New York — Kyle Rittenhouse, who was was found not guilty of charges stemming from killing two men and wounding another during the unrest that followed the shooting of a Black man by a white police officer, says in a new interview that he's "not a racist person" and supports the Black Lives Matter movement. "This case has nothing to do with race. It never had anything to do with race. It had to do with the right to self-defense," the 18-year-old tells Fox News host Tucker Carlson in an interview set to air Monday night. Rittenhouse is white, as were the men he shot. "I'm not a racist person. I support the BLM movement, I support peacefully demonstrating," Rittenhouse tells Carlson in excerpts of the interview released by Fox News ahead of its airing. "The jury reached the correct verdict -- self-defense is not illegal," Rittenhouse said, according to Agence France-Presse. "I'm glad that everything went well. ... We made it through the hard part." A spokesman for the Rittenhouse family, David Hancock, told CBS Milwaukee affiliate WDJT-TV Rittenhouse is ready to move on and be a free 18-year-old man. Hancock said Rittenhouse was "dragged through the mud" with lies this past year, adding that he's a caring, empathetic and civic-minded young man. "He's got some things to say and I think ... you're going to be even more surprised by who Kyle actually is, (the) more people get to know him better," Hancock said. Rittenhouse was 17 last year when he traveled 20 miles from his home in Antioch, Illinois, to Kenosha, Wisconsin, which had been racked with protests in the wake of the Aug. 23 shooting of Jacob Blake. That shooting and the response in Kenosha - protests that turned destructive - became part of the national reckoning over police use of force against Black people following George Floyd's death in Minneapolis the previous May at the hands of police.
Rittenhouse, armed with an AR-style semiautomatic rifle, joined others who said they were intent on protecting private property from potential damage on Aug. 25. During his trial, prosecutors argued that the teenager was a "wannabe soldier" who went looking for trouble that night. Rittenhouse countered that he fired in self-defense after he was attacked and was in fear for his life. The shootings quickly made Rittenhouse a rallying cry for supporters of Second Amendment rights and those angered by the sometimes violent protests seen in some American cities after Floyd's death. Rittenhouse was photographed in a bar before the trial with apparent members of the far-right Proud Boys. Rittenhouse's attorneys have said he is not a white supremacist. A jury last Friday found Rittenhouse not guilty on charges of homicide, attempted homicide and reckless endangering in the deaths of Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and the wounding of Gaige Grosskreutz, now 28. In an interview on the CBS News broadcast "Face the Nation" Sunday, NAACP president and CEO Derrick Johnson said the trial was a "warning shot" for Black communities that "vigilante justice" can be allowed in this country or "in particular communities." "It's hard for African-Americans to reconcile what we witnessed in that trial. We have far too many individuals sitting in jail for crimes they didn't commit or overcharged for crimes that were committed," Johnson said. He said the "current political environment" and former President Trump's administration "opened the door" for the case to become politicized. - CBS News
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Poll garnered more than 3.5 million votes; sale would amount to close to $21B US based on Friday's closing Tesla, Inc. CEO Elon Musk should sell about 10 per cent of his company stock, according to 57.9 per cent of people who voted on his Twitter poll asking users of the social media network whether he should offload the stake.
"I was prepared to accept either outcome," Musk said, after the voting ended. The world's richest person tweeted on Saturday that he would offload 10 per cent of his stock if users approved the proposal. Musk has previously said he would have to exercise a large number of stock options in the next three months, which would create a big tax bill. Selling some of his stock could free up funds to pay the taxes. As of June 30, Musk's shareholding in Tesla came to about 170.5 million shares, and selling 10 per cent would amount to close to $21 billion US based on Friday's closing, according to Reuters calculations. The poll garnered more than 3.5 million votes. "Much is made lately of unrealized gains being a means of tax avoidance, so I propose selling 10% of my Tesla stock," Musk said on Saturday, adding that he does not take cash salary or bonus "from anywhere," and only has stock. U.S. Senate Democrats have unveiled a proposal to tax billionaires' stocks and other tradeable assets to help finance President Joe Biden's social spending agenda and fill a loophole that has allowed them to defer capital gains taxes indefinitely. Musk has criticized the proposal, saying, "Eventually, they run out of other people's money and then they come for you." U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, who chairs the Senate's finance committee and floated the tax proposal, said on Saturday: "Whether or not the world's wealthiest man pays any taxes at all shouldn't depend on the results of a Twitter poll." His brother, Kimbal Musk, on Friday sold 88,500 Tesla shares, becoming the latest board member to offload a large number of Tesla stock, which hit record highs. A week ago, Musk said on Twitter that he would sell $6 billion US in Tesla stock and donate it to the United Nations' World Food Programme, provided the organization disclosed more information about how it spent its money. Gary Black, a portfolio manager at The Future Fund who's bullish on Tesla, tweeted that Musk's potential stock sale would lead to "1-2 days of modest selling pressure" but that there would be solid institutional demand to snap up the shares at a discount. Musk has said he did not want to borrow against stock to pay taxes because stock value could go down. He has an option to buy 22.86 million shares at $6.24 US each, which expires on Aug. 13, 2022, according to a Tesla filing. The option exercise could lead to gains of roughly $28 billion US based on Tesla's Friday closing price of $1,222.09 US. In September, Musk said he is likely to pay taxes of over half the gains he would make from exercising options. Last year, he said he relocated from California to Texas, which should lead to a cut to the total tax bill because Texas has no income tax, experts say. "[It] seems crazy to borrow that much to pay taxes, so I have to assume he'd need to liquidate a substantial amount of the shares purchased from the option exercise to pay taxes," said Bryan Springmeyer, a lawyer at San Francisco-based law firm Springmeyer Law. - CBC News The Golden State Warriors look like legitimate title contenders this season. They have the best record in the NBA following a 120-107 win over the Houston Rockets. They have scored the second-most points per game (113.9) and allowed the second-fewest (100.2). Head coach Steve Kerr’s squad has been feasting on the back of dizzying ball movement and throttling defense. The Warriors left the Chase Center with another win Sunday despite running into some foul trouble in the first half. It was an offensive back-and-forth for much of the first half, but a 20-2 Warriors run in the third quarter sealed the victory. Guards Jordan Poole and Steph Curry led the way in scoring, with 45 combined points. Forward Otto Porter Jr. flashed his smooth shooting once again to chip in off the bench as well The Rockets were the first team to shoot better than 30% from three-point range in a game since Oct. 26 when the Oklahoma City Thunder hit 35% of their looks from deep. The Warriors have played five games since then, winning all but one – an overtime loss to the Memphis Grizzlies. The Warriors put up a solid shooting night, hitting 51.8% from the floor and 32.6% from deep. It was the ball movement that stole the show, though, as they assisted 31 baskets as a team Sunday. Here are some player grades from the win. Sporting a new haircut, star guard Steph Curry put up a respectable 20 points on 8-for-16 shooting with four threes. He found himself in foul trouble in the second quarter, but, like the rest of the team, he figured that out in the second half. His plus-16 was the highest among the starting unit as well. He didn’t play in the fourth quarter, likely due to the Warriors’ back-to-back. Overall a solid night for Curry. He has not had to shoulder as much of the scoring load with the rest of the lineup picking up the slack. He was also visibly engaged with teammates when he was on the bench. Forward Draymond Green has been an active participant in the Warriors’ passing game this season, hitting back-door cutters and kicking the ball to open shooters. He led the team in assists Sunday with nine to go alongside eight rebounds and six points. He also chipped in a block and a steal as well.
This type of stat-line is fairly normal for Green, but he also had six turnovers and four fouls on the night too. That’s where his grade suffers. He did, however, make some nice plays, including a full-court dash for a loose ball in the first quarter that got some of his teammates going. - USA TODAY Mariah Carey kicks off the holidays early with 'All I Want For Christmas Is You' teaser: 'It's time'11/1/2021 Holiday purists aren't going to like this one – Mariah Carey, the queen of Christmas, has already announced "it's time" to get into the holiday spirit with her iconic jam, "All I Want For Christmas Is You."
Call her the Punxsutawney Phil of the holiday season: Carey is now signifying that Halloween has ended and it's time to begin the holiday season. Shortly after midnight Monday, Carey posted a video to social media in which she walks out of her front door wielding a candy cane-striped baseball bat as a clock chimes. Three pumpkins outside are carved to read "IT'S NOT TIME," but the pop icon smashes the middle one as her 1994 Christmas classic begins playing. "It's time," she sing-songs, holding up Christmas ornaments while showing off a sparkly red Santa-inspired getup complete with white fur trim and a black belt with a gold buckle. Other than kicking off the holidays early, Carey appeared to be teasing more presents to come: "11/5" was marked on one gift, which could hint at something new coming Friday. But as a friendly reminder, there are more holidays to go through before we can really start thinking about hanging stockings or waiting under the mistletoe. "It's time!!! To smash that pumpkin and treat it as pie," the video concluded with a text graphic. "Cause we still gotta get through Thanksgiving!!!" Last year, Carey brought some holiday cheer with "Mariah Carey's Magical Christmas Special," which featured plenty of musical performances and celebrity cameos, including Ariana Grande, Jennifer Hudson, Snoop Dogg, Bette Midler and Billy Eichner. Carey spoke with USA TODAY in 2019 to celebrate the 25th anniversary of "All I Want For Christmas Is You," though according to the pop legend, it was as if no time had passed at all. "It's so funny, somebody was just asking me, 'What were you doing 25 Christmases ago?' " Carey said. "I would probably say somebody was giving me a bottle and they were singing me a sweet lullaby Christmas tune. Because I was just one year old, so I don't know!" "It's very much like I live in the land of the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus," she added wryly. "I don't acknowledge time, I don't know what it is. I rebuke it!" 'I don't acknowledge time':Mariah Carey on 'All I Want For Christmas is You' turning 25 Coming off the success of her 1993 third album "Music Box," which was No. 1 for eight non-consecutive weeks, Carey's team came to her with the idea of recording a holiday album. "Originally, I was like, 'This is a little bit too early in my career to do a Christmas album,' " Carey said. "I didn't understand why it was being suggested to me." But she decided to give it a shot anyway. Sharing a home with then-husband Tommy Mottola in upstate New York at the time, she recalled sitting alone at a keyboard one day and starting to play what would soon become "All I Want." "I really started with thinking, 'What are all the things I think about at Christmas?' Lights, presents, stockings, fireplaces," Carey said. "I've always loved Christmas so much my entire life, but I grew up not having a lot of money and not being able to experience it like the other kids did. I wanted Christmas to be perfect, but for a lot of different reasons, it didn't always end up working out well, coming from such a dysfunctional family. So I think when I wrote it, I just put every ounce of longing for that perfect moment in it." - USA Today |
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