"Best Buy is recalling 772,000 air fryers and air fryer ovens sold in the U.S. and Canada after more than 100 incidents in which the products caught fire, burned or melted, in one case hurting a child… The company has heard from 68 U.S. residents and 36 Canadians complaining of the fryers and ovens overheating, Best Buy said Thursday in a notice posted by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. The reports include two injuries — one involving a child's leg, and seven involving minor property damage, the retailer disclosed."
"CNN+, the cable news network's streaming platform, is shutting down on April 30, just one month after its buzzy launch, according to an internal memo obtained by NPR… Management decided to shutter the new service, following a merger between Discovery and CNN's parent company WarnerMedia earlier this month to form Warner Bros. Discovery."
"President Biden will sign an executive order to inventory and protect old-growth forests while visiting Seattle later Friday… The order requires the Department of the Interior and Department of Agriculture to come up with a shared definition of mature and old-growth forests and gives them a year to take stock of their numbers in the U.S. After collecting that data, the agencies must come up with new policies to manage and conserve these wooded areas, with an eye towards threats like wildfires."
"For the past 20 years, Sam has been trying to find evidence of a fifth force of nature, with gravity, electromagnetism and two nuclear forces being the four that physicists already know about… He's pinning his hopes on a major revamp of the Large Hadron Collider. It's the world's most advanced particle accelerator - a vast machine that smashes atoms together to break them apart and discover what is inside them… It's been souped up even further in a three-year upgrade. Its instruments are more sensitive, allowing researchers to study the collision of particles from the inside of atoms in higher definition; its software has been enhanced so that it is able to take data at a rate of 30 million times each second; and its beams are narrower, which greatly increases the number of collisions."
"U.S. health officials have sent out a nationwide alert warning doctors to be on the lookout for symptoms of pediatric hepatitis, possibly linked with a cold virus, as part of a wider probe into unexplained cases of severe liver inflammation in young children… The warning follows investigations in the United States and Europe of clusters of hepatitis in young children."
"These provide clues including about whether a patient has had past exposure to environmental causes of cancer such as smoking or UV light, for example… This is important as these signatures allow doctors to look at each patient’s tumour and match it to specific treatments and medications… However, these patterns can be detected only through analysis of the vast amounts of data unearthed by whole genome sequencing – identifying the genetic makeup of a cell."
"Just how likely are you to pick up a case of COVID-19 on that upcoming flight, bus commute or train ride?… This is what many Americans are trying to gauge after a Florida judge's ruling halted the federal requirement to wear a mask on most forms of public transit."
"Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell affirmed the central bank’s determination to bring down inflation and said Thursday that aggressive rate hikes are possible as soon as next month… 'It is appropriate in my view to be moving a little more quickly' to raise interest rates, Powell said… 'I would say 50 basis points will be on the table for the May meeting.'… Powell’s statements essentially meet market expectations that the Fed will depart from its usual 25 basis point hikes and move more quickly to tame inflation that is running at its fastest pace in more than 40 years. A basis point equals 0.01 percentage point."
"France has issued an international arrest warrant for Carlos Ghosn, the auto tycoon who jumped bail in Japan and fled to Lebanon in a sensational getaway… The warrant was issued over 15 million euros ($16.3m) in suspect payments between the Renault-Nissan alliance that Ghosn once headed and an Omani company, Suhail Bahwan Automobiles (SBA), prosecutors in the Paris suburb of Nanterre told AFP news agency on Friday."
"French voters are expected to hand Emmanuel Macron five more years in office on Sunday, favoring the president over far-right candidate Marine Le Pen after a strong showing in a fiery debate. But investors remain on edge… With polls indicating the presidential election is narrower than when the two candidates faced off in 2017, traders are girding for a surprise Le Pen win, which would rattle Europe's second biggest economy as fears of a recession in the region grow."
"Israeli police in full riot gear stormed a sensitive Jerusalem holy site sacred to Jews and Muslims on Friday after Palestinian youths hurled stones at a gate where they were stationed… The renewed violence at the site, which is sacred to Jews and Muslims, came despite Israel temporarily halting Jewish visits, which are seen by the Palestinians as a provocation. Medics said more than two dozen Palestinians were wounded before the clashes subsided hours later." Ah, it must be Spring again.
"Since the U.S. imposed sanctions in March, American refineries have stopped welcoming tanker ships laden with Russian oil. But Russian crude exports to other parts of the world have been increasing… The American sanctions aim to cut the hard-currency revenues that feed the Russian economy and its war effort: 36% of Russian federal budget revenues came from oil and gas last year, according to Russia's Finance Ministry. But while the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and Australia have formal embargoes, most countries around the world don't, and oil refineries from India to Spain are still purchasing Russian crude."
"As Russian troops tighten their grip on the strategic port town of Mariupol, their strategy is finally becoming clear. Russian military commander Rustam Minnekaev now says the second phase of President Vladimir Putin’s 'special operation' is focused on establishing a 'land corridor' from the Donbas all the way to Moldova, which would cut off the rest of Ukraine from the sea."
"Satellite imagery has revealed what Ukrainian officials say appears to be another mass grave in Ukraine… The site was spotted outside the port city of Mariupol, in the eastern part of the country, which has seen some of the worst fighting since Russia invaded."
"The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Congress may continue to exclude Puerto Rican residents from a federal safety net program that provides direct payments to poor, disabled, and blind American citizens… At issue was whether the Supplemental Security Income program can constitutionally exclude American citizens who reside in Puerto Rico. Congress established the program in 1972 to provide a minimum income for the neediest adults who are over 65, blind, or disabled. Conspicuously excluded from benefits were citizens living in Puerto Rico and other territories."
"Guns became the leading cause of death among children and teens in 2020, killing more people ages 1 to 19 in the U.S. than vehicle crashes, drugs overdoses or cancer."
"After months of back and forth, lawmakers in Florida have passed Gov. Ron DeSantis' controversial congressional district voting map — and have pushed forward his last-minute plan to scrap Disney World's special regulatory status in the state." Tell them what they've won, Johnny! It's billions in debt and a new income tax!
"More of your mail is about to get slower. First it was letters and now some packages may take longer to arrive… The U.S. Postal Service currently considers a first-class package to be late if it's delivered more than three days after it was sent. But under new standards that take effect next month, more than 30% of first-class packages will be seen as delivered on time if they arrive within four or five days."
"A potentially precedent-setting disqualification hearing will kick off Friday in an Atlanta courtroom to determine if Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia is constitutionally barred from running for reelection because of her role in the January 6 insurrection." This could be a sizzler of legalese and finesse, but will probably dissolve into name calling (at least that's where I put my money).
"Earlier this month, the far-right website Gateway Pundit published a surreptitiously taken recording of Republican Sen. John Boozman saying the 2020 election results were legitimate… The Arkansas senator immediately reached out to former President Donald Trump — who told allies he was angry about the remarks, which cut against his false claim that the election was stolen from him — to try to contain the damage."
"New audio released by New York Times reporters on MSNBC confirms that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy told some of his fellow Republican lawmakers that he planned to urge former President Donald Trump to resign following the January 6 Capitol riot… McCarthy and his office denied making the comments several times, both in response to multiple media outlets and in a social media statement Thursday in which he called the Times' initial reporting of the quote 'totally false and wrong.'" Oh what webs we weave.
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