It is my belief that in the future historians are going to see Senator Mitch McConnell and Attorney General Merrick Garand as two of the worst villains and the weakest men of this period. Biden is an institutionalist and he has been weak in dealing with Garland whom he should have replaced several years ago. Garland has failed utterly in protecting our democracy. McConnell is simply lacking in integrty and corrupt.
The House Ethics Committee revealed its report on former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) on Monday — with its authors complaining that Merrick Garland’s Department of Justice stopped it from carrying out a more through investigation.
In its report, which alleged that Gaetz paid an underage girl for sex, among other claims, the Ethics Committee asserts: “The Committee was not able to speak with every woman who received payments from Representative Gaetz that were suspected of being part of illicit activity. Several women initially were responsive to the Committee’s outreach but later told the Committee they would not voluntarily participate. Other women were clear at first contact that they feared retaliation or were unwilling to voluntarily relive their interactions with Representative Gaetz.”
“Due to the women’s reluctance to cooperate, as well as the delay caused by DOJ’s deferral request and subsequent refusal to provide meaningful cooperation, the Committee was unable to determine the full extent to which Representative Gaetz’s payments to women were compensation for engaging in sexual activity with him,” the committee report continued.
Here is some good news although, once again, it is not a development in the United States. While we are about to go backwards to sustain the carbon era to the profit of the oligarchs that have supported criminal Trump’s election, the other democracies of the world are trying to exit that era, as this story describes. Imagine how many vehicles in New York City could be charged if the same thing Spain did were done with the subways in New York.
The Metro Barcelona underground Provença transit station. Credit: Boarding 1 Now / iStock Editorial / Getty
In Barcelona, energy from train brakes that could otherwise be wasted is now being harvested to charge electric vehicles.
As part of Spain’s MetroCHARGE project, 16 subway stations in Barcelona use brake energy recuperators to redirect energy from the train brakes to EV charging stations on the streets, The Associated Press reported.
Regenerative braking is not a new concept, especially for trains. But the move to transport the energy from the brakes through cables to electric vehicle chargers is an innovative way to supply power to charging stations.
According to the Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona (TMB), the main transportation operator in Barcelona, the MetroCHARGE project uses a combination of the brake energy recuperators on select trains as well as five solar power plants and a combination of ultra-fast and semi-fast EV chargers to harness clean energy and create a self-sufficient EV charging network.
“We’re trying to take advantage of the power that’s already in the metro system and use that spare energy to feed EV chargers […]
Amy Maxmen / KFF Health, KFF Staff Writer - truthdig | Kaiser Family Foundation
Stephan:
We may be on the verge of a new pandemic, as this report from the Kaiser Family Foundation reports. What it also makes clear is that once again the American public’s interest has been sacrificed on the altar of greed. We simply seem to be a country that is incapable of making the fostering of social and individual wellbeing a priority. Greed and corruption always seem to define what happens in America.
Keith Poulsen’s jaw dropped when farmers showed him images on their cellphones at the World Dairy Expo in Wisconsin in October. A livestock veterinarian at the University of Wisconsin, Poulsen had seen sick cows before, with their noses dripping and udders slack.
But the scale of the farmers’ efforts to treat the sick cows stunned him. They showed videos of systems they built to hydrate hundreds of cattle at once. In 14-hour shifts, dairy workers pumped gallons of electrolyte-rich fluids into ailing cows through metal tubes inserted into the esophagus.
“It was like watching a field hospital on an active battlefront treating hundreds of wounded soldiers,” he said.
Nearly a year into the first outbreak of the bird flu among cattle, the virus shows no sign of slowing. The U.S. government failed to eliminate the virus on dairy farms when it was confined to a handful of states, by quickly identifying infected cows and taking measures to keep their infections from spreading. Now at least 875 herds across 16 states have tested positive.
Experts say they have lost faith in the government’s ability to […]
As I enjoy the Christmas holiday with my wife, daughter and grandson, I have thought about the misery of the rising number of homeless people in the United States, and the cruelty of American communities. Imagine the number of decent living quarters that could be built if the uber-rich actually paid their fair share of taxes. If the governments we elected actually felt fostering wellbeing was important think how different our world would be. Every vote is a choice each of us makes.
A man walks past a homeless encampment in downtown Los Angeles. Credit: Jae C. Hong / AP
The United States saw an 18.1% increase in homelessness this year, a dramatic rise driven mostly by a lack of affordable housing as well as devastating natural disasters and a surge of migrants in several parts of the country, federal officials said Friday.
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said federally required tallies taken across the country in January found that more than 770,000 people were counted as homeless — a number that misses some people and does not include those staying with friends or family because they do not have a place of their own.
That increase comes on top of a 12% increase in 2023, which HUD blamed on soaring rents and the end of pandemic assistance. The 2023 increase also was driven by people experiencing homelessness for the first time. The numbers overall represent 23 of every 10,000 people in the U.S., with Black people being overrepresented among the homeless population.
“No American should face homelessness, and the Biden-Harris Administration is […]
This is more technical than I usually run in SR but it is a special kind of good health news. If you or anyone you know has rectal cancer this may be important. If that is an issue give it to your physician or give it to them to give to their physician.
Designation based on data showing no evidence of disease in 100% of all 42 patients who completed treatment with dostarlimab
Breakthrough Therapy Designation granted to drugs with potential to show improvement over available therapies for serious conditions
Current standard of care can be associated with significant negative quality-of-life effects, highlighting the need for new options
GSK plc (LSE/NYSE: GSK) announced today that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted Breakthrough Therapy Designation for Jemperli (dostarlimab) for the treatment of patients with locally advanced mismatch repair deficient (dMMR)/microsatellite instability-high (MSI-H) rectal cancer. The Breakthrough Therapy Designation aims to expedite the development and review of drugs with the potential to treat a serious condition and where preliminary clinical evidence may indicate substantial improvement over currently available therapy.1 This is the second regulatory designation for dostarlimab in locally advanced dMMR/MSI-H rectal cancer, following Fast Track designation for the same patient population in January 2023.2
Hesham Abdullah, Senior Vice President, Global Head Oncology, R&D, GSK, said: “Today’s designation, which is based on the unprecedented 100% clinical complete response rate of dostarlimab reported to date, supports a path to help change the treatment paradigm for patients with […]
