Latest news with #Clause
CBS News
27-06-2025
- Health
- CBS News
Supreme Court upholds federal health task force that sets no-cost coverage for preventive services
Washington — The Supreme Court on Friday upheld the structure of a federal health task force that recommends preventive medical services that must be provided to patients at no cost under the Affordable Care Act. The ruling from the Supreme Court in the case known as Kennedy v. Braidwood Management, Inc. leaves intact the 16-member U.S. Preventive Services Task Force. The task force is part of the Department of Health and Human Service and has for decades been making recommendations on preventive medical services to avoid serious health conditions. The court ruled 6-3 in finding that the task force members are inferior officers, whose appointment by the head of Health and Human Services is consistent with the Constitution's Appointments Clause. Justice Brett Kavanaugh authored the majority opinion, with Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch in dissent. This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
Forbes
24-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Essential AI Strategy: Invest Employee Time Before Expecting ROI
Colleagues discuss AI application. Businesses that will benefit heavily from artificial intelligence must first make a capital investment--in the form of employee time. That may seem strange given that AI is supposed to be a time saver. But like all capital investments, money or time must be spent first before the gains are enjoyed. One company's AI strategy experience highlights the need to explicitly tell employees to spend some time exploring rather than producing. With AI, employees must first find specific tools and then learn how to use them effectively. Then they will become much more productive, more than paying back their time investment. That is, if all goes well. Just as with a physical investment, a time investment may fail to produce useful results. But occasional failure of specific employees' learning efforts is not failure of the program. A zero-failure standard would mean hardly anything is every tried. And AI being such a new technology, failure is pretty common according to several surveys. Huge success will also be common, justifying the inevitable failures. Workday Inc.'s experience offers a compelling lesson about how to invest employee time to develop AI-driven productivity. An internal survey found that 43% of its employees did not have time to learn about AI, with many also uncertain about how to use the tools. Chatbots (such as ChatGPT, Clause, and Perplexity) are just the beginning of the learning process. They can be very useful in some cases—I use them regularly. But the largest business AI successes will come from highly specialized applications. The users may not know anything about AI. They may not even know that their application is using AI. All they will need to know is how to feed input into the system and how to use the output. Work tasks vary widely from employee to employee. Even in a small company, there will be people doing widely varying jobs. And each employee likely performs different tasks through the workday. Telling workers to 'ask ChatGPT' will not produce great results in most cases. For some tasks, a chatbot may be very helpful—after some practice and learning. Often better results come from adjusting the 'prompt' (the question or request posed to the chatbot). Some people will learn by trial and error, but others will be helped with some simple guidelines. Workday found that peer-to-peer help was more useful than management exhortations. (And that is a generality that may well apply well beyond AI.) In some work environments, though, the most knowledgeable people may not be encouraged to spend time coaching other employees. First-level supervisors need guidance on how to balance the value of peer-to-peer coaching against the lost productivity of the coaches. Beyond chatbots, though, are specialized applications that use AI to perform very specific tasks. As an example, Steve Brown's Synthetic Newsletter this week highlights four AI tools for businesses. The tools support recruiting, receipt management, sales prospecting and assistants for websites, plus a general interest news app. For example, someone in the human resources department may write position descriptions. That person may not know there are apps specifically for that task. And the HR manager may not know that, or may not know which ones work best in the company's specific situation. The employee should be provided with some background information about AI guidelines (more on that below) and then given rein to go browsing and trying different apps. It will seem that the employee has spent half a day without producing any position descriptions. But if a good tool is found, that half day of searching and testing will pay large dividends in the future. Workday's effort included emphasis on some guidelines involving testing, risk assessment and documentation. An employee using an AI app should review some results to verify that output is correct. This may require some tedious double-checking. Then high-impact results need human eyes before action is taken. If the AI seems good at writing up position descriptions, then maybe they go out without much review. But if the AI says that a particular customer is owed a million-dollar refund, the company probably wants a human to double-check before transferring funds. This is the risk assessment guideline. And procedures should be documented, so everyone can verify exactly what is happening on the input and output of the app. Unfortunately, it will be difficult to know how the AI reasons. This area, called interpretability, is one of the most challenging fields within artificial intelligence. The Workday experience provides good lessons for businesses trying to increase productivity through an AI strategy. The most fundamental lesson is that employees need to spend time before they can save time.
Ottawa Citizen
17-06-2025
- Politics
- Ottawa Citizen
Penny Boudreau, who strangled her 12-year-old daughter, tries for 'early' release
Article content The Conservatives focused on toughening up the chance for early parole for criminals convicted of multiple murders. Leader Pierre Poilievre promised to use Section 33 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, known as the Notwithstanding Clause, to reintroduce the Protecting Canadians by Ending Sentence Discounts for Multiple Murders Act, which the Supreme Court of Canada struck down in 2022 because, in their opinion, it violates an offender's Charter rights. Article content The Supreme Court's decision has impacted the sentences of some of Canada's most notorious killers like Alexandre Bissonnette, who was serving a life in prison with no chance of parole for 40 years for shooting and killing six people in a Quebec Mosque in 2017. After the Supreme Court's decision, Bissonnette will be eligible for parole after serving 25 years. Article content The decision doesn't affect Boudreau, who was convicted of one murder (not multiple murders). She is required to provide her DNA and is prohibited from owning weapons for her lifetime. She has no previous offences that offer insight into her mindset at the time of the murder. She has referenced experiencing low self-esteem, a sense of inadequacy and fears of abandonment, according to her psychological risk assessments in her prison file. Article content Article content Her assessments described her overall risk for unescorted absences and/or day parole was 'generally low.' These ratings, it said, have withstood the test of many years of incarceration and would not be expected to change unless 'you were in an unhealthy relationship which is currently not a concern.' It also noted Boudreau has recently spoken of 'how you work through the many emotions that come with accepting the offence you committed, daily feelings of guilt and shame.' Article content Article content Boudreau toured a community residential facility — halfway house — last December and met with the director. The location remains confidential. In March, the Parole Board of Canada acknowledged recent threats made to Boudreau's personal safety increase the need for security and suggested any measures necessary will be taken when Boudreau appears before the hearing. Article content Article content Today, there is still a memorial for Karissa on the LaHave riverbank where her body was found. Sarty goes there when she is struggling to make sense of how her friend's mother, a woman she knew, could forsake her unconditional love for her daughter. Article content 'I have my own son and my love is deep. He could curse me and put me down to the lowest, and I'm still going to look at him and say, 'I love you.'
Japan Today
21-05-2025
- Politics
- Japan Today
U.S. accepts Boeing jet from Qatar for use as Air Force One
Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani (R) and US President Donald Trump speak to each other at the Royal Palace in Doha on May 14, 2025 U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has accepted the Boeing 747 that the Gulf emirate of Qatar offered to President Donald Trump for use as Air Force One, the Pentagon said Wednesday. Qatar's offer of the jet -- which is valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars -- has raised huge constitutional and ethical questions, as well as security concerns about using an aircraft donated by a foreign power for use as the ultra-sensitive presidential plane. "The Secretary of Defense has accepted a Boeing 747 from Qatar in accordance with all federal rules and regulations," Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement. "The Department of Defense will work to ensure proper security measures and functional-mission requirements are considered for an aircraft used to transport the President of the United States," Parnell said, referring questions to the U.S. Air Force. The U.S. Constitution prohibits government officials from accepting gifts "from any King, Prince or foreign State," in a section known as the Emoluments Clause. But Trump has denied there are any ethical issues involved with accepting the plane, saying it would be "stupid" for the U.S. government not to take the aircraft. "It's a great gesture," the 78-year-old billionaire told reporters at the White House last week when asked if the oil-rich Gulf state would expect anything in exchange. "I would never be one to turn down that kind of an offer. I mean, I could be a stupid person (and) say 'no we don't want a free, very expensive airplane.'" The leader of the Democratic minority in the U.S. Senate introduced legislation earlier this week that would block Trump from using the aircraft. Chuck Schumer's Presidential Airlift Security Act would prohibit the Pentagon from using taxpayer funds to retrofit any plane previously owned by a foreign government for use as the presidential plane. "Donald Trump has shown time and again he will sell out the American people and the presidency if it means filling his own pockets," Schumer said in a statement. "Not only would it take billions of taxpayer dollars to even attempt to retrofit and secure this plane, but there's absolutely no amount of modifications that can guarantee it will be secure." Although several Republicans have voiced concerns about the proposed gift, Senate Majority Leader John Thune -- a Trump loyalist -- is not obliged to bring the bill to the floor of Congress's upper chamber. But Schumer plans to force a vote by offering it as an amendment to spending bills that Republicans will have to pass later in the year. © 2025 AFP
France 24
21-05-2025
- Politics
- France 24
US accepts Boeing jet from Qatar for use as Air Force One
Qatar's offer of the jet -- which is valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars -- has raised huge constitutional and ethical questions, as well as security concerns about using an aircraft donated by a foreign power for use as the ultra-sensitive presidential plane. "The Secretary of Defense has accepted a Boeing 747 from Qatar in accordance with all federal rules and regulations," Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement. "The Department of Defense will work to ensure proper security measures and functional-mission requirements are considered for an aircraft used to transport the President of the United States," Parnell said, referring questions to the US Air Force. The US Constitution prohibits government officials from accepting gifts "from any King, Prince or foreign State," in a section known as the Emoluments Clause. But Trump has denied there are any ethical issues involved with accepting the plane, saying it would be "stupid" for the US government not to take the aircraft. "It's a great gesture," the 78-year-old billionaire told reporters at the White House last week when asked if the oil-rich Gulf state would expect anything in exchange. "I would never be one to turn down that kind of an offer. I mean, I could be a stupid person (and) say 'no we don't want a free, very expensive airplane.'" The leader of the Democratic minority in the US Senate introduced legislation earlier this week that would block Trump from using the aircraft. Chuck Schumer's Presidential Airlift Security Act would prohibit the Pentagon from using taxpayer funds to retrofit any plane previously owned by a foreign government for use as the presidential plane. "Donald Trump has shown time and again he will sell out the American people and the presidency if it means filling his own pockets," Schumer said in a statement. "Not only would it take billions of taxpayer dollars to even attempt to retrofit and secure this plane, but there's absolutely no amount of modifications that can guarantee it will be secure." Although several Republicans have voiced concerns about the proposed gift, Senate Majority Leader John Thune -- a Trump loyalist -- is not obliged to bring the bill to the floor of Congress's upper chamber. But Schumer plans to force a vote by offering it as an amendment to spending bills that Republicans will have to pass later in the year.
