Macron names ally Bayrou as new PM as he aims to restore political stabilityNexiGo N60 1080P Webcam $39.99 $21.99 at Amazon (save $18) Nothing fancy, but maybe that's exactly what you're looking for: a reliable and inexpensive webcam to attend all those meetings you don't really want to go to. It's got a built-in flip-up lens cap and a swivel so it's easy to adjust for the perfect angle. I've got one of these myself and it works great. I don't love being on camera, which means I don't love spending a lot of money on a new webcam. That makes this Black Friday deal an easy pick: it's a reliable and inexpensive webcam, and it's 45% off. The NexiGo N60 webcam is only $21.99 for Black Friday, which feels pretty darn cheap for a device most of us use every day. I can vouch for The NexiGo N60 personally: I bought one in April and it's perfect for meetings, Zoom calls, and recording. It's basic, yes, but that's kind of what I was looking for: I'm not a Twitch streamer or an influencer, I just need a webcam so I can Zoom with my folks, Google Meet with my coworkers, and occasionally hold up a body part to the camera for my doctor so he can say, "Ooh, that doesn't look good. You'd better come in." 👉 We're curating the best Black Friday PC gaming deals right here 👈 There are a few nice features you get with that reasonable price tag. I'm not sure how much truth there is to the rumor that hackers can remotely access your webcam even when you're not using it, but it's an unsettling thought. The NexiGo has a handy little lens cover you can flip down when you're not using it for a little peace of mind. Also, unlike my last webcam that could only tilt up and down, the NexiGo turns fully side-to-side, too, so you can fully swivel it around for the angle you want. And it clamps easily onto the top of your monitor so you don't need to hire a cameraman to hold it and point it at you. Convenient! If you don't trust my personal recommendation, there are over 43,000 reviews on Amazon that average out a 4.3 out of 5 star rating, which is pretty persuasive. This 45% discount also makes it the cheapest it's ever been on Amazon, too. Not a bad deal. 👉 Check out all the Amazon Black Friday PC gaming deals right here 👈
Jordan Ivy-Curry, UCF aim to topple TulsaHARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Democratic Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania conceded his reelection bid to Republican David McCormick on Thursday, as a statewide recount showed no signs of closing the gap and his campaign suffered repeated blows in court in its effort to get potentially favorable ballots counted. Casey’s concession comes more than two weeks after Election Day, as a grindingly slow ballot-counting process became a spectacle of hours-long election board meetings, social media outrage, lawsuits and accusations that some county officials were openly flouting the law. Republicans had been claiming that Democrats were trying to steal McCormick’s seat by counting “illegal votes.” Casey’s campaign had accused of Republicans of trying to block enough votes to prevent him from pulling ahead and winning. In a statement, Casey said he had just called McCormick to congratulate him. “As the first count of ballots is completed, Pennsylvanians can move forward with the knowledge that their voices were heard, whether their vote was the first to be counted or the last," Casey said. The Associated Press called the race for McCormick on Nov. 7, concluding that not enough ballots remained to be counted in areas Casey was winning for him to take the lead. As of Thursday, McCormick led by about 16,000 votes out of almost 7 million ballots counted. That was well within the 0.5% margin threshold to trigger an automatic statewide recount under Pennsylvania law. But no election official expected a recount to change more than a couple hundred votes or so, and Pennsylvania's highest court dealt him a blow when it refused entreaties to allow counties to count mail-in ballots that lacked a correct handwritten date on the return envelope. Republicans will have a 53-47 majority next year in the U.S. Senate. Follow Marc Levy at twitter.com/timelywriter
T he world is reeling from the chaos of disasters, pandemic, war, conflicts, political unrest, hunger, and deprivation, for the people and children who are trying to restart and rebuild their lives and communities. We pray for spiritual grace, healing, love, forgiveness, and lasting world peace. We count our blessings and release all negative vibes. Here’s my annual list of wishes for the children. They are future citizens, and they deserve to inherit a better world. 1. A home with loving parents who will guide and care for them. That all parents will lead by example and teach their kids good manners, family and spiritual values. That all children will be safe from domestic violence and abuse. 2. Good health. That all children, especially those in the rural areas and the marginalized communities, will have proper nourishment and medical and dental care in order to grow strong and healthy. That the essential vaccines to combat diseases will be available to all children in remote and devastated areas. 3. A pollution-free environment — clean air, pure drinking water, open fields, and parks with trees and flowers. That they may appreciate nature and learn how to protect the rivers, seas, lakes, and forests. 4. Quality education. That the public school system will be upgraded with dedicated teachers, more classrooms equipped with internet facilities, and books for students. That all kids will be given the opportunity to study and have the chance to excel. 5. Mental health care. That there will be enough psychologists and guidance counselors to help and protect adolescents with their issues such proper mental health care. Many children suffer from depression and anxiety. Some are desperate and take extreme risks. There should be a holistic psychospiritual treatment program to address this growing situation. 6. A comprehensive sports program for national and international competitions. That kids will learn the values of friendly competition, and the art of winning and losing gracefully. 7. A gender discrimination-free society that will encourage girls and boys to become leaders in school and later in their chosen professions. That they would have the resources from government and the private sector to fulfill their goals. 8. A progressive national arts and culture program and outreach projects to elevate and enhance the consciousness of children. 9. More education grants and financial stipends for good scholarships for deserving students. The appropriate work opportunities and support, both local and international, graduates. 10. Quality and balanced programming on television with more educational and entertaining shows. That producers will not exploit aspiring young performers. That there be proper protection for minors and performers who come out in shows. That all children and adolescents be protected. That social media content would be elevated to a higher level. 11. An accelerated science, math, and technology educational program to equip all future graduates with the necessary IT skills to compete in the international markets. 12. A stable economy. Jobs and livelihood opportunities for parents so that their children can go to and stay in school. Children should not be made to work in sweatshops or beg on the streets. Illegal child labor factories and armies are forbidden. 13. A country with visionary national and local leaders. An efficient, transparent government that is free from corruption. Integrity, compassion, and delicadeza (a sense of pride, honor, propriety, decorum, and/or decency) are some of the best qualities the officials should have. 14. A safe, crime-free, drug-free, abuse-free environment. That all kids be protected from the menace of incest, physical and emotional abuse, and the scourge of drugs. The internet is now being used by predators to exploit children and expose them to sexual abuse. 15. That children not be used as soldiers in areas of armed conflict. 16. Freedom of expression. That children have the right to be themselves. That adults realize that children need respect, and they are entitled to be heard. That there be open communication with parents and teachers or mentors. 17. Innocence. That they have a happy childhood and the chance to enjoy being a child. That they have time to play, study, rest, and heal. Above all, time to grow up at their own pace. A Happy, Prosperous and Healthy New Year to all! Maria Victoria Rufino is an artist, writer, and businesswoman. She is president and executive producer of Maverick Productions. mavrufino@gmail.comNoneThe No. 2 suffered a heartbreaking 13-10 loss on Saturday as the unranked pulled off a stunning upset, despite entering the game as 19.5-point underdogs, according to . This marked Michigan’s fourth straight victory over the Buckeyes, pushing their all-time series lead to 62-51-6. Javascript is required for you to be able to read premium content. Thanks for the feedback.All the signs Michelle Keegan was pregnant as actress announces she is expecting first child with husband Mark Wright
As part of a national “moonshot” to cure blindness, researchers at the CU Anschutz Medical Campus will receive as much as $46 million in federal funding over the next five years to pursue a first-of-its-kind full eye transplantation. “This is no easy undertaking, but I believe we can achieve this together,” said Dr. Kia Washington, the lead researcher for the University of Colorado-led team, during a press conference Monday. “And in fact I’ve never been more hopeful that a cure for blindness is within reach.” The CU team was one of four in the United States that received funding awards from the federal Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health , or ARPA-H. The CU-based group will focus on achieving the first-ever vision-restoring eye transplant by using “novel stem cell and bioelectronic technologies,” according to a news release announcing the funding. The work will be interdisciplinary, Washington and others said, and will link together researchers at institutions across the country. The four teams that received the funding will work alongside each other on distinct approaches, though officials said the teams would likely collaborate and eventually may merge depending on which research avenues show the most promise toward achieving the ultimate goal of transplanting an eye and curing blindness. Dr. Calvin Roberts, who will oversee the broader project for ARPA-H, said the agency wanted to take multiple “shots on goal” to ensure progress. “In the broader picture, achieving this would be probably the most monumental task in medicine within the last several decades,” said Dr. Daniel Pelaez of the University of Miami’s Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, which also received ARPA-H funding. Pelaez is the lead investigator for that team, which has pursued new procedures to successfully remove and preserve eyes from donors, amid other research. He told The Denver Post that only four organ systems have not been successfully transplanted: the inner ear, the brain, the spinal cord and the eye. All four are part of the central nervous system, which does not repair itself when damaged. If researchers can successfully transplant the human eye and restore vision to the patient, it might help unlock deeper discoveries about repairing damage to the brain and spine, Pelaez said, as well as addressing hearing loss. To succeed, researchers must successfully remove and preserve eyes from donors and then successfully connect and repair the optical nerve, which takes information from the eye and tells the brain what the eye sees. A team at New York University performed a full eye transplant on a human patient in November 2023, though the procedure — while a “remarkable achievement,” Pelaez said — did not restore the patient’s vision. It was also part of a partial face transplant; other approaches pursued via the ARPA-H funding will involve eye-specific transplants. Washington, the lead CU researcher, said she and her colleagues have already completed the eye transplant procedure — albeit without vision restoration — in rats. The CU team will next work on large animals to advance “optic nerve regenerative strategies,” the school said, as well as to study immunosuppression, which is critical to ensuring that patients’ immune systems don’t reject a donated organ. The goal is to eventually advance to human trials. Pelaez and his colleagues have completed their eye-removal procedure in cadavers, he said, and they’ve also studied regeneration in several animals that are capable of regenerating parts of their eyes, like salamanders or zebra fish. His team’s funding will focus in part on a life-support machine for the eye to keep it healthy and viable during the removal process. InGel Therapeutics, a Massachusetts-based Harvard spinoff and the lead of a third team, will pursue research on 3-D printed technology and “micro-tunneled scaffolds” that carry certain types of stem cells as part of a focus on optical nerve regeneration and repair, ARPA-H said. ARPH-A, created two years ago, will oversee the teams’ work. Researchers at 52 institutions nationwide will also contribute to the teams. The CU-led group will include researchers from the University of Southern California, the University of Wisconsin, Indiana University and Johns Hopkins University, as well as from the National Eye Institute . The teams will simultaneously compete and collaborate: Pelaez said his team has communicated with researchers at CU and at Stanford, another award recipient, about their eye-removal research. The total funding available for the teams is $125 million, ARPA-H officials said Monday, and it will be distributed in phases, in part dependent on teams’ success. U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, a Democrat who represents Denver in Congress, acknowledged the recent election results at the press conference Monday and pledged to continue fighting to preserve ARPA-H’s funding under President-elect Donald Trump’s administration. The effort to cure blindness, Washington joked, was “biblical” in its enormity — a reference to the Bible story in which Jesus cures a blind man. She and others also likened it to a moonshot, meaning the effort to successfully put Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the moon nearly 50 years ago. If curing blindness is similar to landing on the moon, then the space shuttle has already left the launchpad, Washington said. “We have launched,” she said, “and we are on our trajectory.”US budget airlines are struggling. Will pursuing premium passengers solve their problems? DALLAS (AP) — Delta and United Airlines have become the most profitable U.S. airlines by targeting premium customers while also winning a significant share of budget travelers. That is squeezing smaller low-fare carriers like Spirit Airlines, which filed for bankruptcy protection on Monday. Some travel industry experts think Spirit’s troubles indicate less-wealthy passengers will have fewer choices and higher prices. Other discount airlines are on better financial footing but also are lagging far behind the full-service airlines when it comes to recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic. Most industry experts think Frontier and other so-called ultra-low-cost carriers will fill the vacuum if Spirit shrinks, and that there's still plenty of competition to prevent prices from spiking. Bitcoin ticks closer to $100,000 in extended surge following US elections NEW YORK (AP) — Bitcoin is jumping again, setting another new high above $99,000. The cryptocurrency has been shattering records almost daily since the U.S. presidential election, and has rocketed more than 40% higher in just two weeks. It's now at the doorstep of $100,000. Cryptocurrencies and related investments like crypto exchange-traded funds have rallied because the incoming Trump administration is expected to be more “crypto-friendly.” Still, as with everything in the volatile cryptoverse, the future is hard to predict. And while some are bullish, other experts continue to warn of investment risks. Supreme Court steps into fight over FCC's $8 billion subsidies for internet and phone services WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court has stepped into a major legal fight over the $8 billion a year the federal government spends to subsidize phone and internet services in schools, libraries and rural areas, in a new test of federal regulatory power. The justices on Friday agreed to review an appellate ruling that struck down as unconstitutional the Universal Service Fund. The Federal Communications Commission collects money from telecommunications providers, who then pass the cost on to their customers. The Biden administration appealed the lower court ruling, but the case probably won’t be argued until late March. At that point, the Trump administration will be in place and it is not clear whether it will take a different view of the issue. Stock market today: Wall Street gains ground as it notches a winning week and another Dow record Stocks closed higher on Wall Street, giving the market its fifth gain in a row and notching another record high for the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The S&P 500 rose 0.3% Friday. The Dow added 1%, and the Nasdaq composite tacked on 0.2%. Retailers had some of the biggest gains. Gap soared after reporting quarterly results that easily beat analysts' estimates. EchoStar fell after DirecTV called off its purchase of that company's Dish Network unit. European markets closed mostly higher and Asian markets ended mixed. Treasury yields held relatively steady in the bond market. Crude oil prices gained ground. Australia rejects Elon Musk's claim that it plans to control access to the internet MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — An Australian Cabinet minister has rejected X Corp. owner Elon Musk’s allegation that the government intends to control all Australians' access to the internet through legislation that would ban young children from social media. Treasurer Jim Chalmers said on Friday that Musk’s criticism was “unsurprising” after the government introduced legislation to Parliament that would fine platforms including X up to $133 million for allowing children under 16 to hold social media accounts. The spat continues months of open hostility between the Australian government and the tech billionaire over regulators’ efforts to reduce public harm from social media. Parliament could pass the legislation as soon as next week. Oil company Phillips 66 faces federal charges related to alleged Clean Water Act violations LOS ANGELES (AP) — Oil company Phillips 66 has been federally indicted in connection with alleged violations of the Clean Water Act in California. The Texas-based company is accused of discharging hundreds of thousands of gallons of industrial wastewater containing excessive amounts of oil and grease. The U.S. Department of Justice announced the indictment on Thursday. Phillips is charged with two counts of negligently violating the Clean Water Act and four counts of knowingly violating the Clean Water Act. An arraignment date has not been set. A spokesperson for the company said it was cooperating with prosecutors. US regulators seek to break up Google, forcing Chrome sale as part of monopoly punishment U.S. regulators want a federal judge to break up Google to prevent the company from continuing to squash competition through its dominant search engine after a court found it had maintained an abusive monopoly over the past decade. The proposed breakup floated in a 23-page document filed late Wednesday by the U.S. Justice Department calls for Google to sell its industry-leading Chrome web browser and impose restrictions designed to prevent Android from favoring its search engine. Regulators also want to ban Google from forging multibillion-dollar deals to lock in its dominant search engine as the default option on Apple’s iPhone and other devices. New York judge rejects state efforts to shutter bitcoin mine over climate concerns NEW YORK (AP) — A New York judge has rejected an effort by state regulators to shutter a bitcoin mine over concerns about its greenhouse gas emissions. The decision will allow the Greenidge power plant to continue operating in the Finger Lakes region of the state. The state had previously found the gas-powered crypto mine ran afoul of a climate law intended to limit greenhouse gas emissions. But on Thursday, a state Supreme Court judge found Greenidge was entitled to a process to defend its continued operation. Environmental groups have protested the facility, which they allege is pumping emissions into the air while contaminating the nearby Seneca Lake. What you need to know about the proposed measures designed to curb Google's search monopoly U.S. regulators are proposing aggressive measures to restore competition to the online search market after a federal judge ruled that Google maintained an illegal monopoly. The sweeping set of recommendations filed late Wednesday could radically alter Google’s business. Regulators want Google to sell off its industry-leading Chrome web browser. They outlined a range of behavioral measures such as prohibiting Google from using search results to favor its own services such as YouTube, and forcing it to license search index data to its rivals. They're not going as far as to demand Google spin off Android, but are leaving that door open if the remedies don't work. Apple and Google face UK investigation into mobile browser dominance LONDON (AP) — A British watchdog says Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers. The watchdog's report Friday recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year. The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker’s tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. The CMA’s report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers “the clearest or easiest option.” Apple said it disagreed with the findings.
Ukraine preparing for end to conflict – mediaPenn State clinches Big Ten championship game berth with win vs. Maryland, will play Oregon
The US says it pushed retraction of a famine warning for north Gaza. Aid groups express concern.