- Tina Fey and Amy Poehler Revive ‘SNL’s’ ‘Weekend Update’ at Emmys and Reveal Elton John Is Now an EGOT Winner Variety
- Tina Fey and Amy Poehler Roast Live Variety Special Emmy Nominees in ‘Weekend Update’-Style Presentation Bit PEOPLE
- Tina Fey, Amy Poehler Bring Back ‘Weekend Update’ at 2023 Emmys Us Weekly
- Tina Fey & Amy Poehler Poke Fun At Oscars, Super Bowl Halftime Show, ‘Mean Girls’ In Emmy Weekend Update Deadline
- Tina Fey, Amy Poehler riff on ‘Mean Girls,’ concert that ‘got us all pregnant’ at Emmys USA TODAY
Tag Archives: revive
Katy Perry accusations revive Donald Trump’s Russell Brand critique on Twitter – Hindustan Times
- Katy Perry accusations revive Donald Trump’s Russell Brand critique on Twitter Hindustan Times
- Katy Perry Described Russell Brand as ‘Controlling’ During Their Marriage: ‘It Was Just Like a Tornado’ (Video) Yahoo Entertainment
- Katy Perry was dumped by Russell Brand with New Year’s Eve text UNILAD
- Donald Trump’s tweet to Katy Perry slamming Russell Brand resurfaces as star accused The Mirror
- Russell Brand and his women: Star who dated Kate Moss and Sadie Frost and married Katy Perry boasted of having Daily Mail
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Katy Perry accusations revive Donald Trump’s Russell Brand critique on Twitter – Hindustan Times
- Katy Perry accusations revive Donald Trump’s Russell Brand critique on Twitter Hindustan Times
- Katy Perry Described Russell Brand as ‘Controlling’ During Their Marriage: ‘It Was Just Like a Tornado’ (Video) Yahoo Entertainment
- Inside Katy Perry’s marriage to Russell Brand – including devastating divorce text and how she discovered ‘… The US Sun
- A look at Russell Brands career and dating history ahead of UK exposé Geo News
- Donald Trump’s tweet to Katy Perry slamming Russell Brand resurfaces as star accused The Mirror
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Brazilian authorities intend to revive fraud case against George Santos
Washington
CNN
—
Law enforcement officials in Brazil will reinstate fraud charges against Rep.-elect George Santos, the Rio de Janeiro prosecutor’s office tells CNN, as the New York Republican officially assumes his role in the US House Tuesday under a cloud of suspicion over his dubious resume.
Prosecutors said they will seek a “formal response” from Santos related to a stolen checkbook in 2008, after police suspended an investigation into him because they were unable to find him for nearly a decade.
Authorities, having verified Santos’ location, will make a formal request to the US Justice Department to notify him of the charges, Maristela Pereira, a spokeswoman for the Rio de Janeiro prosecutor’s office, told CNN. The prosecutor’s office told CNN the request will be filed upon reopening on Friday.
CNN previously confirmed that Santos was charged with embezzlement in a Brazilian court in 2011, according to case records from the Rio de Janeiro Court of Justice. However, court records from 2013 state that the charge was archived after court summons went unanswered and they were unable to locate Santos.
CNN has reached out to a lawyer for Santos for comment. The reinstatement of the fraud charges was first reported by The New York Times.
According to the Times, citing court records it has reviewed, the criminal case stems from a visit Santos made to a small clothing store in Niterói, a city outside of Rio de Janeiro, where Santos spent nearly $700 out of the stolen checkbook using a fake name.
In an interview with the New York Post last week, Santos denied that he had been charged with any crime in Brazil, saying: “I am not a criminal here – not here or in Brazil or any jurisdiction in the world. Absolutely not. That didn’t happen.”
Santos, who helped Republicans win a narrow House majority last year when he flipped a Democratic-held seat, is set to take office on Tuesday despite admitting to lying about parts of his resume after The New York Times first revealed that Santos’ biography appeared to be partly fictional.
CNN confirmed details of that reporting about his college education and employment history and uncovered even more falsehoods from Santos, including claims he was forced to leave a New York City private school when his family’s real estate assets took a downturn and that he represented Goldman Sachs at a top financial conference.
Santos’ claims that his grandparents fled the Holocaust as Ukrainian Jewish refugees and that his mother died as a result of being present in the South Tower during 9/11 have also come under scrutiny, CNN’s KFile found.
In interviews with WABC radio and the New York Post on December 26, Santos admitted to lying about attending Baruch College and New York University as well as misrepresenting his employment at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup but said at the time he still intended to serve in Congress.
Two days later, CNN reported that the US attorney’s office in the Eastern District of New York had begun investigating the finances of Santos, who faces questions over his wealth and loans totaling more than $700,000 he made to his successful 2022 campaign.
The same day, the Nassau County district attorney’s office announced it was also looking into fabrications from Santos.
“No one is above the law and if a crime was committed in this county, we will prosecute it,” Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly said at the time.
The district attorney’s office did not specify what fabrications it was exploring and the US attorney’s office in the Eastern District of New York declined to comment.
CNN has reached out to a representative for Santos for comment on the probes.
Santos’ FEC reports contain a number of unusual expenditures, including exorbitant expenses on air travel and hotels, as well as a number of expenses one penny below the dollar figure above which the FEC requires campaigns to keep receipts.
“Campaign expenditures for staff members including travel, lodging, and meals are normal expenses of any competent campaign. The suggestion that the Santos campaign engaged in any unlawful spending of campaign funds is irresponsible, at best,” Joe Murray, a lawyer for Santos, said in a statement to CNN on Saturday.
U.S. appeals court rejects Biden’s bid to revive student debt plan
Nov 30 (Reuters) – A federal appeals court on Wednesday declined to put on hold a Texas judge’s ruling that said President Joe Biden’s plan to cancel hundreds of billions of dollars in student loan debt was unlawful.
The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the Biden administration’s request to pause a judge’s Nov. 10 order vacating the $400 billion student debt relief program in a lawsuit pursued by a conservative advocacy group.
The decision by Fort Worth, Texas-based U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman was one of two nationally that has prevented the U.S. Department of Education under the Democratic president from moving forward with granting debt relief to millions of borrowers.
The administration has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to similarly lift an order by the St. Louis-based 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that, at the request of six Republican-led states, had barred it from cancelling student loans.
A three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit in Wednesday’s brief order declined to put Pittman’s ruling on hold while the administration appealed his decision, but the court directed that the appeal be heard on an expedited basis.
The panel included two Republican appointees and one judge nominated by then Democratic President Barack Obama. Pittman was appointed by then Republican President Donald Trump.
The White House had no immediate comment but the administration has said that if the 5th Circuit declined to halt Pittman’s order it would ask the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene.
Biden announced in August that the U.S. government would forgive up to $10,000 in student loan debt for borrowers making less than $125,000 a year, or $250,000 for married couples. Students who received Pell Grants to benefit lower-income college students will have up to $20,000 of their debt canceled.
During the 2020 presidential campaign, Biden promised to help debt-saddled former college students. Biden’s program has drawn opposition from Republicans, who have portrayed it as shifting the burden of debt from wealthy elites to lower-income Americans.
The Congressional Budget Office in September calculated that the debt forgiveness program run would cost taxpayers about $400 billion.
About 26 million Americans have applied for student loan forgiveness, and the U.S. Department of Education had already approved requests from 16 million by the time Pittman issued his ruling.
Biden last week announced his administration would extend a pause on student loan payments to alleviate uncertainty for borrowers while litigation over the debt relief plan plays out.
Pittman had ruled in a lawsuit by two borrowers who were partially or fully ineligible for the loan forgiveness who were backed by the Job Creators Network Foundation, a conservative advocacy group founded by Bernie Marcus, a co-founder of Home Depot.
The judge said it was irrelevant if Biden’s plan was good public policy because the program was “one of the largest exercises of legislative power without congressional authority in the history of the United States.”
Pittman wrote that the HEROES Act – a law that provides loan assistance to military personnel and that was relied upon by the Biden administration to enact the relief plan – did not authorize the program.
Elaine Parker, president of Job Creators Network Foundation, said in a statement the 5th Circuit’s order on Wednesday prevented the administration during the appeal from trying to “get money out the door to debtors and claim victory.”
Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Tom Hogue, Robert Birsel
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Scientists Revive 48,500-Year-Old ‘Zombie Virus’ Buried in Ice
The potential revival of a virus could infect animals, humans, researchers said. (Representational)
The thawing of ancient permafrost due to climate change may pose a new threat to humans, according to researchers who revived nearly two dozen viruses – including one frozen under a lake more than 48,500 years ago.
European researchers examined ancient samples collected from permafrost in the Siberia region of Russia. They revived and characterized 13 new pathogens, what they termed “zombie viruses,” and found that they remained infectious despite spending many millennia trapped in the frozen ground.
Scientists have long warned that the thawing of permafrost due to atmospheric warming will worsen climate change by freeing previously trapped greenhouse gases like methane. But its effect on dormant pathogens is less well understood.
The team of researchers from Russia, Germany, and France said the biological risk of reanimating the viruses they studied was “totally negligible” due to the strains they targeted, mainly those capable of infecting amoeba microbes. The potential revival of a virus that could infect animals or humans is much more problematic, they said, warning that their work can be extrapolated to show the danger is real.
“It is thus likely that ancient permafrost will release these unknown viruses upon thawing,” they wrote in an article posted to the preprint repository bioRxiv that hasn’t yet been peer-reviewed. “How long these viruses could remain infectious once exposed to outdoor conditions, and how likely they will be to encounter and infect a suitable host in the interval, is yet impossible to estimate.”
“But the risk is bound to increase in the context of global warming when permafrost thawing will keep accelerating, and more people will be populating the Arctic in the wake of industrial ventures,” they said.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Featured Video Of The Day
Study Links Hair Straighteners To Uterine Cancer: Are Chemical Relaxers Safe?
Scientists Revive ‘Zombie’ Virus After 50,000 Years Trapped in Siberian Permafrost
As our world continues to warm up, vast areas of permafrost are rapidly melting, releasing material that’s been trapped for up to a million years. This includes uncountable numbers of microbes that have been lying dormant for hundreds of millennia.
To study these emerging microbes, scientists from the French National Center for Scientific Research have now revived a number of these “zombie viruses” from the Siberian permafrost, including one thought to be nearly 50,000 years old – a record age for a frozen virus returning to a state capable of infecting other organisms.
The team behind the study, led by microbiologist Jean-Marie, says these ancient viruses are potentially a significant threat to public health, and further study needs to be done to assess the danger that these infectious agents could pose as the permafrost melts.
The researchers warned it may just be the tip of the iceberg:
“One-quarter of the Northern Hemisphere is underlain by permanently frozen ground, referred to as permafrost,” researchers wrote in the paper.
“Due to climate warming, irreversibly thawing permafrost is releasing organic matter frozen for up to a million years, most of which decomposes into carbon dioxide and methane, further enhancing the greenhouse effect. Part of this organic matter also consists of revived cellular microbes (prokaryotes, unicellular eukaryotes) as well as viruses that remained dormant since prehistorical times.”
According to Global News:
In 2014, the same researchers unearthed a 30,000-year-old virus trapped in permafrost, the BBC reported. The discovery was groundbreaking because after all that time, the virus was still able to infect organisms. But now, they’ve beaten their own record by reviving a virus that is 48,500 years old.
“If the authors are indeed isolating live viruses from ancient permafrost, it is likely that the even smaller, simpler mammalian viruses would also survive frozen for eons,” virologist Eric Delwart from the University of California, San Francisco told New Scientist.
La Mulana Director Wins Konami Contest to Revive Old IP
The search has ended: After a year-long process, Konami announced the grand prize winner of an open call for indie developers to revive older series from the company’s back catalog. At Tokyo Game Show, we learned first place will go to Takumi Naramura, director of La Mulana and La Mulana 2, as he plans to remake Konami’s The Maze of Galious.
Originally released as a sequel to Knightmare for the MSX computer platform in Japan in 1987, Konami brought The Maze of Galious to the Famicom later that same year. The side-scrolling platform RPG featured two heroes with their own unique skills, Popolon and Aphrodite, trying to fight their way out of a castle filled with monsters.
The Maze of Galious could be described in modern terms as a Metroidvania, since the player explores a series of interconnected rooms, gains experience points for defeating enemies, and searches for power-ups and keys. The MSX version made it to Europe, but the Famicom version was never localized for the NES.
In a press release announcing the winners, representatives from the panel of contest judges wrote that they “could feel tremendous passion for The Maze of Galious” in Naramura’s initial proposal, as he outlined the original game’s strengths and the challenges involved in bringing it to modern audiences. The release also had a comment from Naramura wherein he stated that if he hadn’t won the contest, “I’d probably just stay quiet and make the game anyway.” Years before this contest ever took place, Naramura was open about his fandom for The Maze of Galious, citing it as a primary influence for La Mulana.
Naramura was on hand at Tokyo Game Show when the announcement was made, and he visited the IGN livestream to speak to us and show us a glimpse of what his version of The Maze of Galious might look like. “I was watching last year’s TGS when this contest was announced,” Naramura said, “and I thought ‘there’s no way The Maze of Galious will be on the list.’ But there it was! I hurriedly contacted my teammates to find out what we should do.” Naramura acknowledged that his interest in this particular title was a bit outside the norm. “I think most people saw that list and said ‘Gradius, that’s cool, Goemon, I like that,’ so they might be disappointed that Galious was selected.”
While Naramura’s entry won the top spot, four more developers were also awarded prizes for their ideas. The runners-up included new versions of Star Soldier, Parodius, Twinbee, and Pooyan. Elsewhere, we learned that Konami RPGs Suikoden 1 and 2 are returning with new HD remasters.
Burger King $400 million plan to revive U.S. sales with remodels, advertising
CASCAIS, PORTUGAL – Burger King signs are seen at the local fast food restaurant.
Horacio Villalobos | Corbis News | Getty Images
Burger King on Friday said it plans to spend $400 million over the next two years on advertising and renovating its restaurants as part of a broader strategy to revive lagging U.S. sales.
The Restaurant Brands International chain unveiled a turnaround plan for its U.S. business in Las Vegas at its annual franchisee convention. The investments are expected to weigh on its adjusted earnings per share for 2022 and 2023 by 10 to 12 cents annually. The company expects the investments to start paying off by 2025.
Wall Street analysts surveyed by Refinitiv expect earnings per share of $3.24 in 2023.
In the second quarter, Burger King reported flat U.S. same-store sales growth, trailing behind rivals McDonald’s and Wendy’s. The burger chain has been reporting lackluster U.S. sales over the last year, causing concern for Restaurant Brands CEO Jose Cil. In his tenure as chief executive, Cil has also spearheaded efforts to revive Canadian demand for Tim Hortons, Burger King’s sister chain.
A year ago, Cil also tapped former Domino’s Pizza executive Tom Curtis as the new president for Burger King’s U.S. and Canadian restaurants. Early changes to Burger King included slimming its menu to speed up drive-thru times and cutting down its paper coupons to push customers to use its mobile app.
Freshening up
Now Burger King is preparing to make even bolder changes. It’s planning to spend $200 million to fund remodels of roughly 800 locations. Another $50 million will go toward upgrading about 3,000 restaurants with technology, kitchen equipment and building enhancements. The company has more than 7,000 Burger King locations in the U.S.
Historically, remodeled restaurants see an average sales increase of 12% in their first year and outperform older locations over time, according to Burger King. The company is hoping that being more selective and strategic with its projects will produce even stronger sales growth, although it could take longer to see results.
“We might see remodels start to hit the market mid-2023 and going forward. It should really be a gradual ramp of the business over the course of the couple of years,” Cil told CNBC.
Burger King will also increase its U.S. advertising fund’s budget by 30% by investing $120 million over the next two years. Those investments will start in the fourth quarter.
“We expect that to start having an impact on sales over the next quarter,” Cil said.
An additional $30 million will be spent through 2024 on improving its mobile app, exceeding the digital fees that franchisees pay to the company for the technology.
Burger King’s menu will also get a facelift. The company said it’s built a multi-year blueprint for menu improvements, which include developing new Whopper flavors, betting on its Royal Chicken Crispy sandwich and investing in more employee training.
Franchisee impact
The strategy has received support from franchisees operating 93% of its U.S. restaurants, according to Burger King. Operators will be chipping in their own money alongside the company for remodels and advertising.
Curtis and his team put together a group of franchisees, representing a range of regions and experience, to come up with the strategy over the last three to six months.
“There were many long nights and plane rides,” Curtis said.
In addition to the money they get from Burger King, franchisees making upgrades to their restaurants are expected to make comparable investments to fund the projects.
The company is also changing its incentive structure to encourage operators to make more extensive remodels, which can be costly and typically require a location to be temporarily shuttered. In the past, Burger King operators who remodeled their restaurants received discounts on their advertising and royalty fees for up to seven years.
The new program will give franchisees cash once the project is completed, and let them choose how much of a discount they get on the royalties they pay to the company.
If profitability targets are met, however, Burger King franchisees will have to pay higher fees toward the advertising fund.
China steps up easing, cuts lending benchmarks to revive faltering economy
FILE PHOTO:Employees work on the production line of vehicle components during a government-organised media tour to a factory of German engineering group Voith, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Shanghai, China July 21, 2022. REUTERS/Aly Song
Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com
SHANGHAI, Aug 22 (Reuters) – China cut its benchmark lending rate and lowered the mortgage reference by a bigger margin on Monday, adding to last week’s easing measures, as Beijing boosts efforts to revive an economy hobbled by a property crisis and a resurgence of COVID cases.
The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) is walking a tight rope in its efforts to revive growth. Offering too much of stimulus could add to inflation pressures and risk capital flight as the Federal Reserve and other economies raise interest rates aggressively. read more
However, weak credit demand is forcing the PBOC’s hand as it tries to keep China’s economy on an even keel.
Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com
The one-year loan prime rate (LPR) was lowered by 5 basis points to 3.65% at the central bank’s monthly fixing on Monday, while the five-year LPR was slashed by 15 basis points to 4.30%.
The one-year LPR was last reduced in January. The five-year tenor, which was last lowered in May, influences the pricing of home mortgages.
“All told, the impression we get from all the PBOC’s recent announcements is that policy is being eased but not dramatically,” said Sheana Yue, China economist at Capital Economics.
“We anticipate two more 10 bps cuts to the PBOC policy rates over the remainder of this year and continue to forecast a reserve requirement ratio (RRR) cut next quarter.”
The LPR cuts come after the PBOC surprised markets last week by lowering the medium term lending facility (MLF) rate and another short-term liquidity tool, as a string of recent data showed the economy was losing momentum amid slowing global growth and rising borrowing costs in many developed countries. read more
Shares of Chinese developers listed in Hong Kong (.HSMPI) rose 1.7%, while China-listed property stocks (.CSI000952) were relatively stable in morning deals.
But worries over widening policy divergence with other major economies dragged the Chinese yuan , to near two-year lows. The onshore yuan last traded at 6.8258 per dollar.
In a Reuters poll conducted last week, 25 out of 30 respondents predicted a 10-basis-point reduction to the one-year LPR. All of those in the poll also projected a cut to the five-year tenor, including 90% of them forecasting a reduction larger than 10 bps. read more
TESTING TIME FOR PBOC
China’s economy, the world’s second biggest, narrowly avoided contracting in the second quarter as widespread COVID-19 lockdowns and a property crisis took a heavy toll on consumer and business confidence.
Beijing’s strict ‘zero-COVID’ strategy remains a drag on consumption, and over recent weeks cases have rebounded again. Adding to the gloom, a slowdown in global growth and persistent supply-chain snags are undermining chances of a strong revival in China.
A raft of data, released last week, showed the economy unexpectedly slowed in July and prompted some global investment banks, including Goldman Sachs and Nomura, to revise down their full-year GDP growth forecasts for China.
Goldman Sachs lowered China’s 2022 full-year GDP growth forecast to 3.0% from 3.3% previously, far below Beijing’s target of around 5.5%. In a tacit acknowledgement of the challenge in meeting the GDP target, the government omitted a mention of it in a recent high profile policy meeting.
The deeper cut to the mortgage reference rate underlines efforts by policymakers to stabilize the property sector after a string of defaults among developers and a slump in home sales hammered consumer demand.
Capital Economics’ Yue said the weakness in loan demand is partly structural, “reflecting a loss of confidence in the housing market and the uncertainty caused by recurrent disruptions from China’s zero-COVID strategy.”
“These are drags that can’t be easily solved by monetary policy.”
Sources last week told Reuters that China will guarantee new onshore bond issues by a few select private developers to support the sector, which accounts for a quarter of the national GDP. read more
The LPR cut was necessary, “but the size of the reduction was not enough to stimulate financing demand,” said senior China strategist at ANZ, Xing Zhaopeng, who expects the one-year LPR could be cut further.
Goldman Sachs economists also predicted more easing, but noted that policymakers were facing a testing time.
The economists said the PBOC might not be in a “rush to deliver more interest rate cuts,” because of “rising food prices and potential spillover effects from developed markets’ monetary policy tightening.”
Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com
Reporting by Winni Zhou and Brenda Goh; Editing by Shri Navaratnam
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.