Washington
China defends ditching U.S. talks, says Washington must bear ‘serious consequences’
![China defends ditching U.S. talks, says Washington must bear ‘serious consequences’](https://www.reuters.com/resizer/2V9-xX_gHkYavv13WC18vnfIn5A=/1096x574/smart/filters:quality(80)/cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com/reuters/OO7WIA4E4NLVJHZIEJBIEUZXGA.jpg)
BEIJING, Aug 8 (Reuters) – China’s defence ministry on Monday defended its shelving of army talks with the US in protest in opposition to Home Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s go to to Taipei final week, warning that Washington should bear “critical penalties.”
Pelosi’s go to final week infuriated China, which regards the self-ruled island as its personal and responded with check launches of ballistic missiles over Taipei for the primary time, in addition to ditching some traces of dialogue with Washington.
“The present tense state of affairs within the Taiwan Strait is solely provoked and created by the U.S. facet by itself initiative, and the U.S. facet should bear full duty and critical penalties for this,” defence ministry spokesman Wu Qian mentioned in a web-based publish.
“The underside line can’t be damaged, and communication requires sincerity,” Wu mentioned.
4 days of unprecedented drills had been scheduled to finish on Sunday. Chinese language authorities haven’t formally confirmed they’ve ended, amid fears amongst some safety analysts that the state of affairs within the Taiwan Strait, notably close to the unofficial median line buffer, stays tense.
About 10 warships every from China and Taiwan maneuvered at shut quarters across the line on Sunday, in accordance with an individual accustomed to the state of affairs who’s concerned with safety planning.
A Chinese language Folks’s Liberation Military (PLA) plane flies over the 68-nautical-mile scenic spot, one in all mainland China’s closest factors to the island of Taiwan, in Pingtan island, Fujian province, China August 5, 2022. REUTERS/Aly Tune
The island’s defence ministry mentioned Chinese language army ships, plane, and drones had simulated assaults on the island and its navy. It mentioned it had despatched plane and ships to react “appropriately”.
China referred to as off formal talks involving theatre-level instructions, defence coverage co-ordination and army maritime consultations on Friday as Pelosi left the area.
Pentagon, State Division and White Home officers condemned the transfer, describing it as an irresponsible overreaction.
China’s reducing of a few of its few communication hyperlinks with the U.S. army raises the danger of an unintended escalation over Taiwan at a crucial second, in accordance with safety analysts and diplomats. learn extra
One U.S. official famous that Chinese language officers had not responded to calls from senior Pentagon officers amid the tensions final week, however that they didn’t see this as a proper severing of ties with senior figures, resembling U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin.
Requested straight about these studies, defence ministry spokesman Wu mentioned, “China’s related countermeasures are a needed warning to the provocations of the US and Taiwan, and a legit protection of nationwide sovereignty and safety”.
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Reporting by Beijing Newsroom; writing by Greg Torode. Enhancing by Gerry Doyle
Our Requirements: The Thomson Reuters Belief Rules.
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Washington
Analysis | No, Biden won’t be on performance-enhancing drugs for the debate
![Analysis | No, Biden won’t be on performance-enhancing drugs for the debate](https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=https://arc-anglerfish-washpost-prod-washpost.s3.amazonaws.com/public/ICCGDYAU2QI6XISYMFFM6K4QNU_size-normalized.jpg&w=1440)
So they modify their claim: Biden is addled and wandering, except when he is given some sort of medication, perhaps a stimulant, that reverses that effect. And here we are, with Trump and those seeking his reelection to the White House demanding that Biden submit to some sort of drug test before this week’s first presidential debate, purportedly in effort to sniff out this theoretical drug.
Experts who spoke with The Washington Post, though, confirm that no such medicine exists.
At the outset, we should recognize that this claim is generally not offered seriously. It is, instead, an effort to escape the aforementioned contradiction, a way to hold both that Biden is incapable of serving as president and yet, unquestionably at times, not demonstrating any such impairment. What’s more, the demand that Biden undergo a drug test is itself not serious. It is, instead, meant to create a condition that allows Trump and his allies to continue to claim that any strong performance from Biden is a function of medication. The result is win-win for Trump, who can blame any loss on this wonder drug.
If you haven’t been paying close attention to the debate (such as it is) over this idea, consider a snippet of conversation that aired on Fox Business on Tuesday morning.
Host Maria Bartiromo — no stranger to conspiratorial argumentation — hosted Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) where she offered an observation made by Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-Tex.).
“Jackson says Biden will have been at Camp David for a full week before the debate,” Bartiromo said, “and that they’re probably experimenting with getting doses right. Giving him medicine ahead of the debate.”
Burlison agreed that this was possible, though he offered that it might be more innocuous than medication. Perhaps, he said, Biden’s team is “jack[ing] him up on Mountain Dew.”
Jackson, you will recall, was Trump’s personal doctor while Trump was in the White House. He is not an expert on cognition or cognition-related illnesses, though he is familiar with drug prescription.
“Nothing like that exists,” Thomas Wisniewski, director of the NYU Langone Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center, told The Washington Post by phone. “There are no medications or stimulants that can reverse a dementing process transiently.”
“All of those sorts of things can perhaps make an individual more alert, but quite often that can just exacerbate their confusion, as well,” he added. “They can be more stimulated, but they are not going to be behaving in a more cogent or normal fashion as a result of being stimulated by anything. Very often it’s the reverse.”
Adam Brickman, associate professor of neuropsychology at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, concurred with that assessment.
“I’m not aware of any medications that would reverse or mask cognitive decline,” Brickman said. What’s more, he noted that “the association between energy and cognition is a very weak one. In other words, someone could have low energy but totally intact cognition and vice versa.”
Both doctors noted that such a medication would be of enormous benefit. Reversing cognitive decline, after all, would mean turning back the damage done from diseases that impair cognition in the first place. It would be akin not just to treating the pain of a broken bone but, instead, to directly healing the break itself. Sadly, no such drug for cognition exists.
Again, the argument that Biden is or could be receiving targeted treatment to improve his mental state fails multiple logical tests. Why, for example, would he not simply take this medication all the time? Why would he need to retest his dosage for a debate after giving a lengthy State of the Union address? The answer is that there is no good answer, that the intent of the allegations is simply to maintain the political argument that Biden is mentally deficient even in the face of his performing above expectations in a debate.
Not that that argument is itself well-grounded, as Brickman noted.
“It’s not possible to conclude or to determine whether someone has subtle cognitive change without doing a true clinical evaluation,” he said. “So to judge whether there’s an underlying disease or neurodegenerative condition based on public speeches or interactions that are captured by the press is irresponsible.”
Wisniewski offered a more succinct dismissal of the claims being made by Trumpworld.
“It’s spurious,” he said. “It’s nonsensical.”
In other words, if Biden fares better in the debate this week, it’s not because of a secret Camp David drug-dosing regimen that enabled the administration to mask Biden’s physical degeneration. It’s because Biden out-debated the guy who won’t accept that that’s possible.
Washington
Elderly couple dies in Washington Heights apartment building fire
![Elderly couple dies in Washington Heights apartment building fire](https://www.nydailynews.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/DN_NYDNstaff_14872559.jpg?w=1024&h=768)
An elderly couple died when a massive fire tore through their Washington Heights apartment building early Tuesday, FDNY and NYPD officials said.
The blaze broke out inside a top-floor apartment in the six-story building on W. 178th St. near Broadway, a block from the entrance to the George Washington Bridge, about 1:45 a.m.
“Upon arrival in four-and-a-half minutes we saw heavy fire venting from three windows on the top floor,” FDNY Deputy Chief of Special Operations Malcolm Moore said at the scene. “We did an aggressive interior attack and found a couple, an older male and female, inside the apartment.”
The woman was found suffering from burns and smoke inhalation in the front room, Moore said.
“Once the units battled past the heavy fire condition we found the second victim, believed to be a male, in a back bedroom,” the chief said.
The couple were taken to Harlem Hospital, where they both died, the NYPD confirmed. Their names were not immediately released.
It took more than 130 firefighters about two hours to put out the massive blaze.
Three other building residents, a firefighter, and two FDNY emergency medical technicians suffered minor injuries, FDNY officials said. The civilians were treated at the scene while the FDNY workers were treated at local hospitals.
FDNY fire marshals are investigating the cause of the fire.
Washington
This art museum has a new home for its Picassos: The women’s bathroom
In the meantime, Kaechele, who is married to the museum’s owner, says she did “a little redecorating.”
“I thought a few of the bathrooms in the museum could do with an update … Some cubism in the cubicles. So I’ve relocated the Picassos,” she said in an email shared by a spokeswoman, Sara Gates-Matthews.
The lounge was a conceptual artwork that, as The Washington Post reported previously, only allowed one man inside: the butler who served women fancy high teas. It has been closed since the state of Tasmania’s civil and administrative tribunal gave the museum 28 days to stop refusing entry based on gender.
Kaechele is considering several other possible workarounds to the court ruling.
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The law states that there are certain grounds for denying access based on gender, such as in a religious institution where the religious doctrines require it, in the case of single-gender schools, and in some types of shared accommodation.
“We’ll get the Lounge open again as a church / school / boutique glamping accommodation,” Kaechele said in a social media post on Monday.
Last month, she suggested the Ladies Lounge could become a place to do Bible study — saying that the Bible includes both “inspiring perspectives” and “challenging concepts,” particularly in regard to women “as with all great art.” On Sundays, she proposed “we would open [the Lounge] to men” for “personal enrichment and meditation” in the form of ironing and folding laundry.
“As our work continues on Section 26 of the Anti-Discrimination Act, ladies can take a break and enjoy some quality time in the Ladies Room,” Kaechele said in an email Tuesday.
Previously, the museum’s restrooms were all unisex.
During the tribunal hearing, Kaechele said the practice of requiring women to drink in ladies lounges rather than public bars only ended in parts of Australia in 1970 and that, in practice, exclusion of women in public spaces continues. “Over history, women have seen significantly fewer interiors,” she wrote in her witness statement.
The Tasmanian museum, billed by its wealthy owner David Walsh as a “subversive adult Disneyland,” has a history of unusual — and sometimes controversial — exhibitions.
This month it is exhibiting the world’s only copy of Wu-Tang Clan’s mythical 2015 album “Once Upon a Time in Shaolin,” which is not available to stream in full anywhere online.
Its collection includes a wall of sculpted vulvas and a machine that mimics human digestion, complete with odors, from chewing to defecation.
“I actually think the lawsuit is a blessing in disguise,” Kaechele wrote in an interview posted on the museum’s webpage last month. She added that it “encourages us to move beyond the simple pleasures of champagne and expensive art.”
Frances Vinall and Leo Sands contributed to this report.
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