Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Interceptor7, Magnifico, annetteboardman, Besame and jck. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) 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.
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Chicago Tribune: ‘Irresponsible and dangerous’ partying by some students leads University of Illinois to crack down on social activity and warn of suspensions as campus COVID-19 cases near 800 by Elyssa Cherney
Despite an expansive testing program and models that predicted how many COVID-19 cases would pop up on campus, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is confronting a grim reality shared by other colleges attempting to stay open: Partying among undergraduate students is leading to hundreds of more infections than anticipated, jeopardizing the in-person experience for everyone.
UIUC, the state’s largest university, has tallied roughly 780 new cases on its downstate campus among students, faculty and staff since classes began Aug. 24, according to Martin Burke, a chemistry professor leading the school’s testing program. Earlier Wednesday, the school had characterized the number as “more than 400″ before clarifying during a news conference.
To deal with the surge, UIUC officials announced a number of changes to its contact tracing efforts, stricter disciplinary actions against students flouting the rules and a crackdown on social activity through Sept. 16.
Students were instructed to stay in their residences for two weeks and leave only for essential purposes, such as attending class, going to the grocery store or getting tested for COVID-19. They are also discouraged from “gathering in small or large groups under any circumstances,” the school says.
New York Daily News: Tom Seaver, the greatest Met of all time, dies at 75 by Bill Madden
The long goodbye has ended. The Mets’ “Franchise” is gone.
Tom Seaver, the greatest of all Mets who dropped out of public life in March of 2019 after being diagnosed with dementia died early Monday. Accoring to family sources, Seaver, 75, died peacefully at his home in Calistoga, Calif., from complications from Lyme disease, dementia and COVID-19.
He leaves behind 311 victories, 3,640 career strikeouts, three Cy Young Awards and countless millions New York baseball fans who forever cherish the memories of the Miracle Mets 1969 championship season and his starring role in it.
“We are heartbroken to share that our beloved husband and father has passed away,” said his wife Nancy Seaver and daughters Sarah and Anne in a statement to the Baseball Hall of Fame. “We send our love out to his fans, as we mourn his loss with you.”
Charlotte Observer: DJs, caravans, signs. Inside ‘mad rush’ for the census to count everyone in Charlotte by Danielle Chemtob
On a recent Saturday, people waved from porches and driveways as a caravan of cars with signs, balloons and windows with messages painted in bright pink and blue letters drove through Charlotte’s Hidden Valley neighborhood.
Drivers honked. A DJ blasted music in the back of a pickup truck as the parade navigated through the community. But this wasn’t a neighborhood block party — it was one of the many urgent programs playing out in Charlotte and across the country to promote the 2020 Census.
The Trump administration ordered the once-a-decade count to wrap up a month early, at the end of September, after COVID-19 had delayed operations and shut down field offices.
That left communities and census officials scrambling to ensure as many people as possible were counted, especially in traditionally hard-to-reach areas like Hidden Valley.
The census is used to determine political representation and federal funding for schools, roads, housing and social services. Each person counted in the census annually brings in around $2,000 in federal funding for services, according to Mecklenburg County.
Arizona Republic: 'Stop getting people to snitch!': Some in Arizona lash out against tip line to report COVID-19 scofflaws by Ryan Randazzo
Arizona health officials are getting more than just hundreds of leads on their tip line and website for the public to report businesses that are not requiring masks or otherwise violating orders related to COVID-19.
They also are getting hundreds of complaints of government overreach and general blowback from people tired of accommodating the pandemic.
The Arizona Department of Health Services started the effort last week as hundreds of bars, gyms, movie theaters and water parks got the OK to reopen.
About half the 800 tips received so far are likely to be investigated by DHS, depending on their severity. But about a quarter of them are complaints about the government, not businesses. And another 25% or so are about other types of businesses, which are not a priority at this time, according to DHS.
Buzzfeed: The Trump Administration Wants To Pull Federal Funds From Major Cities Where There Are Anti-Racism Protests by Hamed Aleaziz
The Trump administration plans to review federal funds provided to Seattle, Washington DC, New York City, and Portland, cities where "outrageous acts of violence and destruction have continued unabated," according to a memo signed by President Trump Wednesday.
Within two weeks, the White House will issue guidance to the heads of federal agencies to submit a report on the federal funds provided to the four cities.
In addition, Attorney General William Barr will publish a list “identifying State and local jurisdictions that have permitted violence and the destruction of property to persist and have refused to undertake reasonable measures to counteract these criminal activities (anarchist jurisdictions).”
The memorandum would signal the latest escalation between the Trump administration and cities in which large scale protests have taken place against systemic racism in the wake of high profile police killings of Black people. Since July, Trump administration officials have attacked Portland officials, most notably Mayor Ted Wheeler, for not doing enough to protect federal property and shut down protests.
Reuters: U.S. CDC tells states to prep for COVID-19 vaccine distribution as soon as late October by Manojina Maddipatla
(Reuters) - The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has asked state public health officials to prepare to distribute a potential coronavirus vaccine to high-risk groups as soon as late October, documents published by the agency showed on Wednesday.
The timing of a vaccine has taken on political importance as U.S. President Donald Trump seeks re-election in November, after committing billions of federal dollars to develop a vaccine to prevent COVID-19, which has killed more than 180,000 Americans.
“For the purpose of initial planning, CDC provided states with certain planning assumptions as they work on state specific plans for vaccine distribution, including possibly having limited quantities of vaccines in October and November,” a CDC spokeswoman told Reuters.
The New York Times had earlier reported that the CDC had contacted officials in all 50 states and five large cities with the planning information.
Hell, naw!
Washington Post: First covid-19 death linked to Sturgis Motorcycle Rally reported in Minnesota by Brittany Shammas and Lena H. Sun
A Minnesota biker who attended the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally has died of covid-19 — the first fatality from the virus traced to the 10-day event that drew more than 400,000 to South Dakota.
The man was in his 60s, had underlying conditions and was hospitalized in intensive care after returning from the rally, said Kris Ehresmann, infectious-disease director at the Minnesota Department of Health. The case is among at least 260 cases in 11 states tied directly to the event, according to a survey of health departments by The Washington Post.
Epidemiologists believe that figure is a significant undercount, due to the resistance of some rallygoers to testing and the limited contact tracing in some states. As a result, the true scope of infections stemming from the rally that ran from Aug. 7 to Aug. 16 is unlikely to ever be known. Public health officials had long expressed concern over the decision to move forward with the annual event, believed to be the largest held anywhere in the U.S. since the pandemic shelved most large-scale gatherings.
Guardian: Alexei Navalny novichok finding prompts calls for answers from Moscow by Philip Oltermann and Shaun Walker
World leaders are demanding answers from the Kremlin after toxicological examinations indicated that the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was poisoned with a nerve agent from the novichok family.
The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, revealed that tests carried out at a military laboratory had “identified unequivocally” the Soviet era nerve agent. She referred to the case as an “attempted murder” and said the findings raised “very difficult questions that only the Russian government can answer, and has to answer.”
The UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, called the findings “outrageous” and said: “The Russian government must now explain what happened to Mr Navalny.”
AlJazeera: Exclusive: French reform proposal for Lebanon delves into details by Timour Azhari
Beirut, Lebanon - French President Emmanuel Macron, in a visit to Lebanon, has offered to help provide the crisis-hit nation with vital aid if its politicians make good on long-overdue reforms.
Speaking at the palatial French ambassador's residence in Beirut from where Greater Lebanon was proclaimed by colonial France 100 years ago, Macron said on Tuesday he would rally international aid at an October donor conference aimed at rebuilding the capital after a devastating explosion last month and halting the country's economic demise.
But "we will not give Lebanon a carte-blanche, or a blank check," he added, noting that everything was conditional on whether the country's fractious leaders could unite around change.
Even before the August 4 explosion that killed at least 190 people, wounded more than 6,000 and damaged wide swaths of Beirut, Lebanon had been drowning in economic crisis.
South China Morning Post: Singapore PM concedes Covid-19 missteps, warns against leaving PAP’s ‘Garden of Eden’ by Kok Xinghui and Bhavan Jaipragas
Singapore’s
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Wednesday conceded several shortcomings in the country’s
Covid-19 response– including its handling of the surge in cases in migrant worker dormitories – but said these reflections were “wisdom after the fact”.
In a wide-ranging address to parliament, Lee said “in the fog of war, it is not possible always to make the perfect decisions”.
“Yet we have to decide and move. We cannot afford to wait. The key is to watch things closely, learn from experience, and adapt our responses promptly as new information emerges and the situation changes,” he said.
Speaking to lawmakers for the first time since
Singapore’s July 10 election, Lee broached a wide range of issues, and stressed that even amid the current economic gloom, there remained many investors interested in undertaking projects in the island nation.
BBC News: Coronavirus in South Africa: Misuse of Covid-19 funds 'frightening'
A scathing report into the use of South Africa's Covid-19 relief fund has revealed overpricing and potential fraud, the auditor general says.
Kimi Makwetu says the audit uncovered "frightening findings".
In some cases personal protective equipment (PPE) was bought for five times more than the price the national treasury had advised.
The report also has flagged up 30,000 relief grants which "require further investigation".
Mr Makwetu has been tracking the spending of 500 billion rand ($26bn; £19bn) which is equivalent to 10% of the country's gross domestic product.
"A lot of the effort that we put into this on the detection side of things has revealed a number of frightening findings that require to be followed up very quickly so that there is no significant passage of time before the required actions are implemented," he said at a press conference on Wednesday.
Grub Street: Can Anyone Really Solve New York City’s Indoor-Dining Problem? by Rachel Sugar
Ravi DeRossi is one of New York City’s most well known restaurateurs. His name is synonymous with a certain style of low-key, high-volume, alcohol-forward eatery you find in downtown Manhattan, which perhaps is not a coincidence, because DeRossi is currently operating nine of them. His empire includes an ever-changing roster of businesses: There is a plant-based tapas bar and an actual bar-bar that specializes in bitters. There is a low-lit, earthy date spot. There used to be an “exotic vegetable bar” that soon will be reborn as a vegan Filipino restaurant. With so many various establishments, DeRossi has seen firsthand the very different ways that the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic can affect sales. At Ladybird, his tapas spot, DeRossi says, business is “actually doing very well.” But his restaurant next door — the vegetable bar turned Filipino spot — has shuttered. The difference: Ladybird has space for 40 outdoor seats, which is roughly what it had inside. The space next door is blocked by a fire hydrant. “I’m literally only going to get eight seats,” DeRossi says. “We couldn’t even do enough sales to pay the staff, because of the fire hydrant.”
For the roughly 10,000 restaurants that are currently participating in the program, New York’s expanded outdoor dining is perhaps not the solution to combating the economic downturn that arrived after sitting barefaced near other people became a dangerous activity, but it is certainly a solution, part of the patchwork of projects — merch, meal kits, delivery — that has helped operators stay in business. “Summer dining has allowed us to just do the bare minimum to keep things operational,” says Alfredo Angueira, owner of Bricks & Hops, Bronx Drafthouse, and Beatstro, all in the South Bronx. Now, though, with Labor Day looming, many in the industry are terrified about what happens next: What does New York City look like when the picnics end and the weather cools and everyone heads back inside?
Of course, it’s not simply New York City that is having this issue at the moment.
And finally tonight.
Don’t forget that this Wednesday night OND slot remains open if anyone would like to try their hand at it.
Everyone have a good evening!
