| A new COVID-19 forecast predicts more than 400,000 deaths by the end of 2020. Will the fall wave really be that big? Posted: 09 Sep 2020 02:54 PM PDT  Experts have long feared that colder weather and other factors could create a fall wave of the coronavirus with the potential to dwarf previous peaks — and America's most prominent COVID-19 modelers are projecting just that. So is it time to freak out about the fall? Maybe not just yet.
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| 2 Black Senate hopefuls look to make history in the South — and fix health care while they're at it Posted: 10 Sep 2020 11:08 AM PDT  Shreveport Mayor Adrian Perkins from Louisiana and Jaime Harrison from South Carolina envision a "new South" to address issues they say have been largely ignored by their longtime incumbent opponents.
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| Deadly wildfires rage in Western states: 'I never want to see California again' Posted: 10 Sep 2020 05:15 PM PDT  At least 90 wildfires driven by strong winds were racing through more than a dozen Western states on Thursday. Here are the latest developments.
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| Chick-fil-A is adding three new items to its menu. What to know and when they arrive Posted: 10 Sep 2020 09:50 AM PDT  If you have a sweet tooth, these are for you.
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| Navalny's condition improving, police guard stepped up: Der Spiegel Posted: 10 Sep 2020 12:08 AM PDT  Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny has made further progress in his recovery after what Germany said was poisoning with a Soviet-style Novichok nerve agent, and is able to speak again, Der Spiegel magazine reported on Thursday. The Kremlin critic is being treated in Berlin's Charite hospital after falling ill on a Russian domestic flight last month. Germany says Navalny was the victim of an attempt to kill him and has demanded an explanation from Russia.
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| Texas police group puts up billboard warning "enter at your own risk," saying Austin defunded police Posted: 10 Sep 2020 11:30 AM PDT  Texas Governor Greg Abbott is also calling on every Texan and candidate for public office to sign a pledge against defunding the state's police departments.
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| ‘Miracle With a Sad Ending’: Couple Survive But Lose Baby in Wildfire Chaos Posted: 10 Sep 2020 03:34 PM PDT  When he couldn't reach his cousin Jake Hyland on Monday, Jim Mabry drove to his family's remote property in rural Washington state, where wildfires turned pastures of 4-foot-high sage into dust.Jake and his wife, Jamie, along with their 1-year-old son, Uriel, were visiting their land in Okanogan County when flames from the Cold Springs Fire ripped through the area. Relatives couldn't reach the couple, or emergency services, because power lines were down.On Tuesday, Mabry discovered Jake's truck stuck in a ravine, about a quarter of a mile from the land. The vehicle had blown through a barbed wire fence. Its windshield had melted, and the steering wheel and dashboard were obliterated, he recalled."When I first saw the truck, I didn't want to search," Mabry told The Daily Beast. "I was so convinced I was coming across remains. Because I didn't see any chance of them making it."Yet the Hylands made a harrowing escape, relatives said, abandoning their small pickup truck and heading to the Columbia River, where rescuers miraculously found them Wednesday morning. Their little boy did not survive.Grandmother, 12-Year-Old Grandson, Four More Die as Wildfire Smoke Enshrouds Oregon and California in DarknessNow Jake, 31, and Jamie, 26, are hospitalized in critical condition, their bodies covered in burns. Jamie, who is pregnant, has burns on 50 percent of her body, mostly on her arms, hands and face, Mabry told The Daily Beast."It's a miracle with a sad ending," he said. "They survived, but lost a child." He added, "They loved their son. He was their ray of hope."A GoFundMe page—which shows a photo of the couple and their baby smiling on their remote property just a few months ago—has raised more than $117,000 for the family. Jake, his family said, is expected to have at least four more surgeries and will be in the intensive care unit for at least two weeks.The Cold Springs wildfire is just one of a slew of blazes to decimate swaths of the Pacific Northwest and California in recent days, with fires killing at least a dozen people in that state alone, according to the LA Times. In Lyons, Oregon, 12-year-old Wyatt Tofte died beside his dog. His grandmother, Peggy Mosso, was also killed in a blaze. Officials said the death toll was expected to rise in California, Oregon, and Washington, where thousands of residents have faced evacuation orders. In California, the ferocious August Complex fire—which had burned more than 471,000 acres and was only 24 percent contained as of Thursday afternoon—was the largest blaze in state history.Also on Thursday, the National Interagency Fire Center reported 102 fires had burned through 4.3 million acres throughout the country, mostly in the West. The Cold Springs fire, which burned 172,000 acres, was 10 percent contained.Mabry said Jake's property was deeply isolated—no cell service, electricity, or running water. The closest town is a 45-minute drive. Jake and Jamie stopped at the property to drop some supplies at their Quonset hut on their way home from a wedding in Spokane, Mabry explained, noting that the blaze started around 9:45 p.m. local time Sunday, and reached the property hours later. "People have been making rude comments, about how dumb they are that they didn't get the evacuation notice," Mabry's wife, Tammie, told The Daily Beast. "It is off grid. I don't think people understand that."Mabry said the Hylands ditched the truck, which hit some rocks, and fled in the darkness early Monday morning, carrying their son and a jug of water.Authorities scheduled a search for Wednesday at 10 a.m., but Mabry said the couple was found earlier thanks to a family member's Facebook post on a local fire watch page. A boat from the Colville Tribe's fish and wildlife agency discovered the couple.According to local news channel KREM, detectives with the sheriff's office and tribal police are investigating the child's death as a homicide since the fire could have been "human-caused."Two hundred miles away, the wildfires came for virtually an entire town.Larry Frick, 53, told The Daily Beast he was visiting his son in Pullman—about 47 miles south—when heavy winds set his community of Malden ablaze on Monday.He and his wife, Chandelle, rushed home to save their dogs and cats, one of which has gone missing. They also believed Chandelle's mother was home at the time; luckily, she'd left before the fires consumed their neighborhood, ultimately destroying roughly three quarters of the homes in the town.They passed through smoke, fallen trees, and the torched houses of their neighbors. When they got home, their deck and shed were on fire, and they worked for hours to douse the flames with a garden hose and sprinkler. "The whole time, it literally felt like a war zone. Explosions were going off all through town, ammunition, propane tanks, fires blowing up," Frick said. "A couple made the ground shake.""We're still in shock," Frick added. "I feel a sense of guilt. We have everything and we really don't need anything but our power back on, and everyone around us has lost everything. They just have the shirts on their backs."As for the Hylands, relatives said they were shocked and thankful Jamie and Jake were discovered alive. "When you look at the scene, we were like… we don't know how they could have survived. The truck is like something you couldn't believe," Tammie Mabry said. Jim Mabry said he's gone through a rollercoaster of emotions since his cousin vanished. First he was told the Hyland family survived. Then he learned Uriel had died. The child had joined his parents on a visit to the property last spring during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, when they took a walk to the river where they were later rescued.One recent photo shows little Uriel in a carrier on his mother's back as they roamed the land."Being a mom was her dream," Tammie said of Jamie Hyland. "She was made to be a mom." —with additional reporting from Tracy ConnorRead more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet 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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| Trump rambles about ‘creating’ Air Force and appointing ‘pro-crime judges’ at another rally with few masks Posted: 09 Sep 2020 12:27 AM PDT  President staged outdoor rally in North Carolina, a state he desperately needs to hold in November
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| Outcry in Pakistan as police blame woman who was gang raped for driving at night Posted: 10 Sep 2020 09:07 AM PDT  The gang rape of a stranded woman motorist in front of her children has caused outcry in Pakistan with calls for the public hanging of the culprits. Anger over the attack on a woman who had broken down on a motorway outside Lahore was then increased after a senior police officer appeared to blame the victim for her choice of route. Police on Thursday said they had arrested 12 suspects for questioning during an extensive manhunt. The woman with her two children was driving to Gujranwala when she was forced to stop at the Gujjarpura section of the motorway after her car ran out of fuel at around 1:30am. She called relatives for help, but before they could arrive, two robbers approached the car, smashed the windows and dragged her and her children from the vehicle. The attackers also took jewellery, bank cards and £466 in cash. A senior Lahore police officer later provoked further condemnation when he appeared to blame the victim. Lahore Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) Umar Sheikh questioned why the woman had taken that route and why she had not checked her fuel tank. His comments were condemned by Shireen Mazari, the human rights minister. "For an officer to effectively blame a woman for being gang raped by saying she should have taken the Grand Trunk Road, or question as to why she went out in the night with her children is unacceptable and I have taken up this issue," she said. "Nothing can ever rationalise the crime of rape. That's it." Inspector-General of Punjab Police Inam Ghani claimed that by Thursday night officers had identified the culprits' village. Opposition leaders quickly attacked what they said was the government's breakdown in law and order. "This is a matter of national embarrassment and evidence of a completely broken down legal system," said Shehbaz Sharif, opposition leader in the national assembly. Gang rape is rare in Pakistan, although sexual harassment and violence against women is not uncommon. Nearly 1,000 women are killed in Pakistan each year in so-called "honour killings" for allegedly violating conservative norms on love and marriage.
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| About $500,000 in smuggled cash found in chair cushion shipped from MIA, feds say Posted: 09 Sep 2020 09:33 AM PDT  Even by MIA smuggling standards, this op was over the top: A chair cushion stuffed with almost $500,000 in cash was uncovered by customs officers during an inspection as it was being shipped to the Dominican Republic, authorities said Wednesday.
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| Bollywood actor's death grips India with frenzied TV coverage Posted: 08 Sep 2020 09:47 PM PDT  The demise of a young movie star has transfixed India like no other news in a year of bad headlines. The abrupt death of Sushant Singh Rajput has spurred a debate about the stigma of mental health, the rarefied insider world of Bollywood, and, more recently, condemnation of the media for the non-stop coverage of the duelling accusations between Rajput's family and his girlfriend. Mumbai police initially reported Rajput's death as accidental and local media called it a suicide.
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| 80-year-old hiker missing for 3 nights shows up at a press event for his own disappearance Posted: 10 Sep 2020 09:35 AM PDT  Harry Harvey, 80, was missing for 3 nights and 4 days in the northeast England wilderness. He showed up at a press conference aimed to help find him.
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| Trump campaign asks US judge to kill Nevada vote-by-mail law Posted: 10 Sep 2020 01:56 PM PDT  As the election draws near, the Trump campaign continues its fight against mail-in voting.
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| Iowa refuses to close bars and require masks as Covid-19 cases surge in cities Posted: 09 Sep 2020 02:00 AM PDT  Iowa City and Ames endure worst surge in the country as cases have risen sharply across the whole midwestIowa's governor, Kim Reynolds, is refusing to enforce a White House coronavirus taskforce recommendation to close bars and require people to wear masks after Covid-19 infections in some of the state's cities surged.Meanwhile, coronavirus cases have risen sharply across the whole midwest in recent weeks putting the region at the forefront of America's pandemic. The region accounted for six of the eight states with the highest number of new Covid-19 cases by early September even as infections fell in other parts of the US previously among the worst hit.North Dakota has the largest number of positive cases per capita in the country over the past 14 days. Iowa and South Dakota are enduring the highest percentage increases. Missouri has seen more than 1,300 new cases a day on average over the past week.In Iowa, the increase was centered on university towns following the return of students to classes. By late August, two of the state's cities, Ames and Iowa City, were enduring the worst coronavirus surges in the country. The per capita infection rates were higher than any individual country.Amid warnings that the failure to enforce masks and social distancing was likely to cost hundreds of additional lives in the coming months, the White House taskforce said in a report on 31 August that bars "must be closed" in 61 of Iowa's 99 counties and seating in restaurants should be limited. It also recommended restrictions on the size of gatherings in the worst hit counties along with the closure of gyms."Community transmission continues to be high in rural and urban counties across Iowa, with increasing transmission in the major university towns," the report warned. "Mask mandates across the state must be in place to decrease transmission."But Reynolds has limited bar closures to six counties including those with the universities. She would go no further than "strongly encouraging" people to wear masks, saying that they were "not a silver bullet"."I still believe it's up to the governors in the various states to make those decisions," the governor said.Missouri's governor, Mike Parson, has also consistently resisted making masks obligatory in public spaces, instead issuing guidelines recommending their use while questioning their effectiveness. Authorities in the state's major cities, including St Louis and Kansas City, have imposed their own mandatory requirements.In July, Anthony Fauci, the president's lead coronavirus expert, urged the midwest's political leaders to follow the science by warning that the region should learn from the surge in cases in southern states during the summer.The University of Washington's Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation has predicted that without mandatory masks, the number of daily coronavirus deaths in Iowa will be six times higher than if 95% of people used face coverings.Reynolds blamed "social activity among young adults" for driving the rise in coronavirus numbers. The White House task force warned that university towns need to routinely test all students "to immediately identify new cases and outbreaks and isolate and quarantine".Students at the University of Iowa have demanded testing after nearly 1,600 cases have been self-reported on the campus since 18 August but the university has resisted."Our numbers are clearly terrifying," an associate professor, Naomi Greyser, told CNN. "They're really scary and my students are scared."In the counties around Iowa City and Ames well above half of all of those tested for Covid-19 were positive for the virus.Reynolds also backed plans by Iowa State University to allow 25,000 spectators to attend its first college football home game of the season this week. The university reversed the decision after strong criticism.Coronavirus policy in the midwest has become closely bound up with politics with even prominent politicians buying into conspiracy theories.The US senator for Iowa, Joni Ernst, speculated that doctors were exaggerating the fatalities by falsely pinning deaths from other causes on Covid-19. Ernst, a Republican facing a close race for re-election, picked up on a conspiracy theory that misinterprets official statistics to say she was "so sceptical" about the official coronavirus death toll."These healthcare providers and others are reimbursed at a higher rate if Covid is tied to it, so what do you think they're doing?" she said, according to the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier.The Iowa Medical Society called Ernst's comments "incredibly disappointing". "Now is not the time to spread mistruths and distrust. We must work together to keep Iowans safe and healthy," it said.
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| Top Medicaid official racked up $3.5 million in consulting charges — and billed it all to taxpayers Posted: 10 Sep 2020 08:48 AM PDT  The person in charge of providing health care for low-income Americans spent several million dollars of taxpayer money on furthering her own career, a congressional investigation has found.Seema Verma, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and a member of the coronavirus task force, racked up $3.5 million in consulting charges, event costs, and other things that developed her connections within the Republican party, Politico reports via the investigation set to be published Thursday. That included nearly $3,000 on a "Girl's Night" party, about $1,000 to place an op-ed with Fox News, and dozens more line items before Verma was cut off last year.Politico first reported Verma's excessive spending in March 2019, and her contracts with the consulting firm Nahigian Strategies were soon cut off. But Politico also sparked a congressional probe into those contracts, and investigators sifted through thousands of pages of Verma's emails and billing records. They found that Verma spent more than $3 million over two years in the Trump administration on "handpicked communications consultants used to promote Administrator Verma's public profile and personal brand," congressional Democrats said in a Thursday statement.Among the charges, investigators found Verma spent $115,000 with one consultant who "tried to broker conversations between Verma and well-known Washington reporters," booked conservative media appearances, and even tried to connect her with then-White House communications director Bill Shine, Politico writes. Verma also diverted $13,856 to shoot an "eMedicare" video, including $450 for a makeup artist, and spent at least $3,400 in consulting charges to arrange an appearance on Politico's Women Rule podcast, among many other charges. Read more at Politico.More stories from theweek.com Trump knew it all along The true Election Day nightmare scenario The staggering consequences of Trump's coronavirus lies
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| South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem is using COVID-19 relief funds to pay for a $5 million tourism ad campaign, despite a surge in coronavirus cases following the Sturgis motorcycle rally Posted: 10 Sep 2020 09:33 AM PDT  Governor Kristi Noem's previous state ad campaign —'Meth: We're on it' — sparked conversations and jokes nationwide.
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| Pritzker Prize–Winning Architect Richard Rogers Has Announced His Retirement Posted: 10 Sep 2020 04:50 PM PDT |
| Suspended NY HS senior arrested for showing up to school in violation of COVID-19 restrictions Posted: 10 Sep 2020 07:35 AM PDT  17-year-old Maverick Stow returned to his high school campus after being warned not to show up and that he'd be arrested if he entered school grounds; Laura Ingle reports on the latest.
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| A sheriff launched an algorithm to predict who might commit a crime. Dozens of people said they were harassed by deputies for no reason. Posted: 10 Sep 2020 12:17 PM PDT  A new report sheds light on the pitfalls of "predictive policing" and casts doubt on AI-powered tools meant to fight crime.
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| It’s the peak of storm season and the hurricane center is tracking six systems Posted: 10 Sep 2020 06:08 AM PDT  Two of the systems will be in the Gulf. Two named storms are currently in the Atlantic.
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| No more temperature checks? CDC changing COVID-19 screenings for international air passengers Posted: 10 Sep 2020 09:22 AM PDT  Starting Sept. 14, the U.S. will replace its current system of temperature and symptom checks with one that focuses on where travelers have been.
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| Exclusive: Susan Collins' plight gets worse with new corruption allegation, possible ethics probe Posted: 09 Sep 2020 11:00 AM PDT  Ethics watchdog accuses Maine senator of "blatant corruption" after GOP tax bill sweetened husband's investments
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| Black Democrat urges governor to drop Black court nominee Posted: 10 Sep 2020 12:57 PM PDT  A Black Democratic state lawmaker who is challenging the appointment of a Black woman to the Florida Supreme Court contended Thursday that Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis is engaging in "racial tokenism" by choosing someone the court itself has already ruled is not eligible for the position. State Rep. Geraldine Thompson said in an online news conference that DeSantis only chose Renatha Francis for the high court because she shares his conservative ideology, not because he is trying to achieve racial diversity. Thompson says Francis doesn't meet the constitutional requirement of being a Florida Bar member for at least 10 years, a point the Supreme Court noted two weeks ago when it ruled DeSantis had exceeded his authority by appointing an ineligible candidate.
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| Taiwan denounces large-scale Chinese drills near island Posted: 09 Sep 2020 09:17 PM PDT  Taiwan denounced China on Thursday over large-scale air and naval drills off its southwestern coast, calling them a serious provocation and a threat to international air traffic. China, which claims democratic Taiwan as its own, has stepped up military exercises near the island, in what Taipei views as intimidation to force it to accept Chinese rule. Yeh Kuo-hui, from Taiwan's Defence Ministry's operations and planning department, told a hastily arranged news conference that China's intentions could not be predicted.
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| South Dakota governor says study blaming motorbike rally for 260,000 coronavirus infections ‘completely false’ Posted: 10 Sep 2020 02:42 PM PDT  State has reportedly seen 126 per cent increase in cases over last two weeks
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| The largest contemporary Muslim pilgrimage isn't the hajj to Mecca, it's the Shiite pilgrimage to Karbala in Iraq Posted: 09 Sep 2020 05:17 AM PDT  Every year, Shiite Muslims mark the death of Prophet Muhammad's grandson Hussain with a mourning period that lasts a total of 50 days. Ashura, the tenth day of the Islamic month of Muharram, commemorates the day Hussain died. For millions of Shiites, this mourning period culminates in a pilgrimage to Karbala in Iraq. This pilgrimage has, in recent years, become the largest gathering of people in the world for a religious reason. This year Ashura was observed on Aug. 30 and the pilgrimage, 40 days later, will end on Oct. 9, 2020. My research focuses on Shiite shrines and Muharram mourning practices. The city of Karbala, which I visited twice in 2013, is located 60 miles southwest of Baghdad and 45 miles north of Najaf, the other important Shiite shrine city in Iraq. The pilgrimage and the city of Karbala have been through many changes over a more than 1000-year-old history. This year, the pilgrimage and the holy city are faced with a new challenge: COVID-19. The historic battle at KarbalaKarbala is the place where Prophet Muhammad's grandson Hussain was killed during what is known as the Battle of Karbala in A.D. 680. According to Shiites, Hussain and his men were martyred in this battle on the day of Ashura.Following the death of Prophet Muhammad in A.D. 632, there was a dispute over who would be his rightful heir. Sunnis, who make up the majority of Muslims, believe that Abu Bakr, Muhammad's friend and father-in-law, rightly succeeded Muhammad in A.D. 632. Shiites believe that Ali, Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law, should have been Muhammad's successor.After years of civil war, as well as wars of expansion, the Arab Umayyad dynasty established its rule over the region, from the Middle East to North Africa from A.D. 661 to 750. But there were those who decried Umayyad rule.Hussain had been invited by the inhabitants of Kufa, which was a garrison town near Najaf, to come and lead them in a revolt against the Umayyad caliph in Damascus. Umayyad forces first put down the unrest in Kufa and then met and killed Hussain and his men on the desert plains of Karbala. For Shiite Muslims, Hussain was their third imam, a worldly and spiritual leader whose direct relationship to Muhammad gave him special status and authority.After Hussain's death, a tomb was soon built which attracted devotees and benefactors. Najaf is where Hussain's father, Ali, lies buried. The pilgrimage throughout historyOver the years, Hussain's shrine was destroyed, rebuilt, remodeled and expanded. Muharram mourning rituals, whether in Karbala or elsewhere, have been used for political ends. Sometimes, Muharram practices were sponsored by rulers who sought to gain popular support. At other times, the rituals turned into anti-government protests. Fearing civil unrest, some rulers prohibited or limited pilgrimage to Karbala. For example, Mutawakkil, a caliph of the Abbasid dynasty, which ruled over a vast Islamic empire from the eighth to the 13th century, feared that the rituals inflamed anti-regime fervor. He destroyed the tomb in A.D. 850 and banned the pilgrimage to Karbala. Karbala and Najaf grew in importance in the 16th century with the founding of a Shiite state in Persia, today's Iran, under Shah Ismail I. From then on, the Iraqi shrine cities attracted increasing numbers of pilgrims.Many pilgrims brought bodies of deceased relatives because of a belief that being buried close to Ali or Hussain ensures that when the deceased stands in front of God on Judgment Day, Ali or Hussain will appeal to God's mercy to allow the person's soul to enter heaven. This has led to "Wadi al-Salam," Arabic for "Valley of Peace," in Najaf becoming one of the world's largest cemeteries, holding up to 5 million corpses. The transport and burial of corpses provided employment for a wide strata of the population in Najaf and Karbala. Higher fees were charged from those wanting to be closer to Ali or Hussain in the burial site. Blaming the corpse traffic as one of the reasons for several outbreaks of cholera in 19th-century Persia and Ottoman Iraq, the Ottoman government, which ruled over Iraq from the 16th to the beginning of the 20th century, sought to restrict and control the number of corpses that were brought in. Yet even under these restrictions, around 20,000 dead bodies were brought to Najaf each year at the start of the 20th century. Today, roughly 100,000 are brought for burial in Najaf annually. From decline to rebirthUnder the authoritarian Iraqi Baath regime, from the early 1970s to 2003, Shiite pilgrimage was closely monitored and limited.Like many previous rulers, Saddam Hussain feared that the rituals would be used in order to incite rebellion against his regime, that the pilgrimage would turn into a protest. But once Saddam was overthrown by U.S.-led forces in 2003, the pilgrimage flourished again.In 2004, more than 2 million pilgrims walked to Karbala, and the most common route was from Najaf to Karbala. Since then, the pilgrimage to Karbala has even eclipsed the hajj, which annually draws between 2 and 3 million. In 2014, 17 million people reportedly completed the walk to Karbala. By 2016, the number of pilgrims increased to 22 million. This year, fear of the spread of COVID-19 has greatly restricted many pilgrimages, including the hajj. Only a limited number of Muslims already inside Saudi Arabia was allowed to attend. As a precautionary measure, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a top Iraqi Shiite leader, encouraged his followers to mourn at home, rather than visit Karbala. For Ashura this year, Shiites gathered in Najaf and Karbala, but on a much smaller scale. There was social distancing, but not everywhere. Not all pilgrims wore masks. In the absence of stringent measures, the number of infections in Iraq has already spiked. Whether the government will respond with stricter policies for the pilgrimage at the beginning of October remains to be seen.This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * As coronavirus curtails travel, backyard pilgrimages become the way to a spiritual journey * Online Christian pilgrimage: How a virtual tour to Lourdes follows a tradition of innovationEdith Szanto does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
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| An open letter in solidarity with Jussie Smollett and all targeted by police misconduct Posted: 09 Sep 2020 09:54 AM PDT  At a time when the people of Chicago are demanding community control of the police and when our movement for Black Lives demands that police be defunded and demilitarized, Chicago police and prosecutors continue to expend precious public resources to cover up a hate crime and renew their fabricated case against Jussie Smollett. Jussie faces false charges of felony disorderly conduct and is still being forced to fight back against a relentless and vicious smear campaign initiated by the Chicago Police Department and uncritically disseminated by the media.
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| California wildfires: San Francisco sky turns apocalyptic orange Posted: 09 Sep 2020 06:38 PM PDT  Residents of San Francisco woke on Wednesday morning to an apocalyptic orange sky as smoke from catastrophic wildfires in California blanketed the air and choked the sun. Fires have ravaged the state in the past month, burning at least 2.5 million acres (1 million hectares) of land. A heatwave at the weekend provided perfect conditions for an eruption of new and dangerous blazes across the state. Three people were found dead on Wednesday evening in Butte County, where the North Complex fire – one of more than two dozen in California – has spread at a ferocious rate. The fire, in Northern California, has been burning for more than three weeks before high winds and soaring temperatures helped it surge back again this week, crossing about 25 miles (40 kilometres) of mountainous terrain to destroy scores of homes. Historically, California's fire season does not start until autumn.
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| COVID-19 silently arrived in US near Christmas — earlier than thought, UCLA study says Posted: 10 Sep 2020 01:02 PM PDT  Coronavirus had reached the U.S. and was spreading weeks before any cases were confirmed, the study says.
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| Senate Democrats block GOP coronavirus plan that lacked stimulus checks as hopes fade for relief deal Posted: 10 Sep 2020 11:33 AM PDT  Another round of coronavirus stimulus checks for Americans and renewal of enhanced unemployment benefits appear to be a long shot on Capitol Hill.
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| 'Vicious little suckers': Massive clouds of mosquitoes kill cows, horses in Louisiana after Hurricane Laura Posted: 10 Sep 2020 03:26 PM PDT  Hurricane Laura's rains led to a prime mosquito habitat in portions of Louisiana. Swarms of the insects plagued livestock until they died.
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| China says Australian embassy obstructed law enforcement in case of evacuated journalists Posted: 10 Sep 2020 01:23 AM PDT |
| Trump supporters are increasingly isolated in their denial of systemic racism, according to new polling data Posted: 10 Sep 2020 01:55 PM PDT  Only 9% of Trump voters think it's harder to be Black than white in the US, leaving his base far from the rest of the country, a new Pew poll shows.
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| Delta Force Soldier Selected for Medal of Honor Casts Light on Bravery of Fallen Teammate Posted: 10 Sep 2020 01:23 PM PDT  Master Sgt. Joshua Wheeler was killed leading Kurdish forces through a storm of gunfire.
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| Was Don Lewis pushed from a plane? Posted: 10 Sep 2020 01:15 PM PDT  Correspondent Richard Schlesinger uses his skills as a pilot to test theories raised in the 1997 disappearance of Don Lewis — the former husband of Carole Baskin, who was a key figure in the Netflix "Tiger King" series.
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| 'Zombie' fires smoldered beneath Arctic ice all winter then reignited, causing one of the region's worst fire seasons in history Posted: 09 Sep 2020 02:49 PM PDT  High temperatures are exacerbating 'zombie' wildfires in the Arctic circle — fires that smolder underground during the winter and resurface in summer.
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| An entire university in Illinois has been told to quarantine after COVID-19 outbreak Posted: 09 Sep 2020 07:51 AM PDT  The school will temporarily move to remote learning.
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| 3 killed in plane crash were Tennessee Air National Guard Posted: 09 Sep 2020 09:21 AM PDT  Three people killed in a small plane crash near a Tennessee airport were Air National Guard members, officials said Wednesday. The Federal Aviation Administration said the three were aboard a single-engine Piper PA-28 airplane that crashed Tuesday near Warren County Memorial Airport in McMinnville, southeast of Nashville. Killed in the crash were Lt. Col. Shelli Huether, Capt. Jessica Wright, and Senior Master Sgt. Scott Bumpus, the guard said in a news release.
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| Utah police must now try de-escalation first after officer shot 13-year-old with autism Posted: 10 Sep 2020 07:26 AM PDT  Policy that makes de-escalation tactics "mandatory" for Utah police went into effect hours after an officer shot a 13-year-old boy with autism.
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| GOP turns strategy to attacking Harris over Catholic record Posted: 10 Sep 2020 05:40 AM PDT  Conservatives are trying to frame Democratic nominee for vice president Kamala Harris as anti-Catholic. The strategy comes as Democrats are trying to court Roman Catholic voters.
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| Four stunning revelations Bob Woodward reveals about Donald Trump in his devastating new book "Rage" Posted: 09 Sep 2020 12:30 PM PDT  Between December 2019 and July 2020, Woodward conducted 18 on-the-record interviews with the president
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| Whole Foods workers say a new company policy is a 'slap in the face' and a 'disgusting abuse' of people who worked during the height of the pandemic Posted: 10 Sep 2020 08:29 AM PDT  Whole Foods extended the expiration date for attendance "points," or penalties earned for absences from work, that were earned prior to the pandemic.
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| Republicans are going to try to drown the economy Posted: 10 Sep 2020 03:00 AM PDT  After a campaign season lasting what seems like approximately 20,000 years, the actual election is coming up in less than two months. It has been clear for weeks that the economy is slowly stalling out well short of full employment, and tens of millions of people are falling into destitution because they either were not eligible for the first rounds of pandemic relief, or fell through the cracks in the bureaucracy, or have burned through their savings now that the programs are over.The best thing the Republican Party could do for its president's re-election campaign now would be to take Democrats up on their offer for trillions in additional rescue dollars. Yet Republicans are largely resisting — the latest offer from Senate Republicans is only half the size of the one from weeks ago, and it is not at all clear many of them would actually vote for it. If Joe Biden wins the election, which appears likely, prepare for a tsunami of crocodile tears about spending and the national debt from the GOP. They will attempt to make his presidency a failure by throttling the economy.There are probably two things going on with Republicans here. First is an actual ideological commitment to austere political morals — the belief that government should be strict, cold, and rigorous towards (most of) its citizens. The state should not be in the business of handing out comfy universal benefits or making the lives of the masses better, it should be disciplining and controlling them — specifically by forcing them to work making profits for capitalists.This attitude can be distinguished from the related idea of economic austerity, which means cutting the budget deficit and slowing the economy by raising taxes and/or cutting spending. Republicans love cutting spending on basically anything but the military, but they also love cutting taxes, because that means more money and power in the hands of rich people. Thus they instinctively resist any kind of direct welfare or rescue program to help people by handing out money — as I have previously written, Senate Republicans were incandescently furious that the CARES Act boost to unemployment insurance paid some people who got laid off more than they had made at their jobs. That strikes at the heart of their entire system of morality.So while they are perfectly willing to blow up the national debt with tax cuts for the top 1 percent, and grudgingly accepted a broadly beneficial rescue package when the stock market was collapsing, Republicans are in general so against helping the poor and the working class that they might sacrifice the presidency to do it.Second, I suspect that in the back of their minds Republicans are beginning to accept that Trump is likely to lose. It's not at all a sure thing, but he is far behind in the poll averages, which unlike in 2016 have been remarkably stable. What's more, Trump is barely even trying to shake up the race — his campaign is bleeding hundreds of millions of campaign cash on what appears very much like insider looting, and spending tons of money on Fox News ads that won't reach anyone but his own voters. In any case, Trump is such an inflammatory figure, even a huge new rescue package probably wouldn't change attitudes much. Nearly every day there is a new jaw-dropping scandal, like the recent Bob Woodward recording of Trump saying back in early February he knew the coronavirus was deadly and contagious through the air, when he was publicly saying it would vanish on its own.Thus Republicans may already be preparing for their certain posture should Biden assume the presidency in 2021: total obstruction and demands for maximum spending-side austerity. From 2009-16, they figured if they deliberately strangled the economy and stopped President Obama from doing as much as possible, then the Democrats would get blamed for it, and the GOP would reap the dividends. They were correct.This is just an escalation of the pattern the party has been following for the last 40 years. First they blew up the national debt with high interest rates, tax cuts, and military spending under Ronald Reagan, and threw a massive fake tantrum about borrowing to constrain Bill Clinton's agenda. Then they blew up the debt again under George W. Bush with tax cuts and military spending, and threw a massive tantrum under Barack Obama to constrain his agenda — in addition to filibustering almost every bill in sight. (Democrats by and large went along with them, because unlike Republicans they foolishly believe in keeping down the debt.)Now they have blown up the debt again under Trump with tax cuts and military spending (sensing a theme?), which is actually near record highs thanks to the coronavirus response. Should Biden win, you can bet with perfect confidence that Republicans will start having daily screaming tantrums about the national debt — pounding their lecterns in the Senate, lying on the floor kicking and yelling, and holding their breath until they're blue in the face. The effect, should Biden listen to them, will be to hamstring his presidency, lose the 2022 midterms, and cause grievous long-term damage to the American economy and people.Want more essential commentary and analysis like this delivered straight to your inbox? 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