Good morning.

Thursday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of 85. Sunrise is 5:51 AM and sunset 8:09 PM, for 14h 17m 57s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 9.4% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1974, President Nixon, under orders of the US Supreme Court, releases the “Smoking Gun” tape, recorded on June 23, 1972, clearly revealing his actions in covering up and interfering investigations into the break-in.

Recommended for reading in full — 

Michael Gerson writes We shouldn’t be cruel about covid deaths. We should focus on getting everyone vaccinated:

Some of America may be suffering an outbreak of schadenfreude. Many have walked past the empty vaccination sites at Walmart and Costco, in a country where only half the people have taken the full dose of a miracle medicine that could save their lives. At some point, doesn’t recklessness deserve its reward?

But God help us if everyone got the health outcomes we deserved, when we eat poorly, or refuse to exercise, or ignore symptoms of illness — any of which might eventually bring a higher risk of death than covid vaccine hesitancy. Some of us take our recklessness in smaller, extended dosages.

….

Yet it is political figures who merit the most disgust. Consider Florida’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis. His state is the epicenter of the delta outbreak, accounting for 1 of every 5 new covid infections nationwide. Yet he is not, as the Daytona Beach News-Journal points out, holding daily emergency briefings. Instead: “DeSantis sent out a campaign email accusing Dr. Anthony Fauci … of somehow scheming with the Chinese over the spread of the coronavirus — while at the same time proclaiming the economic folly of taking basic precautions against the disease.” Last month, the DeSantis campaign rolled out a line of T-shirts and beer koozies with anti-Fauci themes. “Yep,” the News-Journal concluded, “He has merch.”

This remains lethal lunacy.

CBS News reports Target to require workers to mask up in areas where Delta variant is surging:

Minneapolis-based Target said Monday that, starting August 3, it will require all store workers in counties that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says face a “substantial or high risk of transmission” to wear face coverings. The big-box retailer, which has more than 1,900 stores, also said it will continue recommending that customers wear masks in its locations, but stopped short of requiring face coverings.

Juliette Kayyem writes Unvaccinated People Need to Bear the Burden: 

The number of COVID-19 cases keeps growing, even though remarkably safe, effective vaccines are widely available, at least to adults. Many public agencies are responding by reimposing masking rules on everyone. But at this stage of the pandemic, tougher universal restrictions are not the solution to continuing viral spread. While flying, vaccinated people should no longer carry the burden for unvaccinated people. The White House has rejected a nationwide vaccine mandate—a sweeping suggestion that the Biden administration could not easily enact if it wanted to—but a no-fly list for unvaccinated adults is an obvious step that the federal government should take. It will help limit the risk of transmission at destinations where unvaccinated people travel—and, by setting norms that restrict certain privileges to vaccinated people, will also help raise the stagnant vaccination rates that are keeping both the economy and society from fully recovering.

Isaac Stanley-Becker and David A. Fahrenthold report His campaign is over. But Trump’s political groups are still spending donor money at his properties:

Save America, the leadership PAC where former president Donald Trump is asking loyalists to direct their political contributions, paid for lodging about two dozen times in the first six months of 2021.

Nine of those times, the payments went to properties owned by the former president, according to a filing made public on Saturday. All told, the PAC sent at least $68,000 to the Trump Hotel Collection, showing how the real estate mogul — long after ending his presidential campaign and leaving office — continues to use donor money at his own properties.

‘Explosive Growth’ of California’s Dixie Fire Forces 15,000 to Evacuate:

Good morning.

Wednesday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of 84. Sunrise is 5:50 AM and sunset 8:10 PM, for 14h 20m 18s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 16% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1821, The Saturday Evening Post is published for the first time as a weekly newspaper.

Recommended for reading in full — 

 Hope Karnopp and Devi Shastri report Republican-led committee votes to block UW campuses’ COVID-19 requirements; UW-Madison immediately issues mask mandate:

MADISON – University of Wisconsin officials who want to ward off a rising COVID-19 caseload now must get permission from the Legislature to implement masking, testing or vaccination requirements, according to a plan Republicans adopted Tuesday.

Within hours, UW-Madison’s chancellor tested the issue by imposing a mask requirement without saying whether she would seek the approval of lawmakers.

The Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules voted remotely without holding debate on the motion to require legislative approval for COVID policies on campuses. All six Republicans voted for the proposal and all four Democrats voted against it.

Republicans say the vote means the UW System must now get approval from lawmakers before putting in place any COVID rules. Democrats dispute that, saying the system still has the power to act on its own.

UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank signaled she believed she could act on her own by issuing a campuswide mask mandate soon after the committee vote.

Her order will require people — whether vaccinated or not — to wear masks when they are in campus buildings, in campus buses or riding with others in university vehicles. There are exceptions for when people are eating and drinking, in their dorm rooms or alone in offices. It takes effect Thursday.

Between the committee’s vote and Blank issuing her order, system officials did not respond to questions from the Journal Sentinel about whether they believed campuses could act on their own.

“Today’s action feels like a political statement; our focus is to ensure we are doing what needs to be done now to safely open for in-person teaching this fall,” UW System spokesman Mark Pitsch said of the committee’s vote.

Republican Sen. Steve Nass of Whitewater introduced the motion last week, which directs the UW Board of Regents to issue any current or future systemwide or campus-by-campus COVID-19 requirements as emergency rules, which the committee could block in part or whole

See also Steve Nass: Troll-King in Autumn.

Laura Bassett writes Biden calls on Andrew Cuomo to resign. He’s not the only Cuomo who needs to go:

The [New York Attorney General’s] report also noted that CNN anchor Chris Cuomo, the governor’s brother, was part of a small team of advisers who helped him respond to the allegations. The journalist Cuomo seems to have gone so far as to draft a statement for his powerful brother in February of this year.

“Sometimes I am playful and make jokes,” the statement says. “You have seen me do it at briefings hundreds of times. My only desire is to add some levity and banter to what is a very serious business.”

The governor Cuomo appeared to take some of those tips, trying to spin the report on camera Tuesday alongside a bizarre montage of him kissing and touching people. He denied the allegations, refused to admit to any misconduct and said he was just being “playful,” which somehow got misinterpreted as flirtation.

“I do on occasion say, ‘Ciao, bella,'” the governor said. “I do banter with people. I do tell jokes — some better than others.”

“I try to put people at ease. I try to make them smile. I try to connect with them,” he continued. “I now understand that there are generational or cultural perspectives that frankly I haven’t fully appreciated.”

Of course, according to the employees in James’ report, the governor’s self-described “banter” neither made them smile nor put them at ease. The women he harassed described his behavior as “deeply humiliating, uncomfortable, offensive” and “inappropriate.” The report concluded that he created a “hostile work environment” that was “rife with fear and intimidation” and that he clearly violated federal and state law.

Given this information, Andrew Cuomo should resign immediately or be impeached.

His brother, too, should resign from covering politics or be fired. It’s extremely inappropriate and unethical for a journalist to advise and craft the statements of a politician, regardless of family relation.

 Wild coyote circles beachgoer for 10 minutes:

Good morning.

Tuesday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 81. Sunrise is 5:49 AM and sunset 8:12 PM, for 14h 22m 37s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 23.5% of its visible disk illuminated.

The Whitewater Common Council meets at 6:30 PM.

On this day in 1958, the world’s first nuclear submarine, the USS Nautilus, becomes the first vessel to complete a submerged transit of the geographical North Pole.

Recommended for reading in full — 

Devi Shastri and Hope Karnopp report ‘This is madness’: Between politics and public health, UW schools work to adapt for fall:

Now, a proposal by state Sen. Steven Nass, R-Whitewater, is adding to the uncertainty and raising questions about how political influences could still stand to hamper the UW System’s fall planning.

If passed, Nass’ motion would direct the UW Board of Regents to issue its COVID-19 policies as emergency rules subject to legislative approval. The Republican-controlled rules committee, which Nass co-chairs, could then block part or all of those rules.

….

Opponents throughout the UW System say the change, if passed, would at least slow down the system’s reaction time by requiring an added layer of legislative approval for any COVID-19 protocol. At worst, they fear, it would end public health efforts like mask mandates altogether, leaving schools without the tools they used to curb COVID-19’s spread last school year.

“I feel like in some ways, going into this fall is actually worse than March 2020 or going into last fall, because at this point, things have been so politicized, people are so tired,” said Tracy Hawkins, chair of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater’s faculty senate. “(The pandemic) is not just a blip anymore. It has been a substantial portion of people’s college experience now. So it’s like the emotions of it are running even higher.”

….

Experts from the American College Health Association to the editor-in-chief of the leading journal Science have called for vaccination mandates on college campuses. While UW System schools still have made no indication they would require vaccination against COVID-19 this fall, some 623 campuses nationwide now do, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education.

That, as of last week, includes half of the Big Ten conference, of which UW-Madison is a part.

Michigan State University was the latest to impose a mandate on indoor masking and COVID-19 vaccination. President Samuel Stanley Jr. wrote that CDC data on the delta variant’s spread among vaccinated people was “concerning and significantly shifts the landscape.”

See also Steve Nass: Troll-King in Autumn.

Mick DeBonis reports As many Republicans try to rewrite history of Jan. 6 attack, Sen. Ron Johnson suggests FBI knew more than it has said:

“I don’t say this publicly, but are you watching what’s happening in Michigan?” Johnson said while discussing the Capitol attack with some of the event’s attendees. “…So you think the FBI had fully infiltrated the militias in Michigan, but they don’t know squat about what was happening on January 6th or what was happening with these groups? I’d say there is way more to the story.”

….

No credible evidence has emerged that the FBI had detailed foreknowledge of a violent assault on the Capitol or that its agents or operatives played a role in fomenting it. No specific claim of FBI involvement has surfaced in court filings made in the hundreds of cases filed against alleged Capitol assailants.

But the allegations have persisted in recent weeks as Republican supporters of former president Donald Trump, who falsely claimed the 2020 presidential election was stolen and encouraged his supporters to march on the Capitol as Congress counted electoral votes on Jan. 6, have consistently sought to finger other culprits for the breach of the Capitol.

See also Whether Ambitious, Compromised, or Crackpot, Sen. Ron Johnson Doesn’t Disappoint.

Russian space module mishap pushes ISS out of position:

Good morning.

Monday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of 75. Sunrise is 5:48 AM and sunset 8:13 PM, for 14h 24m 54s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 32% of its visible disk illuminated.

Whitewater’s Urban Forestry Commission Grants and Sponsorship Sub-Committee meets at 4:30 PM.

On this day in 1939, Albert Einstein and Leo Szilard write a letter to Franklin D. Roosevelt, urging him to begin the Manhattan Project to develop a nuclear weapon.

Recommended for reading in full — 

Hannah Knowles reports ‘I should have gotten the damn vaccine,’ woman says fiance texted before he died of covid-19:

Micheal Freedy was not opposed to vaccination, his fiancee said. Like many Americans who have yet to get their coronavirus shots, the 39-year-old father just wanted to wait and learn more about how people reacted to the vaccines.

“All we were doing is waiting one year,” Jessica DuPreez, 37, told The Washington Post on Sunday.

Then everything changed. This weekend — DuPreez’s grief days old and her voice breaking — the Las Vegas mother of five gave interview after interview to spread the same message: Get the vaccine. She said Freedy came to the same conclusion early on in the fight with covid-19 that put him in an intensive care unit in July.

“I should have gotten the damn vaccine,” he texted DuPreez, according to a picture she shared with The Post.

Freedy, who is listed in her phone as “My Heart,” died on Thursday, leaving behind young children, including a 17-month-old.

Danielle Kaeding reports Town of Peshtigo Residents Have Lived with PFAS Pollution for Years. They’re Still Waiting for a Permanent Source of Safe Water:

Furton and around 140 other residents in the corner of northeastern Wisconsin have been drinking bottled water for years due to PFAS pollution of private wells. The contamination stems from the use of firefighting foam that contained the chemicals at Tyco Fire Products’ fire training facility in Marinette.

Residents knew little about PFAS when the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources directed the company to investigate in the fall of 2017. Several years later, they’re no closer to a permanent source of clean, safe drinking water.

“It shouldn’t be a normal part of life that the water coming into your home isn’t safe,” said Furton.

PFAS are a class of thousands of harmful chemicals that have been linked to serious health issues including testicular and kidney cancers, fertility problems and thyroid disease. Often called forever chemicals because they don’t break down easily in the environment, PFAS substances are used in firefighting foam and everyday products like nonstick cookware and stain-resistant clothing.

Furton was diagnosed with thyroid disease a year after they moved back. She can’t say for sure that it’s due to the contamination, but residents reached a $17.5 million settlement with Tyco earlier this year over their exposure to the chemicals in private wells.

PFAS has seeped into so many parts of their lives that they even give filtered water to their pet chickens Gertrude and Mayo. While they would joke about it, research has shown a link between PFAS concentrations in hens’ drinking water and the levels detected in eggs.

“It just highlights the multiple paths of exposure,” she said.

Peshtigo was the first of many communities in the state to deal with pollution from PFAS. Eau Claire is one of the latest cities to find PFAS in municipal wells.

Moose Gets Loose – and Tranquilized – in Parking Garage:

Good morning.

Sunday in Whitewater will be mostly sunny with a high of 77. Sunrise is 5:47 AM and sunset 8:14 PM, for 14h 27m 09s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 41% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1774, British scientist Joseph Priestley discovers oxygen gas, corroborating the prior discovery of this element by German-Swedish chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele.

Recommended for reading in full — 

Rick Barrett and Kelli Arseneau report With poor data, deficient requirements and little oversight, massive public spending still hasn’t solved the rural internet access problem:

The Federal Communications Commission has said that nationwide around 14 million people lack access to broadband, also known as high-speed internet. However, the firm Broadband Now, which helps consumers find service, estimates it’s closer to 42 million. And although Microsoft Corp. doesn’t have the ability to measure everyone’s actual internet connection, the tech giant says approximately 120 million Americans aren’t using the internet at true broadband speeds of at least 25-megabit-per-second downloads and 3 Mbps uploads — a further indication of how many people have been left behind.

In education, jobs, telemedicine and entertainment, large swaths of the countryside are stifled in basic tasks such as uploading a video or taking an online class.

Today, many believe the nation is at a pivotal moment as President Joe Biden’s administration has proposed spending $65 billion for broadband expansion.

Biden’s initiative, part of his $1.2 trillion American Jobs Plan, would prioritize the creation of future-proof networks, “so we finally reach 100 percent coverage,” the White House said in a recent statement.

[Price County resident Jeff] Hallstrand and others across rural America have heard this before.

In 2004, President George W. Bush called for affordable, high-speed internet access for all Americans by 2007. It was, he said, essential to the nation’s economic growth.

In 2010, President Barack Obama promoted a National Broadband Plan as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The 360-page plan outlined 208 recommendations. “It is a call to action,” the document said, “to replace talk with practical results.”

In 2019, President Donald Trump unveiled the $20 billion Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, saying that farmers “just haven’t been treated properly” when it comes to internet  access. Billions had already been spent on broadband.

None of the efforts under any of the administrations succeeded, and some of the reasons were fairly straightforward. The data on who has broadband  — and who doesn’t  — has been flawed. Some of the upgrades quickly became obsolete. There’s been limited accountability.

“We have given away $40 billion in the last 10 years … and haven’t solved the problem,” said Tom Wheeler, who was FCC chairman in Obama’s administration.

 The New York Times editorial board writes Russia’s New Form of Organized Crime Is Menacing the World:

Whatever the true scope, the problem will not be solved with patches, antivirus software or two-factor authentication, though security experts stress that every bit of protection helps. “We’re not going to defend ourselves out of this problem,” said Dmitri Alperovitch, the chairman of Silverado Policy Accelerator and a leading authority on ransomware. “We have too many vulnerabilities. Companies that are small, libraries, fire departments will never afford the required security technology and talent.”

The battle must be joined elsewhere, and the place to start is Russia. That, according to the experts, is where the majority of attacks originate. Three other countries — China, Iran and North Korea — are also serious players, and the obvious commonality is that all are autocracies whose security apparatuses doubtlessly know full well who the hackers are and could shut them down in a minute. So the presumption is that the criminals are protected, either through bribes — which, given their apparent profits, they can distribute lavishly — or by doing pro bono work for the government or both.

Tonight’s Sky for August:

Good morning.

Saturday in Whitewater will be mostly sunny with a high of 82. Sunrise is 5:46 AM and sunset 8:15 PM, for 14h 29m 22s of daytime.  The moon is in its third quarter with 49.8% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1964, Ranger 7 sends back the first close-up photographs of the moon, with images 1,000 times clearer than anything ever seen from earth-bound telescopes.

Recommended for reading in full — 

 Katie Benner reports Trump Pressed Justice Dept. to Declare Election Results Corrupt, Notes Show:

President Donald J. Trump pressed top Justice Department officials late last year to declare that the election was corrupt even though they had found no instances of widespread fraud, so he and his allies in Congress could use the assertion to try to overturn the results, according to new documents provided to lawmakers.

The demands were an extraordinary instance of a president interfering with an agency that is typically more independent from the White House to advance his personal agenda. They are also the latest example of Mr. Trump’s wide-ranging campaign during his final weeks in office to delegitimize the election results.

The exchange unfolded during a phone call on Dec. 27 in which Mr. Trump pressed the acting attorney general at the time, Jeffrey A. Rosen, and his deputy, Richard P. Donoghue, on voter fraud claims that the Justice Department had found no evidence for. Mr. Donoghue warned that the department had no power to change the outcome of the election. Mr. Trump replied that he did not expect that, according to notes Mr. Donoghue took memorializing the conversation.

“Just say that the election was corrupt + leave the rest to me” and to congressional allies, Mr. Donoghue wrote in summarizing Mr. Trump’s response.

Mr. Trump did not name the lawmakers, but at other points during the call, he mentioned Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, whom he described as a “fighter”; Representative Scott Perry, Republican of Pennsylvania, who at the time promoted the idea that the election was stolen from Mr. Trump; and Senator Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, whom Mr. Trump praised for “getting to bottom of things.”

(Ron Johnson: Trump’s Willing Enabler in Wisconsin.)

 The Associated Press reports Speaker Robin Vos expands investigation into Wisconsin 2020 election after two investigators quit:

MADISON – The highest-ranking Republican in the Wisconsin Assembly said Friday that he was expanding a probe into the 2020 presidential election, saying it will take more investigators and time than originally planned.

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos signed contracts in June with two retired police detectives and a former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice to handle the investigation. But those two investigators quit earlier this month, Vos confirmed for the first time Friday, leading him to “take a different tack.”

Vos has designated retired Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman as a “special counsel” and empowered him to hire as many investigators as he wants, with the goal of completing the probe this fall.

“If he thinks he needs one person, great,” Vos told The Associated Press. “If he thinks he needs half a dozen, great.”

Gableman, who during a pro-Trump rally in November claimed the election had been stolen, did not immediately reply to a message seeking comment.

The move comes amid growing calls from former President Donald Trump and other Wisconsin Republicans for a broader audit.

(Robin Vos: Bringing an Arizona-style Inquisition to Wisconsin Since 2021.)

AI App Decodes Cats’ Feelings:

Good morning.

Friday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of 76. Sunrise is 5:45 AM and sunset 8:17 PM, for 14h 31m 34s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 60.3% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1932, Walt Disney’s Flowers and Trees, the first cartoon short to use Technicolor and the first Academy Award-winning cartoon short, premieres.

Recommended for reading in full — 

 Isaac Stanley-Becker reports Charlie Kirk’s pro-Trump youth group stokes vaccine resistance as covid surges again:

Text messages announcing Kirk as their author warn that President Biden is “sending goons DOOR-TO-DOOR to make you take a covid-19 vaccine.” Facebook ads from Kirk’s tax-exempt nonprofit insist the government has “NO RIGHT to force you to inject yourself with an experimental vaccine,” and say the best response to outreach about the shots is to, “LOCK YOUR DOORS, KIDS!!”

These statements stand on a slew of falsehoods and mischaracterizations, according to vaccine experts. At least 400 people 18 and under have died of covid-19 in the United States, making the virus more lethal than the flu, said Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. The coronavirus also carries the risk of an inflammatory syndrome that can affect the lungs, heart, and kidneys of children and young adults. Federal health authorities recommend the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for children as young as 12. “Any reasonable person who looks at the data would conclude the safer choice is to get the vaccine,” Offit said.

But the communications by Turning Point USA and its affiliate, Turning Point Action, reflect the increasingly hard line taken by the group, which describes itself as the “largest and fastest-growing youth organization in America” and claims a presence on more than 2,500 college and high school campuses. Its dire warnings about a government-backed inoculation program — now a major theme of its Facebook ads, which have been viewed millions of times — illustrate how the Trump-allied group is capitalizing on the stark polarization around vaccine policy.

Adam Gabbatt reports Firm leading Arizona audit received millions from Trump supporters:

The firm leading a widely criticized, Republican-backed audit of election ballots in Arizona has received $5.7m in donations, the majority from supporters of Donald Trump, it revealed on Wednesday.

Cyber Ninjas, a Florida-based company with no prior experience in election audits, said it had received $3.25m from Patrick Byrne, the CEO of the furniture sales company Overstock, who has falsely described the 2020 election as “rigged”, with more money pouring in from figures who have peddled lies about the legitimacy of the vote.

The firm was hired by Arizona’s GOP-led senate to review the 2020 election in Maricopa county, home to Phoenix and most of the state’s registered voters.

Doug Logan, Cyber Ninjas’ CEO, released the detail on the company’s donors after the congressional House oversight and reform committee demandedthe information, citing the Cyber Ninjas’ “lack of experience in conducting election-related audits” and “sloppy and insecure audit practices”.

The Arizona senate allowed Cyber Ninjas to collect private donations even though the company was being paid $150,000 for the audit.

….

The ballot review has been derided as a “sham audit” by Democrats, and even criticized by GOP leaders in Maricopa county. It has been condemned by election experts, who have said that officials are not using a reliable methodology.

On Wednesday the review was subjected to further scrutiny when Ken Bennett, the former Republican secretary of state and the senate’s unpaid liaison to Logan and the audit contractors, said he planned to quit.

Bennett is the only audit leader with substantial experience in elections, and his departure threatened to even further erode any legitimacy the unprecedented partisan post-election review claimed to have.

Disney’s Flowers and Trees: