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Okotoks, Alta. families provided food donations through Dawgs' Food Drive

Residents in Okotoks, Alta. were about to help support those less fortunate in their community by donating non-perishable food items in a drive hosted by a local baseball club.




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1 death and 59 new COVID-19 cases reported in Alberta on Saturday

Alberta reported 59 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, bringing the total number of active cases in the province to 1.837.




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Dog stolen from foster home in Chestermere, Alta. found safe

Wera, a four-year-old terrier cross, has found her way home to a Calgary-care organization after fraudsters tricked the dog's foster family.




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Patio service not OK either, Alberta Health Services says after Calgary coffee shop closed

Two more businesses operating in Calgary have been shut down by health officials for violating the province's rules regarding COVID-19.




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Kiwanis and Soap for Hope lend a (clean) helping hand

A new, squeaky clean business venture is helping Calgary’s most vulnerable during the COVID-19 pandemic.




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Motorcyclist killed in crash, police looking for witnesses

A man is dead after a single-vehicle motorcycle crash in southeast Calgary.




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Blue Skimmer Dragonfly


A Blue Skimmer Dragonfly, photographed yesterday at Campbell's Swamp near Griffith, NSW.




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Cuckoo Bee


A Cuckoo bee feeding on a Buloke mistletoe flower. I took this photo today near Stanhope, Victoria.




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Amaryllis Azure Butterfly


An Amaryllis Azure Butterfly, photographed on Buloke mistletoe, near Stanhope in Victoria.




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Buloke Mistletoe


I photographed this Buloke Mistletoe (Amyema linophylla) flower near Stanhope in Victoria.




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Skipper Butterfly


A Skipper Butterfly, photographed today in my backyard in Bendigo, Victoria.




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Aboriginal scarred trees


Two aboriginal scarred trees, photographed today near Stanhope in Victoria.




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Dust Storm


A dust storm rolls into Goornong in Victoria.




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Sharp-tailed Sandpiper


I photographed this Sharp-tailed Sandpiper (Calidris acuminata) today near Stanhope in Victoria.




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Blue-billed Duck


A male Blue-billed Duck (Oxyura australis), photographed today near Stanhope in Victoria.




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Amaryllis Azure Butterfly


An Amaryllis Azure Butterfly, photographed today on Buloke mistletoe, near Stanhope in Victoria.




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'Happy to be out': Canadian cruise ship crew members return home after months at sea

Canadians working aboard two cruise ships who weren't allowed to come to shore because of concerns about COVID-19 are finally able to return home.




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What it's like to travel on a plane in the era of COVID-19

Flying in Canada during the time of COVID-19 requires a lot extra care, and CTV Senior Political Correspondent Glen McGregor gives a first-hand account on CTVNews.ca.




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'Of course, I'm worried': PM Trudeau expresses concern about Quebec's reopening plans

As Quebec begins to reopen schools and businesses, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he’s ‘worried’ about the province’s deconfinement plans, particularly in Montreal.




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Provinces begin to address backlog of surgeries in wake of COVID-19

Hospitals in British Columbia and Ontario are beginning to address major backlogs in surgeries after the COVID-19 pandemic forced thousands of cancellations that could take well over a year to address.




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2 more deaths, 15 new cases of COVID-19 in B.C.

Dr. Bonnie Henry announced 15 new confirmed cases of the virus in the province, bringing the total number of positive tests since the pandemic began to 2,330.




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101-year-old Oak Bay veteran surpasses $101K fundraising goal

John Hillman - the 101-year-old Second World War veteran who has been walking laps around the courtyard of his Oak Bay retirement home in hopes of raising $101,000 for charity - has surpassed his goal.




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No throwing rice or extra guests permitted – but you can have a COVID-19 'micro-wedding' at Vancouver city hall

The city says couples can book its Helena Gutteridge Plaza at City Hall for just $85 and bring eight guests to have an outdoor, physically distant wedding ceremony.




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101-year-old retailer Army & Navy will close permanently, says owner

A department store that served Vancouver's Gastown and Downtown Eastside neighbourhoods for decades is closing, along with four other Army and Navy locations, because of the COVID-19 pandemic.




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Stranded cruise ship workers arrive back in Canada

After more than a month at sea, isolated to their cabins, dozens of Canadian cruise ship workers have arrived back on home soil.




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Haircuts could be more expensive when salons reopen because of added costs

The manager of a Vancouver barber shop warns that once many B.C. salons are back open, they may have to implement a price increase for their services.




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Last camper moves out of Oppenheimer Park as cleanup begins

Police and City of Vancouver park rangers escorted the last person living in Oppenheimer Park out of the tent city Saturday afternoon, moments before crews with excavators moved in to clean up the mountains of trash left behind.




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DAREarts stepping up to help at risk kids with mental health support

School, friends and normal day to day interactions have taken a virtual shift. However, for those with limited access to the internet, devices and other technology, isolation can be challenging.




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Polar vortex shatters single-day records in Barrie

Many in the region had to dust off their snow shovels for at least one more dig out on Saturday morning after a polar vortex blasted parts of the province, catching many off guard.




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Mark Levin on Michael Flynn Bombshell Documents: This Is “Barack Obama’s Blue Dress” Without The DNA

The following article, Mark Levin on Michael Flynn Bombshell Documents: This Is “Barack Obama’s Blue Dress” Without The DNA, was first published on 100PercentFedUp.com.

Mark Levin nailed the importance of the newly released documents that cleared Michael Flynn and pinned Obama to the wall. He says that the documents are “Barack Obama’s Blue Dress” without the “DNA” alluding to the blue dress from Monica Lewinsky that proved Bill Clinton’s guilt. Levin begins by praising AG Bill Barr and then […]

Continue reading: Mark Levin on Michael Flynn Bombshell Documents: This Is “Barack Obama’s Blue Dress” Without The DNA ...




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Professor Who Mocked Barron Trump During Senate Hearings Gets Censorship Position at Facebook

The following article, Professor Who Mocked Barron Trump During Senate Hearings Gets Censorship Position at Facebook, was first published on 100PercentFedUp.com.

Facebook just announced a 20 person board of oversight that will assist with content moderation. One of the people selected for the board, a professor at Stanford Law School, was announced as a member of the board and is raising eyebrows because of her snarky comment about Barron Trump during Senate Impeachment Hearings. Pamela Karlan, […]

Continue reading: Professor Who Mocked Barron Trump During Senate Hearings Gets Censorship Position at Facebook ...




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California Sheriff Refuses to Arrest People Defying Stay-at-Home Order: “There cannot be a new normal”

The following article, California Sheriff Refuses to Arrest People Defying Stay-at-Home Order: “There cannot be a new normal”, was first published on 100PercentFedUp.com.

Riverside, California Sheriff Chad Bianco spoke to the Riverside Board of Supervisors on May 5th to say that he will not enforce the stay-at-home order in California. He tells people who are afraid of contracting the coronavirus that they should stay home if they want to. Bianco continues with the suggestion that any business owner […]

Continue reading: California Sheriff Refuses to Arrest People Defying Stay-at-Home Order: “There cannot be a new normal” ...




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Rep. Ilhan Omar Asks For Contributions To Her Campaign To Help MN Food Bank…Food Bank Director Says Omar Has Nothing To Do With Project: “I have no idea where this money is going”

The following article, Rep. Ilhan Omar Asks For Contributions To Her Campaign To Help MN Food Bank…Food Bank Director Says Omar Has Nothing To Do With Project: “I have no idea where this money is going”, was first published on 100PercentFedUp.com.

Ilhan Omar is a lot of things. First, and foremost, she’s deceitful. David Steinberg of PJ Media was one of the first investigative journalists to break the story about the anti-Semitic, freshman lawmaker’s marriage to her immigrant brother while she was still married to her first husband, who she has since divorced after having an […]

Continue reading: Rep. Ilhan Omar Asks For Contributions To Her Campaign To Help MN Food Bank…Food Bank Director Says Omar Has Nothing To Do With Project: “I have no idea where this money is going” ...





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Witness Tampering? Asst. HHS Secretary Releases Threatening Text Messages From Dem Rep. Eric Swalwell: “In clear violation of House Ethics rules “

The following article, Witness Tampering? Asst. HHS Secretary Releases Threatening Text Messages From Dem Rep. Eric Swalwell: “In clear violation of House Ethics rules “, was first published on 100PercentFedUp.com.

Now that Michael Caputo, who was previously a target of the Mueller investigation, has been cleared, he has released some pretty damning text messages from the virulently anti-Trump lawmaker from California, Rep. Eric Swalwell (D). The text messages appear to prove that Swalwell, who has spent the last 3 1/2 years calling for Trump’s impeachment, […]

Continue reading: Witness Tampering? Asst. HHS Secretary Releases Threatening Text Messages From Dem Rep. Eric Swalwell: “In clear violation of House Ethics rules “ ...




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OUCH! Michelle Obama’s Netflix Documentary “Becoming” Gets Panned By Critics

The following article, OUCH! Michelle Obama’s Netflix Documentary “Becoming” Gets Panned By Critics, was first published on 100PercentFedUp.com.

Unlike Melania Trump, who’s yet to appear on the cover of a major fashion magazine since becoming America’s First Lady, Michelle Obama has always been given special treatment by the far-left media, who couldn’t put her face on enough magazine covers. When her “Becoming” documentary aired on Wednesday, it was probably expected that the media […]

Continue reading: OUCH! Michelle Obama’s Netflix Documentary “Becoming” Gets Panned By Critics ...




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Protesters demand end to Manitoba's COVID-19 lockdown measures

A crowd descended on the Manitoba Legislature Building Saturday afternoon, demanding an end to the COVID-19 quarantine.




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Neighbor of father and son arrested in Ahmaud Arbery killing is also under investigation

The investigation into the fatal shooting in Brunswick, Georgia, will also look at a neighbor of suspects Gregory and Travis McMichael who recorded video of the incident, authorities said.





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Sean Hannity on the Obama administration's big lie

Sean Hannity reacts on 'Watters' World' to the Obama administration being caught lying about Russia collusion.





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Ousted health official dismisses Trump's claim he is disgruntled: 'I am frustrated at a lack of leadership'

Ousted vaccine expert Rick Bright said he is "frustrated at our inability to be heard as scientists."





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A former editor at the Observer says Kushner's claim of coronavirus 'success' stems from his inability to empathize with other people's grief

Elizabeth Spiers wrote about an incident where Jared Kushner used the memorial of an employee to congratulate himself for success.





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After Five Bloody Years in Syria, Russia Is Turning Against Iran—and Assad

GAZIANTEP, Turkey—After five years fighting to preserve Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria, Russia now appears inclined to dispose of its infamous client. Assad’s persistent brutality and corruption, and his inability to establish even the semblance of a functioning state, has grown to be a burden Moscow would prefer not to bear.And then there’s the problem of Iran. Assad, members of his family, and his Alawite clansmen enjoy close, perhaps unbreakable, bonds to the regime in Tehran and to Iranian-backed militias in Syria. All of which undermines Moscow’s primary mission there: to rehabilitate the Assad regime as a symbol of stability capable of attracting hundreds of billions of dollars of foreign investment for reconstruction, which Russian firms would then be poised to receive. As long as Assad’s relatives continue to function as a mafia and give free rein to Iranian troops using Syria as base of operations to threaten Israel and plan attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq, those countries likely to foot the bill for Syrian reconstruction—the nations of Europe and the Gulf—are unlikely to come up with the cash. Amid Escalating Syrian Carnage, Turkey Shoots Down Assad’s PlanesThis has not gone unnoticed by the United States.“Assad has done nothing to help the Russians sell this regime,”James Jeffrey, the U.S. special envoy for the Coalition to Defeat ISIS, told reporters in a State Department briefing on Thursday. “You find Assad has nothing but thugs around him, and they don't sell well either in the Arab world or in Europe. We have heard repeatedly from Russians we take as credible that they understand how bad Assad is.” The Syrian president’s “refusal to make any compromises” in order to secure diplomatic recognition and acceptance for his regime has jeopardized “hundreds of billions of dollars in reconstruction assistance” for Syria, according to Jeffrey. Yet the Trump administration is unlikely to exploit this growing rift. “Getting Russia out of Syria,” Jeffrey said, “has never been our goal. Russia has been there for 30 years. It has a long-term relationship with Syria. We don’t think it has been healthy for the region. We don’t think it really is even healthy for Russia. But that’s not our policy.”  MEDIA FRENZYJeffrey’s statements come just one week after Russian state media unleashed a slew of reports and editorials targeting Assad, portraying the beleaguered president as hopelessly corrupt and unfit to govern, and suggesting the time had come to replace him with a new leader.The first batch of articles was published by the Russia’s Federal News Agency (FNA), an outlet owned by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Russian oligarch and chairman of several companies implicated in the 2016 U.S. elections scandal. Appearing over the course of a mere three hours on April 17, they would shake Syria to its core. The first of the three articles in question highlighted a corruption scheme carried out by the regime in summer 2019 in which the Syrian prime minister purportedly lied to citizens about oil and gas scarcities in order to justify the occurrence of long power outages while selling Syrian electricity to businessmen in Lebanon. The second piece cited an opinion poll claiming only 32 percent of Syrians would vote for Assad in the country’s upcoming 2021 presidential election. The third and final article, entitled, “Corruption is Worse than Terrorism,” chastized President Assad for personally failing to combat corruption, prevalent at all levels of the state.  That these were published by Prigozhin’s news agency was the kind of signal it would be hard for Assad to miss. Prigozhin, who first built his fortune as a caterer, is sometimes known as “Putin’s chef.” But of particular relevance to Syria is his role as chairman of the Wagner Group, whose mercenaries have fought alongside Assad regime forces since October 2015 and helped the latter take back control of key revenue generating infrastructure such as the al-Sha’ir gas field in Homs province.Deputy Assistant Secretary Christopher Robin told the same State Department briefing Thursday, “Wagner is often misleadingly referred to as a Russian private military company, but in fact it’s an instrument of the Russian government which the Kremlin uses as a low-cost and low-risk instrument to advance its goals.”The article on corruption would also point out, suggestively, that the Assads are not the only powerful family in Syria, “there are also the Makhloufs.”Rami Makhlouf, who is in fact Bashar al-Assad’s first cousin, is Syria’s wealthiest man, and also, it would seem, Russia’s man. Certainly he has strong ties to the Kremlin and for years has been one of the most vocal critics of Iran’s presence in Syria. In July 2018, the al-Watan newspaper, one Syria’s most prominent pro-regime mouthpieces and owned by Rami Makhlouf since 2006, published a then unprecedented public rebuke to Iran, accusing it of sponsoring Islamist fanaticism throughout the Middle East alongside Turkey and Qatar, the main backers of Syria’s opposition. (Rami Makhlouf’s father Muhammad and brother Hafiz meanwhile are alleged by some to be living in Russia.) The April 17 articles published by Prigozhin’s FNA preceded the release of a wave of other articles and items in the media over the next 12 days that would further drive home the point that Moscow was considering options other than Assad to rule Syria. TASS, Russia’s largest state-run news agency, wrote in one editorial that, “Russia suspects that Assad is not only unable to lead the country anymore, but also that the head of the Syrian regime is dragging Moscow towards the Afghani scenario.” This is like evoking the Vietnam War for an American audience, a reference to the Kremlin’s botched campaign through the 1980s that helped bankrupt the Soviet Union and finally break it apart.Amid this coverage, TASS would also take swipes at Iran, claiming that the Islamic Republic has “no interest in achieving stability in the region, because it considers it a battlefield with Washington”.On April 30, the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC), a think tank established by Moscow’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, released a scathing report saying Russia was in talks with other parties to the Syrian conflict to draw up plans for a political resolution that did not include Bashar al-Assad as president. The report highlighted purported Russian efforts to compel the Syrian regime to commit to ceasefires with both American-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), and the Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army (FSA) opposition, while beginning steps to form a new unity government that would include representatives from both. That day, Rami Makhlouf, whose assets were frozen five months earlier as part of a tax dispute, uploaded a video onto his personal Facebook page accusing the Assad regime of corruption. In a state known for carrying out the full-scale slaughter of those who test its authority, Makhlouf’s videos, coming on the heels of the unprecedented Russian attacks in the media, sent shockwaves throughout the country.  THE ROYAL FAMILYWhile the Makhlouf clan clearly has thrown its lot in with Russia, key members of Bashar al-Assad’s immediate family and others with ties to Qardaha in Syria’s largely Alawite Latakia province, are among the most prominent Iranian-backed militia leaders in Syria. It’s an alliance that traces back to his father Hafez al-Assad, who was born in Qardaha, and who forged ties with the Iranian revolution almost from its beginning more than 40 years ago. The Iranians responded by offering religious legitimacy to the Alawite sect, which is regarded as heretical by Sunnis and indeed by many Shi’a.These Qardaha militia leaders have regularly engaged in armed clashes against Russian backed units. They are among the most egregious violators and abusers of power, overseeing wide networks of corruption similar to those lamented in the Russian media. And foremost among them is Bashar’s younger brother, Maher al-Assad. Since April 2018, Maher al-Assad has commanded the Syrian Army’s 4th Armored Division, one of country’s oldest, best equipped and overwhelmingly Alawite brigades. After the 2011 outbreak of the Syrian revolution, when the loyalty of much of the army was in doubt, it became a refuge for numerous Alawite-Shi’a dominated pro-regime militias.Currently, the 4th Armored Division’s members control many smuggling operations throughout the country, in cities from Albu Kamel on Syria’s eastern border with Iraq to Latakia on the Syrian coast, where the port was leased to Iran on October 1 last year. It has since become one of the biggest export hubs for drugs headed to markets in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Examples abound: On July 5, 2019, Greek coast guard and drug enforcement officials announced the biggest drug bust in history, seizing 5.25 tons (33 million pills) of Captagon amphetamines worth $660m hidden in shipping containers loaded at the Latakia port in Syria. That followed a long string of such seizures made by Greek authorities. More recently, in late April, customs officials in both Saudi Arabia and Egypt also announced the seizure of similar quantities of drugs in containers traced back to Latakia. Local reports have accused a range of actors including Maher al-Assad’s 4th Division, Hizbollah, Rami Makhlouf, and others of profiting from the massive drug exports emanating from the port. In January 2019 the 4th Armored Division launched attacks on the Russian-backed Tiger Forces unit in an attempt to wrest control of smuggling routes between regime- and opposition-held territory in Idlib province. The clashes led to the death of 70 fighters. These and other skirmishes prompted Russia to back a major campaign to arrest 4th Division and other Iranian-backed units throughout the country beginning in April 2019, which succeeded in rounding up numerous mid-ranking Iranian-backed officers. Among those targeted in the campaign was Bashar Talal al-Assad, a cousin to the president (similar name, different people) who was wanted on drug and weapons trafficking charges. Unlike others who were detained in the roundup, Bashar Talal al-Assad and his ‘Areen Brigade managed to fight off Russian-backed forces that sought to arrest him in Qardaha. He then pledged to attack Russia’s Hmeimim military base, located 17 miles east of Latakia city, in the event the regime sought to arrest him again.For Russia, the threat of such attacks on its military infrastructure is a real concern. The Hmeimim base—from which Moscow has directed its entire military campaign in Syria—had already been subject to a series of attacks from January to October 2018 by other Iranian-backed militias in the area. The threat posed by both Iran’s acquisition of the Latakia port and its support for local Assad family proxies in Syria’s coastal region is exacerbated by the fact that Tehran has also begun making progress toward completing construction of its Shalamcha railroad, which, via stops in Basra, Baghdad, Albu Kamel and Damascus, will give Tehran direct access to the Syrian and Lebanese coasts. If Iran succeeds in integrating the Latakia port with the Shalamcha rail line, this will cut off Hmeimim from Russian forces in central and southern Syria and enable Tehran to quickly deliver weapons to proxy forces in Latakia that are already engaged in clashes against Russian-backed groups. WORLDWIDE CONSENSUSMoscow’s inability to control Iranian backed Syrian militiamen engaged in widespread crime, corruption, and assaults on Russian forces has infuriated the Kremlin. But Russia is not the only major player on the ground with scores to settle against Iran, and the Russian military leadership in Syria has ignored if not largely encouraged Israeli strikes on Iranian troops throughout the country.It may not be coincidental that the Israeli attacks have increased in pace and scope since April, following the flurry of Russian media articles attacking Assad and his regime. “We have moved from blocking Iran’s entrenchment in Syria to forcing it out of there, and we will not stop,” Israel’s new defense minister, Naftali Bennett, declared on April 28. Without Russia, Iran has found itself the odd man out in Syria, the single party still seeking to push for war at a time when most other international players have been struck with fatigue and simply seek to put Syria’s pieces back together. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey, the last patron of Syria’s battered FSA opposition, has himself made peace with Moscow, effectively agreeing last March to cede control of wide swaths of rebel held territory after a particularly bloody Russian led campaign against the last FSA holdout in Idlib province that ended in victory for regime forces. Ironically, Erdoğan’s long-held desire to overthrow Syria’s president may still come to fruition, albeit not as he expected, as Assad’s ouster may come at the hands of Russia itself, and not the revolution. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.





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Meet the Ohio health expert who has a fan club — and Republicans trying to stop her

Some Buckeyes are not comfortable being told by a "woman in power" to quarantine, one expert said.





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Ahmaud Arbery is dead because Americans think black men are criminals

Whenever Americans see videos of police brutality against black men and women, the first thing they do is assume they deserved their executionWhat skin color are the bad guys in America’s fantasies of vigilantism? When the proverbial “fellas” get together to drink beers and talk about their newest guns and who they’d take down, what race are the “criminals” in the theater of their minds?When Greg McMichael and his son, Travis, got the call from their neighbor that a “burglar” was running through their Brunswick, Georgia neighborhood that chilly February day, what color man do you think they imagined as they locked, loaded, and embarked on their “mission”?Ahmaud Arbery is dead today because when Americans dream of vigilante justice, black men are the villains of their imaginations.We as a nation are so comfortable with this baseline bigotry that our first assumption whenever we see videos of police brutality against or shootings of black men and women, the first thing we do is assume that the victims must have done something wrong to earn their own public execution.This assumption is both a function of white America having a completely different experience with police officers than black America as well as the hundreds of years of vilifying blackness in media and American culture.I will never forget the biggest and most uproarious applause during the theater debut of the lackluster 2007 vigilante film, Brave One, came when the protagonist Jodi Foster got her first vigilante kills of the movie – two threatening and scary black men. That theater filled with men the same age range as Greg and Travis McMichael erupted as if at that moment, all that they had ever imagined had been fulfilled on the big screen. Needless to say, I left that theater before the credits rolled.Across the country, our political leaders hold these same bigoted beliefs which inevitably lead to policies that directly assume criminality based on skin color.During his tenure as mayor of New York City, billionaire Michael Bloomberg made it explicitly clear why it was that he sent police officers into black and brown communities to “throw them” up against the wall. In his 2015 Aspen Institute speech he stated:“People say, ‘Oh my God, you are arresting kids for marijuana who are all minorities.’ Yes, that’s true. Why? Because we put all the cops in the minority neighborhoods. Yes, that’s true. Why’d we do it? Because that’s where all the crime is. And the way you should get the guns out of the kids’ hands is throw them against the wall and frisk them.”And it is for this reason that I do not distinguish between the violence committed by American citizens acting as vigilantes and the violence committed by so-called officers of the law when, in both cases, the working assumption and driving force behind that violence is the deeply bigoted and firmly American association between blackness and criminality.For Ahmaud, that association not only led to his brutal killing, but it also initially meant his killer not being arrested. It took more than two months for the father and son duo to be arrested. When explaining why they were not charged immediately the district attorney, George Barnhill, immediately stated that the victim, Ahmaud Arbery, was, in fact, the “criminal suspect”.“It appears that [Greg and Travis McMichael’s] intent was to stop and hold this criminal suspect until law enforcement arrived. Under Georgia Law [sic] this is perfectly legal.”Even after viewing the video and with no evidence beyond Ahmaud’s skin color, the top cop in the institution designed to bring equal justice under the law concluded that Ahmaud was a criminal suspect when he was simply a black man taking a jog.What are black Americans to do when justice is delayed or outright denied because of the assignment of innocence to vigilantes and police officers?What are black Americans to do when the assumption of guilt because of our skin color is as American as the guns they use to kill us?What are we to do when in our neighbors’ dreams and fantasies of cop-and-robber, the skin color of the bad guy matches our own?The very first thing we are going to do is defend ourselves as if our lives depend on it because when Americans fantasize about killing, those fantasies become our living nightmares. * Benjamin Dixon is the host of the Benjamin Dixon show.





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Top Republican Lawmaker Disclosed Stock in Chinese Company He Labeled a Nat Sec Threat

Representative Michael McCaul, who has harshly criticized China in his position as the ranking member on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, disclosed that his family owns stock in a Chinese tech company he described as a threat to national security.An April 20 periodic transaction report showed that McCaul disclosed a February purchase of between $50,000 and $100,000 in shares of the Chinese firm Tencent Holdings, Politico reported.In November, several months before the shares were purchased, the Texas congressman said that Tencent Holdings is among the "Chinese companies that threaten America’s economic and national security."The tech conglomerate is "heavily involved" in the "social credit system, a dystopian system China has implemented to score its citizens’ behavior," McCaul said at the time, as well as an "integral part" of the Chinese Communist Party’s industrial policies and "one of four national champions for artificial intelligence."McCaul's lawyer, Elliot Berke, said that the shares are not owned personally by McCaul but by his wife, and the decision to invest in Tencent was made by a third party.“Congressman McCaul did not purchase any shares in China’s Tencent Holdings or any other Chinese company,” the attorney said. “Congressman McCaul’s wife has assets she solely owns and a third party manager made the purchase without her direction.”Rachel Walker, a spokeswoman for McCaul, emphasized that the revelation of the Tencent shares “highlights that many Americans unwittingly invest their money in Chinese owned companies."Federal employees are often unaware they own such investments because the federal government’s thrift savings plan program creates portfolios that include Tencent and other Chinese companies, Walker said. McCaul has argued that such retirement investment plans should not invest American dollars in such "shady" Chinese companies, often without the knowledge of the investor."Congressman McCaul has been a fierce critic of the brutal behavior of the Chinese Communist Party and will continue to fight to hold them accountable as the Chair of the China Task Force," Walker said. "This should be a wake-up call to us all that the CCP’s involvement in the U.S. economy is far more reaching than many Americans realize and that we need to change the way we do business with China, including our investments."Tencent owns the Chinese social media platform WeChat, which has more than one billion users and is suspected of monitoring the activities of users both inside and outside of China. Tencent is also associated with Chinese tech firm Huawei, which U.S. officials said can secretly access American cellular phone networks, giving it access to sensitive information.McCaul has taken a leading role in criticizing China's handling of the coronavirus pandemic as well, accusing Beijing of launching perhaps the "worst cover-up in human history."He was tapped on Thursday by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy as chairman of the China Task Force, the aim of which is to develop "legislative solutions to address the Chinese Communist Party’s malign global agenda."The task force will "develop new and enduring policy solutions that, among others, enhance our economic strength and create jobs, protect our national security, rethink our supply chains and grow our competitive edge in technology," McCaul said in a statement on his appointment.





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South Dakota Governor demands Sioux tribes 'immediately' remove COVID-19 checkpoints because they interfere with traffic

South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem sent letters to two Sioux tribes demanding they remove COVID-19 checkpoints because they interfere with traffic.





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Nepal protests new Indian road through disputed territory

Nepal protested India's inauguration of a new road to China that passes through territory claimed by Kathmandu on Saturday, with police arresting dozens demonstrating close to India's embassy. Indian defence minister Rajnath Singh on Friday inaugurated via video link the 80-kilometre (50 miles) long road from Ghatiabagarh in northern Uttarakhand state to the Lipu Lekh pass high in the Himalaya. The pass is claimed by Nepal based on an 1816 treaty that defines its western border with India.





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White House won't consider another stimulus bill in May -Kudlow

The White House has halted talks with Congress over any further coronavirus stimulus package as it waits for more information about how U.S. state reopenings affect the economy, White House top economic adviser Larry Kudlow told reporters on Friday. The Senate and House of Representatives have already passed four major bills to address the novel coronavirus outbreak, including three aimed at stabilizing the economy as most Americans have sheltered in place and unemployment has soared.





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Trump donor and lawyer to represent Biden's accuser

The former Senate staffer, who is accusing Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her 27 years ago, is being represented by a lawyer who is also a donor to President Trump.





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As many as 75,000 could die from "deaths of despair" as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. One expert says economic turmoil has always led to an increase in suicides.

"I think it's always important to think about suicide as individual vulnerabilities and context," Eric Caine said.