Felons, and those convicted of domestic assault, and those with a history of mental illness, cannot by federal law buy firearms or explosive devices, but Americans on the National Counterterrorism Center’s consolidated watch list can — and may possess an unlimited quantity. (In 2013 and 2014, 455 of 486 prospective purchasers on the list passed the background check, and going back to 2004, 2,043 of 2,233, according to a recent Government Accountability Office report.) Legislation to add watch listees as a banned category was introduced again this year, but has failed several times in the past.
— The annual National Basketball Association All-Star game in February provided a windfall for the co-host arena’s proprietor, James L. Dolan, whose family owns not only Madison Square Garden but also the NBA’s richest franchise (the Knicks), hockey’s second-richest (the Rangers), and the New York region’s telecom juggernaut Cablevision. Among the government handouts Dolan receives is the 33-year (and counting) exemption from property taxes for the Garden’s four square blocks (“among the most valuable (plots of land) on Earth,” according to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio) — a government gift, in 2014 alone, worth $54 million.
The three-week February exhibition of Alejandro Figueredo Diaz-Perera consisted of a blank wall in Chicago’s West Loop gallery — with the artist present only in the sense that he was residing in a narrow, 10-foot crawl space behind the wall with only a single sign alerting patrons (“I am here, but you will not see me”). Diaz-Perera’s “In the Absence of a Body” was designed, he said, to explore the boundary between presence and absence.
A motorist smashed into a power pole at 2 a.m. on Feb. 25 in Tukwila, Washington, because, he explained, he was “chasing an owl.” (Police somehow found him to be sober and did not charge him.)
Officials in Salem, Oregon, posted signs in February to warn joggers on a popular running path that they might be attacked by a rogue owl or owls, after four people were aggressively pecked at by dive-bombers. (One design for the sign came from cable TV personality Rachel Maddow.)
A bar called Annie the Owl was scheduled for a special one-week event in London in March, for patrons to sip drinks while domesticated owls perch on their shoulders.
Bill Bresnan, 74, of Toms River, New Jersey, has written a love letter to his wife, Kirsten, also 74, every day for nearly 40 years — more than 10,000 in number — and continuing, according to a ABC News report. “We’ve never had a fight,” he said. Their romance continues over, for example, playing “Boggle” at breakfast or having candlelit dinners with wine.
Margurite Haragan, 58, was charged with two harassment counts against a Jewish woman in Boise after the victim complained of being roughed up by Haragan, who was trying to pressure her to acknowledge a belief in Jesus Christ. After Haragan allegedly stepped on the woman’s neck and pulled her hair upward, the victim promised to become a Christian.
