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.

Reaction...

Mayor Park Won-soon’s body was discovered in hills in northern Seoul, more than seven hours after local authorities launched a massive search for him.

His daughter called police and said her father had given her “a will-like” verbal message before leaving their home hours earlier. She said she decided to contact authorities because she couldn’t reach her father on the phone.

Seoul-based SBS television network reported that one of Park’s secretaries had lodged a complaint with police over alleged sexual harassment such as unwanted physical contact that began in 2017.

The SBS report said the secretary told police investigators that an unspecified number of other female employees at Seoul City Hall had suffered similar sexual harassment by Park.  

Park, 64, a longtime civic activist and human rights lawyer, was elected Seoul mayor in 2011. He became the city’s first mayor to be voted into a third term in June last year. A member of President Moon Jae-in’s liberal Democratic Party, he has been considered a potential presidential candidate in the 2022 elections.

Paint...

*The mayor announced the plan to paint “Black Lives Matter” in front of Trump Tower last month after earlier saying the slogan would be painted on streets at several locations around the city. 

*NYC Cop retirements are surging in the wake of a cut in overtime hours and the burgeoning social justice movement that seeks to defund the police.  

According to NYPD statistics, 179 officers of all ranks filed for retirement between June 29 and July 6 —more than five times the 35 who did so during the same time frame last year.

*The city logged 125 shootings in the first three weeks of the month, more than double the number recorded over the same period last year, police data show. Gunmen opened fire during house parties, barbecues and dice games, and carried out coldly calculated street executions.

Just a thought.

Model...

Mediaite reported on Wednesday that Stony Brook professor Helmut Norpoth is doubling down on his "Primary Model,” which has correctly predicted five out of the past six elections since 1996 and every single election but two in the past 108 years.

“The Primary Model gives Trump a 91 percent chance of winning in November,” Norpoth said. "This model gets it right for 25 of the 27 elections since 1912, when primaries were introduced."

According to Norpoth, Biden is in a much weaker position than Trump because of his poor showing in the first two primary races.

Norpoth's model, which correctly predicted Trump's victory roughly nine months before the 2016 election, suggests that the president will win by even a wider margin in the electoral college with 362 electoral votes versus the 304 he earned against Hillary Clinton.