| Trump trades Twitter jabs with 'Alex' Baldwin Posted: 02 Mar 2018 06:01 AM PST  President Trump lashed out at Alec Baldwin in a typo-ridden tweet early Friday morning about the actor's recent assertion that he is tired of playing Trump on NBC's "Saturday Night Live.."
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| 2 Shot Dead At Central Michigan University Posted: 02 Mar 2018 07:38 AM PST  The victims weren't students of the school, in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, according to police, and no one else was hurt. "Police believe the situation started from a domestic situation," the school said in a statement. CMU police confirm two individuals were fatally shot at Campbell Hall on campus this morning.
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| Georgia Lawmakers Pass Bill Punishing Delta For Cutting Ties With NRA Posted: 01 Mar 2018 02:05 PM PST  Georgia lawmakers passed a bill on Thursday effectively punishing Delta Air Lines for its decision to cut ties with the National Rifle Association in the wake of last month's school shooting in Parkland, Florida. The state's House and Senate passed a major a tax bill, which Republican lawmakers had amended to remove a sales tax exemption on jet fuel, The Associated Press reported. Delta, which is based in Atlanta, would have been the primary airline to benefit from the exemption.
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| Mudslide threat prompts mandatory-evacuation order for 30,000 in Southern California Posted: 01 Mar 2018 04:17 PM PST  The threat of deadly mudslides from an impending Pacific storm prompted authorities on Thursday to order mandatory evacuations for some 30,000 people living adjacent to fire-scarred foothills and mountain slopes along California's Santa Barbara coast. The evacuation was put into effect in the same general area where torrential rains on Jan. 9 unleashed cascades of mud, boulders and other debris that killed 21 people, injured dozens of others and damaged or destroyed hundreds of homes. The bulk of the devastation occurred in the affluent hillside community of Montecito, 85 miles (137 km) northwest of Los Angeles, in a region where vast swaths of the coastal landscape were stripped of vegetation by huge wildfires in December.
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| Puerto Rico power grid snaps, nearly 1 million in the dark Posted: 01 Mar 2018 12:02 PM PST  Puerto Rico's power grid broke down again on Thursday, leaving some 800,000 customers without power, as the US Caribbean possession struggles to recover five months after Hurricane Maria slammed the island. Justo Gonzalez, head of the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA), said that one of the island's main transmission lines was out of service. The government-owned utility has 1.5 customers out of a population of 3.5 million -- not counting the 500,000 Puerto Ricans who left since Maria struck on September 20, 2017.
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| Rocket Launcher and Machine Guns Among 57,000 Firearms Surrendered in Australian Amnesty Posted: 28 Feb 2018 08:51 PM PST  Weapons including a rocket launcher and machine guns were handed in with no penalty
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| New Tax Law Benefiting Shareholders More Than Workers So Far Posted: 02 Mar 2018 10:22 AM PST  WASHINGTON ― Since President Donald Trump signed the Republican tax bill in December, hundreds of retail companies have announced employee bonuses totaling more than $3 billion, which Republicans have said proves them right that the new law benefits regular Americans. According to several estimates, firms have announced roughly $200 billion worth of stock buybacks this year, inflating the value of company shares by reducing their supply. "Stock buybacks are windfalls that drive up the value of investment portfolios for CEOs and high-flyers," Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said in a Senate floor speech this week.
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| In exile with Bill Kristol, the Republican resister-in-chief Posted: 01 Mar 2018 02:00 AM PST  Bill Kristol is steadily launching an unrelenting assault on his own party's president. You could say he is the clearest and most credible voice of Republican resistance in Washington.
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| Authorities: California family lived in filthy desert hovel Posted: 02 Mar 2018 05:28 PM PST  JOSHUA TREE, Calif. (AP) — The mounds of trash, old toys and furniture caught the attention of a Southern California sheriff's deputy passing through the desert earlier this week. As he approached, he spotted a hovel cobbled together with plywood and plastic sheeting.
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| Canadian Outdoor Retailer Drops Products From U.S. Company That Makes Guns Posted: 01 Mar 2018 08:59 AM PST  A major Canadian outdoor retail chain said Thursday it will stop selling products from a U.S. company that manufactures guns and ammunition. Mountain Equipment Co-op, known as MEC, said it would stop carrying products from Vista Outdoor, a sprawling outdoor sports and recreation company that manufactures gun products, including assault-style rifles. MEC, based in Vancouver, sells neither firearms nor ammunition, but said it would quit selling five brands owned by Vista, including CamelBak, Bollé and Bushnell, in an effort to distance itself from the U.S. gun-maker.
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| U.S. issues alert after tourist ferry explosion in Mexico Posted: 01 Mar 2018 07:02 PM PST ![U.S. issues alert after tourist ferry explosion in Mexico]( "U.S. issues alert after tourist ferry explosion in Mexico") A blast last month on a tourist ferry in the Mexican beach resort of Playa del Carmen was caused by "an explosive device" that injured passengers, including U.S. tourists, the U.S. embassy in Mexico said on Thursday. A security alert posted on the embassy's website warned American citizens to exercise caution and said Mexican authorities continued to investigate the blast. Two more explosive devices were found attached to another ferry on the island of Cozumel on Thursday, local media reported, saying marine troops had secured the scene.
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| Scientists Just Got Their First Look at Light From the Universe’s First Stars Posted: 28 Feb 2018 06:33 PM PST  The discovery could unlock the key to elusive 'dark matter'
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| Virginia Mother TerriLynn St. John Found Dead, Covered in Leaves Not Far From Her Home Posted: 01 Mar 2018 04:20 PM PST  The 23-year-old mother vanished two days ago, leaving her toddlers home alone.
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| The Funniest Tweets From Parents This Week Posted: 02 Mar 2018 05:47 AM PST  Kids may say the darndest things, but parents tweet about them in the funniest ways. So each week, we round up the most hilarious 280-character quips from moms and dads to spread the joy.
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| Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer urges Trump to go 'with his instincts' on guns and not the 'destructive' NRA Posted: 02 Mar 2018 09:25 AM PST  The Senate's top Democrat has called for Donald Trump to follow his gut and help push through a number of gun control measures, after the National Rifle Association (NRA) suggested the President does not actually want gun control. Democratic members of Congress and the powerful gun-rights organisation are competing for the president's support on controversial gun issues that have once again become a national talking point in the wake of a mass shooting in Florida last month. "President Trump should go with his instincts, not the clarion and destructive call of the NRA," Mr Schumer said in a statement.
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| Feds: Man sent white powder letters to Trump Jr., 4 others Posted: 01 Mar 2018 03:42 PM PST  WORCESTER, Mass. (AP) — A Massachusetts man was charged Thursday with sending threatening letters with white powder to five people, including one to Donald Trump Jr. that landed his wife, Vanessa, in the hospital.
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| India trip controversy follows Trudeau back to Canada Posted: 01 Mar 2018 01:42 PM PST  Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau faced persistent criticism Thursday over a convicted Sikh extremist's attendance at a Canadian event in Mumbai, nearly a week after the premier's return from a trip to India. Opposition parties and editorialists heaped scorn on the prime minister and his Liberal government over the "fiasco" that dogged Trudeau during his first official visit to India to drum up trade and investment. Canadian-Indian businessman Jaspal Atwal was sentenced in Canada to 20 years in prison for a 1986 assassination attempt on an Indian politician, as part of a violent campaign to establish an independent Sikh state of Khalistan.
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| 16 Tweets That Will Make All Introverts Say 'Me' Posted: 01 Mar 2018 03:40 PM PST  If you're an introvert, you likely value your alone time. You think before you speak. You'd much rather socialize one-on-one than in a group. A phone call is probably your worst nightmare. But most of all, you are silently strong.
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| I'm upbeat German SPD will reject Merkel coalition: youth leader Posted: 02 Mar 2018 06:23 AM PST  By Michelle Martin and Holger Hansen BERLIN (Reuters) - The leader of the youth wing of Germany's Social Democrats (SPD) is optimistic a majority of the party's members will vote down another alliance with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives, he told Reuters on Friday. The result of the SPD's binding ballot of its roughly 464,000 members will be announced on Sunday, more than five months after an inconclusive parliamentary election. Europe's largest economy and pre-eminent power-broker would probably face a new election or a minority government if SPD members reject another tie-up with Merkel.
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| Massachusetts can sue federal student loan servicer, judge rules Posted: 01 Mar 2018 01:04 PM PST  Massachusetts' attorney general can move forward with a lawsuit alleging that one of the largest student loan servicers in the United States has engaged in practices that have undermined a federal debt forgiveness program, a state court judge has ruled. Suffolk County Superior Court Judge Kenneth Salinger in a decision released on Thursday denied Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistant Agency's motion to dismiss Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey's lawsuit.
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| NRA's Top Lobbyist Implies Trump Is Back On Its Side Posted: 01 Mar 2018 08:47 PM PST  The top lobbyist for the National Rifle Association hinted late Thursday that President Donald Trump had cooled on his own plans to support gun control measures. "We all want safe schools, mental health reform and to keep guns away from dangerous people," Cox said after the meeting.
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| Sheriff: Indiana deputy shot during pursuit won't survive Posted: 02 Mar 2018 02:46 PM PST  LEBANON, Ind. (AP) — A central Indiana sheriff's deputy who was shot in the head while chasing three suspects won't survive and was on life support for donation of his organs, authorities said Friday.
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| Abortion to be illegal? Mike Pence’s prediction enrages Newsroom readers Posted: 01 Mar 2018 12:21 PM PST  "It looks like they only care about people before they are born." "This is the zealot we have to look forward to if Mueller does actually bring down Trump." "Abortions have always occurred and always will." Vice President Mike Pence made a startling prediction about legal abortion, saying it would end in "our time." His remark has fired up thousands of Newsroom commenters. Pence made the statement while at a luncheon hosted by the anti-abortion organization Susan B. Anthony List & Life Issues Institute. In his speech he said, "If all of us do all we can, we can once again, in our time, restore the sanctity of life to the center of American law." The majority of the more than 15,000 comments on HuffPost's article express outrage: "His personal beliefs are his personal beliefs not a basis for policy," one reader declared. Many that don't agree with abortion said they still "think that they should be available and safe." The vice president, known for his anti-choice stance, described President Trump as the "most pro-life president in American history" and said the administration would continue to push measures to restrict abortion. What do you think of the future that Pence envisions? Join the conversation in Newsroom.
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| Jimmy Kimmel's Wife Says His Pancake Art Is 'Making My Life Hell' Posted: 02 Mar 2018 04:30 AM PST  Jimmy Kimmel is hosting the Oscars for the second straight year on Sunday, but he's already earning bad reviews from his wife for his performances at breakfast. Kimmel began making "normal" pancakes about a year ago, and graduated to "realistic, totally edible portrayals" of beloved children's characters and other fun shapes, she wrote. "The adorable pancakes my husband, Jimmy Kimmel, cooks for our kids are making my life hell," the headline reads.
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| West Virginia Teacher Strike Heads Into Uncharted Territory Posted: 01 Mar 2018 01:53 PM PST  The statewide strike by teachers and other school workers in West Virginia stretched into its second week on Thursday, as protesters filled the state Capitol for a sixth straight workday with no clear end to the work stoppage in sight. The standoff between workers and legislators appeared all but resolved just two days earlier, when Republican Gov. Jim Justice announced a deal with union leaders to hike pay for teachers and state employees. In a remarkable turn, workers bucked union leadership and vowed to return to the picket lines, carrying out what amounted to a wildcat strike. Schools in all 55 counties stayed closed on Thursday, a day Justice had expected everyone to return to work after a one-day "cooling off" period on Wednesday.
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| The Latest: At UN body, Britain focuses on E Ghouta violence Posted: 01 Mar 2018 01:47 PM PST  BEIRUT (AP) — The latest on developments regarding Syria (all times local):
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| EPA proposes changes to coal ash regulations Posted: 01 Mar 2018 06:42 PM PST  The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday proposed changes to rules regulating coal ash waste from power plants that it said would give states more flexibility over its disposal and save electric utilities up to $100 million a year in compliance costs. The proposal includes more than a dozen changes to an Obama-era rule that established minimum national standards for the disposal of coal ash, a byproduct of coal-based power plants that contains toxic materials such as arsenic and lead. "Today's coal ash proposal embodies EPA's commitment to our state partners by providing them with the ability to incorporate flexibilities into their coal ash permit programs based on the needs of their states," EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt said in a statement.
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| The One Way to Know If You're Officially a Millennial — Whether You Like It or Not Posted: 01 Mar 2018 12:52 PM PST  Wanna take a selfie?
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| Robert Buchel, Star of ‘My 600-Lb. Life,' Dies While Filming TLC Show Posted: 02 Mar 2018 10:07 AM PST  The 41-year-old man suffered a fatal heart attack.
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| Palestinian migrant gets life sentence for supermarket stabbing in Germany Posted: 01 Mar 2018 01:02 AM PST  A Palestinian asylum seeker and radicalized Islamist who killed one person and injured six others in a knife attack in a Hamburg supermarket in July has been sentenced to life in prison, a spokesman for a city court said on Thursday. Hamburg residents threw chairs and other objects at the attacker - who had been known to authorities - helping police to detain him, but a 50-year-old man died of his injuries. The asylum seeker could not be deported as he lacked identification documents and was psychologically unstable, Hamburg's Interior Minister Andy Grote said after the attack.
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| My children have stopped calling me dad - should I be offended? Posted: 01 Mar 2018 05:30 AM PST  Daddy is no more. Three weeks ago, I heard a voice say, "Rhymer, could you please pass me the salt?" I did a double take. These were not the strident, increasingly confident intonations of the 10- year-old but rather the still-sweet, little-girlish vocalisations of her younger sister. Polly, the 10-year-old, has been calling me "Rhymer" for more than a year now. But for the seven-year-old, Claudia, this is a new departure. It is, I will admit, a bit disconcerting. Three weeks later and both of them now regularly call me "Rhymer". The oddest thing is when they refer to me in the third person. "Mummy," they'll say, "is Rhymer coming swimming with us?" Your first thought is, "My life has become an episode of The Simpsons and I am Homer." It's true that they sometimes call their mother Jane. But I don't think they get quite the satisfaction out of it that they do out of calling me by my first name. Of course, children do grow up. With Polly, I'd been anticipating the end of "Daddy" for some time. But I'd also expected it to be - to adopt the language of Brexit - a soft transition. Daddy to dad. I still call my own dad "Dad". But no. Rhymer it is. A couple of friends have told me that "it's just phase they'll grow out of". But I don't think so. It's been a year now and I'm confident "Rhymer" is hard-wired into the 10-year-old's brain. And, as the seven-year-old bases many of her behaviours on the 10-year-old, I've probably lost her too. What's in a name? Rhymer Rigby with daughters Polly and Claudia Credit: Rii Schroer None of this really matters in the sense that it doesn't bother me enormously. I find it, if anything, amusing. But should it matter? Is it disrespectful? Should I come over all Victorian and demand that, as a matter of filial deference, they call me dad or daddy? Or should I go next level - and be troubled by how untroubled I am? I started by examining my own past. I have never called my dad by his first name. But that is because we share a name and it would be really confusing. Indeed, after my birth, my dad tended to be referred to more by his nickname, Rig. My siblings have never called my dad "Rhymer" either. Mostly my parents are still mum and dad to us. I don't think respect or a lack thereof really comes into it. My family are all quite laid-back people, that's just the way it is. Growing up, a very few of my friends did call their parents by their first names. But again this offers little in the way of real insight. It was just "a thing" rather than a matter of great importance and it wasn't even indicative of the parents being Seventies hippies or Eighties individualists. Some grist to my angst mill arrived in the form of a Twitter poll. I asked Twitter if people's children called them mummy and daddy or by their first names. A full 100 per cent (of around 50 votes) said the former. Hoping for more online worries, I next dived into the swamp of parental disquietude that is Mumsnet. This looked promising at first. Mumsnet is great at finding the most worrisome and/or judgmental take on anything. But honestly, even the Mumsnetters didn't seem that bothered. In the UK there's a lot tied up in the idea that, as a parent, you should command respect Next, I spoke to a couple of parenting experts. One, Sue Atkins, who runs an online parenting club, said that being on first-name terms with your firstborn isn't a problem in itself. "You need to be comfortable with it and if you're not you should say so." She added that it's only an issue if it's done to be rude or to annoy. "There should be respect and dignity and you need to be a parent, not a friend." On these grounds I think I'm OK. Polly knows there are boundaries and is tolerably well-behaved. Sarah Ockwell-Smith, author of the The Gentle Discipline Book, says that it can actually be a positive thing. "Normally it's a sign that you have a good relationship with the child." As for any perceived respect angle, she suggests that it's not worth getting hung up on this at all: "In the UK there's a lot tied up in the idea that, as a parent, you should command respect. Discipline in this country is quite old-fashioned." This did make me wonder if parental first names were the norm in any other cultures. But I couldn't find any. The UK-based French political journalist Marie Le Conte told me that her theory is that in France there's a class angle. Only the poshest and the most working-class people routinely call their parents by their first names. The middle is solidly maman et papa. I myself spent four years abroad as a child. When we moved to the US I discovered that (in Eighties Pennsylvania, at least) you were meant to call everyone's else parents "Mr and Mr Smith" rather than "David and Sue". This felt strangely formal and awkward. Although once they discovered the British norm, some of my American friends' parents decided it would be great fun to be on first-name terms. While this felt more natural to me, it also made me different to my peers, which is the last thing any 10-year-old wants. It all felt like a sort of awkward transatlantic comedy of manners and eventually I just called everyone else's parents Mr and Mrs to fit in. I was reminded of this the other day when one of my eldest daughter's friends said, "Hello Mr Rigby" at school. She subsequently explained she was calling me "Mr Rigby" because she didn't know my first name and she was a bit old to call me "Polly's dad". I told her I was fine with "Rhymer." "Yes," said my eldest. "We all call him Rhymer." Indeed they do, but why? One friend may have put her finger on it when she asked, "What do you and your wife call each other?" The answer is mostly "Rhymer" and "Jane". Aha, she replied - that could be the root of things: the friend and her husband mostly don't call each other by their names in front of the children. 'Hey Homer': Bart Simpson also calls his Dad by his first name Indeed, Ockwell-Smith says that a lot of what children do is down to modelling: "Kids learn mostly from what they see us doing so if everyone calls you 'Rhymer' they will too." We've also always been quite grown-up in the way we speak to the girls - our house is not a place of excessively cutesy language - and perhaps this is another driver. I suspect there may be one final factor at work here that is particular to me. When I'm introduced to people (like parents at school) the girls hear other adults get me to repeat my name, express surprise and say things like, "That's such an unusual name. I've never heard it before." So there's a sort of novelty to "Rhymer" that there isn't to say, John or Sarah. Perhaps they've internalised this - and it might account for their untroubling but untypical decision to call me Rhymer. So as long as it's not rooted in overt disrespect, I'm OK with it. If the girls do their homework, tidy their rooms and feed the cat, I can live with being called Rhymer. Perhaps, in time, I'll even stop thinking of Bart Simpson saying "Hey, Homer!" every time they do it.
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| Defend Boyle Heights activists go on protest tour Posted: 02 Mar 2018 10:02 AM PST  Defend Boyle Heights activists go on protest tour calling for "gentrifying" businesses to get out of their neighborhood.
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| Bodycam Video Shows North Carolina Officer Beating Black Man Accused Of Jaywalking Posted: 02 Mar 2018 11:50 AM PST  An Asheville, North Carolina, news outlet published disturbing bodycam footage this week showing a white police officer beating a black resident, prompting public apologies from city officials who are continuing to investigate the incident. The graphic video shows officers chasing Johnnie Rush, 33, throwing him to the ground, shocking him with a stun gun and beating him as he cries out in pain and shouts for help. Photos that Rush provided to the Asheville Citizen-Times show his bandaged and swollen head and other injuries.
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| Deadly attacks by extremists strike Burkina Faso capital Posted: 02 Mar 2018 04:12 PM PST  OUAGADOUGOU, Burkina Faso (AP) — Islamic extremists struck the French Embassy and army headquarters in simultaneous attacks of gunfire and explosives Friday in Burkina Faso's capital, killing eight people and wounding more than 80 others. All eight militants were slain by security forces.
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| This Is the All-Electric Jaguar I-Pace Posted: 01 Mar 2018 10:15 AM PST  Jag's first electric car has a 90 kWh battery pack, all-wheel drive, and 240 miles of range.
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| Kylie Jenner Shares First Photo Of Herself Holding 'Angel Baby' Stormi Webster Posted: 02 Mar 2018 07:22 AM PST  The pictures show Jenner wearing a black patterned sweatsuit with what looks a pair of Yeezy Mud Rat 500s, which are part of Kanye West's Spring 2018 collection. Of course, new dad Travis Scott made sure to mark Stormi's one-month milestone as well.
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| Trump tariffs fuel sell-off in steel and aluminium firms Posted: 01 Mar 2018 11:28 PM PST  Steel and aluminium producers across Asia sank Friday on news of Donald Trump's controversial tariffs, though some analysts said the long-term effects on the sector might not be as bad as thought. The president said Thursday he would slap levies of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum imports, delivering an election campaign promise to put "America First" and protect US jobs from what he claims are unfair trade practices. The announcement has been met with fury across the world -- even from those in his own Republican Party -- with warnings it could spark a painful global trade war, sparking a sell-off on equity markets already on edge over fears of rising US interest rates.
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| U.S. Immigration Chief Says 800 Avoided Arrest Because of Warning from Oakland Mayor Posted: 28 Feb 2018 05:42 PM PST  The warning came hours before the agency launched an operation that resulted in more than 150 arrests
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| New York mother says finding slain children was a 'nightmare' Posted: 01 Mar 2018 03:22 PM PST  After opening statements in which the prosecution described the grisly killings and the defense urged jurors to find the nanny, Yoselyn Ortega, not guilty by reason of insanity, the mother of the slain children appeared as the first witness. Marina Krim recounted going home to her luxury apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side on Oct. 25, 2012, only to discover her daughter Lucia, 6, nicknamed Lulu, and son Leo, 2, stabbed to death. Ortega, 55, on trial for two counts of first-degree murder and two counts of second-degree murder, planned the killing, waiting to be alone with the children and using the family's kitchen knives, said Assistant Manhattan District Attorney Courtney Groves.
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| Jaguar I-Pace finally unveiled Posted: 02 Mar 2018 02:02 AM PST  There's been so much said and written about the Jaguar I-Pace over the last few months you could be forgiven for thinking it had been on sale for some time. Completely new models from major manufacturers deservedly get a lot of attention, but the I-Pace is more than just another new Jaguar as it's the British luxury manufacturer's first venture into the world of all-electric vehicles. It might look quite familiar as this production model is very close to the original 2016 concept, and plenty of images have been published of the I-Pace undergoing testing at the Nurburgring and elsewhere.
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| China Senses and Acts on U.S. Weakness in South China Sea Posted: 01 Mar 2018 08:17 AM PST  China is a rising power and it is only natural that it would seek to expand its areas of naval operations and political influence. China seems to think that, because it was once the center of its world, more respect for its exalted status is needed. There are rising indications, however, that China intends to be just that.
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