Thursday News: “GOP Tunes Out Hurricane, Cop Violence, and 180,000 Dead Americans”; RNC delivers whirlwind of lies great and small”; “Pence Goes Full MAGA”; “NBA Teams Are On Strike Over Police Brutality”; Tucker Carlson Excuses Kenosha Killer

by Lowell

Here are a few national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise, for Thursday, August 27.

Here’s a Fox News host rationalizing and excusing a pro-Trump teenager who is charged with first degree homicide after killing two protesters and wounding a third. Words can be deadly. This is so, so dangerous. https://t.co/Czn7iLNZxv

— Brian Klaas (@brianklaas) August 27, 2020

• Alexei Navalny can’t just become another name on the roll call of Putin’s victims
• Present at the Disruption (“How Trump Unmade U.S. Foreign Policy”)
• On Climate Change, We’ve Run Out of Presidential Terms to Waste
• Germany Set to Start Coal Phaseout Tenders Amid Legal Challenge (“As the effort to phase out coal by 2038 begins, the question of whether the market would have done the job sooner lingers.”)
• Portuguese government confirms world record solar price of $0.01316/kWh
• WoodMac: Solar Inverter Market Reached Record Highs in 2019
• Yes, We Can Get Rid of the World’s Dirtiest Fuel (“Signs of coal’s demise are everywhere, but the world needs a better plan to phase out thousands of coal power plants still in use.” Ditch ’em!)
• The Russians infiltrated Trump’s 2016 campaign. We may never know exactly what happened.
• Hurricane Laura makes landfall as Category 4 in Louisiana with ‘life-threatening’ surge
• Hurricane Laura looms, and Trump is again the man without a plan
• Abbott is launching a $5 rapid COVID-19 antigen test — with results in 15 minutes (“Abbott Laboratories announced Wednesday that its new rapid COVID-19 antigen test — which will cost $5 and provide results in 15 minutes — was granted emergency use authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.”)
• TikTok chief Kevin Mayer quits after Trump threatens to ban app
• Fauci says he was in surgery when task force discussed CDC testing guidelines
• CDC was pressured ‘from the top down’ to change coronavirus testing guidance, official says
• Trump asked for fewer Covid-19 tests. Now the CDC is recommending less testing.
• GOP set to propose smaller coronavirus stimulus bill (“The roughly $500 billion proposal would include enhanced unemployment benefits, an authorization for more small business loans, and funding for schools, treatment and vaccines, but not direct payments to Americans. The bill is unlikely to become law, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has pushed for at least $2 trillion in aid.”)
• POLITICO Playbook: More than 100 Bush-McCain-Romney alums go for Biden
• ‘It’s playing into Trump’s hands’: Dems fear swing-state damage from Kenosha unrest
• The Kenosha Shooting Suspect Was In The Front Row Of A Trump Rally In January (“The law-enforcement obsessed 17-year-old who was charged with shooting and killing two people and injuring another in Kenosha during protests for Jacob Blake appeared in the front row at a Donald Trump rally in January” Of course.)
• An inescapable echo between Trump’s campaign rhetoric and the deaths of protesters in Kenosha
• Officer Rusten Sheskey Identified as Cop Who Shot Jacob Blake (“Rusten Sheskey fired his weapon seven times at Jacob Blake and has told investigators that Blake had a knife.”)
• Facebook chose not to act on militia complaints before Kenosha shooting
• Facebook takes down ‘call to arms’ event after two shot dead in Kenosha
• NBA Teams Are On Strike Over Police Brutality
• Tucker Carlson: “How shocked are we that 17-year-olds with rifles decided they had to maintain order when no one else would?”
• Biden Condemns Both Racism and Violence Because He Isn’t Crazy (Exactly – they are BOTH bad!)
• Hurricane Laura crashes Trump’s convention
• The Harsh Reality Behind Trump’s Reality Show
• Fact-Checking Night 3 of the Republican National Convention
• Trump and Pompeo’s disregard for the Hatch Act is business as usual. That’s the problem.
• R.N.C. Rewrites Trump’s Racism — and America’s
• False claims and a grim message: key takeaways from night three of the RNC
• Republicans are lying about Biden and hoping voters are ignorant enough to believe them
• Mike Pence appears to be living in a fantasyland
• The only old-fashioned aspect of the RNC: The jockeying for 2024 (“Rivals have emerged to Mike Pence in the who-can-glorify-Trump-most sweepstakes.”)
• Pence goes full MAGA
• GOP convention features 15 speakers with legal or ethical issues
• Mike Pence’s Big Lie About Trump and the Coronavirus at the Republican National Convention
• The Manic Denialism of the Republican National Convention
• Republicans Are Gaslighting America. Will It Work? (“Night three of the RNC was more revisionist history.”)
• The RNC is on a Hatch Act crime spree (“The media fails to do justice to the outrageous, illegal conduct.”)
• Outside the RNC bubble, the economy stinks and Americans suffer
• When will Trump be held responsible for the horrors he creates? (“The president’s burden: A spate of violence spurred by White supremacy.”)
• Republican convention delivers whirlwind of lies great and small (“Speaker after speaker piled falsehood upon falsehood to recast Trump as a saintly feminist preoccupied with the nation’s health”)
• RNC speech serves as farewell address for Kellyanne Conway
• Pence hits Biden and makes case for Trump on third night of RNC
• Mike Pence claims Americans would be unsafe under Biden in dark RNC speech (“Vice-president does not mention Jacob Blake as he champions ‘law and order on the streets’ amid protests”)
• Don Jr. robocall urges supporters to vote by mail
• Immigrants in Trump-Led Ceremony Didn’t Know They Would Appear at RNC
• The Republican convention is paving a path for White voters to again choose Trump
• The Special Hypocrisy of Melania Trump’s Speech at the Republican National Convention
• The Lie at the Heart of Melania’s Speech (“The first lady lamented the divides that her husband foments and exploits, and that she herself has done little to overcome.”)
• RNC Video Showing Rioters In “Biden’s America” Is Actually Spain
• Pence reinvents Trump’s presidency on a disorienting night of crises
• GOP Tunes Out Hurricane, Cop Violence, and 180,000 Dead Americans (“GOP Tunes Out Hurricane, Cop Violence, and 180,000 Dead Americans”)
• Pro-Trump media’s outrage over Pelosi’s “domestic enemies” is laughable as the RNC rage-fest carries on (“Instead of discussing the Trump administration’s acts of voter suppression, they make it about rhetoric”)
• The Most Craven Lie on Night 3 of the RNC Came from Kayleigh McEnany
• Fact Check: Pence Falsely Implies Joe Biden Wants To Defund The Police(“Biden has acknowledged what he describes as a pervasive system of racism prevalent throughout society, including among some police officers, but he has defended good police and said he does not believe that all officers are racist.”)
• Of course the RNC featured anti-choice radical Abby Johnson, who thinks women shouldn’t vote
• Republicans Have Been Crying ‘Socialist’ for 60 Years
• What if It All Goes Wrong? (“We’ve learned a lot since 2016. We’re still not prepared for the worst-case scenarios.”)
• Markey widens lead to 12 points in Massachusetts Senate race: poll (Excellent, go Markey!)
• Arizona GOP worried Trump and McSally will cost them the state: “Arizonans are fed up” (“Trump and McSally’s sagging poll numbers now threaten to flip both chambers of the state legislature to Democrats”)
• Metro is struggling to restart — and survive
• New Poll: Joe Biden+14 Points (53%-39%) in Virginia, Up 2 Points From May; Sen. Mark Warner +21 Points (55%-34%) (Biden at 51%-38% favorable; Warner at 51%-26%; Trump at 37%-55%)
• ICYMI: Biden for President Virginia Hosts Women for Biden Virtual Roundtable
• Amidst a Devastating Pandemic, Trump’s Efforts To Terminate the Affordable Care Act Have Left Virginians’ Health Care In Crisis
• Senator [Warner] meets with Shenandoah County business leaders
• Terry McAuliffe moves closer to running for Virginia governor (Finally, someone gets it right, after almost all of the media got it wrong: “Pay no attention to that paperwork filing former Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe’s (D) PAC recently made. It has nothing to do with launching an official campaign for a second term — never mind that the papers change the PAC (and its substantial war chest) into a candidate committee.”)
• Wednesday (8/26) Virginia Data on COVID-19 Finds +823 Confirmed/Probable Cases (to 115,458), +67 Hospitalizations (to 9,326), +21 Deaths (to 2,515) From Yesterday
• Fair Districts PAC Formed to Oppose Virginia’s Redistricting Amendment (Vote NO this November and “push for a truly non-partisan and independent redistricting progress”)
• Critics of Virginia Redistricting Amendment Form New PAC
• Virginia Senate passes bill allowing judges to consider lesser charge in assault of police officer (“The party-line vote kicks off Democrats’ promise to overhaul criminal justice laws. Republicans say it sends the wrong message.” The key is WITHOUT causing injury.)
• Senate backs bill allowing reduced sentence for assaulting law officer – in some cases (“A bill that would redefine what qualifies as assaulting a police officer and eliminate mandatory jail time for the offense triggered a ferocious political debate over police reforms and public protests that drew comments from almost half of the Virginia Senate before passing on a party-line”)
• AG Mark Herring Statement on Passage of Two of His COVID-Related Bills Out of Committee, One Criminal Justice Reform Bill Sent to House Appropriations
• House committee votes to expand workers’ comp, mandate paid quarantine leave
• Breastfeeding in Virginia: New law provides protections for nursing mothers but disparities remain
• Va. Senate committee kills bill to ban police-free ‘CHOP’ zones (Right-wingnut Sen. Bill Stanley proposes “the most useless piece of legislation I’ve ever seen”)
• On Women’s Equality Day, Great Great-Granddaughter of Maggie Walker Endorses Jenn McClellan for Governor
• ‘Marcus Alert’ legislation hits snag in the Senate as Peters’ family decries ‘false victory’
• Editorial: As online schooling begins, digital disparities no longer can be overlooked
• Supreme Court of Virginia tosses injunction in Richmond Confederate statue removal case (“‘An anonymous plaintiff who challenged Stoney’s decision to remove the statues is “not entitled to a temporary injunction,’ the order stated. ‘The circuit court abused its discretion in determining otherwise, and we vacate the temporary injunction.'”)
• Gloucester School Board violated transgender student’s rights, federal appeals court rules (“A three-judge panel votes 2-1 to uphold a ruling that the school board was wrong to bar Gavin Grimm from using the boys’ room at Gloucester High.”)
• Jerry Falwell Jr. was untouchable — until he became unacceptable
• Editorial: Surviving a powerful hurricane depends on resilience investment now (“Hampton Roads is estimated to need about $40 billion in resilience infrastructure to protect against powerful tropical storms. We need that money — and those projects — now.”)
• Delegate Guzman’s Quarantine Bill Passes Virginia House Labor and Commerce Committee
• New lawsuit seeks Pr. William superintendent’s Twitter messages(“Former school board Chair Ryan Sawyers is asking the court to order the release of 20,000 private Twitter messages between students and Prince William County Public Schools Superintendent Steve Walts.”)
• Portsmouth begins taking down Confederate monument
• Arlington increases eviction protection fund, distributes grocery gift cards
• Chesterfield Schools Could Have Students Back In Classrooms By End of September
• Arlington to begin enforcing social distancing ordinance this weekend after caseload rise (“Arlington County will begin enforcing a new ordinance this weekend that prohibits groups of more than three people from congregating on certain streets and sidewalks. The action comes as officials say some restaurant and bar patrons have responded with ‘open defiance’ to police and security personnel amid the coronavirus pandemic.”)
• NFL, Dan Snyder respond to new misconduct claims within Washington Football Team (Snyder has been, and continues to be, a horrible owner.)
• Phillips: As Dan Snyder digs in his heels, it’s up to the other owners to hold him responsible
• Hot and steamy with isolated storms today and Friday. Stormy on Saturday. (“Remnants of Hurricane Laura bring threat of heavy storms to start weekend.”)