The Full Belmonte, 8/25/2023
Donald Trump surrendered at an Atlanta jail yesterday.
Trump's booking photo. (Fulton County Sheriff’s Office/AP)
“What happened? He had his height and weight recorded, was fingerprinted and photographed, and released in roughly 20 minutes. He later tweeted his mug shot.
Why? The former president faces charges that he plotted to overturn his 2020 election loss in Georgia along with 18 others. It’s one of his four criminal indictments.
What’s next? Trump is expected to be arraigned in Atlanta either in person or virtually in the coming weeks.”
Read this story at Washington Post
Vladimir Putin broke his silence yesterday over his rival’s presumed death.
The details: The Russian president appeared to eulogize Yevgeniy Prigozhin, the Wagner mercenary group chief who led a short-lived mutiny against the Kremlin in June.
What else to know: U.S. officials said that it’s ‘likely’ Prigozhin was killed in a plane crash on Wednesday and that an explosion may have downed the plane.
Read this story at Washington Post
Loss of Antarctic ice hurting survival of emperor penguin chicks, study says
FILE - Emperor penguin chicks stand together in Antarctica on Dec. 21, 2005. The loss of ice in a region near Antarctica’s Bellingshausen Sea in 2022 likely resulted in none of the emperor penguin chicks surviving in four colonies in that area, researchers reported Thursday, Aug. 24, 2023, in Nature Communications Earth and Environment. (Zhang Zongtang/Xinhua via AP, File)
“WASHINGTON (AP) — The loss of ice in one region of Antarctica last year likely resulted in none of the emperor penguin chicks surviving in four colonies, researchers reported Thursday.
Emperor penguins hatch their eggs and raise their chicks on the ice that forms around the continent each Antarctic winter and melts in the summer months.
Researchers used satellite imagery to look at breeding colonies in a region near Antarctica’s Bellingshausen Sea. The images showed no ice was left there in December during the Southern Hemisphere’s summer, as had occurred in 2021….” Read more at AP News
Maui’s power utility may have removed evidence about the Lahaina wildfire’s origins.
What to know: Hawaiian Electric removed damaged power polesand other equipment before the arrival of investigators, according to documents obtained by The Post.
Why it matters: Wind-damaged electrical equipment is believed to have started the deadly wildfire. The utility may have violated national guidelines on preserving evidence.
Read this story at Washington Post
Maui search
“Officials in Maui County, Hawaii, have released a list of nearly 400 people who remain unaccounted for following the devastating wildfires this month. The ‘validated list’ was put together by the FBI, a news release from the county said on Thursday. ‘We're releasing this list of names today because we know that it will help with the investigation,’ Police Chief John Pelletier said in the release. ‘We also know that once those names come out, it can and will cause pain for folks whose loved ones are listed,’ he added. The list of 388 names marks a drop from the more than 1,000 people previously believed to be unaccounted for. But that figure could change as the grim search continues, officials said. At least 115 people have already been confirmed dead, making it the deadliest wildfire disaster in the US in more than 100 years.” [CNN]
Mortgage rates
“Mortgage rates soared to 7.23% this week — their highest level since 2001. For comparison, the 30-year fixed-rate a year ago was 5.55%. Mortgage rates have spiked during the Federal Reserve's historic inflation-curbing campaign, sending home affordability to the worst levels since 1984. Buying a home is more expensive now than renting because of the added cost of financing a mortgage and rising home prices. Hopeful house hunters also face historically low inventory, increasing the competition for properties. According to an analysis by Moody's Investors Service, US homebuying costs will remain elevated at least through 2024.” [CNN]
A new covid variant could be the best yet at evading immunity.
“What is it? It’s called BA.2.86. Only about a dozen cases of it have been reported worldwide — including three in the U.S. — but it’s already concerning experts.
The problem: It has even greater potential to escape the antibodies that protect people from getting sick, even if you’ve recently been infected or vaccinated.
Should you be worried? Not yet. Experts aren’t sure whether BA.2.86 will be transmissible enough to cause a surge in cases.”
Read this story at Washington Post
CIA stairwell attack among flood of sexual misconduct complaints at spy agency
BY JIM MUSTIAN AND JOSHUA GOODMAN
“FAIRFAX, Va. (AP) — In a secluded stairwell at CIA headquarters last year, officer trainee Ashkan Bayatpour came up behind a colleague, wrapped a scarf around her neck and plainly spoke as he tried to kiss her on the mouth.
‘There are many uses for this,’ the woman recalls him saying. ‘This is what I want to do to you.’
Bayatpour was convicted Wednesday of a state misdemeanor charge of assault and battery in a case that was remarkable for breaking through the CIA’s veil of ultra-secrecy and playing out in a public courtroom where it has emboldened a sexual misconduct reckoning.
At least two-dozen women have come forward in recent months with their own complaints of abusive treatment within the CIA, telling authorities and Congress not only about sexual assaults, unwanted touching and coercion but of what they contend is a campaign by the spy agency to keep them from speaking out, with dire warnings it could wreck their careers and even endanger national security….” Read more at AP News
Florida Approves Tough Discipline for College Staff Who Break Bathroom Law
“The Florida State Board of Education voted Wednesday to approve new rules at state colleges for transgender employees and students that are intended to comply with a law, passed in May, restricting access to bathrooms.
Colleges will be forced to fire employees who twice use a bathroom other than the one assigned to their sex at birth, despite being asked to leave.
And bathroom restrictions also now apply to student housing operated by the colleges.
‘Bathroom spaces are very intimate and private,’ said Dr. Grazie Pozo Christie, a radiologist, who serves on the state board and voted for approval, adding, ‘This is not something that as a culture we should ditch.’
Adding Sharp Teeth to a New Law
The new regulations show that colleges, like K-12 schools, may be caught in the bureaucracy required to enforce them.
The state college system serves 650,000 students on a network of 28 regional campuses.
It is operated separately from the State University System of Florida, which runs the 12 flagship campuses, including the University of Florida and Florida State.
The Board of Education’s new rules go beyond the state bathroom law. Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican presidential candidate, signed that bill in May and has made restricting transgender rights a signature issue.
The legislation states that employees who break the bathroom rule can be found in violation of professional standards and “are subject to discipline” — but it does not mandate that they should be fired after two violations.
‘We’re seeing in general that after laws are passed, agencies and boards are inflicting new harms,’ said Carlos Guillermo Smith, a senior policy adviser for Equality Florida, an L.G.B.T.Q. rights group. ‘They are really exceeding their authority.’
The Florida Department of Education did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
All seven members of the state education board are appointed by Gov. DeSantis. The board has generally approved sweeping new regulations that codify the governor’s education agenda. It has sought to remove content on race, gender, sex and sexuality from the curriculum; to restrict books on those subjects from K-12 school libraries; and to prevent K-12 educators from asking for students’ pronouns.
What’s Next
The law requires each individual college to outline “disciplinary procedures” for transgender students who break bathroom regulations.
Mr. Smith said he expected that the State University System would soon pass regulations interpreting the bathroom bill in a similarly restrictive way, since that system, too, is governed by officials appointed by the governor.
A spokesman for the Board of Governors, which runs the university system, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.” [New York Times]
“From the moment Yevgeny Prigozhin announced his plan to march with his mercenaries on Moscow to protest Russia’s failures in its war against Ukraine, he was probably living on borrowed time.
Two months later, his private jet spiraled out of the sky near Moscow and crashed in flames. Also on board was the Wagner Group’s second in command — and self-proclaimed founder — Dmitry Utkin.
In some ways, the news was startling. In others, it was utterly unsurprising.
Notably, Russian general Sergei Surovikin was recently removed from his post. He had been linked to the Wagner chief and the failed mutiny.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has long shown a ruthlessness in punishing those who betray him, be it sending goons to assassinate opponents and alleged traitors, stripping tycoons of their empires or condeming political rivals to prison.
The message is loud and and clear, and aimed very much at a domestic audience. Putin, who is paving the way for another term in 2024 elections, is still in charge. And there will be no great indulgence of opposition to him or his war.
Importantly for the Russian president, there are no overt signs right now of broad dissent among the general public. Putin addressed a BRICS summit in South Africa by video without mentioning Prigozhin.
There are some unknowns for Putin, however. We don’t know if authorities can or will mop up the remnants of Wagner’s forces in Russia. Do those forces try and regroup (some of them at least have been fiercely loyal to Prigozhin), or do they vanish like the mercenary ghosts they are?
And are there any elites — be it in business or the military — willing to stick their neck out to take Putin on in his next term?
All coups need a champion. Putin may have staved off, for now, another one emerging. — Rosalind Mathieson [Bloomberg]
The crash site near the village of Kuzhenkino. Source: AP Photo
“Shootings in Canada are soaring as American gun manufacturers push to export the weapons into private hands around the world. The number of semiautomatic pistols and assault rifles coming from the US to Canada each year has skyrocketed from just 6,205 in 2003 to more than 66,000 in 2022. Over the same two decades, the country’s annual rate of shootings per capita — incidents referred to as “discharge firearm with intent” — surged almost sevenfold.” [Bloomberg]
“Official dismissal. In more news out of Moscow, Russian state media confirmed on Wednesday that Gen. Sergei Surovikin, the head of Moscow’s air force, was fired, though the exact date of his termination remains unclear. For months, Surovikin (known as General Armageddon) oversaw Russia’s invasion in Ukraine, but following the Wagner Group’s attempted coup, Surovikin disappeared from the public eye. Regional experts believe Surovikin’s removal correlated with Wagner’s dissent, making him the most senior official to lose his job over the mutiny. However, a Russian defense official said Surovikin was simply transferred to a new post and is currently on a short vacation.
One of Surovikin’s last public appearances occurred on June 24, when he appealed to Wagner troops via video to return to their base. Surovikin has a history of close ties with Prigozhin. In the weeks that followed the insurrection, locals suggested that Surovikin was being detained by the Kremlin for questioning despite one Russian retired general saying he was merely ‘resting.’” [Foreign Policy]
“Voter suppression fears. Zimbabwe’s general election—only its second since the 2017 overthrow of longtime dictator Robert Mugabe—got off to a rocky start on Wednesday, sparking fears of voting irregularities before the first ballots were even cast. Only 18 out of 77 polling stations in the capital, Harare, opened on time, with some voting sites starting four hours late because ballots hadn’t been delivered.
Although 11 candidates are in the running to be Zimbabwe’s next president, the two main contenders are 80-year-old incumbent President Emmerson Mnangagwa and 45-year-old opposition leader Nelson Chamisa. According to an Afrobarometer poll conducted in April and May, Mnangagwa is predicted to lead with 37 percent of the vote compared to Chamisa’s 28 percent.
However, public support for Mnangagwa has fallen in recent months, especially as the southern African nation continues to battle a stagnant economy, hyperinflation of more than 100 percent, government corruption, and high migration. Around 6.6 million Zimbabweans are registered to vote, with results to be announced within five days. If a simple majority is not reached, then Zimbabweans will have to return to the polls for a runoff on Oct. 2.” [Foreign Policy]
This is the last day to claim money from Facebook.
What money? Facebook reached a $725 million settlement this year over allegations it shared users’ data without their consent. Millions of people are entitled to a share.
How to apply: Anyone who used Facebook between May 24, 2007, and Dec. 22, 2022, is eligible, even if you no longer have an account. You can submit a claim here.
Read this story at Washington Post
FIFA opens case against Spanish soccer official who kissed a player on the lips at Women’s World Cup
BY GRAHAM DUNBAR
“GENEVA (AP) — FIFA opened a disciplinary case Thursday against the Spanish soccer official who kissed a player on the lips while celebrating the team’s victory in the Women’s World Cup final.
The governing body’s disciplinary committee will weigh if Spanish soccer federation president Luis Rubiales violated its code relating to ‘the basic rules of decent conduct’ and ‘behaving in a way that brings the sport of football and/or FIFA into disrepute.’
The Spanish soccer federation would not comment on reports in Spanish media that Rubiales was set to resign on Friday after five years as head of the body….” Read more at AP News
Starbucks’ Pumpkin Spice Latte turns 20, whether you like it or not
“The seasonal drink that made pumpkin spice a star is turning 20. And unlike the autumn days it celebrates, there seems to be no chill in customer demand.
Starbucks’ Pumpkin Spice Latte goes on sale Thursday in the U.S. and Canada, as it does each year when the nights start getting longer and the fall winds gather. It’s the coffee giant’s most popular seasonal beverage, with hundreds of millions sold since its launch in 2003. And it has produced a huge — and growing — industry of imitators flecked with cinnamon, nutmeg and clove.
In the year ending July 29, U.S. sales of pumpkin-flavored products reached $802.5 million, according to Nielsen. That’s up 42% from the same period in 2019. There are pumpkin spice Oreos, protein drinks, craft beers, cereals and even Spam. A search of ‘pumpkin spice’ on Walmart’s website brings up more than 1,000 products. A thousand products that smell or taste like, well, pumpkin pie….” Read more at AP News
One-of-a-kind giraffe
Photo: Brights Zoo
“An extremely rare giraffe with no spots was born at a zoo in East Tennessee, Axios Nashville's Adam Tamburin writes.
Zoo officials believe it's the only one on Earth.” [Axios]
”Lives Lived: John Warnock co-founded Adobe Systems but was probably best known for inventing the ubiquitous PDF, making the paperless office a reality. He died at 82.” [New York Times]