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US   MARKETS  
The Fed just cut rates to their lowest point since 2022. Here's what that could mean for mortgage rates.
- The Federal Reserve delivered big financial news this week, announcing yet another interest rate cut — its third in just four months. With this latest rate cut , the Fed has sliced another 25 basis points off the benchmark rate and has officially pushed the federal funds rate down to a range of 3.50% to 3.75%. That, in turn, marks a meaningful milestone: the lowest federal funds rate since November 2022 ...

Source: cbsnews.com
US   BUSINESS  
5 Things Companies Winning With Enterprise AI Get Right
- As we close the third year of AI's mainstream arrival inside organizations, one thing has become unmistakably clear. The excitement around generative tools has not translated into widespread success. Research after research is showing that only a small portion of enterprise AI initiatives are achieving measurable value. Most companies are deploying pilots, running experiments, and adding new tools to old workflows, ...

Source: forbes.com
US   POLITICS  
The Unlikely State Where Democrats Could Turn U.S. Politics on Its Head
- No, Democrats Shouldn't Give Up On Texas After a string of disappointments, the party is tempted to give up on ever turning the state blue. History shows that that's a mistake. to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. In 2018 U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke broke state fundraising records and sparked national attention with his campaign for a Texas Senate seat. ...

Source: slate.com
US   POLITICS  
U.S. seizes oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, escalating tensions
- Washington — The U.S. has seized a large oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, officials said Wednesday, escalating tensions between the two countries . President Trump said he assumes the U.S. will keep the oil.  Bloomberg first reported the oil tanker seizure. Mr. Trump announced the seizure during a roundtable meeting at the White House, saying the tanker was "seized for a very good reason."  ...

Source: cbsnews.com
US   POLITICS  
Judges unseal Epstein and Maxwell grand jury docs. What's inside?
- Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent Notifications can be managed in browser preferences. Swipe for next article Judges and prosecutors have cautioned that the materials might not lead to any new revelations Federal judges in New York and Florida have agreed to unseal grand jury documents tied to investigations into Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell , paving the way for the Department of ...

Source: independent.co.uk
US   POLITICS  
2 Democrats, 2 strategies: Texas Senate race shows party split on Trump-focus in midterm elections
- WASHINGTON (AP) — A Dallas congresswoman opened her Senate campaign by telling voters that she "has gone toe to toe with Donald Trump." Her Democratic primary opponent insisted that Americans are tired of "politics as a blood sport." The divergent approach highlights how U.S. Rep. are navigating a race where Democrats hope to break a three-decade losing streak in Texas. It also reflects a broader divide ...

Source: news.yahoo.com
US  
Trump administration moves to end the SAVE plan for millions of student borrowers
- The Trump administration has reached an agreement that could end President Biden's signature student loan repayment plan, a move that may force millions of borrowers back into repayment. The Education Department on Tuesday announced a proposed settlement with the state of Missouri that it said would terminate the Saving on a Valuable Education, or SAVE, plan, an income-driven repayment plan that tabulates loan ...

Source: cbsnews.com
WORLD   POLITICS  
Zelensky offers to hold elections in 3 months, with Western security
- Dec. 10 (UPI) -- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine could hold elections within the next three months in response to allegations by U.S. President Donald Trump that Kyiv was using the war as an excuse to stay in power. Speaking to reporters Tuesday evening, Zelensky said he was ready for elections and would seek to hold them on condition that the United States and other allies provided guarantees ...

Source: upi.com
Social media ban for children under 16 starts in Australia
- MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese welcomed a world-first social media ban for children younger than 16 that took effect Wednesday as families taking back power from tech giants but warned the implementation would be difficult. Many children posted farewell messages, while parents reported distraught children discovering they'd been shut out of platforms as the landmark law ...

Source: bostonglobe.com
US   POLITICS  
Senate Republicans Unveil Counter-Proposal to ACA Extensions
- Home » » WASHINGTON – Republican Sens. Mike Crapo and Bill Cassidy unveiled a bill that would deposit $1,000 to $1,500 into health savings accounts for qualifying customers. The proposal aims to be an alternative to the extension of the Affordable Care Act . Subsidies granted during the COVID-19 pandemic for the Affordable Care Act , also known as "Obamacare," expire this month. Americans will ...

Source: floridianpress.com
Kentucky State University shooting victim identified
- Dec. 10 (UPI) -- Officials in Kentucky have identified the 19-year-old victim killed in Tuesday's shooting at Kentucky State University. The Franklin County Coroner's Office identified the victim as De'Jon Darrell Fox Jr., according to multiple news reports . He was a student at the school in Frankfort and was the only victim in the incident. He was from Indianapolis, news reports said . Soon after the shooting on ...

Source: upi.com
US   POLITICS  
Trump Administration Reportedly Pushing ICC to Exempt Trump From War Crimes Prosecution
- The Trump administration is reportedly trying to strongarm the International Criminal Court (ICC) into changing its founding document to carve out an exception for President Donald Trump and his top officials ensuring that they are never prosecuted by the court for potential war crimes. The administration is threatening the ICC with yet more sanctions if they do not amend the Rome Statute, which established the ...

Source: truthout.org
BUSINESS  
Amazon to invest $35B in India by 2030 with focus on AI, logistics
- Amazon.com Inc. today announced plans to invest $35 billion in India through the end of the decade. Executives detailed the initiative at the sixth edition of a business event the company holds annually in New Delhi. According to Amazon, the investment will support "all its businesses." That suggests some of the funds could go toward growing Amazon Web Services Inc.'s local presence. AWS inaugurated its first cloud ...

Source: siliconangle.com
US   POLITICS  
Miami mayor-elect Higgins vows to end 'reality TV show' culture at City Hall
- By and Following her decisive victory in Miami's runoff election, Mayor-Elect Eileen Higgins laid out a vision for a new era in Miami politics Wednesday, with promises to end City Hall's "reality TV show" culture and instead focus on tackling major issues plaguing Miami residents. "So first of all, the temperature on the dais has to go down," Higgins told reporters in her first post-election press conference. ...

Source: miamiherald.com
US  
Judge says Trump must end Guard deployment in Los Angeles
- SACRAMENTO — A federal judge ordered the Trump administration on Wednesday to immediately end its current deployment of California National Guard troops in Los Angeles, ruling that the federal government had illegally kept them in the city long after intense street protests had ended in the summer. The ruling by Judge Charles R. Breyer of the US District Court in San Francisco applies to about 100 National ...

Source: bostonglobe.com
WORLD  
Thailand-Cambodia border clashes enter third day as 500,000 flee fighting
- Fighting between Thailand and Cambodia has continued for a third day, with cross-border shelling and air raids forcing more than half a million civilians to flee their homes and seek shelter, according to authorities. Officials from the two Southeast Asian neighbours on Wednesday also accused each other of restarting the conflict that has killed at least 13 soldiers and civilians so far this week and led more than ...

Source: aljazeera.com
Florida governor designates CAIR as foreign terrorist organization
- News Florida governor designates CAIR as foreign terrorist organization Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Monday signed an executive order designating the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) as a foreign terrorist organization. The executive order, an unprecedented step at the state level, cites a supposed connection between the Muslim Brotherhood and CAIR as the primary justification for the designation. ...

Source: jurist.org
SCIENCE  
Ancient Humans Were Making Fire 350,000 Years Earlier Than Scientists Realized
- Set aside your matches or lighter and try to start a fire —chances are you'd be left cold and hungry. But as early as 400,000 years ago, ancient hominins may have had the skills to conjure flame, according to groundbreaking new evidence of fire making that is 350,000 years older than scientists' previous earliest example. Investigators looking to understand our ancestors have long been interested in the ...

Source: scientificamerican.com
US  
OCC Letters Reframe Crypto as Standard Banking Activity | PYMNTS.com
- U.S. banking regulators are warming up to cryptocurrency in a way never seen before. For much of the digital asset sector's history, crypto companies have accused U.S. regulators of regulatory arbitrage by enforcement, while regulators accused the industry of racing ahead of basic risk controls. Banks, caught in the middle, largely stayed on the sidelines, experimenting quietly while waiting for a clearer signal. ...

Source: pymnts.com
US   POLITICS  
Court blocks Trump's ban on wind power, but other anti-renewable policies remain
- President Donald Trump's crusade against renewables was dealt a blow on Monday when a federal judge vacated a January executive order that halted wind energy development on public lands. In May, 17 states and the District of Columbia filed suit against Trump over the order, which directed federal agencies to "not issue new or renewed approvals, rights of way, permits, leases, or loans for onshore or offshore wind ...

Source: reason.com
MEDICINE  
Case study links patient's energy drink habit to stroke
- Energy drinks might give you wings, unleash the beast or fuel your grind - but chugging too many might pose a serious stroke risk, doctors warn. An otherwise fit and healthy man in his 50s with a daily eight-can habit found out the hard way, a case study published Tuesday in the journal BMJ Case Reports states. This patient suffered permanent damage from a minor stroke caused by extremely high blood pressure, ...

Source: upi.com
US  
Supreme Court Probes 'Confusion' Over Death Penalty IQ Tests
- Conservative justices asked whether the Supreme Court needs to sharpen its guidance on how courts assess intellectual disability in death penalty cases, signaling concern that its precedents are misapplied. The justices on Wednesday heard argument in the case of Joseph Smith, who was sentenced to death in Alabama for a 1997 robbery-murder despite evidence that he may have an intellectual disability. After years of ...

Source: news.bloomberglaw.com
MEDICINE  
Uterine Fibroids Significantly Raise Risk of Heart Disease
- Uterine fibroids—common, often missed and frequently painful growths made of muscle and other tissue inside the uterus—may dramatically raise the risk of heart disease, a new paper finds. In a study of 2.7 million women, the more than 450,000 who were diagnosed with the growths had a more than 80 percent higher risk of developing heart disease over a 10-year period. Experts estimate that as many as 80 ...

Source: scientificamerican.com
Iceland joins boycott of Eurovision 2026 in protest at Israel's involvement
- Iceland will not take part in next year's Eurovision Song Contest , the country's public broadcaster has said, joining four other countries boycotting the event over Israel's inclusion. Broadcaster RUV said on Wednesday that the Nordic nation would not participate in the 2026 competition, after organiser the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) greenlit Israel's involvement last week, dismissing calls from some ...

Source: aljazeera.com
CNBC's The China Connection newsletter: U.S.-China AI talent race heats up
- "Chip War" author Chris Miller is worried about the U.S. losing its advantage over China in artificial intelligence talent. In 2020, China's ranked first in the world at 3.57 million STEM graduates — far more than the U.S. with just 820,000. With advances in tech, Chinese companies have also seen the highest growth rate in U.S.-granted patents last year. This report is from this week's CNBC's The China ...

Source: cnbc.com
MEDICINE  
Sperm donor with cancer-causing gene fathered nearly 200 children across Europe, investigation finds
- London —  Sperm from a donor who unknowingly carried a cancer-causing gene has been used to conceive nearly 200 babies across Europe, an investigation by 14 European public service broadcasters, including CBS News' partner network BBC News, has revealed. Some children conceived using the sperm have already died from cancer, and the vast majority of those who inherited the gene will develop cancer in ...

Source: cbsnews.com
POLITICS  
Machado's daughter accepts Nobel Peace Prize in Venezuelan opposition leader's absence
- OSLO, Norway (AP) — Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado 's daughter accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on her mother's behalf Wednesday, hours after officials said Machado would miss the ceremony. Machado has been in hiding and has not been seen in public since Jan. 9, when she was briefly detained after joining supporters in a protest in Caracas, Venezuela's capital. Jørgen Watne ...

Source: apnews.com
US   BUSINESS  
Instacart responds to report that some customers are charged more than others for same items
- SAN FRANCISCO ( KRON ) – Instacart, the San Francisco-based company that operates its eponymous grocery delivery app, is responding to reports that it charged some customers more than others for the exact same items as part of an artificial intelligence-enabled experiment. The allegations stem from a study conducted by Consumer Reports , an advocacy group known as Groundwork Collaborative, and the non-profit ...

Source: wfla.com
BUSINESS   SCIENCE  
A Vital NASA Mars Orbiter Has Gone Dark
- MAVEN has circled Mars for more than a decade, exploring the planet and relaying data from robots on the surface. Reading time 2 minutes NASA has lost the signal from a Martian probe that also serves as a communications relay for the Curiosity and Perseverance rovers on the surface of the Red Planet. The MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN) spacecraft was operating normally on December 6 when its orbit ...

Source: gizmodo.com
Former Michigan football coach Sherrone Moore jailed, hours after his firing
- ▶ Get the AP Top 25 college football poll delivered straight to your inbox every week with AP Top 25 Poll Alerts. Sign up here . ANN ARBOR, Mich. (AP) — Former Michigan football coach Sherrone Moore was jailed on Wednesday, according to court records, hours after he was fired for what the university said was an "inappropriate relationship with a staff member." According to the Washtenaw County Jail, the ...

Source: apnews.com
US   POLITICS  
Judge Emil Bove Faces Ethics Complaint After Attending Trump Rally
- A conservative United States federal judge was seen attending a political rally hosted by President Donald Trump this week, prompting a nonprofit watchdog group to file an ethics complaint against him. Judge Emil Bove, who serves on the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals, was nominated by Trump in June, and narrowly approved by a deeply divided Senate in a 50-49 vote the following month . Prior to his nomination, ...

Source: truthout.org
MARKETS  
Oracle investors have questions about its spending
- The software giant posted quarterly results that fell short of Wall Street's revenue expectations on Wednesday, and shares slid more than 11% in after-hours trading. "Capex & financing needs have been the biggest investor question over the last two months, weighing on the stock," wrote Derrick Wood, an analyst at TD Cowen, ahead of the earnings call. During the call with investors on Wednesday, Clay Magouyrk, ...

Source: aol.com
US  
Women at the top are exhausted and burned out, according to a McKinsey and Lean In report
- Women are hitting the top of the corporate ladder only to find something waiting for them: exhaustion. According to a report published Tuesday by McKinsey and LeanIn.org, a nonprofit founded by Sheryl Sandberg, burnout among senior-level women is the highest it has been in the past five years. Around 60% of these women said they have frequently felt burned out at work in the past few months, compared with 50% of ...

Source: businessinsider.com
US   MEDICINE  
FDA Announces COVID Vaccine Deaths Inquiry, Despite Evidence Showing Safety
- The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced this week that it will investigate whether there is a link between vaccinations for coronavirus and deaths in the United States, despite mountains of evidence that COVID-19 shots are both safe and effective. "FDA is doing a thorough investigation, across multiple age groups, of deaths potentially related to coronavirus vaccines," a Department of Health and Human ...

Source: truthout.org
You'll Never Have To Recharge Pebble's Ingenious New Phone Accessory
- We're long past relying only on smartphones for our mobile computing needs. iPhones and Android devices are routinely paired with specific wearable accessories:  can also help with the latter, reducing the need to use a wrist wearable. In this crowded ecosystem where ideas often get recycled, wearable company Pebble managed to deliver a surprise accessory; a ring with no health sensors. Instead, is a smart AI ...

Source: bgr.com
US  
Marco Rubio orders US State Department to revert to Times New Roman font, calling Calibri adoption 'wasteful'
- US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has ordered diplomats to revert to using Times New Roman font in official communications, calling his predecessor Antony Blinken's decision to adopt Calibri a "wasteful" diversity move, according to a leaked internal cable. The department switched to Calibri, a modern sans-serif font, in January 2023, saying it was a more accessible font for people with disabilities because it did ...

Source: abc.net.au
Big 12 commissioner says Notre Dame comments after CFP snub 'totally out of bounds'
- Big 12 Conference commissioner Brett Yormark said Notre Dame athletic director Pete Bevacqua was "totally out of bounds" for his comments on the Atlantic Coast Conference this week. Notre Dame have a football scheduling alliance with the ACC and are a full member of the conference in other sports. Bevacqua has claimed the ACC damaged Notre Dame's chances at making the College Football Playoff, instead campaigning ...

Source: theguardian.com
US  
Measles Outbreak Nears Grim Milestone as Hundreds Quarantine in South Carolina
- Reading time 4 minutes The South Carolina Department of Public Health reported 27 new cases of measles on Tuesday, all identified since last Friday, bringing the total number of identified cases in the state this year to 114. There are currently at least 254 people in quarantine in South Carolina, though the problem isn't just confined to one state. The latest figures from the CDC, which haven't been updated in ...

Source: gizmodo.com
Egypt and Iran complain to FIFA after World Cup match scheduled to coincide with Seattle Pride event | World News
- The World Cup draw last week for the first rounds saw Iran and Egypt pitched against each other in Group G, and due to play at the Seattle Stadium on 26 June, with local organisers planning a "moment to showcase and celebrate LGBTQIA+ communities". Iran and Egypt have complained after FIFA scheduled a World Cup match between the two nations in Seattle to coincide with the city's LGBTQ+ Pride festival. Seattle's ...

Source: news.sky.com
Google facing a new antitrust probe in Europe over content it uses for AI
- Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... By KELVIN CHAN LONDON (AP) — Google faces fresh antitrust scrutiny from European Union regulators, who opened an investigation Tuesday into the company's use of online content for its artificial intelligence models and services. The latest regulatory flexing by Brussels risks antagonizing President Donald Trump's administration, though EU officials denied they were ...

Source: orlandosentinel.com
MEDICINE  
More Parents Are Turning Down Vitamin K Shots for Newborns — How Important Is It?
- The American Academy of Pediatrics began recommending the shot to newborns starting in 1961. When a baby is born in a medical facility in the U.S., chances are high that they will be offered a range of treatments and tests that are recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics, which includes some of very first shots that are included on the childhood immunization list. Vitamin K is among the first of the ...

Source: greenmatters.com