USA - On Wednesday, Joe Biden warned that Americans may be forced to cancel their plans for celebrating the 4th of July this year if too many Americans choose to not get a coronavirus vaccine, as reported by the New York Post. Although over 51 percent of Americans have already received some form of the vaccine, Biden was still hesitant to declare that the country was free to celebrate its Independence Day. He referred back to a speech he gave in March, which was widely criticized, in which he outlined “conditions” that had to be met in order to allow for “small” 4th of July gatherings.

INDIA - India reported a global record of more than 314,000 new infections Thursday as a grim coronavirus surge hits the world's second-most populous country, sending more and more sick people into a fragile health care system critically short of hospital beds and oxygen. The 314,835 infections added in the past 24 hours raise India's total past 15.9 million cases since the pandemic began. It's the second-highest total in the world next to the United States. India has nearly 1.4 billion people. A large number of hospitals are reporting acute shortages of beds and medicine and are running on dangerously low levels of oxygen. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government ordered an extensive lockdown last year, in the early stages of the pandemic, but has been wary of the economic costs of more tough restrictions. In recent weeks, the government has come in for criticism for holding packed political rallies for local elections and allowing a Hindu festival at which millions gathered.

USA - Even if the calendar says "spring," a wintry storm will be bringing a late round of snow, record low temperatures and severe storms to the Northeast on Wednesday, in a sign that Old Man Winter isn't loosening his freezing grip on millions of people just yet. Freeze warnings are currently in effect for over 70 million people from the Plains through the Northeast for Wednesday night into Thursday morning. "Ironically, today is considered the start date for the growing season across this area," said the National Weather Service (NWS) office in New York. These warnings mean freezing temperatures are likely and could kill crops and sensitive plants while also possibly damaging outdoor plumbing, according to the National Weather Service. Temperatures will be 10 to 20 degrees below average across much of the eastern two-thirds of the nation. In some areas, highs could be 30 degrees cooler than the typical high temperature for this time of the year.

USA - The Biden administration and the Israeli government are increasingly at odds over the ongoing US-Iran talks in Vienna, with Israel believing its concerns regarding a US return to the 2015 nuclear deal are not being taken into consideration. According to a report in Axios Wednesday, Israeli officials involved in the ongoing dialogue with the US on Iran said that things came to a head at a meeting between senior US and Israeli officials, two days after what is widely believed to be an Israeli attack on Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility earlier this month.

MIDDLE EAST - In less than nine months, an assassin on a motorbike fatally shot an Al Qaeda commander given refuge in Tehran, Iran’s chief nuclear scientist was machine-gunned on a country road, and two separate, mysterious explosions rocked a key Iranian nuclear facility in the desert, striking the heart of the country’s efforts to enrich uranium. The steady drumbeat of attacks, which intelligence officials said were carried out by Israel, highlighted the seeming ease with which Israeli intelligence was able to reach deep inside Iran’s borders and repeatedly strike its most heavily guarded targets, often with the help of turncoat Iranians. The attacks, the latest wave in more than two decades of sabotage and assassinations, have exposed embarrassing security lapses and left Iran’s leaders looking over their shoulders as they pursue negotiations with the Biden administration aimed at restoring the 2015 nuclear agreement.

ISRAEL - After Israir Airlines and Tourism was purchased in January by a group that includes BGI Investments, controlled by Shalom Haim and supermarket magnate Rami Levy, it was clear that its days operating flights on the Jewish Sabbath were numbered. Israir is now removing all the flights scheduled to depart on the next few Friday nights and Saturdays from its reservations website, both those to Eilat and to overseas destinations. Israir flights to Eilat will begin again only after Shabbat ends on Saturday night. Before this change, 10 percent of the airlines’ flights were on Shabbat.

AFRICA - A recently completed pier at the Chinese naval base near the entrance to the Red Sea is large enough to support an aircraft carrier, the top US commander for Africa told lawmakers on Tuesday. Referring to the Chines naval base in Djibouti, US Africa Commander Army General Stephen Townsend told the House Armed Services Committee that the People’s Liberation Army was expanding its existing naval installation adjacent to a Chinese-owned commercial deep-water port and also seeking other military basing options elsewhere on the continent. “Their first overseas military base, their only one, is in Africa, and they have just expanded that by adding a significant pier that can even support their aircraft carriers in the future. Around the continent they are looking for other basing opportunities,” Townsend told the HASC.

USA - The non-profit organization that I founded in 2018, Citizens for Free Speech, is weary of the constant propaganda that all speech is protected by the First Amendment, no matter how vile, ignorant or deceptive it might be. The founding fathers intended the First Amendment to protect our unalienable rights to freely communicate ideas and to promote civil debate. Ideas are communicated by the spoken and printed word, plus our associated actions. All five elements of the First Amendment bear this out.

UK - Underwater volcanoes produce so much energy they would be able to power an entire continent, a study has found. Submarine volcanoes litter the world's seabeds, but the eruptions were thought to be less exciting than the terrestrial explosions with slow-moving lava and no ash clouds. However, new research found underwater eruptions do produce ash clouds which in turn drives megaplumes of hot water that spread upwards and then outwards. These megaplumes have been detected previously with researchers identifying how far and fast they moved, propelling around forty million Olympic-sized swimming pools of water. This revealed that to create these underwater ash deposits and to power the megaplumes, the volcanic eruptions must release enormous energy equivalent to the power use of the entire US, the researchers say.

USA - The men of the world are demanding reparations from the women of the world after realizing all their problems stem from Eve taking a bite of the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil over 5,999 years ago. "Eve, the ancestor of all women, ruined everything for us," said Carl McGuinness of Provo, Utah, at a press conference Friday. "We demand payment for the sin and death that rained down upon the human race after the first woman went ahead and took a bite of the forbidden fruit." "This is merely leveling the playing field from all the inequity that women have caused through their ancestor less than 6,001 years ago." After calculating the damages stemming from Eve's bite out of the fruit, men have determined they are owed some $593,000,000,000,000,000. As they realize this will take some time to pay back, they have stated they are graciously willing to take payment in the form of sandwiches for the time being. At publishing time, men had withdrawn their request since women pointed out that if Adam had been there to lead his wife as the head of the household, Satan probably wouldn't have been able to trick her.

CANADA - A Canadian pastor was thrown in jail and his church closed when he refused to limit capacity on his congregation. Why is the state clamping down so heavily on people who just want to practice their religion? Pastor Coates, of GraceLife church in Alberta, Canada, was arrested on February 16 and sent to prison. He spent almost five weeks behind bars. For two weeks, he was in a cell on his own which he was only allowed to leave twice for 15 minutes. His crime was failing to place capacity restrictions upon the congregants in his church.

CHINA - Chinese President Xi Jinping on Tuesday called for a rejection of hegemonic power structures in global governance, amid growing tensions between Washington and Beijing over a widening range of issues including alleged human rights abuses. Speaking at the annual Boao Forum for Asia, Xi criticised efforts by some countries to "build barriers" and "decouple", which he said would harm others and benefit no one.

TAIWAN - The US military has deteriorated to the point that the only way it could win a simulated war game in which it was called on to defend Taiwan from a ‘Chinese invasion’ force was by inventing capabilities it does not yet possess. In 2018 and 2019, the US Air Force conducted detailed simulated war games that had its forces square off against those of China. On both occasions, the US was decisively defeated, the first time challenging the Chinese in the South China Sea, and the second time defending Taiwan – which China sees as an integral part of its territory – against a Chinese invasion. In 2020, the US repeated the Taiwan scenario, and won – but only barely. The difference? In both 2018 and 2019, it played with the resources it had on hand. Last year, it gave itself a host of new technologies and capabilities that are either not in production or aren’t even planned for development. In short, the exercise was as far removed from reality as it could get. The fact is the US can only successfully defend Taiwan from a full-scale Chinese invasion in its dreams.

USA - The US Department of State announced on Monday it will issue a 'Level 4: Do Not Travel' advisory, its highest warning, for about 80 percent of countries. In an official statement, the agency said the risk of COVID-19 while traveling remains too high and urged Americans to 'reconsider all travel abroad.' 'This does not imply a reassessment of the current health situation in a given country, but rather reflects an adjustment in the State Department's Travel Advisory system to rely more on CDC's existing epidemiological assessments,' the statement read. Level 4 is generally reserved for war-torn countries or nations that would be hostile to Americans such as Afghanistan and North Korea. Most countries are currently listed on the State Department website with a 'Level 3 - Reconsider Travel' warning, the second-highest alert.

USA - Consensual incest advocates are rooting for an anonymous New York parent who wants to marry their own adult child. Australian Richard Morris, who is pushing to change incest laws in about 60 countries, said he supports the legal push in Manhattan Federal Court and that such behavior between consenting adults “should not be criminalized.” Fighting for true “marriage equality” is “the right thing to do, isn’t it?” Morris said. “It seems to be as unjust as the law that used to imprison gay people, and the law that used to stop people of different races marrying,” he added. “It is absurd to say that an adult can’t consent to marry their parent. That same adult can be sent to war, take on six or seven figures of debt, operate heavy machinery, be sentenced to death by a federal court, and consent to sex with five strangers (and marriage with one of them) but can’t consent to marry someone they love?” he told The Post.