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Low-Income Homes Dropping Internet Service After Congress Kills Discount Program (Maria)
The author writes, “The death of the US government’s Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) is starting to result in disconnection of Internet service for Americans with low incomes. On Friday, Charter Communications reported a net loss of 154,000 Internet subscribers. … About 100,000 of those subscribers were reportedly getting the discount, which in some cases made Internet service free to the consumer. The $30 monthly broadband discounts provided by the ACP ended in May after Congress failed to allocate more funding.”
How the Proud Boys Are Prepping for a Second Trump Term (Gerry)
From The Economist: “In their most recent public assessment of domestic terrorism, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security warned that threats from ‘anti-government or anti-authority’” groups — they identified the Proud Boys as one of them — were on the rise. This danger could be exacerbated by ‘high-profile elections and campaigns.’”
Kevin Roberts, Architect of Project 2025, Has Close Ties to Radical Catholic Group Opus Dei (Sean)
The authors write, “Kevin Roberts, the Heritage Foundation president and the architect of Project 2025, the conservative thinktank’s road map for a second Trump presidency, has close ties and receives regular spiritual guidance from an Opus Dei-led center in Washington DC, a hub of activity for the radical and secretive Catholic group. … Gareth Gore, the author of a forthcoming book on Opus Dei, called the Catholic organization ‘a political project shrouded in a veil of spirituality.’ The group’s founder, Saint Josemaría Escrivá, saw his followers as part of a ‘rising militia,’ Gore said, who were seeking to ‘enter battle against the enemies of Christ.’”
With Trials Pushed Back, Trump Sees First Big Dip in Legal Bills (Reader Steve)
From the Associated Press: “As former President Donald Trump faces a supercharged Democratic fundraising effort, a persistent drag on his campaign’s coffers may be easing: legal expenses. A new report shows that the Save America political action committee paid about $827,000 in June for Trump’s legal bills — the first time a monthly total has dipped below $1 million in two years. The Trump-aligned PAC has shelled out an average of nearly $4 million a month on such costs since July 2022, most of it on defending the former president in criminal and civil cases, according to an Associated Press analysis of campaign finance records.”
NY Times Makes Incredible Retraction Involving Kamala Harris Polling — And a Bowl of Chili With a Severed Finger in It? (DonkeyHotey)
The author writes, “In a case of incredibly weird odds, The New York Times issued a retraction on Thursday of a quote it used in an article about new polling — because of all the people they asked about the 2024 presidential election, one of them was the woman who was convicted of fraud for planting a severed finger in a cup of chili.”
An Exonerated Man Was ‘50 Feet From Freedom.’ Then a Court Stopped Him. (Dana)
The author writes, “Christopher Dunn was steps away from freedom. … A judge had finally ruled two days earlier what Dunn had always maintained: He was wrongfully convicted of murder in 1990. But as the Missouri Department of Correction was finalizing his release papers Wednesday, the warden got the call. The state Supreme Court had halted the release order after the state attorney general appealed to keep Dunn in prison.”
Unprecedented Numbers of Gray Whales Are Visiting San Francisco Bay, and Nobody Quite Knows Why (Laura)
From the Los Angeles Times: “When Bill Keener started working at the Marine Mammal Center as a field biologist in the 1970s, there were no whales or dolphins in San Francisco Bay. The waters east of the Golden Gate Bridge were chock-full of life — sea lions and harbor seals galore — but not a cetacean to be seen. Starting in the late 2000s, things began to change. There are now four cetacean species living in or regularly visiting the busy waters east of the Golden Gate — harbor porpoises, gray whales, humpback whales and bottle-nosed dolphins.”
