Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
Sorted by date Results 26 - 50 of 487
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Hospitals and clinics are replacing paper files with sophisticated electronic health records. And although some systems can’t share information with each other, which could be a serious problem in an emergency, smartphones are starting to bridge that electronic gap. That capability is already available to Medicare patients and veterans. The Medicare Blue Button and a similar Veterans Affairs medical program allow patients to download three years of their medical history into a simple text file on their smartphones or per...
BOSTON — Three men who attended college with the Boston Marathon bombing suspect removed his backpack from his dorm room at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth three days after the attack, according to charges filed Wednesday. Azamat Tazhayakov and Dias Kadyrbayev are charged with conspiring to obstruct justice. A third man, Robel Phillipos, is charged with making false statements to federal investigators. The affidavit says Tazhayakov and Kadyrbayev agreed to get rid of the backpack after concluding from news reports that Dzhokhar T...
OMAHA — A monthly economic survey index for nine Midwest and Plains states dipped for the second consecutive month in April, but the survey’s organizer said the index indicates slow growth for the region in the coming three to six months. The Mid-America Business Conditions index dropped to 56.8 in April, compared with 58.2 in March, according to a report released Wednesday. Businesses leaders were slightly more optimistic about the regional economy in the next six months, with the April business confidence index rising to 59.9 from 58.2 in...
GERING (AP) — A 39-year-old Scottsbluff man has been given five to eight years in prison for stabbing the husband of his former wife in a dispute over a vehicle. Herman Torres was sentenced Monday in Scotts Bluff County District Court. Court records say he stabbed 35-year-old Jason Lewison, of Scottsbluff, in January. Police say Torres had gone to see Lewison because Lewison and his wife, who is Torres’ former wife, had decided not to sell Torres a vehicle. Lewison was demanding that Torres return the vehicle. The two men’s argument turne...
WASHINGTON — After a storm of complaints, the Obama administration on Tuesday unveiled simplified forms to apply for insurance under the president’s new health care law. You won’t have to lay bare your medical history but you will have to detail your finances. An earlier version of the forms had provoked widespread griping that they were as bad as tax forms and might overwhelm uninsured people, causing them to give up in frustration. The biggest change: a five-page short form that single people can fill out. That form includes a cover page...
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — All-Star point guard Russell Westbrook will have surgery to repair cartilage in his right knee and be out indefinitely, dealing a harsh blow to the Oklahoma City Thunder’s championship chances. General manager Sam Presti said Friday that the Thunder had not yet scheduled Westbrook’s surgery and would not have an accurate timeline for his return until after the procedure was done. No one would rule out Westbrook’s possible return if Oklahoma City keeps advancing in the playoffs, and All-Star teammate Kevin Durant only sa...
NEW YORK (AP) — Short on glam, slim on glitter and no sign of Manti Te’o, the NFL draft was still a solid B-plus. As in Big, as in Brawn, as in Bulk, as in Beefy. We’re talking a scale-busting 600 pounds at the outset Thursday night with offensive tackles Eric Fisher of Central Michigan and Luke Joeckel of Texas A&M. The first seven picks were all linemen: four on offense, three on defense. “That’s a lot of love for the big boys up front, which we usually don’t get,” Fisher said. None of the teams making the first 32 selections went for Te’o, n...
Left unattended, no accessory looks as menacing these days as a backpack. At the airport. On the subway. At a sports event. And, as a result of the two backpack-encased bombs that exploded near the finish line at the Boston Marathon, sports teams and leagues around the world are rethinking what kind of bags, satchels, purses and, yes, black nylon backpacks should be allowed inside stadiums and arenas. The packs will even be the focal point of a conference this summer of stadium-security personne...
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama vowed Friday to join Planned Parenthood in fighting against what he said are efforts by states to turn women’s health back to the 1950s, before the Supreme Court legalized abortion nationwide, and singled out the GOP-governed states of North Dakota and Mississippi for criticism. “When politicians try to turn Planned Parenthood into a punching bag, they’re not just talking about you,” Obama said, becoming the first sitting president to address the abortion-rights group in person. “They’re talking about...
BOSTON (AP) — Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhohkar Tsarnaev was moved from a hospital to a federal prison medical center, while FBI agents searched for evidence Friday in a landfill near the college he was attending. U.S. officials, meanwhile, said that the bombing suspects’ mother had been added to a federal terrorism database about 18 months before the deadly attack — a disclosure that deepens the mystery around the Tsarnaev family and marked the first time American authorities acknowledged that Zubeidat Tsarnaeva had come under inves...
Death toll in Bangladesh collapse passes 300 SAVAR, Bangladesh (AP) — With time running out to save workers still trapped in a collapsed garment factory building, rescuers dug through mangled metal and concrete Friday and found more survivors — but also more corpses that pushed the death toll past 300. Wailing, angry relatives fought with police who held them back from the wrecked, eight-story Rana Plaza building, as search-and-rescue operations went on more than two days after the structure crumbled. Amid the cries for help and the smell of...
Excerpts from recent editorials in newspapers in the United States and abroad: April 24 Boston Herald on politics: President Barack Obama and his team don’t have to worry about commercial flight delays. Maybe that helped secure the decision to begin furloughing air traffic controllers this week, leading to delays at the nation’s airports and the Democrats’ finger of blame pointed at tax-averse Republicans. The administration claims that, because of the sequester-related budget cuts, it has no choice but to furlough all 47,000 Federal Aviation A...
SAVAR, Bangladesh — With time running out to save workers still trapped in a collapsed garment factory building, rescuers dug through mangled metal and concrete Friday and found more survivors — but also more corpses that pushed the death toll past 300. Wailing, angry relatives fought with police who held them back from the wrecked, eight-story Rana Plaza building, as search-and-rescue operations went on more than two days after the structure crumbled. Amid the cries for help and the smell of decaying bodies, the rescue of 18-year-old Mus...
ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) — An abundance of riches on offense. An abundance of bigness on defense. The Denver Broncos added another big defensive tackle in the draft Thursday and felt like they got a big bargain, as well, when they chose 313-pound Sylvester Williams of North Carolina in the first round. A team that’s all but set on offense with Peyton Manning, Wes Welker and company was thought to be looking for a pass rusher or defensive back with its top pick. Instead, the Broncos added another 300-pounder in the middle. Williams joins newly sig...
WASHINGTON — A bill to require Internet shoppers to pay sales taxes for online purchases may be cruising through the Senate but it will soon hit a roadblock in the House. “There’s a lot of political difficulty getting through the fog of it looking like a tax increase,” said Rep. Steve Womack, R-Ark., one of the main sponsors of the bill in the House. The bill would empower states to reach outside their borders and compel online retailers to collect state and local sales taxes for purchases made over the Internet. Under the bill, the sales t...
BOSTON (AP) — The mother of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects had been added to a federal terrorism database about 18 months before the attack, government officials said Thursday. Two government officials said the CIA had Zubeidat Tsarnaeva’s name added along with that of her son Tamerlan Tsarnaev after Russia contacted the agency in 2011 with concerns that the two were religious militants about to travel to Russia. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the case. Being in the...
ASHBURN, Va. (AP) — Mike Shanahan is very familiar with the No. 51 pick in the NFL draft. Three times in a row, he was in that position with the Denver Broncos. The 2001 and 2003 selections were utterly forgettable, but no one has as problem recalling his choice in 2002. “Sometimes when 51 comes up, you have your guy,” the Washington Redskins coach said. “One of those guys was Clinton Portis.” Shanahan chose right. Portis had a pair of 1,500-yard rushing seasons with the Broncos and finished his career with nearly 10,000 yards. Shanahan...
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — This year’s NFL draft is heavy on size and light on glamour. There’s no high-profile quarterback destined to go No. 1 and instantly become the face of a downtrodden franchise. There’s not even a running back or wide receiver worthy of the top overall pick, someone with the kind of swagger that wins over fans weary of losing. Nope, there’s just beef. And lots of it. There’s 6-foot-6, 306-pound Luke Joeckel, the offensive tackle from Texas A&M whom the Kansas City Chiefs are expected to select first overall. There’s als...
NEW YORK (AP) — The Boston Marathon bombing suspects had planned to blow up their remaining explosives in New York’s Times Square, officials said Thursday. New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Dzhokhar Tsarnaev told interrogators from his hospital bed that he and his older brother had decided spontaneously Thursday night to drive to New York and launch an attack with their five pipe bombs and a pressure-cooker bomb like the ones that blew up at the marathon. The plan fell apart after the Tsarnaev brothers were intercepted by...
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel shot down a drone Thursday as it approached the country’s northern coast, the military said. Suspicion immediately fell on the Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon which denied it sent the craft. Hezbollah’s Al Manar TV made the announcement Thursday through a one line statement flashed as an urgent news bar on its screen. Despite the denial, the incident was likely to raise already heightened tensions between Israel and Hezbollah, a bitter enemy that battled Israel to a stalemate during a monthlong war in 2006. Prime...
LONDON (AP) — Britain has given the slip to the Triple Dip. The U.K. dodged a third recession after official figures showed the economy grew 0.3 percent in the first quarter compared with the previous three months — a better-than-expected result that offered a bit of breathing space to a government facing criticism for its tough austerity policies. The figure released Thursday by the Office for National Statistics was above analyst forecasts for 0.1 percent growth and allowed the country to avoid a so-called “Triple Dip” — a third recession...
WASHINGTON (AP) — We’re in denial: Americans underestimate their chances of needing long-term care as they get older — and are taking few steps to get ready. A new poll examined how people 40 and over are preparing for this difficult and often pricey reality of aging, and found two-thirds say they’ve done little to no planning. In fact, 3 in 10 would rather not think about getting older at all. Only a quarter predict it’s very likely that they’ll need help getting around or caring for themselves during their senior years, according to the poll...
OLYMPIA, Wash. — In a quest to save money, political leaders in Washington state are exploring a proposal that would shift some government workers out of their current health plans and onto the insurance exchange developed under President Barack Obama’s health care law. Lawmakers believe the change, which could affect thousands of part-time state employees and education workers, would save the state $120 million over the next two years. It would consequently push more health care costs onto the federal government because many of the low-income...
CLARKSVILLE, Mo. (AP) — Communities in Illinois and Missouri fought Tuesday to hold back surging rivers swollen by days of drenching rain, even as an approaching storm system threatened new downpours. Floodwaters were rising to record levels along the Illinois River in central Illinois; roads and buildings were flooded and riverfront structures were inundated in Peoria Heights. Firefighters feared that if fuel from businesses and vehicles starts to leak, it could spark a fire in areas that could be reached only by boat. “That’s our night...
BOSTON (AP) — Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev was an ardent reader of jihadist websites and extremist propaganda, U.S. officials said Tuesday, adding another piece to the body of evidence they say suggests the two brothers were motivated by an anti-American, radical version of Islam. As he lay in his hospital bed with a gunshot wound to the throat, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, was charged on Monday with carrying out the bombing with his older brother, who died last week in a gunbattle. Tsarnaev could get the death penalty. I...
