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, planter, JML9999, 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.
Guardian: More than 100 dead after powerful earthquake hits southern Mexico by David Agren, Nina Lakhani, and Rory Carroll
Emergency crews and ordinary people were digging with bare hards through rubble in search of trapped survivors after a powerful earthquake stuck central Mexico on Tuesday, toppling dozens of buildings and killing at least 139 people.
The magnitude 7.1 quake, the deadliest to hit the nation since 1985, struck shortly after 1pm local time, causing violent, prolonged shaking which flattened buildings and sent masonry tumbling onto streets, crushing cars and people in the capital Mexico City and surrounding areas.
The earthquake also appeared to have triggered an eruption of Mexico’s Popocatépetl volcano. In Atzitzihuacan on the slopes of the volcano, a church collapsed during mass, killing 15 people, Puebla Governor Jose Antonio Gali said.
As night fell across the region hit by the quake rescuers armed with cutting equipment and sniffer dogs scrambled to reach survivors pinned inside in ruins of offices and apartment blocks amid plumes of dust and wailing sirens. Power blackouts left much of the capital in darkness. Many people remained outdoors, fearful of aftershocks.
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Reuters) - Hurricane Maria, the second maximum-strength storm to hit the Caribbean this month, killed at least one person in Guadeloupe and bore down menacingly on the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico on Tuesday after devastating the tiny island nation of Dominica.
Maria, a rare Category 5 storm at the top end of the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale, churned in the eastern Caribbean about 60 miles (190 km) southeast of St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands, U.S. forecasters said.
Maria was carrying maximum sustained winds of 175 miles per hour (280 km per hour), the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said. The “potentially catastrophic” storm was expected to pass near or over the U.S. Virgin Islands on Tuesday night and over Puerto Rico on Wednesday.
It was too early to know if Maria will threaten the continental United States as it moves northward.
Chicago Sun-Times: Cook County sweetened beverage sales continue to decline by Rachel Hinton
Some retailers have seen their beverage sales decline by around 47 percent, according to numbers released to Can the Tax Coalition from the county’s retailers.
The coalition, which receives funding from the American Beverage Association, teamed up with stores from the Illinois Food Retailers Association. Of the 32 stores that opted to share sales data with the coalition, 24 said that they had experienced sales declines of more than 20 percent. Thirteen of the retailers reported declines of more than 30 percent, and five said that their beverage sales have declined by 40 percent or more with the highest reported at 47 percent.
The data is a comparison of sales from August 2016 to August 2017 to get a “year-over-year comaprison” of sales before and after the penny-an-ounce tax went into effect, said David Goldenberg, a spokesman for Can the Tax.
This interesting column by the Chicago Tribune’s Eric Zorn just came across my Twitter feed.
Maybe the idea of subjecting herself to the brutal indignities of running for Illinois governor or mayor of Chicago, then becoming ringmaster of the circus that is Illinois or Chicago doesn’t appeal to her.
Maybe Friday’s announcement that she’ll step down as attorney general at the end of her current term in early 2019 was simply a move toward reinvention.
Maybe she changed her mind after having said in May that it was “the plan” for her to run for re-election. And maybe, at 51, she sees a better life for herself outside of electoral politics, a life in which she can earn a lot more money and undergo a lot less public scrutiny than she does now.
Maybe the reason she’s passed on many opportunities to seek advancement — including a run for governor in 2014 that looked certain until she bowed out — and now plans to leave politics, is that, at heart, she’s more of a normal person than we, and perhaps she, once thought.
Or maybe not.
Des Moines Register: Shocked by swastikas, white hoods and cross burning in Iowa? You're probably white. by Daniel P. Finney
I read with sadness and disappointment that the national wave of stupidity and hatred passed through Drake University, my alma mater, with racist graffiti appearing on campus over the weekend.
A swastika was carved into the wall of an elevator at the Drake student center, and someone wrote racial epithets on the dry-erase board of a first-year student's door, reported the Register's Jeff Charis-Carlson and Charly Haley.
Drake President Earl "Marty" Martin rightly called the acts "cowardly."
And the students who were interviewed expressed surprise. One student said: "I didn't necessarily think that Drake was that kind of place."
The fact that we're shocked is part of the problem.
Providence Journal: WJAR forced to run pro-Trump programs by Jacqueline Tempera
The company that owns WJAR-TV is mandating the broadcast of multiple programs favorable to President Donald Trump on the state’s most-watched television station.
Sinclair Broadcast Group, a rapidly growing media company that bought Channel 10 in 2014, produces “must-run” segments and distributes them to its local stations nationwide. They must air during daily news programming, Sinclair executives said.
Sinclair is poised to become the nation’s largest owner of TV stations and, with its recent hire of former Trump aide Boris Epshteyn, viewers can expect to see more of the chain’s political programming.
The practice, which has infused a political flavor into the 68-year-old WJAR’s broadcasts, started quietly there at least a year ago.
Three of the segments have rattled viewers and WJAR’s own news reporters, according to Fletcher Fischer, the business manager and financial secretary of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1228, the union that represents broadcast workers there:
‒ The Terrorism Alert Desk, advertised as a daily news update about terrorist activity.
‒ News pieces from Epshteyn, Sinclair’s chief political analyst.
‒ A clearly labeled opinion show featuring Mark Hyman, a former vice president of the company.
These pieces are fed to Sinclair’s 174 stations in the United States every day.
Houston Chronicle: Mexican man fled to Texas fearing gangs, killed after being deported by Fernando Ramirez
The Austin American-Statesman is reporting that a 28-year-old Mexican man who was recently deported from Texas is dead.
Juan Coronilla-Guerrero is believed to have been kidnapped and shot to death last week by the gang members he originally fled from, according to his wife, who chose to remain anonymous and now lives in Mexico with their two children.
In a controversial move, federal immigration agents detained Coronilla-Guerrero six months ago while he was appearing in court for two misdemeanor charges - assault-family violence and possession of marijuana.
His wife said the family violence charge was a misunderstanding and that Coronilla-Guerrero never hit her.
Knoxville News-Sentinel: Nearly half of Tennessee residents affected by Equifax breach, AG says by Jamie McGee
More than 3 million Tennessee residents had personal information stolen through the hacking of credit reporting firm Equifax, leaving them exposed to identity theft and financial loss, according to Attorney General Herbert Slatery's office.
In a letter to Equifax, Slatery pointed to the frustration many consumers have experienced when trying to reach the company, describing long wait times and uninformed employees. He encouraged Equifax to emphasize that its credit monitoring services are free so residents are not confused about costs.
“It is distressing that this massive breach leaves consumers exposed to financial and other harm," Slatery said in a press statement. "Consumers need to be vigilant about regularly monitoring their financial accounts and credit reports, and Equifax must actively assist consumers in those efforts."
Forty-four other attorney generals have expressed similar concerns, according to his letter.
Albuquerque Journal: NM overtakes Mississippi as state with most children in poverty by Rick Nathanson
New Mexico leads the nation with the most children under age 5 living in poverty, 36.2 percent, according to just released U.S. Census Bureau data.
That’s 5 percent more than second place Mississippi’s 31.1 percent.
Two state legislators are taking this information to further their campaign for pulling extra funds from the Land Grant Permanent Fund to pay for programs specifically earmarked for early education.
Drawing just 1 percent more from the fund, which currently has $16.2 billion in it, would free up $136 million a year for those early childhood education programs, and without raising taxes by a single penny, said state Rep. Antonio “Moe” Maestas and Sen. Linda Lopez, both Albuquerque Democrats.
Under the state’s Constitution, 5 percent of the Land Grant Permanent Fund, based on the average of the previous five years, must be moved to the state’s general fund annually, to be used for schools and education programs. Raising that by even 1 percent would require a constitutional amendment.
Washington Post: New health-care plan stumbles under opposition from governors by Sean Sullivan, Julie Eilperin, and Kelsey Snell
Senate Republicans and the White House pressed ahead Tuesday with their suddenly resurgent effort to undo former president Barack Obama’s signature health-care law, even as their attempt was dealt a setback when a bipartisan group of governors and several influential interest groups came out against the proposal.
Powerful health-care groups continued to rail against the bill, including AARP and the American Hospital Association, both of which urged a no vote. But it was unclear whether the opposition would ultimately derail the attempt, as key Republican senators including Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said they had yet to make up their minds.
The measure marks the last gasp of Republican attempts to dramatically gut Obama’s Affordable Care Act, which has added millions of people to the ranks of the insured through a combination of federally subsidized marketplaces and state-level expansions of Medicaid, leading to record lows in the number of those without health insurance. The Graham-Cassidy bill — named for Sens. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.) and Bill Cassidy (La.) — would convert funding for the ACA into block grants for the states and would cut Medicaid dramatically over time.
Reuters: Exclusive: Trump administration prepares to ease export rules for U.S. guns by Mike Stone and Matt Spetalnick
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration is preparing to make it easier for American gun makers to sell small arms, including assault rifles and ammunition, to foreign buyers, according to senior U.S. officials.
Aides to President Donald Trump are completing a plan to shift oversight of international non-military firearms sales from the State Department to the Commerce Department, four officials told Reuters.
While the State Department is primarily concerned about international threats to stability and maintains tight restrictions on weapons deals, the Commerce Department typically focuses more on facilitating trade.
The officials from multiple agencies, speaking on condition of anonymity, say the new rules will cut government red tape and regulatory costs, boosting U.S. exports of small arms and creating jobs at home.
“There will be more leeway to do arms sales,” one senior administration official said. “You could really turn the spigot on if you do it the right way.”
Mother Jones: Trump’s Pick for Ambassador to Russia Says Trump Is Wrong About Russia by Hannah Levintova
During his confirmation hearing today for the post of ambassador to Russia, former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman made clear that, unlike President Trump, he believes that Russia interfered in the US election.
“There is no question, underline no question, that the Russian government interfered in the US election last year, and Moscow continues to meddle in the democratic processes of our friends and allies,” Huntsman said in his opening statement before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
In January, intelligence agencies issued a report that concluded that Russian president Vladimir Putin had ordered an influence campaign targeting the 2016 US election. Still, President Trump has regularly cast doubt on the existence of Russian election interference. In June he called it “a big Dem HOAX!” and later said “it could well have been other countries” that hacked the Democratic National Committee. In his confirmation hearing, Huntsman—who was formally nominated for the Russian ambassadorship by the White House in July—continued to reject Trump’s hedging on this question, reiterating his support for the findings of the intelligence community, and pledging to discuss the matter with Russian officials.
New York Magazine (The Cut): Hillary Clinton Is Finally Expressing Some Righteous Anger. Why Does That Make Everyone Else So Mad? by Rebecca Traister
Back in May, Hillary Clinton addressed the graduating seniors at Wellesley College and advised them: “Don’t be afraid of your ambition, your dreams, or even your anger.”
Clinton, who at the time was working on her quick, raw, postelection memoir, What Happened, has been heeding that last bit of her own advice. What Happened is 100 percent more candid than anything she has previously expressed in 25 years in national politics. But what makes it unusual and unusually valuable — what sent its early critics into apoplexy even before its publication — is that in it, Hillary Clinton is expressing anger, something she was not free to do during the election, even as her opponents, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump, were admired for their ability to channel the rage of their supporters.
The question of whether Clinton could or should have found her own mad voice during the campaign hangs over What Happened. Should she have turned on Donald Trump as he paced behind her at the second debate, she wonders. Could she have found a way to communicate the anger many Americans were feeling? “I couldn’t — and wouldn’t — compete to stoke people’s rage and resentment. I think that’s dangerous … Besides, it’s just not how I’m wired,” she writes, describing the mental diagnostics she was performing as she listened to Trump’s wrathful inauguration, wondering if “maybe that’s why Trump was now delivering the inaugural address.”
Variety: Lawmakers Push for Sex Trafficking Bill Despite Silicon Valley Opposition by Ted Johnson
WASHINGTON — Major internet companies were put on defense on Capitol Hill on Tuesday for their opposition to a piece of legislation designed to root out online sex trafficking.
The bill, sponsored by Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and more than two dozen others, would amend a section of the Communications Decency Act that has shielded internet companies from liability for user-generated content posted on their sites. The legislation would create new liability for internet firms that “knowingly facilitate sex trafficking” via the content they host on their platforms.
“Silicon Valley holds itself out as being more than just another industry, but rather a movement to make a world a better place,” Portman told the committee. “… But the selling of human beings online is the dark side of the internet. It can’t be the cost of doing business.”
But major internet providers, while acknowledging the urgency of addressing the growth of online sex trafficking, say that the legislation is too broadly written.
New York Times: Senate Republicans Embrace Plan for $1.5 Trillion Tax Cut by Alan Rappeport and Thomas Kaplan
WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans, abandoning a key fiscal doctrine, agreed on Tuesday to move forward on a budget that would add to the federal deficit in order to pave the way for a $1.5 trillion tax cut over the next 10 years.
The Republican lawmakers, under mounting pressure to score a legislative win on taxes, say a tax cut of this magnitude will stimulate economic growth enough to offset any deficit impact.
Yet critics say a deficit-financed tax cut is at odds with longstanding Republican calls for fiscal discipline, including that tax cuts not add to the ballooning federal deficit. The federal debt topped $20 trillion earlier this month and is projected to grow by another $10 trillion over the next decade.
Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, who considers himself a strict deficit hawk, said he remains deeply concerned about enacting tax cuts that add to the deficit. But he suggested that Republicans may not solely rely on traditional estimates of a bill’s costs. Republicans have recently voiced concern that some estimates, including those from the Joint Committee on Taxation and the Congressional Budget Office, undervalue the effect of economic growth.
Hindustan Times: US Senate ties defence aid for Pakistan to action taken against Lashkar-e-Taiba by Yashwant Raj
The US Senate passed a legislation on Monday that for the first time proposes to make payments to Pakistan for its cooperation in the war in Afghanistan incumbent on action taken by it against the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the banned terror group founded by Hafiz Saeed.
An amount of $350 million, which is half of the $700 million set aside under the Coalition Support Fund (CSF) for compensating Pakistan for its cooperation in operations in Afghanistan, will be tied to Islamabad’s actions against LeT.
This will be in addition to the action required against the Haqqani Network, which has been part of the precondition for three years. The LeT has primarily targeted India but it has also been increasingly blamed for attacks on American forces in Afghanistan.
This is only a proposal, technically, that will make it to the final legislation only if it is reconciled with the version of the defence budget proposed and passed by the House of Representatives during a legislative process called “conference”, which may or may not approve the Senate’s proposal.
Washington Post: Trump defends ‘America first’ foreign policy at U.N., threatens to ‘totally destroy’ North Korea by David Nakamura and Anne Gearan
NEW YORK — President Trump on Tuesday delivered a toughly worded defense of his “America first” foreign policy in his inaugural address to the United Nations and threatened to “totally destroy” North Korea if necessary.
The president, speaking at the United Nations’ hallowed green-marble rostrum, also excoriated the international nuclear deal with Iran as an “embarrassment” and strongly hinted that his administration would soon back out, against the wishes of many nations in the room.
The defiant and pugilistic speech put the General Assembly hall of more than 150 delegations on notice that the United States, under Trump’s leadership, is willing to pursue an unpopular and unpredictable course to protect its interests across the globe.
Trump called on world leaders to rally in the fight to defeat murderous regimes and “loser terrorists,” and he derisively referred to North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, who oversees an expanding nuclear arsenal, as “Rocket Man.” Reflecting on the United Nations charter of promoting world peace, the president asserted to the room full of diplomats: “Major portions of the world are in conflict, and some, in fact, are going to hell.”
BBC: Norway jails top policeman for smuggling hashish
A senior Norwegian police officer has been sentenced to 21 years in prison for taking bribes and aiding a notorious drug smuggler.
Eirik Jensen, who was responsible for combating organised crime in the capital Oslo, was arrested in 2014.
On Monday, a court found he had received at least 667,800 kroner (€71,300, £63,200) in bribes to help smuggle tonnes of hashish into Norway.
He denies the charges and plans to appeal, his lawyer said.
Jensen's 21-year sentence for corruption was the maximum permitted under the law, and a rare event in Norway.
It is frequently named one of the least corrupt countries, and placed sixth in the 2016 global rankings by anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International.
Guardian: Aung San Suu Kyi says Myanmar does not fear scrutiny over Rohingya crisis by Poppy McPherson
Aung San Suu Kyi has broken her silence on the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar, delivering a speech denounced as a “mix of untruths and victim-blaming” by Amnesty International.
In her first public address since a bloody military crackdown on the Rohingya Muslim minority that has been branded “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing”by the United Nations, the Nobel laureate did not criticise the army and said she did not “fear international scrutiny”.
“I’m aware of the fact that the world’s attention is focused on the situation in Rakhine state. As a responsible member of the community of nations Myanmar does not fear international scrutiny,” she said.
“There have been allegations and counter-allegations … We have to make sure those allegations are based on solid evidence before we take action,” she said in her speech from the capital, Naypyidaw.
AFP: Spain takes control of Catalonia's finances to block referendum
Spain has taken control of Catalonia's finances to prevent funds being used for an independence referendum it deems illegal, a move that limits the region's autonomy and puts in doubt the payment of thousands of public workers' salaries.
"It is a total irresponsibility. They are leading us to an administrative collapse," Catalonia's vice president Oriol Junqueras said Monday, adding the measure was "unprecedented".
Spain's conservative government announced Friday it would take over the payment of essential services and public workers' salaries in Catalonia to prevent it from spending money on the referendum slated for October 1.
Catalonia's pro-separatist government challenged the measure in Spain's Supreme Court but a court spokeswoman told AFP it was "in force" and would not be suspended while judges rule on its legality.
"It is a de facto suspension of Catalonia's financial autonomy," said Alain Cuenca, an expert on the regional financing at the University of Zaragoza who opposes Catalan independence.
DW: Kurdish referendum: Turkey's Erdogan demands vote be called off
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has warned that an independence referendum among Iraqi Kurds would have serious consequences, in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday.
"Steps such as demands for independence that can cause new crises and conflicts in the region must be avoided. We hereby call on the Iraqi Kurdish Regional Government to abort the initiative they have launched in that direction," Erdogan said in New York.
"Ignoring the clear and determined stance of Turkey on this matter may lead to a process that shall deprive the Iraqi Kurdish Regional Government of even the opportunities it currently enjoys."
Erdogan's defense minister was even more explicit and warned Turkey's sizeable Kurdish minority against taking similar action.
AP College Football Top 10
1. Alabama
2. Clemson
3. Oklahoma
4. Penn State
5. Southern California
6. Oklahoma State
7. Washngton
8. Michigan
9. Wisconsin
10. THOSE people
York Press (UK): 'Slug-a-bed', 'betrump' and 'merry-go-sorry' - the 30 old words York researchers say could make a comeback by Victoria Prest (h/t to Smithsonian.com)
LANGUAGE experts at the University of York have come up with a list of 30 words that have fallen out of the English language, but could come back into modern day use.
From "merry-go-sorry" - meaning a mixture of joy and sorrow - to "betrump" - a verb meaning to deceive or cheat - Dr Dominic Watt and his research team say the old words are relevant to life today.
Dr Watt said: "As professional linguists and historians of English we were intrigued by the challenge of developing a list of lost words that are still relevant to modern life, and that we could potentially campaign to bring back into modern day language.
The list of 30 "Lost Words" was formed by grouping the words within themes that Dr Watt believes to be highly relevant to modern life: post-truth, appearance, personality and behaviour, and emotions.
On a Friday morning the word "slug-a-bed" – a person who lies in late - might be particularly useful; but as the weekend goes on "rouzy-bouzy" - an adjective to describe someone boisterously drunk - might come in handy.
My own personal favorite would be the verb ‘'betrump’’ for obvious reasons but I do have to say that I also like the adjective "rouzy-bouzy" even though it has been some years since I have been in that state, myself.
Don’t forget that Meteor Blades is hosting an open thread for night owls tonight.
Everyone have a great evening!