Buffalo (10-2) at Los Angeles Rams (6-6) Sunday, 4:25 p.m. EST, FOX BetMGM NFL odds: Bills by 3 1/2. Against the spread: Bills 8-4; Rams 5-7. Series record: Bills lead 9-5. Last meeting: Bills beat Rams 31-10 in Inglewood, Calif. on Sept. 8, 2022. Last week: Bills beat San Francisco 35-10; Rams beat New Orleans 21-14. Bills offense: overall (10), rush (11), pass (17), scoring (2). Bills defense: overall (11), rush (18), pass (8), scoring (T-6). Rams offense: overall (18), rush (26), pass (11), scoring (20). Rams defense: overall (25), rush (28), pass (15), scoring (21). Turnover differential: Bills plus-17; Rams plus-3. WR Amari Cooper. He has so far played a valuable bit role since being acquired in a trade with Cleveland. He’s scored a TD and made a highlight reel play last weekend by making a one-handed catch and, before getting tackled, lateraled the ball back to Josh Allen to set up the quarterback’s passing and receiving TD. Cooper’s getting healthier after being hampered by a left wrist injury, and is expected to play a larger role in the passing attack down the stretch. LB Omar Speights. Little was expected of Speights as an undrafted free agent out of LSU, but he has quickly established himself as a promising piece of the Rams young defense. Speights had a career-high 10 tackles versus the Saints and was constantly around the ball. Los Angeles will need him to maintain that level of activity against Buffalo’s high-powered offense. Rams offensive line vs. Bills defensive line. Keep QB Matthew Stafford upright, and open up holes for RB Kyren Williams. It’s a pretty simple formula for the Rams, and they executed it well in New Orleans, letting Williams rush for 104 yards while Stafford was only sacked twice. Buffalo has two disruptive ends in Gregory Rousseau (6 1/2 sacks, 15 tackles for loss) and A.J. Epenesa (5 sacks), so keeping them in check will be a challenge. The Bills are also proving to be sturdier in stopping the run in recent weeks, though there was statistical regression last week with San Francisco reduced to keeping the ball on the ground in heavy snowfall. Bills TE Dalton Kincaid resumed practicing, though on a limited basis, after missing two games with a knee injury. He is listed as questionable. ... Rookie WR Keon Coleman (right wrist) is questionable after being limited in practice all week. He sat out the last three games. ... Starting S Taylor Rapp is good to go after landing on the injury report this week with a shoulder/neck injury. ... Rookie DT DeWayne Carter (left wrist) is in position to be activated off IR barring a setback. ... Stafford sprained his ankle against the Saints, but he doesn't expected to be limited by the injury and didn't have a designation on Friday's report. ... Rams LT Alaric Jackson is expected to play through a foot injury. ... OLB Jared Verse should play despite rolling his ankle in practice Thursday. ... TE Tyler Higbee, who sustained a serious knee injury in the NFC wild-card game at Detroit, won’t make his season debut this week despite getting in three full practices. The Bills thumped the Rams at SoFi Stadium in the 2022 season opener, heralding a miserable defense of its Super Bowl title for Los Angeles. ... Buffalo has won three straight in the series, scoring 30 points or more in each of those victories. The Bills have already clinched their fifth straight AFC East title, and look to catch the Kansas City Chiefs (11-1), whom they beat last month, for the conference’s top seed. ... Buffalo is 20-2 in regular-season games played in December and January since 2020. ... The Bills have won seven straight since losing consecutive road games at Baltimore and Houston. They’re one win from matching the franchise’s second-longest streak set first in 1990 and again spanning the 2023-24 seasons. The team record is 11, spanning the 1963-64 seasons. ... Buffalo has at least 10 wins through 12 games for the fifth time in team history and first since 1991. ... Allen has a record of 30-5 when he doesn’t commit a turnover. His two lost fumbles and five interceptions account for all seven of Buffalo’s giveaways this season. And he’s 43-27 overall when committing a turnover. ... With 107 yards rushing, including a career-high 65-yard TD run last weekend, RB James Cook topped 100 yards for the fifth time in his career. Cook has four TDs in his past three games and 12 overall (including one receiving) this season. His 11 TDs rushing are the most by a Bills player since LeSean McCoy had 13 in 2016. ... Edge rusher Von Miller’s 127 1/2 sacks lead active players and rank 17th overall, a half-sack behind Rickey Jackson. ... Buffalo has forced at least one takeaway in each game this season, including three forced fumbles against the 49ers. ... The Rams haven’t forced a turnover in their past two games. They had seven takeaways in the three games prior to this stretch. ... Williams earned his second 100-yard game of the season against the Saints. The 6.9 yards per carry average was Williams’ best of the season. ... Since getting ejected in the first half in Seattle, WR Puka Nacua has 30 receptions for 394 yards and two touchdowns over the past four games. He had five catches for 56 yards and a score versus the Saints, his seventh game with at least 50 yards and a touchdown. ... Stafford threw for 183 yards and two touchdowns in the Superdome, the second time in the past seven games the Rams won with Stafford not passing for 200 yards. They did that just twice in Stafford’s first 46 games with the team. ... CB Cobie Durant had two tackles for loss against New Orleans, the first time in his three-year career having multiple negative stops without a sack. ... After starting 16 for 19 on field goals, rookie PK Joshua Karty has missed his past two attempts. He did not attempt a field goal against the Saints, with coach Sean McVay choosing to go for it on fourth-and-4 from the New Orleans 25-yard line in the second quarter. Williams has put together consecutive solid outings, with at least 70 yards and a touchdown against the Eagles and Saints. The one part of his game that still hasn’t resurfaced is as a passing game option, where Williams has one grab for 9 yards over the past three games. Williams is too useful as a receiver to not get him involved there, so expect McVay to dial up some calls, to the benefit of those in point-per-reception formats. AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/NFL
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Deluxe Corp CEO Barry McCarthy purchases $53,975 in stockCOLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Former South Carolina Sen. Kay Patterson, who rose from cleaning offices at the segregated Statehouse to serving as a state legislator for over 30 years died Friday. He was 93. Read this article for free: Already have an account? To continue reading, please subscribe: * COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Former South Carolina Sen. Kay Patterson, who rose from cleaning offices at the segregated Statehouse to serving as a state legislator for over 30 years died Friday. He was 93. Read unlimited articles for free today: Already have an account? COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Former South Carolina Sen. Kay Patterson, who rose from cleaning offices at the segregated Statehouse to serving as a state legislator for over 30 years died Friday. He was 93. The South Carolina Democratic Party announced Patterson’s death saying he “left an indelible mark on our state. Senator Patterson commanded everyone’s attention with his wit and wisdom.” The statement did not list a cause of death. Patterson was born in 1931 in Darlington County and raised by his grandmothers. They recalled his hardheaded spirit early, recommending he not take jobs as a golf caddy or shoe shiner because he was likely to mouth off to white people in segregated 1940s South Carolina and get in trouble. Instead, Patterson served in the military and then got his teaching degree through the GI Bill at Allen University. While in college, he cleaned offices at the segregated capitol where he and other Black people couldn’t be unless they were working. “When I was a janitor, Black people couldn’t go in the Statehouse,” Patterson said in a 2004 interview with the University of South Carolina. “And then one day I came back down here as a member of the House and then in ’84, I came back sitting in the Senate as a senator. Now that’s a hell of a long way to come.” Patterson spent 30 years in education and was elected to the South Carolina House in 1974 and the Senate 10 years later after U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn urged him to run for the upper chamber seat. In a statement, Clyburn called Patterson “a trusted leader, a tireless champion for civil rights, and a treasured friend. He was a person of strength, determination, wisdom, and a long proponent of removing the Confederate flag from the South Carolina Statehouse dome.” Patterson was also the first Black person to serve on the University of South Carolina Board of Trustees since Reconstruction. Winnipeg Jets Game Days On Winnipeg Jets game days, hockey writers Mike McIntyre and Ken Wiebe send news, notes and quotes from the morning skate, as well as injury updates and lineup decisions. Arrives a few hours prior to puck drop. Patterson was a key member of both the House and Senate, He served on the budget committees in both chambers and was a major voice in support of civil rights, public education and helping poor people. He adamantly demanded the Confederate flag be removed from atop the Statehouse dome and inside the House and Senate chambers long before they were taken down in 2000. The lifelong Democrat said the final years of his political career were the toughest after Republicans took over state government. His seniority no longer mattered and he felt many newer Republicans were religious hypocrites who claimed to help others but only cared for people just like themselves. A few years before he retired from the Statehouse, Patterson said it was important to respect elders and supervisors, but not be afraid to speak up if bothered or something was on one’s mind. “That’s just my hallmark ever since I was a little child. It will get you in trouble now, but you can sleep well at night. And learn to treat everybody as human beings with respect,” Patterson said in the interview with the university’s Champions of Civil and Human Rights in South Carolina program. “You can sleep real good at night. Right now, I’m 73 years old and sleep like a log when I go to bed because I know I’ve done no wrong to my fellow man,” Patterson said. Advertisement Advertisement
The newly created position underscores the president-elect’s intent to boost two rapidly developing industries.Integral Ad Science ( IAS ) has released its new Quality Attention Optimisation product in beta and its new , first-to-market partnership with Lumen Research, the global attention technology company, to offer Social Attention measurement through IAS and provide advertisers the ability to measure attention across both programmatic and social campaigns. As the only attention measurement product in-market to unify media quality and eye tracking with machine learning to deliver proven results, IAS Quality Attention already demonstrates the effectiveness of attention for advertisers to drive a lift in business outcomes, with campaigns achieving up to a 130% lift in conversion rates when comparing high attention impressions vs low attention . With IAS ’s new product, advertisers have a new , simplified and automated way to optimise their campaigns towards high- attention scoring impressions or away from low- attention scoring impressions, driving up attention scores and performance across digital display and video on the open web. “Marketers want to understand two things about their ad budgets, ‘is it working?’ and ‘what can I do about it?’”, said Srishti Gupta , chief product officer of IAS . “A ttention is rightly growing as a way to answer those questions, going beyond isolated metrics like viewability, to truly understand how consumers are engaging and interacting with brands’ ads. “Our attention measurement is already industry-leading to answer the first question, and Quality Attention Optimisation brings a new , simple way for advertisers to action insights from their measurement scores to boost their results.” Advertisers can improve their ROI through IAS Quality Attention Optimisation by: • Reducing Cost/Waste: Optimize away from low- attention inventory sources to improve performance across the marketing funnel. • Reach: Target high quality placements to achieve greater reach as more ads are seen with greater attention . • Awareness: With more brand and product choices for consumers now than ever before, advertisers can drive awareness by showing ads where they stand to garner the most attention . • Consideration: Meet/exceed KPIs by ensuring ads appear in environments that are optimal for success. Gupta said: “Alongside our Quality Attention product, bringing social attention measurement with Lumen to our customers offers a holistic approach to understanding how their campaigns are driving attention with consumers across platforms and screens, in order to maximize their return on ad spend, and we’re excited to keep building on our successful partnership with Lumen.” Lumen’s attention models measure over 300 billion impressions across multiple social platforms, powered by its innovative predictive eye-tracking technology. Lumen has the largest, opted-in eye-tracking dataset in the world, covering 30+ countries, that is continuously updated to provide the most up-to-date models, offering a robust way for advertisers to buy social impressions that they can be confident are actually being seen. “We’re thrilled to partner with IAS to expand both the scope of IAS Quality Attention and the actionability of its insights via pre-bid segments, and to bring our Social Attention measurement reporting to IAS customers,” said Mike Follett , CEO, Lumen Research. “Linking attention to outcomes, then providing tools to allow advertisers to optimize for those outcomes, are major steps on the road to a real ‘ Attention Economy’.” The IAS Quality Attention Optimisation beta is open to advertisers now, and new Social Attention Measurement with Lumen will be live for IAS customers from January 2025. In January 2024, IAS announced the general availability of its Quality Attention measurement product – the first to unify media quality and eye tracking with machine learning and provide transparent metrics to help global advertisers increase return on investment, drive brand consideration, and boost conversions. Measurement was expanded to mobile-in app in July 2024, and IAS announced its extension of Quality Attention to Publishers , giving publishers actionable ways to maximise their inventory for attention metrics, in October 2024. Keep on top of the most important media, marketing, and agency news each day with the Mediaweek Morning Report – delivered for free every morning to your inbox.
Though inflation is slowing down nationally, Marylanders could expect higher Christmas tree prices than 2023, as macroeconomic and environmental stressors to the tree supply chain may be baked into the cheer this year.
By MICHAEL R. SISAK and JENNIFER PELTZ NEW YORK (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump’s lawyers urged a judge again Friday to throw out his hush money conviction, balking at the prosecution’s suggestion of preserving the verdict by treating the case the way some courts do when a defendant dies. They called the idea “absurd.” Related Articles National Politics | Trump wants to turn the clock on daylight saving time National Politics | Ruling by a conservative Supreme Court could help blue states resist Trump policies National Politics | A nonprofit leader, a social worker: Here are the stories of the people on Biden’s clemency list National Politics | Nancy Pelosi hospitalized after she ‘sustained an injury’ on official trip to Luxembourg National Politics | Veteran Daniel Penny, acquitted in NYC subway chokehold, will join Trump’s suite at football game The Manhattan district attorney’s office is asking Judge Juan M. Merchan to “pretend as if one of the assassination attempts against President Trump had been successful,” Trump’s lawyers wrote in a blistering 23-page response. In court papers made public Tuesday, District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office proposed an array of options for keeping the historic conviction on the books after Trump’s lawyers filed paperwork earlier this month asking for the case to be dismissed. They include freezing the case until Trump leaves office in 2029, agreeing that any future sentence won’t include jail time, or closing the case by noting he was convicted but that he wasn’t sentenced and his appeal wasn’t resolved because of presidential immunity. Trump lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove reiterated Friday their position that the only acceptable option is overturning his conviction and dismissing his indictment, writing that anything less will interfere with the transition process and his ability to lead the country. The Manhattan district attorney’s office declined comment. It’s unclear how soon Merchan will decide. He could grant Trump’s request for dismissal, go with one of the prosecution’s suggestions, wait until a federal appeals court rules on Trump’s parallel effort to get the case moved out of state court, or choose some other option. In their response Friday, Blanche and Bove ripped each of the prosecution’s suggestions. Halting the case until Trump leaves office would force the incoming president to govern while facing the “ongoing threat” that he’ll be sentenced to imprisonment, fines or other punishment as soon as his term ends, Blanche and Bove wrote. Trump, a Republican, takes office Jan. 20. “To be clear, President Trump will never deviate from the public interest in response to these thuggish tactics,” the defense lawyers wrote. “However, the threat itself is unconstitutional.” The prosecution’s suggestion that Merchan could mitigate those concerns by promising not to sentence Trump to jail time on presidential immunity grounds is also a non-starter, Blanche and Bove wrote. The immunity statute requires dropping the case, not merely limiting sentencing options, they argued. Blanche and Bove, both of whom Trump has tabbed for high-ranking Justice Department positions, expressed outrage at the prosecution’s novel suggestion that Merchan borrow from Alabama and other states and treat the case as if Trump had died. Blanche and Bove accused prosecutors of ignoring New York precedent and attempting to “fabricate” a solution “based on an extremely troubling and irresponsible analogy between President Trump” who survived assassination attempts in Pennsylvania in July and Florida in September “and a hypothetical dead defendant.” Such an option normally comes into play when a defendant dies after being convicted but before appeals are exhausted. It is unclear whether it is viable under New York law, but prosecutors suggested that Merchan could innovate in what’s already a unique case. “This remedy would prevent defendant from being burdened during his presidency by an ongoing criminal proceeding,” prosecutors wrote in their filing this week. But at the same time, it wouldn’t “precipitously discard” the “meaningful fact that defendant was indicted and found guilty by a jury of his peers.” Prosecutors acknowledged that “presidential immunity requires accommodation” during Trump’s impending return to the White House but argued that his election to a second term should not upend the jury’s verdict, which came when he was out of office. Longstanding Justice Department policy says sitting presidents cannot face criminal prosecution . Other world leaders don’t enjoy the same protection. For example, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is on trial on corruption charges even as he leads that nation’s wars in Lebanon and Gaza . Trump has been fighting for months to reverse his May 30 conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records . Prosecutors said he fudged the documents to conceal a $130,000 payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels to suppress her claim that they had sex a decade earlier, which Trump denies. In their filing Friday, Trump’s lawyers citing a social media post in which Sen. John Fetterman used profane language to criticize Trump’s hush money prosecution. The Pennsylvania Democrat suggested that Trump deserved a pardon, comparing his case to that of President Joe Biden’s pardoned son Hunter Biden, who had been convicted of tax and gun charges . “Weaponizing the judiciary for blatant, partisan gain diminishes the collective faith in our institutions and sows further division,” Fetterman wrote Wednesday on Truth Social. Trump’s hush money conviction was in state court, meaning a presidential pardon — issued by Biden or himself when he takes office — would not apply to the case. Presidential pardons only apply to federal crimes. Since the election, special counsel Jack Smith has ended his two federal cases , which pertained to Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss and allegations that he hoarded classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate. A separate state election interference case in Fulton County, Georgia, is largely on hold. Trump denies wrongdoing in all. Trump had been scheduled for sentencing in the hush money case in late November. But following Trump’s Nov. 5 election victory, Merchan halted proceedings and indefinitely postponed the former and future president’s sentencing so the defense and prosecution could weigh in on the future of the case. Merchan also delayed a decision on Trump’s prior bid to dismiss the case on immunity grounds. A dismissal would erase Trump’s conviction, sparing him the cloud of a criminal record and possible prison sentence. Trump is the first former president to be convicted of a crime and the first convicted criminal to be elected to the office.Climate change and lifestyle: How polluted air is reshaping urban livingMUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Friday dismissed a petition filed by SecLink Technologies Corporation, challenging the state government’s decision to award the Dharavi Redevelopment Project to Adani Properties Ltd. A bench of chief justice Devendra Upadhyaya and justice Amit Borkar held that the plea “lacked force”. SecLink Technologies Corporation, a Seychelles-based company and lead member of a consortium comprising various other companies, had participated in the 2018 bidding process for the redevelopment project, where SecLink’s highest bid was being considered along with Adani Realty’s second highest bid. However, a housing department government resolution (GR), dated November 5, 2020, cancelled the tender process and this was informed to SecLink by a letter from chief executive officer (CEO) of the Dharavi Redevelopment Project/Special Planning Authority (DRP/SPA), dated November 11, 2020. Later, a GR, dated September 22, 2022, approved a fresh tender process with modified terms and conditions. In December 2022, a Committee of Secretaries (CoS) selected Adani Realty as the lead partner in the bidding process. However, SecLink could not participate in the process, allegedly due to changed eligibility conditions. The CEO of the DRP/SPA issued a GR, dated July 13, 2023, which granted Adani Properties a ‘letter of award’ for the redevelopment of the Dharavi Notified Area and directed it to implement the project immediately. Through its 2022 plea, SecLink challenged all of the above decisions in court. Dr. Virendra Tuljapurkar, senior advocate, appearing on behalf of Seclink, had argued that the reasons given for the cancellation of the earlier tender process were not sustainable as the same were non-existent then, and that the cancellation was done for extraneous reasons. He argued that the action was arbitrary and violative of Article 14 of the Constitution. Tuljapurkar also argued that SecLink was issued a letter in March 2019, whereby it was informed that its bid was the highest and that this amounted to final acceptance of the offer by DRP/SPA. Tuljapurkar also alleged that the company could not participate in the 2022 tender process due to the changed eligibility conditions. Tuljapurkar argued that the eligibility conditions had been changed to favour other bidders and oust SecLink. The court, however, noted that there was no decision declaring the petitioner as a successful bidder before the decision regarding the modification of the tender conditions was taken. The court also noted that SecLink had knowledge about the reasons for the change in the tender process and had acknowledged the same in a letter to one of the authorities responsible for the redevelopment. The court further stated that merely because SecLink was one of the highest bidders in the 2018 bidding process did not vest any rights with it, and nor could it be said that the contract was concluded, noting that a letter intimating SecLink of its highest bid did not amount to a conclusion of the contract in its favour. The court also observed that, admittedly, SecLink was not a part of the 2022 tendering process, and it was a settled position of law that one that has not participated in the tender process cannot be permitted to challenge the terms and conditions of the process. The court, while dismissing the petition, said that the decision of “cancelling the earlier tender and all consequential actions of the respondent authorities cancelling the tender and requiring the petitioner (SecLink) ... cannot be said to be bereft of tenable and valid reasons; neither can it be said to be suffering from the vice of arbitrariness, unreasonableness or perversity.” SecLink is the lead member of a consortium consisting of New Consolidated Construction Co, Najaah Global Investment LLV, Al Khalida Real Estate, Krishna Infosol Pvt Ltd, Med Freshe Pvt Ltd, DSP Design Associates Pvt Ltd, and SecLink Technologies Corporation.