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BETHESDA, Md. , Dec. 11, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) today announced its board of directors has elected Admiral John C. Aquilino , former commander of the United States Indo-Pacific Command, to the board, effective today. "Admiral Aquilino's service to the nation and extensive experience in complex, global operations, including in the Indo-Pacific, will bring valuable insight to the board," said Lockheed Martin Chairman, President and CEO Jim Taiclet. "His perspective as a leader and warfighter will enhance board oversight. We look forward to working with him as we continue to advance our 21st Century Security ® strategy to strengthen deterrence and create a more advanced, resilient and collaborative defense industrial base." Aquilino served as the 26th commander of the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, responsible for all U.S. military activities in the Indo-Pacific, from 2021 until his retirement as a four-star admiral in July 2024 . His previous assignments include serving as the Commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, the Commander of the U.S. Fifth Fleet and Naval Forces Central Command, and the Commander of Carrier Strike Group 2. Commissioned in 1984 following graduation from the U.S. Naval Academy , Aquilino has served as a fighter pilot in every geographic combatant command and participated in nearly every major military operation after his commissioning, including Operations Deliberate Force, Southern Watch, Enduring Freedom, Iraqi Freedom and Inherent Resolve. He is also a graduate of the Navy Fighter Weapons School (TOPGUN), Joint Forces Staff College and Harvard Kennedy School's executive education program in national and international security. Aquilino is considered an independent director under applicable rules and regulations and will serve on the Classified Business and Security Committee. About Lockheed Martin Lockheed Martin is a global defense technology company driving innovation and advancing scientific discovery. Our all-domain mission solutions and 21st Century Security ® vision accelerate the delivery of transformative technologies to ensure those we serve always stay ahead of ready. More information at LockheedMartin.com . View original content to download multimedia: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/lockheed-martin-elects-john-c-aquilino-to-board-of-directors-302329516.html SOURCE Lockheed MartinCruise into this holiday season with a non-traditional vacationAbercrombie & Fitch ANF has outperformed the market over the past 5 years by 39.72% on an annualized basis producing an average annual return of 53.31%. Currently, Abercrombie & Fitch has a market capitalization of $7.15 billion. Buying $1000 In ANF: If an investor had bought $1000 of ANF stock 5 years ago, it would be worth $8,484.24 today based on a price of $142.03 for ANF at the time of writing. Abercrombie & Fitch's Performance Over Last 5 Years Finally -- what's the point of all this? The key insight to take from this article is to note how much of a difference compounded returns can make in your cash growth over a period of time. This article was generated by Benzinga's automated content engine and reviewed by an editor. © 2024 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
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With Trump on the way, advocates look to states to pick up medical debt fightNoneBench, a Canada-based accounting startup that offered software-as-a-service for small and medium businesses, has abruptly shut down, according to a notice posted on its website . “We regret to inform you that as of December 27, 2024, the Bench platform will no longer be accessible,” the notice reads. “We know this news is abrupt and may cause disruption, so we’re committed to helping Bench customers navigate through the transition.” The company’s entire website is currently offline except for the notice, leaving thousands of businesses in the lurch. Bench touted having more than 35,000 U.S. customers just hours before it was shut down, according to a snapshot saved by the Internet Archive. Bench, which had raised $113 million from high-profile backers such as Shopify and Bain Capital Partners, developed a software platform to help customers store and manage their bookkeeping and tax reporting documents. The move is a shock to current and former customers. Justin Metros, the co-founder and CTO of Radiator , said years of his company’s accounting and tax documents are still stored on the site, although he no longer uses the platform. He learned about the shutdown from TechCrunch. “I’ve never seen anyone just shut down like that,” Metros said. “That’s crazy.” Others are airing their concerns on social media, with one posting “as a customer, I’m pissed” having just migrated from QuickBooks to Bench. Bench’s notice says its customers should file a 6-month extension with the IRS to “find the right bookkeeping partner.” It also says customers will be able to download their data by December 30, and will have until March 2025 to do so. The notice recommends customers migrate to Kick, a new accounting startup that announced its $9 million seed raise in October 2024 in a round led by OpenAI and General Catalyst. Kick’s CEO and founder, Conrad Wadowski, posted a message on LinkedIn to former Bench users about how Kick is “working to get your financials back in your hands.” Bench did not respond to requests for comment by TechCrunch as of press time. Wadowski did not respond directly to a question from TechCrunch about details of any possible agreement or other business relationship it had with Bench prior to the shutdown. “As you saw on the website, we’re moving fast and are available to support many of Bench’s customers with their bookkeeping needs,” he told TechCrunch. Founded in 2012, Bench employed more than 600 staff, according to a snapshot of its ‘About page’ . The startup was backed by investors, including IT firm Sage, Contour Venture Partners, and Altos Ventures. It was also a member of the TechStars accelerator. Bench last raised $60 million in a Series C round in 2021. Its co-founder and CEO Ian Crosby departed shortly after. Crosby posted on LinkedIn today that he was “very sad” to see Bench shut down, alleging he had been replaced by unnamed board members who wanted to bring in “a new professional CEO” to take Bench in a different direction. “I hope the story of Bench goes on to become a warning for VCs that think they can “upgrade” a company by replacing the founder. It never works,” Crosby wrote.
Israeli troops stormed one of the last hospitals operating in northern Gaza on Friday, igniting fires and forcing many staff and patients outside to strip in winter weather, the territory’s health ministry said. Kamal Adwan Hospital has been hit multiple times over the past three months by Israeli troops waging an offensive against Hamas fighters in surrounding neighborhoods, according to staff. The ministry said a strike on the hospital a day earlier killed five medical staff. Israel’s military said it was conducting operations against Hamas infrastructure and militants in the area of the hospital, without details. It repeated claims that Hamas fighters operate inside Kamal Adwan but provided no evidence. Hospital officials have denied that. The Health Ministry said troops forced medical personnel and patients to assemble in the yard and remove their clothes. Some were led to an unknown location, while some patients were sent to the nearby Indonesian Hospital, which was knocked out of operation after an Israel raid this week. Israeli troops during raids frequently carry out mass detentions, stripping men to their underwear for questioning in what the military says is a security measure as they search for Hamas fighters. The Associated Press doesn’t have access to Kamal Adwan, but armed plainclothes members of the Hamas-led police forces — tasked with keeping security and officially separate from the group’s armed wing — have been seen in other hospitals. The Health Ministry said Israeli troops also set fires in several parts of Kamal Adwan, including the lab and surgery department. It said 25 patients and 60 health workers remained in the hospital out of 75 patients and 180 staff who had been there. The account could not be independently confirmed, and attempts to reach hospital staff were unsuccessful. “Fire is ablaze everywhere in the hospital,” an unidentified member of the staff said in an audio message posted on the social media accounts of hospital director Hossam Abu Safiya. The staffer said some evacuated patients had been unhooked from oxygen. “There are currently patients who could die at any moment,” she said. A largely isolated north Since October, Israel’s offensive has virtually sealed off the northern Gaza areas of Jabaliya, Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya and leveled large parts of them. Tens of thousands of Palestinians were forced out but thousands are believed to remain in the area, where Kamal Adwan and two other hospitals are located. Troops raided Kamal Adwan in October, and on Tuesday troops stormed and evacuated the Indonesian Hospital. The area has been cut off from food and other aid for months , raising fears of famine. The U.N. says Israeli troops allowed just four humanitarian deliveries to the area from Dec. 1 to Dec. 23. The Israeli rights group Physicians for Human Rights-Israel this week petitioned Israel’s High Court of Justice seeking a halt to military attacks on Kamal Adwan. It warned that forcibly evacuating the hospital would “abandon thousands of residents in northern Gaza.” Before the latest deaths Thursday, the group documented five other staffers killed by Israeli fire since October. Israel launched its campaign in Gaza vowing to destroy Hamas after the group’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel in which militants killed around 1,200 people and abducted some 250 others. Around 100 Israelis remain captive in Gaza, around a third believed to be dead. Israel’s nearly 15-month-old campaign of bombardment and offensives has devastated the territory’s health sector. A year ago, it carried out raids on hospitals in northern Gaza, including Kamal Adwan, Indonesian and al-Awda Hospital, saying they served as bases for Hamas, though it presented little evidence. Israel’s campaign has killed more than 45,400 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, and wounded more than 108,000 others, according to the Health Ministry. Its count does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Deaths from the cold in Gaza More than 90% of Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians have been driven from their homes, most of them now sheltering in sprawling, squalid tent camps in south and central Gaza. Children and adults, many barefoot, huddled Friday on the cold sand in tents whose plastic and cloth sheets whipped in the wind. Overnight temperatures can dip into the 40s Fahrenheit (below 10 Celsius), and sea spray from the Mediterranean can dampen tents just steps away. “I swear to God, their mother and I cover ourselves with one blanket and we cover (their five children) with three blankets that we got from neighbors. Sea waters drowned everything that was ours,” said Muhammad al-Sous, displaced from Beit Lahiya in the north. The children collect plastic bottles to make fires, and pile under the blankets when their only set of clothes is washed and dried in the wind. At least three babies in Gaza have died from exposure to cold in recent days, doctors there have said. Khaled and Keath reported from Cairo. Wafaa Shurafa, Fatma Khaled And Lee Keath, The Associated Press
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MADISON, Wis. — Wisconsin public worker and teachers unions scored a major legal victory Monday with a ruling that restores collective bargaining rights they lost under a 2011 state law that sparked weeks of protests and made the state the center of the national battle over union rights. That law, known as Act 10, effectively ended the ability of most public employees to bargain for wage increases and other issues, and forced them to pay more for health insurance and retirement benefits. Under the ruling by Dane County Circuit Judge Jacob Frost, all public sector workers who lost their collective bargaining power would have it restored to what was in place prior to 2011. They would be treated the same as the police, firefighter and other public safety unions that were exempted under the law. Republicans vowed to immediately appeal the ruling, which ultimately is likely to go before the Wisconsin Supreme Court. That only amplifies the importance of the April election that will determine whether the court remains controlled 4-3 by liberal justices. Former Gov. Scott Walker, who proposed the law that catapulted him onto the national political stage, decried the ruling in a post on the social media platform X as “brazen political activism.” He said it makes the state Supreme Court election “that much more important.” Supporters of the law have said it provided local governments more control over workers and the powers they needed to cut costs. Repealing the law, which allowed schools and local governments to raise money through higher employee contributions for benefits, would bankrupt those entities, backers of Act 10 have argued. Democratic opponents argue that the law has hurt schools and other government agencies by taking away the ability of employees to collectively bargain for their pay and working conditions. Union leaders were overjoyed with the ruling, which affects tens of thousands of public employees. “We realize there may still be a fight ahead of us in the courts, but make no mistake, we’re ready to keep fighting until we all have a seat at the table again,” said Ben Gruber, a conservation warden and president of AFSCME Local 1215. The law was proposed by Walker and enacted by the Republican-controlled Legislature in spite of massive protests that went on for weeks and drew as many as 100,000 people to the Capitol. The law has withstood numerous legal challenges over the years, but this was the first brought since the Wisconsin Supreme Court flipped to liberal control in 2023. The seven unions and three union leaders that brought the lawsuit argued that the law should be struck down because it creates unconstitutional exemptions for firefighters and other public safety workers. Attorneys for the Legislature and state agencies countered that the exemptions are legal, have already been upheld by other courts, and that the case should be dismissed. But Frost sided with the unions in July, saying the law violates equal protection guarantees in the Wisconsin Constitution by dividing public employees into “general” and “public safety” employees. He ruled that general employee unions, like those representing teachers, can not be treated differently from public safety unions that were exempt from the law. His ruling Monday delineated the dozens of specific provisions in the law that must be struck. Wisconsin Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said he looked forward to appealing the ruling. “This lawsuit came more than a decade after Act 10 became law and after many courts rejected the same meritless legal challenges,” Vos said in a statement. Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, the state's largest business lobbying organization, also decried the ruling. WMC President Kurt Bauer called Act 10 “a critical tool for policymakers and elected officials to balance budgets and find taxpayer savings." The Legislature said in court filings that arguments made in the current case were rejected in 2014 by the state Supreme Court. The only change since that ruling is the makeup of Wisconsin Supreme Court, attorneys for the Legislature argued. The Act 10 law effectively ended collective bargaining for most public unions by allowing them to bargain solely over base wage increases no greater than inflation. It also disallowed the automatic withdrawal of union dues, required annual recertification votes for unions, and forced public workers to pay more for health insurance and retirement benefits. The law was the signature legislative achievement of Walker, who was targeted for a recall election he won. Walker used his fights with unions to mount an unsuccessful presidential run in 2016. Frost, the judge who issued Monday's ruling, appeared to have signed the petition to recall Walker from office. None of the attorneys sought his removal from the case and he did not step down. Frost was appointed to the bench by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, who signed the Walker recall petition. The law has also led to a dramatic decrease in union membership across the state. The nonpartisan Wisconsin Policy Forum said in a 2022 analysis that since 2000, Wisconsin had the largest decline in the proportion of its workforce that is unionized. In 2015, the GOP-controlled Wisconsin Legislature approved a right-to-work law that limited the power of private-sector unions. Public sector unions that brought the lawsuit are the Abbotsford Education Association; the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Locals 47 and 1215; the Beaver Dam Education Association; SEIU Wisconsin; the Teaching Assistants’ Association Local 3220 and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 695.
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