NBC News
By Sakshi Venkatraman

Conservative pundit Ann Coulter is under fire for a racist tirade against new Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley.

In an appearance on the "The Mark Simone Show" podcast this week, Coulter made several xenophobic comments about Haley, the former governor of South Carolina who was born in the U.S. to Indian immigrant parents. "Why don't you go back to your own country?" Coulter said.

Coulter, known for her racist and anti-immigrant stances, attacked India, as well.

"Her candidacy did remind me that I need to immigrate to India so I can demand they start taking down parts of their history," she said. "What's with the worshipping of the cows? They're all starving over there. Did you know they have a rat temple, where they worship rats?"

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/ann-coulter-tells-nikki-haley-go-back-country-racist-rant-new-gop-pres-rcna71119

Source: Washington Post

President Biden remains “a healthy, vigorous, 80-year-old male who is fit to successfully execute duties of the presidency,” his physician wrote in a memo released hours after the president underwent a routine annual physical at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Thursday morning.

Kevin O’Connor — who has been Biden’s primary care doctor since 2009 — wrote that the most notable update from Biden’s last physical in November 2021 was his covid-19 infection over the summer, but said the president has not experienced any lingering symptoms that could be characterized as “long covid.”

As part of the physical, Biden underwent routine skin cancer surveillance. O’Connor said one “small lesion” on the president’s chest was excised on Thursday and sent for traditional biopsy and that the results are pending. O’Connor noted that Biden spent a “good deal of time” in the sun when he was young and that he had several non-melanoma skin cancers removed before assuming the presidency.

Biden, who at age 80 is the first octogenarian president in American history, has faced repeated questions about his physical and mental fitness — inquiries that have intensified as he prepares for an expected reelection bid. He would be 82 at the start of a second term, and 86 at the end of eight years in the White House.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/02/16/biden-physical-exam/

Local10.com News

VOLUSIA COUNTY, Fla. – A Florida toddler has died after deputies said he found a handgun in his parent’s nightstand and shot and killed himself.

Volusia County Sheriff’s deputies said the boy found the nine-millimeter firearm in the nightstand on Wednesday night.

the parents reportedly kept the firearm there after their lock box stopped working.

The Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood said the parents were out grocery shopping at the time of the incident.

https://www.local10.com/news/florida/2023/02/16/florida-toddler-shoots-kills-himself-with-parents-gun/


NBC News: Florida 3-year-old dies after shooting himself with a handgun, officials say

The father, a Florida state corrections officer, told deputies that his firearms were normally kept in a safe in the bedroom, but the safe's electronic lock function had stopped working and he instead placed one on top of the fridge and the other in his nightstand.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/florida-3-year-old-dies-shooting-self-handgun-officials-say-rcna71049

Long article but worth reading

BBC Future
By Claudia Lee
15th February 2023

Fifteen years ago, Tim Parton, a farm manager at Brewood Park Farm in Staffordshire in the UK, decided to take a leap and start to experiment with biological farming. Instead of using synthetic pesticides and fertilisers, he applies self-brewed biologically active natural inputs, such as trichoderma, a type of fungus, onto his crops, to help them both grow and fix nitrogen and phosphorus into the soil.

Parton is part of a growing farming community practising regenerative agriculture. Regenerative agriculture is an approach to farming that prioritises soil and environmental health by minimising synthetic inputs.

He switched to using biologically active inputs after experiencing headaches and skin rashes from using pesticides. After sheep dipping, which involves immersing sheep in insecticide and pesticide mixtures to eliminate parasites, lumps would often show up on his arms. The reaction would stay for several days. "I would be a mess, but if I went to the doctors, they would say 'you've just had a reaction' and would not take it seriously," he says.

Since adopting a biological farming method, Parton has not experienced any negative health impacts. He has not had to use any phosphorus and potassium fertilisers on his crops for over 10 years. "I try to keep the plant as nutritionally balanced as I can, and if the plant has got all the correct nutrition, it doesn't get ill," he says.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20230215-how-pesticides-harm-human-health

BRADFORD, England — The brooding landscape of the English county of Yorkshire has perhaps been best known as the home of the gothic novels “Wuthering Heights” and “Jane Eyre” by the Brontë sisters.

But long before they put pen to paper, giant carnivorous dinosaurs roamed the area that locals refer to as “God’s own country” and one left a footprint that experts Thursday confirmed was the largest ever discovered in Yorkshire.

More than 3 feet long, the footprint was made by a meat-eating theropod dinosaur almost 166 million years ago from the Jurassic Period, according to the authors of a study published in the Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society journal.

They added that they thought the dinosaur was squatting or resting when it left the three-toed footprint in the Cleveland Basin area, which is now the east coast of Yorkshire.

More

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/record-breaking-footprint-found-englands-dinosaur-coast-rcna70948

Washington Post
By Laura Vozzella and Gregory S. Schneider
February 14, 2023 at 6:24 p.m. EST

RICHMOND — The administration of Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) helped defeat a bill this week to put menstrual data stored on period-tracking apps beyond the reach of law enforcement, blocking what supporters pitched as a basic privacy measure.

Millions of women use mobile apps to track their cycles, a practice that has occasionally raised data-security worries because the apps are not bound by HIPAA, the federal health privacy law. New concerns arose after the Supreme Court gave states the right to ban abortion in June, with some abortion rights groups warning that the information could be used to prosecute women or doctors who violate a state’s restrictions on the procedure.

S.B. 852, proposed by Sen. Barbara A. Favola (D-Arlington), would have prohibited search warrants from being issued for menstrual data stored on computers or other electronic devices. The measure sailed out of the Democratic-led Senate last week on a 31-9 vote, with every Democrat and half of the chamber’s 18 Republicans in support.

But a Republican-led House subcommittee voted along party lines Monday to “table” the bill — essentially killing it — after Maggie Cleary, Youngkin’s deputy secretary of public safety and homeland security, detailed the administration’s concerns that the measure could restrict subpoena powers.

(paywall)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/02/14/youngkin-menstrual-data-abortion-virginia/

Washington Post
By Laura Vozzella and Gregory S. Schneider
February 14, 2023 at 6:24 p.m. EST

RICHMOND — The administration of Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) helped defeat a bill this week to put menstrual data stored on period-tracking apps beyond the reach of law enforcement, blocking what supporters pitched as a basic privacy measure.

Millions of women use mobile apps to track their cycles, a practice that has occasionally raised data-security worries because the apps are not bound by HIPAA, the federal health privacy law. New concerns arose after the Supreme Court gave states the right to ban abortion in June, with some abortion rights groups warning that the information could be used to prosecute women or doctors who violate a state’s restrictions on the procedure.

S.B. 852, proposed by Sen. Barbara A. Favola (D-Arlington), would have prohibited search warrants from being issued for menstrual data stored on computers or other electronic devices. The measure sailed out of the Democratic-led Senate last week on a 31-9 vote, with every Democrat and half of the chamber’s 18 Republicans in support.

But a Republican-led House subcommittee voted along party lines Monday to “table” the bill — essentially killing it — after Maggie Cleary, Youngkin’s deputy secretary of public safety and homeland security, detailed the administration’s concerns that the measure could restrict subpoena powers.

(paywall)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/02/14/youngkin-menstrual-data-abortion-virginia/

Your hearts made my day!

Source: NBC News

TRENTON, N.J. — New Jersey state Sen. Samuel Thompson said Monday he’s leaving the Republican Party and plans to seek reelection this year as a Democrat.

Thompson, 87, said in a phone interview that he decided to leave the GOP after party leaders questioned his fitness for office because of his age.

“The betrayal by so many of my friends — that was too much for me,” he said. “I am not leaving my party. My party leadership has left me.”

Thompson’s departure would expand the Democrats’ edge in the state Senate from 24 to 25 seats in the 40-member chamber.



Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/new-jersey-state-senator-says-leaving-gop-join-democrats-rcna70525