Former astronaut, US Sen. John Glenn is hospitalized in Ohio
Former astronaut, US Sen. John Glenn is hospitalized in Ohio
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — An Ohio State official says former astronaut and U.S. Sen. John Glenn has been hospitalized for more than a week.
Hank Wilson with Ohio State University’s John Glenn College of Public Affairs said Wednesday that the 95-year-old Glenn is at the James Cancer Hospital, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he has cancer.
Wilson said he didn’t have other information about Glenn’s condition, illness or prognosis.
Glenn apologized for his poor eyesight this year at the renaming of Columbus’ airport after him. He said then he’d lost some of his eyesight because of macular degeneration and a small stroke. Glenn had a heart valve replacement in 2014.
Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth in 1962. He served as a U.S. senator from Ohio from 1974 to 1999.
Syrian government advances despite rebel cease-fire offer
BEIRUT (AP) — Syria’s government ignored a rebel cease-fire proposal for Aleppo on Wednesday as its forces captured new neighborhoods around the city center and squeezed some 200,000 tired and frightened civilians into a shattered and rapidly shrinking opposition enclave.
Facing a punishing and brutal defeat, rebel factions proposed a five-day cease-fire for the eastern parts of the city to evacuate the wounded and civilians wishing to flee.
“The artillery shelling is non-stop,” a resident told The Associated Press by messaging service. He asked to conceal his name out of fear for his safety.
“The humanitarian situation is really tough. There are corpses on the streets. … There is very little food. Bread is distributed every two or three days, six pieces per family. That’s small, not enough for breakfast,” he said.
Government officials had not directly addressed the rebel proposal by the evening.
Trump on the attack against ‘SNL’ again
NEW YORK (AP) — The chief critic-elect of “Saturday Night Live,” Donald Trump, is bashing the show and impersonator Alec Baldwin again — this time prodded into action Wednesday by NBC’s own Matt Lauer.
The president-elect called the late-night institution unfunny and Baldwin’s portrayal of him mean-spirited, suggesting “Saturday Night Live” wasn’t long for the world. Trump — who appeared as guest host on “SNL” in November 2015 — has grumbled in tweets about the show three times since October, most recently last weekend after Baldwin and Kate McKinnon appeared in a skit about his Twitter habit.
Trump’s frequent tweeting was raised by Lauer in a telephone interview on the “Today” show following Time magazine’s selection of the president-elect as its Person of the Year.
“Can we agree, President-elect Trump, that it would be better for you to simply stop watching ‘SNL’ as opposed to watching and then complaining about it?” Lauer said.
His question was no ad-lib, since NBC quickly aired clips of the Baldwin-McKinnon sketch as Trump replied.
Raging Oakland warehouse fire trapped victims in smoke
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — The fire that killed 36 people during a party at an Oakland warehouse started on the ground floor and quickly raged, with smoke billowing into the second level and trapping victims whose only escape route was through the flames, federal investigators said Wednesday.
“The occupants were consumed by smoke before they could get out of the building,” said Jill Snyder, special agent in charge of the San Francisco office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Officials previously said recovery efforts at the site had ended with the death toll remaining at 36.
Snyder reiterated that investigators were examining a refrigerator and other possibilities as a potential source of the fire but had not reached any conclusions. Investigators have not found evidence of arson, but she said they have also not ruled it out.
Snyder did not give a timeline for the completion of the investigation.
Renzi quits; search on for new leader to guide Italy to vote
ROME (AP) — Italian Premier Matteo Renzi resigned Wednesday evening, his self-inflicted penalty for staking his job on constitutional changes voters resoundingly rejected earlier in the week. He will stay in a caretaker’s role at the request of Italy’s president until a new government can be formed.
Renzi had first offered his resignation on Monday, shortly after voters rejected the constitutional reforms his center-left government had championed. President Sergio Mattarella, Italy’s head of state, told him to stay in office until Parliament completed approval of the 2017 national budget.
A few hours after the budget was passed on Wednesday, Renzi returned to the Quirinal presidential palace. This time, Mattarella accepted the resignation of the man who in February 2014 became Italy’s youngest premier at age 39.
A presidential palace official, Ugo Zampetti, told reporters that Mattarella would begin consultations Thursday with the heads of Parliament’s two chambers, as well as with former President Giorgio Napolitano.
After hearing out minor parties on Friday, Mattarella on Saturday plans to take proposals from the major players, including the Democratic Party that Renzi leads and the populist 5-Star Movement, Parliament’s No. 1 and No. 2 parties respectively.