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9:45 AM ET, December 17, 2021

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 Top Items: 
Antony Sguazzin / Bloomberg:
South Africa Hospitalization Rate Plunges in Omicron Wave  — Cases remain high compared with previous Covid waves  — Omicron infections may have peaked in epicenter Gauteng  —  South Africa delivered some positive news on the omicron coronavirus variant on Friday …
Discussion: New York Post
RELATED:
David Leonhardt / New York Times:
Omicron Threatens Red America  —  In many communities, most adults remain unvaccinated.  —  Tucker Carlson could do it.  So could Laura Ingraham, Mark Levin or Donald Trump himself.  —  One of these conservative figures could go on the air and explain that the Omicron variant has placed much of their audience in grave danger.
Washington Post:
Omicron outbreak inducing whiplash for many Americans  —  With the omicron variant sending coronavirus cases spiking across the country, the pandemic is once again upending daily life and evoking the early days of the outbreak as scientists race to understand the still-unknown implications of this new type of coronavirus.
Associated Press:
Power of one: Manchin is singularly halting Biden's agenda  —  WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Joe Manchin settled in at President Joe Biden's family home in Delaware on a Sunday morning in the fall as the Democrats worked furiously to gain his support on their far-reaching domestic package.
RELATED:
Wall Street Journal:
Senate Parliamentarian Rejects Democrats' Immigration Proposal in $2 Trillion Bill  —  Proposal would have provided work permits, deportation protections to millions  —  The arbiter of Senate rules found that Democrats' plan to provide temporary protections for immigrants living …
Politico:
Senate that ‘sucks’ gets a dose of reality from Biden
Washington Post:
GOP agrees to pay up to $1.6 million of Trump's legal bills in N.Y. probes  —  The Republican Party has agreed to pay up to $1.6 million in legal bills for former president Donald Trump to help him fight investigations into his business practices in New York, according to Republican National Committee members …
RELATED:
Politico:
GOP blows off Trump's bid to oust McConnell  —  Former President Donald Trump has hit a wall in his efforts to oust Mitch McConnell as GOP leader.  —  Despite months of attacks, the Trump-led campaign to depose the Senate minority leader has resulted in firm pledges from just two Republican candidates …
Jan Hoffman / New York Times:
Judge Overturns Purdue Pharma's Opioid Settlement  —  The ruling said the company's owners, members of the Sackler family, could not receive protection from civil lawsuits in return for a $4.5 billion contribution.  —  A federal judge on Thursday evening unraveled a painstakingly negotiated …
RELATED:
David Remnick / New Yorker:
A Person of the Year: Jamie Raskin  —  How one politician devoted his fight for democracy to his lost son.  —  Ninety-four years ago, the editors of Time magazine declared the transatlantic aviator and anti-Semite Charles Lindbergh their first-ever Man of the Year.
RELATED:
Eugene Robinson / Washington Post:
Eugene Goodman should be Time's Person of the Year
Discussion: pjmedia.com and The Federalist
Andrew E. Kramer / New York Times:
Russia Lays Out Demands for a Sweeping New Security Deal With NATO  —  The proposal, coming as Russia masses troops on the border with Ukraine, was directed at the United States and Ukraine's other Western allies.  —  KYIV, Ukraine — Russia outlined on Friday its demands for a sweeping …
Greg Bluestein / Atlanta Journal-Constitution:
Herschel Walker's campaign falsely claimed he graduated from college  —  Republican Herschel Walker's campaign deleted a false claim that he graduated from the University of Georgia hours after it was posted on a website promoting his U.S. Senate bid.  —  The former football star's campaign removed …
Discussion: Political Wire
The Daily Beast:
Kanye West's ‘Independent’ Campaign Was Secretly Run by GOP Elites  —  The campaign took steps, experts say, to mask its connections to GOP operatives.  That could violate federal election laws.  —  New documents show Kanye West's doomed White House campaign—styled as an “independent” …
Discussion: Raw Story
Joe Kukura / SFist:
Six Bay Area Men Arrested For a Staggering 70 Attacks on Asian Women  —  The suspects allegedly targeted Asian women exclusively, according to the Santa Clara DA, and had a pattern of attacking women walking alone to their cars.  —  In the wave of attacks on Asian Americans since …
Fareed Zakaria / Washington Post:
The puzzle of Joe Biden's unpopularity  —  I find President Biden's unpopularity puzzling.  He is rounding out his first year in the White House with the lowest end of first-year approval ratings of any elected president in modern times with the exception of Donald Trump.  Why?
RELATED:
The Economist:
Young Americans are turning against Joe Biden
Discussion: RedState and Townhall
Nick Anderson / Washington Post:
Harvard won't require SAT or ACT through 2026 as test-optional push grows  —  The fast-spreading movement aims to limit the role of the standardized exams in college admissions  —  Harvard University will extend for four years a policy begun soon after the coronavirus pandemic emerged …
Anna North / Vox:
The world as we know it is ending.  Why are we still at work?  —  From the pandemic to climate change, Americans are still expected to work no matter what happens.  —  For a moment in early 2020, it seemed like we might get a break from capitalism.  —  A novel coronavirus was sweeping the globe …
Andrew Stiles / Washington Free Beacon:
REVIEW: What I Learned From Hillary Clinton's Master Class on ‘The Power of Resilience’  —  You've probably heard the saying: Those who can, do.  Those who can't, teach.  In this day and age, those who really can't become Master Class instructors on how to fail.
Wall Street Journal:
Washington Post Grasps for New Direction as Trump-Era Boom Fades  —  News outlet's audience is down sharply, amid sector-wide declines; subscription growth has stagnated as readers look beyond politics  —  Top Washington Post officials gathered last week and discussed how to respond …
Select Committee to Investigate …:
Select Committee Subpoenas James P.  “Phil” Waldron  —  Washington—Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS) today announced that the Select Committee has issued a subpoena to James P.  “Phil” Waldron for records and testimony.  Mr. Waldron appears to have been involved with efforts to promote claims about fraud in the 2020 election.
BuzzFeed News:
The FBI Said It Busted A Plot To Kidnap Michigan's Governor.  Then Things Got Complicated.  —  The case seemed like a lock — until an informant and one FBI agent were charged with crimes, another was accused of perjury, and a third was found promoting a private security firm.  And that wasn't all.
Discussion: Raw Story
Christian Esch / Spiegel Online:
“I Started Seeing Agents Everywhere”  —  Her father was persecuted, poisoned and imprisoned.  Now Daria Navalnaya discusses her experience during the attack on her father, what he wrote to her from prison and how she feels about the perpetrators. … I wrote to him: You've got to understand …
Politico:
Life without Wallace  —  Presented by the Black Women's Health Imperative  —  Welcome to POLITICO's West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration.  With Allie Bice.  —  “Fox News Sunday” was one of the few shows on Fox News …
Discussion: DNyuz
Daniel Greenfield / Front Page Magazine:
Biden's Vaccine Mandate Triggers a Winter of Lockdowns  —  What happens when you fire nurses and then claim there's no more hospital space.  —  Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.
Tom Nichols / The Atlantic:
Why Are Republicans Siding With Russia?  —  Because Putinism is catnip to a new breed of American losers.  —  There's been a lot of anger this week over Fox News's born-again populist, Tucker Carlson, going all in on attacking NATO and siding with Russia at the very moment …
Katelyn Polantz / CNN:
Dominion Voting wins key decision in lawsuit against Fox News  —  (CNN Business)A judge in Delaware has found that Fox News' coverage of election fraud after the 2020 election may have been inaccurate, and is allowing a major defamation case against the right-wing TV network to move forward.
Jessica Donati / Wall Street Journal:
More Than 60,000 Interpreters, Visa Applicants Remain in Afghanistan  —  About 33,000 of those could be eligible for immediate evacuation, State Department says  —  WASHINGTON—More than 60,000 Afghan interpreters and others who have applied for visas to seek shelter in the U.S …
Discussion: RedState, HotAir and The Daily Wire
David Rothkopf / The Daily Beast:
Kamala's Conundrum: She's Doing a Great Job But Her Story's Not Getting Out  —  AN UNPRECEDENTED POSITION … If the VP's record is supported as it should be, the chattering classes will spin it into the idea that the president is a lame duck.  If not, it will be spun as a critique of her.
New York Times:
Protect Abortion Rights?  Virginia Democrats' Vacation Plans Get in the Way.  —  Some Virginia Democrats want to codify abortion rights into state law in their final weeks in power.  But several state senators do not want to upend their travel to Hawaii, Europe and Africa.
CNN:
In Alabama, Brooks looks to redeem himself with Trump amid campaign struggles  —  (CNN)Just before Donald Trump took the stage at an August rally in Alabama that was meant to boost GOP Rep. Mo Brooks' US Senate bid, the former President ran into one of Brooks' primary opponents offstage.
Discussion: Raw Story
Mary Jordan / Washington Post:
Melania Trump emerges to launch new NFT platform meant to ‘inspire’ — and earn cash  —  Former president Donald Trump once called bitcoin a scam that “competed against the dollar,” but on Thursday Melania Trump announced a new business venture embracing cryptocurrency and digital art.
Lawrence H. Summers / Washington Post:
The Fed's words still don't measure up to the challenge of inflation  —  The Federal Reserve's recognition that inflation is not transitory, that the U.S. labor market is very tight and that priority now must be given to price stability is welcome, if belated.
Capital Research Center:
BREAKING: New IRS Disclosures Confirm Flood of Private Money to Elections Offices from Zuckerberg Grantee  —  Newly released filings for the Center for Technology and Civic Life (CTCL) reveal how the infamous Chicago-based nonprofit funneled hundreds of millions of dollars to local elections offices …
Discussion: The Federalist
Rasmussen Reports:
Generic Congressional Ballot  —  Republicans Lead 48%-39% on Congressional Ballot  —  The 2022 midterm elections are now 327 days away, and Republicans maintain a strong lead in their bid to recapture control of Congress.  —  The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that …
Discussion: pjmedia.com, Power Line and Instapundit
 
 
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 More Items: 
Josh Christenson / Washington Free Beacon:
NFL Marks Taiwan as Part of China
Zachary Basu / Axios:
Senate confirms Nicholas Burns as ambassador to China
Margaret Sullivan / Washington Post:
Vulture capitalists are circling my old newspaper. Here's why we need to fight them off.
Dallas Morning News:
‘Prison gerrymandering’: How inmates are helping the Texas GOP maintain its power
Discussion: Washington Post
Brian Klaas / Washington Post:
Why the media should have a pro-democracy bias
Todd Bensman / The Federalist:
United Nations Grantee Uses U.S. Tax Dollars To Fund Illegal Immigration
Discussion: NOQ Report
 Earlier Items: 
New York Times:
Why 1,320 Therapists Are Worried About Mental Health in America Right Now
Jack Wittels / Bloomberg:
Giant Kites That Drag Cargo Ships Across Oceans Go on Trial
Discussion: Campaign Update and Twitchy
Washington Post:
FDA eliminates key restriction on abortion pill as Supreme Court weighs case that challenges Roe v. Wade
Washington Post:
The Biden administration has been sidelining vaccine experts
Mary Anne Franks / The Boston Globe:
Redo the first two amendments  —  Speech and guns: two of the most contentious issues in America today …
Discussion: Twitchy and The Gun Writer
Kim Masters / Hollywood Reporter:
Chris Noth Accused of Sexual Assault by Two Women
 

 
From Techmeme:

Raffaele Huang / Wall Street Journal:
Apple removes WhatsApp and Threads from its App Store in China, saying it was ordered to do so by China's cyberspace officials citing national security concerns

Ryan Morrison / Tom's Guide:
Microsoft researchers introduce VASA-1, an AI model that can create a realistic talking face video from a portrait photo and an audio file, in research preview

Zaheer Kachwala / Reuters:
Google says it will consolidate teams that focus on building AI models across Research and DeepMind, and move its Responsible AI teams from Research to DeepMind

 
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