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Late veteran’s family donates his wheelchair

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

A highly decorated veteran died before being able to use his brand new electric wheelchair. His family knew what he would want to be done with the chair and that’s when they contacted Help Me Howard with Patrick Fraser.His name is Kenneth Whitmier. His middle name could be “Remarkable.”Tammy Whitmier: “He was a very generous, giving, loving man.”Tammy’s father, Sgt. Maj. Whitmier, served 27 amazing years in the U.S Army.Gary Booze: Two tours in Vietnam, purple hearts, two Bronze Stars, one with valor. It just goes on and on, and on.”Ask Mr. Whitmier about his achievements and Gary says you would learn another fact. He was humble.Gary Booze: “I said, ‘What was the Bronze Star for?’ He said, ‘Being stupid?’ and that was the end of the conversation.”Then in June, Mr. Whitmier passed away.Gary Booze: “Lost the best member of our family and just trying to do something to remember him, and and carry on his...

Don’t feel like cooking this year? Celebrate Thanksgiving Miami style at these restaurants

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

Thanksgiving checklist sound off:Turkey… check.Mashed potatoes… check. Stuffing… check. Am I missing something?Don’t forget about your stretchy pants. Aside from a good home-cooked meal, two Miami restaurants are taking the stress out of the holiday prep with their unique takes on Thanksgiving staples.Don’t be a “Thank-Zilla” this Thanksgiving, and let someone else do all the cooking this holiday.Red Rooster in Overtown is adding some more Miami to their holiday menu.Anastassia Saint-Eloi: “We wanted to add a unique take on the staple Thanksgiving items to bring awareness of the beautiful cultures that are in Miami like the Latin cultures, the African cultures.”And to do that, they’re spicing things up… Literally.Anastassia Saint-Eloi: “We have jerk, we have curry, we have our spice rum butter, that we’re taking influences from the multitude of cultures here in Miami.”Ready to gobble-gobble these cur...

Musk sues Media Matters as advertising exodus continues

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

Elon Musk on Monday made good on his promise to sue Media Matters, filing a federal lawsuit that accuses the left-leaning watchdog group and one of its reporters of doctoring images in an article that showed ads for major corporations next to posts depicting hate speech on X, Musk’s social media platform formerly known as Twitter.In a complaint filed in a Texas federal court, lawyers for X argued that Media Matters “knowingly and maliciously manufactured side-by-side images depicting advertisers’ posts” on X. The lawsuit alleges that the images and the media promotion of that research were done with the intention “to drive advertisers from the platform and destroy” X, citing “a blatant smear campaign” against the company over the last year.Musk’s lawsuit is the latest of his battles with regulators, advocates and advertisers, which have pointed to a rise in hate speech on the platform since he bought it last October and hollowed out its content moderation staff. The tech billio...

How Labour fell in love with Partygate investigator Sue Gray

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

LONDON — Britain’s Labour Party has a new idol and they can’t stop talking about her. Nearly three months ago, Labour Leader Keir Starmer appointed career civil servant Sue Gray his chief of staff. The appointment sent shockwaves through Westminster, and was a surprisingly political move for a career-long civil servant, famed for her dispassionate but tough verdicts as a former director of propriety and ethics for the British government. To make matters worse in the eyes of her opponents, Gray had taken a starring role in the downfall of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson by overseeing an investigation into his administration’s lockdown-busting parties.For all the furor over her appointment, key players from many wings of the Labour Party agree she’s a welcome force, professionalizing the Labour operation as it eyes an election next year. POLITICO spoke to more than a dozen officials and shadow ministers who have worked with Gray since she joined. All were g...

‘Spider in the web’ of Belgian diplomacy set to be new EU ambassador

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

Peter Moors, the chief of staff of Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, is set to become the new Belgian ambassador to the EU after the country’s six month presidency of the Council of the EU period ends in June 2024, according to eight Belgian diplomats and officials. His expected appointment, which still has to be formally approved, is part of a big reshuffle of Belgian top diplomats, including key ambassadorial posts such as to Washington D.C. Many key posts — including Washington, Moscow, New York and Geneva — are open. One diplomat joked that this year’s revamp was “the grand slam” of top jobs.More importantly, it’s the last reshuffle before the Belgian elections of June 2024. Current polls suggest it will be challenging for the current seven-party coalition to continue, meaning that several diplomats working at the top of government could be looking to secure a good posting before the political instability. While the actual moves won’t happen until next sum...

Dutch on brink of electing first female leader

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

THE HAGUE — Dutch voters may be about to get someone very different from the outgoing veteran prime minister Mark Rutte. A former refugee, Dilan Yeşilgöz, who succeeded Rutte as leader of the VVD party, is now leading the polls ahead of Wednesday’s vote and could become the first female prime minister in Dutch history. The contest is on a knife-edge, with three parties vying to win the most seats, but her nearest rival, Pieter Omtzigt has signalled he may not want the top job for himself. That makes it even likelier that Yeşilgöz, the country’s justice minister, will become premier at the head of the next government. Read more: How to watch the Dutch elections like a pro – POLITICOA self-confessed workaholic, Yeşilgöz is media savvy and does not talk much about being a woman in politics. She is invariably good humored and full of energy in public, despite what she says are “tough” demands of her current job. Her liberal-conservative People’s Party for Freedo...

Poland’s President Duda signals Tusk will have bumpy ride as PM

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

WARSAW — A war of words has broken out between Poland’s President Andrzej Duda and Donald Tusk, the likely head of the next government, presaging what’s looking to be a difficult cohabitation between the political rivals.“I am the president, but Donald Tusk is not my candidate for prime minister,” Duda told the right-wing Sieci weekly.Duda, originally a European Parliament backbencher from the Law and Justice (PiS) party before becoming president in 2015, has long been loyal to the nationalist party. Rather than simply rolling over and allowing Tusk to set Poland on a new course in line with the EU mainstream, Duda is laying down a gauntlet that he will use his presidential powers to thwart a new administration. Tusk and his allies have promised wrenching changes to the PiS program — rolling back draconian restrictions on abortion, limiting the role of religion in the education system, firing PiS loyalists in media and state companies, and undoing years of judicial r...

A federalized Europe isn’t in America’s interest

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

Andrew A. Michta is senior fellow and director of the Scowcroft Strategy Initiative at the Atlantic Council of the United States. Views expressed here are his own.There’s a sea change coming to Europe, and its consequences for America’s relations with key allies haven’t yet registered in Washington.Predominantly driven by pressure from Berlin and Paris, the European Union is moving at speed to undergo the most dramatic systemic transformation since its inception. It’s about to centralize power in a way that will change the bloc’s very nature, impacting the Continent’s politics and economics. It will also fundamentally alter how Europe interacts with the United States.The changes currently under consideration would transform the EU from a confederation of sovereign countries into a unitary federal entity, with its central government presiding over partially self-governing nation states. And the key argument put forward by proponents of this is that without it, the bloc’s planned enla...

Our warnings on Hamas were ignored, Israel’s women border troops say

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

TEL AVIV — Did Israel’s security chiefs brush off warnings from women border surveillance soldiers who had evidence that something was brewing in Gaza ahead of the murderous attacks by Hamas militants on October 7? That’s the explosive accusation coming from several soldiers in Israel’s predominantly female border surveillance forces — known as the tatzpitaniyot, or look-outs in Hebrew. The soldiers are telling the media that their superiors did not heed warnings of unusual activity inside Gaza, such as Palestinian guerrillas training with explosives or rehearsing attacks on a replica tank and a mock observation post. Their statements to the media are piling pressure on the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing a firestorm over last month’s catastrophic intelligence blunder. The country’s fabled spy services ultimately failed to detect an impending Hamas onslaught, in which an estimated 3,000 Palestinian fighters killed some 1,2...

Why Germany can’t square a €60 billion circle

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 15:12:57 GMT

BERLIN — As Germany’s divided coalition government grapples with how to plug a €60 billion hole in the federal budget following a bombshell ruling by the country’s top court, more financial trouble may be looming.A ruling by the constitutional court last week is already forcing German leaders to reevaluate how to finance subsidies for energy, industry and microchips, potentially undermining ambitious plans to kickstart Germany’s stagnating economy and accelerate the green transition.The court ruled that a government plan to repurpose €60 billion left over from an emergency COVID-19 fund to finance the country’s green agenda was unconstitutional. But the financial pain may get worse as the ruling may end up having far wider implications that limit the ability of German leaders — on both the federal and state levels — to draw from a variety of special funds that have been created to bring down energy prices an...