TV News LIES

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission sued the country's three largest pharmacy benefit managers on Friday, accusing them of steering diabetes patients toward higher-priced insulin to reap millions of dollars in rebates from pharmaceutical companies.

The case accuses UnitedHealth Group Inc's Optum unit, CVS Health Corp's CVS Caremark and Cigna Corp's Express Scripts of unfairly excluding lower-cost insulin products from lists of drugs covered by insurers.

A Ukrainian drone attack on a Russian missile facility early Wednesday threw up towering fireballs visible from space and thundering detonations that triggered earthquake monitors.

Even by the standards of this incendiary conflict, video showing the blasts north of Moscow was remarkable.

Officials on both sides said it was the result of a large Ukrainian drone attack on Toropets, a town in the Tver region around 230 miles from the Russian capital. Russian state media has previously reported that the military was building an arsenal for storing missiles and other explosives there.

Speaking to reporters early Wednesday, Tver Gov. Igor Rudenya said that all drones in the region were shot down and that there was a fire on the ground as a result of debris from a downed drone. As he spoke, loud explosions could be heard in the background.

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A government funding package championed by Republican House speaker Mike Johnson failed to pass on Wednesday, with less than two weeks left to prevent a shutdown starting 1 October.

The final vote was 202 to 220, with 14 House Republicans and all but three House Democrats opposing the bill. Two Republican members voted “present”.

The bill was not expected to pass, as a number of House Republicans had voiced criticism of the proposal before the vote. Given Republicans’ narrow House majority and Democrats’ widespread opposition to the bill, Johnson could only afford a handful of defections within his conference. Johnson delayed a vote on the funding package last week in the hopes of consolidating Republicans’ support, but those efforts could not get the bill across the finish line.

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The administration of United States President Joe Biden says it is preparing a large aid package for Ukraine in the coming weeks as a debate continues over whether Ukrainian forces should be allowed to use Western-supplied weapons to strike farther inside Russia.

White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Saturday that Washington is working on a “substantial” round of further assistance for Kyiv and Biden will meet his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, this month.

“I do think we need a comprehensive strategy for success in this war, and that is what President Zelenskyy says he is bringing,” Sullivan said in remarks delivered via videolink at the Yalta European Strategy conference in Ukraine’s capital.

“So we are very much looking forward to sitting down and talking that through, and President Biden is eager for that conversation,” he said.

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A historic journey ended in tragedy this week when a Viking replica ship capsized off the coast of Norway, killing an American archaeologist who was part of its international crew.

The six-person team had been piloting the open wooden ship, named Naddodd, on a roughly 1,000-mile trip from the Faroe Islands to Trondheim, Norway.

"This expedition, honoring the Viking navigator Naddodd, aims to preserve Viking culture and navigational skills for future generations," Sail2North expeditions, which organized the voyage, said in an Instagram post in May.

The team — made up of four Swiss, one Faroese and one American — departed on Saturday from Suðuroy, the southernmost of the 18 Faroe Islands, for what was expected to be a several-day journey.

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Democrats sued Georgia state election officials on Monday, alleging new rules that could allow local officials to delay certification of November’s presidential results were illegal.

The lawsuit was filed in the superior court of Fulton county by local Georgia Democratic politicians, the Democratic National Committee and the Democratic party of Georgia. It says the rules approved by the Republican-controlled Georgia state election board this month were intended to give individual county election officials the ability to delay or cancel the certification of votes.

The lawsuit says the new rules “introduce substantial uncertainty in the post-election process and – if interpreted as their drafters have suggested – invite chaos by establishing new processes at odds with existing statutory duties”.

The Georgia secretary of state’s office, which oversees the board, did not respond to requests for comment.

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