DL Open Thread: Sunday, June 5, 2022

Had a great relaxing weekend getaway.  Clearing the mental clutter is a wonderful exercise.

However, the weight of disappointing tens of thousands of our readers was always with me.

I’m back to salve (or heighten) your disappointment.

The Four Gun Control Measures That Could Have Saved 446 Lives:

If the key gun control proposals now being considered in Congress had been law since 1999, four gunmen younger than 21 would have been blocked from legally buying the rifles they used in mass shootings.

At least four other assailants would have been subject to a required background check, instead of slipping through a loophole. Ten might have been unable to steal their weapons because of efforts to require or encourage safer gun storage. And 20 might not have been allowed to legally purchase the large-capacity magazines that they used to upgrade their guns, helping them kill, on average, 16 people each.

Taken together, those four measures might have changed the course of at least 35 mass shootings — a third of such episodes in the United States since the massacre at Columbine High School in Colorado, a New York Times analysis has found. Those 35 shootings killed a combined 446 people.

Let’s face it: These measures aren’t likely to pass Congress.  Delaware?  We shall find out beginning this week.

Pity The Poor Russian Billionaire.  Forced to sell off $500 mill in assets for–$1.  Well, actually, one pound:

Russian oligarch and billionaire Roman Abramovich, one of the most high-profile Russian oligarchs, will sell off his stake in a European telecom company for just £1—the equivalent of one US dollar, for an investment that was worth half a billion dollars before the oligarch faced stringent Western sanctions thanks to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s instigation of the war in Ukraine. The news that Abramovich will sell the company that he and two business partners once invested as much as $375 million (about £300 million) in comes in a report from the UK paper The Times, just a week after the British government okayed a deal for Abramovich to sell the Chelsea Football Club, one of the Premiere League’s top teams and one of the most valuable sports franchises in the world, for $5 billion.

In both cases, Abramovich will see little, if any, profit from the sales, with any possible financial upside for him being frozen until he is no longer sanctioned. In the case of the telecom company, Truphone, Abramovich will be allowed to recoup up to one-third of his original investment, but he won’t receive any of it as long as he remains under sanctions. With the sale of Chelsea F.C., to an investor consortium led by Todd Boehly, an American investment banker who is also a part owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers, the $3 billion that Abramovich invested in the team will be placed in a special fund the U.K. government can use to benefit victims of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The remaining $2 billion will be invested in the team, leaving Abramovich with nothing. 

Trump Trumps Oprah–How Dr. Oz Won Pa. Senate Primary:

Oz triumphed, in large part, by orchestrating one of the most audacious media strategies in American political history. He successfully traded in his long-standing celebrity affiliation with one vintage media star (Oprah Winfrey) for another (Donald Trump).

Naturally, the whole thing started on Fox News.

In spring 2020, with the pandemic ramping up, Oz began making regular appearances on the network. He answered questions about the novel coronavirus and reassured viewers about what might come next. In addition to his impressive medical credentials—accomplished heart surgeon, Columbia University faculty member (he’s now emeritus), multiple Ivy League degrees—Oz brought something else to the assignment: a willingness to tout miracle cures, no matter how seemingly dubious or sketchy. The market, in early 2020, was primed for such things, and Oz delivered. He started talking up the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine as a potential Covid-19 treatment.

Good article. Worth reading.

What do you want to talk about?