States Quietly Pass Laws Criminalizing Fossil Fuel Protests Amid Coronavirus Chaos

Alexander C. Kaufman, HuffPost•March 27, 2020



At least three states passed laws putting new criminal penalties on protests against fossil fuel infrastructure in just the past two weeks amid the chaos of the coronavirus pandemic.

First came Kentucky. On March 16, Gov. Andy Beshear (D) signed legislation that designated “natural gas or petroleum pipelines” as “key infrastructure assets” and made “tampering with, impeding, or inhibiting operations of a key infrastructure asset” a “criminal mischief in the first degree.”

Two days later, it was South Dakota. On March 18, Gov. Kristi Noem (R) signed a bill that expanded the definition of “critical infrastructure” to include virtually any oil, gas or utility equipment, and raised the charges for causing “substantial interruption or impairment” of such facilities to felonies. Five days later, on March 23, the governor approved a second measure defining a felony “riot” as “intentional use of force or violence by three or more persons” that causes “any damage to property.”

On Wednesday, West Virginia followed suit. Gov. Jim Justice (R) greenlighted legislation assigning the same critical infrastructure status to a wide range of oil, gas and pipeline facilities, slapping fines as high as $20,000 on anyone found guilty of causing “damage, destruction, vandalization, defacing or tampering” that totals $2,500 or more.

A defiant Dakota Access pipeline protester faces off against militarized police in 2017 as law enforcement raided their camp. (Photo: Pacific Press via Getty Images)

The wave of legislation came as the United States became the epicenter of COVID-19, the rapidly spreading respiratory disease caused by the novel coronavirus. By Friday, the U.S. death toll topped 1,000, with more than 100,000 confirmed cases, overwhelming hospitals and forcing doctors to publicly beg for basic medical supplies. The economic fallout exceeded even the worst expectations: 3.3 million Americans filed jobless claims this week ― topping both Goldman Sachs’ 2.25 million forecast from last week and smashing the previous one-week record of 695,000 reported job losses.

Yet, as experts blamed the White House’s back-footed response for inflaming the crisis, the Trump administration appeared to ramp up its environmental agenda, ordering the Environmental Protection Agency’s enforcement division to temporarily stop policing polluters, approving a slate of mining projects, auctioning off new drilling leases and reviving a dormant fight over auto emission standards.

The efforts on both the state and federal level offered jarring real-time examples of what the author Naomi Klein dubbed “the shock doctrine”: the phenomenon wherein polluters and their government allies push through unpopular policy changes under the smokescreen of a public emergency.

“While we are all paying attention to COVID-19 and the congressional stimulus packages, state legislatures are quietly passing fossil-fuel-backed anti-protest laws,” Connor Gibson, the researcher at Greenpeace USA who tipped HuffPost off to the bills’ passage, said by email Friday. “These laws do nothing new to protect communities. Instead they seek to crack down on the sort of nonviolent civil disobedience that has shaped much of our nation’s greatest political and social victories.”

The legislation’s similarities were no coincidence. As climate change projections grew more dire and the bloody 2016 fight to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline became a new Alamo cry for environmentalists, the fossil fuel industry’s political allies began promoting state legislation to restrict protests.

Oklahoma passed the first legislation protecting pipelines as critical infrastructure in 2017. Shortly after, the American Legislative Exchange Council, the conservative policy shop funded by big business and right-wing billionaires, drafted a generic bill it called the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act.

In a December 2017 letter sent to state legislators, five energy trade groups and one large oil company cited what they listed as six examples of threats from environmentalists to their facilities and urged them to champion the bill in a bid to head them off. One example was the 2016 case of the so-called “valve-turners,” peaceful protesters who temporarily stopped the flow of heavily polluting tar sands oil through a pipeline.

But, as HuffPost previously reported, the other incidents cited in the letter had nothing to do with environmentalists. Instead, they were loosely connected to mental illness or workplace grievance, and in at least two cases resulted in successful prosecutions under existing laws.

The bills moved forward anyway. By last summer, legislation based on the ALEC model became law in five states. In September, Texas prosecutors charged two dozen protesters who briefly halted traffic by suspending themselves from a bridge in one of the nation’s largest oil ports under the new law.

More bills are on the way. The Alabama state Senate passed its own version on March 12, just before the officials, alarmed at the spread of the new virus, postponed legislative hearings until April. Similar legislation is active in at least five other states ― Illinois, Minnesota, Mississippi, Ohio and Pennsylvania ― but has not progressed in the past month.

Environmentalists and Native American tribes failed to stop construction of the Dakota Access pipeline, which President Donald Trump fast-tracked in 2017. Three years later, their concerns have proved well-founded. The pipeline leaked five times in its first year of operation alone, prompting a federal judge on Wednesday to order the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to conduct a full environmental review.

Related...

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Trump Goes Full ‘Shock Doctrine’ As Pandemic Rages

Sorry, conspiracy theorists. Study concludes COVID-19 'is not a laboratory construct'


KATE HOLLAND,Good Morning America•March 27, 2020


Sorry, conspiracy theorists. Study concludes COVID-19 'is not a laboratory construct' (ABC News)

Conspiracy theories claiming COVID-19 was engineered in a lab as part of a biological attack on the United States have been gaining traction online in recent weeks, but a new study on the origins of the virus has concluded that the pandemic-causing strain developed naturally.

An analysis of the evidence, according to the findings first published in the scientific journal Nature Medicine, shows that the novel coronavirus "is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus," with the researchers concluding "we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible."

"There’s a lot of speculation and conspiracy theories that went to a pretty high level," Dr. Robert Garry, a professor at the Tulane University School of Medicine and one of the authors of the study, told ABC News, "so we felt it was important to get a team together to examine evidence of this new coronavirus to determine what we could about the origin."

Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, supported the study’s findings, writing on his blog, "This study leaves little room to refute a natural origin for COVID-19."

Researchers concluded that the novel coronavirus is not a human creation because it does not share any "previously used virus backbone." It likely arose, the study said, from a recombination of a virus found in bats and another virus, possibly originating from pangolins, otherwise known as scaly anteaters.

COVID-19 is 96% identical to a coronavirus found in bats, researchers said, but with a certain variation that could explain what has made it so infectious.

"We know from the study of other coronaviruses that they’re able to acquire this [variation] and they can then become more pathogenic," Garry told ABC News. "This is a good explanation as to why this virus is so transmittable and has caused this pandemic."

PHOTO: This handout illustration image taken with a scanning electron microscope shows SARS-CoV-2 (yellow)also known as 2019-nCoV, the virus that causes COVID-19isolated emerging from the surface of cells (blue/pink) cultured in the lab. (Handout/National Institutes of Health/AFP via GettY Images)More

The mutation in surface proteins, according to Garry, could have triggered the outbreak of the pandemic, but it’s also possible that a less severe version of the illness was circulating through the population for years, perhaps even decades, before escalating to this point.

"We don’t know if those mutations were picked up more recently or a long time ago," Garry told ABC News. "It’s impossible to say if it actually was a mutation that triggered the pandemic, but either way, it would have been a naturally occurring process."

And while many believe the virus originated at a fish market in Wuhan, China, Garry said that is also a misconception.

"Our analyses, and others too, point to an earlier origin than that," Garry said. "There were definitely cases there, but that wasn’t the origin of the virus."
What to know about coronavirus:

Sorry, conspiracy theorists. Study concludes COVID-19 'is not a laboratory construct' originally appeared on abcnews.go.com

After Considering $1 Billion Price Tag for Ventilators, White House Has Second Thoughts


David E. Sanger, Maggie Haberman and Zolan Kanno-Youngs 3/27/2020


WASHINGTON — The White House had been preparing to reveal on Wednesday a joint venture between General Motors and Ventec Life Systems that would allow for the production of as many as 80,000 desperately needed ventilators to respond to an escalating pandemic when word suddenly came down that the announcement was off.

© John Minchillo/Associated Press A ventilator and other medical supplies on display at a news conference on Monday in Manhattan. The shortage of ventilators has emerged as one of the major criticism of the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus.

The decision to cancel the announcement, government officials say, came after the Federal Emergency Management Agency said it needed more time to assess whether the estimated cost was prohibitive. That price tag was more than $1 billion, with several hundred million dollars to be paid upfront to General Motors to retool a car parts plant in Kokomo, Ind., where the ventilators would be made with Ventec’s technology.


Government officials said that the deal might still happen but that they are examining at least a dozen other proposals. And they contend that an initial promise that the joint venture could turn out 20,000 ventilators in short order had shrunk to 7,500, with even that number in doubt. Longtime emergency managers at FEMA are working with military officials to sort through the competing offers and federal procurement rules while under pressure to give President Trump something to announce.

But in an interview Thursday night with Sean Hannity, the president played down the need for ventilators.

“I don’t believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators,” he said, a reference to New York, where Gov. Andrew Cuomo has appealed for federal help in obtaining them. “You go into major hospitals sometimes, and they’ll have two ventilators. And now all of a sudden they’re saying, ‘Can we order 30,000 ventilators?’”

A General Motors spokesman said that “Project V,” as the ventilator program is known, was moving very fast, and a company official said “there’s no issue with retooling.”

A Ventec representative agreed.

“Ventec and G.M. have been working at breakneck speed to leverage our collective expertise in ventilation and manufacturing to meet the needs of the country as quickly as possible and arm medical professionals with the number of ventilators needed to save lives,” said Chris O. Brooks, Ventec’s chief strategy officer.

The only thing missing was clarity from the government about how many ventilators they needed — and who would be paid to build them.

The shortage of ventilators has emerged as one of the major criticisms of the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus. The need to quickly equip hospitals across the country with tens of thousands more of the devices to treat those most seriously ill with the virus was not anticipated despite the Trump administration’s own projection in a simulation last year that millions of people could be hospitalized. And even now, the effort to produce them has been confused and disorganized.

At the center of the discussion about how to ramp up the production of ventilators is Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and a senior White House aide, who has told people that he was called in two weeks ago by Vice President Mike Pence to produce more coronavirus test kits and who has now turned his attention to ventilators.

He has been directing officials at FEMA in the effort. Two officials said the suggestion to wait on the General Motors offer came from Col. Patrick Work, who is working at FEMA. Some government officials expressed concern about the possibility of ordering too many ventilators, leaving them with an expensive surplus.

As the agency has sorted through offers, trying to weigh production ability and costs, hospitals in New York and elsewhere are reporting a desperate need for more ventilators, which are critical in treating respiratory problems in a fast-rising tide of severe coronavirus cases.

A spokeswoman for FEMA said Colonel Work presented information on each contract in such meetings but did not make any recommendations. A White House spokesman declined to comment.

The involvement of General Motors was first floated this month as the carmaker’s factory floor in Kokomo was grinding to a halt and workers were being sent home — partly because the market was collapsing but also because workers would otherwise risk exposure to the coronavirus.

Last week, General Motors, Ventec Life Systems and a coalition of business executives called StopTheSpread.org issued a statement saying that Ventec would “leverage G.M.’s logistics, purchasing and manufacturing expertise to build more of their critically important ventilators,” including some portable units.

By Sunday, Mr. Trump appeared to suggest on Twitter that a deal had been completed to mass-produce the ventilators, even though it was unclear who would pay to equip the General Motors plant or how long that process would take.

Slide 1 of 50: US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (C) and Representatives Kevin McCarthy (L) and Steny Hoyer show the bill to the press after the House passed a $2 trillion stimulus bill, on March 27, 2020, at the US Capitol in Washington, DC - The House approved by a voice vote a $2.2 trillion rescue package, the largest economic stimulus package in American history, to aid a US economy and health care system battered by the coronavirus pandemic. (Photo by ALEX EDELMAN / AFP) 

“Ford, General Motors and Tesla are being given the go ahead to make ventilators and other metal products, FAST! @fema,” he wrote. “Go for it auto execs, lets see how good you are?”

Not for the first time has Mr. Trump jumped the gun.

Tesla officials had in fact met with engineers from the medical device company Medtronic in a separate negotiation, but no partnership has yet been announced. And while the chief executive of General Motors, Mary T. Barra, was enthused about the ventilator idea, Mr. Trump’s own aides had not embraced the G.M.-Ventec partnership — in part because they had not seen the specifics of the proposal.

Administration officials said Thursday that they were struggling to understand just how many ventilators the new venture could make.

The initial projection, one senior administration official said, was that after three weeks of preparation it could produce an initial run of 20,000 ventilators, or about two-thirds of what Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York recently said his state alone needed to cover the influx of coronavirus patients expected in two weeks, if not sooner.

That number then shrank to 7,500 ventilators in the initial run, or maybe 5,000, an apparent recognition that auto transmissions and ventilators had very little in common. Those numbers are in flux and so are the Trump administration’s because the White House cannot decide how many ventilators it wants.

Targets have changed by the hour, officials said, as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Food and Drug Administration, which approves the use of medical devices, and the White House try to figure out how many ventilators to request and how much they should cost.

Those issues appeared to come to a head on Wednesday afternoon, when FEMA told the White House that it was premature to make a decision.

The $1.5 billion price tag comes to around $18,000 a ventilator. And the overall cost, by comparison, is roughly equal to buying 18 F-35s, the Pentagon’s most advanced fighter jet.

So on Wednesday, despite the president’s tweet three days earlier, FEMA was still weighing competing offers in order to make a recommendation to Mr. Kushner. And it seemed clear to several officials that the agency would have to select multiple manufacturers, in part to avoid the risk that one production line runs into technical troubles, or that its workers contract the very virus the ventilators are being built to defeat.

David Sanger and Zolan Kanno-Youngs reported from Washington, and Maggie Haberman from New York. Ana Swanson contributed reporting from Washington.

Ventec Life Systems and GM Partner to Mass Produce Critical Care Ventilators in Response to COVID-19 Pandemic

PR Newswire•March 27, 2020

GM to also produce surgical masks to support frontline healthcare professionals

BOTHELL, Wash., March 27, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Ventec Life Systems announced today General Motors will build VOCSN critical care ventilators at GM's Kokomo, Indiana manufacturing facility with FDA-cleared ventilators scheduled to ship as soon as next month. This effort is in addition to Ventec taking aggressive steps to ramp up production at their manufacturing facility in Bothell, Washington.

Across all manufacturers, there is a global backorder of critical care ventilators capable of supporting patients fighting COVID-19. The companies are adding thousands of units of new capacity with a significantly expanded supply chain capable of supporting high volume production. GM is donating its resources at cost.

GM will also begin manufacturing FDA-cleared Level 1 surgical masks at its Warren, Michigan manufacturing facility. Production will begin next week and within two weeks ramp up to 50,000 masks per day, with the potential to increase to 100,000 per day.

Critical Care Ventilators

"This unique partnership combines Ventec's respiratory care expertise with GM's manufacturing might to produce sophisticated and high-quality critical care ventilators," said Chris Kiple, CEO of Ventec Life Systems. "This pandemic is unprecedented and so is this response, with incredible support from GM and their suppliers. Healthcare professionals on the front lines deserve the best tools to treat patients and precision critical care ventilators like VOCSN are what is necessary to save lives."

Ventec and GM are working around the clock to meet the urgent need for more ventilators. Efforts to set up tooling and manufacturing capacity at the GM Kokomo facility are already underway to produce Ventec's critical care ventilator, VOCSN. Depending on the needs of the federal government, Ventec and GM are poised to deliver the first ventilators next month and ramp up to a manufacturing capacity of more than 10,000 critical care ventilators per month with the infrastructure and capability to scale further.

"We are proud to stand with other American companies and our skilled employees to meet the needs of this global pandemic," said Mary Barra, GM chairman and CEO. "This partnership has rallied the GM enterprise and our global supply base to support Ventec, and the teams are working together with incredible passion and commitment. I am proud of this partnership as we work together to address urgent and life-saving needs."

GM will deploy an estimated 1,000 American workers to scale production of critical care ventilators immediately. Working with the UAW, GM has brought back employees from GM's Kokomo and Marion facilities.

Since Friday, March 20, Ventec and GM teams across manufacturing, engineering, purchasing, legal and others have been tirelessly and seamlessly working together to create and implement a plan for immediate, scaled production of critical care ventilators. The Ventec and GM global supply base developed sourcing plans for the more than 700 individual parts that are needed to build up to 200,000 VOCSN.

"GM is in the position to help build more ventilators because of the remarkable performance of GM and Ventec's global supply base," added Barra. "Our joint teams have moved mountains to find real solutions to save lives and fight the pandemic."

The Ventec Life Systems team has a history of patient-centric design which includes more than 18 care-changing respiratory devices and more than 40 patents. Ventec's leading product, VOCSN, is the first and only Multi-Function Ventilator and was FDA cleared in 2017. VOCSN seamlessly integrates five separate devices including a critical care ventilator, oxygen concentrator, cough assist, suction and nebulizer into a single portable device. VOCSN provides invasive and non-invasive ventilation across a comprehensive set of modes and settings throughout the care continuum from the hospital to the home.

GM's Kokomo facility supports the production of precision electrical components and is approximately 2.6 million square feet, located on more than 270 acres.

This partnership combines global expertise in manufacturing quality and a joint commitment to safety to give medical professionals and patients access to life-saving technology as rapidly as possible.

Level 1 Surgical Masks

In a separate effort, GM is expanding its support of medical equipment production by temporarily converting its Warren, Michigan plant to build Level 1 surgical masks. Production will begin next week and within two weeks ramp up to 50,000 masks per day, with the potential to increase to 100,000 per day. Daily mask production will be influenced by the availability of materials to build the masks.

The necessary machinery will be delivered to the Warren plant Friday morning and production of masks will begin next week.

This employee-led initiative was created, planned and approved in about 48 hours and involves GM's traditional supply base as well as new partnerships specific to the medical device industry. GM will be collaborating with governments and local suppliers to distribute the masks.

Ventec Life Systems is redefining respiratory care to improve patient outcomes and reduce caregiver challenges from the hospital to home. Ventec's leading product, VOCSN, is the first and only Multi-Function Ventilator that seamlessly integrates five devices - a critical care Ventilator, 6 L/min equivalent Oxygen concentrator, touch button Cough assist, hospital grade Suction, and a high-performance Nebulizer - into one integrated respiratory system that is lightweight and mobile. VOCSN is fully customizable to meet patient needs for pediatric and adult patients. Learn more at VentecLife.com and connect with Ventec on Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram.

General Motors (NYSE: GM) is a global company committed to delivering safer, better and more sustainable ways for people to get around. General Motors, its subsidiaries and its joint venture entities sell vehicles under the Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, Cadillac, Holden, Baojun and Wuling brands. More information on the company and its subsidiaries, including OnStar, a global leader in vehicle safety and security services, and Maven, its personal mobility brand, can be found at http://www.gm.com.
Cision

View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ventec-life-systems-and-gm-partner-to-mass-produce-critical-care-ventilators-in-response-to-covid-19-pandemic-301031046.html

SOURCE General Motors Co.

CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY

What coronavirus? With indictment of Venezeula’s Maduro and sanctions on Iran, U.S. doubles down on ‘maximum pressure’

Adam Taylor  WASHINGTON POST 3/26/2020

The global health crisis caused by the novel coronavirus is prompting calls for global unity, but the Trump administration is showing no sign of pulling back on one of its most divisive foreign policy initiatives: “Maximum pressure.”

© Manaure Quintero/Reuters 

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro speaks during a news conference this month at the Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas.

Instead, it’s doubling down.

The administration upped the ante on Venezuela on Thursday, unsealing indictments against President Nicolás Maduro and several members of his inner circle on narcoterrorism charges and offering a $15 million bounty for information leading to Maduro’s capture and conviction.

“While the Venezuelan people suffer, this cabal lines their pockets with drug money and the proceeds of their corruption,” Attorney General William P. Barr said.

The move came through the Justice Department, not the Treasury or State departments, the main drivers of President Trump’s “maximum pressure,” with sanctions designations. U.S. Attorney Geoff Berman in Manhattan said the charges were based on more than a decade of work.

Analysts suggested the move was in keeping with similar efforts against countries including Iran, North Korea and China.

The United States was “clearly using law enforcement tools as part of the maximum pressure campaign,” said Joshua Glazer, a former Justice Department and National Security Council lawyer.

“This is definitely part of the maximum pressure campaign on the Maduro regime,” said Eric Lorber of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “Justice Department indictments and other legal actions beyond sanctions have played a very important part in a number of ways.”
What’s the impact of the charges against Maduro?

Thursday’s criminal indictment is only the second the United States has brought against a foreign head of state. But it’s not clear whether the previous example holds any clues for future U.S. moves against Maduro.

In February 1988, federal prosecutors in Miami indicted Panamanian strongman Manuel Antonio Noriega on drug dealing and conspiracy charges. In December 1989, President George H.W. Bush ordered troops into Panama to oust him from power; Noriega surrendered on Jan. 3, 1990.

Noriega was convicted of conspiracy to commit drug trafficking in Miami federal court and sentenced to 40 years in prison. He was eventually enmeshed in a prolonged legal tustle that saw him released early by the United States, extradited to France and then extradited back to Panama, where he died in 2017.

Maduro and Noriega were both Latin American strongmen and adversaries of the United States accused in large-scale drug trafficking conspiracies. But Venezuela is a far larger country than Panama, with a more formidable military, and Russian backing.

If the charges don’t immediately result in Maduro’s capture, they could be used to add further economic pressure on the country.

The evidence compiled by the Justice Department could be used in new sanctions, including possibly the State Department designation of Venezuela as a state sponsor of terrorism — a rare move currently applied to only North Korea, Iran, Sudan and Syria.

Lorber, a former undersecretary of the treasury for terrorism and financial intelligence said it was unclear how the administration could do this when it doesn’t consider Maduro legitimate. The United States recognizes opposition leader Juan Guaidó, head of Venezuela’s National Assembly, as the nation’s rightful president.

“The United States would both be recognizing Guiado's government as the legitimate government while simultaneously calling the country a state sponsor of terrorism,” Lorber said.
Where else is the administration increasing maximum pressure?

Venezuela isn’t the only nation facing growing U.S. pressure while also battling covid-19. Over the past month, the Treasury has announced new sanctions designations related to Iran, North Korea, Syria and Venezuela.

“The administration’s tactic of choice toward adversaries is all pressure, all the time,” said Suzanne DiMaggio, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment.

The government of Iran has complained that sanctions on its economy made it difficult to gather the equipment needed to contain an outbreak that has killed more than 2,200.

Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif blamed deaths on “unlawful U.S. sanctions.”

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has dismissed such criticism. U.S. sanctions “do not target imports of food, medicine and medical equipment, or other humanitarian goods,” he said in a statement Monday, and “Iranian documents show their health companies have been able to import testing kits.”

There are some signs of restraint in the maximum pressure campaign. Deadly attacks on U.S. personnel in Iraq this month, widely seen as perpetrated by groups backed by Iran, have prompted only a muted response from the Trump administration, without the discussion of a direct strike against Iran seen only months ago.
Is humanitarian aid being offered to targets of maximum pressure?

The Trump administration has offered Iran aid as it battles the coronavirus, funneled through the Swiss government because Washington cut diplomatic relations with Tehran 40 years ago.

“The United States has offered over $100 million in medical assistance to foreign countries, including to the Iranian people,” Pompeo said this week.

Iran rejected the aid. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said “you could be giving medicines to Iran that spread the virus or cause it to remain permanently.”

The United States has also said it would facilitate humanitarian assistance to North Korea, which has not reported any cases of covid-19. No such offers have been made publicly to Venezuela.

At the same time, the United States has threatened to pull back aid from other countries, including $1 billion from Afghanistan, an ally, in a bid to force the government to support a future peace accord with Taliban insurgents.

Critics of maximum pressure say that by refusing to relent in exceptional circumstances as previous administrations have, the Trump administration is missing an opportunity amid the outbreak.

“At a time when our allies are looking to us for leadership, or at least partnership, on the covid-19 crisis, we're not rising to play that role,” said DiMaggio.

Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University and a critic of U.S. sanctions on Venezuela, said the move against Maduro wasn’t prompted by concerns about international drug trafficking, but by domestic politics — such actions are believed to be popular among the large Venezuelan and Cuban communities in the presidential battleground state of Florida.

“It is very dangerous and irresponsible at the moment of the coronavirus pandemic,” Sachs wrote in an email. “The U.S. should be helping Venezuela and other countries to contain this devastating pandemic.”

adam.taylor@washpost.com

While the US Postal Service fights for its life financially, 2,000 of its workers are in quarantine and dozens have tested positive for the coronavirus
BUSINESS INSIDER 3/27/2020

Scott Olson/Getty Images


The United States Postal Service isn't doing well, both financially and in terms of employees' exposure to the novel coronavirus.

Fifty-one USPS employees had tested positive for COVID-19 as of Wednesday, and 2,000 of its roughly 500,000 employees are in quarantine.

Financially, lawmakers warned this week that plummeting mail volumes could force the USPS to shut down by June without immediate financial help.

The USPS is included in the $2 trillion stimulus bill that President Trump signed on Friday, but the city carriers' union called the $10 billion provision for the service "woefully inadequate."

The US Postal Service is in crisis, with lawmakers warning that plunging mail volumes could shut it down by June without "urgent" financial help — threatening everything from critical medicine deliveries and vote by mail to a third of Amazon orders.

But the crisis is far more than financial. The National Association of Letter Carriers, the union representing USPS city carriers, said 51 USPS employees had tested positive for COVID-19 as of Wednesday. On top of that, nearly 2,000 were in quarantine.

"As the number of confirmed positive coronavirus cases have increased throughout the general public, so too have been the number of postal employees who have tested positive," a statement from the union's president, Fredric Rolando, read. "About half of the postal employees are quarantined by order of public health officials and half have chosen to self-quarantine."

The union on Thursday announced the coronavirus-related death of New York City carrier Rakkhon Kim, age 50.

About 150 employees have returned from quarantine, the statement said. "Eligible" workers ordered to quarantine by health officials are being paid administrative leave during the quarantine, while those who choose to quarantine themselves must take sick leave.

"Employees who do not feel safe working in the facility may be allowed to take emergency annual leave or leave without pay, to the extent feasible," the statement quoted the USPS as saying. "The Postal Service will follow a liberal leave usage policy for employees."

As of this writing, there have been more than 576,000 confirmed coronavirus cases and 26,400 deaths worldwide. On Thursday, the US passed Italy and China for most confirmed cases in the world.

The USPS recorded having just under 497,000 employees in 2019 compared to the 2,000 in quarantine, meaning numbers are relatively low. But the numbers worldwide don't accurately reflect the exact number of cases because of limited testing, nor do they immediately convey the infectiousness of the disease — which has a snowball effect that one expert broke down, explaining how one person could end up infecting 59,000.

Postal employees, like others considered essential — arguably, in some cases — are also still at work, handling packages and touching surfaces where the coronavirus can live for up to several days.

The USPS, the union said, has agreed to certain provisions during the pandemic, including providing daily supplies for employees to clean office items and vehicles; providing hand sanitizer and other cleaning supplies for postal carriers; and providing masks and protective gloves for any employee who requests them.

"We have received almost 3,000 reports from all over the country regarding these issues," the union statement said. "In some places, all of these things are being done. However, in too many places they are not.

"In the places where there are not enough supplies, or none at all, it is generally due to the overall shortage of these items throughout the country. USPS has been working to acquire more items, even authorizing local managers to purchase them if they could be found."

Carriers are also being advised to knock instead of ringing doorbells, keep a safe distance from others, and use an alternative method for signed deliveries — all while the USPS itself fights to stay alive.

Two US representatives warned this week that the USPS could shut down in three months without financial help, introducing a bill that would give the service $25 billion in emergency funding, eliminate its current debt, and require it to prioritize medical deliveries.

The union said Friday that Congress must provide "at least $25 billion" to the USPS "to both protect the public health and to stabilize our economy," but the $2 trillion stimulus bill signed by President Trump on Friday includes only $10 billion to the Postal Service.


The bill passed in the Senate with the language that the USPS could prioritize medical deliveries, and that "if the Postal Service determines that, due to the COVID-19 emergency, the Postal Service will not be able to fund operating expenses without borrowing money," the USPS would be allowed to borrow up to $10 billion from the Treasury "to be used for such operating expenses" and "which may not be used to pay any outstanding debt of the Postal Service."

The USPS lost $3.9 billion in fiscal year 2018, according to a report from the Task Force on the United States Postal System, and lost $62.4 billion between fiscal years 2007 and 2016. The report said that as the service's financial condition "continues to deteriorate," it's expected to "lose tens of billions of dollars over the next decade" — if it makes it that far.

The union called the $10 billion in the stimulus package "woefully inadequate," considering that the USPS' services "are needed more than ever."

"Right now we are delivering notices for the decennial census, CDC pamphlets for households, and a large volume of e-commerce products at a time when retail options are limited," a statement said. "Soon we will likely handle the distribution of Treasury stimulus checks, home virus testing kits and a surge of absentee ballots later this year.

"In view [of] the Postal Service's crucial role, it is all the more disappointing and discouraging that the $2 trillion stimulus legislation that is about to be adopted did so little to help."

Opinion
Congress, Not Amazon, Messed Up the Post Office
Legislators passed a law that made the USPS less competitive with the private sector.

By Barry Ritholtz April 6, 2018

The problems start here. Photographer: Zach Gibson/Getty Images

Barry Ritholtz is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He founded Ritholtz Wealth Management and was chief executive and director of equity research at FusionIQ, a quantitative research firm. He is the author of “Bailout Nation.”Read more opinionFollow @ritholtz on Twitter

Before the news cycle gets consumed by the U.S.-China trade war in the making, let's go back to something I find much more intriguing: the U.S. Postal Service. Specifically, is Amazon.com Inc.'s contract with the USPS kosher, or is it a sweetheart deal that amounts to a government giveaway?

Let's get one thing out of the way up front: President Donald Trump's endless grousing about Amazon is nothing more than a thinly disguised complaint about the Washington Post, which has done a fine job reporting on his administration, revealing its many warts and ethical lapses. He has made no secret of his hostility, as a brief review of his Twitter posts would show.



But let's set that aside and try to answer whether the USPS provides an unfair subsidy to Amazon. To better understand these claims requires a fuller understanding about the Post Office.



Let's start with the USPS mandate: It was formed with a very different directive than its private-sector competitors, such as FedEx Corp. and United Parcel Service Inc. Those two giant private shippers, along with a bevy of smaller ones, are for-profit companies that can charge whatever they believe the market will bear. The USPS, by contrast, is charged with delivering to every home and business in America, no matter how remote. And, they can only charge what Congress allows; increases require approval. It also has congressional pressure and oversight on where it must maintain postal offices. The USPS has been slowly closing sites where there is insufficient customer demand. But closing an obsolete or little-used facility invariably entails a battle with each representative, who in turn faces voter anger when the local post office is targeted for closing. FedEx or UPS can open or close locations with little problem as demand and package traffic dictate.



Then there is the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 (PAEA), which some have taken to calling "the most insane law" ever passed by Congress. The law requires the Postal Service, which receives no taxpayer subsidies, to prefund its retirees' health benefits up to the year 2056. This is a $5 billion per year cost; it is a requirement that no other entity, private or public, has to make. If that doesn't meet the definition of insanity, I don't know what does. Without this obligation, the Post Office actually turns a profit. Some have called this a "manufactured crisis." It's also significant that lots of companies benefit from a burden that makes the USPS less competitive; these same companies might also would benefit from full USPS privatization, a goal that has been pushed by several conservative think tanks for years.



Paying retiree obligations isn't the issue here; rather, being singled out as the only company with a congressional requirement to fully fund those obligations is. It puts the USPS at a huge competitive disadvantage. Yes, a retirement crisis is brewing; most private-sector pensions are wildly underfunded. But the solution is to mandate that ALL companies cover a higher percentage of their future obligations -- not just one entity.

What about lobbying Congress for changes to these rules? Unlike private-sector entities, the Postal Service is barred from lobbying. Similar restrictions do not apply to FedEx or UPS or other carriers.

Perhaps it helps to think of the USPS as two separate entities co-existing together: On one side is the congressionally mandated operation that delivers letters everywhere in the country. This is the side that helped knit together the far-flung cities, towns and settlements that defined the U.S. at the time of the nation's founding. The modern innovations of email, texts and the internet helped turn this into a money-losing business.

The other side of the USPS is the parcel-delivery service, which is profitable. It both competes with, and provides services to, private-sector delivery businesses.

Indeed, both UPS and FedEx contract with USPS to perform so-called last-mile delivery for their rural and most-expensive routes. They leverage the existing infrastructure of USPS to provide services for their client base without having to build that same costly last-mile infrastructure for letters and parcels. Effectively, they arbitrage what would otherwise be low-margin or unprofitable deliveries.

The problem for the USPS isn't the packages from the likes of Amazon, but rather, the rest of the Post Office’s mandate. In its annual report, the USPS noted that 2017 saw "mail volumes declined by approximately 5.0 billion pieces, or 3.6 percent, while package volumes grew by 589 million pieces, or 11.4 percent." Amazon and other internet retailers are a source of profitable deliveries for the post office; the relationship is in no way a subsidy for the retailers. Incidentally, the PAEA bars the Post Office from pricing parcel delivery below-cost.

Pricing, locations, hiring, funding? The Post Office has broad limitations about making routine business decisions that its private-sector competitors do not.

Trump has raised a valid issue in pointing out the unfair conditions under which the USPS operates. He is looking, however, at the wrong side of the problem.

Italian priest accidentally live streams mass with Facebook filters active

March 24 (UPI) -- An Italian priest's live streamed mass on Facebook went viral after the religious leader accidentally left the platform's AR filters active, causing him to appear in various cartoon disguises.

Paolo Longo, parish priest of the Church of San Pietro and San Benedetto di Polla in Salerno province, live streamed mass on Facebook to allow parishioners to attend the service virtually amid the coronavirus outbreak.

Longo's video went viral when he accidentally left the Facebook AR filters active during the live stream, causing him to appear with animated accessories including a sci-fi helmet, lifting dumbbells and a hat and sunglasses.

The priest had a sense of humor about the mistake, later posting: "Even a laugh is good."

Harp seal rescued from duck pond in New Jersey

https://www.facebook.com/njmarinemammal/

March 25 (UPI) -- Animal rescuers in New Jersey said they rescued a 200-pound seal found stranded in a duck pond, but they don't know how the animal ended up in the situation.

The Marine Mammal Stranding Center said a rescue team was dispatched Monday to a duck pond in Shrewsbury where an adult male harp seal had been spotted stranded in the muddy water.

The center said the seal had been struggling for several days and had been eating leaves and mud due to the lack of a suitable food source.

Rescuers said they do not know how the seal ended up in the pond, but they offered some ideas in a Facebook post.

"Did he wander up the freshwater tributary searching for fish, and climb up the steep embankment to rest? Was he swimming in the area during the recent lunar high tide and get swept through a culvert?" the post asked.

A rescuer climbed into the muddy water Monday and snared the 200-pound animal in a specially designed net. Rescuers then hauled the seal to shore.

The center said the seal is now receiving veterinary care and is recovering in a rehabilitation pool.

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Sand dollar found on Mexican beach declared world's largest

A sand dollar found by a British Columbia girl on a 

Mexican beach has been declared the world's largest

 by Guinness World Records. 

Photo by mosaikweb/Pixabay.com

March 18 (UPI) -- A British Columbia student was awarded a Guinness World Record after finding the largest sand dollar in the world on a Mexican beach.

Coldwater resident Neko Wong, a fourth grader at Beairsto Elementary School, said she found the sand dollar, which is larger than her head, on a beach in El Sargenta.

Wong's family submitted the required paperwork to Guinness World Records, which issued the girl a certificate.

The exact measurements of Wong's sand dollar were unclear, but the previous record holder measured about 6 inches in diameter.

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Philadelphia store builds pulley machine to sanitize shopping carts

March 24 (UPI) -- A Philadelphia store constructed a pulley machine outside of the building to keep shopping carts sanitized amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The South Square Market in the City Center area constructed a pulley system outside the store that lifts shopping carts and dips them into giant tubs of liquid sanitizer to ensure they are not spreading coronavirus to customers.

The market, and other grocery stores in the city, are remaining open amid the city and state's stay-at-home orders, as they are considered essential businesses by officials.

"We are glad to have instituted a new practice of cleansing shopping carts and hand baskets frequently," the store said in a Facebook post. "A duplicate system was built for Rittenhouse Market as well."
VIDEO https://www.facebook.com/6abcActionNews/videos/628756357675162/

Website calculates toilet paper needs during COVID-19

March 23 (UPI) -- A website developed by an artist and a London software development student is designed to help families calculate how much toilet paper they need to ride out quarantine during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The website, HowMuchToiletPaper.com, asks users to input how may rolls of toilet paper they currently have inside their home and the average number of daily toilet visits in their household.

The calculator then tells the user how many days their supply will last, as well as what percentage of the user's quarantine time will be covered.

The creators of the website, London-based student software developer Ben Sassoon and artist Sam Harris, said the average user of the website has about 500 percent more toilet paper than they need to ride out the quarantine period during the coronavirus pandemic.

They said they hope the website will help discourage people from hoarding toilet paper supplies.