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Celebrities can spark change when they speak up about their healthDespite Mary Lou McDonald’s confidence around shaping a coalition without Fine Gael and Fianna Fail – the two parties that have dominated the landscape of Irish politics for a century – the pathway to government for Sinn Fein still appears challenging. With counting following Friday’s election still in the relatively early stages – after an exit poll that showed the main three parties effectively neck-and-neck – there is some way to go before the final picture emerges and the options for government formation crystalise. Taoiseach and Fine Gael leader, Simon Harris, has dismissed talk of a Sinn Fein surge and said he was “cautiously optimistic” about where his party will stand after all the votes are counted. Meanwhile, Ireland’s deputy premier and Fianna Fail leader, Micheal Martin, insisted his party has a “very clear route back to government” as he predicted seat gains. The counting process could last days because of Ireland’s complex system of proportional representation with a single transferable vote (PR-STV), where candidates are ranked by preference. The early indications have turned the focus to the tricky arithmetic of government formation, as the country’s several smaller parties and many independents potentially jockey for a place in government. Ms McDonald told reporters at the RDS count centre in Dublin that she would be “very, very actively pursuing” the potential to form a government with other parties on the left of the political spectrum. The smaller, left-leaning parties in Ireland include the Social Democrats, the Irish Labour Party, the Green Party and People Before Profit-Solidarity. Ms McDonald said her party had delivered an “incredible performance” in the election. “I think it’s fair to say that we have now confirmed that we have broken the political mould here in this state,” she said. “Two party politics is now gone. It’s consigned to the dustbin of history and that, in itself, is very significant.” She added: “I am looking to bring about a government of change, and I’m going to go and look at all formulations. “If you want my bottom line, the idea of Fianna Fail and Fine Gael for another five years, in our strong opinion, is not a good outcome for Irish society. “Obviously, I want to talk to other parties of the left and those that we share very significant policy objectives with. So I’m going to do that first and just hear their mind, hear their thinking. But be very clear, we will be very, very actively pursuing entrance into government.” In Friday night’s exit poll, Sinn Fein was predicted to take 21.1% of first-preference votes, narrowly ahead of outgoing coalition partners Fine Gael and Fianna Fail at 21% and 19.5% respectively. Prior to the election, Fianna Fail and Fine Gael both ruled out entering government with Sinn Fein. Fine Gael leader Mr Harris rejected suggestions Sinn Fein had broken new ground. He told reporters in his count centre in Greystones, Co Wicklow: “Certainly we haven’t seen a Sinn Fein surge or anything like it. “I mean, it looks likely, on the figures that we’ve seen now, fewer people, many fewer people would have voted Sinn Fein in this election than the last one. “In fact, I think they’re down by around 5% and actually the parties, particularly the two parties, the two larger parties in government, are likely to receive significant support from the electorate. So definitely, politics in Ireland has gotten much more fragmented.” He said it was too early to tell what the next government would look like. “I think anybody who makes any suggestion about who is going to be the largest party or the construct of the next government, they’re a braver person than I am,” he said. “Our electoral system dictates that there’ll be many, many transfers that will go on for hours, if not days, before we know the final computations at all. “But what I am very confident about is that my party will have a very significant role to play in the years ahead, and I’m cautiously optimistic and excited.” Fianna Fail’s Mr Martin told reporters at a count centre in Cork he was confident that the numbers exist to form a government with parties that shared his political viewpoint. Mr Martin said it “remains to be seen” whether he would return to the role of Taoiseach – a position he held between 2020 and 2022 – but he expressed confidence his party would outperform the exit poll prediction. “It’s a bit too early yet to call the exact type of government that will be formed or the composition of the next government,” he said. “But I think there are, there will be a sufficiency of seats, it seems to me, that aligns with the core principles that I articulated at the outset of this campaign and throughout the campaign, around the pro-enterprise economy, around a positively pro-European position, a government that will strongly push for home ownership and around parties that are transparently democratic in how they conduct their affairs.” Asked if it would be in a coalition with Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and the Social Democrats, he said that would be “racing a bit too far ahead”. The final result may dictate that if Fianna Fail and Fine Gael are to return to government, they may need more than one junior partner, or potentially the buy-in of several independent TDs. Mr Martin said it was unclear how quickly a government can be formed, as he predicted his party would gain new seats. “It will be challenging. This is not easy,” he added. The junior partner in the outgoing government – the Green Party – looks set for a bruising set of results. Green leader Roderic O’Gorman is in a fight to hold onto his seat, as are a number of party colleagues, including Media Minister Catherine Martin. “It’s clear the Green Party has not had a good day,” he said. The early counting also suggested potential trouble for Fianna Fail in Wicklow, where the party’s only candidate in the constituency, Health Minister Stephen Donnelly, is considered to have a battle ahead, with the risk of losing his seat. Meanwhile, there is significant focus on independent candidate Gerard Hutch who, on Saturday evening, was sitting in fourth place in the four-seat constituency of Dublin Central. Last spring, Mr Hutch was found not guilty by the non-jury Special Criminal Court of the murder of David Byrne, in one of the first deadly attacks of the Hutch-Kinahan gangland feud. Mr Byrne, 33, died after being shot six times at a crowded boxing weigh-in event at the Regency Hotel in February 2016. A Special Criminal Court judge described Mr Hutch, 61, as the patriarchal figurehead of the Hutch criminal organisation and said he had engaged in “serious criminal conduct”. The constituency will be closely watched as other hopefuls wait to see if transfers from eliminated candidates may eventually rule him out of contention. In the constituency of Louth, the much-criticised selection of John McGahon appeared not to have paid off for Fine Gael. The party’s campaign was beset by questioning over footage entering the public domain of the candidate engaged in a fight outside a pub in 2018. The Social Democrats have a strong chance of emerging as the largest of the smaller parties. The party’s leader, Holly Cairns, was already celebrating before a single vote was counted however, having announced the birth of her baby girl on polling day.The Latest: Police believe gunman who killed UnitedHealthcare CEO has left New York City
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Yelp Completes Strategic Acquisition of RepairPalNASHVILLE, Tenn. — Married couples across the U.S. have had access to no-fault divorce for more than 50 years, an option many call crucial to supporting domestic abuse victims and key to preventing already crowded family courts from drowning in complicated divorce proceedings. But some advocates for women worried as old comments from now Vice President-elect JD Vance circulated during the presidential campaign opposing no-fault divorce. After President-elect Donald Trump and Vance won the election, warnings began popping up on social media urging women who might be considering divorce to "pull the trigger" while they still could. Some attorneys posted saying they saw a spike in calls from women seeking divorce consultations. Donald and Ivana Trump pose in May 1988 outside the Federal Courthouse in New York after she was sworn in as a United States citizen. Trump — who is twice-divorced — hasn't championed overhauling the country's divorce laws, but in 2021 Vance lamented that divorce is too easily accessible, as have conservative podcasters and others. "We've run this experiment in real time and what we have is a lot of very, very real family dysfunction that's making our kids unhappy," Vance said during a speech at a Christian high school in California, where he criticized people being able to "shift spouses like they change their underwear." Marriage rates held steady but divorce rates of women age 15 and older declined from 2012 to 2022, according to U.S. Census Bureau data released in October. Despite concerns, even those who want to make divorces harder to get say they don't expect big, swift changes. There is not a national coordinated effort underway. States determine their own divorce laws, so national leaders can't directly change policy. "Even in some of the so-called red states, it hasn't gotten anywhere," said Beverly Willett, co-chair of the Coalition for Divorce Reform, whose group unsuccessfully attempted to convince states to repeal their no-fault divorce laws. A couple exchanges wedding bands Oct. 11, 2018, at City Hall in Philadelphia. Mark A. Smith, a political science professor at the University of Washington, said while many Americans became accustomed to no-fault divorce being an option, Vance's previous comments on making it more difficult to separate from a spouse could help jump-start that effort. "Even though he's not directly proposing a policy, it's a topic that hasn't gotten a ton of discussion in the last 15 years," Smith said. "And so to have a national profile politician talk that way is noteworthy." Meanwhile, Republican Party platforms in Texas and Nebraska were amended in 2022 to call for the removal of no-fault divorce. Louisiana's Republican Party considered something similar this year but declined to do so. A handful of proposals were introduced in conservative-led statehouses over the years, but all immediately stalled after they were filed. In January, Oklahoma Republican Sen. Dusty Deevers introduced legislation that would have removed married couples from filing for divorce on the grounds of incompatibility. Deevers backed the bill after writing a piece declaring no-fault divorce was an "abolition of marital obligation." Sen. JD Vance smiles as his wife Usha Vance applauds Nov. 6 at an election-night watch party at the Palm Beach Convention Center in West Palm Beach, Fla. Similarly, in South Carolina, two Republican lawmakers in 2023 filed a bill that would have required both spouses to file for a no-fault divorce application rather than just one. In South Dakota, a Republican lawmaker attempted to remove irreconcilable difference as grounds for divorce since 2020. None of the sponsors of these bills responded to interview requests from The Associated Press. All are members of their state's conservative Freedom Caucus. Nevertheless, some Democratic lawmakers say they remain worried about the future of no-fault divorce. They point to the U.S. Supreme Court overturning the constitutional right to abortion in 2022 as an example of a long-accepted option that was revoked through a decades-long effort. "When you choose to be silent, you allow for this to creep in," said Democratic South Dakota Rep. Linda Duba. "These are the bills that gain a foothold because you choose to be silent." Before California became the first state to adopt a no-fault divorce option in 1969, married couples had to prove their spouse violated one of the approved "faults" outlined in their state's divorce law or risk a judge denying their divorce, said Joanna Grossman, a law professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Qualified reasons varied from state to state, but largely included infidelity, incarceration or abandonment. Donald and Marla Trump wave to photographers Dec. 20, 1993, as they enter their wedding reception in New York's Plaza Hotel. The system was a particular burden on domestic violence victims, who are often women who could be stuck in dangerous marriages while they try to prove their partner's abuse in court through expensive and lengthy legal proceedings. "If there was any evidence that the couple both wanted to get divorced that was supposed to be denied because divorce was not something you got because you wanted it, it was something you got because you've been wronged in a way that the state thought was significant," Grossman said. To date, every state in the U.S. adopted a no-fault divorce option. However, 33 states still have a list of approved "faults" to file as grounds for divorce — ranging from adultery to felony conviction. In 17 states, married people only have the option of choosing no-fault divorce to end their marriages. Photo Credit: shisu_ka / Shutterstock Marriage—and divorce—in the U.S. today are starkly different than in earlier eras of the country’s history. A series of economic, legal, and social shifts reshaped marriage in the second half of the 20th century. More women began working outside of the home in the post-World War II era, which provided avenues to financial security and independence outside of marriage. Greater emphasis on postsecondary educational attainment and career development have led young people to wait longer to enter marriage. States began to adopt no-fault divorce laws throughout the 1960s and 1970s that made it easier to end a marriage. Meanwhile, changing social and cultural attitudes have made it more common for couples to cohabitate, combine finances, and raise children prior to getting married—or without getting married at all. These trends have contributed to a decline in the overall number of marriages and to delays in when people get married for the first time. In the U.S., there are currently only 6.5 marriages per 1,000 people each year , compared to 10.9 five decades ago. For those who do choose to get married, the age of first marriage is happening later. As late as the early 1970s, the median age for a first marriage in the U.S. was just 22. By 2018, that figure had increased to 28.8. These shifts have also affected how likely married couples are to stay together. As women entered the workforce in the mid-20th century and feminism and the sexual revolution took hold, rates of divorce rose quickly throughout the 1960s and 1970s. From 1960 to 1980, the divorce rate per 1,000 people in the U.S. more than doubled from 2.2 to 5.2. But the rate began to fall steadily after 1980, and as of 2018, the rate of divorce had dropped to 2.9 per 1,000 people. The link between rates of divorce and age at first marriage has been borne out over time, but it also explains geographic differences in rates of divorce. Today, most of the states with the lowest rates of divorce are also those with a higher median age for marriage. States like New Jersey, New York, California, and Massachusetts all stand out for having fewer than 10% of adults divorced and an age at first marriage above 30. One exception to this is Utah, which has the lowest overall median age for first marriage at 25.5 but also the third-lowest share of divorced adults at 9%, likely due in part to the state’s strong religious ties to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints . In contrast, Maine and Nevada lead all states in the share of the population currently divorced at 13.9% and 13.8%, respectively. And at the local level, many of the cities with the highest levels of divorce are found in Florida, Appalachia, and the Southwest. The data used in this analysis is from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2020 American Community Survey . To determine the most divorced locations, researchers at ChamberOfCommerce.org calculated the percentage of adults currently divorced. In the event of a tie, the location with the higher percentage of adults currently separated was ranked higher. To improve relevance, only cities with at least 100,000 residents were included. Additionally, cities were grouped into cohorts based on population size: small (100,000–149,999), midsize (150,000–349,999), and large (350,000 or more). Here are the most divorced cities in the U.S. Photo Credit: Jacob Boomsma / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Sean Pavone / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Sean Pavone / Shutterstock Photo Credit: photo.ua / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Jonny Trego / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Tupungato / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Sean Pavone / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Kevin J King / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Sean Pavone / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Galina Savina / Shutterstock Photo Credit: f11photo / Shutterstock Photo Credit: CHARLES MORRA / Shutterstock Photo Credit: LHBLLC / Shutterstock Photo Credit: Valiik30 / Shutterstock Photo Credit: turtix / Shutterstock Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter.
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