Top Items:


Two P.R. Experts at F.D.A. Have Been Ousted After Blood Plasma Fiasco — The agency's chief spokeswoman, Emily Miller, was removed from her position just 11 days into the job. — Two senior public relations experts advising the Food and Drug Administration have been ousted from their positions …
Discussion:
Raw Story, Axios, Political Wire, GovExec.com, The Daily Caller, The Daily Beast and STAT
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Covid-19 Live Updates: 2 F.D.A. Public Relations Experts Are Fired After Plasma Fiasco — A coalition of local health departments called on the C.D.C. to change new recommendations that people without Covid-19 symptoms do not need to be tested. — RIGHT NOW Chancellor Angela Merkel …


FDA ousts top spokesperson after 2 weeks — FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn has ousted his top spokesperson after only two weeks on the job, following unhappiness with the agency's communications strategy. The move sets up a potential fight with the White House, according to four individuals with knowledge of the decision.
Discussion:
Bloomberg, The Week and Kaiser Health News


Rand Paul calls for FBI arrests, investigation into ‘mob’ he believes ‘would have killed us,’ if not for police — ‘It was horrific,’ the GOP senator tells ‘Fox & Friends’ — Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., told “Fox & Friends” he believes he would have been killed if not for the police …
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Protesters confront Rand Paul outside White House after RNC — Sen. Rand Paul was confronted by protesters early Friday morning after leaving the Republican National Convention at the White House. — “Just got attacked by an angry mob of over 100, one block away from the White House.
Discussion:
CNN, Talking Points Memo, Washington Post, Axios, Breitbart, Fox News, The Gateway Pundit, IJR, Mercury News, The North State Journal, Sean Hannity, Florida Politics and ABC News


Protesters confront Rand Paul outside White House after Republican convention
Discussion:
The Federalist, Fox News, The Unz Review, Washington Times, New York Post and Sean Hannity


Biden planning campaign visits to Minnesota, Wisconsin and other battleground states — The Democratic presidential nominee will start doing in-person events after Labor Day. — WASHINGTON — Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden says he's planning to hit the campaign trail - in person …
Discussion:
New York Post and France 24
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The absurdity of Trump's RNC speech, in one photo — Evelyn Hockstein/The Washington Post via Getty Images — Trump tried to make his Republican convention into a celebration. America's current reality is much grimmer. — President Donald Trump's speech on Thursday …
Discussion:
Political Wire

A Carnival of Disinformation — Americans who tuned in to this week's Republican National Convention …
Discussion:
Washington Post, The Daily Beast and The Wrap

3 winners and 4 losers from the final night of the Republican National Convention
Discussion:
New York Times, St. Louis American and Financial Times

Trump Lit Up The Skies (And The Right) While The Streets Raged — And Remade Conventions Forever
Discussion:
Townhall, Alpha News and The Post Millennial


Live Updates: N.B.A. Playoffs to Resume After Jacob Blake Protest — The league and its players' union reached an agreement to restart the playoffs on Saturday after a work stoppage following the police shooting of Mr. Blake in Wisconsin. — RIGHT NOW The league and the players also announced …
Discussion:
ABC News, CBS Philly, TheBlaze, CBS San Francisco, New York Post and The Post Millennial
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The Trap The Democrats Walked Right Into — If law and order are what this election is about, they will lose it. … It finally happened. We have lethal battles in the streets between the two tribes of our polarized politics. This week, a 17-year-old man, Kyle Rittenhouse …
Discussion:
The Atlantic and GEN


This Is How Biden Loses — Here is a prediction about the November election: If Donald Trump wins, in a trustworthy vote, what's happening this week in Kenosha, Wisconsin, will be one reason. Maybe the reason. And yet Joe Biden has it in his power to spare the country a second Trump term.
Discussion:
The Hill, Breitbart, Washington Free Beacon, Townhall, The Federalist and The Daily Caller


Fox News Host Greg Gutfeld Pulls a 180 on Trump's ‘Very Fine People’ in Charlottesville, Now Calls It a ‘Hoax’ — Gutfeld was one of the more forceful critics of Trump's equivocating on neo-Nazi marchers, but three years later he's all-in on defending the president.


Mary Trump says GOP convention ‘disturbing to watch,’ calls portrayal of president a sham — President Donald Trump's wife and children spoke on the first three nights of the Republican National Convention — and his niece showed up for the grand finale. — Mary Trump, who wrote …
Discussion:
Reuters, Breitbart, Raw Story and POLITICUSUSA
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Ivanka Is an Idiot but Unequivocally the Smartest Trump — In the last RNC episode of The New Abnormal, GOP operative Tim Miller makes a hilarious wager about Trump and his family and the trio rate the Trump kids. — Trump and everyone in his orbit tell lots of lies and questionable truths …
Discussion:
Raw Story
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The Malign Fantasy of Donald Trump's Convention — Using the White House as his prop, the President makes war on Joe Biden, and pretends the pandemic is all but defeated. — For four years, Donald Trump has been asking us to believe the unbelievable, to accept the unthinkable, to replace harsh realities with simple fantasies.
Discussion:
New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, Politico, New York Times, Raw Story, The National Interest and Variety


House committee launches contempt proceedings against Pompeo — The House Foreign Affairs Committee announced Friday that it will launch contempt proceedings against Secretary of State Mike Pompeo over his refusal to comply with a subpoena for records related to the State Department's involvement …
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Facebook Employees Slammed Zuckerberg Over Militia Groups And QAnon After Kenosha — Frustrated Facebook employees slammed CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Thursday during a companywide meeting, questioning his leadership and decision-making, following a week in which the platform promoted violent conspiracy theories …
Discussion:
Input, Detroit Metro Times, The Guardian, The Verge and Vanity Fair, more at Techmeme »


Data for August 26 — As of 5 p.m. on August 27, 2020 there were 24,952 cases of novel coronavirus (COVID-19) with 290 deaths due to COVID-19 reported among Mecklenburg County residents. — Of note, approximately 792 COVID-19 tests were conducted among individuals attending …
Discussion:
Associated Press, The Hill, Politico, Reuters, The Daily Caller, Forbes and The US Sun


US to reduce troop level in Iraq to 3,500 from 5,200 — The Iraqi military's progress was cited as a reason for the drawdown. — The U.S. plans to reduce troop levels in Iraq to 3,500 from about 5,200, a U.S. official confirmed to ABC News. — The reduction in forces had been anticipated …
Discussion:
Associated Press
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Barron Trump Is Tall, Conservatives Freak Out When Liberals Point Out This Fact — Trump's 14-year-old son towered over Mike Pence last night. That's NOT an “attack on a child.” — One would think that after what the Right spent years spewing about Chelsea Clinton and the Obama girls …
Discussion:
Althouse


Company that owns President Trump's Vancouver hotel files for bankruptcy — The company that owns the Trump International Hotel in Vancouver, Canada, has filed for bankruptcy, according to Canadian records — raising questions about the future of one of President Trump's newest hotel, just three years after it opened.
Discussion:
disclosure.bursamalaysia.com and Mother Jones


MGM Resorts Lays off 18,000 Workers — Casino industry struggles to regain business after pandemic shutdowns — MGM Resorts International MGM 5.15% is laying off 18,000 furloughed workers in the U.S. as a global travel slowdown impedes the casino industry's recovery from the ongoing pandemic.
Discussion:
CBS Boston

Russia releases secret footage of 1961 ‘Tsar Bomba’ hydrogen blast — MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia has released previously classified footage of the world's largest nuclear explosion, caused when the Soviet Union detonated the so-called Tsar Bomba almost 60 years ago.
Discussion:
The Daily Caller


Top Colorado RNC official spread conspiracy theories and made Islamophobic and sexist comments — (CNN)A recently installed Republican National Committee official for the state of Colorado has a history of spreading conspiracies and making sexist and Islamophobic comments.


A Word Not Uttered by Republican Officials at the Convention: Obamacare — A longtime refrain, promise and rallying cry is gone. — In 2012, right in the middle of his convention speech, Mitt Romney declared Obamacare repeal a crucial priority. It was part of his five-part plan for a “better future.”


Billionaire Trump friend and donor Ronald Lauder goes quiet on the fundraising front in 2020 — Fundraisers and friends of the president's have yet to hear from billionaire Ronald Lauder on whether he plans to give larger contributions to Trump's re-election.
Discussion:
Raw Story


Trump's parade of desperate lies reveals one big and awful truth — When Donald Trump accepted the presidential nomination from the Republican Party in 2016, he declared to the nation: “I alone can fix it.” — Four years later, as he accepted the nomination for a second term on Thursday night …
Discussion:
Raw Story


Trump Botches His Big Speech and No One Will Care — He didn't put much effort into addressing voters other than his most avid supporters. — Nomination speeches at normal conventions are easy. Joe Biden even showed last week that nomination speeches given remotely during a pandemic aren't that hard.
Discussion:
Washington Post and Spectator USA


Democrats Failed The Convention Optics Test — In comparing the DNC and RNC, the optics and the policy contrasts could not have been clearer. And that was even before the fireworks. — In the past two weeks of conventions, during which Democrats' media champions have increasingly raised alarms …
Discussion:
ABC News, Washington Post, Sputnik News, The Daily Beast and Newsbusters


EU mulls sanctions on Turkey over Eastern Mediterranean tensions — BERLIN — The EU is considering imposing economic sanctions against Turkey over its gas drilling activities in the Eastern Mediterranean while urging Ankara to engage in a dialogue, the bloc's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Friday.
Discussion:
One America News Network, Al Jazeera, Bloomberg and WTOP