The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports: The massive storm, which arrived on the 16th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, sent rescuers scrambling to retrieve people from attics as flood waters poured into places like Lafitte, LaPlace and Braithwaite. The winds, matching the highest speeds ever recorded in Louisiana, tore roofs off homes, toppled transmission towers and left historic buildings in ruin. But …

CTV News reports: A disgruntled customer at a Dairy Queen in Port Alberni, B.C., took out his frustration over being told to wear a mask by relieving himself in front of staff at the counter. The incident was captured on camera and appears to show the man urinating on the counter following an altercation with restaurant employees. In the video, …

The Lexington Herald-Leader reports: A woman who attended the University of Kentucky pleaded guilty Monday to a charge related to the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot. In federal court in Washington D.C., Gracyn Dawn Courtright pleaded guilty to a charge of entering and remaining in a restricted area, according to federal court records. She had faced more charges. Courtright, who …

The Insider reports: An Indiana woman has filed a lawsuit against the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and multiple retailers, alleging that their mask requirements violated laws meant to protect people with disabilities. Krispy Kreme, Sephora, and AMC Theatres were among the 16 named defendants in the lawsuit filed on August 18 by Jennifer Reinoehl in US District Court …

Fort Myers’ NBC News affiliate reports: The Lee County School District will now require masks for teachers and students, eliminating the opt-out form. The school superintendent made the announcement Monday. At a workshop meeting Monday, Superintendent Ken Savage said the mandate will be reassessed after that 30 days. “To those that are angry with this decision today, I will likely …

The Tampa Bay Times reports: Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran announced Monday that the state Department of Education has withheld funds from the Alachua and Broward county school districts in amounts equal to school board members’ monthly salaries. The move was a penalty for the school boards requiring students to wear masks during the COVID-19 pandemic, with exceptions only for students …

Axios reports: Vaccine hesitancy in the U.S. is showing signs of crumbling, according to the latest installment of the Axios/Ipsos Coronavirus Index. Fewer adults than ever now say they won’t take the shot, and in the past two weeks there has been a sharp increase in the share of parents who plan to get their younger kids vaccinated as soon …

The Daily Beast reports: Alex Berenson, the former New York Times reporter who became “the pandemic’s wrongest man,” suggested on Monday night that he would sue Twitter for banning his account for repeatedly violating the platform’s COVID-19 misinformation policy. And Fox News host Tucker Carlson not only urged the self-professed “COVID contrarian” to “sue the crap” out of the social …

The American Independent reports: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was asked on Monday why he has not called out members of his caucus for their dangerous anti-mask and anti-vaccine rhetoric. The Kentucky Republican said he did not think speaking out against other people was helpful. “I don’t think it serves any particular purpose to start criticizing others,” told a reporter …

The New York Times reports: A federal judge on Monday struck down a Trump-era environmental rule that drastically limited federal restrictions against pollution of millions of streams, wetlands and marshes across the country. The Biden administration had already begun the lengthy process of undoing the policy, which President Donald J. Trump established in 2020 to please real estate developers and …

Billboard Magazine reports: This year’s Burning Man festival is officially canceled, but that won’t stop thousands of people from gathering at the event’s traditional site in Northern Nevada this week for an unauthorized celebration in the same vein. Officials at the Bureau of Land Management — which controls Black Rock Desert, where Burning Man typically takes place the week before …

From a statement just issued by the White House: I want to thank our commanders and the men and women serving under them for their execution of the dangerous retrograde from Afghanistan as scheduled – in the early morning hours of August 31, Kabul time – with no further loss of American lives. The past 17 days have seen our …

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports: Gov. Brian Kemp committed up to 2,500 Georgia National Guard troops Monday to fighting the surge of COVID-19 cases across the state. While the 105 Guard members Kemp deployed to 10 hard-hit hospitals last week were medically trained, the newly assigned troops will be given non-medical assignments, the governor said. He said hospital executives have told …

Gothamist reports: New York State lawmakers are expected to reconvene in-person in Albany for a rare special session Wednesday to extend the eviction moratorium through next January, while Governor Kathy Hochul attempts to speed up payment of more than $2 billion in federal rent relief funds to tenants in need. There are other pressing but thorny issues Hochul had said …

The Tallahassee Democrat reports: A Tallahassee-based judge on Monday ruled that Gov. Ron DeSantis has the authority to block additional federal unemployment benefits to jobless Floridians. Circuit Judge Layne Smith denied a request for a temporary injunction on DeSantis’ decision in June to have Florida withdraw from the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC) program. FPUC, which runs through Sept. 6, …

News One reports: Candace Owens’ reported absence at an event in Texas because of a “sudden illness” has sparked rumors that the conservative anti-vaccine champion may have come down with COVID-19 after spending more than a year dismissing it as nothing more than a hoax designed to infringe on freedoms enjoyed by Americans. Owens, who has bragged about traveling internationally …

Law & Crime reports: As high-profile conservative attorney John Pierce [photo] reportedly grapples with COVID-19, an employee has started appearing on behalf of suspected Jan. 6th rioters. That employee, Ryan Marshall, has been charged with felonies and is “not a licensed attorney,” federal prosecutors told a judge on Monday. Marshall was the same associate who reportedly told a judge in …

NBC News reports: The United States has finished its evacuation efforts from Kabul’s airport, the Pentagon said Monday, effectively ending America’s longest war. As of early Monday, Western forces evacuated 1,200 people out of the Afghan capital on 26 military cargo aircraft flights in a 24-hour period, according to the latest figures from the White House. Since the mass evacuations …

The New York Times reports: Prescriptions for ivermectin have seen a sharp rise in recent weeks, jumping to more than 88,000 per week in mid-August from a prepandemic baseline average of 3,600 per week, according to researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Calls to poison control centers about ivermectin exposures have risen dramatically, jumping fivefold over their …

Politico reports: California, New York and Louisiana are deploying SMART Health Cards developed by the Vaccination Credential Initiative, a consortium of health and technology companies that includes Apple, Microsoft and the Mayo Clinic. At least a half dozen other states are considering adopting the credentials. “It’s an elegant solution. It works well, it’s open-source,” said Rick Klau, California’s chief technology …