How much have you missed?

Here’s a recap of this week. Just click the story to read on!

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Politics

• Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Trump’s nominee for Supreme Court, began his confirmation hearings this week, in spite of many Democrats pushing for these hearings to be delayed. After a number of documents of Kavanaugh’s personal records were withheld from the Senate until late the night before the hearing, giving senators little time to review them.
• Donald Trump tweeted his disappointment in Attorney General Jeff Sessions over the prosecution of two Republican representatives, whose chances at re-election now seem bleak, per Trump’s tweet.
• In other Trump Twitter news, Trump tweet-dissed former Secretary of State John Kerry regarding his potential presidential bid, stating “I should only be so lucky.”
• David Hogg, a Parkland school shooting survivor, with the help of social activists, have raised over $10,000 to post a billboard in Texas displaying an anti-Ted Cruz tweet posted by Donald Trump in 21016, in an effort to raise support of Cruz’s race against Democrat Beto O’Rourke.
• It was announced Tuesday that Governor of Arizona, Doug Ducey, picked Former Senator Jon Kyl to replace the Late Senator John McCain as representative of Arizona.
• Sen. Cory Booker released confidential Kavanaugh hearing documents to the public.
• Ayanna Pressley ousted 10-term Democrat Michael Capuano to win her primary in Massachusetts. She set to become the first black woman to represent Massachusetts on Capitol Hill because there isn't a Republican on the November ballot.

Pop culture

• Crazy Rich Asians continued to break box office records over Labor Day weekend, surpassinh $100 million, the most money of any movie during a labor day weekend in 11 years. It is the highest-grossing rom-com in Hollywood since 2009.
• The next Bachelor, 26-year old Colton Underwood, has been announced. Colton came in fourth place on the recent season of The Bachelorette, and appeared on season five of Bachelor in Paradise.
• Nike revealed their 30th anniversary Let’s Do It campaign, with football player Colin Kaepernick as the face of the campaign. Kaepernick was the first player to make the choice to kneel for the National Anthem in 2016. The headline of the campaign is, “believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything.” This campaign has sparked both admiration and outrage from the Twitter community.
• Lala Kent, of Vanderpump Rules, is officially engaged to her Hollywood producer boyfriend Randall Emmett. Rumors have begun to spark across Twitter about Lala becoming a future Real Housewife of Beverly Hills.
• Noah Cyrus and Lil Xan reportedly broke up over a Charlie Puth meme and cheating rumors.

Humanity

• The USA Gymnastics President, Kerry Perry, has resignedfrom her position as a result of the Larry Nassar sexual abuse scandal.
• After it was revealed that Steve Bannon would be the headliner at this year’s The New Yorker Festival in October, artists and speakers including John Mulaney, Judd Apatow, Jack Antonoff, and Jimmy Fallon withdrew their names from the lineup. Following the backlash, The New Yorker and its editor, David Remnick, announced that they had uninvited Bannon.
• The National Museum of Brazil was engulfed in an inferno this weekend, causing an estimated 20 million artifacts and pieces of artwork to be destroyed. Following the fire, protests broke out blaming the Brazilian Government’s spending cuts (i.e. inadequate maintenance of the building) on a ‘preventable’ travesty.
• Tropical Storm Gordon made landfall and the remnants are expected to survive through the Great Lakes.
• India has decriminalized gay sex with the Supreme Court overturning a colonial-era law.

Science says...

• NASA’s Parker Solar Probe launched this weekend on its mission to visit the sun and the corona, the sun’s outermost atmosphere. This is the first ever visit to a star.
• Scientists discovered a massive, hidden deep sea coral reef 160 miles off the coast of South Carolina. The reef was discovered during an ongoing deep-sea survey, this particular branch of which focused on mapping deep-sea canyons, gas seeps, and coral reefs. Researchers dove half a mile below the ocean’s surface, and certain mounds of coral were found up to 300 ft tall.
• Police and the FBI have started using real-time facial recognition to catch criminals; however, flaws have been identified in cases of innocent people visually resembling criminals.
• A new mechanism was found by Kumamoto University to activate bone-building cells in Osteoporosis patients. This signifies an advance in the progress of scientists developing therapeutic drugs for this disease, among other bone degenerative diseases.