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Suborbital space tourism finally arrives | FCC prepares to run public C-band auction | The big four in the U.S. launch industry — United Launch Alliance, SpaceX, Blue Origin and Northrop Grumman — hope to be one of two providers that will receive five-year contracts later this year to launch national security payloads starting in 2022. | China’s launch rate stays high | The International Space Station is the largest ever crewed object in space.

 
Dutch leader faces pressure over old-school text...
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The long-serving Dutch prime minister is in hot water over his low-tech cell phone. Mark Rutte is facing unusual political and public pressure after revelations that he has been deleting text messages about official matters for years. Critics accuse him of concealing state activity – but he says the messages just took up too much space in his years-old Nokia phone. Rutte survived a no-confidence vote in parliament on Thursday over the deleted text...

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Elon Musk visits Brazil’s Bolsonaro to discuss...
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Tesla and SpaceX chief executive officer Elon Musk met with Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro on Friday to discuss connectivity and other projects in the Amazon rainforest. The meeting, held in a luxurious resort in Sao Paulo state, was organized by Communications Minister Fábio Faria, who has said he is seeking partnerships with the world’s richest man to bring or improve internet in schools and health facilities in rural areas using technology developed by SpaceX...

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Rapper J. Cole to play pro basketball...
SCARBOROUGH, Ontario (AP) — Rapper J. Cole will play another season of pro basketball, this time in Canada. The Canadian Elite Basketball League tweeted Thursday night that the 37-year-old rapper will join the Scarborough Shooting Stars in the coming season as a guard. The season begins May 25. Cole, whose full name is Jermaine Cole, played with the Rwanda Patriots in the Basketball Africa League in 2021. He also played basketball in high school in North Carolina. Cole won...

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Jordan king places ‘erratic’ half-brother under house...
JERUSALEM (AP) — Jordan’s king has gone public with a royal rift with his half-brother and formalized the former crown prince’s house arrest, calling him “erratic” in an unprecedented harshly worded letter published Thursday. King Abdullah II said in the letter that he had approved measures to detain Prince Hamzah in his palace and restrict his communications and movements, citing his half brother’s “erratic behavior and aspirations.” “We will provide Hamzah with all that he requires to live a...

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Biden has an eye on China as...
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden departs on a six-day trip to South Korea and Japan aiming to build rapport with the two nations’ leaders while also sending an unmistakable message to China: Russia’s faltering invasion of Ukraine should give Beijing pause about its own saber-rattling in the Pacific. Biden departs Thursday and is set to meet newly elected South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. Their talks will touch on trade, increasing resilience...

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Gunman targets Taiwanese faith with long pro-democracy...
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The recent deadly shooting at Irvine Taiwanese Presbyterian Church in California didn’t just violate a sacred space. Taiwanese Americans across the country say it ripped through their cultural bastion. It is where the congregation in Laguna Woods worshipped. But it was also where their native language and support for a democratic Taiwan thrived. Sunday’s mass shooting by man officials say was motivated by political hate of Taiwan has spotlighted the Presbyterian Church of Taiwan’s close...

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Celebrate good times with Kool & The...
Hear our full conversation on my podcast “Beyond the Fame.” toggle audio on and off change volume download audio WTOP’s Jason Fraley previews Kool & The Gang at Wolf Trap (Part 1) $(function () { $(‘.fa-play’).on(‘click’, function(){ var audio_filename= $(‘div.wtop-audio-file’).data(“mp3-url”); ga(‘send’, ‘event’, ‘Audio’, ‘play’, audio_filename); }); }); Are you ready to get down on it and celebrate good times at Wolf Trap in Virginia? Kool & The Gang performs a double bill with Morris Day & The Time on June...

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Congress dives into UFOs, but no signs...
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress held its first hearing in half a century Tuesday on unidentified flying objects. And no, there is still no government confirmation of extraterrestrial life. Testifying before a House Intelligence subcommittee, Pentagon officials did not disclose additional information from their ongoing investigation of hundreds of unexplained sightings in the sky. But they said they had picked a director for a new task force to coordinate data collection efforts on what the government has officially labeled “unidentified...

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National Air and Space Museum names director
The Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum officially has a director. Christopher Browne, who had been serving as acting director since January 2021, was named as the Smithsonian’s choice Tuesday. More D.C. News Browne joined the museum as deputy director in 2017, according to a news release, and helped lead the multi-year flagship building renovation in D.C. He’ll oversee both the flagship museum on the National Mall and the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia. “I am incredibly...

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No hits, no prob: Bucs win with...
PITTSBURGH (AP) — In what’s quickly become a lost season for the Cincinnati Reds, this really was the ultimate misery. Prized rookie Hunter Greene and reliever Art Warren combined to allow zero hits in a complete game, but it didn’t count as a no-hitter — or even a win. Instead, the Pittsburgh Pirates eked out a run in the bottom of the eighth inning on three walks and a groundout for a 1-0 victory Sunday. “It would have been...

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Rematch round: Blues-Avalanche, Panthers-Lightning up next
Florida Panthers deadline addition Brandon Montour may not have had a rooting interest in Game 7 between the Tampa Bay Lightning and Toronto Maple Leafs on Saturday night. Many of his teammates who got eliminated by the Lightning were happy to see the back-to-back defending Stanley Cup champions win to become their next opponent. “I think a lot of guys wanted to play this team,” Montour said Sunday. “It’s always a battle against these guys, and we’re up for...

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As Musk buyout looms, Twitter searches for...
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A toxic cesspool. A lifeline. A finger on the world’s pulse. Twitter is all these things and more to its over 217 million users around the world — politicians, journalists, activists, celebrities, weirdos and normies, cat and dog lovers and just about anyone else with an internet connection. For Elon Musk, its ultimate troll and perhaps most prolific user whose buyout of the company is on increasingly shaky ground, Twitter is a “de facto town...

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As Musk buyout looms, Twitter searches for...
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A toxic cesspool. A lifeline. A finger on the world’s pulse. Twitter is all these things and more to its over 217 million users around the world — politicians, journalists, activists, celebrities, weirdos and normies, cat and dog lovers and just about anyone else with an internet connection. For Elon Musk, its ultimate troll and perhaps most prolific user whose buyout of the company is on increasingly shaky ground, Twitter is a “de facto town...

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Live updates | Zelenskyy: No one can...
KYIV, Ukraine — President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said although Ukrainians are doing everything they can to drive out the Russians, “no one today can predict how long this war will last.” “This will depend, unfortunately, not only on our people, who are already giving their maximum,” he said in his nightly video address to the nation. “This will depend on our partners, on European countries, on the entire free world.” He said he was thankful to all those who are...

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Menaced by flames, nuclear lab peers into...
LOS ALAMOS N.M. (AP) — Public schools were closed and evacuation bags packed this week as a stubborn wildfire crept within a few miles of the city of Los Alamos and its companion U.S. national security lab — where assessing apocalyptic threats is a specialty and wildland fire is a beguiling equation. Lighter winds on Friday allowed for the most intense aerial attack this week on those flames west of Santa Fe as well as the biggest U.S. wildfire...

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