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Editorial: Teachers unions balk at fixing COVID shutdown learning loss

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

Apologists for the nation’s teacher unions have been busy rewriting history on school closures. Now, in some places, they’re opposing efforts to bring struggling students up to speed.The disaster of remote schooling during the pandemic has been well-documented. The Nation’s Report Card recently revealed that eighth-grade reading and math test results hit their lowest levels in decades. Kids from disadvantaged backgrounds suffered the most.It is against this backdrop that national teacher union leaders have embarked on a shameful effort to sanitize the indefensible.Despite their aggressive crusade to keep schools closed far longer than necessary, despite outrageous rhetoric warning of mass deaths and body bags, they now claim no responsibility for shuttered classrooms and the calamity that followed.It’s a crock. But it gets worse.In its June 26 edition, The New Yorker features an essay revealing the hurdles that the education establishment in Richmond, Virginia, erected to plans for ...

Dear Abby: Man lashes out after learning truth about past

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

Dear Abby: A friend of many years, “Adam,” no longer speaks to me. We met in high school and were involved in band, debate club and other activities together. He recently discovered through a genealogy site that he was adopted and neither of his parents were his birth parents. The site led him to clues about other biological relatives, and he eventually reached his birth mother, who rejected his efforts to talk to her.I recently learned about this from another high school friend. When I contacted Adam, he responded with hostility, stating that I am no longer his friend because I didn’t reach out when he was going through all this. But I didn’t KNOW at the time. I cannot locate any voice messages, emails, texts, etc. showing that he shared with me the details of what happened.I live in a different part of the country now. I have offered to travel to visit him. I also offered to talk on the phone, but I’ve received only aggressive and bitter responses. Ho...

Truck carrying oil overturns on I-15

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- A truck carrying oil overturned on Friday afternoon, causing the temporary closure of several lanes on Interstate 15 through Miramar, traffic officials said.Around 4:30 p.m., SkyFOX was over southbound I-15 at Miramar Road, where the truck was seen on its side with oil spillage right beside the vehicle. Gas leak prompts evacuation order in Poway Four lanes were shut down for several hours due to the crash, but have since reopened, according to California Highway Patrol.No other information has been released about how the collision occurred or if there were any injuries.

Six men overdose on fentanyl in North County

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

OCEANSIDE, Calif. -- Six men who overdosed on fentanyl were revived Friday with Naloxone in the Oceanside area, authorities said.The incident occurred at Seagaze Park next to the beach, located south of the Oceanside Pier, Blake Dorse with the Oceanside Fire Department (OFD) said in a news release.When first responders arrived on scene, they found six men who had overdosed on fentanyl, which is known to be a highly potent drug and often deadly. Cartels fighting for control of brothels, strip clubs and bars in Tijuana’s ‘tolerance zone,’ report says Dorse says if the patients had not been treated promptly with Naloxone, an antidote for opioid overdose, the men would not have survived the drug's effects.All six patients refused to be taken to the hospital against the advice of paramedics, officials said.Synthetic opioids have contributed to over 72,000 U.S. deaths in 2022, according to OFD."The Oceanside Fire and Police Departments implore the public to stay clear of drugs and enco...

Over the Line community pays respects to 'Godfather' of sport

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- The Over the Line community is just one day away from the world championship tournament.“A lot of people call this Christmas in July, and it really is, it has that kind of atmosphere to it,” said Old Mission Beach Athletic Club Marketing Chair Tom Doyle.For some, this Christmas in July doesn’t have the same spirit. It’s the first world championship tournament since the passing of one of the sports founders, Mike Curren, known as the Godfather of Over the Line.“We’re going to pay our respects tonight with the celebration of life. All weekend and all next weekend. We want people to understand like OTL is alive and strong. We want more people playing it, we want to let his legacy live on,” Doyle said. Three great white sharks spotted near Blacks Beach; advisory posted Many from the OTL community, or beach rats as Curren called them, miss him. None more than his brother Terry.“Of course, it’s a loss. My oldest brother, I lost my younger brother three weeks ...

Efforts to deceive are a top concern among state election officials heading into 2024

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Efforts to deceive the public about voting and elections remain a top concern for state election officials as they dig into preparations for the 2024 election.Misinformation and the emergence of generative artificial intelligence tools to create false and misleading content were cited in interviews with several secretaries of state gathered recently for their national conference. Other top concerns were staffing and the loss of experienced leaders overseeing elections at the local level. The officials were gathered in Washington, D.C., for the annual summer conference of the National Association of Secretaries of State.“The cliché here is true,” said Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon, a Democrat. “You hope for the best, but plan for the worst. So, we’re planning for the worst, which is that multiple communications channels will be filled with false and misleading information.”State election officials in Michigan and Colorado said they were particularly conce...

Why a single senator is blocking US military promotions and what it means for the Pentagon

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville is waging an unprecedented campaign to try to change Pentagon abortion policy by holding up hundreds of military nominations and promotions, forcing less experienced leaders into top jobs and raising concerns at the Pentagon about military readiness.Senators in both parties — including Republican Leader Mitch McConnell — have pushed back on Tuberville’s blockade, but Tuberville is dug in. He says he won’t drop the holds unless majority Democrats allow a vote on the policy.For now, the fight is at a stalemate. Democrats say a vote on every nominee could tie up the Senate floor for months. And they don’t want to give in to Tuberville’s demands and encourage similar blockades of nominees in the future.Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has said that holding up the promotion of military leaders, most of whom have dedicated their lives to protecting the country, “is one of the most abominable and outrageous things I have ever seen in this...

On the picket lines with Hollywood’s actors and writers, from LA to New York

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — It’s a “Strike Girl Summer.”So read a picket sign as the sidewalks of Hollywood and midtown Manhattan teemed with actors on Day 1 of their strike, protesting alongside the writers who have been at it since May. Together, the two guilds have ground the entertainment industry to a halt. On both coasts, though, there was a buoyant mood in the air as picket lines were reinvigorated by the support of some of the 65,000 actors who comprise SAG-AFTRA (98% of members voted to approve a strike back in June). This is Hollywood’s biggest labor fight in six decades, and the first dual strike since 1960, reigniting the fervor against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers just as a historic heat wave hits Southern California.Outside the Warner Bros. studios in Burbank, California, throngs of protesters chanted: “Fists up, curtains down, LA is a union town.” Food trucks flanking organizers’ tents served churros, boba tea and cold lemonade to p...

The Iowa caucuses are six months away. Some Republicans worry Trump may be unstoppable

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — He’s been indictedtwice. Found liable for sexual abuse. And he’s viewed unfavorably by about a third of his party. But six months before Republicans begin to choose their next presidential nominee, former President Donald Trump remains the race’s dominant front-runner.Early leaders don’t always go on to win their party’s nomination, but a growing sense of Trump’s inevitability is raising alarms among some Republicans desperate for the party to move on. Some described a sense of panic — or “DEFCON 1,” as one put it — as they scramble to try to derail Trump and change the trajectory of the race. But there’s no clear plan or strategy on how to do that and Trump’s detractors aren’t rallying around a single alternative candidate yet.“They’re very concerned,” former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan said of fellow Republican leaders who share his view that renominating Trump would be a disaster for the party n...

Bargain-hunting Uruguayans are flocking to Argentina as its peso slides. Back home, shops struggle

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:14:50 GMT

GUALEGUAYCHÚ, Argentina (AP) — On a recent cross-border shopping trip, four friends from Fray Bentos, Uruguay, visited the nearby Argentine city of Gualeguaychu, where they could afford to live lavishly and snap up eye-popping bargains.Thanks to a huge disparity in the two South American countries’ currencies, Stella Ferreira and a friend treated themselves to a low-cost pampering at a hair salon, while two other friends hunted around for stylish but inexpensive pants.With its economy faltering, Argentina’s peso has plunged against the U.S. dollar and its annual inflation is 115.6%, one of the highest rates in the world. In contrast, Uruguay’s economy is more stable, with low inflation and a stronger currency. The result has been a huge flow of shoppers from Uruguay throwing an economic lifeline to struggling Argentine stores and restaurants in cities like Gualeguaychú, Concordia and Colón. But there’s a downside for Uruguayan businesses along the border: In the provinces of S...