Liberty hosts Connecticut to begin semifinals

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Liberty hosts Connecticut to begin semifinals Connecticut Sun (27-13, 14-6 Eastern Conference) at New York Liberty (32-8, 16-4 Eastern Conference)New York; Sunday, 1 p.m. EDTFANDUEL SPORTSBOOK WNBA LINE: Liberty -6.5; over/under is 162.5WNBA PLAYOFFS SEMIFINALS: Liberty host first series matchupBOTTOM LINE: The New York Liberty host the Connecticut Sun to begin the WNBA playoffs semifinals. New York went 4-0 against Connecticut during the regular season. The Liberty won the last regular season matchup 89-58 on Sept. 2 led by 19 points from Betnijah Laney, while Tiffany Hayes scored 11 points for the Sun.The Liberty have gone 16-4 against Eastern Conference teams. New York is second in the WNBA with 37.9 rebounds led by Breanna Stewart averaging 9.3.The Sun are 14-6 against Eastern Conference opponents. Connecticut is the top team in the Eastern Conference scoring 12.0 fast break points per game.TOP PERFORMERS: Sabrina Ionescu is averaging 17 points, 5.6 rebounds and 5.4 assists for the Liberty. Stewart is averaging 23.3 points ...

Landry's Seafood sued for alleged discrimination at Colorado restaurant

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Landry's Seafood sued for alleged discrimination at Colorado restaurant DENVER (KDVR) -- Landry's Seafood House, a national chain with several locations, is being sued after an employee in Englewood claimed she was being harassed for her national origin and the company failed to intervene.According to a release from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the employee is Iranian and was mocked by other employees, including supervisors and managers. Photos: Mustang, aka Blucifer, gets a bath “Workers, regardless of their country of origin, should be treated equally and fairly in the workplace,” Amy Burkholder, director of the EEOC’s Denver Field Office, said in an emailed release.The EEOC says the discrimination included mocking her accent and physical appearance and that it negatively impacted her pay.The unnamed worker made complaints to the restaurant's GM and even the company's human resource department but they "failed to stop the harassment," according to the EEOC, and even let her go as an employee."An employer must take seriously any...

Biden agrees to send long-range missiles to Ukraine

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Biden agrees to send long-range missiles to Ukraine President Joe Biden promised his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, that the United States will soon provide Kyiv with a small number of long-range missiles to help its war with Russia, according to two U.S. officials familiar with the matter.Biden made the pledge to Zelenskyy during the Ukrainian leader’s visit to the White House on Thursday, fulfilling a long-held wish by Kyiv, according to the officials who like others for this story were granted anonymity to speak about private conversations.The Army Tactical Missile Systems will likely be delivered to Ukraine in the coming weeks. The White House declined to comment on the matterThe news is a major win for Zelenskyy and officials in Kyiv, who have long sought the missiles. ATACMS have a range of 45 to 190 miles and Ukrainians have long argued that they are crucial to striking deep behind entrenched Russian positions along a 600-mile front line.NBC first reported the news that the missiles had been approved.Bid...

Tropical Storm Ophelia forms off the US mid-Atlantic coast, expected to bring heavy rain and wind

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Tropical Storm Ophelia forms off the US mid-Atlantic coast, expected to bring heavy rain and wind ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — Tropical Storm Ophelia has formed off the mid-Atlantic coast and is expected to bring heavy rain, storm surge and windy conditions over the weekend, the National Hurricane Center said.Ophelia had maximum sustained winds of 60 mph (95 kph), according to a 2 p.m. ET advisory from the Miami-based center. The storm was centered 150 miles (240 kilometers) southeast of Cape Fear, North Carolina. It was forecast to make landfall Saturday morning.Virginia’s governor declared a state of emergency Friday and the intensifying weather system forced schools to close early and canceled weekend events.Rain was already moving inland across North Carolina by midday Friday with some areas expected to get up to 7 inches (17.7 centimeters) across eastern parts of the state and into southeast Virginia, forecasters said. Storm surge warning was in effect for some areas, with surges between 3 and 5 feet (0.9 to 1.5 meters) forecast for parts of North Carolina, the hurricane center re...

Lost Truman Capote story published after discovery in notebook

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Lost Truman Capote story published after discovery in notebook (CNN) — An unknown story by Truman Capote has been published for the first time, after it was discovered hiding in plain sight in a red notebook belonging to the acclaimed author.Capote, a famous American writer and novelist, was born in New Orleans in 1924 and died in 1984. His two most famous works, “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” (1958) and “In Cold Blood” (1966), solidified his place among the great American authors of the 20th century.Now, the short story “Another Day in Paradise” has been published Friday in “The Strand” magazine after being discovered by its managing editor, Andrew F. Gulli, in Washington’s Library of Congress.While Gulli had gone to the library to look for works by James M. Cain, the writer responsible for novels including “The Postman Always Rings Twice,” he told CNN he also took the opportunity to search for Capote’s work.“Then in a red notebook, there was a handwritten short story from Truman Capote. Actually I couldn’t believe it, this can’t be happen...

Column: The Chicago Cubs are in a tailspin. Someone notify David Ross and Marquee Sports Network.

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Column: The Chicago Cubs are in a tailspin. Someone notify David Ross and Marquee Sports Network. Panic time at Wrigley Field?Not yet perhaps, but the Chicago Cubs’ struggles in September have fans on edge entering the final regular-season series at Wrigley Field.Manager David Ross noted after Thursday’s loss to Pittsburgh that the Pirates were not a team of “our caliber.” If that’s the case, neither are the 96-loss Colorado Rockies, their weekend opponent. The Rockies sent Noah Davis, a pitcher with a 9.58 ERA, against the Cubs in Friday’s opener.The Cubs were expected to beat teams like the Pirates and Rockies in September, but have instead lost four of their last six games to the two bottom feeders over the last week and a half.Every game is big from now on.“Expectations are one thing, but they’ve all felt big,” Ross said Friday morning. “They felt big in Arizona, right? The Pirates, we need to beat those teams and we didn’t. We start dwindling down (in games) and you’re in a race and there’s a bunc...

Step back in time with these 4 crime fiction novels

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Step back in time with these 4 crime fiction novels Moira Macdonald | (TNS) The Seattle TimesFor this month’s edition of The Plot Thickens, I decided to take a little meander into crime fiction set in the past. (Because the present, i.e. the endless late summer, was just too hot. Reading cools one down, I think.) First up: Amy Chua’s fiction debut “The Golden Gate” (Minotaur Books, $28), set in the Bay Area in the 1940s, where homicide detective Al Sullivan is trying to solve the murder of a presidential candidate — which took place in the same posh Berkeley hotel where a child mysteriously died 10 years earlier. The ghost of that girl haunts this story, which mingles socialites, hotel workers, politicians (Madame Chiang Kai-shek plays an arch cameo role), cops, monks, immigrants and one very smart 11-year-old in a rich and satisfying stew.Chua, a Yale law professor best known for her 2011 nonfiction work “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother,” has clearly done her research: “The Golden Gate”...

Giorgio Napolitano, former Italian president, 1st ex-Communist in that post, has died, at 98

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Giorgio Napolitano, former Italian president, 1st ex-Communist in that post, has died, at 98 ROME (AP) — Giorgio Napolitano, the first former Communist to rise to Italy’s presidency, died on Friday, the Quirinal presidential palace said.Napolitano, who was also the first person to be elected twice to the mostly ceremonial presidency, was 98. A statement issued Friday night by the presidential palace confirmed Italian news reports of the death of Napolitano, who had been ailing in a Rome hospital for weeks. The current president, Sergio Mattarella, in a message hailed his predecessor as head of state, saying that Napolitano’s life “mirrored a large part of the history” of Italy in the second half of the 20th century. As a prominent member of what had long been the largest Communist party in the West, Napolitano had advocated positions that often veered from party orthodoxy. He sought dialogue with Italian and European socialists to end his party’s isolation, and he was an early backer of European integration. The Associated Press

Arrests made in boy’s shooting death that sparked New Mexico governor’s aggressive guns ban

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Arrests made in boy’s shooting death that sparked New Mexico governor’s aggressive guns ban ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Two people were arrested Thursday in connection with a shooting outside an Albuquerque baseball stadium that killed an 11-year-old boy and prompted the New Mexico governor to issue a controversial gun ban.Jose Romero, 22, and Nathen Garley, 21, were being held for the Sept. 6 shooting after an Albuquerque Isotopes game in what appeared to be a case of mistaken identity, Police Chief Harold Medina said at a news conference.Medina said the two men had argued with people during the ballgame and mistakenly opened fire on a truck carrying the boy and his family as it was leaving the parking lot because it closely resembled the truck of the intended targets.“These cowards thought they were tough,” Medina said in an earlier social media post. “They killed an innocent child.”Romero was taken into custody on Thursday evening. He already was wanted for failing to appear in court in connection with alleged drug dealing, Medina said.Garley was already in custody when he...

Medicaid expansion to begin soon in North Carolina as governor decides to let budget bill become law

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 16:56:32 GMT

Medicaid expansion to begin soon in North Carolina as governor decides to let budget bill become law RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper announced Friday he would let the state budget bill coming to his desk become law without his signature, opening the way for Medicaid coverage for 600,000 low-income adults, with some receiving the government health insurance soon. The Democratic governor unveiled his decision on the two-year spending plan minutes after the Republican-controlled General Assembly gave final legislative approval to the 625-page measure. A Medicaid expansion law that Cooper signed in March said that a state budget for this fiscal year still had to be enacted before coverage could be implemented. Negotiations on that budget plan, which was supposed to take effect July 1, carried on throughout the summer. The final two-year plan accelerates individual income tax rate cuts, broadens private-school scholarships to all K-12 children and contained other items that weaken the governor’s office while strengthening the GOP-dominated legislature and its p...