07-27-2024  8:44 am   •   PDX and SEA Weather

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4

NORTHWEST NEWS

People Flee Idaho Town Through a Tunnel of Fire and Smoke as Western Wildfires Spread

Multiple communities in Idaho have been evacuated after lightning strikes sparked fast-moving wildfires.  As that and other blazes scorch the Pacific Northwest, authorities say California's largest wildfire is zero-percent contained after destroying 134 structures and threatening 4,200 more. A sheriff says it was started by a man who pushed a burning car into a gully. Officials say they have arrested a 42-year-old man who will be arraigned Monday.

Word is Bond Takes Young Black Leaders to Ghana

“Transformative” trip lets young travelers visit painful slave history, celebrate heritage.

Wildfires Threaten Communities in the West as Oregon Fire Closes Interstate, Creates Its Own Weather

Firefighters in the West are scrambling as wildfires threaten communities in Oregon, California and Washington. A stretch of Interstate 84 connecting Oregon and Idaho in the area of one of the fires was closed indefinitely Tuesday. New lightning-sparked wildfires in the Sierra near the California-Nevada border forced the evacuation of a recreation area, closed a state highway and were threatening structures Tuesday.

In Washington State, Inslee's Final Months Aimed at Staving off Repeal of Landmark Climate Law

Voters in Washington state will decide this fall whether to keep one of the country's more aggressive laws aimed at stemming carbon pollution. The repeal vote imperils the most significant climate policy passed during outgoing Gov. Jay Inslee's three terms, and Inslee — who made climate action a centerpiece of his short-lived presidential campaign in the 2020 cycle — is fighting hard against it. 

NEWS BRIEFS

Iconic Elm Tree in Downtown Celebrated Before Emergency Removal

The approximately 154-year-old tree has significant damage and declining health following recent storms ...

Hawthorne Bridge Westbound Closes Thursday for Repairs

Westbound traffic lanes will close 2 p.m. Thursday, July 25, through 5 a.m. Friday, July 26 ...

Oregon Senate Democrats Unanimously Endorse Kamala Harris for President

Today, in unified support for Kamala Harris as president of the United States, all 17 Oregon Senate Democrats officially...

Dr. Vinson Eugene Allen and Dusk to Dawn Urgent Care Make a Historical Mark as the First African American Owned Chain of Urgent Care Facilities in the United States

Dusk to Dawn Urgent Care validated as the First African American Owned Urgent Care in the nation with chain locations ...

Washington State Black Legislators Endorse Kamala Harris for President

Members of the Washington State Legislative Black Caucus (LBC) are proud to announce their enthusiastic endorsement of Vice President...

California's largest wildfire explodes in size as fires rage across US West

California's largest active fire exploded in size on Friday evening, growing rapidly amid bone-dry fuel and threatening thousands of homes as firefighters scrambled to meet the danger. The Park Fire's intensity and dramatic spread led fire officials to make unwelcome comparisons to...

Life and death in the heat. What it feels like when Earth's temperatures soar to record highs

BENI MELLAL, Morocco (AP) — In the unrelenting heat of Morocco’s Middle Atlas, people were sleeping on rooftops. Hanna Ouhbour needed refuge too, but she was outside a hospital waiting for her diabetic cousin who was in a room without air conditioning. On Wednesday, there were 21...

Chiefs set deadline of 6 months to decide whether to renovate Arrowhead or build new — and where

ST. JOSEPH, Mo. (AP) — The Chiefs have set a deadline of six months from now to decide on a plan for the future of Arrowhead Stadium, whether that means renovating their iconic home or building an entirely new stadium in Kansas or Missouri. After a joint ballot initiative with the...

Missouri governor says new public aid plan in the works for Chiefs, Royals stadiums

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri Gov. Mike Parson said Thursday that he expects the state to put together an aid plan by the end of the year to try to keep the Kansas City Chiefs and Royals from being lured across state lines to new stadiums in Kansas. Missouri's renewed efforts...

OPINION

The 900-Page Guide to Snuffing Out American Democracy

What if there was a blueprint for a future presidential administration to unilaterally lay waste to our constitutional order and turn America from a democracy into an autocracy in one fell swoop? That is what one far-right think tank and its contributors...

SCOTUS Decision Seizes Power to Decide Federal Regulations: Hard-Fought Consumer Victories Now at Risk

For Black and Latino Americans, this power-grab by the court throws into doubt and potentially weakens current agency rules that sought to bring us closer to the nation’s promises of freedom and justice for all. In two particular areas – fair housing and...

Minding the Debate: What’s Happening to Our Brains During Election Season

The June 27 presidential debate is the real start of the election season, when more Americans start to pay attention. It’s when partisan rhetoric runs hot and emotions run high. It’s also a chance for us, as members of a democratic republic. How? By...

State of the Nation’s Housing 2024: The Cost of the American Dream Jumped 47 Percent Since 2020

Only 1 in 7 renters can afford homeownership, homelessness at an all-time high ...

AFRICAN AMERICANS IN THE NEWS

Apache Christ icon controversy sparks debate over Indigenous Catholic faith practices

MESCALERO, New Mexico (AP) — Anne Marie Brillante never imagined she would have to choose between being Apache and being Catholic. To her, and many others in the Mescalero Apache tribe in New Mexico who are members of St. Joseph Apache Mission, their Indigenous culture had always...

Japan's Sado gold mine gains UNESCO status after Tokyo pledges to exhibit dark WWII history

TOKYO (AP) — The UNESCO World Heritage committee on Saturday decided to register Japan’s controversial Sado gold mine as a cultural heritage site after the country agreed to include it in an exhibit of its dark history of abusing Korean laborers during World War II. The decision...

California date palm ranches reap not only fruit, but a permit to host weddings and quinceañeras

COACHELLA, Calif. (AP) — Claudia Lua Alvarado has staked her future on the rows of towering date palms behind the home where she lives with her husband and two children in a desert community east of Los Angeles. It’s not solely due to the fleshy, sweet fruit they give each year....

ENTERTAINMENT

Educators wonder how to teach the writings of Alice Munro in wake of daughter's revelations

NEW YORK (AP) — For decades, Robert Lecker has read, taught and written about Alice Munro, the Nobel laureate from Canada renowned for her short stories. A professor of English at McGill University in Montreal, and author of numerous critical studies of Canadian fiction, he has thought of Munro...

Adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s ‘Nickel Boys’ to open New York Film Festival this fall

“Nickel Boys,” an adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, will open the 62nd New York Film Festival in September, organizers said Monday. Filmmaker RaMell Ross directed the drama based on the 2019 novel about two Black teenagers in an abusive reform school...

Hikers and cyclists can now cross Vermont on New England's longest rail trail, a year after floods

HARDWICK, Vt. (AP) — A year after epic summer flooding delayed the official opening of New England’s longest rail trail, the 93-mile route across northern Vermont is finally delivering on the promise made years ago of a cross-state recreation trail. The Lamoille Valley Rail Trail...

U.S. & WORLD NEWS

Southeast Asia top diplomats condemn Myanmar violence, urge peaceful means to settle sea disputes

VIENTIANE, Laos (AP) — Southeast Asian top diplomats on Saturday condemned violence in Myanmar's ongoing civil...

Should you stretch before exercise? After? Never? Here’s what to know

For many people of a certain age, high school gym class began with reaching for their toes. Then, over the years,...

FBI says Trump was indeed struck by bullet during assassination attempt

WASHINGTON (AP) — Nearly two weeks after Donald Trump’s near assassination, the FBI confirmed Friday that it...

UK drops plans to challenge ICC arrest warrant request against Benjamin Netanyahu

LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office said Friday that the U.K. will not intervene in the...

Japan's Sado gold mine gains UNESCO status after Tokyo pledges to exhibit dark WWII history

TOKYO (AP) — The UNESCO World Heritage committee on Saturday decided to register Japan’s controversial Sado...

Southeast Asia top diplomats condemn Myanmar violence, urge peaceful means to settle sea disputes

VIENTIANE, Laos (AP) — Southeast Asian top diplomats on Saturday condemned violence in Myanmar's ongoing civil...

Karen Matthews the Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) -- Protesters speaking out against corporate greed and other issues showed no signs of giving up their campaign on Monday, with organizers urging participants to dress up as corporate zombies and to take part in a rally against police brutality.

The arrests of 700 people on Brooklyn Bridge over the weekend fueled the anger of the protesters camping in a Manhattan park and sparked support elsewhere in the country as the campaign entered its third week.

Occupy Wall Street started with fewer than a dozen college students spending days and nights in Zuccotti Park, a plaza near the city's financial center. But a day after Saturday's mass arrests, hundreds of protesters were resolute and like-minded groups in other cities had joined in.

Group spokesman Patrick Bruner urged protesters on Monday to dress up as corporate zombies and eat Monopoly money to let financial workers "see us reflecting the metaphor of their actions."

As the encampment slowly began waking up Monday morning, several dozen police officers stood in formation across the street.

One camper set up a table with tubes of makeup and stacks of fake money and was applying white makeup to the face of a young woman.

John Hildebrand, 24, an unemployed teacher from Norman, Okla., sat up in his sleeping bag around 10 a.m.

He said he arrived Saturday after getting a cheap plane ticket to New York.

"My issue is corporate influence in politics," he said. "I would like to eliminate corporate financing from politics."

He said was returning home on Tuesday and planned to organize a similar protest there.

One supporter, William Stack, sent an email to city officials urging that all charges be dropped against those arrested.

"It is not a crime to demand that our money be spent on meeting people's needs, not for massive corporate bailouts," he wrote. "The real criminals are in the boardrooms and executive offices on Wall Street, not the people marching for jobs, health care, and a moratorium on foreclosures."

Police said the department will continue its regular patrols of the area. And "as always, if it is a lawful demonstration, we help facilitate and if they break the law we arrest them," NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said.

Wiljago Cook, 33, of Oakland, Calif., who joined the protest on the first day, said "exposing police brutality wasn't even really on my agenda but my eyes have been opened."

She and her boyfriend and two neighbors all quit their jobs to come and planned "to stay as long as it seems useful," said Cook, who had worked for a nonprofit theater group.

She was wearing zombie makeup that included a red streak down her forehead. "It's a cheeky and fun way to make the same point that we've been making," Cook said of her painted face.

A map of the country displayed on the plaza identified 21 places where other protests were organized.

Wall-Street style demonstrations with names like Occupy Los Angeles, Occupy Chicago, and Occupy Boston were staged in front of Federal Reserve buildings in those cities. A group in Columbus, Ohio, also marched on the capital city's street. And signs of support were rearing up outside the U.S. In Canada, a Wall Street rally is planned for later this month in Toronto.

"It was chaos here" two weeks ago, said Jackie Fellner, a marketing manager from Westchester County, north of the city.

Campers take turns organizing a "general assembly" on the plaza where they divide tasks among themselves. They have "a protocol for most things," said 19-year-old Kira Moyer-Sims of Portland, Ore., including a makeshift hospital and getting legal help for people who are arrested. They rally around a website called OccupyWallSt.org, and they even started printing a newspaper - the Occupied Wall Street Journal.

The campers also have been fueled by encouraging words from well-known figures, the latest actor Alec Baldwin, who posted videos on his Twitter page that had already been widely circulated. One appeared to show police using pepper spray on a group of women, another a young man being tackled to the ground by an officer.

"This is unsettling," Baldwin wrote. "I think the NYPD has a PR problem."

Fellner said she has an issue with "big money dictating which politicians get elected and what programs get funded."

But "we're not here to take down Wall Street," she insisted. "It's not poor against rich."

Still, the protesters chose Wall Street as their physical rallying point, speaking against corporate greed, social inequality, global climate change and other concerns.

Beside the mass arrest Saturday, police arrested about 100 people Sept. 24 when protesters marched to other parts of the city and got into a tense standoff with officers.

Some said protesters on the Brooklyn Bridge were lured onto the roadway by police, or they didn't hear the calls from authorities to head to the pedestrian walkway. Police said no one was tricked into being arrested, and that those in the back of the group who couldn't hear were allowed to leave.

The NYPD released video footage Sunday to back up its stance. In one of the videos, an official uses a bullhorn to warn the crowd. Marchers can be seen chanting, "Take the bridge."

© 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.