2016年8月5日星期五

Friday Morning Briefing: Mike Pence, more fire dog than attack dog

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Reuters
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Unlike many candidates for vice president, the mild-mannered Mike Pence was not tapped as the attack dog. That’s Donald Trump’s job. Pence's role is harder: Soften Trump’s rough edges and limit the fallout from what many Republicans see as the nominee’s self-inflicted wounds.

Quote of the day:

"This election is Donald's to lose and so far the Democrats have been clever about baiting him and he generally has bitten." – Wilbur Ross, billionaire and Trump supporter

 


Islamic State fighters may have executed 12 Iraqi refugees and captured as many as 3,000 more fleeing the city of Kirkuk in northern Iraq, according to the U.N.'s refugee agency. Yesterday, the Iraqi Observatory for Human Rights said about 1,900 civilians were captured by Islamic State fighters who were using people as shields against attacks by Iraqi security forces.


Digits of the day:

180,000

Is it jobs day again already? The Reuters consensus is 180,000 non-farm jobs added in July, down from June's 287,000 surge, but above the monthly average of 171,500 over the first half of the year.


Around the world

This is Rio de Janeiro’s Rocinha favela, one of the slums that was included in the "police pacification unit" program that began in 2008. REUTERS/Bruno Kelly


  • In a village not far from the Olympic zones in Rio, two 9-millimeter pistols and small packets of cocaine and marijuana sat atop a chipped blue metal table. Two young men slouched in white plastic chairs, while a third held a rifle in a corner. "If you are not buying, move along," said one man at the table. It was supposed to be the job of the "police pacification unit" clean up the slums and construct permanent police outposts. It's not working.
  • Indonesian authorities arrested six suspected militants believed to be linked to Islamic State and plotting an attack on Singapore.
  • Turkey's foreign minister called Austria the capital of "radical racism," after the country called for a halt to talks that would grant Turkey admission to the European Union. Turkey faces opposition to joining the trading bloc after its president Tayyip Erdogan refused to rule out the death penalty for those involved with the country's failed coup. Austria's foreign minister told Ankara to "moderate its choice of words … and do its homework."

Around the country

  • President Obama called on Congress to provide more money to fight the Zika virus before government funding dries up. He warned that development of a vaccine for the virus could be delayed if Congress does not do what he wants.
  • The mayor of Stockton, California, was allegedly caught playing a game of strip poker with at least one underage child at a summer camp he hosts for disadvantaged inner-city children, prosecutors said. Mayor Anthony Ray Silva is accused of using his phone to make an audio recording of conversation among several young people, including a 16-year-old boy, who were playing strip poker with the mayor inside his cabin at the camp. He faces one felony charge for eavesdropping and  misdemeanor charges for contributing to the delinquency of a minor, child endangerment and furnishing alcoholic beverages to individuals under the legal drinking age of 21. Silva's lawyer, Mark Reichel, said his client "will be vindicated" and suggested the case was politically motivated.
  • A software program dubbed "Mayhem" was poised to win the final round of a three-year contest to teach computers to launch and defend against cyber attacks, earning a $2 million prize for the team that wrote the winning code. The event, known as the Cyber Grand Challenge, took place ahead of the Def Con, a hacking convention in Las Vegas.

Around Wall Street

  • Apple plans to offer rewards of up to $200,000 – some of the largest bounties in the industry -- to researchers who find critical security bugs in its products.
  • The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau approved rules that will help prevent wrongful home foreclosures, as part of an effort to reform the country's massive lending market. Mortgage servicers must grant protections to struggling borrowers multiple times over the term of the loan. Previously, servicers were required to provide such protections once.
  • Opponents of the Iran nuclear pact are trying to stop the Treasury Department from signing off on sales of commercial planes to Iran by Boeing and Airbus. The international agreement to curb Iran's nuclear program made such sales possible by easing sanctions on Tehran. But some members of the Congress want to block proposed sales of some 200 jetliners, worth about $50 billion at list prices, to renew Iran Air's aging fleet.

Today's reason to live

Hank Williams – Setting the Woods On Fire

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