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Ukraine is shipping more grain through the Black Sea despite threat from Russia

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Grain thunders into rail cars and trucks zip around a storage facility in central Ukraine, a place that growing numbers of companies turned to as they struggled to export their food to people facing hunger around the world.Now, more of the grain is getting unloaded from overcrammed silos and heading to ports on the Black Sea, set to traverse a fledgling shipping corridor launched after Russia pulled out of a U.N.-brokered agreement this summer that allowed food to flow safely from Ukraine during the war.“It was tight, but we kept working … we sought how to accept every ton of products needed for our partners,” facility general director Roman Andreikiv said about the end of the grain deal in July. Ukraine’s new corridor, protected by the military, has now allowed him to “free up warehouse space and increase activity.”Growing numbers of ships are streaming toward Ukraine’s Black Sea ports and heading out loaded with grain, metals and other cargo despite the threat...

Trump hints at expanded role for the military within the US. A legacy law gives him few guardrails

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Campaigning in Iowa this year, Donald Trump said he was prevented during his presidency from using the military to quell violence in primarily Democratic cities and states.Calling New York City and Chicago “crime dens,” the front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination told his audience, “The next time, I’m not waiting. One of the things I did was let them run it and we’re going to show how bad a job they do,” he said. “Well, we did that. We don’t have to wait any longer.”Trump has not spelled out precisely how he might use the military during a second term, although he and his advisers have suggested they would have wide latitude to call up units. While deploying the military regularly within the country’s borders would be a departure from tradition, the former president already has signaled an aggressive agenda if he wins, from mass deportations to travel bans imposed on certain Muslim-majority countries.A law first crafted in the nation’s in...

Rosalynn Carter tributes will highlight her reach as first lady, humanitarian and small-town Baptist

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

AMERICUS, Ga. (AP) — Rosalynn Carter will make her final journey to the Jimmy Carter Presidential Center on Monday as her family begins three days of memorials for the former first lady and global humanitarian who died Nov. 19 at the age of 96.After brief ceremonies in the Carters’ native Sumter County in south Georgia, Rosalynn Carter’s remains will travel by motorcade to Atlanta, where she will lie in repose at The Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum.The library will be open from 6 to 10 p.m., offering the most direct opportunity for the public to pay their respects during the three-day tribute. Two funerals, set for Tuesday in Atlanta and Wednesday in the Carters’ tiny hometown of Plains, are for invited guests. President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden, longtime friends of the Carters, lead the dignitaries expected to attend the Atlanta service. Motorcade routes will be open throughout the schedule. Rosalynn Carter’s burial Wednesday in Plain...

‘Get Ready With Me’: Video genre that focuses on everyday life is everywhere – and not slowing down

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — “Get Ready with Me” — to go on a date, go to work or … get fired?“Get Ready with Me” videos are everywhere these days, and they’re as straightforward as the name suggests. Social media users, often influencers, invite viewers to watch them get ready to do something or go somewhere. And embedded in the storyline are the skin care, the makeup, the hairdo and all the glam that goes into looking hot — and, of course, the personal stories about life or love that arrest your attention.GRWM videos, as they’re also known, are part of a trend of “with me” content that has gained popularity over the past decade. Think “Clean with Me” videos where users watch people clean their homes for inspiration or pleasure. Or hours-long “Study with Me” videos for students who want buddies for intense cramming sessions but don’t have any friends nearby. More than a decade after debuting on YouTube in the days when creator content was still relatively new, “Get Ready with ...

How did humans get to the brink of crashing climate? A long push for progress and energy to fuel it

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

Amidst record-high temperatures, deluges, droughts and wildfires, leaders are convening for another round of United Nations climate talks later this month that seek to curb the centuries-long trend of humans spewing ever more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.For hundreds of years, people have shaped the world around them for their benefit: They drained lakes to protect infrastructure, wealth and people. They dug up billions of tons of coal, and then oil and gas, to fuel empires and economies. The allure of exploiting nature and burning fossil fuels as a path to prosperity hopped from nation to nation, each eager to secure their own energy.People who claimed the power to control nature and the energy resources around them saw the environment as a tool to be used for progress, historians say. Over hundreds of years, that impulse has remade the planet’s climate, too — and brought its inhabitants to the brink of catastrophe.CONTROLLING THE ENVIRONMENTMexico City traces its roo...

What’s Merriam-Webster’s word of the year for 2023? Hint: Be true to yourself

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — In an age of deepfakes and post-truth, as artificial intelligence rose and Elon Musk turned Twitter into X, the Merriam-Webster word of the year for 2023 is “authentic.” Authentic cuisine. Authentic voice. Authentic self. Authenticity as artifice. Lookups for the word are routinely heavy on the dictionary company’s site but were boosted to new heights throughout the year, editor at large Peter Sokolowski told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview.“We see in 2023 a kind of crisis of authenticity,” he said ahead of Monday’s announcement of this year’s word. “What we realize is that when we question authenticity, we value it even more.”Sokolowski and his team don’t delve into the reasons people head for dictionaries and websites in search of specific words. Rather, they chase the data on lookup spikes and world events that correlate. This time around, there was no particularly huge boost at any given time but a constancy to the increased...

Still looking for deals on holiday gifts? Retailers are offering discounts on Cyber Monday

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

Consumers are scouring the internet for online deals as they begin to cap off the five-day post-Thanksgiving shopping bonanza with Cyber Monday. Even though e-commerce is now part and parcel of our everyday lives and much of the holiday shopping season, Cyber Monday –- a term coined back in 2005 by the National Retail Federation –- continues to be the biggest online shopping day of the year, thanks to the deals and the hype the industry has created to fuel it. For several major retailers, the “Cyber Monday” sale is a days-long event that begins over the weekend. Amazon’s, for example, kicked off on Saturday and runs through Monday. Target’s two-day event began overnight on Sunday, while Arkansas-based Walmart kicked off its most recent discounts Sunday evening. Consumer spending for Cyber Week — the five major shopping days between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday — provides a strong indication on how much shoppers are willing to spend during the holiday season. Shoppers ha...

Police ask for public's help after deadly South L.A. shooting

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

L.A. police are asking for the public’s help in identifying a person responsible for shooting a man to death Sunday morning in the South Los Angeles neighborhood of Vermont Vista, authorities announced.  Officers with the Los Angeles Police Department’s Southeast Area responded to calls of the shooting in the 800 block of West 110th Street at around 7 a.m.  By the time police arrived, the victim, described only as a possibly Hispanic male, approximately 30-40 years old, he had already been declared dead at the scene by medical personnel with the Los Angeles Fire Department.  L.A. police on the scene of a fatal shooting in Vermont Vista on Nov. 26, 2023. (KTLA)L.A. police on the scene of a fatal shooting in Vermont Vista on Nov. 26, 2023. (KTLA)L.A. police on the scene of a fatal shooting in Vermont Vista on Nov. 26, 2023. (KTLA)The victim has not yet been identified, nor have police provided any description of a suspect in the deadly shooting.  Anyone with inform...

San Jose fire takes out 3 mobile homes, displaces 2

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

(KRON) -- Three mobile structures have been lost, two residents were displaced and a dog is unaccounted for after a fire in San Jose Sunday night, San Jose Fire officials said.The fire was called in at around 7:21 p.m. near Cleaves Avenue. It was upgraded to a second-degree fire around 7:37 p.m. Officials said it started in a motor home between a liquor store and a residential building. Firefighters were able to knock it down by 7:50 p.m.The fire resulted in minor damage to the residential building, but no injuries were reported. The cause is still under investigation.

Connor McDavid has goal and 4 assists in Oilers’ 8-2 victory over Ducks

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 17:39:10 GMT

EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) — Connor McDavid had a goal and four assists to give him nine points in two games and help the Edmonton Oilers rout the Anaheim Ducks 8-2 on Sunday night.Zach Hyman had two goals and an assist, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Evander Kane, James Hamblin, Leon Draisaitl and Mattias Ekholm also scored and Stuart Skinner stopped 21 shots. The Oilers have won two straight to improve to 7-12-1.Max Jones scored for Anaheim. The Ducks have lost six in a row to fall to 9-12-0.Anaheim starter Lukas Dostal was replaced by John Gibson in the second period after Edmonton scored six goals on 16 shots. Gibson stopped eight of 10 shots.There were three goals on the first five shots on goal and the Oilers led 4-2 after the opening period.The Ducks struck 3 1/2 minutes in when Jones beat Skinner.Edmonton responded just over a minute later on its first shot. Connor Brown sent a backhand pass across to Kane for his 10th of the season. Brown’s point was his first in his 14th game with the O...