Month: February 2021

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World News

Biden sought to rally allies in Munich as China affect grows

Biden sought to rally allies in Munich as China influence grows

It was intended that Joe Biden used the term “turning point” three times in his key foreign policy address as President on Friday. He wanted to make sure that the historical weight of his words was not overlooked.

Above all, he wanted his virtual audience at the Munich Security Conference to hear that the global democracies were experiencing a decisive moment in their accelerating struggle against authoritarianism and that they would not dare to underestimate the effort. It is an argument that I have made many times in this area, but one that has not been so clearly formulated by a US president.

“We are in the midst of a profound debate about the future and direction of our world,” Biden said to a receptive audience, though it was also an audience unsettled by President Trump’s sudden, if welcome, departure from the cold shower of President Trump’s America was first to the global embrace of his successor.

“We are at a turning point,” said Biden, “between those who argue that autocracy is the best way to go in the face of all the challenges from the fourth industrial revolution to the global pandemic … and those who understand that democracy.” is important, important to master these challenges. “

Biden’s picture, which was beamed from the White House to Munich, was symbolically framed on the large screens of the main stage next to Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron. After each of their three 15-minute speeches, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who had just finished chairing a virtual meeting of G7 leaders, joined them for the Kumbaya Moment.

Wolfgang Ischinger, chairman of the Munich Security Conference, had every reason to be satisfied when he called this reunification of the four allies who had done so much to repair Europe after the devastation of World War II. Working with partners, these four countries took the lead in creating rule-based institutions that have been at the heart of global governance for 75 years.

However, what lurked beneath this powerful moment was the growing recognition among senior government officials in Biden and their European counterparts of how difficult it will be to slow down China’s authoritarian dynamism, especially if it turns out to be the first major economy to escape Covid-19 to restore growth, conduct vaccine diplomacy and offer the lure of its 1.4 billion consumers.

Therefore, the Biden government needs to develop a far more creative, intense, and far more collaborative approach to give and take towards its Asian and European allies than perhaps ever before. Electroplating the international common cause has rarely been so important, but maybe it was never so difficult.

There are mutliple reasons for this.

First, any US policy must take into account China’s role as a leading trading partner for most of America’s major partners, including the dethroning of the United States in 2020 for the first time as the European Union’s leading trading partner.

This will lead most European countries and Germany in particular not to worry about decoupling from the Chinese economy or entering into a new Cold War. The United States must be careful to consider the political and economic needs of its partners – and recognize that it is unlikely to take a common, coordinated position on China without a cold hearted calculation of its own national interests.

President Biden took this into account in his speech. “We cannot and must not return to the reflexive opposition and rigid blocks of the Cold War,” he said. “Competition must not block our cooperation on issues that affect us all. For example, we must work together if we want to defeat Covid-19 everywhere.”

Second, European doubts about the reliability of the American partnership will persist for some time, especially given former President Trump’s continued popularity, the political appeal of his “America First” policy, and his continued role in Republican politics after the Senate’s acquittal .

This can lead to many European officials hedge their bets.

A new survey by the European Council on Foreign Relations found that 57% of respondents saw Biden’s victory as beneficial to the European Union, but 60% believe that China will become more powerful than the US in the next decade, and 32% believe that that the US can no longer trust this.

Third, the Biden government and its European partners must work to resolve or avoid unresolved problems so that they do not compromise the chance of a fresh start. These range from continued Trump administration tariffs and sanctions to Airbus-Boeing trade disputes and German-American battles over the completion of the North Stream 2 pipeline from Russia to Western Europe.

Work to complete the pipeline from Russia halted last year despite investing US $ 10 billion and 94% completion of the project due to secondary US sanctions.

In particular, the Biden administration must proactively work with EU leaders to avoid looming struggles on how best to manage and regulate the influence of American tech giants, including competition, data management, privacy and security issues digital taxation.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told CNBC that President Biden was an “ally” in combating disinformation on the Internet and in tightening the rules of the way technology companies operate. The growing EU talk about “digital sovereignty”, however, underscores the potential for digital conflicts across the Atlantic.

Eventually, the reluctance of the Biden administration to begin new trade negotiations – and the lack of a sufficient Democratic or Republican constituency for such dealings – will keep the United States one hand behind its back with Beijing.

In the meantime, China has reached out to Asian partners through the 15-strong Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and a new Comprehensive EU-China Investment Agreement (CAI).

The thing about historical turning points is that they can turn in positive or negative directions with generational ramifications. President Biden made good sense to draw our attention to our crucial moment. So there can be no excuse if the US and its global partners do not engage in the hard work that is required to meet this epoch-making challenge.

Frederick Kempe is a best-selling author, award-winning journalist, and President and CEO of the Atlantic Council, one of the most influential US think tanks on global affairs. He worked for the Wall Street Journal for more than 25 years as a foreign correspondent, assistant editor-in-chief and senior editor for the European edition of the newspaper. His latest book – “Berlin 1961: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and the Most Dangerous Place on Earth” – was a New York Times best seller and has been published in more than a dozen languages. Follow him on Twitter @FredKempe and subscribe here to Inflection Points, his view every Saturday of the top stories and trends of the past week.

More information from CNBC staff can be found here @ CNBCopinion on twitter.

Categories
Business

20 Black film administrators who modified Hollywood within the final century

20 Black movie directors who changed Hollywood in the last century

(L to R) Ava Duvernay, Spike Lee, Jordan Peele

Getty Images

The films that launched the entertainment industry around the turn of the 20th century were created for white audiences by white filmmakers.

It took decades for Black directors to break into the industry and alter how Hollywood operated behind and in front of the camera and how it viewed Black content. Oscar Micheaux led the charge, launching his own studio in 1919. 

Directors such as Melvin van Peebles and Gordon Parks put Black narratives at the forefront of their storytelling in the 1970s, creating a subgenre known as “blaxploitation.” These films used Black stereotypes about poverty and drug abuse to put Black actors at the center of the action.  

Then in the ’80s and ’90s, Spike Lee and John Singleton used their films to examine urban and racial tensions, providing a mainstream audience with more nuanced Black characters. 

“I’ve been blessed with the opportunity to express the views of black people who otherwise don’t have access to power and the media,” Lee wrote in a companion novel to “Do the Right Thing” published in 1989. “I have to take advantage of that while I’m still bankable.”

During that time, Black female filmmakers were making strides. Kathleen Collins’ work in the ’80s paved the way for Julie Dash to become the first Black woman to have a film get a wide release in 1991.

Each of these directors helped push back barriers and inspire a new generation of Black filmmakers such as Ava DuVernay, Tyler Perry and Barry Jenkins, who have been recognized not only critically for their work but commercially at the global box office.

While Black filmmakers are more prevalent and celebrated in Hollywood in the 21st century, there’s still a lot of work to be done. 

2020 was a banner year for Black ensemble films. “One Night in Miami,” “Da 5 Bloods,” “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” and “Judas and the Black Messiah” stunned critics. However, none of these films was nominated for best picture or best screenplay at the Golden Globes. The Academy Awards will make its nominations in March.

Here’s a look at 20 Black directors who have changed Hollywood:

Oscar Micheaux

Hailed as the first major Black filmmaker, Oscar Micheaux directed and produced 42 feature films between 1919 and 1948. 

He was a writer-turned-filmmaker, using his first novel “The Homesteader” to launch his career in the film industry. During that time, Micheaux’s content was classified as “race film,” a genre of movies made during the Jim Crow era that were created for and by Black people.

Many of his films featured all-Black casts and his characters were not stereotypical, unlike the blackface caricatures seen in more mainstream white films. He tackled subjects such as racial violence, rape, economic oppression and discrimination within his work.

He died in 1951 but has posthumously been inducted into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame and awarded the Golden Jubilee Special Directorial Award from the Directors Guild of America.

A lobby card for the 1921 silent film ‘The Gunsaulus Mystery,” The poster features Oscar Micheaux who was the writer and director of the film, he is regarded as the first major African-American filmmaker, the film belongs to a genre called race films which were produced for all-black audiences, 1921.

Smith Collection | Gado | Archive Photos | Getty Images

William Greaves

An influential independent documentary filmmaker, William Greaves produced and directed more than 100 films. His films captured social issues as well as key African American figures such as Muhammad Ali and Ida B. Wells. 

In the late 1960’s Greaves garnered attention for his experimental film “Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One.” The avant-garde film chronicles a fictional documentary titled “Over the Cliff,” which is directed by Greaves, who acts in it. The documentary focuses on actors as they prepare to audition for a dramatic piece. Greaves used three sets of camera crews: One documented the audition process and the actors, the second documented the first film crew and the third documented the actors and the two other film crews.

The meta-documentary, as it has come to be called, featured a documentary, a documentary about a documentary and a documentary that documented a documentary about a documentary. 

Greaves, who passed away in 2014, is a member of the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame and the recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Documentary Association.

Director William Greaves speaks at the press conference for the film “Symbiopsychotaxiplasm:Take 2 1/2” at the Tribeca Film Festival April 25, 2005 in New York City.

Bryan Bedder | Getty Images

Gordon Parks

Gordon Parks started his career as a prolific and famed photographer before branching out into filmmaking. He started as a consultant on various Hollywood productions in the ’50s before directing a series of documentaries about Black urban life for National Educational Television.

Parks became Hollywood’s first major Black director, bringing the iconic “Shaft” to theaters in 1971. The film spawned a number of follow-ups and helped spark a subgenre known as blaxploitation. The genre was one in which images of lower-class Blacks being involved with drugs and violence were exploited to make commercially successful films.

While this genre played on Black stereotypes, it also cast Black actors in lead roles, instead of as minor characters or sidekicks.

Director Gordon Parks and actor Richard Roundtree on set of the movie “Shaft’s Big Score!”, circa 1972.

Michael Ochs Archives | Moviepix | Getty Images

Melvin van Peebles

Melvin van Peebles directed more than a dozen films during his career in Hollywood, but he is most well known for the 1971 movie “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song,” which he wrote, directed and acted in.

“Sweetback” tells the story of a Black man who is selected as a patsy for a murder by white police officers. The man ends up killing the cops, becomes the target of a massive manhunt and flees to Mexico. It became one of the most successful films of 1971, tallying more than $15 million in box-office sales.

The film proved that a story with a strong African-American lead character could be successful at the box office and helped usher in a new wave of Black cinema.

Actor, director, screenwriter, playwright, novelist and composer Melvin Van Peebles photographed in 1972.

Jack Mitchell | Getty Images

Kathleen Collins

A poet, playwright and filmmaker, Kathleen Collins helped break barriers for female directors in Hollywood. She had two major films: “The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy” and “Losing Ground,” which were released in the early ’80s.

Although “Losing Ground” was denied a large-scale exhibition, it was among the first films created by a Black woman that was feature-length and created for popular consumption. Collins helped pave the way for future Black women filmmakers to have their films get national commercial distribution. 

Collins passed away in 1988 from breast cancer. At that time, the bulk of her work was unpublished and left to her daughter. In 2006, Nina Collins began to go through her mother’s archive and have it published, restored and reissued.

Spike Lee

In the mid-’80s Spike Lee emerged in the film industry with “She’s Gotta Have It,” a film about the love life of a contemporary Black woman. Over the next 40 years, Lee would become known for his exploration of race relations, colorism in the Black community and urban crime and poverty. He has released a movie almost every year since 1986.

He was one of the few Black filmmakers making movies for a wide audience during that time and, while his films were not breaking box-office records, they were gaining critical attention.

Lee was nominated for best documentary feature in 1998 for “4 Little Girls” and best original screenplay in 1990 for “Do the Right Thing.” He received an honorary Oscar in 2016 for his directorial accomplishments. In 2019, Lee finally claimed his first Oscar for best adapted screenplay for his work on “BlacKkKlansman.”

His most recent feature was “Da 5 Bloods,” which was released on Netflix last year. The film received a number of key critics’ prizes, including best film from the National Board of Review and one of the top 10 films of the year by the American Film Institute.

Spike Lee

Steve Granitz | WireImage | Getty Images

Marlon Riggs

Marlon Riggs was an American filmmaker, poet and gay rights activist during the ’80s and ’90s. He produced and directed a number of documentary films including “Tongues Untied,” “Ethnic Notions” and “Color Adjustment” prior to his untimely death in 1994 due to complications from AIDS.

Riggs used film to examine past and present representations of race and sexuality in the U.S. One of his most controversial documentaries was “Tongues Untied.” It looked at gay Black male culture during the AIDS crisis and featured a kiss between two Black men, something that hadn’t been portrayed in mainstream media. It was selected by PBS for its “POV” series.

The documentary was partially funded by taxpayer money though the National Endowment for the Arts, leading some conservatives to use it in long-running attempts to defund PBS and the NEA.

Riggs’ work, although controversial, became a lightning rod for the culture war between conservatives and liberals that raged during that time.

Julie Dash

Just three years after the passing of Collins, Julie Dash released “Daughters of the Dust.” It was the first full-length film directed by an African American woman to get a wide theatrical release in the U.S. Dash’s 1991 film was named to the National Film Registry in 2004.

Dash has directed music videos, commercial spots, shorts and episodic television during her career. She was nominated for a Directors Guild Award for “The Rosa Parks Story,” which was released in 2002. 

Renowned filmmaker Julie Dash, who wrote and directed the acclaimed film, ‘Daughters of the Dust’, teaches filmmaking at Howard University.

The Washington Post | The Washington Post | Getty Images

John Singleton

At the age of 24, John Singleton became the youngest person ever to be nominated for best director at the Academy Awards and the first African-American. He was nominated for his film “Boyz n the Hood,” a 1991 coming-of-age drama that also earned Singleton a best original screenplay nod at the Oscars.

Many of Singleton’s films examined urban and racial tensions including “Poetic Justice” and “Higher Learning,” which were released in the ’90s. He also directed the film “2 Fast 2 Furious.”

Prior to his death in 2019, Singleton wrote, directed or executive produced a number of television shows including “Snowfall,” “Rebel,” “Empire” and “Billions.”

View of director John Singleton, wearing sunglasses and beret, while on the set of his movie ‘Poetic Justice’, Los Angeles, CA, 1993.

Anthony Barboza | Archive Photos | Getty Images

F. Gary Gray

F. Gary Gray began his career directing critically acclaimed and award-winning music videos for artists such as Ice Cube, Dr. Dre and Outkast. It wasn’t until the mid-90s that he made his feature film debut.

In the years that followed, Gray released blockbuster hits and award-nominated films including “The Italian Job,” “Law Abiding Citizen,” “Straight Outta Compton” and “The Fate of the Furious.”

Gray has directed 10 films in the last three decades, tallying more than $2.2 billion in ticket sales. He is the first Black director to have a film gross more than $1 billion at the global box office. “The Fate of the Furious” tallied $1.2 billion in 2017.

Honoree F. Gary Gray accepts the Excellence in the Arts Award onstage during BET Presents the American Black Film Festival Honors on February 17, 2017 in Beverly Hills, California. (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images)

Alberto E. Rodriguez | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty Images

Antoine Fuqua

Like Gray, Antoine Fuqua got his start in the industry directing music videos. He worked with artists such as Toni Braxton, Coolio, Prince and Stevie Wonder before launching into feature films in 1998.

Fuqua is known for directing action and thriller films and has a consistent track record at the box office. His 2001 film “Training Day” earned actor Denzel Washington an Academy Award.

His films “King Arthur,” “Shooter,” “Olympus Has Fallen,” “The Equalizer” and “Southpaw” have garnered more than $1.3 billion at the global box office. His most recent work was a 2019 documentary called “What’s My Name: Muhammad Ali.”

Executive Producer & Director Antoine Fuqua attends the “What’s My Name | Muhammad Ali” Tribeca Premiere on April 28, 2019 in New York City.

Michael Loccisano | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty Images

Tyler Perry

Tyler Perry built a multimillion-dollar brand by creating content for an audience that was often ignored by Hollywood. While some have derided the filmmaker for amplifying negative or stereotypical images of Black identity, particularly with his Madea films, he continues to showcase A-list and up-and-coming Black talent in his work.

Following the box-office success of his 2005 debut “Diary of a Mad Black Woman,” Perry secured a lucrative first-look deal with Lionsgate until 2014. Perry’s two dozen theatrical releases have garnered more than $1.1 billion globally.

Perry operates one of three major studios in Georgia, where he films his movie and television projects and rents out space to other filmmakers. With his studio, Perry has helped nurture the state’s film industry. He has even partnered with the Georgia Film Academy to place interns from the school on productions.

Tyler Perry accepts People’s Champion Award onstage for the 2020 E! People’s Choice Awards held at the Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, California and on broadcast on Sunday, November 15, 2020.

Christopher Polk/E! Entertainment | NBCUniversal | Getty Images

Tim Story

Tim Story is one of the most commercially successful Black filmmakers. His directorial debut came in 2002 with “Barbershop,” a comedy film that spawned two other films in the franchise.

He also directed 2005’s “Fantastic Four” and its sequel “Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer,” which together amassed more than $600 million at the global box office.

In total, Story’s films, which also include “Think Like a Man,” “Ride Along” and 2019’s “Shaft,” have hauled in more than $1.2 billion worldwide.

Director Tim Story attends the premiere of Showtime’s “White Famous” at The Jeremy Hotel on September 27, 2017 in West Hollywood, California. (Photo by Paul Archuleta/FilmMagic)

Paul Archuleta | FilmMagic | Getty Images

Steve McQueen

No, not the American actor. This Steve McQueen is a British filmmaker known for his Academy Award-winning film “12 Years a Slave.”

Born in London, McQueen spent the ’90s making short films before debuting his first feature-length film “Hunger,” about the 1981 Irish hunger strike, at the Cannes Film Festival in 2008.

In 2011, he released “Shame,” a drama about an executive struggling with sex addiction. Two years later, “12 Years a Slave” garnered him the Oscar for best picture, making him the first Black filmmaker to ever win the award.

He later adapted a British television series called “Widows” into an American-based film and released “Small Axe,” a collection of five films set within London’s West Indian community between the 1960s and 1980s.

For his work, McQueen has received the Turner Prize, the highest award given to a British visual artist. He has also been appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

Director Steve McQueen attends the red carpet of the movie “Soul” during the 15th Rome Film Festival on October 15, 2020 in Rome, Italy.

Elisabetta Villa | Getty Images

Barry Jenkins

Barry Jenkins directed two short films before debuting “Medicine for Melancholy” in 2008. The film received an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best First Feature. 

Following an eight-year hiatus from feature filmmaking, Jenkins returned to Hollywood with “Moonlight,” an LGBT-themed independent drama, that went on to win numerous accolades including the Academy Award for best picture. Jenkins became the fourth Black person nominated for best director and the second to win a best picture Oscar. 

His third directorial feature “If Beale Street Could Talk” arrived in 2018 and earned him nominations for best screenplay at the Academy Awards and Golden Globes.

Jenkins was most recently tapped by Disney to direct a second live-action “Lion King” film.

Barry Jenkins accepts Best Director for “If Beale Street Could Talk” onstage during the 2019 Film Independent Spirit Awards on February 23, 2019 in Santa Monica, California. (Photo by Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images)

Tommaso Boddi | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty Images

Dee Rees

A student and mentee of director Spike Lee, Dee Rees graduated from New York University and immediately went to work. She interned on Lee’s “Inside Man” and “When the Levees Broke” in the mid-’00s, using that time to pen a script that would later be developed into her first feature film, 2011’s “Pariah.”

Her third directorial film, “Mudbound,” was nominated for three Academy Awards, including a best screenplay nod for Rees. Rees was the first Black woman nominated for a writing award at the Oscars since Suzanne de Passe in 1973. “Mudbound” also led Rachel Morrison to be the first woman ever nominated for the best cinematography award.

Rees has also written and directed television episodes for series such as “Empire,” “When We Rise” and “Philip K. Dick’s Electric Dreams.”

Dee Rees speaks onstage during the 2020 Sundance Film Festival Awards Night Ceremony at Basin Recreation Field House on February 01, 2020 in Park City, Utah.

Matt Winkelmeyer | Getty Images

Ava DuVernay

Ava DuVernay first made a name for herself in Hollywood with her 2012 film “Middle of Nowhere.” The film earned her the directing award in the U.S. dramatic competition at Sundance. She was the first Black woman to win this award.

Two years later, “Selma” helped DuVernay become the first Black woman to be nominated for a Golden Globe for best director and the first Black female director to be nominated for best picture. In 2017, she was nominated for the Oscar for best documentary feature for her film “13th.”

While her 2018 Disney fantasy film “A Wrinkle in Time” ultimately lost money at the box office and was a flop with critics, it still garnered more than $100 million domestically. DuVernay was the first Black woman to hit that benchmark.

More recently, DuVernay has had a successful run in television. Her Netflix limited series “When They See Us” told the story of the five Harlem teens who were falsely accused of a brutal attack in Central Park. It earned critical acclaim and 16 Emmy nominations. It won the Emmy for outstanding limited series.

Last year, DuVernay was elected to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences board of governors as part of the directors branch.

DuVernay also founded a film collective called Array in 2010. The company is dedicated to amplifying people of color and female directors in the film industry.

Filmmaker Ava Duvernay attends Film at Lincoln Center screening of “When They See Us” at Walter Reade Theater on May 21, 2019 in New York City.

John Lamparski | Getty Images

Ryan Coogler

“Black Panther” director Ryan Coogler has become a household name in less than a decade. In 2013, he gained critical acclaim and attention for his debut film “Fruitvale Station,” which led him to direct “Creed,” a spin-off sequel to the Rocky films.

For his third film, Disney gave him a budget of $200 million to bring the Black superhero Black Panther to the big screen. The film brought in a record-breaking $235 million during its opening weekend and went on to ring up more than $1.3 billion in ticket sales globally. He is the second Black director to have a film top $1 billion worldwide. 

In early February, Disney announced that it had struck a five-year deal with Coogler and his company Proximity Media to create television programming exclusively for Disney. He is already contracted to write and direct a second Black Panther film and will now create a TV series for Disney+ based in the fictional world of Wakanda.

Director Ryan Coogler attends the ‘Black Panther’ BFI preview screening held at BFI Southbank on February 9, 2018 in London, England.

Jeff Spicer | Getty Images

Jordan Peele

For many years, Jordan Peele was identified with the comedy show “Key & Peele,” in which the filmmaker starred alongside fellow comedian Keegan-Michael Key. However, in 2017, Peele delivered an Oscar-winning feature film called “Get Out.”

The film was a horror movie about racism that became a breakout hit and critically acclaimed. It exceeded $100 million in sales domestically within its first three weeks in theaters, making Peele the first Black writer-director to hit that mark with his debut movie.

“Get Out” was nominated for four Oscars, including best picture, best director, best actor and best screenplay. Peele won the award for best screenplay.

Peele’s second film “Us” also received critical and commercial success. He is currently working on his third feature. In the meantime, he has been an active producer of television shows including “Hunters,” “Lovecraft Country” and “The Twilight Zone” as well as films such as “Candyman” and “BlacKkKlansman.”

Writer/Director Jordan Peele attends the ‘Us’ New York Premiere at Museum of Modern Art on March 19, 2019 in New York City.

Roy Rochlin/FilmMagic | Getty Images

Victoria Mahoney

In the last decade, Victoria Mahoney has predominantly worked in television. She has directed episodes of “Queen Sugar,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “American Crime,” “Lovecraft Country,” “Power” and “You.”

She was also handpicked by J.J. Abrams to direct the second unit of “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker,” which makes her the first woman to direct a Star Wars film in the franchise’s more than 40-year history.

Director Victoria Mahoney arrives at the taping of “Queen Sugar After-Show” at OWN Oprah Winfrey Network on November 7, 2017 in West Hollywood, California.

Amanda Edwards | WireImage | Getty Images

Categories
Health

Biden Covid group briefs press as winter storm delays vaccine deliveries

I took 'no pleasure' in contradicting Trump on Covid

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President Joe Biden’s Covid-19 Response Team plans to hold a press conference on Friday while a massive winter storm has closed vaccine dispensaries and delayed shipments to the United States

The Chief Medical Officer of the White House, Dr. Anthony Fauci, warned Thursday that the power outages and winter storm in Texas are a “significant” problem for Covid-19 vaccine distribution this week. The Biden government has announced a number of moves in recent weeks to increase vaccine intake, such as shipping cans directly to retail pharmacies and community health centers.

“We just have to make up for it as soon as the weather subsides a bit, the ice melts and we can get the trucks and the people out,” said Fauci during an interview with MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell.

FedEx and UPS package centers in the Midwest were also hit by the storm, delaying vaccine shipments across the country.

The delay comes because the country’s leading health authorities, including Fauci and the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, calling on Americans to contain the spread of the virus so that the US can give vaccines before highly contagious variants make the pandemic worse.

Read CNBC’s live updates for the latest news on the Covid-19 outbreak.

– CNBC’s Berkeley Lovelace Jr. contributed to this report.

Categories
Business

My Spouse Was Cautious of My Lab-Made Dinner Occasion. The Fake Whiskey Gained Her Over.

My Wife Was Wary of My Lab-Made Dinner Party. The Faux Whiskey Won Her Over.

Cassandra said her drink was perfect. In fact, the foam made from the beta-lactoglobulin lasted longer than shaken egg white. I also pointed out to Cassandra that our bourbon has fewer carbon emissions. She didn’t find that interesting.

I needed her to like her drink so she could have another. Cassandra, a former vegetarian, wasn’t looking forward to our evening. “Wrong meat has a lot of crap. I don’t like highly processed foods, ”she said. “I know a lot of unhealthy vegetarians.”

To change her mood, I gave her a few pieces of diamond jewelry from the lab. Diamond mining is a brutal industry for all I’ve ever learned from a Leonardo DiCaprio movie. Mr DiCaprio is indeed an investor in Diamond Foundry, a Silicon Valley company that slowly grows diamonds in a reactor that heats the plasma to 10,000 degrees, the warmth of the outer layers of the sun.

Its diamonds sell for a little less than mined. This meant I had to gently tell Cassandra that the $ 6,400 tennis bracelet, $ 3,300 worth of earrings, $ 5,400 ring, and $ 4,500 necklace looked great to her, but the closest ones Day how celebrities had to be returned on the red carpet. Her mood wasn’t fixed.

However, she said – completely unsolicited – that my skin was glowing. I had no idea if it was due to the cobwebs, human collagen, two cocktails, or my concern about the return of the diamonds.

My son Laszlo was harder to argue with. “I wanted to heat up some chicken nuggets,” he said. But when he saw the food and thought about the hassle of microwave nuggets, he decided to give it a try. “It doesn’t look gross.”

Categories
Politics

Trump to make first post-presidency speech as CPAC keynote

Trump to make first post-presidency speech as CPAC keynote

President Donald Trump speaks to supporters at Joint Base Andrews before he boarded Air Force One for the last time as President on Jan. 20, 2021 at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland.

Pete Marovich | Pool | Getty Images

Former President Donald Trump is expected to deliver a keynote address at the conclusion of the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida next weekend, sources familiar with the plans told NBC News.

Trump is due to speak about the future of the Republican Party and the Conservative movement, say sources familiar with the plan.

The full list has not yet been released and is subject to change.

The event would be Trump’s first extended public appearance on camera since he left office last month.

For the past few weeks, Trump has continued to rage against top Republicans who stand up against him, including Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell; Senator John Thune, the No. 2 Republican in the Senate; and longtime GOP politician Karl Rove, according to people familiar with the matter.

Trump spokesman Jason Miller responded to CNBC’s request for comment on the matter via email: “Fake news. We are focused on getting the House and Senate back in 2022.”

The former president said he plans to support several key competitors who support his “Make America Great Again” agenda.

Advisors have told Trump that, according to his own strategists, Republican voters don’t want to see an all-out war in the GOP. Instead, voters would rather see Trump focus his attacks on Biden and top Democrats, advisors say.

Rep Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., A Trump defense attorney in Congress, tweeted that grassroots Republicans would be rejected by the party if they don’t accept the former president’s agenda.

Although Trump escaped conviction on his second impeachment trial, he now faces several serious criminal and civil investigations that could be harder to beat. At least one investigation holds the potential for Trump to be jailed if convicted. On January 20, he lost his protection from prosecution while holding the office of president.

“There are a lot of balls in the air in the potential criminal arena and if I were Donald Trump I wouldn’t just rest,” said Joseph Tacopina, a senior New York City criminal lawyer.

Trump spoke at the CPAC several times during his presidency, often making some of his longest speeches, and using his remarks to bolster his conservative base.

Last year’s event organizers came under criticism for their precautions with Covid-19 screening after a New Jersey man attending CPAC tested positive for the coronavirus.

This year’s event will take place from Thursday, February 25th to Sunday, February 28th. Trump is expected to close the events over the weekend.

– CNBC’s Dan Mangan and Brian Schwartz contributed to this report

Categories
Business

NFL asking for 100% enhance on TV rights, Disney pushing again

NFL asking for 100% increase on TV rights, Disney pushing back

New York Giants wide receiver Sterling Shepard (87) caught a pass in the first half at MetLife Stadium in front of Pittsburgh Steelers strong security Terrell Edmunds (34) and linebacker Devin Bush (55).

Vincent Carchietta | USA TODAY Sports

The National Football League plans to charge its current network partners twice their pay for broadcasting games – but Disney is pushing back, citing the high price for Monday Night Football.

The NFL is in active discussions about renewal rates with all four existing network partners – NBC, CBS, Fox, and ESPN owned by Disney – according to those familiar with the matter. The NFL hopes the primary package renewal will be completed by March 17 before the start of the new NFL league year, CNBC reported earlier this month.

NBC, CBS and Fox are likely to accept raises closer to 100% than Disney, which is currently paying much more than the three broadcast networks for its Monday Night Football package, said people who asked not to be named because the negotiations are private.

Disney agreed to pay $ 1.9 billion annually for Monday Night Football in 2011 – a deal that runs through 2021. That dwarfed the average annual cost of $ 1.1 billion for Fox, $ 1 billion a year for CBS, and $ 960 million for NBC’s Sunday Night Football.

Disney has already declined to pay nearly $ 3.8 billion a year for its new deal, two respondents said. Disney CEO Bob Chapek hinted at pushing back the NFL’s price tag during his company’s earnings conference call last week.

“We’re looking at the long-term trends in sports viewers,” Chapek said on February 11th. “We’ve had a long relationship with the NFL. If there’s a deal that adds shareholder value, we sure will.” Have a chat and watch this. But our first filter will be to say if it makes sense for future shareholder value. “

NFL games have been the most watched program on television for many years. The top five shows of 2020 were all NFL games. However, there has been a worrying decline in younger viewers, reflected in a decade-long decline in Super Bowl ratings among 18- to 49-year-olds.

Disney’s trial

Disney’s Monday Night Football deal isn’t just for the games. Disney also gets highlight rights for ESPN, branding rights for shows and, importantly, streaming rights.

The league has asked Disney to pay the same type of raise as its other partners, as Disney is demanding more from the NFL this time around – including the Monday night double-headed games, which aired a game on ABC, the network of networks operated by Disney said the people. Disney also wants ABC to be part of the Super Bowl rotation with NBC, CBS, and Fox. ABC was the home of Monday Night Football until 2005.

Disney also wants flexibility in terms of streaming rights as the company is considering selling ESPN as a direct-to-consumer product. The NFL plans to include streaming rights as part of every network package, people said.

Additionally, the NFL plans to add an 18th week of regular season play as early as next season. This is an additional game for Disney – and every other broadcast partner.

Spokespeople for the NFL and the networks declined to comment.

– CNBC’s Jabari Young contributed to this story.

Disclosure: NBC is part of NBCUniversal, the parent company of CNBC.

WATCH: NFL urges new TV deal to be closed before March

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Health

Her White Blood Rely Was Dangerously Low. Was Med Faculty Nonetheless Secure?

Her White Blood Count Was Dangerously Low. Was Med School Still Safe?

In Niyongere’s office, she first spoke to an intern who disappeared after a full medical history and examination, and then returned with the young doctor the patient had spoken to by phone. A distant part of her brain observed that her doctor was younger than her.

The hematologist sat across from the patient and slowly explained what she knew. In someone who is otherwise healthy and whose other blood types are fine, this severe drop in neutrophils – what is medically called neutropenia – is usually caused by a drug. There were of course other options. Nutritional deficiencies could do this. Insufficient vitamin B12 or copper can affect the blood count. Some viral infections – HIV, mono, hepatitis – could also occur. And they would look for it. But her money was for drugs. The doctor knew that the only drug the patient was taking regularly was Adderall; She had a history of ADHD, and Niyongere had not found anything in the medical literature to associate this drug with neutropenia. Still, the haematologist insisted that this was the most likely cause of her isolated neutropenia.

They would be looking for infections. They would check their levels of vitamins and minerals. And if all of this were normal, the next step would be a bone marrow biopsy. The doctor expected it to be normal – with lots of blood cells of all kinds being made and released. Her first hematologist was right that a cancer or disease process that interfered with the production of these vital defenders was possible – but how healthy the patient looked and felt was very unlikely, according to Niyongere. In the meantime, she should stop the Adderall.

The following week was busy as the student prepared to resume the portion of her medical school education. In just a few days she would be in the hospital learning to care for sick patients, and she needed her immune system to be up to the task. She watched the test results come back. The vitamin levels were normal. She didn’t have any of the viruses. So that Friday the student went back to Niyongere’s office for a bone marrow biopsy. The doctor suggested doing this with sedation in the hospital operating room. No, the patient insisted. You would do it in the office. It was a difficult procedure, but the patient wanted to get it over with. She needed an answer and a few more neutrophils before she could be safe with the sick patients she would see in the hospital.

The results came back faster than expected. A wave of weakness forced her to sit down as she read the results: normal. There were no signs of leukemia or any other process that might affect your body’s ability to produce neutrophils. And she made a healthy amount of all white blood cells, including neutrophils. This meant that everything that happened to these warrior cells happened after they left the safety of the bone marrow and entered the bloodstream. That’s what you would expect if this were a response to a drug. Many drugs can cause neutropenia. Some drugs destroy these battle cells directly. Some trigger an immune response so that other parts of the body’s defense system mistake these cells for invading pathogens and attack them.

Sometimes, if it was a response to a drug, cell counts would go back up almost immediately. Neutrophils have a very short lifespan and a full set of new cells are released from the bone marrow every day. The student waited eagerly for her next blood count. Could just stopping Adderall bring them back to normal?

Categories
Business

What’s Clubhouse? – The New York Instances

What is Clubhouse? - The New York Times

The focus on audio rather than text, photos or videos is a differentiator and part of the appeal. Delia Cai from the Deez Links newsletter wrote about her experience on the app: “It felt spontaneous and engaging and luckily it didn’t include a camera.”

As the name suggests, Clubhouse is based on exclusivity: you need to be invited by an existing user. Early members of the club include venture capitalists from Silicon Valley (Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, both early investors in the app), web-savvy entrepreneurs (Mark Cuban, Tim Ferriss), some artists and cultural influencers (Tiffany Haddish, Drake, Virgil Abloh ) and people with random claims to fame (Vanilla Ice, Roger Stone).

The clubhouse has been criticized by some for its male-dominated, brutal energy (although there are plenty of women on the platform too). Its open exchange of information has also made it popular with users from countries with repressive governments. China blocked the clubhouse this month. Currently, the app, which is still in beta, has that rare (and likely fleeting) sense of a small world. It’s still a surprise when you meet someone you know or when Senator Tim Kaine shows up in a chat room, for example.

The clubhouse can at times reflect Silicon Valley’s relentless focus on personal optimization. Networking, strength training, early retirement, pitching investors and Bitcoin, Bitcoin, Bitcoin – the hectic culture is real and present. But there is also a huge theater scene with staged plays and a dating scene. And conversations are often free, meandering and completely blank. That unpolished quality is part of the charm.

Last week there was a talk show called “Housin ‘Around” hosted by comedian Alexis Gay. a pitch event for entrepreneurs with start-up ideas; a lecture entitled “Creating black creative spaces in fashion”; and karaoke in the clubhouse, including discussions. Daily and weekly shows have emerged from informality, such as “The Cotton Club”, an after-hours chill zone hosted by musician Bomani X, and “Good Time”, which summarizes the technical news of the day every evening at 10 p.m. Pacific time time. Hopping between rooms is easy and great fun.

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World News

Israel Secretly Agrees to Fund Vaccines for Syria as A part of Prisoner Swap

Israel Secretly Agrees to Fund Vaccines for Syria as Part of Prisoner Swap

JERUSALEM – When a young Israeli woman was released from custody in Syria this week after being arrested for illegally entering Syria, the official story was that she benefited from a simple prisoner swap. In return for her freedom, the Israeli government announced that she had been exchanged for two Syrian shepherds captured by the Israelis.

But if this deal between two hostile states that have never shared diplomatic relations sounded too quick and easy, it was. In fact, Israel had secretly agreed to a far more controversial ransom: the funding of an unknown number of coronavirus vaccines for Syria, according to an official familiar with the content of the negotiations.

Under the deal, Israel will pay Russia, which it brokered, to send Russia-made Sputnik-V vaccines to President Bashar al-Assad’s regime of Syria, the official said. Israel has administered at least one vaccine to nearly half of its 9.2 million population, while Syria – now entering its eleventh year of civil war – has not yet started introducing the vaccine.

The Israeli government declined to comment on the vaccination aspect of the deal, while a state-controlled Syrian news agency, the Syrian Arab News Agency, denied that vaccines were part of the deal. When asked about the vaccines in a television interview on Saturday night, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu escaped the question and said only that no Israeli vaccines would be sent to Syria.

“We brought the woman with us, I’m glad,” said Mr. Netanyahu. He thanked Russian President Vladimir V. Putin and said: “I will not add more.”

The agreement is a rare moment of unsettled cooperation between two states that have waged multiple wars and still contest the sovereignty of a stretch of land, the Golan Heights, which Israel conquered from Syria in 1967.

It also highlights how vaccines are increasingly a feature of international diplomacy. And it reflects enormous and growing inequality between rich states like Israel, which have made significant strides with coronavirus vaccines and may soon return to some sort of normalcy – and poor ones like Syria, which haven’t.

Among the Palestinians, news reports about the Israel-Syria agreement have increased frustration at the low number of vaccines Israel is providing to Palestinians in the Occupied Territories. Israel has only delivered a few thousand vaccines to the roughly 2.8 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, and last week the Israeli government briefly delayed the delivery of a first batch of vaccines to Gaza, where nearly two million people live.

Israel claims that the Oslo Accords release it from its responsibility to provide Palestinian health care. But human rights activists and Palestinians cite the fourth Geneva Convention, which obliges an occupying power to coordinate with local authorities to maintain public health in an occupied area.

Israeli officials have said they must vaccinate their own people before turning to the Palestinians. But the Syria deal sends a different message, said Khaled Elgindy, a researcher and former advisor to the Palestinian leadership.

Updated

Apr. 20, 2021, 9:30 a.m. ET

“Israel stands ready to provide vaccines to Syrians outside of their borders, but at the same time is not making them available to an enormous occupied population for which they are legally responsible,” Elgindy said. “That seems to be a message that they are deliberately trying to evade their legal responsibility for the well-being of this occupied population.”

Among the Israelis, the prisoner swap has raised concerns about how a civilian was able to cross the heavily police and strained border with Syria, undiscovered by the Israeli authorities.

The 23-year-old woman traveled to Syria near Mount Hermon on February 2 without being detected by Israeli or Syrian forces. Your name cannot currently be published by court order.

Israel learned she was missing until her friends told the police that she was missing. She only entered Syrian custody after a Syrian civilian who approached her realized she was Israeli and called the police.

Israel then asked Russia – a Syrian ally with a strong military presence in the country – to help mediate its release. Russia and Israel have coordinated in similar episodes in the past. In 2016, Russia helped broker the return of an Israeli tank that was seized by Syrian forces in Lebanon in 1982. In 2019, Moscow facilitated the return of the body of an Israeli soldier, Zachary Baumel, who was killed in the same clash.

The woman grew up in an ultra-Orthodox family in a settlement in the West Bank and is said to have tried in the past to illegally enter Israel’s Arab neighbors – once in Jordan and once in Gaza. On both occasions she was arrested, brought back, questioned and warned by Israeli forces.

Israeli negotiators tried to act quickly to avoid a recurrence of the crisis that followed the disappearance of Avera Mengistu in the Gaza Strip, a man with a history of mental illness who marched into the strip in 2014 and has since been detained by militant Hamas becomes a group that frequently increases the price of his release.

Mr. Netanyahu spoke directly to Mr. Putin twice, while Israeli National Security Advisor Meir Ben-Shabbat communicated with his Russian counterpart Nikolai Patrushev.

The Syrians initially requested the release of two Syrian residents of the Golan Heights imprisoned in Israel, but that agreement collapsed after it became clear that the two did not want to return to Syria.

Israel then offered to release the two shepherds, and at some point in negotiations the possibility of vaccines was raised.

The Israeli cabinet approved the terms of the deal on Tuesday, the day the 23-year-old was flown to Moscow. After further negotiations between Israeli and Russian officials, she was returned to Israel on Thursday.

In Moscow, officials had not offered confirmation of such an agreement by late Saturday, and the Russian news media only covered Israeli publications.

But the Russian government has been using its vaccine skillfully for months in diplomacy from Latin America to the Middle East. On Thursday, Putin’s special envoy for Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev, suggested in an interview with the Tass news agency that Russia would deliver its Sputnik-V vaccine to Syria.

Patrick Kingsley reported from Jerusalem, Ronen Bergman from Tel Aviv and Andrew E. Kramer from Moscow. Hwaida Saad reported from Beirut and Carol Sutherland from Moshav Ben Ami, Israel.

Categories
Entertainment

Peter G. Davis, Music Critic of Vast Data and Wit, Dies at 84

Peter G. Davis, Music Critic of Wide Knowledge and Wit, Dies at 84

Peter G. Davis, who was considered one of the leading critics of American classical music for over 30 years with crisp, witty prose and an encyclopedic memory of countless performances and performers, died on February 13th. He was 84 years old.

His death was confirmed by his husband, Scott Parris.

First as a critic for the New York Times and later for New York Magazine, Mr. Davis wrote precise, astute reviews of all forms of classical music, though his great love was opera and the voice, a bond he developed in his early teenage years .

He presided over the field during New York’s blessing years of the 1960s and 1970s, when gigs were plentiful, tickets were relatively cheap, and when the ups and downs of a performer’s career were the fodder for cocktail parties and post-concert dinners to mention the notebooks of writers like Mr. Davis, which often got five or more reviews a week.

He wrote these reviews with a knowing, dead, sometimes world-weary tone. During a concert by Russian violinist Vladimir Spivakov in 1976, an activist protesting the treatment of Jews in the Soviet Union threw a paint bomb on the stage and splashed Mr. Spivakov and his companion. Mr Davis wrote, “Terrorists need to be extremely insensitive to music because throwing color to a violinist playing Bach’s ‘Chaconne’ is simply bad timing.”

He held onto the traditions of classical music not to keep the past alive but to keep its inner strength, and looked askance at those who tried to update it just to be trendy.

In a nineteenth-century review by French composer Daniel Francois Auber of the Bronx Opera’s 1977 production of Fra Diavolo, he condemned what he saw as “a refusal to believe in the piece by doing it treated as an embarrassment, a work that needs a maximum of directing gimmicks if the audience is to stay interested. “

He might equally disapprove of new music and composers whom he thought were overly hyped. Minimalist composers Philip Glass and Beverly Sills (early “a reliable, hardworking, but not particularly notable soprano” who only became a star after her talents peaked) were regular targets.

Looking back at a performance of Mr. Glass’s work at Carnegie Hall in 2002, he wrote, “It was pretty much the same as usual: the same silly syncopation and jigging ostinatas, the same crazy little tunes on their way to nowhere. the same awkward orchestral climaxes. “

That’s not to say that Mr. Davis was a reactionary – he advocated for young composers and emerging regional opera companies. His great strength as a critic was his pragmatism, his commitment to assessing the performance before him on his own terms and at the same time keeping a skeptical eye on gimmicks.

“He was a vocalist with unquestionable authority,” said Justin Davidson, a former Newsday classical music critic who now writes on classical music and architecture for New York magazine. “He felt that the things that were important to him were important, that they weren’t a niche, not just entertainment, but that they were at the heart of American culture.”

Peter Graffam Davis was born on May 3, 1936 in Concord, Massachusetts, outside of Boston, and grew up in nearby Lincoln. His father, E. Russell Davis, was a vice president at the Bank of Boston. His mother Susan (Graffam) Davis was a housewife.

Mr. Parris, whom he married in 2009, is his only immediate survivor.

Mr. Davis fell in love with the opera as a teenager, built a record collection at home, and attended performances in Boston. In the months leading up to his junior year at Harvard, he toured European summer music festivals – Strauss in Munich, Mozart in Salzburg, Wagner in Bayreuth.

He encountered European opera at a hinge point. It was still shaped by longstanding traditions and had yet to emerge fully from the destruction of World War II, but a new generation of performers emerged from the rubble: the French soprano Régine Crespin, the Austrian soprano Leonie Rysanek, the Italian tenor Franco Corelli and Giuseppe di Stefano. Mr. Davis needed to see her up close.

He graduated from Harvard in 1958 with a bachelor’s degree in music. After spending a year at a Stuttgart Conservatory, he moved to New York to do a Masters in Composition from Columbia University.

Mr. Davis wrote a number of his own musical works in the early 1960s, including the opera “Zoe” and two operettas in the style of Gilbert and Sullivan. But he decided that his future was not to write music, but to write about it. He has become a classical music editor for both High Fidelity and Musical America magazines and a New York music correspondent for The Times of London.

He began writing freelance articles for the New York Times in 1967 and was hired as Sunday’s music editor in 1974, a job that enabled him to add articles to his almost daily edition of reviews – whether it be recordings, concerts, or countless debut evenings which he commissioned from other authors. “He had a great memory,” said Alex Ross, the classical music critic for The New Yorker. “Everything you threw at him he could discuss precisely and intelligently.”

Mr. Davis moved to New York Magazine in 1981. There he could select his reviews and occasionally step back to survey the classical music landscape.

Increasingly, he didn’t like what he saw.

As early as 1980, Mr. Davis lamented the future of opera singing, blaming talent and hard work as well as a star system that pushed promising but immature singers to their physical limits for “good looks and easy adaptability.”

The diminished position of classical music in American culture he documented spared no critics, and in 2007 New York magazine let him go. He returned to freelance work for The Times, writing regularly for Opera News and Musical America.

Despite all of his thousands of reviews, Mr. Davis seemed most proud of his 1997 book, The American Opera Singer, an exhaustive, exciting, and often withered story in which he praised the versatility of contemporary American artists while recording many of them Task of being superficial workhorses.

“I can’t think of a music critic who cares more about the state of opera in America,” wrote critic Terry Teachout in his review of the book for The Times. “If you want to know what’s wrong with American singing, you’ll find the answers here.”