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WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — If last month's election wasn't painful enough for Florida Democrats, they're losing another state House seat after one of their members announced Monday that she's switching parties. State Rep. Susan Valdés, a former school board member who was reelected as a Democrat last month, said on X that she is “tired of being the party of protesting.” Valdés ran to be chairperson for her local county’s Democratic executive committee earlier this month. She won her current term by nearly 5 percentage points but can't run for reelection again because of term limits. Republicans have controlled the governor’s office and both branches of the Legislature since 1999. Valdés is serving her final two years before leaving office due to term limits. Republicans now have an 86-34 majority in the House. “I got into politics to be part of the party of progress,” Valdés wrote. “I know that I won’t agree with my fellow Republican House members on every issue, but I know that in their caucus, I will be welcomed and treated with respect.” House Speaker Daniel Perez reposted Valdés’ statement and welcomed her into the House, where Republicans have a supermajority of 86-34. House Democratic Leader Fentrice Driskell said she was surprised and disappointed by Valdés’ announcement. “It is sad that she has elevated her own aspirations above the needs of her district,” Driskell wrote in a statement on X.The Washington Commanders secured a play-off spot after beating the Atlanta Falcons 30-24 in overtime. Rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels rushed for 127 yards, throwing for another 227 and for three touchdowns, including the game-winning touchdown pass to Zach Ertz. The Commanders staged a dramatic comeback from a 10-point deficit at half-time, sending them to the play-offs for the first time in four years. The win was enough to give the Los Angeles Rams the NFC West title as it ended the Seattle Seahawks hopes ahead of their meeting in the final week of the season. The Falcons need other results to go their way along with a win over the Carolina Panthers in their final game. Saquon Barkley became the ninth running back in NFL history to rush for 2,000 yards in a single season as the Philadelphia Eagles clinched the NFC East title with a victory over the Dallas Cowboys. The 27-year-old achieved the feat with a 23-yard run during the fourth quarter of the Eagles’ crushing 41-7 success at Lincoln Financial Field. Barkley is 100 yards short of Eric Dickerson’s record of 2,105 yards, set in 1984 for the Los Angeles Rams, ahead of next week’s regular season finale against the New York Giants. However, he could be rested for that game in order to protect him from injury ahead of the play-offs. The Minnesota Vikings scored their ninth consecutive win after hanging on to beat the Green Bay Packers 27-25. Sam Darnold threw touchdowns to Cam Akers, Jordan Addison and Jalen Nailer, pushing his total for the season to 35. The victory set up a final-week showdown with the Detroit Lions for both the division title and top seed in the NFC. The Miami Dolphins kept themselves in the play-off race with a 20-3 victory over the Cleveland Browns. With Dolphins’ quarterback Tua Tagovailoa out with a hip injury, replacement Tyler Huntly threw for 225 yards and a touchdown. Miami will need to beat the New York Jets and hope the Denver Broncos lose to the Kansas City Chiefs to clinch the final AFC wildcard berth. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers kept alive their dreams of reaching the play-offs by overcoming the Carolina Panthers 48-14. Veteran quarterback Baker Mayfield produced a dominant performance at Raymond James Stadium, registering five passing touchdowns to equal a Buccaneers franchise record. The Buffalo Bills clinched the AFC conference number two seed for the post season with a 40-14 success over the New York Jets at Highmark Stadium. Josh Allen passed for 182 yards and two touchdowns, while rushing for another. Buffalo finish the 2024 regular season undefeated at home, with eight wins from as many games. The Indianapolis Colts’ hopes of reaching the play-offs were ended by a 45-33 defeat to the Giants. Malik Nabers exploded for 171 yards and two touchdowns and Ihmir Smith-Marsette broke a 100-yard kick-off return to give the Giants their highest-scoring output under head coach Brian Daboll. Quarterback Drew Lock threw four touchdown passes and accounted for a fifth on the ground to seal the win. Elsewhere, Mac Jones threw two touchdowns to help the Jacksonville Jaguars defeat the Tennessee Titans 20-13, while the Las Vegas Raiders beat the New Orleans Saints 25-10.
NEW YORK (AP) — Remember what you searched for in 2024? does. Google released its annual “Year in Search” on Tuesday, rounding up the top trending queries entered into its namesake search engine in 2024. The results show terms that saw the highest spike in traffic compared to last year — ranging from key news events, notably , to the most popular songs, athletes and unforgettable pop-culture moments that people looked up worldwide. Sports — particularly soccer and cricket — dominated Google’s overall trending searches in 2024. topped those search trends globally, followed by the and . Meanwhile, the led news-specific searches worldwide. Queries about and this year’s followed. U.S. President-elect topped searches in Google’s people category this year — followed by , U.S. Vice President and Algerian boxer , who also led athlete-specific searches. Meanwhile, the late , and led search trends among notable individuals who died in 2024. In the world of entertainment, Disney and Pixar’s was the top trending movie of the year, while Netflix’s led TV show trends. And Kendrick Lamar’s dominated song trends. That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Queries for the , made famous by Norwegian swimmer Henrik Christiansen over the summer games, led Google’s global recipe trends this year. The New York Times’ “Connections” puzzle topped game searches. And in the U.S., country-specific data shows, many people asked Google about like the word and “ .” You can find more country-specific lists, and trends , through Google’s . The California company said it collected 2024 search results from Jan. 1 through Nov. 23 of this year. Google isn’t the only one to publish an annual recap or top trends as 2024 draws to a close. , for example, as well as and words of the year, have offered additional reflections for 2024. The Associated PressHow the FDA allows companies to add secret ingredients to our food
Ivana Bacik had separate meetings with Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin and Fine Gael leader Simon Harris on Tuesday afternoon. Fianna Fail, which won 48 seats in last month’s general election, and Fine Gael, which secured 38 seats, headed up the last coalition in Dublin and are expected to continue that partnership into the next mandate. However, with a combined 86 seats, they are just short of the 88 required for a majority in the Dail parliament. If they wish to return to government together, they would need one smaller party as a junior partner, or a handful of independents. Both Fianna Fail and Fine Gael have ruled out doing business with Sinn Fein, which won 39 seats. The centre-left Social Democrats and Irish Labour Party, both of which won 11 seats in the election, are seen as the only two realistic options if Fianna Fail and Fine Gael seek to convince a smaller party to join the coalition. In a statement, the Labour Party said Ms Bacik outlined key policy priorities in her meetings with Taoiseach Mr Harris and Tanaiste Mr Martin. “There was discussion in both meetings on policies and manifesto commitments on housing, health, climate, workers’ rights and disability services among other issues,” said the statement. “The parliamentary party will meet at 1pm on Friday where the party leader will provide an assessment of engagement to date and consider the outcome of these meetings.” A spokesman for Mr Harris said there had been a “constructive engagement” with Ms Bacik. “The Taoiseach is grateful for the time and engagement on a range of substantial policy issues,” he said. The spokesman said Mr Harris had also met independent TDs who are aligned together in what is called the regional group. “These meetings have been productive,” he added. Mr Harris and party colleagues are due to meet the Social Democrats on Wednesday. Fianna Fail deputy leader Jack Chambers and Fine Gael deputy leader Helen McEntee met on Tuesday evening for discussions on government formation, with the parties’ full negotiating teams set to meet on Wednesday. Fine Gael said the meeting between Ms McEntee and Mr Chambers was “positive” and focused on the “structure and format” of the substantive negotiations going forward. When the two parties entered coalition for the first time after the last general election in 2020, there was only a three-seat difference in their relative strength. That resulted in an equal partnership at the head of the coalition, with the Green Party as the junior partner. The two main parties swapped the role of taoiseach halfway through the term. With Fianna Fail’s lead over Fine Gael having grown to 10 seats following this election, focus has turned to the future of the rotating taoiseach arrangement and whether it will operate again in the next mandate and, if so, on what basis. There are similar questions around the distribution of ministries and other roles. While Mr Martin has so far refused to be drawn on the specifics, he has suggested that he expects Fianna Fail’s greater strength of numbers to be reflected in the new administration. However, Mr Harris has insisted that Fine Gael’s mandate cannot be taken for granted when it comes to government formation. Richard Boyd Barrett from People Before Profit-Solidarity, which won three seats, urged Labour not to “prop up” up a Fianna Fail/Fine Gael administration. “We think that’s a huge mistake,” he told reporters in Dublin. “They shouldn’t do it. They should learn the lessons of the past and actually work with other parties of the left to form a decent left opposition to Fianna Fail and Fine Gael and campaign on the issues that matter.” His party colleague Paul Murphy pointed to the experience of the Green Party, which lost all but one of its 12 seats in the election. “In reality, what is going to happen is a changing of the mudguard for Fianna Fail and Fine Gael,” he said. “And for those who are now auditioning to be a new mudguard for Fianna Fail and Fine Gael, there is a very, very sharp and stark lesson in what happened to the Green Party – obviously almost entirely wiped out. “We think it is a very major mistake for anyone who has the perception of being left, with the votes of people who are looking left, to seek to go into coalition with Fianna Fail and Fine Gael.”Elections in 2024 in Japan, both regional and national, highlighted social media's influence, with underdog candidates surprisingly winning after positive portrayals and convincing narratives boosted their popularity online. As more people acquire information from social media rather than traditional news outlets such as TV, what circulates online should no longer be a "black box," analysts said, adding the press and political parties must promote a balanced digital space. A recent telephone survey by Kyodo News, meanwhile, showed that 85.5 percent of respondents expressed concern about the spread of unverified information on social media during election campaigns, casting doubt on the rapidly evolving circumstances. Information about candidates running in elections in Japan is widely shared online, often posted by individuals trying to attract reactions and earn advertising revenue. Frequent exposure to such content seems to be affecting how people vote. In the Hyogo gubernatorial election in November, Motohiko Saito was reelected as governor despite automatically losing the job after a no-confidence motion was unanimously adopted by the prefectural assembly, accusing him of abuse of power. Many news organizations expected Saito to struggle, as the race was held amid an assembly investigation into accusations against him, including the punishment of a subordinate who reported misconduct to the whistleblower's office and later died by apparent suicide. During the campaign period, however, narratives on social media claiming that there was "no abuse," that "reform-minded" Saito was forced to resign, and that a "lone victim" was fighting "vested interests" as a "hero" may have led to his triumph, analysts said. Saito's victory backed by his online popularity was reminiscent of the strong run in July in the Tokyo gubernatorial race by relatively unknown Shinji Ishimaru, a former mayor of a small city in Hiroshima Prefecture, who had no support from any major political party.
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Wants it. Invites it. Needs it. Pittsburgh Steelers coach Mike Tomlin first noticed it more than a decade ago, when Porter was just a kid running around the team facility while his father, Joey Porter Sr., served as an assistant coach. There was something about the way the younger Porter carried himself, a swagger, that made him stand out and served as a precursor to the professional life that was ahead for the second-year cornerback. Tomlin described it as a “serial killer's mentality,” though Tomlin's description of what that actually means isn't as chilling as it sounds. "He’s not running from the fight, he’s running to the fight," Tomlin said. "You better have a short memory at that position, and he’s always had it. He was probably nine or 10 when I met him, and he had it then." It's one of the reasons the Steelers practically sprinted to the podium to take Porter with the first pick of the second round in the 2023 draft, a full-circle moment for a Pittsburgh native well-versed in the franchise's history of excellence at one of the most demanding positions on the field. Porter has not been shy about wanting to become known as an elite defender and is unafraid to ask for the toughest assignments, only too aware that things won't always go his way. Good thing, because of late, they haven't. Porter has found himself being targeted frequently by opposing quarterbacks, looking to use the 24-year-old's innate aggressiveness against him. The results have been a steady stream of flags and the referee finishing his call with “No. 24, defense.” Porter found himself on the wrong side of a call four times in last Sunday's 44-38 victory over Cincinnati as he ping-ponged in between Bengals stars Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins. Twice he was flagged for holding. Twice he was cited for pass interference. It wasn't ideal, to be clear. It also wasn't the end of the world. Porter stood at his locker in the aftermath and answered every question, then did the same on Wednesday. Tomlin made it a point to say the issues with Porter are technical, not mental. It's one of the reasons neither Porter nor his coach seem concerned about one shaky performance bleeding into another, something the first-place Steelers (9-3) can't afford when Jameis Winston and pass-happy Cleveland (3-9) visit Acrisure Stadium on Sunday. “I've just got to keep playing my game and don’t let (the penalties) affect me,” Porter said. Asked if that was easier said than done, Porter nodded. “Definitely,” he said. "Playing DB is a hard position, but you got to have that mentality anyways. That’s the world we live in and I feel like I’m capable of doing that." In some ways, Porter didn't really have a choice. Not with his father — one of the most prolific and productive trash-talkers in the NFL during a 13-year career as a linebacker that included four Pro Bowls and a Super Bowl ring he earned with the Steelers in 2005. He preached the virtues of not letting one play, one moment, one game chip away at the confidence necessary to survive in a pass-happy game. “He’d been telling me that since I was a young kid,” Porter said. "I know what I got to do to be great, look good, and to help this team win." It's telling that for all the flags against him — Porter has been penalized nine times, tops on the Steelers and tied for second in the league among defensive players — he has yet to allow a touchdown pass in coverage. It's a tradeoff the Steelers can live with in general. Porter's 6-foot-2 frame is one of the reasons he was among the most coveted cornerbacks in his draft class. His size is unusual for his position, and necessary given some of the matchups he draws, such as the 6-foot-4 Higgins. “You have to match the physicality of these big people, and sometimes you do so at risk," Tomlin said. “And that’s just a tightrope that I and he are willing to walk in an effort to be competitive." There are certain tendencies Porter has noticed on film that he needs to clean up, particularly around the line of scrimmage. The hiccups that have popped up recently are correctable. The problems that could crop up if Porter started doubting his own ability are another matter. He insists that's hardly the case. “Things happen, you know that,” he said. “I like to bounce back and prove myself again. So that’s what I got to do this upcoming Sunday.” He likely won't lack for opportunities. Winston is coming off a 497-yard performance in a loss to Denver, and the Steelers had trouble keeping Joe Burrow in check in Cincinnati. Winston is not afraid to test opposing cornerbacks. Porter is not afraid to be tested. “I’m trying to be great,” he said. “And I know to do that, I got to clean up with the stuff I’ve been doing. So I just face it and keep working.” NOTES: LB Alex Highsmith (ankle) was limited in practice on Wednesday and is nearing a return after missing the past three games. ... WR Calvin Austin III (concussion) was limited. AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl
Richard Parsons, the former chairman who became a go-to executive brought in to steady such troubled organizations as CBS Corp., Citigroup and the , died Thursday. He was 76. Parsons died at his Manhattan home of bone cancer, Ronald S. Lauder, a member of the Estée Lauder board and a close friend, . He also battled multiple myeloma, a pernicious blood cancer, over the years. In September 2018, Parsons was named interim chairman of CBS after chairman and CEO Leslie Moonves resigned following allegations of sexual harassment. He was a key player in negotiating the Moonves exit and in appointing COO Joseph Ianniello as acting CEO. He also brought in six new directors. Parsons’ tenure, however, lasted less than a month. On Oct. 21, he announced he was leaving the post after learning that his health had taken a turn for the worse. Parsons had been in remission for multiple myeloma following a stem cell transplant in 2016. Parsons was for many years the highest-ranking African American in any media company, though that was a distinction he frequently played down. He advised young African Americans to focus on their new opportunities. “The sky’s the limit,” he told magazine in 2016. “Those barriers that were almost impenetrable a generation ago, certainly two generations ago, are gone. There are other structural things that we need to do in our society to level the playing field, but you can go from the top to the bottom almost regardless of race, origin creed or sexual orientation.” The commanding but soft-voiced executive was a 6-foot-4 former basketball player, White House insider, corporate lawyer and protege of New York governor and U.S. vice president Nelson Rockefeller. He had a gift for inspiring others, yet always claimed he lacked personal ambition. “I’m actually a type-B personality,” he in a February 2018 profile. “I’m not driven. But I am competitive.” He was thrust into the media limelight in May 2002 when he took over the chairmanship of Time Warner when the company was in free-fall after one of the most infamous mistakes in corporate history: the merger of internet goliath AOL with old-school media company Time Warner. “At that moment,” he said, “they were not looking for a visionary or necessarily Mr. Charismatic or someone to replicate the dimension of a mogul.” He added: “Almost nobody recalls that I was the CEO who had the largest recorded loss in the history of American corporations. For the year 2002, my first annual report, we took a write-down of $99 billion. Stunning.” Parsons was president of Time Warner when his immediate boss, chairman and CEO , began to consider a merger in the late 1990s. Nearing the end of his corporate career, Levin was keen to leave a legacy akin to that of board member Ted Turner. After finding himself seated near AOL’s chief executive, Steve Case, when they were in Beijing in October 1999 for a 50th-anniversary celebration of the Chinese Revolution, he came upon the idea of old meeting new. The Levin-Case talks gathered steam upon the colleagues’ return to the U.S., and soon after, Levin told Parsons about his merger plan. “It wasn’t completely Machiavellian,” Parsons told , “though Jerry could be Machiavellian at times.” Parsons acknowledged that he shared some responsibility for the disaster insofar as he did not strenuously object to the merger, which stunned Wall Street when it was presented as a purchase of Time Warner by upstart AOL. “History will record that it was really Jerry’s deal,” he said, “but at the end of the day, I voted for it. I thought we could make it work.” He was wrong. Very quickly after the companies made their pact public in January 2000, when they announced that AOL would buy Time Warner for about $160 billion to create a new entity worth $300 billion, things began to veer off course. Levin and Case had believed that Time Warner’s content would make AOL subscriptions vastly more appealing; Parsons, by his own reckoning an old-school guy with little knowledge of computers and technology (“You don’t even like the internet,” his wife told him), was unable to counsel them that the changing landscape would soon rule that out. “The value proposition with AOL was, ‘We have a walled garden and you have to pay to get in — and once in, the world is yours, so you’ll be happy to pay us $14.95 a month,'” he explained. “But the walled-garden model was starting to break down. All these new services were offering content for free. That model just collapsed.” So did AOL Time Warner’s shares, which plunged from a high of $104 to a low of $10 within two years, wiping out billions of dollars (and costing Turner alone an estimated $2 billion). It was clear that Levin, his reputation in tatters, would have to depart, and in 2002 he did, leaving the question of who would replace him. Rather than turn to an outsider, the AOL Time Warner board selected Parsons as chairman and CEO, and the man who professed to be lacking in vision, who could barely work a computer, let alone navigate a course for the digital age, proved a solid choice. He immediately sold off some AOL Time Warner assets and replaced several top staffers; but more than anything, he sent a message of stability and confidence that was rooted in his measured, empathetic manner — a warmth and human appeal that he described as “wet,” in contrast to Levin’s “dry.” Gathering 300 top staffers together, Parsons brought in a Gulf War leader, Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf, to speak to them. “Norman was asked, ‘What are your rules of leadership?'” said Parsons. “He said, ‘I have two. Rule No. 1: When put in a position of command, take charge, make decisions. And rule No. 2 is: Do what’s right.'” Added Parsons: “I tend to subscribe to that.” He made the decision to sell AOL and restore the company’s former name, Time Warner; and he promoted Jeffrey Bewkes, paving the way for Bewkes to succeed him when Parsons voluntarily stepped down in 2008. Bewkes would remain there another decade, until Time Warner’s recent merger with AT&T. Throughout, Parsons was a voice of skepticism that old- and new-school media could ever function together in harmony, even though at first he had thought they might. “You couldn’t make them work seamlessly,” he said. “The disrupters, the new-media people, just had a whole different way of thinking about business, and when you really cut to the core of it, their job was to disintermediate the old-media guys.” When Parsons stepped down, he was given great credit for restoring the brand, even if its stock price had barely shifted. He was “the steady hand” Time Warner needed after the challenge of AOL, said James Goss, managing director of Barrington Research. Added analyst Harold Vogel, “He was the right guy in the right place at the right time.” Born on April 4, 1948, Richard Dean Parsons was raised in Queens, one of five children of an electrical technician and a homemaker. He was clearly bright and in those early school years was allowed to skip two grades, but then he coasted and had an undistinguished time as a student at the University of Hawaii. Reports that he played basketball for the school were later discounted by him and others. “I was perhaps the least successful student of my generation,” he quipped. That changed when the newly married man went to Albany Law School and interned with the state legislature, then worked for Gov. Rockefeller, who became his mentor. (Parsons’ grandfather had served as head gardener at the Rockefeller estate.) After graduating first among the 4,000 potential lawyers who sat for the New York State Bar, he went to work for Rockefeller when newly named President Ford chose him as his vice president in 1974. He arrived to find a White House in chaos following the resignation of President Nixon, with Ford forced to turn to Rockefeller’s staff to make up for a lack of contenders for top staff jobs among his own inner circle. That gave Parsons immense opportunity. He became general counsel and associate director of what was then the Domestic Counsel and remained a lifelong admirer of Rockefeller, whose charitable foundation he later headed. Parsons stayed at the White House for three of the Ford administration’s four years before leaving to seek a job that paid more and allowed him to spend time with his burgeoning family that included his wife, Laura Bush, a child psychologist whom he had met as a student, a boy and two girls, one of whom is transgender. Hired by the law firm Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler, he remained there until 1988, when he was brought in to run the troubled Dime Savings Bank. In 1991, he was recruited by Time Warner, where he became president in 1995, and, a decade later, assumed the top position. In the years after Parsons left the company, he remained active — indeed, far more than he had intended. He bought a vineyard in Tuscany, Italy, planning to spend much of his retirement there; instead, he was asked to help Citigroup in 2009 after the bank endured five straight quarters of losses and was forced to seek $45 billion in government aid. He was similarly brought in to help save the NBA’s Clippers following a scandal that broke out in 2014 when club owner Donald Sterling made racist remarks and was forced out. Then, he was named CBS’ interim chairman in the wake of the Moonves imbroglio. A strong advocate of education opportunities for the disadvantaged, Parsons toyed with the idea of running for mayor of New York and passed on the possibility of becoming President Obama’s commerce secretary after he learned that he was ill. He had numerous nonprofit involvements, chairing the Jazz Foundation of America and the Apollo Theater Foundation as well as the Smithsonian’s advisory board for its new African American museum. His political activities continued when he chaired a commission on social security for President George W. Bush and worked on the transition teams of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and New York Governor Eliot Spitzer. He is survived by his wife, their children and a daughter he had out of wedlock with model and philanthropist MacDella Cooper. Parsons’ experience with AOL made him skeptical of the Time Warner/AT&T merger that was approved in June 2018. Four months earlier, he said he was “cautious” about its chances. Even if it were to succeed, he said, “It’s going to take longer than people think, and it’s going to be more difficult.” THR Newsletters Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day More from The Hollywood ReporterMamata Machinery Share Price Today, December 30: Mamata Machinery Limited Stock Opens in Negative in Early Trade After Dream Debut on December 27
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