Town Hall News

LeBron James wound up picking Philadelphia, and no billboards were required. Back in February 2018, a businessman named Asher Raphael arranged for three billboards to be placed a few miles outside of Cleveland in a lighthearted effort to woo James to the Philadelphia 76ers. James decided later that year to leave the Cavaliers and join the Los Angeles Lakers. The billboard bit seemed futile. Instead, maybe it was just premature. […]

To be fair, James Cameron did warn us. Long before OpenAI broke out of its test corral and hacked into Hugging Face, before the internet and Sam Altman were even born, Cameron wrote a screenplay about an autonomous artificial intelligence system that triggers a nuclear apocalypse. That system, “Skynet,” was solidly science fiction — and, for its day, pure speculation. But four decades after it appeared in “The Terminator,” it […]

BERLIN (AP) — For Ali Darwich, the deadly attack on the Berlin Pride Festival was an attack on the city of Berlin and everything it stands for: its diversity, its tolerance and its belief in freedom. On a personal level, it also was an attack on everything the Berliner embodies. “Born a Muslim, living as a gay man, working as a police officer,” Darwich said, as he tried holding back […]

Tens of millions of people are under extreme heat warnings across central and southern parts of the United States on Sunday as high temperatures and severe humidity grip large swaths of the country for a second straight day. Heat indices exceeding 105 degrees Fahrenheit (40.5 Celsius) were forecast from Memphis to Montana to Las Vegas. Parts of the southwest could see temperatures as high as 120 degrees Fahrenheit (49 C), […]

SAN DIEGO (AP) — Federal wildlife authorities are investigating after a video appeared to show a person kicking a protected sea lion at a beach in California. A spokesperson for the federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration confirmed an ongoing investigation into the incident but declined to provide additional details Sunday. The video appears to show a person throwing kicks at the sea lion at La Jolla Cove in San […]

Tamara Korpatsch broke the German curse at the MSC Hamburg Ladies Open by claiming the title in a 6-3, 6-3 win over Hungary’s Anna Bondar on Sunday in Germany. Korpatsch, born in Hamburg, is the first German since Steffi Graf in 1992 to win the Hamburg Open. Since Graf’s last title, Germans were 0-4 in the final at Hamburg. Korpatsch claimed her second career singles title in one hour and […]

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Two mosques in the Israeli-occupied West Bank were set on fire overnight in an apparent Israeli settler attack, officials said Sunday, after a spate of deadly violence that killed four Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers. The violence comes as Palestinians and the Israeli opposition accuse Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hard-line government of turning a blind eye to attacks by settlers against Palestinians, which is threatening […]

HAVANA (AP) — Cuba held a traditional rally on Sunday to commemorate one of the revolution’s most important anniversaries, with former President Raúl Castro, 95, conspicuously absent. It’s the first time in at least 30 years that Castro did not attend the event, and no explanation was offered. The event was presided by President Miguel Díaz-Canel, who read a congratulatory message from Castro to his compatriots in the eastern city […]

CAIRO (AP) — The United States paused its attacks on Iran for a second straight day Sunday and Tehran said it had done so too, as efforts continued to bring the countries back to negotiations on an interim ceasefire deal largely undermined by recent exchanges of fire. It was not clear why the U.S. has paused after targeting Iranian coastal areas and infrastructure in a nearly two-week escalation sparked by […]