Abortion rights victory / Twitter triggers / Facebook's fall

Abortion rights victory. In the first big abortion case of the Trump era, the U.S. Supreme Court has reaffirmed its commitment to reproductive freedom …
 … striking down a law that critics said could have forced closure of all but one of Louisiana’s abortion providers.
But it was close.
The court also affirmed the president’s power to fire at will the head of the independent agency Congress created to protect consumers from financial industry abuses.

Weekend from hell. Shootings left at least 47 people wounded and 18 dead in Chicago—including a 1-year-old boy and a 10-year-old girl …

 … mayhem that followed by just hours President Trump’s letter to Mayor Lightfoot and Gov. Pritzker, urging “action on the devastating violence in Chicago.” (Cartoon: Keith J. Taylor.)
Pritzker’s press secretary calls Trump’s letter “a press stunt in an attempt to distract from his long list of failures.”
Mayor Lightfoot’s tweet: “I don’t need leadership lessons from Donald Trump.”
A Tribune editorial: “If the president wants to make a public show of offering ‘to put partisanship aside’ to help distressed neighborhoods, then Pritzker and Lightfoot should pursue the offer.”
The mayor’s special pandemic powers end Tuesday.

Speaking of inaction … Intelligence officials tell The Associated Press that, despite his denials, Trump knew—and did nothing—about Russia’s secret offer of bounties for the killing of American troops in Afghanistan.
The Atlantic’s David Frum: The latest surge in COVID-19 cases “is Trump’s plague now.”

Twitter triggers. Trump today retweeted video of two white people pointing guns at peaceful St. Louis protesters.
That followed Trump’s retwacted retweet of a “white power” video Sunday, after which Poynter’s Tom Jones says, “all heck broke loose” …
 … turning an uncomfortable spotlight on a hotbed of Trump support, a Florida community known as “The Villages.”
Columnist Seth Cohen: America’s white nationalism is “out in the open for all the world to see.”
Politico: Trump has privately reached the “grim realization” that “he’s on course to be a one-term president.”
John Oliver says Republicans missed an opportunity in the COVID crisis: “You could have printed Make America Great Again on a billion red masks and dropped them out of helicopters. People would have worn them! You’re not even capitalizing on a national disaster correctly, you f__king idiots!

Trump’s church problem. As the president’s counted on mega-churches to energize his voters, his administration has pushed to let them reopen. But now their services are looking like COVID-19 super-spreaders.
The Intercept last week: Trump Made a Racist Joke in a Phoenix Megachurch and the Crowd Went Wild.”

Mask or stay home. The Democrats who lead the U.S. House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis have told Republicans who showed up at Friday’s hearing without masks that they won’t be allowed to do that again.
Citing Zoom’s compliance with the Chinese government’s request that it block the accounts of protesters marking the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, Illinois Congressman Adam Kinzinger (link corrected) wants Congress to stop holding Zoom meetings.

‘I’d rename Chicago’s Jefferson Street and leave the Columbus statues alone.’ Columnist Ron Grossman says the removal of statues may not bring the progress some seek.
Today on Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg’s make-believe gameshow, WHEEL ... OF ... DISASTER: “Destruction of civic monuments.”
Mississippi’s abandoning its Confederate-themed state flag …
 … with bad news for atheists: The state legislature is requiring the replacement bear the words “In God We Trust.”

Facebook’s fall from (advertiser) grace. A growing list of big corporations—including Starbucks—are bailing on Facebook ad campaigns to protest the company’s failure to crack down on hate.
Advertiser desertions dented founder Mark Zuckerberg’s fortune by about $7 billion last week.
A pioneer in the environmentally destructive oil and gas production method known as fracking is filing for bankruptcy—as the pandemic knocks the energy business for a loop.


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