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QB Stroud to start for Texans against Saints on Sunday

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

HOUSTON (AP) — Rookie C.J. Stroud will start Houston’s final preseason game Sunday night at New Orleans.Coach DeMeco Ryans made the announcement Wednesday, but the first-year coach still hasn’t said the second overall pick will be the team’s starting quarterback for the season.Ryans was asked Wednesday if Stroud had earned the right to be the starter.“In everybody’s case, we’ll see who earns what, and you’ll see our starters in Baltimore,” Ryans said of the team’s season opener Sept. 10.Despite this, it seems clear that the former Ohio State standout will replace Davis Mills this season. Stroud has started both of Houston’s first two preseason games and has worked almost exclusively with the first team throughout training camp.Ryans said Wednesday that Stroud and the rest of the players who start will play about two possessions before sitting down against the Saints. Stroud played the entire first half in a 28-3 loss to the Dolphins on Saturday, looking better than he did in h...

Business Highlights: Nvidia posts strong quarterly earnings; the Fed faces tough call on rates

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

___Nvidia’s rising star gets even brighter with another stellar quarter propelled by sales of AI chipsSAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Computer chip maker Nvidia has rocketed into the constellation of Big Tech’s brightest stars while riding the artificial intelligence craze that’s fueling red-hot demand for its technology. The latest evidence of Nvidia’s ascendance emerged with Wednesday’s release of the company’s quarterly earnings report. The results covering the May to July period exceeded Nvidia’s projections for astronomical sales growth propelled by the company’s specialized chips needed to power different forms of artificial intelligence such as Open AI’s popular ChatGPT chatbot. Nvidia’s revenue doubled from a year ago to $13.51 billion and the company projected sales are bound even higher. The company’s shares surged 9% in extended trading.___Surprisingly durable US economy poses key question: Are we facing higher-for-longer interest rates?WASHINGTON (AP) — A year ago, Chair Jerome Pow...

Police watching street cameras kill man they saw pull a gun: chief

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

DENVER (KDVR) — Aurora Police are investigating a deadly shooting after officers fired at a man they said was holding a firearm.Just before 4 a.m. Wednesday, the Aurora Police Department tweeted about a shooting near the intersection of Colfax and Havana in the Del Mar Parkway neighborhood.According to interim Aurora Police Chief Art Acevedo, officers were monitoring cameras in the area at around 2:30 a.m. The area is known for high activity of drug use and theft. Officers saw two men get into a confrontation and one pulled out a firearm. Denver to clear homeless camp after downtown shooting Two of the officers who were monitoring the street cameras headed to the scene.Acevedo said two officers attempted to speak to the man with the firearm, he was noncompliant with the demands made by the officers, and that is when one officer fired at the suspect. Officers performed life-saving actions, but the man was transported to a hospital where was pronounced dead. No officers were injured...

Hundreds charged with more than $830M in COVID-19 fraud

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Hundreds of people have been charged with the theft of more than $830 million in COVID-19 emergency aid following a nationwide operation conducted by federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, the U.S. Justice Department announced Wednesday.More than 60 of the defendants have alleged connections to organized crime, the department said, including members of a criminal gang accused of using stolen pandemic aid to pay for a murder. Stolen items offered to CU for display returned to England “This latest action, involving over 300 defendants and over $830 million in alleged COVID-19 fraud, should send a clear message: the COVID-19 public health emergency may have ended, but the Justice Department’s work to identify and prosecute those who stole pandemic relief funds is far from over,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement.The three-month operation, which ended in July, resulted in more than 300 people being charged, underscoring the pervasivenes...

Rolling Stones appear to tease new album in fake ad in local newspaper

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

London (CNN) — If you’re looking for a rock ‘n’ roll end to the summer, then the Rolling Stones may have you covered.The British rock legends appear to have teased a new album through a fake ad for a glass-repair business placed in a local London newspaper.The cryptic ad, which appeared in the east London-based Hackney Gazette last week, looks at first glance like a promotion for the new business, Hackney Diamonds, but on closer examination it contains references to several of the band’s biggest hits.“Our friendly team promises you satisfaction,” it reads. “When you say gimme shelter we’ll fix your shattered windows.”A quick call to the phone number listed in the ad leads to a recorded message.“Welcome to Hackney Diamonds, specialists in glass repairs,” a Cockney-accented male voice says. “Don’t get angry, get it fixed.”Hackney Diamonds supposedly opens for business in early September – something fans are interpreting as a hint at an album release date.The Stones have yet to make a ...

Serena Williams and Alexis Ohanian welcome second child

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

(CNN) — The score is two and plenty of love for Serena Williams and Alexis Ohanian.The couple have welcomed their second daughter, according to a post Ohanian’s verified Instagram account.“Welcome, Adira River Ohanian,” he wrote in a post featuring a series of family photos with the newborn. “I’m grateful to report our house is teaming with love: a happy & healthy newborn girl and happy & healthy mama.”The tech entrepreneur went on to write “Feeling grateful.”“@serenawilliams you’ve now given me another incomparable gift — you’re the GMOAT,” he wrote. “Thanks to all the amazing medical staff who took care of my wife & our daughter. I’ll never forget the moment I introduced @olympiaohanian to her baby sister.”Williams publicly shared she was expecting another baby in May at the famed Met Gala in New York City.The tennis legend and Ohanian married in 2017, the same year their daughter Alexis Olympia Ohanian Jr. (who goes by Olympia) was born.

Halle Berry and Olivier Martinez finalize divorce after 8 years of legal proceedings

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

(CNN) — Halle Berry and Olivier Martinez have finalized their divorce nearly eight years after the former couple filed their initial petitions.They have agreed to share joint legal and physical custody of their 9-year-old son Maceo, according to a copy of the judgment filed on Tuesday and obtained by CNN.Berry has also agreed to pay Martinez $8,000 a month in child support.The Oscar-winner and “Unfaithful” actor announced in a statement shared with CNN in October 2015 that they had “come to the decision to divorce.”“‎We move forward with love and respect for one another and the shared focus of what is best for our son. We wish each other nothing but happiness in life and we hope that you respect our and, most importantly, our children’s privacy as we go through this difficult period,” the statement read.At the time, Berry and Martinez filed separate petitions for divorce in the days that followed their statement, both citing irreconcilable differences.The former couple bec...

Biden admin shrugs at Prigozhin’s death as questions about Wagner’s future linger

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

While the news of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s death stunned the world, the response within official Washington was a collective shrug.Officials demurred from commenting on the circumstances of the downing of a flight with Prigozhin aboard, stressing instead that everyone knew this was the likely outcome of his failed mutiny against Moscow in June and that it doesn’t change the U.S. calculation on Russia or its war in Ukraine.Asked during his vacation in Lake Tahoe if Russian President Vladimir Putin was behind the crash of Prigozhin’s private plane, carrying him and nine others, President Joe Biden said “there’s not much that happens in Russia that Putin’s not behind, but I don’t know enough to know the answer.”The Wagner Group chief, a once-close Putin confidant and a backer of coups and repressive governments around the world, had widely been considered a dead man walking ever since his June insurrection. Russia’s civil aviation agency confirmed Wednesday that Prigozhin was aboa...

UMass Memorial Health moving forward with plan to close Leominster birthing center in September

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

The clock is ticking for the birthing center on the Leominster campus of UMass Memorial Health Alliance-Clinton Hospital, which is set to close next month. UMass Memorial Health announced the closure in May. As the planned closure date of Sept. 23 now approaches, the organization is moving forward with plans despite pushback from the community and nurses in the maternity ward.“I still have hope,” said registered nurse Tara Corey. “I know we’re cutting down to the wire here.” “We will not have our jobs anymore,” Corey said of the pending closure. “There won’t be a need for us in that hospital as far as if we want to stay with obstetrics which is sad.” “It’s crazy that everyone is speaking out against this and the hospital is not hearing us,” Corey continued. The state Department of Public Health recently set out a list of requirements for UMass Memorial Health to proceed with the closure. In response, the hospital wrote a 17-page letter explaining, in part, “The H...

Early testing suggests variant BA.2.86 has been detected in US wastewater, CDC report says

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:37:02 GMT

(CNN) — Preliminary testing of wastewater in the United States has detected the new highly mutated coronavirus variant BA.2.86, according to a risk assessment posted Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.The CDC did not give details on where the positive wastewater sample had been collected but said it was part of routine monitoring through its National Wastewater Surveillance System.Around the world, nine sequences of the new variant have been reported from human Covid-19 infections: three in Denmark, two in the United States, two in South Africa, one in the UK and one in Israel. It has also been detected at low levels in wastewater from Switzerland.The two US sequences came from patients in Michigan and Virginia. The Michigan person is an older adult who has not been hospitalized, according to the state Department of Health. The person who tested positive in Virginia was a woman who had just returned from a trip to Japan ...