following the May 25 killing of George Floyd, the Black man who died under the knee of a white police officer in Minneapolis.
Reuters
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Monday set a May 2021 trial date for Steve Bannon, a former adviser to Donald Trump, and three co-defendants on charges of defrauding donors in a scheme to build the president’s signature wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Federal prosecutors on Aug. 20 accused Bannon, U.S. Air Force veteran Brian Kolfage and two others of orchestrating a scheme to defraud hundreds of thousands of dollars in connection with a $25 million crowdfunding campaign called “We Build the Wall.”
Bannon and Kolfage used hundreds of thousands of dollars of that money to cover personal expenses, according to the charges.
Kolfage, Andrew Badolato, and Timothy Shea all pleaded not guilty at a virtual hearing on Monday. They were granted bail and will surrender their passports. Bannon, 66, pleaded not guilty earlier this month.
The Guardian
Six months into the coronavirus pandemic, Donald Trump tweeted a rare statement of condolences, as the confirmed death toll in the US climbed past 183,000.
But the expression of regret was not for victims of Covid-19. Instead the president memorialized a member of a far-right group killed in Portland, Oregon on Saturday night.
“Rest in peace Jay,” the president tweeted, referring to Aaron “Jay” Danielson, shot dead in clashes after a convoy of Trump supporters drove through an anti-racism protest.
Trump is not often given to expressions of sympathy or understanding. But going back to the days when he took out a full-page ad in the New York Times to call for the deaths of five wrongfully accused Black men in the 1989 Central Park jogger case, he has shown a lifelong penchant for inserting himself at raw public moments to inflame racist hatreds and fears.
The difference now is that Trump is president, and that penchant has become the centerpiece of his re-election strategy. That much is plain from his Twitter feed, which on Sunday included footage of a Black man assaulting a white woman on a subway platform, apropos of nothing.
The Guardian
Glacial lakes have grown rapidly around the world in recent decades, according to satellite images that reveal the impact of increased meltwater draining off retreating glaciers.
Scientists analysed more than quarter of a million satellite images to assess how lakes formed by melting glaciers have been affected by global heating and other processes.
The images show the number of glacial lakes rose by 53% between 1990 and 2018, expanding the amount of the Earth the lakes cover by about 51%. According to the survey, 14,394 glacial lakes spread over nearly 9,000 square km of the planet’s surface.
Based on the figures, the researchers estimate the volume of the world’s glacial lakes grew by 48% over the same period and now hold 156.5 cubic km of water.
Haaretz
In the final week of August, beaches along Sea of Galilee and streams in the Galilee are reflecting two facets of Israel. On one side, hundreds of thousands of citizens with nowhere to fly are descending on every water source or footpath, leaving behind mountains of garbage. Trailing them and attending this mess are workers who, for meager pay and under difficult conditions, have to contend with a country in which discarded beer cans and snack food wrappers have become an inseparable part of the landscape. And these workers, who remain behind to return nature to some semblance of normalcy, report constant daily bullying and expressions of racism by visitors.
Towards the weekend, cleaning staff on Levanon Beach on the eastern side of the Sea of Galilee, or Lake Kinneret, could breathe more easily for a while. This is when the profile of visitors changes, with families with children replacing groups of young adults. As children frolick in the water and smoke rises from a barbecue, Tarek Hassuna, from the Arab village of Misr, who has worked here for a decade, describes an incident from the previous day.
Al Jazeera
Hamas, the Palestinian group running the besieged Gaza Strip, has announced it has reached a Qatari-mediated deal to end the latest escalation of violence with Israel.
After talks with Qatari envoy Mohammed el-Emadi, "an understanding was reached to rein in the latest escalation and end [Israeli] aggression against our people", the office of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar said on Monday.
There was no immediate comment by Israel.The Israeli army has carried out attacks on Gaza almost daily since August 6 in what it says is a response to the airborne incendiary devices and, less frequently, rockets launched into southern Israel.
Reuters
TORONTO/CHICAGO (Reuters) - High-profile COVID-19 vaccines developed in Russia and China share a potential shortcoming: They are based on a common cold virus that many people have been exposed to, potentially limiting their effectiveness, some experts say.
CanSino Biologics’ (6185.HK) vaccine, approved for military use in China, is a modified form of adenovirus type 5, or Ad5. The company is in talks to get emergency approval in several countries before completing large-scale trials, the Wall Street Journal reported last week.
A vaccine developed by Moscow’s Gamaleya Institute, approved in Russia earlier this month despite limited testing, is based on Ad5 and a second less common adenovirus.
“The Ad5 concerns me just because a lot of people have immunity,” said Anna Durbin, a vaccine researcher at Johns Hopkins University. “I’m not sure what their strategy is ... maybe it won’t have 70% efficacy. It might have 40% efficacy, and that’s better than nothing, until something else comes along.”
