News

China’s influence is spreading politically and militarily around the globe. China’s president Xi Jinping recently visited Islamabad to promote $46 billion in Chinese investments in Pakistan’s infrastructure, and Pakistan’s prime minister commented, “Friendship with China is the cornerstone of Pakistan’s foreign policy… Today, we have planned for the future” (Wall Street Journal, April 20, 2015).

“Divorcees are more likely to have a heart attack than their peers who stay married, US research suggests” (BBC, April 15, 2015). According to a Duke University study of over 15,000 people, “Women who divorced once were 24% more likely to have had a heart attack in the study than women who were continuously married. The figure was 77% for those having multiple divorces” (ibid.).

Less than two years after he was appointed head of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis made news by acknowledging the 100th anniversary of the Armenian genocide (2015). Armenians and their supporters welcomed the statement, but it angered Turkish leaders who reject using the label “genocide” to describe the murders of nearly two million Armenians from April 1915 until the end of World War I.

“School days, school days, dear old golden rule days, readin’ and ‘ritin’ and ‘rithmetic taught to the tune of the hickory stick” (1907, by Will Cobb).

The very popular Boston Marathon is scheduled to “run” on April 20, 2015. April 15 marked the anniversary of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings. Violent acts and terrorism are the staple topic of today’s world news. When will this marathon of terror end?