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The secretive committee wiring Europe’s finances: An unlikely duo exits the stage

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

It’s a tale of intrigue, improbable friendship and backroom deal-making that gets to the heart of where political power in the EU really lies.And it concerns one of the bloc’s most secretive — yet influential — bodies, and two of its leading members who have just been booted off it.You’ve probably not heard of the body, and you’ve almost certainly never heard of the pair of officials, yet a clearer example of power-behind-the-throne you’re unlikely to find. Backstage, the strings they pulled helped steer the bloc through choppy economic waters.The twin departures of the Italian and German senior treasury officials, Alessandro Rivera and Carsten Pillath, leave a gap at the center of EU decision-making at a time when governments are battling record inflation, facing a potential banking crisis, and bickering over how to change EU spending rules.Rivera and Pillath sat on the Economic and Financial Committee, and its smaller eurozone-only cousin, the Eurogroup Working Group. No public ag...

Regulating the machine: Europe’s race to get to grips with AI drugs

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

How do you regulate a drug developed by artificial intelligence? That’s the question Europe’s regulators are grappling with as AI medicines speed toward market. At the heart of a regulator’s job is the responsibility to ensure that the benefits of a new medicine outweigh the inevitable risks. But, with AI starting to remake how drugs are developed, they could soon have some very different-looking submissions on their desks. Pharma companies could use algorithms at all stages of the drug-development process: to identify which molecules could best target a specific disease; to select patients for clinical trials based on how they’re expected to respond to a drug; and to extract trial data and complete forms for regulators. AI’s predictive powers could even eliminate the need to test drugs on animals.All this poses a regulatory challenge, raising questions about the transparency of the algorithms, the risk of AI failure and most importantly, the impact...

How to livestream all of Coachella 2023 performances

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

ANAHEIM, Calif. — This year, promoters of the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival are bringing the fans that couldn’t attend the event in-person the most extensive livestreaming coverage it’s ever offered.Goldenvoice has once again teamed up with YouTube to livestream performances during the annual festival, which is taking place April 14-16 and April 21-23 at the Empire Polo Field in Indio with headlining sets by Bad Bunny, Blackpink and Frank Ocean. Unlike in previous years, the 2023 livestream will include coverage of all six stages during both weekends of the festival.Fans will be able to tune in to Coachella’s official YouTube channel, pick which stage they want to watch and, if they can’t watch it live, the performances will be on repeat after the evening’s final performance and until the live show picks up again the next day.There’s also all kinds of exclusive content on the channel, including backstage interviews with artists, behind-the-scenes bits and views of the s...

Pozniak: Stop paging Dr. Google for medical advice

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

A health misinformation storm is raging throughout the country as people use Google to search for help with their medical problems, often leading to unreliable information, inaccurate diagnosis, and inappropriate and costly self-treatments.Dr. Vivek Murthy, Surgeon General of the United States, said that health misinformation is a serious threat to the public health of our country as it causes confusion, mistrust, harms people’s health and undermines the efforts of trained and licensed medical professionals.The explosion of false and misleading health information on social media platforms has created a national challenge for the medical profession. Recent data suggests that 80% of internet users search for medical information and cures for themselves or family members. People of all ages are meeting with physicians and presenting their own diagnoses and medication plan based on what they have read on Google. This leads to growing frustration within the medical community. One l...

‘Paint’ dabs at comedy as portrait of quirky TV artist

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

MOVIE REVIEW“Paint”Rated PG-13. At Landmark Kendall Square, AMC Boston Common and suburban theaters.Grade: B-A past-present temporal mashup, “Paint” from first-time feature writer-director Brit McAdams is set in a world that has stood still, or at least been slow to catch up to our present day. The film, which is set in Vermont and is said to be a send-up of pioneering TV artist Bob Ross, is a deadpan, perhaps too deadpan and not-very-funny comedy that paints a portrait (excuse me, it’s contagious) of Carl Nargle (Owen Wilson), a bearded, ‘fro-sporting, pipe-smoking star of the local Burlington, Vermont PBS station. Carl’s show is entitled “Paint,” and on it he, OK, paints pictures, all of them of Vermont’s Mount Mansfield, the highest peak in the state.Carl is a superstar to legions of oldsters and barflies enraptured by his every word (and picture). This includes his coworkers, who are mostly women, as well as the station manager Tony (Stephen Root), who ca...

Graham: Sununu mocks Mass., writes off Trump

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

Gov. Chris Sununu was in classic form Wednesday as he addressed a friendly New England Council crowd, getting laughs, taking shots at Massachusetts tax policy, and declaring a Trump presidential bid dead on arrival.As for his own potential White House run, Sununu demurred as usual. But he pledged to be a player in the 2024 cycle one way or another.“I may or may not run, but I promise you this: I’m not sitting this one out. I’m going to throw my weight behind somebody,” Sununu said.The New England Council event was held at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics, where the NEC co-hosts the Politics and Eggs breakfasts that are a mandatory part of any first-in-the-nation candidacy. And Sununu had a clear message for the candidates and the primary voters who’ll pick the nominees.“One of the frustrations of America on both sides is we back leadership that either can’t win in November,” Sununu said, adding, “You can’t govern if you don’t win.”And he repeatedly made it clear he believes f...

Editorial: Attack on tech exec could happen anywhere

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

The emerging picture of Bob Lee’s final moments keeps getting darker.The CashApp founder was fatally stabbed in San Francisco early Tuesday morning. San Francisco Police Department Chief Bill Scott said in a statement Wednesday that the investigation is in the “early stages” and the department wouldn’t comment on any evidence obtained thus far.What we do know is that the 43-year-old tech executive was in the well-to-do Rincon Hill neighborhood, a fast-growing section of the city. It’s quiet, it’s nice. It’s the sort of place where one could say “this sort of thing doesn’t happen here.”Until it does.Now, as CNN reported, the moments right after Lee’s stabbing were captured on surveillance video.The footage, reviewed by the online news site The San Francisco Standard, was recorded early Tuesday morning and shows Lee walking alone on Main Street, “gripping his side with one hand and his cellphone in the other, leaving a trail of blo...

‘Tori and Lokita’ a harrowing, heartbreaking tale of African immigrant life

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

MOVIE REVIEW“Tori and Lokita”Not Rated. In French with subtitles. At the Coolidge Corner,Grade: A- Another modern-day, neo-realist effort from the brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne (“Rosetta,” “La Promesse”) from the French-speaking region of Belgium, “Tori and Lokita” tells the heartbreaking tale of two immigrant children from Africa, 11-year-old Tori (newcomer Pablo Schils) and 16-year-old Lokita (newcomer Joely Mbundu). They pose as brother and sister in a Belgian city for reasons presumably having to do with access to social services. Tori has his citizenship papers. But Lokita, who cannot prove Tori is her brother, does not, so she cannot work full time, get them an apartment of their own and make enough money to send to her mother back in Benin.Tori had to leave the country because he was accused of being a sorcerer, and his life was in genuine danger. Tightly bonded by their shared experience, they are inseparable, and now work for Belgian chef Betim (Alban Uka...

Dear Abby: Grandma blackmailed into hosting ‘granddaughter’

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

Dear Abby: My son is in a relationship with “Cheryl.” They live together. Cheryl has a daughter and is demanding that I treat the girl as one of my granddaughters. I have bought birthday presents, Christmas gifts and generally spend the same amount on all the kids. But I have been told that Cheryl doesn’t like what I buy her daughter and tosses the clothes at one of my other granddaughters who lives there and says, “Here! YOU take it. It’s ugly!”I know she talks bad about me to my son, and so does her mother. Interestingly, Cheryl’s mother doesn’t have to buy anything for my granddaughters on their birthdays or Christmas. I’m frustrated because I’m not allowed to have my granddaughters spend the night with me without being told that I must include her daughter. My granddaughters prefer it’d be just them and me.Am I wrong in feeling that I shouldn’t have to take Cheryl’s daughter every time my granddaughter...

Foot guide accused of sexually abusing teenage girl near border

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:25 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- A 26-year-old man was charged Thursday on suspicion of sexually abusing a 17-year-old girl in June 2022 while guiding her from Tijuana, Mexico into the United States, prosecutors said. Cecilio Jimenez-Bautista, along with his 20-year-old brother Alexander Jimenez-Bautista, who also was allegedly traveling with the underage girl, face several charges, Kelly Thornton with the Office of the United States Attorney Southern District of California stated in a news release.The two brothers are accused of guiding the girl and other Mexican citizens from Mexico to the U.S. through the Otay Mountain Wilderness area for three days with the intent to violate the immigration laws of the U.S., according to allegations in a grand jury indictment. Boy, 14, among 2 arrested in deadly park shooting The group was brought along remote, rugged and desolate paths before U.S. Border Patrol agents apprehended them at an area near Otay Lakes Road, per officials. The indictment said Cecilio J...