Buzz Aldrin to be promoted to Air Force general
Retired U.S. Air Force Col. Buzz Aldrin, who joined Neil Armstrong as the first two men to step foot on the lunar surface during 1969′s Apollo 11 mission, will receive an honorary appointment to brigadier general during a ceremony on May 5 at Los Angeles Air Force Base, according to a press release from the U.S. Space Force’s Space Systems Command.
“Always honored to serve our country,” Aldrin, 93, posted soon after the announcement to his Twitter account.
Aldrin thanked U.S. Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif., along with the Air Force and Department of Defense for the honor.
The private ceremony will see Space Systems Command commander Lt. Gen. Michael A. Guetlein leading the promotion for Aldrin, the oldest of the surviving four men to walk on the moon.
Born in New Jersey, Aldrin is a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy West Point and served as a fighter pilot from 1952 to 1959 flying F-86 Sabres in 66 combat missions. He shot down two MIG-15s while part of the 16th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron at Suwon Air Base, South Korea, according to the release. He also served as an F-100 Super Sabre flight commander in the 22nd Fighter Squadron at Bitburg Air Base in Germany.
He later attended graduate school at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, receiving a doctorate in astronautics that included a thesis on “Manned Orbital Rendezvous,” the release said.
—Orlando Sentinel
R. Kelly appeals NY sex trafficking and racketeering conviction
NEW YORK — Disgraced R&B singer R. Kelly says he’s a victim of the #MeToo movement and wants a New York appeals court to toss his Brooklyn conviction or give him a new trial.
Kelly says his Brooklyn case that resulted in his 30-year sentence should be retried based on jurors who admitted seeing “Surviving R Kelly,” the docuseries that brought rampant sexual abuse allegations to light, among other arguments.
“Galvanized by an influential social movement determined to punish centuries of male misbehavior through symbolic prosecutions of high-profile men, the government brought a [federal racketeering] prosecution against the Defendant that was ‘absurdly remote’ from the drafters’ intent,” reads the brief filed this week by Kelly’s attorneys.
A jury convicted Kelly, 56 — who sold over 75 million records at his peak and won three Grammy awards — of one racketeering count and eight Mann Act counts in September 2021 for a decades-long sexual abuse scheme targeting young female fans and some boys. Several were minors.
At sentencing, Judge Ann Donnelly said Kelly mercilessly ruined the lives of young fans he serially raped, abused and isolated “with regularity for almost 25 years.”
—New York Daily News
Computer snafu leaves hundreds languishing outside Disneyland
LOS ANGELES — Between the cost and the crowds, getting into the Disneyland Resort has become difficult for many.
But on Thursday, a computer system hiccup made getting into the parks (temporarily) impossible.
The parks' ticketing system experienced an outage of about 30 minutes Thursday that affected the turnstiles, Disneyland officials said.
As a result, hundreds of guests congregated in the center promenade between the entrances to Disneyland and Disney California Adventure as they awaited entry.
Rebecca Saryan, a resort employee who works at Disney California Adventure, was attending the park on her own time Thursday and was caught up in the snafu.
Despite the extended wait to get into the park, Saryan said guests were mostly understanding.
"Everybody around me, for the most part, were actually pretty nice and considerate," she said.
—Los Angeles Times
Austin expects Sweden to follow Finland into NATO 'soon'
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin reiterated on Friday that he expects Sweden to join NATO soon.
Speaking at a meeting with key Western allies at the Ramstein U.S. air base in Germany on Friday, Austin said: "I'd note that Finland, which has long taken part in this contact group, is here today as a new NATO ally. I expect that Sweden will soon follow."
Despite some wrangling surrounding Sweden's NATO membership, the United States is still assuming that the country will be admitted to the defense alliance by the time it holds its summit in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius in the summer.
Austin had made that clear in remarks on Wednesday at the Swedish naval port of Muskö.
Austin told his Swedish counterpart Pal Jonson that Finland had recently been welcomed as the 31st member of NATO, adding that he hoped Sweden would be welcomed as the 32nd soon.
Sweden applied for NATO membership in May 2022 together with Finland, following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
—dpa
