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Lowry: Tim Scott squares off against Obama on race narrative

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

Barack Obama doesn’t want America validated, at least not by the wrong people.In taking a shot at Republicans Tim Scott and Nikki Haley, Obama told his former campaign manager, David Axelrod, in a podcast interview, “I think there’s a long history of African American or other minority candidates within the Republican Party who will validate America and say, ‘Everything’s great, and we can make it.'”And who would want that dangerous message spreading across the land?Citing America’s racial history, Obama said: “If somebody is not proposing, both acknowledging and proposing elements that say, ‘No, we can’t just ignore all that and pretend as if everything’s equal and fair. We actually have to walk the walk and not just talk the talk.’ If they’re not doing that, then I think people are rightly skeptical.”Obama’s statement was a classic expression of the disdain that progressives feel for minority ...

Dear Abby: Unhappy husband wants life with younger GF

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

Dear Abby: I met my wife in college. We have been married for 40 years and have two adult sons. My wife had a brief affair early in our marriage, but we have long since moved on from that. However, increasingly over the last 15 years, my wife (career homemaker, her choice) has been aggressively making demands in exchange for anything she does for me — i.e., if I don’t buy her something, she won’t cook dinner, do laundry or have sex.I buy her things all the time, and I give her an allowance, roughly 70% of my take-home pay. Some of her demands I simply cannot afford, so I often cook, clean, etc., myself. As a result, we haven’t had sex in more than 10 years.Two years ago, I met a younger woman. She is also married, although separated. She still shares a home with her husband and their two children. We meet as often as we can and I find her delightful and easy to get along with. Lately, she has been saying she wants us to leave our situations and get married.My...

GOP’s Boebert wanted to impeach Biden, but House Speaker McCarthy had other plans

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — A surprise effort by hard-right House Republicans to impeach President Joe Biden has been sidelined for now, but the ability of GOP Rep. Lauren Boebert to force the issue to a House vote demonstrates the ever-escalating challenge Speaker Kevin McCarthy faces in controlling his Republican majority.The impeachment resolution, which charges Biden with “high crimes and misdemeanors” over his handling of the U.S. border with Mexico, angered GOP colleagues who were caught off guard by the unscripted move. Even though it was not expected to pass Thursday, the vote would have been politically tough for GOP lawmakers and a potentially embarrassing spectacle for McCarthy, splitting his party.Instead, McCarthy negotiated a deal with Boebert, the Colorado Republican, to send the Biden impeachment resolution for review to the Judiciary and Homeland Security committees, fending off a vote for some time.“I think it’s best for everybody,” McCarthy told reporters late Wednesday. Bu...

Stock market today: Asian shares mixed after Fed chair inflation comments

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

TOKYO (AP) — Asian shares were trading mixed Thursday following a retreat on Wall Street after the Federal Reserve chair made comments that indicated inflation still isn’t under control. Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 was flat at 33,575.63. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 declined 1.6% to 7,196.10. South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.4% to 2,593.20. Trading was closed in Hong Kong and Shanghai for Dragon Boat Festival, a national holiday. Shares rose in India.The Chinese markets being closed brought a break from jitters about possible renewed tensions in the U.S.-China relationship after President Joe Biden referred to Chinese President Xi Jinping as a dictator. That pushed “back against the idea that the U.S.-China relationship could be warming with Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s visit,” said Yeap Jun Rong, market analyst at IG.Blinken was in Beijing recently where both sides agreed to “stabilize” badly deteriorated ties. But Blinken said China was not ready to resu...

Where abortion laws stand in every state a year after the Supreme Court overturned Roe

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

In the year since the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization that ended nearly a half-century of a nationwide right to abortion, states have enacted contrasting policies on the issue. The Dobbs decision overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that protected the right to an abortion until fetal viability, which is generally considered to be around 23 or 24 weeks of pregnancy.Lawmakers, governors, courts and voters are all shaping policies — and more changes are in the pipeline.A state-by-state breakdown of where things stand:STATES WHERE ABORTION IS BANNED THROUGHOUT PREGNANCYALABAMALaw adopted in 2019 took effect after Dobbs.Exception: Woman’s life or health.ARKANSASLaw adopted in 2019 took effect after Dobbs.Exceptions: Woman’s life.IDAHOLaw adopted in 2020 took effect after Dobbs.Exceptions: Rape, incest and life of the woman. A judge has blocked enforcement in cases of medical emergencies.The state also has a law maki...

New Zealand debates whether ethnicity should be a factor for surgery waitlists

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — New Zealanders this week were debating a thorny health care issue — whether ethnicity should be a factor in determining when patients get surgery.It turns out that in some parts of Auckland, the country’s largest city at 1.4 million people, clinicians have been using an algorithm to adjust where patients sit on elective surgery waitlists. Clinical need remains the top factor, but the algorithm also takes into account how long patients have been on the waitlist, where they live, their financial circumstances, and their ethnicity.Indigenous Māori and Pacific Island patients are given a higher priority on the list, pushing down white New Zealanders and other ethnicities. The idea is to balance out longstanding inequities in the publicly funded health system.“At the moment, there is clear evidence Māori, Pacific, rural and low-income communities have been discriminated against by the health system,” Prime Minister Chris Hipkins told reporters. The al...

Is it chicken? Here’s how the first bite of ‘cell-cultivated’ meat tastes

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

When I told friends and family I was reporting on the first chicken meat grown from animal cells, their first comment was “Eww.” Their second comment was: “How does it taste?”The short answer (you’ve probably heard this sentence before in other contexts): Tastes like chicken.The longer answer, which folds in the “Eww” response, is more nuanced. Yes, it’s strange to think of eating a totally new kind of meat — chicken that doesn’t come from a chicken, meat that will be sold as “cell-cultivated” chicken after the U.S. Agriculture Department on Wednesday gave the green light to two California firms, Upside Foods and Good Meat.But it’s also interesting (and exciting!) to taste test the first offerings of a new era in meat production, which aims to eliminate harm to billions of animals slaughtered for food — and to dramatically reduce the environmental effects of grazing, growing feed for those animals and dealing with their animal waste.FACING UP TO T...

Immigration drove white, Asian population growth in US last year

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

Without immigration, the white population in the U.S. would have declined last year. Immigration also propelled the expansion of the Asian population, which was the fastest-growing race or ethnic group last year in the U.S., while births outpacing deaths helped propel growth in Hispanic, Black, tribal and Hawaiian populations. Population estimates released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau show what drove changes in different race, ethnic and age groups last year, as well as since the start of COVID-19’s spread in the U.S. in April 2020. The country had grown to 333.2 million people by the middle of last year, a 0.4% increase over the previous year, according to the 2022 population estimates.For white residents in the U.S., immigration drove the expansion. Without it, the white population, including those who identify as more than one race, would have dropped last year by more than 85,000 people instead of growing meagerly by more than 388,000 residents, or 0.1%. When the foc...

World leaders, activists in Paris seek financial response to climate emergency, poverty

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

PARIS (AP) — World leaders, heads of international organizations and activists are gathering in Paris for a two-day summit aimed at seeking better responses to tackle poverty and climate change issues by reshaping the global financial system.Developing nations point to an outdated system where the United States, Europe, China and other big economies that have caused most climate damage are leaving the poorest countries to deal with the consequences.The Paris talks also come as the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine and a global debt crisis have led to a drop in life expectancy and an increase in poverty in most countries around the world, the United Nations Development Program reported.French President Emmanuel Macron, who organized the summit, said the fight against poverty, efforts to curb global warming and the protection of biodiversity “are closely intertwined. We therefore need to agree together on the best means to address these challenges in the poor and emerging co...

A year after fall of Roe, 25 million women live in states with abortion bans or tighter restrictions

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:22 GMT

One year ago, the U.S. Supreme Court rescinded a five-decade-old right to abortion, prompting a seismic shift in debates about politics, values, freedom and fairness.Twenty-five million women of childbearing age now live in states where the law makes abortions harder to get than they were before the ruling.Decisions about the law are largely in the hands of state lawmakers and courts. Most Republican-led states have restricted abortion. Fourteen ban abortion in most cases at any point in pregnancy. Twenty Democratic-leaning states have protected access. Here’s a look at what’s changed since the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling.LAWS HAVE BEEN ENACTED IN 25 STATES TO BAN OR RESTRICT ABORTION ACCESSLast summer, as women and medical providers began to navigate a landscape without legal protection for abortion, Nancy Davis’ doctors advised her to terminate her pregnancy because the fetus she was carrying was expected to die soon after birth.But doctors in Louisiana, wh...