George Floyd struggled with opioid addiction: girlfriend

George Floyd’s girlfriend said Thursday that both struggled with opioid addiction for years — and said Floyd relapsed shortly before his police custody death on May 25.

Courteney Batya Ross, 45, also testified at the murder trial of ex-Minneapolis cop Derek Chauvin in Floyd’s death that he was a changed man after his mother’s death in 2018.


More extensive coverage at the Minnesota Star Tribune

Derek Chauvin’s supervisor testifies he wasn’t told immediately of knee on George Floyd’s neck or for how long

Derek Chauvin’s supervisory sergeant told jurors Thursday afternoon about the immediate aftermath of George Floyd’s death as news of the incident spread through department administration.

Third Precinct Sgt. David Pleoger fielded concerns through 911 dispatch on May 25 about possible excessive use of force by officers while detaining Floyd, and his initial assessment was that it sounded more like a less serious “takedown,” according to dispatch audio from that night. He then headed to the scene while questioning Chauvin on what happened.

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Rupa Subramanya: Tories better get their act together, because they are on track to lose the next election

A March 17 poll by the Angus Reid Institute should put a smile on the faces of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberals.

Although 49 per cent of those surveyed say it’s time for a change in government, the Liberals still hold a significant four-point lead over the Conservatives (35 per cent to 31 per cent) when it comes to voter intentions.


From Abacus Data released today…

CURRENT VOTING INTENTION

If an election were held now, the Liberals would win 38% of the vote (up 5 from our last wave), the Conservatives 30%, the NDP 17% (down 2), the Green Party 6% (down 2) and the BQ at 30% in Quebec (up 3). This is the largest lead for the Liberals in our tracking since mid-November 2020.

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Mostly Peaceful Mayhem

Turning a blind eye to violence in Miami Beach, the New York Times previews its post-Floyd-trial coverage.

As the trial of officer Derek Chauvin for the death of George Floyd begins, downtown Minneapolis has already boarded itself up, though the verdict is months away. Unlike the fencing that arose around Washington following the January 6 Capitol riot, the Minneapolis precautions are fully justified. Indeed, the bollards and barricades will grow denser as the verdict nears but will still prove inadequate if Chauvin is not convicted of murder. A firestorm would engulf the city and the nation that will dwarf the riotous destruction of 2020. No trial of a police officer to date has been preceded by the anti-police sentiment and admonitory violence seen over the last year. It is improbable, therefore, that the Chauvin jury will vote to acquit, whatever evidence the defense presents.

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Amazon v the union: The vote the online giant fears

Amazon workers in Bessemer, Alabama, have voted in a historic poll to decide whether they want to be represented by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union.

The results are not expected until next week – but if they say yes, it will become Amazon’s first US union.

Amazon argues its wages and benefits are industry-beating and has gone into battle to persuade workers to vote no.

Most agree the outcome could have major implications for US labour laws.

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Iran Still Hiding Key Parts of its Nuclear Programme, US Trying Bribery Again

With the Biden administration seemingly keen to recommence negotiations with Tehran over its nuclear programme, fresh evidence is emerging that Iran’s regime is up to its old tricks by attempting to conceal key elements of the programme from UN inspectors.

Iran has a long and undistinguished history of seeking to conceal the existence of key elements of its nuclear programme dating back to 2002, when a group of Iranian dissidents first revealed the existence of the Natanz nuclear enrichment site.

I suspect that the eventual disengagement from the Middle East as intended by the Obama administration is back in play.

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Gun-Rights Advocates Want Feds to Look at Prosecuting Hunter Biden

Reports of Hunter Biden’s reckless handling of his firearm have led gun-rights activists to question why federal authorities aren’t considering prosecution of the president’s son.

Alan Gottlieb, founder of the Second Amendment Foundation, says there is significant evidence showing Hunter Biden was using drugs in October 2018 when he purchased his hand gun, which was ultimately recovered by Delaware state police after being tossed in a dumpster by his then-girlfriend. Forms that have emerged since the initial report last week show Biden denied on his federal background check that he was a drug user, indicating to Gottlieb that Biden made a false statement to the government.

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AOC slams ‘barbaric and inhumane’ border conditions and demands REPARATIONS for separated families

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tore into President Joe Biden’s administration’s handling of the southern border crisis, calling conditions ‘barbaric’ and ‘inhumane’ during a town hall Wednesday evening.

‘As we’ve seen there are arrivals and undocumented children – rather unaccompanied children that have come at the border and this had lead to completely inhuman and unacceptable, horrifying conditions of children in CBP [Customs and Border Protection] custody. And it’s unacceptable and it’s horrifying,’ the New York representative told constituents during the virtual event.

She also claimed that families who were separated during Trump’s presidency are ‘owed reparations Period.’

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Beijing Accelerating Plans to Replace US Dollar as World Reserve Currency: Chinese Professor

The Chinese regime is accelerating its efforts to challenge the U.S. dollar’s dominance in global markets and trade by taking advantage of the economic shifts caused by the pandemic, a Chinese professor recently revealed.

In the post-pandemic world, China should be the “one who decides the benchmark of value,” Di Dongsheng, associate dean of the School of International Studies at Renmin University in Beijing said in a video posted on Chinese social media on Feb. 4. “The currency that fixes the price will eventually be the renminbi.”

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Rising Canadian athlete switches citizenship, hoping to compete for Communist China in Tokyo Olympics

Commie Lover

Nina Schultz was just 19 years old when the world realized it had a serious new contender in the heptathlon.

The New Westminster, B.C. native captured a silver medal for Canada at the last Commonwealth Games, finishing behind only the U.K.’s Katarina Johnson-Thompson, now the international number one.

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Obama canceled? Latinos object to naming Illinois city school after ex-POTUS, saying he was ‘deporter in chief’

Waukegan, Illinois was set to change the name of a middle school from American founder Thomas Jefferson to Barack Obama, when ‘Latinx’ activists launched a protest campaign, saying the 44th president was their “oppressor.”

Jefferson was the author of the Declaration of Independence and the third US president, but he also owned slaves – so Waukegan decided to take his name off a middle school last year, amid the George Floyd protests across the US.

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White professor sues NJ college, claims his black colleagues are paid more

A white chemistry professor in Camden, NJ, is suing his college, claiming he suffers “embarrassment and humiliation” because his less-qualified black colleagues are paid more than he is.

William T. Lavell says in his lawsuit that he has taught at Camden County College for more than 25 years, and currently earns $91,923. He holds three professional degrees in his area of certification, the lawsuit says.

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Carson Jerema: Why Canada is rigged against Alberta — and any province that isn’t Ontario or Quebec

Carson Jerema: Why Canada is rigged against Alberta — and any province that isn’t Ontario or Quebec

The Supreme Court’s ruling upholding the federal carbon tax doesn’t rewrite the Constitution, as dissenting judges argued, so much as it reaffirms how Canada has always worked: Ottawa will interfere with natural resources as it pleases, even if it is damaging to the West. That Ontario was one of the losing plaintiffs matters little. Institutions that make up this country are faulty to their core, biased in their makeup towards the Central provinces. It’s a wonder that Canada works at all.

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