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Josh Paul: How can the U.S. renew Mideast peace talks? Recognize Palestinian statehood

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

On Sept. 13, 1993, with a famous handshake on the White House lawn, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat sealed the Oslo accords, which have, in theory, provided the theoretical and practical basis for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process ever since: a set of measures and confidence-building steps that would ultimately lead to a two-state solution.Thirty years later, it is time to acknowledge that Oslo has failed. One can assign plenty of blame for this to all parties involved. Israel’s vast expansion of settlements in the West Bank violated its pledge that the “integrity and status” of the occupied territories would be preserved. Palestinian leadership fell into a pattern of corruption and mismanagement. And the U.S. and the international community didn’t hold both sides accountable.As Israel’s bombardment on the Gaza Strip continues, it’s hard to think of what comes next. But we shoul...

David French: Behold, MAGA Man

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

Last Wednesday, an election worker named Ruby Freeman took the stand in a Georgia courtroom and told the story of how her world was turned upside down by Rudy Giuliani. Three Decembers earlier, Giuliani shared a routine surveillance video of Freeman and her daughter, Shaye Moss, doing the routine yet vital work of counting 2020 presidential ballots at State Farm Arena in Atlanta.But Giuliani’s description of the video was anything but routine. He falsely claimed that the footage was evidence of vote fraud. In that moment, everything changed for Freeman. As she said in her testimony, “Giuliani just messed me up, you know.” That’s a polite way of describing the horrors that followed. She faced an avalanche of threats, racist attacks and harassment at work and home. She had to leave her house — and then, after law enforcement officials found her name on a death list, the house of the friend she’d been staying with. Even now she’s afraid to walk in public without a mask.The purpose of F...

Maureen Dowd: Supreme contempt for women

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

WASHINGTON — The Irish expect the worst to happen at any moment. And they have what my colleague Dan Barry calls “a wry acceptance of mortality.”Still, Ireland was shaken to its core in 2012 by the death of Savita Halappanavar, a beautiful, sparkling 31-year-old Indian immigrant, a dentist married to an Indian engineer. Savita was expecting her first child. She wore a new dress for the baby shower and prayed for the future. But that night she got sick. She went to a Galway hospital, where she was crushed to learn that her fetal membranes were bulging and her 17-week-old fetus would not survive.Knowing her life was at stake, she begged the medical staff to remove the fetus. As Kitty Holland wrote in “Savita: The Tragedy That Shook a Nation,” a midwife explained to her, “It’s a Catholic thing. We don’t do it here.” Ireland had a long history of punishing women, sending them to religious asylums if they were pregnant out of wedlock or deemed “fallen.” Savita developed septic shock and ...

Lakeville man’s high school classmate tipped off FBI to ‘selfie’ he posted in U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, federal charges say

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

The day after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, the FBI got a tip from a high school classmate of a now-43-year-old Lakeville man.The tipster said Martin James Cudo posted a “selfie” from the Capitol on his social media, and the FBI also received information from someone at Cudo’s workplace who identified him in photographs as participating in the Capitol riots, according to federal charges unsealed against him Monday.Cudo was arrested in Lakeville on Monday.Martin James Cudo wearing a red, white and blue “45” hat at the U.S. Capitol. (Courtesy of the U.S. District Court, District of Columbia)FBI agents had interviewed Cudo in Apple Valley on Jan. 13, 2021, and showed him a photo that appeared to show Cudo inside the Capitol and Cudo confirmed it was him, according to the criminal complaint. Cudo said he was the person wearing a red, white and blue hat with “45” in a circle in the middle. Donald Trump was the 45th president.Cudo ...

Mats Zuccarello’s downgraded status adds to Wild’s injuries woes

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

BOSTON — The wins are coming since John Hynes became Minnesota’s head coach on Nov. 27, but there’s one thing that hasn’t changed for the Wild.The injuries keep coming.After missing Monday night’s 4-3 loss at Pittsburgh with an upper body injury, points leader Mats Zuccarello was downgraded from day to day to week to week, Hynes said before Tuesday night’s 6 p.m. puck drop against the Bruins at TD Garden.“It was something that was kind of lingering a little bit, and he just got it checked out this morning,” Hynes said. “So, that’s the report we got.”Zuccarello has six goals among 28 points in 28 games, the team’s most consistent player, and playmaker, this season. Ryan Hartman took his spot on the second line Monday and scored his first goal since Nov. 4. Vinni Lettieri took Hartman’s spot on the fourth line and scored the tying goal early in the third period.“Zucc’s obviously a really important part (of the team),” Hynes said. “He’s played real good hockey, at least in my experienc...

Hiring fairs planned after abrupt St. Louis nursing home closure

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

ST. LOUIS - Officials have planned two hiring fairs for workers out of a job after the sudden closure of St. Louis' Northview Village Nursing Home last weekend. The St. Louis Agency on Training and Employment (SLATE) will hold emergency hiring fairs on Friday, Dec. 22, and Wednesday, Dec. 27. The Northview Village Nursing Home abruptly shut down on Friday, forcing 170 residents out to other care centers around the St. Louis-area. Many employees are out of a job and did not receive a payday as previously scheduled on Friday. “Shame on this owner for treating the people who lived in this facility like pawns who can just be moved at moment’s notice,” said St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones on the situation. “Shame on this owner for not paying the workers what they deserve and shutting down in the middle of the night.”  Charges reduced for Bar:PM owner arrested after police crash Workers at the nursing home want their final paychecks and more. They’re asking for severance pay, and compens...

Two men sentenced in Illinois for attempted child enticement

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

BENTON, Ill. - A man from Illinois and another from Kentucky were sentenced in federal court on Tuesday after being caught in an online sting aimed at child predators.Prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Illinois said Timmy Wayne Smith, 59, and Joseph Randall Edmaiston, 37, pleaded guilty to one count of attempted enticement of a minor.In August 2020, Smith and Edmaiston met an undercover agent online posing as a 15-year-old girl. The two men discussed meeting the teen in order to have sex.The men drove to a house in Marion, Illinois, for the sexual encounter, but police met them there and arrested them.A U.S. District Court judge sentenced each man to 10 years in federal prison. Smith and Edmaiston will also serve five years of supervised release after leaving prison.

Deion Sanders, CU Buffs crushed the transfer portal again. But what will it take for Coach Prime to give Colorado high school football recruits a look?

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

BOULDER — Max Parrott couldn’t believe all the love he was getting from this big, proud CU Buff, a first-time Power 5 head coach, a man driven like a snowplow to make a flagging football program relevant again.The catch?That program was Purdue.And the big, proud Buff in question was former CU star Ryan Walters, who was hired by the Boilermakers about a week after Deion Sanders was introduced as the new face at Walters’ old stomping grounds.“(Purdue) came out and they showed me so much love,” said the 6-foot-4, 273-pound Cherry Creek lineman, rated in the 247Sports.com composite rankings as one of Colorado’s top six prep prospects in the Class of ’24 and one of the top 101 tackles in the country. “They called me every week.“I talked to (Walters) a lot and when I got out there for the first time, I loved it. I loved everything about it.”Parrott was Louis Vuitton enough to land offers from five Power 5 programs: Arizona State,...

Who’s the father of Denver Zoo’s baby orangutan? Maury Povich knows.

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

When it comes to announcing the result of a paternity test – even for the Denver Zoo’s baby orangutan – there are few more qualified than Maury Povich.The longtime talk show host announced the paternity of Siska, the zoo’s 4-month-old Sumatran orangutan, in a TikTok posted on the Denver Zoo’s account Tuesday.“When it comes to the orangutan, 4-month-old Siska – Berani, you are the father!” Povich said, as the video cut to cheering zoo staff.Retired talk show host Maury Povich announces the paternity test results involving Siska, a 4-month-old Sumatran orangutan at the Denver Zoo, Monday, Dec. 18, 2023. (Courtesy TikTok)Siska was born on Aug. 27 to first-time mom Eirina. It took a while for caretakers to get close enough to get a hair sample to determine who the father was, spokesperson Jake Kubié said.“When Siska was born we did not know if it was either Berani or Jaya, who were both potential mates,” Kubié said. “We weren’t able to get close enough to the baby for a few months to ge...

Colorado Supreme Court bans Trump from state's 2024 ballot

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 19:21:52 GMT

The Colorado Supreme Court on Tuesday declared former President Donald Trump ineligible for the White House under the U.S. Constitution’s insurrection clause and removed him from the state’s presidential primary ballot, setting up a likely showdown in the nation’s highest court to decide whether the front-runner for the GOP nomination can remain in the race.The decision from a court whose justices were all appointed by Democratic governors marks the first time in history that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment has been used to disqualify a presidential candidate.“A majority of the court holds that Trump is disqualified from holding the office of president under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment,” the court wrote in its 4-3 decision.Attorney Eric Olson, far right, argues before the Colorado Supreme Court on Wednesday, Dec. 6, 2023, in Denver. The Colorado Supreme Court on Tuesday, Dec. 19, declared Trump ineligible for the White House under the U.S. Constitution’s insurrection clause and ...