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Evan Gershkovich is the first reporter for a US news outlet to be arrested on espionage charges in Russia since the cold war

Sacramento last made the postseason nearly 20 years ago. But a savvy coach and an impressive blend of talent have changed their fortunesThere are the underdogs, and then there are the seemingly cursed. Those franchises who lead a sisyphean existence, one in which they are always the butt of the joke. Until this season, the Sacramento Kings could be described as the latter. Several teams that were founded more recently have a worse win percentage, but the Kings have the most losses in NBA history, with just north of 3,200. While pundits generally approved of their off-season moves this past summer, few would have predicted Sacramento would be third in the Western Conference at the end of March, breaking the longest playoff drought in the the four major US sports leagues. These are not your mom’s Sacramento Kings. So how did they turn it around? Continue reading...

From oil to immigration, the president’s reversal from his 2020 campaign pledges might turn away more voters than it attractsWhen he was running for president in 2020, Joe Biden promised “no more drilling on federal lands, period”. This month, he approved an $8bn oil project in Alaska, violating that campaign pledge.Biden had said he wholeheartedly supports granting statehood to the District of Columbia. Last week, he signed a Republican bill overturning changes to the DC criminal code, which critics attacked as a violation of home rule. Continue reading...

A cabin on the round-the-world MV Gemini costs £75,000. It could be a cost of living escape hatch for the middle classesIt is a juvenile but bankable way to pass time and lift one’s spirits without too much exertion: I’m talking about identifying ways in which the lives of rich people suck, a list that is always imaginatively growing. Gwyneth Paltrow, testifying in Utah, has delivered solidly on this front this week, but there’s an even more gratifying story you might have missed. For a mere £75,000, people with what is officially known as more money than sense can embark on a round-the-world cruise, taking in 135 countries and docking at 375 destinations. If that itinerary sounds overloaded, it’s because you are a wage slave who only takes 14-day holidays. This particular cruise takes three years.I know, right? Three years on a ship playing “indoor golf” with the characters from Triangle of Sadness. It is so perfect a punishment for a certain type of hollowed-out plutocrat it might have been created by a limp, mid-list satirist. According to Life at Sea Cruises, the company behind the venture and a subsidiary of Miray Cruises, demand for the cruise is “unprecedented” and it also goes without saying that the word “cruise” in this case, is a misnomer. Cruises are for people who get excited by the presence of jumbo prawns at the buffet. By contrast, life aboard the “400-cabin MV Gemini” is, says Mikael Petterson, the managing director, “a way of living as opposed to travel”.Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

From hateful rants on Fox news to falsehoods in Congress, the far right exploits the tragedy to demonize vulnerable peopleAn already vigorous assault by Republicans on LGBTQ+ rights around the US is certain to gather pace in the wake of the Nashville school shooting, advocacy groups are warning.Hard-right figures wasted little time in seizing on the reported transgender identity of the Covenant school killer to advance tenets of a “hateful” agenda that has become an obsession of Republican-controlled statehouses from Florida to Tennessee. Continue reading...

The protest movement will either transform into a call for genuine democracy – for Palestinians and Israelis alike – or it will remain locked in the current impasseThere is a certain afterglow to mass protest. It’s a feeling strongest when the slogans have just ceased to echo in the streets, when the barricades have just come down, the banners rolled back up and the flags folded and put back in their place. It is also a dangerous moment, when what looks like sudden success can just as quickly turn into defeat.That is the place where the protests against the Netanyahu government’s plan to strip the judiciary of its power stand right now. Last week saw street demonstrations of a size and intensity never seen before in Israel. It was, largely, a revolt of the educated and the middle class – of self-identified liberal, secular Israel against authoritarian, theocratic Israel. One of the movement’s most prominent organizers, and perhaps most representative, is Shikma Bressler, a professor of particle physics at the Weizman Institute, who for 13 weeks exhorted her fellow Israelis into the streets. Continue reading...

I haven’t eaten octopus in years, yet being smart shouldn’t make them exceptions. All animals need protection from unnecessary sufferingThe collective noun for a group of octopuses, in case you were wondering, is a consortium – not, as some wags might tell you, a seafood buffet.I myself don’t eat octopus, and have made a lot of noise about why: they’re as smart as parrots, their brain is spread over their arms, they are many millions of years older than we are – don’t you know that, of all the species on Earth, only they and we share a high-resolution camera eye?Elle Hunt is a freelance journalist Continue reading...

San Diego and the New York Mets have splashed the cash. But the Houston Astros and Atlanta Braves are superbly run clubsA mixed bag. I’m already on record as being for the pitch clock. As someone who loved watching how hitters approached the shift, however, it feels like a strategic element has been removed for no good reason. HF Continue reading...

UK-German relations are long and complicated, and not all symbolism is emptyKing Charles III will not only travel to Berlin during his state visit to Germany this week, but also Hamburg, the country’s second largest city and home to its biggest port. Hamburg is a trading hub known for its Anglophilia, with close connections to Great Britain that go back centuries that were revived during the British occupation of the city after the second world war, when the former enemy quickly turned into a close partner.When you take the long view at UK-German relations, this part of the king’s trip is at least as important and meaningful as his appointments in the German capital. Those who criticise royal visits as constituting little more than expensive photo-ops fail to understand that not all symbolism is empty. Continue reading...

The bodies of four furry swimmers tested positive for a strain of toxoplasmosis first seen in mountain lionsScientist Melissa Miller was seeing something in California sea otters that she had not seen before: an unusually severe form of toxoplasmosis, which officials have confirmed has killed at least four of the animals.“We wanted to get the word out. We’re seeing something we haven’t seen before, we want people to know about it and we want people working on marine mammals to be aware of these weird findings,” said Miller, a wildlife veterinarian specialist with the California department of fish and wildlife (DFW). “Take extra precautions.” Continue reading...

Congresswoman’s fixation on whether criminal code would have decriminalized public urination made biggest splash at hearingIn bizarre scenes in a US House hearing, the far-right Republican Lauren Boebert asked if a revised Washington DC criminal code was now law – only to be reminded that Congress overturned it earlier this month – then fixated on whether that code would have decriminalised public urination.The revision was meant to give the District of Columbia a first code update in 120 years, but it became subject to fierce debate over crime as a political issue. Republicans said the code was soft on violent offenses. Angering progressives, Joe Biden said he would not veto a Republican measure to overturn the code. Continue reading...

Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen arrives at the Lotte hotel in New York City with her security keeping a close watch. Supporters greet her while some anti-Taiwan independence protesters gathered across the street. Tsai is meeting overseas Taiwanese representatives while she is in New York. The president is also visiting Central America and California before returning home.

Taskforce says it will not take a stand on how much compensation residents should receiveThe leader of California’s first-in-the-nation reparations taskforce on Wednesday said it would not take a stance on how much the state should compensate Black residents whom economists estimate may be owed more than $800bn for decades of over-policing, disproportionate incarceration and housing discrimination.The $800bn is more than 2.5 times California’s $300bn annual budget and does not include a recommended $1m per older Black resident for health disparities that have shortened their average lifespan. Nor does the figure count compensating people for property unjustly taken by the government or devaluing Black businesses, two other harms the taskforce says the state perpetuated. Continue reading...

Details of three children and three adults shot dead at Covenant School in Tennessee capital have begun to emergeDetails from the rich, full lives of the three adults killed Monday at a Nashville elementary school have emerged quickly in the aftermath, but information on the three nine-year-old children – whose lives ended tragically young – has been slower to publicly surface from a community buried in grief.The violence wielded by the hands of a former student of the Covenant School on Monday marks the 129th mass shooting in the US so far this year, according to the non-profit Gun Violence Archive. Continue reading...

Magazine’s editors asked board not to lay off anyone for a month if staff raised $200,000 after Friday’s vote to cease publicationJournalists at the muckraking liberal magazine Texas Observer have raised more than $270,000 through a GoFundMe campaign in a last-ditch attempt to save the publication from closure.The storied publication – founded in 1954 by Ronnie Dugger, edited in the 1970s by Molly Ivins, and described this week by John Nichols as “the connecting tissue of Texas liberalism” – had suffered extreme instability in recent years, with a revolving door of editors-in-chief and frequent conflict between its owners, the non-profit Texas Democracy Foundation, and its staff. Continue reading...

Suzanne Scott wrote in December 2020 that fact-checks ‘have to stop’, messages obtained from $1.6bn Dominion lawsuit revealThe top executive at Fox News was furious one of the network’s reporters was fact-checking Donald Trump’s false claims about the 2020 election, writing in a December 2020 email that it was “bad for business”.Suzanne Scott, the chief executive of Fox News, was responding in early December 2020 to an on-air fact-check by Eric Shawn, one of the network’s anchors. “This has to stop now,” she wrote to Meade Cooper, another Fox executive. “This is bad business and there clearly is a lack of understanding [sic] what is happening in these shows. The audience is furious and we are just feeding them material. Bad for business.” Continue reading...

Grand jury won’t hear evidence on hush money payment due to previously scheduled hiatus, report says

Republican Bill Lee called for compassion in pre-recorded video but didn’t mention guns after six killed at Nashville schoolThe Republican governor of Tennessee called for compassion and an end to mass violence but pointedly declined to mention guns or gun control in a message to his state after three nine-year-old children and three adults were shot dead at a Christian school in Nashville.“I understand there is pain,” Bill Lee said in a short, pre-recorded video. “I understand the desperation to have answers, to place blame, to argue about a solution that could prevent this horrible tragedy.” Continue reading...

Decision not expected to affect current deployments but lawmakers increasingly seeking to claw back congressional powerThe US Senate voted on Wednesday to repeal the resolution that gave a green light for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, an effort to return a basic war power to Congress from the White House 20 years after an authorization many now say was a mistake.Iraqi deaths are estimated in the hundreds of thousands and nearly 5,000 US troops were killed after George W Bush’s administration falsely claimed Saddam Hussein was stockpiling weapons of mass destruction. Continue reading...

Informant who marched to US Capitol with Proud Boys says he didn’t know of plans to invade and ‘crowd did as herd mentality’An FBI informant who marched to the US Capitol with fellow Proud Boys on January 6 testified on Wednesday that he did not know of any plans for the far-right extremist group to invade the building and didn’t think they inspired violence that day.The informant, who identified himself in court only as “Aaron”, was a defense witness at the trial of the former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and four lieutenants charged with seditious conspiracy for what prosecutors say was a plot to keep Donald Trump in the White House after the 2020 election. Continue reading...

Onslaught has brought severe damage, including buildings crushed by snow, flooding and homes threatened by landslidesA powerful weather system has brought more wind, rain and snow to California, reeling a state already battered by months of storms.Forecasters said the storm was not as strong as the systems that pounded California all winter, but it was expected to pull a plume of Pacific moisture into the state as it tracked south. Continue reading...

Howard Schultz defends company’s practices before Senate committee, while Republicans condemn Sanders’ ‘witch-hunt’Starbucks’ former chief executive Howard Schultz was accused at a Senate hearing on Wednesday of running “the most aggressive and illegal union-busting campaign in the modern history of our country”.The hearing, “No Company Is Above the Law: The Need to End Illegal Union Busting at Starbucks”, was chaired by Senator Bernie Sanders, a longtime critic of Starbucks’ anti-union activities. Continue reading...

Move seen as a key strategy to control the US overdose crisis, which has been linked to more than 100,000 deaths a yearThe US Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday approved selling naloxone without a prescription, setting the overdose-reversing drug on course to become the first opioid treatment drug to be sold over counters in the US.It is a move some advocates have long sought as a way to improve access to a life-saving drug, though the exact impact will not be clear immediately. Continue reading...

Despite an uptick in sports movies, the days of Bull Durham, The Natural and Moneyball are long behind usThe crack of the bat. The roar of the crowd. The green grass and the brown dirt. These are the sights and sounds that bring joy to baseball fans every April, both in person and on the silver screen. Historically, baseball films are released in the spring to coincide with Opening Day, when even the most deadened fanbase can spare a smidge of romance and optimism. The Bad News Bears, Major League, Field of Dreams, Fever Pitch and 42 were all released in April. This year, there are none to be found, and that’s not a scheduling accident. A baseball film hasn’t had a significant theatrical release – in any month, let alone April – since 2016, when Richard Linklater’s Everybody Wants Some!! landed with a thud at the box office.It’s a strange phenomenon since movies about other sports are thriving. In March and April, no fewer than four basketball films will be released (Champions, Air, Somewhere in Queens, Sweetwater). Already this year there have been hit movies about the NFL (80 for Brady) and boxing (Creed III). Other 2023 films will tackle wrestling (The Iron Claw), tennis (Challengers), and soccer (Next Goal Wins). The only baseball film on the calendar is The Hill, a faith-friendly true story of a disabled minor leaguer in the 1970s, but it lacks any major stars and is being released in the doldrums of August. Continue reading...

Migrants and activists gathered outside an immigration centre in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, where at least 40 people died in a fire to call for justice after CCTV was released appearing to show guards leaving the building while smoke filled a locked cell with detainees inside. Human rights groups have blamed poor conditions and overcrowding for the fire. The Mexican president has said the fire, which broke out late on Monday, was caused by migrants setting fire to mattresses after discovering they were being deported. Activists have frequently called for better conditions in detention centres as the US and Mexico attempt to cope with record levels of border crossings

Coroners in Las Vegas say DNA analysis shows bone belonged to Donald Smith, 39, who drowned in 1974Coroners in Las Vegas have identified human remains found in Lake Mead as its waters recede as those of a 39-year-old man who drowned nearly half a century ago.The Clark county coroner said the remains were those of Donald Smith, a 39-year-old Las Vegas resident who drowned in April 1974. Officials ruled the death accidental. Continue reading...

As Lily Savage and as himself, he confronted prejudice and celebrated gay culture. His stories must not die with him

Barry C Black said: ‘When babies die at a church school, it is time for us to move beyond thoughts and prayers’The chaplain who leads prayers in the US Senate said on Tuesday: “When babies die at a church school, it is time for us to move beyond thoughts and prayers.”Barry C Black was referring to the shooting at the Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee, on Monday, in which three nine-year-olds and three adults were killed. The shooter was killed by police. Continue reading...

Scott Trust to invest in decade-long programme of restorative justice after academic research into newspaper’s origins. Plus, why the Gwyneth Paltrow ski trial farce is so unmissableGood morning.The owner of the Guardian has issued an apology for the role the newspaper’s founders had in transatlantic slavery and announced a decade-long programme of restorative justice.How did we uncover the Guardian founders’ links to slavery? The process of uncovering where exactly the founder of the Manchester Guardian, John Edward Taylor, and his associates were importing cotton from was a lengthy and difficult one, writes Cassandra Gooptar.What will the Guardian do now? The Scott Trust expects to commit more than £10m to a restorative justice programme of work over the next 10 years. The fund will support community projects and programmes in the south-eastern US Sea Islands and Jamaica. The fund will increase the scope and ambition of Guardian reporting on the Caribbean, South America and Africa, and on Black communities in the UK and US (up to 12 new editorial roles within the Guardian).Will lawmakers take action on gun control? The Republican congressman Tim Burchett answered the question Americans have all but given up asking of their elected officials by telling reporters: “We’re not going to fix it.”What has Josh Hawley said? He said it was an attack on Christians but a Democratic opponent of Hawley labelled the Republican “a fraud and a coward” after the far-right Missouri senator demanded that the shooting in Nashville be investigated as a federal hate crime despite being the only US senator to vote against a bill to crack down on hate crimes against Asian Americans during the Covid pandemic. Continue reading...

Sportswear company had initially said three-stripe design would create confusion with its own logoAdidas has withdrawn a request to US authorities to block the Black Lives Matter movement from trademarking a design featuring three parallel stripes.The German sportswear company had said in a filing on Monday that the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation design would create confusion with the famous branding Adidas had been using for more than 70 years. Continue reading...

A recent debacle at the top of the game in America caused uproar. But the same patterns are repeated through the sport in the USThe American soccer community is still reeling from the fallout between former USMNT coach Gregg Berhalter and the Reyna family. It left the men’s soccer program in an absolute shambles – without a head coach, sporting director, or general manager. The whole thing is a mess, and yet we see similar things in soccer across the US every day. It’s a product of the industry we’ve created. Parents feel entitled because they hand over big money for their child to play – they effectively pay to have an opinion.As the men’s game in America continues to stall – the women’s game is still thriving after two successive World Cup victories – the rest of the world looks at us and wonders why we can’t figure it out. Why is US soccer still a laughing stock?Eric Wynalda is a broadcaster who scored 34 goals in 106 appearances for USA and played at three World Cups Continue reading...

The 26-year-old Oilers star would be a Hall of Famer if he retired tomorrow. All that’s missing from his career is serious hardwareAt the age of six, Connor McDavid was already special – not just talented, but driven and determined. His parents tried to get him into a competitive league for kids a year older, but he was denied. So they found a solution. They put him in a house league – with nine-year-olds. McDavid played up. He did it again when he joined the Ontario Hockey League at 15, and when he joined Team Canada’s World Juniors team at 16. After that, of course, was the NHL.Which is, technically speaking, as high as he can go. The thing is, McDavid is still ready to play up – he just can’t. So, instead, he puts up seasons like this one, which include months like March. On the 14th, McDavid hit 129 points on the season, the highest single-season point total among all active NHL players. On the same day, the next highest points-earner on the year (as it has been all season) was McDavid’s teammate, Leon Draisaitl, with 100 – 29 points behind. If you only took McDavid’s assists into consideration, he’d still rank in the Top 20 overall points leaders on the year. On 22 March, McDavid notched his 60th goal of the season in just 72 games (Auston Matthews hit 60 in 73 games last season). Continue reading...

The Charlotte Hornets have struggled to achieve on-court success under the Hall of Famer. But in business terms, his achievements are nothing but netIt used to be that only the truly exceptional were called “the Michael Jordan of” their particular arena: of acting (Viola Davis), of fibbing (George Santos), of the Democratic party (Barack Obama). “They know what you’re talking about,” Obama said before bestowing the Chicago Bulls legend with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, “because Michael Jordan is the Michael Jordan of greatness.” And now he’s poised to win another title: the Michael Jordan of dealmakers.Last week came news that the six-time NBA champion was in serious talks about selling a portion of his majority stake in the Charlotte Hornets. This comes four years after he sold a slice of the franchise to a group led by the venture capitalist Gabe Plotkin – the Michael Jordan of short-selling, according to some. It’s unclear whether Jordan is trying to bring in investment, or whether he wants to cash out of the league entirely. In the latter case, his take would be an 80% slice of a pie valued at more than $1bn. As investments go, it’s nothing but net. Continue reading...

The internet is now one big harassment machine – and fans can easily become unhealthily fanaticalSo this is embarrassing to admit, but, when I was a tween, I was obsessed with Bush. THE BAND! THE BAND! I adored the lead singer, Gavin Rossdale, and I assumed that one day the stars would align and I would marry him. (The stars made me gay instead.) I spent hours on the dial-up internet inhaling Bush-related content and I harboured a grudge against Gwen Stefani, because she was with Gavin, living my dream. What I didn’t do, however, was send Stefani any online threats. Mainly because 1) that would be unhinged; and 2) the internet was very slow and it wasn’t easy to instantly harass people online.Fast-forward a million years and the internet is now one big harassment machine. Fans, tweenage and older, can become unhealthy fanatics very easily. See, for example, the drama between the fanbases of the model Hailey Bieber and the singer Selena Gomez. This saga is too inane to properly explain, but, in brief, the two women have been pitted against each other by their fans because they each dated Justin Bieber (to whom the model is now married). This fake feud was amplified when Gomez joined TikTok, because social media algorithms love pushing divisive content that drives engagement. Continue reading...

His Democratic opponent says the far-right Missouri lawmaker is ‘a fraud and a coward’ for selective application of hate crime lawsA Democratic opponent of Josh Hawley labelled the Republican “a fraud and a coward” after the far-right Missouri senator demanded that the killing of three nine-year-old children and three adults at a Christian school in Nashville, Tennessee, be investigated as a federal hate crime.Less than two years ago, Hawley was the only US senator to vote against a bill to crack down on hate crimes against Asian Americans during the Covid pandemic. Continue reading...

Assault firearms with ‘phenomenal lethality’ have flooded the US market, with firms making more than $1bn profit in the last decadeIn September 2021, the gun manufacturer Smith & Wesson announced that it was relocating from the Massachusetts town in which it was incorporated in 1852 to a new location – Maryville in Blount county, Tennessee.“We have been left with no other alternative,” the company complained, pointing to proposals in the Massachusetts legislature that would extend the state’s ban on AR-15 style rifles to the selling of all semi-automatic firearms. Some 750 jobs would be moved to Tennessee, the gun maker said, for a number of reasons, the first of which was that the state supported the second amendment right to bear arms. Continue reading...

Defense secretary Lloyd Austin asks Tommy Tuberville of Alabama to lift ‘hold’, while Democrat Chuck Schumer issues firm rebukeA Republican senator holding up more than 100 nominations over Pentagon policy on abortion claimed: “I’m not going to let our military be politicised.”Tommy Tuberville, from Alabama, was speaking on Tuesday at a hearing staged by the armed services committee. Continue reading...

Raashed Hall served nearly 20 years - now he’s getting a second chance through the school’s Pivot program for entrepreneurshipAfter spending nearly two decades in prison, a Washington DC man is striving to rebuild his life by marketing and selling a workout machine he invented while serving his sentence.Raashed Hall, 40, is getting his second chance through Georgetown University’s Pivot program, which is a nine-month course aimed at teaching entrepreneurship and building life skills for people who are returning from incarceration. Continue reading...

Former US president tells Sydney audience that media coverage has helped exacerbate divisions and that we no longer have a ‘shared story’The former US president Barack Obama has suggested that Rupert Murdoch’s media empire has led to greater polarisation in western societies through news coverage designed to “make people angry and resentful”.Speaking to a capacity crowd of about 9,000 people at Sydney’s Aware Super Theatre on Tuesday night, Obama mixed childhood memories of transiting through Australia as a child with pointed observations about the current political discourse and the rise of China. Continue reading...

School shooting that left three children and three adults dead brought condolences from conservatives who oppose gun controlJoe Biden has commented on his ability to get gun control passed following Monday’s massacre at a Nashville elementary school, noting that he can only “plead with Congress” for action.Biden spoke to reporters while on his way to Durham, North Carolina. Continue reading...

US president Joe Biden repeated his call for lawmakers to pass gun control measures after a shooting at a Nashville elementary school on Monday left three students and three adult staff members dead. 'I can’t do anything except plead with Congress to act,' said Biden, when asked by reporters about his ability to enact firearm restrictions. In the aftermath of the shooting on Monday, Biden had pressed Congress to reimpose a ban on assault weapons to counter gun violence

Maryland court orders conviction reinstated and new hearing held but ruling suggests Syed, 41, will not remain convicted for longA court in Maryland has reinstated the murder conviction of Adnan Syed, the Baltimore man whose alleged involvement in the 1999 murder of 17-year-old Hae Min Lee was the subject of the hit podcast Serial.Syed, 41, was convicted of murdering Lee in 2000 and sentenced to life in prison, though he always maintained his innocence. In September last year, state prosecutors revealed they had uncovered new evidence they said undermined Syed’s conviction and pointed to two alternative suspects. Continue reading...

A federal judge ruled the former vice-president must appear in the inquiry into Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 electionFormer US vice-president Mike Pence must testify in front of a grand jury investigating Donald Trump’s election subversion and incitement of the January 6 attack on Congress, a federal judge reportedly ruled on Tuesday.Multiple news outlets reported the ruling, which remained under seal. Continue reading...

Tim Burchett says he doesn’t see a role for Congress in preventing tragedies ‘other than mess things up’ after Nashville shootingAfter the latest massacre of schoolchildren in the United States, the Republican congressman Tim Burchett answered the question Americans have all but given up asking of their elected officials by telling reporters: “We’re not going to fix it.”The three-term congressman from Tennessee, the state where an intruder fatally shot three nine-year-old students and three adults at a small Christian school on Monday, appeared to compare the expectation of safety for American schoolchildren with that of soldiers fighting Japanese suicide attackers during the second world war. Continue reading...

Depositions from Apple, 18, and Moses, 16, would be read in court but they would not be called to give evidence in personJurors in the Gwyneth Paltrow ski crash trial were expected to hear statements from her two teenage children on Tuesday as the proceeding approaches expected summations on Thursday.Attorneys for Paltrow, 50, said depositions from 18-year-old Apple and 16-year-old Moses, would be read in court but they would not be called to give evidence in person as time began to run out on the eight-day trial’s clock. Continue reading...

After record gas prices in 2022, California will now have access to information from gas companies to determine if prices are fairCalifornia lawmakers on Monday approved the nation’s first penalty for price gouging at the pump, voting to give regulators the power to punish oil companies for profiting from the type of gas price spikes that plagued the nation’s most populous state last summer.The Democrats in charge of the state legislature worked quickly to pass the bill on Monday, just one week after it was introduced. It was an unusually fast process for a controversial issue, especially one opposed by the powerful oil industry that has spent millions of dollars to stop it. Continue reading...

Video released on Tuesday showed Nashville police officers confronting the suspected attacker in Monday's school shooting minutes after storming into the private Christian elementary school with rifles and conducting a room-by-room search. The footage showed police clearing one classroom after another on the first floor before venturing up the stairs to the second floor. Shots can be heard seconds before the suspect comes into view and drops to the floor after apparently being shot. The Metropolitan Nashville police department began receiving calls about a shooter at 10.13am, the police spokesperson Don Aaron told reporters. The suspect was pronounced dead by 10.27am