Your Summit Weekly Briefing

By Jovani Contreras, Ethan Ignatovsky, Diana Morales and Sean Quigley

Staff Editors

Disclaimer: Though the Weekly Briefings are no longer tagged in the Opinions section of Summit News and we try to remain as unbiased as possible, our opinions may show through in this article, especially in the “Actions” section.  

Content Warning: Mentions of explicit themes occur in the third section of “General News” and in “Actions”. 

Summit:

1. Seniors: As of Oct. 1, the 2023 FAFSA has officially opened. Make sure to fill out the FAFSA as soon as possible to maximize your financial aid. If you need assistance completing the document, certain Summit sites will be holding college application fairs to help parents and students complete the FAFSA.

General News:

1. Recently in Florida, immigrant workers have been heading over to help with the Hurricane cleanup, undaunted by DeSantis. Ron DeSantis had made a public announcement that he would do his best to keep immigrants from coming to Florida. But, just as he made this public display, a growing number of immigrants started coming to Florida because of Hurricane Ian’s destruction. Saket Soni states “They’re arriving from New York, from Louisiana, from Houston and Dallas,” an executive director of the nonprofit Resilience Force. He advocates for thousands of disaster response workers and the group is made up of mostly immigrants who are undocumented. These workers go across the US to help clean up and rebuild when hurricanes happen. DeSantis does not support the disaster response workers organization coming to Florida and helping clean up because they are immigrants. He told reporters they are illegal in this country and should be sent back to their home countries. He stated, “I’d drag them out by their collars, and I’d send them back to where they came from.” Sergio Chavez, an associate professor of sociology at Rice University who studies Mexican roofers, states that these workers play an important role in the state’s recovery and DeSantis will not be scaring them away. 

Health/Medicine: 

1. Remember the Ice Bucket Challenge ? It was created  in 2014 by the ALS Association and now, in 2022, the benefits of the challenge are making an exceptionally positive impact. The Ice Bucket Challenge raised $2.2 million for the manufacturing of a new drug to fight against ALS (Lou Gherig’s disease). This past week, that drug, known as Relyvrio, was approved by the FDA. However, it didn’t come without some controvery. The drug’s opponents point out that the clinical trial of the drug only included 137 patients. Those for the drug pointed out that the study concluded Relyvrio could extend people’s lives by five months or more. Patient advocacy groups helped get Relyvrio a second chance with the FDA advisory board which led to the drug being approved. A larger study of the drug known as PHEONIX is expected to conclude in 2024, and the drug’s sponsor, Amylyx Pharmaceuticals, said they will pull the drug from the market if Relyvrio was to fail the PHEONIX study. Amylyx are also committed to making the drug as affordable as possible. Relyvrio is a huge accomplishment in the fight against ALS, but it’s not enough for the ALS association who are still using the more then $115 million from the ice bucket challenge to fund ALS research around the world. 
2. A new drug created by Scripps Research Institute’s Neurodegeneration New Medicines Center founding director, and professor of neurosciences and neurology at the University of San Diego School of Medicine and Yale School of Medicine, Dr. Stuart Lipton, along his team, might be able to truely end Covid. The drug the team created is called NMT5, it can be taken orally or through inhalation, and could stop the spread of Covid. NMT5 alters the virus which stops it from attacking cells that covid usually attaches to, meaning the virus isn’t able to infect those cells. This theoretically means if someone were to “spread Covid” they would just be spreading a virus that is coded to destroy itself, theoretically stopping Covid. The study of NMT5 found promising results and will be submitted to the FDA for review and approval. 

Politics: 

1. Senate candidate Herschel Walker has received backlash for having supposedly paid for a girlfriend’s abortion. Herschel Walker, a former football running back, is now running for senate under the republican party and has repeatedly stated his desire to completely ban abortion. Walker has compared abortion to murder, claiming there should be no exceptions, even in the case of rape, incest, or the life of the mother. A woman, who asked to not be identified out of privacy concerns, told the Daily Beast that after Walker had conceived a child with her in 2009 when they were dating he had urged her to get an abortion. These claims were supported by a $575 receipt from an abortion clinic, a get-well-soon card from Walker, and a bank deposit receipt containing an image of a signed $700 personal check from Walker. The woman claimed that the $125 difference stemmed from predicted added expenses, such as the cost of travel and recovery costs. After the story was published Walker stated it was a “flat-out lie” denying the allegations. Walker stated that he desired to sue the Daily Beast for what he stated was a “defamatory lie” Herschel Walker’s son Christian Walker had a much different response, siding with The Daily Beast on Twitter against his father. In a tweet, Walker stated, “Every family member of Herschel Walker asked him not to run for office, because we all knew (some of) his past.” Abortion has become a pivotal campaign issue since the Supreme Court’s repeal of Roe v Wade in July, a fact that is reflected in Walker’s campaign. Walker has been married twice and has fathered four known children, each of which with a different mother.
2. The leaders of Turkey and Armenia have held face-to-face meetings. Recep Tayyip Erdogan, president of Turkey, and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan of Armenia met in Prague at the sidelines of a summit created by European leadership to launch a European Political Community to boost security and economic prosperity across Europe. Later, Erdogan and Pahinyan held bilateral talks between their countries’ delegations. Erdogan noted that the meeting was held in a “friendly atmosphere.” Armenia and Turkey, which have no current diplomatic relations, agreed last year to start talks intended to reopen their joint border. Envoys from the two countries have held four rounds of talks since then. These talks have caused an agreement to resume charter flights between Istanbul and the Armenian capital of Yerevan. Turkey shut down its border with Armenia in response to Armenia’s conflict with Azerbaijan in 1993, with which Turkey continues to be a close ally. In 2020, Turkey supported Azerbaijan in a conflict with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh. Turkey and Armenia’s bitterness  began in 1915 when 1.5 million Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turkey. Turkey and Armenia will continue to send diplomats to improve relations.

Sports:

MLB: 

1. Aaron Judge is the new American Leauge single-season home run king! Judge hit his 62 of the season Tuesday night against the Texas Rangers in Texas, passing Roger Maris to take full control of the AL record, and seventh place for the entire MLB. The home run came in the first inning on just the third pitch of the game, an 88MPH hanging slider from Rangers opener Jesus Tinoco that Judge deposited in the left field bleachers. After crossing home Judge was surrounded by his teammates. This is obviously a great accomplishment for Judge, who will almost certainly win the AL MVP, and is going to help him get a nice contract to say the least this offseason as he enters free agency. 
2. The MLB playoff bracket has been set as the first MLB playoff games will be underway on Friday october 7. This is the first year the MLB has had a 12 team bracket, with six from the American League and National League making the playoffs, but as always the winners of each League will face each other in the World Series. With the 12 team bracket, the top two seeds from each league receive a first round bye (the first round is also known as the Wild Card round), for the American League that’s the Houston Astros (1), and New York Yankees (2), and for the National League the Los Angeles Dodgers (1), and the reigning World Series champions the Atlanta Braves (2). In the American League the Toronto Blue Jays (4) and the Seattle Mariners (5) will face off with the winner of the best-of-three series going on to play the Astros, and the Cleveland Guardians (3) going against the Tampa Bay Rays (6) for the chance to face the Yankees. In the National League it will be the New York Mets (4) and the San Diego Padres (5) going head to head with the winner facing the Dodgers, and the St. Louis Cardinals (3) and Philadelphia Phillies (6) playing each other with the winner advancing to play the Braves. 

NBA:

1. The 2022-23 NBA GM survey has been completed, conducted by NBA.com’s John Schuhman, the survey allows us to see what GM’s around the league are thinking, or at least their collective thoughts. For the first time since the beginning of the Survey, the Milwaukee Bucks are the favorites to win the NBA Finals, but it wasn’t by a wide margin, and the Bucks are only the third team in the last 13 years to be favorites but not exceed 50% of the votes. The Bucks received 43% of the votes for finals winner, the reigning champions the Golden State Warriors received 25% of the vote and the LA Clippers finished the top three with 21%. Paolo Banchero is by far the favorite to win the Rookie of the Year award, receiving 79% of the votes. For the MVP award, Luka Doncic was the answer, he received 48% of votes, with Giannis Antetokounmpo coming in second with 34% of the votes, followed by Joel Embiid (14%), and Steph Curry (3%). Interestingly though, Antetokounmpo was the favorite for starting a new franchise, with 55% of the votes to Doncic’s 45%. The survey doesn’t mean too much as anything can happen on the court, but it’s very cool to see what the greatest minds in the industry as a collective are thinking. 

NFL: 

1. The Pittsburgh Steelers have named Rookie Quarterback Kenny Pickett as the teams new starter going into a week 5 matchup against the Buffalo Bills. Pickett, the only Quarterback taken in the first round of the 2022 NFL draft (20th overall), made his debut last week against the Jets during the second half of the game replacing Mitch Trubisky. Pickett did throw three interceptions, however one was on an end of game hail mary. There were positives too though as he did score two rushing touchdowns and did a good job avoiding pressure and had some nice throws. Steelers Head Coach Mike Tomlin told the media, “In an effort to be better, in an effort to score more points, in an effort to move the ball more fluently, we decided to go to Kenny in the hopes that he will provide a spark for us”. 

Entertainment:

1. The new Netflix drama centering around serial killer Jefferey Dahmer has upset the friends and family of his victims. Dahmer has been the focus of several documentaries and books in the past. Still, none have been at the forefront of the criticism and attention given to Netflix’s Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, a 10-part series dramatizing the killer created by Ryan Murphy. The series stars Evan Peters as Dahmer and Niecy Nash as a neighbor who tries to report him to the police, with the series aiming to explore Dahmer’s killings through the stories of his victims. The first note of controversy regarding the series occurred when the series was labeled under Netflix’s LGBT vertical when it debuted last month. The label was removed after pushback on Twitter. Several friends and family members of Dahmer’s victims questioned the need to dramatize the serial killer in the first place. Eric Wynn, a friend of two of Dahmer’s victims, stated that he was “disappointed” in Murphy, stating in regard to the series, “It couldn’t be more wrong, more ill-timed, and it’s a media grab,” Instead of focusing on the victims, Wynn said, the series focused on Dahmer. Rita Isbell, the sister of victim Errol Lindsey stated that the series brought back trauma and that she was never contacted about the show. Scott Gunkel, 62, worked as a bartender at Club 219 when Dahmer was a customer. Gunkel claims to have only watched two episodes of the series before he could not continue, stating that he and his friends “don’t want to relive it.”
2. Writers for ‘Joker’ and ‘Captain America 4’ have joined as writers for a new movie featuring the character ‘Spawn’ Scott Silver, Malcolm Spellman, and scriptwriter Matt Mixon are teaming up to write a script for the feature, which has been in development at Blumhouse since 2017. Jaime Foxx remains casted as the title character, with Todd McFarlane, the characters creator, among the film’s producers. McFarlane had previously sought to be the director of the film and wrote a previous draft of the script. Now, the comic book writer and artist admits he may not be the perfect fit, given the involvement of several high-profile comic book movie writers in the project. Spellman, who created Marvel Studio’s project Falcon and the Winter Soldier and is now writing Captain America: New World Order has said that Spawn holds a special place for him, stating, “Todd McFarlane’s Spawn character was always one of my favorites — a Black superhero that was no bullshit, he was cool and dealt with modern issues,” McFarlane has stated that the R-rated Joker was a turning point in the development of the film, with McFarlane contacting Scott Siver, the director of the film, to work on Spawn.

Cooking: 

The Ultimate Avocado Sandwich 

Prep time: 5 min       Total time: 5 min     Servings: 1 

Equipment: 

• Toaster 
• Knife 
• Cutting board

Ingredients

• 2 slices whole grain bread (whole wheat)
• 3 slices Brie cheese (3 = about 30g, you can use any cheese you want here really, just check that it uses vegetarian rennet. Low-fat cheese is also fantastic)
• ½ avocado 
• 4-6 cranberries, dried (6 cranberries = 10g)
• ½ small tomato 
• 1 small handful arugula/rocket (1 small handful = 10 g)
• ½ tbsp balsamic vinegar

Instructions

1. If you prefer your bread toasted, toast it. (2 slices wholegrain bread)
2. While that’s happening, cut the avocado flesh into slices (½ avocado)
3. Slice up the tomato and brie too. (3 slices Brie cheese, ½ small tomato) 
4. Wash the arugula and cut the cranberries in half. (1 small handful of arugula/rocket,4-6 cranberries, dried)
5. Assemble everything on one slice of bread and drizzle the balsamic vinegar on top. (½ tbsp balsamic vinegar) 
6. Now just “close” the sandwich with the second slice of bread. Give it a little squish to stop any parts of the sandwich from slipping out. 
7. Now Enjoy!

Actions: 

Editor’s note: The “Actions” section includes petitions to sign, prompts and scripts to write officials with as well as other opportunities to engage in your local, national and global communities.

Contribute directly to “Doctors Without Borders” Staffers with the medical relief organization remain in Ukraine and are “seeking ways to respond to the medical and humanitarian needs as the conflict evolves.” Offer support here.

Watch or listen to this video. All advertisement revenue goes to various aid organizations easing the humanitarian crisis in Yemen. Please note it is blocked on school-issued Chromebooks due to being in the “Entertainment” category

• Learn more about the crisis at www.monareliefye.org

FEATURED IMAGE: Aaron Judge running the bases PHOTO CREDIT: Flickr