Here’s what you need to know today to Get Up to Speed and Out the Door.
1. Mosul
After seemingly endless delays, the battle to liberate Mosul began this morning. ISIS has held the city – Iraq’s second-largest – for years, and winning it back will deal a major blow. But the fight won’t be easy. It’s expected to last weeks, and possibly months, and will involve more than 54,000 Iraqi troops.
2. Campaign 2016
Donald Trump and his surrogates spent the weekend telling anyone who’d listen the election’s rigged by — who else? — the media to get Hillary Clinton elected. Could it be because he’s running out of ways to win? A CNN poll of polls this morning shows Clinton leading 47% to 39%.
3. Elections ugliness
Emotions are starting to run a little too hot over — and let’s just call it what it is — the worst election ever. A NC GOP office was firebombed. And The Arizona Republic, which endorsed a Democrat for the first time ever, is getting nasty death threats. We know you don’t like your choices, people, but really?
4. Syria
We can’t – and shouldn’t – tune out the awful toll Aleppo is paying as the Syrian regime tries to wrest it back from rebels. Airstrikes killed at least 45 yesterday and today. The US and UK are now considering slapping Syria and its ally, Russia, with sanctions. Will it work? Who knows. Nothing else has.
5.Hurricane Matthew
A week after the storm passed, the slow motion disaster is still dumping misery. The US death toll now stands at 46, 26 in North Carolina alone. I was there all last week and things are bad. Here’s my story on 200 residents of an apartment complex who rescued themselves from the floodwaters when help didn’t arrive.
Breakfast Browse
People are talking about these. Read up. Join in.
Hot seller
Beyonce’s not the only one who can sell “Lemonade.” A 7-year-old boy sold $2,285 of it for over two years to buy himself a pony.
Cost cutter
Want to cut down the cost of that haircut? If you’re a kid, head up to this Michigan barbershop which knocks two bucks off if they read out loud.
RIP Jia Jia
Jia Jia, the world’s oldest panda in captivity, was euthanized over the weekend at a Hong Kong zoo. She was 38.
Hot stepper
Some artists make a statement with watercolors or marble. Not Cai Guo-Qiang. He needs a 1,650-foot flaming ladder in the sky to make his point.
And finally …
Press on
Oh, the things we’ll do (and watch) when we have too much time on our hands. Like this guy sticking a bunch of giant playing cards in a hydraulic press.