• Police seek suspects in deadly birthday party shooting
  • Lawmakers launch inquires into U.S. boat strike
  • Nov. 29, 2025, 10:07 PM EST / Updated Nov. 30, 2025,…
  • Mark Kelly says troops ‘can tell’ what orders…

Be that!

contact@bethat.ne.com

 

Be That ! Menu   ≡ ╳
  • Home
  • Travel
  • Culture
  • Lifestyle
  • Sport
  • Contact Us
  • Politics Politics
☰

Be that!

Rainy conditions cause crashes on California freeway

admin - Latest News - November 16, 2025
admin
16 views 5 secs 0 Comments



Rainy conditions cause crashes on California freeway



Source link

TAGS:
PREVIOUS
Here's the biggest news you missed this weekend
NEXT
National Zoo's Cheetah Cub Cam returns with new babies
Related Post
October 16, 2025
Oct. 16, 2025, 5:46 PM EDT / Updated Oct. 16, 2025, 6:01 PM EDTBy Aria BendixPresident Donald Trump on Thursday announced two policy changes aimed at making in vitro fertilization more affordable — a long-awaited follow-up to his pledges to require health insurers to cover IVF services and to an executive order aimed at lowering the cost of fertility treatments.However, the announcement was not a new rule that insurers must cover IVF. Rather, the Trump administration said that the White House has negotiated with two specialty pharmacies and a drug manufacturer to lower the cost of a commonly prescribed fertility drug that stimulates the ovaries to produce eggs.Additionally, the administration announced forthcoming guidance from the Labor, Treasury, and Health and Human Services departments that will help employers offer fertility benefits outside of major medical health insurance plans, the same way they offer dental, vision or life insurance. “We want to make it easier for all couples to have babies, raise children and start the families they have always dreamed about,” Trump said at a briefing in the Oval Office. The bulk of Thursday’s announcement focused on discounted fertility medications from drugmaker EMD Serono, which is part of the pharmaceutical giant Merck. The company said it would make its IVF drugs available at a lower cost through TrumpRx, a direct-to-consumer website operated by the federal government, starting in early 2026. “We are proud to announce that Americans will have access to our leading IVF therapies for an 84% discount off list prices,” Libby Horne, head of U.S. fertility at EMD Serono, said.Most IVF patients in the U.S. pay out of pocket for treatment, according to KFF, a nonprofit research group. Among the discounted drugs is a commonly used medication called Gonal-f, which some IVF patients take in the form of daily injections for roughly one or two weeks.Lab staff prepare small petri dishes, each holding several embryos, for cells to be extracted from each embryo to test for viability in Houston in 2024.Michael Wyke / AP fileSenior administration officials said the specialty pharmacies involved in the deal, CVS Specialty and Express Scripts’ Freedom Fertility — which they estimated account for more than 80% of the distribution of Gonal-f — agreed to reduce their expenses associated with the drug’s handling.“Upwards of 40% of the cost of IVF comes from the specialty drugs used for this treatment. Reducing these costs can have a significant impact on affordability and access,” Dr. Roger Shedlin, CEO of the fertility benefits company WIN, said in a statement.Trump’s announcement came after months of relative silence from the White House on which policies it was considering to expand IVF access. The executive order he issued in February had called for recommendations for “protecting IVF access and aggressively reducing out-of-pocket and health plan costs for IVF treatment.” Trump received a list of those recommendations in May.The new deal is part of Trump’s broader effort to bring the cost of prescription drugs in the U.S. more in line with the lowest prices charged in other wealthy countries — what’s known as the “most favored nation” pricing model.The White House has not yet negotiated lower prices on IVF drugs from other manufacturers.Sean Tipton, chief advocacy and policy officer at the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, which represents IVF providers, called the announcement a “crucial first step,” but said it still doesn’t go far enough to boost affordability.“One executive action cannot, on its own, ensure that every patient who needs IVF — which for some represents the only option to have a child — can access it,” he said.For now, senior administration officials said, medications made by EMD Serono will be discounted on TrumpRx at varying levels depending on a buyer’s income. Patients earning below 550% of the federal poverty level will be eligible for the more significant discount, the officials said.Trump campaigned last year on expanding IVF access, referring to himself at the time as the “father of IVF.” However, some conservatives and anti-abortion groups see IVF as unethical because the process often involves discarding embryos that have genetic issues or aren’t needed. The Washington Post reported in August that the administration had veered away from the idea of an IVF coverage requirement for health insurers.EMD Serono is seeking approval from the Food and Drug Administration for another fertility drug, Pergoveris, which is approved in Europe but not the U.S. Administration officials said on Thursday the FDA intends to give that application priority review status, which would expedite the process.Aria BendixAria Bendix is the breaking health reporter for NBC News Digital.
September 27, 2025
Sept. 27, 2025, 12:27 PM EDTBy Natasha KoreckiCHICAGO — In the run-up to former FBI Director James Comey’s indictment, there was no question who would step up to represent him.Friend and former colleague Patrick Fitzgerald, who served as U.S. attorney in Chicago for over a decade, would spring from retirement to be his man.Nationally, Fitzgerald is best known for his role as special prosecutor in the investigation into a CIA leak that brought charges against I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby.But to Chicago, Fitzgerald is something of a legend. The George W. Bush appointee left an indelible legacy as a scrupulous, hard-charging prosecutor who disrupted the kinds of crooked backroom deals that were long a trademark of Illinois politics.Over his nearly 12-year tenure as U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, his prosecutions took down the Chicago mob, put two consecutive governors — one Republican, one Democratic — behind bars and won a conviction against a top donor to Barack Obama just as Obama was running for the White House. He jailed longtime “untouchables” in Chicago and Springfield political circles while prosecuting international cases, including a Hamas funding scheme and major terrorism cases.Still in the Chicago area, Fitzgerald retired as a top partner at the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom two years ago and was enjoying spending more time with his family while doing some teaching. He’s entering the national spotlight to be Comey’s attorney out of longtime loyalty to a dear friend, those close to him say.But he’s potentially embarking on what could become a political firestorm. President Donald Trump made clear in his own social media post that he wanted his attorney general to bring charges against Comey.“Comey implicitly trusts Pat Fitzgerald. They’ve been best friends, or really good friends, for years,” said Robert Grant, former FBI special agent in charge of the Chicago office at the time Fitzgerald served as U.S. attorney. “They’re that close, and he also has a tremendous amount of respect for Pat.”When Fitzgerald landed in Chicago in 2001, he was dubbed “Eliot Ness with a Harvard Law degree.” But before that, he was the first to bring a case against Osama bin Laden — in 1996 — years before bin Laden masterminded the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. It was one-term Illinois Republican Sen. Peter Fitzgerald (no relation) who recommended Patrick Fitzgerald for the post, at the time saying he wanted someone to lead the office who was unassailable and unafraid to root out public corruption.“Pat was out of central casting to be the incorruptible guy that was in aggressive pursuit of the facts and dispensing justice and vindicating the public’s right for honest government,” said Patrick Collins, a former federal prosecutor who led the case against former Gov. George Ryan, a Republican.“As a line assistant who was intensely involved in a prosecution and worked in an office that had a reputation for prosecuting without fear or favor, having Pat Fitzgerald as your boss — he had your back,” he added. “We always knew that cases would rise or fall on the facts.”Fitzgerald’s and Comey’s personal styles couldn’t be more different. For years, Comey has publicly clashed with Trump, who fired him during his first White House term. Most controversially, Comey held a news conference days before the 2016 presidential election to disclose new findings of an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails. Comey also frequently posts on social media — including a video on the day of his indictment vowing to take on Trump.Comey responds to indictment saying ‘I’m innocent’00:57For his part, Fitzgerald is unassuming and does not relish being in the limelight, those close to him say. Fitzgerald, an Amherst College and Harvard Law graduate, had “a steel-trap mind” when they worked together, Grant said, describing a photographic memory that would allow him to rattle off cellphone numbers of defendants years after prosecuting a case. But his demeanor was shaped by humble beginnings in Brooklyn, where he grew up the son of a hotel doorman.“There’s a little bit of hubris you see in Comey that you don’t see in Pat,” Grant said. “When you first meet Pat, he’s so down-to-earth that you don’t realize what a brilliant mind there is behind that genial exterior. Whoever that prosecutor is, she’s up against a damn good lawyer.”Lindsey Halligan, the new interim U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, presented the case to secure Comey’s indictment on her own, according to a source familiar with the grand jury proceedings in Alexandria, Virginia, on Thursday. A senior Justice Department official told NBC News that career prosecutors in Halligan’s office sent her a memo saying they believed probable cause did not exist to secure the indictment.Trump tapped Halligan — who has no prosecutorial experience but was on his defense team in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case — after the previous acting U.S. attorney left the position under pressure from the president to prosecute Comey.When he gained national exposure for prosecuting Libby, Fitzgerald became something of a media darling. He was sometimes referred to jokingly as “prosecutie,” according to one of his friends, and in 2005, much to his dismay at the time, he was named in People magazine’s “sexiest men alive” issue.The straight-laced prosecutor appeared visibly uncomfortable when reporters asked him about the designation at a news conference.“I almost enjoy going back to the leak questions I can’t answer,” he said at the time. “I played a lot of practical jokes on people for a lot of years, and they all got even at once. OK, new topic.”Fitzgerald’s investigations during his time in Chicago broke open a seminal case against the criminal organization known as the Chicago Outfit. Dubbed “Operation Family Secrets,” his office brought sweeping charges against more than a dozen mobsters and exposed evidence of 18 previously unsolved murders dating back decades. He also dug into Chicago City Hall, then under the longtime grip of Mayor Richard M. Daley. A massive investigation into an illicit trucking operation sent dozens to prison and exposed the underbelly of city corruption.Fitzgerald had plenty of detractors.Many of their criticisms stemmed from one of the highest-profile cases to come of his office: the prosecution of then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich. The yearslong investigation culminated in the stunning 2008 arrest of a sitting governor. Though several of his aides were already convicted of related crimes, Blagojevich, a Democrat, spoke openly on the phone — with the FBI listening — about how he could extract a personal benefit in exchange for naming the successor to what was then Obama’s vacant Senate seat.In one of the best-known lines of the case, Blagojevich was recorded relishing a potential payout from using his power as governor to name the next U.S. senator: “I’ve got this thing, and it’s f—–g golden.”Blagojevich was also later convicted of trying to shake down a children’s hospital executive for a $25,000 campaign contribution in exchange for an increase to pediatric reimbursement rates, as well as holding up action on a horse-racing bill while he illegally sought a $100,000 campaign contribution.In laying out the charges on the day of the governor’s arrest, Fitzgerald declared Blagojevich was on a “public corruption spree” that would make “Lincoln roll over in his grave.”Fitzgerald faced criticism for making extrajudicial remarks and potentially prejudicing a jury. For years, Blagojevich assailed Fitzgerald for bringing the weight of the office against him. Trump first commuted Blagojevich’s sentence, then pardoned him earlier this year.Then there was the Libby case, which involved extensive travel to Washington, D.C., while managing the Chicago office and its myriad blockbuster cases. According to law enforcement officials who worked under him, he never dropped the ball back home. At the same time, Fitzgerald drew national attention as he handled the investigation, which sought to uncover who leaked the identity of Valerie Plame Wilson, a covert CIA agent.At one point in the case, New York Times reporter Judith Miller was jailed for refusing to disclose her sources. Fitzgerald took heat from conservatives who called him overzealous in attempting to notch a conviction against Libby, who had served as then-Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff. Bush commuted Libby’s 30-month sentence, and in 2017, Trump pardoned him, saying he had heard Libby was treated unfairly.In a statement at the time, Fitzgerald defended the prosecution, saying Libby “lied repeatedly and blatantly about matters at the heart of a criminal investigation concerning the disclosure of a covert intelligence officer’s identity.”Those who worked with Fitzgerald in Chicago defended him as zealously apolitical, noting he served under presidents of both parties. They held up his body of work as evidence he was no friend to those on either side of the aisle.“I worked with him for nine years. I have no idea if he’s a Republican or a Democrat, and it quite frankly never came up. He’s entirely about justice and doing the right thing,” said Eric Sussman, a defense attorney who worked as an assistant U.S. attorney under Fitzgerald.Sussman prosecuted a corruption case against onetime media baron Conrad Black, another high-profile defendant sent to prison in that era after he was convicted of diverting proceeds from his newspaper sales for his personal use. Like with Blagojevich, Trump would eventually pardon Black.“Pat really professionalized the office and made sure that everyone underneath him operated with the same professionalism, integrity and commitment to doing the right thing in Justice,” Sussman added. “That carried over not just to the attorneys in the office, but to how people in Chicago perceived him and perceived the office that he ran.”Natasha KoreckiNatasha Korecki is a senior national political reporter for NBC News.
November 18, 2025
Nov. 17, 2025, 7:44 PM ESTBy Phil Helsel, Daniel Arkin and Adam ReissThe Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is investigating a sexual battery allegation from five years ago against Sean “Diddy” Combs, the hip-hop mogul who is serving a 50-month prison sentence on two interstate prostitution convictions.The new allegation was made in Largo, Florida, on Sept. 20, according to a police report. A male music publicist and producer said he was invited to a photoshoot in a Los Angeles warehouse in 2020 about an upcoming project, according to the police report.The accuser said that at that shoot, Combs allegedly began masturbating under a shirt while watching pornography, and then exposed himself and told the accuser to assist, according to the report.The producer did not respond to Combs, who continued before throwing the shirt at him, he told police, according to the document.The man told police that he did not tell anyone about the event out of embarrassment, according to the police report. In March 2021, while in Santa Monica about the music project, two men at a house grabbed the producer, threw something over his head, and took him to a room where Combs berated him and called him a snitch, the man told Largo police, according to the report.The name of person who made the new sexual battery complaint is redacted in the Largo police report. The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department said that it received a copy of the Largo police report Friday.“Special Victims Bureau will be investigating the allegations,” the LASD said.A spokesperson for Combs did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday evening.The allegations are separate from those that sent Combs to prison.Combs was convicted by a jury on July 2 of two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution at the conclusion of an eight-week federal trial in New York. He was acquitted on two more serious charges: racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion.The Grammy-winning rapper and Bad Boy Records founder pleaded not guilty. He is incarcerated at FCI Fort Dix, a low-security federal prison in New Jersey.In the trial, prosecutors accused Combs of leading a criminal enterprise spanning decades. Two of his former girlfriends, Casandra “Cassie” Ventura and a woman known pseudonymously as “Jane,” accused Combs of forcing them to participate in marathon, drug-fueled sexual encounters known as “freak offs.”Combs, 56, still faces a raft of civil lawsuits accusing him of rape and sexual assault. He has denied wrongdoing.Phil HelselPhil Helsel is a reporter for NBC News.Daniel ArkinDaniel Arkin is a senior reporter at NBC News.Adam ReissAdam Reiss is a reporter and producer for NBC and MSNBC.Meriam Bouarrouj and Juliette Arcodia contributed.
October 8, 2025
Dolly Parton's sister asks for prayers for her health
Comments are closed.
Scroll To Top
  • Home
  • Travel
  • Culture
  • Lifestyle
  • Sport
  • Contact Us
  • Politics
© Copyright 2025 - Be That ! . All Rights Reserved