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Abortion Rights and Weed Are Super Popular. Who Knew?

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

This article was originally published as a newsletter from Ryan Grim. Sign up to get the next one in your inbox.Voters yesterday enshrined abortion rights and legal marijuana into the Ohio Constitution, flipped the Virginia legislature to Democrats, expanded majorities in New Jersey, flipped the Pennsylvania Superior Court, and held the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. A Bernie-inspired candidate, Sara Innamorato, won the powerful Allegheny County executive seat in western Pennsylvania. Broadly speaking, this is one of those moments where I think the conventional wisdom from the press was correct: Their take is that abortion as an electoral issue continues to power Democrats and drag down Republicans. It drove voters to the polls in Ohio, Virginia, and Pennsylvania, and in New Jersey, the GOP’s unpopular position on abortion rights undercuts everything else they do on the culture front. The effort by Republicans in New Jersey to ride culture war anger at trans-related school policies als...

National Zoo’s pandas begin long journey back to China

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

(new Image()).src = "https://capi.connatix.com/tr/si?token=9be9c680-c459-4acb-af21-654a2ccca384&cid=c2ffed0c-3624-46c0-b10f-97c976d290a3";cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "47e4863b-15c7-465f-9e72-3f8243cec59b"}).render("69a18e8c39524fac9804ecb6d65fd693"); });It is the day many have been dreading around the D.C. area. The pandas at the Smithsonian National Zoo are departing Wednesday for their long trip back to China.Tian Tian, Mei Xiang and Xiao Qi Ji were loaded into specialized crates with hundreds of pounds of bamboo and some of their favorite toys hours before the zoo was set to open. The crates were loaded onto FedEx trucks emblazoned with panda photos — affectionately called the “Panda Express” — and headed to Dulles International Airport just before 9:30 a.m.Their flight takes off at 1 p.m. and will make a 19-hour journey to the Wolong Panda Reserve in Chengdu, China. For Ron Zampini, the 777 chief pilot at FedEx, “It’s the highlight ...

Stock market today: Stocks slip as Wall Street measures earnings, potential economic outcomes

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks slipped Wednesday as Wall Street continues to recalibrate following its sharp recent swings.The S&P 500 fell 0.3% after several days of quiet, mixed trading. Its movements have become much calmer after the index screamed to its best week of the year last week, which itself came after months of painful losses.The Dow Jones Industrial Average was fell 120 points, or 0.1%, as of 12:18 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.4% lower.American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines were all flying at least 2% higher at the front of the market as oil prices continue to drop and ease the pressure on fuel costs. Warner Brothers Discovery tumbled 16.2% after it reported a worse loss for the latest quarter than analysts expected. It also lost more streaming subscribers than forecast. The reporting season for summertime profits is winding down, and the majority of companies has been topping Wall Street’s forecasts. That’s usually the case, and i...

Minnesota city is believed to be the first in the US to elect a Somali American as mayor

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

ST. LOUIS PARK, Minn. (AP) — A suburban Minnesota city became what is believed to be the first in the U.S. to elect a Somali American mayor when 27-year-old Nadia Mohamed was chosen to lead St. Louis Park.“This is a milestone. This is not the destination,” Mohamed told supporters after the results came in Tuesday. “As mayor, I want to ensure people see themselves reflected in our policies.”Mohamed won with 58% of the vote, defeating retired banker Dale A. Anderson, who got 41% of the vote. She had served on the City Council since she was elected at age 23 in 2019.Deqa Dhalac of South Portland, Maine, was the first Somali American to serve as mayor of an American city, but she was selected by that city’s six-member council in 2021, not elected by the voters.Mohamed campaigned in support of investing in community policing and programs to make homeownership more affordable, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported. Mayor Jake Spano did not seek reelection, and he endorsed Mohamed.Mohamed ...

One-call defense? New USC coordinators considering all options for turnaround

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Shaun Nua and Brian Odom have been tasked with turning around Southern California’s defense, one of the worst in college football.Making it happen with two games left in the regular season, including a visit to No. 6 Oregon on Saturday, to salvage the Trojans’ Pac-12 tile hopes is another matter entirely.“That’s the million dollar question right now,” Nua said Tuesday.Nua and Odom, who will be interim co-coordinators for the rest of the year after Alex Grinch was fired on Sunday, indicated all options are under consideration to make it happen for USC (7-3, 5-2 Pac-12).“And we might go in with one call if that’s what it takes for them to fricking fly around and play as physical as possible, as fast as possible, as right as possible,” Nua said.Giving USC something it understands and can execute at a competent level might not be the worst idea considering the defense has allowed 44.2 points over its past six games, including a season-worst 52 in its loss to No. 5 Was...

Roblox, DaVita rise; Toast, Lucid Group fall, Wednesday, 11/8/2023

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks that are trading heavily or have substantial price changes on Wednesday:Rivian Automotive Inc. (RIVN), down 60 cents to $16.82.The electric vehicle maker will allow companies besides Amazon to buy its delivery vans.Toast Inc. (TOST), down $2.78 to $14.47.The restaurant software provider gave investors a disappointing sales forecast.Roblox Corp. (RBLX), up $5.21 to $40.28.The online gaming platform reported encouraging third-quarter financial results.Upwork Inc. (UPWK), up $1.21 to $13.24.The online freelance marketplace raised its earnings and revenue forecasts for the year.LegalZoom.com Inc. (LZ), up 65 cents to $11.22.The online platform for legal services beat analysts’ third-quarter financial forecasts.DaVita Inc. (DVA), up $3.34 to $83.43.The kidney dialysis provider raised its profit forecast for the year.Masimo Corp. (MASI), down 38 cents to $3.92.The medical technology company cut its profit forecast for the year.Axon Enterprise Inc. (AXON), up $...

Suspects wanted in Halloween weekend shooting in Boulder

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

DENVER (KDVR) — Boulder Police detectives are looking to identify a man who allegedly shot at a person on Halloween weekend, as well as three others who were involved in a fight. According to the Boulder Police Department, the shooting happened at 1:30 a.m. on Oct. 28 when a group of people tried to enter a home in the 900 block of Pennsylvania Avenue near Columbia Cemetery on University Hill. Police said the residents inside the home were having a gathering and refused to let the unknown group inside. The group then began arguing with the residents when a fight broke out on the front porch. Dogs’ owners wanted in attack at Arapahoe County park A man from the group pushed inside the home and fired one shot at a man inside the house, narrowly missing him, according to Boulder police. Part of the altercation was caught on camera.Now, detectives want to identify the people in the video. They are described as:Man wearing red pants with a white stripe down the sideMan wearing a yellow...

UN chief: Gaza death toll suggests Israel’s tactics are ‘clearly wrong’

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

U.N Secretary-General António Guterres on Wednesday said the death toll in Gaza amid Israel’s war with Hamas demonstrates something is wrong with Israel’s military operations.“There are violations by Hamas when they have human shields. But when one looks at the number of civilians that were killed with the military operations, there is something that is clearly wrong,” he said at the Reuters NEXT conference.Guterres made those remarks as Israel continues to attack Gaza by air, expand its ground operation and impose a complete siege on 2.2 million people in Gaza, ignoring international calls for a cease-fire and pauses in the war.More than 10,000 people, including thousands of children, have been killed in Israel’s retaliatory operation, now in its second month, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry. Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, killing more than 1,400 people and taking hundreds of hostages, according to Israeli officials. He added: “...

‘They are monsters’: Israel foreign minister rails against Hamas during MEP audience

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

BRUSSELS — Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen told MEPs that Hamas militants who killed 1,400 Israelis and took more than 200 people hostage on October 7 are worse than animals. “If you will see the movies you will not call the Hamas animals, it’s a compliment to call them animals; they are monsters,” the Israeli minister said before screening a two-minute video of the atrocities that brought some in the European Parliament to tears, at an event organized by the Israeli mission to the EU and hosted by Spanish European People’s Party lawmaker Antonio López-Istúriz.The conference — an effort by Israel to remind politicians and journalists of the October 7 attacks and the continued suffering of the hostages — came as global attention shifts to the desperate humanitarian situation in Gaza. The Israeli embassy also screened a 46-minute movie of footage recorded by Hamas to journalists in Brussels Monday.In response to last month’s attacks, Israel launched a war aga...

Stars of David tags in Paris linked to pro-Russia interference: reports

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:54:08 GMT

The Stars of David found painted in several locations in Paris last week are likely part of a destabilization operation tied to a pro-Russia businessman.Four people — including a Moldovan couple arrested last week — are suspected of painting more than 250 blue Stars of David across the French capital, likely to sow unrest in France amid a surge of antisemitic acts since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau on Tuesday said a judge had been appointed to lead an investigation into the tags, adding it “could not be excluded that the tagging … was carried out at the explicit request of someone living abroad.”An investigation by Le Monde showed that news of the tagging was amplified via social media accounts affiliated with Doppelgänger — a wide-ranging online operation associated with Russian disinformation campaigns. “Phone searches suggest that both pairs of authors were in relation to the same third person,” the prosecutor said in a written statement share...