TribLive stories, Page 2349
E-cigarettes outperform patches and gums in quit-smoking study
WASHINGTON — A major new study provides the strongest evidence yet that vaping can help smokers quit cigarettes, with e-cigarettes proving nearly twice as effective as nicotine gums and patches. The British research, published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine, could influence what doctors tell their patients and...
Feds indict powerful Philly union boss, councilman, others
PHILADELPHIA — A powerful union boss with a tight grip on construction jobs in the Philadelphia region and outsized influence in city and state politics has been indicted in alleged schemes to embezzle more than $600,000 and have a councilman on the union payroll to do his bidding at City...
Monarch population up 144 percent at Mexico wintering grounds
MEXICO CITY — The population of monarch butterflies wintering in central Mexico is up 144 percent over last year, experts said Wednesday. The data presented by Andrew Rhodes, Mexico’s national commissioner for protected natural areas, was cheered but scientists quickly warned that it does not mean the butterflies that migrate...
Peter Jackson making new documentary of Beatles’ ‘Let It Be’
NEW YORK — The Beatles’ farewell documentary “Let It Be” is getting an encore, and a reinvention. “Lord of the Rings” director Peter Jackson announced Wednesday that he is making a new film out of some 55 hours of footage — shot in January 1969 — that has never been...
Foxconn reconsiders plan for Wisconsin manufacturing hub
MADISON, Wis. — Electronics giant Foxconn reversed course and announced Wednesday that the massive Wisconsin operation that was supposed to bring a bounty of blue-collar manufacturing jobs back to the Midwest — and was offered billions of dollars in incentives from the state — will instead be devoted mostly to...
Connellsville residents take the snow angel challenge
It was a cold snowy Sunday and Amelia Lincoln, 8, of Connellsville, was restless. Her father, Mayor Greg Lincoln was a little bored himself, so he told Amelia to get her coat — they were going outside to make snow angels. However, before they ever hit the snow-covered ground, the...
Richland Township Building designated warming center
With temperatures below zero with windchills exceeding -20 below, some local municipalities are providing warming centers for anybody that needs refuge from the cold weather. The Richland Township Building, located at 4019 Dickey Road, will be open Jan. 30 and 31, for community members to use as a place to...
Police: No footage yet of alleged attack on ‘Empire’ actor Jussie Smollett
CHICAGO (AP) — Detectives have reviewed surveillance footage of “Empire” actor Jussie Smollett walking to a downtown Chicago apartment after an early-morning visit to a Subway restaurant, but none of it showed the alleged attack on the actor, a police official said Wednesday. Investigators “for the most part” can confirm...
Analysis: This is what 40 below zero feels like
The fact of the matter is I don’t know exactly how cold it got at my house today. The mercury thermometer on our porch only goes down to minus 30. The digital thermometer in our backyard weather station bottoms out at minus 40. For roughly two hours on Wednesday, this...
Letter to the editor: We need solutions, not blame
The Tribune-Review wasted an editorial with “Whose shutdown is it?” (Jan. 20, TribLIVE). The question is not who is responsible/owns the shutdown. The question should have been, what should be done to get us out of the impasse? Politicians and the media talk about who is to blame, not solutions....
Letter to the editor: Wecht’s JFK myth is ‘nonsense’
Regarding the article “Cyril Wecht shreds ‘nonsense’ JFK single-bullet theory for Fox Chapel Area students” (Jan. 16, TribLIVE): The only nonsense is that the Tribune-Review and the Fox Chapel AP history teacher would give credibility and a platform for conspiracist Wecht to spread his widely debunked myth of multiple shooters...
Letter to the editor: How to end shutdown
If all the people who want to build Trump’s wall were to contribute $50,000 or $100,000 to the GoFundMe account to build the wall, there would be more than enough money to build it. After all, they saved tens of thousands of dollars in taxes from the great tax cut...
A cookie in a skillet? Skeptical? Just try it
A cookie in a skillet? We admit this Internet phenom made us skeptical—until we tried it. Unlike making a traditional batch of cookies, this treatment doesn’t require scooping, baking and cooling multiple sheets of treats; the whole thing bakes at once in a single skillet. Plus, the hot bottom and...
‘Project Runway’ returns with twists, more cash to winner
PASADENA, Calif. (AP) — “Project Runway” is going home, back to its original network with several new twists. The biggest change is new host and executive producer Karlie Kloss, who takes over from the departed duo of Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn when the show debuts March 14 on Bravo....
Char Valley grads’ band ‘The Summercamp’ getting noticed
Four Chartiers Valley graduates and their buddy from Fox Chapel Area want you to come along with them to summer camp. It’s a place where everyone can be themselves and imagine where life will take them. The “camp counselors,” as they jokingly call themselves, are members of the indie pop...
Poetic Waxing (and Waning)
Our Book Club recently read various works by Edgar Allen Poe, including his poem “The Raven.” This led to a discussion of poetry in general and complaints about the awarding of the 2016 Nobel Prize for Literature to Bob Dylan for his song lyrics. In contradiction to the opinion of...
Get a Taste of Hampton this Saturday
Tickets are now available for the third annual Taste of Hampton party from 7 to 10 p.m. Feb. 2 at the Hampton Community Center on McCully Road in Allison Park. The Taste of Hampton is a celebration of food and community hosted by the nonprofit Hampton Community Association. Proceeds from...
Lifetime’s ‘Love You to Death’ delves into Munchausen syndrome by proxy
LOS ANGELES — It’s easy to judge the incidents that inspired the Lifetime movie “Love You to Death” as extreme cruelty and abuse. It’s a case of Munchausen syndrome by proxy when a mother forces her healthy young daughter to pretend she is ill so she can reap the rewards...
Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin: Closing schools for cold shows ‘we’re getting soft’
LEXINGTON, Ky. — Political rivals and educators took Gov. Matt Bevin to task this week, when he told a talk-radio host that canceling schools for cold weather is an indication that “we’re getting soft.” Bevin followed up the comment by saying that “it’s better to err on the side of...
Why Penn State basketball coach Pat Chambers isn’t worried about his job security
Mired in a seven-game losing streak and still seeking a Big Ten win this season, Pat Chambers isn’t worried about his job security. Even if the growing social media mob suggests he ought to be. “No one’s patting me on the shoulder saying, ‘You’re walking the plank.’ I don’t feel...
Ryan Crocker: The U.S. is surrendering to Taliban
January 2002. I arrive in Kabul, Afghanistan, to reopen the U.S. Embassy. Destruction is everywhere. Kabul airport is closed, its runways cratered and littered with destroyed aircraft. The drive south from the military base at Bagram is through a wasteland. Nothing grows. No structures stand. In the city itself, entire...
Steel Valley product Luke Getsy named Packers’ QB coach
GREEN BAY, Wis. — The Green Bay Packers are bringing back Luke Getsy, this time as their quarterbacks coach to work with Aaron Rodgers. Getsy, a former Pitt quarterback and a Steel Valley product, spent four seasons on former coach Mike McCarthy’s staff before leaving to become Mississippi State’s offensive...
S.E. Cupp: What has age of Trump wrought? People like Ocasio-Cortez
In the wake of his unprecedented campaign and unexpected election, the question always was: What would come after Donald Trump? What were the consequences of electing someone who was inexperienced, undeterred by and uninterested in facts and uncannily adept at whipping people into a frenzy by way of mere gesticulations...
Justice Department watchdog wants to investigate Alex Acosta’s plea deal with serial sex abuser
MIAMI — The U.S. Department of Justice’s inspector general urged Congress on Tuesday to allow him to investigate Alex Acosta — the former U.S. attorney in Miami whose controversial 2008 plea deal with a politically connected serial sex abuser has led to calls for Acosta to resign as secretary of...
What industry has seen pay fall below average in the most states? Public schools.
In a search for jobs which once paid well, but have fallen below average in most states, we considered hundreds of industries. Public schools stood out. In the early 1990s, when today’s veteran educators were starting out, public-school teachers and support staff pulled in above-average paychecks in 26 of the...
