Mehmet Oz responds to crudités shopping video
PITTSBURGH — No one expected the discourse in one of the country's most important U.S. Senate races to be hijacked by talk of crudités and grocery stores, but that's the reality of a race between a self-proclaimed internet troll and a longtime TV celebrity.
Republican Mehmet Oz, facing a barrage of playful scrutiny over a viral clip of his grocery store pursuits to assemble crudités for his wife, finally got the chance to respond Wednesday when a host on the conservative site Newsmax asked about it — and whether he's "relatable to the everyday hardworking American there in Pennsylvania."
In response, Oz said his whole life, he's rolled up his sleeves, saved lives as a cardiothoracic surgeon and tried to help people however he could. He said the crudités video was meant to poke at how "ridiculous it is that you can't even put vegetables on a plate," referring to the rising costs of food and high inflation.
"We'll do whatever we need to do to make sure the people of Pennsylvania respect what we're about, and we're going to work as hard as we can to fix their problems," Oz said. "It's what I've done my whole life. It's what I'll continue to do."
—Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
First-quarter traffic deaths highest in 20 years, regulators say
WASHINGTON — Traffic deaths rose 7% in the first quarter of 2022 over last year, federal regulators announced in preliminary estimates Wednesday.
More than 9,500 people died on U.S. roads between January and March this year — the highest number of deaths since 2002. "The overall numbers are still moving in the wrong direction," said Steven Cliff, the outgoing administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Traffic deaths skyrocketed in 2020 when the coronavirus pandemic hit, rising 7.2% over 2019. Deaths rose again in 2021 by 10.5%. "We'd hoped these trends were limited to 2020, but sadly they aren't," he said. Wednesday's release is the first set of publicly available 2022 traffic death data.
NHTSA didn't release a breakdown of crash deaths by category, but Cliff said around one-third of crashes are traditionally due to driving while drunk or on drugs.
—The Detroit News
Salman Rushdie interviewer Henry Reese speaks out after attack, details his injuries
The interviewer who was on the stage with Salman Rushdie when the controversial author was attacked by a knife-wielding man has broken his silence and revealed the injuries he suffered while trying to defend Rushdie.
Speaking to the BBC, Henry Reese revealed deep bruising around his right eye as well as several stitches around his right eyebrow where he was gashed by 24-year-old New Jersey man Hadi Matar after he repeatedly stabbed Rushdie at the Chautauqua Institution near Buffalo, New York.
Speaking from his home in Pittsburgh Tuesday, Reese said he was recovering but was much more concerned with the condition of Rushdie, who may lose an eye and had been placed on a ventilator over the weekend.
“Our concern is for Salman,” Reese said. The City of Asylum founder said he would not be intimidated and that the attack was an example of how important it is to support persecuted writers.
—New York Daily News
Syria denies responsibility for kidnapping US journalist in 2012
DAMASCUS, Syria — The Syrian government has denied all responsibility for the kidnapping of U.S. journalist Austin Tice 10 years ago.
On Wednesday, the Syrian state news agency Sana reported that the Damascus Foreign Ministry had denounced allegations made by U.S. President Joe Biden.
Tice was working in Syria as a freelance journalist when unidentified individuals abducted him in August 2012 at a checkpoint in a suburb of the capital. A few weeks later, Tice's family reported a video had surfaced showing Tice with a group of gunmen.
Last week, Biden said the U.S. government knew "with certainty that he has been held by the Syrian regime." The U.S. president called on Syria to send Tice home. The Foreign Ministry in Damascus, however, said that the Syrian government had not kidnapped or arrested any U.S. citizen.
But the ministry did point out that Tice and other Americans had entered Syria illegally. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation has offered a $1 million reward for information leading to Tice's return.
—dpa
