
A former aide to anti-trans lawmaker Nancy Mace has ripped the South Carolina congresswoman over her bill that would ban trans women from women’s restrooms, calling it nothing more than “a ploy” to get on TV, a claim that Mace has faced before. “If you think this bill is about protecting women and not simply a ploy to get on Fox News , you’ve been fooled,” Natalie Johnson, who served as Mace’s director of communications in 2021, posted on X in response to Mace’s bill which targets restrooms solely in the U.S. Capitol. Her bill was introduced two weeks after Sarah McBride (D-Del.) became the first openly trans person elected to Congress. Mace’s legislation is a clear reversal of prior pro-LGBTQ comments she’s made while in office, though it falls in line with current rhetoric that has been credited in part with helping fuel President-elect Donald Trump ’s reelection campaign. If you think this bill is about protecting women and not simply a ploy to get on Fox News, you've been fooled. pic.twitter.com/RWvAS2DsmE “I strongly support LGBTQ rights. No one should be discriminated against,” Mace told the Washington Examiner shortly after taking office as a freshman lawmaker in 2021. “Having been around gay, lesbian, and transgender people has informed my opinion over my lifetime.” Newsweek on Thursday said it counted 326 instances within the last 72 hours where Mace posted, reposted or responded to posts on social media about bathrooms. Her posts include her repeatedly and intentionally identifying transgender women, like McBride, as men. “It’s offensive that a man in a skirt thinks that he’s my equal,” Mace said in an interview with Newsmax Wednesday. A representative with Mace’s office did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment on Johnson’s criticism or on why Mace’s support of the LGBTQ community has changed. Don't let this be the end of the free press. The free press is under attack — and America's future hangs in the balance. As other newsrooms bow to political pressure, HuffPost is not backing down. Would you help us keep our news free for all? We can't do it without you. Can't afford to contribute? Support HuffPost by creating a free account and log in while you read. You've supported HuffPost before, and we'll be honest — we could use your help again . We view our mission to provide free, fair news as critically important in this crucial moment, and we can't do it without you. Whether you give once or many more times, we appreciate your contribution to keeping our journalism free for all. You've supported HuffPost before, and we'll be honest — we could use your help again . We view our mission to provide free, fair news as critically important in this crucial moment, and we can't do it without you. Whether you give just one more time or sign up again to contribute regularly, we appreciate you playing a part in keeping our journalism free for all. Already contributed? Log in to hide these messages. Mace, who ran her own PR firm before seeking office, has previously been accused by former staffers of not being “a real legislator” and primarily “using her office to get on TV.” Earlier this year, she was also accused by staffers of wanting to “get punched in the face” by rioters during the 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol so that she’d get media attention for it. Transgender rights ended up playing a major role in the 2024 presidential election, with Republicans gaining ground by painting Democrats as being too far to the left on social issues like transgender rights. One particular pro-Trump ad that criticized Kamala Harris ’ support of trans rights was deemed “the most impactful commercial of his campaign” and even suggested as having “won Donald Trump the election.” Related From Our Partner
Bank of Canada preparing for more uncertain, shock-prone futureBERKELEY, Calif. , Dec. 6, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Bamboo Technology , a mental health technology innovation company, is announcing its participation in Batch 19 of the prestigious UC Berkeley Skydeck IPP Program for startup acceleration. The company's HereHear AI therapist solution will be the key focus of the program, driven by the vision of revolutionizing mental health with AI-powered virtual solutions. To learn more about HereHear, please visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngU32WgiWf4 "HereHear is here in the US, and I am truly grateful to the Berkeley Skydeck IPP Program for recognizing its potential," noted Lynia Huang , Bamboo Technology's CEO. "As important as mental health has become in recent years, there is a shortage of mental health providers and access to support is low — and HereHear is paving the way for AI to bridge that gap as a first line of defense." A growing case for incorporating AI into mental healthcare With data showing that the US is in a mental health crisis, the CDC recently noted a dire need for public health initiatives that create environments centered around mental health. Specific to the workplace, the Society for Human Resource Management's Employee Mental Health in 2024 Research Series found that 44% of US employees feel burned out at work. The combination of a shortage of mental health providers in the US with the flourishing capabilities of AI builds a strong case for the technology to be deployed in the form of human-guided mental health solutions. HereHear's YangYang: A personalized 3D virtual therapist As organizations seek out ways to empower team members to take better care of their mental health, AI is increasingly emerging as a solution for on-demand, personalized support. Offering a more engaging interaction than chatbots, HereHear's 3D virtual therapist YangYang was launched in January 2024 and offers: YangYang has already been implemented in several therapy clinics and has helped 70% of users improve stress and depression levels by 25% within 3 months. Taking the form of a sheep further distinguishes her — this functions both to provide a 'cute' aspect lending to the warm, healing emotional support she provides, while also helping users who are struggling emotionally to keep in perspective that their interactions are ultimately not with a human. Bringing success in Taiwan to the US market Bamboo Technology's acceptance into the Berkeley Skydeck IPP Program is a major accomplishment as the platform seeks to enter the US market. Batch 19 has only 117 startups out of around 2300 applications, and the program will support HereHear to develop, pilot and launch, as well as to pitch for funding. The company aims to target the app in the human resources space—as a tool for companies to offer staff for on-demand, privacy-first mental health support. Back in Taiwan , the app already has hospitals, mental health clinics, universities, publicly listed companies, and government agencies that use it, similarly spurred by a shortage of mental health workers. About Bamboo Technology Established in November 2018 , the Taipei -based Bamboo Technology is a mental health technology innovation company that focuses on improving public mental health with voice emotion analysis technology. It embraces a belief that a universal, objective, and scientific mental health system can effectively solve the problem of deteriorating mental health in today's society — a core tenet upheld by its many psychologists; social workers; and information management, AI and big data experts. View original content to download multimedia: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/bamboo-technologys-herehear-virtual-ai-therapist-joins-berkeley-skydeck-ipp-program-302325187.html SOURCE BAMBOO TECHNOLOGY LTD.
DETROIT – Starting in September of 2027, all new passenger vehicles in the U.S. will have to sound a warning if rear-seat passengers don't buckle up. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said Monday that it finalized the rule, which also requires enhanced warnings when front seat belts aren't fastened. Recommended Videos The agency estimates that the new rule will save 50 lives per year and prevent 500 injuries when fully in effect, according to a statement. The new rule will apply to passenger cars, trucks, buses except for school buses, and multipurpose vehicles weighing up to 10,000 pounds. Before the rule, seat belt warnings were required only for the driver's seat. Under the new rule, outboard front-seat passengers also must get a warning if they don't fasten their belts. Front-center seats will not get a warning because NHTSA found that it wouldn't be cost effective. The agency said most vehicles already have warnings for the outboard passenger seats. The rule also lengthens the duration of audio and visual warnings for the driver's seat. The front-seat rules are effective starting Sept. 1 of 2026. Rear passengers consistently use seat belts at a lower rate than front passengers, the agency says. In 2022, front belt use was just under 92%, while rear use dropped to about 82%. About half of automobile passengers who died in crashes two years ago weren’t wearing belts, according to NHTSA data. The seat belt rule is the second significant regulation to come from NHTSA in the past two months. In November the agency bolstered its five-star auto safety ratings to include driver assistance technologies and pedestrian protection. Safety advocates want the Department of Transportation, which includes NHTSA, to finish several more rules before the end of the Biden administration, because President-elect Donald Trump has said he’s against new government regulations. Cathy Chase, president of Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, urged the department to approve automatic emergency braking for heavy trucks and technology to prevent impaired driving.
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Military leaders are rattled by a list of 'woke' officers that a group urges Hegseth to fireNone
In 2003, Hubble spotted a massive planet around a very old star, almost as old as the Universe. This implied that some planet formation happened when our Universe was very young. And those type of planets had time to form and grow big inside their young discs, to grow even bigger than Jupiter. Yet, back then, stars possessed only small amounts of heavier elements that are the building blocks of planets. So, how could such a planet form? This was puzzling. To answer this question, researchers used Webb to study stars in a nearby galaxy that, much like the early Universe, lacks large amounts of heavy elements. They found that some stars there have planet-forming discs, and those discs are even longer-lived than those seen around young stars in our Milky Way galaxy. “With Webb, we have a strong confirmation of what we saw with Hubble, and we must rethink how we create computer models for planet formation and early evolution in the young Universe,” said study leader Guido De Marchi of the European Space Research and Technology Centre in Noordwijk, the Netherlands. In the early Universe, stars formed from mostly hydrogen and helium, and very few heavier elements such as carbon and iron, which came through the first generation of supernova explosions. “Current theoretical models predict that with so few heavier elements, the discs around stars have a short lifetime, so short in fact that planets cannot grow big,” said the Webb study’s co-investigator Elena Sabbi, chief scientist for Gemini Observatory at the National Science Foundation’s NOIRLab in Tucson, Arizona, USA. “But Hubble did see one of those planets, so what if the models were not correct and discs could live longer?” To test this idea, scientists trained Webb on the Small Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy that is one of the Milky Way’s nearest neighbours. In particular, they examined the massive, star-forming cluster NGC 346, which is also poor of heavier elements. The cluster serves as a nearby proxy for studying stellar environments with similar conditions in the early, distant Universe. Hubble observations of NGC 346 from the mid 2000s revealed many stars about 20 to 30 million years old that seemed to still have planet-forming discs around them. This went against the conventional belief that such discs would dissipate after 2 or 3 million years. “The Hubble findings were controversial, going against not only empirical evidence in our galaxy but also against the current models,” said Guido. “This was intriguing, but without a way to obtain spectra of those stars, we could not really establish whether we were witnessing the stars’ growth and the presence of discs, or just some spurious effect.” Now, thanks to Webb’s sensitivity and resolution, scientists have the first-ever spectra of forming, Sun-like stars and their immediate environments in a nearby galaxy. “We see that these stars are indeed surrounded by discs and are still in the process of gobbling material, even at the relatively old age of 20 or 30 million years,” said Guido. “This also implies that planets have more time to form and grow around these stars than in nearby star-forming regions in our own galaxy.” This finding refutes previous theoretical predictions that the star would very quickly blow away the disc when there are very few heavier elements in the gas. In that case, the disc’s life would be very short, even less than a million years. But if a disc doesn’t stay around the star long enough for the dust grains to stick together and pebbles to form and become the core of a planet, how can planets form? The researchers explained that there could be two distinct mechanisms, or even a combination, for planet-forming discs to persist in environments scarce in heavier elements. First, to be able to blow away the disc, the star’s light applies pressure to the gas in the disc. This process is more efficient when the gas contains elements heavier than hydrogen and helium. The massive star cluster NGC 346 only has about ten percent of the heavier elements that are present in the chemical composition of our Sun. So, perhaps it simply takes longer for a star in this cluster to disperse its disc. The second possibility is that a Sun-like star must form from a larger cloud of gas when there are few heavier elements. A bigger gas cloud will produce a bigger disc. When there is more mass in the disc, it would take longer to blow the disc away. “With more matter around the stars, the accretion lasts for a longer time,” said Elena. “The discs may take ten times longer to disappear. This has implications for how you form a planet, and the type of planetary systems that you can have in these different environments. This is so exciting.” The science team’s paper appears in the 16 December 2024 issue of The Astrophysical Journal. Webb is the largest, most powerful telescope ever launched into space. Under an international collaboration agreement, ESA provided the telescope’s launch service, using the Ariane 5 launch vehicle. Working with partners, ESA was responsible for the development and qualification of Ariane 5 adaptations for the Webb mission and for the procurement of the launch service by Arianespace. ESA also provided the workhorse spectrograph NIRSpec and 50% of the mid-infrared instrument MIRI, which was designed and built by a consortium of nationally funded European Institutes (The MIRI European Consortium) in partnership with JPL and the University of Arizona. Webb is an international partnership between NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). astrobiologyApple’s Foldable iPad: Could It Be Like Two iPad Pros Side-by-Side?GCC Summit: Strengthening ties amid multiple regional challenges
NEW YORK (AP) — New York City Mayor Eric Adams appears open to switching parties to become a Republican, as he declined to rule out a future change in political allegiances during a pair of interviews Friday that came as he has increasing warmed to President-elect Donald Trump. The comments from Adams, the top Democrat in one of the country's most liberal cities, riled critics who have grown concerned over the mayor's increasing willingness to throw his support behind Trump and his hardline immigration policies. Adams, who faces federal corruption charges , was a registered Republican in the 1990s and early 2000s but has spent his political career as a Democrat. In a Friday morning interview with the local cable news station NY1, Adams was asked if he would consider a return to the GOP. The Democrat appeared to leave open the possibility of a switch. “The party that’s the most important for me is the American party,” he said. “I’m a part of the American party. I love this country. This is the home of the free, the land of the brave.” In another interview about a half-hour later on PIX11, Adams said he would run for reelection as a Democrat but still appeared to leave some wiggle room for his future. “So no matter what party I’m on or vote on, I’m going to push for the American values," he said. "And I think America has told us, stop the squabbling, leaders, and start leading us out of the crisis that we’re facing.” Adams won office on a centrist platform and has spent significant time as mayor quarreling with the progressive wing of his party. But his rhetoric has taken a noticeable rightward turn in the weeks since Trump's election victory, particularly on immigration, with Adams boosting the president-elect's platform and appearing enthusiastic about the incoming administration. Rather than restricting cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, as he once promised, Adams recently expressed a willingness to roll back the city’s so-called sanctuary policies, and he plans to meet with Trump’s top border official over concerns about what the mayor said was the “rising illegal alien crime rate in New York City.” He has also praised those in Trump’s orbit, including Elon Musk, who has claimed falsely that Democrats are illegally “importing” migrants to garner votes. “This is a racehorse that wanted to run its right pace and we’ve been holding back that racehorse out of fear of being canceled,” Adams said of the country Tuesday. “And now you have a bunch of people who are not afraid of being canceled.” The shift comes as Adams is trying to fight off an indictment on federal corruption charges while governing the city and gearing up to run for a second term. Adams has pleaded not guilty in his criminal case, in which he has been accused of accepting free or discounted overseas trips and illegal campaign contributions from people looking to gain his influence, including people connected to Turkey or the Turkish government. Adams’ critics have seized on his recent comments about the Trump administration as a move toward self-preservation, accusing the mayor of cozying up to the next president in an effort to secure a pardon in his corruption case. “Eric Adams continues to sound more like he is auditioning for a job in right-wing media than running for reelection in a Democratic primary,” said Zohran Mamdani, a state assembly member who is challenging against Adams in the mayoral primary. “Eric Adams is in City Hall because Democratic voters sent him there. To serve his own narrow self-interests, he is clearly prepared to betray them.” Zellnor Myrie, a state senator who is also challenging Adams in the primary, said “at a time when the Republican Party has never been more out of line with New York values, we need a mayor who isn’t scared to call himself a Democrat.” “Instead of playing footsie with the next president, we need a mayor with the courage to stand up for our city,” Myrie wrote on X. Adams on Friday did distance himself from the Trump administration's potential plans to carry out mass deportations, saying, “You know, I’m not for mass deportation, but I’m not for mass saturation.” Still, the mayor's recent remarks are a major departure from his stance before he took office. In June of 2021, a few weeks before winning the Democratic mayoral primary, Adams spoke to a room full of immigrant New Yorkers about the challenges facing city residents who are in the country illegally. “Too many of our neighbors live in the shadows,” he said at the time, “scarred by the abusive rhetoric and tactics of the Trump era and fearing a denial of their rights.” ___ Izaguirre reported from Albany. Anthony Izaguirre And Jake Offenhartz, The Associated Press
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The comments from Adams, the top Democrat in one of the country's most liberal cities, riled critics who have grown concerned over the mayor's increasing willingness to throw his support behind Trump and his hardline immigration policies. Adams, who faces federal corruption charges , was a registered Republican in the 1990s and early 2000s but has spent his political career as a Democrat. In a Friday morning interview with the local cable news station NY1, Adams was asked if he would consider a return to the GOP. The Democrat appeared to leave open the possibility of a switch. “The party that’s the most important for me is the American party,” he said. “I’m a part of the American party. I love this country. This is the home of the free, the land of the brave.” In another interview about a half-hour later on PIX11, Adams said he would run for reelection as a Democrat but still appeared to leave some wiggle room for his future. “So no matter what party I’m on or vote on, I’m going to push for the American values," he said. "And I think America has told us, stop the squabbling, leaders, and start leading us out of the crisis that we’re facing.” Adams won office on a centrist platform and has spent significant time as mayor quarreling with the progressive wing of his party. But his rhetoric has taken a noticeable rightward turn in the weeks since Trump's election victory, particularly on immigration, with Adams boosting the president-elect's platform and appearing enthusiastic about the incoming administration. Rather than restricting cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, as he once promised, Adams recently expressed a willingness to roll back the city’s so-called sanctuary policies, and he plans to meet with Trump’s top border official over concerns about what the mayor said was the “rising illegal alien crime rate in New York City.” He has also praised those in Trump’s orbit, including Elon Musk, who has claimed falsely that Democrats are illegally “importing” migrants to garner votes. “This is a racehorse that wanted to run its right pace and we’ve been holding back that racehorse out of fear of being canceled,” Adams said of the country Tuesday. “And now you have a bunch of people who are not afraid of being canceled.” The shift comes as Adams is trying to fight off an indictment on federal corruption charges while governing the city and gearing up to run for a second term. Adams has pleaded not guilty in his criminal case, in which he has been accused of accepting free or discounted overseas trips and illegal campaign contributions from people looking to gain his influence, including people connected to Turkey or the Turkish government. Adams’ critics have seized on his recent comments about the Trump administration as a move toward self-preservation, accusing the mayor of cozying up to the next president in an effort to secure a pardon in his corruption case. “Eric Adams continues to sound more like he is auditioning for a job in right-wing media than running for reelection in a Democratic primary,” said Zohran Mamdani, a state assembly member who is challenging against Adams in the mayoral primary. “Eric Adams is in City Hall because Democratic voters sent him there. To serve his own narrow self-interests, he is clearly prepared to betray them.” Zellnor Myrie, a state senator who is also challenging Adams in the primary, said “at a time when the Republican Party has never been more out of line with New York values, we need a mayor who isn’t scared to call himself a Democrat.” “Instead of playing footsie with the next president, we need a mayor with the courage to stand up for our city,” Myrie wrote on X. Adams on Friday did distance himself from the Trump administration's potential plans to carry out mass deportations, saying, “You know, I’m not for mass deportation, but I’m not for mass saturation.” Still, the mayor's recent remarks are a major departure from his stance before he took office. In June of 2021, a few weeks before winning the Democratic mayoral primary, Adams spoke to a room full of immigrant New Yorkers about the challenges facing city residents who are in the country illegally. “Too many of our neighbors live in the shadows,” he said at the time, “scarred by the abusive rhetoric and tactics of the Trump era and fearing a denial of their rights.” Izaguirre reported from Albany.Bank of Canada preparing for more uncertain, shock-prone future
NYC's mayor warms to Trump and doesn't rule out becoming a Republican
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