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The world’s tallest flagpole. A tiny Maine town. An idea meant to unite people is dividing them

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

COLUMBIA FALLS, Maine (AP) — Lobster boat engines rumble to life in quiet coves. Lumberjacks trudge deep into the woods. Farmers tend expanses of wild blueberries. Maine’s Down East region is where the sunlight first kisses a U.S. state’s soil each day, where the vast wilderness and ocean meet in one of the last places on the East Coast unspoiled by development.Which makes it a striking backdrop to one family’s bold vision for the region: a flagpole jutting upward from the woodlands toward spacious skies — the tallest one ever, reaching higher than the Empire State Building. And atop it? A massive American flag bigger than a football field, visible from miles away on a clear day.To promoters, the $1 billion project, funded in part by donations, would unite people of all political stripes and remind them of shared values in an era of national polarization. Here’s how Morrill Worcester, founder of Worcester Wreath, tells it: “We want to bring Americans together, remi...

Executives urge Europe to rethink its world-leading AI rules

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

LONDON (AP) — More than 150 company executives are urging the European Union to rethink the world’s most comprehensive rules for artificial intelligence, saying Friday that upcoming regulations will make it harder for companies in Europe to compete with rivals overseas, especially when it comes to the technology behind systems like ChatGPT.Officials at companies from French planemaker Airbus and carmaker Renault to Dutch beer giant Heineken signed an open letter to EU leaders saying the 27-nation bloc’s groundbreaking legislation may put shackles on the development of generative AI. That technology gives popular AI chatbots like ChatGPT the power to generate text, images, video and audio that resemble human work.“Such regulation could lead to highly innovative companies moving their activities abroad ” and investors withdrawing their money from AI development in Europe, the letter said. “The result would be a critical productivity gap between the two sides of the A...

South African president cleared of wrongdoing in scandal over $580,000 in cash stolen from his farm

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — South African President Cyril Ramaphosa was cleared of wrongdoing Friday by a public watchdog over a scandal involving the theft of more than half a million dollars in U.S. currency that had been stashed in a sofa at his game farm.Acting Public Protector Kholeka Gcaleka, whose office holds politicans to account, said Ramaphosa did not violate the ethics code for members of South Africa’s executive over the incident, which happened in 2020 but was only revealed publicly last year.The scandal was seen as the biggest callenge to Ramaphosa’s reputation and his leadership of Africa’s most developed economy. There is still an ongoing criminal investigation into the incident. Ramaphosa said $580,000 in cash was stolen. Gcaleka said it was not part of her investigation to confirm how much money was involved and didn’t give a figure.Ramaphosa, 70, was accused of not reporting the theft properly to police in an attempt to cover up the existence of t...

A week after an armed rebellion rattled Russia, key details about it are still shrouded in mystery

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

Did mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin have inside help from the military and political elite in his armed rebellion that rattled Russia?A week after the mutiny raised the most daunting challenge to President Vladimir Putin’s rule in over two decades, key details about the uprising are still unknown.Uncertainty also swirls around the fate of Prigozhin and his Wagner private military forces, along with the deal they got from the Kremlin, and what the future holds for the Russian defense minister they tried to oust.Finally, and perhaps the biggest unknown: Can Putin shore up the weaknesses revealed by the events of last weekend?DID PRIGOZHIN HAVE INSIDE HELP?Many observers argue that Prigozhin wouldn’t have been able to take over military facilities in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don so easily on June 24 and mount his rapid march toward Moscow without collusion with some members of the military brass.Thousands of members of his private army drove nearly 1,000 kilometers (about 620 m...

Elián González 2 decades on: From a focus of international tug-of-war to a member of Cuba’s congress

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

HAVANA (AP) — Elián González has the same big, expressive eyes he did 23 years ago when an international custody battle transformed him into the face of the long-strained relations between Cuba and the United States.Now 29, González is stepping into Cuban politics. He recently entered his country’s congress with hopes of helping his people at a time of record emigration and heightened tension between the two seaside neighbors.“From Cuba, we can do a lot so that we have a more solid country, and I owe it to Cubans,” he said during an exclusive interview with The Associated Press. “That is what I’m going to try to do from my position, from this place in congress — to contribute to making Cuba a better country.”González has given only a handful of interviews since he was unwittingly thrust into the geopolitical spotlight as a boy. In 1999, at just 5 years old, he and his mother were aboard a boat of Cuban migrants headed toward Florida when the boat capsized in the Florida Straits. His...

Finland’s economics minister steps down from government over alleged ties to extreme right wing

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — The economic affairs minister in Finland’s new four-party center-right governing coalition, resigned Friday after 10 days in the job for his alleged ties to the extreme right wing, Finnish media said.A member of the populist, anti-immigration Finns Party, Vilhelm Junnila stepped down in part for a speech in connection with a far-right memorial in the western city of Turku in 2019, Finland broadcaster YLE said.He also reportedly has made a reference to Adolf Hitler. He has allegedly joked about his candidate number in the 2019 parliamentary elections — which was randomly assigned as 88 — jokingly saying it represented two H’s. The eighth letter in the alphabet is H, and 88 is a numerical code for “Heil Hitler.”Junnila has apologized and distanced himself for his remarks and jokes, saying in a Facebook post that he never had any ties or affiliation with extreme elements.On Friday, he resigned.“I see that it is impossible for me to continue as a ministe...

French president urges parents to keep teens at home to quell rioting spreading across France

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

NANTERRE, France (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron is urging parents to keep teenagers at home to quell rioting spreading across France and says social media are fueling copycat violence. After a second crisis meeting with senior ministers, Macron said Friday that social media are playing a “considerable role” in the spreading unrest triggered by the deadly police shooting of a 17-year-old. He said he wants social media such as Snapchat and TikTok to remove sensitive content and said that violence is being organized online. Of young rioters, he said: “We sometimes have the feeling that some of them are living in the streets the video games that have intoxicated them.”THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.NANTERRE, France (AP) — Protesters erected barricades, lit fires and shot fireworks at police, who responded with tear gas and water cannons in French streets overnight as tensions grew over the deadly police shooting of a 17-year-old that has shocke...

Stock market today: Wall Street heads toward gains as markets try to finish the month strong

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

BANGKOK — Wall Street pointed toward gains Friday ahead of closely-watched inflation data that could impact the Federal Reserve’s next interest rate decision.Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.3% before the bell and the S&P 500 gained 0.4%. The government’s consumer spending report that will be released before the opening bell contains a measure of inflation that is closely watched by the Fed, which has been raising rates furiously for more than a year in an effort to bring down inflation not seen since the early 1980s. Analysts forecast that inflation retreated from the previous month, which had come in higher than expected. Measured year over year, prices increased 4.4% in April, up from 4.2% in March. That’s down sharply from a 7% peak last June but remains far above the Fed’s 2% target.Before the Fed’s most recent meeting in June when officials declined to bump up rates, the central bank had raised its benchmark borrowing rate 10 time...

Court says Tulsa can’t give a Choctaw man a ticket because the Oklahoma city is on reservation land

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Tulsa lacks the jurisdiction to prosecute a Native American man cited by police for speeding because the city is located within the boundaries of an Indian reservation, a federal appeals court ruled.The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued its decision on Wednesday, rejecting the city’s argument that the Curtis Act, an 1898 federal law passed before Oklahoma became a state, gave the city jurisdiction over municipal violations committed by Native Americans.The court’s ruling was based on the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark 2020 decision that found that much of eastern Oklahoma, including Tulsa, remains an Indian reservation because it was never formally disestablished by Congress. That ruling has since been expanded to include several other reservations in eastern and southern Oklahoma that make up about 40% of the state.Justin Hooper, a citizen of the Choctaw Nation, was cited for speeding in 2018 by Tulsa police in a part of the city within...

Dean's Reviews: Indiana Jones & The Dial of Destiny

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:09:25 GMT

Dean reviews what is said to be the final film in the iconic 'Indiana Jones' franchise.Get Dean's reviews and A-List interviews delivered right to your inbox. Sign up for Dean's Downloads weekly newsletter. You'll also get his Dean Cooks recipes too!