Letter: Paper's Opinion On Smoking Stinks

Enjoy your balmy Monday, South Florida: The polar vortex snarling much of the U. S. in snow and ice is on its way — and it’s planning to chill here for a few days. The National Weather Service is forecasting a multiday stretch of unusually cold weather for South Florida beginning on Tuesday morning, when minimum apparent temperatures, also known as the “feels like” temperature, will be in the mid to upper 40s. But that’s just the prelude for a bitter night, when “feels-like” temperatures Tuesday night and Wednesday morning will be in the upper 30s in western sections of Palm Beach and Broward counties, with low to mid 40s along the coast. The pattern is expected to continue on Wednesday and Thursday, with highs only hitting the mid to upper 60s before falling to the upper 40s and low 50s across the region overnight. After enduring a chilly morning with lows in the low 50s, Friday’s high should return to the low to mid 70s, slightly warmer and sunny on Saturday. Temperatures in some parts of western Broward County will feel like the 30s early Wednesday morning.

WASHINGTON — To hear President-elect Donald Trump tell it, he is about to take over a nation ravaged by crisis, a desolate hellscape of crime, chaos and economic hardship. “Our Country is a disaster, a laughing stock all over the World!” he declared on social media last week. But by many traditional metrics, the America that Trump will inherit from President Joe Biden when he takes the oath for a second time, two weeks from Monday, is actually in better shape than that bequeathed to any newly elected president since George W.

EAST RUTHERFORD, N. J. — Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa is in line to miss his second consecutive game with an ailing hip and sixth game of the 2024 regular season. Tagovailoa enters Sunday’s finale against the New York Jets doubtful. Inactives will be announced 90 minutes prior to the 4:25 p.m.

MIAMI — The last time Jimmy Butler forced his way out from a team during the course of a season, as he is in the midst of doing now with the Miami Heat, the return was meager. On Nov. 12, 2018, in exchange for Butler and Justin Patton, the Timberwolves received from the Philadelphia 76ers Jerryd Bayless, Robert Covington, Dario Šarić and a 2022 second-round draft pick. That is all. Not a single definitive difference maker. Now, it appears if the Heat come up with a Butler trade ahead of the Feb.

By VALERIE GONZALEZ McALLEN, Texas (AP) — When Roselins Sequera’s family of seven finally reached the U. S. from Venezuela, they spent weeks at a migrant shelter on the Texas border that gave them a place to sleep, meals and tips for finding work. “We had a plan to go to Iowa” to join friends, said Sequera, who arrived at the Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley in October.

By FATIMA HUSSEIN WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden on Sunday plans to sign into law a measure that boosts Social Security payments for current and former public employees, affecting nearly 3 million people who receive pensions from their time as teachers, firefighters, police officers and in other public service jobs. Advocates say the Social Security Fairness Act rights a decades-old disparity, though it will also put strain on Social Security Trust Funds, which face a looming insolvency crisis. The bill rescinds two provisions — the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset — that limit Social Security benefits for recipients if they get retirement payments from other sources, including public retirement programs from a state or local government. The Congressional Research Service estimated that in December 2023, there were 745,679 people, about 1% of all Social Security beneficiaries, who had their benefits reduced by the Government Pension Offset.