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📝 Good afternoon and welcome to Notes on the News. Here’s what you should know today, Dec. 20: Democratic leaders assessed how to proceed after Sen. Joe Manchin said he wouldn’t vote for the “Build Back Better” package, Chilean voters elected leftist Gabriel Boric as president and Moderna said its booster works against Omicron. Let us know what you think by replying to this email. Thanks for reading. |
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| Sen. Chuck Schumer said Democrats would take up the Build Back Better Act early next year after weeks of ‘deep discontent and frustration.’ PHOTO: J. SCOTT APPLEWHITE/ASSOCIATED PRESS |
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1. Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) vowed a floor vote on “Build Back Better” after a crucial lawmaker opposed it. The Senate majority leader promised to plow forward early next year after Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.)’s weekend announcement likely doomed the $2 trillion education, healthcare and climate package, which members of his party have spent months drafting and revising. Economists generally aren’t as concerned as Manchin about the bill’s likely inflation impact. 2. Chilean voters elected leftist Gabriel Boric as president. He received 56% of the votes, handily defeating conservative rival José Antonio Kast, an immigration hardliner and ally of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. Boric, a former student-protest leader, pledges to raise taxes to expand social services and dismantle a private pension system in Latin America’s richest nation 3. Peng Shuai denied accusing anyone of sexual assault, raising further questions about her welfare. The Chinese tennis star cited “a lot of misunderstanding” in an interview with a state-controlled Singapore newspaper, after a period when she went missing following a social-media post alleging sexual coercion in a relationship with a former senior Beiijing official. The Women’s Tennis Association says Peng’s apparent retraction hasn’t eased their concerns. 4. Moderna says its Covid-19 booster dose works against the Omicron variant. The company said lab tests showed that a third dose increased immune responses against the new coronavirus strain compared with two doses, signaling the shot could still offer protection despite the variant’s mutations. 5. Donald Trump is suing New York Attorney General Letitia James. The complaint accuses her of having a political vendetta and abusing her office to launch investigations into him, his company and his family. James, a Democrat, is investigating the former Republican president and his businesses for alleged corruption. |
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20,000 — The number of additional H-2B seasonal guest-worker visas the Biden administration will make available to employers ahead of the winter hiring season, in addition to the 33,000 visas already set aside for seasonal employers, such as landscapers, hotels and ski resorts this winter. $7.1 billion — The value of the art sold by Christie’s International this year—the highest annual total in the past five years amid an industry comeback that saw prices skyrocket. All three of the world’s chief auction houses have recently reported strong sales, citing, among other factors, millennial collectors who showed up during the pandemic eager to splurge. 10 — The factor by which Himalayan glaciers’ shrinkage rate has accelerated over the past 40 years compared with the previous seven centuries. Researchers say the extraordinary pace of melting imperils residents of India, Nepal and Bhutan with greater risks of avalanches, flooding and other disasters that threaten to disrupt agriculture for hundreds of millions of people across South Asia. |
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| What Everyone Wants To Know |
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| PHOTO ILLUSTRATION: WSJ, BLOOMBERG NEWS(2), REUTERS |
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Here is what to do if you test positive for Covid-19 as the Omicron variant surges. When you get a positive test result, you should quarantine immediately, infectious-disease doctors say. It doesn’t matter whether you got a rapid test or a PCR test or whether you are unvaccinated, vaccinated or boosted: Isolate for 10 days, they say. You should tell your “close contacts,” which the CDC defines as anyone you’ve been within 6 feet of for 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period. Remain at home in a private room and bathroom, if possible. If you can, get a thermometer and pulse oximeter to monitor your temperature and blood-oxygen levels, as well as ibuprofen to help lower fevers. Avoid or limit interaction with other members of your household. Many patients still experience fatigue and other symptoms for more than 10 days, but so long as symptoms are improving, it’s all right to stop isolating after the 10-day period, medical professionals say. Call your doctor if your symptoms include a high fever for multiple days, difficulty breathing or chest pain, or an inability to drink or eat, experts say. A loss of smell and taste is a common symptom and may persist beyond 10 days. Many NYU graduate students and their families are left drowning in debt. Students in advanced-degree programs and their parents collectively borrowed more in federal Plus loans over the past decade than at any other university in the U.S., a WSJ analysis of federal Education Department data found—clocking in at some $3.4 billion. NYU skimped on scholarships for needy undergraduates. During the past school year, the university covered about 62% of undergraduates’ financial needs on average. That was the lowest percentage of any private school with at least a $1 billion endowment that publishes the figures. Parents of 2018 and 2019 NYU bachelor’s degree recipients who took out Parent Plus loans borrowed a median $74,000, according to the most recent data. That’s a higher figure than at 99% of four-year colleges in the U.S. for which federal data are available. And in many cases those loans don’t pay off. In 40 out of 49 programs, NYU graduate students who took out federal loans borrowed more than they earned two years out of school. Data gaps are making it hard to track Omicron’s spread across the U.S. Many states have pulled back on what were once daily efforts to track and report on the latest Covid-19 trends. Some have cited a lack of resources and turnover among public-health officials. Meanwhile, the uneven availability of tests and limited ability to track and sequence variants is obscuring the picture public-health experts have of Omicron’s spread. Over the summer, public-health departments in some states said the change in daily data reporting came as vaccination rates increased and Covid-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths fell. Recently, long lines for Covid-19 testing and delays for results from more-accurate PCR tests are making it harder to track the virus, or for people to know whether they might be at risk of spreading it. Charting the latest Covid-19 case data |
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| PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY ELENA SCOTTI/THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, ALAMY (1), GETTY IMAGES (1) |
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Go let off some steam: Feel like you’ve been cursing more? You’re not alone. The old boundaries between work and home have blurred, reducing formalities and often forging foxhole bonds during difficult times. |
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Today's newsletter was curated by Alex Janin in New York, in collaboration with publishing editor Rich Bellis in New York. We hope you’re enjoying Notes on the News. If you would prefer to receive a different newsletter, please check out all your options to keep up with the latest on markets, economics, politics and more. For members, we recommend The 10-Point. |
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