Nation & World News – at a glance -for Wednesday, April 12, 2023

White House Suggests Colorado River Cuts Be Spread Evenly Among States

The Biden administration on Tuesday proposed to put aside legal precedent and save what’s left of the Colorado River by evenly cutting water allotments, reducing the water delivered to California, Arizona and Nevada by as much as one-quarter. The size of those reductions and the prospect of the federal government unilaterally imposing them on states have never occurred in U.S. history. Overuse and drought have threatened to provoke a water and power catastrophe across the West, with flows of the river having recently fallen by one-third compared with historical averages. If changes were based on seniority of water rights, California would mostly be spared, greatly harming Nevada and forcing disastrous reductions on Arizona.

Gunman Who Killed Five in Louisville Left Note, Bought Rifle Legally

The man who killed five people Monday at a bank in Louisville, Kentucky, told at least one person that he was suicidal before the rampage, and he legally purchased the AR-15-style rifle used in the shooting at a local dealership last week, officials said Tuesday. “We know he left a note,” Democratic Rep. Morgan McGarvey said at a news conference. Officials released body camera footage of the police confrontation, in which one officer was shot. Nine minutes passed from the first reports of gunfire until the assailant was killed, police said. Four victims, including the officer, remained hospitalized Tuesday at University of Louisville Health. Another who initially survived died overnight.

Second Drug Can Be Used on Its Own for Medication Abortion

An order by a federal judge invalidating the approval of the abortion pill mifepristone did not apply to the second drug used in the typical two-medication abortion regimen, misoprostol. For now, mifepristone remains legally approved. But if the Texas ruling is ultimately upheld, many clinics and services are prepared to prescribe misoprostol on its own to patients seeking abortions in early pregnancy. Although the two-drug combination is the typical protocol for medication abortion in the United States, misoprostol alone is used in many countries. A recent analysis, published in the journal Contraception, reported that misoprostol on its own is “very safe,” however, studies suggest that taking only misoprostol may be less effective.

Defending Its Rankings, U.S. News Takes Aim at Top Law Schools

Last fall, Yale, Harvard and other elite law schools announced that they would no longer submit data to U.S. News and World Report’s rankings, charging that the influential list was an engine of inequality. Now, U.S. News has fired back. In a public relations campaign, the publication has accused the schools of trying to avoid accountability on admissions and outcomes for students, and it connected the boycott to a looming Supreme Court decision that could end affirmative action. The rankings are criticized by many universities but are popular with families — making them potentially another flashpoint in the country’s divisive debate over education issues.

Leaders in Congress Given Classified Records Found at Homes of Biden and Trump

American intelligence agencies have begun providing leaders of the House and Senate access to copies of the classified documents found in the possession of former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden, according to U.S. officials. The materials are being shared exclusively with the so-called Gang of Eight, which includes the leaders of both chambers and the chairs and ranking members of the two congressional intelligence committees. Until last week, the Justice Department resisted sharing copies of the documents with Congress. But lawmakers pointed out that intelligence officials regularly provide the Gang of Eight with information about the nation’s most secret operations and intelligence.

Chicago Will Host 2024 Democratic Convention as Party Returns to Midwest

President Joe Biden and his party have selected Chicago to host the 2024 Democratic National Convention, elevating a large liberal city in the heart of the Midwest, a critical battleground region. The convention will be held Aug. 19-22 at the United Center, the Democratic National Committee announced Tuesday. Republicans plan to hold their 2024 national convention on July 15-18 in Milwaukee, underscoring the fierce competition for the Midwest on the cusp of another presidential election. In the final deliberations, Chicago beat out New York as well as Atlanta, whose mayor, Andre Dickens, offered his congratulations in a statement while stressing that his city “represents the future of the Democratic Party.”

Russia Moves to Make Draft Evasion More Difficult

With many Russians worried that the government may again resort to a military conscription to shore up its faltering invasion of Ukraine, lawmakers in Moscow on Tuesday moved to make it harder for people to dodge the draft. Measures passed by Russia’s lower house of Parliament would bar anyone called up to fight in Ukraine from leaving the country, among other restrictions. While the Kremlin insists that it does not plan a new draft, the government appears intent to ensure that if there is one, it is not as chaotic as the mass conscription ordered last fall, when tens of thousands of men headed for the borders, finding havens in other countries.

U.S. Officials Speak to Ukrainians After Document Leaks

Senior Biden administration officials sought Tuesday calm anger in foreign capitals over the leak of classified military and intelligence documents but had little new information about the source of the breach or its motive. In their first public comments since the documents appeared online several weeks ago, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken said they had spoken to their Ukrainian counterparts. Blinken also said he had spoken to unidentified American allies to “reassure them about our own commitment to safeguarding intelligence.” Blinken and Austin spoke at a joint news conference at the State Department.

Leaked Documents, Accusations of U.S. Spying Spark Outrage in Seoul

Opposition lawmakers in South Korea criticized the leaked Pentagon documents as a major security breach and possible evidence of U.S. spying as the government of President Yoon Suk Yeol on Tuesday sought to downplay the disclosures and defend Seoul’s alliance with Washington. The classified leaked documents suggest the United States has ​been spying on top national security officials in Yoon’s administration, which opposition lawmakers described as “a super-scale security breach.​” Yoon’s administration has insisted that the scandal would not and should not damage his country’s alliance with the United States.​

Volcano Erupts in Russia, Spewing Ash Into the Stratosphere

An enormous, billowing gray plume high above a landscape. Streets and cars blanketed in 3-inch-thick layers of ash. A person in a hazmat suit making an “ash angel.” Those images were testimony to the power of the eruption on Tuesday of Shiveluch, a volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Russian Far East, which spewed a giant ash cloud some 12 miles into the atmosphere, blanketing nearby villages and prompting emergency warnings for aircraft, according to Russian officials. Despite the volcano’s intense blowout, there were no immediate reports of deaths or injuries on the sparsely populated, mountainous peninsula, which juts out between the Bering Sea and Sea of Okhotsk in the Northern Pacific Ocean.

Macron Returns From China to Allied Dismay

President Emmanuel Macron’s return from a state visit to China has been chilly. Already embattled at home, facing huge weekly protests in the streets, he now finds himself excoriated abroad for what has been criticized as his naiveté — first with President Vladimir Putin of Russia, whom he failed to dissuade from war after an intense courtship, and now with China’s president, Xi Jinping, who wants to drive a wedge between Europe and the United States and has warned of American “containment.” In short order in China, Macron managed to alienate or worry allies from Warsaw to Washington, with his embrace of what a Sino-French declaration called a “global strategic partnership with China.”

Airstrike in Rebel-Held Region of Myanmar Kills at Least 100

Myanmar’s military regime continued its relentless campaign of airstrikes Tuesday by bombing a large gathering in rebel-held territory, killing at least 100 people in the junta’s deadliest attack since seizing power in a coup more than two years ago. At least 30 children were among the dead in the attack in Sagaing Region, said an emergency worker at the scene and an official of the shadow National Unity Government, which considers itself to be Myanmar’s true government. The death toll was expected to rise. The apparent target of the attack was a celebration to mark the local resistance movement’s opening of an administration office.

by wire sources