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 and Besame. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) wader, palantir, JML9999, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse, ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Man Oh Man, Doctor RJ, 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.
Subbing for maggiejean this evening; it’s her birthday today!
BBC
US pushes back on foreign takeover deals
The US has passed a new law that strengthens the government's power to review - and potentially block - business deals involving foreign firms.
US President Donald Trump signed the bill, which is part of a broader military spending measure, on Monday.
The measure was spurred by US concerns that Chinese companies are using investments and acquisitions to gain access to new technology.
Those worries are also behind new US tariffs on Chinese goods.
The law was supported by both Republicans and Democrats in Congress, which approved the measure earlier this year.
It comes as other countries, including the UK, consider ways to toughen their scrutiny of foreign deals with an eye to China.
The Guardian
Turkish lira record low ripples through global currency markets
A fresh plunge in the Turkish lira sent tremors through global currency markets on Monday, amid fears that the failure of Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government to tackle its worsening financial crisis would have a domino effect on other vulnerable countries.
Argentina’s central bank raised its key interest rate by five percentage points to 45% following a fall in the peso, and the South African rand was also hit in a day of turbulence that saw the lira fall 8% against the dollar.
Erdogan lashed out at “economic terrorists on social media” as he accused Donald Trump of stabbing Turkey in the back.
But the Turkish president’s insistence that his country would survive an economic siege failed to reassure financial markets alarmed at the possible collapse of the strategically vital emerging market country.
Concerns that the 45% drop in the value of the lira this year would prove ruinous for companies that had borrowed heavily in foreign currencies prompted the renewed sell off of the lira and pushed up the cost of servicing Turkey’s budget deficit.
Washington Post
Turkey’s currency plunge fans fears of new global financial crisis.
Turkey’s plight deepened on Monday as the lira fell to new lows and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s refusal to abandon his unorthodox economic policies left investors fearing a new global financial crisis.
Turkey and other countries that borrowed freely when dollars were plentiful and cheap now face soaring debt payments they may no longer be able to make.
Such worries mounted as the plunging lira dragged down currencies in developing countries such as South Africa, Argentina, Mexico and Indonesia.
On Wall Street, trading screens glowed red as stock market losses that started in Asia spread across North America and Europe.
Turkey’s ills have been inflamed by President Trump’s abrupt move on Friday to double tariffs on imported Turkish metals in a bid to punish Erdogan for refusing to free an American pastor held on terrorism-related charges.
The Guardian
Nebraska set to become first US state to use fentanyl in execution
The first execution in the US using the opioid drug fentanyl is expected to take place on Tuesday after a federal appeals court rejected a German pharmaceutical company’s move to block the killing.
The court gave the go ahead on Monday for Nebraska to put to death Carey Dean Moore on the grounds it is the “will of the people”. Moore has been on death row for four decades for the 1979 murders of two cab drivers in Omaha.
Nebraska has included fentanyl – a synthetic opioid found in more than 20,000 overdose deaths in 2016 alone – in the cocktail of drugs it intends to use for its first execution in 21 years after struggling to buy pharmaceuticals in the face of opposition from manufacturers and distributors.
Moore, who has said he wishes to die, is among the longest serving prisoners on death row in the US.
Moore will be given the sedative Valium alongside fentanyl, a combination increasingly found in drug overdose deaths because they both suppress breathing.
Al Jazeera
Iran's Khamenei: No war, no negotiations with Trump
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has ruled out negotiations with the administration of US President Donald Trump, going toe-to-toe with him in a series of social media posts.
"Even if we ever - impossible as it is - negotiated with the US, it would never ever be with the current US administration," Khamenei said on Monday.
Khamenei, who has the final say in Iran's most important political decisions, said that as demonstrated in the 2015 nuclear deal, his country will only enter into negotiations in the position of strength "so that US' pressures and uproars won't affect us".
"Recently, US officials have been talking blatantly about us. Beside sanctions, they are talking about war and negotiations. In this regard, let me say a few words to the people: THERE WILL BE NO WAR, NOR WILL WE NEGOTIATE WITH THE US," Khamenei continued.
Al Jazeera
Indonesia's Lombok earthquake death toll passes 430
The death toll from a major earthquake on the Indonesian island of Lombok reached more than 430 on Monday.
Bodies were still being pulled from destroyed buildings following the shallow 6.9-magnitude quake on August 5 that levelled tens of thousands of homes, mosques, and businesses across Lombok.
A week earlier, another tremor hammered the island, killing 17 people.
"Search-and-rescue teams are still removing victims who were buried beneath collapsed buildings and landslides," said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, a spokesman from the National Disaster Mitigation Agency.
The total number of people killed is now 436, Nugroho said, with more than 1,300 injured and nearly 353,000 internally displaced.
Reuters
As Canada faces rising gun violence, tighter laws are a tough sell
TORONTO (Reuters) - Rising violence in Canada has prompted calls for the federal government to tighten gun laws but tougher regulations could cause a political backlash in a country where 2 million people are licensed to own a firearm.
In 2016, 223 people were murdered with a gun, a 23 percent increase from 2015 and the highest rate since 2005, according to Statistics Canada.
One of the deadliest shooting sprees so far this year took place on Friday when four people were shot to death in the Eastern Canadian city of Fredericton. Weeks earlier, a gunman opened fire on a bustling Danforth Avenue in Toronto, killing two and injuring 13 before turning the gun on himself.
In Fredericton, a commonly available “long gun” such as a rifle or shotgun was used, police said Monday, adding that the suspect had a permit to use it. In Toronto the gunman used a handgun. It is not clear how the suspects obtained the guns.
Canada’s firearm homicide rate of 0.61 per 100,000 people is about 10 times greater than the rate in the United Kingdom. In the United States, by contrast, four in every 100,000 residents are killed with a gun, or almost 13,000 annually.
NPR
Boardwalk Collapses In Spain, Injuring More Than 330 People At Oceanside Concert
A wooden boardwalk collapsed during a concert in the port city of Vigo, Spain, late Sunday, injuring at least 336 people who were attending a festival. Rescue workers say there was chaos when boards buckled and concert-goers began sliding into the sea.
"Witnesses reported scenes of panic as hundreds of people fell into the ocean around midnight, some falling right on top of each other," Lucia Benavides reports from Barcelona for NPR's Newscast unit.
Five people were seriously injured, including two who were still in intensive care on Monday morning, according to the regional Galician government website.
Police, rescue and emergency crews worked for hours to get people out of the water, set up a triage site and send the injured to nearby hospitals.
The collapse occurred shortly after the concert headliner, Rels B, tried to pump up the crowd by telling people to jump, witnesses told local news site Faro de Vigo.
Many of those attending the show were teenagers; as part of the emergency response, organizers and aid workers helped reunite them with their parents and share details about which patients had been taken to which hospitals, Faro de Vigo reports.
NPR
West Virginia House Votes To Impeach 3 State Supreme Court Justices
West Virginia's House of Delegates voted to impeach three of the four justices on the state's Supreme Court of Appeals on Monday, saying Justices Allen Loughry and Robin Davis should face an impeachment trial in the Senate over the use of state funds to renovate Supreme Court offices.
The third justice the House voted to impeach was Chief Justice Margaret Workman. She and Davis are accused of paying retired senior status judges more than the law allowed.
After two hours of debate, an article of impeachment against Loughry was approved in a matter of seconds, by a final vote of 64-33. The tally easily exceeded the 51 votes needed to go forward with trial proceedings.
The vote to send an article of impeachment against the second justice, Davis, passed by a slightly narrower margin, 56-41.
Any justices who are impeached in the House are then tried in the Senate, with lawmakers from the upper chamber serving as jurors and deciding whether to remove the justices from office.
Raw Story
Trump aide John Bolton met Turkey ambassador to discuss US pastor: White House
White House national security adviser John Bolton met on Monday with Turkey’s ambassador to the United States to discuss Turkey’s detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson, the White House said.
“At the Turkish ambassador’s request, Ambassador John Bolton met with Ambassador Serdar Kilic of Turkey today in the White House. They discussed Turkey’s continued detention of Pastor Andrew Brunson and the state of the U.S.-Turkey relationship,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said.
Christian Science Monitor
France fights flight to big cities with funds for smaller towns
France’s small towns have long had an image of enchanting tranquility for tourists and city dwellers alike. But medical deserts – where the number of doctors in France is 30 percent less than the national average – are a symptom of a larger problem across the globe: An increasing number of small towns are struggling economically and demographically to remain competitive in the face of urbanization. As more young people move to major city centers, the vibrancy and economic viability of small and medium-sized towns are slowly dying. Now, local leaders and grass-roots efforts are working to reverse the trend.
To combat the exodus to larger cities, in March the government named 222 towns that will receive €5 billion ($6.8 billion) in state aid over the next five years – to revitalize city centers, create jobs, and improve transportation and quality of life. After he was told his son would wait months for a doctor’s appointment, Maxime Lebigot and his wife, Elodie, headed up the Mayenne regional branch of a citizens’ rights group whose specific aim is to tackle the medical desert problem. “There are enough doctors in France in terms of numbers, but they are very poorly divided up.”
C/Net (Don’t trust your toaster)
Your smart air conditioner could help bring down the power grid
You probably don't think about your air conditioner all that often, maybe only when you need relief from summer heat. But hackers might be able to use it to bring down the power grid.
Princeton University security researchers have determined that a botnet composed of thousands of connected-but-hacked home appliances, such as air conditioners and water heaters, could cause massive blackouts by overwhelming the power grid with demand for electricity, according to a Wired report. The Princeton team will present its findings at the Usenix Security conference in Baltimore this week.
"We hope that our work raises awareness of the significance of these attacks to grid operators, smart appliance manufacturers, and systems security experts in order to make the power grid (and other interdependent networks) more secure against cyber attacks," the researchers wrote in the report. "This is especially critical in the near future when more smart appliances with the ability to connect to the Internet are going to be manufactured."