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Adam Sandler’s ‘Leo’ a surefire hit for Netflix

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

Is “Leo” better than Disney’s blockbuster wannabe “Wish?” Yes, while it doesn’t boast Disney’s lavish production values, Netflix’s memorable and colorful computer-animated musical comedy directed by Robert Marianetti, Robert Smigel and David Wachtenheim, all veterans of “Saturday Night Live,” is a small gem. Boasting Adam Sandler and Bill Burr voicing its two talking reptilian lead characters: a dyspeptic turtle named Squirtle who is a master of mean comedy (yes, Burr) and a Yoda-like tuatara lizard named Leo (Sandler), who finds his purpose in life by advising children and helping them get through life’s challenges.At first, a bitter Leo refers to the children in his class at Central Florida’s Fort Myers Elementary School as “fifth grade head cases” and does not have a lot of patience for them.But when he finds out that a lizard’s life expectancy is 75 years and that he is 74, Leo has a “old-life crisis,” and his heart softens. Squirtle and...

Puckrein: Will Medicaid’s proposed price rule harm patients?

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

Medicaid is one of the largest — and most important — tools in the federal government’s arsenal to improve health equity. That’s why policymakers should be careful about making dramatic changes that could inadvertently decrease Medicaid beneficiaries’ access to care.Medicaid is a lifesaving resource for vulnerable Americans. Multiple states have reported that after expanding Medicaid eligibility, they experienced an aggregate decrease in all-cause mortality rates. Even without expansion, Medicaid has long been associated with improved self-reported health status and decreased infant, child and adult mortality rates.And the program’s reach is unrivaled. More than 85 million individuals are enrolled in Medicaid — that’s more than one in five Americans nationwide, four in 10 children, eight in 10 children in poverty, one in six adults, and almost half of adults in poverty. Relative to White children and adults, Medicaid covers a higher share of Black, Hispanic and Native American...

Dear Abby: Boss takes advantage of kind employee

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

Dear Abby: My boss, who recently separated from her husband and is getting divorced, has moved within walking distance of work. The problem is, she can’t drive, and her daughter needs to be taken to and from school. I offered to help her out with her daughter, but now she’s asking me to take her everywhere she needs to go.I have been accommodating and have done this for a couple of months, but she has never offered me any money toward gas in my car even though she’s always bragging about all the things she has ordered off the internet. I never offered to be her chauffeur.I work third shift, which is hard enough, and have my own child to take care of during the day. How can I tell her it’s got to stop without hurting her feelings? I am getting close to losing control and telling her off. Everyone I know is advising me to stop, and she’s just using me. — Used in the MidwestDear Used: Explain to your boss (politely) that you were glad to help her out...

Wisconsin Supreme Court hearing arguments on redistricting that could result in new maps for 2024

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The liberal-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments Tuesday in a redistricting case that Democrats hope will result in new, more favorable legislative maps for elections in 2024 that will help them chip away at the large Republican majority. The case is being closely watched in battleground Wisconsin, a state where four of the past six presidential elections have been decided by fewer than 23,000 votes, but where Republicans have built large majorities in the Legislature under maps they drew over a decade ago.Democratic voters who filed the lawsuit being heard by the court Tuesday argue that the maps passed in 2022, which vary little from those drawn in 2011, are unconstitutionally “unsalvageable” and must be struck down and redrawn. The Legislature counters that Democrats are exercising “raw political power” and trying to take advantage of the new liberal majority on the court to overturn its 2021 ruling that adopted the current maps.T...

Affordable housing and homelessness are top issues in Salt Lake City’s ranked-choice mayoral race

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Erin Mendenhall is seeking reelection as mayor of Utah’s capital Tuesday in a ranked-choice contest that includes a challenge by former Mayor Rocky Anderson.The third left-leaning choice for mayor is Michael Valentine, an activist and business owner. Though the position is officially nonpartisan, the city is largely Democratic in a mostly Republican state.Three of the mayoral candidates had a debate Oct. 24 that touched on several of the main issues: conserving water, fighting climate change, reducing crime and addressing homelessness.Anderson, who served two terms from 2000-2008, has criticized Mendenhall for not doing enough to alleviate the rising cost of housing.“We have got to provide a safe community and we’ve got to deal effectively with the homelessness crisis and the affordability crisis we have,” Anderson said in the debate, which was sponsored by KSL, the Hinckley Institute of Politics and Better Utah.He proposed mixed income housing buil...

60 years after JFK’s death, today’s Kennedys choose other paths to public service

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Patrick Kennedy, son of Sen. Ted Kennedy and nephew of President John F. Kennedy, remembers being a young state legislator in Rhode Island some 30 years ago and hearing encouraging words from the opposition leader at the time.“I just want you to know that no matter what you do, nothing’s going to take away from everyone’s memory and appreciation of what your family has done for this country,” Republican David Dumas told him.“He meant that ’Don’t preoccupy yourself with worrying about whether you’re a good representative of your family or not,'” Patrick Kennedy, now a former congressman, said in a recent Zoom interview. Kennedy spoke shortly before the 60th anniversary of the assassination of President Kennedy, a seismic national event that predates most American lives but remains an inflection point in the country’s history — as a wellspring of modern conspiracy theories, as a debate over what JFK might have achieved, as an e...

New Hampshire man had no car, no furniture, but died with a big secret, leaving his town millions

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

HINSDALE, N.H. (AP) — Geoffrey Holt was unassuming as the caretaker of a mobile home park in Hinsdale, New Hampshire, where he lived a simple, but curious life. Residents would see Holt around town in threadbare clothes — riding his lawn mower, headed to the convenience store, parked along the main road reading a newspaper or watching cars pass.He did odd jobs for others, but rarely left town. Despite having taught driver’s ed to high schoolers, Holt had given up driving a car. He opted for a bicycle instead and finally the mower. His mobile home in the park was mostly empty of furniture — no TV and no computer, either. The legs of the bed went through the floor.“He seemed to have what he wanted, but he didn’t want much,” said Edwin “Smokey” Smith, Holt’s best friend and former employer.But Holt died earlier this year with a secret: He was a multimillionaire. And what’s more, he gave it all away to this community of 4,200 people.His will had brief instructions: $3.8 million to...

Ukrainians who fled their country for Israel find themselves yet again living with war

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

ASHKELON, Israel (AP) — Tatyana Prima thought she’d left the bombs behind when she fled Ukraine more than a year and a half ago, after Russia decimated her city, Mariupol. The 38-year-old escaped with her injured husband and young daughter, bringing the family to safety in southern Israel. The calm she was slowly regaining shattered again on Oct. 7, when Hamas militants invaded. “All these sounds of war that we hear now, they sometimes work as a trigger that brings back memories of what we’ve gone through in Mariupol,” she said. “It’s hard feeling like that you’re the one responsible for your child, the one who wants what’s best for them, and in some way like you’ve failed them.” Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, more than 45,000 Ukrainians have sought refuge in Israel, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics and aid groups. Like Prima, most of them were slowly picking up the pieces of their lives and finding ways to cope when the war in Israel e...

Alert level downgraded for Papua New Guinea’s tallest volcano

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Papua New Guinea’s tallest volcano had its alert level reduced Tuesday and a tsunami was ruled out one day after Mount Ulawun erupted, spewing smoke as high as 15 kilometers (50,000 feet) into the sky.One of the South Pacific nation’s most active volcanoes, Ulawun erupted on Monday afternoon, placing regional neighbors, including Japan temporarily, on tsunami alert.The alert level for the volcano on the northeastern island of New Britain was downgraded by Papua New Guinea’s Geohazards Management Division to Stage 3, which means a “moderate-to-strong eruption.” The division rated the tsunami risk in a bulletin at “nil.”The organization had on Monday elevated it to Stage 4 which in Papua New Guinea’s four-tier scale indicates a “very strong eruption.”But the volcano, which stands 2,334 meters (7,657 feet) above sea level, remained active and the eruption could continue indefinitely, the division said.The Volcanic Ash Advisory Center in Darwin, Australia, rep...

Utah special election for Congress sees Republican former House staffer face Democratic legislator

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 10:20:48 GMT

Voters in Utah will choose between a Republican former congressional staffer and a Democratic state senator in a special election Tuesday to replace Republican U.S. Rep. Chris Stewart, who recently resigned.Republican Celeste Maloy, who is Stewart’s former chief counsel, and state Sen. Kathleen Riebe, who as minority whip is the No. 2 Democrat in the state Senate, are competing to become the first woman in Utah’s congressional delegation since 2019 and only the fifth in history.Maloy, a southern Nevada native and resident of southwestern Utah, is the heavy favorite in the Republican-leaning 2nd congressional district, which stretches from southern and western Utah to Salt Lake City. The winner will join the state’s three other Republican U.S. House members. The state’s two U.S. senators are also Republican. Maloy campaigned on improving security on the U.S.-Mexico border, reining in what she calls “out of control” federal spending, protecting religious freedom and ...