Over 51,086 new US Covid cases (new daily record) but the day is not over.

Over 46,500 new cases and the day is not officially over.

We may make a new high for "daily new cases" in the US The previous high was June 26 (last Fri) at 47,300.

Edit...new daily record was reached at 50,000 and the day is not over.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/

Newsom orders new shutdown of restaurants, other indoor business in 19 California counties

His order requires restaurants, wineries, family entertainment centers, movie theaters, museums, zoos and cardrooms in the 19 counties to halt indoor operations for at least three weeks. The affected establishments are allowed to operate outdoors, such as restaurant patios. Newsom also ordered the full closure of all bars and breweries in the 19 counties, both indoor and outdoor operations.

Combined, the 19 counties include nearly three-fourths of California’s population. Besides the Bay Area counties, the list includes Los Angeles, Orange, Sacramento, Stanislaus, Fresno, Glenn, Imperial, Kern, Kings, Merced, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Joaquin, Santa Barbara, Tulare and Ventura counties.

The governor said the state will also close parking lots at state beaches, including those in the Bay Area, for the holiday weekend. Newsom implored Californians to practice social distancing and wear masks as they mingle and travel for the holiday. He said people must “disabuse” themselves of any notion that people have stopped dying of COVID-19, noting that the statewide death toll hit 110 on Tuesday.

“Let’s do our best to meet this moment, as we met the moment many months ago and bent the curve again the first time,” he said. “Let’s do it again.”

On Tuesday, the state recorded 7,820 new cases — its second-highest tally in a 24-hour period — and surpassed 6,000 deaths. The state reported 5,898 new cases on Wednesday. Newsom’s administration began allowing counties in May to move ahead on reopening businesses including indoor restaurants and shopping malls if they hit benchmarks in slowing the spread of the virus and creating capacity to contain a surge.

Alarming updates about the virus’ toll continue to mount: San Francisco announced Tuesday that the city has seen a 49% spike in hospitalizations over the last week as patients from San Quentin State Prison and hard-hit rural Imperial County were transferred to city hospitals.
https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/Newsom-orders-shutdown-of-indoor-business-in-19-15380217.php

Russians grant Putin right to extend his rule until 2036 in landslide vote: partial results

Source: Reuters

Russians appeared to have paved the way for Vladimir Putin to stay in power until 2036 by voting overwhelmingly for a package of constitutional changes which will also boost pensions, partial results of a nationwide vote showed on Wednesday.

Results, after almost a third of ballots had been counted, indicated that the former KGB officer who has ruled Russia for more than two decades as president or prime minister would easily win the right to run for two more terms. That means he could remain president for 16 more years.

Russians have been encouraged to vote with prize draws offering flats and an ad campaign highlighting other constitutional amendments in the same reform bundle, such as the pensions protection and a de facto ban on same-sex marriages.

One-off payments of 10,000 roubles ($141) were transferred to those with children at Putin’s order as people headed to polling stations on Wednesday, the last day of the vote, held over seven days to try to limit the spread of the coronavirus.

Read more: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-putin-vote/russians-grant-putin-right-to-extend-his-rule-until-2036-in-landslide-vote-initial-results-show-idUSKBN24254A

Carl Reiner spoke for us...

Clean Up Your Act, Facebook, or We're Leaving The social media company...

"Clean Up Your Act, Facebook, or We’re Leaving
The social media company has taken steps toward reining in Trump. It’s too little, too late."

"Last week, you announced that you are finally labeling the most egregious dreck that is broadcast on Facebook by President Trump, after years of his escalating behavior. But it’s too little, too late. And it’s too calculating. You and other Facebook executives keep hauling out the tired line, “We know we have more work to do.” It’s irksome. And you won’t like me when I am irked."

"You seem to be shifting toward labeling — after insisting recently to your employees that you would not budge on this — in reaction to a campaign to persuade advertisers to boycott your company, a movement known as Stop the Hate for Profit. After years of other forms of pressure that apparently failed, those who are seeking to force you to change are finally getting traction by focusing on your wallet, knocking billions off your net worth in recent days, as your stock price goes down."

"Still, other companies, like Starbucks and Coca-Cola, are not joining Stop the Hate, but instead are declaring that they will cut off marketing on all of social media. As if all social media companies are equal. They are not. Your stranglehold on the ad business is undeniably the source of your power. I talked recently with some people running businesses that rely on Facebook, all of whom are scared to speak out publicly against your platform. Many compared your service to a bad relationship."

"As I deactivated, I was asked by Facebook why I was doing it, and I picked “other” from a long menu of reasons, many of which I would have clicked if I could have chosen more than one, including: I have a privacy concern; I don’t feel safe on Facebook; I don’t find Facebook useful. This column — and the deactivation of my account — is my way of cleaning up my world. But to say I am confident that you, Mark Zuckerberg, will do your part to clean up the rest of the world would be something of an overstatement. Facebook’s still high stock price and your complete control over the company means you can and will continue to do as you please."

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/30/opinion/facebook-zuckerberg-labeling.html#click=https://t.co/B3NFyzbma4

Second highest new cases in US today...46,000

TX and CA have new highs...8,000 each. FL has 6,000 new cases.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/

US had 2nd highest Covid "new cases" today, 44,700.

Highest day for CA 6,900. TX had 2nd highest 6,126.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us

John Roberts Is No Pro-Choice Hero: The latest Supreme Court decision sets the stage...

"John Roberts Is No Pro-Choice Hero
The latest Supreme Court decision sets the stage for further attacks on abortion rights."

By The Editorial Board
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/29/opinion/supreme-court-abortion.html#click=https://t.co/OK13VjGPPE

"Would the chief justice’s disapproval of abortion outweigh his desire for the court to respect its own very recent precedent?"

"It turns out that it didn’t. In a concurring opinion that provided the fifth vote for a majority, the chief justice wrote that the court’s doctrine requires it to “treat like cases alike.” Because the Louisiana law — which requires doctors who perform abortions to get admitting privileges at a hospital near their clinic, supposedly in the interests of women’s health and safety — was more or less a carbon copy of the Texas law the court previously struck down, and because it burdened women in the same way, it “cannot stand,” he wrote."

"That’s good as far as it goes, which is not very far. It would be a mistake to interpret this decision as a sign that the chief justice has had a change of heart about protecting the bodily autonomy of American women. Even in his concurring opinion, Chief Justice Roberts said that he still believes that the Texas case was “wrongly decided” and that he voted to strike down the Louisiana law solely out of respect for precedent. He appears to have decided that the circumstances of this case were not ideal for crippling reproductive rights — but he left the door open to doing so in the future. Monday’s decision, with the plurality opinion written by Justice Stephen Breyer, isn’t so much good news for reproductive freedom as it is a temporary reprieve from all the bad."

"Abortion access in many parts of the country is abysmal — five states have only one abortion clinic, for instance. If the Louisiana law had been upheld, clinics in that state (which has only three such facilities) and across the country could have closed, forcing many women to travel longer distances at prohibitive expense to receive reproductive health care."

American Airlines will stop blocking off middle seats starting July 1

American Airlines will stop blocking off middle seats starting July 1, essentially forgoing social distancing on flights.

Be careful and spread the word to family and friends who may be flying.