An employee working on a project for Hasbro blew the whistle on reported critical race theory training inside the toy and boardgame giant on “Hannity.”
He kept the borscht belt style of comedy alive long after the Catskills resorts had closed and eventually brought it, triumphantly, to Broadway.
Jackie Mason in 2003 in the Broadway musical revue “Laughing Room Only.” He appeared on Broadway several times, mostly in one-man shows. Credit…Sara Krulwich/The New York Times
The FBI agents took an active part in the scheme from its inception, according to court filings, evidence and dozens of interviews examined by BuzzFeed.
One FBI informant from Wisconsin allegedly helped organize meetings where the first inklings of the Whitmer plot surfaced, even paying for hotel rooms and food to entice people to attend, BuzzFeed reported. The Iraq veteran, identified as “Dan” by BuzzFeed, allegedly shelled out for transportation costs to militia meetings and apparently goaded members to advance the plot.
Kareem Johnson, a black, left-wing attorney representing Pete Musico, one of the 14 arrested, told The Post the FBI played an outsize — and, at the very least, inappropriate — part in the incident. Before the bureau was involved, Johnson and other attorneys said, the Watchmen weren’t even considered a violent threat.
“The FBI knew these people had some beliefs and were egging them on and providing help and ammunition,” Johnson said. “They encouraged, helped instigate and escalated the criminal conduct of those individuals. At the end of the day, there were almost as many FBI agents leading the group as the other people in the group.”
(CNN)Law enforcement officers from the Vancouver, Washington, area are mourning a deputy killed in a shooting Friday night.
Police said Saturday they have detained two suspects and are searching for a third. Tthe suspects “may be armed and dangerous,” authorities alerted earlier.
Sgt. Brent Waddell with the Clark County Sheriff’s Office told a media briefing that the shooting occurred in Vancouver, which is a suburb of Portland, Oregon.
Waddell said the deputy was taken to the hospital in unknown condition. The department later announced in a press release that the deputy had been “killed in the line of duty.”
EAST STROUDSBURG. Pa. (AP) — A decomposed body has been found in a dumpster at a construction company in eastern Pennsylvania.
Workers at the firm in East Stroudsburg found the body of a woman late Thursday morning while trying to detect the source of a strong odor. The workers initially believed they were smelling the remains of a dead animal and had searched in several spots before the body was discovered, officials said.
(CNN)Arizona’s Senate held a Thursday briefing on the ongoing Republican-initiated “audit” of the 2020 election in Maricopa County, where Joe Biden outperformed Donald Trump by enough of a margin to win the state.
The review is being conducted by Cyber Ninjas, a cybersecurity firm that has no experience in election auditing. And the company’s chief executive officer, Doug Logan, made some Thursday claims that were immediately called into question by the county and independent experts.
(CNN)The proportion of schizophrenia cases linked with problematic use of marijuana has increased over the past 25 years, according to a new study from Denmark.
In 1995, 2% of schizophrenia diagnoses in the country were associated with cannabis use disorder. In 2000, it increased to around 4%. Since 2010, that figure increased to 8%, the study found.
“I think it is highly important to use both our study and other studies to highlight and emphasize that cannabis use is not harmless,” said Carsten Hjorthøj, an associate professor at the Copenhagen Research Center for Mental Health and an author of the study published in the medical journal JAMA Psychiatry, via email.
“There is, unfortunately, evidence to suggest that cannabis is increasingly seen as a somewhat harmless substance. This is unfortunate, since we see links with schizophrenia, poorer cognitive function, substance use disorders, etc,” Hjorthøj wrote.
Previous research has suggested that the risk of schizophrenia is heightened for people who use cannabis, and the association is particularly driven by heavy use of the drug. Many researchers hypothesize that cannabis use may be a “component cause,” which interacts with other risk factors, to cause the condition.”
Of course, our findings will have to be replicated elsewhere before firm conclusions can be drawn,” Hjorthøj continued. “But I do feel fairly confident that we will see similar patterns in places where problematic use of cannabis has increased, or where the potency of cannabis has increased, since many studies suggest that high-potency cannabis is probably the driver of the association with schizophrenia.”
Around the world tens of millions of people use cannabis. It’s legal for recreational use in 19 US states and Canada. In these and some other places, it’s also approved to treat some medical conditions.
GM is once again recalling nearly 70,000 Chevrolet Bolt electric vehicles because of a risk that the battery will catch fire when the car is parked.
New York (CNN Business)GM is once again recalling nearly 70,000 Chevrolet Bolt electric vehicles because of a risk that the battery will catch fire when the car is parked.
The company does not have a fix for the problem that has been tied to at least nine fires nationwide since early 2020. The new fix will likely involve replacing battery modules orperhaps the entire battery pack, said GM spokesperson Dan Flores.
GM and federal safety regulators are providing steps that Bolt owners should take before their cars can be repaired. These include not parking it in a garage or next to another structure such as a home or other building due to the risk of a fire spreading. All the fires occurred when the cars were parked, and there were two reports of injuries.
The Bolt is the only EV that GM currently sells in North America, though it has other EVs it sells elsewhere, including China. US sales of the Bolt have been climbing rapidly, rising 142% to 20,000 in the first six months of this year compared with the first half of 2020. The model year 2020 and 2021 Bolts have a newer type of battery than the ones that caught fire.
This latest fire risk is comes just as GM is trying to expand its EV business.
Over the next four years, GM plans to invest $35 billion to unveil 30 different electric vehicles, 20 of them slated for the US market alone. The company has saiditexpects to be selling 1 million EVs annually by 2025 and has set a goal of selling only emission-free vehicles by 2035.
The new versions of the Bolt, the Bolt EV and Bolt EUV debuted earlier this year. The GMC Hummer EV pickup is due to go on sale later this year, and the Cadillac Lyriq, the luxury brand’s first EV, is scheduled to hit dealerships late next year.
GM first announced a recall of the affected Bolts in November 2020 but, then as now, it said it did not know how to fix the problem. In May it announced a software repair but then there were two fires involving vehicles that got that software fix, prompting the latest recall.
Battery packs are the most expensive component of an electric vehicle, and replacing them could prove very costly. Hyundai recalled 82,000 electric cars globally earlier this year to replace their batteries after 15 reports of fires involving the vehicles, at a cost of about $11,000 per vehicle.
The nation’s largest wildfire raged through southern Oregon on Friday, but crews were scaling back some night operations as hard work and weaker winds helped reduce the spread of flames even as wildfires continued to threaten homes in neighboring California.
In Montana, five firefighters remained hospitalized a day after a thunderstorm and swirling winds blew a lightning-caused wildfire back on them, federal officials said.
The five had joined other crews working on the 1,300-acre Devil’s Creek fire burning in rough, steep terrain near the rural town of Jordan. The firefighters were building a defensive line Thursday when the weather shifted, Bureau of Land Management spokesperson Mark Jacobsen said.
Jacobsen declined to release the extent of the firefighters’ injuries but said they were still being evaluated and treated Friday. The firefighters included three U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service crew members from North Dakota and two USDA Forest Service firefighters from New Mexico.
The blaze is among a number burning across the U.S. West, where extremely dry conditions and recent heat waves tied to climate change have made wildfires harder to fight.
In Oregon, the Bootleg Fire has destroyed an area half the size of Rhode Island. It was 40% surrounded after burning some 70 homes, mainly cabins, fire officials said. At least 2,000 homes were ordered evacuated at some point during the fire, and an additional 5,000 were threatened.
The upper eastern edge of the fire continued to move toward Summer Lake, jumping fire lines Thursday and prompting an evacuation order for some portions of Lake County to be raised to “Go now!” fire officials said.
Winds up to 10 mph (16 kph) could drive the flames through timber but not at the pace seen last week, when the wind-driven blaze grew exponentially, fire information officer Angela Goldman said.
The fire, which was ignited by lightning, had been expanding by up to 4 miles (6 kilometers) a day, pushed by strong winds and critically dry weather.
PITTSBURGH — There has been an increase in violence in recent months in the South Side, including shootings and fights. Also, as more people return to the area following the lifting of COVID-19 restrictions, sidewalks have become more crowded and more people are walking into streets, leading to some instances in which people have been hit by cars.
Police are now investigating a deadly shooting in the South Side Slopes, hours after a violent night rocked a different part of the neighborhood.
According to police, after the shooting, a friend of the victim started to drive them to the hospital but stopped after seeing police patrolling the area. The friend then asked the officers for help.
Unfortunately, after they tried to render aid, the victim died. The Pittsburgh police chief had this to say.
“It’s concerning with the level of violence that’s going on in the city of Pittsburgh. The number of people carrying guns and here, once again, area kids are playing football, and to have someone shot is unacceptable. This has to stop,” said Scott Schubert.
KABUL — The United States has launched several airstrikes in support of embattled Afghan forces in recent days, U.S. officials said Friday, an escalation in U.S. involvement in Afghanistan as the Taliban seizes more territory from government forces.
At least four of the strikes were carried out Wednesday and Thursday, including some in Kandahar, which is the birthplace of the Taliban and increasingly under pressure by Taliban forces, said one U.S. official, who, like another U.S. official, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation.
The airstrikes were conducted at the request of Afghan forces under attack by the Taliban or to destroy equipment stolen by the militants, including artillery and vehicles, according to the two U.S. officials.
An Afghan military official, also speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the situation, said the escalation of U.S. strikes has been “significant” compared to recent months, concentrated in the northern province of Kunduz and in Kandahar.
The Taliban has made rapid territorial gains, including border crossings vital for trade, as the U.S. drawdown nears completion. Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Wednesday militants had seized about half of the country’s 419 district centers. He told lawmakers last month the Taliban held just 81 district centers.
“Strategic momentum appears to be sort of with the Taliban,” Milley said.
For weeks, the Afghan military has bitterly fought to maintain control of provincial capitals after losing huge swaths of the country’s rural territory, often with little or no resistance. Militants have besieged the capitals by seizing districts nearby, choking off key roads in a bid to deny Afghan troops freedom of movement.
No provincial capitals have fallen, but Milley said the Taliban’s strategy has forced Afghan security forces to abandon some districts and reconsolidate to defend populated cities.
A Greensburg doctor pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to taking kickbacks, health care fraud and conspiring to distribute controlled substances.
Thomas Whitten, 71, will be sentenced by U.S. District Judge William S. Stickman IV on Dec. 7.
According to prosecutors, Whitten received kickbacks from Arizona-based Insys Therapeutics from May 2013 to November 2015 in exchange for prescribing Subsys, a powerful opioid containing fentanyl. Subsys, which is a liquid that gets sprayed under a patient’s tongue, is only approved for the “management of breakthrough pain in cancer patients” who have developed a tolerance to other pain killers.
However, investigators said Whitten prescribed the drug to patients for whom it was not medically necessary and, therefore, it was not eligible for insurance reimbursement.
Whitten also pleaded guilty to conspiring to distribute phentermine hyrocholoride and diethlpropion to patients at five weight-loss clinics from November 2017 to December 2019.
At least three people have been shot and one officer injured in a shooting on E. Carson Street on the South Side.
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) – It was a chaotic scene early on Friday morning on E. Carson Street.
Multiple shots were fired in the South Side and some of those shots hit buildings like the PNC Bank branch, as two large bullet holes could be seen in the window.
It is not known at this time how many shooters were involved or the motive behind it.
“I have to compliment the officers and their quick work as the chief said we do have multiple witnesses that were actually held as well as some individuals being detained and that would not have happened if it wasn’t for the quick work of the officers,” said Pittsburgh Public Safety Director Wendell Hissrich.
Since there are multiple crime scenes, police say this will be a lengthy investigation.
As of 4:30 a.m., E. Carson Street has reopened to traffic.
Dan Carney, executive director of Union Mission of Latrobe, said about $1.5 million was directed to 270 applicants over the past three months. Another 45 are awaiting payment. The organization was tapped to manage the county’s portion of funds received under the federal Emergency Rental Assistance Program. Carney said 592 applications have been received since the program opened in mid-April.
“We’ve got a really good distribution through the county,” he said.
To be eligible, households must have an income at or below 80% of the area median income and some type of financial hardship resulting from the coronavirus pandemic. The household must be either delinquent on rent and/or utility bills or have the inability to afford next month’s rent.
Union Mission was selected by the county commissioners to handle the funding. Carney said some parts of the county, such as the Mon Valley, New Kensington and Route 30 corridor, had higher needs than others — which was expected.
So far, applicants got an average of nine months of assistance worth $5,400.
In the July 13 edition of the Stanwood Camano News, a letter to the editor called for the removal from office those who aid and abet sedition and insurrection activities. The writer lists a number of Republicans who he believes are complicit. He’s right that that should not be tolerated, and elected officials should be held accountable.
But wait. How many of the rioters in the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol have been charged with sedition or insurrection? The answer is zero.
More than 500 people have been arrested in this riot, and rightly so. However one would think that if the Justice Department, especially after such an aggressive effort to track down and arrest the rioters, had a good case to charge them with sedition or insurrection, they would surely do so. But they haven’t. Why? Perhaps they don’t believe that that was really the crime.
Yet the letter writer wants the Republicans held accountable for a crime that in the eyes of the Justice Department they can’t prove. Maybe the writer wants the Republicans held accountable for Democrats’ talking points. On the contrary, I wonder if the writer is equally concerned with the assaults on one of our other equal and cherished institutions — the judiciary.
Antifa rioters have assaulted federal courthouses numerous times, doing severe damage and attempting to burn them. Yet despite Democratic lawmakers’ claims that Antifa doesn’t exist, the writer doesn’t call for their accountability. Can we look forward to a letter from him on their accountability?
Representative Madison Cawthorn claims President Joe Biden is “mentally unstable” and said first lady Jill Biden should be called out for being “cruel” to her husband.
Cawthorn, a Republican who represents North Carolina’s 11th congressional district, spoke to Newsmax’s Chris Salcedo about his views on the president’s mental state and Jill Biden’s treatment of her husband.
Salcedo said that Biden “has lost control of the pandemic” and cited border crossings by unvaccinated individuals. He asked Cawthorn if Republicans should “hold Biden accountable” for “putting America in reverse” in terms of COVID.
Cawthorn said. “You know, I would love to have a congressional inquiry to understand exactly what Joe Biden’s reasoning is, but unfortunately I don’t think he could find his way to Congress.”
“I’m talking from a very objective standpoint here. I think we should indict Jill Biden – I’m not saying indict in terms of criminal – but I’m saying that we should call her out for being so cruel to her husband,” Cawthorn went on.
WASHINGTON — Lawyers for the state of Mississippi urged the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday to overturn Roe v Wade, taking a more aggressive approach than the one presented when they asked the court a year ago to hear the case.
The case for overturning the two main decisions that legalized abortion in the United States — Roe v Wade in 1973 and a later case, 1992’s Planned Parenthood v Casey — is overwhelming, the state said. “The conclusion that abortion is a constitutional right has no basis in text, structure, history, or tradition.”
By ruling that a state may not impose an undue burden on a right to abortion, the Supreme Court has placed itself “at the center of a controversy that it can never resolve.”
The state is appealing lower court rulings that struck down a law banning most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. The Gestational Age Act would allow later abortions only in medical emergencies or cases of severe fetal abnormality.
Residents in the rural Hempfield village of Hannastown helped direct state police to a man accused of forcing his way into a home Tuesday and initially refusing to leave before running away moments before officers arrived.
Blake R. Quakenbush, 26, of Latrobe was arrested on charges of burglary, criminal trespass, disorderly conduct and public drunkenness after the incident on Steel Avenue. He was ordered held in the county prison after failing to post $50,000 bond.
Troopers said two adults inside the residence reported Quakenbush barged into the house, “shutting the door behind him and began yelling, screaming and causing a disturbance.”
A female said she picked her two-year-old child from the floor and ran into a nearby room, locking the door during the incident.
The male owner of the home said Quakenbush, a stranger, initially refused to leave after he barged in, Trooper Matthew Cunningham said in court documents.
The pair reported Quakenbush appeared to be under the influence of a controlled substance.
Responding troopers “were informed by several neighbors” that they saw Quakenbush running away and Cunningham said the suspect was located a short time later and taken into custody.
A Facebook post claimed that an officer involved in the killing of a woman during the Jan. 6 capitol riots was “a bodyguard to a high-ranking Democrat in Congress.” That’s false.
Here’s why: There are plenty of questions still unanswered about the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. For some Republicans, that includes identifying who shot one person who stormed the Capitol that day. In a recent email to supporters, former President Donald Trump asked, “Who shot Ashli Babbitt?”
Trump brought up the question again on July 11 during a discussion with Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” host Maria Bartiromo. But this time, he had a theory.
“I will tell you they know who shot Ashli Babbitt. They’re protecting that person,” Trump said in the phone interview. “I’ve heard, also, that it was the head of security for a certain high official — a Democrat — and we’ll see, because it’s going to come out. It’s going to come out.”
The comments set off a frenzy of social media posts, like this one shared on Facebook, that claim the high-ranking official the officer was assigned to was either Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer or House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The photo in the post shows a person in a suit wearing a face mask and holding a handgun in his right hand. By the background seen in the photo, he appears to be pictured in the House of Representatives. “He shot Ashli Babbitt,” the caption reads. “Pelosi’s or Schumer’s personal bodyguard. Prove me wrong!”
The officer involved was placed on leave while Babbitt’s death was being investigated by D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department, which shares jurisdiction with the Capitol Police.
The investigation concluded in April, and the Justice Department announced that it would not be pursuing criminal charges against the officer involved.
“Officials examined video footage posted on social media, statements from the officer involved and other officers and witnesses to the events, physical evidence from the scene of the shooting, and the results of an autopsy,” the department said in a statement. “Based on that investigation, officials determined that there is insufficient evidence to support a criminal prosecution.”
A Pelosi spokesperson declined to comment for this story, deferring to the Capitol Police statement. Schumer’s office did not respond to an email seeking comment.
Our ruling
Because official sources have not identified the officer involved in the shooting, we cannot verify or debunk any names being thrown around on the internet. But claims that the officer worked for Schumer or Pelosi are contradicted by the Capitol Police. They say that the person who fired the shot was not assigned to any Congress member’s security detail. We rate this post False.
Sources
Facebook post, July 11, 2021
Fox News, ‘Sunday Morning Futures’ on Trump’s Big Tech lawsuit, US-China relations, July 11, 2021
NBC News, Trump wrong about officer who shot Jan. 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt, law enforcement official says, July 12, 2021
Justice.gov, Department of Justice Closes Investigation into the Death of Ashli Babbitt, April 14, 2021
Coin Metrics’ Nic Carter is “glad” that Elon Musk has been reevaluating the facts regarding BTC mining but thinks that in any case “the environmental costs are offset by its enormous utility.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has revealed for the first time that his firm SpaceX owns Bitcoin (BTC).
The company is yet to officially announce how much Bitcoin it has purchased, however Musk’s other company Tesla purchased $1.5B of the cryptocurrency earlier this year which sparked a major Bitcoin price rally.
That rally came to an abrupt end after Tesla stopped taking Bitcoin payments due to environmental concerns, but speaking at “The ₿ Word” — a virtual Bitcoin (BTC) event — the erratic tech billionaire suggested Tesla was on the verge of accepting the cryptocurrency again following promising signs the percentage of renewable energy used for mining was increasing.
The changing narrative of Bitcoin going “green” may help reignite a rally, with Coin Metrics co-founder Nic Carter telling CNBC a few hours ago that BTC’s fundamentals are getting better in terms of sustainability.
Musk appeared alongside Ark Invest CEO Cathie Wood, and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, and moderator Steve Lee from Square Crypto. Musk did not reveal any additional details about SpaceX’s purchase apart from saying:
“I do own Bitcoin, Tesla owns Bitcoin, SpaceX owns Bitcoin, and I do personally own a bit of Ethereum and Dogecoin of course.”
Rainmaking has become common in dry countries such as the United Arab Emirates.
Officials in Dubai are using drones to artificially increase rainfall as the city grapples with oppressive heat, video this week shows.
The rainmaking technology, known as “cloud seeding,” was put into use as summer temperatures have surged past 120 degrees Fahrenheit in the United Arab Emirates city, the Independent reported.
Experts have said the technology aims to make rain form more efficiently inside clouds and in doing so, make more water come down.
Drones are used to shoot electrical charges into clouds, causing them to clump together and trigger more rainfall.
Footage shared on Sunday by the UAE’s National Center of Meteorology showed the intense showers flooding roads in addition to flashes of lightning.
An argument over pizza led to the weekend shooting on Pittsburgh’s South Side that left a man in critical condition, according to charges filed in the case.
Rafik White, 22, is charged with attempted homicide in the shooting, which happened shortly before 2 a.m. Saturday. Police said they responded to a ShotSpotter alert and found a man with gunshot wounds to his chest.
Four friends who were with the man said they had been walking on South 13th Street toward Bingham Street with some pizza when two men, one of whom was later identified as White, asked them for some pizza, according to the complain
The men, who were sitting on a burgundy Ford F-150, followed the group after they declined to hand over any pizza, the witnesses told police. An argument followed, and White allegedly pulled out and gun and shot the victim, according to the complaint.
Investigators also obtained footage captured by a nearby vehicle’s dashboard camera, police said.
Residents in Johnstown gathered to celebrate the life of Johnstown native Monique Knudson Tuesday evening. The Stone Bridge was lit up pink in her honor. She founded the Greater Johnstown Restaurants and Businesses Facebook page to help local businesses during the pandemic. According to those that know her, Monique lost her own battle to COVID at age 44 Thursday.
(CNN)A federal judge forced a US Capitol rioter to unlock his laptop Wednesday after prosecutors argued that it likely contained footage of the January 6 insurrection from his helmet-worn camera.
The judge granted the Justice Department’s request to place Capitol riot defendant Guy Reffitt in front of his laptop so they could use facial recognition to unlock the device. The maneuver happened after the hearing ended and Reffitt’s lawyer confirmed to CNN that the laptop was unlocked.
Investigators seized the laptop and other devices earlier this year pursuant to a search warrant.
Reffitt has been in jail since his arrest in January. His case received national attention after his son spoke publicly about how Reffitt had threatened to kill family members if they turned him into the FBI.
Give and Go Prepared Foods is voluntarily recalling some of its muffin products “due to the potential for the products to be contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes,” according to the company’s recall notice.
By: KDKA-TV News Staff
About 11% of nearly $13 million in emergency rental and utility bill funds has been disbursed to Westmoreland County residents who experienced hardship because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Dear Editor,
Coin Metrics’ Nic Carter is “glad” that Elon Musk has been reevaluating the facts regarding BTC mining but thinks that in any case “the environmental costs are offset by its enormous utility.”
Rainmaking has become common in dry countries such as the United Arab Emirates.
