Light News Dump

Be kind to yourself today Pete family....I know it sucks. Some of us have been here. Our entire lives. Some haven’t. It doesn’t get easier and too often gets worse. 2016 was a nightmare. You might have not slept much, treat yourself to afternoon [vegan] icecream. Get out of work for lunch. Don’t work too hard and come back tomorrow and kick ass, be excellent. This is life, it’s okay, we’ll be okay. America will be okay. Pete already is okay. A 38 year old Rhodes Scholar who earned a ton of recognition just from his campaign alone? Yeah no, he ain't going anywhere.

Amy Klobuchar is ending her Democratic presidential campaign
https://apnews.com/1592713687548e8303538842bef31254

Millions have already early-voted and sent in absentee ballots for the Super Tuesday states. Tens of thousands, maybe a few hundred thousand or more, have already voted for Amy/Pete/Steyer already. Those votes and delegates will not go to Biden or Sanders.

Yes! The two old disgusting out-of-touch uber-wealthy white men - one a racist antisemitic mysognist terrorist shitstain and the other suffering from dementia who thinks Republicans are great and rails against much-needed progressive policy upgrades - will break the record for over 80 as president! This was meant to be. Maybe covid-19 will make this an easier choice.

The most Midwestern way for the Amy-Pete feud to end, of course, would be for both of them to never mention or speak of it ever again

Taliban ends peace deal, will resume terrrist operations
https://www.thenational.ae/world/asia/taliban-to-resume-attacks-against-kabul-as-violence-deal-ends-1.987043

EPA scientists found a toxic chemical damages fetal hearts. The Trump White House rewrote their assessment.
https://www.revealnews.org/article/epa-scientists-found-a-toxic-chemical-damages-fetal-hearts-the-trump-white-house-rewrote-their-assessment/

CDC Mistakenly Released Texas Coronavirus Patient Who Later Tested Positive, San Antonio Mayor Says
https://www.newsweek.com/cdc-mistakenly-released-texas-coronavirus-patient-who-later-tested-positive-san-antonio-mayor-says-1489939

Benjamin Netanyahu defeats Benny Gantz. Exit polls say Likud, UTJ, Shas and Yamina have 60 seats. If they actually get 61 it's a right-religious government. If he gets 61, first of all he will get himself immunity and pass a law that the Knesset can override the supreme court. After that, I see two options. Either he will be content with his immunity and resign, or more likely in my opinion is that he will stay PM, meaning that he will have do bend down to the demands of the Haredim and Yemina to keep his government so that there will be further restraint of the supreme court, a crackdown on Hiloni liberty (shops, transportation and public works on the Sabbath at the very least), more money and no conscription for Haredim, and perhaps his annexation promises won't be just promises. Last government Netanyahu had Kulanu to restrain him, but this time nothing prevents him from taking radical measures to keep his government together. What he does after (if) he gets immunity will be a test if he truly cares about his country or if he really does only care about his own seat, or perhaps decades later we will realize he is just taking Jabotinski's iron wall to a whole new level.
https://www.jpost.com/Israel-Elections/Benjamin-Netanyahus-Right-bloc-wins-majority-exit-polls-619513

Constant Reminder: The Problem With Telling Sick Workers to Stay Home. Even with the coronavirus spreading, lax labor laws and little sick leave mean that many people can’t afford to skip work.
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/02/coronavirus-could-hit-american-workers-especially-hard/607213/

Texas closes hundreds of polling sites, making it harder for minorities to vote
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/mar/02/texas-polling-sites-closures-voting

Coronavirus: World Health Organisation tells over-60s to avoid crowded areas
https://inews.co.uk/news/health/world-health-organisation-chief-warning-elderly-crowded-places-2005411

I understand how Pete supporters feel right now. His journey is not over. Neither is Yang's or O'Rourke's. These people share the same vision for America, they love America, they are committed to fighting for this planet. Pete and Andrew had historic runs, their running never ends. The impact is permanent.

.@PeteButtigieg ran a historic, trail-blazing campaign based on courage, compassion, and honesty. We will be a better country for his continued service. This is just the beginning of his time on the national stage.
https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1234290223451901954

We will not forget how @BernieSanders and his supporters mocked, lied, and slandered Pete. We will not forget how the media treated the first LBGTQ candidate. We will not forget how you did your best to erase his historic candidacy. Fuck all of you
https://www.twitter.com/Dreamwrecker16/status/1234269395586887680

Post-Suleimani strike, the Trump admin (rightly) highlighted the number of US service-members killed by Iran in Iraq: more than 600. As it signs peace deal with the Taliban, will it discuss the approx 2000 US service-members the Taliban killed in Afghanistan?
https://twitter.com/jimsciutto/status/1234475006425489408

Global Death Toll Surpasses 3,000 as U.S. Scrambles to Slow Spread | A second death was registered in the United States as the number of cases in the country jumped to 88. New York officials reported the city’s first case late Sunday.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/02/world/coronavirus-news.html

Florida governor declares public health emergency after state records first coronavirus cases
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/485421-florida-governor-declares-public-health-emergency-after-state-gets-its

Miami man doesn't have coronavirus but could now owe thousands for being tested
https://www.businessinsider.com/miami-man-doesnt-have-coronavirus-but-could-now-owe-thousands-2020-2

The Supreme Court Will Leave The Gun “Bump Stocks” Ban In Place
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/dominicholden/guns-bump-stocks-ban-supreme-court

Brexit will cost the UK up to 30 times more than it will gain back from striking a Trump trade deal
https://www.businessinsider.com/brexit-will-cost-uk-more-than-donald-trump-trade-deal-2020-3

Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth is endorsing Joe Biden for president as Illinois' Democratic establishment lines up behind Barack Obama's former No. 2
https://twitter.com/chicagotribune/status/1234505736555843584

"Ask yourselves: why does EVERY Republican operative working for Trump -- and I mean EVERY one -- desperately, passionately, urgently want to pick Bernie as the Dem nominee?" - Rick Wilson on Twitter
https://twitter.com/TheRickWilson/status/1234474714787172356?s=20

The guy who once wrote an essay praising Bernie dropped out to stop Bernie and will be endorsing Biden today. Fate it seems is not without a sense of irony. Fuck Shitstain Sanders and his campaign and his base for being hateful terrorists. If Shitstain had not run, Elizabeth, who ran on his 2015-2016 campaign platform until Sanders entered the race - forcing her to go hard left which derailed her campaign and lost her pretty much her entire base, and who had the full backing of the DNC until she veered hard left to win Sanders' base - Elizabeth would be the "moderate" candidate with a fair-minded progressive platform that would have prevented Biden from running. Bloomberg may still have run, but the vicious hateful racist misogynist antisemitic vile from the Sanders campaign would never have happened.

African-Americans and saving the republic. Name a more iconic duo. Year after year. One day, I hope soon, the burden of saving America from itself will be lifted. Until then, thank you for being the sane core of the party

#1 Thing to Remember to Stop Sanders: The Person you vote for needs 15% to take any delegates away from Sanders. For those of you not sure to vote for but want to stop Sanders. Candidates need to reach 15% on the district level to get district delegates and 15% on the state level to get state delegates. One of the reasons Pete dropped was to let other campaigns reach that 15% state viability for California's and Texas' hundreds of state delegates that Sanders could have swept. I know you should be voting for the person you want to win, but keeping delegates from Sanders will help any other Democrat win.

World's first double-lung transplant for COVID-19 infection succeeds in China
https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1181228.shtml

Chapman's Ice Cream says proposal to bury nuclear waste in the Great Lakes basin is 'shortsighted' | Ontario ice cream maker Chapman's says a proposal to bury the nation's stockpile of spent nuclear fuel in the province's agricultural heartland doesn't do the dairy industry any favours
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/canada-nuclear-waste-dairy-1.5474139

Renewable energy sources provided a record 61.2% of Germany’s net public electricity generation in February, according to figures provided by the Fraunhofer Institute
https://reneweconomy.com.au/germany-hits-record-61-per-cent-renewables-for-month-of-february-99434/

Newly obtained documents show Huawei role in shipping prohibited U.S. gear to Iran
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-huawei-iran-sanctions-exclusive/exclusive-newly-obtained-documents-show-huawei-role-in-shipping-prohibited-u-s-gear-to-iran-idUSKBN20P1VA

NASA wants you to take pictures of SpaceX's Starlink satellites with your smartphone, which will help them "document the degradation of our night sky."
https://astronomy.com/news/2020/03/nasa-needs-you-to-photograph-starlink-satellites-with-your-smartphone

Kicking Extremists Off Social Media Helps Fight Hate, Report Finds. Organisation “Hope Not Hate” said deplatforming Tommy Robinson had worked by “severely” reducing the number of his followers, making it harder for him to organise demonstrations and direct his supporters against minorities.
https://huffingtonpost.co.uk/amp/entry/tommy-robinson-social-media-hope-not-hate_uk_5e5bdf7fc5b6beedb4ed28a7/

Erdogan warns 'millions' of refugees heading to Europe The Turkish president has vowed to keep the border with Greece open to migrants. Germany has called on Turkey to respect its €6 billion deal with the EU to control migration.
https://www.dw.com/en/erdogan-warns-millions-of-refugees-heading-to-europe/a-52603580

Turkey shoots down two Syrian government warplanes as tensions escalate in Idlib Province
https://www.euronews.com/2020/03/01/turkey-shoots-down-two-syrian-government-warplanes-as-tensions-escalate-in-idlib-province

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Lipton

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betsy_Byars

Trump administration orders four Chinese news outlets in U.S. to reduce staffs
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/trump-administration-orders-four-chinese-news-outlets-in-us-to-reduce-staffs/2020/03/02/b532fea6-5c9d-11ea-b29b-9db42f7803a7_story.html

Billboards Showing Kids in Cages Appear Across Three States to Remind Voters 'Immigrants Are Still Under Attack'
https://www.newsweek.com/super-tuesday-billboards-show-children-cages-immigration-1490031

Trump Is Trying to Pull Millions off Insurance as Coronavirus Spreads
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/n7jqk8/supreme-court-obamacare-case-is-a-disaster-for-coronavirus?utm_content=1583180511

CDC drops coronavirus testing numbers from their website
https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/2/21161693/cdc-coronavirus-testing-numbers-website-disappear-expansion-us

CDC abruptly postpones coronavirus press briefing
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/02/cdc-postpones-coronavirus-briefing-118815

If Bernie can split up Public Enemy (he didn't....) then he can split up the big banks

If Bernie is the nominee: Good luck uniting a party you've never been a member of and spent your entire life attacking. 

Sounds like someone familiar: @BernieSanders supporters have started booing reporters at rallies. One yelled at us in the pen as he exited in LA yday. Not at the same level but starting to feel Trumpian. And Sanders and some top surrogates have been going after "the corporate media" with increasing disdain.
https://twitter.com/cam_joseph/status/1234592775758237696

“My heart is telling me one thing, but my mind is telling me another,” Weddle said, as the church choir danced and sang in what seemed to be a soaring dramatic soundtrack to the uncertainty she had felt. But this morning, she was confident in her decision: She would vote for Bloomberg on Tuesday. “As much as I would like to go with Biden, I don’t think he’s the guy that’s going to get enough voters to get that man out of the White House,” she said. | Though Biden got new endorsements on Sunday, he has lagged behind rivals for months in fundraising and organizing in the Super Tuesday states, prompting some Democrats to question whether he was bothering to compete or just relying on years of political goodwill.

Perhaps nowhere is that dynamic more evident than in Memphis, a majority-black city that is the beating heart of Tennessee’s African American population. Memphis is the seat of Shelby County, the state’s largest, with a population of about 940,000 that is over 50 percent black. In Memphis proper, about two-thirds of the population is black, and on the eve of Super Tuesday, many in the community remained divided over Biden’s candidacy, viewing him as a beloved party figure but questioning his ability to win. His chief rival here is Bloomberg, who has dramatically outspent and out-organized Biden as he looks to Tennessee to rack up his first primary win. While the former mayor has crisscrossed the state in recent weeks, his campaign has focused heavily on Memphis, where his personal foundation has invested millions of dollars in community programs in recent years to help revitalize the city. He’s won the endorsements of Mayor Jim Strickland, who also serves as his national campaign co-chair, and former Rep. Harold Ford Sr., the state’s first African American congressman and a political legend here who remains deeply influential. | “Most of my friends are straddling the fence between Joe Biden and Mike Bloomberg. They love Biden, but they’ve watched him on the debate stage, and he’s had these kind of canned speeches and kind of looks like he’s stumbling. … And Bloomberg isn’t dynamic, but you just feel like he can get things done. You feel like he can actually win and change things.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/03/02/ahead-super-tuesday-many-black-voters-wonder-whether-biden-can-go-distance/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mike-bloombergs-money-buys-him-a-very-different-kind-of-campaign-and-its-a-big-one/2019/12/07/0593ec7c-184a-11ea-a659-7d69641c6ff7_story.html
https://www.memphisdailynews.com/editorial/ArticleEmail.aspx?id=60224

Sanders was born before Pearl Harbor

Age of remaining top presidential candidates at 2021 inauguration:
Warren: 71 (June 22, 1949)
Trump: 74 (June 14, 1946)
Biden: 78 (November 20, 1942)
Bloomberg: 78 (February 14, 1942)
Sanders: 79 (September 8, 1941)

Epidemics, like disasters, have a way of revealing underlying truths about the societies they impact. The Chinese have already paid a high price for the secretiveness of their system, and for the top-down bureaucratic culture that led many, initially, to conceal the disease. By contrast, one of the reasons Italians aren’t panicking more is that they have confidence in the public-health system, and indeed the system in the broader sense of the word, despite Salvini and his disinformation campaigns. Italy has already tested many thousands of people for the virus—testing is free, of course—which is one of the reasons the numbers are so much higher there than elsewhere. People know this, and repeat it to one another, sometimes joking about it (“We Italians are too honest”) but it is a source of pride. Few others in Europe, so far, are testing that widely. And, of course, the U.S. is not doing anything of the sort. In the U.S., I am afraid we might learn that neither our public-health system nor our “system” more broadly understood how to build feelings of trust. Even though we have the highest-tech health-care system in the world, even though we have the best surgeons and the best equipment, we have not created a public-health culture that induces confidence. The hospital system has been pared down to the bone; there is no extra capacity, and everyone knows it. If people have to pay to be tested, then many may refuse. If people have to be quarantined, they may escape.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/italys-response-to-coronavirus/607306/

2000 Winning Essay by Peter Buttigieg, how times have changed
https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/education/profile-in-courage-essay-contest/past-winning-essays/2000-winning-essay-by-peter-buttigieg

Coronavirus count in the United States reaches 100 cases via @CNN: California: 18 Washington: 18 (6 dead) Illinois: 4 Oregon: 3 Rhode Island: 2 Florida: 2 Arizona: 1 Massachusetts: 1 New Hampshire: 1 New York: 1 Wisconsin: 1 Cruise ship (repatriated): 45 Wuhan (repatriated): 3
https://twitter.com/ryanstruyk/status/1234608948893954048

While Sanders has led the field in national polling, he hasn’t been able to crack 30% in the polling composite. When you can’t get a third of the support, you have no business being put in charge.

If your message wasn’t a majority message four years ago, and you want to win, wouldn’t you tweak it? They proudly and explicitly did not tweak it. They had zero intention of growing new support by broadening and expanding their message. Sanders and his campaign saw that their ceiling was 30%, and they built an entire strategy around winning with 30%. That means that instead of seeing the other 70% of voters as allies, they saw them as THE ENEMY. Even when there was ideological alignment.

Winning a presidential election is literally about building coalitions, and Sanders never bothered to try. That’s not the establishment’s fault.

It's hilarious how the Berniebros are freaking out about Pete and Amy endorsing Biden but had no problems with Marianne Williamson, Mike Gravel, and Bill de Blasio, and Chuck D, endorsing Bernie.

Turkey declares war on Syria’s Bashar al-Assad and unleashes swarms of killer drones
https://nationalpost.com/news/world/turkeys-killer-drone-swarm-poses-syria-air-challenge-to-putin

@JoeBiden will bring dignity, integrity and normalcy back to the White House, restoring the soul of America and faith in our leaders and institutions. He is best equipped to work across the aisle to get Americans' business done in Congress.
https://twitter.com/AmbassadorRice/status/1234575450367762432

Above all, @JoeBiden is a Democrat and the strongest candidate to take on and defeat Trump. That's why Trump is so scared of Biden. Our fate as a nation depends on beating Trump. Nothing is more important, and now is not the time for risky bets or divisive revolutions.
https://twitter.com/AmbassadorRice/status/1234575451613470720

With @JoeBiden as our nominee, we have the best chance to expand the Democrats' majority in the House and take back the Senate -- so we can finally get stuff done.  Every day, he will put the national interest above his personal interest. Please join me in supporting @JoeBiden.
https://twitter.com/AmbassadorRice/status/1234575452808806400

I'm proud to endorse @JoeBiden for President. Here he is comforting me on 1/4/17 just after my mother passed away. There is no one kinder, more empathetic and caring than @joebiden. He will lead America with the same deep compassion and decency.
https://twitter.com/AmbassadorRice/status/1234575446714523654 

We were beaten, we were tear-gassed. I thought I was going to die on this bridge. But somehow and some way, G/d almighty helped me here. We cannot give up now. We cannot give in. We must keep the faith, keep our eyes on the prize.
https://twitter.com/repjohnlewis/status/1234277472776183810