COLU @ CONCEPTS

NIPTON, Calif. (AP) — Now that one of the nation’s largest cannabis companies has bought the entire California desert town of Nipton, a question remains: Will the new owners rename the place Potsylvania? The name Weed already belongs to an old mill town in Northern California. American Green Inc. announced Thursday it is buying all 80 acres of Nipton, which includes its Old West-style hotel, a handful of houses, an RV park and a coffee shop. Its plans are to transform the old Gold Rush town into what it calls “an energy-independent, cannabis-friendly hospitality destination.” The town’s current owner, Roxanne Lang, said the sale is still in escrow, but confirmed American Green is the buyer. She declined to reveal price before the sale closes, but noted she and her late husband, Gerald Freeman, listed the property at $5 million when they put it up for sale last year. Asked what her husband would think of the buyers’ plans to turn Nipton into the pot paradise of the Californ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Get your insurance through your employer? The ongoing political turmoil around “Obamacare” all but guarantees you’ll still be able to do that. Ask Walt Rowen, whose business is etching glass but whose experience managing century-old, family-owned Susquehanna Glass makes him something of an expert on health care. He’s provided coverage to employees, then canceled it, steering them to the health insurance exchange. But with those premiums rising, Rowen this year is again covering his 70 or so workers under the umbrella of employer-sponsored health insurance. As politicians continue debating government’s role in health care, employers like Pennsylvania-based Susquehanna Glass will likely continue offering health insurance as a way to attract and retain employees. (Aug.3) Employer-provided health insurance is so ingrained in the American workplace that people expect it to continue even as politicians thrash out the role of government in health care. That’...

NEW YORK (AP) — Dunkin’ is thinking about dumping “Donuts” from its name. A new location of the chain in Pasadena, California, will be simply called Dunkin’, a move that parent company Dunkin’ Brands Inc. calls a test. The Canton, Massachusetts-based company said Thursday that a few other stores will get the one-name treatment too. The chain wants people to think of its stores as a destination for coffee, although it will still sell doughnuts. Dunkin’ Donuts said it won’t make a decision on whether it will change its name until late next year, when it expects to start redesigning stores. News of the test was first reported by Nation’s Restaurant News. Source: www.apnews.com 

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The staff of the weekly newspaper Riodoce normally meets on Wednesdays to review its plans for coverage of the most recent mayhem wrought in Sinaloa state by organized crime, corrupt officials and ceaseless drug wars. But on this day, in the shadow of their own tragedy, they’ve come together to talk about security. It’s important to change their routines, they are told. Be more careful with social media. Don’t leave colleagues alone in the office at night. Two senior journalists discuss what feels safer: to take their children with them to the office, which was the target of a grenade attack in 2009, or to leave them at home. Security experts have written three words on a blackboard at the front of the room: adversaries, neutrals, allies. They ask the reporters to suggest names for each column — no proof is needed, perceptions and gut feelings are enough Allies are crucial. In an emergency, they would need a friend, a lawyer, an activist to call. The lon...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Attorney General Jeff Sessions took new steps Thursday to punish cities he believes are not cooperating with federal immigration agents in a move that was met with bewilderment by local officials who said they did not know why they were being singled out. The Justice Department sent letters to four cities struggling with gun violence, telling them they would not be eligible for a program that provides money to combat drug trafficking and gang crime unless they give federal immigration authorities access to jails and notify agents before releasing inmates wanted on immigration violations. Baltimore, Albuquerque, and Stockton and San Bernardino in California all expressed interest in the Justice Department’s Public Safety Partnership, which enlists federal agents, analysts and technology to help communities find solutions to crime. None of the four has declared itself a “sanctuary city,” a mostly symbolic term that nevertheless is strongly associated w...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Transcripts of President Donald Trump’s conversations with the leaders of Mexico and Australia in January offer new details on how the president parried with the leaders over the politics of the border wall and refugee policy — with random asides on such subjects as drug abuse in New Hampshire. The president’s exchanges with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull just a week after the inauguration were widely reported upon at the time. But transcripts published Friday by The Washington Post offer new detail on the new president’s blunt exchanges with the U.S. allies. The White House said Thursday that the release of the transcripts is a disservice to Trump. “I’m not going to comment on leaked calls,” White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said. “It’s a national security matter when phone call transcripts are being leaked out. It prevents the president from being able to do what he does best, negotiate with foreign...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s tweets declaring transgender people unwelcome in the armed forces have plunged the Pentagon into a legal and moral quagmire, sparking a flurry of meetings to devise a new policy that could lead to hundreds of service members being discharged. Months after officially allowing transgender troops to serve openly in the military, the department may be forced to throw out those who willingly came forward after being promised they’d be protected. A team of military lawyers has been pulled together to deal with the matter, Adm. Paul Zukunft, the Coast Guard commandant, revealed at the Center For Strategic and International Studies this week. These lawyers are working with the White House to flesh out some of the issues, and they’re bolstered by a Pentagon working group that had initially been set up to advance the implementation of the Obama administration’s year-old repeal of a transgender ban. Now, they must deal with whatever new post-t...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawmakers have scattered for their summer recess, leaving behind a slim record of achievements and a steaming President Donald Trump. The president is angry about what the Republican-led Congress couldn’t do — repeal Obamacare — as well as one of the few things it did: approve a Russia sanctions bill he detests. So Republican senators leave Washington with simmering tensions between them and the White House now out in public for all to see. They’ll face voters back home who have cause for frustration about an unproductive Congress led by a party given over to infighting. Lamenting poor relations with Russia, Trump sniped over Twitter on Thursday, “You can thank Congress, the same people that can’t even give us HCare!” “I was shocked by that,” responded Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Pat Toomey, who is not one for criticizing Trump publicly. “Relations with Russia are in a bad place, and it’s entirely because of Vladimir Putin, it’s not because of Congress.” ...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Police in Dubai have reopened the streets around one of the world’s tallest residential skyscrapers after firefighters put out a blaze that erupted early Friday in the high-rise, forcing residents to evacuate in the middle of the night and sending chunks of debris plummeting below. No major injuries had been reported. A few people were treated for smoke inhalation, according to Dubai’s Gulf News website. Several residents said the fire broke out just after 1 a.m. at the 86-story Torch Tower — a more than 1,100-foot-tall (335 meters) residential building in Dubai’s popular waterfront Marina district. The same building had also caught fire just two-and-a-half years earlier. Fire is engulfing a high-rise residential tower in Dubai in the middle of the night, sending plumes of smoke into the air and debris falling below. Police say no injuries have been reported so far in the blaze at the Torch Tower. (Aug. 3) The cause of the fire on w...

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro is heading toward a showdown with his political foes, promising to seat a new constituent assembly Friday that will rewrite the country’s constitution and hold powers that override all other government branches. Leaders of the opposition urged Venezuelans to fill the streets of the capital Friday, hoping to provide a strong showing that many people object to the assembly. The body’s 545 delegates were expected to be installed at the legislative palace in a room just yards (meters) from the chamber where the opposition-controlled National Assembly meets. Maduro, who has said he will use the assembly to punish his opponents, planned to attend the opening session. The legislature building has been the scene of bloody clashes in recent weeks and the installation of the all-powerful assembly will intensify a political struggle that has brought three months of bloody anti-government protests to Venezuela. Maduro vows th...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, is revealing a brief advisory role with a firm related to a controversial data analysis company that aided the Trump campaign, The Associated Press has learned. The disclosure of Flynn’s link to Cambridge Analytica will come in an amended public financial filing in which the retired U.S. Army lieutenant general also discloses income that includes payments from the Trump transition team, according to a person close to Flynn who spoke to AP on condition of anonymity Thursday to describe details of the filing made to the White House. The amended disclosure shows that just before the end of the campaign, Flynn entered into a consulting agreement with SCL Group, a Virginia-based company related to Cambridge Analytica, the data mining and analysis firm that worked with Trump’s campaign. The person said Flynn didn’t perform work or accept payment as part of the agreement with SCL Group. The ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Special Counsel Robert Mueller is using a grand jury in Washington as part of an investigation into potential coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia, a person familiar with the probe says. The use of a grand jury, a standard prosecution tool in criminal investigations, suggests that Mueller and his team of investigators are likely to hear from witnesses and demand documents in the coming weeks and months. The person who confirmed to The Associated Press that Mueller had turned to a grand jury was not authorized to discuss the investigation by name and spoke on condition of anonymity. Special Counsel Robert Mueller is using a Washington grand jury as he probes the potential coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia. Meanwhile, Michael Flynn is detailing previously undisclosed income and consulting. (Aug. 3) The Wall Street Journal first reported the use of a grand jury. Grand juries are common vehicles to subpoena witnesses and...