Stories from Monday, February 13, 2023

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Missouri's Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey on Friday called for doctors to pause giving puberty blockers and hormones to new patients at a transgender youth clinic. The call comes a day after he announced an investigation into claims the facility rushed to give children gender-affirming care without informed consent...

For those who follow the popular adage "March to the beat of your own drummer", there will be plenty to choose from at the Percussion Ensemble Clinic on Thursday, Feb. 23, at the Southeast Missouri State University River Campus. Ensembles from Jackson, Perryville and Farmington, Missouri, high schools will attend and perform at the percussion clinic, which takes place from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. It is open to the public, and admission is free...

Acee's Neighborhood Market & Deli, a Paducah, Kentucky-based company, has rebranded three former Winks convenience stores in Cape Girardeau County under the "Winks by Acee's" name. The stores were acquired by Acee's in 2021 but maintained the Winks identifier until early February when store signage was changed...

Come Valentine's Day, Rae Lynn Myrick Munoz will have been executive director of the not-for-profit Missouri's National Veterans Memorial in Perryville, Missouri, for precisely three months. The one-time Marine Corps corporal and mother of three daughters spent four years on active duty out of high school and four more as a reservist...

Today is Monday, Feb. 13, the 44th day of 2023. There are 327 days left in the year. Today's Highlight in History: On Feb. 13, 1935, a jury in Flemington, New Jersey, found Bruno Richard Hauptmann guilty of first-degree murder in the kidnap-slaying of Charles A. Lindbergh Jr., the 20-month-old son of Charles and Anne Lindbergh. (Hauptmann was later executed.)...

O Lord Jesus, our Savior and Lord, may we love others as you love us. Amen.

We try not to sit with our pain for too long. We want to fix what hurts. I made a mistake at work last week. I owned it, listened, apologized and learned. I know I'll do better next time. Accountability is important, but when it first happened, all I could muster in the kitchen when retelling it to my husband was, "I messed up and it's hard." He searched for ways to help, and I followed up again with, "I don't want you to try to fix it right now; I just need you to listen."...

The problem with young people today is no one teaches them history. If they knew what the East German government did to their Olympic women athletes in the 1970s and 1980s, for instance, they might understand why it's not fair for transgender women to compete against women in sports like swimming, tennis and surfing...

People are uneasy about the debt ceiling fight. Many think it's unhealthy and a sign of poor fiscal management, and they are right. However, they should get used to it. These budget fights will keep getting more frequent and more intense. That's because no one wants to talk about budget restraints. The truth is that existing spending commitments are rapidly shrinking the share of the budget that politicians have control over as their appetite for spending expands...

On Tuesday we will celebrate Valentine's Day, a holiday dedicated to the celebration of love and marriage. The day is often marked by the giving of Valentines — cards, flowers, chocolates and nice dinners are all favorites. But there is a powerful story behind it all, one of deep conviction and, indeed, love...

You can close more business in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get people interested in you.

Dana Townsend is now on staff with Crain Funeral Home and Cremation Service, 829 N. West End Blvd. in Cape Girardeau. Townsend, an Indiana native, has 13 years of licensed experience, including 11 years at her most recent employer, Ford and Sons Funeral Home...

Pixcellence Photo Booth, self-described as an interactive party entertainment service for weddings and other events, was launched in January by Lukas Keip and Jessica Baldwin of Cape Girardeau. The company offers a personalized event screen and photo prints that send digitally or are downloaded to a memory stick with all photos taken during an event...

Utah-based Pinnacle Quality Insight has recognized two local institutions serving seniors with 2023 awards. n Chateau Girardeau Rehab was noted for performance in five categories, including overall satisfaction, pace of progress and results achieved — scoring in the top 15% of the nation in these categories. Chateau is at 3120 Independence St. in Cape Girardeau...

SoutheastHEALTH has finished as one of two runners-up in the collaboration category of the 2022 Health Quality Innovators of the Year Awards, Richmond, Virginia-based HQI has announced. According to HQI's website, "SoutheastHEALTH implemented an 'all hands on deck' approach to eliminating hospital-acquired pneumonias. ...

Pump prices remain on a downward arc with the approach of Valentine's Day, with the average U.S. price dropping to $3.42 Saturday and to $3.09 in Missouri, according to AAA. Gas prices have fallen every day since Jan. 28, "with fewer people fueling up and lower costs for oil," reported the auto club federation. "If gas demand and oil costs remain lower, drivers likely will see pump prices drop through the coming week."...

LeGrand Brothers Transmissions, 4340 Route W in Cape Girardeau, is marking its founding in 1953. Launched by Ben LeGrand, the family-owned business continues today under the leadership of Ben's son, Dave, and his grandson Josh.

Recreational marijuana, also called adult-use marijuana, became available for purchase in Missouri on Feb. 6 following state voter approval in November of Amendment 3. Missouri joins 20 other U.S. states who've legalized recreational cannabis...

Missouri Department of Revenue figures for February indicate increased post-COVID in-person shopping activity in Cape Girardeau County. General sales tax revenue for the month, according to figures released through the office of County Treasurer Roger Hudson, reveal a 10% increase in receipts to $800,007.45 compared to February 2022...

Auction Technology Group, based in London has purchased Vintage Software LLC at 100 S. High St. in uptown Jackson, for $40 million, Auction Technology announced in a Feb. 7 statement. Micky McQuade is CEO of Vintage Software, which trades as www.estatesales.net...

BERLIN -- Climate commitments by companies aren't always as green as they seem. A new report concludes major brands are exaggerating how ambitious their efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions are -- in effect misleading consumers, investors and governments...

MEXICO CITY -- It has been nearly two years since the United States began pressing Mexico over labor rights violations by using rapid dispute resolution methods contained in the U.S.-Mexico Canada free trade agreement. The administration of President Joe Biden has brought six such complaints and brags that, for the first time, someone is challenging Mexico's anti-democratic, old-guard unions that have kept wages painfully low for decades...

KYIV, Ukraine -- Russian forces over the weekend continued to shell Ukrainian cities amid a grinding push to seize more land in the east of the country, with Ukrainian officials saying that Moscow is having trouble launching its much-anticipated large-scale offensive there...

VIENNA -- Austria has come under heavy criticism for granting visas that will allow sanctioned Russian lawmakers to attend a Vienna meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. The issue highlights the delicate balancing act the European country has engaged in while trying to maintain its longstanding position of military neutrality during the war in Ukraine. ...

ANTAKYA, Turkey -- When Zafer Mahmut Boncuk's apartment building collapsed in Turkey's devastating earthquake, he discovered his 75-year-old mother was still alive -- but pinned under the wreckage. For hours, Boncuk frantically searched for someone in the ancient, devastated city of Antakya to help him free her. He was able to talk to her, hold her hand and give her water. Despite his pleas, however, no one came, and she died on Tuesday, the day after the quake...

WASHINGTON -- The Capitol riot trial for Proud Boys leaders promised to be a historic showcase for some of the most compelling evidence of an alleged plot by far-right extremists to halt the transfer of presidential power after the 2020 election. One month into the trial, there have been plenty of fireworks, but mostly when the jury wasn't in the courtroom...

BATON ROUGE, La. -- Police in Louisiana's capital city have arrested two people for a mass shooting that left 12 others wounded at a nightclub in January. Two 19-year-olds, Nikeal Franklin and Jy'Shaun Jackson, were arrested Friday, the Baton Rouge Police Department said. Franklin was charged with 12 counts of attempted first-degree murder while Jackson was charged with 12 counts of principal to attempted first-degree murder...

NEW YORK -- Former President Donald Trump has called for parents to elect and fire school principals. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has banned instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade. And Nikki Haley, the former U.N. ambassador who is expected to announce her White House candidacy this coming week, is among the Republicans taking aim at critical race theory...

REDMOND, Wash. -- Nearly a quarter-century after Google's search engine began to reshape how we use the internet, big tech companies are racing to revamp a familiar web tool into a gateway to a new form of artificial intelligence. If it seems like last week's newly announced AI search chatbots -- Google's Bard, Baidu's Ernie Bot and Microsoft's Bing chatbot -- are coming out of nowhere, well, even some of their makers seem to think so. ...

WASHINGTON -- The subpoena to former Vice President Mike Pence is a milestone moment in an ongoing Justice Department special counsel investigation. But it doesn't guarantee he's going to be testifying before a grand jury anytime soon. Pence is the latest official in former President Donald Trump's administration to be subpoenaed as part of the investigation into efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, but the push for Pence's testimony is unique because he's the highest-ranking official known to have been summoned.. ...

ATAREB, Syria -- After years of war, residents of areas in northwest Syria struck by a massive earthquake are grappling with their new and worsening reality. Almost one week after the devastating 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck northern Syria and neighboring Turkey, the U.N. has acknowledged an international failure to help Syrian quake victims...

MEXICO CITY -- Pope Francis on Sunday expressed sadness and worry at the news that Bishop Rolando Alvarez, an outspoken critic of the Nicaraguan government, had been sentenced to 26 years in prison. It's just the latest move against the Catholic Church and government opponents, and comes amid growing concern for Alvarez...

Pedro Yudel Bruzon was looking for someone in the U.S. to support his effort to seek asylum when he landed on a Facebook page filled with posts demanding up to $10,000 for a financial sponsor. It's part of an underground market that's emerged since the Biden administration announced it would accept 30,000 immigrants each month arriving by air from Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and Haiti. ...

NEW YORK -- When the pandemic threat eased, Maureen Holohan was eager to scale back her online shopping and return to physical stores so she could more easily compare prices and scour ingredients on beauty and health care products for herself and her three children...

WASHINGTON -- While some Republicans blame the COVID-19 vaccine or "wokeness" for the Army's recruiting woes, the military service says the bigger hurdles are more traditional ones: Young people don't want to die or get injured, deal with the stress of Army life and put their lives on hold...

WASHINGTON -- A U.S. fighter jet shot down an "unidentified object" over Lake Huron on Sunday on orders from President Joe Biden. It was the fourth such downing in eight days and the latest military strike in an extraordinary chain of events over U.S. airspace that Pentagon officials believe has no peacetime precedent...

The third installment in the "Magic Mike" series danced its way to the top of the box office charts this weekend with a James Cameron double header, "Avatar: The Way of Water" and "Titanic" (yes that "Titanic"), looming close behind. "Magic Mike's Last Dance" earned $8.2 million in its first weekend in North American theaters, according to studio estimates Sunday. ...

ST. LOUIS -- A judge will announce this week whether he will overturn the conviction of a Missouri man who was imprisoned for a 1994 murder that he has always said he didn't commit. St. Louis Circuit Judge David Mason has set a hearing for 1:30 p.m. Tuesday to announce his decision in the case of Lamar Johnson, who was been serving a life sentence after being convicted in 1995 of killing Marcus Boyd...

Here's a collection curated by The Associated Press' entertainment journalists of what's arriving on TV, streaming services and music and video game platforms this week. n Just a week after hitting theaters, the neo-noir thriller "Sharper", anchored by Julianne Moore, arrives on Apple TV+ on Friday, Feb. ...

A Cape Girardeau police crackdown on illegal sales of tobacco and alcohol to minors has resulted in the issuance of 20 criminal court summonses to employees of local convenience stores; the violations were identified during an alcohol and tobacco compliance inspection program conducted the night of Feb. 6, as part of the police department's Operation Safe Streets program...

Jackson Area Chamber of Commerce has two events scheduled this week: n Business After Hours, 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 14, at Freedom Fit Zone, 2336 Old Orchard Road in Jackson. n Business Breakfast, 7:30 a.m. Friday, Feb. 17, at Jackson Civic Center, 381 E. Deerwood Drive. Cape Family Medical Clinic is sponsor...