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Vandals attack French politician’s office over pensions row

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

PARIS (AP) — Protesters have vandalized the Nice office of the president of the Republicans party in an apparent threat to get his right-wing party to vote to block President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reform.Eric Ciotti tweeted a photo of his office in the French Riviera city with shattered windows, after a paving stone was thrown at it overnight into Sunday. The vandals also scrawled the words “the motion or the stone” — in reference to the motions of censure against the pension reform that will be voted on Monday in the National Assembly in Paris. Amid weeks of mass protests over Macron’s plan to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64, Macron last week ordered Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne to invoke a special constitutional power to skirt a vote in the lower chamber of parliament. In response, lawmakers at both ends of the political spectrum filed no-confidence motions against her Cabinet on Friday.Ciotti had announced his party would not vote for either of the two motions ...

Man stabbed to death on a carousel at a German funfair

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

BERLIN (AP) — Officials shut down a large funfair in western Germany on Sunday after a man was stabbed to death on a carousel.Police said the 31-year-old victim and another man got into a fight while riding a carousel at the fair in Münster, a city of around 300,000, on Saturday evening. During the altercation, the suspect stabbed the victim with a knife. Despite attempts to resuscitate him, the victim died on the scene.According to police, the two men did not know each other beforehand.Police are still searching for the suspect and another man who was with him at the time of the attack, both of whom fled.Sunday was slated to be the final day of the fair, but city officials chose to end it early “out of respect for the victim,” Markus Lewe, Münster’s mayor, said in a statement.The fair, known as the Send, is held three times a year in Münster. According to the organizers’ website, it draws up to a million visitors annually. The Associated Press

Alex Jones transferring assets to family and friends, evading payments to Sandy Hook families: NYT

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

Infowars host Alex Jones has transferred millions of dollars’ worth of assets to family and friends, potentially shielding his wealth from the nearly $1.5 billion in legal damages he owes to the families of the Sandy Hook shooting victims, according to The New York Times.Jones was ordered last fall to pay more than $1.4 billion in damages to the families of eight victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting, which left 20 young children and six adults dead. He was also ordered to pay another $50 million to the parents of a Sandy Hook victim in a separate Texas case.The Infowars host was hit with multiple defamation lawsuits after he repeatedly suggested that the school shooting in Newton, Conn., was a “false flag” operation staged by the U.S. government. The families of the victims, who he accused of being actors, were threatened and harassed by his followers.He filed for both personal and business bankruptcy within the last year as the damages piled up — a move that the Sand...

ATCEMS: 2 auto-pedestrian accidents reported overnight, 1 dead

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Austin-Travis County EMS responded to two separate auto-pedestrian crashes overnight Saturday into Sunday. The first crash happened in the 7900 block of Decker Lane near Lake Water E. Long around 9:48 p.m. ATCEMS said one person died at the scene.The second crash happened in north Austin around 5:30 a.m. Sunday on the North I-35 Service Road southbound near Barwood Park. ATCEMS said a person was struck by multiple vehicles and was taken to the hospital with critical life-threatening injuries. A second patient refused transport, EMS said. No other information was available at the time of the crashes.

Literary calendar for week of March 19

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

AFRICAN IMMIGRANTS IN THE U.S.: “Immigration, Identity and the Arts” is the theme of a conversation on the experiences of African immigrants seen through the lenses of music and literature, including Thi Bui’s NEA Big Read book “The Best We Could Do.” Shannon Gibney, writer, educator and activist, hosts a dialogue with Nigerian composer-performer Kashimana Ahua and Somali author Abdullahi Janno, whose children’s book “When River Stopped Singing to Cloud” will be featured. Free. Noon Saturday, March 25, East Side Freedom Library, 1105 Greenbrier St., St. Paul.MARY KAY ANDREWS: Author of bestselling novels that evoke Southern locales and themes presents her latest, “The Homewreckers,” featuring Georgia house flipper Hatti Kavanaugh, in the Club Book series. Free. 7:30 p.m. Monday, March 27, R.H. Stafford Library, 8595 Central Park Place, Woodbury.CHAD CORRIE: Introduces “The Shadow Regent,” a standalone fantasy th...

Meteorologists say winters may be warmer, snowier. What is St. Paul doing to prepare?

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

Heavy Midwest snows this season have stranded travelers, narrowed roads, forced St. Paul and Minneapolis to institute one-sided parking bans and generally made an icy, slushy muck out of travel.Experts say this is the climatological future, though not every year.“Our winter precipitation has been going up,” said Kenny Blumenfeld, a senior state climatologist with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. “We’re having a year with a lot of precipitation, and average to above average for temperatures. Even though this trend is going to continue, we’re still going to have some old-fashioned winters — maybe not as frequently as they used to be.”In other words, Blumenfeld said, brace for wetter, heavier snowfalls in the years ahead than, say, 30 or 40 years ago, including some potential record-setters like the current one, interspersed with some winters like any other.“Is this going to be the new normal? Winters like this are probably ...

Sunday Bulletin Board: Today’s starting picture: the late, great Brave Bud Grant!

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

In memoriamWrites CHRIS, “formerly of Falcon Heights, now from beautiful White Bear Lake”: “Feeling sad today about the passing of Bud Grant. Reminds me of this entry to BB I made in 2019:“‘Hunted high and low for this photo before the Vikings football season comes to an end. You always find what you’re looking for in the last place you look.“The young baseball player in the back row on the left is our own Bud Grant. Before he made his mark as a football coach, he was a star pitcher for the Osceola Braves baseball team from 1950 to 1953. Baseball was king in Osceola, Wisconsin, in the late 1940s and early 1950s. A playoff game often drew more than 2,000 fans. As a Vikings fan, I’m glad he didn’t stick to baseball.’“R.I.P., Bud.”Dept. of Neat Stuff (Paperweight of the Gods Division)Gregory J. of Dayton’s Bluff: “‘A paperweight is just what it says: It’s a weight that sits on paper, with th...

Longtime activist and St. Paul resident Vic Rosenthal given his own day in St. Paul

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

Longtime community activist and St. Paul resident Vic Rosenthal, 68, was honored Saturday by the city declaring March 18 “Victor Rosenthal Day” in honor of his decades of community organizing and work for social justice.In the proclamation from St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter, Rosenthal was lauded as a champion for racial, social and economic justice, and a tireless advocate for immigrant rights, marriage equality and voting rights.He “has made St. Paul a more equitable and accessible place to live,” through his work to build affordable housing, to provide access to light rail, as an educator at Metro State University and as an advocate for inclusionary zoning and much more, the proclamation said.“Vic’s tenacity and unflagging spirit have always been accompanied by a total inability to hear the word no or stop fighting for justice, in spite of any political environment, inclement weather, illness, or (being told no in the past),” the mayor wrot...

Chilly and sunny Sunday, more rain expected later this week

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

ST. LOUIS -- Sunday will be sunny with highs around 40 and wind chills in the low to mid 30s. Mostly clear and the mid to upper 20s again tonight. Spring begins Monday and temperatures will be back up to near normal, in the mid to upper 50s with lots of sun. Rain chances return Tuesday afternoon and last on and off through Friday. Tuesday won't be a washout, but as we get to later in the week multiple rounds of heavy rain are becoming a concern. Temperatures climb up into the 60s Wednesday and 70s Thursday, with more seasonal air moving back in for Friday.

Battlehawks fall to the Defenders 20 to 28

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:18:42 GMT

ST. LOUIS -- In Week 5 of the 2023 XFL season, the D.C. Defenders and the St. Louis Battlehawks played each other again. D.C. stayed unbeaten by beating A.J. McCarron and the St. Louis Battlehawks 28-20. Running Back Abram Smith ran for 218 yards and 3 rushing touchdowns.