Washed...

Roughly two weeks after a massive Black Lives Matter street painting appeared in downtown Redwood City, Calif., it was washed away — leaving the asphalt without a trace of the message’s familiar bright yellow paint. But unlike in other cities where vandals targeting BLM murals have been arrested and even charged with a hate crime, this time the city suddenly removed the artwork.

Despite granting permission for the temporary street art and even providing the paint for the July 4 project, officials in the Northern California city ordered the painting be cleared from its prime location late last week, KPIX reported.

“Staff is concerned about public safety issues that may arise from painting murals on its public streets, which could result in driver confusion and traffic accidents,” city spokeswoman Jennifer Yamaguma told The Washington Post in a statement early Wednesday. “Thus, the existing mural has been removed from Broadway and no further art installation will be authorized on the City’s streets.”

Bowl...

Former Bernie Sanders campaign co-chair Nina Turner offered a not-so-appetizing analogy when asked about voting for presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

Turner, who was a prominent surrogate for Sen. Sanders, I-Vt., during the 2020 Democratic primary, expressed her lack of excitement for the former VP to The Atlantic.

“It’s like saying to somebody, ‘You have a bowl of sh-- in front of you, and all you’ve got to do is eat half of it instead of the whole thing.’ It’s still sh--," Turner described to Atlantic staff writer Peter Nicholas.

quotations...

Peaceful...

Laying Low

Riot...

Seattle police declared a riot Saturday following large demonstrations in the city’s Capitol Hill neighborhood and deployed flash bangs and pepper spray to try to clear an area near where weeks earlier people had set up an “occupied protest zone” that stretched for several blocks.

Via Twitter, police said they had made more than two dozen arrests for assault on officers, obstruction and failure to disperse. They also said they were "investigating a possible explosive damage" to the walls of the city's East Precinct police station.

Authorities said rocks, bottles, fireworks and mortars were thrown at officers as they attempted to clear the area over the course of several hours stretching into Saturday night. One officer was hospitalized with a leg injury caused by an explosive.

Earlier, protesters in Seattle broke through a fence where a youth detention facility was being built, with some people setting a fire and damaging a portable trailer, authorities said.

Peaceful demonstration according to the Fake Media.

Freebie...

In hearings that took place this week, lawmakers grilled drug companies on their pricing plans for their potential vaccines, with some going so far as to ask executives at companies including Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, and AstraZeneca if they would supply their vaccines at cost. 

While executives from other pharmaceutical companies also largely declined to agree to provide their potential vaccines at prices that would provide them with zero profits, the pressure from the Democratic Congress to do so appears to be rising.  

Even shares of BioNTech -- which, along with its partner Pfizer, locked up a nearly $2 billion order for its COVID-19 vaccine candidate from the U.S. government on Wednesday -- saw its shares fall.

Investors could be growing concerned that future deals may be negotiated more fiercely, and potentially at prices that could make profits difficult to come by.

When someone comes with a vaccine, pay them as much as you can. They are saving lives.
Just a thought.

Shut...

Charlamagne tha God ripped Joe Biden on his radio show Friday, saying the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee should "shut the eff up forever" to avoid making gaffes.

"The Breakfast Club" host took issue with Biden's remarks earlier this week when he suggested President Trump is the first "racist" U.S. president.

"How the hell can Donald Trump be the first racist president in a country where 12 presidents before him owned slaves?" asked Charlamagne, the popular African American host on New York's Power 105.1.

"I really wish Joe Biden would shut the eff up forever and continue to act like he's starring in the movie 'A Quiet Place,' because as soon as he opens his mouth and makes noise, he gets us all killed, OK?" Charlamagne added.

Denied...

Riot.

A federal judge on Friday denied an order sought by Oregon's attorney general to prohibit federal agents from making arrests during the ongoing protests in Portland amid a battle between progressive local leaders and the Trump administration over the presence of federal forces.

U.S. District Court Judge Michael Mosman said the state lacked standing to sue on behalf of protesters.

Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum sued the Trump administration last week, alleging federal agents have arrested protesters without probable cause and used excessive force. Authorities deny the accusations.

How embarrassing.

Jr...

 A woman, 64, was issued a criminal court summons for illegal posting of flyers. A photo provided by police showed one of the flyers designed like an internet meme, with a close-up picture of 1-year-old shooting victim Davell Gardner Jr. under the words "DID MY LIFE MATTER" followed by a crying emoji.

Next to Gardner’s picture was a message written in red marker: “I wasn’t killed by a cop. I was killed by a Black person. Where’s BLM?”

To Go...

New York, New Jersey and Connecticut are now requiring visitors from 31 states to quarantine for 14 days in an effort to combat the growing number of coronavirus cases in the country.

The metro area announced Tuesday that 10 additional states would be added to the travel advisory that mandates the quarantine: Alaska, Delaware, Indiana, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Virginia and Washington. Minnesota was removed from last week's list.

The new travel restrictions come as New York attempts to protect itself from further serious outbreaks across the country after the tri-state area was the U.S.'s initial epicenter for COVID-19 earlier this year.  

New York experienced its peak of new COVID-19 cases in early April, with 12,274 new cases on April 4, but now has a seven-day average of 725 new cases per day, according to New York Times data. Since the beginning of the pandemic, New York has confirmed 408,181 cases and 35,058 deaths.

Soon New Yorkers would be unable to go anywhere. Just a thought.

Yep...

Foley...

Go ahead boys-Make my day.

A line of NYPD officers in riot gear cleared out the remaining Occupy City Hall protesters from their month-long encampment early Wednesday, police confirmed.

The officers began pushing the remaining occupants north on Centre Street toward Foley Square around 4 a.m.

Seven people were taken into custody during the operation but they were not immediately charged.

About 70 people, including both protesters and the homeless, were camped out when the NYPD contingent moved through, WABC-TV reported.

The goal of the Occupy City Hall protest, which started last month, was to demand $1 billion in cuts to the NYPD’s budget. The encampment remained for weeks after the City Council approved the cuts.

The police appears to disagree. Just a thought.

Tear-Gassed...

A riot was declared in Portland just after midnight Thursday morning after Mayor Ted Wheeler’s tense visit with protesters-- where he was booed, told to resign, given a list of demands and tear-gassed by federal agents.

His visit ended with his security detail engaging in a struggle with protesters late Wednesday night as they worked to get the mayor to safety, a report said.

Earlier, he moved with protesters to the fence outside of the federal courthouse where he stood at the front and was tear-gassed along with the crowd, according to New York Times correspondent Mike Baker.

Wheeler left, a few protesters following him tried to push against his security team once he had entered a building. Others threw water bottles and other projectiles at the glass door, according to Baker.

It is a sad situation when people get hurt as a result of foolishness.  Just a thought.

Redundant...

The NYPD has nixed two key enforcement units and reassigned their officers to work on gun violence prevention, The Post has learned.

Police brass officially pulled the plug on the Traffic Congestion Mitigation unit at 1 a.m. Friday with the transfer of the unit’s 114 members.

The unit, which conducted a majority of NYPD’s enforcement on moving vehicles before its dissolution, was disbanded because it was “redundant,” an NYPD spokesperson said. Traffic enforcement agents who write parking tickets were not impacted.

Police brass also nixed NYPD’s roughly 85-person homeless outreach unit after the City Council and Mayor Bill de Blasio decided to take the responsibility away from cops entirely.

The approximately 200 cops have been reassigned to other precincts.

Well, that is 200 extra officers in a time that the budget and the slow of the economic activities decreased dramatically. Some reduction in budget is in order.

Deliver...

Women, on average, tend to be more attracted to men who have a relatively narrow waist, a V-shaped torso, and broad shoulders. Women also tend to be more attracted to men who are taller than they are, and display a high degree of facial symmetry, as well as relatively masculine facial dimorphism.

“Many men honestly do not know what women want, and women honestly do not know why men find what they want so hard to comprehend and deliver.” Deborah Tannen

 Deborah Tannen

Soul...

The great question that has never been answered, and which I have not yet been able to answer, despite my thirty years of research into the feminine soul, is 'What does a woman want?'

Sigmund Freud

Matter...

Two women were arrested after police said they dumped cans of black paint on the block-long mural on Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue.

It marked the third such act of vandalism targeting the street art since Mayor Bill de Blasio helped paint the mural in front of President Trump’s namesake tower on July 9.

Bystanders shot video of the chaotic scene showing police surrounding a Black woman as she used her hands to spread paint on the mural's bright yellow letters.

Refund the police," the woman screamed. “Jesus matters! 

We will never support Black Lives Matters!.”

Shifting...

Mayor Bill de Blasio should take responsibility for the city’s crime wave instead of shifting blame to state judges, the court system’s spokesman said Thursday. Earlier in the day, de Blasio said the courts should be in charge of keeping New Yorkers safe from a surge in shootings.

“I am imploring everyone at the Office of Court Administration, please, we need our court system to run again. We cannot keep this city safe if we don’t have a functioning court system, it has been too many months already. “Please hear our plea because that’s what will keep our communities safe,” De Blasio said.

But Lucian Chalfen, spokesman for the Office of Court Administration, said judges never stopped working.

“Throughout this pandemic, through the unceasing hard work and dedication of judges, non-judicial staff and court officers, the New York State Court system has continued to function. We have never closed: not for one day, not for one hour, not for one minute,” Chalfen said.

“Clearly the Mayor continues to refuse to take any responsibility for his actions, instead shifting the blame,” he added.

Blame...

Stand Down...

A New York City store owner is suing Gov. Andrew Cuomo, accusing state and city leaders of failing to send in law enforcement to respond to the rioting that happened during recent protests, according to the attorney handling the case.

The lawsuit, filed on behalf of Domus Design Center, an interior design business located on Madison Avenue in Manhattan, also names Mayor Bill de Blasio and NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea as co-defendants.

“Basically, the city and state government owe a duty to the individual storefronts to protect them," attorney Sal Strazzullo said.

My law firm believes [that] through depositions, we’re going to be able to find that the city or state had intelligence in regards to these criminals that looted these stores and didn’t do anything about it,” he added.

Strazzullo continued, “The lackeys that are politically appointed in the NYPD probably were told to stand down and basically it is a travesty."

He added that he believes more businesses will join as plaintiffs to make it a class-action lawsuit, seeking more than $100 million in damages.

Apples...

Chanice...

Marchers with the “Power of Prayer” rally were entering Lower Manhattan from Brooklyn when anti-police activists camped out in City Hall Park confronted the marchers on the bridge.

The scuffle left three cops bloodied and Monahan with a finger wound, weeks after he took a knee with Black Lives Matter protesters.

Cops on Thursday took a woman into custody they believe participated in the bridge attack. Chanice Reyes, 24, of Morris Plains, N.J., is charged with two counts of assault on a police officer.

Peace...

Eating in restaurants in New York City is back, national looting season is over and now businesses are busy.

Shootings and gun violence increased in certain part of the city where guns are not allowed. Some act as if some lives doesn't matter to them.

Defunding and demoralizing the police leads to police caution on responding and enforcing the law. Silence and disappearance of community leaders is the worst of all as the street would be for additional violance.

We have seen it all. The good, the bad and the ugly. But there is always a hope for peace.

 Just a thought.

Bye...

Dishonest...

CNN's chief anti-Trump reporter Jim Acosta was blasted on social media over a tweet that quoted White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany out of context. 

He was hit with major backlash.

"Classic stuff here. Acosta tweets half of one quote without context & gets nearly 20,000 retweets. Had plenty of room to add the full context in the original comment by McEnany stating “the science is on our side here.” Waits 10 minutes before writing a second tweet, gets 450 RTs," The Hill media reporter.

This isn’t journalism. It’s a dishonest fragment used to whip up animosity, rather than inform," Daily Caller editor Vince Coglianese tweeted.

Acosta's own colleague Jake Tapper weighed in on the distorted quote that was being shared, urging everyone to "read the ENTIRE McEnany comment."

According to Finapp, Acosta earns $700,000 per year and has a net worth of about $4 million. A small price for his performance.

Bottoms...

Bottoms, one of the top prospects to be presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden's running mate, said during the interview with Blitzer that she wasn't shocked by Trump's decision not to wear a mask.

"So by not having on a mask, President Trump did violate law in the city of Atlanta, but I am somehow not surprised that he disregarded our rules and regulations in the city," she said.

Her comments, however, placed her in disagreement of he superior Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp about whether her mandatory mask ordinance is enforceable in the city as it goes beyond the measures he's put in place.

An executive order Kemp signed Wednesday included language that local governments are prohibited from implementing rules requiring people to wear masks and face coverings in public places.

Show up on CNN more frequently and you are trapped for more humiliations.
Just a thought.

Hailed...

There is a widespread feeling that New York has been blessed with its exemplary leadership. Gov. Andrew Cuomo, incredibly enough, has sky-high approval ratings.

This is all perverse given that New York is only now emerging from one of the worst COVID debacles on the planet.

If New York is going to be held up as the model, every officeholder in the country has a new road map for handling the virus: 

See a significant percentage of residents of your largest city get infected, barely prevent your hospital system from getting overwhelmed, implement a policy that increases infections and deaths at nursing homes, suffer more than 35,000 deaths and a higher per-capita death rate than any country in the world  and then, after all that, get hailed as a hero.

Ask for the help from the federal government for the Comfort Ship, then the Javits Center to be transferred to a 4000 bed hospital, and the Samaritan Purse that occupied Central Park, and non was appreciated. Cuomo has raised the bar.

Middle...

This guy cornered himself into a a bad spot.

He announced he is picking a woman for the vice president. Then added to his initial decision a color to it. SO the media now is talking which black lady would be the best for position. Then he wants to have a green plan to spend two trillion dollars on transforming America into a better money wasting machine.

Leave well enough alone. It is changing on its own.  Just a thought.

Where is Biden...

Pain...

Warmth...

Cicero once described the face as a picture of the mind and the eyes as its interpreter. In a world where many aspects of our everyday lives have been altered with limited human exposure and social distancing in place, the addition of face masks has significantly impacted our ability to create and maintain interpersonal interactions.

More than ever, we are tasked with the somewhat conflicting goals of optimizing youthfulness and attractiveness and optimizing social interactions. Face masks are forcing us to deduce and convey as much information as possible through our eyes and foreheads, and the migration to more virtual interaction through platforms like Zoom and FaceTime has led to hyper-awareness of our personal appearances.

The area around the eyes has been shown to be particularly important for effective interactions. A slightly different degree of smile can lead to perceptions of warmth, trustworthiness, and attractiveness. When a mask is put on, we are only able to convey or interpret a partial inventory of information. We are now limited to using the area around the eyes, commonly called crow’s feet, to help determine if a smile is genuine or not.

Processed...

One of the Worst Foods for High Blood Pressure is salt.

Sodium is the substance that may cause your blood pressure to increase. MSG (monosodium glutamate), found in many popular processed foods, is an example of sodium added to food.

According to the American Heart Association, when you eat too much salt, which contains sodium, your body holds extra water to "wash" the salt from your body. In some people, this may cause blood pressure to rise.

One of the biggest culprits of high salt is packaged instant noodles. They typically take no more than two or three minutes to prepare, making them easy for students and working adults alike looking for a quick and easy meal.

According to a study published in the U.S. National Library of Medicine, increased instant noodle consumption was associated with cardiometabolic risk factors, which include high blood pressure.

The research was based off participants in South Korea, which has the highest per capita instant noodle consumption in the world.

Sophia...

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared Istanbul's iconic Hagia Sophia open to Muslim worship on Friday after a top court ruled the building's conversion to a museum by modern Turkey's founding statesman was illegal.

Erdogan made his announcement, just an hour after the court ruling was revealed, despite international warnings not to change the status of the nearly 1,500-year-old monument, revered by Christians and Muslims alike.

The Hagia Sophia that stands today was originally built as the cathedral for the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire in the sixth century, and became a mosque in 1453 with the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople. It remained a Muslim house of worship until the early 20th century, when the Turkish government secularized the Hagia Sofia and turned it into a museum in 1934. More than 50 years later, UNESCO included Hagia Sophia as part of its Historic Areas of Istanbul World Heritage Site.

Scooter...

Lewis "Scooter" Libby is an American lawyer^[2][3] and former adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney.

From 2001 to 2005, Libby held the offices of Assistant to the Vice President for National Security Affairs, Chief of Staff to the Vice President,^[4] and Assistant to the President George W. Bush.

In October 2005,^[5] Libby resigned from all three government positions after he was indicted on five counts by a federal grand jury concerning the investigation of the leak of the covert identity of Central Intelligence Agency officer Valerie Plame Wilson.^[6]

He was subsequently convicted of four counts (one count of obstruction of justice, two counts of perjury, and one count of making false statements),^[7] making him the highest-ranking White House official convicted in a government scandal since John Poindexter, the national security adviser to President Ronald Reagan in the Iran–Contra affair.^[8]

After a failed appeal, President Bush commuted Libby's sentence of 30 months in federal prison, leaving the other parts of his sentence intact.^[9] As a consequence of his conviction in United States v. Libby, Libby's license to practice law was suspended until being reinstated in 2016.^[

Cyberscam...

A Nigerian influencer who posted photos of his life of luxury amassing 2.5 million Instagram followers was arrested by the FBI.

The FBI and Dubai police stormed the 37-year-old's apartment in the city seizing more than £30 million in cash, before the pair appeared in a Chicago court on July 3.

In June Ramon Olorunwa Abbas - known to his followers as Ray Hushpuppi - and another man -  Jacob Ponle (aka Mr Woodberry) - were both arrested in Dubai under suspicion of a £350 million cyberscam.

A statement posted on Facebook, the Dubai police said that the FBI director had thanked them for extraditing Abbas.

However, the U.S. Department of Justice told the BBC that the accused was expelled from Dubai, rather than extradited, reportedly telling the broadcaster 'you'll have to ask them about why they called it an extradition'.

Commutation...

Constitutional law professor Jonathan Turley rejected the characterization of criticism from Sen. Mitt Romney and CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin regarding the commutation of Roger Stone’s prison sentence by President Trump.

“Jeff Toobin just said that the Stone commutation is ‘the most corrupt and cronyistic act in all of recent history.‘

Toobin stated ‘This is simply not done by American presidents they don’t pardon or commute sentences of people who are close to them or about to go to prison. It just does not happen until this President.’ 
Turely:
That is unfortunately not true. History is replete with such examples for presidential interventions for friends, allies, and some of the most dubious figures in history. The record of this power is hardly pristine. To the contrary, this barely measures up to some of the most infamous cases," Turley said.  

Turley mentioned former President Bill Clinton pardoning his own brother, as well as Marc Rich, a Democratic donor and fugitive.

Supersede...

Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms has reinstated Phase 1 reopening guidelines after a steady surge in coronavirus cases.

In following Phase 1 guidelines, residents should wear face masks, restaurants should close dining rooms, non-essential city facilities should close and individuals are encouraged to leave home only for essential trips. 

The Phase 1 guidelines conflict with guidance from the state level, where Gov. Brian Kemp has encouraged mask-wearing but asked cities not to mandate it. According to the governor’s office, Bottoms’ Phase 1 guidelines are unenforceable. Kemp’s executive orders legally supersede the mayor’s guidelines. 

Kemp released a statement critical of the mayor’s plans.

Opt-out......

The Supreme Court ruled that the  administration acted within its authority when it expanded exemptions to the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) requirement for employers to provide insurance coverage that includes contraception -- in a victory for Little Sisters of the Poor, the Catholic group that has been at the center of the national debate over the mandate.

The court ruled 7-2 in favor of the Trump administration and the Catholic charity that cares for the elderly in two related disputes against Pennsylvania, which sued over the validity of a rule from the Trump administration that allowed religiously-affiliated groups and some for-profit companies to opt-out of providing contraception coverage to employees.

The majority opinion, written by Justice Clarence Thomas, ruled that the Trump administration's challenged rulemaking was aboveboard, and hailed the work of the Little Sisters of the Poor.

Buy your own contraceptives.  Just a thought.