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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/03/31/business/roxbury-chance-build-massports-model-inclusive-development/
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In the push to spread the wealth of Boston’s booming development industry far wider into disadvantaged communities, this could be a game changer.
All eyes should be on a city-owned 7.7-acre parcel in Roxbury known as P3. If fully developed, it has the potential to dwarf the benefits from the diversity effort at the new Omni hotel in the Seaport District. The massive hotel was built on land owned by the Massachusetts Port Authority, which used a novel approach to make sure work was awarded to a more diverse group of builders and subcontractors than has been the norm in Boston.
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On the Roxbury site, two teams — HYM Investment Group/My City at Peace, and Tishman Speyer/Ruggles Progressive Partners — recently submitted bids to develop the long-dormant site along Tremont Street. Each proposes to spend more than $1 billion to build a mix of labs, housing, and civic space. That’s more than twice the cost of the Omni hotel.
The so-called Massport model ― which makes diversity a major factor in determining development rights on the agency’s property holdings ― has created wealth and opportunities for people of color, many of whom have used the experience to win other contracts. Since 2018, the Boston Planning & Development Agency has followed Massport’s cue for projects on 16 city-owned parcels. But with P3, Boston has a chance to take the model a big step further and show that such inclusivity on building projects can help to transform lower-income neighborhoods by creating wealth and opportunities for residents, not just the executives of a few companies.
What both P3 teams are pitching is extraordinary. Beyond bringing lab space to Roxbury, they envision forming partnerships with nearby Roxbury Community College, Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology, and Madison Park High School to train students for life science jobs. Both teams also plan a significant amount of affordable homes that can be purchased, as well as rental housing.
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“That is something we have pushed for,” said Norm Stembridge, cochair of the Roxbury Strategic Master Plan Oversight Committee. “People have seen this as an opportunity to move the community forward.”
Like some other large projects in Boston, this one has a public space component. But unlike most, the plans for P3 feel like they have been carefully thought out so they accomplish more than just meeting a requirement. The HYM/My City at Peace team wants to house King Boston, a nonprofit dedicated to honoring the formative time that Dr. Martin Luther King and Coretta Scott King spent in Boston. The “Embrace Center,” as they call it, would feature a museum, function space, and a home for King Boston’s economic justice research and policy work.
Tishman/Ruggles is partnering with the Museum of African American History to create a Roxbury Museum. The team also proposes to set aside space for pop-up businesses, as well as music and play areas for families.
The city has been trying to develop P3 for more than two decades, with plenty of false starts over the years. Everything from a BJ’s Wholesale Club to a soccer stadium for the New England Revolution to a state transportation headquarters has been considered.
At one point, the BPDA awarded the development rights to Feldco Development, but took them away in 2019 after the company struggled to secure financing. Meanwhile, the neighborhood had grown increasingly unhappy with the various proposals that came along over the years. They wanted a project that could produce a virtuous economic circle, one that creates good-paying jobs and careers, and puts people on the path to homeownership and generational wealth.
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The BPDA will hold a series of community meetings in the coming months to review the bids. A decision could come by the fall.
The P3 process has also shone a spotlight on how development in Boston doesn’t have to be so white.
A who’s who of the Black business community have lined up to participate. Some have been working on real estate projects for years (Richard Taylor, Kevin Bynoe, JocCole “JC” Burton, Greg Minott, Herby Duverné, Darryl Settles, Kai Grant), while others are relatively new to the game (the Rev. Jeffrey Brown, Manikka Bowman, Chanda Smart, Ricardo Pierre-Louis, Sheena Collier).
For many, it represents a watershed moment for their business.
Minott, managing principal at Boston architectural firm DREAM Collaborative, said he has worked on plenty of major projects as a subcontractor, but this is the first time his firm will take the lead on designing the master plan.
A member of the HYM/My City At Peace team, Minott said that if awarded the bid, his company would double in size by by adding two dozen jobs. That’s great, but why did it take so long for a firm that has been around for 14 years to be the lead on a massive project?
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“It’s always been a mystery to us,” Minott said. “We have the expertise and talented team. We are just as qualified and in some cases more qualified. Why not? We have not been invited to do it.”
Just as important is making sure that opportunities like these don’t always go to the same people of color. Doing so means the diverse pipeline can grow bigger.
Bowman launched her development firm, HarveyReed, in 2021, but Tishman managing director Jessica Hughes became familiar with Bowman when she was an executive at the Urban Land Institute.
“She knew I was competent and I was able to roll up my sleeves,” said Bowman. “She knew the value of investing in a woman and a Black woman launching a development firm.”
Bowman’s role is to oversee a fund that addresses displacement, which is one of the community’s biggest concerns, as new development usually drives up property values and pushes out longtime residents. Tishman/Ruggles proposes seeding the fund with $250,000 and growing it to $1 million to help low-to-moderate income Roxbury homeowners remain in their homes by offsetting tax increases and paying for maintenance.
For Ricardo Pierre-Louis, P3 represents a chance to realize a dream: owning a parking garage. As a college student, he worked as a valet parking cars on the weekends and then started his own company, Privé Parking. He met HYM managing partner Tom O’Brien a few years ago with the goal of getting into the development business.
The HYM/My City At Peace bid contains two garages with a total of 500 spaces. Privé would manage them and hold an equity stake in both properties.
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“When you own something, now you’re in a different position,” said Pierre-Louis.
For another member of the HYM/My City at Peace team, working on P3 is a kind of homecoming. Smart, chief executive of OnyxGroup Development & Brokerage, spent part of her childhood a couple of blocks from the site. Her great-grandmother lived in Roxse Homes public housing on Tremont Street.
“It’s extremely exciting for us . . . how many people can say I grew up across the street and I have a part in this development?” said Smart.
Her great-grandmother passed away close to three decades ago. But if Smart is part of the winning P3 bid, she knows what she would have said: “I knew you could do it.”
Shirley Leung is a Business columnist. She can be reached at shirley.leung@globe.com.
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/03/31/business/union-trails-amazon-vote-alabama-with-challenges-pending/
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Union supporters are narrowly trailing opponents in a union election at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama, the National Labor Relations Board said Thursday. But the vote was far closer than a vote at the same warehouse last year, when workers voted down the union by a more than 2-1 ratio.
The union had 875 yes votes versus 993 no votes, but the more than 400 challenged ballots are sufficient to potentially affect the outcome of the vote. The challenges will be resolved at a labor board hearing in the coming weeks.
Overall, roughly 2,300 ballots were cast in the election in Bessemer, Ala., out of more than 6,100 eligible employees.
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The labor board mandated the revote, which was conducted by mail from early February to late March, after concluding that Amazon violated the so-called laboratory conditions that are supposed to prevail during a union election.
The labor board is also counting votes in another high-profile election at an Amazon warehouse on Staten Island in New York. At the end of the first day of counting, 57 percent of the ballots supported being represented by Amazon Labor Union, and 43 percent were opposed. The NLRB said the count should be finished Friday.
Workers who supported the union cited frustrations over low pay, inadequate break,s and overly aggressive productivity targets. Amazon has said its pay — just under $16 per hour for full-time, entry-level workers — is competitive for the area. It has also pointed to a benefits package that it says is attractive, including complete health care benefits for full-time employees as soon as they join the company. The company has said its performance targets reflect safety considerations and individual employees’ experience.
Several employees who backed the union said coworkers were generally less afraid to question management or show their union support this year. “People are asking more questions,” Jennifer Bates, an employee who helped lead the organizing effort both last year and this year, said in March. “More employees are standing up and speaking out.”
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The union also cited key differences in its approach to the more recent election. Last year, the union curtailed in-person organizing efforts because of COVID-19 safety concerns, but this time its organizers visited workers at home. Other unions dispatched organizers to Alabama to aid in these efforts.
Workers also appeared to be more active in organizing within the plant. They wore union T-shirts to work twice each week to demonstrate support, and one group delivered a petition to managers with more than 100 signatures complaining of inadequate breaks and break room equipment.
Still, Amazon retained advantages, not least of which was its high rate of employee turnover, which made it difficult for organizers to sustain momentum as disaffected workers simply left their jobs.
The company also appeared to spend generously on its effort to dissuade employees from backing the union, hiring consultants and holding more than 20 anti-union meetings with employees per day before mail ballots went out in early February. Union supporters accused Amazon of excluding them from meetings to mute criticism and pushback, but Amazon denied the accusation.
The result was consistent with a broader trend in rerun elections, more than half of which unions have lost since 2010.
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/03/31/metro/bill-banning-hairstyle-bias-approved-by-massachusetts-senate/
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BOSTON (AP) — A bill aimed at banning discrimination based on natural and protective hairstyles in workplaces, school districts, and school-related organizations was unanimously approved Thursday by the Massachusetts Senate.
The vote comes two weeks after the Massachusetts House approved a similar bill.
Supporters say Black women in particular have faced pressure in school and the workplace to alter their hair to conform to policies biased against natural hairstyles.
The Senate added a provision to the House version of the bill that would include the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association to the list of school entities banned from adopting and implementing restrictions on natural hairstyles.
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Advocates say the change will ensure those participating in sports and extracurricular activities will not be asked to change their natural or protective hairstyles in order to participate.
The bill has its roots in the case of a Massachusetts charter school that came under fire in 2017 for a policy of banning hair braid extensions. After intense criticism, the school abandoned the policy.
The U.S. House also approved a bill earlier this month that would bar discrimination against Black people who wear hairstyles like Afros, cornrows or tightly coiled twists in society, school and the workplace. The federal bill would explicitly say that such discrimination is a violation of federal civil rights law.
President Joe Biden has said he would sign the bill into law. It now heads to the U.S. Senate.
Lawmakers in the Massachusetts House and Senate now have to come up with a single version of the bill before taking a final vote and shipping it to Republican Gov. Charlie Baker for his signature.
If signed into law, Massachusetts would become the fifteenth state to adopt the measure, known as the CROWN Act.
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/03/31/metro/das-favor-new-legislation-address-possible-felony-murder-injustices/
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Several district attorneys said Thursday that a new law would be the best way to address potential injustices in which people who never killed anyone are serving lifetime sentences under “felony murder” rules that have since been abolished.
“A legislative fix is the most appropriate step to addressing the matter of individuals convicted of felony murder,” Suffolk District Attorney Kevin R. Hayden said in response to a Boston Globe Spotlight Team report about the issue. “This would provide a statewide framework to equitably address these cases, where there is currently no legal avenue to provide relief.”
In the meantime, his office’s Integrity Review Bureau “is prepared to review requests from any individual who believes that they received a fundamentally unfair sentence” in Suffolk County, Hayden said in a statement, referring to the panel created in 2019 that investigates past convictions for miscarriages of justice.
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The Spotlight report published Sunday highlighted the stories of people sentenced to life in prison without hope for parole, even though they killed no one. They were convicted under the state common law of the time, which said that if someone died during the commission of certain serious felonies, everyone involved in the underlying crime could be on the hook for first-degree murder — even participants who inflicted no violence on the victim and may have never intended to hurt anyone. The penalty for first-degree murder is automatic life in prison without parole.
The Spotlight analysis identified nearly two dozen people who fell into this category, including Joseph Jabir Pope, 69, who last month argued before the state’s highest court that his felony murder conviction should be overturned and that he deserves a new trial, after serving 37 years in prison.
Reporters also found that, in some cases, the actual killer took a plea bargain and got a lighter sentence than the individual convicted of felony murder and given life without parole.
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In 2017, the Supreme Judicial Court, in the landmark case of Commonwealth vs. Timothy Brown, narrowed the felony murder rule, deciding that from that date forward, no one could be convicted of felony murder unless prosecutors proved the defendant had murderous intent.
The SJC ruling was not retroactive, however, and did not apply to people already convicted under the old felony murder rule. The court said in its decision that closed cases may have been handled differently if prosecutors knew they had to prove murderous intent to secure a murder conviction.
The organization of public defenders also endorsed legislative reforms, and offered their services to help those convicted under the old rules.
“Public defenders would support any legislation making the Supreme Judicial Court’s decision abolishing felony murder retroactive,” said Anthony Benedetti, chief counsel for the Committee for Public Counsel Services. “We also stand ready and willing to represent any person seeking to have a conviction under this draconian theory of murder overturned.”
Candidates running for the state’s top prosecutor spots are also weighing in on this issue.
A legislative fix “is the best remedy because it applies to everyone caught up in the injustice of not making the felony murder decision retroactive. But it’s not the only remedy,’’ said Boston City Councilor Ricardo Arroyo, who is challenging Hayden for Suffolk County district attorney. “While we wait for legislative action, district attorneys should not sit on their hands.”
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Arroyo said that if elected he would use the tools already made available through the Legislature, which includes resentencing. That requires an agreement with both the district attorney and the defense attorney, and an assent by a judge.
Plymouth District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz said in a statement that he “would certainly consider taking a look at any proposed bills that address parole eligibility.”
Rahsaan Hall, a civil rights lawyer running against Cruz for Plymouth DA, said, “There should be a legislative fix precisely because the criminal legal system has for too long paid far more attention to finality than with justice.”
State Representative Brandy Fluker Oakley, a Boston Democrat, proposed a bill that she said would give prosecutors the ability to address unjust felony murder convictions.
“Defendants who are sitting in prison today for actions that are no longer considered to be felony murder should have their sentences vacated or reduced,” Fluker Oakley said. “My bill . . . would empower our prosecutors to ask a court to reevaluate convictions like these after injustices in our law have been rectified.”
The bill has been assigned to the Judiciary Committee, which has set an April 15 deadline to either recommend the bill for passage or to squash it, said Fluker Oakley.
Bristol District Attorney Thomas M. Quinn III said there were “good reasons the court did not make the Brown decision retroactive,” but said lingering injustices are best addressed through new legislation.
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“If it appears that justice was not done in a prior felony murder conviction, a defendant should have the opportunity to have the case reviewed,” Quinn said in a statement. “This should be done on a case-by-case basis.”
Norfolk District Attorney Michael W. Morrissey agrees that any sweeping change will have to come from the Legislature.
“A case-by-case examination is the more difficult course, but is likely the wiser path,” Morrissey said.
Mark Arsenault can be reached at mark.arsenault@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @bostonglobemark. Meghan E. Irons can be reached at meghan.irons@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @meghanirons.
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/03/31/metro/former-mit-researcher-inspired-by-breaking-bad-buy-poison-is-spared-prison-term/
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A biomedical engineer told a judge Thursday that he was inspired by “Breaking Bad” when he bought castor beans and lily of the valley plants, which produce deadly toxins and were used by a character on the popular television show to poison people.
Ishtiaq Ali Saaem, 38, a former research director at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said during his sentencing hearing in federal court in Boston that he was “guided by innocent curiosity” to learn more about ricin, a lethal agent that can be extracted from the beans.
“I never made the poison nor intended to harm anyone,” said Saaem, now of Allentown, Pa. He said he was “scared and overwhelmed” when FBI agents confronted him about his online purchases in 2015 “which led to my poor choice of not telling the truth.”
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US District Judge Richard G. Stearns sentenced Saaem to six months of home confinement and three years of probation for obstruction of justice.
While it’s not illegal to buy castor beans, Saaem pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice last year for making false statements to the FBI. He admitted he falsely claimed that he wanted to plant the beans and decorate his Cambridge apartment with their colorful blossoms.
The judge rejected the government’s request to sentence Saaem to a year in prison, in part because he is the primary caretaker for his 3-year-old son, who was born three months premature and has chronic medical conditions.
“I am persuaded that incarceration for the defendant, while deserved in this case, would pose an undue and extreme hardship on his family,” Stearns said after hearing testimony from Saaem’s wife, who is a doctor, and reviewing their son’s medical records.
The judge also said that after reviewing the evidence and 17 letters of support from Saaem’s relatives, friends, and former colleagues, he believed Saaem “is extremely remorseful for his conduct.”
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Assistant US Attorney Kriss Basil had urged the judge to send Saaem to prison for a year, arguing that his interest in ricin was frightening, especially given his biomedical engineering expertise.
“Ricin has only one purpose,” Basil said, and that’s “to kill people.”
In its sentencing memorandum, the government said Saaem’s inspiration was “Breaking Bad” character Walter White, a disaffected scientist who used convallatoxin, from lily of the valley, and ricin to poison people.
“Although the government cannot identify any specific intended victim and is aware of no specific threat made by Saaem to use ricin or convallatoxin against a person, his conduct was nevertheless threatening,” prosecutors wrote in the memorandum.
But, Saaem’s attorney, Derege Demissie, told the judge that Saaem never possessed ricin, which is extracted from castor beans, and his conduct can best be summed up as “misplaced curiosity.”
After watching “Breaking Bad,” Saaem ordered the plants and beans as “a good conversation piece” and thought he might experiment with them, Demissie said, adding,“There’s no evidence whatsoever that Mr. Saaem intended to use ricin to harm people.”
He said Saaem never took any steps to extract poison and lost his career as a scientist for making false statements to the FBI about his online purchases.
Saaem earned a PhD in biomedical engineering at Duke University and an MBA at Northwestern University. He came under scrutiny by the FBI in 2015 after ordering 800 castor beans and six lily of the valley plants, according to court filings.
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He told the FBI he was only interested in the castor beans for gardening and had accidentally purchased 100 packets instead of one. After that visit, Saaem amended his order and received only one packet of the beans, according to his lawyer.
But, he also began searching the Internet for tasteless poisons and rat poison and visited webpages with articles headlined, “What is the most lethal poison?” and “The five deadly poisons that can be cooked up in a kitchen,” according to court filings.
In 2019, the FBI renewed its focus on Saaem after discovering he had been accused of embezzling money from his employer a few years earlier by submitting false invoices for laboratory equipment, according to court filings. That case was resolved without criminal charges when Saaem paid the company $275,000.
Prosecutors charged Saaem with obstruction of justice last March for making false statements to the FBI about his interest in ricin.
In letters to the judge, Saaem’s supporters described him as a good man, father, and colleague and an accomplished scientist.
In one letter, Saaem’s older sister wrote that as a child growing up in Bangladesh he was very fond of several American television series, including “MacGyver,” “Bionic Woman,” and “ThunderCats,” and used to perform experiments learned from the show with material from old toys and other household items.
On Thursday, Saaem’s voice cracked with emotion and he struggled to hold back tears as he told the judge that he wanted to be a “hero” for his son, someone proud of his accomplishments “and not seen as a criminal.”
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Saaem, former associate director of the synthetic group at the MIT-Broad Foundry, said his curiosity had been an advantage in his work, including moon mission projects that “sound like science fiction.”
But, he said his curiosity proved to be a detriment in the criminal case and he doesn’t know if he will ever be allowed to work as a scientist again. He’s now a stay-at-home father.
After leaving the courtroom, Saaem said he was grateful that the judge had followed the defense’s recommendation and sentenced him to home confinement and probation.
“I never had any intent to harm anyone,” he said. “I’m moving on with my life.”
Shelley Murphy can be reached at shelley.murphy@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @shelleymurph.
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/03/31/metro/helping-ukrainian-refugees-is-easier-said-than-done/
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Mike Gilbert is a software consultant from Arlington, so it goes without saying he’s pretty good with computers.
Using his computer, he has become a voice of hope to a handful of Ukrainian refugees, some of the more than 4 million people, mostly women and children, who have fled Vladimir Putin’s unconscionable and needless war.
Just having someone take an interest in their plight is a morale boost for the Ukrainians. But Gilbert, like many other Americans, wants to be more than a shoulder to cry on. He and others hope that Ukrainians escaping the war can come, even if only temporarily, to the United States.
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But they are finding that while countries such as Poland and Romania have taken in millions of refugees, the US, the richest, most powerful nation in the world, can’t fulfill its modest offer of sanctuary.
“When I heard President Biden say we would take in 100,000 Ukrainians, I had to laugh, because the number is so low and our system is not even able to take that number in,” said Gilbert. “The existing US visa programs require months of paperwork, which is not useful to refugees who are being bombed every day and need to emigrate urgently as a matter of life and death.”
Under the Trump administration, the asylum system was decimated, a deliberate policy of sabotage. The Biden administration vowed to restore a functioning asylum and immigration system, but progress has been glacial. The government said it would take in 125,000 refugees in fiscal year 2022 but is on pace to take in 16,000.
Biden’s promise to take in Ukrainians consists of a pledge, not a plan.
Mike Gilbert is in constant contact with Kristina Bondarenko, who with her mother, two daughters, two dogs, and a cat, fled their home in Kharkiv, eventually getting to Warsaw.
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“They are exhausted,” Gilbert said. “They want to come to Boston.”
Gilbert travels a lot for work, and has a bunch of frequent flier miles he is willing to donate to the Bondarenko family. But they can’t get a US visa to board a plane in Warsaw.
Gilbert relates the story of Bondarenko’s friend, Diana Hlushko, who was in a hospital in Kharkiv with severe abdominal pain when the Russians started bombing. When the windows cracked, she fled the hospital at 5 in the morning, in desperate pain.
Hlushko spent days in a bomb shelter with her parents, who are deaf, before her parents and her 14-year-old brother made it out to Germany. Diana remains behind, in western Ukraine, trying to figure out if the call she got asking her to return to the morgue to claim the body of an uncle killed while defending Kharkiv was real or a prank by Russian soldiers who found her uncle’s phone.
Gilbert is in regular contact with a half-dozen Ukrainian families.
“None of them have said they want to make a life in the United States,” he said. “As soon as the war is over, they want to go back to Ukraine.”
He is also part of an ad hoc network of ordinary Americans who are willing to help Ukrainians get here, to give them jobs. Some have offered to take refugees into their own homes.
“Blaming bureaucracy for inaction in the face of a humanitarian disaster just doesn’t cut it,” Gilbert said. “There are people willing to help, if only our government could give visas to these refugees.”
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In 1999, as civilians in Kosovo were being slaughtered by Serb forces, the US allowed 20,000 Kosovars to take immediate sanctuary in the US while their asylum paperwork was being processed. There’s no reason the US government can’t push the paperwork aside again now.
Hanging a Ukrainian flag, or wearing a swatch of blue and yellow on your lapel, is a nice gesture. But Ukrainians need more than gestures. With more than 4 million refugees already after five weeks of war, the least the US can do is loosen the bureaucratic strings and allow Americans like Mike Gilbert to do what the government is proving incapable of doing.
Kevin Cullen is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at kevin.cullen@globe.com.
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/03/31/sports/bruins-pay-homage-retired-goalie-tuukka-rask-pregame-puck-drop-ceremony/
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Tuukka Rask didn’t have to worry about nerves as he prepared to step on the ice at TD Garden for the first time since he officially announced his retirement in February and, in his mind, what might be the last time in a long while.
He was used to seeing the crowd.
“I’m kind of more uncomfortable wearing a suit and going on the ice than wearing my uniform,” he said. “It’s a little different.”
Rask was honored by the Bruins before their matchup Thursday against the Devils at TD Garden. He performed the ceremonial puck drop with his wife and three daughters on hand.
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“It’s nice to have my family here,” he said. “It’ll be fun. Fun memories for them, too.”
Rask’s 15-year career (all in Boston) came to an end two months ago after a failed comeback attempt. The 35-year-old goalie had offseason hip surgery last summer, but the Bruins left the door open if he wanted to return. He did in January, but it took just four games to realize his body couldn’t stand the rigors.
With his retirement decision behind him, Rask said his body feels fine, and was comfortable with the outcome.
“Most days, it feels like, ‘Yeah, I think I could do it,” he said. “But then you get a day or two where you’re like, ‘Oh, thank God I don’t have to put the gear on and go butterfly.’ So yeah, there’s days that I feel great and, hopefully, it continues that way. But I know that it just wouldn’t hold if I was playing. So I always keep that in the back of my mind.”
Rask said he wasn’t disappointed by the outcome of his comeback attempt even though he went through with the surgery last summer.
“I would have done the surgery anyways at some point because it was at the point that it affected my everyday life,” he said. “I just did it because I wanted to come back and play because I couldn’t play without the surgery. [I] knew that going into the surgery, that it’s going to go either way. Did the rehab, tried to come back. At least I tried, right?”
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Rask didn’t see a future for himself as a coach quite yet, but he will work with the organization on corporate sponsorships.
“I’ll be hanging out with sponsors, golfing and shaking hands in suites,” he said. “We’re going to have to figure out a better title for me, I guess. But that’s something I’ve always been intrigued about — the business side of things — anyways. I don’t know what the future holds. Maybe I’ll get into coaching, maybe not. But for now, I’ll be hanging out with sponsors.”
He’s seen the hugs that have become a ritual for Jeremy Swayman and Linus Ullmark after wins and he approves.
“It’s great to have that chemistry,” Rask said. “What I understand is that it just kind of happened by accident and they just kept doing it. So it’s good. Those are the fun stories that happen during the season. They stuck with it. Hopefully, they get to do it very often. That means they’re winning.”
Changes in the lines
Bruce Cassidy anticipated making changes after Tuesday’s loss to the Maple Leafs, but two of them were out of his control.
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Craig Smith was “under the weather” and Nick Foligno was dealing with a lower-body injury. With Smith day-to-day, Marc McLaughlin, a Billerica native and Boston College product, made his Bruins debut on the third line with Charlie Coyle and Trent Fredric. Anton Blidh slotted into Foligno’s spot on the fourth line.
The changes Cassidy planned to make were along the blue line. Reilly and trade deadline addition Josh Brown replaced Connor Clifton and Derek Forbort on the third defensive pairing.
Brown wasted no time making his presence felt when he engaged New Jersey’s Mason Geertsen in a first-period bout, which earned him a five-minute fighting major (Geertsen was also sent off for five minutes) and a stick salute from his Bruins teammates on the bench.
Reilly hadn’t played since March 21 against Montreal. Blidh’s last game was March 16 against Minnesota.
“We had discussed a while ago how to get all eight guys involved,” Cassidy said. “They had been practicing together. I think that helps a little bit. So keep them as a pair and then we’ll sort through as we go how it breaks out after that.”
Clifton and Forbort had been a steady third pair, but Clifton was on the ice for three goals in the 6-4 loss to Toronto on Tuesday night and Forbort was on for two.
“Cliffy had a tough night the other night, but they’d been good, him and Forbort, for a while,” Cassidy said. “Good stretch — good, solid, consistent, played within themselves hockey.”
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Cassidy said he expects Foligno to be available for Saturday night’s game against the Columbus Blue Jackets.
A family gathering
Making his NHL debut was one thing, but doing it in a Bruins jersey made it that much more special for McLaughlin, who grew up in Billerica and starred at Boston College.
Putting a ballpark figure on how many people he expected to show up at TD Garden for him Thursday was a challenge.
“A lot,” he said. “Too many to count.”
Pressed to pick a number, McLaughlin guessed about 50 family members and friends were at the Garden to see his debut.
He signed a two-year entry-level contract on March 15 and was given time to get acclimated before being tested Thursday against the Devils.
“It’s been really good,” McLaughlin said. “There’s a ton of leaders in that locker room. So just trying to absorb as much as I can and learn from them. They’re all such great professionals, so just trying to absorb it.”
McLaughlin, a center by nature but a right wing Thursday, was the Eagles’ captain his junior and senior seasons. He scored 21 goals and had 11 assists as a senior this past season. While only 22 years old, Cassidy said it was a good sign that McLaughlin showed the habits of a pro in practice.
“Very professional in his approach,” Cassidy said. “Does everything hard. Ready to go when it’s his turn. Alert, focused. So that part’s great. Shoot’s the puck very hard, he passes the puck very hard, so he’s got hard habits, for lack of a better term, which are going to be required at this level.”
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Julian Benbow can be reached at julian.benbow@globe.com.
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FORT MYERS, Fla. — Red Sox third base coach Carlos Febles and infielder Christian Arroyo were zeroed in on the art of turning a double play early Thursday morning.
The pair had a student and teacher bond with Febles, who works with the infielders, affirming or correcting Arroyo’s moves around the second base bag. Febles fed baseballs to Arroyo from a machine cranked up to moderate speed. This allowed Arroyo to work through double plays at a steady pace. Going too fast would, perhaps, disrupt Arroyo from hammering down the mechanics.
In this drill, Febles wanted Arroyo to work behind the bag, not making his move toward second until he was certain where the machine would deliver the ball.
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“The main thing is you have to see the flight of the baseball and use your legs,” an animated Febles explained. “To me, everything you do on the field, you have to use your legs. You cannot start your legs before seeing the baseball.”
With each rep it appeared Arroyo got the hang of it, staying behind the bag before pouncing. Febles clapped his hands emphatically once the round was over before reflecting with Arroyo on the session and what the infielder took from it. At that point, Febles walked back to the machine and started feeding baseballs through it again.
It’s been the routine for Red Sox infielders this spring. Each morning, just before batting practice and other infield work on the back fields at Fenway South, infielders plant themselves on a sliver of turf outside the clubhouse.
It’s divided into two sections. On one side, Febles delivers flies to the infielders. On the other, it’s all about grounders. The players start on their knees. Glove-side grounders; grounders in front of the player; backhand grounders; glove-side grounders with in-between hops; grounders in front of the player with in-between hops; backhand grounders with in-between hops. The infielders then stand up and repeat the movements in their usual ready positions, but at a slow pace, utilizing miniature baseballs, and sometimes a pancake glove. Both require intense focus and attention to detail. If you don’t look the ball in, you’re likely to boot it.
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“I like them a lot,” Arroyo said of the drills. “Because it allows me to focus on catching the ball in my pocket and getting it in a sweet spot and also with the transfer for the smaller ball. We’ll sometimes do double-play feeds with them. Then when you grab the regular ball it feels like a beach ball.”
Much of the goal, Febles said, is to isolate the hands from the rest of the body.
“Then when we get on the field, that’s when we work on angles and first-step quickness,” Febles said. “Here, it’s all about hand work.”
Entering the 2021 season, manager Alex Cora said he wanted the Red Sox to make more of a commitment to defense. Yet the Sox still struggled, committing the second-most errors in baseball (108) behind the Marlins (122).
That forced Cora and his staff to come up with another plan. They began these drills last season, but this year it’s been more consistent.
“It worked out well for us the last part of the season,” shortstop Xander Bogaerts said. “And also in the playoffs. It helped me, personally, and I’m going to continue to do it.”
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Bogaerts’s area of improvement was his backhand, Febles said. So, when it was his turn, Bogaerts took grounders to his backhand with miniature baseballs and a pancake glove.
On the other side was first baseman Bobby Dalbec. Febles shot baseballs through the machine with Dalbec mimicking receiving snap throws from the catcher. Febles said Dalbec has a tendency to reach for the ball instead of getting into his legs. This creates more of a distance between the tag and the runner. When Dalbec gets into an athletic and crouched stance and waits for the ball to come to him, that cuts the distance between the tag and the runner significantly.
“Now, it’s a straight-down, quick tag,” Febles said.
There’s no quick fix to some of the Sox’ defensive woes from 2021, but consistency in the proper movements builds fundamentally sound players who make routine plays routinely.
“I think the drills help get everyone kind of locked in with their hands and their eyes, just getting us moving,” Arroyo said. “The more you do it, when it happens in a game it’s natural.”
Julian McWilliams can be reached at julian.mcwilliams@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @byJulianMack.
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Unseeded Naomi Osaka defeated No. 22 Belinda Bencic, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, in the Miami Open semifinals. She’s in a championship match for the first time since the 2021 Australian Open, and will meet either No. 16 Jessica Pegula or No. 2 Iga Swiatek on Saturday in Miami Gardens. Fla. It has been a long, trying and often emotional ride for former No. 1 Osaka since her win in the 2018 U.S. Open final over Serena Williams. She was rattled during a loss at Indian Wells on March 12 following a derogatory shout from a spectator, withdrew from last year’s French Open to address her mental state and left last year’s US Open in tears. But in South Florida, one of the places she considers home, it’s been all support from the fans. Osaka entered the tournament ranked No. 77 in the world, will leave Miami no worse than 36th and would be back in the top 30 if she wins the title … Hubert Hurkacz, seeded eighth, moved two wins away from defending his Miami Open title by wearing down the top-seeded Daniil Medvedev, 7-6 (7-5), 6-3, in a men’s quarterfinal. Had Medvedev prevailed, he would have overtaken Novak Djokovic on Monday and returned to No. 1 in the world rankings. Instead, the Russian will stay No. 2.
NBA
Hall of Fame inductees decided
Former San Antonio Spurs guard and two-time All-Star Manu Ginóbili will be inducted into the Hall of Fame in his first time on the ballot, according to The Athletic. Tim Hardaway, a five-time All-Star, and George Karl, the NBA’s sixth-winningest head coach, will also inducted. Others include WNBA legend Swin Cash, a four-time All-Star and two-time Olympic gold medalist and West Virginia coach Bob Huggins, who has coached for 45 years and earned NCAA Coach of the Year honors twice throughout his career.
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Chinese state TV airing games again
China Central Television, China’s state-run TV network, has begun to broadcast NBA games again, signaling that the rift between the league and the authoritarian government that has persisted since 2019 appears to be coming to an end. The first game this year on state TV was Tuesday’s matchup between the Los Angeles Clippers and the Utah Jazz. According to Global Times, the broadcast was the start of a full return of the NBA to China’s airwaves. The league has been almost entirely off the air on Chinese state television since 2019, except for a lone finals game in 2020. The dispute between China and the NBA began in the fall of 2019, when Daryl Morey, then an executive with the Houston Rockets, shared an image supportive of pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong. The social media post angered the Chinese government, causing games to be pulled off the air and Chinese companies to pull sponsorships from the league … President Joe Biden has appointed Suns star Chris Paul to his board of advisors on historically Black college and universities. Biden along with Vice President Kamala Harris — a graduate of Howard University, an HBCU—have committed more than $5.8 million to support toward the financial commitment to these institutions.
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NHL
Capitals rest Ovechkin
Washington Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin missed practice, taking a maintenance day to rest, according to the team. That rest, though, comes at an unusual time - after two days off for the Capitals, following a loss to Carolina on Monday. Capitals Coach Peter Laviolette said he expects Ovechkin, who was at the Capitals’ practice facility Thursday, back on the ice for Friday’s practice. Ovechkin has shouldered a significant workload this season, averaging 21:04 per game. The last time Ovechkin averaged more than 21 minutes a night was during the 2010-11 season … Clayton Keller is out for the season after breaking his leg in the third period against the San Jose Sharks on Wednesday. The forward was injured with 5:15 remaining after falling and hitting the end boards legs first. The Coyotes said he had surgery and is expected to make a full recovery in 4-6 months … Goalie Petr Mrazek will be out at least six weeks for the Toronto Maple Leafs because of a groin injury, meaning the goalie would miss the start of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
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Auto racing
Vettel back after COVID
Aston Martin driver Sebastian Vettel is “fit to race” after recovering from COVID-19. The four-time world champion will make his season debut at the Australian Grand Prix on April 10. The 34-year-old German missed the first two races of the F1 season — in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia — because of his coronavirus infection. Reserve driver Nico Hulkenberg replaced Vettel for both races, finishing 17th in Bahrain and then 12th in Saudi Arabia. Aston Martin is still searching for its first points this season.
Miscellany
Tribe supports Conn. city
A small American Indian tribe is supporting a Connecticut city’s attempt to retain funding put in jeopardy by its continued use of a Native American mascot and imagery for its schools’ athletic teams. The Schaghticoke Tribal Nation, which has just over 100 members in Western Connecticut, passed a resolution this month supporting the city of Derby’s use of the nickname “Red Raiders” and logos that include an arrowhead and the profile of the head of an American Indian. The tribe says it supports the use of those images “as a public means of sustaining Native American culture and history of Connecticut’s first citizens,” according to the March 15 resolution from the tribal council. The state last year enacted a law that requires municipalities whose athletic teams use Native American names or mascots to receive written support from a state or federally recognized tribe in Connecticut or risk losing state grants derived from revenue at the state’s two tribal casinos, The Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods Resort Casino.
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Over the last month, Russian forces have assaulted the people of Ukraine. In addition to news of attacks on civilians and families displaced, there are now initial reports that Russian forces have committed sexual violence.
This month, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba claimed that Russian soldiers had committed "numerous" rapes against Ukrainian women. Last week, Ukrainian MPs charged that Russian forces were targeting women and girls specifically and that elderly women had been raped.
No hard evidence for these allegations has yet come to light. But evidence from recent conflicts along with certain aspects of the current invasion suggest cause for great concern.
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Russian armed forces have recently perpetrated sexual violence in other conflicts
First, Russia has a recent history of committing sexual violence in war. According to the Sexual Violence in Armed Conflict data set, sexual violence by Russian forces has been reported in three of seven years of conflict since 2014 in eastern Ukraine.
Most of the sexual violence took place while Russians held women and men in detention. Just in the past two years, Russian-led forces have been reported to have committed rape, sexual torture, forced prostitution and sexual mutilation against detained individuals in Ukraine.
The State Department's 2020 Country Report for Human Rights Practices in Ukraine notes, for example, that Russian-led forces reportedly carried out "beatings and electric shock in the genital area, rape, threats of rape, forced nudity, and threats of rape against family members" in 2020 as a "method of torture and mistreatment to punish, humiliate, or extract confessions" from detainees.
This is also nothing new for Russia. The Russian military is reported to have committed rape in Chechnya every year for seven consecutive years at the turn of the century, against people both in and outside detention.
For example, Amnesty International reported cases of gang rape by Russian forces of pregnant Chechen women in 2002 following military raids on their homes. The State Department wrote in a 2004 report that Russian forces had raped numerous detainees in Chechnya, including Chechen boys as young as 13.
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The Russian military’s lack of unity is a red flag
Second, Russian forces' apparent lack of internal unity is concerning. Research suggests that low levels of internal cohesion within armed groups - meaning that they lack social bonds with one another - correlate with wartime sexual violence. When members of the military don't trust and care for each other, they are more likely to rape. This is because when fighters rape together, it can strengthen loyalty and cohesion within armed groups.
There are strong signs that the Russian army suffers from low morale and a lack of unity. Early reports from Ukraine indicated that many soldiers were not motivated to fight. Many seem confused about the purpose of their mission in Ukraine. Videos on social media show hungry soldiers asking for food and looting Ukrainian stores. Gross inequalities within the military also undermines solidarity.
Researchers find that forced recruitment, especially by press ganging when men are taken with or without notice and forced into the military, may also cause cohesion to fray. The Russian military is conscription-based, so all service is mandatory. But reports suggest Russia is now relying on desperate measures. Men have even been snatched from their cars or the streets in broad daylight.
Sexualized and dehumanizing language has preceded mass rape elsewhere
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Third, dehumanizing and sexualized language may also portend conflict-related sexual violence. Such language has been a precursor of mass rape in other situations, such as the sexualized dehumanization of Tutsi women that preceded the genocide in Rwanda.
One example is Russian President Vladimir Putin's crude remark to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last February, referring to an old joke about marital rape. When discussing the implementation of the 2015 Minsk agreements between Ukraine and Russia aimed at stopping the war in eastern Ukraine, Putin said, "like it or don't like it, it's your duty, my beauty." Experts have traced the Kremlin's gendered and sexualized rhetoric toward Ukraine and described Putin's abusive behavior as "characteristic of rape culture."
Putin has also denied the existence of Ukraine as a country and denied the existence of Ukrainian culture, while bizarrely claiming that the country has been taken over by Nazis (ignoring the fact that Ukraine has a Jewish president).
Syrian soldiers joining Russian forces in Ukraine is bad news
Fourth, Putin's recruitment of Syrian soldiers to fight in Ukraine raises alarms. Syrian forces are reported to have committed systematic rape and sexual torture against civilian populations and detainees every year from 2013 to 2017 in the Syrian civil war. They might bring that practice with them to Ukraine.
Research suggests that recruiting foreign fighters may increase the prevalence of conflict-related sexual violence, at least by rebel groups. This is in part because they may threaten the armed group's internal social cohesion.
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Population matters
Lastly, population size consistently correlates with state repression and human rights abuse, including wartime rape.
When war takes place in countries with larger populations, the people are more likely to endure government-perpetrated rape and other human rights violations than the people in smaller countries. Ukraine, with 44 million people, is a larger-than-average nation.
What to be prepared for in Ukraine
With all these factors in play, initial reports of sexual violence in Ukraine are alarming. In particular, Russia's recent history of conflict-related sexual violence in Ukraine and the lack of cohesion within the Russian armed forces are among the most worrying signs.
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Esther Hallsdóttir is a Master in Public Policy candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School, and a research assistant to the Sexual Violence in Armed Conflict data project. Previously, she was a project manager at UNICEF Iceland and served as Iceland’s Youth Delegate for Human Rights to the United Nations.
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ANKARA — The Turkish prosecutor in the case against 26 Saudi nationals charged in the slaying of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi made a surprise request Thursday that their trial in absentia be suspended and the case transferred to Saudi Arabia, raising fears of a possible coverup.
The panel of judges made no ruling on the prosecutor’s request but said a letter would be sent to Turkey’s Justice Ministry seeking its opinion on the possible transfer of the file to Saudi judicial authorities, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported. The trial was adjourned until April 7.
The development comes as Turkey has been trying to normalize its relationship with Saudi Arabia, which hit an all-time low following Khashoggi’s grisly October 2018 killing. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said in an interview on Thursday that Saudi authorities were more cooperative on judicial issues with Turkey but did not elaborate.
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In arguing for the transfer, the prosecutor told the court that the Saudi chief public prosecutor’s office requested the Turkish proceedings be transferred to the kingdom in a letter dated March 13 and that international warrants issued by Ankara against the defendants be lifted, according to the private DHA news agency.
The prosecutor said that because the arrest warrants cannot be executed and defense statements cannot be taken, the case would remain inconclusive in Turkey.
Amnesty International urged Turkey to press ahead with the trial, saying if it is transferred to Saudi Arabia, Turkey will be “knowingly and willingly sending the case to a place where it will be covered up.”
Moving Khashoggi’s trial to Saudi Arabia would provide a diplomatic resolution to a dispute that represented the wider troubles between Ankara and the kingdom since the 2011 Arab Spring.
Turkey under Erdogan supported Islamists as the uprisings took hold, while Saudi Arabia and its ally the United Arab Emirates sought to suppress such movements for fear of facing challenges to their autocratic governments. Meanwhile, Turkey sided with Qatar in a diplomatic dispute that saw Doha boycotted by Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE.
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Since President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election, the Gulf Arab states have set aside — but not fully resolved — the Qatar dispute. Meanwhile, Turkey under Erdogan has faced a rapid devaluation of its lira currency over his refusal to hike interest rates. Bilateral trade to the kingdom and the UAE, a major transshipment point for the world economy, also collapsed.
Since the start of 2022, Erdogan has sought to improve those ties, including making his first visit to the UAE in nearly a decade. Saudi Arabia and the UAE, after fighting through the coronavirus pandemic’s economic effects, facing a grinding war in Yemen, and struggling with renewed tensions with Iran, also want to resolve the outstanding feud.
Khashoggi disappeared on Oct. 2, 2018, after entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, seeking documents that would allow him to marry Hatice Cengiz, a Turkish national who was waiting outside the building. He never emerged.
Turkish officials allege that the Saudi national, who was a United States resident, was killed and then dismembered with a bone saw inside the consulate. His body has not been found. Before his killing, Khashoggi had written critically of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince in columns for The Washington Post.
Turkish authorities said he was killed by a team of Saudi agents. Those on trial in absentia include two former aides of the prince.
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Saudi officials initially offered conflicting accounts concerning the killing, including claims that Khashoggi had left the consulate building unharmed. But amid mounting international pressure, they stated that Khashoggi’s death was a tragic accident, with the meeting unexpectedly turning violent.
Turkey decided to try the defendants in absentia after Saudi Arabia rejected Turkish demands for their extradition.
The slaying had sparked international condemnation and cast a cloud of suspicion over Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Western intelligence agencies, as well as the US Congress, have said that an operation of this magnitude could not have happened without his knowledge.
In urging Turkey to proceed with the trial, Amnesty International said Ankara would be complicit in a coverup if it grants the Saudi request for a transfer.
“If the prosecutor’s request is granted, then instead of prosecuting and shedding light on a murder that was committed on its territory ... Turkey will be knowingly and willingly sending the case to a place where it will be covered up,” said Tarik Beyhan, Amnesty’s campaign director for Turkey.
Beyhan said he didn’t want to “think about the possibility” that the prosecutor’s request may be related to the improving ties between Riyadh and Ankara.
“Basic human rights ... should not be made the subject of political negotiations,” he said. “A murder cannot be covered up to fix relations.”
Some of the men were put on trial in Riyadh behind closed doors. A Saudi court issued a final verdict in 2020 that sentenced five mid-level officials and operatives to 20-year jail terms. The court had originally ordered the death penalty but reduced the punishment after Khashoggi’s son Salah, who lives in Saudi Arabia, announced that he forgave the defendants. Three others were sentenced to lesser jail terms.
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On Thursday, Khashoggi's fiancee, Cengiz, appeared to criticize the prosecutor’s request in a tweet in English. “It is an exemplary situation in terms of showing the dilemma facing humanity in the modern era,” she wrote. “Which of the two will we choose? To want to live like a virtuous human being or to build a life by holding material interests above all kinds of values.”
She did not respond to a request for comment.
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It’s hard to say why something is funny. The best humor eludes explanation. Brain waves hardly matter for belly laughs. It may be even harder to say why something isn’t funny. This makes reviewing “The Bubble” a challenge.
“The Bubble” starts streaming on Netflix April 1.
Judd Apatow directed and co-wrote (with Pam Brady). So that’s promising. Also promising is an intriguingly oddball cast that includes Leslie Mann (Apatow’s wife), Keegan-Michael Key, David Duchovny, Fred Armisen, Maria Bakalova, and Kate McKinnon. Playing a film-studio boss, McKinnon is the one reliable laugh-getter. The other actor who consistently holds his end up is Peter Serafinowicz, he of the blended-whiskey voice, playing a movie producer.
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Studio head? Movie producer? “The Bubble” is a movie about making a movie, but with a public-health twist.
The movie being made, or whose making is being attempted, is the sixth film in “the 23d-biggest action franchise of all time.” That would be “Cliff Beasts.” Cue the CGI. Apatow enjoys including scenes from that movie within this movie.
But we’re talking about the pre-vaccine days of the pandemic. So the “bubble” the title refers to encloses the film shoot. “The safest place in the world right now is a film set,” an agent tells a client. Oh, the places you’ll go? Oh, the things people will say to get their 10 percent.
Cast and crew assemble in a luxury hotel in the English countryside. Bakalova is among the increasingly bemused staff. The director (Armisen) is definitely out of his comfort zone. “I won Sundance with a movie I made on an iPhone!” he reminds people. One of the stars (Key) is less interested in the movie than in promoting something called Harmony Ignite. “It’s not a cult,” he explains. “It’s a lifestyle brand.”
To try to broaden the franchise’s appeal, a TikTok star (Iris Apatow, Mann and Apatow’s daughter), is making her movie debut. Two “Cliff Beasts” veterans (Mann and Duchovny) are a married couple — and seriously estranged. Another cast member (Karen Gillan) skipped “Cliff Beasts 5,″ and now that she’s back on board she’s not going to be allowed to forget that act of disloyalty. “It’s a hotel, not a war zone,” the producer says to the head of security. Yes and no.
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Stringing together a set of skits and calling it a movie isn’t the worst thing in the world. It had better not be, since that’s how an awful lot of American film comedy has functioned since the ‘80s. Call it the “SNL” effect. But at least some of the skits have to be funny. It helps, too, if the donnée, as Henry James, that master of matters mirthful, might say, is interesting. The targets here are depressingly easy: the narcissism of actors, the mindlessness of special-effects movies, the even greater mindlessness of TikTok videos.
In his last movie, “The King of Staten Island” (2020), Apatow was stretching, both emotionally and tonally, and it largely worked. Here he isn’t, and it doesn’t. The question isn’t whether he’s shooting fish in a barrel (shooting fish in a “Bubble”?). It’s how many bullet holes there were even before he began to fire.
There are compensations. It’s not every movie where you get to hear McKinnon intone the words “hakuna” and “matata.” The ending offers a nicely meta twist. Also, keep an eye out for cameos from Beck, John Cena, Benedict Cumberbatch, John Lithgow, James McAvoy, and Daisy Ridley. “Cliff Beasts” meets “Where’s Waldo?”
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★½
THE BUBBLE
Directed by Judd Apatow. Written by Apatow and Pam Brady. Starring Karen Gillan, Leslie Mann, David Duchovny, Iris Apatow, Keegan-Michael Key, Fred Armisen, Kate McKinnon, Maria Bakalova. Streaming on Netflix. 124 minutes. R (language throughout, sexual content, drug use, and some violence).
Mark Feeney can be reached at mark.feeney@globe.com.
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Boston police rescued a woman who was pinned under her car in Dorchester Monday night, the department said.
Police responded to a call for assistance at 11:05 p.m. on 17 Abbot St. and found the woman with her leg pinned under her car, police said in a statement.
Officers used a car jack from their cruiser to lift the car off the woman’s leg so she could be pulled from underneath, the statement said.
She was then transported to a local hospital to be treated, police said
The woman’s car had rolled forward and pinned her leg underneath after she had gotten out of the car, police said.
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No further information was available.
Madison Mercado can be reached at madison.mercado@globe.com.
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Paul Herman, who put in appearances as wiseguys and schlemiels in such movies as Martin Scorsese’s “Goodfellas” and “Casino” and three seasons of “The Sopranos,” died Tuesday, his 76th birthday.
His manager, T Keaton-Woods, confirmed the death in a statement but did not specify the cause or say where Mr. Herman died.
Over a four-decade career, Mr. Herman was perhaps best known for his role on “The Sopranos” as Peter Gaeta, known as Beansie, the owner of pizza parlors who gets in trouble with a mobster — his travails include being hit on the head with a pot of hot coffee — but who manages to reestablish himself.
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Mr. Herman also appeared for five seasons on another beloved HBO series, “Entourage,” as an accountant who pleads unsuccessfully with his celebrity client to be less of a wastrel.
He frequently played unnamed characters in the roughly half-dozen films by Scorsese in which he appeared, but in the director’s most recent feature, “The Irishman,” he had a more notable part: Whispers DiTullio, who, like Beansie, is a businessman involved with the Mafia who angers the wrong people and comes to grief.
Mr. Herman’s dozens of other film credits include such crime-themed movies as “The Cotton Club” (1984), “Once Upon a Time in America” (1984), “Heat” (1995), and “American Hustle” (2013), a screwball comedy about political corruption for which he and other members of the cast shared a Screen Actors Guild Award.
“The only one who ever gave me the chance to play a saint is Marty,” Mr. Herman told The New York Times in 1989, referring to his role as Philip the Apostle in Scorsese’s 1988 film, “The Last Temptation of Christ.”
Paul Herman was born March 29, 1946, in Brooklyn. His movie career got going with “Dear Mr. Wonderful,” a 1982 West German film about working-class life in Newark and New York City that featured Joe Pesci in his first starring role.
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From there, Mr. Herman made a specialty of using his haggard but trusting mug to play bit characters including a burglar (in Woody Allen’s “Radio Days”), a headwaiter (in another Allen film, “Bullets Over Broadway”), and a bartender (in Sondra Locke’s “Trading Favors”), along with a motley assortment of gangsters.
Information on survivors was not immediately available. Mr. Herman had homes in New York and Santa Monica, Calif.
Offscreen, he was known for being friendly and well connected. “If you visited NYC from LA, he was the entertainment director,” actor Tony Danza said on Twitter after his death.
Music executive Tommy Mottola posted an undated black-and-white photo on Instagram of Mr. Herman sitting at a restaurant between young versions of Robert De Niro and actress-director Penny Marshall, who died in 2018. Mottola said Mr. Herman had been on a “first name basis with every superstar actor and musician in the world.”
Mr. Herman was a part owner of the now closed but once buzzy Upper West Side restaurant Columbus, where one evening in 1989, sitting beside Al Pacino, he told the Times that he served as the nightly “social director.” The restaurant’s patrons included Scorsese, Allen, and Francis Ford Coppola — all friends who had cast him in their movies over the years.
Those three men had very different directing styles, Mr. Herman told the Times in 1989.
With Scorsese and Coppola, “you can give them your ideas on a scene,” he said. “But with Woody, well, you just don’t do that with him because he has ideas he’s working out. You really can’t say one style is better than another, though.”
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Rep. Madison Cawthorn, R-N.C., was called into a private meeting with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., this week to discuss his outlandish accusation that prominent political players had invited him to orgies and done “a key bump of cocaine” as he watched.
McCarthy has hosted similar private meetings after other Republican members aligned with former president Donald Trump stole attention away from his agenda -- for example, when two members recently addressed a white nationalist event -- but this time, he did something different: He talked openly about it.
"I mean he's got to turn himself around," McCarthy told reporters on Wednesday, soon after the closed-door meeting. "This is unacceptable and there is no evidence to this, he changes what he tells and that's not becoming of a congressman. He did not tell the truth."
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McCarthy has made clear that he believes the pathway to regaining the majority requires Republicans to present a united front and keep the public focused on the Democrats' intraparty fights rather than those within his own party. He wants to focus on telling voters exactly how Republicans will introduce needed legislation and hold the Biden administration accountable, and he doesn't want that message overshadowed.
But there’s a splintering divide among House Republicans between staunch Trump allies who tend to offend more than legislate and members who have grown restless over McCarthy’s lack of an upper hand with the former group.
McCarthy listed other unbecoming behavior that Cawthorn has displayed: driving on a suspended license earlier this month, calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a "thug" amid Russia's violent invasion and lying to a Capitol Police officer in an attempt to sneak a GOP candidate onto the House floor. But the Republican leader stopped short of punishing Cawthorn, allowing him to remain on committees.
Cawthorn has remained defiant and has not recanted his tale of a Washington filled with "sexual perversion" and drugs.
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"The radical left, the establishment and the media want to take me down," Cawthorn tweeted on Thursday, even though the challenges have been coming from within his own party. "Their attacks have been relentless. I won't stop fighting. I won't bow to the mob. They want to silence the America First movement. I'm not going anywhere."
McCarthy met privately with Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., a Trump ally who is being investigated for potentially violating sex-trafficking laws, accusations he has denied.
"I've spoken to Mr. Gaetz about the accusations. He's told me he's innocent of the accusations," McCarthy told reporters last year after previously pledging to remove Gaetz from committees if the allegations proved true.
McCarthy has also met privately with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., and Rep. Paul A. Gosar, R-Ariz., following their numerous offenses, most recently when both addressed attendees at a white nationalist event.
McCarthy called their attendance "unacceptable," stressing that the party does not embrace those values. But he has also promised to reassign both members to committees after Democrats stripped them from that right following numerous controversies.
He stayed notably silent when Gosar posted an anime video showing himself killing Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and assaulting President Biden.
He did not publicly condemn Greene when she posted the office number of 13 Republican colleagues who voted for the infrastructure bill, which led to members receiving violent threats against them and their families. Instead, McCarthy told colleagues at a weekly conference meeting to stop attacking one another and drawing unwanted attention, according to numerous aides in the room. It struck some members as McCarthy needing to do more to discipline the group.
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It's not that he doesn't know how. For months, McCarthy has proudly punished those who voted to impeach Trump, particularly Reps. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., and Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill.
Some of his critics say that McCarthy's approach is based on his ambitions to be speaker if Republicans regain control of the House in the midterm election this fall and the need to appease a majority of his conference, including the most rambunctious members.
While the discipline may seem like a contradiction to many onlookers, fellow Republicans defend it.
Many Republican members have a similar mentality to McCarthy, saying that dealing with intraparty riffs behind closed doors diminishes the chances of giving even more oxygen to a colleague's bad behavior.
"As far as some of this goes -- which sometimes is nonsensical, sometimes it's personality conflict, sometimes it's just some folks that are a little weird, I don't know how else to say it -- I think it's best to try and deal with it internally and see if you can bridge those gaps," said Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-N.J.
He continued, "You know what we don't need? We're going to get the majority. We don't need a circular firing squad. We don't need to beat each other up. We don't need to literally destroy the possibilities of really making some positive change."
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GOP members and aides, most of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations, noted that McCarthy is publicly more vocal when a majority of his conference is united against the behavior of a particular colleague. When members began to complain that Cheney's constant criticism about Trump was becoming too much of a distraction about a year ago, McCarthy endorsed the movement to remove her as conference chair, as she no longer resonated with her colleagues.
A similar scenario played out with Cawthorn as members, including those who typically do not complain, expressed their outrage when they returned to Washington this week.
In an interview last week with the "Warrior Poet Society" podcast, Cawthorn was asked whether the hit television show "House of Cards" was an accurate reflection of life in the nation's capital. Cawthorn responded by talking about the "sexual perversion that goes on in Washington."
"I mean, being kind of a young guy in Washington, where the average age is probably 60 or 70 -- you know, I look at all these people, a lot of them that I've always looked up to through my life, always paid attention to politics, guys that, you know. Then all of a sudden you get invited to, like, 'Oh hey, we're going to have kind of a sexual get-together at one of our homes. You should come,'" Cawthorn, 26, said in the interview, which was reported Sunday by Business Insider. "And then you realize they're asking you to come to an orgy."
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Cawthorn also claimed that he had witnessed "people that are leading on the movement to try and remove addiction in our country" consume "a key bump of cocaine right in front of you."
Rep. Steve Womack, R-Ark., does not consider himself one to call out his own colleagues or cause much of a stir. He said Tuesday was only the third time during his decade-long career on Capitol Hill that he stood up during a weekly GOP conference to say something. This time it was about Cawthorn.
"I've not had anything really get to me quite like the remarks made by my colleague from North Carolina in the time that I've been here," he said. "It's not because there haven't been other things said, by him or anybody else, that would be judged as nonsensical or out of line. I mean, a lot of people say things up here that are just kind of crazy talk."
He told all his colleagues that they all better prioritize behaving from now to the midterms, noting their singular focus should be on "not bringing negative attention to ourselves."
A Republican in the room said that when Womack spoke up, members audibly groaned and grumbled, expressing that they, too, were upset by Cawthorn's remarks and how it implicated them.
"Those remarks were very unfortunate, a terrible exaggeration of the truth, and that if you're going to make an accusation like that, name names; just name names. And spare the people like me who kind of live boring lives, I'm in bed by 9 o'clock every night," Womack added.
Republicans also demurred that Cawthorn's remarks brought unwanted attention to the conference just days after a retreat in Florida, where members worked to finalize issue policies they said they believed would unite them.
"When you actually run on a platform, here's what we care about, here's what we're going to do because the American people care about that -- that will help keep the team together and accomplishing what we told the people we were going to do when we ran for the job and the reason why they're gonna put us in the majority and make Kevin speaker," Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, said last Friday in Ponte Vedra, Fla.
For Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., Cawthorn's latest comments were not the tipping point for him. He listed multiple reasons Cawthorn lost his trust, including the congressman's decision to declare he would compete in a neighboring district, only to jump back into his race weeks later. Fed up with the antics, Tillis on Thursday endorsed state senator Chuck Edwards over Cawthorn in primary race in North Carolina's 11th Congressional District.
"The fact that he would leave, move on to another district 11 months into his current tenure; and some of his comments, at the worst possible time on Ukraine, calling Zelensky a thug; they just speak to a lack of judgment that I expect more of a member in our congressional delegation," Tillis said.
McCarthy acknowledged the same, telling reporters that Cawthorn's repeated patterns and consistent lying to spin his way out of problems is not the way to behave on Capitol Hill. He said that during their meeting, Cawthorn denied knowing what cocaine is after suggesting he had seen a congressional staffer using the drug in a garage 100 yards away.
"It's just frustrating. There's no evidence behind his statements when I sat down with him of what's true," he said.
During the retreat in Florida last week, McCarthy often touted the need to not just win the majority next year, but to ensure that a "governing majority" is prioritized. Members and aides privately acknowledged that that also means electing candidates who prioritize legislating over publicity that could make a potential speakership difficult.
McCarthy previously said he still supported Cawthorn's reelection following his anti-Ukraine remarks. But when pressed on it Thursday, McCarthy dodged the question.
"We talked about Madison yesterday," McCarthy told reporters. "In the process, there was just no evidence that he provided to make me think that that story is right."
Asked again, McCarthy responded with silence.
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The Washington Post’s Felicia Sonmez contributed to this report.
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LOS ANGELES (AP) — Oscars producer Will Packer said Los Angeles police were ready to arrest Will Smith after Smith slapped Chris Rock on the Academy Awards stage.
“They were saying, you know, this is battery, was a word they used in that moment," Packer said in a clip released by ABC News Thursday night of an interview he gave to “Good Morning America.” “They said we will go get him. We are prepared. We’re prepared to get him right now. You can press charges, we can arrest him. They were laying out the options.”
But Packer said Rock was “very dismissive” of the idea.
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“He was like, ‘No, no, no, I’m fine,” Packer said. "And even to the point where I said, ‘Rock, let them finish.’ The LAPD officers finished laying out what his options were and they said, ‘Would you like us to take any action?’ And he said no.”
The LAPD said in a statement after Sunday night's ceremony that they were aware of the incident, and that Rock had declined to file a police report. The department declined comment Thursday on Packer's interview, a longer version of which will air on Friday morning.
The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences met Wednesday to initiate disciplinary proceedings against Smith for violations against the group’s standards of conduct. Smith could be suspended, expelled or otherwise sanctioned.
The academy said in a statement that “Mr. Smith’s actions at the 94th Oscars were a deeply shocking, traumatic event to witness in-person and on television."
Without giving specifics, the academy said Smith was asked to leave the ceremony at the Dolby Theatre, but refused to do so.
Smith strode from his front row seat on to the stage and slapped Rock after a joke Rock made about Smith's wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, when he was on stage to present the Oscar for best documentary.
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On Monday, Smith issued an apology to Rock, the academy and to viewers, saying “I was out of line and I was wrong.”
The academy said Smith has the opportunity to defend himself in a written response before the board meets again on April 18.
Rock publicly addressed the incident for the first time, but only briefly, at the beginning of a standup show Wednesday night in Boston, where he was greeted by a thunderous standing ovation. He said “I’m still kind of processing what happened.”
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Follow AP Entertainment Writer Andrew Dalton on Twitter: https://twitter.com/andyjamesdalton
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Getting blown out on home ice Tuesday night by the Toronto Maple Leafs left the Bruins with a nasty taste in their mouths. Handing the New Jersey Devils the kind of beating rarely seen on an NHL ice sheet was a palate cleanse for the Bruins Thursday night at TD Garden.
The Bruins paid the punishment forward, wiping out the Devils, 8-1, on a night they paid homage to their retired veteran puck stopper, Tuukka Rask, in a pregame ceremony. The victory wrapped up the Bruins’ three-game season sweep of the Devils by an aggregate tally of 18-6.
Boston scored seven unanswered goals — including six in a decisive second-period flurry — to turn a 1-1 first-period tie into an insurmountable seven-goal lead after 40 minutes.
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The Bruins poured in their season-high for goals in a game. Brad Marchand scored twice and thought he had a hat trick when he beat Devils reserve goaltender Jon Gillies in the second period only to have it waived off by the officials.
Jake DeBrusk (1-1—2) extended his goal-scoring streak to three games. With friends and family on hand for his NHL debut, Billerica native Marc McLaughlin scored his first career NHL goal at 12:04, highlighting a three-goal outburst that spanned 3 minutes 3 seconds. The three-goal flurry was triggered by Patrice Bergeron’s power-play tally at 9:01 and followed by Marchand’s second tally of the period at 10:34 that ended the night for Devils starting goaltender Nico Daws (15 saves).
Four minutes after McLaughlin’s memorable tally, Taylor Hall found the back of the net at 16:12 to give the Bruins a commanding 8-1 lead.
It was just the fourth time in the last 10 years the Bruins scored at least eight goals while giving up just one. They beat Montreal, 8-1, in 2019 (the last time they scored eight goals in a game), Toronto, 8-0, and Calgary, 9-0, in 2012.
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Tough losses may sting, but the Bruins don’t let them linger. The Bruins are 19-4-2 after losses this year. They are 15-3-1 over their last 19 games and haven’t lost back-to-back games since suffering consecutive setbacks to the Ranges and Islanders in mid-February.
Matt Grzelcyk, who was minus-2 in the Bruins’ loss to the Maple Leafs, but made up for it quickly against the Devils, scoring his fourth goal of the season just 57 seconds into the game.
Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy wanted to make room for Josh Brown and Mike Reilly on one of the three defensive pairings after the trade deadline created a numbers game along the blue line. The loss to the Leafs only accelerated the process.
Cassidy plugged Reilly and Brown into the third line for Connor Clifton and Derek Forbort, and they clearly understood the assignment. Not even five minutes into the game, both of them were in the penalty box.
Brown was more than transparent about his style of play when he arrived (he has no problems with letting his hands fly). Mason Geertsen took exception with a hit from Brown along the boards and challenged Brown as soon as he sprung up from the ice. Brown obliged and got the better of the tussle, landing a right hand that staggered Geertsen.
Both were sent off to serve five-minute fighting majors.
A couple minutes later, Reilly saw Miles Wood check Charlie McAvoy into the end boards and immediately rushed in to defend the Bruins’ top defenseman.
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Reilly came flying in and took a direct shot at Wood. The two combatants got into a quick tangle that ended quickly once they tumbled to the ice. Reilly earned a pair of roughing penalties put the Devils on the man advantage.
The Bruins were able to kill that penalty, but they gave up a goal as soon as they got back to full strength.
Jack Hughes evened the score at the 16:09 mark with his 25th goal of the season. But it proved the last time the Devils would get within striking distance as the Bruins went on to put the game out of reach by rattling off seven unanswered goals.
Julian Benbow can be reached at julian.benbow@globe.com.
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PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey refused to say Thursday if transgender people actually exist, twice dodging direct questions on the subject just a day after he signed legislation limiting transgender rights.
The Republican worked instead to defend his signatures on bills that bar transgender girls and women from playing on girls high school and women's college sports teams and barring gender affirming surgery for anyone under age 18.
When specifically asked if he believed that there “are really transgender people,” the governor paused for several seconds before answering.
“I’m going to ask you to read the legislation and to see that the legislation that we passed was in the spirit of fairness to protect girls sports in competitive situations,” Ducey said, referring to the new law that targets transgender girls who want to play on girls sports teams. “That’s what the legislation is intended to do, and that’s what it does.”
Asked again if he believed there are “actual transgender people,” he again answered slowly and carefully.
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“I ... am going to respect everyone, and I’m going to respect everyone’s rights. And I’m going to protect female sports. And that’s what the legislation does,” Ducey said.
Ducey's response was “appalling,” according to the Arizona director of the Human Rights Campaign, a national civil rights group that advocates for equality for LGBTQ people. The organization worked to ensure families and transgender young people came to the Capitol to testify against the bills as the Republican-led House and Senate considered them this session.
“It's quite shocking that he can't even address trans people or even say that he thinks they exist,” Bridget Sharpe said.
Wednesday's signing of the two transgender bills and a third that bars abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy and is currently unconstitutional put Ducey right in the middle of two top issues national Republicans are highlighting in the runup to November's midterm elections.
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Ducey also signed election legislation that minority Democrats said amounted to voter suppression by requiring longtime Arizonans to be thrown off the voter rolls if they did not prove their citizenship and residence location.
The governor leads the Republican Governors Association, which is charged with helping elect GOP chief executives in U.S. states. He in is the last year of his second term as Arizona governor and term limits bar him from seeking reelection.
The top Democrat in the state House, Rep. Reginald Bolding, called Wednesday “probably one of the darkest days we've seen in the history of Arizona."
“With the stroke of a pen, Gov. Ducey has hurled Arizona backwards to its ugliest past,” Bolding said Wednesday. “And today, he put in jeopardy pregnant people, transgender youth in danger and curtailed voting rights for people of color.”
Social conservative groups and the Arizona Republican Party praised Ducey's action. The Center for Arizona Policy, whose president shepherded the abortion and women's sports bills through the Legislature, called it a victory.
"Thank you, Governor Ducey, for taking a bold stand for women athletes, vulnerable children, and the unborn by putting your signature on (the bills) in the face of intense opposition from activists," Center for Arizona Policy president Cathi Herrod said in a news release she posted on Twitter.
She said the legislation protects the unborn, ensures a level playing field for female athletes and shows that “Arizona will do everything it can to protect vulnerable children struggling with gender confusion” by enacting the surgery ban.
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Ducey said the surgery ban protects children from irreversible decisions.
“These are permanent surgeries of reassignment that are irreversible, and those discussions can happen once adulthood is reached,” he said.
The American Civil Liberties Association has vowed to sue over the surgery ban. U.S. Supreme Court precedent currently says women have a constitutional right to abortion until about 24 weeks of pregnancy, although it is considering whether to uphold a 15-week ban enacted in Mississippi and may overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision enshrining a woman's right to choose.
Arizona joins 13 other states in enacting laws preventing transgender girls and women from playing on girls teams. Utah Gov. Spencer Cox vetoed a transgender sports ban in his state, saying it would harm transgender girls, but the Legislature overrode the veto. Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb also vetoed a sports bill, but lawmakers hope to override his action as well.
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RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. — Jennifer Kupcho shared the lead Thursday in The Chevron Championship in her second — and last — start at Mission Hills, the tree-lined layout she has quickly fallen in love with.
“Honestly, I think it’s just being comfortable on this golf course,” Kupcho said. “I get here and I just, I feel comfortable. I love this place."
Kupcho shot a 6-under-par 66 in sunny and calm morning conditions to join fellow early starter Minjee Lee atop the leaderboard after the first round of the final edition of the major championship at Mission Hills.
“I really like the layout of this golf course, the beautiful shape that it’s in every year,” Kupcho said. “It always is so fun to be here, so just taking advantage of how much I like the course and the atmosphere.”
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Unable to find a sponsor willing to remain at Mission Hills, the tournament that started in 1972 as the Colgate-Dinah Shore Winner’s Circle and became a major in 1983 is shifting to Houston next year under a deal with Chevron.
“Definitely sad,” Carolina Masson said after a 68. “I understand why we’re doing it, but I’m just trying to soak in every second being out here. The golf course is playing as good as ever.”
Defending champion Patty Tavatanakit was a stroke back, finishing late in the afternoon in gusting wind.
“Really proud,” Tavatanakit said. “I feel like I really got my momentum going, was really present today.”
Kupcho birdied Nos. 11-14 to get to 8 under, then bogeyed the next two holes. She birdied four of the first five and finished with nine birdies and three bogeys.
“You really need to hit fairways on a major golf course, so that was like my biggest thing today, to hit a bunch of fairways,” Kupcho said. “That really set me up for all my birdies.”
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Winless on the LPGA Tour, Kupcho won the 2018 NCAA individual title for Wake Forest and took the inaugural Augusta National Women’s Amateur the following year after passing up a spot that week at Mission Hills.
The 24-year-old from Colorado arrived early in the desert after missing the cut Friday in Carlsbad. "I just used the two days that I did have on the weekend to come here and practice,” she said.
Lee birdied all four par 5s in a bogey-free round on the mountain-framed course.
“It was perfect,” Lee said. “Not like a breath of wind when we played. Maybe just a tiny bit. But conditions are great. Putting greens are rolling real nice. I don’t think you can get better than that.”
The 25-year-old Australian, ranked fourth in the world, won the Evian Championship last summer for her first major title and sixth LPGA Tour victory.
“I know I have one under my belt, but I do want a little bit more,” Lee said. “I just think I have a little bit more belief in myself and my game, so I can be a little bit more comfortable just hitting the shots."
Third-ranked Lydia Ko, the 2015 champion, was at 68 with Masson, Anna Nordqvist, Georgia Hall, Gabriela Ruffels, and Pajaree Anannarukarn. Lexi Thompson, the 2014 winner, was another stroke back with Sarah Schmelzel, Annie Park, Lauren Stephenson, Pauline Roussin-Bouchard and Hinako Shibuno.
Thompson marveled at course she first played as a 14-year-old amateur.
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“I’ve never seen it this good," Thompson said. “It always surprises me every year. It’s always better. The greens are amazing. I’m one to putt and usually aim at things along the way, and there is just not an imperfection on greens to aim at. It’s a good problem.”
Schmelzel is making her fourth appearance.
“This place is really special,” Schmelzel said. “I feel like growing up watching the LPGA Tour, these are holes that I remember. These are holes that I wanted to be on one day.”
Park played as a single in the first group in the afternoon off the first tee.
“It was kind of weird the first couple holes just playing by myself,” Park said. “It was really peaceful."
Top-ranked Jin Young Ko, the 2019 winner, shot a 74 to end her under-par streak at 34 rounds. Her run of at least one birdie ended at 53 rounds.
“I was hitting lots of great shots, but my putting wasn’t good,” she said. “I couldn’t see the break as much or speed. Everything was wrong."
Ally Ewing and Moriya Jutanugarn had an eventful finish on the par-5 18th when the sprinklers on the green turned on at about 6 p.m. as Ewing was preparing for a 4-foot birdie putt. After a short delay, she holed out for a 70.
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AUGUSTA, Ga. — Anna Davis was little more than a silhouette from right of the ninth green as darkness fell quickly at the end of a long day at the Augusta National Women’s Amateur. The only light came from a video board and headlights from carts making their way in.
Not the least bit rattled, the 16-year-old from San Diego pitched with perfect pace to 2 feet to save par and post a 4-over-par 76 at Champions Retreat, one of only nine players to finish the second round.
What started as lingering thunderstorms turned into a heavy rain that delayed the start of the second round for for seven-and-a-half hours. That led to what should be a longer day, but far more fun on Friday.
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Fifty-one players will finish the second round in the morning — some with only one hole to play, others with nine holes — before heading over to Augusta National for a practice round.
It starts with an elite competition. It ends for so many of them with a dream come true.
Of the nine players who finished, Davis was at 2-over 146 and in a tie for eighth, virtually assured of being among the 30 players from a field of 60 who advance to the final round at the home of the Masters.
No one was under par.
Beatrice Wallin of Sweden was 1 under for the round through 16 holes and even par for the tournament, tied with Amari Avery, who also was 1 under for the day through 16.
Joining them at even par was Hailey Borjas, the Californian who plays at Michigan. Her day ended on a sour note with consecutive bogeys. Even so, she was excited for Friday.
She was at Augusta National earlier in the week, driving down Magnolia Lane and having a group dinner hosted by the club chairman.
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“Seeing Augusta for the first time, it was like a dream come true,” Borjas said.
She was more excited about her first chance to play it than her position in the Augusta National Women's Amateur, in its third year but already considered elite among amateur events because of where it's at.
“I don't really like to think about golf when I'm playing golf, if that makes any sense," Borjas said. “I like to talk about other things, like shoes. So to think about Augusta National tomorrow will keep me going.”
US Women’s Amateur champion Jensen Castle had the best round going at 2 under through 16 holes, leaving her one shot out of the lead.
The course was just as difficult as the opening round, when strong wind allowed only five players to break par. The wind subsided after the rain, though it left the course soggy and longer, even as the greens were slightly more receptive.
Rose Zhang, the No. 1 amateur in the world, made progress by not really going anywhere. She put together one bogey and 13 pars and improved from a tie for 39th to a tie for 26th.
Rachel Heck of Stanford, the No. 3 player in women's amateur golf who won six times in one semester last year as a freshman, was going the other direction. Heck had a pair of double bogeys in her opening four holes and was 5 over through 10 holes, leaving her outside the projected cut line at 6 over.
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The cut is a hard 30. Any ties lead to a sudden-death playoff to see who advances, although everyone gets to play a practice round at Augusta National on Friday.
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SAN ANTONIO — Russell Knox recorded four straight birdies on the back nine and fired a 7-under-par 65 Thursday for a one-shot lead after the opening round of the Valero Texas Open.
Knox closed out his round with a seven-foot putt to save par at the par-5 18th at TPC San Antonio, and was one shot ahead of Rasmus Hojgaard.
Hojgaard fired a 66 despite a double bogey on his final hole. Matt Kuchar is another stroke back after an opening 5-under 67 and is among a group that includes Denny McCarthy, Aaron Rei and J.J. Spaun.
Defending champ Jordan Spieth and Rory McIlroy finished at even-par 72. They were outside the top 60 after one round and could flirt with the cut line Friday.
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Bryson DeChambeau had a 1-over 73. After holing a bunker shot for eagle on his 11th hole and following with a birdie on the next, he made bogey on four of his last six holes.
Knox, a 32-year-old Scotsman with two career PGA Tour wins, started his birdie streak at No. 12. All of his birdie putts were inside 10 feet. At the 15th, he was about 20 feet away from a back pin position following his approach and chipped in from the fringe. It was his second chip-in in the round.
“That was one of those kind of bonus birdies that you need when you’re going to have a good day,” Knox said. “Obviously thrilled with the round. It’s been more of the way I want to play.”
Hogjaard, a 21-year-old from Denmark and two-rime winner on the European Tour, had his sights on the first-round lead heading to his closing hole. But, his drive sailed well left of the fairway. It took him four shots to reach the green on the par-4 ninth.
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“I had to chip sideways back into the fairway,” he said. “Just was a little too aggressive after that. Yeah, short-sided myself and I didn’t get up and down and suddenly you walk away with double-bogey. Yeah, that was a bit annoying, but it happens.”
Kuchar was 5 under after 11 holes. Thirty feet away from the pin on the next hole, he failed to get up and down and missed a seven-foot putt for par. He got a shot back with a birdie on his 14th hole, and parred out, falling short in a bid to match his season-best round of 64 at the Sony Open, where he finished in the top 10.
“A lot of good and bad that can happen here on this course,” Kuchar said. “I was kind of managing early on in the round and then found a little something on about the fifth or sixth hole. I started having some birdie chances and converted on a few late in my first nine.”
Kuchar has won nine times on the PGA Tour. McCarthy, Rai and Spaun are looking for their first.
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Marc McLaughlin scored in his NHL debut with the Bruins Thursday night against the Devils.
With a little less than eight minutes left in the second period, McLaughlin took a pass from Trent Frederic on a two-on-one and beat goaltender Jon Gilles to make it 7-1, Boston.
McLaughlin’s family was in the stands, and the NESN cameras caught their wild celebration after the goal.
NHL Debut ✔️
— NESN (@NESN) April 1, 2022
First NHL goal ✔️
...Remember the name. pic.twitter.com/5IvlYVfSOs
Before the game, the Billerica native estimated he had more than 50 friends and family at the game.
The 22-year-old had 21 goals and 10 assists as Boston College’s captain this season, and is coming off a stint with the U.S. Olympic team in Beijing. He signed with the Bruins earlier this month at the end of his college campaign.
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Christopher Price can be reached at christopher.price@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter at cpriceglobe.
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GENEVA — The head of the United Nations said Thursday that nearly all Afghans don’t have enough to eat and some have resorted to “selling their children and their body parts” to get money for food.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres’ statement was part of a dramatic appeal from the world body and several rich countries that want to help beleaguered Afghans, whose fate has worsened since the Taliban returned to power last year.
Guterres kicked off a virtual pledging conference backed by Britain, Germany, and Qatar, seeking to make progress toward the UN aid office’s biggest-ever funding drive for a single country: $4.4 billion.
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It is a decidedly ambitious goal when much of the world’s attention is on Russia’s war in Ukraine, and some wealthy nations have frozen nearly $9 billion in Afghan assets overseas so the Taliban can’t access them.
In recent weeks, senior UN officials have made visits to Afghanistan, even meeting top Taliban officials to say the country has not been forgotten. With Afghanistan buckling beneath a debilitating humanitarian crisis and an economy in free fall, some 23 million people face acute food insecurity, according to the UN.
Guterres called on the world to “spare” Afghans who have had their rights stripped — like many women and girls — after the Taliban’s ouster of the country’s internationally backed government last summer. Rich nations have tried to put a financial squeeze on the Taliban in hopes of spurring desired reforms.
“Wealthy, powerful countries cannot ignore the consequences of their decisions on the most vulnerable,” the UN chief said. “Some 95 percent of people do not have enough to eat, and 9 million people are at risk of famine,” he added, citing UNICEF estimates that more than a million severely malnourished children “are on the verge of death without immediate action.”
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“Without immediate action we face a starvation and malnutrition crisis in Afghanistan,” he said. “People are already selling their children and their body parts in order to feed their families.”
In many parts of rural Afghanistan and among the country’s poorest, girls are often married off at puberty, sometimes earlier, and their families receive a dowry. Aid groups have documented a few cases of children being sold by desperate parents, but such practices are not believed to be widespread.
As the UN worked to secure pledges, British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said Britain will renew this year its 286 million pounds ($380 million) of support from 2021. Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock of Germany said her country had stepped up with 200 million euros ($220 million). Qatar said it had contributed $50 million in recent months, and pledged another $25 million for 2022.
Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the US ambassador to the United Nations, said the United States announced nearly $204 million in new humanitarian assistance funding to help Afghans.
“This humanitarian aid, like all aid from the United States, will go directly to NGOs and the United Nations,” Thomas-Greenfield said, referring to nongovernmental organizations. “The Taliban will not control our humanitarian funding.”
In a final tally, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA, said $2.4 billion was pledged Thursday from 41 countries. Because donors might elect to direct some of the money to help Afghan refugees in neighboring countries, not all the pledges count toward the $4.4 billion appeal for Afghanistan.
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Meanwhile, 11 US senators issued a joint statement urging the Biden administration to encourage international donors to step up to help fulfill the needs laid out by the UN. The senators, all Democrats, alluded to a number of humanitarian crises that are competing for funds and the world’s attention.
“Amid crises in Yemen, Ukraine, Ethiopia, Syria, and elsewhere, the international community must not lose focus on Afghanistan,” they wrote.
The complexities of helping Afghans while not rewarding the Taliban came into focus in Kabul on Thursday: Leaders of the militant group raised their largest white flag over Kabul’s historic Wazir Akbar Khan hill, with one leader all but taunting the US-led coalition’s forces that left the country for good last year.
“Because of the rule of this flag, because of the rule of the monotheistic word, thousands of brave sons of this nation placed the bombs in their chests (suicide vests) and drove the occupiers out of this homeland,” Abdul Salam Hanafi, deputy prime minister of the interim Taliban government, said.
Among the Taliban leadership, there are deep divisions, however, about the group's increasingly rigid rule. Pragmatists among them are seeking greater involvement with the international community and believe education and work for women and girls is a right in Islam.
Since a leadership meeting in the southern city of Kandahar in early March, Taliban hardliners have issued repressive edicts almost daily, harkening to their harsh rule of the late 1990s. The edicts have further alienated a wary international community and infuriated many Afghans.
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The decrees include a ban on women flying alone; a ban on women in parks on certain days; and a requirement that male workers wear a beard and the traditional turban. International media broadcasts like the BBC’s Persian and Pashto services have been banned, and foreign TV series have been taken off the air.
A surprising last-minute ban on girls returning to school after the sixth grade shocked the international community and many Afghans. In schools across the country, girls returned to classrooms on March 23 — the first day of the new Afghan school year — only to be sent home.
“It broke my -- I guess it broke everybody’s heart -- to see the images of these girls crying in front of their closed schools,” the Germany's Baerbock said. “The plight of girls is a dark illustration of the suffering of the Afghan people,” she added.
The situation for Afghans also has grown worse amid the worst drought in years, and skyrocketing prices for food caused by the fallout from Russia’s war in Ukraine, a key European breadbasket.
“Ukraine is of vital importance, but Afghanistan, you know, calls to our soul for commitment and loyalty,” Martin Griffiths, who heads OCHA, said ahead of Thursday’s pledge drive. “In simple terms, the humanitarian program that we are appealing for is to save lives.”
The amount of Thursday’s appeal for funds is three times what the UN aid agency sought for Afghanistan a year ago, a request that was exceeded once donors saw the needs that would have to be met after the Taliban takeover.
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Many donor countries are seeking to help beleaguered Afghans while largely shunning the Taliban — but the UN agency suggested that political and economic engagement from abroad should return one day, too.
“It’s very important for the international community to engage with the Taliban over time on issues beyond the humanitarian,” said Griffiths. “The humanitarian assistance is no replacement for other forms of engagement.”
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A female student at Haverhill High Schoolwas arrested Thursday after a fight broke out during lunchtime, police said.
School resource officers responded to a fight between two students at 11:30 a.m. and arrested a girl involved in the fight, Haverhill police said.
There were no injuries reported. Her name was not released because she is a juvenile.
“The situation is under control and students are safe,” Haverhill High School Principal Jason Meland said in a letter to parents posted on Facebook.
Classes continued as usual for the rest of the school day, but with restrictions in place, such as limited hall passes, Meland said.
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Any student found without a pass was brought to the school auditorium and their parent or guardian was called to take them home, the letter said.
No further information was available.
Madison Mercado can be reached at madison.mercado@globe.com.
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After going undefeated en route to a Merrimack Valley Conference title last spring, the Chelmsford boys’ lacrosse team turned the page with a new cast of characters, and kept up their winning ways in the MVC by topping visiting Andover, 9-5, in Thursday’s season opener.
“We have a young team,” Chelmsford coach Sean Wright said. “We have three seniors. We have a lot of talented players, but you don’t know until you get on the field. We got over the nerves in the beginning, and we didn’t close the way we wanted to, but we got the win.”
Andover struck first in the first quarter, but Chelmsford responded swiftly with Manny Marshall (4 goals, assist) scoring two goals in a span of 20 seconds and three goals total in the opening frame. Will Walsh added a pair of goals and an assist in the second quarter to give the Lions a 6-1 advantage heading into the break.
With junior captain Dan Craig out sick, junior Ryan Lally stepped up in his first varsity start along with juniors Jack McCarthy, Ryan Blagg, and sophomore Austin Nigro. Joe Tays made his first varsity start in net, tallying eight saves in the victory.
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“We were kind of sporting a new look on defense today and I’m really proud of the way they played,” Wright said.
Florian Kiernan scored a pair of goals as Andover rallied with three goals in the waning minutes, but Chelmsford hung on.
The Lions went 13-0 during the regular season last year and earn their first win over North Andover since the latter joined the MVC. Chelmsford ran through Andover in the preseason, beat the Warriors twice in the regular season and earned a 14-4 win over Andover in the D1 North quarterfinals. They’ve now won 15 straight regular-season games against conference foes.
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“These kids have been chomping at the bit, and obviously they’ve been playing a lot in the offseason,” Wright said. “We’ve been focusing on development, and finding out who are varsity team is going to be. It’s been a little chaotic getting it together, but whenever anyone can get a lacrosse stick in their hands and play it’s a good day.”
Weston 13, Arlington 3 — Senior midfielder Liam Falvey led the Wildcats (1-0) with 3 goals and 2 assists in the nonleague win.
Whitman-Hanson 7, Hull 6 — Three minutes into overtime, Collin Murphy beat his opponent on a dodge from behind the net, finding the back of the net and winning the season opener for the Panthers (1-0).
Girls’ lacrosse
Gloucester 16, Revere 2 — Zoe Hedges scored three goals, and Ella Costa (2 assists) added two more in the season-opening win for the Fishermen (1-0).
Sandwich 9, Scituate 8 — A solid outing from Claire Moniz (4 goals, 2 assists) helped the Blue Knights (1-0) win the closely-contested nonleague matchup. Ryann Cobban and Riley Morrison each added two goals for the visitors.
St. John Paul II 7, Nauset 5 — Hadley Crosby netted three goals and Flynn Kayajan blocked seven shots to power the Lions (1-0) to the Cape & Islands win.
Boys’ tennis
Whitman-Hanson 5, Middleborough 0 — Aidan Hickey (6-3, 6-3), Will Mulligan (6-0, 6-1), and Dan McDevitt (6-0, 6-4) each started the season with singles victories in the sweep for the Panthers (1-0)
Girls’ tennis
Winchester 5, Burlington 0 — Nora Dunn and Catie Kotwicki swept first doubles, 6-0, 6-0, for the visiting Red and Black in the Middlesex League win.
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Boys’ track
West Bridgewater 114, South Shore Voc-Tech 22 — Ben Fuller led the Wildcats (1-0), placing first in the triple jump and 100 meters, and second in the long jump. Tommy Perna also contributed to the Mayflower win by placing first in the long jump, 110-meter hurdles and high jump.
Girls’ track
West Bridgewater 103, South Shore Voc-Tech 14 — Aly Basset paced the Wildcats (1-0), placing first in the triple jump, 100 hurdles, 400 hurdles and 4x100 relay. Ella Dunbury also contributed to the Mayflower Athletic Conference win, taking first place in the 2-mile, 800, and 4x400 relay.
Boys’ volleyball
Greater Lawrence 3, North Middlesex 1 — Eddy Herrera (12 kills), Euri Nunez (14 service points, 6 aces) and Oscar Valoy (4 blocks) propelled the Reggies to victory in their season opener.
St. John’s Prep 3, Haverhill 1 — Dan Schorr’s 35 assists helped power the Eagles to a season-opening win at home.
Correspondents Sarah Barber, Ethan Fuller, Ethan McDowell, Vitoria Poejo, and AJ Traub contributed to this story. To report scores, call 617-929-2860/3235 or email hssports@globe.com. Tweet scores @GlobeSchools.
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CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Friday it will send armored Bushmaster vehicles to Ukraine after President Volodymyr Zelensky specifically asked for them during a video appeal to Australian lawmakers for more help in its war against Russia.
Zelenskyy addressed the Australian Parliament on Thursday and asked for the Australian-made, four-wheel-drive vehicles.
Morrison told reporters the vehicles will be flown over on Boeing C-17 Globemaster transport planes. He didn’t specify how many would be sent or when.
“We’re not just sending our prayers, we are sending our guns, we’re sending our munitions, we’re sending our humanitarian aid, we’re sending all of this, our body armor, all of these things and we’re going to be sending our armored vehicles, our Bushmasters, as well,” Morrison said.
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Zelenskyy has been tailoring his message to individual countries through video appeals like the one shown to legislators in the Australian Parliament. Lawmakers gave him standing ovation at the start and end of his 16-minute address.
Zelenskyy also called for tougher sanctions and for Russian vessels to be banned from international ports.
“We need more sanctions against Russia, powerful sanctions until they stop blackmailing other countries with their nuclear missiles,” Zelenskyy said through an interpreter.
Zelenskyy specifically asked for Bushmaster vehicles.
“You have very good armed personnel vehicles, Bushmasters, that could help Ukraine substantially, and other pieces of equipment,” Zelenskyy said.
While the Ukrainian capital Kyiv is 15,000 kilometers (9,300 miles) from the Australian capital Canberra, Zelenskyy said Australia was not safe from the conflict which threatened to escalate into a nuclear war.
He suggested that a Russian victory over Ukraine would embolden China to declare war on Taiwan.
“The most terrible thing is that if we don’t stop Russia now, if we don’t hold Russia accountable, then some other countries of the world who are looking forward to similar wars against their neighbors will decide that such things are possible for them as well,” Zelenskyy said.
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Zelenskyy also said Russia would not have invaded Ukraine if Moscow had been punished for the 2014 downing of a Malaysia Airlines plane in Ukraine.
Two weeks ago, the Australian and Dutch governments launched a legal case against Russia at the International Civil Aviation Organization to hold Moscow accountable for its alleged role in the missile strike that killed all 298 people on MH17. Of the victims, 196 were Dutch citizens and 38 were Australian residents.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison had earlier told the president that Australia would provide additional military assistance including tactical decoys, unmanned aerial and unmanned ground systems, rations and medical supplies. He later said the additional help would cost 25 million Australian dollars ($19 million).
“You have our prayers, but you also have our weapons, our humanitarian aid, our sanctions against those who seek to deny your freedom and you even have our coal,” Morrison said.
Australia has already promised or provided Ukraine with AU$91 million ($68 million) in military assistance, AU$65 million ($49 million) in humanitarian help and 70,000 metric tons (77,200 U.S. tons) of coal.
Earlier Thursday, the government announced Australia was imposing an additional 35% tariff on all imports from Russia and Belarus starting April 25.
Oil and energy imports from Russia will be banned from that date. Exports to Russia of Australian aluminum ore will also be banned.
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Sanctions have been imposed on more than 500 individuals and entities in Russia and Belarus. The sanctions cover 80% of the Russian banking sector and all government entities that handle Russian sovereign debt.
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Associated Press journalist Nick Perry contributed to this report from Wellington, New Zealand.
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When Eddie Mason died at age 88, he left behind a real stumper. Back in the 1950s, Mason served as the maintenance man for a lakeside retreat in Vermont, home at the time to a communal group of people who claimed to have a sixth sense.
For years after his death, Mason’s granddaughter held onto a trove of recordings he’d made during his time on the commune. He also kept scrupulous notes, intending at one point to write a biography of the group’s spiritual leader, an eccentric mystery man named H.X. Newhaven.
Not long ago Beth Mason contacted the British journalist Solomon Davies to ask for some help: Would he be willing to come to Vermont to assess the validity of the music Newhaven’s followers had recorded? They were primitive folk-and-country-based songs that sounded awfully familiar, bearing beloved titles — “Please Please Me,” “In My Life,” “All You Need Is Love.”
Fact is, no one had yet heard of the Beatles in 1958, when the New England soothsayers made their recordings. Teenagers John Lennon and Paul McCartney had just met in Liverpool; calling themselves the Quarrymen, it would be five years before they introduced themselves to the world as the Beatles.
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Steered by Davies, a music critic whose father was a renowned parapsychologist, Beatles fanatics can now listen for themselves and decide what they’re hearing. Beginning Friday, “The Music of the Beatles as Channeled in 1958 by the Echo Lake Home for the Potentially Clairvoyant” will be available at ESPeatles.com. The release includes Davies’s extensive liner notes, which tell the improbable story of Newhaven and his exploration of psychic phenomena.
It just so happens that the release coincides with April Fools’ Day, says Ryan H. Walsh, the Boston musician and author who “edited” Davies’s liner notes. In truth, the whole thing is an elaborate joke, a figment of Walsh’s imagination with input from his friend Robert M. Johanson, an actor and composer in New York City.
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“The Music of the Beatles” brings together several of Walsh’s most abiding interests, he says, from cultural arcana and the cult of personality to paranormal hoaxes.
“I sometimes feel like both a Mulder and a Scully trapped in one body,” Walsh says. “I both want to believe in something and then rip it apart.”
Years ago, Walsh and Johanson (who was then part of Walsh’s band the Stairs) created a parody called “The Lost Recordings of Dust Johnson,” which was designed to sound like old-timey music of the 1920s. Walsh stuffed copies of it into mail orders for the Stairs’ records. When a fan reached out a year or so ago to ask what had become of Dust Johnson, Walsh — the author of the instant classic “Astral Weeks: A Secret History of 1968,” a countercultural history of Boston — was inspired to conjure a new musical fiction.
“The Beatles are not just a band, they’re a myth,” he explains. “And you can play with a myth.”
Over the course of a long weekend, members of Walsh’s long-running band Hallelujah the Hills and various friends gathered in Charlestown to record their “clairvoyant” versions of some of the most beloved songs in the English language. Johanson improvised the charismatic character of Newhaven as a kind of collision between Joseph Smith, Philip Seymour Hoffman’s title role in “The Master,” and William Shatner’s absurd spoken-word renditions of classic pop songs.
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“My grandfather always told me I would be a preacher,” says Johanson, a founding member of New York’s Nature Theater of Oklahoma. “For a minute he gets to be right.” He modeled Newhaven’s lugubrious version of “Help!” after Roy Orbison’s real-life, slowed-down rendition of Lennon’s song.
Josh Kantor, best known as the Fenway Park organist, chipped in on accordion, and Walsh’s high school media studies teacher, Edward Morneau, dropped by to sing on a couple songs. More than 20 years ago, he’d turned his young student into a lifelong Beatles fanatic when he gave Walsh a cassette of lesser-known songs by the group.
According to the tall tale of the Potentially Clairvoyant, much of the Echo Lake recordings were made by amateurs. This gave the musicians a built-in excuse to flounder as much as they wanted. Just as the Beatles themselves do, Walsh notes, throughout “Get Back,” the celebrated, recently reworked footage of the band’s late-period studio sessions.
Watching the long documentary was a revelation, Walsh says.
“They taught each other new songs the same dumb way we do,” he says. “Even the best start out clumsy and flailing.” And you don’t have to be psychic to see it.
E-mail James Sullivan at jamesgsullivan@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @sullivanjames.
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Q. I met “Shari” through other friends. We got along well, and always had a great time. I thought we had an amazing bond. However, once the pandemic hit, I started to see a different side of her.
She is very anti-vaxx and has refused to acknowledge the seriousness of the pandemic. She has ramped up the anti-vaxx posts on social media.
I did send her a message about one post, stating that it wasn’t true, and she sent a tirade back at me, rehashing a number of points about COVID-19 and the vaccine that are all untrue.
I don’t make friends easily. I have serious trust issues, but I don’t see being able to maintain a friendship with someone who is so diametrically opposed to my values and views. I am willing to accept her being against vaccinations, but she is posting pure falsehoods, and is argumentative when called out with facts, stating that anyone who disagrees with her or counters her arguments is brainwashed by the government and media.
I keep thinking that once we get past the pandemic, maybe things will be better. I try not to bring it up, but when I see some of the posts, and when we are together with other friends, it comes up. I put my head down and keep quiet, but this is eating me up.
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My challenge is: How do I end the friendship? I am afraid to end it, as we are part of a group of friends, and if I need to pull my friendship away from her, I will lose those friends, who are my only friends right now.
But I wonder if being alone would be better than this.
STUCK
A. You see this as an “all or nothing” situation, where because of this person’s behavior, all of your other friendships are at risk, but she is not in charge of your other relationships. You are.
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You should completely disengage from her on social media. She is not reasonable and does not want to engage in an exchange of ideas, so remove your access to her on this platform. Quietly “hide,” “block,” or “unfriend.” Change the channel.
There is no need to abruptly end the friendship by declaring it to be over. You simply need to back away from the relationship. Detach from her.
Don’t gossip about her with others. If she asks you why you are distant, you can truthfully tell her that you’ve become exhausted by her declarations and tirades, which run counter to your own values.
Q. My mother-in-law is a smoker. Her own house is permeated with the smell of cigarettes. Even though I don’t like it, I can handle this when we’re visiting.
I know it is her house and she has the right to do what she wants when she’s at home, but I cannot stand it when she lights up at our place. We have a balcony, and I am fine with her smoking on the balcony if she wants to, but please, not in our townhouse.
My husband doesn’t want to say anything to her, but I do. Do you have any ideas?
PUFFED-OUT
A. Smoking anywhere indoors has become so rare that at this point it is almost taboo.
Many rental units and condo associations ban smoking, even inside units, because of the risks associated with secondhand smoke. You should check to see if there are any rules within your townhouse development, and if even smoking on a balcony is permitted (balconies are sometimes considered “common areas”).
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If smoking is banned inside units where you live, you should notify your mother-in-law. Otherwise, even if your husband won’t say anything to his mother, you should.
Keep your tone neutral, and simply say: “I hope you won’t mind standing outside to smoke.” If she says, “Why yes, I do mind,” you’ll have to say, “Well, smoke really bothers me, so I’d appreciate it if you could do that for me.”
Q. The writer signing her question “Just Say: Get Well Soon!” said she had shared the fact that she was getting surgery on Facebook, but she didn’t like the fact that one friend queried her about the details.
Thank you for pointing out the obvious: When you post personal news on social media, you don’t get to control how people respond!
AGGRAVATED
A. My own life without a personal Facebook presence (I maintain a professional page) has been a little less colorful, but a lot less aggravating.
Amy Dickinson can be reached at askamy@amydickinson.com.
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Today is Friday, April 1, the 91st day of 2022. There are 274 days left in the year. This is April Fool’s Day.
Birthdays: Actor Don Hastings is 88. Actor Ali MacGraw is 83. R&B singer Rudolph Isley is 83. Reggae singer Jimmy Cliff is 74. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito is 72. Rock musician Billy Currie (Ultravox) is 72. Actor Annette O’Toole is 70. Movie director Barry Sonnenfeld is 69. Singer Susan Boyle is 61. Actor Jose Zuniga is 60. Country singer Woody Lee is 54. Actor Jessica Collins is 51. Rapper-actor Method Man is 51. Movie directors Albert and Allen Hughes are 50. Political commentator Rachel Maddow is 49. Former tennis player Magdalena Maleeva is 47. Actor David Oyelowo is 46. Singer Bijou Phillips is 42. Comedian-actor Taran Killam is 40. Country singer Hillary Scott (Lady A) is 36. Rock drummer Arejay Hale (Halestorm) is 35. Actor Asa Butterfield is 25.
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In 1865, during the Civil War, Union forces routed Confederate soldiers in the Battle of Five Forks in Virginia.
In 1891, the Wrigley Co. was founded in Chicago by William Wrigley, Jr.
In 1924, Adolf Hitler was sentenced to five years in prison for his role in the Beer Hall Putsch in Munich. (Hitler was released in December 1924; during his time behind bars, he wrote his autobiographical screed, “Mein Kampf.”)
In 1945, American forces launched the amphibious invasion of Okinawa during World War II. (US forces succeeded in capturing the Japanese island on June 22.)
In 1970, President Richard M. Nixon signed a measure banning cigarette advertising on radio and television, to take effect after Jan. 1, 1971.
In 1972, the first Major League Baseball players’ strike began; it lasted 12 days. Twenty years later, on April 1, 1992, the National Hockey League Players’ Association went on its first-ever strike, which lasted 10 days.
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In 1975, with Khmer Rouge guerrillas closing in, Cambodian President Lon Nol resigned and fled into exile, spending the rest of his life in the United States.
In 1976, Apple Computer was founded by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne.
In 1977, the US Senate followed the example of the House of Representatives by adopting, 86-9, a stringent code of ethics requiring full financial disclosure and limits on outside income.
In 2003, American troops entered a hospital in Nasiriyah, Iraq, and rescued Army Private First Class Jessica Lynch, who had been held prisoner since her unit was ambushed on March 23.
In 2011, Afghans angry over the burning of a Quran at a small Florida church stormed a UN compound in northern Afghanistan, killing seven foreigners, including four Nepalese guards.
In 2012, a coalition of more than 70 partners, including the United States, pledged to send millions of dollars and communications equipment to Syria’s opposition groups. Myanmar’s democracy icon, Aung San Suu Kyi, was elected to her country’s parliament. Taylor Swift was named entertainer of the year for the second year in a row at the Academy of Country Music Awards.
In 2016, world leaders ended a nuclear security summit in Washington by declaring progress in safeguarding nuclear materials sought by terrorists and wayward nations, even as President Barack Obama acknowledged the task was far from finished.
In 2017, an avalanche of water from three overflowing rivers swept through a small city in Colombia, leaving more than 300 dead. Bob Dylan finally received his Nobel Literature diploma and medal during a small gathering in Stockholm, where he was performing a concert. Two-time NBA scoring champion Tracy McGrady, Kansas coach Bill Self, former Chicago Bulls executive Jerry Krause, and former UConn star Rebecca Lobo were among 11 people named to the Basketball Hall of Fame.
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In 2020, resisting calls to issue a national stay-at-home order, President Donald Trump said he wanted to give governors “flexibility” to respond to the coronavirus. Under growing pressure, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis joined his counterparts in more than 30 states in issuing a stay-at-home order.
Last year, in the opening day of the baseball season, the game between the Washington Nationals and the New York Mets was postponed after four Nationals players tested positive for COVID-19; the entire three-game series would be postponed a day later. Virginia’s highest court ruled that the city of Charlottesville could take down two statues of Confederate generals, including one of Robert E. Lee that became the focus of a violent white nationalist rally in 2017. Seven pro-democracy advocates in Hong Kong were convicted on charges of organizing and participating in massive anti-government protests. North Carolina said Hall of Fame basketball coach Roy Williams was retiring; the decision came two weeks after Williams closed his 18th season with the Tar Heels.
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KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian troops left the heavily contaminated Chernobyl nuclear site early Friday after returning control to the Ukrainians, authorities said, as eastern parts of the country braced for renewed attacks and Russians blocked another aid mission to the besieged port city of Mariupol.
Ukraine’s state power company, Energoatom, said the pullout at Chernobyl came after soldiers received “significant doses” of radiation from digging trenches in the forest in the exclusion zone around the closed plant. But there was no independent confirmation of that.
The exchange of control happened amid growing indications the Kremlin is using talk of de-escalation in Ukraine as cover to regroup, resupply its forces and redeploy them for a stepped-up offensive in the eastern part of the country.
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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that Russian withdrawals from the north and center of the country were just a military tactic to build up forces for new powerful attacks in the southeast. A new round of talks between the countries was scheduled Friday, five weeks into a conflict that has left thousands dead and driven 4 million Ukrainians from the country.
“We know their intentions,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address to the nation. “We know that they are moving away from those areas where we hit them in order to focus on other, very important ones where it may be difficult for us.”
“There will be battles ahead,” he added.
Meanwhile in Mariupol, Russian forces blocked a convoy of 45 buses attempting to evacuate people after the Russian military agreed to a limited cease-fire in the area. Only 631 people were able to get out of the city in private cars, according to the Ukrainian government.
Russian forces also seized 14 tons of food and medical supplies in a dozen buses that were trying to make it to Mariupol, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.
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The city has been the scene of some of the worst suffering of the war. Tens of thousands have managed to get out in the past few weeks by way of humanitarian corridors, reducing the population from a prewar 430,000 to an estimated 100,000 by last week, but other relief efforts have been thwarted by continued Russian attacks.
The International Atomic Energy Agency said it had been informed by Ukraine that the Russian forces at the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster had transferred control of it in writing to the Ukrainians. The last Russian troops left early Friday, the Ukrainian government agency responsible for the exclusion zone said.
Energoatom gave no details on the condition of the soldiers it said were exposed to radiation and did not say how many were affected. There was no immediate comment from the Kremlin, and the IAEA said it had not been able to confirm the reports of Russian troops receiving high doses. It said it was seeking more information.
Russian forces seized the Chernobyl site in the opening stages of the Feb. 24 invasion, raising fears that they would cause damage or disruption that could spread radiation. The workforce at the site oversees the safe storage of spent fuel rods and the concrete-entombed ruins of the reactor that exploded in 1986.
Edwin Lyman, a nuclear expert with the U.S.-based Union of Concerned Scientists, said it “seems unlikely” a large number of troops would develop severe radiation illness, but it was impossible to know for sure without more details.
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He said contaminated material was probably buried or covered with new topsoil during the cleanup of Chernobyl, and some soldiers may have been exposed to a “hot spot” of radiation while digging. Others may have assumed they were at risk too, he said.
Early this week, the Russians said they would significantly scale back military operations in areas around Kyiv and the northern city of Chernihiv to increase trust between the two sides and help negotiations along.
But in the Kyiv suburbs, regional governor Oleksandr Palviuk said on social media Thursday that Russian forces shelled Irpin and Makariv and that there were battles around Hostomel. Ukrainian forces counterattacked and some Russian withdrawals around the suburb of Brovary to the east, Pavliuk said.
At a Ukrainian military checkpoint outside Kyiv, soldiers and officers said they don’t believe Russian forces have given up on the capital.
“What does it mean, significantly scaling down combat actions in the Kyiv and Chernihiv areas?” asked Brig. Gen. Valeriy Embakov. “Does it mean there will be 100 missiles instead of 200 missiles launched on Kyiv or something else?”
Chernihiv came under attack as well. At least one person was killed and four were wounded in the Russian shelling of a humanitarian convoy of buses sent to Chernihiv to evacuate residents cut off from food, water and other supplies, said Ukrainian Human Rights Commissioner Lyudmyla Denisova.
Elsewhere, Ukraine reported Russian artillery barrages in and around the northeastern city of Kharkiv.
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Ukraine’s emergency services also said the death toll had risen to 20 in a Russian missile strike Tuesday on a government administration building in the southern city of Mykolaiv.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said intelligence indicates Russia is not scaling back its military operations in Ukraine but is instead trying to regroup, resupply its forces and reinforce its offensive in the Donbas.
“Russia has repeatedly lied about its intentions,” Stoltenberg said. At the same time, he said, pressure is being kept up on Kyiv and other cities, and “we can expect additional offensive actions bringing even more suffering.”
The Donbas is the predominantly Russian-speaking industrial region where Moscow-backed separatists have been battling Ukrainian forces since 2014. In the past few days, the Kremlin, in a seeming shift in its war aims, said that its “main goal” now is gaining control of the Donbas, which consists of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, including Mariupol.
The top rebel leader in Donetsk, Denis Pushilin, issued an order to set up a rival city government for Mariupol, according to Russian state news agencies, in a sign of Russian intent to hold and administer the city.
With talks set to resume between Ukraine and Russia via video, there seemed little faith that the two sides would resolve the conflict any time soon.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said that conditions weren’t yet “ripe” for a cease-fire and that he wasn’t ready for a meeting with Zelenskyy until negotiators do more work, Italian Premier Mario Draghi said after a telephone conversation with the Russian leader.
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As Western officials search for clues about what Russia’s next move might be, a top British intelligence official said demoralized Russian soldiers in Ukraine are refusing to carry out orders and sabotaging their equipment and had accidentally shot down their own aircraft.
U.S. intelligence officials have concluded that Putin is being misinformed by his advisers about how badly the war is going because they are afraid to tell him the truth.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the U.S. is wrong and that “neither the State Department nor the Pentagon possesses the real information about what is happening in the Kremlin.”
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Karmanau reported from Lviv, Ukraine. Associated Press journalists around the world contributed to this report.
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WASHINGTON (AP) — The House has passed a bill capping the monthly cost of insulin at $35 for insured patients, part of an election-year push by Democrats for price curbs on prescription drugs at a time of rising inflation.
Experts say the legislation, which passed 232-193 Thursday, would provide significant relief for privately insured patients with skimpier plans and for Medicare enrollees facing rising out-of-pocket costs for their insulin. Some could save hundreds of dollars annually, and all insured patients would get the benefit of predictable monthly costs for insulin. The bill would not help the uninsured.
But the Affordable Insulin Now Act will serve as a political vehicle to rally Democrats and force Republicans who oppose it into uncomfortable votes ahead of the midterms. For the legislation to pass Congress, 10 Republican senators would have to vote in favor. Democrats acknowledge they don't have an answer for how that's going to happen.
“If 10 Republicans stand between the American people being able to get access to affordable insulin, that's a good question for 10 Republicans to answer,” said Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Mich., a cosponsor of the House bill. “Republicans get diabetes, too. Republicans die from diabetes.”
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Public opinion polls have consistently shown support across party lines for congressional action to limit drug costs.
But Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., complained the legislation is only “a small piece of a larger package around government price controls for prescription drugs." Critics say the bill would raise premiums and fails to target pharmaceutical middlemen seen as contributing to high list prices for insulin.
Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said Democrats could have a deal on prescription drugs if they drop their bid to authorize Medicare to negotiate prices. “Do Democrats really want to help seniors, or would they rather have the campaign issue?" Grassley said.
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The insulin bill, which would take effect in 2023, represents just one provision of a much broader prescription drug package in President Joe Biden's social and climate legislation.
In addition to a similar $35 cap on insulin, the Biden bill would authorize Medicare to negotiate prices for a range of drugs, including insulin. It would penalize drugmakers who raise prices faster than inflation and overhaul the Medicare prescription drug benefit to limit out-of-pocket costs for enrollees.
Biden's agenda passed the House only to stall in the Senate because Democrats could not reach consensus. Party leaders haven't abandoned hope of getting the legislation moving again, and preserving its drug pricing curbs largely intact.
The idea of a $35 monthly cost cap for insulin actually has a bipartisan pedigree. The Trump administration had created a voluntary option for Medicare enrollees to get insulin for $35, and the Biden administration continued it.
In the Senate, Republican Susan Collins of Maine and Democrat Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire are working on a bipartisan insulin bill. Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock has introduced legislation similar to the House bill, with the support of Sen. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York.
Stung by criticism that Biden's economic policies spur inflation, Democrats are redoubling efforts to show how they'd help people cope with costs. On Thursday, the Commerce Department reported a key inflation gauge jumped 6.4% in February compared with a year ago, the largest year-over-year rise since January 1982.
But experts say the House bill would not help uninsured people, who face the highest out-of-pocket costs for insulin. Also, people with diabetes often take other medications as well as insulin. That's done to treat the diabetes itself, along with other serious health conditions often associated with the disease. The House legislation would not help with those costs, either. Collins says she's looking for a way to help uninsured people through her bill.
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About 37 million Americans have diabetes, and an estimated 6 million to 7 million use insulin to keep their blood sugars under control. It’s an old drug, refined and improved over the years, that has seen relentless price increases.
Steep list prices don't reflect the rates insurance plans negotiate with manufacturers. But those list prices are used to calculate cost-sharing amounts that patients owe. Patients who can’t afford their insulin reduce or skip doses, a strategy born of desperation, which can lead to serious complications and even death.
Economist Sherry Glied of New York University said the market for insulin is a “total disaster” for many patients, particularly those with skimpy insurance plans or no insurance.
“This will make private insurance for people with diabetes a much more attractive proposition,” said Glied.
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As Moscow’s forces bog down in Ukraine, many young Russians of draft age are increasingly jittery about the prospect of being sent into combat. Making those fears particularly acute is an annual spring conscription that begins Friday and aims to round up 134,500 men for a one-year tour of military duty.
Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu pledged at a meeting of the military brass this week that the new recruits won't be sent to front lines or “hot spots.”
But the statement was met with skepticism by many in Russia who remember the separatist wars in the southern republic of Chechnya in the 1990s and early 2000s, when thousands of poorly trained young men were killed.
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“I don't trust them when they say they won't send conscripts into combat. They lie all the time,” said Vladislav, a 22-year-old who is completing his studies and fears he could face the draft immediately after graduation. He asked that his last name not be used, fearing reprisals.
All Russian men aged 18-27 must serve one year in the military, but a large share avoid the draft for health reasons or deferments granted to university students. The share of men who avoid the draft is particularly big in Moscow and other major cities.
Even as President Vladimir Putin and his officials say that conscripts aren’t involved in what Russian authorities call “the special military operation in Ukraine,” many appeared to have been taken prisoner during its initial days. Videos emerged from Ukraine of captured Russians, some being shown calling their parents, and were put on social media.
The mother of one of the prisoners said she recognized her 20-year-old draftee son in a video even though he was shown blindfolded.
“I recognized him by his lips, by his chin. You know, I would have recognized him by his fingers,” said the woman, who asked to be identified only by her first name, Lyubov, for security reasons. "I breastfed him. I raised him.”
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The Defense Ministry was forced to walk back its statements and acknowledge that some conscripts were sent to Ukraine “by mistake” and were taken prisoner while serving with a supply unit away from the front.
There have been allegations that before the invasion, some conscripts were forced to sign military contracts that allowed them to be sent into combat — duty that is normally reserved only for volunteers in the army. Some of the captured soldiers said they were told by their commanding officers that they were going to a military exercise but suddenly found themselves fighting in Ukraine.
Lyudmila Narusova, a member of the upper house of the Russian parliament, spoke in early March about an entire company of 100 men who were forced to sign such contracts and were sent into the combat zone — and only four survived. Military officials did not comment on her allegation.
Svetlana Agapitova, the human rights commissioner in St. Petersburg, said Wednesday that relatives of seven soldiers had written to her to complain the men had been forced to sign the contract and sent to Ukraine against their will. She said two of them already had been brought back to Russia.
In recent years, the Kremlin has emphasized increasing the share of volunteer contract soldiers as it sought to modernize the army and improve its readiness. The force of 1 million now has over 400,000 contract soldiers, including 147,000 in the infantry. If the war drags on, those numbers could be insufficient to sustain the operations.
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The Kremlin could eventually face a choice: Keep fighting with a limited number of troops and see the offensive stall, or try to replenish the ranks with a broader draft and risk public outrage that could fuel anti-draft sentiment and destabilize the political situation. Such a scenario occurred during the fighting in Chechnya.
Dmitry, a 25-year-old IT expert, has a deferment that should keep him out of the draft for medical reasons. But he's still nervous like many others, fearing authorities could abruptly waive some deferments to bolster the military.
“I hate the war. I think it's a total disaster,” said Dmitry, who also asked that he not be identified by has last name, fearing reprisals. “I fear that the government could change the rules and I could face the draft. They also were saying for months that they wouldn’t attack Ukraine, so why should I trust what they say about the draft now?”
Proposed legislation would facilitate the draft by allowing military recruiters to call up conscripts more easily, but the bill has been put on hold for now.
Still, it added to the public’s anxiety.
Alexei Tabalov, a lawyer who advises conscripts, said medical panels at recruitment offices often admit youths who should be exempt from service because of illness. Now, he added, their attitudes could grow even tougher.
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“It's quite probable that doctors may shut their eyes to conscripts' illnesses and declare them fit for military duty,” Tabalov said.
In addition to lowering the medical standard for draftees, there are fears that the government could try to impose some sort of martial law that would ban Russian men from leaving the country and, like Ukraine, force them to fight.
“We have received a lot of calls from people fearing mobilization,” Tabalov said. “People now are afraid of everything in this situation. No one even thought before about the need to analyze the law on mobilization.”
The Kremlin has strongly denied any such plans, and military officials insist the army has enough contract soldiers to serve in Ukraine. Still, many Russians remain skeptical of the officials' denials, given their track record.
“What kind of trust could there be if Putin says one day that conscripts will not be sent there ... and then the Defense Ministry recognizes that they were there?” Tabalov asked.
An existing law allows for a 21-month alternative civil service in hospitals, nursing homes and other facilities for those who view military duty as incompatible with their beliefs, but military conscription offices often broadly ignore requests for such service.
After the war began, Tabalov said his group saw a large increase in inquiries about the alternative service law, which is vaguely phrased and allows military officials to easily turn down applications.
“We are worried that in the current militarist mood, military conscription offices can take a tougher attitude and reject appeals for the alternative civil service,” he said.
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Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
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The article “School violence fuels debate about bringing police back” (Page A1, March 24) reveals that 795 incidents in schools this year led to a police response, as compared with 951 for the COVID-19-abbreviated 2019-20 school year. The article also reports that there were more than 4,000 incidents in schools, but then clarifies that they can range from cutting class to talking back, indiscretions police are not allowed to address under Massachusetts law.
The “emotional and mental health challenges causing teenagers to act out at school” have unfortunately inspired a call to bring back police, bringing punitive rather than therapeutic responses to trauma endured by students and communities most harmed by the pandemic. This, despite peer-reviewed research showing that police are an ineffective solution that does nothing to address the underlying needs of these youth.
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Boston Public Schools eliminated police as part of an attempt to roll back the criminalization of youth that erupted in the 1990s. That era of bad policy was fed by sensationalist headlines and selective truths that spoke to deep biases. Let’s not go back there.
Leon Smith
Executive director
Citizens for Juvenile Justice
Boston
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When I open my Globe every morning, I head immediately to Page One — not to get the latest news (I’ll read that later), but to find the tiny weather information feature at the bottom. I’m not particularly interested in the forecast; I just want to see the overline, that two- or three-word phrase that can make me laugh out loud or, at the very least, lift my spirit if I’m feeling grouchy. Kudos to the geniuses who come up with these wonderful puns and bits of wordplay. Reading them is a delightful way to start my day.
Lee Leffingwell
Hingham
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For cancer survivor, Medicare was not just good, it was a lifesaver
When I read the headline of Abdallah Fayyad’s March 21 op-ed — “Does anyone actually like their health care plan?” — I enthusiastically raised my hand to answer yes. I am a breast cancer survivor of more than 10 years, and the reason that I can write to you today is that I was on Medicare when my cancers were diagnosed.
Medicare had paid for my annual mammograms and MRIs, for my surgeon, and for the whole oncology staff who supported me and who continue to monitor my health. Had my cancers developed several years earlier, when I wouldn’t have been able to afford a mammogram or MRI, my cancers would have grown undetected and could eventually have killed me.
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I thank my congressman, Bill Keating, and lawmakers on the Cape for their support of both national and statewide versions of universal health care. Health insurance is not what is important. What matters is the “care” in Medicare for All, or universal health care.
I hope that Fayyad will investigate pending legislation in Congress and on Beacon Hill and write another op-ed informing us of the benefits of a health care system that covers us all.
Betsy Smith
Brewster
Clash over cost vs. access is a distraction — health benefits should focus on value
The fundamental question we need to ask is whether the benefit offering is aligned with and truly providing value to all stakeholders in the continuum — patients, providers, and employers.
Our health care policy conversations have continually zeroed in on a choice between cost and access. While this dichotomy has been propagated by insurers, employers have been forced to buy into it, and it has been easy for our government (either party) to embrace it. This flawed dichotomy has improved neither costs nor health outcomes, while creating a weak experience for the end consumer. We need to get past this dichotomy and drive a health care benefits conversation based on value.
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Consumer research over the years has given us a recipe for making it better: comprehensive coverage for core wellness and preventive care services; solid handling of catastrophic coverage needs, to ensure that health care doesn’t drive bankruptcy; and competent handling of everything in between.
We need to focus on simplifying the system. Employers, who pick up about 80 percent of the costs for commercial health insurance premiums in the country, need to be more vocal about this.
Karthik Ganesh
CEO
EmpiRx Health
Montvale, N.J.
EmpiRx Health specializes in pharmacy benefit management.
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If any language association offers an award for Sentence of the Year, I would like to nominate one that appeared in Renée Graham’s “As Republicans flailed, Ketanji Brown Jackson never flinched” (Ideas, March 27). Graham noted that “Jackson spent more than 24 hours over three days being roasted by mediocre people whose whiteness has been their greatest asset.” Here is a perfect and perfectly concise summation of the Republican senators and their interrogation of Judge Jackson.
How topsy-turvy is our world when the least qualified get to rate the best merely on the basis of skin color.
LeRoy Mottla
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Peaks Island, Maine
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/04/01/world/ukraine-top-agenda-china-eu-prepare-meet-summit/
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BEIJING (AP) — The European Union will seek China’s assurances that it won’t assist Russia in circumventing economic sanctions leveled over the invasion of Ukraine at an annual summit Friday.
EU officials say they will also look for signs Beijing is willing to cooperate on bringing an end to the war at the virtual meeting.
Other topics include China’s travel ban on members of the European Parliament, Beijing’s economic boycott of EU member Lithuania over its Taiwan relations, the fate of a stalled investment agreement and civil and political rights under China’s authoritarian Communist Party regime.
The summit takes place amid sharply rising negative sentiment toward China within the bloc, fueled by China's increasingly aggressive foreign policies and trade practices.
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Beijing has dismissed European criticisms as biased and driven by an anti-China agenda being pursued by its chief global rival, the United States.
The war in Ukraine has thrown those differences into stark relief, with the EU rallying to the Ukrainian cause and China refusing to condemn Russia, while repeating Russian disinformation about the war and criticizing punishing economic sanctions brought against Moscow.
“We are looking for assurances that China has no intention of providing an economic lifeline or other support to Russia during this war,” an EU official told reporters Thursday, speaking on customary condition of anonymity in line with government rules.
Underlying the EU's expectations for China is the possibility of penalties against Chinese companies that undermine measures taken against Russia. EU officials point out that 13.7% of China’s total trade is done with the 27-nation bloc, and 12% with the United States, compared to just 2.4% with Russia.
Officials said they also wish to emphasize the impact the war is having on the availability of fertilizer and global energy and food prices, which are hitting the poorest countries in Africa and the Middle East hardest.
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European Council President Charles Michel, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell will first meet with Chinese officials led by Premier Li Keqiang, then later with President and Communist Party leader Xi Jinping.
The EU also plans to raise China’s trade spat with Lithuania sparked by Baltic state’s decision to allow Taiwan to open an unofficial representative office in its capital, Vilnius, under the name “Taiwan." China considers the self-governing island republic part of its territory with no right to independent foreign relations and has frozen trade with Lithuania in retaliation.
Beijing also sanctioned some European Union lawmakers last year after the EU, Britain, Canada and the United States launched coordinated sanctions against officials in China over human rights abuses in the far western Xinjiang region.
The European Parliament responded by saying it will not ratify a long-awaited business investment deal as long as the sanctions remain in place.
Rights groups have also urged the EU to take a more assertive stand with China over repression in Xinjiang, Tibet, Hong Kong and elsewhere and the persecution of Chinese dissidents including Sakharov Prize winner Ilham Tohti and Chinese-Swedish publisher Gui Minhai.
“The EU's foreign policy chief has pointed with alarm to the Chinese government's ‘revisionist campaign' against universal human rights and institutions," Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch said in a news release.
“Brussels should revise its approach to match the magnitude of that threat,” Richardson said.
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/04/01/opinion/12-aca-is-alive-well-getting-steadily-better/
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The Affordable Care Act has now turned 12 — and despite years of determined Republican opposition, the law they dubbed Obamacare is on increasingly firm ground. Designed to increase the number of Americans covered by health insurance and to improve the quality of that insurance, that’s just what the law has done. A record number of people, some 13.6 million, have signed up for health coverage for 2022 on the insurance exchanges set up under the 2010 law. About 92 percent of those purchasers will receive tax credits to help them afford their plans.
That success shows, in part, the importance of a concerted effort to make the complicated law work. The Biden administration has expanded public-information ads about the ACA, bolstered efforts to help people navigate the law, extended the regular open enrollment period, and offered a special pandemic enrollment opportunity. The administration has also reversed the Trump administration’s approval of state work requirements, which were a way of keeping otherwise qualified people from using the ACA’s expanded Medicaid coverage.
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Further, the Biden team is about to issue a rule that will increase the number of families who can acquire tax-credit-subsidized care by fixing what’s known as the “family glitch.” Under the ACA, if a person has access to affordable health coverage offered by his or her employer, he or she can’t decline that coverage in favor of using the ACA exchanges. The threshold for judging affordability is that an individual’s premiums for such a plan must not consume more than 9.6 percent of total household income.
The way the law has been interpreted, that’s so even if the would-be purchaser is trying to buy a family plan and the employer-offered family plans are excessively expensive.
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That counterintuitive interpretation emanated from the IRS during the Obama years. The administration is finalizing a new regulation more in keeping with the intent of the law. To wit, that if an employer-offered family plan is deemed too costly, an individual can qualify to buy one on the insurance exchanges, even if the workplace-offered individual plan meets the affordability ceiling.
That seemingly small change would open affordable coverage to millions more. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit with deep health care expertise, another 5.1 million individuals would receive affordable coverage, most of them children or women. Kaiser estimates that some 4.4 million, or about 85 percent, of that group are currently covered, but under plans that cost the purchaser more than 10 percent of his or her income. According to the foundation’s estimates, more than 100,000 Massachusetts residents fall into that gap.
There is, however, much more that could be done to bolster the ACA. One such action would be to make permanent, or pass a longer-term extension of, the enhanced ACA tax-credit subsidies provided on a temporary basis as part of the American Rescue Plan, the administration’s major pandemic relief effort. That extra help expires at the end of this year. Democrats had hoped to extend those subsidies through their Build Back Better legislation, but that bill is currently stalled in the Senate.
The cost there isn’t insignificant, but neither is it staggering. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated the expense of keeping the higher subsidies at $22 billion a year. For another $18 billion annually, we could close the coverage gap in the 12 states that haven’t chosen to offer expanded Medicaid, as authorized and largely paid for by the ACA.
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“There is no opposition among Democrats over the idea of extending the extra ACA premium help,” noted Larry Levitt, executive vice president for health policy at Kaiser. “If there is a legislative train this year, the extended ACA subsidies will be on it.”
Those added subsidies have made a significant difference for consumers. Kaiser previously estimated the average savings at about $70 per month for those who buy coverage on the exchanges. The Biden administration’s more recent comparable estimate is $59.
Because that change is budget-reconciliation eligible, it can pass with 51 Senate votes, which means Democrats command the numbers to do it themselves.
The problem: If the fractious party can’t come together on some sort of domestic agenda, there won’t be a vehicle for those subsidies to pass. That’s all the more reason for the party’s moderate and progressive wings to come together around a domestic package that can pass.
Editorials represent the views of the Boston Globe Editorial Board. Follow us on Twitter at @GlobeOpinion.
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If you’ve Googled anything related to the ketogenic diet, preparing your student for college, medical billing for health care providers, cloud computing for small businesses, or how the industrial Internet of things affects farming — among a dozen other topics — there’s a solid chance you’ve read my work.
I’d like to tell you it’s because I’m a fine writer with a wide array of interests. But the real reason I have hundreds of thousands of readers a month is search engine optimization. SEO is a series of strategies for ranking higher in all search engines, especially Google, which captures around 86 percent of all Internet searches. I spend my days writing optimized blog articles that feature short paragraphs and less sophisticated wording — proven SEO winners — to help my clients appear at the top of search results.
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I had no clue what SEO was when I was hired by a Silicon Valley health startup in 2018. But it wasn’t long before I understood the value of ranking higher in search engines.
Approximately 75 percent of clicks go to the top three results on search engines. To put that into context, I run a college-student tips website with one of the top-ranking articles for the question “How much do college students spend on food?” In 2019, my article was the number one search result for that query. That year, 35,339 people read it. In 2021, my article dropped to the bottom of page one, where it hovered between spots eight and 10. The page received only 8,470 views last year, a 76 percent decline.
If I sold a product or service through my website, dropping even eight spots on Google would have lost me 26,869 potential new customers. I’ve seen search engine updates affect a company’s search rankings so much that they effectively destroyed a five-figure monthly online business overnight.
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Today, more businesses than ever before rely heavily on SEO to get their products in front of new eyes. Because it’s viewed as a long-term growth strategy, companies are investing more resources than ever in SEO. Here’s why this is troubling: Companies that have access to expensive SEO artificial intelligence tools and the funds to pay freelance writers often outcompete true experts who lack such resources. It’s a numbers game: The more an entity is willing to spend, the greater the likelihood that its information — accurate or not — ends up at the top of search engines. Ask yourself: How often do you look for the answer you seek on the second page — or even the bottom of the first page — of search results?
Access to the top of page one on Google, like life in many of America’s cities, is becoming less affordable every day.
The artifice of SEO
Being an SEO writer is an exercise in imagination. I’m a city dweller who’s never owned a home, yet I pay my rent by writing home improvement articles. I once wrote a Christian book review right after writing about language hacks that men can use to pick up women. I’m a former physical education teacher with expired personal training credentials, yet from 2018 to 2021, I wrote hundreds of health articles.
When clients ask me to conduct research before writing an article, the instructions are usually pretty simple: “See what the top articles are doing, and do it better.”
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“Better,” I’ve come to understand, doesn’t mean more factual or presented with more compelling statistics. The client wants me to reiterate what the top-ranking websites have already said. By peppering in terms related to the topic that people might search for, it’s not hard to make poached words sound like my own.
I try in earnest to create original, well-sourced content. Yet I’d be silly not to cherry- pick ideas from pages that, according to Google, are winning the rankings game. I’m not paid to write beautiful prose; I’m paid to grab eyeballs.
But for freelancers working for SEO content farms who churn out a dozen or more articles per day, the research standards are far lower. It’s about a paycheck. A Google spokesperson told me that the search engine identifies and penalizes spam and scraped content, but I regularly spot reshuffled sentences, if not outright plagiarism, on the first page of Google search results.
Recently, I attended an SEO Lunch and Learn Zoom call for a marketing agency I write for. Showing us the back end of the agency’s Google Analytics page, the marketing director clicked on a company whose website was getting about 100,000 monthly views.
“This article receives about 20,000 clicks each month,” he boasted of a piece written by a freelancer but bearing the CEO’s byline.
“[He] doesn’t even know his company has a blog,” the marketing director said, referring to the CEO and laughing.
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This is another thing about SEO. Companies get a great return on their investment by paying an unknown freelancer to write a piece that the CEO’s name will go on.
“Author authority is good for SEO,” you’ll hear. But if that blog has 100,000 monthly readers and the CEO hasn’t written any of its content, is that really author authority? What if everyone did it that way?
The thing is, many companies do.
To sum up the game of SEO-upmanship: Freelance writers, cheaper than actual experts, get paid to write things that are way out of their wheelhouse. If they follow basic SEO principles, their articles — especially ones bearing the name of someone well known — can rank high in search engines.
The kicker is that the reason people invest in SEO in the first place — to get new visitors and potential customers to their website — may soon be gone. Consider Google’s content-snippet feature that previews answers and the FAQ accordion box that pops up before the first search result. With each of these tools, Google tries to answer your question before you even have to click on any of the search results.
If you find the answer to your question without ever leaving Google, the companies paying for SEO-optimized content lose money. Once the information middleman, Google is morphing into an information landing page. This is one reason you often have to scroll through so many ads before you get to the information you’re looking for. Google’s revenue from search-related advertising was $149 billion in 2021.
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A cog in the SEO machine
For some time I haven’t felt great about the work I’m doing. I may spend my workday writing, but I’m not writing for artistic expression. I’m marketing my words to a search engine. In that sense, I’m more of a literary salesman than a writer, using industry-standard sentence structure and similar tactics to sell Google’s algorithm on my product.
In addition to the spread of low-quality, zero-accountability information online, I wonder if SEO harms us in other, subtler ways. It’s entirely possible that the mental health crisis in America is being exacerbated by our efforts to fix complex life problems with “Seven Simple Steps” how-to articles. Even though a lot of us know these bullet-pointed formats are superficial, they’re great for SEO.
I used to think of Google as the information superhighway — an unbiased resource where you could go to find the best answers to your questions, ranked in terms of quality. This is not to say that Google turns a blind eye; the spokesperson said that the company believes it’s cut in half the number of “irrelevant results” on searches over the past seven years. Even so, I have come to believe that Google’s primacy as the default search engine comes at the expense of quality information.
Something happened recently that put a finer point on that concern.
While eating lunch, I found myself wondering about something. Like most of us do, I Googled it. I clicked the top result and read the majority of the article, only to be completely shocked when I reached the bottom of the page and saw the image in the author box.
It was a picture of my face. The article said “Written by Ben Kissam.”
I’ve written so many articles on topics I’m not qualified to write about that I accidentally learned something from an article I wrote.
Ben Kissam is a writer and stand-up comedian in Denver. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram @benkissam.
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It has not gone unnoticed that the National Council of Teachers of English decided to suspend its annual Doublespeak award earlier this year. Previous winners of this coveted condemnation of circumlocutional crudescence included Kellyanne Conway, for coining the term “alternative facts”; Rudy Giuliani, for his assertion that “truth isn’t truth”; and numerous other miscreants stretching back in time.
Doublespeak traces its roots to two of George Orwell’s coinages in the novel “1984″: “doublethink” (“to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies”) and “Newspeak” (e.g., “prolefeed” for popular culture).
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Since the publication of “1984″ over 70 years ago, we have become inured to the fabric of lies and evasions embedded in everyday discourse. A tax increase is a “revenue enhancement,” a brutal invasion of a sovereign nation becomes a “special military operation,” and so on.
How sad that the NCTE awards are on hiatus, because so many worthy contenders are vying for attention:
▪ American corporations can be always relied on to provide excellent material for the Doublespeak bulletin board. IBM came up with a particularly strong entry this year, when the company used the word “dinobabies,” for unwanted older workers who they hoped would become “extinct” after “the company fired tens of thousands of workers over 40 years old,” according to Business Insider.
IBM’s unfortunate e-mails, revealed in the course of an age discrimination suit, also referred to Big Blue’s “dated maternal workforce” — apparently older women — who “really don’t understand social [media] or engagement. Not digital natives. A real threat for us.”
In official statements, the company said it “never engaged in systemic age discrimination,” while allowing that “[s]ome language in emails. . . that has been reported is not consistent with the respect IBM has for its employees.”
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▪ Doctors are no strangers to double-talk. Massachusetts General Hospital recently paid out its third multimillion-dollar settlement for allegedly double-booking orthopedic surgeries. While shelling out $14.6 million, the docs continue to insist that they’ve done nothing wrong: “While the MGH continues to believe it always has complied with legal requirements regarding overlapping surgery, we determined that it would be most prudent to resolve the matter fully by settlement at this time,” wrote MGH president Dr. David F.M. Brown and Dr. Marcela del Carmen, president of the hospital’s physician organization.
▪ Former New York governor Andrew Cuomo recently spent $369,000 to air a 30-second advertisement suggesting that most sexual harassment charges against him hadn’t panned out, and that he was the victim of “political attacks.”
Alas, according to The New York Times, “reality has been less kind to Mr. Cuomo than the advertisement suggests.” The newspaper notes that a “report by the State Assembly found “overwhelming evidence” that the former governor had committed misconduct.”
The Times story relates that much of Mr. Cuomo’s ire seems to be directed toward New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose long-running probe of Donald Trump’s business practices has prompted him to denounce her “racist attack.” James is Black.
She must be doing something right.
▪ Wait — here is a last-minute entry! While many multinational corporations have halted or suspended business in Russia following its invasion of Ukraine, Minnesota-based agricultural giant Cargill explained to The Wall Street Journal why it’s staying in Russia: “Food is a basic human right and should never be used as a weapon,” the company said.
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Really? If food is a “basic human right,” like, say, freedom of speech, then surely Cargill would be loath to profit from its sale? The privately held company doesn’t report profits, but its latest annual report notes that revenues rose 17 percent last year, to $134 billion.
Human rights pays better than I thought.
The Doublespeak awards can’t return soon enough.
Alex Beam’s column appears regularly in the Globe. Follow him on Twitter @imalexbeamyrnot.
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Year built 1920
Square feet 1,170
Bedrooms 2
Baths 2 full
Fee $275 per month (estimated)
Water/Sewer Public
Taxes $6,477 (2022, estimated)
Swap your golf shoes for sneakers before you walk the half mile from the city-owned George Wright Golf Course to this condo building.
A short walkway ends in a comfy farmer’s porch, one of two on this blue 102-year old Roslindale building, which is being converted from a two-family into two condo units.
Recessed lighting and a natural wood ceiling add to the charm of the porch, which offers plenty of room for a couch and chairs for an après-links rest.
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A bright yellow front door beckons into the first-floor unit where hardwood flooring with a walnut stain and tall, elaborate baseboards create cohesion.
The living room (156 square feet) is to the right of the foyer and features thin crown molding, a drum shade ceiling light, a light gray-blue paint, and a bank of three windows. The space connects to a sunroom (95 square feet) set up as a home office with a view of the front porch and street. The light green-gray walls offer a visual mood lift only a room awash in natural light can bring.
Back in the living room, a wide square archway opens into a welcoming dining area (157 square feet) with a highly-sought-after feature for people looking to entertain after two years of COVID-caused isolation: a stunning built-in bar with wood shelving, a wallpaper backsplash that looks like painted brick, and lighting to show off your most glamorous bottles.
A small cabinet next to it houses a beverage fridge that is topped with a granite counter under a recessed light. A companion counter, a long peninsula with seating for at least two, offers a spot to watch a big-screen TV under pendant lighting. The space currently hosts a table for four as well. The walls above the chair rails here are a light-grayish blue, while the lower sections are a darker shade. The dining area and the kitchen have Bluetooth-controlled speakers in the ceiling.
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The kitchen (209 square feet) is only steps away. The sink sits under a window overlooking the backyard. Nearly everything is gray and silver — the subway tile backsplash, the walls (with a hint of blue), and the stainless steel appliances — but the Shaker-style cabinets are white with long nickel pulls. The kitchen also features undermount and recessed lighting, as well as a coffee nook.
The adjoining full bath has a standalone shower with frameless glass doors, a rain shower head, a natural pebble mosaic floor, a gray glass tile surround, and a herringbone stone tile ceiling. The flooring outside the shower is porcelain with a wood grain, and the single vanity is a dark color. There is a Bluetooth-controlled speaker in the ceiling.
A short hallway off the kitchen passes a laundry closet with a stacked washer and dryer. The home’s owner suite is directly across from closet and offers a 112-square-foot bedroom space, two windows, thin crown molding, and a flush-mounted ceiling light with an opaque, round glass shade. All of the bedrooms are painted gray and have closets with custom shelving but no door.
The en-suite bath is a kicked-up version of the main bathroom. It features a single vanity with a long counter. The cabinetry is dark, and the flooring is the same porcelain tile with a wood-grain look. The shower is bigger, however, with a large-format gray glass tile surround, a mosaic pebble floor, a rain shower head, a herringbone stone tile ceiling, and a seat. There is a Bluetooth-controlled speaker in the ceiling.
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The second bedroom, located farther down the hallway in the front corner of the unit, offers a bigger bedroom area (131 square feet) than the primary suite. It has thin crown molding and three windows.
The unit comes with exclusive use of the back deck off the kitchen, but the owners will share the slate patio and fenced-in yard with the other unit.
The heating, air conditioning, roof, plumbing, and electrical have been updated in the past two years, according to the listing agents, Pat and Alana Scanlon of eXp Realty in Boston. The unit has a tankless on-demand hot water system, and the sale will include one off-street parking space.
Follow John R. Ellement on Twitter @JREbosglobe. Send listings to homeoftheweek@globe.com. Please note: We do not feature unfurnished homes and will not respond to submissions we won’t pursue. Subscribe to our newsletter at pages.email.bostonglobe.com/AddressSignUp. Follow us on Twitter @GlobeHomes.
John R. Ellement can be reached at john.ellement@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @JREbosglobe.
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WASHINGTON — At the Kennedy Center, in the nation’s capital, Issa Rae celebrated Black folk as a fine art.
Over 6,000 people in all shades of black, brown, and gold poured through the halls and theaters of The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts last weekend, where the scent of sandalwood and shea butter wafted gently in the air.
With faces masked and vaccination wristbands, the hugs and laughs were plentiful. It was more than one thing. It was a weekend of everything: A concert by Mereba, short films, The Read live comedy album by Kid Fury and Crissle, a conversation between Issa Rae and Keke Palmer, plus panels and parties.
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She could have done this in Los Angeles, where she does so many events, back home where her companies are headquartered. But Simone Eccleston, the inaugural director of hip-hop culture and contemporary music at the center, invited Rae and the world she is building.
“I have to say that the thing that’s most special about being here is that a Black person, a Black female who works here, reached out to us to bring us here. I feel like that is necessary, like that in some ways the only way that we get to be in these spaces is because someone is looking out,” Rae said in a roundtable interview.
For a lot of us, 2022 has been about re-emerging into life outside. Rae is like us that way. Except she’s doing it at The Kennedy Center.
“This year is to kind of just reintroduce what we do to the industry,” she said. “And to be able to do that in a place that celebrates culture and have them celebrate Black Culture and uplift it, this means the world to me and us.”
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A living memorial to John F. Kennedy, our most arts-driven president, the center is celebrating its 50th anniversary season. As they put their programming together, they kept Kennedy in mind.
“I see little of more importance to the future of our country and our civilization than full recognition of the place of the artist,” he said at Amherst College in 1963.
An artist’s place is everywhere. Too often, we’ve allowed institutions to dictate to us what constitutes high art, assigning elite values to a very exclusive club of creatives that has all too often left out Black people and folk of color.
So we made space. We have our Basquiat, Alvin Ailey, Ava DuVernay, and Kendrick Lamar. We have our Donald Glover, Queen Latifah, and Questlove. Our cup flows with creative genius.
And Issa Rae helps fill it. She may have started with “Awkward Black Girl” on YouTube and “Insecure” on HBO, but Rae is making more than art. She is creating space. The $40 million deal she signed with HBO last year is for both films and television. With every opportunity she gets, she brings rising voices to the table.
Her media company, HOORAE, houses film, TV, and digital ventures. It includes ColorCreative Management, a company specifically for women and creators of color. Plus her label, Raedio, is more than a music label. They do podcasts, concerts, and get music placed in campaigns, TV, and more.
“As a company, one of the things that’s an ethos is not just the scaling of the business but scaling our impact,” said Morgan Davis, director of brand partnerships, events, artists relations at Raedio/HOORAE.
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The takeover, with tickets intentionally priced between $25-$89 for accessibility, was about bringing the Black community in.
“Reimagining the notions of spaces where Black people attend, where we’re accepted, where we are seen — one of the biggest things is returning equity back to Black people,” she added.
And this is what Eccleston wanted to bring to the Kennedy Center. JFK cared about the freedom and space of an artist. Rae is furthering that vision by reclaiming space that was always ours to have, and making more where we thought we had none.
“As part of the Kennedy Center’s 50th anniversary, one of the core things for us was really looking at the individuals and the organizations that are not only creating work that is of the moment, of the day, but are doing things that will carry us forward,” Eccleston said. “I would say that I think that Issa Rae is one of the most important visionaries of our generation.”
The Kennedy Center has been working its way here. In 2014, the center teamed up with Nas and the National Symphony Orchestra. In 2016, Q-Tip was named the center’s first artistic director of hip-hop culture. In 2017, Eccleston became the inaugural director of hip-hop culture and contemporary music. By 2018, the center announced its Hip Hop Culture Council.
The door just widens and widens. Last weekend, Issa Rae screened her new HBO show, “Rap Sh*t.” As part of The Read’s comedy album, young rapper Flo Milli came to the Kennedy Center stage. Rae and the Kennedy Center are adding to the nuance of who and what can and will be celebrated.
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“I think about that moment, Issa Rae’s famous statement, ‘I am rooting for everyone Black,’ ” Eccleston said. “What you saw this weekend was the most divine manifestation of it. What HOORAE is doing is legacy work and helping turn the tide for generations of creatives as it relates to resources and opportunity.”
For musician Mereba, who opened the weekend with a soulful and jazzy concert, this type of community building is refreshing. Mereba performed as part of “pieces,” a live version of Rae’s Web series bringing the stories behind our favorite artist’s songs.
“I just admire how Issa spreads her light and she is not afraid to also spread other people’s light. It’s so incredible,” the songstress said after her performance. “It’s not exploitive, it’s not just for a quick look. It’s real support, from like a sister, and it’s super inspiring and it’s super empowering and I would love to see more of that.”
At the heart of everything Rae does is community and opportunity.
“We wanted to build something that had an ecosystem, so if you come through one door, you are not stuck in that one room,“ said Benoni Tagoe, Raedio president and Rae’s longtime friend. “Now that her career has grown and she’s in a position to be able to provide opportunities, Issa is reaching back and bringing people up.”
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New voices and collaboration, Rae believes, are key to how we grow as a people and as an industry.
“I know what it’s like to not have opportunities and to be seeking them and to feel like no one cares in the mainstream when I know the non-mainstream does,” she said. “To always be able to have my eye on what others are doing that I know appreciate, that I know, culturally, others would appreciate is important to me.”
She is always looking for talent, opening doors, and sitting in conversations with creatives she admires — be it Keke Palmer or Melina Matsoukas. This is part of how she builds and expands HOORAE.
“I also feed off of working with other hungry people and working with people who are passionate and want to be here because you can get disillusioned working in this industry,” she said.
“To work with people who are finding a new way in and are rich with new ideas only makes me more excited and makes me feel more empowered to make all the difference,” Rae added. “I think that we only get stronger working with and giving opportunities to people outside of the industry. I think that’s how the industry gets better.”
When “Insecure” aired its final episode last year, it was a bittersweet goodbye. That show, from the music to the fashion to the businesses they supported and, obviously, the storylines, was a love letter to us. So many stars who were told they would never beam were able to shine because of it. Closed doors began to open.
JFK believed the artist was the last champion of the individual mind and logic against “an intrusive society and an officious state.”
With Issa Rae — an artist faithful to the culture, driven by her purpose and her creativity — our champ is here.
Jeneé Osterheldt can be reached at jenee.osterheldt@globe.com and on Twitter @sincerelyjenee and on Instagram @abeautifulresistance.
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