13. Water supply contaminated after night of wild weather. Residents in almost 90 suburbs across Victoria have been urged to boil water due to electrical damage caused by wild storms across Victoria on Thursday night. Emergency water tankers have been deployed to residents who have no power to boil water after a chaotic day cleaning up from a storm that killed three people, brought down trees and potentially contaminated the drinking water of hundreds of thousands. More than 270,000 households across 99 suburbs were urged to boil water and about 16,000 people remained without power on Friday night after the wild storms the night before.

14. In Germany, thousands rally against COVID restrictions in Berlin after protest ban is overturned, counter-protests expected. Thousands of people rallied to protest against policies of Merkel and restrictions in connection with coronavirus. Around 30,000 people had gathered on the main street Friedrichstrasse. Authorities have attracted 3,000 police officers, and arrests have already begun in the Brandenburg Gate area. Police water cannons and Thyssen-Henshel TM-170 armored personnel carriers arrived. Police began arresting protestors. In total, about 38 thousand people took part in the rallies. More than 300 were arrested. At a rally near Victory Column, Michael Ballweg of the Stuttgart Lateral Thinking Initiative called for the repeal of all laws that were passed due to the pandemic. He also called on the federal government to step down. Similar protests against coronavirus lockdown were also held in Paris and London.

15. Tweet from RFK, Jr.: “Tomorrow, I will speak to largest crowd in German history. We are expecting 1 million+ people protesting Bill Gates’ bio security agenda, rise of authoritarian surveillance state + Pharma sponsored coup d’etat against liberal democracy.” The organizers of this event had a main stage live stream and multiple other streams going the whole day. Berlin was packed with journalists both from mainstream and independent outlets. For some reason, every version of this speech currently available is cell phone footage and the coverage so far in the media is limited to mentioning that RFK Jr. is controversial for his views on vaccines and a known conspiracy theorist. However, no one is showing the actual speech so far. Our media has been talking about this protest for weeks now and repeatedly connected it to the far right or outright neo-Nazis. RFK opened his speech by telling the Germans this exact same thing, only he was talking about the US media reporting he would be speaking to "5000 Nazis.”

16. Far-right extremists tried to storm the German parliament building Saturday following a protest against the country's pandemic restrictions, but were intercepted by police and forcibly removed. Protesters with flags of the German Empire in their hands tried to take the Reichstag by storm. Police used tear gas. Detentions were rather harsh, but unlike Belarus, journalists have not been arrested yet. Police prevented hundreds from entering Reichstag and disbanded the march protesting against Covid protection measures.

17. The Berlin clinic "Charite,” where Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is undergoing treatment, has asked for help from experts on poisons and chemical warfare agents from laboratories of the Bundeswehr and the British army. The request was sent to a closed military laboratory in Munich, where the country's best specialists in poisons and chemical warfare agents work. The British research center for biological and chemical weapons in Porton Down was also contacted for information. The laboratory there was involved in the investigation after the attack on the Russian ex-agent Sergei Skripal with the Russian neurotoxin Novitschok.

18. Around 3,700 Swedes received false-positive COVID-19 test results thanks to a faulty testing kit from China, according to Reuters who cited a statement made Tuesday by Sweden’s Public Health Agency. The statement said that the kit was unable to distinguish between a very low level of the virus and a negative result.

19. Riots broke out in Sweden after one of the leaders of the local ultra-right party "Hard Line" burned the Koran. Some 300 people clashed with police in Malmo, after far-right extremists burned a Koran. Malmo is home to the largest Iraqi community outside of Iraq itself - up to half a million people, mostly Shiites. During the time of Saddam, Sweden cooperated with Iraq and willingly issued them visas. The Hard Line party advocates the prohibition of Islam and the deportation of all "non-Westerners" who have been granted asylum.

20. Bonduelle Managing Director Jerome Bonduelle dies in car crash.

21. Barbados is considering allowing visitors to stay for up to 12 months to work remotely, extending the previous limit for U.S. passport holders without a visa by six months.

22. Flying car with one aboard gets off the ground in Japanese test. SkyDrive hopes the flying hybrid vehicle will be a real-life product by 2023.

23. Elon Musk unveils pig with chip in its brain. Gertrude the pig is a prototype of a brain-to-machine interface.

24. Workers are fleeing farms to avoid mandatory COVID-19 testing.  California is ordering meat plants to close.

25. Balajis on San Francisco tech: “This is very different from the dotcom crash. These are fairly healthy companies paying to get out of SF. In summary: - Don't come to SF for tech - Do get out of SF if you can - Big numbers outweigh anecdotes - More companies will follow We're finally decentralizing technology.”

26. Why are there still not enough paper towels? Blame lean manufacturing. A decades-long effort to eke out more profit by keeping inventory low left many manufacturers unprepared when Covid-19 struck. And production is unlikely to ramp up significantly any time soon.

27. MGM Resorts lays off 18,000 previously furloughed employees. Six months after the coronavirus pandemic forced casinos nationwide to close, MGM Resorts is sending separation letters to 18,000 furloughed employees.

28. Boeing CEO pledges a 20 percent increase in black employees. Boeing is seeking to increase black US employees throughout the company by 20 percent and mandate benchmarks for hiring people of color, Chief Executive Dave Calhoun told employees in a memo on Friday.

29. Cashierless stores are popping up at gas stations, stadiums and even Dunkin’. The concept popularized by Amazon Go may be getting a lot bigger.

30. Apple has now terminated Epic’s App Store account following legal dispute between the two companies. As previously warned by Apple, Epic’s App Store account has now been terminated due to the Fortnite developer knowingly violating App Store policy. Epic Games still had a few apps available for iOS aside from Fortnite, and they were all removed. Fortnite for iOS was updated earlier this month with a new option that allowed users to purchase in-game items directly through Epic’s payment system instead of using Apple’s In-App Purchases. Once Apple removed Fortnite from the App Store, Epic Games started a public campaign and a legal battle against Apple, which led the Cupertino-based company to announce that it would terminate Epic’s developer account. Statement from Apple: “We are disappointed that we have had to terminate the Epic Games account on the App Store. We have worked with the team at Epic Games for many years on their launches and releases. The court recommended that Epic comply with the App Store guidelines while their case moves forward, guidelines they’ve followed for the past decade until they created this situation. Epic has refused. Instead they repeatedly submit Fortnite updates designed to violate the guidelines of the App Store. This is not fair to all other developers on the App Store and is putting customers in the middle of their fight. We hope that we can work together again in the future, but unfortunately that is not possible today.” Statement from Epic: “Apple's statement isn't forthright. They chose to terminate Epic's account; they didn't have to. Apple suggests we spammed the App Store review process. That's not so. Epic submitted three Fortnite builds: two bug-fix updates, and the Season 4 update with this note.”

31. Police say robbers are targeting Apple Store customers across Manhattan. At least 15 thefts have been reported. The NYPD says this has been happening all across the city since June 30. The most recent incident happened this past Sunday.

32. Scientists identify 50 new planets from old NASA data using artificial intelligence for the first time. These planets range from worlds as large as Neptune to those smaller than Earth and with orbits that range from as long as 200 days to as little as a single day.

33. Starfleet amendment puts Space Force in a political bind. Introduced by Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas), the proposal to use navy ranks got a prominent endorsement from the Starfleet captain himself, William Shatner. Before the House passed the so-called “Starfleet” amendment, Space Force officials had been internally debating a new rank structure to set the space branch apart from its parent service the U.S. Air Force. The amendment in the House version of the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act requires the Space Force to use the Navy’s rank structure. The proposal will be debated later this year in a House and Senate conference. The Senate would have to support the amendment for it to become law. Shatner lit an internet firestorm calling on the U.S. Space Force to adopt the Star Trek naval ranks for its officers and enlisted personnel. In an emoji-filled op-ed in Military Times Shatner said it should be obvious to everyone that space ships are led by captains, not colonels.
Crenshaw on Aug. 25 tweeted to Shatner: “I got you covered. My amendment passed out of the House, and instructs the Space Force to use Navy Ranks. We’ll be working to keep it in the NDAA!” Space Force officials declined to comment on Shatner’s article or on whether his views might carry any weight with lawmakers.

34. Top US general tells Congress the military won't play a role in the 2020 election.

35. From the Pope Valley, CA, fire: “My friends in Pope valley saw the most un natural form of lighting while out fighting the fires. They have never seen anything like it. A few of them think they are loosing their minds because it wasn’t normal. What they described was like a laser with an explosion.” Note: Pay attention to unnatural lightning patterns. Stay away from these regions.

36. A protestor was just shot in Portland near the Justice Center, reports of multiple shots fired, situation fluid. People are driving through crowds and spraying mace out of vehicles. Some are armed with paint ball funs and pepper spray.

37. Seattle Antifa group arrested in Kenosha with riot gear and controlled substances. Members of Riot Kitchen 206 have been arrested by authorities in Kenosha after police suspected that they were "…preparing for criminal activity related to the civil unrest."

38. Minneapolis officers requested to assist National Guard soldiers near Nicollet Mall and Alice Rainvile Place downtown for a group of “aggressive people.” Males tried to grab the weapons of the National Guard soldiers. Two suspects were detained after a short foot pursuit.

39. Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker activated up to 1,000 National Guard members in the state on Friday, though he's yet to give a reason for the order. The order began on Friday and will continue until the further order of the Adjutant General. The measure comes amid civil unrest in Kenosha, Wisconsin in the aftermath of the police shooting of Jacob Blake. National Guardsmen have been present in Massachusetts twice already in 2020. Once in March during the earliest stages of the response to the coronavirus pandemic, and again in late May in the days following the murder of George Floyd at the hands of officers. It is not believed that this order is related to the virus. In a statement, the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security said that "National guard personnel are deployed only at the request of, and in coordination with, the communities seeking support." The state is paying for the deployment of the National Guard this time around, unlike in March, when the federal government footed the bill.

40. In a bust that spanned just two weeks, Marshals were able to locate 39 missing or endangered children, many from the metro Atlanta area.

41. Shirtless, spear-wielding man allegedly stabs teen in Times Square. An apparently unhinged man stabbed a 15-year-old boy in the head with a makeshift spear in a random attack in Times Square.

42. University of Alabama has 1,200 students who have tested positive for Covid-19.

43. Activist Shaun King accused of profiting off Chadwick Boseman's death.

These pictures remind me of John Trump ⬇️

🇺🇸 — PHOTOS: A streak of lightening passes behind president Trump as he walked off Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews, Md. on Friday following a campaign rally in New Hampshire.

Wizard Trump 🧙‍♂️

Footage released by the Turkish ministry of defence shows Turkish and Greek F-16s chasing each other over the eastern Mediterranean yesterday and Turkish F-16s locking onto Greek F-16s.