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Crystal River resident describes ordeal after Hurricane Idalia hit Florida

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

CRYSTAL RIVER, Fla. (WSVN) — As Idalia moves further into the open ocean, those hit by the storm are starting the recovery process. The powerful storm left a trail of destruction behind in towns along the coast, including Crystal River.Homes and buildings were almost completely underwater. Now, one survivor who decided to ride out the storm, is telling her story.Tara Salute was born and raised in Crystal River and is now shell-shocked as a 7-foot storm surge cut her off.“In less than five minutes, everything just started, coming,” Salute said.Panicked, she grabbed her dog Millie and escaped through her window and paddleboarding to her next door neighbor’s house and the safety of their second floor.She dodging water and something else.“There were snakes crawling around outside my window. I mean, it was bad,” she said.Then hours later, there was more destruction.The neighbor’s house on the other side caught fire.Neighbors heard the explosions.“...

Nobel Prize chiefs spark backlash by inviting Russia to award ceremony

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

The Nobel Foundation’s decision to invite Russian ambassadors to this year’s Nobel Prize award ceremonies triggered fierce criticism from Swedish and Ukrainian politicians.The Nobel Foundation announced Thursday it would invite ambassadors from all countries that are diplomatically represented in Sweden and Norway, where award ceremonies are to be held in December. This includes Russia and Belarus, which last year were excluded following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.Executive Director of the Nobel Foundation Vidar Helgesen said in a statement that this decision was made to counter a tendency in which “dialogue between those with differing views is being reduced.”But the announcement sparked strong reactions in Sweden, with many politicians announcing they would boycott the event. Center Party leader Muharrem Demirok, Left Party leader Nooshi Dadgostar and Green Party co-spokesperson Märta Stenevi all announced on X, formerly Twitter, they would not attend the ceremonies.J...

EU lawmakers pitch sweeping treaty reform

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

BRUSSELS — A group of European lawmakers plan to pitch a long-shot reform of the EU’s basic treaty that, if approved, would radically alter the way it functions, according to a draft obtained by POLITICO.The draft proposal — which is dated August 17 and was written by six members of the European Parliament on a committee for constitutional affairs — proposes a wholesale shift away from the unanimous decision-making in the Council of the EU. Instead, it advocates for qualified majority voting and normal legislative procedure in a range of areas including defense, taxation and foreign policy.The draft also proposes renaming the European Commission the “European Executive” and drastically expanding the powers of Parliament, as well as granting EU institutions exclusive competence — or the right to negotiate on behalf of its members — to decide on environmental and climate matters.The draft obtained by POLITICO was signed by Flemish Belgian Open Liberals and Democrats member ...

Man gets 2-year prison sentence in pandemic fraud case to buy alpaca farm

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

BOSTON (AP) — A former pizzeria owner has been sentenced to two years in prison for using over $660,000 in fraudulently obtained pandemic relief funds to buy an alpaca farm.In 2020, Dana McIntyre, 59, of Grafton, Vermont, submitted a fraudulent application for a Paycheck Protection Program loan, prosecutors said. He inflated information about the pizzeria’s employees and payroll expenses and falsified a tax form to try to qualify the business for a larger loan amount.After receiving the loan, McIntyre, formerly of Massachusetts, sold his pizzeria and used nearly all of the money to buy an alpaca farm in Vermont and eight alpacas, the U.S. attorney’s office in Boston said. He also paid for two vehicles and weekly airtime for a cryptocurrency-themed radio show that he hosted, prosecutors said.He was arrested in 2021.“Dana McIntyre capitalized on a national catastrophe and stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from a limited pool of money set aside to help struggling ...

FDA says it will finalize ban on menthol tobacco products ‘in coming months’

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

(CNN) — The US Food and Drug Administration says it still plans to finalize rules that would prohibit the sale of menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars this year, but the agency is running behind schedule.In April 2022, when the FDA initially announced that it was going to ban the popular flavor, it set a deadline of August 2023 to work out the details. That deadline is still listed online, but a spokesperson said it will instead complete work on the rule “in the coming months.”Flavors in cigarettes were banned in 2009, but after serious lobbying from the industry, menthol was left out of the ban. Many public health leaders say that regulations on the last flavor allowed in cigarettes can’t come soon enough.“The law passed in 2009 and we’re here in 2023, 14 years later, so while we worked very closely with FDA on this issue, we’re pretty unhappy that they’ve taken such a long time to get this done,” said President and CEO of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Ki...

Two ex-Proud Boys leaders get among the longest sentences in the Jan. 6 Capitol attack

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN and LINDSAY WHITEHURST (Associated Press)WASHINGTON (AP) — Two former leaders of the far-right Proud Boys extremist group were sentenced to more than a decade each in prison Thursday for spearheading an attack on the U.S. Capitol to try to prevent the peaceful transfer of power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden after the 2020 presidential election.The 17-year prison term for organizer Joseph Biggs and 15-year sentence for leader Zachary Rehl were the second and third longest sentences handed down yet in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack. They were the first Proud Boys to be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly, who will separately preside over similar hearings of three others who were convicted by a jury in May after a four-month trial in Washington that laid bare far-right extremists’ embrace of lies by Trump, a Republican, that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Enrique Tarrio, a Miami resident who was the Proud Boys’ national chairman and ...

Ohio police release video showing officer’s fatal shooting of pregnant Black woman Ta’Kiya Young

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

By SAMANTHA HENDRICKSON (Associated Press/Report For America)COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Ohio authorities on Friday released bodycam video showing a police officer fatally shooting Ta’Kiya Young in her car in what her family denounced as a “gross misuse of power and authority” against the pregnant Black mother.Sean Walton, an attorney representing Young’s family, said the video clearly shows that the Aug. 24 shooting of the 21-year-old woman was unjustified and he called for the officer who shot her to be fired immediately and charged in her death. Walton also criticized police for not releasing the video footage for more than a week after the shooting.“Ta’Kiya’s family is heartbroken,” Walton said in an interview with The Associated Press. “The video did nothing but confirm their fears that Ta’Kiya was murdered unjustifiably. Ta’Kiya and her young daughter were murdered unjustifiably, and it was just heartbreaking fo...

A nanoengineer teamed up with Rihanna’s tattoo artist to make smarter ink

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

By Rae Ellen Bichell, KFF Health NewsBOULDER, Colo. — Mad-scientist kind of moments happen fairly often for nanoengineer Carson Bruns. A few months ago in his lab at the University of Colorado-Boulder, he tested his latest invention on his own arm and asked a colleague for help.“We were like, ‘OK, we’re going to tattoo ourselves. Can you help us today?’” he said.The tattoo is like a freckle, a little blue dot. But he can turn it on and off. Like the way a mood ring changes color with temperature, this tattoo changes with light: Ultraviolet light to turn it on, daylight (or even a flashlight) to turn it off.“You can go to court and turn it off, and then go to the party and turn it on. And then go to Grandma’s house and turn it off,” said Bruns, who is affiliated with the university’s ATLAS Institute, which prides itself on fostering out-of-the-box ideas.Bruns started a company with tattoo-artist-to-the-stars Keith “Bang Bang” McCurdy, along with a former doctoral student. Early next ...

It may have just gotten harder to protect minority communities from pollution

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

By Alex Brown, Stateline.orgIn recent years, some states have invested in air quality monitoring, applied extra scrutiny to permitting decisions and steered cleanup funding to minority communities that have borne the brunt of pollution for decades.Now, in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision striking down race-conscious college admissions policies, state lawmakers are facing a new conundrum: Can they remedy environmental racism without mentioning race?“The [Supreme Court] majority really reinforced the idea that a generalized government policy of rectifying past discrimination would not pass constitutional muster,” said Emily Hammond, an environmental law expert and professor at the George Washington University Law School.Lawmakers are scrambling to figure out what the ruling will mean for their environmental justice efforts. In some states, legislators expect lawsuits to threaten their policies. The question is whether they can defend those measures in court, or if ...

The best time to book holiday travel is very soon

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:51:15 GMT

By Meghan Coyle | NerdWalletIf your swimsuit is still drying from your last trip or you’re packing for a Labor Day getaway, traveling for Thanksgiving or the winter holidays probably isn’t top of mind. After all, it’s not even September.And remember last year when people were procrastinating and finding last-minute holiday travel deals? Well, the surge in air travel this year has changed all that.The most recent data from Google Flights shows the lowest average price for flights starting in mid-December (around Christmas) are usually available around 71 days before departure. That’s a whopping six weeks earlier than Google’s findings last year when holiday prices were lowest about 22 days before departure.So now, the best time to book your end-of-December flights is by mid-October. And if you apply the same thinking to Thanksgiving flights, you’ve got just a few weeks until you should book.Thanksgiving flights will probably be cheapest around mid-September. Wait too long, and you mi...