Left aghast at blast from recent working past

Michael Douglas comes to terms with fears, fame, father

NEW YORK — Michael Douglas, the award-winning actor and producer, recently turned 82. He is a cancer survivor, a recovered addict, a married man, the father and son of actors.

He is also an author, who begins his memoir with a message of thanks to his family — past and present and future — for the “sense of immortality.”

“Many times my father was asked, ‘Kirk, are you jealous of your son?’” he said during a recent interview at a Manhattan hotel, referring to his late father, fellow actor and sometime combatant Kirk Douglas.

“And he said, ‘Jealous?’ This is a sense of immortality, a continuity of generations.’”

PCs call for crackdown on property crime

A Progressive Conservative government would open a Crown prosecutor’s office dedicated to dealing with property crime.

Interim party leader Konrad Narth made the announcement Wednesday flanked by colleagues in front of a boarded up 7-Eleven on Main Street. Narth promised to hire 25 prosecutors who would focus on property theft, which he said is the type of crime attorneys have been inundated with in recent years.

Narth said crime has increased under the NDP government and pledged to crack down on thieves in Winnipeg and rural areas, if the PCs win power in the next provincial election, due on or before Oct. 5, 2027.

“Under this premier, Manitoba’s crime rate is 81 per cent above the national average. Property crime represents 58 per cent of crimes committed, an increase of nearly 25 per cent since Wab Kinew and the NDP took office,” Narth said, citing numbers from Statistics Canada. “In Winnipeg, the rise of property crime has significantly increased the cost of doing business and forced many businesses to now close their doors.”

Kelly Taylor

Kelly Taylor is a Winnipeg Free Press copy editor and award-winning automotive journalist. He's been a member of the Automobile Journalists' Association of Canada since 2001.

Hammer attack on cabbie has industry on edge

A leader in Winnipeg’s taxi industry is calling for people to come forward with information after one of his drivers was attacked by a man with a hammer.

The 26-year-old cabbie was taken to hospital in unstable condition after the incident Saturday morning, Unicity Taxi’s general manager said Wednesday.

“It was a very serious incident,” said Abhishek Tara, adding the driver remains in hospital.

“He lost a lot of blood.”

US jobless claims drop; still at 847,000 as pandemic rages

WASHINGTON - The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits fell but remained at a historically high 847,000 last week, a sign that layoffs keep coming as the coronavirus pandemic continues to rage.

Last week’s claims dropped by 67,000, from 914,000 the week before, the Labor Department said Thursday. Before the virus hit the United States hard last March, weekly applications for jobless aid had never topped 700,000.

Tempering last week's bigger-than-expected drop in claims: The four-week moving average — which smooths out week to week gyrations — rose by more than 16,000 last week to 868,000, highest since September.

Overall, nearly 4.8 million Americans received traditional state unemployment benefits the week of Jan. 16. That is down from nearly 5 million the week before and far below a staggering peak of nearly 25 million in May when the virus brought economic activity to a near halt. The drop suggests that some of the unemployed are finding new jobs and that others have exhausted state benefits.