Latest news with #SyracuseUniversity
The Independent
30 minutes ago
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Fans reel after successive deaths of Hulk Hogan, Ozzy Osbourne and other celebrities
Kevin Huigens wipes away tears as he gazes upon the statue of Cubs' legend Ryne Sandberg outside Chicago 's famed Wrigley Field. Flowers, Cubs caps, American flags and — of course — baseballs, litter the base and the ground beneath. 'I believed in him,' said Huigens, 68, of nearby Berwyn. 'He made being a Cubs fan enjoyable.' Sandberg, who had cancer, died Monday. 'But he's here in sprit, and he's going to lift up our Cubs even if he's not here physically,' Jessie Hill, 44, said, wearing a Cubs cap and jersey. Social media is swamped with outpourings of love, regret and sadness at the death of Sandberg and other cherished celebrities who died this month. The Cosby Show star Malcolm-Jamal Warner, 54, drowned in Costa Rica on July 20. Two days later, legendary heavy metal and reality show star Ozzy Osbourne, who had Parkinson's disease, died at age 76. Jazz musician Chuck Mangione also died July 22 in his sleep at age 84. Then, on Thursday, former professional wrestler Hulk Hogan, whose real name was Terry Bollea, was pronounced dead at a hospital after a cardiac arrest. He was 71. 'A loss you can share with everybody' When celebrity deaths come in quick succession, 'if nothing else, it reminds people of their own mortality,' said Robert Thompson, a professor of television and pop culture at Syracuse University. 'The people who were a central part of the culture of the 1980s are getting to that age when biology has its way,' said Thompson, 65. 'When it happens in these big chunks, it becomes even more powerful.' Hogan, Warner and Sandberg were introduced to millions of people as television's popularity exploded during the 1980s. Mangione's trumpet and flügelhorn were staples on smooth jazz radio stations during the 1970s and into the 1980s. Osbourne's career spanned multiple decades, from the 1970s, when his band, Black Sabbath, dominated the heavy metal scene, through the 2000s, when his family dominated reality TV with "The Osbournes.' 'The silver lining about celebrities is they continue to exist for us exactly as they did before' Thompson said, because we can continue to listen to their music or watch their TV shows even after they die. 'When you lose a grandparent or an uncle it's sad and you grieve with your family,' he continued. 'But it's a private kind of thing. When a celebrity dies, it's a loss you can share with everybody.' Eternal fans Robert Livernois, 59, said he grew up an Osbourne fan. He lives in Birmingham — not the gritty city in the English Midlands where Ozzy was born and raised, but a tony city in suburban Detroit. 'I loved his music. I never subscribed to any of the theatrics,' said Livernois, a radio show host. Osbourne famously bit off the head of a bat during a live performance. Robert West, 40, produces content for The Wrestling Shop in San Antonio. He said he lost two icons within days when Osbourne and Hogan died. He learned of Hogan's death through a text from a friend. 'It's almost like the last bits of my childhood is almost gone,' West said. 'I think he was part of everyone's life.' Hogan was a pioneer in the wrestling and entertainment industries, having a similar impact to that of Elvis Presley and Michael Jackson in music, West added. Twenty-three-year-old Indigo Watts is a Black Sabbath and heavy metal fan who was working at Flipside Records, a store in Berkley just north of Detroit, when he learned his hero had died. 'Some guy came in and before he left he asked 'Have you heard about Ozzy?'' Watts said. 'As soon as he said, it my heart just sank.' He said the recent celebrity deaths remind him of a dark period in 2016 when the world lost music legends Prince and David Bowie. 'I was still young, but that hit me like a truck,' Watts said. 'When you're a celebrity and you die, you leave an impact on the world.'
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Military veteran shares the top small business resources for former service members
Listen and subscribe to The Big Idea on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts. Getting any business off the ground is difficult work. But veterans have access to resources that can provide an additional boost and leverage their military experience. Veteran and former Congressman Patrick Murphy shared on the Big Idea podcast some of those resources he frequently recommends to veterans trying to get their entrepreneurial dreams off the ground. 'I'm a big believer in Bunker Labs,' Murphy said, talking about the nonprofit that's a part of Syracuse University's D'Aniello Institute for Veterans and Military Families, which supports military veterans and their spouses in becoming entrepreneurs. Bunker Labs offers educational programs that help veterans and military spouses develop business plans and the skills and connections they need to launch their businesses. 'For over 30 cities across America, they help veterans get a business plan,' explained Murphy, who also co-hosts Yahoo Finance's Warrior Money podcast. 'Because it's not just about, 'Hey, I have an idea. I want to start a business.' It's ... How are you going to get customers? What's your business plan? What's your return on investment?' Once an idea is formed and an action plan is made, funding is the next crucial step. Murphy recommended searching for business grants on online platforms such as Hello Alice, which was founded by Big Idea host Elizabeth Gore. He likened the services to a Pathfinder in the Army who can guide entrepreneurs along tried-and-true paths. Murphy also encouraged veterans to explore how the post-9/11 GI Bill can help fund entrepreneurship training. He emphasized that 49% of veterans from World War II went on to start small businesses, including Walmart (WMT) founder Sam Walton. Today, only 5.6% of veterans pursue the same goal. 'We've got to prime the pump there to get [veterans] to have that confidence to go do great things and maybe even start their own small business,' he said. Another tip that Gore highlighted is for veterans to register their company with the US Small Business Administration as a veteran-owned or service-disabled veteran-owned small business. Those who qualify can take advantage of the government's supplier diversity initiatives for securing contracts and other opportunities. Ultimately, Murphy recommended that veterans find a business model that allows them to continue to pursue the 'purpose-driven' motivations instilled in them by military service. For Murphy, that has been teaching at Wharton, where he helps others learn how to 'leverage the opportunities [they've] earned,' and using his entrepreneurial skills to aid veterans in their transitions post-discharge. 'To me, the lightbulb moment was, I was betting on myself, ... and even though I was in my forties ... I was like, I could do this, and I could do it well,' Murphy said of his experience transitioning from public service to entrepreneurship. 'And it hasn't been linear. You know, some of the companies are no longer with us. But that's part of the venture capital, and that's part of being an entrepreneur.' Every Thursday, Elizabeth Gore discusses real-life stories and smart strategies for launching a small business on The Big Idea podcast. You can find more episodes on our video hub or watch on your preferred streaming service. Sign up for the Mind Your Money newsletter
Axios
4 days ago
- Politics
- Axios
More immigrants will fight deportations alone as Trump ramps up enforcement
Immigrants are finding it increasingly hard to find legal representation as the Trump administration ramps up deportation proceedings. The big picture: An expected surge in new federal funding could supercharge both arrests and deportations at a time when immigration attorneys are already struggling to keep up with their day-to-day casework. Deportation is a civil sanction, not criminal, so immigrants are not automatically entitled to a government-appointed attorney if they can't afford representation. By the numbers: Roughly 49% of people facing deportation nationwide have no attorney to advise them of their rights, according to the June data from Vera Institute for Justice. In the top three states with the most immigration cases pending, Florida, California and Texas, representation rates vary wildly. In Florida and Texas, 25.1% and 24.5% of all pending cases are likely to have legal representation, where as in California, there's a 63.9% chance of retaining an attorney, according to nationwide released data by Syracuse University in June. Case in point: Immigrants have a much higher likelihood of winning their cases when they have an attorney present. In January 2025, 77% of people facing deportation for entering the country illegally who had an attorney to represent them were permitted to remain in the U.S., a report by the Vera Institute for Justice found. Of the more than 340,000 people who were removed from the country in the 12 months prior to January 2025, 79% lacked representation. Driving the news: The immigration funding included in the newly passed "One Big Beautiful Bill" could significantly increase ICE's detention capabilities, Axios' April Rubin reported. The bill allocates $29.9 billion to fund hiring, training and retention of ICE officers, agents and support staff. An additional $4.1 billion is apportioned for hiring and training Border Patrol agents, Customs and Border Protection officials and others. Some $45 billion goes towards building new adult detention and family residential centers, which could result in at least 116,000 additional beds, according to a report from the American Immigration Council. Friction point: Earlier this year, the Trump administration ended five federally-funded legal service programs that provided basic due process information and education to immigrants facing removal proceedings without an attorney, compounding the shortage. The administration decided that two of the orientation programs providing due process information should be in-sourced, which advocates say is at odds with the administration's goals of deporting record numbers of people as quickly as possible. The Executive Office for Immigration Review, which runs the orientation programs, declined to comment. Yes, but: Some non-profit organizations say they're experiencing a "Trump bump" in volunteers who are motivated by the administration's immigration crackdown. Professor Alberto Benítez, who ran George Washington University's Immigration Clinic for 29 years, said he's been experiencing an increase of interest in students wanting to study law this year, similar to a rise in interest studied by the American Bar Association during Trump's first term. "An unintended consequence of this man's policies is that he's generating outrage at the violations of the law and of human rights generally," Benítez said. "And law students want to do something about it." The bottom line: "We are still providing as much education and intake and referrals as we can," Michael Lukens, executive director for the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights said. "And we're not going to stop."
New York Times
5 days ago
- Politics
- New York Times
With a Single Image, U.S. Deportation Narrative Is Turned on Its Head
'No one will ever forgive me.' Those were the words Dahud Hanid Ortiz wrote in an email to an in-law after he barged into the office of a lawyer he believed was having an affair with his wife and brutally killed three people, the authorities say. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison for the crime. But forgiven or not, a beaming Mr. Hanid Ortiz appears in a photo released by the State Department of 10 Americans and U.S. permanent residents newly freed from a Venezuelan prison as part of a prisoner swap. At the time of the exchange, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the prisoners had been 'wrongfully detained' in Venezuela. But Mr. Hanid Ortiz has been less generous in his self-assessment, at least when it comes to his actions in Madrid, almost a decade ago. 'I am responsible for everything,' he wrote in the email to his wife's sister, the authorities in Spain said when they were seeking his extradition from Venezuela, where Mr. Hanid Ortiz, a dual U.S.-Venezuelan citizen, had fled. The killings took place in 2016. Mr. Hanid Ortiz arrived at the lawyer's office in search of a man he thought was having an affair with his wife, the Spanish authorities say. But he killed the wrong man, beating him to death along with a woman who was also in the office. He fatally stabbed another woman there. 'I did terrible things,' Mr. Hanid Ortiz, a U.S. Army veteran who was awarded a Purple Heart for injuries sustained in Iraq, said in the email. He said, 'I lost my head.' How Mr. Hanid Ortiz came to be on the plane with the other free Americans, at least some of whom had been seized by the Venezuelan government as bargaining chips, is uncertain. President Trump is better known for his vows to expel ostensible criminals from the United States, not repatriate them. The image of a convicted killer on a plane en route from Venezuela, surrounded by cheerful people waving American flags, is at best problematic for the White House. 'That runs counter to Trump's message that he's trying to purge this country of immigrants who are violent criminals,' said Jennifer Stromer-Galley, a professor at the Syracuse University's School of Information Studies. The State Department did not respond to questions about why the administration had decided to include Mr. Hanid Ortiz in the prisoner swap. It has also not said whether he is now a free man. Parin Behrooz and Julie Turkewitz contributed reporting.
Yahoo
22-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Zohran Mamdani: 5 lessons for Democrats
New York Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani has stoked a debate in the wider Democratic Party with his surprise primary victory. Do Democrats need to follow more of his lessons to get back on track with their brand? Or does the democratic socialist's brand of politics fit a left-leaning New York primary, but not the rest of the county? The answer is probably somewhere in between, but a number of Democrats interviewed by The Hill said there are clear lessons the party can learn from the upstart's victory. Affordability Mamdani mounted his campaign on a message of affordability, coining soundbites such as 'freeze the rent,' 'city-run grocery stores' and 'make buses fast and free' as cornerstones of his campaign. Political observers say the unequivocal cost of living promises resonated with an electorate seeking change. 'He answers the questions very directly and very specifically. … He's like, 'I want to freeze rents, I want to create free buses, I want to raise the minimum wage to $30 an hour,'' said Grant Reeher, the director of Syracuse University's Campbell Public Affairs Institute. Democrats say the national party's messaging on economic issues in 2024 was weak, as Americans blamed then-President Biden for inflation. Mamdani's victory shows the importance for candidates to be seen as being the side working to make things more affordable for average voters. Authenticity One of Mamdani's biggest assets, some Democrats say, is his authenticity. The political neophyte went from relative obscurity to becoming a boldface name by keeping it real throughout his campaign. Not only did the 33-year-old speak about issues important to New Yorkers, but he did it in a way that was true to himself, instead of out of a Democratic playbook. In a 30-second video posted to his Instagram and TikTok accounts four days before election day, for example, Mamdani could be seen walking with his sleeves rolled up surrounded by a crowd of his supporters delivering his message of affordability directly to voters. 'It's the authenticity, stupid!,' one top Democratic strategist said. 'Mamdani is showing that at least part of the path forward for Democrats is to stop running away from your perceived weaknesses; instead run directly at them.' Eddie Vale, another Democratic strategist, agreed: 'The lessons that everyone can learn from and do is just be normal. Talk like a human being. Do events and tons of digital and podcasts, where normal people are. New blood Mamdani's youthfulness and grassroots campaign funding strategy appealed to voters who are looking for a new generation of political leadership — one that sheds the trappings of big-money interests and fights for regular people, Democrats said. For example, Mamdani's campaign relied overwhelmingly on crowdfunding and matching funds from the city's Campaign Finance Board. Mamdani is definitely an outsider, but 39 percent of voters in a poll by the Democratic super PAC Unite the Country said they think the Democratic Party is corrupt. So being seen as an outsider helped Mamdani. Some Democrats think leaders of the party in Washington need to reach out more to Mamdani. 'It is baffling to me that Hakeem Jeffries hasn't embraced Mamdani wholeheartedly as a rising star,' Democratic strategist Christy Setzer said. 'Mamdani has done what few Democrats, including and especially Jeffries, can: Excite, rather than infuriate, the base. Fight with a smile. Disarm. Lead with love and big ideas. Don't just be against Trump For several cycles, Democrats have sought to rally their base around an anti-President Trump message. It worked during the 2018 and 2020 elections, but it fell flat in 2024. 'This party has to be for something for a change,' a second Democratic strategist said, adding that the party 'can't just be against Trump.' Mamdani successfully walked the line between putting forward a vision of his own for New York and being an anti-Trump candidate. In doing so, some say he set an example for Democrats nationally. 'It's important to give voters something to vote for and not just something to vote against, and that's something that Mamdani did well,' said Basil Smikle, a former executive director of the New York State Democratic Party. 'He wasn't just the anti-Trump candidate, he wasn't just the antiestablishment candidate, but he talked about big picture ideas, things that voters really care very much about.' Social media and retail politics Democrats dropped the ball on social media in 2024 and had a hard time connecting with voters overall. But Mamdani set an example for what effective social media campaigning looks like and leveraged the power of retail politics to connect with voters even more. 'Have a campaign that beats the moment,' Smikle said. 'It is 2025. It's driven a lot by social media, a lot by influencers, but also by really, really strong retail politics.' Mamdani coordinated a citywide volunteer effort that elevated his ground game and allowed his campaign to reach every corner of the city. More than 30,000 people knocked on nearly 1.6 million doors across the city. 'His intense ground game — you can't underestimate the power of that,' Reeher said. 'Even from political science research, we know that the most effective way to get people to turn out is face-to-face contact. He's doing a lot of that. … He's got tons of volunteers.' 'You can't short-shrift the ground game, the retail politics,' he added. Mamdani also used social media to generate energy around his campaign, becoming a trend of sorts on platforms such as Instagram and TikTok. He amassed his own following of more than 4.5 million across the two platforms and collaborated with various social media influencers in New York City throughout his campaign. 'He's generating enthusiasm from younger voters, and he's running a race on his own terms — not defensively, on someone else's terms,' Setzer said. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
