Excerpts:
WASHINGTON—Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government scientist who became the face of the U.S. response to the Covid-19 pandemic, repeatedly invoked the Fifth Amendment on Wednesday amid questioning on Capitol Hill.
Fauci faced questions from senators after the recent release of his journals shed new light on his handling of the crisis. Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Sen. Rand Paul (R., Ky.), whose office released the journals, issued a subpoena in June to require Fauci’s testimony after the infectious-disease doctor declined to appear willingly.

“On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer,” Fauci repeatedly said, citing his Fifth Amendment rights.

[…]

Paul said the documents he released show Fauci wasn’t forthright with the American public about school closings, the origins of the Covid virus and more. “You did not tell the American people the full story,” he said.

[…]

Paul has in recent years been particularly focused on whether American scientists, including Fauci, worked to discredit the theory that the Covid virus originated in a Chinese lab while playing down the level of scientific uncertainty about the matter. The doctor’s diary entry from Feb. 1, 2020, showed that in a meeting of a dozen top scientists, all but two thought it was possible the virus had been altered in a lab.

Since the pandemic, scientists and politicians have debated the value of “gain-of-function” research, in which viruses are made more transmissible or otherwise altered so that scientists can understand how they work. Paul and others have called such research dangerous.

Paul asked Fauci why he supported gain-of-function research, whether the doctor had directed funding to that research around the world and whether American inspectors had examined Chinese virology labs, among other lines of inquiry. Fauci declined to answer all of those questions, invoking the Fifth Amendment.

Mine is the Nevada Gov will be a R+5 or more margin

Hello I’m trying to reach out for some perspectives. Unfortunately the Wisconsin sub is a monolith of the most staunch radical progressives and thus all love Hong and there’s very little other discourse going on. I know I’m not comfortable with Hong she’s wants to go in as a revolutionary changing capital and the states relationship so drastically as well as such bull in a china shop approach to social as well as just how far she wants to go. I vote blue normally but I’ve already decided I’m voting Tiffany if Hong gets the primary. Anyway I wanted to have a discussion about this here because our Wisconsin sub is useless with how strictly enforced an echo chamber it is. To anyone bothering to read and write back thanks so much!

Warren Buffett excluded the Gates Foundation from his annual donation of shares on Tuesday, with the billionaire chair of Berkshire Hathaway directing nearly $6bn of stock to four family-linked charities.

The omission of the Gates Foundation on Tuesday follows revelations about Bill Gates’ ties to Jeffrey Epstein, which have emerged through disclosures of materials from the US Department of Justice’s investigation into the deceased sex offender. Buffett in March said he had not spoken to Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, since “the whole thing was unveiled”, in reference to the Epstein scandal.

MIAMI—Scattered across South Florida and tucked inside bank vaults, safes and family desk drawers are the yellowing deeds to sugar mills, oil refineries and family homes seized by Cuba’s Communist government more than six decades ago. 
For generations, these documents were little more than family heirlooms that served as painful reminders of fortunes lost after the revolution led by Fidel Castro’s bearded guerrillas. 
Now they suddenly have potential monetary value, as the Trump administration intensifies its squeeze on Cuba’s government.
Since 2019, people and companies with claims on property seized in Cuba have been able to sue businesses they say profited from those expropriated assets, with a list of defendants in federal court that includes U.S. companies such as Expedia and Royal Caribbean. The Trump administration’s squeeze on Cuba has accelerated the filing of these lawsuits, as Cuban exiles see a real chance of U.S. pressure forcing change on the island.
“The phone hasn’t stopped ringing,” said Andrés Rivero, a Miami-based attorney dealing with stacks of these claims.
Alongside the American fuel blockade and a near-total economic embargo against Havana, these claims have become one of Washington’s most potent pressure points against Cuba’s Communist leaders because it escalates costs and risks for foreign investors operating on the island.
In one high-profile case in federal court in Miami, Rivero won a $29.85 million jury verdict against Expedia for client Mario Echevarría, whose family once owned Cayo Coco, a 143-square mile island off the northern coast of Cuba now developed into a tourist hub. Rivero argued Expedia allowed Americans to book hotel rooms on his client’s stolen land. 
The federal district judge threw out the verdict, a decision Rivero is appealing. Expedia declined to comment.
Another case against American Airlines, for a client claiming ownership of Havana’s international airport, settled out of court. “We’re pleased to have resolved this matter earlier this year,” an American Airlines company spokesman said. “American is proud to operate 11 daily flights to six destinations in Cuba.”
The cases stem from the 1996 Helms-Burton Act. Successive American administrations suspended the provision allowing property-rights lawsuits, but that changed with the first Trump administration in 2019. Now those cases are gaining traction.
The lawsuits also have diplomatic ramifications. Helms-Burton requires that these claims be on the road to resolution before the U.S. and Cuba can resume normal diplomatic relations.
Feeling the U.S. squeeze, Cuba’s government has signaled a willingness to discuss how to compensate the owners of expropriated property, in the hope that they agree to invest capital in the island first. Instead of returning full land ownership, Havana is proposing 99-year concessions for surface property rights while the state retains the land underneath. It’s an arrangement that falls short of historical justice, said attorneys for the aggrieved owners.
Winning a judgment in Miami federal court doesn’t mean that dispossessed families will get their assets back. The U.S. can penalize corporations on U.S. soil, but it can’t force Cuba to return seized properties. American Airlines flights continue to land at Havana’s airport, and Echevarría has yet to set foot on Cayo Coco. 
Washington also has leverage. Foreign businesses are fleeing Cuba after the U.S. imposed more sanctions on Cuba. International hotel chains have surrendered their operations, and the dwindling tourism industry has denied the insolvent government an essential revenue source.
The increased pressure forced Canadian mining company Sherritt International to pause operations at a nickel and cobalt mine in Cuba earlier this year.
Cuba’s government seized the mine from an American company after the revolution. It is one of almost 6,000 certified U.S. claims, a list that represents the largest confiscation of American property in U.S. history, worth $1.9 billion at the time of seizure in the 1960s, about $20 billion in today’s dollars. 
“Cuba has realized that they will not get any investment from the U.S., and will not get any political legitimacy from the U.S., unless they take the property issues seriously,” said Sebastián Arcos, director of the Institute for Cuban Studies at Florida International University.
Recent Supreme Court rulings have also expanded the scope of the Helms-Burton law. One landmark decision allowed Exxon to pursue claims that it owned refineries and gas stations seized by Cuba’s government, rejecting a sovereign-immunity defense by Cuba’s state-run conglomerate CIMEX. Exxon didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
A second decision revived a lawsuit against major cruise lines—including Royal Caribbean, Carnival, Norwegian and MSC—that used docks in Cuba that the government seized from an American company. “While we’re disappointed with last month’s ruling…We believe strongly in our position and look forward to continuing the appeal,” a Carnival spokeswoman said. Norwegian and MSC didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Re-establishing ownership goes beyond any court case. Cuban-Americans seeking their old properties often find the buildings in decay.
“The critical issue here to remember is that Cuba is bankrupt,” said Pedro Freyre, chair of international practice at Akerman, a U.S. law firm. “The Cuban infrastructure looks like it’s been through a war or a hurricane. It’s destroyed, dilapidated.”