Will long Labor Day weekend mean another coronavirus spike?

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Americans headed into Labor Day weekend — the unofficial end to the Lost Summer of 2020 — amid warnings from public health experts that backyard parties, crowded bars and other gatherings could cause the coronavirus to come surging back.

“I look upon the Labor Day weekend really as a critical point,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious-disease expert. “Are we going to go in the right direction and continue the momentum downward, or are we going to have to step back a bit as we start another surge?”

The rise in infections, deaths and hospitalizations over the summer, primarily in the South and West, was blamed in part on Americans behaving heedlessly over Memorial Day and July Fourth.

The landscape has improved in recent weeks, with the numbers headed in the right direction in hard-hit states like Florida, Arizona and Texas, but there are certain risk factors that could combine with Labor Day: Children are going back to school, university campuses are seeing soaring case counts, college football is starting, more businesses are open, and flu season is around the corner.

And a few states are heading into the holiday with less room in hospitals than they had over Memorial Day and the Fourth of July. Alabama, for example, had about 800 people hospitalized with the virus on July 1. This week, it has just under 1,000.

More beaches will be open on Labor Day than on Memorial Day, but Fauci said that is not cause in itself for concern, as long as people keep their distance.

“I would rather see someone on a beach, being physically separated enough, than someone crowded in an indoor bar,” he said.

The outbreak is blamed for about 187,000 deaths and almost 6.2 million confirmed infections in the U.S., by far the highest totals in the world. Cases of COVID-19, which spiked from about 20,000 per day to around 70,000 during the summertime surge in the South, are now down to about 40,000.

Dr. Albert Ko, a Yale University epidemiologist, said he is concerned about students heading back to school across the nation next week after coming back from holiday travel and a weekend of social gatherings.

“Any transmission events that happen here could be amplified unless we’re careful about it,” Ko said. “Whether it’s going to be a perfect storm, l don’t think so. People are aware of the risk, and people have been socially distancing. But this is certainly a concern.”

Associated Press

Virus testing in the US is dropping, even as deaths mount

U.S. testing for the coronavirus is dropping even as infections remain high and the death toll rises by more than 1,000 a day, a worrisome trend that officials attribute largely to Americans getting discouraged over having to wait hours to get a test and days or weeks to find out the results.

An Associated Press analysis found that the number of tests per day slid 3.6% over the past two weeks to 750,000, with the count falling in 22 states. That includes places like Alabama, Mississippi, Missouri and Iowa where the percentage of positive tests is high and continuing to climb, an indicator that the virus is still spreading uncontrolled.

Amid the crisis, some health officials are calling for the introduction of a different type of test that would yield results in a matter of minutes and would be cheap and simple enough for millions of Americans to test themselves — but would also be less accurate.

“There’s a sense of desperation that we need to do something else,” said Dr. Ashish Jha, director of Harvard’s Global Health Institute.

Widespread testing is considered essential to containing the outbreak as the U.S. approaches a mammoth 5 million confirmed infections and more than 156,000 deaths out of over 700,000 worldwide.

Testing demand is expected to surge again this fall, when schools reopen and flu season hits, most likely outstripping supplies and leading to new delays and bottlenecks.

Some of the decline in testing over the past few weeks was expected after backlogged commercial labs urged doctors to concentrate on their highest-risk patients. But some health and government officials are seeing growing public frustration and waning demand.

In Iowa, state officials are reporting less interest in testing, despite ample supplies. The state’s daily testing rate peaked in mid-July but has declined 40% in the last two weeks.

“We have the capacity. Iowans just need to test,” Gov. Kim Reynolds said last week.

Jessica Moore of rural Newberry, South Carolina, said that after a private lab lost her COVID-19 test results in mid-July, she had to get re-tested at a pop-up site organized by the state.

Moore and her husband arrived early on a Saturday morning at the site, a community center, where they waited for two hours for her test. Moore watched in the rear-view mirror as people drove up, saw the long line of cars, and then turned around and left.

“If people have something to do on a Saturday and they want to get tested, they’re not going to wait for two hours in the South Carolina heat for a test, especially if they’re not symptomatic,” Moore said.

Before traveling from Florida to Delaware last month, Laura DuBose Schumacher signed up to go to a drive-up testing site in Orlando with her husband. They were given a one-hour window in which to arrive.

They got there at the start of the window, but after 50 minutes it looked as if the wait would be another hour. Others who had gone through the line told them that they wouldn’t get their results until five days later, a Monday, at the earliest. They were planning to travel the next day, so they gave up.

“Monday would have been pointless, so we left the line,” Schumacher said.

The number of confirmed infections in the U.S. has topped 4.7 million, with new cases running at nearly 60,000 a day on average, down from more than 70,000 in the second half of July.

U.S. testing is built on highly sensitive molecular tests that detect the genetic code of the coronavirus. Although the test is considered the gold standard for accuracy, experts increasingly say the country’s overburdened lab system is incapable of keeping pace with the outbreak and producing results within two or three days, the time frame crucial to isolating patients and containing the virus.

“They’re doing as good a job as they possibly can do, but the current system will not allow them to keep up with the demand,” said Mara Aspinall of Arizona State University’s College of Health Solutions.

Testing delays have led researchers at Harvard and elsewhere to propose a new approach using so-called antigen tests — rapid technology already used to screen for flu, strep throat and other common infections. Instead of detecting the virus itself, such tests look for viral proteins, or antigens, which are generally considered a less accurate measure of infection.

A number of companies are studying COVID-19 antigen tests in which you spit on a specially coated strip of paper, and if you are infected, it changes color. Experts say the speed and widespread availability of such tests would more than make up for their lower precision.

While no such tests for the coronavirus are on the U.S. market, experts say the technology is simple and the hurdles are more regulatory than technical. The Harvard researchers say production could quickly be scaled into the millions.

A proposal from the Harvard researchers calls for the federal government to distribute $1 saliva-based antigen tests to all Americans so that they can test themselves regularly, perhaps even daily.

Even with accuracy as low as 50%, researchers estimate the paper strip tests would uncover five times more COVID-19 cases than the current laboratory-based approach, which federal officials estimate catches just 1 in 10 infections.

But the approach faces resistance in Washington, where federal regulators have required at least 80% accuracy for new COVID-19 tests.

To date, the Food and Drug Administration has allowed only two COVID-19 antigen tests to enter the market. Those tests require a nasal swab supervised by a health professional and can only be run on specialized machines found at hospitals, doctor’s offices and clinics.

Also, because of the risk of false negatives, doctors may need to confirm a negative result with a genetic test when patients have possible symptoms of COVID-19.

On Tuesday, the governors of Maryland, Virginia, Louisiana and three other states announced an agreement with the Rockefeller Foundation to purchase more than 3 million of the FDA-cleared antigen tests, underscoring the growing interest in the technology.

When asked about introducing cheaper, paper-based tests, the government’s “testing czar,” Adm. Brett Giroir, warned that their accuracy could fall as low as 20% to 30%.

“I don’t think that would do a service to the American public of having something that is wrong seven out of 10 times,” Giroir said last week. “I think that could be catastrophic.”

Associated Press

Now Trump says it's wrong to compare coronavirus to regular flu

WASHINGTON, United States — President Donald Trump said Tuesday that the risk from coronavirus is emphatically worse than regular flu, reversing his previous statements.

Trump told a White House press conference that "a lot of people" had previously suggested the country should simply let the coronavirus take its course, just like the seasonal flu.

"Ride it out, don't do anything, just ride it out and think of it as the flu," they said, according to Trump, who said: "But it's not the flu. It is vicious."

Trump's clear statement contrasted with numerous recent times when he made the argument himself that the pandemic was comparable to the annual spread of flu.

He appeared to favor this thinking while questioning the need to shut down the US economy through social distancing measures and travel bans.

On March 9, for example, Trump noted that tens of thousands of Americans die from the flu annually.

"Nothing is shut down, life & the economy go on," he tweeted. "At this moment there are 546 confirmed cases of CoronaVirus, with 22 deaths. Think about that!"

Just a week ago, Trump told Fox News in an interview that despite deaths of about 36,000 people a year on average from flu, "we've never closed down the country for the flu."

"So you say to yourself, 'What is this all about?'"

Projections that at least 100,000 people will have been killed by the coronavirus in the United States, even if social distancing measures are carried out, appear to have prompted a major shift in Trump's outlook.

On Tuesday, he said that with no social distancing, the projections ran as high as 2.2 million deaths.

"If we did nothing, if we just carried on with our life," he said, "you would have seen people dying on airplanes, you would have seen people dying in hotel lobbies. You would have seen death all over."

Agence France-Presse

Tech executives head to US Congress under harsh spotlight

WASHINGTON – Facebook Inc, Twitter Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google head before US lawmakers on Tuesday for two days of grueling hearings on how Russia allegedly used their services to try to sway the 2016 US election.

At stake for the Silicon Valley companies are their public images and the threat of tougher advertising regulations in the United States, where the technology sector has grown accustomed to light treatment from the government.

Facebook, the world’s largest social network, added fuel to the debate on Monday when it told Congress in written testimony that 126 million Americans may have seen politically divisive posts that originated in Russia under fake names.

That is in addition to 3,000 US political ads that Facebook says Russians bought on its platform.

Google and Twitter have also said that people in Russia used their services to spread messages in the run-up to last year’s US presidential election.

The Russian government has denied it intended to influence the election, in which President Donald Trump, a Republican, defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton.

US lawmakers have responded angrily to the idea of foreign meddling, introducing legislation to require online platforms to say who is running election ads and what audiences are targeted.

“The companies need to get ahead of the curve here,” said James Lewis, senior vice president of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. If they can, he added, they might avoid regulation.

Lewis, speaking during the Reuters Cyber Summit in Washington, said he expects European officials to watch the US hearings closely.

The US Senate’s crime subcommittee will be the first of three committees to hold hearings on Russia. Its hearing is set for 2:30 p.m. ET (1830 GMT).

Facebook and Twitter are dispatching their general counsels, Colin Stretch and Sean Edgett, to appear before the subcommittee, while Google is sending its director of law enforcement and information security, Richard Salgado.

“Our goal is to bring people closer together; what we saw from these actors was an insidious attempt to drive people apart. And we’re determined to prevent it from happening again,” Stretch will tell lawmakers, according to an advance copy of his remarks.

Facebook and Twitter have taken steps toward self-regulation, saying they would create their own public archives of election-related ads and also apply more specific labels to such ads.

Google followed on Monday, saying it would create a database of election ads including ones on YouTube.

The companies have meanwhile disclosed new details about the extent of Russia-based material, raising alarms about a sector that once inspired idealism.

“The internet was seen as a great engine for promoting democracy and transparency. Now we are all discovering that it can also be a tool for hijacking democracy,” said Karen Kornbluh, a senior fellow for digital policy at the Council on Foreign Relations.

source: interaksyon.com

McCain: How to get started as a dictator? Suppress free press.

MUNICH - US Senator John McCain, defending the media against the latest attack by President Donald Trump, warned suppressing the free press was "how dictators get started."

The Arizona Republican, a frequent critic of Trump, was responding to a tweet in which Trump accused the media of being “the enemy of the American people.”

The international order established after World War Two was built in part on a free press, McCain said in an excerpt of an interview with NBC's "Meet the Press" that was released in advance of the full Sunday morning broadcast.

"I hate the press. I hate you especially," he told interviewer Chuck Todd from an international security conference in Munich. "But the fact is we need you. We need a free press. We must have it. It's vital."

"If you want to preserve - I'm very serious now - if you want to preserve democracy as we know it, you have to have a free and many times adversarial press. And without it, I am afraid that we would lose so much of our individual liberties over time. That's how dictators get started," he continued.

"They get started by suppressing free press. In other words, a consolidation of power. When you look at history, the first thing that dictators do is shut down the press. And I'm not saying that President Trump is trying to be a dictator. I'm just saying we need to learn the lessons of history," McCain said.

McCain’s comments followed Trump’s tweet and came days after the president held a raucous news conference at which he repeatedly criticized news reports about disorder in the White House and leaks of his telephone conversations with the leaders of Mexico and Australia.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel underscored the importance of a free press at the Munich conference on Saturday, saying, "I have high respect for journalists. We've always had good results, at least in Germany, by relying on mutual respect."

Merkel did not mention Trump specifically, but called freedom of the press "a very significant pillar of democracy."

source: interaksyon.com

Trump signs executive order against Obamacare

WASHINGTON -- President Donald Trump on Friday signed an executive order aimed at limiting the "burden" of the Obamacare health law that the incoming US leader has vowed to repeal.

During the signing in the Oval Office, Trump's chief of staff Reince Priebus described the order as aimed at "minimizing the economic burden" of the 2010 Affordable Care Act, "pending repeal."

Doing away with Barack Obama's signature domestic achievement is a top priority for Republicans, who control both chambers of Congress and, since Trump's inauguration Friday, the White House.

In their view, Obamacare -- which aimed to ensure healthcare for the millions of Americans who are neither covered by public insurance, nor by their employers -- marked a costly drift toward socialized, European-style medical care.

Until lawmakers are able to repeal Obamacare, "it is imperative for the executive branch to... take all actions consistent with law to minimize the unwarranted economic and regulatory burdens of the Act, and prepare to afford the States more flexibility and control to create a more free and open healthcare market," the executive order said.

The order instructs the US health secretary and other departments and agencies to "exercise all authority and discretion available to them to waive, defer, grant exemptions from, or delay the implementation of any provision or requirement of the Act" that imposes a fiscal burden or other cost on a state, on consumers, on insurers or on a range of healthcare providers.

Trump has pledged to start undoing the divisive health law on his first day in office, while also declaring it inconceivable that poor Americans are locked out of coverage.

The president has said the law should be repealed and replaced "simultaneously," a stiff challenge given the complexity of America's vast health care system.

Obamacare added more than 20 million people onto insurance rolls, lowering the percentage of Americans without coverage from 16 percent in 2010 to 8.9 percent last year.

Republicans are pledging a repeal of Obamacare -- which has been blamed for sharply rising insurance premiums -- and rapid votes on a replacement bill in order to prevent gaps in coverage and reassure a restless insurance industry.

Only one third of the US population is covered by public insurance -- either Medicare, for those over age 65, or Medicaid for the poorest Americans.

Half of all Americans are insured through their employers, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, while about seven percent are covered through the so-called individual market, which serves those who are self-employed or are employees without coverage through work.

Obama's solution rested largely on requiring that everyone be insured, and providing federal subsidies to those who cannot afford coverage.

Republicans deemed the first requirement too coercive, and the latter too costly.

source: interaksyon.com

At long last, Americans decide between Clinton and Trump

NEW YORK - Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump face the judgment of the voters on Tuesday as millions of Americans turn out on Election Day to pick the next US president and end a bruising campaign that polls said favored Clinton.

In a battle centered largely on the character of the candidates, Clinton, 69, a former secretary of state and first lady, and Trump, 70, a New York businessman, made their final, fervent appeals to supporters late on Monday to turn out to vote.

Their final week of campaigning was a grinding series of get-out-the-vote rallies across battleground states where the election is likely to be decided.

"We choose to believe in a hopeful, inclusive, big-hearted America," Clinton said in Philadelphia before a crowd of 33,000 - the biggest of her campaign.

She was joined by Democratic President Barack Obama, his wife Michelle, and Clinton's husband, former President Bill Clinton

Trump made one of his final appearances late on Monday in Manchester, New Hampshire, where polls showed a tight race.

“Tomorrow, the American working class will strike back,” Trump said. “It’s about time.”

He brought much of his family on stage for his last rally in the state where he scored his first victory in the Republican nomination fight.

First woman president

Clinton went into Election Day as the favorite to become the first US woman president after spending eight years in the White House as the first lady in the 1990s.

A Reuters/Ipsos States of the Nation poll gave Clinton a 90 percent chance of defeating Trump and said she was on track to win 303 Electoral College votes out of 270 needed, to Trump's 235.

But Trump advisers said the level of his support was not apparent in the polling and believed the New York businessman was in position for an upset victory along the lines of the "Brexit" vote in June to pull Britain from the European Union.

"We have seen enormous momentum," said deputy Trump campaign manager Dave Bossie.

Financial markets brightened in reaction to the latest twists in what has been a volatile presidential campaign. Global stock markets and the US dollar surged, putting them on track for their biggest gains in weeks.

Investors, who see Clinton as a known quantity, were buoyed by an announcement on Sunday by FBI Director James Comey that cleared Clinton of a cloud of controversy involving her use of a private email server while President Barack Obama's secretary of state from 2009 to 2013.

While opinion polls showed a close race, but tilting toward Clinton, major bookmakers and online exchanges were more confident of a Clinton victory. PredictIt put her chances of capturing the White House at 81 percent.

Both Clinton and Trump planned to vote on Tuesday - she in Chappaqua, New York, and he in Manhattan. They were then to hold victory rallies about a mile apart in the evening in New York City.

Eyes on Florida, North Carolina
An early indicator of the strength of each candidate could come in North Carolina and Florida, two must-win states for Trump that have been the subject of frantic last-minute efforts by both the Republican and Democratic campaigns.

Races in both those states were shifting from favoring Clinton to being too close to call.

A strong vote for Clinton could jeopardize Republican control of the US Senate, as voters choose 34 senators of the 100-member chamber. Democrats needed a net gain of five seats to win control. The 435-seat House of Representatives was expected, however, to remain in Republican hands.

Voters had to choose between Clinton, who has vowed to largely continue the policies of Democrat Obama, and Trump, who has never held public office and has positioned himself as a change agent. Both were viewed unfavorably by majorities of voters.

The long-running US election campaign has been one of the most negative in American history with each candidate accusing the other of lacking the character and judgment to be president.

Trump, a former reality TV star, reveled in the drama and seized the spotlight time and again with provocative comments about Muslims and women, attacks against the Republican establishment and bellicose appeals to build a wall along the US southern border with Mexico to stem illegal immigration.

But the spotlight was not always kind to Trump, with the release of a 2005 video in which he boasted about groping women damaging his campaign and leaving him on the defensive for critical weeks.

Clinton, a former US senator with a penchant for secrecy, sustained damaging blows of her own linked to her handling of classified information as the country's top diplomat. FBI Director Comey shook up the race and slowed her momentum with an Oct. 28 announcement the agency was reviewing newly discovered emails that might pertain to her email practices.

On Sunday, Comey told Congress that investigators had found no reason to change their July finding that there was no criminal wrongdoing in Clinton's use of the server. (Additional reporting by Emily Stephenson and Amanda Becker)

source: interaksyon.com

Tom Hanks calls Donald Trump ‘self-involved gasbag’

ROME | Movie star Tom Hanks took a shot at U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump Thursday, branding him “a simplistic, self-involved gasbag of a candidate”.

Hanks, in Rome to receive a lifetime achievement award at the eternal city’s film festival, joked with the press ahead of the ceremony about similarities between Trump and Italy’s ex-prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.

“Why the Trump?” he said, imitating one of the many Italian journalists who had asked him the same question, before quipping: “You’re Italian. Why the Berlusconi?”

The star attended the world premiere of his new film “Inferno” last week in Florence.

“Every four years, the circus comes to town in the United States. Every four years, we decide who’s going to be the leader,” he added.

“It’s always at some form of crossroads. Often there is a fever pitch of fear and anxiety. Sometimes it’s warranted, and other times it’s manufactured.”

The two-time Academy Award winning actor said “without a doubt the world is going through something quite profound in which the future is shaky, in which the future is mysterious, in which great parts of the world are dealing with problems that seem as though they have no solution”.

However, “when America has faced those circumstances and times, we have never turned to a simplistic, self-involved gasbag of a candidate,” he said.

source: interaksyon.com

‘Latinos for Trump’ co-founder warns of ‘taco trucks on ever corner’ if Republicans lose

WASHINGTON -- If the United States fails to crack down on immigration, according to the Donald Trump camp, the nation will be inundated with criminals, illicit drugs and job-stealers.

And tacos.

The popular Mexican dish that includes a tortilla shell filled with meat, vegetables and cheese is the latest threat facing Americans if the Republican presidential candidate loses, the co-founder of Latinos for Trump told MSNBC.

"My culture is a very dominant culture. It is imposing and it's causing problems," Marco Gutierrez said Thursday.

"If you don't do something about it, you're going to have taco trucks (on) every corner."

The earnest warning unleashed a flurry of social media activity, with many Americans relishing in the idea of life in a country where taco trucks rule the streets.

"A chicken in every pot, a car in every garage, & #TacoTrucksOnEveryCorner," comedian and actor Orlando Jones tweeted, using a hashtag that quickly went viral.

"If this is wrong. Then I don't want to be right. #ImWithHer," tweeted another user, using Clinton's campaign slogan.

The post included an image of breakfast tacos, a Texas morning staple that often includes eggs and chorizo sausage.

Gutierrez's alert came the night after Trump delivered a fiery speech outlining his harsh immigration plan, which would include stepping up deportations, cancelling President Barack Obama's executive orders protecting millions of undocumented migrants, and blocking federal funding to so-called "sanctuary cities" that bar discrimination against the undocumented.

His rival Hillary Clinton has expressed support for a pathway to citizenship for most of America's undocumented.

Her campaign called Trump's plan part of his "campaign of hate."

"In his darkest speech yet, Donald Trump doubled down on his anti-immigrant rhetoric and attempted to divide communities by pitting people against each other and demonizing immigrants," it said in a statement.

#TacoTrucksOnEveryCorner is not the first time the internet has had a field day with taco symbolism this campaign season.

On May 5 -- the Cinco de Mayo holiday that commemorates Mexican resistance -- Trump posted a photograph of himself tucking into a taco salad, a dish of American origin.

Under the picture the billionaire wrote: "Happy #CincoDeMayo! The best taco bowls are made in Trump Tower Grill. I love Hispanics!"

Many considered the tweet a weak attempt at wooing the important Hispanic-American voting bloc, which Trump has largely alienated.

source: interaksyon.com

Clinton vows to be president for 'all Americans'

PHILADELPHIA -- Hillary Clinton on Thursday accepted the Democratic Party's White House nomination, casting herself as a tireless champion of the people and rejecting Donald Trump's dark picture of America.

Becoming the first woman to win the nomination of a major political party, Clinton promised to be a president for "all Americans," whether they voted for her or not.

Making a bold play for the political center ground in an election year that has seen the hard right and the hard left become louder and more shrill, Clinton vowed to "be a president for Democrats, Republicans, and Independents."

"For the struggling, the striving and the successful. For those who vote for me and those who don't. For all Americans."

Much of Clinton's address to Democrats gathered in Philadelphia for their party's convention was focused on perhaps her biggest weakness come November -- a tough public image forged over decades of withering political trench warfare.

"Some people just don't know what to make of me," she said with a frankness that is unusual in American politics.

"The truth is, through all of these years of public service, the service part has always come easier to me than the public part."

But addressing her image of putting policy above politics, Clinton was unrepentant.

"It's true," she said. "I sweat the details," be it the amount of lead permissible in drinking water or the cost of prescription drugs.

"It's not just a detail if it's your kid, if it's your family," she said.

Clinton also trained fire on Trump's dystopian view of America.

"He wants to divide us from the rest of the world and from each other," Clinton said, mocking Trump's claim that he alone can "fix" the country.

"He's taken the Republican Party a long way from 'Morning in America' to midnight in America. He wants us to fear the future and fear each other."

Clinton also offered an olive branch to those who backed her rival Bernie Sanders, telling them their voice had been heard, even as isolated voices of dissent echoed around the Philadelphia sports arena.

"I want to thank Bernie Sanders ... And to all of your supporters here and around the country, I want you to know I've heard you," Clinton said.

"Your cause is our cause."

source: interaksyon.com

Clinton attacks Trump's foreign policy as a threat to US safety

WASHINGTON - US Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton lambasted Donald Trump's foreign policy platform as "dangerously incoherent" in a speech on Thursday that cast her Republican rival as both a frightening and laughable figure.

In remarks that at times resembled a comedy roast, Clinton unleashed a torrent of polished zingers and one-liners to attack Trump's policies and character, suggesting Trump might start a nuclear war if elected to the White House simply because "somebody got under his very thin skin."

"Donald Trump's ideas are not just different, they are dangerously incoherent," she said to a room of supporters in San Diego, California. "They're not even really ideas, just a series of bizarre rants, personal feuds and outright lies."

Clinton, the front-runner in the race to become the Democratic presidential nominee, delivered her speech as she seeks to shift her attention to the Nov. 8 election against likely rival Trump and away from Bernie Sanders, a US senator from Vermont, who is continuing his long-shot bid for the nomination.

Clinton was speaking in San Diego ahead of California's June 7 primary election.

Democratic Party leaders have fretted about how to best oppose Trump, who managed to knock out all 16 rivals for the Republican nomination in part with his uninhibited style of assailing them with personal insults. Trump revels in referring to Clinton as "Crooked Hillary" and dredging up the infidelities of her husband, Bill Clinton, the former president.

Clinton's remarks were intended in part to show she would not be cowed and that she could go toe-to-toe with him in scornful put-downs.

"He says he has foreign policy experience because he ran the Miss Universe pageant in Russia," she said as the crowd guffawed, and she suggested Trump would run the US economy "like one of his casinos."

During her speech, Clinton predicted Trump, who has been deeply critical of Clinton's foreign policy record, would take to his Twitter account to insult her, and he did.

"Bad performance by Crooked Hillary Clinton!" ran one posting during the speech, which included a typo. "Reading poorly from the telepromter! She doesn't even look presidential!"

Trump has said previously that Clinton is distorting his actual policies.

Two visions

Amid the laugh lines, Clinton cited her own experience as secretary of state, in particular her role advising President Barack Obama during the mission to kill al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, to suggest her approach to foreign policy was the more serious.

"He praises dictators like Vladimir Putin and picks fights with our friends, including the British prime minister, the mayor of London, the German chancellor, the president of Mexico and the pope," Clinton said, listing some of the allies with whom Trump has verbally sparred in the last year.

Obama, who has also been repeatedly mocked by Trump, has criticized Trump as being ignorant or cavalier about world affairs and has said that Trump's rise has "rattled" foreign leaders.

Trump has talked tough on foreign policy. He has said he would bring back waterboarding and other brutal interrogation techniques for terrorism suspects that are widely regarded as torture and were discontinued by Obama.

Trump has also vowed to renegotiate trade deals, called for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the country, and said he would ask members of the 28-nation NATO alliance to "pay up" or "get out." He has said he would sit down with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to try to stop Pyongyang's nuclear program.

Clinton derided these and other positions, promising she would do a better job keeping the United States safe. Standing in front of a backdrop of 19 large US flags, an unusual abundance even by the standards of presidential campaign events, Clinton painted the election as a choice between "two very different visions."

"One that's angry, afraid and based on the idea that America is fundamentally weak and in decline," she said, summing up Trumpism. "The other is hopeful, generous and confident in the knowledge that America is great, just like we always have been."

Trump has criticized Clinton for her handling of foreign policy during her 2009-2013 stint as secretary of state, including the Sept. 11, 2012, attack by Islamist militants on a US diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya, that killed the US ambassador and three other Americans.

He cites Clinton's support for the war in Iraq, launched by former Republican President George W. Bush, as another example of her shortcomings.

Democratic challenger Sanders echoed Clinton's concerns about Trump after her speech, though he also criticized Clinton's foreign policy. "I agree ... that Donald Trump's foreign policy ideas are incredibly reckless and irresponsible," Sanders said in a statement.

In criticizing Clinton, Sanders cited her vote for the war in Iraq, calling it "the worst foreign policy blunder in modern American history," and said "she has been a proponent of regime change, as in Libya, without thinking through the consequences."

In assailing each other's suitability for the White House, Clinton and Trump are reflecting a negative voter mood ahead of next month's party conventions that will choose the presidential nominees.

Both Clinton and Trump are facing record-low favorability ratings. A Reuters/Ipsos poll taken Friday through Tuesday shows half of Trump supporters say the primary reason they are going to vote for him is "I don't want Hillary Clinton to win," while 41 percent of Clinton supporters cite their primary reason as not wanting Trump to win. (Additional reporting by Chris Khan in New York and Ginger Gibson in Washington)

source: interaksyon.com

Clinton, Trump move closer to White House nominations

CLEVELAND -- Hillary Clinton took a monumental step toward clinching the Democratic party's White House nomination Tuesday, while Donald Trump's seemingly unstoppable rush to victory hit a bump in Ohio.

Trump won key Republican primaries in Illinois, North Carolina and Florida -- where he thumped home state Senator Marco Rubio, who immediately announced he was suspending his presidential campaign.

"This was an amazing evening," a buoyant Trump told supporters. "We're going to win, win, win and we're not stopping."

Rubio's loss was a major setback for Republicans trying to stop the bellicose businessman, whose populist anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim stance they fear will split the party.

The 69-year-old Trump was clinging to a narrow lead in Missouri with nearly all of the votes counted, but was denied a clean sweep by Ohio Governor John Kasich, who carried his home state, a key general election battleground.

Trump may now struggle to reach the 1,237 delegates necessary to avoid a challenge at the party's nominating convention in July in Cleveland.

"The bottom line after tonight: it looks like Trump will not have a majority of delegates in July," said Paul Beck, a professor of political science at Ohio State University.

Big night for Clinton

There were fewer problems for Clinton, who defeated her rival Bernie Sanders in Florida, North Carolina, Ohio and Illinois. She also had a slight edge in Missouri, according to vote tallies.

Sanders now faces an almost impossible task to catch up with Clinton's formidable delegate advantage.

"We are moving closer to securing the Democratic party nomination and winning this election in November," said Clinton, casting one eye on the general election -- and at Trump.

"When we hear a candidate for president call for rounding up 12 million immigrants, banning all Muslims from entering the United States -- when he embraces torture, that doesn't make him strong. It makes him wrong."

Republicans will now have to decide whether to rally behind one candidate or siphon votes away from Trump as a team.

The scope of Trump's victory against Rubio in Florida will shock the Republican establishment as much as it will raise hopes the party can challenge in the one-time swing state come November 8.

President Barack Obama carried the state in both the 2008 and 2012 elections.

Rubio bowed out, saying: "While it is not God's plan that I be president in 2016 or maybe ever, and while today my campaign is suspended, the fact that I've even come this far is evidence of how special America truly is."

Kasich meanwhile openly called for a contested convention and vowed to campaign on.

"I want to remind you, again tonight, that I will not take the low road to the highest office in the land," he said.

Ted Cruz, an ultra-conservative senator from Texas, also remains in the Republican race.

Projections by US media showed him just behind Trump in Missouri, and in second place in Illinois and North Carolina.

Cruz made a call for Republicans to unity against Trump behind him.

"Donald may be the one person on the face of the earth that Hillary Clinton can beat in the general election," he said, telling Republicans they now face "a clear choice."

'Vulgar and divisive'

Trump's incendiary attacks on immigrants, threats of mass deportations and a proposal for a wall on the border with Mexico have ignited the campaign trail and drawn condemnation in some quarters -- the latest being from President Barack Obama.

Without pointing the finger directly at Trump, Obama professed to being "dismayed" at some of the comments during campaigning.

"We have heard vulgar and divisive rhetoric aimed at women and minorities -- at Americans who don’t look like 'us,' or pray like 'us,' or vote like we do," said the president, who along with his wife Michelle cast absentee ballots in their home state of Illinois.

But Trump's populist message has resonated -- even with some Democrats like 69-year-old Katharine Berry.

"We don't need all these illegals," she told AFP outside a polling station at the Zion Lutheran Church in Canton. "They're taking our jobs, they've got all these rights, Americans don't have rights.

"I voted Democrat today. But if Trump wins, then I'm going to vote for him in the general election."

source: interaksyon.com

US payrolls surge, bolster Fed rate hike prospects

WASHINGTON - US employment gains surged in February, the clearest sign yet of labor market strength that could further ease fears the economy was heading into recession and allow the Federal Reserve to gradually raise interest rates this year.

Nonfarm payrolls increased by 242,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department said on Friday. The unemployment rate held at an eight-year low of 4.9 percent even as more people piled into the labor market.

"This is the best news the Fed could have expected going into the meeting. With jobs bouncing back, you can be sure that rate hikes are just around the corner," said Chris Rupkey, chief economist at MUFG Union Bank in New York.

The economy added 30,000 more jobs in December and January than previously reported. The only blemish in the report was a three-cent drop in average hourly earnings, but that was mostly because of a calendar quirk.

The average length of the workweek also fell last month.

Economists had forecast employment increasing by 190,000 last month and the jobless rate holding steady.

The employment report added to data such as consumer and business spending in suggesting the economy had regained momentum after growth slowed to a 1.0 percent annual rate in the fourth quarter. Growth estimates for the first quarter are around a 2.5 percent rate.

Fears of a recession in the wake of poor economic reports in December and slowing growth in China sparked a global stock market rout at the start of the year, causing financial market conditions to tighten.

Financial markets have priced out bets of a rate rise at the Fed's March 15-16 policy meeting and see a roughly 50 percent chance of a hike at the September and November meetings, according to CME FedWatch.

Economists, however, believe the strong jobs market and improved growth outlook, together with signs that inflation is creeping up, could prompt the Fed to lift borrowing costs in June.

The Fed raised its key overnight interest rate in December for the first time in nearly a decade.

Prices of U.S. Treasuries fell after the data, while U.S. stock index futures rose. The U.S. dollar gained against the euro and hit session highs against the yen and Swiss franc.

Slower wage growth
Fed Chair Janet Yellen has said the economy needs to create just under 100,000 jobs a month to keep up with growth in the working-age population.

The labor force participation rate, or the share of working-age Americans who are employed or at least looking for a job, increased two-tenths of a percentage point to 62.9 percent, the highest level in just over a year.

Adding to the report's strength, a broad measure of joblessness that includes people who want to work but have given up searching and those working part-time because they cannot find full-time employment fell two-tenths of a percentage point to 9.7 percent.

The employment-to-population ratio also increased to 59.8 percent last month, the highest since April 2009, from 59.6 percent in January.

While wage growth weakened in February, it was largely payback for January's jump, which was driven by a calendar quirk. Growth in wages is seen accelerating as the labor market settles into full employment.

The drop in average hourly earnings lowered the year-on-year gain in earnings to 2.2 percent from 2.5 percent in January. The average workweek fell to 34.4 hours from 34.6 hours in January.

In February, job gains were almost broad-based, though manufacturing and mining employment fell. The services sector created 245,000 jobs after adding 153,000 jobs in January. Mining lost a further 18,000 jobs after shedding 9,000 positions in January.

Mining payrolls have declined by 171,000 jobs since peaking in September 2014, with three-fourths of the losses in support activities. More losses are likely after oilfield services provider Halliburton Co. said last month it would cut a further 5,000 jobs because of a prolonged slump in oil prices.

Manufacturing employment lost 16,000 jobs, reversing some of January's surprise increase. Private education jobs rebounded after plunging in January. Construction payrolls increased 19,000 and government added 12,000 jobs.

source: interaksyon.com

Record US lottery jackpot hits $950 million

NEW YORK - Americans with dreams of life-changing riches flocked Saturday to buy lottery tickets and a chance at winning the record $948.9 million jackpot, the largest in US history.

The winning numbers, announced just before 0400 GMT, are 32-16-19-57-34 and the Powerball is 13, organizers said.

No winner has yet been announced, but one person could take home a lump sum of $558 million before taxes, they said.

The jackpot began on November 7, but rolled over a surprising 19 times before Saturday.

The Powerball prize skyrocketed from $800 million on Friday, fueling excitement across the US.

Saturday's prize shatters the previous record for a US lottery jackpot of $656 million, scooped up by three winning tickets in North Carolina, Puerto Rico, and Texas in March 2012.

In the Powerball lottery, which takes place each Wednesday and Saturday at 10:59 p.m. (0359 GMT), five white balls are drawn from a drum containing 69 balls. One red one is pulled from a drum with 26.

To win the jackpot, a ticket holder has to match all the numbers on the six balls selected.

The winner can choose to be paid the full jackpot in annual installments over 29 years -- or take a lower one-off payment in cash.

source: interaksyon.com

Mississippi declares emergency as storms in US South kill 11 on Christmas Eve

Southern US states began digging out on Thursday after severe storms killed at least 11 people, and Mississippi declared a state of emergency in areas pounded by tornadoes.

With about 100 million Americans expected to travel over the Christmas holiday, the National Weather Service forecast isolated severe thunderstorms from the mid-Atlantic region to the Gulf Coast and record warmth in New York.

The storm system packed high winds and triggered more than 20 tornadoes in Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and Michigan on Wednesday, authorities said.

A large tornado tore a 100-mile (160-km) path through northern Mississippi, demolishing or heavily damaging more than 100 homes and other buildings before plowing into western Tennessee, authorities said.

Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant declared a state of emergency in areas affected by the storm, saying 14 tornadoes had touched down in the state. Bryant said seven people were killed and one person was missing.

"Everybody is pulling together here in Mississippi today to help respond to this disaster," Bryant said on CNN.

He said shelters had been set up and the full extent of the damage would not be known for several days. Mississippi authorities said some 40 people were injured and a 7-year-old boy was among those killed.

Three people died in Tennessee and an 18-year-old woman was killed in Arkansas when a tree crashed into her house, authorities said.

Thirteen counties in Tennessee suffered severe damage, with a post office destroyed and a state highway washed out.

Emergency crews in Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee were searching for several people reported missing. Scores were injured in the region.

A rare tornado touched down in Canton, Michigan, and about 15,000 homes in the state and neighboring Wisconsin were without electricity. The weather service issued a gale force wind warning for Lake Michigan, where waves could reach 15 feet.

About 500 flights were delayed or canceled at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson airport as the area was hit by a thunderstorm.

Meanwhile, much of the northeast enjoyed balmy weather on Thursday, including New York, which surpassed its record for the warmest Christmas Eve reaching 71 degrees Fahrenheit (22 C).

Cold and snow were forecast on Christmas Day for the US Northwest, including temperatures in the teens in Montana and snow likely in Washington, Oregon, northern California, and Nevada.

Of the 100 million Americans traveling over the holiday, 91 million will use cars, according to the American Automobile Association.

source: interaksyon.com

Weekly sex makes for happy couples: US study

How much sex is enough? Just once a week is all it takes for optimal happiness among married heterosexual couples and those in long-term relationships, said a US study Wednesday.

The findings are based on surveys of more than 30,000 Americans collected over four decades, and are published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science.

"Although more frequent sex is associated with greater happiness, this link was no longer significant at a frequency of more than once a week," said lead researcher Amy Muise, a social psychologist and postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto-Mississauga.

"Our findings suggest that it's important to maintain an intimate connection with your partner, but you don't need to have sex everyday as long as you're maintaining that connection."

Researchers noted that the study was not designed to show cause-and-effect, so it remains unknown whether happiness leads to weekly sex, or if weekly sex arouses more joy in life.

The study was also limited to people in romantic relationships, not single people.

"In fact, there was no association between sexual frequency and well-being for single people," said Muise.

The findings were also consistent across age groups, gender and the length of the relationship -- whether months or decades.

Muise said couples should discuss whether their sexual needs are being met, rather than simply press for more sex.

"It's important to maintain an intimate connection with your partner without putting too much pressure on engaging in sex as frequently as possible," she said.

source: interaksyon.com

WATCH | Clueless Americans decipher #AlDub in Buzzfeed video

Buzzfeed finally came to the AlDub party.

“This show is electric! I don’t know what the f*ck is going on but it’s just like a whirlwind of fun sh*t,” says a staffer of one of the internet’s premier merchants of viral content in the video “Americans Respond to #AlDub”, released online on Friday, two days after BBC Online reported about the global social media phenomenon spawned by the “Eat Bulaga” love team of Alden Richards and Maine Mendoza.

The hilarious two-minute video dissects the tandem’s appeal and the meaning of “pabebe” from the point of view of Americans who not only don’t understand a word of Tagalog but also think “Bulaga” sounds like a whale — “a cute whale.”

One respondent even pronounced it “Ba-loo-ga” — as in the pejorative term for a dark-skinned person — while paying the the 36-year-old noontime show the ultimate compliment.

“Say good bye to your ’Desperate Housewives’, ‘Parks and Recreations’. Throw that sh*t out. ‘Eat Baluga’ is coming to the States.”

Watch the video here:

source: interaksyon.com

Jennifer Lawrence, ‘Hunger Games’ stars team up in Ebola video

LOS ANGELES | Jennifer Lawrence says she’d be fine if she got Ebola, in a video that encourages Americans to focus more on West Africans far more likely to die from the dreaded virus.

The Oscar-winning actress teamed up with fellow stars from “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1″ for the nearly two-minute online public service announcement from the Ebola Survival Fund.

The video opens with a montage of clips from breathless US television news coverage of the tiny handful of Ebola cases so far in the United States.

It then points out that none of the eight “American patients” treated for Ebola in US hospitals have died — while in some parts of West Africa only two out of every 10 cases survived.

“A lot of them didn’t make it,” says Lawrence, to which her “Hunger Games” co-star Josh Hutcherson replies: “They didn’t have a lot to begin with.”

“In Liberia, they had 50 doctors for 4.4 million people,” Hutcherson said, before telling Lawrence: “I know what would happen if you got Ebola.”

“I’d be fine,” she solemnly replied.

Mahershala Ali, Liam Hemsworth, Julianne Moore and Jeffrey Wright also appear in the video.

But the core message came from Harvard medical professor and Partners in Health co-founder Paul Farmer, well-known for his work in developing health care in poor countries.

Ebola patients in West Africa, he said, urgently need IV fluids, electrolytes, food and “many more well-trained West African medical professionals.”

“With high-quality supportive care, the great majority of people in West Africa will survive Ebola,” Farmer added.

Two Ebola fatalities within the United States have been reported, but neither were native-born Americans.

Last month, another posse of Hollywood stars including Ben Affleck, Bono, Vincent Cassel, Matt Damon and Morgan Freeman, came together for an Ebola video sponsored by the ONE Campaign.

Watch the video here:

source: interaksyon.com

California to require anti-theft ‘kill switches’ on smartphones

SAN FRANCISCO — The bill would be the strongest attempt yet by a U.S. state to fight smartphone theft, which accounts for more than half of crimes in several of the state’s large cities.

“Our efforts will effectively wipe out the incentive to steal smartphones and curb this crime of convenience, which is fueling street crime and violence within our communities,” said Democratic state Senator Mark Leno, the bill’s author.

Under the new law all smartphones sold in the state after July 2015 will come pre-equipped with technology allowing them to be shut down remotely in the event of theft.

The bill received wide support from California prosecutors and law enforcement agencies that hoped it could help reduce smartphone thefts.

According to the National Consumers League, handheld devices were stolen from 1.6 million Americans in 2012. In California, smartphone theft accounts for more than half of all crimes in San Francisco, Oakland and other cities.

Other states experiencing a rash of smart phone thefts have considered similar measures, and Minnesota passed a theft-prevention law in May. California’s new law, though, will go further, requiring manufacturers to notify consumers that the technology is available on their phones, hopefully prompting consumers to enable the kill switch.

The wireless industry removed its opposition to the bill after Leno agreed to postpone its effective date until July of 2015, the senator said.

source: interaksyon.com

Cellphone unlocking bill clears US House, heads to Obama

WASHINGTON — The U.S. House of Representatives approved legislation on Friday to give mobile-phone users the right to ‘unlock’ their devices and use them on competitors’ wireless networks, something that is now technically illegal.

The legislation cleared the Senate last week. President Barack Obama said in a statement that he looked forward to signing the bill into law.

“The bill congress passed today is another step toward giving ordinary Americans more flexibility and choice, so that they can find a cell phone carrier that meets their needs and their budget,” Obama said.

The lawmaking follows a 2012 ruling by the Library of Congress, the minder of U.S. copyright law, that effectively made phone unlocking illegal, even after the consumer completed the contract with its wireless carrier.

U.S. wireless carriers often tether, or “lock,” smartphones to their networks to encourage consumers to renew mobile contracts. Consumers, for their part, can often buy new devices at a heavily subsidized price in return for committing to long-term contracts with a single carrier.

In December, major wireless carriers – including Verizon Wireless, AT&T Inc, Sprint Corp and T-Mobile US Inc – struck a voluntary agreement with the Federal Communications Commission to make it easier for consumers to unlock their phones after contracts expire.

Under current law, someone who unlocks their phone without permission could face legal ramifications, including jail.

New legislation, welcomed by consumer advocates, reinstates the exemption given to mobile phones in the copyright law before the controversial 2012 ruling by the Library of Congress and calls on the officials there to reconsider the issue during its next round of reviews in 2015, potentially expanding the exemption to tablets and other devices.

“Today’s action by the House moves us closer to alleviating any confusion stemming from the Copyright Office’s 2012 decision,” Jot Carpenter, vice president of government affairs at the wireless association CTIA, said in a statement.

source: interaksyon.com