Monday News: “U.S. to Send Virus-Ravaged India Materials for Vaccines”; “A majority of Americans feel good about Biden’s first 100 days”; “Census To Release 1st Results”; Ayala Endorsed for LG by VA Gov, Speaker, House Majority leader

by Lowell

Here are a few national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise, for Monday, April 26.

• India reports record Covid cases for a fifth straight day with more than 350,000 new infections
• U.S. to Send Virus-Ravaged India Materials for Vaccines
• India’s Covid Surge Is Most Ferocious Yet. ‘Spreading Like Wildfire.’ (“New coronavirus wave hit nation of over 1.3 billion after loosening restrictions and public complacency set in, with variants possibly at play”)
• “Battery of the world”: Australia’s key role in fast transition to wind and solar
• A Billion Shots Have Been Given, but Global Covid-19 Cases Keep Rising
• Iran’s Foreign Minister, in Leaked Tape, Says Revolutionary Guards Set Policies
• India’s coronavirus crisis deepens as countries promise aid
• Top general says military in Afghanistan begins closing down
• Angela Merkel Has Been in Power for 15 Years. What Comes Next?
• Beware Of Humans (“But, more broadly, reverse zoonosis is still a risk that isn’t taken as seriously as it should be, scientists told me. It’s probably more common for viruses to spread from humans to animals than we even know…”)
• Kremlin says date and location of Putin-Biden summit not yet decided
• Vaccinated American Tourists May Soon Travel to Europe
• Russia suspends activities of Alexei Navalny’s organisation (“Move by prosecutor comes ahead of expected ruling to outlaw opposition movement as ‘extremist’”)
• “Dying by blood or by hunger”: The war in Ethiopia’s Tigray region, explained
• Why It’s So Hard To Compare Countries’ Climate Goals
• More reasons for optimism on climate change than we’ve seen for decades: 2 climate experts explain
• Let’s Launch a Moonshot for Meatless Meat
• New U.S. cases still at a ‘precarious’ level, Fauci says, amid slowing vaccination rates
• Polls: A majority of Americans feel good about Biden’s first 100 days
• Biden’s 100 days: bold action and broad vision amid grief and turmoil (“Biden’s solution to the myriad crises is an ambitious economic agenda that promises to ‘own the future’ by expanding the role of government in American life”)
• How Biden anchored his first 100 days on two simple principles
• Biden’s 1970s-Era Taxes on Rich Collide With GOP and SALT Rebels
• Biden’s $1.8 trillion ‘families plan’ would reshape taxes, spending
• Republicans Still Don’t Really Know What to Say About Joe Biden
• ‘Help is here’: 100 days of the Biden doctrine (“How a man guided by a deep belief in an active federal government has navigated his early days at the helm of a nation in crisis.”)
• 100 Days: How Biden Has Fared So Far On His Promises
• Joe Biden’s hundred days at the kitchen table
• Census To Release 1st Results That Shift Electoral College, House Seats
• Kamala Harris cements her place in Biden’s inner circle during a consequential week
• Biden job approval hits 53%, broad majority support his infrastructure plan: NBC News poll
• Juan Williams: A breakthrough on immigration?
• US lawmakers ‘making progress’ on police reform – but it’s still early stage
• Democrats push for chokehold ban, limited immunity in police reform talks
• How US chemical industry lobbying and cash defeated regulation in Trump era
• GOP worries fiscal conservatism losing its rallying cry
• Kevin McCarthy Is Still Whitewashing What Happened on January 6 (McCarthy is horrendously bad, should never be allowed to be Speaker.)
• House GOP retreat to Florida fraught with peril
• Supreme Court Eyes Rich Activists, Their Anonymous Donations And Tax Breaks
• Minnesota AG says Floyd bears no responsibility for his death
• CBS News poll: Widespread agreement with Chauvin verdict (Except among…yep, Republicans, who are divided.)
• Ted Cruz won’t break ties with an extreme nativist group? Shocker. (“The entire GOP is an extreme nativist group.”)
• Voters elected Joe Biden for this moment of racial reckoning
• 1st Time Gun Buyers Help Push Record U.S. Gun Sales Amid String Of Mass Shootings
• CEO of vaccine maker sold $10 million in stock before company ruined Johnson & Johnson doses
• How Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook Became Foes (“The chief executives of Facebook and Apple have opposing visions for the future of the internet. Their differences are set to escalate this week.”)
• 7 winners and 4 losers from the deeply eccentric 2021 Oscars (“A fantastically unpredictable show ended on a huge bummer of an anticlimax.”)
• The 2021 Oscars Were a Film Production That Ran Out of Money
• Oscars 2021: ‘Nomadland’ wins best picture at the 93rd Academy Awards
• Strangest Oscars Ever? From Snubbing Chadwick Boseman to ‘Da Butt’ and the Bizarre Stage
• Video: Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA07) Previews President Joe Biden’s Joint Address to Congress on Wednesday (Rep. Spanberger also calls it “disturbing” that some politicians are willing to “lie about election results to gain political favor with a subset of their voters”)
• CNN Examines the “political revival of Ralph Northam: How an ostracized governor became a progressive champion” (Majority Leader Charniele Herring says Northam “could have put a barrier up, shut us down, but he listened and that was key”)
• With Two Weeks to Go Until VA GOP Convention, Amanda Chase Spends Saturday With Marjorie Taylor Greene, Michael Flynn, Donald Trump; What Were Glenn Youngkin, Pete Snyder and Kirk Cox Up To?
• Amanda Chase takes her gubernatorial campaign to Florida
• Virginia GOP gubernatorial candidates have first debate (“The candidates who participated were: Kirk Cox, a member of the House of Delegates and former House speaker; Glenn Youngkin, the former co-chief executive of The Carlyle Group; Peter Doran, a former think tank executive; and Sergio de la Peña, a retired Army colonel.”)
• Governor Ralph Northam, Speaker of the House of Delegates Eileen Filler-Corn, and House Majority Leader Charniele Herring Endorse Delegate Hala Ayala for Lieutenant Governor (“Ayala — the first Afro-Latina elected to the General Assembly — serves in leadership of the House Democratic majority as Chief Deputy Whip”)
• Northam endorses Ayala for lieutenant governor
• The Republican State Central Committee agrees to allow early voting in convention for religious reasons (“The Republican State Committee just reversed course and approved an amendment to allow Orthodox Jewish people to vote on Friday before the convention. The vote tonight had no objection.”)
• Virginia still ranks last in nation for quickly resolving issues with unemployment insurance claims
• Sunday (4/25) Virginia Data on COVID-19: Slowest 1-Day Increase In Cases Since 10/19/20; Slowest 10-Day Increase In Cases Since 11/4/20
• Virginia To Resume Use Of Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 Vaccine
• Virginia Immigrants Hit Hard By Pandemic Fear Eviction, Housing Squeeze
• After Trump, Richmond-area races could decide control of House of Delegates
• Younger people are being hospitalized more with COVID-19, Hampton Roads hospitals say
• Virginia wants to make Fort Wool island an avian habitat. Historical groups say plan is for the birds.
• Editorial: Virginia will pay you to move to Southside or Southwest. (Some restrictions apply)
• Southwest Virginia is setting a model for virtual learning — even after the COVID-19 pandemic
• D.C.-area forecast: First taste of summer heat poised for midweek arrival (“Next two days deliver gorgeous spring-like conditions, and the weekend looks promising as well.”)