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There was no suspense Thursday morning at Council Chambers.
There was, however, plenty of drama.
Not the kind of drama that comes from an uncertain outcome. I’m talking about a drama that makes the air heavy with anticipation, with the rare sense that history is about to unfold before your eyes.
On Thursday morning, Rosie Castro became a member of the San Antonio City Council.
That fact had been predetermined a day earlier when council members put aside their own recent precedent and came out of the applicant-interview process for the District 7 interim appointment not with the usual three finalists, but with a single finalist: Rosie Castro.
Council members sensed the magnitude of the moment and didn’t want to mar it by bringing in two other candidates for Rosie’s moment of triumph on Thursday. And besides, it would have been unfair to the other applicants to bring them back for a second round of interviews when we all knew who deserved the appointment.
In fact, there was a vague sense of sheepishness to the process, because some council members felt unworthy of grilling a legendary activist and civil rights crusader who not only played a huge role in transforming our city — but also raised twin sons (Julián and Joaquin) who have been dominant figures in San Antonio politics over the past two decades.
East Side Councilman Jalen McKee-Rodriguez, the first openly gay man ever to serve on the council, prefaced his question for Castro on Wednesday with this thought: “It is an honor to interview you and I feel a little bit silly interviewing you for a place on the dais.”
That same afternoon, Adriana Rocha Garcia looked to fellow Councilwoman Teri Castillo and mused, “Do we really have to ask questions?”
It was a rhetorical question for which the obvious answer was “no.”
After all, Rosie’s résumé speaks for itself.
In case you missed it: Why Rosie Castro would be an ideal choice to fill the rest of Sandoval’s term
As a young student at Our Lady of the Lake University, she followed migrant families to the Midwest and helped create a mobile school that taught migrant children. Later, in the Edgewood Independent School District, she worked as a preschool teacher.
Those experiences informed her son Julián’s later commitment to creating a state-of-the-art pre-K program (Pre-K 4 SA) during his mayoral tenure.
In 1971, Rosie took on the entrenched power of San Antonio’s Good Government League and ran for City Council as part of a four-person Committee for Barrio Betterment slate. The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund cited that campaign in its successful legal fight to bring single-member council districts to this city.
While working for the city of San Antonio, Rosie helped recruit women to the fire department.
She successfully advocated for a downtown campus for University of Texas at San Antonio and for a Mexican American collection in the San Antonio Public Library.
She has volunteered her time to more community organizations than most of us could even name.
She tirelessly worked in 1981 to help her friend María Berriozábal become the first Latina elected to the San Antonio City Council.
“She opened the door for people who would not win, election after election, because the cards were stacked against us,” Berriozábal told the council Thursday. “This woman is an incredible leader.”
The essence of Rosie Castro’s greatness is her belief in the principle that opportunity is a precious commodity that must be cultivated, passed on and expanded with each generation.
In a recent interview with me on the KLRN show “Texas Talk,” Rosie recalled how her mother, a Mexican immigrant who was pulled out of school in the third grade, dreamed of being a journalist but knew she had no chance without an education.
She wanted better for her daughter.
More from Gilbert Garcia: Councilwoman Teri Castillo is right to question SAPD’s ‘hot spot’ policing strategy
“I think she was committed to the idea that if she didn’t have the chance, maybe I would have the chance,” Rosie said.
Rosie applied that same philosophy to her sons — and the community she called home.
“For me, the greatest privilege has been to be able also to offer some opportunities to my sons,” she told council members Thursday.
“And to know that, like you, they are committed to making sure that everyone in this beloved city has the opportunity to grow, to live, to prosper. Not to hate, but to love. And to be the very best that they can be.”
As Rosie was quick to point out this past week, her stint on the council will only be about three months. It won’t offer much time for policymaking. It will primarily be about constituent engagement and stewardship of existing infrastructure projects.
But her appointment means so much more than a three-month City Council tenure.
It means that someone who devoted her life to helping others shine will get her own much deserved moment in the sun.
ggarcia@express-news.net| Twitter: @gilgamesh470 | 2023-03-04T13:34:28+00:00 | expressnews.com | https://www.expressnews.com/news/local/article/rosie-castro-appointment-san-antonio-17818921.php |
EAGLE PASS, Texas (AP) — At least eight migrants were found dead in the Rio Grande after dozens attempted a hazardous crossing near Eagle Pass, Texas, officials said Friday.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Mexican officials made the discovery Thursday while responding to a large crossing of migrants. U.S. officials recovered six bodies, while Mexican teams recovered two others, according to a CBP statement.
The agency said U.S. crews rescued 37 migrants from the river and detained 16 others, while Mexican officials took 39 migrants into custody. Officials on both sides of the border continue searching for any possible victims, the CBP said.
Days of heavy rain in the Big Bend region had resulted in swift currents in the Rio Grande.
The Border Patrol’s Del Rio sector, which includes Eagle Pass, has been especially dangerous because river currents can be deceptively fast and change quickly. The area draws migrants from dozens of countries, many of them in families with young children. Crossing the river can be challenging even for strong swimmers.
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In a news release last month, CPD said it had discovered bodies of more than 200 dead migrants in the Del Rio Sector from October through July. The Del Río sector extends 245 miles (395 kilometers) along the Río Grande.
Surveys by the U.N. International Organization for Migration and others point to rising fatalities as the number of crossing attempts have soared. In the last three decades, thousands have died attempting to enter the United States from Mexico, often from dehydration or drowning. | 2022-09-03T01:56:14+00:00 | wcfcourier.com | https://wcfcourier.com/news/national/us-border-patrol-8-migrants-die-trying-to-cross-rio-grande/article_c3ce04b7-2368-51aa-b174-374d8e095345.html |
Funding round will be used to accelerate R&D for data-centric machine learning solutions
ANN ARBOR, Mich., Sept. 21, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Voxel51, a data-centric machine learning software company, announced today that it has raised a $12.5 million Series A funding round from Drive Capital, Top Harvest Capital, Shasta Ventures, and existing investors. The round follows the company's $2.875M Seed round from eLab Ventures, ID Ventures, and the University of Michigan.
With more than 150,000 monthly active users, Voxel51's open source technology empowers machine learning model builders to bring transparency and clarity to the datasets they use to build computer vision applications. The recent explosion of computer vision data—there are an estimated 45 billion cameras in the world today—creates a tremendous opportunity for machine learning products, but only if it can be properly organized, indexed, and labeled. Without infrastructure for building high-quality data pipelines, engineers are often forced to misallocate their talents wrangling data.
To address this challenge, Voxel51 is also announcing today the launch of FiftyOne Teams, the company's enterprise platform that helps organizations bring unbiased machine learning (ML) products to market by unlocking the complexities in their visual datasets, enabling them to understand real-world situations and edge cases. Voxel51's existing customers are already using the technology to build products in verticals such as retail, security, advertising, agriculture, and robotics.
"We're proud to be at the forefront of this increasingly important area of machine learning development. High-quality, clean data is critical to the success of ML, and we're providing key infrastructure for data-centric model development with an open source product to support everyone in the space," said Jason Corso, Co-Founder and CEO of Voxel51.
"Voxel51 sits at the intersection of several large markets: AI, Perception, and Automation. Having contributed years of work to the open source FiftyOne project, the founders are deeply technical and are building the type of world class team we look for," said Andy Jenks, lead investor and general partner at Drive Capital. "Voxel51's platform is a critical piece of the AI stack for any team looking to develop ML products on accurate and diverse data."
"Voxel51 immediately stood out for me as an attractive investment because of the quality of the founding team, the quality of the machine learning technology, and the scope of the market opportunity for data-centric AI in image, video, and now 3D data," said Adam Ghobarah, founder of Top Harvest Capital and former longtime Google executive and partner at Google Ventures. "Voxel51 provides a well-rounded platform for data-centric AI; it has a leading open source solution and now, with FiftyOne Teams, an excellent enterprise companion."
The fully-remote company will be using the capital to expand its diverse team committed to shaping the future of machine learning in roles focused on product, engineering, community, and more.
To learn more about FiftyOne Teams and try out open source FiftyOne, go to voxel51.com.
Supporting Quotes
"Vision AI has the power to unlock the future of automation in a way we have not seen since the Web Revolution; Voxel51's product is helping to drive that revolution with FiftyOne's data-centric tool focus. It's the right tool for this revolution to leverage as it catapults in the coming years."
- Issac Roth, Partner, Shasta Ventures
"We've used FiftyOne Teams at ADT Commercial for a year now. It has helped us manage our huge datasets, collaborate on model evaluation, tighten our production schedule, and ultimately deliver solutions that help our customers better manage their risk. FiftyOne Teams has added tremendous value to our computer vision processes."
- Philippe Sawaya, Director of Artificial Intelligence, ADT Commercial
"At eLab, we look for deep-tech innovation AI platforms such as the one the Voxel51 team has produced and we continue to be impressed by their fast pace of growth in the open source community. Their data-centric machine learning software appears to have struck a significant chord in the data scientist community and we are excited to see how additional capabilities are introduced to enable teams of users in the enterprise setting."
- Doug Neal, Partner, eLab Ventures
About Voxel51
Voxel51 is bringing transparency and clarity to the world's data. Our open source and commercial software enables developers, scientists, and organizations to build high-quality datasets and computer vision models that power some of today's most remarkable machine learning and artificial intelligence. Tens of thousands of engineers and scientists have integrated open source FiftyOne into their ML workflows. Enterprise customers spanning verticals like automotive, robotics, security, retail, and healthcare rely on FiftyOne Teams to securely collaborate on their datasets and models. We're building a fully-remote team of exceptional and diverse people who want to bring data-centric ML to the world. To learn more, visit voxel51.com.
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SOURCE Voxel51 | 2022-09-21T17:47:45+00:00 | kfyrtv.com | https://www.kfyrtv.com/prnewswire/2022/09/21/voxel51-raises-125m-series-bring-transparency-clarity-computer-vision-data/ |
CHELSEA, MI - Chelsea’s largest city park is set to get a major facelift if an ambitious upgrade project proceeds as planned.
The plans in the works for Timbertown Park, off Sibley Road, include a a new six-court pickleball facility, improvements to the existing wooden play structure and designation of the park as a trailhead for the Washtenaw County Border-to-Border (B2B) Trail.
That’s in addition to upgrades to bathrooms, lighting and parking, as well as restoration of a mosaic art piece there, according to a presentation Chelsea City Manager Roy Atkinson delivered to City Council on Monday, Nov. 28.
“It’s a pretty substantial public-private partnership,” Atkinson said, referencing participation from the city, Washtenaw County Parks and Recreation Commission, Huron Waterloo Pathways Initiative and private funders.
The complex wooden play structure at Timbertown, built in 1996, represented “a great coming together of the community,” said Council Member Peter Feeney at the meeting.
“Right now the consideration for the trailhead (and) pickleball courts is a great coming together of a number of diverse projects that have achievable funding and achievable execution,” he added. “This is something we can do.”
The plans for the park improvements are likely to involve devotees of pickleball, one of the country’s fastest growing sports and a game that combines elements of tennis, badminton and Ping-Pong.
The Chelsea Senior Center’s pickleball club has grown to over 200 members, doubling in size in the past year, said Bill Personke, part of the group, at the Council meeting.
The pickleball community has a few courts in a school gym and a couple outside, but could use room to expand, Personke said, motioning to the flock of people in the audience who showed up in support of the proposal.
Read more: $7 million, 37K-square foot pickleball facility planned for Ann Arbor area
Tournaments in similarly-sized cities regularly draw 200 players for a weekend, and such events in Chelsea would be a major economic driver for local businesses, he added.
The park improvements would also put Timbertown on the map for cyclists and other users of the B2B Trail, Atkinson said in his presentation.
The pathway already runs through the park. “It’s only natural that we have (a trailhead) here given our points of access to the trail,” the city manager said.
The project would also involve restoration of the “Pathway to Renewal” mosaic art piece at the park, which needs some attention, Atkinson said.
City leaders took no action on the proposed plan on Monday, but Atkinson said the proposal would likely be back for some kind of preliminary vote at the City Council’s Dec. 19 meeting.
The project is currently in conceptual development stages and would go through revisions this year before a formal plan and fundraising in the spring, according to a timeline included in City Council documents. There are no price estimates yet for the project.
The individual pieces of the park upgrade plan could happen independently of the others, and the timeline may vary for each, it notes, while giving a target completion date of sometime next year.
The project has an ideal “quarterback” in Jeff Hardcastle, board chair for the Huron Waterloo Pathways Initiative, a nonprofit based in Chelsea developing the B2B Trail and area pathways, according to Feeney.
“This is something we can do together,” the council member said.
More from The Ann Arbor News:
New Washtenaw County Border-to-Border Trail segment opens up 6+ miles from Chelsea
Chelsea residents sue for release of police misconduct records city has kept confidential
Celebrate the holidays in Washtenaw County with Santa visits, Christmas parades
E-superbike built by University of Michigan students reaching 160 mph speeds | 2022-11-29T17:28:52+00:00 | mlive.com | https://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/2022/11/major-upgrades-could-bring-6-pickleball-courts-trailhead-to-chelsea-park.html |
Sarasota County gives update on Malaria fight
SARASOTA, Fla. (WWSB) - Sarasota County Mosquito Management continues to urge the public to take the current Malaria spread seriously, but also gave a positive update on the effectiveness of their spraying missions.
“It’s benefitting over time. We’re noticing a reduction of Anopheles populations specifically in that wood lot where we have had positive pools in the past,” says Wade Brennan, manager of Sarasota County Mosquito Management.
Brennan says while things could be heading in the right direction, he acknowledges there is still a lot that needs to be done.
“It’s just so important and we need everyone to take it serious. Wear those repellants, wear those long sleeves. I know it’s hot, but it’s just so important. If we can get all those efforts along with our efforts, we can really knock this out and take care of this situation so it doesn’t persist,” says Brennan.
A local nonprofit organization knows all about taking some of these precautions.
Agape Flights in Venice makes weekly trips to countries where the risk of getting Malaria is much higher than in the United States.
Director of Flight Operations at Agape Flights, Greg Haman discussed some of the environments he has stayed in while spending time in less-developed countries.
“I’ve stayed in places that have required bug netting in the past when there wasn’t any air conditioning. Obviously with that, you are sleeping under a mosquito net to try to keep the mosquitos off while you sleep and you are using bug spray and pretty much whatever you can to keep the mosquitos off,” says Haman.
Haman said one of his pilots got Malaria while on a missions trip.
“He said it had him down and out for a couple of weeks, and even after you recover from it you’re still weak,” says Haman.
Click here for more information on aerial spraying schedules and tips on how to best protect yourself and others.
Copyright 2023 WWSB. All rights reserved. | 2023-06-29T21:11:52+00:00 | mysuncoast.com | https://www.mysuncoast.com/2023/06/29/sarasota-county-gives-update-malaria-fight/ |
Toy Company To Celebrate Two Decades in Business with Events for Employees and Customers
ELKHORN, Neb., Oct. 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Nebraska-based Fat Brain Toys was launched on Halloween evening, 2002. Approaching 20 years later, the company is celebrating both its employees and customers with special events to recognize the milestone.
Fat Brain has seen many toy trends come and go in 20 years, and even created one of their own with their popular Dimpl brand toys. But, as much as things have changed, much has also stayed the same. The company was inspired by the founders' 10-year-old son, Adam. Twenty years later, he is now the company's lead industrial designer. The company's first employee is, too, still with the company.
"This team, that believed in us and joined us for this crazy journey, has truly been a gift," exclaimed Karen Carson, co-founder of Fat Brain Toys.
But in other ways, the company has undergone massive changes that have enabled it to become one of the largest direct-to-consumer toy companies in America. Starting with a website and 200 square feet in the basement of the founders' home in 2002, the company now occupies 195,000 square feet of warehouse space, has two retail store locations and a corporate headquarters, and sells their toys in more than 140 countries around the world.
"Approaching this milestone, it's been therapeutic to reminisce about where we've been and how far we've come as a company," said co-founder Mark Carson, "but seeing the joy a toy brings to a child never gets old!"
The company will kick off the celebration starting October 25th with a 20% off sale on its website and retail stores in Omaha and Kansas City. Fat Brain employees will ring in the occasion with a Halloween-inspired costume party and live music.
About Fat Brain Toys
Fat Brain Toys is one of the nation's leading direct-to-consumer toy companies. Unlike mainstream alternatives, Fat Brain Toys creates and curates quality toys, games, and clever gifts that enable children to learn through pure, authentic play. Fat Brain Toys' products are available at leading retailers around the world, including their own website, www.fatbraintoys.com. Fat Brain Toys is a family-operated business based in Elkhorn, Nebraska.
Contact: carol@fatbraintoys.com
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SOURCE Fat Brain Toys | 2022-10-25T12:53:27+00:00 | kwtx.com | https://www.kwtx.com/prnewswire/2022/10/25/fat-brain-toys-rides-waves-change-over-twenty-years/ |
Mr. Hilt brings deep experience in building and scaling global consumer brands
Transformational leader will focus on enhancing the customer experience and unlocking long-term opportunities for AMS
Founder Bill Gale will continue to serve the Board of Directors and Mr. Hilt as an expert advisor and industry leader
EAGAN, Minn., March 1, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Asset Marketing Services, LLC (AMS), the leading international multi-brand collectors' platform, announced today that Jim Hilt has been appointed by the Company's Board of Directors to the role of Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Hilt will be based at AMS Headquarters in Eagan and assume day-to-day leadership on March 1, 2023, replacing the Company's Founder Bill Gale, who will remain a member of the Board and trusted Company and industry advisor.
A Minnesota native, Mr. Hilt brings more than 25 years of consumer-focused business experience, including his most recent work as President of Shutterfly, Inc. While there, he deepened the innovative photography and customized product company's connections to its customers through deeper brand experiences along with strategic acquisitions and partnerships. Mr. Hilt previously held leadership positions at EXPRESS, Barnes & Noble, Sears, SAP and IBM, where he built a reputation for enhancing the consumer experience and employee operations to improve outcomes for all stakeholders.
"We are very fortunate to have Jim join AMS," Mr. Gale said. "He is a true innovator whose passion for customer-focused culture is apparent. I am excited to see Jim drive our Company forward, strengthen AMS's reputation and position it as the top destination for collectors and enthusiasts in the industry."
"I am honored and incredibly grateful to Bill and the Board for providing me the amazing opportunity to lead the incredible team at AMS. We will work together to build upon the great heritage of the Company and deepen our relationships with collectors by bringing people and technology together to make collecting even more meaningful," Mr. Hilt said.
Jim Hilt, Chief Executive Officer of Asset Marketing Services
Transformational leader and technology pioneer Jim Hilt most recently was President of Shutterfly, Inc., where he was responsible for the overall strategy and business performance for the Shutterfly and Snapfish brands, bringing together business development, analytics, merchandising, product management, marketing, operations and technology. Prior to joining Shutterfly, Mr. Hilt was Executive Vice President, Chief CX Officer at EXPRESS, where he created compelling consumer experiences and a more inclusive brand by reinventing how products were merchandised and marketed. During his career, Mr. Hilt also held executive roles with Barnes & Noble, Sears and SAP. Mr. Hilt began his career at IBM, where he held various roles including Strategy & Business Development Executive and Worldwide Sales Manager.
Mr. Hilt currently sits on the Board of Directors for Hibbett Sporting Goods, a $1 billion athletic apparel retailer, is a 2018 Henry Crown Fellow from the Aspen Institute and is a graduate of the University of Minnesota.
Bill Gale, Founder of Asset Marketing Services
A collectible coin expert, educator, inventor and industry advocate, Bill Gale founded New York Mint in 1996 which eventually became AMS through a merger in 2010. He fostered lasting partnerships with organizations like the Smithsonian, became a key contributor to the National Museum of American History's The Value of Money exhibit, testified before the Minnesota Senate, patented coin collection products and serves on the prestigious Professional Numismatists Guild. He also co-authored an award-winning reference book—the first of its kind to focus exclusively on United States Proof Sets and Mint Sets—and avidly supports the Anti-Counterfeiting Task Force. Mr. Gale was also a major television personality for over 15 years and became the on-air coin expert for QVC, CVN, ShopNBC and HSN.
About Asset Marketing Services
Since 1984, AMS has provided collectors, history buffs and others with the finest numismatic and collectible coin products. Its brands, GovMint.com, ModernCoinMart (MCM) and LPM.hk., combine to make one of the largest direct-to-consumer marketers of coins and numismatics. In 2022, AMS expanded its collectibles marketplace to include sports memorabilia and vintage advertising under the brand Collectors Limited.
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SOURCE Asset Marketing Services, LLC | 2023-03-01T13:35:17+00:00 | wcjb.com | https://www.wcjb.com/prnewswire/2023/03/01/asset-marketing-services-appoints-jim-hilt-chief-executive-officer/ |
WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Sherrod Brown has survived a decade of statewide Democratic losses in Ohio by building a reputation as the rare person in his party who can still connect with the white working-class voters who have increasingly shifted to Republicans.
But as he heads into what could be a tough reelection campaign, Brown is facing a critical test in the aftermath of a train derailment in an eastern Ohio village. Republicans, including former President Donald Trump, argue the federal response shows Democrats have left such regions behind. Brown is under heightened pressure to prove them wrong.
In the early stages of what will be a fierce fight for control of Congress next year, the response to the train derailment in Ohio is emerging as an early barometer of whether Democrats can rebuild support in working-class communities. Brown has laid the blame for the disaster squarely on the corporation that operated the train that derailed, Norfolk Southern, and positioned himself as a fighter for places like East Palestine.
“It’s the kind of community that’s too often forgotten about or exploited by corporate America,” he told reporters this week. “My job is always to fight for the dignity of work, to fight for these workers, to fight for these communities, to make sure this never happens again. I’ll work with anyone to do that and to get these reforms passed.”
Brown has also made a pair of visits to East Palestine to meet with emergency workers and local residents. And this week, he followed with bipartisan legislative action to call on federal agencies to make long-term medical testing available to residents as well as proposing new federal safety regulations and financial consequences for train operators.
As the images of black, billowing smoke from the wreck and concerns of local residents morphed from a man-made disaster into a political battleground, there is a growing sense among lawmakers that locals don’t appreciate being used as pawns. A parade of political figures, social media influencers and TV producers have descended on the village of 5,000 residents in recent weeks.
Republican Rep. Bill Johnson, who represents the area, called on President Joe Biden to visit the community and said he would hold a field hearing of the House Subcommittee on Environment, Manufacturing and Critical Minerals in East Palestine. But he also urged caution: “Right now, the residents of that community want the workers to get that place cleaned up. The last thing they want is a circus of politicians coming there to get what they determine to be a photo op.”
Johnson and other House Republicans also expressed skepticism this week at any new regulations on train operators, even as Republicans for weeks had eagerly seized on the derailment as proof Democrats are not focused on policy at home.
Trump toured the village last week, both reprising his presidential role of providing disaster assistance and hitting the campaign trail. He handed out red “Make America Great Again” hats and slammed Biden for visiting Ukraine while forgoing Ohio. The state’s junior senator, Republican JD Vance, joined Trump’s tour, and conservative figures like Rudy Giuliani and Tulsi Gabbard soon followed.
The stretches of eastern Ohio industrial towns have tilted increasingly to Republicans over the last decade, contributing to Ohio’s shift from a presidential bellwether to a potential GOP stronghold. Republicans have cast it as a forgotten swath of the country — fertile ground for Trump’s grievance politics or Vance’s own rags-to-riches story, told in his 2016 memoir “Hillbilly Elegy” that made him a political star.
“They felt like they have been ignored, which is why it’s been very strong Trump country,” said former Rep. Tim Ryan, a Democrat who lost the Senate race to Vance last year and urged bipartisanship and an emphasis on economic policy over social issues during the campaign and as part of Vanderbilt University’s Project on Unity and American Democracy.
But the region is also familiar ground for Brown, who has become a mainstay in the state’s political constellation with a populist brand. Brown, who wears suits purchased from a union shop near his Cleveland home, has developed an old-school network of union support over a decades-long political career that began in the General Assembly.
David Pepper, a former chair of the Ohio Democratic Party, says Brown’s “secret sauce” is his willingness to take his made-in-America, union-strong messaging to places outside the cities. Brown doesn’t usually win the rural towns and suburbs, but he is able to dampen his losses there to defy the political headwinds.
“There’s a sense that’s built over decades of work,” Pepper said of Brown’s brand. “That guy is fighting against big corporations for the little guy.”
For Democrats, he’s proof they can still win in the Buckeye State. But as Republicans look to Ohio as both a must-win presidential state and a potential path to a Senate majority, Brown sits atop the list of seats that could be flipped.
At times, Brown has appeared uneasy in the aftermath of the East Palestine derailment. He said it was a “mistake” by the Biden administration not to quickly dispatch a high-level official to the scene. He repeatedly emphasized his bipartisan work with Vance, calling their rail safety bill “a signal” that he would work well with the Trump-aligned Republican. And he pointed out that he had made multiple trips to East Palestine in recent weeks.
But already, Brown’s political opponents have seized on a Fox News report that Brown also attended a fundraiser in California last week before stopping in northeast Ohio on his way back to Washington.
Matt Dolan, one Republican challenger, called Brown “the toast of Hollywood liberals” this week and has tried to tie him closely to Biden. Dolan, a state lawmaker who lost the GOP primary to Vance last year, is the only Republican to officially enter the 2024 race, though more are expected.
Brown was dismissive both of Trump’s visit and the report on the California fundraiser.
But Pepper said he would face a tough reelection that could hinge on whether Trump’s wing of the GOP remains dominant in its primary. Statewide, Republicans with a more muted, centrist style, such as Gov. Mike DeWine, have performed best by attracting moderate voters.
Pepper said, “The more Trumpy the candidate against Sherrod, the better Sherrod does.”
In last year’s Senate contest against Vance, Ryan complained that national Democrats never saw the race as winnable and spent funds elsewhere — another sign the party had moved on from places like Ohio. But as Democrats try to hold a razor-thin Senate majority next year, Sen. Gary Peters, the chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, vowed to help Brown.
”I will make sure that he has the resources to win in the end,” Peters said. | 2023-03-04T18:00:38+00:00 | wric.com | https://www.wric.com/news/politics/ap-ohio-derailment-tests-sen-browns-push-to-buck-dem-defeats/ |
Former Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal’s Book “Wyoming: Paradox of Plenty” is a deep dive into the legislative sessions that created the severance tax system within Wyoming’s economy.
The Carbon County Historical Society hosted former Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal to present ideas from his new book "Wyoming: Paradox of Plenty" on Tuesday, March 28.
Former Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal’s Book “Wyoming: Paradox of Plenty” is a deep dive into the legislative sessions that created the severance tax system within Wyoming’s economy.
The Carbon County Historical Society hosted former Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal to present ideas from his new book "Wyoming: Paradox of Plenty" on Tuesday, March 28.
RAWLINS — The Carbon County Historical Society hosted former Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal to present the ideas from his new book “Wyoming: Paradox of Plenty” on Tuesday, March 28.
According to the Vice President of the historical Society, Dave Throgmorton, the book is a deep dive into the legislative sessions that created the severance tax system within Wyoming’s economy.
“He is the only person I know who can make how severance taxes came into being and became Wyoming’s economic backbone into an engaging story,” Throgmorton said. “He noted that the Code of the West that he signed into law was ‘aspirational,’ because as individual taxpayers and homeowners, we have never really borne the true cost of keeping up the infrastructure that our communities need to operate.”
Throgmorton added, “We’ve shifted that burden to mineral taxes and federal funds. That is not a great formula for ‘building livable communities’ that we need to keep Wyoming young people in Wyoming.”
Almost 40 people attended the meeting and asked “thoughtful and interesting” questions, according to Throgmorton said.
During the event, Freudenthal signed copies of his book. A few copies of it are available from the historical society through the Carbon County Museum for $20.
Looking forward, the next Carbon County Historical Society meeting will be held in June. The historical society will be featuring another Wyoming historian.
The historical society has been active in the community for several decades, according to Throgmorton. He said that participation has been “robust” at times and then less so at other times.
“We had a pretty good head of steam when Covid hit, and two years of no in-person meetings took its toll. But we’re back.”
In the past, the historical society has sponsored “treks” to the Carbon townsite, as well as to one of the last large sheepshearing barns in the county.
“We encourage local schools to participate in Wyoming History Day in April,” Throgmorton said. “This year’s theme is ‘Fronteirs in History: people, places, ideas.’ Students at the Little Snake River Valley School consistently win awards in the History Day school programs; they are clearly proud of their community and its roots.
“Our goal is to encourage people living in Carbon County to learn more about its rich history.” | 2023-04-04T20:58:22+00:00 | wyomingnews.com | https://www.wyomingnews.com/wyomingbusinessreport/industry_news/government_and_politics/carbon-county-historical-society-hosts-former-wyoming-governor-and-author-dave-freudenthal/article_ca36d04c-d30b-11ed-b528-4fb1b5eacdb9.html |
PHILADELPHIA, June 24, 2022 /PRNewswire/ --
NastLaw LLC announces if you purchased certain named generic pharmaceutical drugs directly from certain pharmaceutical manufacturers from May 1, 2009 through December 31, 2019, your rights may be affected by proposed class action settlements.
A federal court authorized this notice. This is not a solicitation from a lawyer.
What is the lawsuit about? Two proposed settlements (the "Settlements") have been reached in a class action lawsuit ("the Lawsuit"), which alleges that Sun Pharmaceutical Industries, Inc. and its affiliates Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories, Ltd., Mutual Pharmaceutical Company, Inc., and URL Pharma, Inc., and Taro Pharmaceuticals U.S.A., Inc. (collectively "Settling Defendants") violated the federal antitrust laws by conspiring with other generic drug manufacturers to fix, maintain, and stabilize prices, rig bids, and engage in market and customer allocations of certain generic drugs (the "Named Generic Drugs"), causing direct purchasers of the Named Generic Drugs to pay more than they should have. The Settling Defendants deny liability as alleged in the Lawsuit. The Court has not decided who is right. The proposed Settlements do not resolve any of the claims of the Settlement Class against the remaining Defendants. The Lawsuit against the remaining Defendants is ongoing.
Who is included? The Court certified a Settlement Class that includes all persons or entities, and their successors and assigns, that directly purchased one or more of the Named Generic Drugs from one or more Defendants in the United States and its territories and possessions, at any time during the period from May 1, 2009 through December 31, 2019. Excluded from the Settlement Class are Defendants and their present and former officers, directors, management, employees, subsidiaries, or affiliates, judicial officers and their personnel, and all governmental entities. The Settlement Agreements listing the Named Generic Drugs and Defendants are available on the settlement website: GenericDrugsDirectPurchaserSettlement.com. The Settlement Agreements also are on public file with the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, 601 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA 19106 in the case In re: Generic Pharmaceuticals Pricing Antitrust Litigation, Case No. 2:16-MD-02724.
What do the Settlements provide? The proposed Settlements provide for the following payments by Settling Defendants: (1) $17,357,000 payment by Sun Pharmaceutical Industries, Inc. and its affiliates Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories, Ltd., Mutual Pharmaceutical Company, Inc., and URL Pharma, Inc. and (2) $67,643,000 payment by Taro Pharmaceuticals U.S.A., Inc. These payments (collectively $85,000,000) will comprise the total "Settlement Fund." The Settlement Fund may be reduced by up to $10 million or increased to a maximum of $105 million under certain circumstances as explained in the Settlement Agreements. In addition, the attorneys who have worked on the Lawsuit for the Settlement Class will seek Court approval to pay expenses, attorneys' fees of up to one-third of the Settlement Fund, including interest, after expenses (and service awards) are deducted, and service awards for the class representatives (or named plaintiffs) out of the Settlement Fund. Any motion for expenses and service awards and to set aside one-third of the remaining Settlement Fund (plus accrued interest) for payment of attorneys' fees will be posted on the settlement website GenericDrugsDirectPurchaserSettlement.com once they are filed on August 9, 2022. Settlement Class Counsel will file a motion for an award of fees at a later appropriate time.
The calculations of the dollar amount that each Settlement Class Member that submits a Claim Form will be paid from the Settlement Fund is set forth in the Plan of Allocation, which also is available on GenericDrugsDirectPurchaserSettlement.com.
What are your options? If you are a Settlement Class Member and you do nothing, you will remain in the Settlement Class and be eligible to participate in the Settlements as described in this notice, if the Settlements are approved. However, you will need to complete, sign, and return the Claim Form (once it is sent to you) in order to obtain a payment. It is anticipated that Defendants' sales data will be used to calculate Settlement Class Members' eligible purchases and pro rata share of the Net Settlement Fund, but if such data is not available from Defendants then you may be required to submit data showing your eligible purchases. We do not know when the Claim Forms will be mailed. You should check GenericDrugsDirectPurchaserSettlement.com for information regarding timing. If you did not receive a Notice in the mail, and you think you are a potential Settlement Class Member, please identify yourself or your company by letter to the following address: In re: Generic Pharmaceuticals Pricing Antitrust Litigation – Direct Purchasers, c/o A.B. Data, Ltd., P.O. Box 173095, Milwaukee, WI 53217, or send an email to info@GenericDrugsDirectPurchaserSettlement.com, or call 877-315-0583. You may be required to submit proof of a qualifying purchase to establish that you are a member of the Settlement Class. Claimants may also be required to submit purchase data as part of the claims process. As a Settlement Class Member, unless you opt out of the Settlements, you will be bound by all orders and judgments of the Court.
In addition, you may request exclusion from (or opt out of) the Settlements and may object to the Settlements if you do not opt out. Instructions for opting out or objecting can be found in the publicly-available case file and website, as described above. You must mail your request to opt out or your objection by September 23, 2022. The Court will hold a Fairness Hearing on December 13, 2022 at 1:30 p.m. EST to decide whether to approve the Settlements and any requests for fees, expenses, and service awards for the class representatives. The Court will also consider a Plan of Allocation for distributing the Settlement Fund to Settlement Class Members. If there are objections, the Court will consider them at the hearing. You do not need to attend the hearing. If you wish to appear at the hearing, you must file a "Notice of Intention to Appear" with the Court and you may hire your own attorney to appear in Court for you at your own expense.
For more information: Go to the website: GenericDrugsDirectPurchaserSettlement.com or call 877-315-0583 for more information on the Settlements, the Lawsuit, and your potential rights and options related to the Settlements. The website includes, for example, a list of the generic drugs that you would have had to purchase and a list of the generic drug manufacturers that you would have had to purchase directly from in order to be eligible for a payment.
View original content:
SOURCE NastLaw LLC | 2022-06-24T18:49:05+00:00 | kfyrtv.com | https://www.kfyrtv.com/prnewswire/2022/06/24/direct-purchaser-plaintiffs-announce-settlements-in-re-generic-pharmaceutical-pricing-antitrust-litigation-if-you-purchased-certain-named-generic-pharmaceutical-drugs-directly-certain-manufacturers-may-1-2009-through-december-31-2019-your-rights-may-be-affected-by-proposed-class-action-settlements/ |
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If you or a loved one has questions or needs to talk to a professional about gambling, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit 1800gambler.net for more information. | 2022-05-17T22:48:57+00:00 | cleveland.com | https://www.cleveland.com/betting/2022/05/draftkings-promo-code-grab-30-1-odds-for-nba-conference-finals.html |
Tasty Takeout: Top 5 favorite BBQ foods
by: Paris Himes
Posted: / Updated:
Who doesn’t love a good summertime BBQ?
On today’s Tasty Takeout, a local eatery visited the show with a delicious BBQ spread, discussing Cody and Alexis’ Top 5 favorite BBQ foods. Take a look!
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- Road rage incident on I-465 leads to man being shot | 2023-05-24T21:47:00+00:00 | wishtv.com | https://www.wishtv.com/news/allindiana/tasty-takeout-top-5-favorite-bbq-foods/ |
MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
All right. Pull up a chair. Get comfortable because you are going to want to settle in and listen to these next two guests.
TANYA TUCKER: I'm Tanya Denise Tucker. And what else would you want to know?
BRANDI CARLILE: That you're a country music singer.
TUCKER: I'm a singer. Yeah. Yeah.
KELLY: Now meet the woman you just heard helping her out there.
CARLILE: I'm Brandi Carlile. I'm also a singer, songwriter, producer and a good friend of the great Tanya mother-Tucker.
TUCKER: (Laughter) Wow. Now, that's an honor right there.
KELLY: Tanya Tucker and Brandi Carlile have 32 Grammy nominations, eight Grammy wins between them. But they'd never met until they decided to make a record together and then a movie about making that record. The result is "The Return Of Tanya Tucker." They dropped by our New York studios this week to talk about it, including the moment in 2019 that Brandi first reached Tanya on the phone.
CARLILE: It was the day I woke up...
TUCKER: The day.
CARLILE: ...And I was nominated for all those Grammys for the first time in my life.
TUCKER: Yeah.
CARLILE: That was the day I met you.
KELLY: Brandi Carlile might have just been nominated for six Grammys, but Tanya Tucker had never heard of her.
TUCKER: I really didn't - I never knew her music. So I'm an idiot. But my kids knew who she was. Mom, oh, my God - Brandi Carlile. But anyway, so the phone rings. So I answered. And she just went to talking, and I was sold.
CARLILE: I was like, Miss Tucker, I have got a plan.
TUCKER: Yeah, I was sold. By the time I got done talking, I'm not sure if I was sold. No, I was sold.
CARLILE: She was kind of blown away, you know?
TUCKER: Yeah.
CARLILE: And we had been trying to talk her into coming out. She wasn't sure how serious we were. You know, her kids knew who I was...
TUCKER: Yeah.
CARLILE: ...But not because I was famous - because I had been calling them. I had been circling the wagons, and I was saying, I really believe this is a moment of reckoning for country music.
KELLY: Here's the background to why a new Tanya Tucker album seemed like a moment of reckoning. Tanya dropped her first big hit 50 years ago, when she was 13 years old.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DELTA DAWN")
TUCKER: (Singing) Delta dawn, what's that flower you have on? Could it be a faded rose from days gone by?
KELLY: That's "Delta Dawn," her first hit from 1972. By the time she was 15, she was on the cover of Rolling Stone. Brandi Carlile grew up listening to her. She draws a direct line between what Tanya was doing with her voice in the 1970s and what she, Brandi, does with hers today.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "THE STORY")
CARLILE: (Singing) I climbed across the mountaintops, swam all across the ocean blue. I crossed all the lines, and I broke all the rules.
I don't like compartmentalizing genre in terms of gender. But if you think about this, there's been a whole lane in sort of female-fronted country music that's, like, got this kind of - like, The Chicks are like this - kind of sassy, kind of rebellious with a wide gait. They stand there. They hold their ground. You got Miranda Lambert doing this. You've got several generations of women influenced by, like, a toughness that comes from, like, a rural sensibility that's different than your typical Southern belle. It's not feminine. It's something else. And I just think that Tanya is the architect of that in the same way that Johnny Cash was the architect of the concept of his lament and the man in black and his stoicism and steadiness. And music was indelible. And Tanya's is indelible, too. We just so happen to be lucky enough that she's young. She was young when she started. She's young now. We have her here. Let's stop screwing around. Let's make sure we get out and see her play because she built us.
TUCKER: Well, that's awfully nice of her to say so. But it was, I mean, unintentional. I was just trying to - you know, trying to get by and survive and do the only thing I knew how to do.
CARLILE: Well, you were so young, you know...
TUCKER: Sometimes I wonder about that.
CARLILE: ...When you started. And unfortunately - this is what we were talking about - it also means that all your peers, all your friends are so much older than you...
TUCKER: Yeah.
CARLILE: ...That you're having to say goodbye.
TUCKER: That's what I was leading up to, and that's what our next single is about.
CARLILE: Yeah.
KELLY: Oh, give me a preview.
TUCKER: (Humming).
CARLILE: It's called "Ready As I'll Never Be."
TUCKER: I'm singing it all the way over here.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "READY AS I'LL NEVER BE")
TUCKER: (Singing) So gather round now. It's time to sing. It's bittersweet, but it's a hell of a silver lining.
CARLILE: Tanya writes songs...
TUCKER: (Singing) Gather round now.
CARLILE: ...In, like, one-liners. And it's - and they're amazing when she'll drop this line on you and it'll just blow your mind. And we had just lost John Prine to COVID. And then...
TUCKER: Yes.
CARLILE: Billy Joe Shaver passed away.
TUCKER: Yes, Billy Joe Shaver. That was tough.
CARLILE: Yeah.
TUCKER: And my heroes, you know?
CARLILE: Yeah.
TUCKER: And people that were my friends went from being my heroes to being my friends and back to being heroes again.
CARLILE: So I go up to have dinner with her in Nashville the night Billy Joe Shaver died.
TUCKER: Yes.
CARLILE: And we were walking up the stairs, and I said - I didn't want to bring it up, but I said, Tanya, I'm sorry about Billy Joe. I know how much you loved him. And she goes - she says, oh, honey. She goes, that's the thing about - you know, they're all going to get their wings before I do...
TUCKER: Yeah.
CARLILE: ...You know, God willing. And then she looks at me with that Tanya look, and she goes, ready as I'll never be.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "READY AS I'LL NEVER BE")
TUCKER: (Singing) I guess I'm ready, ready as I'll never be.
CARLILE: Oh, my. What an amazing sentiment. How true is that - that because she's so much younger, that these icons are going to always go sooner, you know? And it's - God's going to keep you here.
TUCKER: But the difference between her and what I've had before is that, you know, an idea is just an idea until you put it into action. She takes it, and she goes with it, and she don't stop.
KELLY: So this brings me - I want to spend a little time on the song that's at the heart of the film and of y'all's collaboration, "Bring My Flowers Now." That start something like this? Tell us how it started.
CARLILE: The same way.
TUCKER: Same thing. I had the chorus for a long time.
CARLILE: Yeah.
TUCKER: Long, long, long time. And I was leaving Nashville, going to Austin for Christmas. But on the way, I always call Loretta when I go - 'cause I go right by where the turnoff is to her ranch.
KELLY: Loretta Lynn. Yeah.
TUCKER: We talked, and I sang her that chorus for some reason. I don't know why I do things. But - and then I guess I sang it to you.
CARLILE: Yeah. And you sang her that chorus, and she wanted to write it. And as soon as I heard you say it, you know, bring my flowers...
TUCKER: Yeah.
CARLILE: ...Now while I'm livin' (ph) because I don't want to need your love when I'm gone. Don't spend time, tears or money on my old, breathless body.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BRING MY FLOWERS NOW")
TUCKER: (Singing) ...On my old, breathless body. If your heart is in them flowers, bring them home.
KELLY: "Bring My Flowers Now" won Best Country Song of the Year at the 2020 Grammys. It is Tanya's voice, Tanya's story. Brandi shared the Grammy with her as co-songwriter.
CARLILE: I wrote it down for you so you could be your own voice, but I know those are your feelings. So you wrote that song, you know, even if I held the pen.
TUCKER: Well, you know, we all do things differently. But she gets me. And I'm so thankful for her because she's the only one that's really gotten me and has done something about it, you know? And we've talked about what she gets out of it. She ain't getting no money. I guarantee you she putting her in the hole. And I said, why not, Brandi? She goes, because I want people to know I'm serious.
CARLILE: Yeah, it's true.
KELLY: Brandi Carlile and Tanya Tucker. Our conversation continues Monday, when we hear about that time Tanya came to stay with Brandi.
TUCKER: She makes the best huevos rancheros I've ever had.
CARLILE: Oh, yeah. I made that for you.
TUCKER: It was awesome.
CARLILE: That was with the shrimp and stuff like that.
TUCKER: I don't know what - it was just awesome.
CARLILE: I'd wake up in the morning. She'd be standing there in her boxers, cooking...
TUCKER: Yeah.
CARLILE: ...Bacon with a fork.
TUCKER: Yeah. Those little muffins you made - those are so great.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MUSTANG RIDGE")
TUCKER: (Singing) I got my knee on the wheel, and I'm feeling free with my hobnail on the gas. I just crossed over the county line, trying to make it up to Wild Rose Pass. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR. | 2022-10-26T04:49:40+00:00 | nepm.org | https://www.nepm.org/2022-10-21/country-music-artists-tanya-tucker-and-brandi-carlile-on-their-new-documentary |
Shipman, Margaret, 82. Cleveland, Oklahoma, .. Died Saturday, November 5.. Service Pending . Chapman-Black Funeral Home
Obituaries Newsletter
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Get up-to-the-minute news sent straight to your device. | 2022-11-09T06:21:27+00:00 | tulsaworld.com | https://tulsaworld.com/obituaries/deathnotices/shipman-margaret-82-cleveland/article_c7e2e4db-a642-597a-8eda-1353bc16542c.html |
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Boston College offensive lineman Christian Mahogany is a projected first-round NFL draft pick, and he fielded his fair share of calls about whether he would consider transferring for the 2023 season.
Mahogany was adamant about one thing: He would return to the Eagles to build on his draft stock after missing all of last year with a torn ACL in his right knee.
"No amount of money could take me away from a place that's believed in me from the start," Mahogany told ESPN on Thursday during ACC Kickoff. "Why would I leave for some money? I'm like a rental at that point. There's no care, there's no love. I wanted to finish here, and that was my end goal."
Mahogany was rated the No. 2 guard for the 2023 NFL draft before being sidelined for the season. He then had to watch as Boston College struggled through myriad injuries and inexperience along the offensive line en route to a 3-9 season. He did consider leaving for the NFL despite missing the season, but he thought it best to return to school. ESPN draft analyst Jordan Reid currently has Mahogany at No. 20 in his summer mock draft.
"I have to go back out there and show that I'm better than what I was," Mahogany said.
But that did not stop the calls about transferring. Mahogany was a three-star prospect in the class of 2019 and has spent the last four seasons at Boston College, crediting coach Jeff Hafley for his faith and belief in what he could become.
"BC took a chance on me, and we're an O-line school at the end of the day, so why would I leave just to be a six-month rental when I could just build something special here?" Mahogany said. "I can't look [my teammates] in the face and say, 'I'm leaving.' That's not who I am. And, realistically, I was a high school recruit, too. They didn't offer me in high school. So why do you want me now?"
Last season, BC receiver Zay Flowers also returned to the Eagles after turning down big-money offers to transfer. Flowers ended up going in the first round in the NFL draft a few months ago. Hafley said he was nervous about what would happen with Mahogany until the day the transfer portal window closed in January.
"People were calling constantly," Hafley said. "Do you know how much money he could have made if he went? Our players so far have stayed, and I think it says a lot about our team, and our culture and where we're going, especially after the year we had."
Mahogany said he could not wait for fall practice to begin so he can get back on the field with his teammates, but also to show just how much better he is as a player.
"I was telling somebody the other day: You either come back better or you come back worse from an injury," Mahogany said. "There's no the same, in my opinion. It's been 15 long months for me, but I think I'm better. My numbers say I'm better. The weight room says I'm better. Who I am as a person, I'm better.
"I'm a better football player. I'm a better student. I'm a better person. So I'm excited to finally be able to play football again. I just can't wait." | 2023-07-27T17:05:28+00:00 | espn.com | https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/38082504/christian-mahogany-chose-boston-college-being-rental |
FRANCIS (nee Toler), Pauline E.
Age 73, of South Lebanon, Ohio, passed away April 24, 2022. Funeral service Thurs., April 28, 2022, at 1pm at Stine Funeral Home of Lebanon, OH.
View the obituary on Legacy.com
Funeral Home Information
Stine Kilburn Funeral Home
801 Monroe Rd | 2022-04-28T09:02:48+00:00 | springfieldnewssun.com | https://www.springfieldnewssun.com/obituaries/francis-pauline/DRYVMDGE5RH2RHFAHM7K22EQFA/ |
Conquer The Burg is an adult scavenger hunt held in and around Cedarburg
Brian Kramp is at Olsen’s Piggly Wiggly with a preview of this weekend’s event that’s raising money for a great cause.
Conquer The Burg is an adult scavenger hunt held in and around Cedarburg that combines physical, mental and fun challenges for teams of four in an effort to "conquer the burg." Brian Kramp gets a preview of this weekend’s event that’s raising money for a great cause.
If you like scavenger hunts or amazing races, there’s one happening this weekend in Cedarburg that will have you biking, singing and strategizing
Brian Kramp is in Cedarburg learning more about the challenges and how to participate in this weekend’s fun.
et ready to work your mind, body and even belly this weekend as Cedarburg’s Conquer The Burg returns for a day full of kayaking, puzzle solving and eating
Brian Kramp is outside Cedarburg City Hall with some teams that are figuring out how they’ll "conquer the burg."
You don’t have to be a marathon runner to participate in this weekend’s adult scavenger hunt
Brian Kramp is in Cedarburg with a preview of the fun and sometimes silly challenges teams will take part in.
Conquer The Burg is an adult scavenger hunt held in and around Cedarburg that combines physical, mental and fun challenges
Brian Kramp is in Cedarburg with a preview of Saturday’s event that’s raising money for a great cause.
If you like scavenger hunts or amazing races, there’s one happening this weekend in Cedarburg
Brian Kramp is at Cedarburg Toy Company learning more about the challenges and how to participate in this weekend’s adult scavenger hunt. | 2022-09-08T18:21:15+00:00 | fox6now.com | https://www.fox6now.com/news/conquer-the-burg-scavenger-hunt-held-in-and-around-cedarburg |
Owner of the submersible that imploded during Titanic dive suspends operations
(AP) – The company that owned a submersible that fatally imploded on its way to explore the wreck of the Titanic said Thursday it has suspended operations.
OceanGate, a company based in Everett, Washington, owned the Titan submersible that is believed to have imploded as it made its descent on June 18 in the North Atlantic. The implosion killed all five people on board, including Stockton Rush, the submersible’s pilot and the chief executive officer of the company.
The company’s website said Thursday that it “has suspended all exploration and commercial operations.”
The Coast Guard is investigating the implosion.
OceanGate is based in the U.S. and OceanGate Expeditions, a related company that led the Titan’s dives to the Titanic, is registered in the Bahamas. The Titan submersible itself “was not a U.S. flagged vessel and was never certified or certificated by the U.S. Coast Guard,” the Coast Guard has said.
Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. | 2023-07-06T17:49:46+00:00 | kwch.com | https://www.kwch.com/2023/07/06/owner-submersible-that-imploded-during-titanic-dive-suspends-operations/ |
The U.S. Navy has ordered an independent investigation into the Navy SEAL selection course following the death of a sailor during the program, according to a report from The New York Times.
Vice Chief of Naval Operations Admiral William K. Lescher called for the investigation in a letter obtained by the paper.
The investigation will focus on the Basic Underwater Demolition/SEALS (BUD/S) course, probing its safety measures and drug testing protocol as well as the qualifications of medical personnel assigned to the program.
Many sailors have been found to use performance-enhancing drugs to get through BUD/S, particularly during what is known as “Hell Week,” the most intense part of the selection course where sailors experience dire physical conditions, according to the Times.
The Aug. 31 letter also ordered investigators to look into changes made since the passing of Kyle Mullen in February. Mullen was a Navy sailor who died after being sent to the hospital in San Diego shortly following Hell Week.
An anonymous Navy official told the Times that the Naval Special Warfare Command (NSWC), which houses the SEALs, had also been investigating Mullen’s death before their probe was brought to a halt.
Leaders found that the NSWC report placed too much responsibility on Mullen rather than highlighting the flaws of the SEAL training program, according to the official.
The letter indicates that the Special Warfare Command will refocus its investigation into whether Mullen died in the line of duty, but will leave other questions to the independent investigators.
“The Navy remains committed to transparency and ensuring the final reports are thorough, accurate, impartial, and that confidence and credibility are maintained throughout the entire process,” it told the Times.
The Hill has reached out to the Navy for further comment on the investigation. | 2022-09-13T00:17:47+00:00 | kxnet.com | https://www.kxnet.com/hill-politics/navy-orders-probe-into-seal-selection-course-after-death-of-sailor-nyt/ |
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden's education secretary has tested positive for COVID-19.
Miguel Cardona, who has been vaccinated and boosted against the virus, tested positive Tuesday and has mild symptoms, the Education Department said in a statement.
He tested positive the morning after he attended Halloween festivities at the White House. Biden and his wife, Jill, hosted a trick-or-treat event at the White House on Monday, but the Education Department said they are not close contacts of Cardona, as defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Cardona, 47, separately welcomed elementary school trick-or-treaters to the Education Department on Monday and later spoke at the Association of Art Museum Directors’ annual meeting.
The education chief will continue attending meetings and performing his duties while working remotely and in isolation, his agency said. He will return to in-person meetings when he tests negative.
Cardona is among several Biden administration officials who have gotten COVID-19, including CDC director Dr. Rochelle Walensky and Health Secretary Xavier Becerra.
___
The Associated Press education team receives support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The AP is solely responsible for all content. | 2022-11-01T18:34:41+00:00 | sfgate.com | https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Education-secretary-tests-positive-for-COVID-19-17549930.php |
The Air Force confirmed it provided unauthorized access to the military records of seven Republican congressional candidates in 2022.
The Air Force made the admission in a letter to House Armed Services Committee Chair Mike Rogers. R-Ala., and Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, R-Ky., dated Friday.
In addition to the five Republicans already known to have been affected by the breach, the Air Force confirmed the data of GOP candidates J.R. Majewski and Robert "Eli" Bremer were also accessed – this brings the total number of compromised Republicans to seven.
TWO MORE REPUBLICANS IDENTIFIED AS HAVING AIR FORCE RECORDS IMPROPERLY RELEASED TO DEM-LINK RESEARCHER
The other Republican candidates whose records were released to the Democratic Party-aligned research firm are Rep. Donald Bacon, Rep. Zachary Nunn, Kevin Dellicker, Jennifer-Ruth Green and Samuel Peters.
The firm in question is Due Diligence Group, whose Abraham Payton was named by the Air Force in letters to Peters and Dellicker as having made "multiple requests" for their records.
Due Diligence Group received more than $110,000 from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) from January 2021 to December 2022, according to FEC records, although it is unknown if the campaign committee used or received these or any other materials from Due Diligence.
GOP REP LIVID AT DEMOCRAT ‘POLITICAL DIRTY TRICKSTERS’ WHO OBTAINED AIR FORCE RECORDS OF REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES
The Air Force told Fox News, "There was no evidence of political motivation or malicious intent on the part of any employee."
"During the two-year period covered by the timeline in your letter, AFPC received a total of 19,597 requests for military personnel records. Immediately after we became aware in October 2022 of the improper records release concerning Ms. Jennifer-Ruth Green's records, AFPC conducted a Personal Identifiable Information (PII) breach investigation, as required under OMB and Department of Defense (DoD) policy."
HOUSE GOP DEMANDS ANSWER FROM PENTAGON ON LEAKED RECORDS OF JENNIFER-RUTH GREEN'S SEXUAL ASSAULT
"AFPC also initiated a seperate audit of all third-party requests (10,599) received between early 2021 and early 2023. That audit identified a total of 11 individuals who had their military records released without proper authority."
The Air Force said their discovery came from an internal audit that began following the discovery that Republican Indiana House candidate Green’s military records were improperly released. Those records, reported on by Politico in October 2022, included details of a sexual assault.
The release of Green's records led Rogers and Comer to send a letter to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin demanding information, including a list of the improperly released records of congressional candidates over the past two years and a list of punitive actions taken against those responsible for the leak.
Fox News' Ronn Blitzer contributed to this report. | 2023-03-22T20:07:07+00:00 | foxbangor.com | https://www.foxbangor.com/news/national/air-force-confirms-2-more-republican-candidates-whose-records-were-improperly-accessed/article_b91ed59c-1f00-5640-a934-28b43ba2ff45.html |
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — After years of opposition to any form of marijuana legalization in Wisconsin, Republican lawmakers are now working privately to build support for a medical cannabis program that could win bipartisan backing and be enacted into law later this year, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos told The Associated Press on Thursday.
For now, the group of lawmakers — whom Vos declined to name — are working only among Assembly Republicans to build enough support, and he hopes to introduce the plan this fall. Vos has long backed some form of medical marijuana program, but no bill has ever received a vote in either the GOP-controlled Assembly or Senate.
Vos said he remains steadfastly opposed to legalizing recreational marijuana and does not want to create a medical program that would be a precursor to that. Wisconsin remains an outlier nationally, with medical marijuana legal in 38 states and recreational marijuana legal in 21. The push for legalization in Wisconsin has gained momentum, as neighboring Illinois and Michigan allow recreational use while Minnesota and Iowa have legalized medical use.
“We are not Illinois. We are not California. We are not Colorado,” Vos said in an interview. “We are a state that’s at best purple. And purple is not legalization of recreational marijuana.”
Vos’s announcement that Republicans have been working on a deal he hopes can pass the Legislature comes on April 20, or “420 Day,” marijuana’s high holiday. Advocates for pot legalization planned to announce a “Grass Routes Tour” that will make four stops across the state to promote cannabis legalization.
Democratic Senate Minority Leader Melissa Agard, who is leading the fight for full legalization, cast doubt on Vos’ intentions.
“We’ve seen this story before — but actions speak louder than words,” Agard said in a statement. “Session after session, the Speaker has come forward with empty promises but no tangible steps toward any form of legal cannabis Wisconsin.”
Democratic Gov. Tony Evers proposed full legalization of marijuana in his state budget, an idea that Republicans vowed to reject. Last April 20, a Republican-authored bill creating a medical marijuana program received a public hearing, the first time any such bill made it that far in the GOP-controlled Legislature.
However, the bill died in committee.
Senate Republicans have been less open to pot legalization than those in the Assembly. But in January, Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu said a bill to create a medical marijuana program could pass this legislative session — as long as regulations are put forward to ensure it’s for those in serious pain.
Sixty-four percent of Wisconsinites support legalizing marijuana for any use, according to October polling by the Marquette University Law School. More than 80% of Wisconsinites supported the idea of a medical marijuana program, according to 2019 polling. | 2023-04-21T11:50:07+00:00 | ourquadcities.com | https://www.ourquadcities.com/health-2/ap-health/wisconsin-gop-lawmakers-working-on-medical-pot-legalization/ |
LOS ANGELES — LeBron James scored 26 points and Anthony Davis added 23 to help the Los Angeles Lakers to their first win of the season with a 121-1110 victory over the Denver Nuggets on Sunday night.
Russell Westbrook had 18 points for the Lakers (1-5), who had lost their first five games of the season under first-year head coach Darvin Ham. Los Angeles was the last winless team in the NBA.
Westbrook drove the lane and scored on a layup to extend the Lakers lead to 117-106 in the final minutes as the Lakers closed out the win.
Nikola Jockic scored 23 points and Jamal Murray added 21 for the Nuggets (4-3), who had four of their last five and two straight games before Sunday’s loss.
Austin Reaves made a 3-pointer from the top of the arc and Lonnie Walker IV drove the baseline for a dunk to give the Lakers a 113-100 advantage. That 13-point lead was their largest of the season.
The Lakers made 13 3-pointers after struggling with long-range shooting this season in their previous five games. The Nuggets made 15 3-pointers.
Davis was aggressive early after missing one game with lower back tightness and was questionable Sunday but played. He tweaked his back in the game against Denver on Wednesday when the Nuggets beat the Lakers 110-99 in Denver.
The Lakers led 55-51 at halftime. They trailed by as many as 10 points in the first quarter but overcame that deficit by halftime.
UP IN THE RAFTERS
Hall of Famer George Mikan had his jersey retired. His family was there to celebrate the honor and watch No. 99 be unveiled. He’s the 11th player to have his jersey retired, along with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Elgin Baylor, Kobe Bryant, Wilt Chamberlain, Gail Goodrich, Magic Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal, Jerry West, Jamaal Wilkes and James Worthy. Worthy was there Sunday and spoke about Mikan.
TIP-INS
Nuggets: G Bones Hyland missed the game with a left hip strain … G Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (sprained ankle) returned Sunday and had nine points … C DeAndre Jordan ran out of bounds on one play, leaned over a fan to stop his momentum and ate some of his popcorn.
Lakers: C Anthony Davis (lower back tightness) and F LeBron James (foot soreness) both played and were in the starting lineup … Pau Gasol, who won two championships with the Lakers, attended the Mikan Jersey unveiling and game on Sunday. His jersey will be retired by the Lakers in March
UP NEXT
Nuggets: Have three days off before Thursday’s game at Oklahoma City.
Lakers: Hosts the New Orleans Pelicans on Wednesday.
SUGGESTED VIDEOS: Sports | 2022-10-31T05:59:54+00:00 | 9news.com | https://www.9news.com/article/sports/nba/denver-nuggets/lebron-james-helps-lakers-win-for-first-time-this-season/73-b9acf2d8-c855-4b3d-bd14-ef269ab6fc5e |
Request unsuccessful. Incapsula incident ID: 1164000890012840303-24394946166134345 | 2022-11-02T22:31:51+00:00 | bizjournals.com | https://www.bizjournals.com/kansascity/news/2022/11/02/mckesson-finalizes-acquisition-of-rx-savings.html |
Scholten shares experience with complicated pregnancy, miscarriage
Washington — West Michigan Democratic congressional candidate Hillary Scholten opened up about losing her first child to miscarriage, saying a nationwide abortion ban after 15 weeks would have further complicated a deeply challenging decision about her pregnancy.
In a column published in the Holland Sentinel on Wednesday, Scholten, 40, recounted learning that her daughter had Turner's syndrome, a rare genetic condition that cause a range of medical and developmental problems in girls. Her doctors told her it was "incompatible with life," she said, and offered her the option to abort the pregnancy.
She was 29 years old and 14 weeks pregnant. She wrote that she was "anguished to the point of physical illness" as she and her husband considered their options, but decided to wait in order "to give our daughter as much of a chance at life as possible."
The piece comes less than one week before the November general election, when voters will decide between her and Republican candidate John Gibbs, who does support congressional Republicans' 15-week ban on abortions. The two are running to represent Michigan's new 3rd Congressional District, which encompasses portions of Kent, Ottawa and Muskegon counties.
Michigan voters statewide will also vote on Proposal 3, which would enshrine a right to abortion in the state constitution. Michigan has a law dating back to 1846 that bans abortion at all stages except to save the life of the mother, which is currently held up in legal challenges.
Abortion has been one of the most animating issues for Michigan voters in the wake of a U.S. Supreme Court decision this summer that struck down a longstanding Roe v. Wade ruling that required abortion access nationwide. A plurality of respondents to a recent statewide poll commissioned by The Detroit News and WDIV TV (Channel 4) said abortion is the biggest thing pushing them to vote this November, with 36% citing it as their top motivating issue.
Six weeks after Scholten learned about the syndrome, she miscarried.
If congressional Republicans' legislation to ban abortion nationwide after 15 weeks had been law, she wrote, she would have been "placed on an an arbitrary timeline set by politicians in Washington" after learning of the diagnosis and would not have had the freedom to wait and see how the baby's heart developed.
"Missing from the national conversation on abortion and choice is this important fact: outlawing abortion will not eliminate complications in pregnancies," she wrote. "It won’t take away choice, it will just change who gets to make the choice in these highly complex situations. It will take medical decisions out of the hands of medical professionals and the women who are impacted, and place those decisions into the hands of politicians."
It is the first time Scholten, who is a member of the Dutch Reformed Church and grew up Christian, has publicly shared the story of her complicated pregnancy.
She decided to share her experience to show how being religious and supporting abortion rights "can be reconciled" and to reach other religious women who "haven't necessarily seen themselves and their belief in wanting to protect life that they have inside themselves" reflected in abortion rights advocacy.
Scholten and her husband consulted their pastor and researched the baby's condition. They weighed the knowledge that they could and would "eagerly" raise a child with severe disability with the understanding that she may live with serious pain.
"I think stories like mine have not really been able to find a place in the pro-choice movement," she told The Detroit News. "I wanted to exemplify how my faith informed my own decision, and how that is very much at home" in the fight for abortion rights.
She added that she hopes "it will get people to think a little more deeply about the issue."
"I don't know when life begins, that is a question for the ages," she said. "But we do know is that when these complex decisions arise, we do know who should be in the position to make these complicated choices. I believe that my story highlights why it's so important to allow women and their families and their doctors to make these choices for themselves."
rbeggin@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @rbeggin | 2022-11-03T02:24:19+00:00 | detroitnews.com | https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/michigan/2022/11/03/scholten-shares-experience-with-complicated-pregnancy-miscarriage/69614852007/ |
Pope Francis to miss Way of the Cross event in cold Rome
VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican says Pope Francis, who was recently hospitalized for bronchitis, won’t preside over Good Friday’s late-night Way of the Cross event due to extremely cold weather in Rome.
It said that instead of presiding over the torch-lit procession at the Colosseum, Francis will watch from the hotel where he lives in the Vatican.
He will still attend the earlier Passion of the Lord celebration at St. Peter’s Basilica, the Vatican added. There, the cross will be unveiled before it goes to the Colosseum for the procession.
Francis, 86, was discharged from a Rome hospital on Saturday following treatment for bronchitis. The Vatican said at the time that he would carry out the complete Holy Week schedule, including the Way of the Cross procession and Easter Sunday Mass in St. Peter’s Square.
On Thursday, he presided over Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica and later washed and dried the feet of a dozen residents of a Rome juvenile prison in a ritual symbolizing humility.
Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. | 2023-04-07T14:46:37+00:00 | kcbd.com | https://www.kcbd.com/2023/04/07/pope-francis-miss-way-cross-event-cold-rome/ |
By FATIMA SHBAIR, The Associated Press
JABALIYA REFUGEE CAMP, Gaza Strip (AP) — Twenty-one victims of a fire that tore through a top-floor apartment in the Gaza Strip during a birthday party were members of the same family, two of their relatives said Friday.
Thousands later joined a funeral procession for the victims.
Officials in Hamas-run Gaza have said Thursday night’s blaze in a three-story residential building in the Jabaliya refugee camp was apparently fueled by stored gasoline. They said it was not clear how the gasoline ignited, and that an investigation is underway.
It was one of the deadliest incidents in Gaza in recent years outside the violence stemming from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The blaze destroyed the top-floor apartment in the building, home to the Abu Raya family.
Mohammed Abu Raya, a family spokesman, told The Associated Press that the extended family had gathered for twin celebrations — the birthday of one of the children and the return of one of the adults from a trip to Egypt.
Abu Raya spoke at the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza, where the bodies had been taken and where sobbing relatives were waiting for funeral processions to begin.
Abu Raya challenged assertions that stored gasoline fueled the blaze, saying furniture made from flammable materials was more likely to have accelerated the flames. “The disaster was that no one came out alive to tell us the truth of things,” he said. “I do not think that it was stored gasoline.”
Those killed were from three generations — a couple, their five sons and one daughter, two daughters-in-law and 11 grandchildren, according to Abu Raya and Mohammed Jadallah who had married into the Abu Raya family.
Gaza faces a severe energy crisis, largely because of a crippling Israeli-Egyptian border blockade that has been in place since the Islamic militant Hamas seized control of the territory 15 years ago. People often store cooking gas, diesel and gasoline in homes in preparation for winter. House fires have previously been caused by candles and gas leaks.
More:
U.S. moves to shield Saudi prince from lawsuits over journalist’s killing
Man carries sword, ax into New York Times building | 2022-11-18T15:37:55+00:00 | pennlive.com | https://www.pennlive.com/nation-world/2022/11/fire-kills-21-members-of-the-same-family-at-gaza-birthday-party.html |
BOISE, Idaho (AP) — Idaho Republican Lt. Gov. and gubernatorial candidate Janice McGeachin on Monday demanded that Republican Gov. Brad Little call a special legislative session to eliminate rape and incest as legal exceptions to Idaho’s abortion law.
The Idaho law will go into effect if the U.S. Supreme Court overturns the landmark Roe v. Wade case that legalized abortion nationwide.
McGeachin is running against Little in the Idaho Republican gubernatorial primary and in a statement said the potential Idaho law is insufficient because of numerous exceptions. Besides rape and incest, it also allows abortions to save mothers’ lives.
“It is shameful that Idaho’s abortion laws are not the most pro-life in our country,” said McGeachin, who is endorsed by former President Donald Trump. “No child should ever be murdered because of the circumstances surrounding his or her conception.”
Little in 2020 signed the so-called trigger law put forward by a group called Idaho Chooses Life, which has endorsed Little.
“It’s easy for Janice to offer cheap rhetoric on the campaign trail and try to salvage her campaign by politicizing the abortion issue,” said the group’s executive director, David Ripley. “But the fact of the matter is it’s hard to imagine criminalizing conduct in those situations.”
He said his group advocates a culture of love and compassion so that eventually women or girls who become pregnant through rape or incest choose to have the child.
“I don’t think we can get at those compassions through criminal law,” he said.
A poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research in June found that 61% of Americans say abortion should be legal in most or all circumstances in the first trimester of a pregnancy. However, 65% said abortion should usually be illegal in the second trimester, and 80% said that about the third trimester.
Majorities of Americans — Republicans and Democrats alike — think a pregnant woman should be able to obtain a legal abortion if her life is seriously endangered, if the pregnancy results from rape or incest or if the child would be born with a life-threatening illness.
McGeachin is in a tough race against the first-term Little and appears to be targeting far-right Republicans in deeply conservative Idaho for the May 17 primary. Republican primaries are only open to those registered as Republicans and draw far fewer voters than the general election. Early in-person and mail voting is happening now for the primary.
The part-time Idaho Legislature adjourned for the year in March. The only way it can come back into session is if Little calls a special session.
Little’s office didn’t immediately respond to a telephone message seeking comment on McGeachin’s demand for the special legislative session.
Earlier this year during the regular session, lawmakers approved and Little signed another abortion ban modeled after a Texas law that would be enforced through lawsuits to avoid constitutional court challenges.
The latter law is on hold while the Idaho Supreme Court considers a lawsuit from a regional Planned Parenthood group contending it violates the Idaho Constitution regarding separation of powers. | 2022-05-10T06:53:48+00:00 | krqe.com | https://www.krqe.com/news/national/idaho-lieutenant-governor-wants-harshest-us-abortion-ban/ |
Indiana County man charged with drug delivery resulting in death
James Emerson, 52, is facing multiple charges
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Indiana County man charged with drug delivery resulting in death
James Emerson, 52, is facing multiple charges
State police said charges have been filed against an Indiana County man accused of providing the drugs that killed another man in February.On Feb. 4, Chad Stineman, 23, of Coral, was found dead in a home on Locust Street in Center Township.Investigators said he died of multiple drug toxicity.State police announced Monday that James Emerson, 52, of Indiana, is accused of being the person who delivered, sold and distributed the drugs that led to Stineman’s death.Emerson faces a preliminary hearing next month.
CORAL, Pa. —
State police said charges have been filed against an Indiana County man accused of providing the drugs that killed another man in February.
On Feb. 4, Chad Stineman, 23, of Coral, was found dead in a home on Locust Street in Center Township.
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Investigators said he died of multiple drug toxicity.
State police announced Monday that James Emerson, 52, of Indiana, is accused of being the person who delivered, sold and distributed the drugs that led to Stineman’s death.
Emerson faces a preliminary hearing next month. | 2023-04-18T11:01:59+00:00 | wtae.com | https://www.wtae.com/article/indiana-county-man-charged-with-drug-delivery-resulting-in-death/43628213 |
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — This article involves commercial content.
The products and services featured appear as paid advertising.
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Charlotte Today is a local lifestyle and entertainment show where you'll learn everything about the Queen City with hosts Mia Atkins and Eugene Robinson on WCNC Charlotte live weekdays at 11 a.m.
From what’s trending to local restaurants, events and entertainment, you’ll find it all on this show.
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If you have a question for the Charlotte Today team, feel free to email them at charlottetoday@wcnc.com | 2023-01-10T18:36:54+00:00 | wcnc.com | https://www.wcnc.com/article/entertainment/television/charlotte-today/shane-smith-law-attorney/275-1d713073-f67a-4fd7-8adf-563c0c0b0445 |
Tennessee moved into a tie with Ohio State for No. 2 in The Associated Press college football poll Sunday to set up a 1 vs. 2 matchup next week with top-ranked Georgia.
Georgia-Tennessee will be the 25th regular-season game matching the top two teams in the AP poll, and the third straight involving Southeastern Conference teams. Neither the Bulldogs nor the Volunteers have ever played in a 1-2 game in the regular season.
Georgia remained No. 1 for the fourth straight week, receiving 30 first-place votes and 1,528 points in the AP Top 25 presented by Regions Bank.
The Volunteers moved up a spot, receiving 18 first-place votes and 1,500 points to match Ohio State. The Buckeyes received 15 first-place votes. The last time there was a tie at No. 2 in the AP poll was Nov. 14, 2004, between Auburn and Oklahoma behind No. 1 Southern California.
On Saturday, Tennessee routed Kentucky 44-6 and Ohio State won 44-31 at Penn State.
Tennessee has not been ranked this high since it was No. 2 in 2001, a season the Vols finished fourth.
No. 4 Michigan, No. 5 Clemson, No. 6 Alabama, No. 7 TCU and No. 8 Oregon held their spots in the rankings. USC moved up a spot to ninth and No. 10 UCLA gave the Pac-12 three teams in the top-10 for the first time since November 2016.
The last time both Los Angeles schools were in the top 10 was September 2015.
The first College Football Playoff rankings of the season will be released Tuesday night.
POLL POINTS
The last two 1-2 regular-season games both involved Alabama and LSU.
The Tigers were No. 1 in 2019 when they beat the second-ranked Crimson Tide in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, on the way to an SEC and national championship.
In 2011, the top-ranked Tigers won at No. 2 Alabama in overtime and the two SEC West rivals played again in the BCS national championship game. The Tide won the rematch and finished No. 1.
Including postseason games, this will be the 53rd game matching AP’s No. 1 and No. 2 since the poll began in 1936.
IN
Three teams are making there season debuts on the Top 25 this week.
— No. 23 Liberty is ranked for the first time since 2020, when the Flames were ranked for eight weeks and peaked at No. 17 in the final poll of the season.
— No. 24 Oregon State becomes the latest Power Five school to snap a long absence from the rankings. The Beavers had not been ranked since they were No. 25 in the 2013 preseason poll. They had not been ranked in the regular season since 2012 when they finished 20th.
Earlier this year Kansas broke a 13-year rankings drought, which had been the longest in Power Five. Then Illinois broke the next longest dry spell, moving into the rankings for the first time since 2011.
Rutgers currently holds the longest AP Top 25 drought among Power Five teams, dating back to 2012. Vanderbilt is next. The Commodores have not been ranked since the 2013 season.
— No. 25 UCF is ranked for the first time since Sept. 27, 2020.
OUT
SEC East rivals Kentucky and South Carolina both dropped out of the poll after absorbing their third losses of the season. The Gamecocks are out after just one week ranked. The Wildcats are unranked for the first time this season.
Cincinnati also dropped out of the rankings after losing to UCF.
CONFERENCE CALL
SEC — 5 (Nos. 1, 2, 6, 11, 15).
ACC — 5 (Nos. 5, 17, 20, 21, 22).
Pac-12 — 5 (Nos. 8, 9, 10, 12, 24).
Big Ten — 4 (Nos. 2, 4, 14, 16).
Big 12 — 3 (Nos. 7, 13, 18).
American — 2 (Nos. 19, 25).
Independent — 1 (No. 23).
RANKED vs. RANKED
Big weekend in the SEC as both division leads will be up for grabs.
No. 6 Alabama at No. 15 LSU. First ranked matchup for the Crimson Tide and Tigers since that 2019 1 vs. 2 game.
No. 20 Wake Forest at No. 21 North Carolina State. For the second straight year, the Demon Deacons and Wolfpack will meet as ranked opponents. | 2022-10-31T21:17:15+00:00 | wnct.com | https://www.wnct.com/sports/college-football/ap-ap-top-25-tennessee-ohio-st-tied-at-2-uga-next-for-vols/ |
(CNN) — Food is still getting more expensive, but at a slower pace than earlier this year.
In the month of October, food was .6% pricier compared to September, adjusting for seasonal swings, according to data released Thursday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
For the year through October, without seasonal adjustments, food got 10.9% more expensive, with groceries increasing 12.4% and restaurant prices jumping 8.6%.
The increases are less than the record highs clocked just a few months ago, but food prices are still outpacing the overall rate of inflation, which hit 7.7% for the year.
The Federal Reserve has been attempting to curb inflation by raising interest rates, but that doesn’t do much for grocery and restaurant prices.
When it comes to food, a number of far-flung factors are disrupting supply.
Extreme heat and drought and a deadly avian flu are hurting some crops, as well as squeezing the supply of turkeys and egg-laying hens. Volatility in the grain market caused by the war in Ukraine as well as high energy prices, which impact fertilizer and transportation costs, are also raising food prices.
“Those things are still problematic,” said Tom Bailey, senior analyst of consumer foods with Rabobank.
Issues like these have led to soaring prices throughout the grocery store.
What’s getting more expensive, and what’s getting cheaper
In the year through October, eggs got a whopping 43% more expensive. Butter went up 26.7%, the price of flour went up 24.6%. Lettuce jumped 17.7%, potatoes popped 15.2% and poultry increased 14.9%. Bread, rice and coffee each went up 14.8%.
A handful of items, however, have seen decreases this year, especially in the meat aisle. Uncooked beef steak fell 6.9%, and beef and veal prices dropped 3.6%.
“We’ve seen a little bit of retailer easing of pricing for some of the beef products,” said Bailey. That’s a sign that they are trying to get customers into stores, he noted.
Even as prices cool down, shoppers are still feeling the pain.
“For the consumer, the share of spend of their wallet on food is still well above where we’ve been in the last two decades,” said Bailey.
In October, some prices jumped compared to the previous month.
Eggs saw the highest increase with a 10.1% jump from September. Lunch meats got 3.4% more expensive, lettuce went up 3.3%, tomatoes jumped 2.3% and flour rose 2%.
But several items got less expensive. Fresh fruit fell 2.4%. Uncooked beef roasts and hot dogs both dropped 2.3%, breakfast sausage went down 2% and fresh doughnuts, sweet rolls and coffee cakes fell 1.9%. | 2022-11-10T21:18:42+00:00 | wishtv.com | https://www.wishtv.com/news/national/heres-whats-getting-more-expensive-at-the-grocery-store-3/ |
MUMBAI, India, Oct. 10, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Educate Girls conducted a comprehensive study with mothers, girls and boys from 900+ households across villages of Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh in India, to understand how the pandemic impacted the education of girls aged 5-18.
In November and December 2021, Educate Girls, an Indian non-profit working towards girls' education in rural India, conducted a comprehensive study to estimate the impact of the pandemic on girls aged 5-18 in Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. This study was conducted with the support from Dalberg International Advisors, by surveying mothers and over 3,200 girls and boys from 900+ households.
Educate Girls wanted to understand the changes brought about by the pandemic in the lives of such vulnerable girls in India and how it may have affected their chances to return to school.
Biggest roadblocks preventing girls from resuming or staying in school
- Increased financial distress and school attendance
In villages where schools had opened, about 94% girls and 96% boys said they are attending school. However, the proportion of adolescent girls not attending school (23%) was nearly double that of adolescent boys not attending school.
- Increased burden of household chores
For all girls, the number of hours spent on household chores has increased by more than 1 hour a day to an average of over 3.5 hours per day. Most of this increase is in chores that need to be done in the morning before they go to school.
- Burden of early marriage
In Uttar Pradesh, roughly 30% of participating girls were either married or engaged. Many girls mentioned aggravated poverty during lockdown, coupled with other circumstances, have left them at risk of early marriage.
"The findings of the study are clear - the barriers to girls' education are greater than ever before and we need to fight greater odds to ensure these girls go to school, don't drop out, and continue learning. The impact is most acute for adolescent girls. The study also highlights the stories of girls and the long-term effect the pandemic has left on their lives," says Safeena Husain, Founder and Board Director, Educate Girls.
The findings of this study have been compiled in a report titled 'Impact of Covid-19 in rural India and its effect on girls'. It outlines the opportunities that lay ahead, which involves teachers and peers keeping adolescent girls connected to learning and bringing them back to school.
About Educate Girls
Educate Girls is a non-profit that focuses on mobilising communities for girls' education in India's rural and educationally backward areas. Working in partnership with the Government, Educate Girls currently operates successfully in over 20,000 villages of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh and has brought 1.1 million+ girls back to school till date. By engaging with a huge base of community volunteers, Educate Girls helps to identify, enrol, and retain out-of-school girls and to improve foundational skills in literacy and numeracy for all children (both girls and boys).
Learn more: www.EducateGirls.ngo
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SOURCE Educate Girls | 2022-10-10T15:11:43+00:00 | newschannel10.com | https://www.newschannel10.com/prnewswire/2022/10/10/increasing-household-chores-early-marriage-are-preventing-girls-rural-india-staying-school-according-study-by-educate-girls/ |
A woman is dead and nine others were taken to a western Michigan hospital after a fireworks explosion in Park Township.
Ottawa County deputies said the incident happened at a fireworks show on private property Monday night.
The 43-year-old woman was reportedly unresponsive when first responders arrived. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
Officials said the injuries to the nine others ranged from minor to critical.
Pictures from the scene show numerous fireworks on the ground and lawn chairs in the distance.
Authorities said several homes and vehicles were damaged in the explosion.
One vehicle's side window was completely shattered.
It's still unclear what caused the fireworks explosion. Anyone with information is asked to call the Ottawa County Sheriff's Office or Silent Observer at 1-877-88-SILENT.
This story was originally reported by Chris Bovia on Scripps News Grand Rapids.
SEE MORE: Fireworks warning: They caused 11 deaths, 10,200 injuries in 2022
Trending stories at Scrippsnews.com | 2023-07-04T19:17:15+00:00 | tmj4.com | https://www.tmj4.com/woman-dies-9-others-hurt-in-michigan-fireworks-explosion |
ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) — Nathaniel Hackett defended his handling of the lead-up to his first year as head coach of the Denver Broncos on Tuesday.
Hackett said the rash of injuries and penalties and the offensive struggles under quarterback Russell Wilson have nothing to do with him taking it easy on the players in the summer.
"I think a lot of the injuries that we're having are kind of crazy from the standpoint of the amount of ACLs," Hackett said after announcing that linebacker Aaron Patrick was lost for the season with a torn ACL after a sideline mishap in the Broncos' 19-16 loss to the Chargers on Monday night.
Patrick, who got a cleat stuck on a carpet and plowed into a sideline worker, is the fifth Broncos player to tear an ACL this season.
The Broncos (2-4) are allowing just 16.5 points per game, but they're last in the league with a 15.2-point scoring average behind Russell Wilson, whom Hackett said is day to day with a strained hamstring he sustained against the Chargers.
"I think from the standpoint of the offense getting in rhythm, I think we had a lot of great practices" last summer, Hackett said. "For whatever reason, there's certain things that we're missing, whether they're pressing, that consistency is not there."
Hackett didn't play his starters in the preseason and his players hardly hit or broke a sweat in training camp.
Absent were the staple 7-on-7 drills that helps quarterbacks build confidence and rapport with their receivers and the 1-on-1 pass rush drills where O-linemen are more comfortable tweaking their technique than during 11-on-11s.
General manager George Paton concurred with Hackett's approach that emphasized safety and science ahead of risk and ritual. Paton said it was a plan that Hackett detailed in his job interview.
The goal, both men said, was to finish strong even if they started slow, which is exactly what they've done.
Out of sync with most of his targets, Wilson has just five touchdown passes, putting him on pace for a career-low 14, and his 20 sacks have him on track for a career-high 57.
More than a dozen players have gone on IR so far and the Broncos lead the league with a whopping 54 penalties, putting them on pace for 153, which would be 70 more than they committed last year.
Wilson looked as if he had finally figured it all out Monday night when he completed 12 of his first 14 passes for 173 yards and a score, hitting nine different receivers during a 10-for-10 start.
Yet, even during that hot start, he had tight end Greg Dulcich wide open for a first down before the pocket collapsed as he held onto the ball too long, something that's become a disturbing pattern.
After driving the Broncos to the Chargers 9 in the closing seconds of the first half, Wilson reverted to the quarterback quandary he's become for the Broncos, misfiring three on short passes and bringing on his kicker for a field goal.
It only got worse in the second half and overtime when he completed just 3 of 11 passes for 15 yards. Add the lost yardage on a trio of sacks and the Broncos were a net minus-9 yards passing after the break.
For the second straight game, TV cameras caught a Broncos receiver displaying his anger. Last week, it was KJ Hamler who threw his helmet onto the ground after the Broncos lost to the Colts in overtime, and this time it was Jerry Jeudy complaining on the sideline late in the game.
"You want them to be frustrated to a certain extent," Hackett said, "because they want to win."
WHAT'S WORKING
Denver's defense, which is allowing fewer points than all but three teams: the Bills (13.5), 49ers (14.8) and Cowboys (16.3).
WHAT NEEDS WORK
The offense, including Melvin Gordon, who didn't get a snap after running three times for 8 yards early on.
STOCK UP
ILB Alex Singleton had 21 tackles, including 19 solo.
STOCK DOWN
CB Damarri Mathis was whistled four times for pass interference totaling 87 yards in his first career start, and fellow rookie KR Montrell Washington's fumbled punt led to the Chargers' game-winning kick.
INJURIES
Besides Wilson and Patrick, CB Essang Bassey will miss time with a pulled hamstring.
KEY NUMBER
151 — yards of penalties, the Broncos' most since Nov. 7, 1976, when they piled up 160 against the Bucs.
WHAT'S NEXT
The Jets (4-2) visit Denver on Sunday. | 2022-10-19T00:06:16+00:00 | wyomingnews.com | https://www.wyomingnews.com/broncos-early-struggles-an-indictment-of-hacketts-approach/article_49fbf794-4f3b-11ed-95de-af4d027c315c.html |
WASHINGTON (AP) — TikTok is ramping up a public relations campaign to fend off the possibility of a nationwide ban by the Biden administration, and it’s bringing some unconventional advocates to help: online influencers.
Dozens of TikTok creators — some with millions of followers on the video-sharing app — came to Capitol Hill on Wednesday to lobby in favor of the platform, one day before lawmakers are slated to grill the company’s chief executive about concerns over user data falling into the hands of the Chinese government.
Shou Zi Chew plans to tell Congress on Thursday that TikTok, which was founded by Chinese entrepreneurs, is committed to user safety, data protection and security, and keeping the platform free from Chinese government influence. He will also answer questions from U.S. lawmakers worried about the social media platform’s effects on its young user base.
At the heart of TikTok’s trouble is a Chinese national intelligence law that would compel Chinese companies to fork over data to the government for whatever purposes it deems to involve national security. There’s also concern Beijing might try to push pro-China narratives or misinformation through the platform.
At a media event coordinated by TikTok on Wednesday, some content creators acknowledged that concerns about data security are legitimate, but pointed to precautions the company is taking, such as a $1.5 billion plan — dubbed Project Texas — to route all U.S. data to domestic servers owned and maintained by the software giant Oracle.
TikTok has been attempting to sell that proposal to the Biden administration, but skeptics have argued it doesn’t go far enough. The administration is reportedly demanding the company’s Chinese owners sell their stakes or face a nationwide ban.
Janette Ok, a fashion and beauty influencer on TikTok, said in an interview Wednesday that TikTok invited her to the lobbying event a few weeks ago and paid for her trip to Washington. She’s been able to make a full-time career from her videos, earning income from partnerships with brands looking to capture the eyes of her 1.7 million followers. She said her popularity on TikTok has also allowed her to have other opportunities, like TV and commercial acting roles.
“I don’t know much about politics, but I know a lot about fashion, and I know a lot about people,” Ok said. “And just to be here and share my story is what TikTok has invited me to do.”
Tensions around TikTok have been building on Capitol Hill, reaching a boiling point late last year when a proposal to ban the app off of government phones passed with bipartisan support and was signed into law by President Joe Biden. House Republicans are pushing a bill that would give Biden the power to ban the app.
Other bills have also been introduced — some bipartisan — including a measure that would circumvent the challenges the administration would face in court if it moved forward with sanctions against the social media company.
The effort to target TikTok is part of a larger, tougher approach that Congress has taken in the past several months as China’s relationship with two U.S. adversaries — Russia and Iran — has come into focus. A recent incident with a spy balloon forced even some wary congressional Democrats to join Republicans in opposition, and there is now a strong bipartisan concern in Washington that Beijing would use legal and regulatory power to seize American user data or use the platform to push favorable narratives or misinformation.
But the company has also gotten support from at least three progressive lawmakers who say they oppose a ban on the platform. At a news conference Wednesday with the influencers, Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., characterized the national security concerns that have been raised as xenophobic hysteria due to TikTok’s Chinese origins. He said if Congress wants to have an “honest” conversation about data collection, it should focus on a national privacy law that targets all social media companies – not just TikTok.
“Usually when there’s an issue of national security concern, they hold a bipartisan Congressional briefing on that particular issue,” Bowman said. “We have not received a bipartisan Congressional briefing on the national security risk of TikTok.”
TikTok’s response to the political pressure can be seen all around the nation’s Capitol, with the company putting up ads in area airports and metro stations that include promises of securing users data and privacy and creating a safe platform for its young users. Last year, the company spent more than $5.3 million on dispatching lobbyists to the Hill to make its case, according to Open Secrets, a nonprofit that tracks lobbying spending.
On Thursday, Chew will be sticking to a familiar script as he urges officials against pursuing an all-out ban on TikTok or for the company to be sold off to new owners. TikTok’s efforts to ensure the security of its users’ data go “above and beyond” what any of its rivals are doing, according to Chew’s prepared remarks released ahead of his appearance before the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce.
Chew pushed back against fears that TikTok could become a tool of China’s ruling Communist Party because its parent company, ByteDance, was founded in Beijing and also operates from there.
“Let me state this unequivocally: ByteDance is not an agent of China or any other country,” Chew said.
He distanced TikTok from its Chinese roots and denied the “inaccurate” belief that TikTok’s corporate structure makes it “beholden to the Chinese government.” ByteDance has evolved into a privately held “global enterprise,” Chew said, with 60% owned by big institutional investors, 20% owned by the Chinese entrepreneurs who founded it and the rest by employees.
It’s “emphatically untrue” that TikTok sends data on its American users to Beijing, he said.
“TikTok has never shared, or received a request to share, U.S. user data with the Chinese government,” Chew said. “Nor would TikTok honor such a request if one were ever made.”
Whether those promises will alleviate concern is another matter. TikTok has come under fire in the U.S., Europe and Asia-Pacific, where a growing number of governments have banned the app from devices used for official business. India, Afghanistan and Indonesia have banned it nationwide.
Chew, a 40-year-old Singaporean who was appointed CEO in 2021, said in a TikTok video this week that the congressional hearing comes at a “pivotal moment” for the company, which now has 150 million American users.
Chew said TikTok’s data security project is the right answer, not a ban or a sale of the company.
“No other social media company, or entertainment platform like TikTok, provides this level of access and transparency,” he said.
The company started deleting the historical protected data of U.S. users from non-Oracle servers this month, Chew said. When that process is completed later this year, all U.S. data will be protected by American law and controlled by a U.S.-led security team.
“Under this structure, there is no way for the Chinese government to access it or compel access to it,” he said.
He said a TikTok ban would hurt the U.S. economy and small American businesses that use the app to sell their products, while reducing competition in an “increasingly concentrated market.” He added that a sale “would not impose any new restrictions on data flows or access.” | 2023-03-23T10:11:20+00:00 | fox59.com | https://fox59.com/morning-news/technology/ap-technology/tiktok-ceo-to-tell-congress-app-is-safe-urge-against-ban/ |
WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s employers added a healthy number of jobs last month, yet slowed their hiring enough to potentially help the Federal Reserve in its fight to reduce raging inflation.
The economy gained 315,000 jobs in August, a still-solid figure that pointed to an economy that remains resilient despite rising interest rates, high inflation and sluggish consumer spending. Friday’s report from the government also showed that the unemployment rate rose to 3.7%, up from a half-century low of 3.5%. Yet that increase was also an encouraging sign: It reflected a long-awaited rise in the number of Americans who are looking for work.
“It’s a very positive report and still holds open the possibility for a soft landing,” said Ellen Gaske, an economist at PGIM Fixed Income, referring to the Fed’s goal of slowing the economy enough to cool inflation without going so far as to cause a recession.
Prices are rising at nearly the fastest pace in 40 years, which has handed congressional Republicans a hammer to use against Democrats in the fall congressional elections. Texas Republican Rep. Kevin Brady noted Friday that rising wages aren’t keeping up with inflation, leaving Americans with “shrinking paychecks.”
The White House has pushed back, claiming credit for what it calls evidence that the economy remains on firm footing.
“Jobs are up, wages are up, people are back to work and we’re seeing some signs that inflation may be, may be … beginning to ease,” President Joe Biden said Friday.
Inflation did fall to an 8.5% annual rate in July from 9.1% in June, mostly as gas prices steadily dropped. Prices at the pump fell to $3.81 a gallon Friday from a peak of $5.02 in mid-June. But inflation has declined in the past only to jump higher again, and few economists are willing to declare yet that it has peaked.
The August hiring gain was down from 526,000 jobs that were added in July, and it fell below the average increase of the previous three months. Wage growth weakened a bit last month, too, which could also serve the Fed’s inflation fight. Average hourly pay rose 0.3% from the previous month, the smallest gain since April. Businesses typically pass the cost of higher wages on to their customers through higher prices, thereby fueling inflation.
Gaske suggested that the figures could allow the Fed to raise its benchmark short-term interest rate by a half-percentage point at its next meeting later this month, rather than by three-quarters of a point, as many Wall Street traders and some economists have expected. Either size increase would exceed the Fed’s typical hike of a quarter of a percentage point. When the Fed increases its rate, it leads over time to higher rates on mortgages, auto loans and business borrowing and can weaken the economy.
The Fed is rapidly raising rates to try to cool the economy and reduce inflation. Some economists fear, though, that the Fed is tightening credit so aggressively that it will eventually tip the economy into recession.
Most industries added workers last month, with the biggest increases in professional and business services, which gained 68,000 jobs. That sector includes architects, engineers and some tech workers. Health care added 61,500 jobs, retailers 44,000.
Some companies, particularly in technology, have announced layoffs in recent months. On Wednesday, Snap, the parent company of the social media platform Snapchat, said it would cut 20% of its staff. The fitness equipment maker Peloton, the stock trading app Robinhood and the online furniture Wayfair have also said they are laying off workers. Bed, Bath & Beyond says it will close 150 stores and slash its workforce by 20%.
Yet with unemployment still very low and many businesses desperate to find workers, people who have been laid off are still finding plentiful opportunities elsewhere. One eager employer is TruBlue Total House Care, which does home renovations and repairs, with a focus on making homes safer for senior citizens.
Sean Fitzgerald, president of TruBlue, based in Cincinnati, said all its 87 locations have posted job openings. The number of people applying has risen recently, he said — a welcome sign for a company that has been short-staffed since soon after COVID-19 struck in the spring of 2020.
“We have far more demand than we do employees,” Fitzgerald said. “Our biggest hurdle continues to be getting enough qualified employees hired.”
To help retain its workers, TruBlue in some cases is lending company vehicles to employees and paying for gas.
Fitzgerald said a slowdown in home building, one consequence of the Fed’s rate hikes, has likely cost some construction workers their jobs, making it a bit easier for his company to hire.
Becky Frankiewicz, president of the staffing firm Manpower Group North America, said that laid-off workers, particularly in technology, are being quickly rehired. Software development, she said, is the second-most in-demand skill, behind nursing. The job market is the “eye of the economic hurricane,” she said, with hiring resilient despite the turmoil created by weaker growth and high inflation.
But Frankiewicz said she is starting to see some early signs that employers are dialing back: Job postings at Manpower were down 6% in August from a month ago. Wage growth has also started to plateau.
Mathieu Stevenson, CEO of Snagajob, an hourly hiring platform, said his firm has also seen a small decline in job postings, though hiring is still strong. Some employers, after being short-staffed for so long, appear to have figured out how to get by with fewer workers, he said — a trend that could slow future job gains.
“People are less panicked by the understaffing, because they’ve just gotten so accustomed to operating with it,” Stevenson said. “And so they’re much less aggressive about how hard they’re trying to hire.”
Recent data has painted a somewhat conflicting picture of the economy. The broadest measure of the economy’s output — gross domestic product — has shrunk for two straight quarters, meeting one informal definition of a recession. Yet another measure, focused on incomes, indicates the economy expanded in the first half of the year, albeit slowly.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell, in a high-profile speech last week, made clear that the central bank was prepared to continue raising short-term interest rates and to keep them elevated to keep fighting inflation. Powell warned that the Fed’s inflation fight would likely cause pain for Americans in the form of a weaker economy and job losses.
The Fed chair also said the job market was “clearly out of balance,” with demand for workers “substantially exceeding” the available supply. Friday’s jobs figures and a report earlier this week that showed the number of job openings rose in July suggest that the Fed’s rate hikes so far haven’t restored much balance.
There are roughly two advertised job openings for every unemployed worker. | 2022-09-02T19:40:23+00:00 | krqe.com | https://www.krqe.com/news/top-stories/ap-top-headlines/ap-fed-is-hoping-august-hiring-report-will-show-slowdown-2/ |
GUATEMALA CITY (AP) — A court in Guatemala convicted former President Otto Pérez Molina and his vice president, Roxana Baldetti, on fraud and conspiracy counts Wednesday.
Their sentences have yet to be announced. Both were acquitted of illegal enrichment charges.
Pérez Molina and Baldetti resigned in 2015 and have been in custody on charges of permitting and benefiting from a customs graft scheme known as La Linea, or “The Line.”
The scheme involved a conspiracy to defraud the state by letting businesses evade import duties in exchange for bribes.
Around 30 others including customs officials and business people were implicated in the case, which involved about $1 million in bribes and $2 million in lost income for the government. Some of those accused were acquitted Wednesday.
Pérez Molina, who governed from 2012 to 2015, continues to deny the charges. He remains under investigation in two other cases.
“It is a lie,” the former president, 72, said during a break in the court proceedings Wednesday. “Nobody has ever said I gave an illegal order, and I never gave any. They never said I was given money. I feel disappointed and frustrated.”
Pérez Molina’s prosecution was a high point in Guatemala’s effort to combat systemic corruption, aided by the United Nations-backed anticorruption mission, known by its Spanish initials CICIG.
Over 12 years, the mission supported the Special Prosecutors Office Against Impunity in dismantling dozens of criminal networks while at the same time building their capacity to handle complex corruption cases.
Then President Jimmy Morales ended the CICIG’s mission in 2019 while he was under investigation. Anticorruption efforts have faltered since then and those who worked closely with the international mission have seen the justice system turned against them.
The U.S. government has sharply criticized the weakening of anti-corruption efforts in Guatemala and last year cancelled the U.S. visa of current Guatemalan Attorney General Consuelo Porras, who had been pursuing former prosecutors who conducted corruption investigations.
Around 30 former anti-corruption officials have fled the country. | 2022-12-08T14:32:27+00:00 | cenlanow.com | https://www.cenlanow.com/international/ap-international/ap-guatemalan-court-convicts-ex-president-of-fraud-conspiracy/ |
Simon Pagenaud not cleared to return for Toronto, Tom Blomqvist to make IndyCar debut
After making 190-straight starts to begin his full-time IndyCar career, Simon Pagenaud will miss a second consecutive race Sunday after series medical personnel declined to approve him to return to the cockpit for the Honda Indy Toronto following the Meyer Shank Racing driver's violent practice crash July 1 at Mid-Ohio, the team announced Tuesday.
MSR sportscar ace Tom Blomqvist, the two-time defending will sub for Pagenaud in the No. 60 Honda for the Toronto street race, which kicks off with Friday's first practice of the weekend at 3 p.m., marking the Briton's IndyCar race debut.
Pagenaud traveled to Indianapolis from his North Carolina home early this week to be reevaluated by IndyCar medical director Dr. Julia Vaizer, who conducted his initial scans minutes after his crash during the Mid-Ohio race weekend and saw him again that Sunday morning before making a decision on his race condition. Ultimately, Dr. Vaizer declined to medically clear Pagenaud to return to the cockpit, requiring Conor Daly to hop in and replace MSR's full-time driver on short-notice, due to Pagenaud's ongoing concussion-like symptoms.
After more than a week of rest, those symptoms have persisted.
"We're obviously still working to get Simon as healthy as possible. He is feeling find and is ready to get back in the car once he is cleared," MSR team owner Mike Shank said in a release. "The decision to put Tom in the car was an easy one. He's coming off of an IMSA win at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park last weekend and I have all the confidence in the world putting him in our Indy car."
The news comes after Pagneaud walked away from a violent crash during a July 1 practice where his car spun off-course at roughly 180 mph after suffering brake failure and proceeded to make more than six barrel rolls before coming to a stop upside down up against a tire barrier. After he was extricated by the AMR Safety Team, Pagenaud walked to the medical truck under his own power and told reporters following his initial scans by IndyCar's medical team that he was "feeling fine."
Pagenaud's tone remained the same Sunday morning after the team announced he'd miss the July 4th weekend race, though the series veteran applauded the IndyCar medical team's handling of the situation.
'I'm feeling fine':Simon Pagenaud walks away from scary Mid-Ohio crash
'I could finally drive how I wanted':Inside Conor Daly's last-minute ride with MSR
"I'm 'okay', but I'm not a doctor. When you look at the violence of the crash, I think that had a big influence on it all, and I'm not going to fight the doctors that are telling me I'm not 100%," Pagenaud told IndyStar hours before the Mid-Ohio race. "I feel fine, but I respect their opinion. You can't negotiate with the doctors.
"A few years back, I don't think the process would've been as detailed, and I think I would be racing, but would that be good for me? Probably not. I was excited to see the care. It was amazing right away, but then the protocols that went in, I was busy all-day (Saturday after the crash) with the medical staff. I feel they have our back 100% with our health, and that's great."
In addition, Pagenaud revealed that the medical team had told him at the time of his initial reevaluation before Mid-Ohio that they didn't have any doubt he'd be ready to go for Toronto.
In the nine days since, circumstances clearly changed.
Less than a month after being booted from his No. 20 Ed Carpenter Racing ride following Detroit, Daly drove Pagenaud's No. 60 car from last on the grid (27th) to 20th by the checkered flag at Mid-Ohio. Shank said after the race that MSR would look at a variety of options to stand-in for Pagenaud at Toronto, including Daly and other drivers not currently in a ride that the team is considering hiring for 2024.
“First and foremost, I'm thinking of Simon and hoping that he recovers as quickly as possible so that he can get back behind the wheel. I have to thank Mike and Jim (Meyer) for considering me to fill in this weekend," Blomqvist said in a release. "I'm definitely looking forward to seeing what IndyCar has to offer.
"Diving straight into the deep end is an understatement after only having one test in the MSR Indy car last year. I’m excited but aware of the challenges getting up to speed during a race weekend, so I’m not putting any pressure on myself. Just going to go out there soak it all in and give it all I’ve got.”
Pageanud's consecutive starts streak in IndyCar had dated back to his full-time series debut with what is now Arrow McLaren (and then Schmidt-Hamilton Motorsports) at the start of the 2012 campaign. In three seasons in the No. 77 ride, he logged his first four IndyCar wins to go with three consecutive top-5 championship finishes, including a best of 3rd in 2013. For the start of 2015, Pagenaud moved to Team Penske, where he'd win a 2016 title and the 2019 Indianapolis 500, along with a pair of runner-up championship finishes in 2017 and 2019.
Last year, Pagenaud opted to continue his full-time IndyCar career rather than shift into a sportscar role with Team Penske, joining MSR's team that was expanding to two full-time cars for the first time. There, he notched seven top-10s with the midfield team and finished 15th in the championship. During a struggle of a second season --which marks the end of his current deal with the team -- Pagenaud's No. 60 entry currently sits 23rd in points among 27 full-time entries, right on the bubble of IndyCar's Leaders Circle program that would hand MSR nearly $1 million in extra funding directly from the series in 2024.
At Mid-Ohio, Shank told IndyStar his team has locked in one of its two full-time entries for 2024 -- set to be announced in August -- though he declined to elaborate whether he was referencing the Pagenaud's No. 60 or the No. 06 currently driven by Helio Castroneves, who is also in a contract year with the team. | 2023-07-11T20:39:47+00:00 | indystar.com | https://www.indystar.com/story/sports/motor/2023/07/11/indycar-simon-pagenaud-not-medically-cleared-toronto-tom-blomqvist-to-replace-him-meyer-shank-racing/70397976007/ |
Little more than a day after being found liable for battery and defamation of a woman who says he raped her in the 1990s, former President Donald Trump is scheduled to take questions in a live town-hall event on the news network whose journalists he called "the enemy of the people" while running for the presidency and serving in office.
Before the jury foreperson announced the verdict at a courtroom in lower Manhattan Tuesday, the immediate stakes for Trump – and CNN – were already high. Now they are even higher.
For months, Trump has been furious at Fox News, which serves as a pillar of the Republican Party and its controlling owners Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch, who have been auditioning Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as a GOP presidential candidate before Fox audiences.
Just hours before Tuesday's verdict in E. Jean Carroll's civil suit against him, Trump wrote an angry post on his Truth Social account inveighing against the Murdochs, Fox corporate director Paul Ryan ("Worst Republican Speaker ever") and their premier newspaper, the Wall Street Journal, as well as Fox, which he wrote was "rapidly disintegrating." (Indeed, its primetime ratings have plunged since it fired star Tucker Carlson late last month.)
The CNN appearance was intended to allow Trump to demonstrate his independence from a network often favored by his fans. It hasn't been a complete Fox blackout; Trump has given interviews this year to conservative Fox hosts Sean Hannity and Mark Levin, as well as Carlson before his departure.
CNN has much to prove, as well. In his first year on the job, chairman and CEO Chris Licht has sought to put his mark on the network by draining it of the anti-Trump rhetoric that defined many of its most popular shows.
He canceled the media criticism show Reliable Sources and shifted primetime star Don Lemon to the morning. Lemon was fired this spring after accusations of sexism both on air and toward his female co-hosts. Lemon and his attorney contest those characterizations. Licht has told his staff they are re-establishing the channel's original identity.
He is carrying out the wishes of his boss, David Zaslav, the chief executive of CNN's parent company Warner Bros. Discovery.
"The U.S. has divided government," Zaslav said last week on CNBC. "We need to hear both voices. Republicans are on the air on CNN. Democrats are on the air. All voices should be heard on CNN."
"Our network is about the best version of the facts," Zaslav said. "This is a new CNN."
A live town hall with Trump carries risks for CNN
The announcement of CNN's town hall with Trump engendered a backlash from both liberals and journalists who question the wisdom of putting Trump on the air live. During Trump's drive to the White House in 2015 and 2016, the press failed repeatedly to cover him adequately. His rapid-fire bombast and glibness with false claims overwhelmed reporters' ability to process the implications of what he was saying in real time.
MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan argued against inviting Trump on. Failing that, however, he declared that CNN had an obligation to confront the former president about his record and his character, in and out of office. CNN should start by asking Trump whether he had disqualified himself from the presidency, both for his actions ahead of the Jan. 6 riot on the U.S. Capitol and recent comments that appeared to justify "terminating" parts of the U.S. Constitution.
The CNN town hall will feature Republican and non-committed New Hampshire voters at St. Anselm College. It will be moderated by morning host Kaitlin Collins. She is well-known to Trump, as a former White House correspondent for CNN.
CNN political director David Chalian said the network approached the event as it would one for any candidate, but called Trump a "unique candidate" in that he's a former president – the first one to run for the White House in more than a century.
And Chalian acknowledged another distinction.
"Obviously, he is under indictment in one case. He's under investigation in several other cases, and then there's the insurrection – January 6th – and how Donald Trump left office," Chalian told NPR before Tuesday's verdict in the Carroll case. "Our job is to do what we do best, which is to ask him questions, follow up, hold him accountable for his words and actions, and in this case, convene this conversation that he's going to have directly with voters as well."
Moderator Kaitlin Collins tussled with Trump as a White House reporter
Collins carries conservative bona fides as a former reporter for the Daily Caller, founded by Carlson. But she did not display a strong ideological affinity as a CNN White House reporter. Indeed, she was hardly seen as a pushover. Trump aides irked over her coverage once blocked her from attending a press conference. (The Trump White House unsuccessfully went to court to revoke the credentials of her colleague Jim Acosta.)
That's a more familiar dynamic for Trump and CNN. He earlier accused the network of "anger and hatred" toward him and said he considered it to be serving as the opposition to his administration.
Now he's encouraging followers to tune in Wednesday night. "They made me a deal I couldn't refuse!!!" Trump posted on his social media site, Truth Social. "Could be the beginning of a New & Vibrant CNN, with no more Fake News, or it could turn into a disaster for all, including me."
Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org. | 2023-05-10T09:30:55+00:00 | nprillinois.org | https://www.nprillinois.org/2023-05-10/cnns-town-hall-with-donald-trump-takes-on-added-stakes-after-verdict-in-carroll-case |
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department is investigating a homicide that left one person dead in east Charlotte early Sunday morning.
Shortly before 3 a.m., police responded to an assault with a deadly weapon call along Central Avenue, not far from Sheridan Drive.
A victim was found dead from a gunshot wound at the scene, according to police. The victim has not yet been identified.
No suspects have been identified in this incident yet. WCNC Charlotte has reached out to CMPD for more information on what happened.
Check back here as this story develops and on the WCNC Charlotte app.
Anyone with information about this incident is asked to call 704-432-TIPS and speak directly to a Homicide Unit detective.
WCNC Charlotte is committed to reporting on the issues facing the communities we serve. We tell the stories of people working to solve persistent social problems. We examine how problems can be solved or addressed to improve the quality of life and make a positive difference. WCNC Charlotte is seeking solutions for you. Send your tips or questions to newstips@wcnc.com.
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All of WCNC Charlotte's podcasts are free and available for both streaming and download. You can listen now on Android, iPhone, Amazon, and other internet-connected devices. Join us from North Carolina, South Carolina, or on the go anywhere. | 2022-11-06T12:49:17+00:00 | wcnc.com | https://www.wcnc.com/article/news/crime/homicide-investigation-underway-in-east-charlotte-cmpd-police-say/275-4fe06b53-17db-4997-8e47-6b395fc0027e |
Expert tips for tidying, cleaning and sanitizing children’s spaces
IN THIS ARTICLE:
- OxiClean Laundry and Home Sanitizer
- Microban Disinfectant Spray
- Shark AZ2002 Vertex Powered Lift-Away Upright Vacuum
After a long winter, opening the windows and letting in some fresh air feels wonderful. Spring cleaning may be more complex, but it feels just as good once completed. We talked to BestReviews cleaning expert Ketia Daniel about tackling spring cleaning in some of the most intimidating parts of the house: the kids’ rooms. She shared her tips for effectively and efficiently cleaning kids’ bedrooms, as well as her top picks for products that help make children’s items cleaner and safer.
The best way to clean kids’ bedrooms
“Cleaning your kid’s room can be a headache, but it doesn’t have to be,” Daniel said. Her process for cleaning children’s rooms helps it go quickly and smoothly.
Daniel suggests starting with decluttering, keeping an eye out for items that aren’t being used anymore.
“I always recommend starting by sorting like items,” she said. “Place toys, clothing, trash, and shoes in their own piles. Then you put items in their designated area, leaving trash for last.” You can have your child help with this process. Ask them to pick out toys that they no longer play with or clothing that they’ve outgrown.
If your child’s bedroom still feels cluttered, spring cleaning is an excellent opportunity to implement new storage systems. Daniel is a fan of storage cube organizers, which can keep similar types of toys together while also providing storage space for books or action figures.
How to disinfect kids’ bedrooms
Once the room is decluttered, it’s time to clean and sanitize.
“Spring cleaning your kid’s room is the perfect time to disinfect their items,” said Daniel. Toys and surfaces are obvious targets, but bedding, backpacks, shoes and more can all benefit from sanitizing cleaners. Don’t forget doorknobs, light switches or drawer pulls. Toys can often be put in buckets to soak while you clean other parts of the room.
“Take down curtains, bedding and blankets and move area rugs out of the room to wash or vacuum,” Daniel recommended. For items that can go in the washing machine, look for a laundry treatment that kills germs and removes odors. For anything from plastic toys to smelly shoes, try a sanitizing spray.
Lastly, consider going over any carpet or area rug with a carpet shampooer. Carpet shampooers deep-clean carpets, removing dirt, pet dander, allergens and more. This can help the room feel and smell fresher and make the space healthier for kids with asthma or allergies.
BestReviews expert’s top spring-cleaning products
OxiClean Laundry and Home Sanitizer
Daniel recommends this for washing curtains, bedding and blankets. The 3-in-1 formula sanitizes items and removes odors and stains, and it can be used on floors and in the washing machine.
Sold by Amazon
“This is the best sanitizing spray,” said Daniel. It can sanitize rugs, bedding and mattresses, doorknobs, counters and other surfaces kids touch frequently. It also prevents mold and mildew.
Sold by Amazon and Home Depot
Shark AZ2002 Vertex Powered Lift-Away Upright Vacuum
“This is a great vacuum for getting rid of allergens,” said Daniel. Along with its HEPA filter, she appreciates its ability to deep-clean carpets and hard flooring. The lift-away pod and nozzle make it easy to clean almost anywhere.
Sold by Amazon and Home Depot
CleanSmart Toy Disinfectant Spray
Daniel likes using this spray to clean and sanitize toys and hard surfaces. The powerful yet gentle formula is free from bleach, alcohol, gluten, fragrance, ammonia and more.
Sold by Amazon
Other top spring-cleaning products
Clear out trash, corral dirty cleaning rags or package up items for donating in these sturdy drawstring trash bags. They’re fragrance-free and hold 30 gallons each.
Sold by Amazon
Rubbermaid Commercial Products Deluxe Carry Caddy
Easily transport spray bottles, cleaning rags and more in this basic yet sturdy cleaning caddy. It can hold eight 32-ounce bottles of cleaning products and easily wipes clean.
Sold by Amazon
Oxo Good Grips Microfiber Delicate Duster
This duster mimics the shape of a classic feather duster, but it’s made with dust-grabbing microfiber strands instead. The head is machine-washable, and the textured, grippy handle makes the duster easy to use.
Sold by Amazon
Dyson Ball Animal Upright Corded Vacuum
Boasting easy ball-wheel steering, a HEPA filter and powerful cyclonic action, this vacuum helps clear dirt and allergens from floors. Accessories and a long-reach hose help it clean under furniture or in high corners.
Sold by Amazon
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Laura Duerr writes for BestReviews. BestReviews has helped millions of consumers simplify their purchasing decisions, saving them time and money.
Copyright 2023 BestReviews, a Nexstar company. All rights reserved. | 2023-04-22T19:14:37+00:00 | pix11.com | https://pix11.com/reviews/br/home-br/cleaning-tools-supplies-br/how-to-effectively-spring-clean-your-kids-bedroom/ |
Give to shelters
The ASPCA continues to flood our TV screens with heartrending promotions, as they have for many years, but questions persist concerning where the bulk of the money goes, and how much actually reaches the animals in need at the local level.
Charities come in all shapes and forms. Some are longstanding in their sincerity and their missions (humane society). Others are thinly veiled frauds. Here's a suggestion. The state of North Carolina does a poor job of funding animal shelters, while continuing to give tax breaks to corporations and billionaires. Democrats and Republicans, are you listening?
Since the shelters are all desperately overcrowded and underfunded, why not start there? You can donate money directly to county animal shelters, and there are many excellent local rescue groups in the state. Homeless, abused and neglected animals are desperate for our help. Don't waste what you give. Make it count!
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Bob Gaines
Greensboro
Leaf collection
Regarding the many complaints about the curbside loose-leaf pickup schedule in Greensboro:
Leaf pickup costs $10 per person in the city. It’s one of the cheapest services per person that we have. What are you complaining about?
Everyone wants it done now, but it takes time and there are only a few folks who can work on it. The city has a huge employee shortage and unfortunately the pure service departments such as waste and yard waste are severely low on staff.
Complain all you want, but our waste service and yard waste employees are the ones who keep our city going and keep it clean. They take our nastiest personal items every week. The leaf guys have to walk miles a day with tubes trying to suck up as many leaves as possible. People put their sticks in the leaf piles, dog poop, anything. Those pose a danger to the leaf collectors, yet they continue.
Think about how many streets there are in Greensboro. Think about a few guys trying to keep up. If you can’t wait on these dedicated employees, bag the leaves yourself!
Carol Crutchfield Carter
Greensboro
Poking the bear
On Jan. 5, the Reuters news agency reported: "Russia's Medvedev Snaps Back after U.S. Appeal over Ukraine War."
He warned the U.S that hypersonic missiles would soon be close to NATO's shores, including the Potomac River, after the U.S. embassy in Moscow released an appeal in a brief video — "to the people of Russia" — that it stood in solidarity with Russians who opposed the war in Ukraine.
Medvedev, a close Putin ally and one-time president of Russia, lashed out at the video, describing the U.S. government in extremely undiplomatic language.
Inasmuch as Russia's invasion of Ukraine has triggered the deepest crisis in Russia's relations with the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, this military threat should be taken seriously. Referring to President Putin's deployment of a warship with hypersonic cruise missiles to the Atlantic, Medvedev described the alleged action as a New Year's gift with an ammunition package of Zyrcon missiles. He said the missiles could be placed 100 miles off the U.S. coast.
As a long-time observer of Russia, I would suggest that this is not an ideal time to goad the nervous — and perhaps losing — aggressor in the war in Ukraine. Nor a time to trust Moscow.
William E. Jackson Jr.
Davidson | 2023-01-13T13:01:09+00:00 | greensboro.com | https://greensboro.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/fridays-letters-for-january-13-2023/article_df159bea-92da-11ed-b142-ff86ff1b11c1.html |
SANTA Fe, New Mexico (AP) — The Santa Fe Opera will present the world premiere of “The Righteous” by composer Gregory Spears with a libretto by Pulitzer Prize-winner Tracy K. Smith on July 13 next year, a work set among church communities in the American Southwest.
The opera stars baritone Michael Mayes as a preacher who becomes governor during a period stretching from the Iran hostage crisis in 1979 to the Gulf War in the 1990s, the company announced Wednesday. The cast includes countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo, bass-baritones Greer Grimsley and Nicholas Newton, sopranos Amber Wagner and Elena Villalón, and mezzo-soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano.
Spears and Smith collaborated on "Castor and Patience," which premiered at the Cincinnati Opera last July. Smith won the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and was the U.S. Poet Laureate from 2017-19.
Jordan de Souza conducts a production directed by Kevin Newbury, which will be given six performances through Aug. 13, 2024.
Santa Fe's 2024 season includes a new Louisa Muller production of Verdi's “La Traviata” opening June 28, starring soprano Mané Galoyan and conducted by Corrado Rovaris; a new Stephen Barlow staging of Mozart's “Don Giovanni” opening June 29, starring bass-baritone Ryan Speedo Green and conducted by Harry Bicket; a staging of Strauss' “Der Rosenkavalier” first seen at Britain's Garsington Opera in 2021 and starring Rachel Willis-Sørensen; and a revival of Stephen Lawless' 2009 production of Donizetti's “L’Elisir d’Amore (The Elixir of Love). | 2023-06-07T19:20:48+00:00 | springfieldnewssun.com | https://www.springfieldnewssun.com/nation-world/santa-fe-opera-to-premiere-the-righteous-by-spears-smith-in-july-2024/DSENBEB6CJAVFBT4YVOK5EOQ6A/ |
BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — A former British rap artist and alleged jihadist has died in custody in Spain, the Interior Ministry said Thursday.
Abdel-Majed Abdel Bary was found dead in a Spanish prison Wednesday, the ministry said. The cause of death is yet to be confirmed.
Abdel Bary was arrested in 2020, accused of heading a jihadist terror cell. He was facing up to 9 years in prison. A trial was set for sentencing July 14 and he was awaiting verdict.
Abdel Bary, 32, left London in 2013 to join an Al Qaeda faction and later ISIS militias in Syria. He made a name for himself on social media sites by showing himself clutching the severed head of one of his alleged victims.
Before joining the Jihad, Abdel Bary performed as rapper lyricist under the name Jinn.
He was the son of an Egyptian operative of al-Qaeda who was convicted for events related to the 1998 bombings at U.S. embassies in Africa that killed 224 people. Abdel Bary stopped making music not long after his father’s extradition to the U.S. on terror charges.
Spanish police arrested Abdel Bary and two other men in April 2020, shortly after they crossed the Strait of Gibraltar on a skiff from Algeria.
He was accused of leading a jihadist terror cell formed by him and the two other men, dedicated to committing internet banking scams and trafficking in cryptocurrencies to “finance their terrorist activities”.
Abdel Bary denied being a cell leader during the trial. | 2023-07-27T18:49:21+00:00 | nwahomepage.com | https://www.nwahomepage.com/news/international/ap-international/ap-former-british-rapper-abdel-bary-accused-of-heading-jihadist-cell-is-found-dead-in-spanish-prison/ |
Dear Miss Manners: A few times a year, my in-laws invite my wife and me to join them for a concert at a small local venue. They cover all the costs for the dinner and the show, which can be very pricey.
This is a small, dimly lit venue, and I’m sure other tables nearby can see the glare of the phones lighting up. Yet we’ve never had the venue host stop by to give the same reminder. Not only is the filming distracting to our own experience, but we also feel highly embarrassed being associated with people who don’t respect the rules.
After we declined to join them at last week’s concert, they sent us several videos they took of the evening’s event so we could see what we missed. My wife and I both cringed. We don’t know what to say without feeling like we are shaming them.
Rather a tricky moral question: If your relatives are cheating, do you ignore it or turn them in?
Miss Manners prefers to avoid such a painful decision. She knows you have tried to tell them not to break the rules, so let’s try something stronger:
Go with them next time, and as you enter the theater, ask the host, within your in-laws’ hearing, if taking videos is allowed. (Never mind how often you’ve heard that announcement.) When the reply is “No,” you say to the host, in a much quieter voice, “They believe they can do it inconspicuously; you might want to see if you agree.”
Yes, the in-laws will squeal. But you can say, “I was only repeating what you have told me: that your filming doesn’t bother anyone.”
Dear Miss Manners: How do you apply gravy to your mashed potatoes, especially if you would like to contain it in a “lake”?
We discussed the idea of using the serving spoons, either from the potatoes or the gravy, to make an indentation — historically we have used the gravy spoon, and it is made in the perfect shape! — and also the idea of fussily using your own spoon to make the indentation amid the passing of the mashed potatoes and gravy.
What is the right way to do this? We hope the answer isn’t to just pour the gravy on the mashed potato mountain, as we like the gravy to stay in a unit with the potatoes!
You will have used your soup spoon by the time the potatoes arrive, so the only place-setting spoon that might be available would be your dessert spoon. And the residue of gravy would not enhance your creme brulee.
Miss Manners does not see how the usual argument about sanitation would apply to using the smaller gravy spoon on your untouched potatoes. So gently lower it onto the mound of potatoes to create a crater, and then turn it to unload. Any splashing and the game is up.
New Miss Manners columns are posted Monday through Saturday on washingtonpost.com/advice. You can send questions to Miss Manners at her website, missmanners.com. You can also follow her @RealMissManners.
© 2023 Judith Martin | 2023-04-03T04:20:07+00:00 | washingtonpost.com | https://www.washingtonpost.com/advice/2023/04/03/miss-manners-recording-concerts-in-laws/ |
Fifteen students and two adults were injured after a school bus was involved in a crash in Charlotte, North Carolina on Wednesday.
About 40 students were on the bus when it collided with a dump trump.
Authorities said the students were able to get off the bus quickly, but it took about 30 minutes to free the bus driver and dump truck driver due to the impact of the crash.
The driver of the dump reportedly has life-threatening injuries. Everyone else is expected to recover.
It's unclear what led to the crash. However, it appears to have been an accident because police said no charges are expected. | 2022-05-11T15:57:52+00:00 | abc15.com | https://www.abc15.com/news/national/17-injured-in-school-bus-crash-in-north-carolina |
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KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — As was his habit before each flight, the veteran Ukrainian army pilot ran a hand along the fuselage of his Mi-8 helicopter, caressing the heavy transporter’s metal skin to bring luck to him and his crew.
They would need it. Their destination — a besieged steel mill in the brutalized city of Mariupol — was a death trap. Some other crews didn’t make it back alive.
Still, the mission was vital, even desperate. Ukrainian troops were pinned down, their supplies running low, their dead and injured stacking up. Their last-ditch stand at the Azovstal mill was a growing symbol of Ukraine’s defiance in the war against Russia. They could not be allowed to perish.
The 51-year-old pilot — identified only by his first name, Oleksandr — flew just the one mission to Mariupol, and he considered it the most difficult flight of his 30-year-career. He took the risk, he said, because he didn’t want the Azovstal fighters to feel forgotten.
In the charred hell-scape of that plant, in an underground bunker-turned-medical station that provided shelter from death and destruction above, word started reaching the wounded that a miracle might be coming. Among those told that he was on the list for evacuation was a junior sergeant who’d been shredded by mortar rounds, butchering his left leg and forcing its amputation above the knee.
“Buffalo” was his nom de guerre. He had been through so much, but one more deadly challenge loomed: escape from Azovstal.
___
A series of clandestine, against-the-odds, terrain-hugging, high-speed helicopter missions to reach the Azovstal defenders in March, April and May are being celebrated in Ukraine as among the most heroic feats of military derring-do of the four-month war. Some ended in catastrophe; each grew progressively riskier as Russian air defense batteries caught on.
The full story of the seven resupply and rescue missions has yet to be told. But from exclusive interviews with two wounded survivors; a military intelligence officer who flew on the first mission; and pilot interviews provided by the Ukrainian army, The Associated Press has pieced together the account of one of the last flights, from the perspective of both the rescuers and the rescued.
Only after more than 2,500 defenders who remained in the Azovstal ruins had started surrendering did Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy first give wind of the missions and their deadly cost.
The Azovstal fighters’ tenacity had frustrated Moscow’s objective of quickly capturing Mariupol and prevented Russian troops there from being redeployed elsewhere. Zelenskyy told Ukrainian broadcaster ICTV that pilots braved “powerful” Russian air defenses in venturing beyond enemy lines, flying in food, water, medicine and weapons so the plant’s defenders could fight on, and flying out the injured.
The military intelligence officer said one helicopter was shot down and two others never came back, and are considered missing. He said he dressed in civilian clothes for his flight, thinking that he could melt into the population if he survived a crash: “We were aware it could be a one-way ticket.”
Said Zelenskyy: “These are absolutely heroic people who knew what was difficult, who knew that it was almost impossible. ... We lost a lot of pilots.”
___
If Buffalo had had his way, he would not have lived to be evacuated. His life would have ended quickly, to spare him the agony he suffered after 120mm mortar rounds tore apart his left leg, bloodied his right foot, and peppered his back with shrapnel during s treet fighting in Mariupol on March 23.
The 20-year-old spoke to The Associated Press on condition that he not be identified by name, saying he didn’t want it to seem that he is seeking publicity when thousands of Azovstal defenders are in captivity or dead. He had been on the trail of a Russian tank, aiming to destroy it with his shoulder-launched, armor-piercing NLAW missile on the last day of the invasion’s first month, when his war was cut short.
Tossed next to the wreckage of a burning car, he dragged himself to cover in a nearby building and “decided it would be better to crawl into the basement and quietly die there,” he said.
But his friends evacuated him to the Ilyich steel mill, which subsequently fell in mid-April as Russian forces were tightening their grip on Mariupol and its strategic port on the Sea of Azov. Three days passed before medics were able to amputate, in a basement bomb shelter. He considers himself lucky: Doctors still had anesthetic when his turn came to go under the knife.
When he came around, a nurse told him how sorry she was that he’d lost the limb.
He cut through the awkwardness with a joke: “Will they return the money for 10 tattoo sessions?”
“I had a lot of tattoos on my leg,” he said. One remains, a human figure, but its legs are gone now, too.
After the surgery, he was transferred to the Azovstal plant. A stronghold covering nearly 11 square kilometers (more than 4 miles), with a 24-kilometer (15-mile) labyrinth of underground tunnels and bunkers, the plant was practically impregnable.
But conditions were grim.
“There was constant shelling,” said Vladislav Zahorodnii, a 22-year-old corporal who had been shot through the pelvis, shredding a nerve, during street fighting in Mariupol.
Evacuated to Azovstal, he met Buffalo there. They already knew each other: Both were from Chernihiv, a city in the north surrounded and pounded by Russian forces.
Zahorodnii saw the missing leg. He asked Buffalo how he was doing.
“Everything is fine, we will go clubbing soon,” Buffalo replied.
___
Zahorodnii was evacuated from Azovstal by helicopter on March 31, after three failed attempts.
It was his first helicopter flight. The Mi-8 took fire on its way out, killing one of its engines. The other one kept them airborne for the remainder of the 80-minute early morning dash to Dnipro city on the Dnieper River in central Ukraine.
He would mark his deliverance with a mortar-round tattoo on his right forearm: “I did it not to forget,” he said.
Buffalo’s turn came the following week. He was ambivalent about leaving. On the one hand, he was relieved that his share of the dwindling food and water would now go to others still able to fight; on the other, "there was a painful feeling. They stayed there, and I left them.”
Still, he almost missed his flight.
Soldiers hauled him on a gurney out of his deep bunker and loaded him aboard a truck that rumbled to a pre-arranged landing zone. The soldiers wrapped him in a jacket.
The helicopter’s cargo of ammunition was unloaded first. Then, the wounded were lifted aboard.
But not Buffalo. Left in a back corner of the truck, he’d somehow been overlooked. He couldn’t raise the alarm because the mortar blasts had injured his throat, and he was still too hoarse to make himself heard over the whoop-whoop-whoop of the helicopter rotors.
“I thought to myself, ‘Well, not today then,’” he recalled. “And suddenly someone shouted, ‘You forgot the soldier in the truck!’”
Because the cargo bay was full, Buffalo was placed crosswise from the others, who’d been loaded aboard side by side. A crew member took his hand and told him not to worry, they’d make it home.
“All my life,” he told the crew member, “I dreamed of flying a helicopter. It doesn’t matter if we arrive — my dream has come true.”
___
In his cockpit, the wait seemed interminable to Oleksandr, the minutes feeling like hours.
“Very scary,” he said. “You see explosions around and the next shell could reach your location.”
In the fog of war and with the full picture of the secret missions still emerging, it’s not possible to be absolutely sure that Buffalo and the pilot who spoke to journalists in a video interview recorded and shared by the military were aboard the same flight. But details of their accounts match.
Both gave the same date: the night of April 4-5. Oleksandr recalled being fired upon by a ship as they swooped over waters out of Mariupol. A blast wave tossed the helicopter around “like a toy,” he said. But his escape maneuvers got them out of trouble.
Buffalo also recalls a blast. The evacuees were told later that the pilot had avoided a missile.
Oleksandr gunned the helicopter to 220 kilometers (135 miles) per hour and flew as low as 3 meters (9 feet) above the ground — except when hopping over power lines. A second helicopter on his mission never made it back; on the return flight, its pilot radioed him that he was running short of fuel. It was their last communication.
On his gurney, Buffalo had watched the terrain zip past through a porthole. “We flew over the fields, below the trees. Very low,” he said.
They made it to Dnipro, safely. Upon landing, Oleksandr heard the wounded calling out for the pilots. He expected them to yell at him for having tossed them around so violently during the flight.
“But when I opened the door, I heard guys saying, ‘Thank you,’” he said.
“Everyone clapped,” recalled Buffalo, now rehabbing with Zahorodnii at a Kyiv clinic. “We told the pilots that they had done the impossible.”
___
AP journalists Sophiko Megrelidze in Tbilisi, Georgia, and Oleksandr Stashevskyi in Kyiv contributed.
___
Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine | 2022-06-21T06:31:58+00:00 | expressnews.com | https://www.expressnews.com/news/article/The-impossible-Ukraine-s-secret-deadly-rescue-17254485.php |
Updated September 27, 2022 at 8:20 PM ET
HAVANA — Hurricane Ian tore into western Cuba as a major hurricane Tuesday and left 1 million people without electricity, then churned on a collision course with Florida over warm Gulf waters amid expectations it would strengthen into a catastrophic Category 4 storm.
Ian made landfall in Cuba's Pinar del Rio province, where officials set up 55 shelters, evacuated 50,000 people, and took steps to protect crops in the nation's main tobacco-growing region. The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Cuba suffered "significant wind and storm surge impacts" when the hurricane struck with top sustained winds of 125 mph (205 kmh).
Ian was expected to get even stronger over the warm Gulf of Mexico, reaching top winds of 130 mph (209 kph) approaching the southwest coast of Florida, where 2.5 million people were ordered to evacuate.
Tropical storm-force winds were expected across the southern peninsula late Tuesday, reaching hurricane-force Wednesday — when the eye was predicted to make landfall. With tropical storm-force winds extending 140 miles (225 kilometers) from Ian's center, damage was expected across a wide area of Florida.
It was not yet clear precisely where Ian would crash ashore. Its exact track could determine how severe the storm surge is for Tampa Bay, said University of Miami hurricane researcher Brian McNoldy. Landfall south of the bay could make the impact "much less bad," McNoldy said.
Gil Gonzalez boarded up his windows Tuesday and had sandbags ready to protect his Tampa home. He and his wife had stocked up on bottled water and packed flashlights, battery packs for their cellphones and a camp stove before evacuating.
"All the prized possessions, we've put them upstairs in a friend's house and nearby, and we've got the car loaded," Gonzalez said on his way out. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis urged people to prepare for extended power outages, and to get out of the storm's potential path.
"It is a big storm, it is going to kick up a lot of water as it comes in," DeSantis told a news conference in Sarasota, a coastal city of 57,000 that could be hit. "And you're going to end up with really significant storm surge and you're going to end up with really significant flood events. And this is the kind of storm surge that is life threatening."
He said about 30,000 utility works have already been positioned around the state but it might take days before they can safely reach some of the downed power lines.
"This thing's the real deal," DeSantis said. "It is a major, major storm."
DeSantis said nearly 100 shelters had been opened by Tuesday afternoon, with more expected. He said most buildings in Florida are strong enough to withstand wind, but the 2.5 million people who have been told to evacuate face the greatest danger from flooding.
Hundreds of residents were being evacuated from several nursing homes in the Tampa area, where hospitals were also moving some patients. Airports in Tampa, St. Petersburg and Key West closed. Busch Gardens in Tampa closed ahead of the storm, while several Orlando-area theme parks, including Disney World and Sea World, planned to close Wednesday and Thursday.
NASA rolled its moon rocket from the launch pad to its Kennedy Space Center hangar, adding weeks of delay to the test flight.
Ian's forward movement was expected to slow over the Gulf, enabling the hurricane to grow wider and stronger. The hurricane warning expanded Tuesday to cover roughly 220 miles (350 kilometers) of Florida's west coast. The area includes Fort Myers as well as Tampa and St. Petersburg, which could get their first direct hit by a major hurricane since 1921.
Forecasters said the storm surge could reach 12 feet (3.6 meters) if it peaks at high tide. Rainfall near the area of landfall could top 18 inches (46 centimeters).
"It's a monster and then there's the confusion of the path," said Renee Correa, who headed inland to Orlando from the Tampa area with her daughter and Chihuahua. "Tampa has been lucky for 100 years, but it's a little scary now."
Kelly Johnson was preparing to hunker down at her home two blocks from the beach in Dunedin, west of Tampa. She said she would escape to the second floor if sea water surges inland, and had a generator if power goes out.
"I'm a Floridian, and we know how to deal with hurricanes," Johnson said. "This is part of living in paradise — knowing that once in a while these storms come at you."
Forecasters warned the hurricane will be felt across a large area as it plows across Florida with an anticipated turn northward. Flash floods were possible across the whole state, and portions of Florida's east coast faced a potential storm surge threat as Ian's bands approach the Atlantic Ocean. Parts of Georgia and South Carolina also could see flooding rains into the weekend.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp pre-emptively declared a state of emergency Tuesday, ordering 500 National Guard troops on standby to respond as needed.
As the storm's center moved into the Gulf, scenes of destruction emerged in Cuba's world-famous tobacco belt. The owner of the premier Finca Robaina cigar producer posted photos on social media of wood-and-thatch roofs smashed to the ground, greenhouses in rubble and wagons overturned.
"It was apocalyptic, a real disaster," wrote Hirochi Robaina, grandson of the operation's founder.
Local government station TelePinar reported heavy damage at the main hospital in Pinar del Rio city, tweeting photos of collapsed ceilings and toppled trees. No deaths were reported.
At the White House, President Joe Biden said his administration was sending hundreds of Federal Emergency Management Agency employees to Florida and sought to assure mayors in the storm's path that Washington will meet their needs. He urged residents to heed to local officials' orders.
"Your safety is more important than anything," he said.
Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org. | 2022-09-28T00:41:13+00:00 | mainepublic.org | https://www.mainepublic.org/npr-news/npr-news/2022-09-27/ian-is-intensifying-into-a-catastrophic-category-4-hurricane-before-it-hits-florida |
Duck and cover. I remember those air raid drills as an elementary school student in the 1950s and early 1960s. When air raid sirens blared across my town, we ducked under our desks and covered our heads. If we were at recess, we pressed our faces into a school wall and covered our heads with our hands, waiting for the blinding flash of light if, this time, it was for real.
Once, as I walked home from school, the piercing air raid sirens screamed and, in total fear, I ran into the local bank where I got a lollipop every Friday when my mom cashed my dad’s paycheck.
Fast-forward to current times and once again our schoolchildren “duck and cover.” Instead of anticipating a blinding flash of light from a Soviet atomic bomb, they duck and cover in fear of bullets. In addition to learning to read and write, they learn how to duck and cover. I know that fear. I lived that fear.
Meanwhile, I see members of Congress duck and cover from reporters who question their allegiance to the Second Amendment. They say there is nothing they can do to stop the sale of weapons that I believe don’t belong in the hands of everyday Americans. But they are wrong.
They say their job in Congress is not to protect Americans. But they are wrong.
What members of Congress are really saying is that they love guns more than children — and more than adults who were once children.
Judene Gaul
East Petersburg | 2023-04-02T10:06:08+00:00 | lancasteronline.com | https://lancasteronline.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/congress-loves-guns-more-than-children-letter/article_3acb869c-cefa-11ed-b1fe-eb84196f3c75.html |
HOUSTON, May 31, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Ascend Performance Materials has completed its purchase of Formulated Polymers Limited, an engineered materials producer based in Chennai, India. The acquisition establishes Ascend's first production facility in South Asia.
"The team at FPL has a 30-year track record of serving customers throughout the subcontinent with high-performance compounds," said Dharm Vahalia, Ascend's managing director for India. "We look forward to bringing them into Ascend and broadening the portfolio available to customers in India."
Ascend's Starflam® flame-retardant engineered materials will continue to be produced at the facility and the company is qualifying production of its other materials.
"Our strategy has been to expand our manufacturing footprint and our product portfolio in line with our customers' growth roadmaps," said Isaac Khalil, senior vice president for polyamides at Ascend. "South Asia is a vital part of that growth."
Details of the deal were not disclosed.
Ascend Performance Materials makes high-performance materials for everyday essentials and new technologies. Our focus is on improving quality of life and inspiring a better tomorrow through innovation. Based in Houston, Texas, and with regional offices in Shanghai, Brussels and Detroit, we are a fully integrated material solutions provider with global manufacturing facilities in North America, Europe and China. Our 2,800-person global workforce makes the plastics, fabrics, fibers and chemicals used to make safer vehicles, cleaner energy, better medical devices, smarter appliances and longer-lasting apparel and consumer goods. We are committed to safety, sustainability and the success of our customers and our communities.
Learn more about Ascend at www.ascendmaterials.com.
Contact: Ally Jahn, +1 713-210-9809, ajahn@ascendmaterials.com
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SOURCE Ascend Performance Materials | 2022-06-01T07:14:24+00:00 | live5news.com | https://www.live5news.com/prnewswire/2022/06/01/ascend-completes-purchase-plant-chennai/ |
Metro Nashville Public Schools joins the growing number of innovative school districts that have partnered with Zum, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland and Seattle
REDWOOD CITY, Calif., Dec. 13, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) has awarded a five year transportation contract to Zūm, the leader in modern student transportation. The decision signals the district's commitment to providing a safe, reliable, efficient and equitable solution for the students and families of Metro Nashville.
MNPS serves more than 80,000 students across 159 schools. The district's partnership with Zum allows MNPS to deliver expanded transportation services that are safe and reliable, built around the needs of students, families, schools and drivers, all committed to creating the best educational experience for every student, every day. In particular, this contract will allow Zum to support special needs, homeless, foster, and other students, where traditional bus transportation can prove challenging. Zum partners to complement existing drivers and services, not to replace them.
MNPS joins the growing number of innovative school districts that have partnered with Zum, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland and Seattle.
Benefits of Zum include:
- Cleaner and greener: Transportation is the largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. As the first and only 100% carbon neutral student transportation company in the U.S., Zum is committed to transitioning their school bus fleet to electric vehicles. In fact, through its Net Zero Initiative, the company has already offset 100% of its fleet's carbon emissions.
- Safer and more reliable: Zum's technology is built to keep students safe from the moment they get on the bus until they are back home. Through the Zum app, parents are able to view the complete profile of their child's driver, along with real-time information about vehicle location and their child's pickup or dropoff time and status. District and school administrators are able to track rides in a map view from start to finish, and routes are adjusted in real time to account for absent students or traffic issues. At the same time, drivers are able to preview all students on assigned routes, along with important supplemental information for each student where necessary for enhanced safety and superior service.
Through Zum's proprietary safety technology, driver training, and certification program, SafeGuard, all drivers not only meet and exceed all state and federal requirements but also are trained on and required to adhere to specific protocols while picking up or dropping off students and while driving. The Zum platform also ensures timely, secure and centralized reporting to keep everyone appropriately informed.
- More equitable and efficient: Modernizing transportation can address inequalities in the current system. By selecting Zum, districts are demonstrating their commitment to modernizing student transportation to ensure equity and access for all students and maximize operational efficiency while providing a superior experience for students and families.
"Zum is at the forefront of a massive transformation in student transportation, helping thousands of schools move away from a one-size-fits-all approach to a modern experience that provides parents, students, drivers and districts with safer, greener, more reliable, transportation services," said Ritu Narayan, founder and CEO at Zum. "With this decision, Metro Nashville Public School District demonstrates its commitment to a future where student transportation advances equity, accessibility and environmental stewardship for the community."
"Metro Schools is committed to ensuring the continuity of learning for students experiencing special and unique circumstances that create transportation challenges," Sean Braisted, Executive Officer of Communications. Having partners like Zum who can be on-call to service their unique transportation needs will help us to meet our district's goal of ensuring every student is known and cared for."
Zum offers its drivers competitive pay, strong safety and training programs, resulting in excellent job satisfaction, the highest safety standards students and drivers, and a positive work culture. Zum's culture, driver satisfaction and modern benefits have already helped existing partner districts overcome obstacles in the face of a nationwide driver shortage.
School districts and families across the U.S. are already starting to see the benefits of working with Zum: San Francisco Unified School District is on track to save $15 million over the next five years. In Oakland, the number of students spending more than one hour on a bus has dropped from 70 percent to less than 10 percent.
Zum is available nationwide, serving 4,000 schools, including the nation's second largest school district, Los Angeles Unified School District, across the U.S. For more information, visit: www.ridezum.com.
Zum has reimagined student transportation, the nation's largest mass transit system. Our integrated end-to-end cloud-based platform provides a modern service for school districts purpose-built around the needs of kids and the expectations of their families. Zum provides one seamless, real-time interface for parents, drivers, schools, districts, administrators, and operators, to transport children safely and with increased visibility and personalized care. Our multi-sized vehicle approach includes an electric vehicle-first commitment, reduces student commute times by up to 20%, and coupled with our marketplace, delivers added fleet efficiency and optimization. We have been driving the industry forward since 2015, and with more than 8 million miles completed to date. Recognized for leading a new era of safe, reliable, efficient and sustainable transportation, Zum was listed as CNBC's Disruptor 50, Fast Company's World Changing Ideas and a Gold Stevie winner for The 20th Annual American Business Awards. Learn more at www.ridezum.com.
CONTACT:
press@ridezum.com
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SOURCE Zūm | 2022-12-13T12:03:27+00:00 | wagmtv.com | https://www.wagmtv.com/prnewswire/2022/12/13/metro-nashville-public-schools-partners-with-zum-offer-safe-efficient-sustainable-tech-enabled-student-transportation/ |
DUNEDIN, Fla. — A preschool teacher near Tampa, Florida faces a charge of felony child abuse after the sheriff's office said she was seen punching a 4-year-old child in the head on Wednesday.
The sheriff's office said deputies were called to the Kindercare Learning Center in Dunedin.
The witness told authorities they heard screaming coming from the playground and saw Ashley Richards, 32, repeatedly punching the toddler "to the back and side of the head" with both an open and closed fist.
The sheriff's office said Richards was also seen pushing the child to the ground and yelling, "Do you want me to hit you?" The witness captured part of the incident on their cellphone, authorities said.
According to an arrest report, the witness video captured Richards pulling the toddler over her legs to lay him down on her lap before she punches what "appears to be the child's head with a closed first multiple times." The report said she then forcefully pushed the victim to the ground.
The toddler told authorities he got in trouble for fighting with his brother and he was hit by Richards in the back of his head and eye as punishment, according to the arrest report.
The report said Richards admitted to putting her hand over the victim's mouth when he laughed at her but denied hitting or punching him.
A parent picking up his kids from the preschool on Thursday told ABC Action News he was as shocked as anyone.
“I mean it’s unfortunate. I don’t know all the details. Thankfully, we live in a country where there is due process, and she’ll be able to stand trial and plead her case," the parent, who did not want to provide his name, said. "I had never had any negative interactions. She’d been nothing but respectful to me and my family, my children,"
Richards was hired at the learning center in March 2021. The sheriff's office said she's on administrative leave as a result of the alleged abuse.
Richards was arrested and taken to the Pinellas County Jail.
Kindercare Learning Companies provided the following statement on the arrest:
"Nothing is more important to us than the safety of the children in our care. The teacher’s alleged actions do not reflect who we are or the training we provide our teachers. We are working with the police to determine what may or may not have happened. In the meantime, the
teacher involved is on administrative leave until further notice."
This story was originally published by WFTS in Tampa, Florida. | 2022-08-12T03:45:25+00:00 | fox17online.com | https://www.fox17online.com/news/national/florida-preschool-teacher-caught-punching-4-year-old-in-head-sheriffs-office-says |
Realizing this potential will require reaching emerging customer groups, including the estimated 250 million Generation Y and Z customers with annual incomes over $100,000 by 2030
BOSTON, July 11, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Bain & Company released today a new study on the wealth management market, predicting customer demand for wealth management services to surge to more than $500 billion by 2030—double the size of the market in 2021. The study shows that wealth management, with capital efficiency and recurring revenue streams, has the potential to help any parent company double market capitalization. However, realizing this potential has become more difficult due to emerging customers with different priorities, requiring new delivery models, new offerings and new economic models.
Targeting Generation Y and Z customers
Demographic shifts and the expansion of wealth globally are creating new customer segments. An estimated 250 million Generation Y and Z customers—those born between 1981 and 2012—will have an annual income of over $100,000 by 2030.
Bain & Company projects a $90 trillion increase in liquid assets from all investors globally, from 2021 to 2030, with $40 trillion coming from individuals who have assets between $100,000 and $1 million. The Americas and Asia-Pacific will lead the charge.
"New younger customers are more self-directed and self-educated," said Markus Habbel, a partner at Bain & Company and leader of the firm's wealth and asset management work. "While overall these emerging customers want digital delivery, for their most difficult decisions they want human interaction, requiring a high-touch hybrid approach."
Catering to differing priorities for products and offerings
As emerging segments grow, so too do their different priorities, including:
- ESG. 75% of wealthy millennials consider environmental, social and governance (ESG) to be an important factor in investment decisions. Bain & Company projects that ESG-related assets will compose about 46% of all assets under management by 2030, up from 33% today.
- Private markets. The rapid growth and outperformance of private markets relative to public markets has whetted investors' appetites, spurring several wealthtech companies to broaden access to private equity and debit.
- Digital assets. The market cap of public companies issuing cryptocurrency reached $2.2 trillion before sliding back to $1.3 trillion as of mid-May. Many advisors expect to invest between 1% and 5% of clients' portfolios in digital assets over the next five years.
- Retirement solutions. With baby boomers retiring amid the ongoing shift from defined benefit to defined contribution plans, investors are looking for innovative decumulation solutions to maintain a comfortable standard of living.
Scaling new high-tech, high-touch delivery models
If wealth managers hope to generate outsized growth in the future, they will need to create a more approachable value proposition for younger investors with fewer liquid assets than older generations. This will require creating a delivery model that actively leverages digital tools and channels and reserves human interactions for critical or complicated episodes, allowing companies to increase the ratio of clients per advisor to around 300. A similar trend of broadening brand appeal and reach revived the luxury goods industry.
These currents will continue to drive greater returns at scale. Bain & Company's study estimates that returns to scale are about 35% higher with a digitally intensive model relative to traditional models. To attain the competitive advantage of greater scale, many firms will turn to mergers and acquisitions.
Tapping into emerging business models
Wealth management firms that come out ahead in this new world will consider one of three emerging business models:
- Integrated platform provider. Large firms with distinctive capabilities and expertise, the ability to build standout products and insights, and access to high-quality investment opportunities will have an edge. They should seek to expand to affluent customers by democratizing their offerings through digital tools and channels that offer a better experience.
- Customer acquisition specialist. This model relies on access to customers through highly productive advisor forces or adjacent business lines. One distinctive feature of this model is holistic advice for customers.
- Specialist provider. This business model provides a value proposition tailored to a clearly defined customer segment. While smaller in scale, it stands out by applying the right advice and offerings to customers who will not be well served by larger, broad-based competitors.
Editor's Note: To arrange an interview, contact Katie Ware at katie.ware@bain.com or +1 646 562 8102.
About Bain & Company
Bain & Company is a global consultancy that helps the world's most ambitious change makers define the future.
Across 65 cities in 40 countries, we work alongside our clients as one team with a shared ambition to achieve extraordinary results, outperform the competition, and redefine industries. We complement our tailored, integrated expertise with a vibrant ecosystem of digital innovators to deliver better, faster, and more enduring outcomes. Our 10-year commitment to invest more than $1 billion in pro bono services brings our talent, expertise, and insight to organizations tackling today's urgent challenges in education, racial equity, social justice, economic development, and the environment. We earned a gold rating from EcoVadis, the leading platform for environmental, social, and ethical performance ratings for global supply chains, putting us in the top 2% of all companies. Since our founding in 1973, we have measured our success by the success of our clients, and we proudly maintain the highest level of client advocacy in the industry.
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SOURCE Bain & Company | 2022-07-11T13:12:14+00:00 | kwch.com | https://www.kwch.com/prnewswire/2022/07/11/bain-amp-company-expects-wealth-management-market-double-size-exceeding-500-billion-revenues-by-2030/ |
La Grange Public Library has a new executive director.
Jennifer Hovanec has accepted the position and is scheduled to begin her new role in La Grange on Jan. 25., according to a news release.
Hovanec has been serving as Circulation Manager at Northbrook Public Library, and as a Trustee for the Villa Park Public Library, the release said. She also served as the Calumet City Public Library Director. Hovanec earned her master’s degree in library science from Dominican University, and her bachelor’s degree in English literature from Benedictine University.
“I am honored to be joining the team at the La Grange Public Library as Executive Director,” Hovanec said in the release. “Both the Board of Trustees and staff wowed me with their enthusiasm for their community and passion for library work. I am looking forward to collaborating with the staff, trustees and community partners throughout the Village of La Grange.”
According to the release, the Library Board of Trustees began a national search for the new executive director in September with the assistance of Bradbury Miller Associates when former director Charity Gallardo accepted the role of Executive Director at Schenectady County Public Library System in Schenectady, New York.
“We are thrilled Jenn will be leading our team. Her broad background in libraries and management, along with her infectious enthusiasm for the patrons and staff, make her a great fit for the La Grange community. We look forward to working with her,” Library Board President Elizabeth Crewe, said. | 2023-01-17T16:37:41+00:00 | chicagotribune.com | https://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/la-grange/ct-dlg-lagrange-library-exec-director-tl-0119-20230117-nhe25yqpmvcqjdysx2e3ww7ive-story.html |
WASHINGTON (Nexstar) – President Joe Biden visited California on Thursday as the state suffers damage from devastating storms, which killed at least 20 people.
President Biden toured coastal California towns that were devastated by the storms.
“The federal government is not leaving its responsibility ‘til it’s all fixed, it’s done,” Biden said.
Biden approved a major disaster declaration for the golden state and the amount of federal assistance was increased this week after California was hit by massive storms that delivered between a foot and 17 inches of rain in some areas and about a food and a half of snow in the mountains.
The president met with business owners and people impacted by the severe weather that badly damaged homes and businesses.
“The country is here for you,” Biden said.
The storms also caused landslides around the state in areas that had previously been impacted by drought and wildfires.
“Roads are washing away and already people are dying so we desperately need the help,” Representative Judy Chu (D-CA) said.
More than 500 agents from FEMA and other agencies are in California to help.
“They’re with you to provide disaster relief,” Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said.
Lawmakers, like California’s Judy Chu and Ro Khanna, say states need to become more resilient to climate change and severe weather.
“We’re working very, very hard to bring resources from the federal government to address these issues but we also have to tackle climate,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) said.
California Governor Gavin Newsom says the state remains on high alert.
Following President Biden’s visit, Vice President Kamala Harris will also visit California on Friday. | 2023-01-20T18:28:06+00:00 | krqe.com | https://www.krqe.com/news/washington-dc/biden-visits-storm-damaged-california-ups-aid-amid-desperately-needed-help/ |
BRUSSELS (AP) — One day after French President Emmanuel Macron criticized her appointment because of her nationality, the American candidate to become one of the European Union's chief economists will now not take up the position because of the political controversy it stirred, the bloc announced Wednesday.
In a letter to the EU’s executive Commission released early Wednesday, Yale economics professor Fiona Scott Morton wrote that she had “determined that the best course of action is for me to withdraw and not take up the Chief Economist position.”
EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, who had pushed through the decision to appoint an American to such a high-level position, said, “I accept this with regret and hope that she will continue to use her extraordinary skillset to push for strong competition enforcement.”
Macron had not been the only one to criticize the unusual move to take on an American for such a post but his criticism had the most impact.
On Tuesday, he insisted that if the European Union needed more strategic independence, it was a bad move that the EU head office planned to hire an American expert as its chief competition economist.
“Is there really no great European researcher with academic qualifications that could do this job?” Macron asked at an EU summit.
In a bloc of some 450 million people, “is there no one in the 27 member states that has a researcher good enough to advise the (European) Commission? That is a real question mark,” Macron said.
The EU’s executive commission announced last week that it had appointed Scott Morton as chief competition economist in its department tasked with ensuring that “all companies compete equally and fairly on their merits within the single market, to the benefit of consumers, businesses and the European economy as a whole.″
Macron insisted that he has nothing against Scott Morton herself, an economist with multiple diplomas from elite schools.
But the French leader demanded answers from the commission and suggested that hiring a non-EU citizen to such a senior job should not be allowed under EU statutes.
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
Credit: AP | 2023-07-19T08:54:25+00:00 | springfieldnewssun.com | https://www.springfieldnewssun.com/nation-world/as-macrons-criticism-reverberates-us-economist-says-she-wont-take-top-eu-job/5YULMUQEUNHCLAQEA66ATHVGUA/ |
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — Eddy Kenzo doesn’t know precisely when he was born, a quirk of personal history that goes to the heart of how the Ugandan singer sees himself: a humble man who’s sometimes anxious about what happens next.
And yet Kenzo, who became the first Uganda-based singer to earn a Grammy nomination, keeps scaling heights that defy his expectations and those of his fans and rivals in this east African country where his work is sometimes questioned.
Some Ugandans dismiss his musical style as rather playful, saying he’s not that much of a singer. But others see in his experimentation the creative potential that marks him as an artiste with original gifts.
For Kenzo, any recognition of his work is a reminder of how far he’s come.
“Honestly speaking, I am so overwhelmed. I am so nervous at the same time,” Kenzo said in an interview with the AP, speaking of his nomination. “I thank God that we made it.”
Kenzo’s “Gimme Love,” a collaboration with the American singer Matt B that began with a fortuitous meeting in Los Angeles, is nominated for a Grammy in the category of best global music performance.
Kenzo, whose real name is Edirisa Musuuza, won a BET award in 2015 as the viewers’ choice for best new international artiste, the first and only Ugandan so honored to date. The accolade followed his breakout song “Sitya Loss,” accompanied by a video featuring dancing kids whose energetic performance captured the attention of global stars like Ellen DeGeneres.
That song was a nod to Kenzo’s own humble beginnings in a remote part of central Uganda, as a barely literate child who didn’t know from where his next meal would come. By his own account, Kenzo spent 13 years in the streets after losing his mother when he was only 4. He didn’t know who his father was, and he only discovered some of his siblings as a grown man.
He wanted to become a soccer player and even won a scholarship to boarding school based on his talent, but he later dropped out and returned to the hustling that he says made him a man.
“I am a hustler,” he told AP. “This is a very huge step for me, my family and the ghetto people, the hustlers, the people who come from nothing. It gives us a lot of hope that anything is possible.”
He recorded his first single in 2008 and achieved stardom in 2010 with the song “Stamina,” beloved by politicians, lovers, and others for its praise of youthful energy. In addition to winning awards, Kenzo is frequently invited to perform across the world.
Three days before he found out he had been nominated for a Grammy, Kenzo held a festival in Kampala that was attended by thousands, including Uganda’s prime minister. It was a proud moment for a singer whose music is often ignored by local FM stations, which can make or break a song with the choices DJs make.
There’s a sense even for Kenzo that he’s more appreciated abroad than at home.
“My biggest fanbase is outside Uganda, because the world is bigger than Uganda,” he said thoughtfully. “Uganda is just a small country.”
Andrew Kaggwa, an arts reporter with the local Daily Monitor newspaper, described Kenzo as an enigma who “has disrupted the industry in ways no one can explain.”
He spoke of Kenzo as the Ugandan singer “who refused to fail.” DJs may dislike his music, but he has a loyal following and he wins honors despite the odds.
“For some reason things happen” for Kenzo, Kaggwa said. “He just lets the awards, the accolades, speak for him.”
___
For more music coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/music | 2022-11-22T13:43:20+00:00 | wate.com | https://www.wate.com/entertainment/ap-entertainment/ap-kenzo-first-ugandan-nominated-for-grammy-had-humble-start/ |
Artemis I Mission: Teams to perform test to moon rocket to confirm repairs
BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. - NASA is preparing another attempt to launch the Artemis I rocket to the moon later this month after it was scrubbed twice due to hydrogen leaks and other technological issues.
On Wednesday, the space agency said teams will test adding super-cooled fuel to the rocket to confirm the repairs.
If the issues have been repaired, NASA is targeting Sept. 27 to launch the moon rocket from Cape Canaveral. A backup date is planned for Oct. 2, which is under review.
The 70-minute launch window on Sept. 27 is scheduled to open at 11:30 a.m. If postponed to Oct. 2, that launch window would be 109 minutes and would open at 2:52 p.m.
Leaders plan to hold a teleconference to discuss the test Monday at 11:30 a.m. ET.
FOX 35 News will stream it live in the above video player. | 2022-09-19T16:04:06+00:00 | fox35orlando.com | https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/artemis-i-mission-teams-to-perform-test-to-moon-rocket-to-confirm-repairs |
'Arthur' returns with new podcast series for kids
BOSTON - After coming to an end earlier this year, the long-running, animated kids’ show "Arthur" is getting its own podcast featuring the beloved aardvark.
The first season of "The Arthur Podcast" will feature eight episodes, released each week on Thursdays. It taps into the "Arthur" content library spanning 25 years, retelling episodes from the television series in a new audio format.
The new podcast launches on Thursday, Oct. 20, and will be available for free on all major podcast platforms like Apple Podcasts and Spotify, as well as on the PBS KIDS Video app, The Arthur YouTube channel, and pbskids.org.
RELATED: Spotify launches audiobook hub with 300,000 titles
Listeners can submit responses to "Arthur’s Inbox" on the PBS KIDS for Parents website to be potentially included in future episodes.
The podcast comes from PBS Kids, Boston’s GBH Kids, production partner Gen-Z Media, and is distributed by PRX.
"It’s been so fun to help Arthur make his new podcast," Carol Greenwald, GBH Kids’ senior executive producer, said in a statement. "He, D.W., and Buster has done a great job sharing their adventures – and the podcast platform will allow us to reach new audiences as well as reconnect longtime fans to many of our classic stories."
"Arthur" first appeared on air in October 1996. Throughout its run, the bespectacled aardvark named Arthur Read navigated life with his family, friends, and school — pushing the boundaries of animation and teaching kindness, empathy, and inclusion through everyday adventures.
The Peabody and Emmy Award-winning "Arthur" series is based on the bestselling "Arthur Adventure" book series by Marc Brown.
Characters from the longest-running animated U.S. children’s show "Arthur" are seen in a promotional image. (PBS Kids)
The show detailed Arthur’s life in Elwood City as he faced issues related to culture, class, and even same-sex marriage. In a 2019 episode, Arthur examined the same-sex marriage between his teacher, Mr. Ratburn, and Patrick, the local chocolatier, in an episode titled "Mr. Ratburn and the Special Someone." The episode was boycotted by Alabama Public Television and they refused to air the show.
In 2020, a series of digital short "Arthur" videos sought to give parents and families tools to discuss pressing issues like the importance of hand-washing and wearing a mask during the pandemic, learning and talking about racism in society, and encouraging everyone to participate in elections.
The end of the series was announced last year, and the series finale aired in February. PBS Kids celebrated the moment with a marathon and four new episodes, "which culminate in a much-anticipated ending that gives a glimpse into what’s in store for the future of these beloved characters."
Meanwhile, current fans (and potential future fans) can still watch episodes of "Arthur" on PBS Kids.
Ahead of the podcast release, PBS Kids also released a digital short called "Arthur Makes a Podcast," starring Arthur Read and his sister, D.W.
"Adapting one of the most beloved kids’ animated series in the world for audio has been a privilege, not to mention a lot of fun," Ben Strouse, CEO of Gen-Z Media, said in a statement. "We hope the podcast version provides kids as well as those of us who have grown up with the iconic show an important new way to enjoy these wonderful and relatable stories."
This story was reported from Cincinnati. | 2022-10-10T18:46:58+00:00 | fox10phoenix.com | https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/new-arthur-podcast-launch-for-kids-where-to-find |
Exclusive: China operating over 100 police stations across the world with the help of some host nations, report claims
By Nina dos Santos, CNN
Beijing has set up more than 100 so-called overseas police stations across the globe to monitor, harass and in some cases repatriate Chinese citizens living in exile, using bilateral security arrangements struck with countries in Europe and Africa to gain a widespread presence internationally, a new report shared exclusively with CNN alleges.
Madrid-based human rights campaigner Safeguard Defenders says it found evidence China was operating 48 additional police stations abroad since the group first revealed the existence of 54 such stations in September.
Its new release — dubbed “Patrol and Persuade” — focuses on the scale of the network and examines the role that joint policing initiatives between China and several European nations, including Italy, Croatia, Serbia and Romania have played in piloting a wider expansion of Chinese overseas stations than was known until the organization’s revelations came out.
Among the fresh claims leveled by the group: that a Chinese citizen was coerced into returning home by operatives working undercover in a Chinese overseas police station in a Paris suburb, expressly recruited for that purpose, in addition to an earlier disclosure that two more Chinese exiles have been forcibly returned from Europe — one in Serbia, the other in Spain.
Who runs the police stations?
Safeguard Defenders, which combs open-source, official Chinese documents for evidence of alleged human rights abuses, said it has identified four different police jurisdictions of China’s Ministry of Public Security active across at least 53 countries, spanning all four corners of the globe, ostensibly to help expatriates from those parts of China with their needs abroad.
Beijing has denied it is running undeclared police forces outside its territory, with its Ministry of Foreign Affairs telling CNN in November: “We hope that relevant parties stop hyping it up to create tensions. Using this as a pretext to smear China is unacceptable.” Instead, China has claimed the facilities are administrative hubs, set up to help Chinese expatriates with tasks like renewing their driver’s licenses. China has also said the offices were a response to the Covid-19 pandemic, which had left many citizens locked down in other countries and locked out of China, unable to renew documentation.
When approached by CNN last month about Safeguard Defenders’ original allegations, China’s foreign affairs ministry said the overseas stations were staffed by volunteers. However, the organization’s latest report claims one police network it examined had hired 135 people for its first 21 stations.
The organization also sourced a three-year contract for a worker hired at an overseas station in Stockholm.
Undeclared consular activities outside of a nation’s official diplomatic missions are highly unusual and illegal, unless a host nation has given their explicit consent, and the Safeguard Defenders report claims China’s overseas offices predate the pandemic by several years.
Their reports have prompted investigations in at least 13 different countries so far and enflamed an increasingly heated diplomatic tussle between China and nations like Canada, home to a large Chinese diaspora.
China isn’t the only superpower to be accused of employing extrajudicial means to reach targets for law enforcement or for the purposes of political persecution abroad.
Russia, for instance, has on two occasions been accused of deploying lethal chemical and radioactive substances on British soil to try to assassinate its former spies — allegations Russia has always denied.
In the United States, the CIA was embroiled in a scandal over the extraordinary rendition of terrorism suspects from the streets of Italy to Guantanamo Bay after 9/11.
Yet the suggestion of widescale repression of Chinese citizens in foreign countries comes at a pivotal time for a nation contending with its own unrest at home, amid fatigue at the country’s restrictive zero-Covid policy, as leader Xi Jinping’s third term in power gets under way. Last week, China indicated it would loosen some of its pandemic restrictions, three years after the onset of Covid-19.
As the second largest economy in the world, China has developed a deepening relationship with many of the countries where the new police stations have been allegedly found, raising awkward questions for national governments balancing commercial interests against national security.
China signs police patrol agreements with nations
Italy, which signed a series of bilateral security deals with China over successive governments since 2015, has kept largely silent during the revelations of alleged activities on its soil.
Between 2016 and 2018 Italian police conducted multiple joint patrols with Chinese police — first in Rome and Milan — and later in other cities including Naples where at the same time, Safeguard Defenders says, it has found evidence that a video surveillance system was added to a Chinese residential area ostensibly “to effectively deter crimes there.”
In 2016, an Italian police official told NPR that joint policing would “lead to a wider international cooperation, exchange of information and sharing resources to combat the criminal and terrorist groups that afflict our countries.”
The NGO determines Italy has hosted 11 Chinese police stations, including in Venice and in Prato, near Florence.
One ceremony in Rome to mark the opening of a new station was attended by Italian police officials in 2018, according to videos posted on Chinese websites, demonstrating the close ties between police forces in the two countries.
Earlier this year, the Italian newspaper La Nazione reported local investigations into one of the stations had not unearthed any illegal activity. Il Foglio quoted police chiefs as saying recently that the stations did not present any particular concern as they appeared to be merely bureaucratic.
Italy’s foreign and interior ministries did not reply to questions from CNN.
China also struck similar joint police patrol agreements with Croatia and Serbia between 2018 and 2019 as part of the nation’s increasing strategic footprint along the path of Xi’s defining foreign policy, dubbed the Belt and Road Initiative.
Chinese officers were seen on a joint patrol with their Croatian counterparts on the streets of the capital Zagreb as recently as July of this year, Chinese media reported.
A Zagreb police official interviewed by Xinhua said the patrols were essential for “protecting and attracting foreign tourists.”
A 2019 report from Reuters said Chinese officers had joined Serbian officers on patrol in Belgrade to help address the influx of Chinese tourists. One Serbian officer noted the Chinese didn’t have the power to make arrests.
Safeguard Defenders also says Chinese stations were able to get a toehold in South Africa, and in nearby nations thanks to a similar accord with Pretoria, in place for years.
China began laying the foundations for closer policing ties with South Africa’s law enforcement agencies almost two decades ago, later setting up a network of what are officially called “Overseas Chinese Service Centers” in cooperation with the government of South Africa thanks to successive bilateral security agreements.
China’s consulate in Cape Town has said the plan “unites all the communities, both South Africans and foreign citizens in South Africa.”
Since its establishment, the framework “has been actively preventing crimes against the community and reducing the number of cases significantly,” the consulate has said while noting that the centers are non-profit associations with no “law enforcement authority.”
South African government officials have frequently been featured by Chinese media expressing support for the centers and saying their work has helped police deepen their relationship with Chinese expatriates who live there, according to a 2019 report from the Jamestown China Brief.
CNN reached out to the South African Police Service, but it has not yet received comment.
China tries to return people against their will
Safeguard Defenders stumbled on the police networks while trying to assess the scale of China’s efforts to persuade some of its people to return to China even against their will, which, based on official Chinese data, could number almost a quarter of a million people around the world during the time Xi has been in power.
“What we see coming from China is increasing attempts to crack down on dissent everywhere in the world, to threaten people, harass people, make sure that they are fearful enough so that they remain silent or else face being returned to China against their will,” said Safeguard Defenders Campaign director Laura Harth.
“It will start with phone calls. They might start to intimidate your relatives back in China, to threaten you, do everything really to coax the targets abroad to come back. If that doesn’t work, they will use covert agents abroad. They will send them from Beijing and use methods such as luring and entrapment,” Harth said.
The French interior ministry declined to comment on the allegation that a Chinese citizen was coerced into returning home by a Chinese police station in a Paris suburb.
Reports spark anger and investigations
The revelations have prompted vocal outrage in some countries and a conspicuous silence in others.
Last month, FBI Director Christopher Wray told a Homeland Security Committee he was deeply concerned about the revelations. “It is outrageous to think that the Chinese police would attempt to set up shop, you know, in New York, let’s say, without proper coordination. It violates sovereignty and circumvents standard judicial and law enforcement cooperation processes,” he said.
Ireland has shut down the Chinese police station found on its territory, while the Netherlands, which has taken similar measures, has a probe underway, as does Spain.
Harth told CNN the organization will likely find more stations in the future. “It’s the tip of the iceberg,” she said.
“China is not hiding what it is doing. They expressly say that they are going to expand these operations so let’s take that seriously.
“This is a moment when countries have to consider that it’s a question of upholding the rule of law and human rights in their countries as much for people from China, as for everyone else around the world,” she said.
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2022 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved. | 2022-12-04T08:19:14+00:00 | krdo.com | https://krdo.com/news/national-world/cnn-world/2022/12/03/exclusive-china-operating-over-100-police-stations-across-the-world-with-the-help-of-some-host-nations-report-claims/ |
WFO AMARILLO Warnings, Watches and Advisories for Wednesday, June 1, 2022
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SPECIAL WEATHER STATEMENT
Special Weather Statement
National Weather Service Amarillo TX
604 AM CDT Wed Jun 1 2022
...Strong thunderstorms will impact portions of Carson, southern
Hutchinson, northwestern Gray, east central Potter and southwestern
Roberts Counties through 630 AM CDT...
At 604 AM CDT, Doppler radar was tracking strong thunderstorms along
a line extending from 9 miles north of Skellytown to 9 miles west of
Panhandle. Movement was east at 20 mph.
HAZARD...Penny size hail.
SOURCE...Radar indicated.
IMPACT...Minor damage to outdoor objects is possible.
Locations impacted include...
Borger, Panhandle, Fritch, White Deer, Skellytown, Sanford and
Pantex.
PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...
If outdoors, consider seeking shelter inside a building.
Torrential rainfall is also occurring with these storms and may lead
to localized flooding. Do not drive your vehicle through flooded
roadways.
Frequent cloud to ground lightning is occurring with these storms.
Lightning can strike 10 miles away from a thunderstorm. Seek a safe
shelter inside a building or vehicle.
LAT...LON 3583 10074 3528 10131 3531 10168 3579 10151
TIME...MOT...LOC 1104Z 265DEG 18KT 3570 10121 3538 10155
MAX HAIL SIZE...0.75 IN
MAX WIND GUST...<30 MPH
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Copyright 2022 AccuWeather | 2022-06-01T12:26:23+00:00 | sfgate.com | https://www.sfgate.com/weather/article/TX-WFO-AMARILLO-Warnings-Watches-and-Advisories-17211609.php |
A deal for where the U.S. debt limit will lie, for now, could be placed on President Joe Biden's desk as early as Thursday night. Senate leaders announced they had come to an agreement to pass a bill on the debt ceiling by Thursday evening.
Majority leader Sen. Chuck Schumer confirmed leadership had come to a place where it promised to pass the legislation by Thursday night, as he called on his colleagues in Congress to act quickly as they vote.
"I am pleased, so pleased, to announce that both sides have just locked in an agreement that enables the Senate to pass legislation tonight avoiding default. I thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for their cooperation. Let's finish the job and send this very important bipartisan bill to the President's desk tonight," said Sen. Schumer.
On Wednesday, the House voted by a 314–117margin in favor of H.R. 3746, which, if signed into law, would raise the debt limit for two years and cut spending on some discretionary programs.
That legislation was placed in the Senate's hands as they began voting and debating Thursday night.
At least 11 senators were scheduled to be allowed to vote on amendments with both sides locked into an agreement to pass legislation by Thursday night to avoid a default. That meant lawmakers in the Senate would have to debate and vote on 11 amendments, making it uncertain how late into the night the session on the Senate floor would go as Sen. Schumer announced the rules.
The Senate began voting on the amendments at 7:30 p.m. ET.
Although the bill got the support of a majority of both Republicans and Democrats in the House, Schumer acknowledged that not everyone was completely happy with it.
This is a developing story and will continue to be updated.
SEE MORE: How Biden and McCarthy struck a debt-limit deal
Trending stories at Scrippsnews.com | 2023-06-02T01:17:56+00:00 | wsfltv.com | https://www.wsfltv.com/voting-has-started-as-lawmakers-agree-on-a-debt-limit-deal |
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — FOR SATURDAY, 11/19; PHOTOS ALREADY LINKED —afrizzell edited
Democrats celebrated winning what was billed as North Carolina’s lone toss-up race for the U.S. House this month, as state Sen. Wiley Nickel’s narrow victory over Republican Bo Hines in the 13th Congressional District helped weaken any national GOP midterm wave.
Nickel’s win creates a 7-7 split in the state’s delegation, marking the best showing for state Democrats after a decade of trailing the GOP in an otherwise closely divided state. Trial judges drew the latest district boundaries after redistricting litigation successfully blocked maps passed by the Republican-controlled legislature that could have whittled Democrats down to four seats.
“We’re a 50-50 state — we should have a 7-to-7 delegation,” Nickel told The Associated Press this week during a break in his congressional orientation in Washington. “When we have fair maps, we get fair results that reflect the choice of the voters.”
But there’s a good chance Nickel’s Raleigh-area district and others will be dramatically altered for the 2024 elections, returning the advantage to Republicans.
A confluence of events opens the door for General Assembly Republicans to pass their preferred congressional map in 2023 and have it used the following year. A new GOP majority on the state Supreme Court likely will be more skeptical of legal challenges that allege excessive partisanship.
“Seven-seven does not reflect the will of the voters in North Carolina,” House Speaker Tim Moore told reporters the day after the election. “So it should be something different. I don’t know what that is. But at the end of the day … let’s trust the voters of this state.”
Republicans hold eight of the state’s 13 U.S. House districts through the year’s end. Population growth gave North Carolina a 14th seat with the November election.
GOP legislators vehemently opposed a split opinion by the state Supreme Court last winter that struck down a more favorable map for their party by declaring the state constitution prohibited partisan gerrymandering of boundaries.
State law required the judge-drawn map be used only for this year’s races. Republicans will continue to have majorities in the state House and Senate next year comfortable enough to pass their favored map. Redistricting plans are not subject to Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto stamp.
Most importantly, Republicans will have a 5-2 majority on the Supreme Court come January with victories by Trey Allen and Richard Dietz for seats currently held by registered Democrats.
The current 4-3 Democratic majority ruled that congressional and legislative maps approved by the General Assembly in November 2021 unlawfully gave Republicans outsized favoritism compared with Democrats. The three Republican justices who dissented wrote that the constitution doesn’t expressly bar or limit partisan advantage in mapmaking.
The arrival of two more GOP justices makes it more likely — but not assured — that the court would uphold a future congressional map by the legislature while rejecting last year’s landmark ruling that defined illegal partisan gerrymandering.
Senate leader Phil Berger said he expected the state would now move away from what he called the “judicial gerrymander” to “what would be, I think, a different drawing of the congressional maps.”
It’s too soon to say what the next congressional lines will look like. Plans approved by the legislature but never implemented would have positioned Republicans to win 10 of the state’s 14 congressional seats.
Michael Bitzer, a political science professor at Catawba College in Salisbury, said Nickel would be a likely target for Republican lawmakers to place in a more GOP-friendly district.
Democratic state Sen. Jeff Jackson, who won the newly created 14th District seat covering portions of Mecklenburg and Gaston counties, and 6th District Democratic Rep. Kathy Manning of Greensboro, who won her third term, are also vulnerable, Bitzer said.
It’s possible the state Supreme Court shift could be moot. Litigation involving the congressional map is before the U.S. Supreme Court and could result in state courts losing the ability to judge laws involving federal elections, including seat boundaries. Oral arguments are scheduled for next month in the case, in which lawyers for Berger and Moore argue the U.S. Constitution delegates “the Times, Places and Manner” of congressional elections solely to state legislatures.
“Even if they’re unsuccessful in the U.S. Supreme Court, they now have a state Supreme Court that is most likely to be deferential to whatever the legislature comes up with, excusing any precedent” reached by the state justices, Bitzer said.
An analysis by Bitzer of federal statewide contests in North Carolina since 2008 show Republican candidates winning nearly 51% of the cumulative votes compared with 47% for Democrats. But the idea that a political party should be assured of seats aligned with their percentage support at the ballot box over time was shunned by authors of the state Supreme Court’s prevailing and dissenting opinions last February.
Nickel said he’s not worrying himself about what a future map looks like.
“We’ve got a huge opportunity to make some real bipartisan accomplishments in the next Congress, so that’s really the focus,” Nickel said. “At some point, they will draw new maps, but I’m optimistic that when that happens, we’ll have a seat we can run in.”
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Schoenbaum is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. | 2022-11-20T04:59:57+00:00 | cbs42.com | https://www.cbs42.com/news/politics/ap-politics/ap-nc-democrats-parity-in-congress-delegation-may-be-fleeting/ |
(The Hill) — Fans are questioning whether Madonna is making a statement about her sexual orientation in her latest TikTok video.
The “Vogue” singer posted a brief clip for her nearly 3 million TikTok followers on Sunday. In the video, Madonna is seen holding a pair of hot pink underwear, with the words, “If I miss, I’m Gay!” captioned on the screen.
She then tosses the garment towards a wastebasket, and misses, as it lands on the floor.
The mother of six, who was born Madonna Ciccone and was previously married to Sean Penn and Guy Ritchie, has been a longtime supporter of LGBTQ+ rights.
In 2019, GLAAD called her “the LGBTQ community’s greatest ally,” as it recognized her with its Advocate for Change award.
During her acceptance speech, the 64-year-old performer told the LGBTQ advocacy organization’s audience, “Fighting for all marginalized people is a duty and an honor I could not turn my back on, nor will I ever.”
A representative for Madonna didn’t immediately return ITK’s request for comment. | 2022-10-10T18:41:27+00:00 | wnct.com | https://www.wnct.com/news/national/fans-ask-whether-madonna-made-statement-on-her-sexual-orientation-with-tiktok-video/ |
Police: Serbia school shooting suspect had list of students to target
BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Police say a teenager who opened fire at his school in Serbia’s capital Wednesday meticulously planned the attack that left eight fellow students and a guard dead.
Senior police official Veselin Milic said the shooter drew sketches of classrooms and wrote a list of children he planned to “liquidate.”
Milic identified the shooter as Kosta Kecmanovic.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — A teenager opened fire at his school in Serbia’s capital Wednesday, killing eight children and a school guard before being arrested in the school yard, police said. Six more children and a teacher were hospitalized.
A father of a student at the school in central Belgrade said the shooter entered his daughter’s classroom, firing at her teacher and then her classmates as they ducked under their desks. Most students were able to flee through a back door, according to a local official.
Police said the shooter, whom they identified by his initials, K.K., was a student at the Vladislav Ribnikar school and was born in 2009. They said he used his father’s gun.
Local media footage showed a commotion as police removed the suspect, whose head was covered as officers led him to a car. Police sealed off the blocks around Vladislav Ribnikar, which is what’s known as a primary school, whose students would typically range in age from 6 to 15. Authorities later carried body bags to a waiting van.
Mass shootings are extremely rare in Serbia and in the wider Balkan region; none were reported at schools in recent years. In the last mass shooting, a Balkan war veteran in 2013 killed 13 people in a central Serbian village.
Experts, however, have repeatedly warned of the danger posed by the large number of weapons in the country after the wars of the 1990s. They also note that decades of instability stemming from the conflicts as well as the ongoing economic hardship could trigger such outbursts.
Police said they received a call about the shooting at around 8:40 a.m. on the first day that classes resumed after a long weekend for the May 1 holiday.
“I was able to hear the shooting. It was nonstop,” said a student who was in a sports class when gunfire erupted elsewhere in the building. Her mother asked that her name be withheld because of her age. “I didn’t know what was happening. We were receiving some messages on the phone.”
The student described the suspect as a “quiet guy” who had good grades.
“He was not so open with everybody. Surely I wasn’t expecting this to happen,” she said.
Milan Nedeljkovic, the mayor of the Belgrade area of Vracar where the shooting happened, said that most of the students were taken out a back door of the school.
“We have video surveillance, but now this is a lesson, we need metal detectors too,” he said. “It is a huge tragedy ... something like this (happening) in Belgrade. Such a tragedy at an elementary school.”
Four students and a teacher were sent to University hospital, according to the hospital’s director, who said one child and the teacher were in serious condition.
Milan Milosevic, who said his daughter was in a history class when the shooting took place, told N1 television that he rushed to the school when he heard what had happened. He received a call from his daughter who had gotten out of the building and was unharmed.
“He (the shooter) fired first at the teacher and then the children who ducked under the desks,” Milosevic said his daughter told him.
Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. | 2023-05-03T12:43:28+00:00 | ktiv.com | https://www.ktiv.com/2023/05/03/teenage-shooter-kills-8-children-guard-school-serbia/ |
ANAHEIM, Calif. (AP) — Shohei Ohtani already knows he is headed to the All-Star Game in two weeks. It remains unclear whether he will take part in the Home Run Derby in Seattle on July 10.
“I don’t know when my next (pitching) start is and it really kind of depends on that. I haven’t thought that far ahead yet,” Ohtani said through his interpreter after the Los Angeles Angels beat the Chicago White Sox 4-2 Tuesday night.
The two-way Japanese superstar leads the majors with 28 home runs, including 13 in June. He became the first American League pitcher in nearly 60 years to hit two homers and strike out 10 batters in a game in Tuesday’s victory.
Ohtani led the AL with 2,646,307 votes to wrap up his third straight All-Star start at designated hitter. It is the second year the top vote-getters in each league in the first phase of online voting get starting spots.
Ohtani participated in the 2021 Home Run Derby in Denver. He lost to Juan Soto 31-28 in the second swing-off in the first round. Ohtani was also the AL’s starting pitcher that year.
He did not take part in last year’s Derby despite it being held at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Ohtani cited pitching the Angels’ first game after the All-Star break as a reason.
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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports | 2023-06-29T02:11:38+00:00 | localsyr.com | https://www.localsyr.com/sports-news/ohtani-still-hasnt-decided-whether-he-will-participate-in-the-home-run-derby/ |
LAREDO, Texas (AP) — A recount was underway Thursday in a Texas primary race between Democratic U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar and progressive challenger Jessica Cisneros following their tight runoff in May.
Before the recount, Cuellar had been leading Cisneros by 187 votes, or 0.4 percentage points, out of 45,429 ballots counted as of last week, according to an Associated Press count. The AP will not declare a winner until the recount is completed.
It was not clear Thursday when the recount would be finished.
The recount was requested by Cisneros, a 29-year-old immigration attorney who is trying to unseat the nine-term South Texas congressman for the second time in as many years. She lost by 4 percentage points in 2020 behind national support from the party’s progressive leaders, including Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
Cuellar has said his lead will hold in Texas’ 28th Congressional District, which is heavily Hispanic and runs to the southern border with Mexico. He has bucked his party for years over issues including abortion and gun rights but has kept the support of Democratic leaders in Congress, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The winner of will face Cassy Garcia, who won the Republican runoff for the seat in May. | 2022-06-17T03:44:53+00:00 | wdtn.com | https://www.wdtn.com/news/politics/ap-politics/texas-recount-underway-between-texas-rep-cuellar-cisneros/ |
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court has never been so slow.
For the first time, the justices have gone more than three months without resolving any cases in which they heard arguments, since their term began in early October.
By this point, they always had decided at least one case, and usually a handful, according to Adam Feldman, the creator of the Empirical SCOTUS blog.
But fall turned to winter without any decisions, and not even a three-week holiday break produced any published opinions.
The next opportunity is Monday, before the justices take another break of nearly four weeks.
The court has offered no explanation, but several possibilities exist: a change in personnel with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson joining the court, less consensus on a deeply divided bench and the consequences of last term’s leak of a draft opinion in the case that overturned a half-century of abortion rights.
While their opinions have not been prolific, the justices’ questioning of lawyers has been robust, with Jackson the most verbose questioner at the court’s arguments, Feldman has found.
“If the amount of speech is related to the amount of writing we will find in her opinions and to opinions to which she signs on, this could also hamper the pace,” Feldman wrote on Twitter.
The divide between the six conservative and three liberal justices is showing up more often in decisions. Last term produced more 6-3 outcomes than unanimous decisions, which typically make up the largest share, according to statistics compiled by Scotusblog.
This term, too, seems likely to produce its share of sharp divisions over the consideration of race in college admissions, voting rights, election law and a dispute between religious and gay rights.
Cases in which more than one justice writes an opinion, whether a dissent or a concurrence, take longer than those in which the court is unanimous.
In 2018, then-Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg produced the court’s first opinion on Nov. 6, in a case argued 36 days earlier. “Rapid Ruth,” as Ginsburg jokingly called herself, was the court’s speediest writer. Ginsburg died in 2020.
Last year, just under 30% of decisions were unanimous, and presumably some of this term’s cases will lead to that same result.
That’s where the early May leak of Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion in the abortion case might come into play. It’s possible, and maybe even likely, that the justices have changed some of their internal practices to reduce the chances an opinion will leak. Any changes could extend the time to finalize a decision.
The court has said nothing about the state of the investigation of the leak that Chief Justice John Roberts ordered. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that the court brought in outside government investigators who helped narrow down the possible suspects by early summer. But no culprit has been identified, apparently.
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Justice Sonia Sotomayor is the most recent of the nine members of the nation’s highest court to comment on the June decision that overturned nearly a half-century of abortion rights.
Sotomayor was responding to a simple question from Berkeley law school dean Erwin Chemerinsky, who moderated an event with the justice for the American Association of Law Schools. After last term’s momentous decisions, Chemerinsky asked, “How are you?”
Sotomayor appeared to focus on just one of the term’s big, conservative-driven cases, which also included expanding gun and religious rights and limiting the Biden administration’s efforts to combat climate change. Sotomayor dissented in all those cases.
“If you’re asking how that momentous decision affected me, my word description would have varied from day to day,” Sotomayor said. “Sometimes I was shell-shocked. Other times, I was just deeply, deeply sad. And many times I did have a sense of despair about the direction my court was going.”
But ultimately, she said, she felt she had no choice but to persevere. “Yet I realized that one doesn’t have an option to fall prey to despair, that I have to get up and keep on fighting,” she said.
The event was held in early January, and the association posted a video online last week.
Other justices have talked about the damage to the court that they believe resulted from the leak. Justice Elena Kagan spoke several times during the summer and fall about the dangers of the court being viewed as a political body.
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Sotomayor appeared virtually for the law school association event, but she had been among the court’s most frequent travelers before the coronavirus pandemic changed everything.
Only then-Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016, rivaled her in getting out of Washington, she said.
The justices are supposed to report their travel when someone else foots the bill in an annual disclosure that is released to the public.
But Fix the Court, a watchdog group, has found gaps in the reporting for Sotomayor and other justices.
The group on Tuesday sued the Justice Department under the federal Freedom of Information Act for records related to the justices’ travel. The U.S. Marshals Service, part of the Justice Department, regularly provides security when the justices leave town.
Fix the Court is seeking records from 2018 to 2022. Two earlier lawsuits and requests for information under state public records laws turned up trips that were not reported by the justices and additional details of some trips that were.
In 2016, Sotomayor took six trips paid for by public universities that she initially omitted. She eventually updated her report for that year.
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Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court at https://apnews.com/hub/us-supreme-court. | 2023-01-19T16:43:53+00:00 | pix11.com | https://pix11.com/ap-political/ap-supreme-court-notebook-justices-yet-to-decide-any-cases/ |
Which tax preparation software is best?
When the taxman comes to the door, there’s no need to turn your house into a rummage sale just to pay your dues. All you need is the right tax preparation software. The best software for you should only be as complex as your finances. Otherwise, you can end up paying more for no extra benefit.
The best tax preparation software for the average person is Intuit TurboTax Deluxe Federal And State 2021. It covers all the most common deductions and credits and has an easy-to-understand interface.
What to know before you buy tax preparation software
Tax preparation software complexity
Some people’s taxes are simple enough to take 15 minutes once a year, while others must carefully track income and expenses all year. Varying levels of software match those needs.
- Basic software is for those with little to no complication and small incomes. If you’re filing taxes for the first time, start here.
- Advanced software is for those with complications and good-sized incomes. If you’re married with dependents and have a few revenue streams, go with this.
- Premium software is for those with several revenue streams and many complications. If you’ve ever considered an accountant due to your tax complexity, this is your best bet.
- Self-employed software is for freelancers and gig workers, etc. It covers the basics of expenses on top of premium offerings.
- Small-business software is more for year-round accounting than tax-time inputs.
- Business software is also for year-round accounting but for those with bigger businesses.
Operating system compatibility
Most tax preparation software can be used on only one operating system. The most common operating systems are Windows, found on the majority of computers, and macOS, found on Apple computers. Most tax prep software comes with a version for each, so make sure you order the right one.
What to look for in quality tax preparation software
Easy data import
The best tax preparation software makes importing your data as simple as possible. This can include uploading a picture of your files rather than needing to input them manually or letting you import your various accounts’ info.
E-filing
Most tax preparation software includes the ability to e-file your taxes with the Internal Revenue Service. Double-check that yours does before you buy, or you’ll have to print and mail your return instead.
Customer support
Tax preparation software customer support includes the usual help with technology issues, but the best also includes support for those with tax questions. Software that includes tax question customer support is a lifesaver for those new to filing taxes and those with complex returns.
How much you can expect to spend on tax preparation software
Basic tax software can be found for free, as you aren’t required to pay the IRS to file your taxes. More advanced software can cost as little as $20 or as much as $100-plus. All-year accounting software usually starts around $100 and can cost $1,000-plus.
Tax preparation software FAQ
Should I do my own taxes or hire an accountant?
A. Neither course of action is better than the other. It comes down to how complex your taxes are, how good you are with numbers and whether you’re willing to spend the time it takes to prepare everything.
If you run a business and it’s your first tax time after opening it then you may want to hire an accountant who can both do your taxes and explain to you how to do them on your own next year.
If you have multiple sources of income and complicating factors such as being married, having kids and paying student loans, it’s a bit of a toss-up. An accountant is more expensive than software, but you save time and effort and might get a bigger refund.
If you have one income source and few to no complicating factors, free tax software or services that walk you through the steps are probably best.
I’ve never done taxes before. Where do I start?
A. The first step is to collect every piece of information you have on what money came in and what money went out. The more information you have, the more complex software you need. If you’re really lost, hire an accountant.
What’s the best tax preparation software to buy?
Top tax preparation software
Intuit TurboTax Deluxe Federal and State 2021
What you need to know: This is an excellent balance of simplicity and depth for those with more complex returns.
What you’ll love: It covers 350-plus deductions and credits and walks you through each of them while skipping those that don’t apply to you. You can import most of your tax files quickly and easily, including previous returns if you’ve used this software before.
What you should consider: This is last year’s version. The 2022 version comes out in November. Some consumers had issues installing it. State filing can be prepared but not e-filed.
Where to buy: Sold by Amazon, Dell and Staples
Top tax preparation software for the money
What you need to know: If your taxes are simple, there’s no need for anything more complex.
What you’ll love: It covers simple income for both single and married people, whether filing jointly or individually. It also covers basic tax deductions and credits for those with dependents, such as children. It’s available for Windows and macOS systems. State taxes are available for an extra fee.
What you should consider: Like TurboTax, this is last year’s version with the 2022 version coming in November. A few customers found the font too small and the interface confusing.
Where to buy: Sold by Amazon, Dell and Staples
Worth checking out
Intuit QuickBooks Desktop Premier Plus With Payroll
What you need to know: This is the best software you can get if you run a small business with employees.
What you’ll love: This software covers everything you need to keep your finances clean and precise, from tracking expenses to preparing your taxes. It can even create paychecks and lets you set up direct deposits for your employees. Your data is automatically backed up.
What you should consider: It’s only available as a yearly subscription and it’s among the most expensive. It’s complex and can take time to get the hang of.
Where to buy: Sold by Amazon, Dell and Staples
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Copyright 2022 BestReviews, a Nexstar company. All rights reserved. | 2022-08-26T20:35:05+00:00 | cbs42.com | https://www.cbs42.com/reviews/br/electronics-br/computer-accessories-peripherals-br/best-tax-preparation-software/ |
2 suspects charged in 3 Metro Detroit bank robberies using paycheck stubs for notes
FOX 2 (WJBK) - Two suspects were charged on March 29 for three bank robberies and an attempted fourth robbery.
Investigators say that Collin Carl Love, Jr. and LaRonte Hill would pass the teller a note that demanded money. Feds later learned one of the notes the suspect used was a paystub that belonged to one of the suspects.
The two - Love, 24, and Hill, 22, are accused in the following robberies:
- Community Choice Credit Union in Redford, Michigan on February 4, 2023
- The Christian Financial Credit Union in Harper Woods on February 10, 2023
- The Fifth Third Bank in Grosse Pointe Woods on March 3, 2023,
- Investigators say the two attempted to rob the Eastpointe Community Credit Union on February 24, 2023.
At the Community Choice bank robbery, one of the suspects produced a note saying "I want 20,000. All 100 dollar bills no dye packs no tracking devices or funny business. I have a gun and I will shoot somebody PSA give me this check back when done!"
The teller went to the back to retrieve money and told their manager it was a robbery, and the manager alerted police. The teller then handed the suspect $4,000 and the robber fled on foot.
The note appeared to have been written on a paycheck stub that tracked to a temp agency, Kelly Services, in Troy. The business provided police the name the account was connected to, which was Collin Love Jr.
Love has a CCW conviction from 2023 and police found he was denied a firearm purchase the same day as the robbery, due to an injunctive order against him for a report of domestic violence.
A note with the same message written was used in the Harper Woods robbery, in which the teller gave the robber $9,000.
The note was also written on a paycheck stun from a temp business that is no longer open. Michigan State Police did an analysis on it and matched a fingerprint to Love.
In the Eastpointe robbery attempt, a teller received a similar note but never returned up front, leading to the suspect fleeing. | 2023-03-30T12:28:38+00:00 | fox29.com | https://www.fox29.com/news/2-suspects-charged-in-3-metro-detroit-bank-robberies-and-attempting-a-4th |
KYIV, Ukraine — Ukraine kept the counteroffensive momentum in its war against Russia going Monday, saying it liberated one village after another and claiming that in one region it pushed the invaders back right up to the border in a lightning military move that stunned many.
“In some areas of the front, our defenders reached the state border with the Russian Federation,” said the regional governor of the northeastern Kharkiv region, Oleh Syniehubov. Russian troops crossed the border in the region on Feb. 24, the first day of the invasion.
Russia acknowledged the military developments by saying it was regrouping. As throughout the war, military claims were hard to verify independently.
After Sunday's attacks by Russia on power stations and other infrastructure that knocked out electricity in many place across Ukraine, Kyiv authorities also said that electric power and water supplies have been restored to some 80 percent in the Kharkiv region.
"You are heroes!!!, wrote Kharkiv mayor Ihor Terekhov early in the morning on Telegram, highlighting the ebullient mood in the nation that has endured more than 200 days of war and occupation. “Thanks to everyone who did everything possible on this most difficult night for Kharkiv to normalize the life of the city as soon as possible.”
The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said that its troops had liberated more than 20 settlements within the past day.
The buoyant mood was also captured by a defiant President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on social media late Sunday, comments that immediately went viral.
“Do you still think you can intimidate, break us, force us to make concessions? Did you really not understand anything? Don’t understand who we are? What we stand for? What we are talking about,” Zelenskyy exhorted.
“Read my lips,” he continued. “Cold, hunger, darkness and thirst for us are not as scary and deadly as your ‘friendship’ and brotherhood.’"
He added: "We will be with gas, lights, water and food… and WITHOUT you!”
Yet even amid the ebullience, the casualties kept mounting. Ukraine’s presidential office said Monday that at least four civilians were killed and 11 others were wounded in a series of Russian attacks in nine regions of the country. The U.N. Human Rights Office said last week that 5,767 civilians were killed so far.
The Russians continued shelling Nikopol across the Dnieper from the Zaporizhzhia power plant, damaging several buildings there and leaving Europe's largest nuclear facility in a precarious position.
The turn of events and all-important reversal of initiative was backed up by international observers who warned of dire times ahead for Russian troops. It stood in sharp contrast to the first days of the war when Russian troops were moving toward Kyiv's doorstep.
“In the face of Ukrainian advances, Russia has likely ordered the withdrawal of its troops from the entirety of occupied Kharkiv Oblast west of the Oskil River,” the British defense ministry said Monday, signifying a major advance by Kyiv. “Ukraine has recaptured territory at least twice the size of Greater London,” it said.
The British said that likely will further deteriorate the trust Russian forces have in their commanders. Ukraine's initial move on the southern Kherson area, drawing the attention of enemy troops there, before pouncing on more depleted Russian lines in the northeast beyond Kharkiv has been seen as a great military move so far.
Even around Kherson, Russia is struggling to bring forces across the Dnipro River to stop the Ukrainian offensive there, the British military said.
It added: “The rapid Ukrainian successes have significant implications for Russia’s overall operational design. The majority of the force in Ukraine is highly likely being forced to prioritize emergency defensive actions.”
The Washington-based Institute for the Study of War said Monday that Russia likely lacks the reserve forces it needs to bolster its defenses in Ukraine.
While the war likely will stretch into next year, the institute believes that “Ukraine has turned the tide of this war in its favor” by effectively using Western-supplied weapons like the long-range HIMARS missile system and strong battlefield tactics. “Kyiv will likely increasingly dictate the location and nature of the major fighting."
Seeking to contain its loss of momentum, Russia fired missiles at power plants and other critical infrastructure, immediately meeting with Ukrainian and U.S. criticism for centering on civilian targets.
The bombardment ignited a massive fire at a power station on Kharkiv’s western outskirts and killed at least one person. Zelenskyy denounced the “deliberate and cynical missile strikes” against civilian targets as acts of terrorism.
“Russia’s apparent response to Ukraine liberating cities and villages in the east: sending missiles to attempt to destroy critical civilian infrastructure,” U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget A. Brink wrote.
Separately, the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in the Russia-occupied south completely shut down in a bid to prevent a radiation disaster as fighting raged nearby.
___
Arhirova reported from Kyiv. | 2022-09-12T19:54:57+00:00 | kagstv.com | https://www.kagstv.com/article/news/nation-world/ukraine-reaches-russian-border/507-3c9b7b25-ec69-4f5b-b6d2-f8093ea7f157 |
Livingston Parish Council chairman Jeff Ard announced Wednesday he will run for parish president.
Ard, who has served as a a parish council member for the past eight years representing District 1, said in a news release that he plans to focus on drainage challenges and infrastructure enhancements, among other goals during his campaign.
“While serving two terms in the leadership position as Livingston Parish Council Chairman, I had the opportunity to work with my fellow parish council members and the parish administration to address many important issues in Livingston Parish,” Ard said. “This experience will allow me to continue to work for the families and businesses in our great parish.”
He called Livingston's expansive growth over the last decade the parish's "biggest asset" as well as its "biggest challenge."
“As our parish grows, this will continue to put a strain on our infrastructure, education system, law enforcement and just about every other area in our parish," he said. "That is why it is imperative we have a Parish President with the vision and fortitude to lead Livingston Parish in making decisions where everyone benefits.”
Ard has served two terms as Livingston Parish council chair. He is a registered Republican and an active member of the National Rifle Association. Professionally, Ard works as the site manager for MMR Group/VEC, is the owner of JSA Contractors, LLC and a director of YAFI Adventures, LLC.
The Livingston Parish president election is Saturday, October 14, 2023. | 2023-01-11T22:07:58+00:00 | theadvocate.com | https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/jeff-ard-announces-bid-for-livingston-parish-president/article_5312a49a-91e9-11ed-8aef-5f0f14ea46df.html |
The fifth Indianapolis-area location for Upland Brewing Co. is expected to open in late August at Clay Terrace in Carmel.
The 5,300-square-foot Upland taproom plans to serve a rotating beer and seasonal food menu at 14490 Clay Terrace Blvd. The new taproom, which will replace Prodigy Burger Bar, will be Upland’s second location in Carmel.
Founded in 1998, Bloomington-based Upland operates a brewpub in Fountain Square and taprooms at 4842 N. College Ave. and 4939 E. 82nd St. in Indianapolis, and 820 E. 116th St. in Carmel.
Padraig Cullen, Upland’s vice president of hospitality, said in written remarks that expanding the company’s footprint in Carmel is a natural step for Upland.
“From shopping steps away, to the Monon Trail and a nearby dog park, it offers something for all Upland fans,” Cullen said. “It is also very large with a nice patio and garage doors that create an indoor/outdoor experience we think customers will enjoy.”
Upland produces 16,000 barrels of beer a year in Bloomington, at both a main production brewery and a separate brewery that produces sour ales.
Based on volume, it’s the state’s third-largest brewer behind Indianapolis-based Sun King Brewing Co. and Munster-based 3 Floyds Brewing Co.
Please enable JavaScript to view this content. | 2023-06-29T14:38:08+00:00 | ibj.com | https://www.ibj.com/articles/upland-brewing-to-open-new-taproom-in-august-at-clay-terrace-in-carmel |
(KTLA) – A vicious attack by two dogs last Friday morning left an 80-year-old woman dead, and now questions have arisen over whether or not that particular dog breed should be kept as a pet.
Deputies with the San Bernardino Sheriff’s Department said they were called around 11 a.m. The victim, Soon Han, had been out on her morning walk when she was attacked, official said.
First responders discovered the 80-year-old unresponsive in the dirt roadway and believe she was attacked by two dogs from a nearby home.
The news came as a shock to neighbors who saw Han walking almost every day.
“Makes me really, really emotional because she was really friendly,” said a neighbor identified only as Guadalupe.
Guadalupe said she had seen the two dogs roaming freely, and that she has closed her gate when they are near to protect her small children and four dogs.
“I see them roaming, probably got out, but as an owner, we should be responsible for our own dogs,” Guadalupe told KTLA. “We should notice when they’re not inside the house or outside.”
Han unfortunately died at the scene. Flowers still decorate the area.
San Bernardino County Animal Control responded and took both dogs into custody pending the investigation. Authorities said both dogs are Dogo Argentinos, a breed that experts say was created nearly a century ago to protect family and property.
“A house pet is not what they’re bred to be, and there’s photos of them with children. You’re going to see that. It’s not about that or that it couldn’t be nice to its family. It’s about anyone that walks near that property could be facing a life-or-death situation. ” Colleen Lynn, president of DogsBite.org, an advocacy organization for dog bite victims.
Lynn told KTLA that the breed is growing in popularity, especially in California. She believes that as the population increases, so will attacks. She also said that it’s the owners’ responsibility to keep the dogs secure.
“These dogs should have been securely in a pen or something like this, should not have been wandering around. I don’t care how rural it is,” Lynn said.
The Dogo Argentino Club of America, the AKC Parent Club for the Dogo Argentino in the United States, released a statement to KTLA that reads:
“The Dogo Argentino is a strong, tenacious and rustic breed that was created in the 1920s in Argentina to protect family and property, as well as to hunt large game.
“The breed is a faithful companion at home and in the hunting field. Today, the Dogo Argentino is still used in hunting all around the world. Dogos are also very intelligent, natural guardians and family companions and very trainable in the right home. The breed is for an owner with large breed experience. Dogos need a home that provides an outlet for exercise and training with strong boundaries. Aggression is not tolerated. They love pleasing their family and can be very affectionate.
“With diligent training along with mental and physical stimulation, the Dogo Argentino makes an excellent dog for skilled owners who enjoy a loyal, high-energy working breed. It is imperative to find a reputable breeder and mentor when considering the breed.” | 2022-10-11T21:19:50+00:00 | krqe.com | https://www.krqe.com/news/weird/80-year-old-woman-mauled-to-death-by-neighborhood-dogs-in-california/ |
Easy ways to make your wedding more affordable
Consider DIY for decorations and other amenities
(InvestigateTV) — The average cost of a wedding in 2023 is expected to be around $29,000, about $1,000 more than 2022, according to wedding planning platform Zola.
Sara Bigham is a lifestyle contributor with the popular website and app, Eventbrite. She shared several ideas to help you reign in your wedding budget.
Look for free tastings
“I’ve seen these offered pretty regularly from catering companies and even restaurants,” Bigham said. “It’s a great way to nibble a few bites, see what might work for your menu at your wedding without having to pay for those very expensive catering tasting menus.”
Consider DIY flower arrangements
“Flowers are costly, so grab your girlfriends and do it yourself,” Bigham suggested. “There are plenty of flower arranging classes, flower crown workshops and even make your own bouquet classes found on Eventbrite.com”
Do you own makeup
If you have a friend who is skilled, consider asking them to help. You can also look for a bridal makeup class to help find ideas, or search for makeup tutorial videos on TikTok.
Copyright 2023 Gray Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved. | 2023-05-15T21:24:37+00:00 | waff.com | https://www.waff.com/2023/05/15/easy-ways-make-your-wedding-more-affordable/ |
Teenager in custody for robbing off-duty officer in New Orleans, police say
NEW ORLEANS (WVUE/Gray News) - A 16-year-old boy is in custody after robbing an off-duty New Orleans police officer early Monday in French Quarter, according to authorities.
Police did not identify the juvenile suspect, or the off-duty officer he allegedly robbed on the 700 block of St. Louis Street around 2:56 a.m.
WVUE reports the off-duty police officer was riding a bicycle on St. Louis Street between Royal and Bourbon streets, when the teen “approached and demanded the victim’s bike.” Police said the officer “did not comply,” which led to a struggle between the officer and suspect.
The teen managed to rob the 23-year-old police officer of unspecified “property” before fleeing the scene, but later was found and taken into custody, according to the department.
The 16-year-old was booked into the Juvenile Justice Intervention Center on allegations of second-degree battery and simple robbery.
The NOPD did not disclose injuries sustained by the officer, nor say when or where the suspect was apprehended.
Anyone with information on the incident is asked to contact NOPD Eighth District detectives at (504) 658-6080 or Crimestoppers at (504) 822-1111.
Copyright 2022 WVUE via Gray Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved. | 2022-08-08T23:04:39+00:00 | ksla.com | https://www.ksla.com/2022/08/08/teenager-custody-robbing-off-duty-officer-new-orleans-police-say/ |
CLEVELAND, Ohio -The Bengals defense struggled to contain the Browns offense during Monday’s 32-13 loss to the Cleveland Browns.
On 70 snaps, safety Jessie Bates III led the Bengals in overall defensive grading, with a 80.0 rating, and rush-defensive grading with a 90.3 rating, according to Pro Football Focus.
Safety Vonn Bell led the way with a 86.0 overall pass-rush grade on 70 snaps, while linebacker Germaine Pratt contributed with a 77.8 coverage-grading on 58 snaps.
Here’s how the rest of the offense graded out:
(PFF grades every player on every play and uses a scale of 0-100, with higher grades indicating better play. PFF has explained its grades this way: 100-90 elite; 89-85 Pro Bowler; 84-70 starter; 69-60 backup; 59-0 replaceable. In other words, it’s similar to how we would match up percentages with traditional letter grades in school.)
NOTE: Snap counts in parentheses.
DEFENSIVE END
Trey Hendrickson: 68.2 (39)
Cameron Sample: 65.1 (27)
Sam Hubbard: 61.6 (52)
Joseph Ossai: 48.9 (25)
DEFENSIVE TACKLE
B.J. Hill: 57.4 (60)
Domenique Davis: 37.5 (18)
Jay Tufele: 27.9 (36)
Zachary Carter: 27.3 (52)
LINEBACKER
Germaine Pratt: 70.2 (58)
Logan Wilson: 65.6 (71)
Markus Bailey: 53.8 (7)
Akeem Davis-Gaither: 45.1 (7)
CORNERBACK
Chidobe Awuzie: 61.2 (27)
Tre Flowers: 51.1 (26)
Mike Hilton: 49.9 (46)
Cam Taylor-Britt: 49.2 (70)
Daxton Hill: 46.6 (19)
SAFETY
Jessie Bates III: 80.0 (70)
Vonn Bell: 54.2 (70)
Browns’ Best Five Offensive Grades
Ethan Pocic: 94.0 (71)
Joel Bitonio: 93.0 (71)
Jacoby Brissett: 90.8 (71)
Michael Dunn: 85.8 (23)
Jedrick Wills Jr.: 84.3 (71)
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If you or a loved one has questions and needs to talk to a professional about gambling, call the Ohio Problem Gambling Helpline at 1-800-589-9966 or the National Council on Program Gambling Helpline (NCPG) at 1-800-522-4700.
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Ja’Marr Chase is out, so Tee Higgins should step up to help fill the void for the Bengals
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Ja’Marr Chase out 4-6 weeks with hip injury, according to report | 2022-11-01T18:27:37+00:00 | cleveland.com | https://www.cleveland.com/bengals/2022/11/how-jessie-bates-iii-germaine-pratt-and-the-rest-of-the-bengals-defense-graded-vs-the-browns.html |
NEW YORK, Aug. 19, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Jakubowitz Law announces that a securities fraud class action lawsuit has commenced on behalf of shareholders of Outset Medical, Inc. (NASDAQ: OM).
To receive updates on the lawsuit, fill out the form:
https://claimyourloss.com/securities/outset-medical-loss-submission-form/?id=30972&from=4
This lawsuit is on behalf of all persons or entities who purchased Outset Medical common stock between September 15, 2020, and June 13, 2022.
Shareholders interested in acting as a lead plaintiff representing the class of wronged shareholders have until September 6, 2022 to petition the court. Your ability to share in any recovery doesn't require that you serve as a lead plaintiff.
According to a filed complaint, Outset Medical, Inc. issued materially false and/or misleading statements and/or failed to disclose that:(1) the Company's flagship product, Tablo Hemodialysis System ("Tablo"), would require an additional 510(k) application to be filed with The United States Food and Drug Administration ("FDA"), as defendants had "continuously made improvements and updates to Tablo over time since its original clearance"; (2) as a result, the Company could not conduct a human factors study on a cleared device in accordance with FDA protocols; (3) the Company's inability to conduct the human factors study subjected the Company to the likelihood of the FDA imposing a "shipment hold" and marketing suspension, leaving the Company unable to sell Tablo for home use; and (4) as a result, defendants' positive statements about the Company's business, operations, and prospects were materially false and misleading and /or lacked a reasonable basis at all relevant times.
Jakubowitz Law is vigorous in pursuit of justice for shareholders who have been the victim of securities fraud. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.
CONTACT:
JAKUBOWITZ LAW
1140 Avenue of the Americas
9th Floor
New York, New York 10036
T: (212) 867-4490
F: (212) 537-5887
View original content:
SOURCE Jakubowitz Law | 2022-08-19T10:55:20+00:00 | kmvt.com | https://www.kmvt.com/prnewswire/2022/08/19/om-shareholder-alert-jakubowitz-law-reminds-outset-medical-shareholders-lead-plaintiff-deadline-september-6-2022/ |
Biden calls for tougher penalties for execs of failed banks
President Joe Biden on Friday called on Congress to allow regulators to impose tougher penalties on the executives of failed banks, including clawing back compensation and making it easier to bar them from working in the industry.
Biden wants the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to be able to force the return of compensation paid to executives at a broader range of banks should they fail, and to lower the threshold for the regulator to impose fines and bar executives from working at another bank.
He called on Congress to grant the FDIC those powers after the failures of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank sent shockwaves through the global banking industry.
“Strengthening accountability is an important deterrent to prevent mismanagement in the future,” Biden said in a statement. “Congress must act to impose tougher penalties for senior bank executives whose mismanagement contributed to their institutions failing.”
Currently the FDIC can only take back the compensation of executives at the largest banks in the nation, and other penalties on executives require “recklessness” or acting with “willful or continuing disregard" for their bank's health. Biden wants Congress to allow the regulator to impose penalties for “negligent” executives — a lower legal threshold.
The White House highlighted reports that Silicon Valley Bank CEO Gregory Becker sold $3 million worth of shares in the bank in the days before its collapse, saying Biden wants the FDIC to have the authority to go after that compensation.
The shuttering of Silicon Valley Bank last Friday and of New York’s Signature Bank two days later has revived bad memories of the financial crisis that plunged the United States into the Great Recession about 15 years ago.
Over the weekend the federal government, determined to restore public confidence in the banking system, moved to protect all the banks’ deposits, even those that exceeded the FDIC’s $250,000 limit per individual account. | 2023-03-17T18:38:39+00:00 | koat.com | https://www.koat.com/article/biden-tougher-penalties-execs-failed-banks/43351000 |
Happy Avocado month — celebrate with huge savings on certified organic mattresses and more, and support the planting of avocado trees.
LOS ANGELES, July 11, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- In celebration of Avocado Month, Avocado Green — makers of certified organic and eco-luxury products — is launching a sale with exclusive savings on their certified organic mattresses, reclaimed wood bed frames, adjustable bed frames, organic certified linen sheets and pillows, bath collection, luxurious loungewear, and clean skin + body products.
As part of Avocado's Giving initiative, through which they donate 1% of all revenue to 1% For the Planet, all sales during the Avocado Day sale will support the Fruit Tree Planting Foundation's effort to plant 4,000 fruit trees in the central region of El Salvador.
From July 11 to July 31 only, customers can save up to $400 on Avocado's top-rated GOTS-certified organic Green and Vegan Mattress. Shoppers will also save 20% on all bedding, including Avocado's exceptionally cozy, naturally breathable, GOTS-certified organic sheets, duvet covers, pillowcases, and protectors. Avocado's Supercharged Reishi Body Melt and Alpaca Sweater Collection are 30% off and their Fleece Lounge Collection and GOTS-certified (CU863637) Organic Cotton Collection — sustainable, cozy layering pieces — are 50% off.
Over the five years Avocado has supported the Fruit Tree Planting Foundation for National Avocado Day on July 31, they've planted more than 14,000 fruit trees together, primarily in Latin America, where demand for sustainable livelihoods for farmers and low-income households is greater than ever.
"Working with Avocado has been a joy, allowing our shared visions of a greener and fairer future to come to fruition," said Lizzy Rainey, Development Manager for FTPF. "Food-producing trees, including avocados, are a simple yet very effective way to address environmental, economic, and nutritional injustices all at once."
Every order during the sale also comes with free carbon negative shipping. As a Climate Neutral certified brand — and one of B Corp's "Best for the World™"brands — Avocado reduces its footprint, offsets all of its scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions, and advocates for legislation that will help mitigate the climate crisis.
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SOURCE Avocado Green Mattress | 2023-07-11T21:07:40+00:00 | newschannel10.com | https://www.newschannel10.com/prnewswire/2023/07/11/avocado-green-announces-huge-savings-avocado-month/ |
OPELOUSAS, La., Dec. 19, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Sweet and savory, rich and creamy, this holiday treat is sure to impress your guests. Baked brie is one of the most popular appetizers, finding its way onto festive tables across the country. Its decadent flavors mixed with the sweet heat of Tony Chachere's Praline Honey Ham Marinade, create a dish perfectly designed for entertaining.
PRALINE HONEY-BAKED BRIE
By: @willworkforheels
Wheel of Brie (8 Ounces)
1 French Baguette, Cut into ½-Inch Rounds, Buttered and Toasted
1/4 Cup Tony's Praline Honey Ham Injectable Marinade
1/3 Cup Maple Syrup
2 Teaspoons Tony's More Spice Seasoning
1 Tablespoon Rosemary, Chopped
1/2 Cup Pecans, Chopped
1/4 Cup Dried Cranberries
Butter, to Taste
Prep Time: 10 Minutes
Cook Time: 20 Minutes
Serves: 4-8
- Preheat oven to 375°F.
- Remove the brie from its wrapping and make crisscrossed scores in the cheese. Place the wheel of brie in an oven-safe baking dish.
- Bake the brie for 20 minutes.
- While the brie is baking, cut the baguette into ½-inch rounds and add butter to them.
- 5 minutes before taking the brie out of the oven, add the bread to the oven to lightly toast.
- In a small saucepan, heat maple syrup, Tony's Praline Honey Ham Marinade, Tony's More Spice Seasoning and rosemary. Bring to a boil.
- Add in cranberries and pecans and mix well. Remove the pan from the heat.
- After the brie is finished baking, remove it from the oven and add the praline mixture to the top.
- Garnish with a few sprigs of rosemary and enjoy with the toasted baguette rounds. (You can also add candied pecans as a garnish.)
Tony Chachere's® Famous Creole Cuisine is celebrating its 50th Anniversary! Established in 1972 by Tony Chachere, the "Ole Master" of Creole cooking, Tony's remains family-owned and operated in Opelousas, Louisiana. Employing more than 100 people, the family maintains a tradition of Creole authenticity in its comprehensive line of seasonings, dinner mixes, marinades, and sauces for both the pantry and the table.
As part of Tony's 50th Anniversary Celebration, pick up your commemorative can of Tony's Original Creole Seasoning. Order it now at tonychachere.com.
tonychachere.com
#PassAGoodTime
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SOURCE Tony Chachere's | 2022-12-19T20:01:56+00:00 | kwch.com | https://www.kwch.com/prnewswire/2022/12/19/put-cajun-spin-your-favorite-baked-brie-this-holiday-season-with-tony-chacheres/ |
The language might have been meant to shock, but it was not really a surprise when former President Trump this week responded to his arraignment on federal criminal charges by vowing to return to office and "appoint a real special counsel to go after the most corrupt president in history, Joe Biden, and the whole Biden crime family."
It was also amazing — but in character — that Trump spent the afternoon prior to his arraignment interviewing prospective lawyers to represent him in a legal matter that has been bubbling to a boil for two years.
Throughout that time, of course, Trump has had a platoon of lawyers battling for him and his claim to ownership of national security files. Although their roster has seen some shuffling, they have been resisting subpoenas and filing motions in Washington, D.C., and in Florida since the National Archives first notified the ex-president he needed to comply with the law in 2021.
Yet with hours to go to court time, Trump was still looking for a top-drawer lawyer who had a federal practice in South Florida and was willing to take his case.
On display in these fraught moments of American legal history was the attitude Trump has taken toward the legal profession and the court system itself, an attitude he has maintained for half a century. The problem, time and again, has been that Trump is not just looking for a lawyer. He seems to be looking for a wartime consigliere.
That phrase came into popular use with The Godfather movies in the 1970s. Early in the first film, a temporary head of the fictional Corleone family berates his attorney for negotiating.
"Do me a favor, Tom. No more advice on how to patch things up, just help me win," he says, adding that what he really wants is "a real wartime consigliere."
While the Italian word connotes an advisor or counselor, the meaning is in the modifier. This particular kind of counselor is meant to be a warrior at heart, a chief strategist and a weapon personified. And Trump had a model in mind.
'Where's my Roy Cohn?'
"Other than his father, the most important influence on the future president was Roy Cohn," wrote the New York Times' Maggie Haberman in her Trump biography: Confidence Man.
Cohn had been notorious since the early 1950s, when, fresh out of Columbia Law School, he was the staff attorney for Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy (R-Wis.) when the latter conducted his hearings into communists in government.
McCarthy's efforts collapsed and he was censured by the Senate, but Cohn slid into private practice back home and made a fortune. His client list included individuals from all five of New York's actual crime families. (It also included famous figures from the worlds of sports and entertainment and even a Catholic Cardinal.)
He and Trump met in 1973 and Cohn was soon advising the young businessman on how to deal with the federal government and fight enforcement of laws against racial discrimination in housing.
"Don't tell me what the law is," Cohn would say, "tell me who the judge is."
But Cohn died in 1986, and Trump is still in search of a substitute. In his account of Trump's first year in the White House, writer Michael Wolff said Trump would often ask the question out loud, to no one in particular: "Where's my Roy Cohn?"
After Cohn died, Trump often relied on far less expensive legal help. Legal services for his Trump Organization or for personal matters were farmed out to a wide variety of available attorneys with an eye on minimizing cost.
That was important because Trump and his company were often involved in lawsuits. He and the company have been sued in civil court hundreds of times and they have sued and counter-sued often.
One of Trump's longest-serving counselors was Michael Cohen, who from 2006 to 2018 operated as both a lawyer and a "fixer" — cleaning up messes for Trump. One of these, the payment of hush money to a porn actress just before the 2016 election, eventually earned Cohen disbarment and a three-year prison sentence for tax evasion and other charges. Cohen in 2020 published a tell-all about Trump titled Disloyal: A Memoir.
Lawyers, lawyers everywhere
Trump was frustrated upon entering the White House because he was virtually surrounded by lawyers but could not regard any of them as his lawyer.
His first chief of staff, Reince Priebus, was a well-established lawyer in Wisconsin before becoming chairman of the Republican National Committee and eventually joining Trump.
For his first attorney general, Trump had turned to Jeff Sessions, who had been the first U.S. senator to endorse Trump for president – the only one to do so before the primaries. Sessions, too, was a lawyer. He had been a judge in his home state of Alabama, and he seemed as loyal to Trump as he could be.
And then there was Donald McGahn, the White House counsel, who had worked on Trump's 2016 campaign. Washington Republicans knew his work as a top-flight campaign finance lawyer and as past chairman of the Federal Election Commission.
Finally, Trump had reason to feel good about yet another lawyer in what he hoped would be his inner circle. That was James Comey, the director of the FBI. Although appointed by President Obama, Comey was a lifelong Republican with a strong conservative reputation.
There had been disappointment in the GOP when Comey's investigation did not result in the indictment of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for what he called her "extremely careless" use of a private email server while in office. But he had redeemed himself for some when he briefly re-opened the case 11 days before the 2016 election. Much was made of that apparent breakthrough, and far less notice was taken when Comey closed the case shortly thereafter.
But after his inauguration, Trump wanted to know where Comey stood, and he brought him to the White House for a dinner chat. According to Comey, Trump asked if he had the director's loyalty. When Comey said Trump would always have his honesty, Trump was not satisfied. "I need loyalty," he said. "I expect loyalty."
Comey said Trump had made that "request" in the same manner as Salvatore "Sammy The Bull" Gravano, leader of the Gambino crime family (whom Comey had prosecuted).
That was a week after Inauguration Day. Less than four months later, Comey was fired while on a trip to visit FBI field offices. But the attrition among Trump's lawyerly staff had just begun.
Priebus lasted just six months, being fired by tweet while waiting for transport on a tarmac. Sessions, presented with evidence that Russians had sought to interfere in the 2016 U.S. election, possibly to help Trump, recused himself from the issue as required by Department of Justice policy. But when his next-in-command appointed a special counsel (former FBI director Robert Mueller) to investigate the charges, Trump was furious. After initially telling Sessions he was fired, Trump let him stay until just after the 2018 midterm elections.
By that time, McGahn was also gone. He had helped shepherd scores of candidates for federal judgeships into the confirmation process, but he had also clashed repeatedly with Trump, who thought the White House counsel should operate as his private attorney.
Barr fills the bill — until he doesn't
For a time, it appeared that Trump had found his man in William Barr, his second attorney general, who was confirmed early in 2019 and almost made it through the end of 2020. Barr had been attorney general for about a year under former President George H.W. Bush and thereafter served as in-house counsel for major corporations such as Verizon.
Barr had been out of the government for almost 30 years when he sent an unsolicited letter to the administration criticizing the appointment of a special counsel in the Russian interference case. When Mueller finished his voluminous report, finding extensive Russian interference but no direct link to the Trump campaign, Barr announced the results and treated it as an exoneration – as indeed Trump did himself.
But Trump would be far less pleased with Barr's response to allegations of election fraud in November 2020. Barr had his department look into the allegations and reported back that they were without basis.
According to several published accounts of that report, which took place at a White House meeting of Trump's inner circle, the president reacted by saying "You must hate Trump" and accepted Barr's resignation. But Barr was persuaded to return for a few weeks by McGahn's successor, Pat Cippolone.
During this same period, a frustrated Trump turned to an entirely different set of attorneys, an unofficial group assembled largely by Rudy Giuliani. Trump and Giuliani had been allies and associates since the latter was mayor of New York in the 1990s (and on Sept. 11, 2001).
Giuliani brought in a team of attorneys, including Jenna Ellis and Sidney Powell, both of whom have since faced disciplinary action by state or bar authorities. Giuliani himself has had his license temporarily suspended and is awaiting a final ruling.
Also part of the mix in the last days of 2020 was John Eastman, a California lawyer and former law school dean who thought it plausible that the Electoral College results could be challenged at the point of certification in Congress on Jan. 6. Seizing on that theory, Trump and Giuliani and others thought Vice President Mike Pence and some members of Congress together could block certification and send the election back to the state legislatures in several swing states — potentially making Trump the winner.
Cippolone, who as the White House counsel had helped defend Trump in his first impeachment trial in 2019 and in his second in 2021, pushed back on the plotting from Giuliani's group. In particular he resisted the notion that Trump could elevate a lawyer from the department ranks at Justice to serve as Barr's temporary successor and thereby bolster claims of fraud and demands for recounts or new rounds of voting.
Meanwhile, back in Miami
As it turned out, Trump came before the magistrate judge in Miami this week flanked by two veteran attorneys who have worked for him in the past and are admitted to practice in Florida. But they were not the two who had been handling the case up until the indictment the previous week. Jim Trusty and John Rowley left the team on June 9. This week, Trusty also asked that his name be removed from a case Trump has pending against CNN.
Instead, Trump was represented at arraignment by Christopher Kise and Todd Blanche. Kise is a veteran Florida attorney associated with the statewide campaigns of Republicans Gov. Ron DeSantis and Sen. Rick Scott. Kise had been part of the documents team for Trump in 2022 but then reassigned to deal with civil proceedings Trump's business is facing in New York.
Blanche is expected to lead the team in the Florida case but has a similar role in the criminal case in New York involving the hush money payments and subsequent bank fraud.
Whoever represents Trump at trial will face one specific problem regarding what Trump has said to some of his previous attorneys. Unless the evidence is suppressed, the indictment includes dialogue between Trump and two of his (unnamed) lawyers in which Trump proposes lying about the documents he has kept.
At this point, that conversation would appear shorn of its "attorney-client privilege" because it attempts to involve the attorneys in furthering a crime.
Barr and others have made clear this testimony is especially damning on the charge of obstructing justice.
Whether it provides the crucial evidence for that crime or not, it certainly makes Trump sound like a man who expects his lawyer to do what he is asked. And to have undivided loyalty.
Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org. | 2023-06-17T14:14:36+00:00 | wbfo.org | https://www.wbfo.org/2023-06-17/trump-has-had-a-lot-of-lawyers-but-still-longs-for-his-wartime-consigliere |
BRASILIA, Brazil — A top court in Brazil on Tuesday authorized three patients to grow cannabis for medical treatment, a decision that is likely to be applied nationwide in similar cases.
Brazil’s health ministry is yet to regulate home cultivation of cannabis for medical use, which puts anyone doing it at the risk of arrest.
Judge Rogério Schietti said the top court’s panel acted because the government had failed to take a scientific position on the issue.
“The discourse against this possibility is moralistic. It often has a religious nature, based on dogmas, on false truths, stigmas,” Schietti said. “Let us stop this prejudice, this moralism that delays the development of this issue at the legislative, and many times clouds the minds of Brazilian judges.”
Judge Antonio Saldanha said that “there is a deliberately backward action toward obscurantism” in Brazil’s government’s delay.
The country’s health ministry did not respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.
President Jair Bolsonaro, a far-right politician facing a tough battle to get reelected in October, said in June 2021 that he disagreed with any authorization for Brazilians to grow marijuana at home, no matter their aim.
Former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the main leader of the leftist Workers’ Party, leads all opinion polls to return to the job he held in 2003-2010.
Uruguay is the only South American country where the use of marijuana is legal even for recreational use. Argentina’s approved on May 27 a law to regularize the medical use of cannabis and established a regulatory agency to control how patients obtain seeds and marijuana derived products.
The Brazilian court’s decision follows protests in Brazil in favor of medical cannabis on June 11. | 2022-06-15T00:00:51+00:00 | washingtonpost.com | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/brazil-court-approves-home-grown-cannabis-for-medical-use/2022/06/14/cc88c2ca-ec33-11ec-9f90-79df1fb28296_story.html |
(The Hill) – Three men were convicted on Wednesday of all charges against them over supporting a plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) in 2020.
The jury found Joe Morrison, his father-in-law Pete Musico and Paul Bellar guilty of providing material support for terrorist acts, gang membership and carrying or possessing a firearm during the commission of a felony.
The men are members of the Wolverine Watchman, a far-right paramilitary group. Several others arrested in connection with the plot were also members of the group.
A jury previously convicted two men, Adam Fox and Barry Croft Jr., of conspiring to kidnap Whitmer in August. Another jury was unable to reach an unanimous conclusion on Fox and Croft and acquitted two other defendants.
The Associated Press reported that Morrison, Musico and Bellar held gun drills in a rural county with Fox, who led the plot and despised Whitmer.
Prosecutors argued the men were hoping to incite a civil war with the kidnapping.
Whitmer was ultimately unharmed, and the men were arrested before the plot could be set into motion. FBI informants and agents infiltrated the plan early on.
FBI Special Agent Mara Schneider, a spokesperson for the FBI’s Detroit field office, said in a release from the Michigan attorney general’s office that the defendants believed violence was an appropriate way to address ideological grievances.
“Today’s verdict sends a clear message they were wrong,” Schneider said. “Violence is never the answer, and the FBI remains committed to investigating and holding accountable anyone who seeks to further an ideological cause through violence.”
The defense argued that the three men cut off their ties with Fox before the Whitmer plot developed and noted that they did not travel to northern Michigan to overlook Whitmer’s home or participate in a weekend training session inside a “shoot house,” according to AP.
The three men are scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 15 and will remain in jail while they await sentencing. | 2022-10-26T19:50:43+00:00 | ksn.com | https://www.ksn.com/news/national-world/3-men-convicted-of-supporting-plot-to-kidnap-michigan-gov-gretchen-whitmer/ |
WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court 's conservative majority sounded sympathetic Monday to a Christian graphic artist who objects to designing wedding websites for gay couples, a dispute that's the latest clash of religion and gay rights to land at the highest court.
The designer and her supporters say that ruling against her would force artists - from painters and photographers to writers and musicians - to do work that is against their beliefs. Her opponents, meanwhile, say that if she wins, a range of businesses will be able to discriminate, refusing to serve Black customers, Jewish or Muslim people, interracial or interfaith couples or immigrants, among others.
Over more than two hours of spirited arguments, the justices repeatedly tested out what ruling for the designer could mean, using detailed and sometimes colorful hypothetical scenarios. Those included a Black Santa asked to take a picture with a child dressed in a Ku Klux Klan outfit, a photographer asked to take pictures for the Jewish dating website JDate and also the marital infidelity website Ashley Madison, and a food business called "Grandma Helen's Protestant Provisions."
Justice Neil Gorsuch, one of three high court appointees of former President Donald Trump, described Lorie Smith, the website designer in the case, as "an individual who says she will sell and does sell to everyone, all manner of websites, (but) that she won't sell a website that requires her to express a view about marriage that she finds offensive."
Where to draw the line for what a business might do without violating state anti-discrimination laws was a big question in Monday's arguments at the high court.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson asked whether a photography store in a shopping mall could refuse to take pictures of Black people on Santa's lap.
"Their policy is that only white children can be photographed with Santa in this way, because that's how they view the scenes with Santa that they're trying to depict," Jackson said.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor repeatedly pressed Kristen Waggoner, the lawyer for Smith, over other categories. "How about people who don't believe in interracial marriage? Or about people who don't believe that disabled people should get married? Where's the line?" Sotomayor asked.
But Justice Samuel Alito, who seemed to favor Smith, asked whether it's "fair to equate opposition to same-sex marriage to opposition to interracial marriage?"
The case comes at a time when the court is dominated 6-3 by conservatives and follows a series of cases in which the justices have sided with religious plaintiffs. Across the street from the court, lawmakers at the Capitol are finalizing what would be a landmark bill protecting same-sex marriage.
The proposed law, which also would protect interracial marriage, has gained momentum following the high court's decision earlier this year to end constitutional protections for abortion. That decision to overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling prompted questions about whether the court - now that it is more conservative - might also overturn its 2015 decision declaring a nationwide right to same-sex marriage. Justice Clarence Thomas explicitly said that decision should be reconsidered.
The case being argued before the high court Monday involves Smith, a graphic artist and website designer in Colorado who wants to begin offering wedding websites. Smith says her Christian faith prevents her from creating websites celebrating same-sex marriages.
"Ms. Smith believes opposite-sex marriage honors scripture and same-sex marriage contradicts it," Waggoner told the justices.
But offering wedding websites to same-sex couples and refusing to design them for opposite sex couples could get Smith in trouble with state law. Colorado, like most other states, has what's called a public accommodation law that says if Smith offers wedding websites to the public, she must provide them to all customers. Businesses that violate the law can be fined, among other things.
Five years ago, the Supreme Court heard a different challenge involving Colorado's law and a baker, Jack Phillips, who objected to designing a wedding cake for a gay couple. That case ended with a limited decision and set up a return of the issue to the high court. Waggoner, of the Alliance Defending Freedom, also represented Phillips.
Like Phillips, Smith says her objection is not to working with gay people. She has had gay clients, her lawyer said. But she objects to creating messages supporting same-sex marriage, just as she wouldn't create a website for a couple who met while they both were married to other people and then divorced.
Smith says Colorado's law violates her free speech rights. Her opponents, including the Biden administration, the American Civil Liberties Union and the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, disagree.
Twenty mostly liberal states, including California and New York, are supporting Colorado, while 20 other, mostly Republican states, including Arizona, Indiana, Ohio and Tennessee, are supporting Smith.
The case is 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, 21-476. | 2022-12-05T22:54:59+00:00 | abc30.com | https://abc30.com/supreme-court-case-today-arguments/12529523/ |
KAMPI ya SAMAKI, Kenya (AP) — Winnie Keben had felt blessed to be raising her children in her husband’s childhood home in the community of Kampi ya Samaki – just over a quarter mile (500 meters) from the shoreline of Lake Baringo.
The vast freshwater lake buzzing with birds and aquatic life in the semi-arid volcanic region of Kenya’s Great Rift Valley had long been an oasis. It attracted fishers and international tourists to the community, about a five-hour drive from Nairobi.
But over the past decade Lake Baringo has doubled in size, due primarily to heavy rainfall tied to climate change, according to scientists, and its fast-rising waters are increasingly becoming a menace. The expanding lake has swallowed up homes and hotels and brought in crocodiles and hippos that have turned up on people’s doorsteps and in classrooms.
“It was not like this in the past,” Keben said. “People would move when the water moves, but it would go back soon enough.”
Keben had never imagined leaving.
Then the lake took away almost everything.
___
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is part of an ongoing series exploring the lives of people around the world who have been forced to move because of rising seas, drought, searing temperatures and other things caused or exacerbated by climate change.
___
In her last moments in Kampi ya Samaki, Keben was washing off garden dirt in Lake Baringo’s refreshing waters. It had been a day of working her maize fields with her husband. Evening was falling. Her mind was on getting back to the house to make dinner.
Then something moved.
“No sooner had I bent down to wash my right leg, than I saw a crocodile pop up from the waters,” she said. “I screamed so loudly but unfortunately, I fell into the lake.”
The crocodile dragged her into deeper water as she tried to fight it off. Her husband ran from the fields toward her screams. But she was struggling to stay above the surface.
She managed to reach her hand above the water and wiggle her fingers, hoping her husband, now at the shore, would see them.
Laban Keben saw, jumped in and grabbed her but the ferocious animal held on. Laban tried again. And again. After his third attempt, his wife and the mother of their children lost consciousness, he said.
“I saw her dying, leaving me behind,” he said.
He thought of their daughter, barely six months old, and their two other children.
Not knowing what else to do, he started screaming for help. Another man ran over with a machete and struck at the crocodile, Laban said, and suddenly, it swam away, leaving Winnie’s limp body behind.
_____
Her leg was nothing but bones with hanging flesh, said Laban, who along with local residents carried Winnie past flooded roads to the nearest paved one where vehicles could get her to medical care. But at the hospital in the next town, doctors said they were not equipped to treat such a severe injury.
Two hospitals later, she feared she would not survive.
“I told my husband to pick up my children and to take them to my mum, as I knew I was not going to make it,” she said.
Doctors ended up amputating the leg to save her life. Her mom stayed by her bedside until she was discharged from the hospital.
The family was forced to sell their chickens, and goats to cover her medical costs.
But while she was healing, an incessant rain continued to fall. The lake took still more from the Kebens. It flooded their home and farmland.
_____
They left their community, the final loss.
A resident from another village, Meisori, learned of their ordeal and offered to take them in, a gesture of kindness for which she is grateful.
But leaving Kampi ya Samaki, where her husband and children were born, still hurts.
“I loved my place very much, as I could do farming with my husband and raise money for food and school fees,” Winnie said.
With only one leg, Winnie said she no longer can farm. Her husband earns a meager living digging pit latrines and working at area farms to support their growing family. She gave birth to her sixth child last month.
“Now we are land beggars,” she said.
_____
Baringo is one of ten lakes in Kenya’s Rift Valley that have been expanding over the past decade. The entire Eastern African rift system, which stretches south to Mozambique, and the Western Rift – all the way to Uganda – are also affected. The rainfed waters have submerged villages and islands and brought the fierce Nile crocodiles face-to-face with residents.
The rising lake waters have displaced more than 75,000 households, according to a 2021 report on the expanding lakes by Kenya’s Ministry of the Environment and Forestry and the United Nations Development Program.
Flooding around Lake Baringo has been among the most severe, according to the report, with more than 3,000 households destroyed.
Lake Baringo remains an important source of freshwater for villagers, livestock, fisheries, and wildlife. But scientists fear it could someday merge with a large salt lake not far away, the also-expanding Lake Bogoria, contaminating the freshwater.
Keben remembers when the shoreline was a short walk from their home and the hippos and crocodiles stayed deep inside the lake.
“They never attacked people or animals,” Keben said. “Today they attack everything.”
Keben, 28, is still haunted by her attack a decade ago. She has not returned to her family’s village — even for a brief visit — and with good reason. The risks of such attacks have only increased: Since she left, more crocodiles and hippos have turned up in Kampi ya Samaki.
It’s not rare now to see village children scarred by sharp teeth marks.
Others, like Keben, have lost limbs, and an unknown number have died.
A 10-year-old boy was recently dragged off by a hippo and has not been found.
Keben said she doesn’t plan to ever return to Kampi ya Samaki. Though she longs for the community.
“That is the place I called home,” she said, her voice still filled with pain.
___
Watson reported from San Diego.
___
Associated Press climate and environmental coverage receives support from several private foundations. See more about AP’s climate initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content. | 2022-09-08T22:00:49+00:00 | wnct.com | https://www.wnct.com/news/international/ap-climate-migration-kenyan-woman-loses-nearly-all-to-lake/ |
Father dies in assault over middle school fight, family says
BROOKLYN PARK, Md. (WBAL) - A Maryland father was beaten to death outside his home while protecting his children from a fight that started at his son’s middle school, his family says.
Christopher Wright, 43, was killed when a fight that started at Brooklyn Park Middle School was brought to his doorstep, according to his fiancée, Tracy Karopchinsky. She says her 14-year-old son got into a fight with another teenager at school Friday afternoon.
Later that day, she says three teenagers and two adults showed up at her house looking to fight her son. She says Wright went outside and told the group that the 14-year-old would not be coming out to fight.
“Then, they said that if he’s not going to fight, then you’re going to fight us,” Karopchinsky said.
Wright was badly beaten by the group, his fiancée says. He was taken to a trauma center, where he was pronounced dead Saturday from a traumatic brain injury.
“Just looking at the damage that was done to him, that wasn’t just punching that did that... I mean, the damage was done before the ambulance ever took him away. He had had a seizure. It was done. There was nothing that the hospital could do,” Karopchinsky said.
The incident was caught on the victim and a neighbor’s security cameras.
“My dad and I tried to go on to the camera to look, and the first video that comes up is my 12-year-old son screaming, ‘Daddy, Daddy, Daddy’ and running out of the house to go into the street and help his dad. I couldn’t watch anymore after that. I just couldn’t,” Karopchinksy said.
School officials confirmed the fight between the teens and say they worked to address the issue. Now, they’re working with police on the investigation.
Police say charges could be filed against the individuals involved.
“Anybody who assisted or abetted or was an accomplice of the main suspect or the primary suspect in this incident would be culpable,” said Marc Limansky, spokesman for Anne Arundel County Police.
Karopchinsky is now warning parents that violence among teens has gone too far and that parents need to step up.
“They didn’t just ruin our lives. Their lives are gonna be changed forever. Their parents’ lives are gonna be changed forever, and nobody thinks about that just from a fight. It’s everywhere, and somewhere, we as parents, are failing these children... It’s not the school’s responsibility. It’s our responsibility,” she said.
She adds that Wright was a devoted father who loved the stars and gardening. The family is planning to hold a candlelight vigil in his memory.
Police are asking anyone with information on the case to contact them.
Copyright 2023 WBAL via CNN Newsource. All rights reserved. | 2023-05-23T08:38:54+00:00 | live5news.com | https://www.live5news.com/2023/05/23/father-dies-assault-over-middle-school-fight-family-says/ |
The search for famed U.S. ski climber Hilaree Nelson is underway a day after she fell near the peak of Mount Manaslu in Nepal.
Nelson and her partner Jim Morrison were taking part in a ski expedition managed by Shangri-La Nepal Treks, who told the Associated Press that the duo was skiing down the summit when she fell off the mountain.
Eyewitnesses told The Himalayan Times that Nelson reportedly fell about 82 feet into a crevice.
Rescue efforts for the 49-year-old were called off Monday due to bad weather. Still, on Tuesday, a helicopter was able to hover over the mountain to search for the famed climber, the Associated Press reported.
Also on Monday, the news outlet reported an avalanche near the lower elevation of the world’s eighth-highest mountain swept away several climbers, who have all been accounted for.
The news outlet reported that those who were injured were flown to Kathmandu and treated in hospitals.
A Nepali guide was killed in the avalanche, the Associated Press reported.
Hundreds of climbers are in Nepal to participate in the autumn climbing season. | 2022-09-27T19:09:07+00:00 | abc15.com | https://www.abc15.com/news/national/search-for-famed-us-ski-climber-underway-after-she-fell-from-nepal-mountain |
Biscuits and Blue Wahoos suspended
Montgomery and Pensacola tied 2-2 in top of the 6th inning
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (WSFA) - The Biscuits (11-8) and the Blue Wahoos (9-10) were suspended due to rain on Saturday night at Riverwalk Stadium. The game will resume on Sunday at 1:30 PM CT with both teams tied at two moving into the sixth. The nine-inning game scheduled for 3:33 PM CT will follow in what will be the series finale.
Montgomery started the game with Jacob Lopez (0-0) on the mound for the third time this season, with M.D. Johnson (0-1) making his fourth start of the year for Pensacola. The first inning contained little action, although Greg Jones did advance to third base following a walk to start the bottom-frame. Johnson was able to prevent the runner from scoring, as Logan Driscoll struck out on three pitches to end the inning.
The Blue Wahoos opened the second inning with a pair of singles from Victor Mesa Jr. and Jose Devers before Cody Morissette brought in Mesa Jr. on a fielder’s choice. J.D. Orr recorded an RBI-single to give Pensacola a 2-0 lead, but things took a turn at the end of the top-frame due to heavy rain forcing the game into a delay.
Following a 31-minute delay, Alex Ovalles moved into scoring position for the Biscuits, launching a triple to the center field wall. In the next at-bat Evan Edwards singled to first baseman Joe Rizzo, bringing in Ovalles to end a 22-inning scoreless streak. The next two batters flied out, but Montgomery was able to cut the lead in half, trailing 2-1 moving into the third inning.
The game shifted into a pitching battle for the next two innings, with Lopez striking out three and Johnson striking out five over that span. The first hit since the second inning came on a single from Orr in the fifth, but the Blue Wahoos could not capitalize, leaving the score at 2-1. Diego Infante doubled to the left field wall to start the bottom of the inning for the Biscuits, and Alika Williams recorded an RBI-double in the next at bat to tie the game.
Weather conditions continued to be a problem, and after the fifth inning ended, players were told to leave the field as the game entered its second and final delay of the evening.
The final game of the series will include a Dog Giveaway presented by Montgomery Area Humane Society & Bark in the Park on Sunday, April 30.
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Copyright 2023 WSFA. All rights reserved. | 2023-04-30T18:03:12+00:00 | wsfa.com | https://www.wsfa.com/2023/04/30/biscuits-blue-wahoos-suspended/ |
FIRST ALERT: Portion of Wando Landing St. closed as crews respond to fire
Published: Jul. 5, 2023 at 4:01 PM EDT|Updated: 23 minutes ago
DANIEL ISLAND, S.C. (WCSC) - The Charleston Fire Department is responding to a structure fire on Daniel Island Wednesday afternoon.
Law enforcement has closed Wando Landing Street between Daniel Island Drive and Pierce Street.
According to the Charleston Police Department, crews are responding to a residential structure fire on Wando Landing Street near Augustus Street.
Officials say the lone occupant was able to get out of the home safely.
The Mount Pleasant Fire Department is assisting with the call.
This is a developing story.
Copyright 2023 WCSC. All rights reserved. | 2023-07-05T20:30:11+00:00 | live5news.com | https://www.live5news.com/2023/07/05/first-alert-portion-wando-landing-st-closed-crews-respond-fire/ |
Panhandle native and Girl Scout alumni serving as director for Camp Kiwanis this summer
AMARILLO, Texas (KFDA) - The new camp director is hopeful to teach young girls communication and leadership skills through various activities this summer.
“I have been doing it for over seven years as a volunteer, I’ve been privileged to be the aquatics supervisor for the last two years here at Camp Kiwanis. I am super excited to be the camp director this year,” said Amanda Larson, camp director for Camp Kiwanis.
This year, Camp Kiwanis is offering three weeks of day camp starting in June. Registration is open for girls in kindergarten through 12th grade.
“We’ve been recovering from COVID-19 and so we’re trying to figure out this new norm. With day camp, this is going to be a really good step for them to start getting used to camp,” said Larson.
Camp dates are:
- June 12 to June 16
- June 19 to June 23
- June 26 to June 30
Camp Kiwanis is also looking for summer volunteers. Available jobs include: aquatics director, archery instructor, ropes course supervisor, and horse wranglers.
To register or volunteer, click here.
Copyright 2023 KFDA. All rights reserved. | 2023-04-06T23:13:07+00:00 | newschannel10.com | https://www.newschannel10.com/2023/04/06/panhandle-native-girl-scout-alumni-serving-director-camp-kiwanis-this-summer/ |
ROCHESTER, N.Y., Feb. 9, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Hyzon Motors Inc. (the "Company") (NASDAQ: HYZN), a global supplier of zero-emission fuel cell electric heavy-duty vehicles, today announced that on February 3, 2023, the Company received a Staff Determination (the "Staff Determination") from the Listing Qualifications Staff (the "Staff") of The Nasdaq Stock Market LLC ("Nasdaq") notifying the Company that, unless the Company requests an appeal, trading of the Company's Class A common stock and warrants will be suspended from The Nasdaq Capital Market at the opening of business on February 14, 2023, and a Form 25-NSE will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC"), which will remove the Company's securities from listing and registration on Nasdaq.
The Staff Determination will not immediately result in the suspension of trading or delisting of the Company's securities, and the Nasdaq Listing Rules provide a procedure for the Company to appeal the Staff Determination and seek a stay pending the appeal.
By February 10, 2023, the Company plans to appeal the Staff Determination and request a hearing before the Nasdaq Hearings Panel (the "Hearings Panel"). Under Nasdaq Listing Rules, a request for a hearing regarding a delinquent filing automatically stays the delisting process of the Company's securities for a period of 15 days from the date of the request. However, the Company intends to request a stay of the suspension of its securities pending the hearing which, according to the Staff Determination, is typically scheduled to occur approximately 30-45 days after the date of the hearing request.
The Staff Determination was issued because, on January 30, 2023, the Company informed Nasdaq that it will not file its Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q for the periods ended June 30, 2022 and September 30, 2022 (the "Quarterly Reports"), on or before February 13, 2023 (the "Extended Date").
Although the Company is working diligently to file the Quarterly Reports as soon as practicable, there can be no assurance that such reports will be filed before any hearing before the Hearings Panel, or that the Hearings Panel will grant the Company's request for a stay pending the hearing. If the Company's appeal to the Hearings Panel is denied, the Company's securities will be subject to delisting on The Nasdaq Capital Market.
Audit Committee Determination - Form 10-Q For the Quarter Ended September 30, 2021
On February 6, 2023, the Audit Committee of the Board of Directors (the "Board") of the Company, based on the recommendation of management, determined that the Company's previously issued financial statements included in the Company's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2021 (including the consolidated balance sheet of Hyzon Motors Inc. and subsidiaries as of September 30, 2021, and the related consolidated statements of operations and comprehensive income (loss), consolidated statement of changes in stockholders' equity, and consolidated statement of cash flows for the three and nine months ended September 30, 2021) (the "Non-Reliance Period") should no longer be relied upon. The Audit Committee's determination stems from the Company's Board-appointed committee of independent board members (the "Special Committee") formed to investigate, with the assistance of independent outside counsel and other advisors, issues regarding revenue recognition timing and internal controls and procedures that were brought to the attention of the Board by Company management as previously reported on its Current Report on Form 8-K with the SEC on August 4, 2022 pertaining to the Company's previously issued financial statements included in the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2021. The Audit Committee concluded that the Company's previously issued financial statements included in the Company's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2021 should no longer be relied upon primarily because of issues regarding the recognition of revenue relating to its European joint venture operations for the quarter ended September 30, 2021.
The Company intends to restate and reissue the consolidated financial statements relating to the Non-Reliance Period as soon as practicable. Based on the facts and circumstances known to date, the Company currently anticipates that the primary impact of the restatement will be to eliminate substantially all of the revenue, inventory, and contract liabilities and to reduce cost of revenue associated with customer sales contracts assumed from Holthausen Clean Technology B.V. that were recorded as of and for the quarter ended September 30, 2021.
As previously reported on its Current Report on Form 8-K with the SEC on August 18, 2022, management previously reported a material weakness in the Company's internal control over financial reporting in its previously issued financial statements filed on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2021, and on Form 10-Q for the three-month period ended March 31, 2022. The existing material weakness related to the identification of limited resources and business processes necessary to ensure the appropriate segregation of duties and effective review procedures with respect to the processing and recording of financial transactions, as well as an appropriate level of control oversight over the financial statement reporting process. Management is assessing the effect of the control deficiencies associated with the matters underlying the revenue recognition issues and planned restatements and anticipates identifying and reporting one or more material weaknesses as the restatements are finalized.
Board of Directors Committee Appointments
On February 6, 2022, the Board appointed Dennis Edwards who currently serves as a member of the Board, to serve on the Company's Audit Committee. The Board has affirmatively determined that Mr. Edwards meets the definition of "independent director" for purposes of serving on an audit committee. The Board also determined that Elaine Wong, who currently serves on the Audit Committee, qualifies as an "audit committee financial expert."
The Company's management and the Audit Committee have discussed the matters disclosed in this press release with KPMG LLP, the Company's independent registered public accounting firm.
About Hyzon Motors
Hyzon is a global leader in fuel cell electric mobility, with US operations in the Rochester, Chicago and Detroit areas, and international operations in the Netherlands, China, Australia, and Germany. Hyzon is an energy transition accelerator and technology innovator, providing end-to-end solutions in the transport sector with a focus on commercial vehicles and hydrogen supply infrastructure. Utilizing its proven and proprietary hydrogen fuel cell technology, Hyzon aims to supply zero-emission heavy duty trucks and buses to customers in North America, Europe and around the world to mitigate emissions from diesel transportation, which is one of the single largest sources of carbon emissions globally. The Company is contributing to the escalating adoption of fuel cell electric vehicles through its demonstrated technology advantage, leading fuel cell performance and history of rapid innovation. Visit www.hyzonmotors.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release includes "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. All statements, other than statements of present or historical fact included in this press release, are forward-looking statements. When used in this press release, the words "aim," "could," "should," "will," "may," "believe," "anticipate," "intend," "estimate," "expect," "project," the negative of such terms and other similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements, although not all forward-looking statements contain such identifying words. These forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations and assumptions about future events and are based on currently available information as to the outcome and timing of future events. Except as otherwise required by applicable law, Hyzon disclaims any duty to update any forward -looking statements, all of which are expressly qualified by the statements in this section, to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this press release. Hyzon cautions you that these forward-looking statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, most of which are difficult to predict and many of which are beyond the control of Hyzon, including risks and uncertainties described in the "Risk Factors" section of Hyzon's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2021 filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC") on March 30, 2022, our Amended Registration Statement on Form S-1 filed with the SEC on April 6, 2021, and other documents filed by Hyzon from time to time with the SEC. These filings identify and address other important risks and uncertainties that could cause actual events and results to differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements. Hyzon gives no assurances that Hyzon will achieve its expectations.
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SOURCE Hyzon Motors Inc. | 2023-02-10T01:50:24+00:00 | kfyrtv.com | https://www.kfyrtv.com/prnewswire/2023/02/09/hyzon-motors-announces-receipt-nasdaq-listing-determination-company-request-hearing-further-stay/ |
The head of House Democrats has submitted Reps. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) to sit on the powerful Intelligence Committee, setting up a battle with Republican leaders who are vowing to keep them off the panel.
Separately, Democrats this week are also expected to seat Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, according to a source familiar with the Democrats’ plans, which will likely prompt GOP leaders to hold a floor vote to remove her.
In a letter sent Saturday to Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said Schiff, the top Democrat on the Intelligence panel, and Swalwell are both “eminently qualified” to continue their service on the committee. Jeffries requested that McCarthy seat them there.
“Together, these Members have over two decades of distinguished leadership providing oversight of our nation’s Intelligence Community, in addition to their prosecutorial work in law enforcement prior to serving in Congress,” Jeffries wrote.
The developments were first reported Monday by Punchbowl News.
Unlike most committees, however, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence has special rules empowering the Speaker to assign the panel’s members, in consultation with the minority leader. That means McCarthy can also decline to seat members without relying on a full House vote.
Historically, that process has proceeded without controversy and the minority party’s recommendations have been seated. But Republicans have been up in arms since 2021, when Democrats staged successful votes to remove two Republicans — Reps. Marjorie Taylor Green (Ga.) and Paul Gosar (Ariz.) — from their committee assignments. And McCarthy has vowed since then to keep Schiff and Swalwell from returning to the Intelligence panel — a pledge he amplified on Capitol Hill last week.
“What I am doing with the Intel Committee [is] bringing it back to the jurisdiction it’s supposed to do. Forward-looking to keep this country safe, keep the politics out of it,” McCarthy told reporters in the Capitol.
“So yes, I’m doing exactly what we’re supposed to do,” he added.
Schiff, as former chairman of the Intelligence Committee, had led the investigations into former President Trump’s ties to Russia, and Republicans have accused him of lying to the public during the course of those probes.
In Swalwell’s case, Republicans have highlighted his ties to a suspected Chinese spy who had helped fundraise for Swalwell’s 2014 reelection campaign, which were first revealed in 2020. After the FBI informed Swalwell of their concern, he cut ties with the Chinese national and has said McCarthy’s decision to remove him from the Intelligence Committee is “purely vengeance.”
Schiff also served as a lead House manager for Trump’s first impeachment trial, while Swalwell served as a manager for the second.
Fact-checkers have repeatedly found the GOP accusations to be false. And Democrats maintain that McCarthy’s threats are merely another promise to the conservative detractors who fought to deny him the Speaker’s gavel earlier in the month.
Jeffries, in his letter, sought to carve out a distinction between the scenarios, noting that both Greene and Gosar were removed after revelations that they had promoted violent actions against Democrats, and both votes received some Republican support.
“This action was taken by both Democrats and Republicans given the seriousness of the conduct involved, particularly in the aftermath of a violent insurrection and attack on the Capitol,” Jeffries wrote. “It does not serve as precedent or justification for the removal of Representatives Schiff and Swalwell, given that they have never exhibited violent thoughts or behavior.”
He also pointed out that McCarthy and the Republicans recently gave two committee posts to Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.), who is under fire for a series of résumé fabrications and questionable campaign finance activities. Jeffries called him a “serial fraudster.”
“The apparent double standard risks undermining the spirit of bipartisan cooperation that is so desperately needed in Congress,” Jeffries wrote.
Under Intelligence Committee rules, rank-and-file members are limited to four cycles — a cap Swalwell has hit — meaning that Jeffries waived that limit in order to force McCarthy to make good on his promise not to seat him. Schiff, as ranking member, is exempt from the cap.
Separately, the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee is scheduled to meet this week to finalize the party’s committee rosters, including the expected move to put Omar, one of three Muslim lawmakers in Congress, on the Foreign Affairs panel.
The Minnesota Democrat, a Somali refugee, has been highly critical of the Israeli government and its supporters, particularly on issues related to Palestinian rights, leading to charges of antisemitism. In one 2019 episode, Omar was forced to apologize after suggesting wealthy Jews are buying congressional support for Israel.
Unlike the Intelligence panel, McCarthy cannot block members of the Foreign Affairs Committee unilaterally. GOP leaders are expected to stage a vote to remove her from the panel, as was the case for Greene and Gosar. | 2023-01-23T16:31:14+00:00 | valleycentral.com | https://www.valleycentral.com/hill-politics/jeffries-submits-schiff-swalwell-for-intel-panel-forcing-fight-with-mccarthy/ |
Nevada expert says more are using 988 suicide prevention lifeline than originally anticipated, defends against critics
LAS VEGAS, Nev. (FOX5) - It has now been six weeks since the new number for the suicide prevention lifeline 988 was rolled out. In its first week alone, the volume of people reaching out was up by about 45 percent from the week before the transition.
But mental health experts are now defending the lifeline against critics and setting the record straight.
“It’s been kind of surprising with more people using the number than what they initially thought, especially with the number being so new. So that’s been great to hear,” said Dr. Sheldon A. Jacobs, licensed marriage and family therapist and board member on the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).
Broadening access was always the goal with shortening the phone number to just three simple digits.
“It’s easy to remember! 911, 988, it’s easy to remember. There’s also a text option too,” he said.
Ideally 988 will help mental health professionals get a handle on the issue of suicide in the U.S., according to Southern Nevada’s own Dr. Jacobs.
“It’s also a screening, ya know, it’s a screening mechanism,” said Dr. Jacobs. “You know somebody might be calling the number 988 just because they want to talk to somebody, and from that conversation, from that discussion, ya know that person shares that, ’I want to hurt myself or I want to hurt somebody else.’ And in those situations the right support, the right level of treatment and care need to occur.”
If it is also determined that a person has lethal or imminent means to hurt themselves or others, 988 call center workers may call police, and the caller could be taken to a hospital involuntarily.
It’s an aspect of the hotline facing some criticim. Some are arguing it could cause further traumatization, Dr. Jacobs said.
“It’s a controversial issue... because being in the hospital sometimes can be traumatic for some folks.”
But Dr. Jacobs said it is a legal requirement for them to report it, because it is designed to keep people at imminent risk-- safe. He said that should not discourage people in crisis from using the hotline.
“I’m here to tell everyone that 988 is meant to save lives,” said Dr. Jacobs.
Separately, Dr. Jacobs recently made history when he became the first Nevadan to be elected to the national board of NAMI. He said it is allowing him to advocate for a stronger national focus on the mental health needs of Nevadans.
Copyright 2022 KVVU. All rights reserved. | 2022-09-13T02:54:15+00:00 | fox5vegas.com | https://www.fox5vegas.com/2022/09/13/nevada-expert-says-more-are-using-988-suicide-prevention-lifeline-than-originally-anticipated-defends-against-critics/ |
Complaint Asserts Central Bank of Curacao and Sint Maarten Unlawfully Retained Control of Private Assets and Orchestrated the Sale to Notorious Money-Launderer Tied to Central Bank Official
LOS ANGELES, Jan. 17, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Dr. Nina Ansary, an internationally recognized women's rights advocate and award-winning Iranian American author and historian today filed a complaint against the Central Bank of Curacao and Sint Maarten for its illegal expropriation of her equity stake in Parman International B.V. (PIBV) — a Curacao company owned by U.S. investors.
According to the complaint, since seizing control of PIBV's insurance subsidiaries and related businesses in 2018 under the guise of an "emergency restructuring" allegedly necessary to bring the insurance subsidiaries into regulatory compliance, the Central Bank has been engaged in a scheme to systematically loot the assets of the enterprise for the economic and political benefit of its officials, including orchestrating the unnecessary sale at a steep discount of Banco di Caribe to an internationally known money-launderer and crony of the former head of the Central Bank. Now, buoyed by its success, the Central Bank has put plans in place to seize 160 acres of prime real estate in Sint Maarten held by PIBV, even after numerous public attestations by Central Bank officials to the restored fiscal health of the enterprise.
"Long after determining that there is no longer any fiscal 'emergency' or danger of insolvency, the Central Bank of Curacao continues to loot the assets of American investors. It's abundantly clear that this ongoing seizure is not about the health of the enterprise or accountability to policyholders, but only about greed and opportunism by officials at the Central Bank," said Dennis Hranitzky of Quinn Emanuel, Urquhart and Sullivan, an attorney for Dr. Ansary.
Mr. Hranitzky continued, "The thuggish behavior by officials of the Central Bank of Curacao and Sint Maarten toward Dr. Ansary, an internationally known author and women's rights activist, goes far beyond the theft of her personal investments and includes an audacious campaign of legal and personal intimidation that extends to targeting even her primary residence for seizure. While such behavior is unsurprising given Curacao's reputation as an infamous haven for money-laundering and criminal activity, it is in clear violation of existing treaties between the United States and the Netherlands as well as Dr. Ansary's human rights."
The U.S. State Department categorizes Curacao as a country/jurisdiction of Primary Concern with respect to money-laundering and financial crimes.
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SOURCE Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, LLP | 2023-01-17T23:39:32+00:00 | uppermichiganssource.com | https://www.uppermichiganssource.com/prnewswire/2023/01/17/internationally-renowned-womens-rights-advocate-files-suit-against-central-bank-curacao-sint-maarten-theft-property/ |
Stars can be glimpsed in such unexpected places.
Chonkasaurus was at rest on a pile of rotting river pylons and rusty chains along the Chicago River just below Division Street early last weekend when Joey Santore and Al Scorch captured their image on video.
"Look at the size of that effing thing," Joey Santore announced, and he didn't say effing.
"Oh my God, it's a massive turtle. Is that a snapper? He's a snapper, " Al Scorch added, civic pride suffusing his voice. "It's a Chicago River snapper!"
The video they posted on YouTube, in which they dub the snapper Chonkosaurus, has reached hundreds of thousands of viewers, including me, who have shortened the turtle's name to Chonk. There's even merch — T-shirts and sweatshirts — emblazoned with Chonk's sturdy frame.
The turtle looks broad and strong, as if embodying the spirit of the concrete city that booms above their river perch. Snapping turtles can weigh up to 75 pounds, and Chonk's steady girth seems to be part of what has endeared them to so many.
Think of Chonk as being in rhyme with Carl Sandburg's poem, "Chicago":
"Stormy, husky, brawling,
Turtle of the Big Shoulders."
Put a Chicago Bears jersey on Chonk, and they could be a middle linebacker.
In times beset with much dispiriting news, there's something encouraging in Chonk's robust appearance on a bed of rusted chains. The Chicago River was an industrial dumping ground for decades; it caught on fire several times. Fires, you may recall, have an especially harrowing history in Chicago.
But 70% of the water in the river now comes directly from wastewater treatment plants. Officials still don't recommend you take a river swim. But Margaret Frisbie of Friends of the Chicago River, who organize groups to pick up litter and help look after wildlife, says the river is the cleanest today that it's been in 150 years.
Joey Santore tweeted when he posted his video of Chonk, "Great to see this beast thriving here on what was once such a toxic river, but is slowly getting cleaned up and restored."
If you ever despair about the possibility of progress, you might want to think of Chonk the Snapper, flopped out and sunning on a berth of greenish, old pylons as boats pull past, and the city rises around them. A river, once described as "a wave of poo," is now healthy enough to be a home.
Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org. | 2023-05-20T14:38:40+00:00 | kunm.org | https://www.kunm.org/npr-news/npr-news/2023-05-20/opinion-progress-can-be-a-turtle |
What they're saying in Russia about Ukraine's advances By Charles Maynes Published September 11, 2022 02:22 PM Facebook Twitter Listen • 3:39 Amid a Ukrainian counteroffensive, Russian forces withdrew from several key cities in the northeast. But things are being framed differently in Moscow. Copyright 2022 NPR | 2022-09-11T22:30:19+00:00 | kpcc.org | https://www.kpcc.org/2022-09-11/what-theyre-saying-in-russia-about-ukraines-advances |
With severe weather season comes the threat of scams
FCC: No fee required to apply for or get disaster assistance
InvestigateTV - As the spring storm season begins, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) warned of scams in the aftermath of severe weather.
Better Business Bureau Vice President of Communications Josh Planos said as you plan for possible severe weather, you should also prepare for fraudsters who may show up during the aftermath looking to steal your money or information.
“Unfortunately, we see folks who are really looking to weaponize everything from lumber to new identification cards and kind of everything in between,” Planos said.
The FCC issued guidelines on staying safe from bad actors posing as legit contractors. The agency’s biggest piece of advice was to never give out personal information or agree to payment until you can independently verify the call is legitimate.
The FCC also warned contractors may claim to be a partner with your insurance company. In the release it cautioned people to never give policy numbers, coverage details, or other personal information out to companies with whom you have not entered into a contract.
Planos explained that a lot of municipalities require solicitation permits. He shared several tips to help avoid cons:
- Ask any door-to-door salesperson for identification
- Check their vehicles for a business name, phone number, and license for your state or province
- Be wary of out of state vehicles
Lastly, government disaster assistance agencies do not call or text asking for financial account information and there is no fee required to apply for or get disaster assistance from FEMA or the Small Business Administration (SBA).
You can review full fraud warnings from FEMA, FCC, and FTC for more information.
Copyright 2023 Gray Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved. | 2023-03-01T22:09:03+00:00 | fox5vegas.com | https://www.fox5vegas.com/2023/03/01/severe-weather-brings-out-scammers/ |
Knight, Clooney, Grant feted at Kennedy Center Honors
WASHINGTON (AP) — A heartfelt Patti LaBelle praised her lifelong friend Gladys Knight. Matt Damon playfully teased George Clooney and Sheryl Crow performed a heartfelt rendition of “Baby Baby” for Amy Grant. Sean Penn called U2 “four scrappy Dublin punks,” and ballet dancers performed for conductor and composer Tania León. Knight, Clooney, Grant, León and U2 were feted during Sunday’s Kennedy Center Honors. Every year the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts honors a select group of people for their artistic contributions to American culture. The show will be broadcast on Dec. 28 on CBS. President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and their respective spouses were in attendance.
Oxford Dictionaries names 'goblin mode' its word of the year
LONDON (AP) — Oxford Dictionaries has announced its 2022 word of the year: “goblin mode.” It defines the term as “a type of behavior which is unapologetically self-indulgent, lazy, slovenly, or greedy, typically in a way that rejects social norms or expectations.” First seen on Twitter in 2009, “goblin mode” gained popularity in 2022 as people around the world emerged uncertainly from pandemic lockdowns. The word of the year is intended to reflect “the ethos, mood, or preoccupations of the past twelve months." For the first time, this year’s winning phrase was chosen by public vote, from among three finalists selected by Oxford Languages lexicographers: goblin mode, metaverse and the hashtag IStandWith.
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Cowboys score 33 points in 4th quarter, rout Colts 54-19
ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Malik Hooker returned a fumble 38 yards for a touchdown against his former team in a 33-point fourth quarter for Dallas, propelling the Cowboys to a 54-19 rout of the Indianapolis Colts. Dallas led 21-19 entering the fourth when Dak Prescott threw the last of his three touchdown passes. Hooker’s scoop-and-score was the first of four fourth-quarter takeaways by Dallas, all of which led to touchdowns. The Cowboys had their highest-scoring quarter since at least 1991. It was just the third time in NFL history a team scored as many as 33 points in the fourth. Matt Ryan threw three interceptions and lost a fumble for the Colts.
Bob McGrath, 'Sesame Street' legend, dies at 90
Actor, musician and children’s author widely known for his portrayal of one of the first regular characters on the children’s show “Sesame Street,” Bob McGrath, has died at the age of 90. McGrath’s passing was confirmed by his family who posted on his Facebook page on Sunday. Sesame Workshop tweeted Sunday evening that it “mourns the passing of Bob McGrath, a beloved member of the Sesame Street family for over 50 years.” McGrath was a founding cast member of “Sesame Street” when the show premiered in 1969. He is survived by his wife, Ann Logan Sperry, and their five children.
Power outages could last days after shootings at substations
Two power substations in a North Carolina county were damaged by gunfire in what is being investigated as a criminal act. A spokesman for Duke Energy said at a news conference with local officials Sunday that the damage caused the night before could take days to repair. Power was out for roughly 35,400 customers Monday morning, down by several thousand from the peak of the outages. In response, officials had announced a state of emergency that included a curfew from 9 p.m. Sunday to 5 a.m. Monday. County schools are closed Monday. Moore County Sheriff Ronnie Fields says authorities have not determined a motivation.
Airplane crash in Gulf of Mexico leaves 2 dead, 1 missing
VENICE, Fla. (AP) — Police say a private airplane crashed into the Gulf of Mexico off the Florida coast Saturday night, with two people confirmed dead as authorities searched for a third person. Authorities in Venice, Florida, initiated a search Sunday after 10 a.m. following an inquiry to the Venice Municipal Airport about an overdue Piper Cherokee aircraft. A Venice spokesperson says that around the same time, recreational boaters found the body of a woman floating about 2.5 miles west of Venice. Divers located the wreckage of the rented airplane around 2 p.m. about a third of a mile offshore. Rescuers found a deceased girl in the plane’s passenger area. A third person, believed to be a male who was the pilot or a passenger, remained missing Sunday.
Tampa police chief on leave after golf cart traffic stop
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — The police chief of Tampa has been placed on leave after a video emerged of her flashing her badge from the passenger seat of a golf cart to get out of a traffic ticket. Tampa Mayor Jane Castor placed Chief Mary O’Connor on administrative leave Friday pending an investigation of the Nov. 12 traffic stop. The body camera video shows O’Connor identifying herself as the Tampa police chief and asking the Pinellas County sheriff’s deputy not to ticket her and her husband, who she says was driving the golf cart without a tag. O'Connor later released a statement saying the incident reflected “poor judgement."
SEC halftime contest booed, both students awarded $100,000
ATLANTA (AP) — Two college students have won $100,000 in tuition after a confusing finish in the SEC championship game’s halftime competition. Boos rained down from the fans in attendance for the game between No. 1 Georgia and No. 11 LSU when one of the two students appeared to win the Dr Pepper ball toss competition in overtime on a technicality. The winner was due to get $100,000 and the runner-up $20,000. Baylor student Reagan Whitaker and St. Augustine student Kayla Gibson exchanged leads multiple times in regulation. In overtime, they tied again, but Whitaker was declared the winner. It was announced on the broadcast in the fourth quarter of the game that Dr Pepper would gift both Whitaker and Gibson with $100,000 in tuition.
Ohio school cancels drag story time, citing security dispute
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — An Ohio school says an internal dispute over security prompted a last-minute cancellation of a weekend children’s storytelling event featuring performers in drag amid a planned protest by a far-right group. The Red Oak Community School’s “Holi-Drag Storytime” event was slated Saturday morning at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Columbus. The Ohio Chapter of the Proud Boys said last month it would protest the event. School director Cheryl Ryan said the cancellation stemmed from an internal disagreement “about how this community could be best protected.” About 50 to 70 members of the Proud Boys and other groups came to protest on roads leading to the church.
2.500 dead seals found on Russia's Caspian coast
MOSCOW (AP) — Officials say about 2,500 seals have been found dead on the Caspian Sea coast in southern Russia. Environment ministry authorities in Russia's Dagestan province said Sunday it was unclear why the mass die-off happened but that it was likely due to natural causes. The head of the Caspian Environmental Protection Center says the seals likely died a couple of weeks ago. He added that there was no sign that they were killed or caught in fishing nets. Experts of the Federal Fisheries Agency and prosecutors inspected the coastline and collected data for laboratory research, which didn’t immediately spot any pollutants. | 2022-12-05T13:13:53+00:00 | wcfcourier.com | https://wcfcourier.com/news/national/ap-trending-summarybrief-at-7-18-a-m-est/article_c3530f03-11da-5272-84a5-0cdb58b2c670.html |
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