Asia stocks uneven as China data, Japan policy weighed

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Chinese stocks fell Monday after a weak manufacturing report while Japan extended gains following its central bank's introduction of a negative interest rate policy to boost lending by banks. Other markets were mixed.

KEEPING SCORE: Japan's Nikkei 225 rose 1.8 percent to 17,833.53 and South Korea's Kospi added 0.3 percent to 1,918.22. Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 0.6 percent to 19,557.75 and the Shanghai Composite in mainland China lost 1.7 percent to 2,689.89. Australia's S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.8 percent to 5,047.40. Stocks in Taiwan and Southeast Asia were lower.

CHINA MANUFACTURING: An index based on a survey of factory purchasing managers fell to 49.4 in January, its lowest in more than three years, in the latest sign of weakness for the world's No. 2 economy. January's reading was down from December's 49.7 on a 100-point scale on which numbers below 50 indicate contraction. Separately, the private Caixin/Markit purchasing managers' index showed improvement but was weak overall.

THE QUOTE: Investors will expect more stimulus from Beijing as the latest data showed that China's manufacturing is "in a state of further deterioration," said Mizuho Bank in a daily commentary. "Markets could be betting on more coordinated and forceful stimulus from Beijing too now that there is a certain policy stimulus momentum established."

CENTRAL BANKS: Analysts said after Japan's central bank introduced a negative interest rate policy on Friday, central banks in other countries may add to stimulus or be more cautious about tightening policy. "The Bank of Japan's move sets a more dovish tone for major central banks around the world," said Ric Spooner, chief analyst at CMC Markets in Sydney. "At the margin, it will increase the incentive for the ECB to add stimulus as it seeks to keep its currency relatively weak. Similarly the Fed and the Bank England will be a little more cautious about lifting rates."

WALL STREET: U.S. stock markets posted their biggest gains in about five months on Friday though ended January with losses. The Dow Jones industrial average surged 2.5 percent to 16,466.30. The Standard & Poor's 500 rose 2.5 percent to 1,940.24. The Nasdaq composite index jumped 2.4 percent to 4,613.95.

ENERGY: Benchmark U.S. oil was down 70 cents to $32.92 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It finished Friday at $33.62 a barrel, up 40 cents, or 1.2 percent. Brent crude, a benchmark for international oils, fell 73 cents to $35.26 a barrel in London.

CURRENCIES: The dollar rose to 121.20 yen from 121.12 yen on Friday. The euro strengthened to $1.0853 from $1.0831.

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Officials: Man who led escape had help from jail teacher

SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — One of three violent inmates who broke out of a Southern California jail a week ago surrendered Friday, and authorities believe the other two may be 400 miles north in the San Jose area.

Bac Duong, 43, surrendered in Southern California earlier in the day and told investigators he had been with the other two fugitives, 20-year-old Jonathan Tieu and 37-year-old Hossein Nayeri, in San Jose on Thursday, Orange County Sheriff's Lt. Jeff Hallock said. The two may be headed to Fresno, he said.

"If they are watching, we want them to understand that we are pressing forward, and we are coming after them," Hallock said at a news conference, addressing the escapees directly for the first time. "We will take you back into custody."

Duong was taken into custody in Santa Ana, where the trio made their brazen escape on Jan. 22 from the maximum security facility, authorities said.

It's not clear how he got back to Southern California from San Jose, but early Friday Duong contacted a woman he knew at an auto electric repair shop just a few miles away from the jail, authorities and witnesses said.

Lee Tran, whose family owns Auto Electric Rebuilders, said Duong came to the shop looking for Tran's sister, Theresa, and told her that he wanted to surrender.

"He was scared for his life, pretty much," Tran said. "That's why he asked one of our people to turn him in."

Tran said his sister called 911, and Duong stayed outside, smoked a cigarette and waited for police.

"She was crying her head off," said Trach Tran, her father, who was also there. "Everybody was scared."

Lee Tran said his sister's boyfriend knows Duong, and federal authorities had come by to speak with her earlier this week because she might have visited Duong in jail.

Shortly after the late-morning arrest, a team of well-armed officers in protective vests swarmed the business.

Tieu and Nayeri are believed to be still together in a white utility van the fugitives stole a day after the escape, and they could be headed to Fresno where there may be an associate who can help them, Hallock said.

The three men had all been awaiting trial for separate violent crimes at the Central Men's Jail. They were held in a dormitory with about 65 other men in the jail about 30 miles southeast of Los Angeles.

The men escaped in the early morning hours after cutting a hole in a metal grate then crawling through plumbing tunnels and onto the roof of a four-story jail building.

They pushed aside barbed wire and rappelled down using a rope made of bed linen.

It took jail staff 16 hours to realize the three men were missing.

On Thursday, authorities arrested a woman who taught English inside the jail. Nooshafarin Ravaghi, 44, gave Nayeri a paper copy of a Google Earth map that showed an aerial view of the entire jail compound, Hallock said.

She was booked on suspicion of being an accessory to a felony and was being held pending a court appearance set for Monday. It wasn't clear if she had a lawyer.

Ravaghi and Nayeri also exchanged "personal and close" handwritten letters, but Hallock could not say if the two were romantically involved.

"It wasn't the relationship that you would expect between a teacher and an inmate in a custody setting," he said.

It wasn't clear why Nayeri was allowed to take Ravaghi's class because he spoke fluent English. "Why he was attending that class ... that is very much of a concern for us," Hallock said.

It also wasn't clear why jail deputies, who read all inmate correspondence, didn't flag the letters.

Ravaghi, who was born, like Nayeri, in Iran, was working as a part-time English instructor a local community college district and had taken a sheriff's class on jail rules and how to avoid manipulation by inmates, officials said.

It was the first escape in nearly three decades from the California facility built in 1968 that holds 900 men.

Tieu is charged with murder and attempted murder in a 2011 gang shooting. Nayeri had been held without bond since September 2014 on charges of kidnapping, torture, aggravated mayhem and burglary.

Duong, a native of Vietnam, has been held since last month on charges of attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon.

After authorities left the shop, the elder Tran said the family was focused on regaining calm and hadn't had time to think about the reward offered by officials for tips leading to the fugitives' capture.

"Right now, we don't even care about that," he said.

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Don't try to manage your newly complex business with the same decision-making tools you used when it was small.

Trump refuses to debate; calls Fox's Kelly 'a lightweight'

MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa (AP) — Donald Trump on Tuesday bowed out of the final Republican presidential debate before the leadoff Iowa caucuses, saying Fox News moderator Megyn Kelly is "a lightweight."

With 48 hours to go before the faceoff, campaign manager Corey Lewandowski confirmed Trump's decision Tuesday evening after a press conference in which Trump lashed out at Kelly and said she'd been "toying" with him.

"He will not be participating in the Fox News debate Thursday," Lewandowski said immediately after the press conference.

Trump, who called his decision "pretty close to irrevocable" in the press conference, said he'd hold an Iowa event at the same time as the debate to raise money for wounded veterans. Iowa hosts the nation's opening presidential primary contest on Monday.

"With me, they're dealing with somebody that's a little bit different. They can't toy with me like they toy with everybody else," he said. "Let them have their debate and let's see how they do with the ratings."

He added, "Why do I have to make Fox rich?"

On Tuesday night's airing of her Fox News show, "The Kelly File," Kelly said she'll be at the debate, which will "go on with or without Mr. Trump."

In a statement released Tuesday night, a Fox News spokesperson said Trump is still welcome to participate in the debate, but will not be allowed to "dictate the moderators or the questions."

"Capitulating to politicians' ultimatums about a debate moderator violates all journalistic standards," Fox said.

The Republican National Committee said the decision was up to Trump.

"Obviously we would love all of the candidates to participate, but each campaign ultimately makes their own decision what's in their best interest," said RNC chief strategist Sean Spicer.

Trump had suggested he might skip the Fox debate earlier in the day, drawing a sarcastic statement from the television network that "the Ayatollah and Putin both intend to treat Donald Trump unfairly when they meet with him if he becomes president."

"A nefarious source tells us that Trump has his own secret plan to replace the Cabinet with his Twitter followers to see if he should even go to those meetings," the Fox statement said.

The New York real estate mogul's presence has helped produce massive ratings in the previous six Republican presidential debates. His decision leaves seven candidates to share the primetime stage Thursday: Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul.

"Let them have their debate. I'm going to raise money during that period of time for the wounded warriors and for the vets. Let Fox play its games," Trump said.

He added, "I don't think Iowa's gonna care."

At the very least, the high-profile debate feud serves as a major distraction in the Republican contest just six days before Iowa voters cast the first votes in the 2016 primary contest.

Trump, now locked in a tight race with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, has proven to be a master of commanding media attention at key moments. Among other things, he has called for a temporary ban on all Muslim immigrants and later questioned Cruz's presidential eligibility given that he was born in Canada.

The provocative declarations have often left little oxygen in the race for his opponents.

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Can You Spot the Expert? Test Your Knowledge of Google’s Content Quality Standards

Want to hear something scary? No, not scary like Five Nights at Freddy's. More like disturbing. Alarming. Even depressing.

I used to write articles about:

• How to protect yourself from necrotizing fasciitis


• How to escape from an airplane safety slide


• How to tell if you've been poisoned by sushi


• Whether runners could benefit from platelet-rich plasma surgery


• How much alcohol you should drink


• Why the rate of concussions is higher among women

Now, what makes this admission scary is that I'm not a surgeon. And I'm not a nurse practitioner, physical therapist, or chiropractor.

In fact, I've never had any medical training in my life — nor have I ever slid down an airplane safety slide!

Horrified yet? Well, just wait. Because medical advice was not the only thing I used to freely dispense as a web writer.

I used to write articles about child injury law, start-up culture, buying an apartment in New York City, and so on. And I have absolutely no training, experience, or knowledge in any of those areas.

But what's the big deal, you say? Journalists write about topics they're not experts in all the time. They simply craft a story from expert sources and authoritative studies. What's wrong with that?

Nothing.

However, the difference between what I was doing and what a journalist does is that I hardly had time to spell-check, let alone hunt down actual experts, studies, or statistics. Who would when you need to crank out 5 to 10 of these 500-word articles each week?

Sadly, the only knowledge I had was what I found online about these topics. Ah, the glory days of ghostwriting.

Uh, so what exactly makes an expert … an expert?

I wasn't the only one creating this stuff.

Hundreds (thousands perhaps, maybe even millions) of more drones just like me were clogging up the Internet with shallow, water-thin content on every subject known to man … all in service to people who wanted to game search engines.

Fortunately, Google has since put the kibosh on such behavior through updates like Panda, Penguin, and Hummingbird. And, fortunately, they continue to refine those algorithms, most recently with what they call "Expertise-Authoritativeness-Trustworthiness (E-A-T)".

That's Google's shorthand for what it takes to create high quality web pages and websites. As written in their Search Quality Rating Guidelines, released November 19, 2015:

"High quality pages and websites need enough expertise to be authoritative and trustworthy on their topic."

These terms — particularly authoritativeness and trustworthiness — are not new to any regular readers of Copyblogger. But have you ever wondered what exactly an expert is?

In some cases, it's easy to define an expert. For instance, the only person giving advice about knee surgery should be an orthopedic surgeon. Someone with the right training, the proper credentials.

But, according to Google, this is not the only type of expert. Pay attention, because you and I have got something at stake here.

Let me explain.

The rules behind the quiz

I don't have a college degree in copywriting or content writing.

But because I produce those types of writing for a living — as well as evaluate applications for Copyblogger's Certified Content Marketers program — it could be argued that I'm an expert.

And you, dear content marketer, are probably struggling with the same type of concern: what exactly makes you an expert?

Well, that's what this quiz is all about. It's designed to help you refine your sense of becoming an expert.

Before we get started, let me outline the rules:

I'm going to give you a scenario involving a so-called expert. Your job is to decide if the person described in the scenario is an expert or not.

After each scenario, I'll tell you the correct answer — according to Google's content quality standards — and go on to explain the reason behind the answer.

And just so we are clear: every single scenario I share below is a work of fiction, based loosely on real-life experience. But names, places, and incidents are the products of my imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), businesses, companies, events, or locations is entirely coincidental.

Now that we've got that out of the way, let's get going. Ready?

1. Advice about a sports injury

Third-year University of Georgia, Athens economic student and ultra-marathon runner Heather Soso got tired of her chronic plantar fasciitis, a condition she'd been ignoring since her senior year in high school.

Naturally, she did what we all do when we want medical advice: she looked it up online.

She was amazed at the variety of amateur and professional advice available on treating and preventing the condition. Each approach might have some scientific support, but it was mostly anecdotal.

Which approach should she try? It was so confusing! But then she had a brilliant idea: she would try them all and blog about it.

Over the next year, she tried each approach and wrote dozens of articles. Her most popular page was about the six toe exercises that treated her condition successfully.

That's right: six exercises for her little piggies.

So, what do you think: would Google consider Ms. Soso an expert? Her article on toe exercises authoritative? Trustworthy?

The answer is "yes," because while her website's topic is medical in nature, Google would view Heather as an "everyday expert" — someone with relevant life experience.

And because plantar fasciitis is not a life-threatening condition, Google will "not penalize the person/page/website for not having ‘formal' education or training in the field."

And this is true for other activities, such as cross-fit training, passing the GMAT, and even teaching SEO. If you've got everyday experience, flaunt it!

2. Retirement advice

Dee Dell, from Big Cottonwood Canyon, Utah, is frustrated to no end over the fact that so many Americans don't have a retirement plan — and don't even seem to care.

Furthermore, he believes this is not good for our economic future since this may mean that nearly 40 million people will be dependent upon a government that is already stretched thin.

This professor of business management and partner with MegaMo Asset Management is on a mission to encourage men and women over 40 to start saving — and he's showing them exactly how to do it.

But because Dee is an impatient, aggressive man, his articles are often brief, rushed, and laced with profanity — but oh so much fun to read because of his passion for the subject!

This allows him to churn out four posts a week, but his company and busy schedule with the school keep him from updating the information in his content.

So, what do you think Google would think of Dee's pages? Expert enough to be authoritative and trustworthy (since he's got the credentials)?

It's more than likely that Dee's pages may not be of the expert variety despite his credentials. Google is explicit that financial advice should come from expert sources but also that the content "should be maintained and updated."

That's something Dee is not doing.

In addition, to improve his pages and be taken more seriously by Google, Dee should write in a professional style, go in-depth (even if this means he publishes only once a week), and have his content edited — possibly even reviewed by a peer as well.

3. Tree house building advice

After winning $8,047,882 in the Canadian lottery, former newspaper editor and math teacher Kimball Saddlechurn took it upon himself to scratch an itch he's had since childhood: mastering the art of building tree houses.

But not just any tree houses — really high tree houses.

In the last 6 years, he's built 14 multi-room tree houses more than 90 feet above the ground. It's still not clear whether or not these tree houses are legal, but he could care less since he's a multimillionaire.

Which got him thinking: $8 million may not last forever, so maybe he could pad his retirement nest by flipping his hobby into a source of income.

During a casual lunch of veal limone and rabbit gnocchi, his girlfriend told him about the benefits of content marketing. Intrigued, Kimball washed down his meal with a tumbler of Aultmore of the Foggie Moss, spread his laptop out on his indigo pajama bottoms, and launched a sleek website.

In his blog posts, he goes into great detail about the structure and safety of building a tree house that high off the ground. He offers multiple blueprints and considerations about weather conditions and tree types.

This is important, because there is not only money on the line (it takes thousands to build a tree house of this caliber), but lives as well, which makes this Your-Money-or-Your-Life content. (YMYL, for short.)

So, what do you think: would Google consider Kimball's pages expert enough, especially given the financial nature (people will be dropping thousands of dollars to build a tree house) and risk to life?

Answer: yes.

The reason is that while Kimball is a hobbyist (a rich one at that), he's got the right type of experience: 6 years, 14 tree houses, and, most importantly, no one has ever fallen out of a tree.

Besides, Google smiles upon the fact that Kimball writes in-depth articles (with blueprints at various angles to boot).

Now, exactly how much experience he needed before he became an expert is unclear. Was it the eighth tree house or the ninth? Maybe it was the fourth?

Here's a moral I think you can get out of this: there is no perfect time to get started. As long as you are not dealing with lives and big money, you don't have to wait until a certain number of years to launch.

This is equally true for activities like photography, dog sitting, and learning how to play guitar.

Just start publishing because there are advantages to having a website with age.

4. Advice on a forum

Morton Ambledowny Piff loves Quora — the question-and-answer site where community members ask, answer, and edit the responses. Morton particularly loves sharing answers about his speciality: North Korean culture.

So, it may come as no surprise that this 72-year-old widow and ex-Marine, who spent 37 years working for the government-run Foreign Languages Publishing House in North Korea as a publicist (his fluency in six Asian languages was a major boon), has one of the most popular posts on Quora.

In fact, the article — along with several others — are among the top-ranked in Google search results for a specific keyword phrase. But these top-ranked posts from Morton are not about North Korean culture; they're about stage IV lung cancer.

You might be thinking, "Huh? How could a former North Korean publicist give medical advice on such a complicated medical topic? Shouldn't YMYL content come from a medical professional?"

It depends.

See, Morton not only had the unfortunate experience of caring for a father who died of stage IV lung cancer, but Morton himself now suffers from stage IV lung cancer. And his Quora answers are all about his personal experience with lung cancer.

So would Google consider these posts authoritative? This is what Google writes:

"In fact, some types of information are found almost exclusively on forums and discussions, where a community of experts can provide valuable perspectives on specific topics."

As long as Morton writes about living with and caring for someone with stage IV lung cancer, Morton is an "everyday expert."

To some degree, he might even be able to write authoritatively about prevention and treatment, but those subjects should probably come from medical professionals.

5. Lifestyle advice

The 33-year-old Wiga Mikolajczak-Jefferson, usually one to agonize for long periods of time over a decision, knew the moment she laid eyes on Blake "The Mighty Thigh" Jefferson that he was her man.

Three days later she was married.

What she didn't realize was that she'd be moving into Blake's 251-square-foot bungalow.

But since she was an interior designer by trade and smitten to the bone over her boy, she decided to give it a try. And wouldn't you know it: after several months of rearranging the bed, she fell in love with the simplicity of living in such a small space.

And because she was a recovering McMansion dweller, she decided to start an email newsletter to tell everyone else about her discovery and the advantages of living a simple, clutter-free life.

Over time, her newsletter attracted 22,000 readers, which made her kind of famous. Unfortunately, though, her blog posts weren't getting very high search rankings.

Wiga didn't respond well to this.

"Why are you treating me this way, Google?" she would cry in the dead of the night, shaking her fist.

"Don't you understand I'm a professional interior designer, have 22,000 readers on my mailing list … and am married to the former NFL running back star Blake Jefferson? Don't you know that?!"

Sadly, Google ignored her pleas. See, the problem with Wiga's content boiled down to three things:

1. Sloppy writing (she refused to capitalize "I")


2. Reams of rambling prose (she never got to her point, and when she did, she usually fell down another rabbit hole)


3. Bunches of broken English

See, according to Google, lifestyle advice falls into the category of "future happiness," so "advice on parenting issues … should also come from ‘expert' sources which users can trust."

And this type of content demands expertise (which she had, both professionally and personally), but it also demands clear, concise, and compelling writing. And it would help to think like a Google engineer, too.

Which, fortunately, means that Wiga can instantly improve the credibility of her content by simply hiring an editor.

A summary of what you should have learned

Let's wrap this up with some tidy little principles about what we learned, based on section 4.3 of Google's Search Quality Rating Guidelines:

• When it comes to high quality medical advice, it "should come from people or organizations with appropriate medical expertise or accreditation."


• However, some topics, even medical in nature, only demand that you are an "everyday expert." Google writes, "These ordinary people may be considered experts in topics where they have life experience."


• Aim for deep and detailed content no matter what you write about, but especially if you're dealing with YMYL content.


• Perform original research to help your content go deep.


• Avoid redundant or duplicated content — and don't steal content from other sites.


• Edit your content. In other words, spell correctly, fix factual errors, and repair poor grammar.


• Maintain and update your content on a regular basis.


• Write in a professional style: clear, concise, and compelling. Be sure to avoid jargon.


• Remain balanced, professional, and worthy of your audience’s trust.


• Financial advice should come from expert sources.


• Cover a topic comprehensively. Don’t aim for an arbitrary word count and stop once you reach it.


• When giving "future happiness" advice, make sure you have the appropriate expertise (even if it is of the "everyday" variety) and make sure it's professionally written.


• Avoid the obvious. If 30 people have already reported on the Facebook Graph Search, then find something else to write about (unless you have information nobody else does).


• Write content a professional print magazine would publish.


• Spend an insane amount of time on detail.


• Commenting on forums like Quora can get you attention and build trust — as long as your posts are encyclopedic, accurate, and easy to read.

Share what you learned in the comments below, and let me know if you have any questions or doubts about whether or not you are an expert.

I know this was somewhat of an unorthodox way to cover this topic, but my hope is that you had fun. Because I know I did.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Want to become a content marketing expert?

Authority is our advanced content marketing education program. Inside Authority, we pull back the curtain on the topics, tactics, and strategies that don’t show up in public blog posts.

The doors to Authority are open until this Wednesday, January 27, 2016, and then we close our doors again until later this year.

Click the button below to join Authority today before the doors close on January 27, 2016.

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The post Can You Spot the Expert? Test Your Knowledge of Google's Content Quality Standards appeared first on Copyblogger.

The Latest: Konta through to 4th round at Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — The latest from the Australian Open on Saturday (all times local):

2:45 p.m.

Milos Raonic has dedicated his third-round victory at the Australian Open to victims of a shooting in Canada which left four people dead and at least two injured.

A gunman opened fire at the La Loche Community School in a remote aboriginal community in Saskatchewan, and at a second location.

After his win over Viktor Troicki on Saturday, the 25-year-old Canadian said, "Today, before I stepped out on court it was a difficult day back home."

His voice sounding emotional at times, Raonic added: "Unfortunately in Saskatchewan in a very small community there was a shooting at a high school, so I want to take a moment and give thoughts to that community. Today's victory was for that community, and a quick recovery and all of Canada, and I'm sure the world is behind you."

___

2:30 p.m.

No. 13-seeded Milos Raonic has reached the fourth round at Melbourne Park for the fourth time, defeating Viktor Troicki 6-2, 6-3, 6-4 to advance.

Raonic trailed 4-1 in the third set before winning five consecutive games and the match. He set up match point with an ace, his 14th of the match, and clinched it when No. 21 Troicki hit a forehand long.

The match pitted the winners of the two Australian Open warmup tournaments — Raonic beat Roger Federer for the Brisbane International title and Troicki defeated Grigor Dimitrov in Sydney.

Last year as the No. 8-seeded player, Raonic had his best Australian Open result by reaching the quarterfinals and losing to eventual champion Novak Djokovic.

___

2 p.m.

Victoria Azarenka has cruised into the fourth round with another quick victory, dispatching Japanese qualifier Naomi Osaka 6-1, 6-1 in 56 minutes.

The two-time Australian Open champion, seeded 14th this year, has lost just five games in three matches so far at Melbourne Park.

Azarenka had 24 winners to only four for Osaka, who was making her Grand Slam main draw debut.

Azarenka said after the match, "It wasn't easy for sure, especially when you don't know who you play. ... She's a little unpredictable and she surprised me with her game."

Azarenka next faces Barbora Strycova, a straight-sets winner over the No. 3 seed, Garbine Muguruza earlier Saturday.

___

12:35 p.m.

Third-seeded Garbine Muguruza has become the latest casualty in the women's draw at Melbourne Park, beaten by Barbora Strycova 6-3, 6-2 in the day's first match on Rod Laver Arena.

Muguruza misfired frequently on her groundstrokes, finishing with 32 unforced errors, and looked a bit listless throughout the match.

Since reaching last year's Wimbledon final, the Spanish player has lost in the second round of the U.S. Open and now the third round at Melbourne Park.

Strycova has only been past the third round once before in 38 Grand Slam appearances when she reached the quarterfinals of Wimbledon in 2014.

No. 2 Simona Halep, No. 6 Petra Kvitova and No. 8 Venus Williams have also been eliminated from the tournament.

____

12:25 p.m.

Johanna Konta has become the first British woman to reach the fourth round at the Australian Open in 29 years.

Konta beat No. 8 Venus Williams in straight sets in the first round and on Saturday had another straight-sets win over Denisa Allertova, 6-2, 6-2.

The 47th-ranked Konta is making her debut in the main draw at Melbourne Park but has shown few jitters and a fighting spirit as she moves through the draw.

Konta said she knew what to expect from Allertova, who stretched her to three sets in the first round at last year's French Open.

The 22-year-old Konta was born in Australia and became a British citizen in 2012, making her the first British woman to reach the round of 16 at Melbourne Park since Jo Durie in 1987.

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The Latest: Rain delays play on Aussie Open outside courts

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — The latest from the Australian Open on Thursday (all times local):

2:38 p.m.

Victoria Azarenka has quickly dispatched another opponent at Melbourne Park, defeating Danka Kovinic of Montenegro 6-1, 6-2 in just over an hour.

The two-time Australian Open champion hasn't given up more than three games in any of the 14 sets she has played this year, including her run to the title at the Brisbane International two weeks ago.

She beat Alison Van Uytvanck 6-0, 6-0 in the first round at Melbourne Park.

"I really don't count the games," she said after Thursday's match. "What really works for me is to stay in the moment. It keeps me focused."

Azarenka next plays Japan's Naomi Osaka, who has reached the third round of a Grand Slam for the first time with a win over the 18th seed, Elina Svitolina.

___

2:26 p.m.

Third-seeded Garbine Muguruza had a 6-4, 6-2 win over Kirsten Flipkens to reach the third round of the Australian Open for the third straight year.

Muguruza, who lost last year's Wimbledon final to Serena Williams, made it to the fourth round in 2014 and 2015 at Melbourne Park. Last year, Williams beat the Venezuelan-born Spaniard in the fourth round here.

Muguruza will next play Barbora Strycova, who beat American Vania King 7-6 (5), 6-4.

____

1:50 p.m.

John Isner is back in the third round at Melbourne Park for the fifth time in seven years following a 6-3, 7-6 (5), 7-6 (2) win over Marcel Granollers of Spain.

The 10th-seeded Isner had 20 aces and 53 winners in the match, and also won 33 of his 44 approaches to net.

He was one of eight Americans through to the second round at the Australian Open — the most since 2008. Four other Americans are playing their second-round matches on Thursday.

Isner has only been past the third round once before in Melbourne. He faces the winner of the match between Spain's Feliciano Lopez and Guido Pella of Argentina.

Isner lost to Lopez in the third round in 2012.

___

12:50 p.m.

Ana Ivanovic has advanced to the third round at Melbourne Park following a 6-3, 6-3 win over qualifier Anastasija Sevastova in a match that was suspended when a spectator fell on the stairs at Rod Laver Arena.

Ivanovic was up a service break and leading 4-3 in the first set when medical personnel rushed to the woman's aid in the upper level of the 15,000-seat stadium. Tournament organizers said the woman was treated in the stadium before taken away on a stretcher for observation and further treatment.

___

12 noon.

Play was suspended on Rod Laver Arena early Thursday when a spectator fell on a stairwell in the upper level of the 15,000-seat stadium.

Former French Open champion Ana Ivanovic was up a service break and leading qualifier Anastasija Sevastova 4-3 in the first set of their third-round match when play was stopped to allow medical personnel to come to the aid of the spectator. No other details were immediately available.

When play resumed after a half-hour delay, Ivanovic held serve for a 5-3 lead.

___

11:40 a.m.

Misty rain has briefly delayed the start of play on outdoor courts at the Australian Open.

Play has begun on the three main stadiums with roofs at Melbourne Park, including the opening match on Rod Laver Arena between 2008 French Open champion Ana Ivanovic and qualifier Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia.

Margaret Court Arena was hosting an all-French third-round match Thursday between Gael Monfils and Nicolas Mahut, while American John Isner, the 10th-seed player, took on Marcel Granollers of Spain at Hisense Arena.

Andy Murray was set to open night play at Margaret Court Arena against Australian Sam Groth, while Lleyton Hewitt was to play David Ferrer in what could be the Australian veteran's last match before retiring.

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One of this year's NHL All-Stars doesn't even play in the NHL — and it's a stranger story than you can imagine

A largely unknown hockey player is going to be a captain at next week's NHL All-Star Game — and he's not even in the NHL.

Responding to enormous fan pressure, the league announced Tuesday that journeyman hockey player John Scott will get to keep his fan-voted spot on the all-star roster, even though he was demoted to a minor league team last week.

Scott was unexpectedly named the winner of the All-Star Game's fan vote earlier this month, thanks to a well-organized Internet campaign publicized on sites such as Puck Daddy and Reddit's hockey forum.

"I am looking forward to enjoying a fun and unique experience at All-Star Weekend in Nashville with my family," Scott said in a statement released by the NHL. "While being voted to the All-Star Game by the fans was not something I expected to happen, I am excited to participate in the All-Star events with my fellow players."

Scott, who most recently played for the Arizona Coyotes, is a journeyman enforcer known more for his fistfights than his goal-scoring prowess. The 33-year-old has played for six teams in eight NHL seasons, scoring just 5 goals and logging 542 penalty minutes along the way.

For fans who participated in the campaign, the thought of the 6-foot-8 bruiser squaring off against the likes of Alex Ovechkin and Patrick Kane was too much to resist. The fact that Scott was waived by the Coyotes in December, making him team-less for the third time this season, didn't change that.

The NHL didn't seem to appreciate the humor, however. As the Scott campaign gained steam, the league broke tradition and began concealing the All-Star vote totals. By mid-December, the NHL removed links to the All-Star ballot — and all references to the game itself — from its website. And when Scott ultimately won the fan vote, the NHL buried the accomplishment in the 25th paragraph of a press release.

Last week, Scott was dealt in a three-team trade to the Montreal Canadiens, who promptly demoted him to the St. John's IceCaps of the American Hockey League. TSN's Bob McKenzie soon reported that the NHL had pressured Scott into sitting out the All-Star Game:

John Scott was previously asked by both NHL and Arizona Coyotes to bow out of NHL All-Star Game. He refused. Trade likely takes care of that

— Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) January 15, 2016

The conspiracy theories immediately followed:

McKenzie: "His inclusion in this trade, in my mind, was absolutely orchestrated to solve the All-Star issue for the league." #Habs #Coyotes

— Chris Nichols (@NicholsOnHockey) January 15, 2016

Fans began circulating a #FreeJohnScott hashtag, and were even pledging to boycott the All-Star Game before the NHL reversed course Tuesday.

In the statement, the NHL acknowledged that Scott's "unique circumstance" required review, "the result of which was a determination to maintain the status quo for the All-Star weekend in order to preserve all parties' pre-existing expectations, including Scott’s desire to participate."

The only question now is what team Scott will represent during All-Star weekend — he'll be captaining the Pacific squad despite playing for the minor-league affiliate of a team in the Atlantic Division.

John Scott tells Bob McCown he might wear - if allowed by NHL - a St. John's IceCaps jersey at NHL all-star game. "That's who I'm with now."

— Robin Short (@telyrobinshort) January 19, 2016

This isn't the first time the NHL has found itself at the center of an All-Star voting scandal. In 2007, the league purportedly manipulated the online voting results to deprive the Vancouver Canucks' Rory Fitzpatrick of a roster spot.

Like Scott, Fitzpatrick was an unremarkable "grinder" who soared to popularity through an Internet-based campaign.

Read the NHL's full statement here.

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Backstrom, Ovechkin power 1st-place Caps past Blue Jackets

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Nicklas Backstrom scored twice, Alex Ovechkin had a goal and an assist and Braden Holtby earned his league-leading 30th win to lift the NHL-best Washington Capitals past the last-place Columbus Blue Jackets 6-3 on Tuesday night.

Marcus Johansson added a goal and an assist, and Jason Chimera and Andre Burakovsky also scored for Washington, off to the best start in franchise history at 35-8-3. Evgeny Kuznetsov had a career-high four assists, and Matt Niskanen chipped in with two.

Holtby made 32 saves after being pulled Saturday in a 4-1 loss to Buffalo. The following night he couldn't finish a win against the Rangers because of a migraine that blurred his vision.

Kerby Rychel had a goal and an assist, and Boone Jenner and Ryan Murray also scored for Columbus, which was attempting to match its longest winning streak of the season at three games. Seth Jones added two assists.

The Blue Jackets also welcomed back their No. 1 goalie, Sergei Bobrovsky, who missed 17 games with a groin injury. He was rusty at the start, allowing two goals on the Capitals' first three shots and five goals on their first 15 before finishing with 22 stops — including a penalty shot by Ovechkin in the third period.

Columbus outshot Washington 35-28.

The Blue Jackets opened the scoring when Rychel netted his first career goal in his 21st game at 9:30 of the first period. He finished a slick 2-on-1 backhand pass from William Karlsson, but it was all Capitals the rest of the way.

Only 3 minutes later, Dalton Prout couldn't corral the puck at the attacking blue line and Ovechkin took off on an odd-man break. He nudged the puck to T.J. Oshie, who pushed it to Backstrom for a quick strike over Bobrovsky's glove.

Later in the period, Justin Falk turned the puck over into the high slot. Chimera, who had briefly gone into the locker room after taking a shot to his hand, quickly scored on a snap shot for his 13th to give the Capitals a 2-1 lead at 15:52.

Falk was also in the mix again early in the second period, and again the outcome wasn't good for him. He was sent off with a high-sticking double-minor and Washington scored twice to increase its lead to 4-1.

It took 13 seconds into the first penalty for Ovechkin to rip a shot from the left circle by Bobrovsky for his 28th. Backstrom followed with his second of the game and 14th of the season at 4:47, standing still with nobody near him and easily tapping in Kuznetsov's centering pass.

Jenner made it 4-2 at 9:35, stuffing in his own rebound on the power play for his team-leading 16th.

Burakovsky got the goal back 50 seconds later with a shot from high above the left circle that sailed past Bobrovsky.

Murray backhanded a loose puck near the crease to make it 5-3 at 5:07 of the third period.

Johansson capped the scoring with an empty-netter at 19:27.

NOTES: Washington D Karl Alzner has played in 422 consecutive games to tie Bob Carpenter for the longest streak in franchise history. ... Columbus LW Scott Hartnell, the team's co-scoring leader but also first in penalty minutes, was a healthy scratch for the second time this season. ... The Capitals have the best road record (17-5-2) in the league. ... Blue Jackets captain and LW Nick Foligno missed his fifth straight game with an upper-body injury. ... Washington improved to 26-0-1 when leading after two periods.

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NFL Latest: Gronk ties record for tight end playoff TDs

The Latest from NFL divisional games Saturday. (All times EST)

11:00 p.m.

The Cardinals are back in the lead after a Carson Palmer pass was deflected by Packers defensive back Damarious Randall and ended up in the arms of Michael Floyd for his second touchdown of the game.

With less than four minutes remaining, the Arizona leads the Green Bay Packers 17-13.

___

10:43 p.m.

Carson Palmer is having his worst game of the season at precisely the wrong time.

Arizona's quarterback threw for 74 yards on 8-of-14 passing in the first half and has two interceptions in the second.

The second pick, by Damarious Randall, came in the end zone with the Cardinals trailing 13-10 in the fourth quarter.

— John Marshall reporting from Glendale, Arizona.

___

10:21 p.m.

The Cardinals answered Green Bay's first touchdown — with a field goal.

Arizona marched 74 yards after Jeff Janis' TD catch, but bogged down once it hit the red zone. Larry Fitzgerald was hit with an illegal block penalty and Carson Palmer missed a potential touchdown when he couldn't get the ball to David Johnson near the goal line.

Arizona settled for Matt Catanzaro's 28-yard field goal to pull within 13-10 late in the third quarter.

— John Marshall reporting from Glendale, Arizona.

___

10:09 p.m.

The Packers have their first lead against the Cardinals.

Jeff Janis scored on an 8-yard pass from Aaron Rodgers to put Green Bay up 13-7 after Ha Ha Clinton-Dix pulled down a jump ball for an interception on a pass by Carson Palmer. The interception was upheld upon review and Eddie Lacy broke free for a 61-yard run up the middle two plays later to set up Janis' TD.

Clinton-Dix's interception came after Rodgers had a pass tipped at the line of scrimmage an intercepted by Rashad Johnson.

— John Marshall reporting from Glendale, Arizona.

___

10:01 p.m.

Green Bay will be without backup cornerback Micah Hyde for the rest of the game with a hip injury.

Hyde was listed as questionable after being injured in the second quarter, but the team said he was out at the start of the third.

— John Marshall reporting from Glendale, Arizona.

___

9:41 p.m.

The Arizona Cardinals lead the Green Bay Packers 7-6 at halftime in a defense-dominated NFC divisional playoff game.

Arizona scored early on a toe-tapping catch by Michael Floyd, but its offense labored the rest of the half, finishing with 75 total yards.

The Packers were able to move the ball against the Cardinals' defense some, but had to settle for a pair of field goals by Mason Crosby.

The game is far different than the one played by these two teams here on Dec. 27. The Cardinals ran over the Packers in that game, winning 38-8.

— John Marshall reporting from Glendale, Arizona.

___

9:23 p.m.

Green Bay will be without its top receiver the rest of the night.

Randall Cobb injured his chest on the final play of the first quarter against the Cardinals when he made a diving 51-yard catch to Arizona's 3-yard line. The catch was negated on offsetting penalties and Cobb left the field on a cart shortly after.

The Packers said in the second quarter that he would not return.

Cobb led Green Bay with 79 catches this season, gaining 829 yards and scoring six TDs.

— John Marshall reporting from Glendale, Arizona.

___

9:04

Talk about a turn of events.

Arizona's Patrick Peterson appeared to have returned an interception for a 100-yard touchdown early in the second quarter, but it was overturned due to a hands-to-the-face penalty on Cardinals defensive lineman Frostee Rucker.

Instead of being up 14-0, the Cardinals had a 7-3 lead after Green Bay's Mason Crosby kicked a 28-yard field goal.

— John Marshall reporting from Glendale, Arizona.

___

8:56 p.m.

Packers receiver Randall Cobb has left Green Bay's playoff game against Arizona on a cart after suffering a chest injury during a spectacular catch in the first quarter.

Cobb stretched out for a diving 51-yard catch to Arizona's 3-yard line, landing hard on the turf. He was taken to the locker room on a cart and the team said his return is questionable.

The catch didn't count, either — it was called back by offsetting penalties.

— John Marshall reporting from Glendale, Arizona.

___

8:30 p.m.

The Arizona Cardinals got on the scoreboard first against the Packers thanks to a toe-tapping catch by Michael Floyd.

Carson Palmer threw a high pass into the corner of the end zone, and Floyd snatched it over his head while getting one foot down and dragging his other foot to stay in bounds.

Arizona leads 7-0.

___

8:00 p.m.

Thanks to their 27-20 victory over the Chiefs, the Patriots are moving on to their fifth straight AFC title game. The Patriots will find out if they have another home game tomorrow evening after the Steelers play the Broncos.

If the No. 1 seed Broncos win at home, they will host the Patriots next Sunday. If the Steelers win, Pittsburgh travels to Foxborough.

___

6:55 p.m.

The New England Patriots are down a couple of linebackers against the Kansas City Chiefs.

Jamie Collins is questionable to return with a back injury, while Jerod Mayo is also questionable with a shoulder ailment.

The Patriots' only remaining active linebackers are starter Dont'a Hightower and backups Jonathan Freeny, Darius Fleming and Dekoda Watson. Jonathan Bostic was inactive.

New England leads Kansas City 21-13 at the start of the fourth quarter.

— Dennis Waszak reporting from Foxborough, Massachusetts.

___

6:04 p.m.

The scoreboard shows it's still close, but Tom Brady and the Patriots are in control.

New England leads Kansas City 14-6 at halftime of the AFC divisional playoff game Saturday, with the offense moving the ball efficiently and Bill Belichick's defense holding the Chiefs out of the end zone.

Brady is 17 of 25 for 157 yards and a touchdown pass to Rob Gronkowski. Brady also has a 1-yard run for a score. New England has just seven rushed for 26 yards, but the Chiefs haven't been able to manage much when they've had the ball.

Kansas City settled for two field goals by Cairo Santos and missed a prime opportunity for a touchdown shortly before halftime when the Chiefs got down to the Patriots 9. A delay-of-game penalty on third-and-9 pushed the ball back to the 14, and Alex Smith's pass to Chris Conley fell incomplete, setting up Santos' 32-yarder.

Smith opened the game 5 of 5 for 29 yards, but is at 10 of 21 for just 65 yards at halftime.

— Dennis Waszak reporting from Foxborough, Massachusetts.

___

5:48 p.m.

Tom Brady rushed for his sixth postseason touchdown, second in Patriots history, to give New England a 14-3 lead over Kansas City with 3:23 remaining in the first half.

The score came moments after Brady scrambled for 10 yards to get to the 1; video review upheld the ruling that he went out of bounds just short of the goal line. With center Bryan Stork back in after leaving briefly with an ankle injury and backup center David Andrews lined up as a fullback, Brady pushed forward into a pile of Chiefs for the score.

Brady is one rushing TD behind LeGarrette Blount, who has seven for the Patriots. Steve Young holds the NFL postseason record for quarterbacks with eight.

— Dennis Waszak reporting from Foxborough, Massachusetts.

___

5:45 p.m.

The referees are trying to keep this game under control, a week after the game between Cincinnati and Pittsburgh was tainted by illegal hits and penalties.

Patriots receiver and punt returner Danny Amendola was flagged for a hit on Kansas City's Jamell Fleming midway through the second quarter. Amendola was back to receive a punt, but Fleming was covering and got under the ball at around the 4-yard line. Amendola lowered his head and leveled Fleming.

On the next drive, Dezman Moses tried to take it out on Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and was called for roughing the passer.

— Jimmy Golen reporting from Foxborough, Massachusetts.

___

5:20 p.m.

New England center Bryan Stork is questionable to return against the Kansas City Chiefs with an ankle injury.

Backup David Andrews took Stork's place early in the second quarter.

The Patriots offensive line has been beset by injuries all season, with 12 combinations of starters during the regular season.

New England just got back left tackle Sebastian Vollmer, who missed the regular-season finale after an ankle injury against the New York Jets on Dec. 27.

— Dennis Waszak reporting from Foxborough, Massachusetts.

___

4:55 p.m.

Chandler Jones started at defensive end for the New England Patriots despite his issues off the field last weekend.

Jones' status was uncertain for the game Saturday against Kansas City after he wandered over to a police station last Sunday, shirtless and disoriented, leaving his house reeking of burnt marijuana.

The Pro Bowl selection, who was fifth in NFL with a career-high 12 1/2 sacks, apologized to his teammates and fans on Thursday, saying he made a "pretty stupid mistake." He declined to elaborate on what happened, and coach Bill Belichick refused to say whether Jones would be benched for any part of the game.

The Chiefs scored a field goal on the first drive, cutting the lead to 7-3.

— Dennis Waszak reporting from Foxborough, Massachusetts.

___

4:45 p.m.

New England's Rob Gronkowski tied Dave Casper and Vernon Davis for the most touchdown catches by a tight end in postseason history with his seventh.

Gronkowski, who was questionable to play with back and knee ailments, caught an 8-yard touchdown pass from Tom Brady on New England's opening drive to give the Patriots an early 7-0 lead over the Kansas City Chiefs in their AFC divisional round playoff game Saturday.

Gronkowski led the Patriots with 11 TD catches during the regular season and became the only tight end in NFL history with five career 10-TD seasons.

— Dennis Waszak reporting from Foxborough, Massachusetts.

___

4:40 p.m.

NFL referees might need to work on their coin tosses in the offseason.

At the AFC division playoff game Saturday between Kansas City and New England, referee Craig Wrolstad flipped the coin, and it was tails — which the Chiefs had called.

But, Wrolstad turned to the Patriots players and said, "You win the toss."

One of the Kansas City players then shouted that the Chiefs had called tails — and Wrolstad quickly corrected himself. Kansas City had, indeed, won the toss and deferred the opening kickoff.

The Patriots were involved in a coin flip-related controversy in Week 16, when they lost to the Jets 26-20 in overtime. Bill Belichick told his team to kick if it won the coin toss, which it did. But there was confusion when Patriots wide receiver Matthew Slater thought New England could choose the direction in which the team could kick.

— Dennis Waszak reporting from Foxborough, Massachusetts.

___

AP NFL website: www.pro32.ap.org and www.twitter.com/AP_NFL

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Charlies Martin wins vacant IBF heavyweight championship

NEW YORK (AP) — Charles Martin won the vacant IBF world heavyweight championship in an underwhelming bout against injured Vyacheslav Glazkov on Saturday night at the Barclays Center.

Martin (23-0-1) was crowned the champ once the fight was stopped at 1:50 the third round because Glazkov fell twice and hurt his right knee.

Glazkov, from the Ukraine, suffered a torn ACL and the fight was stopped as the pro-Polish crowd booed the finish.

The IBF stripped Tyson Fury of the belt when he agreed to an immediate rematch against Wladimir Klitschko instead of defending it against Glazkov, the organization's mandatory challenger.

Martin, a rare left-handed heavyweight champion, withdrew from a scheduled fight last month once he had an unexpected shot at the title.

Deontay Wilder (35-0) defends the WBC version of the title against Artur Szpilka (20-1) in the main event.

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American missionary among dead in Burkina Faso hotel attack

WESTON, Fla. (AP) — The mother-in-law of an American missionary has confirmed that he is among those killed after al-Qaida fighters attacked a hotel and cafe in Burkina Faso's capital of Ouagadougou.

Carol Boyle said Michael Riddering, 45, died in the Cappuccino Cafe, where he was to meet a group that was going to volunteer at the orphanage and women's crisis center he ran with his wife, Amy Boyle-Riddering. Riddering arrived early and was in the cafe with a pastor, and when the attack started they ran in different directions, Boyle said. The pastor had Riddering's phone, and called Boyle-Riddering to say that they were at the cafe and there was gunfire, but then the line went dead. The pastor hid in the cafe and survived. It wasn't until a fellow Christian missionary found Riddering in the morgue on Saturday that they knew he was dead.

He leaves behind four children, two of whom were adopted from Burkina Faso.

"He was extremely well-loved and respected. He wasn't a hypocrite, he wasn't a two-face. He had his guiding light, and he followed it," Boyle said by phone from her home in Weston.

Riddering, who once managed a yacht outfitting company in Cooper City, Florida, and his wife, a graphic designer, sold their property and possessions and moved to the town of Yako to run the Les Ailes de Refuge orphanage in 2011, Boyle said. The complex also includes a clinic, classrooms and a home for abused women and widows.

"They were looking forward to continuing to working in Burkina Faso and raising their children together," said a statement from Sheltering Wings, the missionary organization that sponsored the orphanage. "Tragically and unexpectedly, Mike's life was cut short. We grieve with Amy and her family, and all who knew Mike."

At least 28 people died in the attack by fighters, which triggered a siege lasting more than 12 hours. The dead, which included victims from 18 different countries, included the wife and young daughter of the Italian cafe owner, two French citizens, two Swiss citizens, and six Canadians.

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AP FACT CHECK: Claims from the Republican debate

WASHINGTON (AP) — Did Ted Cruz mean to suggest he would have gone to war with Iran over its brief and smoothly resolved detention of U.S. sailors? Did Chris Christie realize that the Common Core education standards he took credit for ending in New Jersey are still very much alive?

In their rush to slam the Obama administration, play up their records and play down inconvenient realities, Republican presidential candidates served up some misshapen rhetoric in their latest presidential debate.

A look at some claims and how they compare with the facts:

CRUZ: Any country that makes U.S. service members get on their knees like the 10 sailors whose boats were boarded and seized by the Iranian military this week "will feel the full force and fury of the United States of America."

CHRISTIE: "Tin pot dictators ... are taking our Navy ships."

THE FACTS: Neither candidate addressed the fact that the short-lived crisis was created by the U.S. sailors who steered their boats into sovereign Iranian waters, where they were boarded and seized by Iranian naval forces. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said Thursday that the U.S. sailors had made a navigation error.

Under such circumstances it would not be unusual to disarm members of a foreign military force — even a small one like the two Navy boats — and hold them temporarily for questioning. What was exceptional about this episode — and perhaps a provocation — is that the Iranians videotaped the Americans during the encounter and posted the images on the Internet.

The suggestion by Cruz that he would have launched a military attack on Iran in response to such an incident is hard to square with accepted international tests for the use of force.

Iran returned the sailors unharmed and their boats undamaged.

___

JEB BUSH: "Every weapons system has been gutted."

DONALD TRUMP: "Our military is a disaster."

BEN CARSON: "We have the world's best military, even though he (President Barack Obama) has done everything he can to diminish it."

MARCO RUBIO: "This president is undermining our military." ''This president is more interested in funding Planned Parenthood than in funding the military."

THE FACTS: These broadsides were stated in sweeping terms that reflect defense budget cuts approved by a Republican-controlled Congress and signed into law by Obama.

It's true that the defense budget has shrunk and that this has forced the military services to reduce their ranks and attempt to trim benefits paid to troops. But far from being "gutted," some key elements of the military have expanded, including the special operations forces.

Under the Obama administration the military services are undertaking a wide range of modernization efforts, including nuclear forces, combat fighter jets and missile defense systems.

The defense budget problem has been worsened by repeated partisan conflicts over "sequestration," or automatic budget cuts that resulted from the 2011 budget control agreement between the White House and the Congress.

___

CHRISTIE, countering Rubio's criticisms for his past positions: "Common Core has been eliminated in New Jersey." ''I never wrote a check to Planned Parenthood."

THE FACTS: Common Core has not been eliminated in his state — far from it.

A panel Christie put together recommended a series of changes to state standards this week, but only recommended changes to 232 out of 1,427 standards in math and English. The panel also proposed renaming the standards the New Jersey Student Learning Standards. A separate Christie panel recommended the state continue using a Common Core-aligned test — and require it for graduation by 2021.

On Planned Parenthood, Christie's denial is at odds with a Sept. 30, 1994, Newark Star-Ledger story that quotes Christie as saying, "I support Planned Parenthood privately with my personal contribution, and that should be the goal of any such agency, to find private donations."

Christie was running for local office in Morris County, New Jersey, at the time. The same quote appeared again in a book, "Chris Christie: The Inside Story of his Rise to Power," a book with which Christie cooperated.

The original story was written by Star-Ledger reporter Brian Murray, who now works as a spokesman for Christie in the governor's office. On Tuesday, Christie said he was misquoted in the 1994 story.

___

CARSON on pursuing Islamic State militants wherever they can be found: "Why should we be letting people smoke their cigars in their comfortable chairs in Raqqa?"

THE FACTS: Carson is not likely to find IS fighters lounging with cigars in Raqqa, their de facto capital in Syria. The group has imposed a strict smoking ban throughout its territory in Syria and Iraq. In fact, the militant group implements stiff fines for anyone caught smoking, and even more brutal punishments for those caught selling cigarettes, water pipes or anything that can be smoked, cigars included.

Also in the debate, Carson suggested Syrian refugees be allowed to settle in "al-Saqqa province, where they'll be in their own country."

But there is no such place. He probably meant al-Raqqa, or Raqqa. As an IS stronghold, it would not be much of a safe haven for people trying to flee the group.

___

Associated Press writers Josh Cornfield in Ardmore, Pennsylvania, Jill Colvin in Des Moines, Iowa, and Vivian Salama in Washington contributed to this report.

EDITOR'S NOTE _ A look at political claims that take shortcuts with the facts or don't tell the full story

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