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Williams back with Padres, won’t coach for at least 4 weeks

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

SAN DIEGO (AP) — San Diego Padres third base coach Matt Williams already had baseball on his mind when the anesthesia was wearing off following colon cancer surgery two weeks ago.“I woke up and I asked what time batting practice was. I let my brother know that I had to get to the ballpark so I could hit Croney grounders,” Williams said Thursday, referring to first baseman Jake Cronenworth. “I don’t know what that’s all about. My family has video of it so I’ll never live that one down. I was anxious to get back for sure.”Williams won’t be hitting fungoes or coaching third base for at least four weeks while he continues to heal. But he’s back with the Padres and will watch games from the dugout. He has a follow-up appointment with his surgeon on Friday and hopes to be cleared to travel before the Padres’ next trip, which begins at Arizona next Thursday, when superstar Fernando Tatis Jr. is eligible to return from an 80-game suspension for testing positive...

Fans react to Dan Snyder’s pending sale of the Commanders

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

People around the D.C. area, especially fans of Washington’s NFL team, the Commanders, are reacting to the news that the team could soon be under new ownership following a sale by the team’s current embattled owner Dan Snyder.WTOP spoke with fans and got mixed reactions about Snyder’s impending transfer of power.“I think it’s going to be good for Washington at the end of the day, people had soured on Snyder for a while now,” said James Hughes of Arlington, Virginia.Simon Roberts of the District said the team needs a fresh start, and Snyder selling the team is a good sign that things within the franchise are changing for the better.“They need a new approach, I think everybody has gotten tired of all the drama that’s been wrapped around the current owners,” Roberts said.Brian Simpson of Severn, Maryland, said, “It is about time,” when he was told the team may soon be sold. He said for fans this is great news.“It’s like you have had that bad marriage/relationshi...

Former Commanders employee says news of sale is ‘surreal’

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

A former Washington Commanders employee who publicly complained about a hostile work environment with the team said hearing about a pending sale was a “surreal moment.”“I was in the middle of a work call, and all of a sudden, I had like 10 text messages at one time,” said Megan Imbert, who used to work in the team’s broadcast department. “I don’t know if it’s really sunk in just yet.”The team’s owner, Dan Snyder, reportedly has a deal in place to sell the Commanders for the biggest price paid for a North American professional sports team.A group led by private equity investor Josh Harris and businessman Mitchell Rales that includes Magic Johnson has an agreement in principle to buy the team for a record $6.05 billion, two people with knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press on Thursday.The people confirmed the deal was a fully financed, nonexclusive agreement that was not yet signed.Once the deal is approved, Ha...

Dons await bargaining as certification granted

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

Residence Dons at Queen’s University have officially been certified as members of United Steelworkers (USW) Local 2010.Current dons with the university said unionization had been discussed in previous years, and the time was right to put it to a vote resulting in 73% voting in favour.USW organizing manager Amanda Zakhour said after an objection with the Labour Board from Queen’s, USW expected a hearing to take place but on Friday they were told the dispute had been dropped. Zakhour said from her knowledge the objection stemmed from a potential conflict of interest in USW representing both residence dons and their direct superiors, Residence Life Coordinators (RLC). She said USW never viewed that as an issue considering RLCs don’t have hiring or firing power over dons, and their only managerial relationship is through scheduling. Zakhour said she would guess that the university realized the dispute would not carry and decided to not prolong the process and delay neg...

Aurora to give cash prize to resident who reports the biggest pothole of the month

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

AURORA, Colo. (KDVR) - The City of Aurora is going one step further to deal with potholes left over from the rough winter months Colorado has seen.Potholes and issues on roadways come with every winter in our state. Aurora relies on citizens to report the potholes so they know where to go.Since November they've been running a contest where whichever citizen reports the biggest pothole of the month wins $25. This is an effort to get more reports in and this is just a small portion of what they’ve been doing. Police release photo of suspect in tackle of Colorado Rockies mascot Dinger Aurora is averaging around 30 to 40 potholes reported per week.Ken Lee, Aurora's Public Works Street Operations Supervisor said winter is the main cause of the number of potholes they've seen -- namely, the colder temperatures.“Because of the colder temperatures, everything happened a couple of months prematurely, and of course, potholes followed suit," Lee said. "And they really had a big push early i...

Russia’s new iron curtain

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

OPINIONRussia’s new iron curtainA majority of Russians today seem content not to join the rest of the world.By ELISABETH BRAWElisabeth Braw is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, an advisor to Gallos Technologies and author of the upcoming book “Goodbye, Globalization.” From St. Petersburg to Vladivostok, a new iron curtain has descended across Eurasia. Behind that line lie famous cities and the populations all around them, subject in one form or another to a very high, and in some cases increasing, measure of control from Moscow. Regrettably, today we’re thusly forced to paraphrase Winston Churchill’s famous 1946 Iron Curtain speech, as the Kremlin has pulled down a curtain around Russia once more. However, this iteration of the infamous drape leaves those inside even more isolated than during the time of the Warsaw Pact. Those behind the Iron Curtain, as it existed in the 1970s and 1980s, could be denounced, even arrested, for simply trying to...

Here’s what the leaked US war files tell us about Europe

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

Europe has special forces on the ground in Ukraine. Poland and Slovenia are providing nearly half of the tanks heading to Kyiv. And Hungary may be letting arms through its airspace.Those are just a few of the eye-catching details about Europe’s participation in the war buried in a 53-page dossier POLITICO reviewed from a leak of unverified U.S. military intelligence documents. The disclosure has generated a tempest of head-spinning revelations that has the U.S. playing clean-up with allies. The documents detail American doubts about Ukraine’s spring offensive, suggest it was spying on South Korea and display intelligence accusing Egypt of plotting to prop up Russia’s quixotic war.Yet Europe, for the most part, has been spared these relationship-damaging divulgences.That doesn’t mean there isn’t knowledge to be gleaned about Europe’s war effort from the documents, however. The leaked files contain insights on everything from a U.K.-dominated special forces group in Ukraine to ho...

Legal veto threatens Macron’s pension reform. Is that good news for him?

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

PARIS — French constitutional judges are expected to rule Friday on Emmanuel Macron’s contentious pensions reform in a much anticipated decision that could see parts of the text blocked on legal grounds. That could actually be good news for the French president.Macron’s decision to bypass parliament and impose his deeply unpopular pensions reform last month has left his government in a political dead end after months of prolonged crisis, with a gridlock parliament and continued protests against the plan to raise the retirement age from to 64 from 62 and increase the number of years of contributions required to receive a full pension.France’s Constitutional Council is set to decide whether the proposed pensions overhaul is in line with the constitution, especially when it comes to the adoption procedure, and to weigh in on a request by opposition lawmakers to hold a referendum on the bill.While the final ruling cannot be predicted, several constitutional lawyer...

The return of the (problematic) king and the end of the teenage hacker

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

Welcome to Declassified, a weekly humor column.This week’s nonsense comes to you from the Picos de Europa mountain range in northern Spain, where the country’s royal family decamp every year with their minor entourage of soldiers, servants, helicopter pilots and enough medics to staff a field hospital. Spain’s royals are considerably less in the news since problematic old Juan Carlos decided to step away, hand over the throne to his son Felipe, and concentrate on shooting things that shouldn’t be shot and counting all the cash he was given by the Saudis. But Juan Carlos is reportedly flying to London in the coming days for a meeting with King Charles to talk about whatever it is that kings and ex-kings talk about. The cost-of-living crisis, what day the garbage gets collected, or something similar? The meeting might prove a touch awkward as randy Juan was once accused of making a pass at Princess Diana during a holiday she and the then-Prince Charles spent in...

State officials announce plans to repair Tobin Bridge after lead paint chips found in Chelsea neighborhood

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:36 GMT

State officials announced plans to repair the Tobin Bridge on Thursday amid concerns about lead paint chips from the bridge falling in a neighborhood in Chelsea. Crews have previously been working under the bridge, using vacuums to clean up the chips. At a standing room only meeting this week, officials promised to fix the bridge itself. “That’s structural repairs. That’s cleaning and removing the existing lead paint and repainting it,” MassDOT Highway Administrator Jonathan Gulliver said. Just last month, Chelsea residents learned testing had shown paint chips around their neighborhood contained lead. Speaking this week, concerned resident Katherinne Zabaleta-Alvarabo shared her reaction to the news.“[I was] shocked, angry because they also took forever to take action,” Zabaleta-Alvarabo said. “I’ve been here since I was five, why are they doing this now?”Thursday night’s meeting was spearheaded by GreenRoots, a Chelsea-based organization, which helped coordinat...