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Kenny Rogers, a longtime star of country music, died Friday night, according to a statement posted by his family. He was 81. Known for such hits as “The Gambler,” “Lady,” “Islands in the Stream,” and “Lucille,” Rogers died peacefully at home in Sandy Springs, Ga., of natural causes at 10:25 p.m., the statement said.

Ever since he was a black-faced babe in arms, Eddie has embraced all that family life offers at Whitehall Farm in Dumfries and Galloway. What better than a game of chase with the dogs? Or a kick-about in the yard with Evie, nine, and Bertie, six? Or perhaps a bracing walk to meet them from school, followed by a snooze in front of the Aga? As a youngster, he loved a cuddle on the sofa while glued to an impressively eclectic range of TV shows — children’s programmes, Love Island and occasionally, when he fancied more intellectual stimulation, Laura Kuenssberg...

Kenny Rogers, whose legendary career spanned decades, passed away quietly at 81

Hundreds of staffers who worked on Mike Bloomberg’s defunct presidential campaign were laid off Friday after he announced he was shutting down the operation. Bloomberg’s decision came after the former staffers, including some who were let go during an earlier round of terminations, said they were hoping the billionaire media mogul would have lived up to a promise to keep them on the payroll until November. Those expectations were lost when they were put on notice in conference calls Friday that Bloomberg was not going forward with pans for a super PAC.

I suspect that when the economic statistics for this period are assembled, they will report one huge growth industry: meme creation. The creativity of the meme-isphere is truly impressive, and a great reason to hope that we’re going to come out of this mess just fine. I’ve got enough material in the inventory to fill out TWiPs for weeks to come. Which may come in handy since it looks like our current de facto martial law may last for weeks to come. In the meantime, Keep Calm and Meme On!

The China coronavirus and COVID-19 outbreaks, deaths and responses continue to dominate US, European and Asian news. Meanwhile, an equally or even more serious infestation is devastating East African crops and leaving tens of millions at risk of starvation and death. If COVID hits these weakened populations, amid their malaria and other systemic diseases, it would bring tragedy on massive scales. “Across Somalia, desert locusts in a swarm the size of Manhattan have destroyed a swath of farmland as big as Oklahoma,” the Wall Street Journal’s Nicholas Bariyo reports. “In Kenya, billions-strong clouds of the insects have eaten through 800...

This will be a weekly post. Count remains at 191 judges confirmed. 138 District Court judges 51 Circuit Court judges 2 Supreme Court justices

California Governor Gavin Newsom on Thursday ordered the state’s some 40 million citizens to “shelter in place,” meaning they shouldn’t leave their homes except to perform essential activities such as picking up food or medicine. Then on Friday Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York ordered all non-essential businesses to keep their workers home, as did Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont. Governor Philip Murphy of New Jersey said he would do so on Saturday. These actions got a federal imprimatur when Dr. Anthony Fauci of the White House’s response task force endorsed the degree of shutdown ordered by Governors Newsom and Cuomo....

In a world suffering a pandemic, cash is no longer king. A growing number of businesses and individuals worldwide have stopped using banknotes in fear that physical currency, handled by tens of thousands of people over their useful life, could be a vector for the spreading coronavirus. Public officials and health experts have said that the risk of transferring the virus person-to-person through the use of banknotes is small. But that has not stopped businesses from refusing to accept currency and some countries from urging their citizens to stop using banknotes altogether. Open Books, a non-profit bookstore in Chicago, sent...

The liberal media may have temporarily won the battle to trash the stock market with this Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, but the Trump administration’s proactive response to this disease is winning the larger public relations battle. Polls now show a majority of Americans now approve of how the president is handling the crisis. The anti-Trump media cannot fight a two-front war. They’re not smart enough. So, either way—Trump has won—again. And if this outbreak is contained—and God-willing that occurs soon—the economy should recover. The media has done well in stirring up apocalyptic-laced reports about this disease, which while highly contagious, has...

ANDY Cohen is feeling "terrified" after testing positive for coronavirus. **SNIP** A source close to the Bravo presenter, 51, exclusively told The Sun that he's "stressing out" about his shock diagnosis and is "scared" his loved ones could get the virus too. Andy revealed on Friday that he had tested positive for coronavirus, after admitting to not "feeling great" while in quarantine. Sharing a downcast selfie on Instagram, he wrote: "After a few days of self-quarantine, and not feeling great, I have tested positive for coronavirus." **SNIP** His diagnosis comes days after he interviewed Hillary Clinton, and also stars including...

A former associate director of a US biotechnology company is facing up to seven years in prison in China after allegedly hiding her coronavirus symptoms and flying from Los Angeles to Beijing in hopes of receiving treatment. The Chinese national, 37, gobbled down anti-fever medicine at LAX to suppress her high temperatures before boarding the 13-hour flight back to her homeland with her husband and son, Chinese authorities said. The mother-of-one, named as Jie Li, worked for Biogen, a multinational firm at the center of an outbreak of the coronavirus in Massachusetts. Around 30 per cent of the confirmed cases...

There are many sorrows of this time of coronavirus, and one of them is political. On the first Tuesday we were really truly grappling with the pandemic as a country, one of our national leaders in defense of innocent human life lost his primary race. Rep. Dan Lipinski of Illinois is pretty much the pro-life Democrat, at least in Washington, D.C. Lipinski is a man of conscience and courage. And my first thought when news came in that he had lost was: We don't deserve him. There wasn't a lot of press time given to Lipinski's loss, for obvious reasons,...

Hat Tip GKJoe I knew there was something sketchy about Dr. Anthony Fauci. Within the WikiLeaks HRC email files there’s a letter from Fauci to Hillary Clinton through her aid/lawyer Cheryl Mills: “Please tell her that we all love her and are very proud to know her.” LOOK:

"China helps Cuba out of its economic crisis with subsidies and Cuba provides its archipelago to be its (China’s) command post in the Americas.” (Chinadialogue, Nov. 19, 2019) "Cuba to attract more Chinese visitors with versatile appeal: The number of Chinese visitors to Cuba has in recent years risen to 50,000. Cuban tourism authorities hope to see 4.5 million foreign visitors in 2020, up by 200,000 from 2019, including thousands more from China.” “Italy links coronavirus outbreak to Chinese tourists. The coronavirus outbreak spreading across Europe has been linked to two Chinese tourists who fell ill with it in Italy in January after...

The critical shortage of medical supplies across the U.S., including testing swabs, protective masks, surgical gowns and hand sanitizer, can be tied to a sudden drop in imports, mostly from China, The AP has found. Trade data shows the decline in shipments started in mid-February after the spiraling coronavirus outbreak in China led the country to shutter factories and disrupted ports. Some emergency rooms, hospitals and clinics have now run out of key medical supplies, while others are rationing personal protective equipment like gloves and masks. The United States counts on receiving the vast majority of its medical supplies from...

The five U.S. states where governors have closed or have said they will soon be closing non-essential businesses account for about 31% of the world’s biggest economy. Authorities have called such steps necessary to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Here are some key facts about the collective economic heft of California, New York, Illinois, New Jersey and Connecticut, which individually rank No. 1, No. 3, No. 5, No. 8 and No. 23 among all 50 states by GDP. California’s $3 trillion economy alone accounts for 14.5% of the U.S. output, making the state by itself a bigger economic powerhouse...

George Webb treads into very dark territory with his initial analysis episode of how the corona pandemic started. Apparently, there is more to come.

WARSAW (Reuters) - Natalia Broniarczyk, an activist with a charity that assists Polish women who want to terminate pregnancies, says its hot line began ringing non-stop after the government announced border closures to stem the coronavirus outbreak last week. Many callers were worried about their shipments of abortion pills, which are illegal in Poland, and others feared they would not be able to reach clinics abroad in time to have the procedure, which is unavailable in Poland in most cases. “The idea that we would have to tell a woman that because of the pandemic she won’t be able to...

Capitalism has been suspended in the UK. That is the ultimate consequence of the extraordinary moves announced by Chancellor Rishi Sunak on Friday evening. Never before has the government of this country stepped in to pay a major chunk of workers' wages in companies across the nation. It is a move of such consequence that the numbers involved - 80% of the salaries of affected workers, caps of £2,500 per worker, potentially £4bn of money flowing out of the Exchequer every quarter - are dwarfed by the symbolism. A Conservative government is effectively nationalising parts of the private sector, paying...