 | | Skating with Santa at Rockefeller Center. Happy holidays! Chang W. Lee/The New York Times | Your Thursday Briefing By ADEEL HASSAN |
| Good morning. |
| Here's what you need to know: |
| • Severe weather alert. |
| The National Weather Service says the threat of tornadoes continues in the U.S. southeast after at least six people were killed on Wednesday, with storms causing significant damage in some areas. |
| Unseasonably warm temperatures will continue today in the east, but Utah, at least, can expect a white Christmas. |
| • Ninth arrest in Paris attacks. |
| The Brussels police have arrested a man in connection with the attacks in Paris that killed 130 people last month, the Belgian authorities said today. More details are expected later today. |
| • Guilt trip in New Hampshire? |
| Jeb Bush and Gov. Chris Christie, lagging in polls, have been telling Republican voters in New Hampshire that they have an enormous responsibility: to pick a candidate not named Donald J. Trump. |
| Hillary Clinton is using Mr. Trump's crude characterization of her 2008 defeat as a way to unite women behind her campaign. But an effort to appeal to young Hispanic voters seems to have backfired. |
| • A year of disasters in China. |
| The deadly landslide on Sunday in the southern boomtown of Shenzhen, in which a man-made mountain of dirt and construction debris collapsed, is exposing the weaknesses in China's rapid growth. |
| Disregard for safety standards and environmental regulations remains common, as demonstrated by the series of disasters that struck the country this year. |
| • Shooting suspect wants to be his own lawyer. |
| Robert L. Dear Jr., the man accused of a deadly rampage at a Planned Parenthood center in Colorado Springs, has told a judge that he wants to represent himself and that he doesn't trust his public defender. |
| Mr. Dear will have a competency examination to determine whether he is mentally able to waive his right to a lawyer and stand in his own defense. |
| • Thumbs down to daily fantasy sports. |
| The Illinois attorney general said on Wednesday that it did not matter whether daily fantasy sports involved skill or luck, because state law prohibits them either way. |
| Resistance to the pastime, which has been embraced by professional sports leagues and is a huge advertiser on television, has grown this year. |
| • Midnight Masses. |
| Pope Francis leads Christmas Eve midnight Mass at the Vatican tonight, to be shown on NBC beginning at 11:35 p.m. Eastern. And Christian pilgrims will gather for midnight Mass at the Church of the Nativity on Manger Square, in the West Bank town of Bethlehem, where Jesus is believed to have been born. |
| Here's a look at Christmas decorations and festive lighting around the world. |
| BUSINESS |
| • Airlines are adding dozens of flights today for the Christmas travel rush, after more than 5,000 flights were delayed and more than 400 were canceled on Wednesday because of bad weather. |
| • Hyatt Hotels is warning that hackers may have obtained customers' credit card numbers or other sensitive information. |
| • It's high time to improve our digital literacy, our technology columnist writes. |
| • The "12 Days of Christmas" gift index, tracked annually as a humorous gauge of inflation, barely increased this year. |
| • Major stock markets in the U.S. close at 1 p.m. Eastern. Here are snapshots of the U.S. and world markets. |
| NOTEWORTHY |
| • Tracking Mr. Claus. |
| The U.S. military, in a 60-year-old tradition, is using radar to follow Santa's flight around the world tonight. |
| The practice began in 1955, when an advertisement in Colorado encouraging children to call Santa misprinted the telephone number, instead giving the number for an air defense command operations center. The director had members of his staff give updates on Santa's location to children who called. |
| • A blockbuster Friday. |
| Among the holiday releases: "Concussion," with Will Smith, and "Daddy's Home," a comedy starring Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell. |
| "Joy," a comedy-drama hybrid, reunites the filmmaker David O. Russell with Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro and Bradley Cooper. |
| Quentin Tarantino's "Hateful Eight" is a drama set in Wyoming shortly after the Civil War, and "The Revenant" is an action-adventure starring Leonardo DiCaprio. |
| • That song that's always on … |
| Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" is in its usual perch atop Billboard's Holiday 100 chart, part of her pursuit of seasonal supremacy. |
| • Scoreboard. |
| The Raiders could be playing their final home game in Oakland, Calif., tonight, against the San Diego Chargers (8:25 p.m. Eastern, NFL Network). |
| And Dirk Nowitzki moved into sixth place on the N.B.A.'s career scoring list, as he helped the Dallas Mavericks gain a 119-118 win over the Brooklyn Nets on Wednesday night. |
| • Remember the neediest! |
| For more than 100 years, The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund has provided direct assistance to struggling New Yorkers. |
| You can learn more and donate today, if you like. |
| BACK STORY |
| Until 1906, listening to the radio wasn't an enjoyable experience. The medium was used only as a way to transmit Morse code through the air — with the dots and dashes spoken as "di," dit" and "dah." |
| One scientist saw bigger possibilities: Reginald Fessenden, an electrical engineer who was working for the United States Weather Bureau at the turn of the century. |
| The bureau's goal was to send forecasts using signals, like Morse code, over the airwaves. That proved to be frustrating for Mr. Fessenden, and he aimed for more: transmitting sound waves to carry human voices. |
| He was able to turn those sound waves into electric waves and lay them upon existing radio waves. These were the first radio waves to carry signals for a range of sound. |
| After years of experimenting, a transmitter on the Massachusetts coast sent out the first clearly heard broadcast 99 years ago tonight. |
| The hourlong radio program, heard by ships at sea, began at 9 p.m. Eastern time. The broadcast included seasonal Bible readings, Mr. Fessenden's own violin rendition of "O Holy Night" and a recording of Handel's "Largo." |
| He wrapped up the night by wishing his listeners a merry Christmas. |
| The Morning Briefing won't be published on Christmas Day, but we will be back at 6 a.m. Eastern on Monday. Have a happy holiday. |
| What would you like to see here? Contact us at briefing@nytimes.com. |
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