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Good morning. After a week-long competition filled with adorable animals from around the country, the first inaugural DONUT Pet Olympics is now over and "The One Pet to Rule Them All" has officially been crowned – though since they come in a pair, it’s more like "The Two Pets to Rule Them All."
A big thank you to everyone who entered, voted, and cheered along! We hope you had just as much fun as we did putting this together. 🥰 🐶🐱🐰🐠
⏰🚀 Ready, Set, Go: Today’s newsletter takes 4.27 minutes to read. (With the 360° view: +2.85 minutes.)
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👇📰 Quick Bits
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🇰🇷 Why Can't We Be Friends? 🇰🇵
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in in September 2018; Image: Pyongyang Press Corps
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🎁 DONUT Headline: North Korea agreed to resume communicating with South Korea in a move some experts called a sign Pyongyang is warming to diplomatic relations with the West. Others say it's the same old song and dance.
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North Korea and South Korea agreed yesterday to resume previously suspended communication channels between the two countries.
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The countries' leaders also agreed to “restore mutual confidence and develop their relationships again as soon as possible,” according to South Korean President Moon Jae-in.
🤿 A deeper dive... The rival countries use the communication channels to describe their positions on issues and prevent any accidental clashes along their disputed sea boundary.
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North Korea occasionally cuts off communication in the channels in times of tension with South Korea or the U.S. The most recent cutoff came in June 2020 after Northern officials accused the South of failing to stop activists from floating anti-Pyongyang leaflets across the border.
🦠 North Korea & COVID-19... Little is known about the notoriously secretive nation's state of affairs since the pandemic began over a year ago.
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Even though North Korea keeps reporting zero COVID-19 cases to the WHO - a claim believed by virtually no one - it has "taken drastic containment measures that have worsened the regime’s economic woes, including closing the border with its biggest trade partner, China," per Bloomberg ($).
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At a Politburo meeting late last month, Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un fired a variety of officials in "the biggest leadership shake-up in nearly a decade" and warned his country's COVID-19 situation was grave, according to the WSJ.
👁️ Looking ahead... Officials agreed to engage on the hotline twice a day.
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Some analysts see the re-establishment of comms as a sign the North could be warming to Western diplomacy, possibly due to a severe economic and humanitarian crisis fueled by the pandemic.
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Others cautioned against reading too much into the move, since North Korea has repeatedly opened and closed communications in the past.
From the Right: WSJ
From the Left: NPR
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🏈🏀 Red River Shakeup? 🥎⚾
Image: Twitter
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🎁 DONUT Headline: Texas and Oklahoma have officially began the process of leaving the Big 12 conference – a move with massive implications for the college athletics landscape.
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UT Austin and The University of Oklahoma, two founding members of the Big 12 Athletic Conference, announced plans on Monday to leave the conference in 2025. Yesterday, they released a joint statement asking to join the SEC.
Just like Ron Burgundy, this is kind of a big deal.
The two schools joining the SEC would:
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Create the first 16-team super conference.
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Likely start a domino effect in college athletics that could topple the Big 12 – or, at the least, result in a shakeup. Per CBSSports.com, the conference will lose 50 percent to 75 percent of its value from the two departures.
Though let’s not get ahead of ourselves… The two schools joining the Southeastern Conference isn’t yet a done deal. The SEC's by-laws state that 11 of 14 institutions must vote in the affirmative to invite new members. There may be some current SEC teams reluctant to accept additional league members for myriad reasons.
✋ Yes, but… “I can assure you, we’re not winging it,” an SEC athletic director told Matt Hayes of Saturday Down South.
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With Texas and Oklahoma on board - the #1 and #8 highest-grossing athletic departments, respectively - the SEC would have the potential to pass the Big Ten as collegiate athletics’ most lucrative conference.
👁️ Looking ahead… “The expectation is for (Texas and OU) to play in the SEC in 2022,” another SEC athletic director told Saturday Down South. “It doesn’t do anyone any good for them to be in one conference and committed to another beyond that one year.”
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But, but: If the two schools depart the Big 12 before 2025, they could be subject to fines of up to $80 million apiece.
Stay tuned.
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🍩 DONUT Holes…
Image: M.R. Gamage
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☝️ The world’s largest sapphire cluster, worth up to $100 million, was reportedly unearthed by accident in a backyard in Sri Lanka.
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🤸 Simone Biles withdrew from the Olympic women's team gymnastics final yesterday, citing her mental health and well-being; early this morning, Biles said she would also withdraw from Thursday's individual
all-around competition; the U.S. won silver in the team all-around competition yesterday, while Russia won gold.
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⚖️ The Georgia man who killed eight people in shootings at three Asian American-owned spas in metro Atlanta was sentenced to life in prison after pleading guilty to the first four counts of murder.
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🏛️ The House select committee investigating the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol held its first hearing on Tuesday. (From the Left | From the Right)
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💽 The only existing copy of the 31-track Wu-Tang Clan album Once Upon a Time in Shaolin - previously owned by infamous "Pharma Bro" Martin Shkreli - was sold to an anonymous buyer for an undisclosed price by the U.S. government to pay off Shkreli's debts.
+Bonus: Stay up to date on everything Olympics.
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🔥💸 Sponsored by KING KANINE 🐕🐩
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👑 KING of Doing Less
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Your dog hates the evil vacuum machine.
Ok, just vacuum less.
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(Side note: Why don’t human hairbrushes do all of this?! 🤔)
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And even better – enter the code “DONUT15” at checkout for 15% off anything in-store.
Start vacuuming AND sneezing less with your KING KOMB.
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🔥 The Hot Corner
💬 Heard Through the Grapevine… “It has been burning in extremely steep canyons, some places where it is almost impossible for human beings to set foot on the ground. It’s going to be a long haul.” –Rick Carhart, spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, referring to the blaze that resulted when two California wildfires combined into one on Sunday.
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As of Tuesday morning, the combined result of the Dixie Fire and Fly Fire had burned over 208,000 acres and was 23% contained.
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Over 10,000 homes remain threatened by the fire, which officials said is the 14th largest in state history.
🔢 Stat of the Day... A new study found the average American reaches “peak financial recklessness” at 22.
📖 Worth Your Time… I Just Learned I Only Have Months to Live. This is What I Want to Say (soft paywall)
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🗣👂 Dose of Discussion
😷 New CDC Masking Guidance
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Image: CDC
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🎁 DONUT Headline: In response to the Delta variant, the CDC revised its guidelines to recommend fully-vaccinated individuals wear masks indoors both in schools and in areas with widespread COVID-19 transmission (a distinction that currently applies to ~63% of the country).
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The CDC updated its mask guidance on Tuesday to recommend that fully-vaccinated people resume masking in indoor public spaces in areas with high or substantial COVID-19 transmission.
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Roughly 46% of U.S. counties are currently considered high-transmission areas, while another 17% are considered to have substantial transmission levels. ☝️
🤿 A deeper dive... The CDC also recommended schools reopen in the fall with universal indoor masking for students, teachers, and staff, even among people who are fully-vaccinated.
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The agency said its reversal came after officials reviewed new unpublished data on the Delta variant showing fully vaccinated people could carry higher levels of COVID-19 than previously thought – and were potentially able to infect others.
✋ Yes, but... Some government officials and outside public health experts have said they're "concerned that revising the masking guidelines could sow doubt among the vaccinated about the efficacy of the vaccines," per the WSJ.
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CNBC reported federal health officials "still believe fully vaccinated individuals represent a very small amount of transmission."
👁️ Looking ahead... The CDC’s guidance is only a recommendation, leaving it up to states and local officials to decide whether to reintroduce mask rules.
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Several cities across the country have already reinstated indoor mask mandates, including LA, St. Louis, and Savannah, GA.
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Eight states have introduced legislation banning schools from requiring masks – Arizona, Arkansas, Iowa, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, and Vermont.
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📣🗣💬 This Week’s Poll Question
In today's Dose of Discussion, we covered the CDC's new masking guidance recommending that all individuals - fully-vaxxed or not - wear masks indoors in schools and areas with widespread COVID-19 transmission.
Our question to you: Do you agree with the CDC's new guidance?
Yes
No
Unsure
+Note: The most thoughtful responses will be featured in tomorrow’s newsletter.
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🛸🌄📲 Calling from the Future…
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🧠 Magnetizing Concept
Image: Houston Methodist Neurological Institute
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🎁 DONUT Headline: Oncology researchers created a helmet that generates a magnetic field to shrink brain tumors.
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Based on research showing the cancer-fighting effects of electromagnetic fields, the helmet features three rotating magnets powered by a rechargeable battery. Following a human trial, the device shows promise as a noninvasive treatment of a deadly form of brain cancer known as glioblastooma.
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A 53-year-old patient wore the device at a clinic for five weeks. He initially received exposure to the generated magnetic field for two hours at a time, then gradually increased that time to six hours each day.
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During the treatment period, the mass and volume of the patient’s tumor shrunk by nearly one-third.
The helmet, which received FDA approval for compassionate use treatment, is simple enough to be operated in a patient’s own home.
Keep reading.
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🤗 Daily Dose of Positive
🐶💒 Man’s Best… Man?
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Image: Facebook
Justin Lansford is an Army Veteran who lost his leg in Afghanistan and struggled to readapt to everyday life upon returning to the States.
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Thanks to Warrior Canine Connection, Justin was soon paired with a service dog named Gabe who helped him adapt to life as an amputee.
“Since day one, we’ve been joined to the hip,” Justin explained. “He’s there for me all day, every day.”
It only made sense that, upon his engagement to his now-wife Carol, Justin asked Gabe to fill a major position on the special day – his best man.
Keep reading.
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💡 Dose of Knowledge
📅 Look Before You 'Leap'
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Which of the following will be a leap year?
A) 2022
B) 2023
C) 2024
D) 2025
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(keep scrolling for the answer) |
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🍩 Share The DONUT
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Access exclusive rewards and even an all-expenses-paid round trip to Austin, TX, just for sharing this newsletter.
Simply:
1. Copy your unique referral link.👇
2. Drop said link in the department Slack channel, DM a friend or three, post it on flyers all around town, etc.
3. Watch the rewards roll in.
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Ambassador Rewards and Progress → |
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💡 Dose of Knowledge Answer
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C) 2024
The most recent leap year occurred in 2020, meaning the next Leap Day will occur on February 29, 2024.
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