Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Doctor RJ, Magnifico, annetteboardman and Man Oh Man. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) wader, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse, ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Interceptor7, BentLiberal, Oke and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on 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.
Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
New York Times: Trump Campaign Aides Had Repeated Contacts With Russian Intelligence by Michael S. Schmidt, Mark Mazetti, and Matt Appuzzo
WASHINGTON — Phone records and intercepted calls show that members of Donald J. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and other Trump associates had repeated contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials in the year before the election, according to four current and former American officials.
American law enforcement and intelligence agencies intercepted the communications around the same time they were discovering evidence that Russia was trying to disrupt the presidential election by hacking into the Democratic National Committee, three of the officials said. The intelligence agencies then sought to learn whether the Trump campaign was colluding with the Russians on the hacking or other efforts to influence the election.
The officials interviewed in recent weeks said that, so far, they had seen no evidence of such cooperation.
But the intercepts alarmed American intelligence and law enforcement agencies, in part because of the amount of contact that was occurring while Mr. Trump was speaking glowingly about the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin. At one point last summer, Mr. Trump said at a campaign event that he hoped Russian intelligence services had stolen Hillary Clinton’s emails and would make them public.
This OGL story is being discussed in this DK thread. The media and intelligence seem to be very methodically confirming the intel contained in Mr. Steele’s dossier (if they hadn’t already by the time the dossier became public knowledge).
And most of it seems to be true.
Sacramento Bee: Trump administration OKs Jerry Brown’s disaster requests by Sean Cockerham and Christopher Cadelago
Federal emergency officials approved Gov. Jerry Brown’s requests to pay for winter storm damages and to support California’s unfolding response to the emergency at the distressed Oroville Dam, the White House announced Tuesday
“I want to thank FEMA for moving quickly to approve our requests,” Brown said, a day after expressing optimism that the Trump administration would come to his state’s assistance. “This federal aid will get money and resources where it’s needed most.”
Brown had indicated there were increasingly positive signs that the Republican president might agree to financial assistance for the storm-ravaged state even with the lingering animosity between the president and a state he called “out of control.” The White House said in a statement that the president’s action authorizes the Federal Emergency Management Agency and Department of Homeland Security to coordinate all disaster relief efforts.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer said earlier Tuesday that Trump was keeping a “close eye” on the crisis at California’s Oroville dam. Nearly 200,000 people were initially evacuated out of fear of a catastrophic flood following damage to the emergency spillway at the dam. They have been allowed to return.
“We hope everyone remains safe as the evacuations continue and we will be working alongside with FEMA and appropriate government entities to make sure that we are doing everything we can to attend to this matter,” Spicer told reporters at the White House.
There had been intense speculation in California over what Trump might do. A website created a month ago, called the Sacramento Dispatch, helped increase concern with a fake news story claiming that Trump had denied the federal assistance for California.
California has been in deep conflict with Trump since the election over immigration, health care and other issues.
WASHINGTON — Mayor Rahm Emanuel huddled with key members of President Donald Trump’s team here on Monday: White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, senior adviser Jared Kushner, Trump’s influential son-in-law and Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Emanuel also traveled to Capitol Hill to meet with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., an outspoken Trump critic who has become a target of the president.
Emanuel’s daytrip was his first of the Trump-era and comes as Emanuel’s mission, a City Hall spokesman said, is to forge relationships with a new cast of Republican power players.
There is a sense of urgency: Trump regularly attacks Chicago for its violence and threatens to “send in the Feds” if Emanuel can’t stop the bloodshed.
Sessions, confirmed by the Senate last week — with only one Democrat voting yes — met with Emanuel in his conference room at the Justice Department.
The two avoided a hot-button issue, whether the Trump administration intends to pursue a consent decree, which could result in the appointment of a federal monitor, to implement sweeping reforms to the Chicago Police Department recommended after the Obama Justice Department found patterns of racial bias.
Sessions opposes the use of police department consent decrees.
Of course, the Chicago Sun-Times neglected to mention this.
And then there’s this next story.
Chicago Sun-Times: WATCHDOGS: 71 percent of Chicago cops’ street stops are of blacks Mick Dumke
The number of street stops by the Chicago Police Department has plummeted by 85 percent in a year, but African-Americans continued to account for the vast majority of those detained and frisked, a Chicago Sun-Times investigation has found.
That’s the case even though African-Americans were no more likely to be found with weapons or drugs than people of other racial backgrounds, the Sun-Times found by analyzing data on stops collected by the department for the first time in 2016.
The police reported stopping thousands of people because they fit the description of a criminal suspect, were found near the scene of a crime, or acted in a manner deemed “indicative” of drug dealing.
In most cases, officers checked a box on their reports for “other” to explain the justification for the stop. The department hasn’t released records to show whether further details were provided.
“It’s kind of a double-edged sword,” says Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6th), chairman of the Chicago City Council’s Black Caucus. He says many of his South Side constituents would like the police to be more aggressive in searching for guns.
But Sawyer says he’s concerned the police continue to stop people without a “reasonable suspicion” of a crime, which is required for an investigatory stop to be constitutional.
“Were the reasons legitimate?” the alderman says. “Or is it still ‘walking while black?’ ”
One of these days, I’ll tell you why I generally don’t get too worked up about Emanuel’s relations with Chicago African-American communities...now is not the time.
Detroit Free Press: More allegations surface against MSU gymnastics coach Kathie Klages by Matt Mencarini
GRAND RAPIDS — During a medical appointment in the late 1990s, Larry Nassar "held down" a teenage girl who "specifically declined" an intervaginal procedure and performed it against her will, according to court documents filed Tuesday.
Those court documents also allege that head MSU women's gymnastics coach Kathie Klages asked the girl if Nassar had performed procedures that included digital vaginal and anal penetration on her.
When the girl said yes, "Klages told (her) that there is no reason to bring up Nassar’s conduct," attorneys wrote in the court documents.
That conversation came before the incident where the girl was held down, according to her attorney, David Mittleman. Nassar treated his client several times in 1997, according to court documents, although Mittleman said the appointment where she was held was the last, or next to last, time she sought treatment from Nassar.
The woman, identified in court documents as Jane IMSU Doe, is the second alleged victim to make allegations against Klages in recent weeks. Court documents filed last month allege that in the late 1990s Klages cautioned a different teenage girl who came forward with concerns about Nassar's treatment of her that filing a complaint could lead to "serious consequences" not only for Nassar but for her.
Klages couldn't be reached for comment. The university suspended her on Monday but declined to say why.
“MSU” = Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Trump policies could threaten Pittsburgh's low-income housing efforts by Mark Belko
As the city battles to increase affordable housing in Pittsburgh, it fears that Trump administration policies could jeopardize a decades-old tax credit program crucial to that ambitious effort.
Kevin Acklin, Mayor Bill Peduto’s chief of staff and Urban Redevelopment Authority board chairman, said reductions in the low-income housing tax credit market could undermine plans to create thousands of affordable rental units in the city, including those at the former Civic Arena site.
“If we don’t continue these programs, we’re going to see a lot of displacement, a lot of gentrification and people being pushed out of their communities,” Mr. Acklin said. “Without those federal investments and tax credits, it would be catastrophic to plans like Mayor Peduto has to keep Pittsburgh affordable.”
The uncertainty comes as the city is looking for ways to finance an affordable housing trust fund, which is intended to supplement federal investments. One option under consideration is tweaking a controversial proposal to raise the 4 percent deed transfer tax by as much as 1 percentage point.
For decades, the low-income housing tax credit has been the primary way to create new affordable housing not only in Pittsburgh but in the United States as a whole. Through the program, created in the 1980s, developers compete for a limited number of tax credits each year. Investors then buy the credits.
The program is administered by state entities, including the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency, which allocated more than $40 million in tax credits for state projects last July, including seven in Allegheny County.
President Donald Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress are expected to decrease corporate taxes, which in turn has lowered the market value of the tax credits. Mr. Acklin said that could lead to gaps in financing for affordable housing developments.
Charlotte Post: Black voters aren't happy with President Trump or Democrats by Herbert L. White
African American voters feel taken advantage of by Democrats and nervous about President Donald Trump’s leadership, according to a national poll conducted for the Congressional Black Caucus.
Black lawmakers discussed the results last week at their retreat in Washington as a guide for the 115th Congress. The results showed African Americans’ dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party, Trump and want more far-reaching programs and policies to improve their communities.
“African Americans are the Democratic Party’s most loyal voters and they should be treated as such,” CBC Chairman Cedric Richmond (D-La.) said. “The results of this survey are clear marching orders for the Congressional Black Caucus – African Americans want Democrats to stop using the same old playbook and to make substantive progress on the issues that affect their communities.”
Black voters, a bedrock constituent of the Democratic Party, are disenchanted, with 63 percent saying they feel taken advantage of. That discontent played out in the 2016 presidential election when African American turnout fell back to 2004 levels – the last cycle before former president Barack Obama’s historic campaign. As a result, the so-called “Obama Coalition” of people of color, young adults and white liberals splintered. African Americans’ perception that Democrats aren’t working to earn their support could pose an issue going into the 2018 mid-term elections.
I will write more about this poll in a separate diary but the bottom line to me seems to be this: When Cornell Belcher says something like this, we need to listen. I’ve hinted around some of his conclusions here and there. Mr. Belcher’s findings in this poll do not surprise me AT ALL.
Boston Globe: Mish Michaels isn’t alone: Many meteorologists question climate change science by David Abel
They observe changes in the atmosphere like astronomers study the stars, analyzing everything from air pressure to water vapor and poring over computer models to arrive at a forecast.
But for all their scrutiny of weather data, many meteorologists part ways with their colleagues — climate scientists who study longer atmospheric trends — in one crucial respect: whether human activity is causing climate change.
Meteorologists are more skeptical than climate scientists, and that division was underscored by the recent departure of Mish Michaels from WGBH News.
Michaels, a former meteorologist at WBZ-TV, lost her job as a science reporter at WGBH’s show “Greater Boston” last week after colleagues raised concerns about her views on vaccines and climate change. She had previously questioned the safety of vaccines and the evidence that human activity was causing global warming, both widely held views in the scientific community.
A national survey last year by researchers at George Mason University in Virginia found that just 46 percent of broadcast meteorologists said they believed that climate change over the past 50 years has been “primarily or entirely” the result of human activity. By contrast, surveys of climate scientists have found that 97 percent attribute warming to human activity.
Miami Herald: Miami trial could highlight alleged ties between Sarasota Saudis, 9/11 hijackers by Dan Christiensen
In moves aimed at heading off an unusual Freedom of Information Act trial in Miami next month, the FBI has released new information about the secretive work of its 9/11 Review Commission.
In one disclosure, the FBI made public how much it paid Reagan-era Attorney General Edwin Meese and two other men who served on the Review Commission, and staff. In another, the FBI put a human face on its effort to discredit a dramatic April 16, 2002, FBI report that said agents had found “many connections” between Saudis living in Sarasota and the 9/11 hijackers.
The FBI withheld the 2002 report from both Congress and the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, known as the 9/11 Commission.
Late last year, in response to FOIA litigation brought by Florida Bulldog, the FBI made public copies of its personal services contracts with Meese, former ambassador and congressman Timothy Roemer and Georgetown professor Bruce Hoffman, but blacked out their pay.
On Friday, however, after U.S. District Court Judge Cecilia Altonaga told a trio of government lawyers she wasn’t satisfied with the FBI’s explanations for withholding such information, the bureau relented and restored those contract details in documents re-released to Florida Bulldog.
The contracts show that Meese, Roemer and Hoffman were paid $80,000 apiece plus $4,000 for travel expenses for 11 months of work.
The FBI also provided new information about payments to more than a half-dozen staffers for the 9/11 Review Commission.
Just over a year ago, Natasha Lucas, an agent for the University of Kentucky’s Owsley County Extension Office, needed a local lung cancer survivor to speak at a popular annual cancer awareness event in Booneville, Kentucky. But she had a devil of a time finding one. It took weeks to track someone down, but as sad as that was, it wasn’t surprising. When it comes to lung cancer, Lucas said matter-of-factly, “there are just very few survivors.”
Located along the Kentucky River on the western side of the Appalachian Mountains, Owsley County had one of the highest percentage increases of cancer mortality per capita in the U.S. from 1980 to 2014, according to a recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Deaths per 100,000 people went up 45.6 percent. But this small, rural county provides just a snapshot of the larger cancer epidemic in Appalachia. According to new research out of the University of Virginia, cancer incidence has declined in much of the country since 1969 — but not in rural Appalachia. In rural Appalachian Kentucky, the cancer mortality rate is 36 percent higher than it is for urban, non-Appalachian people in the rest of the country; in rural Appalachian Virginia it is 15 percent higher; in those areas of West Virginia, 19 percent. People in much of rural Appalachia are more likely to die within three to five years of their diagnoses than those in both urban Appalachian areas and urban areas across the U.S.
Vice: Why Trump Likely Won't Save This All-American Town from Decline by Seth Ferranti
In 1947, when Forbes magazine published its 30th anniversary issue, it selected Lancaster, Ohio, as the quintessential representation of the all-American town. It had the perfect balance of large companies—Anchor Hocking Glass Company was huge—small businesses like shops, and farms just outside of town. To hear Forbes tell it, it was a beautiful, cohesive, nice small town, one of many all across the United States.
Today, towns like Lancaster are struggling to stay alive. Industries have fled the Midwest, opportunities have dried up, income inequality has risen, and many places around America are shells of their former selves, even as the national economy hums along. In his new book, Glass House: The 1% Economy and the Shattering of the All-American Town, out on Tuesday, longtime magazine writer Brian Alexander explores this trend, using Lancaster as a microcosm for what is happening all across the nation.
Alexander moved back to Lancaster, his hometown, and spent almost all of 2015 there. He bought a car, found a place to live, and started hanging out, talking to people and researching. He kept tabs on townsfolk who were struggling with low-paying jobs, opiate addiction, and institutional bankruptcy. I chatted with him by phone to find out more about what he learned, how economic forces destroyed towns like Lancaster, what Donald Trump can do about it, and what the future holds for companies like Anchor Hocking that have sustained small towns for generations.
Chicago Tribune: Official: U.S. military used depleted uranium for first time since 2003 Iraq invasion by Samuel Oakford
Officials have confirmed that the U.S. military, despite vowing not to use depleted uranium weapons on the battlefield in Iraq and Syria, fired thousands of rounds of the such munitions during two high-profile raids on oil trucks in Islamic State-controlled Syria in late 2015.
The air assaults mark the first confirmed use of this armament since the 2003 Iraq invasion, when it was used hundreds of thousands of times, setting off outrage among local communities, which alleged that its toxic material caused cancer and birth defects.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) spokesman Maj. Josh Jacques told Airwars and Foreign Policy that 5,265 armor-piercing 30 mm rounds containing depleted uranium (DU) were shot from Air Force A-10 fixed-wing aircraft on Nov. 16 and Nov. 22, 2015, destroying about 250 vehicles in the country's eastern desert.
Earlier in the campaign, both coalition and U.S. officials said the ammunition had not and would not be used in anti-Islamic State operations. In March 2015, coalition spokesman John Moore said, "U.S. and coalition aircraft have not been and will not be using depleted uranium munitions in Iraq or Syria during Operation Inherent Resolve."
The Atlantic: How Barack Obama Is Like Jim Harbaugh by Gene B. Sperling (did you really think that I could pass up a headline like this?)
As an Ann Arbor native and Michigan football fanatic, I’m one of hundreds of thousands who deeply appreciate coach Jim Harbaugh. In his two years, Michigan has gone from having a 5-7 record, with no national ranking and no bowl appearance, to two 10-3 seasons, a top 10 national power, and one of the best class of recruits for 2017. At the same time no Michigan fan—including Harbaugh—thinks this is good enough: Michigan lost to Ohio State twice. Enough said.
This simple concept of both appreciating that someone’s performance can be excellent even if things could still be better is not hard for any Michigan football fan—or, really, any football fan of any improving team—to grasp. Yet, when it comes to judging the performance of the economy under President Obama, this concept seems to be lost. Way too much political dialogue is forced into an absurd dichotomy that either the economy is flawless or Obama’s economic policies failed miserably. For instance, when I argued on a cable news show a year-and-a-half ago against the Federal Reserve raising rates because labor markets were still not tight enough, it was treated as a gotcha moment by one of my questioners. “It sounds like you’re saying that Obamanomics continues to fail the average American.” Really?
Mic: Hackers just helped NASA save a treasure trove of climate data from an uncertain future by Susmita Baral
While you were brunching and binge-watching your favorite TV series over the weekend, coders saved a large amount of the government's climate science data.
Roughly 200 programmers congregated Saturday in the Doe Library at the University of California, Berkeley, to take part in a hackathon focusing on NASA's earth sciences programs and the Department of Energy. Wiredreported the group of coders had the common goal of saving data that could be deleted or otherwise tucked away under President Donald Trump.
Using web-crawler scripts and patching together data sets, the hackers were able to successfully preserve 8,404 web pages onto the Internet Archive — a digital library with a plethora of screenshots from websites — and download 25GB of data from 101 public datasets.
Aside from archiving, the coders are creating "robust systems" to track modifications to government websites, according to Wired. For instance, the Global Change Data Center's reports archive and a NASA atmospheric carbon dioxide dataset had already been deleted.
The fear of missing data is valid, considering Trump's stance on climate change and the environment. In 2015, while on Hugh Hewitt's radio show, Trump said: "I'm not a believer in manmade global warming." During his campaign, he referred to climate change as a "hoax" at a speech in Hilton Head, South Carolina.
Reuters: South Korea suspects female assassins killed half-brother of North Korea leader by Ju-Min Park and Joseph Sipalan
South Korea's spy agency suspects two female North Korean agents assassinated the estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Malaysia, lawmakers in Seoul said on Wednesday, as Malaysian medical authorities sought a cause of death.
U.S. government sources also told Reuters they believed that Kim Jong Nam, who according to Malaysian police died on Monday on his way to hospital from Kuala Lumpur International Airport, had been murdered by North Korean assassins.
South Korean intelligence believed Kim Jong Nam was poisoned, lawmakers said after being briefed by the country's spy agency.
They said the spy agency told them that the young, unpredictable North Korean leader had issued a "standing order" for his half-brother's assassination, and that there had been a failed attempt in 2012.
According to the spy agency, Kim Jong Nam had been living with his second wife in the Chinese territory of Macau, under Beijing's protection, the lawmakers said. One of them said Kim Jong Nam also had a wife and son in Beijing.
Portly and gregarious, Kim Jong Nam had spoken out publicly against his family's dynastic control of the isolated state.
"If the murder of Kim Jong Nam was confirmed to be committed by the North Korean regime, that would clearly depict the brutality and inhumanity of the Kim Jong Un regime," South Korean Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, the country's acting president, told a security council meeting.
Deutsche Welle: Just who votes for Wilders and Dutch Party of Freedom? by Barbara Wesel
Geert Wilders hails from Venlo, a city with a population of 100,000 people near the border with Germany. Matheus, a local restaurant owner, says everyone knows stories from Wilders' childhood. Apparently all the other kids used to beat him up because his mother was from Indonesia and he looked different. Matheus openly admits to supporting Wilders and his Party for Freedom (PVV) - and is apparently one of the few people who will. He says he is attracted to Wilders' pledges to control immigration.
Robert Housmans leads the PVV in the Limburg regional parliament, where it is the second strongest party. He has good chances of entering parliament in The Hague in March.
"We want our sovereignty back," Housmans said when asked about his party's anti-EU stance. He wants the Dutch state to decide who can and cannot enter the Netherlands, which already has the strictest asylum laws in the European Union.
Housmans does not see a problem with leaving the EU. "It is easy to reach a bilateral agreement with Germany, Belgium or France," he said.
Just why are there so many angry people in The Netherlands, a wealthy country that is enjoying annual economic growth of 2 percent? Martijn van Helvert, a candidate for the Christian Democrats, believes that the economy has made losers out of many people, as has happened in the United States. "Prime Minister Rutte has only spread optimism," van Helvert said. "He says if you work hard, things will get better after four years. But that is not true." As the mainstream parties have lost their credibility, it has become easier for outsiders like Wilders and the PVV to grow support.
Guardian: Journalists shot dead during Facebook Live video in Dominican Republic by Nina Lakhani
Two radio journalists have been killed in the Dominican Republic after gunmen opened fire during a news bulletin which was being broadcast on Facebook Live.
Luís Manuel Medina, the presenter of the news programme Milenio Caliente – or Hot Millennium – was killed while on air on Tuesday morning. Producer and director Leo Martínez was shot dead in an adjacent office at the radio station FM 103.5.
Gunfire could be heard during the Facebook Live video, along with a woman yelling “Shots! Shots! Shots!” before the transmission abruptly cuts off.
The station secretary Dayaba Garcia was also injured in the attack and taken to hospital where she needed emergency surgery.
Police said the shooting occurred in San Pedro de Macorís, a small city 45 miles east of the capital, Santo Domingo. The radio station is located within a shopping mall.
BBC: Jakarta elections: Voting begins amid governor blasphemy trial
Residents of the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, are voting for a new governor, in an election overshadowed by the incumbent's blasphemy trial.
Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, known as "Ahok", is the first Christian and ethnic Chinese leader of the majority Muslim city in more than 50 years.
He is on trial for insulting Islam, after he accused his opponents of using the Koran to mislead voters.
Tens of millions of Indonesians will also be voting in regional elections.
Voting started at 07:00 local time in elections for the leaders of seven provinces, 18 cities and for the local leaders of 76 districts.
The election in Jakarta is seen as a test of religious tolerance in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation. About 85% of the population are Muslim, but the country officially respects six religions.
It is Mr Purnama's first electoral test as governor, a role he stepped into from the deputy position in 2014 when then-governor Joko Widodo became president.
He was seen as the favourite to win - and as a potential future president - until he was charged with blasphemy in late 2016, a criminal offence in Indonesia.
AlJazeera: Opioids: Sierra Leone's newest public health emergency by Cooper Inveen
Freetown, Sierra Leone - The dark street corner would have been silent if not for the grumble of a motorbike. It was nearing midnight, but for Ibrahim Sesay - a 27-year-old motorbike taxi driver in Freetown - the evening had just begun. He pulled four small pills from his breast pocket, gulped them down without water and set off into the night.
"Every night I take tramadol, for the past year at least," he explained, referring to the pills.
"Lots of [motorbike taxi drivers] take it. It helps me stay awake while I work, but now I can't do anything without it. I have to take it when I wake up or I feel sick ... It is scares me because I don't really know what to do and I think it's getting worse."
Sesay said he had never heard of tramadol - a cheap, opioid painkiller with stimulating effects - until last year's holiday season, when a fellow rider offered him one of the green capsules before a long shift.
He started taking just one 225-milligram pill a day, but as continuous use strengthened both his tolerance and dependence, he gradually came to crave higher amounts. Now he takes 900 milligrams, more than twice the recommended maximum daily dosage, and likens the withdrawal symptoms to a heavy bout of malaria.
He is not alone. What was until recently a little-known prescription-only medication for treating chronic pain has in the past two years been at the centre of a rapidly expanding addiction crisis in Sierra Leone - a country with virtually no avenues for drug rehabilitation and which remains haunted by an 11-year civil war during which there were high rates of drug abuse among combatants.
Hartford Courant: UConn Women: The Past And Present Come Together For 100th Win In A Row by Paul Doyle
The first stretch of the season was about finding an identity and making people stop thinking about those no longer wearing a UConn uniform.
But by the time this year's team distinguished itself from last year's team, questions about The Streak were percolating. When the Huskies surpassed the record 90 wins in a row, talk shifted to 100.
On Monday, the 2016-17 UConn women's basketball team reached the milestone. The Huskies extended their record to 25-0, sprinting across the 100-win finish line with a baton handed to them by a team that rode on the backs of Breanna Stewart, Moriah Jefferson and Morgan Tuck.
After beating South Carolina 66-55, the Huskies can exhale.
"Now we can focus on the season, what's next, and what's in store for this team," coach Geno Auriemma said.
While it is fitting that this team, a team expected to lose early in the season, was celebrated Monday night, it also was sharing in the revelry with the other players who helped lead UConn to 100. Stewart and Tuck were at the game. This was their night, too.
Sports Illustrated: This summer, O.J. Simpson is up for parole. How good are his chances of getting out of prison? by Michael McCann and Jon Wertheim
As prison life goes, you could do worse than a stretch at the Lovelock Correctional Center. The inmates at Lovelock—1,680 when filled to capacity—are fed fresh fruit and permitted to watch ESPN. Each 80-square-foot cell is shared by two men. The facility is designated “medium custody,” so the inmates’ relationship with guards tends to the cordial, and violence is rare. Located in the windswept midsection of Nevada, an hour and a half northeast of Reno off I-80, Lovelock sits on a vast tract of land, allowing for multiple prison yards and sports fields.
Lovelock’s most prominent inmate is number 1027820. Controversial as it may be, his record indicates no prior felonies. It lists him as standing 6' 2", 235 pounds, with a “medium” build and “dark” complexion. Brown eyes. Black hair, though in the official prison photo, it’s more salt than pepper and appears to be in a state of retreat. The same manifest lists a series of aliases that includes “Juice.”
O.J. Simpson turns 70 in July. Incarcerated since 2008, he is due to go before the Nevada parole board as early as this summer. Depending on the board's recommendation, 2017 might well be the year that perhaps the most famous inmate in America—the subject of an award-winning documentary and an award-winning scripted show two decades after his Trial of the Century—returns to society.
The Hollywood Reporter: Controversy Surrounds Russian Film Project About Last Tsar's Affair With Actress by Vladimir Kozlov and Nick Holdsworth
Controversy is stirring in Russia over a film in the works about the last Russian tsar's affair with a famous actress, with nationalists threatening to burn theaters that plan to screen Matilda: The Mystery of the Romanovs by Golden Globe-nominated director Aleksey Uchitel, scheduled for release in October.
There are also allegations about corruption schemes involving top Russian officials related to the production of the $40 million movie, which the producers of the movie are denying.
Anger has boiled over in recent days after the second trailer for Matilda, centered on the last tsar Nicholas II's affair with Polish ballerina Mathilde Kschessinska, was released online, leading to threats from a right-wing group calling itself Christian State-Holy Russia to take "radical action" and set cinemas that screen the movie on fire.
Anger has boiled over in recent days after the second trailer for Matilda, centered on the last tsar Nicholas II's affair with Polish ballerina Mathilde Kschessinska, was released online, leading to threats from a right-wing group calling itself Christian State-Holy Russia to take "radical action" and set cinemas that screen the movie on fire.
The group sent letters to Russian movie theaters, threatening to resort to "radical methods of struggle," arguing the movie distorts Russian history. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that threats of that kind could be qualified as "extremism", and the government will treat them "in a hard way."
Pink News: White supremacist gay porn star arrested in drugs raid by Benjamin Butterworth (NSFW)
A gay porn actor and white supremacist has been arrested in a drugs raid.
Timothy Harper, who goes by the porn name of Cameron Diggs, was among four men arrested on the charges.
Mr Harper was charged with the manufacture or delivery of a controlled substance after police found him at an apartment complex with more than 1,600 grams of a substance believed to be methamphetamine.
Paraphernalia “consistent with narcotics trafficking” was also found during the raid in Texas, USA.
Bail has been set at $100,000.
He has previously become infamous for her tattooed body – including apparent Nazi era tattoos and white supremacist views.
Among the tattoos covering his body are a Nazi iron cross on each shoulder and a Waffen-SS insignia on each of his hips.
A feature for Vice on racism in the gay porn industry brought to light some of his views.
Ed. Note: I added the link to the Vice story on racism in the porn industry; the link was not in the original story at Pink News.
The Root: Jeremy ‘Prison Bae’ Meeks Makes NYFW Runway Debut by Yesha Callahan
Momma, he’s made it! Jeremy Meeks, the man dubbed #PrisonBae after his mug shot went viral, made his New York Fashion Week runway debut in Phillipp Plein’s show Monday.
In 2014, Meeks caught the world’s attention after he was arrested in Stockton, Calif., and taken into custody and booked on five felony weapons charges and one gang charge. The Stockton Police Department then posted his mug shot to its Facebook page, and the rest, as they say, is viral photo history.
Although Meeks was sentenced to two years in prison, he managed to line himself up with a manager, who has taken control over his face and career since Meeks was released in March 2016.
During his NYFW debut, Meeks had some pretty heavy hitters following him on the runway. Plein’s show also included Young Thug, Desiigner, Fetty Wap, Sofia Richie, Fall Out Boy’s Pete Wentz and Olivia Culpo.
Don’t forget that Mr. Meteor Blades is hosting an open thread for night owls tonight.
Everyone have a great evening!