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Greens want Germany to use heat pumps, but they’ve struggled to install one in party HQ

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

BERLIN — The Greens want Germany to ban gas and oil heating and switch to heat pumps — but have been struggling to install such a device in their own party headquarters for years.The Greens wanted to use the renovation of its headquarters in the heart of Berlin to renew its gas heating system, making it climate-neutral and in line with their plans for German society. But according to a report in Der Spiegel, the party has been trying and failing since the end of 2019 to complete construction work and install a heat pump.At the time, Michael Kellner, then general secretary of the party and now state secretary in Robert Habeck’s economy ministry, said during a tour: “We’ll rebuild the house first and then the land.”Things turned out differently, however, as the Green Party’s approval ratings have plummeted to 14 percent from 23 percent last summer — and the heat pump, a blue box with a fan, vegetates in the courtyard of the headquarters. In an ambitiou...

Trump still holds massive lead in polls, some ‘tightening’ seen

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

Former President Donald Trump’s poll numbers are unindictable — pre-indictment.FULL TEXT: Trump IndictmentHis 53.2% national average, tallied by Real Clear Politics, is a football field ahead of the 22.4% Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis holds in second place. All others drop so far behind it doesn’t seem like a race, yet.DeSantis was quick to blast the Justice Department for targeting the ex-president in a 37-count indictment.“Why so zealous in pursuing Trump yet so passive about Hillary or Hunter?” tweeted DeSantis, referring to Hillary Clinton and her secret server and presidential trainwreck son Hunter Biden.The real test will come in the weeks ahead as pollsters chart the fallout from the DOJ’s indictment of Trump. Until then, it’s a game of survival and lukewarm support by other GOP presidential rivals.Former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley holds an anemic 4.4% national polling average far back in third place. Former VP Mike Pence, also given the job by Trump,...

Boston police received 47 drink spiking reports in first six months of 2023

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

Boston police received 47 reports of drink spiking in the city during the first six months of the year, according to data provided to the Herald.That comes as lawmakers on Beacon Hill are sorting through legislative responses to what has been described as an “alarming” situation after 116 reports came into the Boston Police Department last year. And department officials have said they are concerned about a “real threat” to the public.Drinking spiking incidents have permeated the United States “for quite some time now,” said Shannon Hogan, the sexual assault kit initiative site director for the Boston Police Department.Boston police “continue to learn more and take action” as they partner with their licensing unit, work to track incidents, raise public awareness, and offer an option to report drink spiking on police reports,” Hogan said earlier this week at a legislative hearing.“While such documented occurrences of the use of these drugs or ‘roofies’ in the U.S. date back to the ear...

Lucas: FBI must stop being goons

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

It was news the embattled FBI did not need to hear — not in the middle of the GOP House effort to hold FBI Director Christopher Ray — currently set aside — in contempt of Congress.But, as the saying goes, when it rains it pours.And it poured all over the FBI when it was announced that former FBI Agent Robert P. Hanssen, 79, “the most damaging spy in (FBI) history,” was found dead in his prison cell at the supermax U.S. Penitentiary in Florence, Colorado Monday.Hassen had been serving life without parole after pleading guilty in 2001 to selling classified information to the Russians for $1.4 million in cash, bank funds and diamonds.Among the information he sold was that the U.S. had dug a Cold War tunnel beneath the Soviet embassy in Washington for eavesdropping purposes. Another was that he provided Moscow with the names of three KGB officers who were spying for the U.S., two of whom were later executed.Paul J. McNulty, the U.S. attorney who prosecuted Hanssen, said Hanssen’s ...

Intense fighting reported in Ukraine as last nuclear reactor is shut down amid flooding

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine’s military reported intense fighting with Russian forces on Saturday, while the country’s nuclear energy agency said it put the last operating reactor at Europe’s largest nuclear power plant into a “cold shutdown” for safety as Russia’s war on Ukraine drags on through its 16th month. After Russian forces pummeled Ukraine with missiles and drones overnight resulting in deaths and damage to a military airfield, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau arrived in Kyiv Saturday for an previously unannounced visit, his second trip to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in February last year. He was accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland.Ukraine’s General Staff said Saturday that “heavy battles” were ongoing, with 34 clashes over the previous day in the country’s industrial east. It gave no details but said Russian forces were “defending themselves” and launching air and artillery strikes in Ukraine’s southern Kherson and Zaporizhzh...

Canada’s PM Trudeau meets Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy on surprise trip to Kyiv

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

KYIV, Ukraine — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is meeting with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during an unannounced visit to Kyiv to show Canada’s support for the fight against Russia.Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland is with him on the trip, which began with a wreath-laying at a memorial wall to honour Ukrainians who have died while defending their homeland.This is the second time Trudeau has made an unannounced visit to the embattled country since Russia began its large-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.Trudeau last travelled to Ukraine just over a year ago, where he reopened the Canadian Embassy in Kyiv and met Zelenskyy in person for the first time since the war began.Trudeau and Zelenskyy also spent some time together just last month on the margins of the G7 summit in Hiroshima, Japan, where the Ukrainian president continued his campaign to shore up support among western allies for the defence of his country.Some media outlets, including The ...

Boris Johnson’s bombshell exit from Parliament leaves UK politics reeling

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

LONDON (AP) — Former U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson left chaos in his wake Saturday after quitting Parliament with a blast at fellow lawmakers he accused of ousting him in a “witch hunt.”As opponents jeered, the Conservative government absorbed the shock of yet another Johnson earthquake, while a band of loyal supporters insisted Britain’s divisive ex-leader could still make a comeback.Less than a year after he was forced out as prime minister by his own Conservative Party, Johnson unexpectedly stepped down as a lawmaker late Friday — “at least for now,” he said in a self-justifying resignation statement.Johnson quit after being told he will be sanctioned for misleading Parliament over “partygate,” a series of rule-breaking gatherings in the prime minister’s office during the coronavirus pandemic. Johnson was among scores of people fined by police over late-night soirees, boozy parties and “wine time Fridays” that broke restrictions the government had imposed on the country.Johns...

Police in Somalia say nine killed in extremist attack on beachside hotel in Mogadishu

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Police in Somalia say nine people, including three soldiers, were killed in Friday night’s extremist attack on a beachside hotel in the capital, Mogadishu.The police statement said 10 other people were wounded while 84 people were rescued from the hourslong assault that ended early Saturday morning.Al-Qaida’s East Africa affiliate, al-Shabab, claimed responsibility for the attack. The Somalia-based extremist group is known for carrying out attacks on hotels and other high-profile locations in Mogadishu, usually starting with a suicide bombing.Witnesses had told The Associated Press that some people were trapped inside the Pearl Beach hotel, which is popular with government officials. The Lido Beach area is one of Mogadishu’s most popular.Abdulkadir Adan, the director of Amin Ambulance service, said that “what occurred last night was quite tragic as it occurred in an unexpected setting and at an unexpected time.”Mulki Osman told the AP she and her friends “i...

Indonesia set to deport Australian surfer who apologized for drunken rampage

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesia’s authorities were set to deport on Saturday an Australian surfer who apologized for attacking several people while drunk and naked in the deeply conservative Muslim province of Aceh. Bodhi Mani Risby-Jones, 23, from Queensland, was detained in late April on Simeulue Island, a surf resort, after police accused him of going on a drunken rampage that left a fisherman with serious injuries.Risby-Jones was released from prison on Tuesday after he went through a restorative justice process, apologized for the attack and agreed to pay compensation to the fisherman. That allowed him to avoid going to court and facing a possible charge of assault that could have landed him up to five years in prison.His lawyer, Idris Marbawi, said the two sides agreed that Risby-Jones would pay the fisherman’s family for hospital fees and a traditional peace ceremony. The total payment was 300 million rupiah ($20,000). The fisherman underwent surgery in Banda Aceh, ...

Can a chatbot preach a good sermon? Hundreds attend experimental Lutheran church service to find out

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 10:27:15 GMT

FUERTH, Germany (AP) — The artificial intelligence chatbot asked the believers in the fully packed St. Paul’s church in the Bavarian town of Fuerth to rise from the pews and praise the Lord.The ChatGPT chatbot, personified by an avatar of a bearded Black man on a huge screen above the altar, then began preaching to the more than 300 people who had shown up on Friday morning for an experimental Lutheran church service almost entirely generated by AI.“Dear friends, it is an honor for me to stand here and preach to you as the first artificial intelligence at this year’s convention of Protestants in Germany,” the avatar said with an expressionless face and monotonous voice.The 40-minute service — including the sermon, prayers and music — was created by ChatGPT and Jonas Simmerlein, a theologian and philosopher from the University of Vienna.“I conceived this service — but actually I rather accompanied it, because I would say about 98% comes from the machine,” the 29-yea...