“At least 20 countries have agreed to end financing for fossil fuel projects abroad in a deal that’s expected to be announced today as part of the COP26 summit in Glasgow. Several countries made a similar deal this week to end international financing for coal, but this new one will be the first of its kind to include oil and gas projects, too. The summit is now in the nitty-gritty phase of negotiations, with groups trying to reach agreements on everything from emissions reporting transparency to forest protection. More than 450 companies across 45 countries have also signed on to the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero, which aims to deliver $100 trillion in financing over the next three decades to combat the climate crisis.” Read more at CNN
“LONDON — Regulators in Britain granted approval to the experimental drug molnupiravir from U.S. pharmaceutical giant Merck on Thursday, marking the first authorization from a public health body for an oral antiviral treatment for covid-19 in adults.
Experts say that if widely authorized, the medicine could have huge potential to help fight the coronavirus pandemic: Pills are easier to take, manufacture and store, making them particularly useful in lower- to middle-income countries with weaker infrastructure and limited vaccine supplies.
‘We will continue to move with both rigor and urgency to bring molnupiravir to patients around the world as quickly as possible,’ Merck President Robert M. Davis said in a statement.
The company has applied to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization, while the European Medicines Agency has launched a rolling review of the drug. Merck said it was also working to submit applications to other regulatory agencies.” Read more at Washington Post
“After more than a year and a half of intense economic stimulus measures, the Federal Reserve is finally -- gently -- applying the brakes on bond buying and other economic supports. This is called tapering, and it’s intended to return things to normal in a way that keeps prices and unemployment as stable as possible. The Fed also hopes the move will address high inflation, which is quelling hope of an economic recovery. Prices of groceries and gas are still rising, with a national average of $3.40 a gallon at the pump -- a seven-year high. This tapering process will have a long tail, and for now, the Fed will maintain its target interest rates near zero. However, it still feels like a milestone in the pandemic, and the results could have a huge impact on everyday people, especially those looking to buy a home or run a business.” Read more at CNN
“OPEC plus countries meet today to decide whether to increase oil production as the world faces a growing supply crunch, fueled by an economic rebound in the developed world.
Oil prices have risen to seven-year highs in recent weeks as demand has steadily rebounded following a steep fall at the outset of the coronavirus pandemic.
Back then, with oil trading at $30 a barrel, U.S. consumers could enjoy prices of less than two dollars per gallon at the pump. Now the average gas price has ticked up to $3.38 per gallon, according to figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
That crunch on consumers is the reason why U.S. President Joe Biden is pushing OPEC to pump more oil and force the price down. ‘The idea that Russia and Saudi Arabia and other major producers are not going to pump more oil so people can have gasoline to get to and from work, for example, is not right,’ Biden said on Sunday.
These crowd-pleasing comments come in stark contrast to U.S. attempts to arrest the damage of fossil fuels at COP26. Asked about the discrepancy, Biden deflected. ‘It does on the surface seem inconsistent,’ Biden said. ‘But … the idea that we’re going to be able to move to renewable energy overnight and not have—from this moment on, not use oil or not use gas … is just not rational.’
That kind of short-term thinking may become the default for the Biden administration, with less than a year until mid-term elections and an ambitious agenda already watered down by the Democratic party’s conservative wing, the White House will be under pressure to show it can deliver something, anything, to win voters back to its side—or at least do enough to avoid Republican attacks.
The issue of gas prices cuts across political boundaries in a country where, pre-pandemic, 86 percent of Americans traveled to work by car.
The United States may well go the same route as China, which has drawn on its own fuel reserves to keep prices down locally. The United States holds roughly 600 million barrels of crude oil in its strategic petroleum reserve, and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm suggested in October that it could soon be put to use.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“The Supreme Court signaled skepticism of concealed gun restrictions.The justices heard arguments in a case involving a New York state law that limits the carrying of concealed firearms. The outcome, while hardly certain, could lead to the largest expansion of gun rights in more than a decade.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Some employers, including New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority, may not pay death benefits to families whose unvaccinated loved ones die of Covid-19. While some are calling such policies needlessly cruel, others say they are in line with some penalties leveraged against workers who ignore on-the-job safety precautions. As employers work to create or maintain vaccine mandates, limiting other benefits -- such as short-term disability payments -- to unvaccinated workers are also on the table. Meanwhile, China is scrambling to contain its most widespread Covid-19 outbreak since the first wave of infections that began in 2019 in Wuhan.” Read more at CNN
“New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy has eked out a victory, becoming the first Democratic governor in more than four decades to win reelection there. The race was far closer than many Democrats had assumed. Combined with a demoralizing defeat in the Virginia gubernatorial election, Democrats are now trying to glean lessons from this week's big races to take into the midterm elections next year. Tuesday’s races provided other road tests as well, like in Georgia, where voters headed to the polls for the first time under the state’s new restrictive voting laws. Activists used the opportunity to try to estimate what conditions would look like in a larger-scale election.” Read more at CNN
“Lost in the public obsession with former President Trump’s loss, grievances and threats to run again: Non-Trump Republicans have had a strong, yearlong run nationally beneath and around him.
Why it matters: Democrats control Washington and hold sway in most colleges and corporate suites, plus much of the mainstream media. But Republicans are thriving despite Trump's tactics and antics.
Republicans kept their distance from Trump and won the governor's mansion in Virginia — and almost won liberal New Jersey.
They picked up a dozen House seats in 2020 when almost everyone thought they would lose a bunch.
Republicans also picked up 154 state legislative seats in 2020 to take control of two new chambers.
These statehouse wins help them draw districts for 2022 that could net as many as 13 seats, according to a Democratic study.
Redistricting alone is expected to give Republicans the five seats they'd need to flip the U.S. House.
Ahead of January's inauguration of Glenn Youngkin in Virginia, Republicans control 27 of the 50 state governor's mansions.
Republicans hold 54% of the nation's state legislative seats, and control 61% of state legislatures, according to a tally by the National Conference of State Legislatures….
The bottom line: While Trump himself lost in 2020, he grew his total vote and share of Black men and Hispanics. Republicans are expanding those gains.” Read more at Axios
“Late Wednesday, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer announced House votes are possible Thursday on President Joe Biden's now-$1.85 trillion bill of social services and climate change programs, as well as the slimmer $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package that had stalled amid deliberations on the larger package. Voting could also push until Friday, aides and lawmakers said. With a flurry of late adjustments, Democrats added key provisions to what has grown to a sprawling 2,135-page package — adding back a new paid family leave program, work permits for immigrants and changes to state and local tax deductions. The Democrats are anxious to finish the president's signature package after drawn-out talks on Capitol Hill were partly blamed for the party's dismal election results in bellwether states this week. ‘Get it to my desk!’ Biden said Wednesday.” Read more at USA Today
“Paid leave is back in the House Democrats’ budget package. In the latest turn in the long-running negotiations, party lawmakers reintroduced plans for the program after earlier dropping it from their proposed social spending and climate bill. The renewed paid-leave idea is still set to face changes in the Senate, where Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.) has opposed it previously.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“WASHINGTON — If at first you don’t succeed, make Republicans vote again.
That’s the strategy Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer appears to be pursuing as the New York Democrat forced another test vote Wednesday on legislation to overhaul the nation’s election laws. For the fourth time since June, Republicans blocked it.
Democrats entered the year with unified, albeit narrow, control of Washington, and a desire to counteract a wave of restrictive new voting laws in Republican-led states, many of which were inspired by Donald Trump’s false claims of a stolen 2020 election.
But their initial optimism has given way to a grinding series of doomed votes that are meant to highlight Republican opposition, but have done little to advance a cause that is a top priority for the party ahead of the 2022 midterm elections.” Read more at Boston Globe
“At least seven people who attended the pro-Trump rally on Jan. 6 in Washington that preceded the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol were elected to public office Tuesday.
BuzzFeedNews first reported last week that at least 13 Republicans who traveled to Washington on Jan. 6 to protest the results of the 2020 election were running for office this year. None were charged with crimes, and all denied being part of the pro-Trump mob that stormed the Capitol to try to stop the certification of President Biden’s electoral college win. The attack resulted in five deaths and left some 140 members of law enforcement injured.
On Tuesday, three of those 13 Republicans — Dave LaRock, John McGuire and Marie March — were elected to the Virginia House of Delegates, as first reported by HuffPost. LaRock and McGuire won reelection, while March won an open seat.
‘We’re in a very conservative district, and a lot of people do like Donald Trump,’ March, a restaurant owner, told the Associated Press on Wednesday. ‘He was the sitting president of the United States of America at the time. We went to see him speak.’
March told the AP she did not regret participating in the rally.
LaRock, who has represented Virginia’s 33rd District since 2014, lashed out at critics who called on him to resign after it was revealed that he participated in the Jan. 6 rally, according to the Loudoun Times. Before that, he had spread conspiracy theories about the election. In a statement released after the rally, LaRock said participants were ‘law-abiding, patriotic, mom and pop, young adults pushing baby carriages.’
‘This event was, for the most part, an outstanding exercise of the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances,’ said LaRock, who went on to falsely claim that those who infiltrated the Capitol were ‘paid provocateurs.’
McGuire did not acknowledge publicly that he participated in the rally until July, when he told The Washington Post. McGuire told reporters then that he didn’t enter the building.
Two other Republicans who were at the Capitol that day — Philip Hamilton and Maureen Brody — lost their races Tuesday for the Virginia House of Delegates.
According to HuffPost, other Jan. 6 rallygoers who won elected office Tuesday include Christine Ead for the Watchung, N.J., city council; Natalie Jangula for the city council in Nampa, Idaho; Matthew Lynch for the local school committee in Braintree, Mass.; and Susan Soloway for reelection to the board of directors in Hunterdon County, N.J.” Read more at Washington Post
“A top police union says cities and states are unlikely to see many new ‘defund the police’ proposals, after Minneapolis voters rejected a measure to overhaul the police department, Axios' Russell Contreras reports.
‘I believe, by and large, that ship has sailed,’ said Jim Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, a national police organization that represents 356,000 officers.
The big picture: The rejection of the massive change in the city where George Floyd was murdered by a police officer came as Republicans made gains and amid rising crime.
The results suggest shifting sentiments about how dramatically to reform policing, a year and a half after demonstrators demanded an end to systemic racism in policing, media and politics.” Read more at Axios
“The American Psychological Association has apologized for its complicity in perpetuating systemic racism. The organization released a long statement saying the field of psychology as a whole has, for decades, harmed people of color, and it had failed in its mission to better the lives of others.” Read more at NPR
“A new PAC focused on electing conservative candidates to public school boards — by raising fears about how race is taught — won three-fourths of 58 races across seven states on Tuesday, Axios' Stef Kight reports.
Why it matters: The wins for the 1776 Project PAC underscore the potency of culture wars and COVID issues in schools — and how GOP candidates are seeking to ride the trend.
Reality check: School officials are concerned there's been intense hype and misinformation about what's being taught in most schools.
By the numbers: 13 Pennsylvania school board candidates backed by the group won their races, plus 11 in Colorado ... nine in Kansas ... four in New Jersey ... three in Virginia ... and two each in Ohio and Minnesota.
They're not just winning in Republican areas. Several candidates won in solid-blue counties: Montgomery County, Pa. ... Passaic County, N.J. ... and Johnson County, Kansas.” Read more at Axios
“After a lengthy jury selection process, Thursday will be spent on motion hearings and getting "acquainted with the court," said Judge Timothy Walmsley in the trial of three men accused of killing 25-year-old jogger Ahmaud Arbery last year in Georgia. A panel of 16 with 12 jurors and four alternates – and only one Black person – was finalized Wednesday. While Walmsley agreed that there ‘appears to be intentional discrimination,’ the judge declined to change the racial makeup. Jurors will be sworn in 9 a.m. Friday, followed by opening arguments. The trial comes two years after Arbery, who was Black, was fatally shot while jogging in his hometown of Brunswick. Three white men – Greg McMichael, 65, his son Travis, 35, and their neighbor William ‘Roddie’ Bryan, 52 – are charged with his murder. Video of the shooting taken by Bryan was leaked two months later, sparking national outrage over a lack of arrests.” Read more at USA Today
“Attorneys are still trying to reach the parents of 270 migrant children who were separated at the US-Mexico border under the Trump administration. President Biden created a reunification task force after taking office, and 58 children have been reunited since then. However, it looks like earlier pledges of financial compensation for such families are now blowing in the wind. Migrant families separated at the US-Mexico border under the Trump administration’s ‘zero-tolerance’ policy were reported to be eligible for significant financial compensation, to the tune of $450,000, as part of ongoing settlement negotiations between the Justice Department and the families' lawyers. Biden said yesterday those families will not get those payments but did not get into details about any other possible monetary settlements for them.” Read more at CNN
“The W.H.O. granted emergency authorization to Covaxin, a Covid vaccine developed in India.” Read more at New York Times
“The Marine Corps released a new plan Wednesday that says it must overhaul how it recruits and retains Marines, suggesting for the first time in decades that threats posed by China and other adversaries require personnel changes that could require some shrinking of the service to accommodate a new emphasis on keeping trained personnel.
Gen. David H. Berger, commandant of the Marine Corps, said that he sees no alternative but to pivot away from a system that through multiple wars has prioritized massing a ‘young, physically tough, replaceable force’ that was ‘not all that highly skilled.’ For the past 35 years, Berger said, the service has turned over about 75 percent of its force each year, rotating annually through thousands of young enlisted Marines who join for four years, while other services retain a higher percentage of troops.
‘We’re the anomaly, and we brag about it — and I think it’s worked for us,’ Berger said. ‘It will not work for us going forward, I don’t think.’
Berger said the Marine Corps is going to have to ‘treat people like human beings instead of inventory,’ making it appealing for more who already have experience to stay. There is urgency to do so, he said, because rising challenges such as China will require mature, experienced service members who possess multiple skills and can act on their own in the absence of communications with higher headquarters.
The plan — titled ‘Talent Management 2030’ — amounts to a significant cultural shake-up for a service that once told Americans in recruiting advertisements that they were ‘looking for a few good men’ and wouldn’t ‘promise you a rose garden.’ It also calls for the service to promote equity and diversity among Marines, create ‘lateral’ ways for people with coveted skills to join the service without starting at bottom ranks, and reduce requirements for personnel to move as frequently.
Additionally, the Corps plans to seek authorization next year to increase the duration of parental leave available to its personnel. The plan calls for primary caregivers to be able to take up to a year of leave, with a secondary caregiver receiving up to 12 weeks.
Berger left open the possibility that the service could shrink to accommodate the shift to a more seasoned force which makes more money. The plan is not meant to create a ‘kinder and softer’ Marine Corps, he said, but to focus on quality over quantity and make it appealing for good Marines to stay in uniform.” Read more at Washington Post
“Among the various supply-chain problems rippling through the U.S. economy, trucking has emerged as a major choke point. Trucks haul more than 70% of domestic cargo shipments, yet many fleets say they can’t hire enough drivers to meet booming consumer demand. The American Trucking Associations, one of the largest trade bodies, estimates the industry is some 80,000 drivers short of the workers needed to keep goods moving freely this year—up from an estimated shortage of 61,500 drivers before the pandemic. Now, the surge of goods in need of delivery has created jams at loading docks and port terminals, gobbling up scarce trucking capacity and making drivers’ jobs even harder. Factories and warehouses are also short of staff to load and receive goods. The freight backup has intensified longstanding strains in the trucking industry over drivers’ hours, pay, working conditions and retention. In the meantime, transportation costs are rising and retailers and manufacturers are facing protracted disruptions ahead of the critical holiday season.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“For months, the NFL has resisted calls to release a detailed report on the findings of its investigation into a toxic workplace culture within the Washington Football Team . Now, under a deadline imposed by Congress, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has until Thursday to release a detailed report on the findings of its investigation as well as the league's general use of non-disclosure agreements. Goodell said last week that the league would be ‘cooperative’ with the request but did not specify whether the NFL would turn over all of the requested documents by the deadline. Tom Davis, a former chair of the House Oversight Committee, said that the next steps in the NFL inquiry "depends on what’s in the documents, and how forthcoming everybody is." Read more at USA Today
“Damon Galgut won the Booker Prize for ‘The Promise,’ a satirical novel about a white family in post-apartheid South Africa.” Read more at New York Times
“The NFL will conduct an investigation into whether Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers properly followed COVID-19 protocols and whether he will be subject to any punishments over the matter. Columnist Nancy Armour writes that Rodgers lied about being vaccinated – and about being a team player.” Read more at USA Today
“Another go | The U.S. and Iran will resume talks Nov. 29 on reviving the 2015 agreement that limits Tehran’s nuclear program, after a five-month delay that fueled doubts the two sides can bridge their differences. The meetings, in which the U.S. and Iran don’t speak face-to-face but through European and Russian intermediaries, will be held in Vienna.” Read more at Bloomberg
“Fall from grace | Few leaders have seen their fortunes turn as dramatically as Ethiopia’s Abiy Ahmed. A Nobel Peace prize winner in 2019, the prime minister is now accused of human rights abuses and has asked residents to secure the capital against a potential assault by rebel forces. Marc Champion, Simon Marks and Fasika Tadesse set out the reasons for his sudden reversal. Facebook removed a post on Abiy’s page for violating its policies against inciting violence.” Read more at Bloomberg
“On Thursday, Diwali celebrations will begin all over the world across various religions and cultures, especially in South Asia. Diwali, also known as the festival of lights, is observed differently by Hindus, Jains, Sikhs and Buddhists, creating a rich tapestry of cultural traditions and customs. People will often line candles and lamps throughout their house and along their driveway to illuminate their surroundings. They might also buy colorful new clothes and host gatherings of friends and family to celebrate together. For Hindus, Diwali is a time for dana (charitable giving) and seva (selfless service). And for Sikhs, Diwali celebrates the release from prison of the sixth Guru. Diwali typically takes place in October and November, with festivals and celebrations usually lasting for several days.” Read more at USA Today
A Hindu devotee holds an oil lamp while offering prayers during Diwali, the festival of lights, at a Hindu temple in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on Nov. 4, 2021.ISHARA S. KODIKARA, AFP via Getty Images
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