- The national debt ceiling drama gains sanity.
- McCarthy and Biden pulled it off.
- Ironically, more Democrats (165) than Republicans (149) supported McCarthy's bill in the House. Passage was 314-117.
- The Senate will act tonight.
- Biden will sign on Friday. I thought the deadline was June 8, today?
- The Women's NCAA Softball World Series begins with four games.
- I've been watching game #2, Oklahoma vs Stanford.
- Oklahoma, for the whole year has a team batting average of .372, and is on a 48-game winning streak. Never heard of anything close to that kind of batting average.
- During these playoff games this year they have had 18 home runs. The rest of the 7 teams at Oklahoma City had 25. Oklahoma is highly favored to win their third straight championship.
- Stanford has a freshman pitcher, NiJaree Canady (right). Should be an Oklahoma blowout. I just saw her pitch a 75 MPH fastball. 74 MPH is equivalent to a 100 MPH baseball. But into the fifth inning (I'm watching now), the score is 0-0.
- Oh, well, Oklahoma just scored 2 runs, so this will become their first of other victories to come.
- The National Stanley Cup Finals has game #1 on Saturday: Vegas Golden Knights vs Florida Panthers. I don't watch ice hockey.
- Never saw an NBA game on TV all year...until the end of Boston's victory over Miami and a bit more of Miami over Boston to make the finals.
- Tonight at 8:30 EDT, Miami at Denver on ABC. I'm planning to watch.
- A #8 semi-finals team has never won the championship. That is the Miami Heat.
- Boston was #1, but Denver is #2 and a 79% favorite to beat Miami.
- In their 47th year, this is the first time Denver has reached the finals.
- Denver has the most un-athletic-looking basketball player you'll ever see in the NBA.
- His name is Nikola Jokic...but he is not a joke.
- Hate to be racist, but he is a white player from Serbia.
- Was the 41st pick by Denver in the 2014 draft.
- He is now the league's most valuable player.
- Does everything, and you need five players to guard him.
- 28 years old, 6'll" tall, with a wingspan of 7'3", weighing 284 pounds.
- In one game, had a triple double in 14 minutes and 33 seconds of court time...fastest ever in NBA history.
- But a selfless team player.
- Made 38.3% of 3-pointers, 83% of foul shots and 63.2% of all shots this year, and gets a whole lot of rebounds and assists. NBA average is 39% and 46% for all shots, while the NCAA 35% for 3 pointers and 45% of all shots.
- Read these articles to prep you for the NBA finals.
- Tonight, the finals of the Scripps Spelling Bee championship. Go to your Ion Channel. In Hawaii, we see it after it's all over, at 7PM on Channel 1027 or 27. Your home channel? Good luck finding it. Not on ESPN anymore. Here are the 11 finalists, and note the dominance of those with roots in India. Can you believe that the smallest person below, 12-year old Tarini Nandakumar, is only a sixth grader, and this is already her third time in this competition. The oldest person here is 15.
Worrisome—New XBB-driven #COVID wave in Chinawith ~40 million infections per week by late May and ~65 million infections/week by June… all while state-media downplayed outbreak last week. Bad sign—40% cases are already **reinfections** and rising as immunity from previous illness wanes. But China rolling out #XBB-targeting strain vaccines soon, while US/Europe still has… none.
This same Omicron subvariant (XBB.1.5) is also responsible for most of the U.S. cases today. While it's true that the U.S. does not have a specific vaccine for this virus, the lates Omicron booster is around 50% effective for the XBB, but only about a third for those 65 and older. There will be no next booster until the coming Fall.
- By January of this year, almost 80% of China's 1.4 billion population had been infected.
- Then came this second and current wave, where his modeling shows the infection rate rising to 65 million/week in June.
- Boosting his projection is data from Beijing, where the number of new infections grew four times in four weeks in that city. Most of those are re-infections.
- Said that a specific vaccine for the XBB.1.5 will soon be available.
- Peru 4.9%
- Mexico 4.5%
- Ukraine 2.1%
- Iran 1.9%
- USA 1.1%
- Germany 0.4%
- France 0.4%
- Japan 0.2%
- Australia 0.2%
- Iceland 0.1%
- New Zealand 0.1%
- Singapore 0.1%
- Qatar 0.1%
- S. Korea 0.1%
Finally, global death toll from past influenza pandemics. Not shown are the 6.9 million deaths from the COVID-19 Pandemic.
America's Got Talent premiered last night, and the Mzansi Youth Choir getting a golden buzzer. Simon cried. They are from South Africa. My favorite was 11-year old D'Corey Johnson, who sang Journey's Open Arms.
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