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.
BBC
Typhoon Mangkhut: South China hunkers down for deadly storm
South China is bearing the brunt of Typhoon Mangkhut, which is deluging areas with heavy rain and wind speeds of up to 100mph (162km/h).
Millions of lives have been put on standstill as flights are cancelled, trains stopped and major roads closed.
Residents in the densely populated province of Guangdong have been in lockdown on the highest alert.
Two people were killed there, according to Chinese state media. At least 64 died in the Philippines.
Mangkhut, considered the strongest storm of 2018, ploughed through the north of the main Philippine island of Luzon on Saturday before travelling west.
Mangkhut is expected to gradually weaken into a tropical depression by Tuesday as it continues to move inland.
Reuters
Philippines says typhoon destroys 250,000 tons of paddy rice
MANILA (Reuters) - The Philippines said on Monday a total of 250,730 tons of paddy rice has been lost due to the strong typhoon that hit the northern provinces over the weekend, according to initial estimates.
The Department of Agriculture said the estimates put the total crop damage at about 5 billion pesos ($92 million), including 1,204 tonnes of corn.
The Philippines, one of the world’s biggest rice importers, had been under pressure to boost its stocks even before Typhoon Mangkhut struck, with soaring retail prices helping to push inflation to its highest level in nearly a decade.
The Guardian
Massachusetts police tweet lets slip scale of leftwing surveillance
At the height of Thursday night’s gas emergency that affected 8,000 people and in which one person was killed, Massachusetts state police posted to Twitter a map of responses to fires and explosions.
It was an image of a computer monitor, showing locations of 39 incidents as confirmed “by MSP Watch Center”, and it included a vital message: “Reminder: all residents of Lawrence/Andover/N[orth] Andover who have Columbia Gas must evacuate, as should anyone else who smells gas.”
But the image also showed something else: a bookmarks bar at the top of the browser window which listed several leftwing groups.
The bookmarks included a Facebook group for Mass Action Against Police Brutality (MAAPB); the Coalition to Organize and Mobilize Boston Against Trump (Combat); Facebook 413; Facebook MA Activism; and Resistance Calendar, which notes timings for canvassing for Democratic or progressive candidates and anti-Trump rallies.
The Guardian
Strawberry sabotage: copycat fears as Greg Hunt orders investigation
The health minister, Greg Hunt, has ordered the national food safety watchdog to assess the handling of strawberry contamination.
It comes as police investigate claims that needle sabotage has now spread to at least six brands of strawberries in four states.
Coles and Aldi supermarkets have pulled all strawberries from their shelves across the country, except Western Australia, as a precaution over needle contamination fears.
Police are also investigating contamination of fruit sold by Delightful Strawberries, Love Berries and Oasis in stores in New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria and the ACT.
The latest contaminated batch was detected in Woodville, near Newcastle in New South Wales. The punnet of Wallace Road strawberries was bought from Coles at the Stockland Greenhills shopping centre, police said.
Al Jazeera
Aid groups strain as Venezuelan refugee crisis spills over
Peru has continued to absorb a huge swell of Venezuelan refugees, more than anywhere else apart from Colombia.
Many arrive exhausted after travelling for days without knowing what to do or where to go.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has asserted that Venezuelan refugees are working in "slave-like" conditions in Peru, a claim the Peruvian government dismissed as "propaganda".
Nevertheless, aid groups and sympathetic Peruvians are struggling to keep up with the mass migration out of Venezuela.
NPR
Meredith Corp. To Sell 'Time' Magazine To Salesforce Founder For $190 Million
Meredith Corp. said Sunday it has reached a "definitive agreement" to sell Time magazine to Salesforce founder and tech billionaire Marc Benioff and his wife Lynne Benioff for $190 million.
The deal, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, comes almost eight months after Meredith finalized its purchase of Time Inc.
In a press release, the Iowa-based publisher of magazines such as Better Homes & Gardens, People and InStyle said the sale is expected to close within 30 days.
Meredith said the agreement is unrelated to Salesforce.com, the cloud computing company founded in 1999 by Benioff where he also serves as chairman and co-CEO. Marc and Lynne Benioff "will not be involved in the day-to-day operations or journalistic decisions," Meredith added.
NPR
Study: A Daily Baby Aspirin Has No Benefit For Healthy Older People
Many healthy Americans take a baby aspirin every day to reduce their risk of having a heart attack, getting cancer and even possibly dementia. But is itreally a good idea?
Results released Sunday from a major study of low-dose aspirin contain a disappointing answer for older, otherwise healthy people.
"We found there was no discernible benefit of aspirin on prolonging independent, healthy life for the elderly," says Anne Murray, a geriatrician and epidemiologist at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis, who helped lead the study.
The study involved more than 19,000 people ages 65 and older in the United States and Australia. The results were published in three papers in the New England Journal of Medicine. For older, healthy people, "the risks outweigh the benefits for taking low-dose aspirin," Murray says.
Raw Story
Trump ‘likely’ to announce new China tariffs as early as Monday: source
U.S. President Donald Trump is likely to announce new tariffs on about $200 billion on Chinese imports as early as Monday, a senior administration official told Reuters on Saturday.
The tariff level will probably be about 10 percent, the Wall Street Journal reported, quoting people familiar with the matter. This is below the 25 percent the administration said it was considering for this possible round of tariffs.The upcoming tariffs will be on a list of items that included $200 billion worth of internet technology products and other electronics, printed circuit boards and consumer goods including Chinese seafood, furniture and lighting products, tires, chemicals, plastics, bicycles and car seats for babies. It was unclear if the administration will exempt any of the products that were on the list, which was announced in July.
N Y Times
North Korea’s Trump-Era Strategy: Keep Making A-Bombs, but Quietly
WASHINGTON — For seven years, Kim Jong-un has pursued an in-your-face strategy for building his nuclear arsenal: detonating blasts underground and firing missiles into the sky, all to send the message that his country’s nuclear buildup is irreversible.
Now he appears to be changing his approach, current and former American intelligence officials say, tailoring it to his reading of the man he met for a few hours three months ago in Singapore: President Trump.
North Korea is making nuclear fuel and building weapons as actively as ever, the publicly available evidence suggests. But he now appears to be borrowing a page from Israel, Pakistan and India: He is keeping quiet about it, conducting no public nuclear demonstrations and creating no crises, allowing Mr. Trump to portray a denuclearization effort as on track.
Mr. Kim’s new forbearance has helped keep a stream of warm words coming from Mr. Trump. A week ago, the president praised Mr. Kim, with whom he says he has forged a special relationship, after the North Korean leader refrained from parading missiles down the streets of Pyongyang during a military celebration.
C/Net
Aliens sadly not to blame for closure of New Mexico solar observatory
After being closed for 10 days following a sudden and unexplained evacuation, the Sunspot Solar Observatory in New Mexico is set to reopen on Monday.
The observatory on Sacramento Peak, which overlooks the nearby White Sands Missile Range, was cleared along with the local post office and a handful of nearby residences, following a visit from the FBI earlier this month. No explanation for the evacuation was given to the observatory's employees or to local law enforcement.
"The Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) who manages the facility is addressing a security issue at this time," AURA spokesperson Shari Lifson said in an emailed statement last week.