Island of hope

January 22, 2016 - Daily News Briefing

The effort by Cyprus's Turkish and Greek leaders to reunify the island is a ray of light in a divided region.

Subscribe Now to read this post!

To read this post and thousands more articles, subscribe today!

As winter storm Jonas bears down on the East Coast Thursday, likely bringing blizzard conditions and high winds to Washington, D.C., Baltimore, and much of the New York City metro area, travelers could face flight cancellations, delays and gridlocked roads over the weekend. With more than 73 million people – or about one in four Americans – living in an area likely to be affected by the storm in some way, meteorologists, state officials, and travel experts are asking people intending to travel over the weekend to consider changing their plans.

Pakistanis buried their dead and observed a day of nationwide mourning Thursday following the brazen attack by Islamic militants who stormed a northwestern university the previous day, gunning down students and teachers and spreading terror before the four gunmen were slain by the military. Meanwhile, the death toll from the assault at Bacha Khan university in the town of Charsadda rose to 21, after another student died in hospital, said police official Tariq Khan.

Oregon Gov. Kate Brown called for an end to the occupation of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge by antigovernment protesters Wednesday, directing her frustration at the federal government. “The residents of Harney County have been overlooked and underserved by federal officials’ response thus far,” said Governor Brown, despite her pleas to the US Department of Justice and the White House. Led by Ammon Bundy, the protesters have occupied the wildlife refuge for three weeks in protest of two fellow ranchers imprisoned by federal authorities for arson and what they see as the lack of private lands for small farmers in the area.

In a field of Republican candidates who deny climate change, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz seems to find himself in a whole other category, say scientists. “The radical left loves attacking people as anti-science when anyone dares question their computer models on global warming,” Cruz said at an Iowa Agriculture Summit in March of last year. “They scream, ‘you’re anti-science,’ when someone points out, for example, that in the last 17 years, satellite data shows there’s been no warming whatsoever.” Carl Mears, senior scientist for Remote Sensing Systems, tells the Associated Press that Cruz is misusing this satellite data. Cruz specifically started his present comparison at 1997, a year with unusually high temperatures because of El Niño weather.

A family made famous by the reality show “Sister Wives” is calling on a Utah appeals court to uphold a ruling that essentially decriminalized polygamy, saying the state’s historic ban on the practice raises constitutional issues about freedom of religion, association, and privacy rights of consenting adults. The Utah Attorney General challenged the ruling, with state attorneys saying they don’t intend to charge Kody Brown and his four wives – Meri, Jangle, Christine, and Robyn – if the law stands, but the ban should stay on the books to prevent crimes such as underage marriage. The case is set to go before the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver on Thursday.

Bush dogs – one of the world’s most mysterious species – have been caught on camera in Panama. Not much larger than a house cat, bush dogs are an elusive canid species that live throughout South America. Typically running through tropical forests in packs up to 10, bush dogs mainly eat rodents. Despite their broad habitat from Panama to Paraguay, bush dogs (Speothos venaticus) are rarely seen by humans.

Subscribe Now to read this post!

Are you sure?

Forgot to add folder?

Tags Error