Clay Aiken primary opponent Keith Crisco found dead - Washington Post (blog)

North Carolina businessman Keith Crisco, a Democrat who ran for Congress against former "American Idol" star Clay Aiken, was found dead at his home Monday, his company and campaign said.

An employee at the company Crisco co-founded and his campaign each said he suffered a fall but did not immediately provide further details. Crisco was 71.

A businessman and former state Commerce secretary, Crisco had been vying for the Democratic nomination for U.S. House against Aiken in the state's 2nd congressional district. The contest was without an official winner nearly a week after the primary election.

With all precincts reporting the results of last Tuesday's election, Aiken led Crisco by fewer than 400 votes, while a third candidate, Toni Morris, lagged behind the two. Crisco did not concede the race, awaiting the results of a final count, including absentee ballots that continued to pour in for days.

In a statement, Aiken said he was "deeply saddened" by Crisco's death and called him a "good and honorable man." Aiken announced that he was "suspending all campaign activities as we pray for his family and friends."​

The state Board of Elections said in a statement that it was "saddened to hear of the passing of Keith Crisco. A native of North Carolina, we are grateful for Mr. Crisco’s service to our state and his community through the years. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Crisco family during this difficult time."

Crisco was vying for a chance to run against Rep. Renee Ellmers (R) in a district that leans Republican.

"I am deeply saddened by this sudden and painful tragedy and wish God's blessings for Keith's family through the coming days," said Ellmers. "His kindness and dedication to his principles were models we should all strive toward, and he will be dearly missed. My thoughts and prayers are with Keith's family, friends and loved ones during this difficult time."

Updated at 8:13 p.m.

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Blackhawks' Andrew Shaw to miss fifth straight game - CBSSports.com

Andrew Shaw won't be returning to the Blackhawks for Game 6. (USATSI)

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Since this is the playoffs, teams are particularly evasive when it comes to injuries. The Chicago Blackhawks haven't shared much about forward Andrew Shaw's timetable for return. He has been out of the lineup since leaving Game 1 of the club's second-round series against the Minnesota Wild. As each game approaches since Shaw's injury, the update has been the same: Shaw isn't playing.

Shaw will indeed be out for Game 6, the team announced. He will be missing his fifth straight contest with a lower-body injury after taking a hard hit from Wild defenseman Clayton Stoner in Game 1. He has been listed as day-to-day since suffering the injury.

The Blackhawks have missed the agitating forward and what he brings to their lineup. In addition to his ability to get under other players' skin and play a physical game, Shaw helps provide some scoring depth and had four points in the postseason before going down.

"He's progressing, but he's not on the trip," Blackhawks head coach Joel Quenneville offered the assembled media (via ESPNChicago.com).

Shaw hasn't even resumed skating yet, so his absence for Game 6 in St. Paul is hardly surprising. He is expected to get back on the ice within the next few days, though.

Quenneville is a noted line-tinkerer, but the Blackhawks haven't found a ton of really consistent combinations since Shaw has been out. Losing a key depth player will do that. Then add in the suspension of Brandon Bollig, who won't be eligible to return to the lineup until after Game 6, and things have really been jumbled for the Blackhawks.

The club has a chance to close out the series, but will be hard-pressed to do so as the Wild have been essentially unbeatable on home ice this year. They are 5-0 at the Xcel Energy Center this postseason.

Having Shaw for that tough contest would have helped the Hawks, but they'll have to hope for some of their lower-lineup forwards to step up in what is sure to be a really tough Game 6 on Tuesday in St. Paul.

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Weather Channel Caught In Storm Of Controversy Over Sarcastic Tweet - Huffington Post

Outgoing Fort Worth, Texas, Councilman Joel Burns received a snarky response to his request for The Weather Channel app to use a photo of Fort Worth and not Dallas for the local weather. | YouTube/startelgramvideo

The Weather Channel has apologized to outgoing Fort Worth, Texas, City Councilman Joel Burns after a recent Twitter flap.

Burns, an openly gay politician, gained national attention in October of 2010 when he made an impassioned “It Gets Better” speech at a council meeting, decrying the bullying of young LGBT students.

The incident between Burns and The Weather Channel began when Burns tweeted his frustration over pictures of Dallas being displayed by the app when people check the weather for Fort Worth.

When his plea received no response, he followed through on his declaration, deleting the app from his phone.

That’s when the folks behind The Weather Channel’s Twitter feed finally spoke up.

Rather than engage in the throwing of shade on Twitter, Burns took the high road and let the court of public opinion deal with The Weather Channel’s tweet.

“Wow, way to be a d--k in responding to a simple request," one user tweeted at The Weather Channel after the exchange. "You suck, social media intern."

“Fire your social media person. That was an awful response to Joel,” another wrote.

Within a couple hours of the altercation, The Weather Channel had tweeted an apology.

It also issued a statement to The Wrap:

This morning one of our team members used sarcasm in an unfortunate and unacceptable way on our Twitter account. ... It was not our intention to offend and we are sorry that we did. We have since apologized to Councilman Burns and want to restate that sincere apology and assure him that this tweet does not represent our views. In fact, this is the opposite of how we want to interact with our fans, as we value their input on any occasion. We are taking the necessary steps to be sure something like this does not occur again.

Burns used the attention from the Twitter feud to try and raise a little money and awareness for a cause that he supports. In the video below, he calls on The Weather Channel to donate $100,000 to an anti-bullying project of its choice.

It’s unclear at this time if The Weather Channel will be taking Burns up on his challenge to donate money.

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Second US case of MERS confirmed - CNN

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• The patient traveled from Saudi Arabia to Florida on May 1
• The first patient was released from an Indiana hospital Friday
• Health officials say the virus poses a low risk to the general public

(CNN) -- There is a second confirmed case of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome imported into the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Monday.

Officials from the CDC and the Florida Department of Health are investigating.

The first U.S. case was reported this month in Indiana. That patient was released from a hospital Friday into home isolation, according to state health officials.

The Indiana patient was an American health care provider who had been working in Saudi Arabia and was on a planned visit to Indiana to see his family.

The Florida patient is also a health care provider who lives and works in Saudi Arabia, said Dr. Anne Schuchat, assistant surgeon general with the U.S. Public Health Service and director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.

However, the Florida case is not linked to the Indiana case, she said.

The "risk to the general public remains very low," Schuchat said. In some countries, the virus has spread from person to person, but only in close contact, such as a person who was caring for an ill person.

"This virus has not shown the ability to spread easily from person to person in community settings," she said.

The 44-year-old Florida patient traveled on May 1 from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, to London, then from London to Boston; Boston to Atlanta; and Atlanta to Orlando.

MERS: 5 things to know

The man began feeling unwell on the flight from Jeddah, and continued feeling ill on subsequent flights, with symptoms including "fever, chills and a slight cough," Schuchat said.

On May 8, the man went to the emergency department of Orlando's Dr. P. Phillips Hospital.

The hospital said the man is "in good condition and continuing to improve."

Dr. Antonio Crespo, an infectious disease specialist at the hospital, said officials "believe the risk of transmission from this patient is very low since his symptoms were mild and he was not coughing when he arrived at the hospital."

The man was visiting family and did not visit any theme parks in the Orlando area, said Dr. John Armstrong, Florida's state surgeon general and secretary of health.

As in the Indiana case, officials were attempting to contact people -- in this case, more than 500 -- who may have come in contact with the person during travel, both in the United States and abroad.

In addition, 16 staff members at Dr. P. Phillips Hospital have been notified of possible exposure and are being tested for the virus.

Testing of people who have come in contact with the Indiana patient continues, and no additional cases have been seen, said Dr. Tom Frieden, CDC director.

The CDC has dispatched a team to Saudi Arabia in conjunction with the WHO, Frieden said.

MERS first emerged in 2011, with the first cases being diagnosed in the Arabian Peninsula in 2012. As of Friday, there have been 538 cases in 17 countries, including 145 deaths, according to the WHO, said Schuchat.

The virus is also known as MERS-CoV, since it is a coronavirus, the same group of viruses as the common cold. It attacks the respiratory system, according to the CDC. Symptoms can lead to pneumonia or kidney failure.

Testing for MERS involves looking for the virus's molecular structure in a patient's nose or blood. While the patient in Indiana was the first MERS case on U.S. soil, the CDC has been preparing for such a scenario and had been conducting an awareness campaign with hospitals and doctors since MERS emerged.

There are no travel restrictions to the Arabian Peninsula; however, the CDC suggests that people who visit there monitor their health and watch for any flu-like symptoms. If you do feel unwell after such a trip, be sure to tell your doctor about your travel.

There is no vaccine or special treatment for MERS. Doctors say they believe the Indiana patient's quick diagnosis and care dramatically increased his chances for getting better.

MERS mystery: Virus found in camels

No one knows exactly how this virus originated, but evidence implicating camels is emerging. In a recently published study in mBio, researchers said they isolated live MERS virus from two single-humped camels, known as dromedaries. They found multiple substrains in the camel viruses, including one that perfectly matches a substrain isolated from a human patient.

The same group of researchers reported in February that nearly three-quarters of camels in Saudi Arabia tested positive for past exposure to the MERS coronavirus.

CNN's Miriam Falco, Elizabeth Cohen, Elizabeth Landau and Jen Christensen contributed to this report.

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Weather Channel Caught In Storm Of Controversy Over Sarcastic Tweet - Huffington Post

Outgoing Fort Worth, Texas, Councilman Joel Burns received a snarky response to his request for The Weather Channel app to use a photo of Fort Worth and not Dallas for the local weather. | YouTube/startelgramvideo

The Weather Channel has apologized to outgoing Fort Worth, Texas, City Councilman Joel Burns after a recent Twitter flap.

Burns, an openly gay politician, gained national attention in October of 2010 when he made an impassioned “It Gets Better” speech at a council meeting, decrying the bullying of young LGBT students.

The incident between Burns and The Weather Channel began when Burns tweeted his frustration over pictures of Dallas being displayed by the app when people check the weather for Fort Worth.

When his plea received no response, he followed through on his declaration, deleting the app from his phone.

That’s when the folks behind The Weather Channel’s Twitter feed finally spoke up.

Rather than engage in the throwing of shade on Twitter, Burns took the high road and let the court of public opinion deal with The Weather Channel’s tweet.

“Wow, way to be a d--k in responding to a simple request," one user tweeted at The Weather Channel after the exchange. "You suck, social media intern."

“Fire your social media person. That was an awful response to Joel,” another wrote.

Within a couple hours of the altercation, The Weather Channel had tweeted an apology.

It also issued a statement to The Wrap:

This morning one of our team members used sarcasm in an unfortunate and unacceptable way on our Twitter account. ... It was not our intention to offend and we are sorry that we did. We have since apologized to Councilman Burns and want to restate that sincere apology and assure him that this tweet does not represent our views. In fact, this is the opposite of how we want to interact with our fans, as we value their input on any occasion. We are taking the necessary steps to be sure something like this does not occur again.

Burns used the attention from the Twitter feud to try and raise a little money and awareness for a cause that he supports. In the video below, he calls on The Weather Channel to donate $100,000 to an anti-bullying project of its choice.

It’s unclear at this time if The Weather Channel will be taking Burns up on his challenge to donate money.

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Hawks missing Andrew Shaw's disruptive presence - Chicago Tribune

Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville on getting more from the fourth line.

For those Blackhawks desiring a little peace and quiet in their dressing room, the last five games had to have seemed like paradise beside the ice with Andrew Shaw not present.

"He's a little fireball out there," winger Bryan Bickell said. "I know when we see him in the locker room he doesn't want to shut up."

But truth be told, the Hawks miss their little fireball, especially on the ice, where Shaw is adept at creating havoc in front of the net and providing scoring chances from in close, something the Hawks have lacked at times against the Wild.

Someone else will have to play traffic cop in front of the net in Game 6 on Tuesday, with coach Joel Quenneville saying Shaw won't make the trip to Minnesota because of a lower-body injury he suffered in Game 1. It will be Shaw's fifth consecutive game out.

"We said he's day to day at the beginning of the series. But now he's a little closer to day to day," Quenneville said with a laugh.

But the Hawks weren't laughing at their inability to create chances in front of Wild goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov, a deficiency they corrected enough for Sunday's 2-1 victory in Game 5, when both goals came as a result of havoc created in front of the net.

That element was absent from the Hawks' attack in Games 3 and 4 with Shaw back in Chicago recuperating and the Hawks failing to generate significant chances on Bryzgalov. Perhaps the Hawks are missing Shaw a little more than they thought they would.

"He's got a really good knack for being in that right spot on the power play," Quenneville said. "In talking about his regular shifts, he brings an intangible that you appreciate when you do have him in your lineup, that feistiness, that competitiveness. You lose a little bit of that.

"I don't think there are too many Shaws around the league."

The Hawks may have found the blueprint for beating the Wild without Shaw on Sunday night. Take Jonathan Toews' go-ahead goal. Toews fought through the riffraff in front of Bryzgalov and started whacking away at the Wild and at the puck.

Eventually the puck popped loose and Toews was able to backhand a shot into the net. A gritty, greasy goal, but in essence one that could not have been more pristine for the Hawks.

"We got some bodies to the net and made it hard on their goalie to see pucks," Hawks goalie Corey Crawford said. "It's a lot harder to control rebounds when guys are coming hard to the net and you're kind of thinking about the guy crashing the net."

That blueprint is what the Hawks would like to follow Tuesday night. Without Shaw, that becomes even more imperative.

"There's not going to be fancy goals," Quenneville said. "It's going to be second opportunities, it's going to be tip shots, it's going to be screen shots, it's going to be guys determined in the rebound area — ugly goals."

Chris Kuc contributed to this report.

chine@tribune.com

Twitter @ChristopherHine

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Another Gold for Belarus in Aerials at Olympics - ABC News

This was a high five Anton Kushnir will never forget.

Five spins into the frosty night air followed by a near-perfect landing gave Kushnir the gold medal Monday and wrapped up a sweep of aerials gold at the Sochi Olympics for Belarus.

He won it three nights after Alla Tsuper, who recently moved to Belarus from Ukraine, took the women's gold.

"We managed to repeat the success," Kushnir said. "I don't know actually how this happened but I got the gold medal."

Kushnir won with the biggest trick going in the game right now — the "back double full-full-double full," which is five twists packed into three head-over-heels flips while he soars 50 feet (15 meters) off the ramp.

He earned a score of 134.5 for the trick to beat David Morris of Australia by more than 24 points.

A pair of Chinese jumpers, Qi Guangpu and Jia Zongyang, had a chance to better those scores but both fell on the landings of their five-twist jumps.

Jia wound up with the bronze but this was another disappointment for the country that regularly brings a handful of top-10 athletes into the Olympics, yet has walked away only with a pair of bronze medals since Han Xiaopeng took gold in 2006.

"It was quite sad that we didn't get more medals than we actually did," Jia said. "Probably we could have done better. We lost some good opportunities."

Qi finished fourth, Wu Chao came in 11th and the world's top-ranked jumper coming into the Games, Liu Zhongqing, fell on both his qualifying jumps and finished last among the 21 skiers.

Belarus, meanwhile, keeps on finishing first.

This is the second straight men's gold for the country. In 2010, Alexei Grishin won the title and got his picture on a postage stamp back home. On Monday, he didn't make it through qualifying. Maybe Kushnir will replace him on the stamp.

"I'd be happy if that happens," he said. "I'd never thought about that."

Though the Olympics have been won with five twists before — Ales Valenta back in 2002 — it was the late Jeret "Speedy" Peterson who set the bar with his "Hurricane" trick — a more difficult five-twister, in which three of the twists come during the middle flip.

He won silver with that in 2010. That, combined with a new competition format in which the skiers need to keep increasing their level over four or five jumps in one night, inspired more skiers to double down on versions of their own five-twisters for this Olympic cycle.

Kushnir said he'd landed one at a World Cup contest in 2009, but not since.

He finished 15th at the 2010 Olympics and the past four years have been a series of injuries and false starts.

He got healthy in time for Sochi, and had the trick in the bag if he needed it.

"To be honest, we've been preparing this jump for quite a long time," he said.

The only man of the four finalists who didn't try five spins was Morris, who executed his four-spin jump cleanly and sat on the side watching his score of 110.41 hold up for silver.

Quite a victory for men's aerials in a country that focuses on the women in this sport. Lydia Lassila took bronze Friday for Australia's fourth Olympic aerials medal since 2002.

"I'm the only guy doing it in the country. I'm the men's team," Morris said. "But hopefully, people will come up and say, 'Hey I want to do that. It looks stupid.'"

The sport has a bigger following in Belarus and Kushnir is the new top man.

He knew something good had happened as soon as he landed. He delivered an uppercut to the air and covered his mouth with his hands. At the top of the hill, his coach picked up snow and flung it into the air.

Including Darya Domracheva's biathlon win Monday, Belarus now has five gold medals at the Sochi Games, lifting the country with a population of around 9.5 million into a share of second spot in the gold medal standings, behind only Germany.

"It was the best jump I've ever witnessed in person," said 18-year-old American Mac Bohonnon, whose Olympic debut ended with a heartening fifth-place finish. "To see Anton go out and do it that well is special."

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