Today's top stories in US news, politics, government, and world affairs:
The past two weeks have been filled with grants of both pardons and clemencies from The White House, first kicking off with President Joe Biden’s most publicized decision to pardon his own son, Hunter Biden. It is not unusual for Presidents to make decisions of pardons and clemency at the very end of their term, as President Donald Trump will take office shortly on January 20th. While there are certainly cases in which grants of clemency make sense - such as when a court of law has been a decision in error or was careless in sentencing - there are also cases in which the facts are clear, and the actors who committed crimes categorically hurt their fellow American citizens. Biden’s decision last week to grant clemency to 1,500 people certainly included some people which shocked the general public. And on a personal level, while I proudly voted for Biden in 2020 I believe these grants of clemency were absolutely outrageous and indefensible.
What started last week as a large number of mysterious drones reportedly flying over parts of New Jersey has turned into reported drone sightings all across the northeast, sparking speculation and concern over who sent them and why. In addition to New Jersey there have been police reports of drones over New York, Connecticut, Maryland, and Washington D.C. While The FBI is among several agencies investigating, it’s now been more than 23 days into the phenomenon and the Pentagon seems to still have no answers about the origins of these mysterious drones. An important takeaway here is that the United States homeland is not nearly as impenetrable as it should be, given the fact that we have funded and assembled the strongest military in the history of the world. One must only remember that just last year, a Chinese spy balloon penetrated American airspace, using a commercially available U.S. network to communicate and navigate. While scary, the drone sightings give us an opportune time to take steps to harden our homeland security for the mainland U.S. With a defense budget of $750 Billion, there’s absolutely money to spend, and there’s definitely no time to waste.
Weight loss drugs like Ozempic should be affordable for all Americans. The United States is facing a severe health crisis. To contextualize this problem and just how severe it is, 4 in 10 of Americans - or 132 Million Americans - are now considered obese. And this is a major problem in so many different areas. In terms of military readiness, the United States, where our armed forces continue to face a critical recruiting shortage, which is entirely made of volunteers - generals currently believe we would have major difficulty in the need for an emergency draft. In terms of economic productivity this is a major issue, as employees suffering from obesity face issues with absenteeism, increased risk of illness, reduced economic activity, and presenteeism. And of course the biggest issue here is related to costs of public health. Given this grim reality, thank goodness scientists have made a breakthrough with Compounded semaglutide - which is the main ingredient in drugs like Ozempic - and it’s showing miraculous results in reducing obesity and weight loss issues. The issue here of course is that the high cost of the drug is a huge barrier for the vast majority of Americans: according to CBS, a monthly supply of Wegovy rings up at $1,300 and Zepbound will put you out $1,000. Shortages of the drugs have also limited the supplies. When you take all of these facts together, it is conclusive that we should be working immediately to make these drugs affordable and available for all Americans.
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