blackjack vs baccarat
blackjack vs baccarat
blackjack vs baccarat
Find the links between the words to win today's game of Connections. Looking for Thursday’s Connections hints and answers instead? You can find them here: Hey there! I hope you’ve recovered from yesterday’s game. That was a humdinger. Without spoiling too much, today’s grid is a return to normality. Before we get started, I’ve started a discussion group for Connections and this column on Discord . You can chat about each game (and other topics) with me and other folks. I’m always curious how other people approach the game, so join us! It’ll be fun. It’s also the best way to give me any feedback about the column, especially on the rare(!) occasions that I mess something up. Today’s NYT Connections hints and answers for Friday, December 13, are coming right up. iOS 18.2—Update Now Warning Issued To All iPhone Users Microsoft Warns 400 Million Windows Users—Do Not Update Your PC Selena Gomez And Benny Blanco Are Engaged—And The Internet Has Opinions How To Play Connections Connections is a free, popular New York Times daily word game. You get a new puzzle at midnight every day. You can play on the NYT website or Games app. You’re presented with a grid of 16 words. Your task is to arrange them into four groups of four by figuring out the links between them. The groups could be things like items you can click, names for research study participants or words preceded by a body part. There’s only one solution for each puzzle, and you’ll need to be careful when it comes to words that might fit into more than one category. You can shuffle the words to perhaps help you see links between them. Each group is color coded. The yellow group is usually the easiest to figure out, blue and green fall in the middle, and the purple group is usually the most difficult one. The purple group often involves wordplay. Select four words you think go together and press Submit. If you make a guess and you’re incorrect, you’ll lose a life. If you’re close to having a correct group, you might see a message telling you that you’re one word away from getting it right, but you’ll still need to figure out which one to swap. If you make four mistakes, it’s game over. Let’s make sure that doesn’t happen with the help of some hints, and, if you’re really struggling, today’s Connections answers. As with Wordle and other similar games, it’s easy to share results with your friends on social media and group chats. If you have an NYT All Access or Games subscription, you can access the publication’s Connections archive. This includes every previous game of Connections , so you can go back and play any of those that you have missed. Aside from the first 60 games or so, you should be able to find my hints for each grid via Google if you need them! Just click here and add the date of the game for which you need clues or the answers to the search query. What Are Today’s Connections Hints? Scroll slowly! Just after the hints for each of today’s Connections groups, I’ll reveal what the groups are without immediately telling you which words go into them. Today’s 16 words are... And the hints for today’s Connections groups are: What Are Today’s Connections Groups? Need some extra help? Be warned: we’re starting to get into spoiler territory. Today’s Connections groups are... What Are Today’s Connections Answers? Spoiler alert! Don’t scroll any further down the page until you’re ready to find out today’s Connections answers. This is your final warning! Today’s Connections answers are... That's my third loss in a row. Yikes! Here's how I fared: 🟪🟩🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟨🟨🟨🟨 🟪🟦🟦🟦 🟪🟦🟪🟦 🟦🟦🟦🟪 There was a bit of an internet/email theme here today, given the likes of TRASH, PHISH, TROLL, SPAM, LINKS, DRAFTS and SENT. So I figured I'd go with a "types of email" guess of PHISH, SPAM, DRAFTS and SENT. I was one away. I had a hunch that PHISH was the outlier and, sure enough, I had the greens. The yellows were then easy to spot on the rearranged grid. The game then pushed CRUSH and SQUIRT together on the right-hand side. I thought that might lead to a group of Finding Nemo characters (those are two of the turtles Nemo and Dory ride a current with). I didn't see any other obvious character names, so I tried SPRITE and PHISH. That put me one away from a group. There was only one other present tense verb left, so I swapped out SPRITE for BORE. No dice. I didn't have it, so I tried swapping PHISH for TOWED, but that didn't work either. I've never heard of SQUIRT and STARRY sodas and I am only vaguely familiar with CRUSH. I probably should have figured out the purples though. As soon as I saw PHISH, I thought that I should keep all three meanings in mind: the animal homophone, the band and the social engineering attack. But, uh, I forgot all about that by the end. For those who are curious, the purples refer to boar (BORE), lynx (LINKS), fish (PHISH) and toad (TOWED). That’s all there is to it for today’s Connections clues and answers. Be sure to check my blog for hints and the solution for Saturday’s game if you need them. P.S. I had a different recommendation planned, but I'll save that for another day now that I've got Finding Nemo on the brain. What a gorgeous, brilliant film that is. I loved it at the theater and it was the first Blu-ray I watched on my first high-def TV. Weirdly, I can't find a good official HD version of the original trailer on YouTube, so here's one for the 3D re-release: Have a great day! Call someone you love! If you’re so inclined, please do follow my blog for more coverage of Connections and other word games and even some video game news, insights and analysis. It helps me out a lot! Also, follow me on Bluesky ! It’s fun there.
Hollywood star slams Welsh arts cuts as 'stabbing'A good host will adapt with grace
Service Robotics Market to Grow by USD 90.41 Billion (2024-2028), Driven by Robotic Automation Demand, Report Highlights AI-Powered Market Evolution - TechnavioKamala Harris could count on winning California’s 54 electoral college votes as she campaigned for president, and the state’s voters delivered. In fact, California’s electoral votes were almost a quarter of the 226 she won nationwide, 44 short of what she needed to defeat Donald Trump. Simultaneously, however, Harris’s party fell short of regaining control of the House of Representatives, thanks in part to failing to flip as many seats in California as party leaders, such as Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi, had hoped. Those outcomes illustrate the powerful role that the nation’s most populous state plays in determining who controls the federal government. Looking ahead, however, California’s clout in both presidential and congressional elections — and therefore in the rooms where post-election policy decisions are made — is shrinking. It’s a stark reminder of the old adage that demography drives destiny. California experienced strong population growth for the first 150 years of the state’s existence, largely due to migration from other states and nations and a high birthrate. The state’s decades-long expansion reached a high point in the 1980s when its population exploded by more than 25%, from 23.8 million to 30 million, due to strong foreign immigration and a new baby boom. There was a newborn every minute. The decade’s population growth granted it seven new congressional seats after the 1990 census, increasing from 45 to 52. In 1992, Bill Clinton claimed the state’s 54 electoral votes, becoming only the fourth Democrat to win the state in the 20th century. Democratic nominees have continued to win California’s electoral votes in every presidential election since, but they could no longer count on a new harvest every decade. Population growth began to slow in the late 1990s, thanks largely to out-migration of Southern California aerospace workers and their families as defense spending dried up after the breakup of the Soviet Union. It gained one seat after the 2000 census, but population growth stagnated during the 2010 decade, with a net increase of 2.4 million, just 10% of what occurred in the 1980s. The state lost a congressional seat after the 2020 census, so California now has 52 districts. The COVID-19 pandemic and other factors, such as a declining birthrate and increasing death rate, have led to population stagnation since then. “California lost 433,000 people between July 2020 and July 2023,” the Public Policy Institute of California calculated. “Most of the loss occurred during the first year of the pandemic and was driven by a sharp rise in residents moving to other states. But fewer births, higher deaths and lower international migration also played a role.” Related Articles Opinion Columnists | Here’s to hoping Trump delivers on some of his Libertarian promises Opinion Columnists | Grand DOGE promises of massive cuts to the federal government are unlikely to materialize Opinion Columnists | Republican populism goes all in for the Nanny State Opinion Columnists | After botched Gaetz nomination, Trump should pivot on Cabinet picks Opinion Columnists | $165 billion revenue error continues to haunt California’s budget That’s where we are now: roughly 39 million, a bit under the 2020 census number. But the future looks like slow growth at best, which means the state will likely lose four or more congressional seats, and therefore electoral votes, after the 2030 census. A 2023 analysis by the liberal Brennan Center estimated that California will lose four seats, while the conservative American Redistricting Project pegged the likely loss at five seats. It’s a major chunk of a wider shift of population, congressional seats and electoral votes from blue states — New York will also be a big loser — to red states such as Texas and Florida, whose economies are growing smartly and where housing is affordable. By either 2030 projection, were the 2032 Democratic nominee for president to carry the same states that Harris did this year, he or she would win 12 fewer electoral votes. Demography is destiny. Dan Walters is a CalMatters columnist.
Market darling LTR Pharma raises new equity; two brokers on ticket
WASHINGTON — The House passed a bill Thursday that would create dozens of new federal district court judgeships for the first time in decades, although the Biden administration has threatened to veto it. Supporters of the legislation, which passed the House 236-173 on Thursday and the Senate via unanimous consent in August, say the bill is aimed at addressing case backlogs in the federal court system. The measure would add 63 permanent positions to the federal judiciary and three temporary positions. The permanent positions would be created in phases between 2025 and 2035. In total, 207 House Republicans and 29 House Democrats voted for the measure. Members of both parties agreed the federal judiciary needs more judges. But the timing of the vote drew opposition from the Biden administration and some House Democrats, who said Republicans were playing political games by refusing to bring the bill up for a floor vote until after the November general election. By waiting to vote on the bill until after the election, there is no longer uncertainty over which presidential candidate would get to appoint the first two tranches of judgeships, which would come in 2025 and 2027, Democrats argued. New York Rep. Jerrold Nadler, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, argued that when the bill arrived in the House, Republican leadership refused to touch it. “If Republican leadership had brought the bill to the House floor in September, we could have passed it on suspension in no time,” Nadler said. “Back then, the president would still have been unknown, and the underlying promise of the bill was still present.” Speaking on the floor, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., acknowledged the bill would have passed by unanimous consent had it been brought up sooner. “I apologize to everyone here for the hour we’re taking for something that we should have done before” the election, he said. But Issa said it would only be “pettiness today if we were to not do this because of who got to be first.” He compared the situation to a coin flip at the start of a football game, where the flip winner gets to decide whether they kick or receive the ball. “Afterwards, it will go back and forth for a very long time. This is a very long time, and we should be the long thinkers on the most permanent body in government,” Issa said. Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, said on the floor that sudden opposition to the bill from Democrats was “nothing more than childish foot-stomping.” The Biden administration threatened to veto the bill earlier this week, saying in a statement of administration policy that the bill is “unnecessary to the efficient and effective administration of justice.” The statement said the bill would add new judgeships in states where senators “have sought to hold open existing judicial vacancies.” “Further, the Senate passed this bill in August, but the House refused to take it up until after the election,” the statement read. Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Ga., said when the bill arrived in the House, Republican leadership injected politics into the legislation. He argued bringing the bill to the floor until after the election isn’t fair. “You don’t get to pick the horse after that horse has already won the race, but that’s exactly what my Republican colleagues are seeking to do today,” he said. Issa weighed in after Johnson’s speech. “We often hear the term here in the House and throughout our country: ‘country before party.’ It’s clear we didn’t hear that here yet today on the other side of the aisle,” Issa said. Congress has added a relatively smaller number of district court judgeships since 1990, created using appropriations or authorization bills, but the federal courts say they need much more based on an increase in caseload over the years. The Judicial Conference in 2023 called for 66 new district court judges and seven temporary judges to be made permanent. Gabe Roth, the executive director of Fix the Court, said in press releases that Biden should reconsider his veto threat given “the bill’s bipartisan origins, its broad support among Democratic judicial appointees and its importance to Delaware, whose federal court would get two new judgeships — a 50 percent increase.” “As someone who’s worked for years on adding judgeships, I know how difficult it is to get to the right formula of which judgeships to add when, how much money is needed for appropriations and when in an election cycle to move legislation,” Roth said. “We finally had each of these things in place and now comes a veto threat? That’s a slap in the face to our overworked federal judges, Democratic and Republican appointees alike, who say they desperately need the help,” Roth said.
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Mumbai: MahaYuti comprising BJP, Shiv Sena NCP has not only recorded a landslide victory but its development plank with an assurance of continuity in governance convinced voters. Barely five months after the dismal performance in the Lok Sabha elections, the five major factors that helped MahaYuti to score major victory include Ladki Bahin Yojana and other welfare and development schemes, RSS’ planning and Batenge To Katenge slogan, hard work by Devendra Fadnavis, aggressive campaign to counter opposition’s communal and divisive politics and promise to increase the pace of state’s development by carrying out a slew of infrastructure projects and keeping the state’s most favour destination status intact. Voters thereby preferred MahaYuti over Maha Vikas Aghadi. Ladaki Baheen Yojana Plays A Major Role Ladaki Baheen Yojana played a major role in the victory of MahaYuti. The Grand Alliance government changed the picture by introducing this scheme four months before the elections. More than 2.36 crore women got Rs 7,500 (Rs 1,500 each from July to November) with the assurance to increase the financial aid to Rs 2,100 and later to Rs 3,000 per month. Due to the flawless implementation of the scheme, women's faith in the MahaYuti increased. In Madhya Pradesh too, BJP got success with the Ladli Bahna scheme. The BJP had accused Congress-ruled Karnataka, Telangana, and Himachal Pradesh of failing to implement welfare schemes. The opposition, especially the Congress, could not respond to this. BJP Makes Meticulous Planning For Maharashtra Assembly Elections After the shock in the Lok Sabha results, the BJP made meticulous planning in Maharashtra ahead of the assembly election. RSS and its affiliated organisations united and implemented the 'Sajag Raho' campaign (Remain Alert) appealing to the voters to vote and increase the voting percentage. It got a big response in the cities, but in the rural areas, it was clear from the results that the preachers stood with all their might in favour of the BJP. Slogans like 'Batenge to Katenge' and 'EkHai to Seif Hai' stirred the state. BJP and MahaYuti leaders cornered the Congress party to play appeasement politics, especially after its support to Ulema over the reservation to the Muslim community. The Congress and Maha Vikas Aghadi tried to counter the Batenge To Katenge and Muslim reservation issue but failed to get voters’ support. In urban-rural areas, Hindu voters stood behind the MahaYuti across castes. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Aditynath was the first to give the Batenge to Katenge slogan that helped the BJP to aggressively lure Hindu voters. Significance Of The Role Played By Maharashtra Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis BJP won 84 per cent of the seats it contested. The role played by DCM Devendra Fadnavis was quite crucial in BJP’s victory and increase in its strike rate. The pro-Maratha reservation activist Manoj Jarange Patil consistently targeted Fadnavis but instead of replying to him, the latter reminded the Maratha community voters that during his tenure as the state chief minister the state government had provided reservation in jobs and education to the Maratha community. His meticulous planning in the selection of candidates and campaigning yielded positive results for BJP. After Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah hinted that Fadnavis would be the next chief minister, Jarange stepped up attacks against Fadnavis. Jarange-Patil held meetings with Muslim, Dalit, and Maratha leaders to checkmate the BJP but it worked in favour of the BJP and MahaYuti to garner votes from OBCs. Moreover, urban voters overwhelmingly supported BJP and MahaYuti for undertaking a slew of infrastructure projects worth over Rs 8 lakh crore. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s MahaYuti Jithe Ahe Tithe Pragati Ahe (where there is MahaYuti there is progress) call created magic as urban voters voted for MahaYuti in a big way. Nearly, 40 per cent of the seats in the state are urban-semi-urban of which 95 per cent were won by the MahaYuti. The effective marketing of projects like Samruddhi Marg, Atal Setu, Mumbai Coastal Road, and Metro projects worked wonders for the MahaYuti. The mega victory has boosted the BJP and MahaYuti especially ahead of civic and local body elections as they will make every effort to consolidate their positions. On the other hand, the Maha Vikas Aghadi faces a tough challenge to stay relevant in state politics and counter the BJP-centric politics. (Except for the headline, this article has not been edited by FPJ's editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)
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North Carolina interviews Bill Belichick for head coaching job, AP sources say
FDA Accepts Ascendis Pharma’s Supplemental Biologics License Application for TransConTM hGH for the Treatment of Adults with Growth Hormone DeficiencyDiversity statements will no longer be used in University of Michigan faculty hiring, promotion and tenure, a move applauded by critics who have called the practice "litmus tests" that limit diversity of thought while diversity advocates said the process was "preordained" and dishonest. Provost Laurie McCauley announced the decision Thursday based on a recommendation from a UM faculty working group to end diversity statements. But the recommendation is "deceptive," coming after the regents rejected a previous recommendation to keep the diversity statements, a faculty leader said. Diversity statements are documents written by faculty job candidates that let applicants explain to a search committee the distinct experiences they would bring to the university along with their commitment to diversity. The statements help search committees identify applicants "who have professional skills, experience and/or willingness to engage in activities that would enhance campus diversity and equity efforts," according to a University of California at San Diego statement referenced by UM's Center for Research on Learning & Teaching. McCauley's announcement came hours before the Board of Regents is scheduled to meet and a protest is planned beforehand at UM President Santa Ono's house. Many in the UM community are concerned the regents may dismantle a multimillion dollar diversity, equity and inclusion effort built after the school was at the center of a decade-long national debate around affirmative action in higher education, and DEI programs have been under attack across the nation.. "Diversity, equity and inclusion are three of our core values at the university," McCauley said in the University Record, an internal UM publication for faculty and staff, in announcing the end of diversity statements. "Our collective efforts in this area have produced important strides in opening opportunities for all people. As we pursue this challenging and complex work, we will continuously refine our approach.” But there is more that happened in this process, UM Faculty Senate Chair Rebekah Modrak wrote on the University Record page under the announcement. After the regents called for diversity statements to be banned last summer, McCauley formed a faculty committee to review diversity statements in the spirit of shared governance that came up with a different recommendation, Modrak wrote. "My understanding is that the committee’s first report recommended that the use of diversity statements should be up to each unit, a recommendation that honors our decentralization, independence, and academic freedom," Modrak wrote. "The Regents rejected that report and central leadership didn’t support their own faculty committee. Sending a committee back to work to give a second report with preordained results is neither honest nor respectful of faculty expertise. The University Record’s erasure of the Regents’ autocratic hand in this process is also deceptive." Regents will not vote on the provost's action, but may discuss it during the meeting, said Regent Sarah Hubbard, one of two Republicans on the eight-member UM board. "I applaud the provost for ending the practice of requiring diversity statements," said Hubbard. "This policy change removes a barrier to diversity of thought on campus by eliminating the ideological litmus test." No action is expected during Thursday's meeting around other DEI issues, added Hubbard, who previously said the regents have been looking for a long time at the university's DEI efforts and want to realign funds closer to student scholarships. Any budget decisions wouldn't happen until next year when budgetary decisions get made, she said. Even so, hundreds of students, faculty and staff demonstrated on campus earlier this week to show support for the university's DEI programs, and others are planning to attend the protest organized by UM's Black Student Union before the regents meeting and show up to the official meeting. UM's decision to discontinue diversity statements came after the statements were also eliminated in May at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and in June at Harvard University’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences. In June, UM's provost charged the eight-member faculty working group to examine diversity statements, though the university did not have an institutional policy on the statements but units did have the discretion to ask for them. The working group recommended the end of the statements after reviewing other policies and surveying more than 2,000 faculty members. “Critics of diversity statements perceive them as expressions of personal identity traits, support of specific ideology or opinions on socially-relevant issues, and serve as a ‘litmus test’ of whether a faculty member’s views are politically acceptable,” the working group wrote in its report. “Thus, as currently enacted, diversity statements have the potential to limit viewpoints and reduce diversity of thought among faculty members.” The working group said it acknowledged the concerns. "But, well-written diversity statements do not necessarily require expression of one’s identity, and they need not express one's beliefs or stances on socially-charged issues," the working group wrote. "Instead, well-written diversity statements contain reflections of how identity has shaped a faculty member’s approach with their students, how they work with their colleagues, and how they interact with society. These are desirable features of current and future U-M faculty members, and this information should be considered when potential faculty are hired and current faculty are promoted." The work group also offered two other recommendations, including that the university "can and must" incorporate of content about DEI into teaching, research and service statements. "Through this incorporation, the problematic features of diversity statements can be eliminated, while the useful and necessary information that exists in diversity statements can be saved and placed where it more naturally belongs," the group wrote in its report. However, UM did not adopt those recommendations. UM's decision to discontinue diversity statements followed other steps the university has taken in recent months that supporters said will create an environment that expands diverse views on campus. They include the regents' controversial adoption last month of a policy on institutional neutrality that prohibits some officials from taking public stances on political and social issues not related to the internal governance of the university. Last month the Faculty Senate passed a resolution censuring the Board of Regents and accusing the regents of "increasingly exhibiting authoritarian tendencies, and silencing free speech. ©2024 The Detroit News. Visit detroitnews.com . 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Erick Thohir Envisions Bali as a Global Leader in Medical Tourism, With New Hospital Set to Offer Top-Tier Healthcare Services and Wellness Experiences
