| How is Japan readying itself against an unpredictable North Korea? Posted: 17 Mar 2017 02:39 PM PDT ![How is Japan readying itself against an unpredictable North Korea?]( "How is Japan readying itself against an unpredictable North Korea?") Residents of Japan's northwestern city of Ogo performed a civilian evacuation drill on Friday, the country's first, in preparation for a scenario in which ballistic missiles – launched by a country that went unnamed by the city's disaster authorities – were to fall close to shore. The exercise comes in response to a string of weapons tests by North Korea that have sent ballistic missiles into Japanese territorial waters in recent months, alarming authorities. Recommended: Think you know Japan?
|
| Why Tillerson’s tough talk on N. Korea was likely a message to China Posted: 17 Mar 2017 02:33 PM PDT ![Why Tillerson's tough talk on N. Korea was likely a message to China]( "Why Tillerson's tough talk on N. Korea was likely a message to China") Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's statement in South Korea Friday that military action against an increasingly threatening North Korea is "on the table" was rattling – and perhaps that was the intent. With Mr. Tillerson set for talks in Beijing Saturday, the point of raising the prospect of using force to address the North's advancing nuclear threat may have been as much to send a signal to the region as anything else. Recommended: How much do you know about China?
|
| Nine years after disaster, Fukushima to host 2020 Olympic baseball games Posted: 17 Mar 2017 02:31 PM PDT ![Nine years after disaster, Fukushima to host 2020 Olympic baseball games]( "Nine years after disaster, Fukushima to host 2020 Olympic baseball games") Fukushima, the prefecture that was hit by a tsunami-triggered nuclear disaster in March 2011, has been approved to host baseball and softball matches in the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics Games, organizers said on Friday. "By hosting Olympic baseball and softball events, Fukushima will have a great platform to show the world the extent of its recovery in the 10 years since the disaster," Mr. Mori said in a statement after the International Olympic Committee Executive Board gave a green light to the plan.
|
| New twist for deportation opponents: sanctuary in the streets Posted: 17 Mar 2017 12:50 PM PDT ![New twist for deportation opponents: sanctuary in the streets]( "New twist for deportation opponents: sanctuary in the streets") When the early morning distress call came, it took about 20 minutes for Peter Pedemonti and a group of some 70 members of a consortium of Philadelphia faith communities to gather downtown at the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement office to protest and pray. An undocumented immigrant had called their network's hotline as ICE agents arrived at his home to take him into custody. "It was intense," recalls Mr. Pedemonti, the co-founder and director of New Sanctuary Movement of Philadelphia.
|
| Does Trump's budget really propose gutting Meals on Wheels? Posted: 17 Mar 2017 12:35 PM PDT ![Does Trump's budget really propose gutting Meals on Wheels?]( "Does Trump's budget really propose gutting Meals on Wheels?") For many seniors, veterans, and people with disabilities, Meals on Wheels is a lifeline. "If it wasn't for Meals on Wheels, I would go hungry," Diane Burnett, a disabled woman in Los Angeles, told CBS Local, adding, "It's security. The suggestion that the program's federal funding would be axed under President Trump's budget proposal, released on Thursday, quickly sparked internet backlash.
|
| Tourists narrowly escape as Mount Etna spews molten rocks Posted: 17 Mar 2017 08:51 AM PDT ![Tourists narrowly escape as Mount Etna spews molten rocks]( "Tourists narrowly escape as Mount Etna spews molten rocks") Thirty-five tourists, their guides, and BBC film crew escaped serious injury after they were forced to turn and run down Sicily's Mount Etna, pelted from above by potentially deadly, searing debris. The group had come to witness one of the world's most frequently erupting volcanoes, when a phreatic explosion, caused when lava hit thick snow, sent up a billow of steam followed by "boiling rocks and boulders" that began raining debris on the group as it retreated through "whiteout" conditions, according to BBC journalist Rebecca Morelle, whose camera woman kept it rolling throughout the ordeal.
|
| Campuses take a stand when protests go too far Posted: 17 Mar 2017 08:28 AM PDT ![Campuses take a stand when protests go too far]( "Campuses take a stand when protests go too far") The students turned their backs. Unable to start his campus talk, libertarian Charles Murray was escorted by college officials to another room where his speech could be streamed on the internet. The March 2 confrontation at Middlebury College got worse.
|
| Through 32 years in prison, Andrew Wilson never lost hope Posted: 17 Mar 2017 06:58 AM PDT ![Through 32 years in prison, Andrew Wilson never lost hope]( "Through 32 years in prison, Andrew Wilson never lost hope") Wearing a broad smile and a Maroon Loyola Law School T-shirt, Andrew Leander Wilson emerged a free man for the first time in 32 years on Thursday, after serving time for a murder he says he never committed. Clasping the hands of his daughter and sister, he walked through the doors of the Los Angeles County Men's Central Jail into a sea of cameras and the applause of a group of law students who worked to free him. "Believe it or not, I think I'm all right upstairs," he said, adding that his mother Margie Davis of St. Louis had been his most strident advocate during his three decades behind bars.
|
| US rhetoric on North Korea shifts as Tillerson sets military action 'on the table' Posted: 17 Mar 2017 06:36 AM PDT ![US rhetoric on North Korea shifts as Tillerson sets military action 'on the table']( "US rhetoric on North Korea shifts as Tillerson sets military action 'on the table'") If North Korea escalates the threat to America and its allies in the region, the United States will not hesitate to push back, Rex Tillerson indicated on Friday. Speaking to a news conference in Seoul, South Korea, the secretary of State and former Exxon Mobil chief executive officer said the US government is prepared to do whatever it takes to deter a nuclear threat or threats to US and South Korean troops in the region. Ideally, a coordinated sanctions policy would be sufficient, he indicated, but military force is also a possibility.
|
| China enlists an unlikely ally in battling pollution: public activists Posted: 17 Mar 2017 06:33 AM PDT ![China enlists an unlikely ally in battling pollution: public activists]( "China enlists an unlikely ally in battling pollution: public activists") Duan Shumin is still getting used to her new surroundings on the outskirts of this city in Shandong province, some 200 miles south of Beijing. Factories that make everything from asphalt to xylitol, a sweetener used in gum, line the roads leading to the apartment she moved to last July. "This is an average day," Ms. Duan says while stopped at an intersection in her black SUV.
|
| What America without the NEA and NEH would look like, and why that matters Posted: 17 Mar 2017 03:24 AM PDT ![What America without the NEA and NEH would look like, and why that matters]( "What America without the NEA and NEH would look like, and why that matters") President Trump has said he wants to build American infrastructure – even as he proposes cutting funding for so-called cultural infrastructure. Four cultural federal organizations, including the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), have for years been the target of conservative critics. For arts and cultural groups across the country, the four agencies – although they account for only 0.02 percent of federal spending – have long been considered crucial in supporting outreach to underserved communities between the coasts, particularly in rural areas.
|
| GOP pushes 'economic terrorism' bills in 18 states to discourage protests Posted: 16 Mar 2017 04:09 PM PDT ![GOP pushes 'economic terrorism' bills in 18 states to discourage protests]( "GOP pushes 'economic terrorism' bills in 18 states to discourage protests") After watching protests erupt around the country against police shootings, tougher immigration laws, and the Trump administration, Arizona state Sen. John Kavanagh reportedly came to a conclusion: "This stuff is all planned" by "ideologues" and "anarchists," he told the Arizona Capitol Times. In response, Senator Kavanagh sponsored a bill patterned on the kind of racketeering laws usually reserved for the Mafia: Anyone involved in a protest could be guilty of a felony if things get out of control, "whether or not such person knows [the] identity" of the person actually breaking a law. Senate Republicans in Arizona voted in favor of Kavanagh's proposal, joining conservative lawmakers in some 18 states in moving forward tough new bills intended to curb what they see as lawlessness during a new age of demonstrations and street mobilization.
|
