Thursday News: “Boris Johnson’s constitutional crisis now resembles America’s”; “Greta Thunberg, Climate Activist, Arrives in N.Y. With a Message for Trump”; Cooch “Compares Statue of Liberty to Tucker Carlson’s Face”

by Lowell

Here are a few national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise, for Thursday, August 29.

• China Indicates It Won’t Retaliate Now on New U.S. Tariffs
• Brazil and the world need to strike a balance to save the Amazon
• Britain’s PM suspends Parliament so he can force through his Brexit vision (“The government can’t collapse over Brexit infighting if there’s no government at work” Britain appears to have gone completely mad. Kinda like the U.S. Greeeeaaat.)
• Many Britons React With Anger Over Suspension Of Parliament
• Did Boris Johnson Just Break Parliament? (“One of the world’s oldest democracies takes an alarmingly authoritarian turn.”)
• Boris Johnson’s constitutional crisis now resembles America’s
• Boris Johnson’s reckless path is bad for Britain
• Boris Johnson’s suspension of parliament is an affront to democracy (“MPs must pass a no-confidence vote in the government and trigger a general election”)
• ‘Stop the coup’: Protests across UK over Johnson’s suspension of parliament
• Boris Johnson Corners His Opponents and Pushes Brexit Toward a Showdown (“Opponents effectively have until Sept. 12 to come up with plan. Britain is due to crash out of the EU at the end of October”)
• Ruth Davidson quits as Scottish Tory leader citing Brexit and family
• Italy’s Transition From One Weak Government to Another (“The pact between the populist Five Star Movement and the center-left Democratic Party, engineered to keep Matteo Salvini from power, may have its days numbered.”)
• The Israel-Iran Shadow War Escalates and Breaks Into the Open
• Greta Thunberg, Climate Activist, Arrives in N.Y. With a Message for Trump (“The Swedish 16-year-old sailed across the Atlantic on an emissions-free yacht to speak at the U.N. Climate Action Summit next month.”)
• The Misogyny of Climate Deniers (“Why do right-wing men hate Greta Thunberg and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez so much? Researchers have some troubling answers to that question.” “The connection has to do with a sense of group identity under threat, Hultman told me—an identity they perceive to be under threat from all sides. Besieged, as they see it, both by developing gender equality—Hultman pointed specifically to the shock some men felt at the #MeToo movement—and now climate activism’s challenge to their way of life, male reactionaries motivated by right-wing nationalism, anti-feminism, and climate denialism increasingly overlap, the three reactions feeding off of one another.”))
• Hurricane Dorian is getting stronger and could hit the US as a Category 3
• Republicans grow anxious about the Trump economy (“Trump’s trade war with China could undermine GOP chances of holding the White House and Senate in 2020.”)
• If Trump Causes a Recession, How Severe Will It Be? (“Economic indicators aren’t even pointing to a mild recession. Here’s how the floor could collapse.”)
• Businesses plead with Trump as trade war pain sets in
• Democrats alarmed by Trump’s promise of pardons to build border wall (Of course, everyone should be alarmed, not just Democrats.)
• Trump Administration Set to Roll Back Rules on Methane Emissions (That’s a HUGE mistake, of course, as methane is a potent greenhouse gas. But this administration is utterly corrupt and in the pocket of fossil fuel interests, so…)
• Trump deserves impeachment quite apart from the Mueller report
• Trump’s War on the Media Keeps Getting More Extreme (“But there’s some bad news for the president: His escalating smear tactics may be failing.”)
• Trump turns up the volume with days of anti-media attacks
• Op-Ed: I made a joke about Bret Stephens and bedbugs. His response was never about civility
• Column: Bret Stephens, Donald Trump and the epidemic of male fragility
• Debate Stage Cut In Half For 1-Night September Showdown (“Making the cut are: former Vice President Joe Biden, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro, California Sen. Kamala Harris, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and entrepreneur Andrew Yang. It’s the third debate so far this cycle, and will take plance in Houston hosted by ABC News and Univision.”)
• Kirsten Gillibrand Drops Out Of Democratic Presidential Race
• ‘Clarifying’: The Democratic debate stage narrows and candidates quit the race (“The overcrowded Democratic primary for the right to take on Trump is entering a new phase.”)
• Tom Steyer’s mega-millions debate gambit flops (Good!)
• Some children of US troops born overseas will no longer get automatic American citizenship, Trump administration says (WTF???)
• Surprise Georgia resignation jolts battle for the Senate (“Republicans will now be forced to defend two seats in an emerging swing state”)
• Democrats see golden opportunity to take Georgia Senate seat (“The party believes the state’s demographics are moving in its direction, and President Trump’s low approval ratings have Democrats thinking he may leave other Republicans vulnerable.”)
• The Man Who Couldn’t Take It Anymore (“‘I had no choice but to leave,’ General James Mattis says of his decision to resign as President Trump’s secretary of defense.”)
• Group founded by Nixon’s infamous ‘Jew counter’ attacks Democrats for supporting anti-Semitism
• The Tea Party is Alive and Well (“Its ideas and attitudes find their natural expression in President Trump.”)
• The New York Times omits mention of race from its history of the tea party (In fact, it was almost all about racism.)
• MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell retracts and apologizes for thinly sourced Trump finances story
• Trump’s Acting Immigration Director Compares Statue of Liberty to Tucker Carlson’s Face (“Acting Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Ken Cuccinelli made a bizarre comparison between the Statue of Liberty and Fox News pundit Tucker Carlson.” What on earth is wrong with Cooch?)
• Northam appointee who made derogatory and anti-Catholic statements on social media resigns (The RTD has now run three front-page stories on this. Why? This is *that* important?!?)
• Does Denver Riggleman Agree with Secretary Perdue That Farmers Need to “Stop Whining”?
• Presidential candidate O’Rourke plans return to Charlottesville
• BREAKING: Federal Agency Asks Fish and Wildlife Service to Start Over on Crucial Permit for Mountain Valley Pipeline
• Shad Plank: How does Virginia lure new companies? A rare glimpse at the wooing process.
• GOP state senator attacks his ‘radical’ challenger, a Muslim, over ‘Islamic terrorism’ (That says all you need to know about Stuart. Vote him out on November 5.)
• Virginia showcases new Israeli technology for transforming waste and hopes economic investment follows (“The Richmond region will become the national showcase for an innovative technology that an Israeli company says will transform household waste — everything, including kitchen scraps — into ‘the greenest thermoplastic material on the planet.'”)
• George Mason University’s Role in the Conservative Takeover of the Courts (“Public Record Requests Yield New Insights into Right-Wing Pipeline”)
• DNC Member from Virginia on Climate Debate: “Replace any elected DNC member who voted to kill this resolution”
• ‘Willing to take the political risk’: Del. Ibraheem Samirah explains his brash brand of activist politics
• Former legislator, Charlottesville School Board member Tom Michie dies
• Peninsula Regional Animal Shelter striving for a dramatic increase in foster pet parents
• Dockless scooters have had a rough ride in Richmond
• Richmond man gets 5 years for torturing to death Tommie, the pit bull (Just evil.)
• Sunny and delightfully warm through Saturday. Just a few showers late in the holiday weekend.