Tighten Up: Punishing Russia for its continued involvement in the Ukraine crisis, President Obama yesterday imposed new and more severe sanctions on Russian banks, energy, and defense companies. “I’ve repeatedly made it clear that Russia must halt the flow of weapons and fighters across the border into Ukraine,” the president said. “So far Russia has failed to take any of the steps that I mentioned.” These sanctions are more severe than those previously laid down, restricting these companies and some individual people from access to the American debt market. The Russian market opened down this morning and its biggest oil company stock dropped 5 percent.

On Hold: Hamas resumed firing rockets immediately at the end of a five-hour “humanitarian” ceasefire today that allowed residents of Gaza to re-stock food and supplies. Israel also foiled an attack by 13 Palestinians as they emerged from a tunnel near a kibbutz. It has not been reported how many were killed. More than 220 Palestinians have died in 10 days of fighting, including four boys 9 to 11 years old killed on a beach by naval gunfire yesterday. Hamas has fought tenaciously, despite getting pummeled, and Israel is making noise that a ground invasion is increasingly likely.

Nation: Microsoft announced that it’s laying off 18,000 people, the biggest layoff in its 39-year history. About 12,500 of the cuts will come from Nokia, the Finnish cellphone company Microsoft bought only a few months ago. Microsoft has struggled to get into the game with tablet computers and cellphones now dominated by Apple and Samsung.

Death Knell: A federal judge has ruled that California’s death penalty violates the Constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. The decision itself is unusual, saying California’s system is so arbitrary that it condemns a prisoner to decades of uncertainty as to whether he will live or die.

And the judge says, the few who are executed represent an arbitrary selection. Of the 900 people condemned to death in California since 1978, only 13 have been executed. Judge Cormac Carney wrote that California has a “system in which arbitrary factors, rather than legitimate ones like the nature of the crime or the date of the death sentence, determine whether an individual will actually be executed.” Next stop for this case, the 9^th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Sports: NFL draftee Michael Sam gave an emotional speech at ESPN’s Espy Award last night after being given the Arthur Ashe Award for courage. Sam came out as gay before the draft, challenging the league to hire an openly gay player and the St. Louis Rams took him. Sam said,

“To anyone out there, especially young people, feeling like they don’t fit in and will never be accepted, please know this: great things can happen if you have the courage to be yourself.”

The Obit Page: Texas bluesman Johnny Winter died in a Zurich hotel room while on a European tour. He was 70. Rolling Stone Magazine once named the platinum-haired Winter one of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time.

Photo Bomb: Federal authorities have met resistance as they’ve tried to distribute immigrant children to facilities around the country. In Michigan this week protesters carried rifles and handguns. Amidst all the noise about unaccompanied illegal immigrant children, Arizona Tea Party sharpie Adam Kwasman tweeted a picture of a busload of children with the caption, “This is not compassion. This is the abrogation of the rule of law.” It was certainly the abrogation of something. The bus was loaded with local kids out for a day at a YMCA camp.

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