President Joe Biden tripped and fell after handing out the last diploma at a graduation ceremony at the U.S. Air Force Academy on Thursday.
The 80-year-old U.S. president quickly got up on one knee helped by three people and walked back to his seat unassisted.
As Biden was helped up, he pointed behind him, seeming to indicate what he tripped over.
White House communications director Ben LaBolt said on Twitter that Biden was fine. "There was a sandbag on stage while he was shaking hands," he explained.
The fall came after Biden delivered a commencement address to a flag-waving audience where he warned graduates they will enter service in an increasingly unstable world, citing challenges from Russia and China.
Biden is running for re-election in 2024. Doctors declared him healthy and fit for duty after a physical examination in February.
Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping on May 30 told his top national security officials to be ready for “worst case scenarios” and “stormy seas”.
Xi was addressing officials attending the first National Security Commission meeting since the CCP’s 20th National Congress last year, according to state-run Xinhua.
As commission chairman, Xi said they must deeply understand “the complexity and difficulty of the national security issues we now face have increased significantly.” Xi called on CCP officials to carry forward the “spirit of struggle” and “must adhere to bottom-line thinking and worst-case-scenario thinking, and get ready to undergo the major tests of high winds and rough waves, and even perilous, stormy seas.”
Xi’s use of “bottom-line thinking and worst-case-scenario thinking” has drawn the outside world’s attention.
Wang He, China affairs commentator and The Epoch Times columnist, wrote: “This may be the first time in a top political meeting of the CCP that the two terms are used together. The combination of these two terms shows that the tone of the National Security Commission meeting is really combative.
“When the CCP faces the most dangerous time for it, it acts most viciously. It also means the CCP is at its weakest point and using ferocious acts to cover up its inner weakness.”
‘Complex and Grave’
Xi also emphasized the regime must speed up the modernization of the military, making it more effective in “actual combat and practical use,” as the CCP faces a “complex and grave” situation in terms of national security.
Regarding Xi’s latest assessment of the situation in the meeting, China affairs observer Zhong Yuan told The Epoch Times that this is equivalent to admitting that after the CCP’s 20th Party Congress last year, the new top national security officials were active but did not improve the situation.
“National security issues for the CCP, on the contrary, have deteriorated significantly,” Zhong said.
“This assessment is unusual, as the situation should have improved after the new national security commission came to power. But now they finally admitted the true situation, which shows that the CCP top officials are indeed more worried,” he said.
Since last year, a series of measures taken by the United States, such as the containment of the CCP in the high-tech sector, the arrests of Chinese spies, the shutdown of China’s overseas secret police stations, and sanctions against Chinese officials, are all powerful countermeasures against the regime’s global expansion and infiltration. Other countries are also following suit.
“The top circle of the CCP should obviously feel that the pressure from the international community is increasing,” Zhong said.
“Now the CCP dares not openly advocate for war, but instead claims to ‘take the initiative to shape an external security environment that is beneficial to us’. They must be really afraid of any counterattacks and being defeated.”
In the meeting, Xi also required the construction of a national security risk monitoring and early warning system, enhanced national security education, and improved data and AI security management.
“The CCP is not only afraid of external pressure,” Zhong said. “But it is also afraid of internal problems, so Xi requires maintaining political security and improving the management of data and artificial intelligence security.”
Moscow signed 10 new cooperation agreements with Iran for the oil sector alone on 18 May.
China waited for the dust to settle before it too signed new cooperation agreements with Iran on 23 May.
China has significantly expanded its influence in the Middle East in order to secure sufficient hydrocarbon supplies to fuel its economic growth.
The last week or so has seen a flurry of major cooperation agreements - including in energy, security, and logistics – between various permutations of Iran, Iraq, Russia, and China. Like a very dark version of the old U.S. soap opera parody ‘Soap’ this real-life version is equally convoluted, albeit a lot less funny. Its key elements constitute a significant part of the new global oil market order, which is analysed in depth in my new book on the subject, but the three most recent principal cooperation agreements will have immediate consequences for oil and gas flows around the world and their pricing.
The best place to start here is at the end point of what China wants in its grand scheme of things, as delineated in its multi-generational power-grab project, ‘One Belt, One Road’. What it wants is to turn the Middle East into a large oil and gas station by which it can fuel its economic growth to overtake the U.S. as the number one superpower by 2030. The three biggest oil and gas reserves in the region belong to Iran, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia, so it wants to control those to begin with. For Russia, which already has lots of oil and gas – over which China already has significant control – the objectives in the Middle East are more varied. One objective is to continue to exert influence in several countries that it regards as being key to maintaining some of its hold over the Former Soviet Union states. Another, more recent one, is to use this influence to bolster its position as a partner of note to China. As for the other countries in this soap opera –Iran, and Iraq, and now also more clearly, Saudi Arabia – they are in this new global alliance partly for the economic and political support from China (and to a lesser degree, Russia) and because their political systems are naturally much closer to the authoritarian regimes of China and Russia than they are to the democratic ones of the U.S. and its allies.
To the money shot, then, which was Iran and Iraq signing a new set of oil and gas agreements within the last two weeks. As also analysed in full in my new book on the new global oil market order, Iran has long exerted enormous influence over its neighbour directly and indirectly through its political, economic, and military proxies. Iraq was always pre-disposed to such cooperation in the energy sector, as the two countries share several of their biggest oil reservoirs. These include Azadegan (on the Iran side)/Majnoon (on the Iraq side), Azar/Badra, Yadavaran/Sinbad, Naft Shahr/Naft Khana, Dehloran/Abu Ghurab, West Paydar/Fakka and Arvand/South Abu Ghurab. This has long proven extremely useful to Iran in avoiding sanctions, as oil from its side of these reservoirs can easily be re-branded as non-sanctioned Iraqi oil and then shipped anywhere in the world. It has also proven a useful tool for Iraq through which it can extort billions of dollar from the U.S. by promising to stop the import of Iranian electricity and gas, only to renegue on those promises the second the money hits the downtown Baghdad bank accounts. The latest cooperation agreements strengthen all these ties between Iran-Iraq further.
Cue the other recent cooperation agreements aimed at making sure that whatever is Iran’s (including control over Iraq’s oil and gas reserves) it is also China’s and Russia’s. First up was Moscow, signing 10 new cooperation agreements with Iran for the oil sector alone on 18 May. According to a source who works closely with Iran’s Petroleum Ministry spoken to exclusively last week by OilPrice.com, the agreements comprise six memorandums of understanding, two contracts, one broader military cooperation roadmap, and another roadmap related to bilateral cooperation in the fields of industry, transfer of technology and oil recovery enhancement. In essence, these add up to a renewal and extension of the previous five-year and 10-year rolling agreements between Russia and Iran as also analysed in full in my new book. These allow Russia (together with China in separate agreements, to be covered in a moment) to have its firms present in any oil and gas field in Iran that Moscow chooses. It also allows for the exchange of the most promising military officers between the two countries and for Russia to have full access to Iran’s airports and seaports. Additionally, it allows for continued cooperation in other military and security matters, including intelligence, equipment and technology sharing.
Russia’s man in Iran - Deputy Prime Minister and co-chair of the Permanent Russian-Iranian Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation, Alexander Novak – stressed as well that the two countries are working on on banking interactions and using their national currencies in bilateral transactions. Further progress was also made on the North-South Transport Corridor (NSTC), with several agreements reached in the rail, road, maritime, and air transport sectors. Moscow is interested in developing the corridor all the way to India and beyond. Aside from boosting trade between Russia and Iran through the Caspian and Persian Gulf regions, these routes would also provide many opportunities for ‘dual purpose’ use – both civilian and military - of the airports and seaports.
Always looking to make a big entrance, China waited for the dust to settle before it too signed new cooperation agreements with Iran on 23 May. According to the Iran source spoken to by OilPrice.com, these agreements were simply nailing down some of the remaining details on financial, investment, and energy cooperation contained in the ‘Iran-China 25-Year Comprehensive Cooperation Agreement’ first revealed anywhere in the world in my 3 September 2019 article on the subject and covered in depth as well in my new book. In the 25-Year Agreement, China is guaranteed oil and gas prices from Iran at least 30 percent lower than the relevant oil pricing benchmarks. However, since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, China has been demanding an extra discount on Iranian oil to the 30 percent discount at which it can currently also buy Russian oil, according to the Iran source. “On average, the Chinese discount for Iranian crude oil to the international benchmark over the last 12 months has been around 44 percent,” he said. “But, it is even worse for Iran, as – from 11 November 2022 - China has been paying Iran in non-convertible Yuan, that is Yuan that can only be used inside China and/or spent buying Chinese goods,” he added. “Worse still is that whilst Yuan is the key instrument in payment, China is also using the currencies of Angola, Zambia and Kenya to pay Iran, and China is doing this as a means to induce Iran to buys goods from these countries so that these countries, in turn, can service their loans to China,” he concluded.
Submitted a new drug application (NDA) for troriluzole in Spinocerebellar Ataxia Type 3 (SCA3) to U.S. FDA in 2Q2023, marking the team's fourth NDA in approximately 3 years
Released additional data from Kv7 platform, including Phase 1 safety data by dose groups for BHV-7000 that further validates differentiated profile
Projected Phase 3 Spinal Muscular Atrophy trial to complete enrollment in 2023
Initiated Phase 1 study of brain penetrant TYK2/JAK1 inhibitor, BHV-8000, and anticipate beginning Phase 2 trial in Parkinson's disease next year
Highlighted robust pipeline with multiple INDs planned to be filed within the next year, including pan IgG degrader for multiple immune-mediated diseases in 2023
From the outside, Gourmet Deli at 90th Street and First Avenue seems like every other deli spread across the city.
On a typical morning, various locals pop in for bacon, egg and cheese bagel sandwiches and $1.50 drip coffee.
But, another wave of customers is flooding in through food delivery apps — only they don’t know they’re ordering from a bodega.
The deli located at 1741 First Avenue is advertised as no less than 27 different restaurants across Uber Eats, Postmates, Grubhub, Seamless and DoorDash.
Each spot has a cutesy name highlighting a type of food offered and variations of the same menu with different pricing.The several virtual restaurants listed for First Avenue Gourmet Deli sell tuna melts for $16 or $17 while the deli prices theirs at $9.While the store names, photos, descriptions and prices all vary, all the tuna melts are being made in the same kitchen by the same staff.
Each spot has an eerily similar menu, but prices can differ — especially from the original outpost.
Princess Panini, Empire State Panini, and Panini Fantasy all offer a Tuna Melt Panini for $16 to $17. First Avenue Gourmet Deli sells theirs for $9.
During the pandemic, virtual restaurants — in which a single brick-and-mortar space operates a number of “delivery only” operations under different names — sprang up as businesses looked for new revenue streams. They rose alongside, and are often confused with, ghost kitchens, in which an existing restaurant is rented by a new crew to operate a delivery-only kitchen.
Both business models continue to exist — in a quick sweep, The Post found 10 delis across the five boroughs that operated, on average, eight different “restaurants” — but some customers say the virtual spots feel like false advertising.
In a viral thread on Twitter, numerous users weighed in to say they felt “tricked” to discover the restaurant they were ordering from was actually a chain restaurant or, worse, a gas station.
Virtual restaurants are single brick-and-mortar spaces that operate a number of “delivery only” operations under different names while ghost kitchens are where a new crew rents out an existing restaurant to operate a delivery-only kitchen.Tamara Beckwith
“‘Virtual Brand’ = always a no. Sorry if they’re great, I’ll never know. It seems irresponsible, like where is the chain of liability if someone gets sick from the food??” @ChismesYPuteria tweeted.
“Idk if this is misleading or straight up ‘scammy,'” @LutfilLeHadi said of the practice on Twitter.
The Post spoke to a manager at Gourmet Deli who said they were aware of the various online listings but not privy to details. They said the partner who manages the online brands was out of the country and could not be reached.
In some cases, a chain restaurant will list itself as a different brand to appeal to more customers. Denny’s, one of the country’s largest chains, also offers its menu, for delivery only, under the name the Meltdown.
The desserts displayed in the casing at Gourmet Deli are sold online by La Bella Italian Desserts.Tamara Beckwith
The Meltdown’s branding — “handcrafted sandwiches with attitude” — is quite distinct from Denny’s: “always open, always serving your favorites.”
Hospitality insiders note that virtual kitchens aren’t necessarily good for the industry.
“They add more competition to an already competitive marketplace and can harm existing restaurants,” Andrew Rigie, executive director of NYC Hospitality Alliance, told The Post. “If all of a sudden there’s multiple virtual brands competing with your brand online, it undercuts and undermines your business and makes it that much more difficult.”
Most delis and bodegas in the city are classified as “stores,” “supermarkets” and “food manufacturers,” and regulated by New York State’s Department of Agriculture and Markets not the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
Customers and restauranteurs have concerns about the health and safety of these establishments noting that most delis and bodegas in the city are classified as “stores,” “supermarkets” and “food manufacturers,” and regulated by New York State’s Department of Agriculture and Markets not the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.Tamara Beckwith
As such, they are not subject to the same letter grades and inspections as traditional restaurants.
Delivery platforms have, for the most part, allowed — and in some cases even encouraged — virtual restaurants to proliferate.
On its website, Grubhub, which owns Seamless, promotes virtual restaurants as “the food industry’s secret weapon” that “boost profits” by allowing companies to “capture new business with very low risk.”
DoorDash’s website says that virtual kitchens offer “operators new opportunities to expand their business” by driving additional sales and enabling “restaurants to provide consistent shifts to their employees.”
Uber Eats, however, recently announced plans to crack down on the practice and remove 5,000 online storefronts.
It’s a “Wild West, anything goes kind of situation,” Uber Eats’ John Mullenholz told the Wall Street Journal. “It’s fair to say that kind of erodes consumer confidence.”
But, some people are happy so long as the meals are good.
