Kenosha Shop Owner Was Replaced In Trump’s Damage Tour After Declining To Be Featured

THE TRUMP SCHOOL OF FALSIFICATION

KENOSHA, WISCONSIN - SEPTEMBER 01: Police prepare for President Donald Trump's visit on September 1, 2020 in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Kenosha is recovering from several days of unrest and demonstrations following the shoo... MORE

By Zoë Richards  TPM
September 2, 2020 8:21 a.m.

A Kenosha business owner rebuked President Donald Trump for appearing to use his leveled shop for political gain after he refused to participate in the President’s tour of the city’s damage and was later replaced by a man who was misrepresented as the shop’s current owner.

Tom Gram who owns an old camera shop that was leveled in fires last Monday after protests broke out in the Wisconsin city told an NBC-affiliate in Milwaukee that he immediately refused when the White House called on Monday, asking if he would accompany the President on a tour that would showcase his leveled business.

“I think everything he does turns into a circus and I just didn’t want to be involved in it,” Gram told WTMJ-TV.

The White House had called with a request from President Trump for Gram to be featured in a presidential tour of damage following demonstrations that turned destructive in the aftermath of the shooting of Jacob Blake after Trump arrived in Kenosha on Tuesday. When Gram said no, it appears that a former owner of the shop who lavishly praised the president’s efforts was featured instead.

Gram told WTMJ-TV that he has been the shop owner of the century-old Rode’s Camera Shop for the past eight years after he purchased the shop from the Rode family. A website for the business confirms that when the business reached its 100-year milestone in 2011, in preparation to retire then-owner John Rode III sold the business to his employees. Before purchasing the shop, Gram said he worked at the store for more than four decades. Co-owner Paul Willette joined the business in 2001.

To Gram’s surprise, he discovered while watching television that President Trump had replaced him. Trump is featured in the video alongside the camera shop’s former owner in a doctored scene that makes it look like the business still belongs to him even though he sold it to Gram several years ago.

Gram’s story is not the first case of President Trump bending facts to suit his political campaign objectives. He featured several public housing tenants in a self-aggrandizing video that aired without their knowledge at the Republican National Convention last week.

While WTMJ-TV found that Rode is still the property owner at 2204 Roosevelt Road in Kenosha, where Gram ran the camera business which is now in ruins, Rode is not the rightful owner of the shop that he sold to his employee.

“I just appreciate President Trump coming today; everybody here does,” Rode — Gram’s false stand-in– said in the clip. “We’re so thankful that we got the federal troops in to help because once they got here, things did calm down quite a bit.”

President Trump also introduced Rode as the “owner of Rode’s Camera Shop,” during a round table conversation on Tuesday.

“I think he needs to bring this country together rather than divide it,” Gram said of Trump, telling WTMJ-TV that he did not believe it was correct to solely focus on law enforcement when “there’s a lot of good people in this community.”

Zoë Richards is a TPM newswriter based in New York. Previously, she reported on local politics in Kampala, Uganda, wrote about sustainability from a think-tank in Paris, France, and has pursued documentary and broadcast news projects closer to home. She holds a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University.

Thought to be extinct for 50 years, New Guinea singing dog was thriving all along

Scientists found the wild dogs from which the captive New Guinea singing dog population was derived. Photo by New Guinea Highland Wild Dog Foundation

Sept. 1 (UPI) -- The New Guinea singing dog was thought to have disappeared from the wild some 50 years ago, but new research suggests the unusual species has been thriving all along in the New Guinea Highlands.

Genomic analysis, detailed this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, confirmed a group of wild dogs discovered in the New Guinea Highlands as the population from which New Guinea singing dogs were derived.

New Guinea singing dogs are noted for their distinct, melodious howls.

"Canids make all kinds of sounds, but the sound that New Guinea singing dogs make is different, it's unlike any dog sound you've heard," Elaine Ostrander told UPI on Tuesday.

RELATED New study details the genetic evolution of domesticated animals

"It has a harmonic, tonal quality that goes up and goes down in pitch," said Ostrander, lead investigator at the National Human Genome Research Institute of the National Institutes of Health.

Knowledge of the New Guinea singing dog can be traced back in the scientific literature to the 19th century, but by the 1970s, scientists reported the dog missing from the wild.

In an effort to conserve the species, a handful of dogs were brought from conservation centers in New Guinea to the United States. On the surface, the effort was a success, breeders turned eight or nine dogs into a population of nearly 300.

RELATED Increase in promiscuity likely encouraged animal domestication

"The problem is that when you start with just eight or nine dogs and you breed them and breed them, you lose genetic diversity very quickly," Ostrander said.

In the mid-2000s, word spread of a group of dogs in the mountains of Indonesia that resembled New Guinea singing dogs. James McIntyre, president of the New Guinea Highland Wild Dog Foundation, led a pair of expeditions to find and document the wild dogs. On the second expedition, in 2018, McIntyre was able to obtain blood samples.

Back in the lab, scientists were able to isolate the nuclear genomes of three individual dogs from DNA in the blood samples.

RELATED Study finds wolves understand cause and effect better than dogs

"When we looked at the highland dogs' genome and compared it to all known dog breeds from everywhere in the world, as well as to dingoes and village dogs from New Guinea, it was clear that they were most closely related to New Guinea singing dogs," Ostrander said.

The findings also allowed researchers to measure the loss of genetic diversity the New Guinea singing dog experienced while in captivity, data that could help conservation biologists improve future captive breeding programs and protect species vulnerable to genetic bottlenecking.

Often, captive breeding programs start with only a small sample of a popualion's genetic diversity.

RELATED Dogs and wolves have an innate sense of inequity

"Those eight or nine dogs were all taken from around the same area, so chances are that they were probably fairly closely related," Ostrander said. "By the time a species is a candidate for a captive breeding program, they are undergoing duress and have already lost some genetic diversity."

Researchers hope the wild dogs of the New Guinea Highlands can help conservationists restore the genetic diversity of the New Guinea singing dog.

Ostrander said he hopes a more complete picture of the New Guinea singing dog's genome could help her and her colleagues locate the genes responsible for the dog's unique singing ability.

"That's something I'm personally very interested in finding out," she said. "Then I'd like to know what these same genes are doing in humans. Nature is very clever about redundancy, it will often use the same genes for slightly different things."

The new findings could also have implications for the complex and still poorly understood story of dog domestication.

"When we build a tree of all the canids, we find that New Guinea Highland wild dogs, New Guinea singing dogs and dingoes all tie closely together on a branch, and that branch came off pretty early on, well before the emergence of all the other kinds of dog breeds we know today," Ostrander said. "But where [the New Guinea singing dog] falls into the story of domestication is something we can't say for certain. We need to do more research in order to better understand it."

upi.com/7034958

Full 'Corn Moon' rises in September for 1st time in 3 years

A full moon rises behind the Statue of Liberty in New York City on May 7. September was graced by the Corn Moon, summer's last full moon, on Tuesday and Wednesday. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

Sept. 1 (UPI) -- September's lone full moon rose so early this year that it shined as the Corn Moon on Tuesday night and promised that October skies will be graced by a Blue Moon on Halloween.

For the first time in three years, the Corn Moon -- the final full moon of the summer -- rose in September and peaked about 1:22 a.m. EDT Wednesday on the opposite side of the sun, according to NASA.

Usually, September's full moon rises closer to the Autumn Equinox, which ushers in the fall season on Sept. 22, and is named the Harvest Moon in relation to when Native Americans traditionally harvested their crops, according to the Farmers' Almanac.

However, the nearest moon to the equinox is to rise on Oct. 1 this year, meaning September's full moon is the Corn Moon as it appears around the traditional corn harvest, the annual calendar publication said.

"Corn requires up to 100 frost-free days to reach harvest depending upon variety and the amount of heat during the growing season," the almanac said. "That would take us to around the end of August to early September. Hence, for a full moon in early September, it seems appropriate to brand it as a Corn Moon."

This means that the celestial body will appear full twice in October's skies with the Blue Moon, the latter of the two full moons, to fall on Oct. 31 -- Halloween.

Corn Moons occur in September about once every three years.

CAMPBELL'S CREAM OF ANARCHIST SOUP
Trump ridiculed after bizarre rant about 'anarchists throwing soup' resurfaces

Posted 4 hours ago by Greg Evans 

2020 has been a rough year for Donald Trump and the United States.

Not only has he done a terrible job of handling the coronavirus pandemic but he has also faced months and months' worth of Black Lives Matter protests following the death of unarmed Black people in the US at the hands of police.

Rather than offer words of support or a solution to the decades-long problem, Trump has criticised the protesters and even suggested that Black Lives Matter is 'discriminatory' and 'bad for Black people.'

Just a few weeks ago, on July 31, the president went on a bizarre rant about protesters and soup, which he claimed was being thrown at police. Yes, you read that correctly – soup.

Speaking during a meeting with the National Association of Police Organizations Leadership, the president said:

In cities across the nation, we’ve also seen police officers assaulted with bricks, rocks, bats, Molotov cocktails, frozen bottles of water.

Somebody said last night, one of the protesters — I saw it — he said, 'It’s only water. How can water hurt you?' Yeah, they don’t say it’s frozen, in a bottle the size of a football. And they throw it at the police. It’s unbelievable. 'It’s water.'

And then they have cans of soup. Soup. And they throw the cans of soup. That’s better than a brick because you can’t throw a brick; it’s too heavy. But a can of soup, you can really put some power into that, right? 

And then, when they get caught, they say, 'No, this is soup for my family.' They’re so innocent. 'This is soup for my family.' It’s incredible.

And you have people coming over with bags of soup — big bags of soup. And they lay it on the ground, and the anarchists take it and they start throwing it at our cops, at our police.

And if it hits you, that’s worse than a brick because that’s got force. It’s the perfect size. It’s, like, made perfect

And when they get caught, they say, 'No, this is just soup for my family.' And then the media says, 'This is just soup. These people are very, very innocent. They’re innocent people. These are just protesters. Isn’t it wonderful to allow protesting?'

It's hard to know exactly what Trump has a grievance with here. Is it the protesters or the soup? Regardless, the bonkers rant has been widely ridiculed on social media.

There was the inevitable comparison to the famous 'Soup Nazi' episode from Seinfeld.

It's amazing that this took so long to come to light but we can at least be thankful that it is in the world now. We can't wait to see what Joe Biden will make of this

Pakistan bans dating apps Tinder, Grindr over 'immoral' content

Pakistan has blocked access to multiple dating apps, including Tinder and Grindr, in a bid to restrict "immoral" and "indecent" content.

    

Pakistan has blocked several dating apps, including Tinder and Grindr, in a bid to restrict "immoral" and "indecent" content, authorities said on Monday.

The Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA) said it issued notices to the management of Tinder, Grindr, Tagged, Skout and SayHi, seeking the removal of dating services on those platforms.

Read more: Pakistani women break dating taboos on Tinder

The notices were sent "keeping in view the negative effects of immoral/indecent content streaming," according to the PTA, but the companies did not respond within the time outlined by local laws.

Pakistan is the second-largest Muslim-majority state in the world. Extra-marital relationships and homosexuality are against the laws of the country.

Last week, the regulatory body asked YouTube to block all videos that were considered "objectionable" in the country. In the past, video app TikTok and live-streaming app Bigo Live were also reprimanded over explicit content.

However, with greater regulations imposed on digital platforms, rights groups are worried that the government is attempting to push censorship and gain control of free media.

"If adults choose to be on an app, it is not for the state to dictate whether they should use it or not," said Shahzad Ahmad, director of Bytes For All, a Pakistani digital rights group. Calling the ban "completely ridiculous," he said it was an attempt at  "moral policing."

Data shows that within the past 12 months, Tinder was downloaded 440,000 times, Grindr, Tagged and SayHi about 300,000 times each, and Skout 100,000 times in Pakistan.

see/aw (Reuters, AFP)

Elon Musk to meet with German Economy Minister Peter Altmaier

The billionaire is visiting Germany to explore a potential coronavirus vaccine made by CureVac. The biotechnology firm, which Germany has a direct stake in, is in the advanced stages of developing a vaccine candidate.

Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk is visiting Germany to scope out the development of a coronavirus vaccine candidate and meet with the economy minister.

Musk is scheduled to meet with Economy Minister Peter Altmaier on Wednesday, according to government sources.

Read more: EU joins WHO's coronavirus vaccine alliance, offers €400 million investment

On Tuesday, the Tesla CEO visited biotechnology company CureVac in the southwestern town of Tübingen. The firm is in the advanced stages of developing a potential vaccine for the virus.

On Sunday, Musk announced that he would head to Germany to discuss cooperation with CureVac and the construction of a Tesla factory in Grünheide, on the outskirts of Berlin.

Read more: Global race to buy coronavirus vaccine: What you need to know

"Tesla, as a side project, is building RNA microfactories for CureVac and possibly others," he tweeted in July.

The car manufacturer has not yet released details on the project.

Starting in mid-2021, Tesla plans to produce around 500,000 electric vehicles annually at the Grünheide "Gigafactory," creating around 12,000 jobs. The plan does not yet have full environmental approval.

The European Commission said in August that it was in advanced talks with CureVac, which is partly owned by the German government, regarding the purchase of 225 million doses of its vaccine. In June, Germany paid €300 million ($356 million) for a 23% stake in the company.

Until then, billionaire German entrepreneur Dietmar Hopp, co-founder of German software company SAP, had been the biotech firm's biggest investor.

Germany also signed an agreement with France, Italy and the Netherlands to procure 300 million doses of a potential coronavirus vaccine from the British-Swedish pharmaceutical group AstraZeneca. Under the deal, all EU member states must receive supplies of the vaccine as soon as it is discovered.

Read more: Coronavirus: German vaccine study draws thousands of volunteers

Date 02.09.2020
Related Subjects Coronavirus
Keywords Elon Musk, Altmaier, vaccine, coronavirus, COVID-19

Permalink https://p.dw.com/p/3htsx

US won’t join WHO-led effort for coronavirus vaccine

The Trump administration has said that the United States will not be joining the COVAX alliance headed by the WHO, which aims at developing and mass distributing any potential coronavirus vaccine.

    

The United States will not join an international effort to develop and distribute vaccination for the coronavirus, as it does not want to be restricted by multilateral groups like the World Health Organization, officials said on Tuesday.

"The United States will continue to engage our international partners to ensure we defeat this virus, but we will not be constrained by multilateral organizations influenced by the corrupt World Health Organization and China," the Washington Post first quoted White House spokesman Judd Deere as saying.

"This president will spare no expense to ensure that any new vaccine maintains our own Food and Drug Administration's gold standard for safety and efficacy, is thoroughly tested and saves lives."

Read more: EU joins WHO's coronavirus vaccine alliance, offers €400 million investment

While some countries are striking bilateral deals to secure supplies of potential COVID-19 vaccines, a major cooperative effort has been set in motion by over 150 countries under the leadership of the WHO, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and the vaccine alliance Gavi.

The COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access Facility, or COVAX, has received support from traditional US allies, including Japan, the European Union and Germany. The initiative will allow members to gain access to a range of potential vaccines so that a larger section of the world can be covered when an effective solution is developed.

Shortsighted approach to the pandemic

Critics have voiced concerns over the US decision to step away from the alliance, calling it "shortsighted" in the face of a global pandemic.

"Joining COVAX is a simple measure to guarantee US access to a vaccine — no matter who develops it first," tweeted US Representative Ami Bera from the state of California, who is also a medical doctor. "This go-it-alone approach leaves America at risk of not getting a vaccine."

The other major possibility could be that the US develops its vaccine but hoards it to vaccinate citizens. This would leave the country vulnerable to imported cases of the virus and impact the US economy harshly if the global economy has not recovered.

US withdrawal from the WHO

Trump has repeatedly criticized the WHO for its early response to the outbreak, and has accused the agency of colluding with China and participating in a cover-up of information about the virus.

In April, the Trump administration announced a freeze on US funding to the United Nations subsidiary, followed by the decision to terminate ties with the intergovernmental organization. By July, the US communicated its intent to withdraw from the WHO.

Mauritian citizen becomes powerful voice for oil spill anger



Issued on: 02/09/2020 -

Bruneau Laurette has channelled the anger that many Mauritians feel after the catastrophic oil spill Fabien Dubessay AFP
4 min
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Port Louis (Mauritius) (AFP)

In normal times, Bruneau Laurette spends his days providing armed escort to ships dodging pirates as they head through the Indian Ocean.

But in recent weeks, the maritime security expert has surged into a new role: the voice of a nation's anger after an oil spill soiled the coast of his native Mauritius.

The disaster occurred after a 100,000-tonne Japanese bulk carrier, MV Wakashio, ran aground on a coral reef on July 25.


It spewed more than 1,000 tonnes of oil into pristine waters that are home to mangrove forests and endangered species and are vital for fishermen and the country's tourist industry.

After the 300-metre (1,000-foot) ship split in two, the larger piece was towed out to sea and sunk, but the smaller section remains stranded on the reef.

Public anger continues to mount. On Saturday, in one of the country's biggest rallies in years, tens of thousands of black-clad people took to the streets of the capital Port Louis in response to Laurette's call for a protest over what he sees as a flawed government response.

"The number exceeded my expectations," Laurette said of the crowd size during an interview with AFP.

- Government 'breakdown' -

The outspoken Laurette -- a muscular 46-year-old with a shaved head who often wears military-style garb -- has given voice to Mauritians concerned about the long-term damage caused by the spill.

"I don't feel anger. My feelings are more of sadness, when I see the incompetence," he said.

It is still unclear why the MV Wakashio veered so close to the coast, and Laurette believes an explanation is long overdue.

He has also chastised the government for failing to recognise the gravity of the threat and for taking too long to start pumping oil from the ship, which only began leaking fuel more than a week after it ran aground.

In a crisis "we cannot carry on as we do every day," he said. "We have to adapt to the situation and evolve. But here we have a tendency to wait and wait. But we cannot do this. That's why I say there was a breakdown."

The government has vowed to seek compensation from the owner and the insurer of the ship for "all losses and damages" caused by the spill as well as clean-up costs.

But Laurette says he doesn't trust the government to hold to account local officials who may share in the blame.

This is why he filed his own legal complaint -- dragging two government ministers in front of a court -- saying he was "aggrieved and afflicted" by the massive spill.

He also filed a complaint against the Indian captain of the ship, who was separately arrested by Mauritian authorities.

In his affidavit, Laurette described how he would go swimming in Blue Bay and take his children for picnics on the Ile aux Aigrettes -- both areas affected by the spill.

"I also used to buy fish and seafood, oysters and crabs, from local fishermen at Mahebourg."

-'Hungry for justice'-

Laurette has also called for the resignation of Prime Minister Pravind Jugnauth, a move praised by many Mauritians who took part in Saturday's protest.

Jugnauth, who took office in 2017, is the son of former Prime Minister Anerood Jugnauth.

His critics, Laurette among them, lament the fact that a select group of families have played an outsized role in Mauritian politics.

Protesters on Saturday went beyond the oil spill to denounce corruption, inequality and a government they say is increasingly authoritarian.

"I don't believe he is humble enough to step down," Laurette told AFP, denouncing Pravind Jugnauth's "oversized ego" and "arrogance".

In the first weeks after the oil spill, the prime minister dismissed criticism of his response and refused to apologise.

But in a televised address Monday evening, he said he had "heard" his critics and vowed to open a public inquiry into the disaster.

"That's just the warming up," he said. "It hasn't started yet."

© 2020 AFP

Mauritius asks Japan to pay $34 million after oil spill: report
Nearly a month after Mauritius declared an environmental emergency over an oil spill from a Japanese bulk carrier, the government has asked Japan to pay up, a report shows.



Mauritius has asked Japan to pay close to 3.6 billion yen (€28.5 billion, $34 million) in order to support local fishermen whose livelihoods were adversely impacted by an oil leak last month, according to a Mauritian government document accessed by Japanese news agency Kyodo News.

The spill occurred when Japanese bulk carrier MV Wakashio, owned by Nagashiki Shipping Co., crashed into a reef off southeastern Mauritius in July. More than 1,000 tons of oil spilled into waters that are home to mangrove forests and endangered species, causing Mauritius to declare a "state of environmental emergency" on August 7.

As the island nation attempts to control the spread of the fuel, there has been considerable debate over who will pay for the damage inflicted on sea life and those who are dependent on it for their livelihoods.

Read more: Who will pay for the Mauritius oil spill?

According to the document cited by Kyodo, Mauritius has estimated a cost of over $30 million for constructing 100 fishing boats, while over $240,000 would be used for providing training to 475 fishermen and 60 skippers who may not have experience fishing in rough seas.

Over $3 million has been requested for renovating Mauritius' Albion Fisheries Research Center, which was built in the 1980s with Japanese assistance.

According to the Japanese agency, an official from the Embassy of Japan in Mauritius confirmed that various requests had been received. The official said, "It is true that we are currently receiving various requests. Japan is working to promptly do all that it can."

Over the weekend, Mauritius saw large scale demonstrations in the capital, the biggest protests the country has seen in 40 years. Close to 75,000 protesters marched against Prime Minister Pravind Jugnauth's inaction in dealing with the crisis, calling for the leader and many top officials to step down.

Signs such as "Your incompetence is destroying our island," "You have no shame," and "I've seen better Cabinets at IKEA" were carried by protesters, who were also outraged over the alarming discovery of dozens of dead dolphins in recent days.

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Mauritius: Thousands protest over government response to oil spill

Tens of thousands of Mauritians have marched in the capital city to protest against the government's handling of a giant oil spill off its pristine Indian Ocean coast.

How environmental courts can help Africa

The oil spill off the coast of Mauritius is a grim reminder of the need for environmental courts in Africa. They could play an important role in punishing environmental offences as a recent case from Kenya proves.

Mauritius arrests captain of Japanese ship over oil spill

The Japanese-owned bulk carrier MV Wakashio ran aground in July, causing a devastating oil spill near a protected coral reef. Police from the island nation have detained the ship's captain. 

AUDIOS AND VIDEOS ON THE TOPIC
Oil spill on Mauritian coast threatens tourism and livelihoods

Date 02.09.2020
Author Seerat Chabba
Related Subjects Climate Change, Japan
Keywords Mauritius, oil spill, japan, climate change

Permalink https://p.dw.com/p/3htAS

Over 30% of LGBT+ people in Germany experience discrimination at work
More than 40% of transgender people have reported negative treatment at work. LGBT+ people tend to be more highly educated and work more often in health and social services.



Thirty-percent of homosexual people and more than 40% of transgender people in Germany reported being discriminated against at work, according to a study issued Wednesday by the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW).

According to the study, homosexual people and transgender people are employed to a similar extent as the heterosexual population, but they are usually more highly qualified, according to the report, made available to the Funke Media Group. For example, the proportion of LGBT+ who have graduated from technical school and university is 60%, compared to 42% of the rest of the population.

LGBT asylum in Germany: Similar cases, different outcome

Read more: Germany reveals details of compensation plan for gay soldiers

LGBT+ people work less often in the manufacturing industry, but more often in health and social services as well as the arts and entertainment industries than the rest of the German population.

"The figures are consistent with what we know from our own surveys and also from our counseling practice," Bernhard Franke, acting head of the Federal Anti-Discrimination Office, told Funke.

Read more: German parliament debates relaxing blood donation rules for LGBT+ men

LGBT+ people often experience forms of bullying and harassment at work and so frequently keep their sexual identity a secret, said Franke. "No one should be discriminated against in Germany because of their sexual or gender identity," he said.

Transgender people have to deal with a particularly high level of discrimination, Franke said, adding that studies show people's name changes are often not accepted. Transgender people often face, for example, "an inappropriate, often sexualized interest in private life, imitating or ridiculing voices or gestures or not being able to use toilets according to one's gender identity," he said.

Read more: European LGBT+ equality survey shows east-west divide

Franke added that employers should be the first to take action: "Companies should emphasize and promote diversity, not hide it. In addition, it is important to intervene as soon as discrimination is recognized."