U.S. President Joe Biden Monday marked the fourth anniversary of the deadly school shooting in Parkland, Florida by calling on the country to uphold the “solemn obligation” to end gun violence. 

 

“On this difficult day, we mourn with the Parkland families whose lives were upended in an instant; who had to bury a piece of their soul deep in the earth,” Biden said in a statement. “We pray too for those still grappling with wounds both visible and invisible.” 

 

On February 14, 2018, a gunman opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, killing 17 people in the deadliest high school shooting to date. Fourteen of those killed were students, the others, educators. The gunman, Nikolas Cruz, was 19 years old at the time and a former student at the school.  

 

Cruz pleaded guilty to the shootings last October. His sentencing trial is set to begin later this year. Jurors will decide whether he spends the rest of his life in prison or gets the death penalty. 

 

The shooting stirred a movement, March for Our Lives, started by students advocating for stricter gun laws. 

 

“Out of the heartbreak of Parkland a new generation of Americans all across the country marched for our lives and towards a better, safer America for us all,” Biden said, “Together, this extraordinary movement is making sure that the voices of victims and survivors and responsible gun owners are louder than the voices of gun manufacturers and the National Rifle Association.” 

 

The NRA is America’s biggest gun rights lobby. The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution affirms the right to bear arms. In the wake of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting, Florida, a Republican-led state, imposed a three-day waiting period to purchase firearms and raised the minimum age to buy a gun from 18 to 21. The NRA argued the state law is unconstitutional. 

 

Since the Parkland incident, school shootings have continued. Between Aug. 1 and Dec. 31, there were 136 instances of gunfire at schools, according to gun control advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety.  

 

Biden outlined steps that his administration is following to counteract this rise, including “curbing the proliferation of ‘ghost’ guns,” unregistered firearms that can be purchased without a background check.  

 

He called on Congress to take action saying, “Congress must do much more — beginning with requiring background checks on all gun sales, banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, and eliminating immunity for gun manufacturers.” 

 

Multiple bills to scrutinize gun buyers and restrict purchases of the deadliest weapons have been put forward in the U.S. Congress over the last decade. None became law. 

 

Most Democratic Party lawmakers back tighter gun regulations while most Republicans oppose them, citing the Second Amendment. 

 

 
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Ivan Reitman, the influential filmmaker and producer behind many of the most beloved comedies of the late 20th century, from “Animal House” to “Ghostbusters,” has died. He was 75. 

Reitman died peacefully in his sleep Saturday night at his home in Montecito, Calif., his family told The Associated Press. 

“Our family is grieving the unexpected loss of a husband, father, and grandfather who taught us to always seek the magic in life,” children Jason Reitman, Catherine Reitman and Caroline Reitman said in a joint statement. “We take comfort that his work as a filmmaker brought laughter and happiness to countless others around the world. While we mourn privately, we hope those who knew him through his films will remember him always.”

Known for bawdy comedies that caught the spirit of their time, Reitman’s big break came with the raucous, college fraternity sendup “National Lampoon’s Animal House,” which he produced. He directed Bill Murray in his first starring role in the summer camp flick “Meatballs,” and then again in 1981′s “Stripes,” but his most significant success came with 1984’s “Ghostbusters.”

Not only did the irreverent supernatural comedy starring Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Ernie Hudson, Sigourney Weaver and Rick Moranis gross nearly $300 million worldwide, it earned two Oscar nominations, spawned a veritable franchise, including spinoffs, television shows and a new movie, “Ghostbusters: Afterlife,” that opened this last year. His son, filmmaker Jason Reitman directed.

Paul Feig, who directed the 2016 reboot of “Ghostbusters” tweeted that he was in shock. 

“I had the honor of working so closely with Ivan and it was always such a learning experience,” Feig wrote. “He directed some of my favorite comedies of all time. All of us in comedy owe him so very much.”

“A legend,” comedian and actor Kumail Nanjiani said on Twitter. “The number of great movies he made is absurd.”

Among other notable films he directed are “Twins,” “Kindergarten Cop,” “Dave,” “Junior” and 1998′s “Six Days, Seven Nights.” He also produced “Beethoven,” “Old School” and “EuroTrip,” and many others, including his son’s Oscar-nominated film “Up in the Air.” 

He was born in Komárno, Czechoslovakia, in 1946 where his father owned the country’s biggest vinegar factory. His mother had survived Auschwitz and his father was in the resistance. When the communists began imprisoning capitalists after the war, the Reitmans decided to escape, when Ivan Reitman was only 4. They traveled in the nailed-down hold of a barge headed for Vienna.

“I remember flashes of scenes,” Reitman told the AP in 1979. “Later they told me about how they gave me a couple of sleeping pills so I wouldn’t make any noise. I was so knocked out that I slept with my eyes open. My parents were afraid I was dead.” 

The Reitmans joined a relative in Toronto, where Ivan displayed his show biz inclinations: starting a puppet theater, entertaining at summer camps, playing coffee houses with a folk music group. He studied music and drama at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, and began making movie shorts. 

With friends and $12,000, Reitman made a nine-day movie, “Cannibal Girls,” which American International agreed to release. He produced on a $500 budget a weekly TV revue, “Greed,” with Dan Aykroyd, and became associated with the Lampoon group in its off-Broadway revue that featured John Belushi, Gilda Radner and Murray. That soon led to “Animal House.”

Reitman seized the moment after “Animal House’s” massive success and raised money to direct “Meatballs,” which would be tamer than the hard-R “Animal House.” 

He hand picked Murray to star, which would prove to be a significant break for the comedian, but Ramis later said that Reitman didn’t know if Murray would actually show up until the first day of the shoot. But it was the beginning of a fruitful and longrunning partnership that would produce the war comedy “Stripes,” which Reitman said he thought up on the way to the “Meatballs” premiere, and “Ghostbusters.” 

Reitman also put Schwarzenegger in his first major comedy, opposite Danny DeVito in “Twins.” There was such uncertainty around the project that all forfeited their fees for a share of the profits, which would prove to be a lucrative deal when the film earned $216 million against an $18 million production budget. In Sept. 2021, it was announced that a sequel, “Triplets” was in the works with Reitman directing his original cast, plus Tracy Morgan as their long lost brother. 

By the time 1990′s “Kindergarten Cop” came around, Reitman had established himself as the most successful comedy director in history. Though not even being the father of three children could have prepared him for the arduous task of directing 30 children between the ages of 4 and 7 in the Schwarzenegger comedy.

The political comedy “Dave,” starring Kevin Kline as an ordinary man who has to double for the US President, provided a bit of a departure for Reitman. Roger Ebert wrote at the time that “The movie is more proof that it isn’t what you do, it’s how you do it: Ivan Reitman’s direction and Gary Ross’ screenplay use intelligence and warmhearted sentiment to make Dave into wonderful lighthearted entertainment.”

Reitman slowed down as a director after “Six Days, Seven Nights,” the 1998 adventure comedy with Harrison Ford and Anne Heche — only four films would follow “Evolution,” “My Super Ex-Girlfriend,” “No Strings Attached” and “Draft Day,” from 2014.

But he continued producing. His company, the Montecito Picture Co., produced Todd Phillips’ first movie, “Road Trip.” And with “Ghostbusters: Afterlife,” even found himself on the press circuit with his son, providing emotional moments for both with the passing of the baton. Jason Reitman, who was only 7 when the original came out, included some nods to his father’s films like “Beethoven” and “Cannibal Girls” in “Afterlife.”

“Directing ‘Ghostbusters Afterlife’ was completely intimidating,” Jason Reitman said last year. “I was lucky enough to do it sitting next to my dad.” 

When asked why the 1984 film continued to fascinate, Reitman told the AP that it was hard to define.

“I always had a sort of sincere approach to the comedy,” he said. “I took it seriously even though, it was a horror movie and a comedy, I felt you had to sort of deal with it in a kind of realistic and honest way.”

He always took comedy and the power of laughter seriously.

“The great cliche is about how damn tough comedy is. But of course, nobody really gives that any respect,” he told the Los Angeles Times in 2000. “It’s such a visceral thing, laughing. So, getting to the point where you can get an audience of 600 people laughing is really precise and intricate work. … My sense is we’re laughing at the same things we’ve always laughed at, but the language of the filmmaker and the performer shifts.” 
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WINDSOR, ONTARIO — The busiest U.S.-Canada border crossing reopened late Sunday after protests against COVID-19 restrictions closed it for almost a week, while Canadian officials held back from a crackdown on a larger protest in the capital, Ottawa. 

Detroit International Bridge Co. said in a statement that “the Ambassador Bridge is now fully open allowing the free flow of commerce between the Canada and US economies once again.” Esther Jentzen, spokeswoman for the company, said in a later text to The Associated Press that the bridge reopened to traffic at 11 p.m. EST.

The crossing normally carries 25% of all trade between the two countries, and the blockade on the Canadian side had disrupted business in both countries, with automakers forced to shut down several assembly plants.

Police in Windsor, Ontario, said earlier in the day that more than two dozen people had been peacefully arrested, seven vehicles towed and five seized as officers cleared the last demonstrators from near the bridge, which links the city — and numerous Canadian automotive plants — with Detroit. 

The protest in Ottawa, meanwhile, has paralyzed downtown, infuriated residents who are fed up with police inaction and turned up pressure on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who presided at a Cabinet meeting late Sunday. 

The demonstrations have reverberated across Canada and beyond, with similar convoys in France, New Zealand and the Netherlands. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security warned that truck convoys may be in the works in the United States. 

The Ambassador Bridge had remained closed for most of the day despite the break up of the protest as a heavy snowstorm blanketed the area. Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens had said the span would open once authorities determined it was safe to do so.

Canada’s industry minister, François-Philippe Champagne, welcomed the development, saying on Twitter: “Good news. Glad to see that the Ambassador Bridge is now reopened.”

U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration on Sunday acknowledged the seemingly peaceful resolution to the demonstration, which it said had “widespread damaging impacts” on the “lives and livelihoods of people” on both sides of the border.

“We stand ready to support our Canadian partners wherever useful in order to ensure the restoration of the normal free flow of commerce can resume,” Homeland Security Advisor Dr. Liz Sherwood-Randall said in a statement.

In Ottawa, which is about 500 miles northeast of Windsor, Mayor Jim Watson said Sunday the city struck a deal with protesters who have jammed downtown streets for more than two weeks that will see them move out of residential areas in the next 24 hours.

Watson said he agreed to meet with demonstrators if they confined their protest to an area around Parliament Hill and moved their trucks and other vehicles out of residential neighborhoods by noon Monday.

The mayor shared a letter from one of the protest’s organizers, Tamara Lich, in which she said demonstrators “agree with your request” to focus activities at Parliament Hill. But Lich later denied there was an agreement, saying in a tweet: “No deal has been made. End the mandates, end the passports. That is why we are here.”

Watson added in his letter to protesters that residents are “exhausted″ and “on edge” due to the demonstrations and warns that some businesses are teetering on the brink of permanent closure because of the disruptions.

The ranks of protesters had swelled to what police said were 4,000 demonstrators by Saturday, and a counter-protest of frustrated Ottawa residents attempting to block the convoy of trucks from entering the downtown emerged Sunday.

Clayton Goodwin, a 45-year-old military veteran who was among the counter-protesters, said it was time for residents to stand up against the protesters.

“I’m horrified that other veterans would be down there co-opting my flag, co-opting my service,” said Goodwin, who is the CEO of the Veterans Accountability Commission, a nonprofit advocacy group. “It’s a grift. The city was free. We’re 92% vaccinated. We’re ready to support our businesses.”

Colleen Sinclair, another counter-protester, said the demonstrators have had enough time to have their discontent heard and need to move on — with police force, if it comes down to it.

“They’re occupiers. People are scared to go to work, too scared to leave their homes,” she said. “This is not how you get your voice heard. This is domestic terrorism and we want you out of our city. Go home.”

The city has seen similar expansions of the protest on past weekends, and loud music played as people milled about downtown where anti-vaccine demonstrators have been encamped since late January, to the frustration of local residents.

“It just feels like I’m living in a different country, like I’m in the States,” said Shannon Thomas, a 32-year-old teacher. “It just makes me really sad to see all these people waving Canadian flags and acting like patriots when it’s really the most sad and embarrassing thing I’ve ever seen.”

Trudeau has so far rejected calls to use the military, but had said that “all options are on the table” to end the protests. Trudeau has called the protesters a “fringe” of Canadian society. Both federal and provincial politicians have said they can’t order police what to do.

Major-General Steve Boivin, commander of Canadian Special Operations Forces Command, said Sunday that two of his special forces soldiers were supporting the protests in Ottawa and were in the “process of being released” from service. Boivin said the activity goes against the military’s values and ethics.

On Friday, a judge ordered an end to the blockade at the crossing in Windsor and Ontario Premier Doug Ford declared a state of emergency allowing for fines of 100,000 Canadian dollars and up to one year in jail for anyone illegally blocking roads, bridges, walkways and other critical infrastructure.

Partial closures at the bridge started on Feb. 7 and by midweek the disruption was so severe that automakers began shutting down or reducing production. The standoff came at a time when the industry is already struggling to maintain production in the face of pandemic-induced shortages of computer chips and other supply-chain disruptions.

“We are protesting the government taking away our rights,” said Windsor resident Eunice Lucas-Logan. “We want the restrictions removed. We have to wait to find out.”

The 67-year-old has been out supporting the protest for the past four days. She said she appreciated that police have been patient.

On the other side of the country, a major truck border crossing between Surrey, British Columbia, and Blaine, Washington, was closed Sunday, a day after Canadian authorities said a few vehicles had breached police barricades and a crowd entered the area by foot.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said Sunday afternoon four people had been arrested for “mischief” during the protest. Some people who stayed overnight had packed up and left, but the border crossing and roads in the area remained closed.

A border blockade that began in Coutts, Alberta, north of Sweet Grass, Montana, on Jan. 29 remained in place as well. Police issued more than 50 traffic tickets Saturday and continued issuing them Sunday, RCMP Cpl. Troy Savinkoff said. 

Officers also intercepted and disabled three excavators that were being brought to the protest, Savinkoff said.

“Had those made their way to the blockade, it would only have compounded the unfortunate situation we’re facing at the border,” he said.

While the protesters are decrying vaccine mandates for truckers and other COVID-19 restrictions, many of Canada’s public health measures, such as mask rules and vaccine passports for getting into restaurants and theaters, are already falling away as the omicron surge levels off.

About 90% of truckers in Canada are vaccinated, and trucker associations and many big-rig operators have denounced the protests. The U.S. has the same vaccination rule for truckers crossing the border, so it would make little difference if Trudeau lifted the restriction.

Pandemic restrictions have been far stricter there than in the U.S., but Canadians have largely supported them. The vast majority of Canadians are vaccinated, and the COVID-19 death rate is one-third that of the United States.

Meanwhile, Biden, in an interview with NBC’s Lester Holt on Sunday ahead of the Super Bowl, struck a critical tone when asked about those likely to object to the mask mandate at the NFL championship game.

“I love how people talk about personal freedom,” he said. “If you’re exercising personal freedom, but you put someone else in jeopardy, their health in jeopardy, I don’t consider that being very good with freedom.” 
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U.S. President Joe Biden assured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Sunday of Washington’s commitment to “Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity” even as the United States says the threat of a Russian invasion of Ukraine looms as a “distinct possibility” in the coming days.

Biden conferred by phone with the Ukrainian leader from the Camp David presidential retreat outside Washington, where the U.S. leader is spending the weekend as Western officials express increased fears that Russian President Vladimir Putin could attack the one-time Soviet republic in the next few days, possibly by Wednesday.

The White House said in a statement that Biden “made clear [to Zelenskiy] that the United States would respond swiftly and decisively, together with its allies and partners, to any further Russian aggression against Ukraine.”

Biden, however, has ruled out sending U.S. troops to fight alongside Ukrainians in the event of a Russian invasion, while vowing to impose “swift and severe” economic sanctions.

The White House said Biden and Zelenskiy “agreed on the importance of continuing to pursue diplomacy and deterrence” to a Moscow invasion, although Western diplomatic overtures to Putin have so far failed to end the stalemate.

Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, told CNN’s “State of the Union” show that the U.S. cannot predict whether Russia might invade this week or after the Beijing Olympics end in a week, but that there is “a distinct possibility there will be a major military action.”

While the U.S. has warned for several months of the threat of a Russian attack, Sullivan said “in the last few days” Moscow has accelerated its military buildup.

Biden, in an hour-long call Saturday with Putin, warned the Russian leader that invading Ukraine would cause “widespread human suffering.” Biden said the United States and its allies remained committed to diplomacy to end the crisis but were “equally prepared for other scenarios.”

Russia said Biden continued to fail to address Moscow’s main security concerns, including ruling out Ukraine’s possible membership in the 30-country NATO military alliance led by the U.S.

The Western allies have ruled out Russian veto power over NATO membership as a nonstarter but said they are willing to negotiate other security issues, such positioning of missiles in NATO counties closest to Russia and NATO troop training exercises.

Moscow’s troops have now surrounded much of Ukraine with more than 130,000 troops, to the north of Ukraine in Russian ally Belarus and along Ukraine’s eastern border with Russia, while positioning warships to the south in the Black Sea along the Crimean Peninsula that Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.

“I’m not handicapping what will happen,” Sullivan said, but added that the U.S. and its allies would impose a “significant strategic [economic] loss” on Russia if it attacks Ukraine.

While ruling out sending the U.S. military to fight in Ukraine, Biden sent 5,000 U.S. troops to NATO countries in eastern European countries closest to Russia to help bolster their fighting forces.

The U.S. has urged all Americans living in Ukraine to leave immediately, and the Defense Department has pulled out 160 military advisers who had been assisting the Kyiv government.

Sullivan said the U.S. believes a Russian attack could start with a barrage of missiles and aerial bombings followed by a ground invasion.

“Civilians could be killed regardless of their nationality,” he said.

Numerous countries have ordered their diplomatic personnel to leave Kyiv, while some are keeping smaller contingents in consulates in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, near the Polish border.

Several international airlines have stopped flying into Ukraine because of the impending threat of warfare, although Ukraine said it has not closed its airspace.

Dutch airline KLM said Saturday that it has canceled flights to Ukraine until further notice.

Dutch worries about the potential danger in Ukrainian airspace are high in the wake of the 2014 shootdown of a Malaysian airliner over an area of eastern Ukraine held by Russia-backed rebels. All 298 people aboard were killed, including 198 Dutch citizens.

The Ukrainian charter airline SkyUp said Sunday that its flight from Madeira, Portugal, to Kyiv was diverted to the Moldovan capital, Chisinau, after the Irish leasing company that owns the plane said it was banning flights in Ukrainian airspace.

Some material in this report came from the Associated Press.
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