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NFL Notes: The Patriots can start to prove themselves again Sunday night

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

The promise of this Patriots season was never a playoff win.It wasn’t even a postseason berth.It wasn’t joy or winning or more automatic, biannual beatdowns of the Jets.It was clarity.Finally learning Mac Jones’ true potential. Finding out whether Bill Belichick is positioned to lead the Patriots long-term or will drop himself onto an already rumored hot seat. Discovering whether the Patriot Way is a dust-gathering relic of the past or a blueprint the franchise has successfully rolled out again.Yet here we are, still waiting.Of course, that promise was never going to be kept in Week 1. NFL season-openers are both the most anticipated and least telling games of the year. What the Patriots’ loss to the Eagles taught us is largely what we already knew.Against top-tier opponents, Jones can both lead the Patriots close to victory and count himself among the reasons they ultimately lost. Belichick can still devise as sharp a defensive game plan as you could imagine...

Activists in Europe mark the anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s death in police custody in Iran

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

LONDON (AP) — Hundreds gathered in central London on Saturday to mark the anniversary of the death of Mahsa Amini, the 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman who died in police custody in Iran last year, sparking worldwide protests against the country’s conservative Islamic theocracy.Chanting “Women! Life! Freedom!,” the crowds held her portrait and rallied around the memory of a young woman who died on Sept. 16, 2022, after she was arrested for allegedly violating Iran’s mandatory headscarf law. Similar protests took place in Italy, Germany and France.In Iran, authorities sought to prevent the anniversary from reigniting the protests that gripped the country last year. Amini’s father was detained outside his home after the family indicated that they planned to gather at her grave for a traditional service of commemoration, the Kurdish rights group Hengaw said. People in downtown Tehran reported a heavy security presence, and security forces were seen in western Iran, where t...

Texas AG Ken Paxton’s impeachment trial is on the brink of a verdict as senators end deliberations

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — The Texas Senate on Saturday ended deliberations over whether Attorney General Ken Paxton should be removed from office, putting the Republican’s historic impeachment trial on the brink of a verdict.The jury of 30 senators, most of whom are Republicans, spent about eight hours deliberating behind closed doors. A two-thirds majority is required to convict Paxton on any of 16 articles of impeachment that accuse Paxton of bribery, corruption and unfitness for office. Voting was expected to begin at 10:30 a.m. CT. The vote could be a slow, public process. Each article of impeachment gets a separate vote. Republicans hold a 19-12 majority in the Senate, meaning that if all Democrats vote to convict Paxton, they would need nine Republicans to join them. Deliberations started Friday, and the talks dragging out for more than a day behind closed doors fed a rare lack of assurance about how a vote might go in the Texas Capitol, where a dominant Republican majority typical...

An explosion hits an apartment in northern Syria. At least 1 person was killed with others wounded

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

BEIRUT (AP) — An explosion ripped through an apartment on the second floor of a building in a northern Syria town controlled by Turkey-backed opposition fighters Saturday, killing at least one person and wounding others, pro-government media reported.It wasn’t immediately clear what caused the blast in the town of Afrin, which has witnessed explosions and rocket attacks over the past few years that have left dozens of people killed or wounded. The previous attacks were blamed on Kurdish fighters who once controlled the town.The daily Al-Watan said that one person was killed and several people were wounded in the explosion in the residential building. Sham FM radio station said that two people were killed and several others were wounded in the blast. It added that gunmen used the apartment to prepare explosives. Afrin has been under the control of Turkey and its allied Syrian opposition fighters since 2018, following a Turkey-backed military operation that pushed Syrian Kurdish...

The Senate’s bipartisan approach to government funding is putting pressure on a divided House

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — On one side of the Capitol, two senators have steered the debate over government funding mostly clear of partisan fights, creating a path for bills to pass with bipartisan momentum.Steps away, on the House side of the building, things couldn’t be more different.House Republicans, trying to win support from the far-right wing of the party, have loaded up their government funding packages with spending cuts and conservative policy priorities. Democrats have responded with ire, branding their GOP counterparts as extreme and bigoted, and are withdrawing support for the legislation.The contrary approaches are not unusual for such fights in Congress. But the differences are especially stark this time, creating a gulf between the chambers that could prove difficult to bridge. The dynamic threatens to plunge the United States into yet another damaging government shutdown, potentially as soon as the end of September when last year’s funding expires.Leaders in both cha...

Top EU official heads to an Italian island struggling with migrant influx as Italy toughens stance

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

MILAN (AP) — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen plans to travel Sunday to the Italian island of Lampedusa, which was overwhelmed with thousands of migrants arrivals this week, at the invitation of Italy’s premier, who is calling for a naval blockade of North Africa.Von der Leyen’s spokesman, Eric Mamer, confirmed on Saturday that she would make the trip at the invitation of Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni. Tensions on the small island were rising Saturday, as both residents and migrants chafed at the long wait times to transfer people from the crowded reception center to the Italian mainland. About 7,000 migrants arrived on Lampedusa from Tunisia this week, and the Red Cross said that 3,800 remained on the island on Friday. Media reports indicated that was down to about 2,000 on Saturday. Residents gathered in the center of town Saturday to protest plans to put up a tent city on Lampedusa, and demanded a meeting with a Sicilian regional law enforcement official. A rep...

London police arrest a man who allegedly climbed over a wall near Buckingham Palace stables

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

LONDON (AP) — London police arrested a 25-year-old man early Saturday morning after he allegedly climbed over a wall and entered the royal stables at Buckingham Palace.The man was detained at 1:25 a.m Saturday for trespassing on a protected site, London’s Metropolitan Police Service said in a statement. He was taken to a London police station, where he remained by late morning.Officers found the man outside the royal stables following a search of the area. He didn’t enter enter the palace or its gardens at any time, police said.Buckingham Palace, which is some 300 years old, is undergoing renovations, and King Charles III does not live there. The monarch was in Scotland on Saturday.The Associated Press

UAW strike exposes tensions between Biden’s goals of tackling climate change and supporting unions

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two of President Joe Biden ‘s top goals — fighting climate change and expanding the middle class by supporting unions — are colliding in the key battleground state of Michigan as the United Auto Workers go on strike against the country’s biggest car companies.The strike involves 13,000 workers so far, less than one-tenth of the union’s total membership, but it’s a sharp test of Biden’s ability to hold together an expansive and discordant political coalition while running for reelection. Biden is trying to turbocharge the market for electric vehicles to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and prevent China from solidifying its grip on a growing industry. His signature legislation, known as the Inflation Reduction Act, includes billions of dollars in incentives to get more clean cars on the roads. Some in the UAW fear the transition will cost jobs because electric vehicles require fewer people to assemble. Although there will be new opportun...

Thousands of Czechs rally in Prague to demand the government’s resignation

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

PRAGUE (AP) — Thousands of Czechs rallied in the capital on Saturday to demand the government’s resignation over high energy and other prices as well as the war in Ukraine. The protest united far-right with far-left forces and was the third such rally at Prague’s Wenceslas Square this year that was organized by a new political party known as PRO.The demonstrators repeatedly chanted a message for the five-party ruling coalition to “resign.”The head of the populist group, Jindrich Rajchl, blamed the government “for following orders from Brussels,” criticized the country’s support for Ukraine and its close ties with the United States.His group, whose name in English stands for Law, Respect, Expertise, has no seats in parliament.Some demonstrators demanded the country quit NATO.The protesters were planning to march to the Interior Ministry building in Prague.The Associated Press

Loss of bison herds still affecting Plains First Nations, research suggests

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:50:46 GMT

The collapse of the teeming bison herds that once blackened the prairie was an economic catastrophe that still affects those who once depended on them, new research suggests. “Economic opportunity is determined in part by history,” said Donn Feir, an economic historian at the University of Victoria and one of three authors of a recently published paper on the lingering economic impact of that near-extinction. “When you look at the landscape of economic development and Indigenous economic growth in Canada and the U.S., you have to keep in mind that history is still very much with us.”Feir and her colleagues used data collected by long-ago government agents and anthropologists to compare how the loss of the bison affected First Nations that depended on them with those that didn’t. They conclude that loss, together with reduced access to institutions such as banks, marked those nations physically and economically.   “Those historical injustices are b...