Top of the Fold

• DC calls in National Guard ahead of coming trucker convoy: Joe Biden’s Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin approved a request from the DC Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) and the U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) to send National Guard troops to help deal with the soon-to-be-arriving trucker Freedom Convoy protest. Some 400 unarmed National Guard members will be deployed to assist the MPD and USCP to “provide support at designated traffic posts, provide command and control, and cover sustainment requirements.” The Freedom Convoy, which is protesting Biden’s COVID mandates and other pandemic-related restrictions, plans to arrive in Washington prior to Biden’s State of the Union Address and will seek to shut down the Capital Beltway. Protest organizer Bob Bolus explained, “I’ll give you an analogy of that of a giant boa constrictor. That basically squeezes you, chokes you and it swallows you, and that’s what we’re going to do to DC.” Bolus notes that the truckers would leave one lane open for emergency traffic.

• America’s obesity epidemic: Is it COVID or the nation’s high obesity rate that’s primarily responsible for killing more than 900,000 Americans? With 78.4 million Americans having contracted COVID, the resulting death percentage is 1.19%, but a significant percentage of those who were hospitalized and died from COVID were obese. The Journal Record observed: “Multiple studies have concluded that people who are obese who come down with COVID-19 are more likely than others to become severely ill. … In fact, health care professionals believe obesity can triple the risk of hospitalization.” From the very beginning of the COVID pandemic, it was known that obesity increased one’s risk, and the resulting data only underscores this reality. Obesity and the litany of other comorbidities associated with it such as diabetes and heart disease may be the biggest factor behind COVID’s morbidity rate.

• AP investigation finds Fort Ord had toxic chemicals in groundwater and military knew about it: The result of an Associated Press investigation into the “connection between toxic substances at California’s Fort Ord and illnesses among those who lived and worked there” concluded that there were indeed high levels of trichloroethylene (TCE) in the decommissioned U.S. Army base’s groundwater. TCE is a human carcinogen linked to various blood cancers. As early as 1985, scientists discovered the presence of TCE along with several other toxics in Fort Ord’s drinking water supply above the legal drinking limit. A 1985 memo shows that the U.S. Army knew there were TCE and other toxins in Fort Ord’s groundwater and brought in contractors to clean it up but warned them not to tell the public. The Defense Department does not track service personnel chemical exposures, nor has the Department of Veterans Affairs engaged in “comprehensive epidemiological studies to determine whether veterans are getting ill from their service.”

Headlines

• Supreme Court to hear Colorado case over religious liberty, LGBTQ “rights” (National Review)

• U.S. Soccer caves to baseless “equal pay” outrage, settles big with women’s team (Washington Examiner)

• Former lovers of Hunter Biden spill on his lavish spending as feds eye “tax affairs” (Fox News)

• BLM hires Clinton aide who paid for Steele dossier to sort shady finances (New York Post)

• COVID infections plummet 90% from U.S. pandemic high (CNBC)

• Phil Mickelson apologizes for explosive Saudi golf comments, loses sponsor (New York Post)

• Colombia decriminalizes abortion (Daily Wire)

• Policy: Biden’s next economic nightmare: An oil price shock? (1945)

• Satire: Ottawa Senators change name to Ottawa Dictators (Babylon Bee)

For more of today’s editors’ choice headlines, visit Headline Report.

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