Sunday, September 15
Russia-Ukraine War and Kim Jong-un’s Visit: Latest News
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
News

Russia-Ukraine War and Kim Jong-un’s Visit: Latest News

In a photo released by Russian state media on Friday, Kim Jong-un, center, viewed a fighter jet in Russia’s Far East.Credit...Mikhail Degtyarev, Governor of Russia’s Khabarovsk Krai, via ReutersNorth Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, peeked his head into the cockpit of a fighter jet at a factory in the Russian Far East on Friday as he pressed ahead on a multiday tour of Russia that is enticing him at each stop with off-limits military technology.Although Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, hasn’t promised Mr. Kim any of the weaponry and has vowed to abide by U.N. sanctions banning their transfer, the tour carried an implicit threat — an example of what analysts have said is a growing danger posed by Mr. Putin’s increasingly warm relationship with authoritarian leaders who can pose problems f...
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Can’t Hear the Dialogue in Your Streaming Show? You’re Not Alone.
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
Technology

Can’t Hear the Dialogue in Your Streaming Show? You’re Not Alone.

“What did he just say?”Those are some of the most commonly uttered words in my home. No matter how much my wife and I crank up the TV volume, the actors in streaming movies and shows are becoming increasingly difficult to understand. We usually end up turning on the subtitles, even though we aren’t hard of hearing.We’re not alone. In the streaming era, as video consumption shifts from movie theaters toward content shrunk down for televisions, tablets and smartphones, making dialogue crisp and clear has become the entertainment world’s toughest technology challenge. About 50 percent of Americans — and the majority of young people — watch videos with subtitles on most of the time, according to surveys, in large part because they are struggling to decipher what actors are saying.“It’s getting...
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F1 Schedule Continues to Grow With New Races
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
Sports

F1 Schedule Continues to Grow With New Races

There are more Formula 1 races than ever, and next season there will be even more, with 24 races, the most in the sport’s history.This year’s Formula 1 schedule, at 23 events, should have set the record, but the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix was canceled because of the extreme rainfall that devastated the region. That event, at the Imola circuit in Italy, will return on May 19, 2024, and will be the seventh race of the year.Also returning to the calendar is the Chinese Grand Prix, which was last held at the Shanghai International Circuit in 2019. Formula 1 and the Chinese race’s promoter have a contract through 2025, and next year’s Grand Prix will be on April 21, the season’s fifth race.“Now there’s a lot of people really into racing and Formula 1 who can’t wait to go back there — also myself...
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Ireland’s Latest Fiscal Headache: What to Do With 10 Billion Euros
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
Economy

Ireland’s Latest Fiscal Headache: What to Do With 10 Billion Euros

Fifteen years after a collapsed housing bubble forced Ireland to borrow tens of billions of dollars or risk going bust, the country is discovering that having too much money can also be a problem.Swollen by rising corporate tax revenue, mainly from American tech and pharmaceutical corporations, the government is expecting to have a record budget surplus of 10 billion euros ($10.9 billion) this year. Next year, the windfall is projected to be even larger, reaching €16 billion.For years, Ireland’s low corporate tax rate has lured multinational organizations to set up overseas subsidiaries here. Their tax payments have created a financial cushion for the government, while stirring the ire of other countries.Although plans promoted by the United States and others to create a global corporate t...
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Washington University Stops Offering Gender Medications to Minors
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
Health

Washington University Stops Offering Gender Medications to Minors

BackgroundIn June, Gov. Mike Parson, Republican of Missouri, signed into law the ban on gender-affirming care for new patients under 18, part of a wave of more than 20 laws across the country severely restricting such care.Under the new law, existing patients of Washington University’s youth gender clinic were still allowed to receive the treatments. But the law includes a provision allowing patients to make legal claims against doctors who prescribe hormonal medications to minors. The university said this part of the law made it “untenable” to continue providing this care.Since it opened in 2017, the St. Louis clinic had seen a sharp increase in patient demand, overwhelming its small staff, The New York Times reported last month. Many patients and their families told The Times that the cl...
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Professor Who Was Banned from Campus Sues SUNY Fredonia
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
News

Professor Who Was Banned from Campus Sues SUNY Fredonia

Stephen Kershnar, a philosophy professor, is in academic purgatory.He is still employed by the State University of New York at Fredonia, but he has not taught or even been allowed on campus for more than a year — fallout from remarks he made in a 2022 podcast about whether it is ever moral for an adult male to have sex with a “willing” 12-year-old girl.“It’s not obvious to me that this is, in fact, wrong,” he said on the philosophy podcast, as part of a wide-ranging thought experiment about ethics and consent. (As a matter of law, he has said that it should be criminalized.)His remarks went viral after a right-wing social media account, LibsofTikTok, posted about it.The president of SUNY Fredonia, Stephen H. Kolison Jr., called the professor’s comments “absolutely abhorrent” and said that...
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Arm Soars 25% in the Year’s Biggest Initial Public Offering
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
Technology

Arm Soars 25% in the Year’s Biggest Initial Public Offering

Call it Wall Street’s Groundhog Day.When shares of Arm, the British chip designer, began trading on the Nasdaq stock exchange on Thursday in the year’s biggest initial public offering, investors, tech executives, bankers and start-up founders were watching closely for how it performed.If Arm’s stock fell, they knew the market for I.P.O.s was likely to stay frozen for longer. But a warm welcome for the shares would probably mean many more companies going public in the coming months, ending the cold streak.They quickly got their answer: It was an early spring. Arm’s shares opened trading at $56.10, up 10 percent from its initial offering price of $51. Shares quickly soared further, rising 25 percent by the end of trading to close at $63.59 and giving the company a fully diluted valuation of ...
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Spain’s Female Soccer Players Call Off Wage Dispute Strike
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
Sports

Spain’s Female Soccer Players Call Off Wage Dispute Strike

Players in Spain’s women’s soccer league have called off a strike that delayed the opening of the season after reaching an agreement with the league over minimum salaries, a rare moment of harmony in what has been an acrimonious period in Spanish soccer.The agreement, confirmed early Thursday, would raise the minimum salary for players in the league to 21,000 euros, or about $22,500, from 16,000 euros this season, a significant increase but still far short of what their male counterparts make.The minimum is scheduled to rise to €23,500 for the 2025-2026 season, with the potential for an even higher benchmark “if enough profits are obtained from commercial assets,” such as sponsorship, according to a statement from the unions representing the players.Spanish soccer is in the midst of a turb...
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What Retail Sales and Other Data Say About China’s Economy
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
Economy

What Retail Sales and Other Data Say About China’s Economy

China’s trains, planes, stores and beaches were a little fuller last month than a year ago, and the pace of activity picked up at factories, particularly those making mobile phones and semiconductors.A batch of numbers released on Friday by China’s National Bureau of Statistics showed a modest improvement in the country’s overall retail sales and industrial production during August. A series of small steps taken by the government over the summer, including two rounds of interest rate cuts, seems to be yielding a slightly better-than-expected improvement in the country’s economy.“The national economy has accelerated its recovery, production and supply have increased steadily, market demand has gradually improved,” Fu Linghui, China’s director of national economic statistics, said at a news ...
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Legal Actions Seek Guarantee of Abortion Access for Patients in Medical Emergencies
15Sep Avatar photoBy Austin B. PowerNo Comments
Health

Legal Actions Seek Guarantee of Abortion Access for Patients in Medical Emergencies

Early in her pregnancy, Jaci Statton was in her kitchen when she felt like she was going to pass out and saw that her jeans had become soaked with blood. Doctors told her the pregnancy was not viable and that it could threaten her life if an abortion was not performed soon, she said.But Ms. Statton lives in Oklahoma, a state that bans most abortions. Three hospitals declined to provide the procedure, she said. At the third, “they said, ‘We can’t touch you unless you’re like crashing in front of us,’” Ms. Statton, 26, said in an interview. The hospital’s only suggestion, she said, was “we should wait in the parking lot until I was about to die.”On Tuesday, Ms. Statton filed a legal complaint with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services asserting that the third institution, Oklahoma...
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