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Bill Maher hits Fox News over Jan. 6 hearing coverage

HBO host and comedian Bill Maher criticized Fox News over its decision not to air the House Jan. 6 committee’s first public hearing on its primary channel and the way it prioritized news stories around that time on its website.

During his opening monologue on “Real Time with Bill Maher” Friday, the host quipped, “Fox News wouldn’t even show it. They had their regular programming. They put it on Fox Business Network because I think we could all agree this is a business story.”

“The Fox News website today had — you know what … the big thing was on it? Britney Spears. One of her exes crashed her wedding. This is like if during Watergate The Washington Post ran a story about Cher. falling in the pool,” he added. 

The House select committee held its first public hearing on Thursday in an effort to make the case that former President Trump played a central role in a plot to remain in power following the 2020 presidential election.

During the hearing, the panel aired clips of testimony from former Attorney General Bill Barr and former President Trump’s daughter, Ivanka Trump. It also included live testimony from Capitol Police officer Caroline Edwards and documentarian Nick Quested.

Fox News Media announced ahead of the committee’s hearings earlier this week that it would not be carrying live, continuous coverage of the hearing on its primary channel. Instead, coverage would take place on Fox Business with anchors Martha MacCallum and Bret Baier.

Other coverage of the prime-time hearing was offered on Fox Nation, Fox News Digital and Fox News Audio. Its local affiliates throughout the U.S. also aired live coverage. 

Fox News Media said that it would “cover the hearings as news warrants” on its primary channel.

“They’re all upset that Fox’s isn’t covering it live,” prime-time Fox News host Laura Ingraham said on her show on Tuesday. “We actually do something called, ya know, cater to our audience. Our audience knows what this is. We’ll cover it, and we’ll do plenty of coverage … but it’s the theater, total theater.” 

The Hill has reached out to Fox News for comment. 

Source: TEST FEED1

Will Alito apply leaked draft abortion reasoning and vote to uphold New York’s concealed carry gun law?

There has been a lot of debate about the implications of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s leaked draft opinion for the constitutional right to abortion. But the draft also has strong implications for another highly politically charged case the court is expected to decide later this month: the challenge to New York’s concealed carry law in the midst of the continuing awful and unacceptable nightmare of gun violence in this country.

The New York law requires individuals who wish to carry a concealed firearm to show a special need and obtain a permit. It is a critical measure to increase gun safety and reduce gun deaths and injuries in New York.

If Alito is consistent, and he applies the reasoning and logic of his leaked draft, he should vote to uphold the New York law.

When it comes to abortion, Alito says the court generally should not stray from the text of the Constitution. Well, the text of the Second Amendment does not say anything about the concealed carry of a firearm, let alone create a right to do so:

“A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.”

Alito writes, in the context of abortion, that if the court departs from the constitutional text it should look to historical evidence of whether a right is “deeply rooted in [our] history and tradition” and “whether it is essential to our Nation’s ‘scheme of ordered liberty.’” Well, as Justice Clarence Thomas has explained, “traditionally” states have “prohibit[ed] the carrying of weapons in a concealed manner” and those laws “neither prohibit nor broadly frustrate any individual from generally exercising his right to bear arms.” The late Justice Antonin Scalia similarly wrote in his decision in Heller, the case that in 2008 established the right to have handguns for self-defense in one’s home: “the majority of the 19th-century courts to consider the question held that prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons were lawful under the Second Amendment or state analogues.” And then-judge Brett Kavanaugh, before his elevation to the Supreme Court, emphasized that “Heller affirmatively approved . . . concealed carry laws.”

In fact, by Alito’s logic in his leaked draft, the Second Amendment should not apply to state laws at all. In 2010, the court found the liberty clause of the Fourteenth Amendment makes the Second Amendment applicable to the states even though it does not mention the Second Amendment. But when it comes to abortion, Alito’s draft says the liberty clause cannot include the right to abortion because it is not mentioned in the Constitution or fourteenth Amendment. Trying to justify this distinction, Alito’s draft observes that at the time the Fourteenth Amendment was enacted in 1868, “at least 22 of the 37 states protected the right to keep and bear arms.” But that hardly shows it was considered “essential to our Nation’s scheme of ordered liberty” since, by his own telling, 15 states (more than 40 percent) did not protect it.

Alito maintains that when it comes to abortion, “the people of the various States may evaluate [the] interests differently” and should be allowed to do so and regulate or allow abortion to the extent they see fit. He says the court should not “short-circuit” the “democratic process by closing it to the large number of Americans who dissented in any respect from Roe [v. Wade].” If so, the right of New Yorkers to limit the concealed carry of firearms should also not be foreclosed. In fact, there is far more reason to allow New Yorkers to decide for themselves in the context of firearms because the text of the Second Amendment expressly states its purpose is to protect “the security of a free State.” Textualists like Alito should agree, then, that each state should be free to decide how to protect its “security,” including by regulating concealed carry.

Alito says the right to abortion is different from other rights because it destroys what Roe calls “potential life.” By that logic, the Second Amendment is even more different from other rights. There is no question that guns are used to kill and injure untold numbers of people every day. Alito also says the court does not have “the authority to weigh” the arguments for a woman’s right to choose to have an abortion against “fetal life” and should not “usurp the power to address a question of profound moral and social importance.” If so, the court surely cannot weigh the arguments for the right to live free of death and injury caused by concealed firearms against the arguments for freedom to carry them, a question of profound moral and social importance.

Alito argues, when it comes to abortion, “it is telling that other countries almost uniformly eschew” the “viability line,” and this country should not have a rule that “allow[s] the States less freedom to regulate abortion than the majority of Western democracies enjoy.” It should be even more “telling” for Alito that virtually every Western democracy either forbids or severely restricts not just concealed carry, but firearms more generally. New Yorkers should not have “less freedom” to do so.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett told a University of Louisville audience last year that her “goal today is to convince you” the court rules “based on the law, not politics.” If Alito and any other justices who sign on to his draft opinion on abortion are consistent in defining “the law,” New Yorkers should be able to sleep peacefully at night free of worry about the death, injury and other heart-breaking consequences that would follow if New York is not permitted to continue to limit the proliferation of concealed firearms under its current law. Michael J. Dell was a founding director of Americans for Firearm Injury Reduction in Medicine. He co-authored an amicus brief for the American Medical Association, the Medical Society of the State of New York, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in support of New York’s concealed carry law. He also represents women who seek to protect their constitutional right to abortion.

Source: TEST FEED1

Housing prices being driven up by migration to South and West, data shows

New research from Freddie Mac, the federal home loan mortgage corporation, states that low mortgage rates, limited supply and increased migration to the South and West have driven up home prices.  

The research, published in an online research note on Thursday, states that home prices have gone up across the country by 33 percent over the past two years.  

In addition, Freddie Mac found “a race to beat future rate increases” and a record number of people in the typical age range for first-time home buying. The research notes that there are now 46.1 million people in the United States between the ages of 25 and 34, 18 percent more than there were in 2006, which has driven up demand for single and multifamily housing.  

America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news.

Research crafters note however, that there are other factors playing a role in the increasing prices of housing including the pandemic and the subsequent need for more space and home offices as well as government stimulus funds.  

In fact, a recently published working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research claims that the national shift to remote work accounted for over half of the 23.8 percent increase in housing prices between 2019 and 2021.  

Although fewer Americans moved in 2020, where Americans are choosing to pick and go has changed during the pandemic. Data from Freddie Mac joins the collection of research pointing out that the COVID-19 pandemic sped up the migration out of large cities that has been taking place over the last 20 years.  

As of February 2022, people are leaving the country’s 25 largest cities at a three-time higher rate than they did pre-pandemic, according to Freddie Mac, with the greatest number of people moving to small and midsized cities in the South and Mountain West.  

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What will actually make schools safer

As the school year ends across the country, parents are asking a question that would have been unthinkable a generation ago: Is my child safer because they are not going to school today?

Such a question should be unthinkable, but the murder of 19 students and two teachers in Uvalde, Texas, was another reminder that schools — like shopping centers, churches and movie theaters — have become targets for mass shootings. The assailants are almost always young men, who express their anger or grievances with a gun, often an AR-15. 

Students across the country are asking their teachers and parents a direct and difficult question: Can you keep me safe? 

Instead of “thoughts and prayers” lawmakers at the state and federal level must act now. When students return in the fall, educators and parents must know that extra measures have been taken to protect them. Safety is an essential prerequisite for teaching and learning. We can’t expect to reach any of our educational goals if the safety of students, and the educators who serve them, is not treated as our highest priority. 

After the Uvalde shooting, I joined other experts in calling for steps to reduce gun violence at schools. Sadly, that statement was merely an updated version of the plea we made in 2018, following the murders at Stoneman Douglass High School in Parkland, Fla. Since that horrific incident no meaningful action has been taken by policy makers, and kids continue to be killed in school. 

It is important to note that while the killers in Uvalde and Sandy Hook were unaffiliated with the schools they attacked, most often, the shooters have been students at the schools where the violence has occurred. In such cases, there are strategies that can be pursued that will help to make schools safer. 

First, every school can be encouraged to establish measures so that every student and their needs are known. Since the Columbine massacre of 1999, there have been many cases where the kids were aware that a problem was brewing before the adults. We know that student anonymity in school increases the likelihood that kids in need go unnoticed. We also know that if kids trust you, they will be more likely to speak up when a threat is brewing. They will alert the educators if another student has been issuing threats or is carrying a weapon, especially if they believe they will be protected when they speak up.

Second, we should prioritize hiring sufficient numbers of counselors, social workers, and school psychiatrists. Teachers should not be expected to address all of the needs of kids by themselves. They must have well-trained professionals that they can refer students to when a need is apparent. Rather than arming teachers we must provide them with the support they need.

Third, all schools should implement annual school climate surveys so that students can report whether or not they feel physically and emotionally safe at school. Such surveys can also help in identifying students in need of intervention.

In the aftermath of other mass shootings, we have seen some politicians refuse to address access to guns and instead talk at length about the need to focus on mental health. That might make sense if they offered concrete suggestions about what should be done, especially while the nation is in the grips of a pervasive mental health crisis.

However, let’s be clear about two things: Violence is not intrinsically a byproduct of mental illness. We must make sure that as policy makers rush to act like they’re “doing something” that we do not adopt policies that will increase the stigma on people suffering from mental illness and make it even less likely that they will be open to receiving help. 

Additionally, we must acknowledge that the real problem is that Americans have too many guns. Common sense gun safety laws must be a part of the solution. This includes comprehensive background checks, enforced red flag laws to remove guns from people threatening violence to themselves or others, and a ban on the sale of military-style weapons that have been used in so many of these killings. 

Poll after poll shows the majority of people support these reforms. It is beyond time for legislators to act. 

Summer should be a time when students and teachers get to rest and recharge. It’s a necessary break for growth and rest. However, for Congress and state legislatures, this summer must be a time for work. They must enact reasonable gun control measures and direct resources to fund counselors and social workers to reinforce school safety. Too many of our children have already died. We cannot afford to wait until it happens again. 

Pedro A. Noguera is dean of the University of Southern California Rossier School of Education and an expert on school safety and climate. He is also among the leaders of The Interdisciplinary Group on Preventing School and Community Violence.

Source: TEST FEED1

Alleged gunman in Maryland shooting charged with murder

A 23-year-old man is facing multiple charges of murder and assault, among others, for allegedly opening fire at his workplace in Maryland earlier this week.

The Washington County Sheriff’s Office identified the suspect as Hedgesville, W.Va., resident Joe Louis Esquivel, who faces more than two dozen charges in connection to a shooting at Columbia Machine, Inc. on Thursday in Smithsburg, Md., which left three dead and one critically injured. 

The sheriff’s office said in an earlier press release that Esquivel had been an employee there and had shown up to work his shift that day as usual. 

He allegedly left work on Thursday afternoon to grab a weapon from his car before heading back inside the building where he allegedly “proceeded to the area of the breakroom” and began “to fire upon employees,” officials said. 

“The suspect then left the scene in his vehicle, a bronze Mitsubishi Eclipse, which was quickly encountered by Maryland State Police in the area of Mapleville Road and Mount Aetna Road. The suspect and the Troopers exchanged gunfire and the suspect and one Trooper were injured. Both survived and were transported for medical treatment,” the sheriff’s office said.

Three people inside the building were found dead. Officials identified them as Hagerstown, Md., residents Mark Alan Frey and Joshua Robert Wallace and Smithsburg resident Charles Edward Minnick. 

Officials did not provide details regarding the identity of the injured victim. The sheriff’s office noted that more firearms were found by authorities at the suspect’s residence following a search warrant. Esquivel is being held without bond by the Washington County Detention Center.

The shooting comes against the backdrop of several high-profile ones in Buffalo, N.Y., Uvalde, Texas, and Tulsa, Okla.

Source: TEST FEED1

NY Post editorial board: 'Trump can't look past 2020. Let him remain there'

The editorial board of the New York Post argued in an op-ed published Friday that former President Trump is hanging on to the past, dwelling on the events of 2020 and Jan. 6, 2021.

The paper’s board said that the House investigation into the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and its hearings are a Democratic “campaign ad” and that the former president, and Democrats refuse to move on.

“It’s time for Republicans to move on,” the board, who previously endorsed Trump in 2020, stated.

The op-ed comes after the House select committee investigating the events of Jan. 6 held its first public hearing during prime time on Thursday, making their case that Trump was at the center of a plot to remain in power following a loss to President Biden in November, 2020.

The committee aired clips of testimony from those close to the former president, including his daughter and former senior adviser Ivanka Trump and former Attorney General Bill Barr.

Following the first hearing, Trump took to his social media app, Truth Social, to bash the event. He alleged that Ivanka was “checked out” after the 2020 election.

“…Trump has become a prisoner of his own ego. He can’t admit his tweeting and narcissism turned off millions. He won’t stop insisting that 2020 was ‘stolen’ even though he’s offered no proof that it’s true,” the Post’s editorial board wrote.

“He insults Barr, and dismisses Ivanka as ‘checked out.’ He clings to more fantastical theories, such as Dinesh D’Souza’s debunked ‘2,000 Mules,’ even as recounts in Arizona, Georgia and Wisconsin confirm Trump lost,” the editorial board continued. 

Before the events of Jan. 6, 2021, Trump repeatedly made unsupported claims that the election was “stolen” or “rigged.” However, federal and state elections officials as well as Barr stated that there was no evidence of widespread voter fraud.

The former president also publicly called on former Vice President Mike Pence to reject the election results while presiding over Congress’s certification process. Pence, at the time, signaled he would not do so.

“Meanwhile, reports that Trump was pleased that the Jan. 6 crowd chanted for Vice President Mike Pence to be hanged — a truly reprehensible sentiment — makes him unworthy for the office. Trump can’t look past 2020. Let him remain there,” the Post said.

The editorial board further touted possible 2024 presidential hopefuls like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo as potentially viable candidates for the Republican nomination.  

Trump has not yet declared whether he will run in the next presidential election, and Republicans have been waiting to see what the former president decides before announcing their own decisions to run. 

Source: TEST FEED1

Gas prices are high now, but they've been worse before: Here's when

(NEXSTAR) – Gas prices have been on the rise, and don’t appear to be leveling off anytime soon. But, as crazy as it may seem, gas prices have been higher before.

On Thursday, the national average price of gas jumped to $5 a gallon, according to GasBuddy. This jump doesn’t come as a surprise for most — gas prices have been on the rise for months amid supply chain problems, increased demand for fuel, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. President Biden even authorized the largest-ever oil reserve release from the country’s strategic reserves to combat rising prices.

And if $5 for a gallon of gas seems like a lot to you, that’s just the national average — some states are already paying well above that to fuel up. One gas station in Northern California has some of the highest prices in the nation, with GasBuddy reporting a gallon of regular gasoline selling for $9.63 on Monday. As of Thursday, prices for that Chevron station are no longer listed on GasBuddy’s platform.

Though paying $5 at the pump seems alarming, Americans have faced worse, believe it or not.

It was the summer of 2008, just before the U.S. economy hit a massive recession, prices at the pump peaked at $4.11, according to Kiplinger, a business and finance news site.

When adjusted for inflation, using the Bureau of Labor Statistic’s calculator, $4.11 in July 2008 is equivalent to $5.40 today (based on the most recent data from April 2022). We’ve already surpassed another notable gas spike, which happened in 1981 when gas prices jumped to a then-record of $1.31. Adjusted for inflation, that’s equal to $4.13 in today’s prices.

Still, gas prices don’t seem to be slowing down anytime soon. The U.S. has been steadily setting records for gas prices since March when the national average price of regular gas broke $4 for the first time since 2008.

“It’s been one kink after another this year, and worst of all, demand doesn’t seem to be responding to the surge in gas prices, meaning there is a high probability that prices could go even higher in the weeks ahead,” said Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, in Thursday’s press release. “It’s a perfect storm of factors all aligning to create a rare environment of rapid price hikes. The situation could become even worse should there be any unexpected issues at the nation’s refineries or a major hurricane that impacts oil production or refineries this summer.”

Earlier this week, while speaking to the Senate Finance Committee, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen took heat for inflation that’s near 40-year highs, with gasoline prices up almost 50% since last year.

“Given the global nature of these markets, it’s virtually impossible for us to insulate ourselves from shocks like the ones that are occurring in Russia that move global oil prices,” Yellen said.

Data from AAA and GasBuddy shows, however, that Americans are still fueling up, despite the high prices.

Source: TEST FEED1

Do you need a mask to protect you from monkeypox?

(NEXSTAR) – Americans hoping to dodge another virus now making its way through the country may be wondering if they should start sanitizing surfaces, stop touching their face and mask up once again.

Monkeypox can be spread through respiratory droplets, admitted Dr. Tom Inglesby, the director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, but there are some key differences between this virus and a coronavirus. Mainly, when it comes to transmission, it appears monkeypox is spreading through close contact between people.

“Monkeypox spreads between people primarily through direct contact with infectious sores, scabs, or body fluids. It also can be spread by respiratory secretions during prolonged, face-to-face contact. Monkeypox can spread during intimate contact between people, including during sex, as well as activities like kissing, cuddling, or touching parts of the body with monkeypox sores,” writes the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In other words, monkeypox can spread from mouth to mouth, but doesn’t appear to be spreading throughout a room full of people, hitting everyone along the way. That would suggest masks and face coverings are less relevant in the fight against monkeypox when compared to COVID-19.

However, there was some confusion caused by the CDC’s original travel guidance on monkeypox. The New York Times noted the agency posted the following advice before later removing it:

“Wear a mask. Wearing a mask can help protect you from many diseases, including monkeypox.”

The CDC told the Times it removed the advice “because it caused confusion,” but said people who are in close contact with someone with confirmed monkeypox should still consider masking up as an added precaution.

While the virus can be spread through respiratory droplets in the air, it’s not the primary way the virus appears to be going from person to person, Inglesby emphasized.

“It is not acting in a way like a disease that spreads through respiratory droplets or airborne dominantly does. So it’s not acting like influenza or covid or chickenpox or measles – things that spread quickly in an unvaccinated community. It is acting more like a disease that is spreading by close contact.”

It’s another factor that makes monkeypox spread less quickly than COVID-19.

Source: TEST FEED1

From Truman to Biden, presidential addresses have barely changed. It’s time to enliven them

On the evening of Sept. 1, 1950, President Truman gave a televised speech from the White House explaining recent developments in the Korean War.

On June 2, President Biden gave a primetime speech from the White House urging Congress to pass laws to reduce gun violence.

In the nearly three-quarters of a century between the two speeches, remarkably little has changed in the way presidents give White House addresses.

Of course, the images are now in color instead of black and white, and Teleprompters have replaced the sheets of paper Truman held in his hands. But the basic format has remained the same: the president sits at a desk or stands at a lectern with the U.S. and presidential flags behind him as he looks squarely at the camera and reads his speech without any adornment.

The look of presidential speeches has become predictable and, let’s face it, boring — no matter how important the content is. After doing things the same way for 14 administrations, it’s time to shake things up. If Biden and future presidents want to communicate their ideas to the public more effectively, they should take greater advantage of the technology that’s available to them.

Using a new approach could help revive public interest in presidential addresses, whose audiences have been declining for decades. When President Nixon gave primetime talks, more than half of U.S. households usually watched. By the time of Bill Clinton’s presidency, less than a third did, according to political scientists Samuel Kernell and Laurie L. Rice. Only 38.2 million Americans, less than one-eighth of the U.S. population, bothered to watch Biden’s 2022 State of the Union.

A little presidential pizzazz could help recapture some of that audience. There is no good reason White House addresses can’t be enlivened using graphics, photos and videos, just like business presentations, college lectures and newscasts have been for years and as the House January 6 committee effectively did Thursday night.

As Biden discussed mass shootings in recent years, a map displaying their locations around the country could have appeared behind him. Or a chart illustrating the soaring number of gun deaths. Or a timeline showing the growing carnage once the assault weapons ban ended. Imagine the power of a short video or audio clip of parents describing their grief after Biden talked about the heartache caused by school shootings.

The same multimedia approach could be used for other topics such as the war in Ukraine, the fight against COVID-19 or administration efforts to fight inflation and improve the economy. The result would be more powerful presidential addresses that could better compete for the public’s attention against the multitude of cable television and streaming options now available.

As I describe in “Clash: Presidents and the Press in Times of Crisis,” presidents who communicated successfully often took advantage of changing technology. President Kennedy allowing his news conferences to be televised live for the first time. So did President Obama through his use of social media.

Perhaps no president took better advantage of improved technology than Franklin Roosevelt, who transformed presidential speeches by mastering the increasingly popular medium of radio. A week after his 1933 inauguration, he gave the first of his famous fireside chats to a nation suffering through the depths of the Depression. “My friends,” he began, “I want to tell you what has been done in the last few days, and why it was done, and what the next steps are going to be.” 

With these words, Roosevelt reached 60 million people, half the U.S. population. For many of them, it was the first time they had ever heard a president’s voice. He sounded reassuring, like a kindly uncle giving advice. Afterward, the humorist Will Rogers said that Roosevelt had done such a good job of explaining the nation’s banking crisis that even the bankers understood it. 

Roosevelt’s fireside chats remained popular throughout his presidency. After U.S. forces lost a string of World War II battles in early 1942, Roosevelt asked Americans to have a world map in front of them during his next radio talk. He then calmly guided his listeners around the map, explaining the military challenges, detailing the advantages held by the United States and its allies, and expressing confidence that they would eventually win.

Biden could do something similar the next time he speaks to the nation about the war in Ukraine or another foreign crisis. But he wouldn’t need to ask people to get out their own maps; he could show one on the screen behind him.  

To be sure, change can be risky, and using multimedia elements poorly would be embarrassing. They need to be expertly crafted by tech savvy aides and carefully rehearsed by the president so as not to sacrifice the seriousness of a presidential address. Holding up a National Weather Service map that has the path of a hurricane altered with a black marker to show it going where it didn’t actual go, as former President Trump once did, is not the right approach.

If done well, however, this new approach to White House addresses will improve presidential communications. And it can help Biden increase public support for new gun control laws and the rest of his policy agenda.  

Jon Marshall is an associate professor at Northwestern University’s Medill School and the author of “Clash: Presidents and the Press in Times of Crisis” (Potomac Books, 2022).

Source: TEST FEED1