Saving them raises thorny church-and-state issues. A few years back, the National Park Service denied a grant for repairs to Boston’s Old North Church because it is still an active parish. But for heaven’s sake–this is the church where Paul Revere had those lanterns raised to warn that the British were coming! Ultimately, the Park Service reversed the decision, but some local governments don’t want to touch religious buildings, either with funding or special designations....
Anyone who doubts this last proposition should examine the farm-subsidy programs, which are the classic example of how unnecessary spending survives. It is a parable for our larger budget predicament. Every year the government sends out checks to about 700,000 to 900,000 farmers. Since 1978, federal outlays to support farmers’ incomes have exceeded $300 billion. How large is that? Well, the publicly held federal debt (the result of past budget deficits) is about $3....
My surgeon, in customary manner, breezes into the room. She is going away for the weekend but has stopped in to see me, as promised. After checking the fluid levels, she announces that the tubes can come out. “Yes,” I tell her, “the resident said he’ll do it later in the day.” “Well, I can do it now,” she offers. I am happy to see the drains go, but not prepared for what she says next....
Now, 28 years later, much in the way of public relations is being attempted to rectify the memory of that horrendous summer. But it’s not clear that any of the spinning is really needed. Just now, Chicago, where I have lived for more than half a century, seems a most agreeable place. Most people who live here aren’t eager to be elsewhere. The city may even have become one of those secret good places, as Seattle may once have been but without all the overpriced coffee and pretentiousness about simple living that besmirch that city....
Such shows, in which owners get together to swap car stories and share tips on finding parts, usually involve hundreds of automobiles. The gatherings are held in sunshine and in rain, on fairgrounds or farmers’ fields or even in parking lots. Show organizers provide a placard for each vehicle that spells out the make, model, year and owner’s name. The signs invariably include the line do not touch! Many cars also bear signs that say such things as don’t even think about touching this car and touch me only with thine eyes....
VITAMIN PILLS Before there were pills, there was food. And as a general rule, the best way to get your daily vitamin requirement is in foods, which often are rich in several vitamins as well as fiber and other health-giving substances. Twenty years ago doctors believed that the typical U.S. diet provided adequate vitamins, and that very few of us needed to take vitamin pills. In the United States and other developed nations, full-blown vitamin-deficiency diseases have been rare for decades because most people eat foods that prevent them....
But Franks liked the idea that bringing a pool reporter along on his seven-hour foray would help shine the spotlight on the troops in the field. He takes every chance to deflect attention toward them. When a soldier asked to have a picture taken with the general, Franks replied: “Why would anyone want a picture of me? I’m an old ugly son-of-a-(expletive),” reported John Broder of The New York Times, the chosen reporter who was the eyes and ears for the rest of the press corps back at Central Command....
The team looked at every known aspect of the probe’s design but just couldn’t find anything that would explain the deceleration. Things really got weird when they looked at Pioneer 11, a sister ship headed in the opposite direction, and then at the Ulysses probe, currently circling the sun. They, too, seemed to be experiencing unexplained tug in the direction of the sun. Eventually Anderson’s team had to face an unsettling possibility: with no obvious cause in sight, possible explanations dwindled to a fundamental problem with our understanding of gravity or time....
This week there will be no doubt which side of the Atlantic Garcia hails from. He will tee up for Europe against a Woods-led U.S. squad in what has become golf’s greatest showdown, the biennial Ryder Cup. While America boasts the world’s most successful golfers, Europe has won the last two Cups and five of the last seven (this one will be played outside Boston). But the stalwarts of those European triumphs–Nick Faldo, Seve Ballesteros, Bernhard Langer–are gone from the team, and Europe’s elite dozen will feature seven Ryder Cup rookies....
Aidid has been in hiding since June, after an ambush in which his troops killed 23 Pakistani soldiers–members of the U.N. peacekeeping force in Somalia. Flight hasn’t blunted the warlord’s sting; four American soldiers were killed on Aug. 8 by a bomb apparently detonated by his militia, and early last week six GIs were wounded by another remote-control explosion. Washington ordered 400 army rangers to reinforce the 1,200 American combat troops already on station....
Is that the stuff of revolution? The organizers of the Cacak protest, a coalition called Alliance for Change, plan a “summer of rallies” across the country, finishing up in downtown Belgrade. Another pro-democracy group staged a demo on Friday in Novi Sad. There is a tradition of anti-Milosevic protests; in 1997 up to 1 million demonstrators rallied in the capital. Milosevic survived–but that was before the Kosovo war. NATO bombing caused massive damage to the Serb economy, which was already a basket case....
Unlike modern Orthodox Jews–whose acceptance of the Torah as the word of God goes together with a firm embrace of the temporal world–my brother regarded secularism as philosophically incompatible with his religious values, and he set out to build a life apart. For years my brother’s religious transformation filled me with a rage and embarrassment so profound that I struggle even today to understand it. I had always hoped that Tony would find a focus, but ultra-Orthodox Judaism was never what I had had in mind....
I don’t recall being scared. What I did have, though, and what is a more agonizing sensation, is the feeling of dying. It was during an offensive when the French Army was moving forward through the German lines–April 16, 1917. I was wounded six or seven kilometers inside the German lines. A shell exploded near me; my arm, my chest, my whole left leg were bleeding. My knee was broken, and I was limping....
The conviction she got is dearly not what her father intended. Last week a military court in Peru sentenced Berenson, 26, to life in prison for treason, a fate usually reserved for terrorist guerrilla leaders. Police say she helped supply arms, a safe house and intelligence information to the Marxist Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA), which had planned to take congressional hostages and exchange them for imprisoned MRTA rebels. Police say they found a stash of weapons in a Lima house she rented, as well as espionage reports on congressmen and a draft of the congressional seating chart....
Some side effects happen right after your shot, like mild pain in your arm. Others may take hours to develop. Remember that with the two-dose vaccines like Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, you may notice more side effects after the second shot. This article offers a step-by-step timeline of possible symptoms to help you understand what to expect after the jab. Right After Vaccination The COVID vaccines are intramuscular, or “IM” for short....
It’s easy to forget that things could have been so much different for Brown, who seemed destined to snag fly balls rather than touchdowns at one point in his athletic career. Brown was a two-sport star in high school, showcasing a multi-faceted approach on both the diamond and the gridiron. In fact, Brown became just the second player (after Kyler Murray) to feature in Under Armour’s All-American football and baseball games....
INJURY UPDATE: Dalvin Cook ‘unlikely’ to play Week 3 Brown was originally deemed questionable to return to the game because of the injury. However, he was declared out before the start of the second half, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter. It’s unclear exactly when Brown may have suffered the injury, but surely, his status will bear watching. Soft-tissue injuries tend to linger, so Tennessee may choose to be cautious with Brown’s hamstring issue....
Shut out, in fact. No. 18 Houston throttled Vanderbilt 34-0. MORE: Why you should love college football | 25 best November games There is something happening in the American Athletic Conference. There is a fury under way. An American fury. A fury that’s seen Ole Miss, Vanderbilt, Penn State, Louisville, Kansas tossed aside like week-old pumpkins. It’s an AAC whose third-best team Temple took top-10 Notre Dame to the brink....
The brother of Backstreet Boys singer Nick Carter was found dead in a bathtub at his California home on Saturday. He was pronounced dead at the scene at age 34. A couple of months before his 30th birthday, Carter revealed his greatest fear was dying young. It came during an appearance on the talk show The Drs where the former child star talked about his bisexuality and took an HIV test on the show....
