Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Interceptor7, Magnifico, annetteboardman, Besame and jck. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Man Oh Man, wader, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community featureon Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
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US NEWS
Al Jazeera
Trump enjoys 90 percent support in the Republican Party, a party he has remade in his own image.
Donald Trump will announce he will run for president again in coming days.
It has been four years since the businessman used his profile as a reality TV star to propel him to victory in the 2016 elections.
While many of his policies and proclamations are at odds with traditional Republican positions, the party is now solidly the party of Trump.
Reuters
DUBAI/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Acting U.S. Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan announced on Monday the deployment of about 1,000 more troops to the Middle East for what he said were “defensive purposes,” citing concerns about a threat from Iran.
“The recent Iranian attacks validate the reliable, credible intelligence we have received on hostile behavior by Iranian forces and their proxy groups that threaten United States personnel and interests across the region,” Shanahan said in a statement.
Reuters
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Time has claimed many of the street fighters who rebelled against the police raid of a New York City gay bar 50 years ago, in what has become known as the Stonewall uprising. Those who remain are still a little astounded at what they did.
Standing outside the Greenwich Village tavern one recent morning, at what is now the Stonewall National Monument, Mark Segal recalled the spirit of 1969, when protests against the war in Vietnam coincided with the African-American, Latino and women’s rights movements.
Gay power was next.
“Standing across the street that night, that little 18-year-old boy who is me, I never thought that I’d be here 50 years later talking about it. We didn’t know it was history. We just ... knew it had changed,” said Segal, now 68, who has been at the forefront of the LGBTQ rights movement ever since.
Reuters
(Reuters) - Harvard University has rescinded its admission offer to a survivor of the 2018 massacre at a Florida high school over his past use of racial slurs in an online document posted on Twitter, the student said on Monday.
The student, Kyle Kashuv, was a junior at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida when a gunman opened fire in February 2018 and killed 17 students and staff. He became the target of online criticism last month after images of a shared study guide from more than a year ago circulated on Twitter, showing he wrote anti-black slurs.
“A few weeks ago, I was made aware of egregious and callous comments classmates and I made privately years ago - when I was 16 years old, months before the shooting - in an attempt to be as extreme and shocking as possible. I immediately apologized,” Kashuv wrote on Twitter on Monday.
Reuters
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday handed Republican legislators in Virginia a defeat, leaving in place a ruling that invalidated state electoral districts they drew because they weakened the clout of black voters in violation of the U.S. Constit
The justices, in a 5-4 decision, sidestepped a ruling on the merits of the case. They instead found that the Republican-led state House of Delegates lacked the necessary legal standing to appeal a lower court ruling that had invalidated 11 state House districts for racial discrimination.
Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring, a Democrat and the state’s top law enforcement official, opposed the appeal and argued that the Republican legislators were not entitled to act on behalf of the state in the case. A new political map is being used for this year’s state elections.
BBC
The mayor of the US city of Phoenix has apologised after a video allegedly showing police threatening to shoot a black family went viral.
Officers were responding to an alleged shoplifting incident last month when the video was recorded.
Police officers can be seen shouting at the family to get out of their vehicle before threatening them.
The parents say they did not realise their four-year-old had taken a $1 (£0.79) Barbie doll from a store.
Mayor Kate Gallego said the officers' actions were "completely inappropriate and clearly unprofessional".
NPR
With less than two weeks left in the U.S. Supreme Court's term, the justices handed down four decisions on Monday. Defying predictions, three were decided by shifting liberal-conservative coalitions.
Here, in a nutshell, are the results, as well as the fascinating shifting votes:
Dual sovereignty upheld, with Ginsburg, Gorsuch dissenting
In a 7-2 vote, the court reaffirmed its 100-year-old rule declaring that state governments and the federal government may each prosecute a person separately for the same crime, without violating the Constitution's double jeopardy clause. Dissenting were the court's leading liberal justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and one of its most conservative justices, Neil Gorsuch.
WORLD NEWS
DW News
Former Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi has died during a court hearing, according to state television. The democratically elected Islamist held power for just one year before being ousted by the military in 2013.
Mohammed Morsi, Egypt's former president, died Monday after collapsing during a session in court, state television reported.
The 67-year-old was the country's first democratically elected president and a member of Egypt's most powerful Islamist group, the now banned Muslim Brotherhood.
Morsi had been on trial for espionage and treason when he blacked out in the courtroom, reports said. He was taken to a Cairo hospital but could not be revived.
"He was speaking before the judge for 20 minutes then became very animated and fainted," a judicial source told Agence France-Presse.
The Islamist was democratically elected in 2012, one year after the popular uprising that ended the rule of longtime leader Hosni Mubarak.
Read more: Is Egypt heading toward another uprising?
DW News
A suspected neo-Nazi's arrest in the Kassel politician's murder case has focused concerns on far-right terrorism in Germany. The city is home to an extremist scene and was the location of a notorious NSU murder in 2006.
Germany's federal prosecutors have taken over the investigation into the murder of Walter Lübcke, indicating that the killing of the Kassel district president on June 2 is being treated as a politically-motivated terrorist act.
A number of German outlets have reported details of the alleged far-right ties of the suspect arrested in the city of Kassel in the early hours of Sunday morning.
The German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung reported on Monday that the 45-year-old man, named only as Stephan E., had a long criminal record, had already issued death threats via his YouTube channel, and that weapons were found during the search of his home.
According to the paper, Stephan E. had written a comment on YouTube in 2018 under his alias Game Over that read "Either this government abdicates soon or there will be deaths."
DW News
European foreign ministers have urged restraint in directing blame over an alleged attack on oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman. The US has pointed the finger at Iran, but European diplomats say they need more evidence.
Top EU diplomats meeting in Luxembourg on Monday said they were still seeking information about who may have launched attacks against two oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz.
The gathering comes amid escalating tensions between the US and Iran. It also follows Tehran's announcement that it plans to breach a 2015 nuclear deal struck with international powers.
Al Jazeera
Sudan's former President Omar al-Bashir has appeared in public for the first time since his overthrow by the military following months of mass protests against his 30-year-long autocratic rule.
Dressed in a white robe and turban, the toppled leader was seen on Sunday as he was escorted under heavy guard from a maximum security prison in Sudan's capital Khartoum to the prosecutor's office.
There, prosecutors informed him he faced charges of "possessing foreign currency and acquiring suspicious and illicit wealth", according to the official SUNA news agency.
He was given one week to raise objections, questioned on additional unspecified corruption charges, and taken back to Kobar prison.
The Guardian
Protesters have kept up pressure on Hong Kong’s leader by blocking streets outside the shuttered legislature building and welcoming the city’s most prominent political activist, Joshua Wong, on his release from jail.
As the political crisis entered its second week, Hong Kong’s police chief admitted that his officers had sought to arrest wounded demonstrators in hospitals after a previous protest, but claimed criminal screening was routine for anyone arriving at A&E.
He said 32 people had been arrested for their role in protests last week, and five charged with rioting offences, which carry heavy sentences.
The city was electrified by a record march on Sunday, the third major demonstration in a week. Organisers claimed that nearly 2 million people turned out to oppose an extradition law pushed by the territory’s chief executive, Carrie Lam, called for her resignation, condemned police brutality against protesters and demanded they drop any rioting charges.
The Guardian
Ed. note: Trump seems to be a fan favorite of Fascists everywhere.
Jeremy Hunt has vigorously defended Donald Trump for quoting the far-right commentator Katie Hopkins in an attack on the London mayor, Sadiq Khan, as Downing Street initially declined to condemn the US president’s words.
The foreign secretary said he would not have used the same words as Trump but he would “150% agree” with the overall sentiment.
The Hopkins post referred to the capital as “Khan’s Londonistan” and “stab-city”, after the deaths of three men in separate attacks on Friday and Saturday.
Trump then sent a tweet of his own a few hours later saying Khan was “a national disgrace who is destroying the City of London”.
The Guardian
It has been described as the world’s most sought-after beer. Just over 5,000 barrels are brewed annually by the 19 Trappist monks of St Sixtus abbey in Westvleteren, Flanders, and drinkers tempted by the regular appearance of its darkest brew at the top of the world rankings must travel in person and on appointment to pick up their allotted two crates.
But even the reclusive brothers are having to change with the times – to an extent. In order to stay one step ahead of those seeking to sell on their beer at steeply inflated prices, the abbey has announced it is going digital. A website has been set up where customers can order their two crates, with priority given to recent and new customers.
Drinkers will still need to come in person to the abbey’s shop nestled in Flemish farmland to pick up their purchases but they will avoid having to use a hotline that at peak times has attracted about 85,000 callers an hour.
Brother Manu van Hecke, the abbot of the St Sixtus abbey, said he was determined to ensure the Cistercian monastery maintained control after a recent incident in which their bottles were found on sale in a Dutch supermarket.
Reuters
MADRID/BARCELONA (Reuters) - As Spain’s Socialists seek a partner to form a national government two months after a parliamentary election, the splintering of Spanish politics is being felt right down to regional and municipal level.
The far-right Vox party on Monday suspended coalition talks with the conservatives over the Madrid region after a row over the Madrid municipality.
And the center-right Ciudadanos, another relative newcomer, broke with its unsuccessful candidate for Barcelona mayor, who had criticized its policy of making alliances with Vox.
Meanwhile, senior Socialist Jose Luis Abalos said outgoing prime minister Pedro Sanchez would ask parliament “soon” to give him a new term, but without saying when, or with whose support.
ENVIRONMENT, SCIENCE, AND HEALTH
Climate Central (6/5/2019)
Happy meteorological summer! While many view summer as the season of vacations and outdoor activities, it is also the season of extreme heat. Those extremes can get much more frequent with a seemingly small increase in average temperatures — an increase that is already happening with climate change. Warming summers are endangering health, stressing agriculture, and raising energy costs.
As temperatures rise, summer’s heat is kicking in earlier and lasting longer, with more extremely hot days and longer heat streaks. In the past half-century, summer temperatures have risen 2.0°F on average in the contiguous U.S. Among the 244 cities analyzed, nearly 95% have recorded an increase in average summer temperatures since 1970. The eight largest increases have occurred in Texas and the West, led by Boise, Idaho (5.3°F); Las Vegas, Nevada (5.3°F); and McAllen, Texas (5.1°F).
The more intense heat is threatening health and recreational revenue, while increasing cooling costs indoors. In the western areas with the steepest temperature rises, additional evaporation can intensify droughts that jeopardize crop yields. Droughts and water deficits are projected to be the most severe impacts of climate change for much of the West. Warming itself heightens the risk of heat exhaustion, especially for outdoor workers and athletes — exercising produces 15 to 20 times more body heat than resting does. And when we escape indoors, we can’t escape the rising costs of air conditioning (also a source of warming greenhouse gases). A 2018 Climate Central report found that 93% of cities analyzed are experiencing more cooling degree days, leading to higher cooling costs.
The Guardian
What happens to your plastic after you drop it in a recycling bin?
According to promotional materials from America’s plastics industry, it is whisked off to a factory where it is seamlessly transformed into something new.
This is not the experience of Nguyễn Thị Hồng Thắm, a 60-year-old Vietnamese mother of seven, living amid piles of grimy American plastic on the outskirts of Hanoi. Outside her home, the sun beats down on a Cheetos bag; aisle markers from a Walmart store; and a plastic bag from ShopRite, a chain of supermarkets in New Jersey, bearing a message urging people to recycle it.
Tham is paid the equivalent of $6.50 a day to strip off the non-recyclable elements and sort what remains: translucent plastic in one pile, opaque in another.
A Guardian investigation has found that hundreds of thousands of tons of US plastic are being shipped every year to poorly regulated developing countries around the globe for the dirty, labor-intensive process of recycling. The consequences for public health and the environment are grim.
The Guardian
United States of Plastic, a new series that will run for the rest of 2019, will reveal global inequality and the environmental consequences of our dependence on a miracle material
What happens to your plastic after you drop it in a recycling bin?
According to promotional materials from America’s plastics industry, it is whisked off to a factory where it is seamlessly transformed into something new.
United States of Plastic, a Guardian US series running for the remainder of 2019, will reveal what really happens – and the consequences of our reliance on this miracle material.
Only 9% of plastic has ever been recycled, and today the recycling system is breaking down. Plastic is being landfilled, burned or dispatched to developing nations, where it is probably being disposed of improperly, to the detriment of people who can least afford to deal with the consequences. Plastic waste and microplastics are found everywhere from whales’ stomachs to aquifers deep underground. America is a nation in a plastic-coated crisis.
Science Blog
A powerful new form of computing could help scientists design new types of materials for nanoelectronics, allow airlines to solve complex logistical problems to ensure flights run on time, and tackle traffic jams to keep cars flowing more freely on busy roads.
While modern digital computers are capable of impressive feats of calculation, there are some problems that even the most advanced supercomputers struggle with. But researchers believe new computers that tap into the power of quantum mechanics, which govern the strange behaviour of microscopic particles like bosons, fermions, and anyons could tackle these problems in a matter of seconds.
Building general purpose quantum computers has proven to be exceptionally difficult and currently, only a handful of expensive machines are under development.
Some scientists are instead taking another approach by building computing systems known as analogue quantum simulators in an attempt to find a shortcut to some of the answers quantum computers promise to provide.
Science Blog
In a new study, Stanford psychologists examined why some people respond differently to an upsetting situation and learned that people’s motivations play an important role in how they react.
Their study found that when a person wanted to stay calm, they remained relatively unfazed by angry people, but if they wanted to feel angry, then they were highly influenced by angry people. The researchers also discovered that people who wanted to feel angry also got more emotional when they learned that other people were just as upset as they were, according to the results from a series of laboratory experiments the researchers conducted.
Their findings, published June 13 in Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, reveal that people have more control over how their emotions get influenced than previously realized, the researchers said.
“We have long known that people often try to regulate their emotions when they believe that they are unhelpful,” said James Gross, a professor of psychology at Stanford’s School of Humanities and Sciences. “This set of studies extends this insight by showing that people can also regulate the way they are influenced by others’ emotions.”
BBC
A few years after saving the euro is it now time for the EU to save the planet?
Tackling climate change is among the key challenges for EU leaders, meeting on Thursday to set the bloc's priorities for the next five years.
A leaked draft of the EU's Strategic Agenda also speaks of the need to control migration to the EU and adapt industrial policy for the digital age.
A greener Europe
The green agenda has become mainstream, after months of student-led #fridaysforfuture protests and the #Extinction Rebellion civil disobedience campaign.
By keeping global warming in the public eye the protests helped Green parties in last month's European elections. They won 74 seats in the European Parliament, compared with 52 before.
Their surge, and the boost for liberal parties in the centre, will change the dynamic of EU politics. The cosy centre-left/centre-right majority is now gone.
OBITUARY
The Guardian
Gloria Vanderbilt, an American heiress who became a successful model, designer, writer and artist, has died, her son Anderson Cooper announced on Monday on CNN. She was 95.
“Gloria Vanderbilt was an extraordinary woman who loved life and lived it on her own terms,” Cooper said. “She was a painter, a writer and designer but also a remarkable mother, wife and friend. She was 95 years old, but ask anyone close to her and they’d tell you she was the youngest person they knew – the coolest and most modern.”
Vanderbilt died at home surrounded by friends and family, according to CNN.
Gloria Laura Morgan Vanderbilt was born on 24 February 1924 and lived a storied life from infancy. Her father was the renowned rake Reginald Vanderbilt, the great-grandson of the railroad magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt. Her mother, who married in her teens, was more of a party girl than an attentive parent.
When Gloria was 18 months old, her father died of cirrhosis of the liver, aged just 45. She received a $5m trust fund which her mother used to fund a lavish socialite lifestyle full of travel and affairs.