USA - Former White House doctor Ronny Jackson, who is currently a Republican congressman from Texas, said Sunday it is possible that President Joe Biden suffers from a disease that is progressively worsening his cognitive abilities. “I saw him periodically throughout the years I was there, making the comment that I wasn’t his physician at the time,” Jackson said. “I oversaw the guy that did take care of him, but I wasn’t his physician at the time. But I have seen the same thing everybody else saw. I saw a Joe Biden that was always prone to gaffes.” Jackson said there is a stark difference now.

EUROPE - With Europe in the throes of what could be one of its worst heat waves, fatalities mounted in Spain and Portugal and a 116-degree reading in Portugal broke a national record. The heat wave that has seared much of the Iberian Peninsula since last week has killed at least 1,000 people in Portugal and Spain, according to BNO News. The majority of these deaths have occurred in Portugal where 659 deaths were recorded last week, according to the Directorate-General for Health. At least 368 deaths occurred in neighboring Spain in the same time period. On July 10, the first day of the heat wave, 15 heat-related deaths were recorded in Spain. Since then, the number of daily deaths has increased every day across both Spain and Portugal as temperatures surpassed 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius) daily.

UK - Britain's cost of living crisis is biting hard as cash-strapped families face a £454 jump in annual grocery bills amid rampaging food and drink price inflation. Milk, butter and dog food experienced massive price increases of around 20% in the 12 weeks to July 10 compared to the same period last year, while grocery price inflation jumped to nearly 10% - the second highest level on record - over the four weeks to July 10 compared to last year.

AFRICA - A catastrophic decline of vulture populations in Africa and Asia is causing alarm among researchers, who fear that a “cascade” effect could lead to the spread of deadly old and new diseases, including plague, anthrax, and rabies. For thousands of years, the birds have been synonymous with death and gluttony. “Where the corpse is, vultures will gather,” Jesus is quoted as saying in Matthew 24. But in reality, the birds serve us in ways that we are only just beginning to understand – helping to keep ecosystems and pathogens in check. If the lion is the king of the savannah, the vulture is the hardworking, unsung grounds keeper. A flock of vultures can wipe a dead antelope clean in about 20 minutes, stopping the carcass from turning into a toxic soup leaking into water sources. Maggots and bacteria are the only things more effective at disposing of dead meat. But now, many vultures and other raptor species are diving beak first into the abyss. In the 1990s, vulture populations on the Indian subcontinent plummeted by about 99 per cent. Seven out of eleven of the species found in Africa are now on the verge of extinction. “If you get rid of a hugely important component of an ecosystem – like a vulture which hoovers up dead meat – diseases can proliferate because they're not being kept in check,” Mr Kapila said.

USA - A California man is suing the candy maker Mars, alleging Skittles contains a “known toxin,” making the popular candy “unfit for human consumption.” On Thursday, San Leandro resident Jenile Thames filed a lawsuit seeking class-action status in the US District Court for the Northern District of California. Attorneys for Thames said Skittles were unsafe for consumers because they contain “heightened levels” of titanium dioxide. Mars Inc uses titanium dioxide to produce Skittles’ rainbow of artificial colors. In 2016, the Mars publicly stated its intention to remove the additive from its products. However, the Thursday complaint noted it is still used in products like Skittles today. In a statement sent by Mars to several other news outlets, the company said: “While we do not comment on pending litigation, our use of titanium dioxide complies with FDA regulations.” Although the additive is legal in the US it has been banned in other countries.

MIDDLE EAST - Purnima Anand, the chair of the Forum, said that at the 14th BRICS summit they discussed the possibility of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkey joining BRICS very soon. According to the president of the BRICS International Forum, Purnima Anand, Turkey, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia might “very soon” join the club of major emerging economies, which also includes Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. “All these countries have shown an interest in joining and are preparing to apply for membership. I think this is a good step, because expansion is always perceived positively; this will clearly increase the influence of BRICS in the world… I hope that the accession of countries to BRICS will happen very quickly, because now all representatives of the core of the association are interested in enlargement. So it will be very soon,” Purnima Anand stated.

USA - Tesla has asked owners in Texas not to charge their cars during a heat wave to help avoid blackouts and overloading the state’s failing power grid. The state is expected to register temperatures of more than 100 degrees in the coming days. The heat also stops wind power from being generated in Texas, which usually provides the state with a quarter of its electricity. The alert comes as the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) called on residents to conserve energy. They have asked the state’s residents to refrain from using electricity from appliances and more to stop the grid from being pushed to near-emergency conditions. “The reality is: we’re going to have to get used to more blackouts as long as we continue down this green energy path,” Lesser said. “The technology simply isn’t there. You’re going to either have more blackouts or more requirements to conserve energy.” Pushing too quickly for green energy will lead to a lack of power and a direct impact on most Americans.

USA - Democrats and climate activists were left outraged on Thursday when Senator Joe Manchin (Democrat for West Virginia) refused to go forward with his party’s economic package, citing its climate and energy programs as well as its raising of taxes on wealthy Americans. Manchin’s decision to pull the plug comes after weeks of negotiations with Democrats to craft a bill that he would support and seven months after he killed President Joe Biden’s “Build Back Better” plan. “Political headlines are of no value to the millions of Americans struggling to afford groceries and gas as inflation soars to 9.1 percent,” said Sam Runyon, a spokeswoman for Manchin. “Senator Manchin believes it’s time for leaders to put political agendas aside, re-evaluate and adjust to the economic realities the country faces to avoid taking steps that add fuel to the inflation fire.” According to the New York Times, Manchin’s rejection of the plan shatters President Biden’s “ambitious climate agenda,” which aimed to be “the largest single federal investment in American history toward addressing the toll of climate change.”

EUROPE - Wildfires are scorching parts of France and Portugal and temperatures in the UK could top 104 degrees for the first time on record as extreme heat takes over much of Europe. Britain's national weather agency, known as the UK Met Office, issued its first-ever red extreme heat warning Friday. The warnings, in place for Monday and Tuesday, cover much of southern England, where temperatures could reach 40 degrees Celsius - or about 104 degrees. "Nobody alive has seen a temperature of 40 degrees Celsius in the UK" weather.com senior meteorologist Jonathan Erdman pointed out. "That would be a hot day this time of year in Dallas or Houston, much less London." In fact, a temperature that high has never even been forecast in Britain, according to the Met Office. The current record high temperature for the UK is 38.7 degrees Celsius - about 102 degrees Fahrenheit - set on July 25, 2019, at Cambridge Botanical Garden, about 50 miles north of London.

USA - We blew our chance to quickly contain monkeypox. Now the dangerous virus is spreading fast all over the world. Health experts agree: the outbreak could soon qualify as a pandemic, if it doesn’t already. And the situation is likely to get worse before it gets better. More infections, more deaths, more chances for the pox to mutate. “We are in uncharted territory with this outbreak… and still early in the event,” James Lawler, an infectious disease expert and a colleague of Wiley at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, told The Daily Beast. The latest figures from the US Centers for Disease Control are startling. The CDC tallied 9,647 infections as of July 11. That’s a fourfold increase compared to just a month ago. The virus, which causes a rash and fever and can be fatal in a very small percentage of cases, is in 63 countries — 57 of which don’t usually have any monkeypox cases. As of July 4, the most recent date for which figures are available, the World Health Organization had recorded just three deaths in the current outbreak.

USA - Do you think the GOP will win a landslide victory in the November midterms? Do you think it will be a cakewalk? Boy are you naïve. Democrats and their PR wing (the mainstream media) will soon be inundating you with scary news to make you hysterical, hide in your home for months, mask up, and get your 25th vaccine. Covid. It’s back - just as I’ve predicted for many months. Just read the tea leaves. The WHO just recommended indoor masks for everyone. New York has mandated indoor masks again. Los Angeles is mandating indoor masks starting in two weeks. Both cities claim to be inundated with Covid cases. More tea leaves to read. China just shut down all their Macao casinos. In the UK, the media is warning of new lockdowns coming. Biden’s HHS Secretary is warning of a bad Covid outbreak this Fall.

FRANCE - French President Emmanuel Macron was humiliated in parliament after his vaccine passport plan was defeated. The hard-left La France Insoumise (LFI), the right-wing Republicains (LR), and the right-wing populist National Rally (RN) all voted against the Emmanuel Macron government’s vaccine passport measure, which resulted in their defeat. The vote was defeated by Macron’s government 219 votes to 195. “The bill’s defeat was met with wild cheering and a standing ovation from opposition lawmakers, in footage that was widely circulated on social media,” reports the Telegraph. The bill, one of the first introduced by the new minority government, shows how difficult it will be for Macron to pass new laws in the country.

USA - Zelensky, 2022, Stalin 1942: the US propaganda machine can easily make heroes, but it can quickly change the script. The US campaign to build public support for Ukraine harks back to a propaganda push lionizing Stalin’s Soviet regime during WWII. Eight decades ago, Churchill and US President Franklin Roosevelt faced a similar challenge in trying to beautify the Western public image of Stalin, a hated enemy before Nazi leader Adolf Hitler broke a non-aggression pact by attacking the Soviet Union.

SAUDI ARABIA - Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman allegedly called out Washington’s long track of “mistakes” made in Iraq and Afghanistan as President Joe Biden confronted him over the gruesome murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. That's according to Reuters, quoting a statement made by a senior Saudi official to Reuters on Saturday. While Saudi Arabia admitted its “mistakes” made in the Khashoggi affair, it has “taken all measures to prevent similar mistakes in the future,” the crown prince, commonly referred-to by the acronym MBS, was quoted as having told Biden.

MIDDLE EAST - Protests greeted US President Joe Biden as his motorcade arrived in the occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem on Friday. Signs reading “This is Apartheid,” “Justice for Shireen Abu Akleh,” and “our exiled sons must return to their motherland” greeted US President Joe Biden as his motorcade passed along the main road of Bethlehem in the southern occupied West Bank on Friday. Biden arrived in the city to meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as the last stop in his four day trip to Israel, during which he renewed firm US support for Israel, and expressed his own pride in being a Zionist. Despite heavy restrictions on movement, and a wider ban on protests and photography on the main roads of the city enforced by the Palestinian Authority (PA), Palestinians took to the streets in Bethlehem to express their discontentment with Biden’s visit.