The Americans: Three Americans including two US service members are being called heroes today for taking down a gunman who had opened fire yesterday on a train bound from Amsterdam to Paris. They rushed him and grabbed him by the neck before beating him senseless with his own automatic rifle. One of the Americans was badly cut but his injuries are not life threatening.

The three Americans are high school friends travelling together after one had returned from Afghanistan. A 26-year-old Moroccan man, who had been armed with a pistol, an AK-47 rifle, and a knife, was taken into custody.

Econ 101: As stock prices around the world dropped yesterday, the Dow Jones was off by 530.94 points, a 3.1 percent loss that, added to losses this year, amounts to 10 percent, what the money people call a “correction.” Some analysts say the six-year market rally may have come to an end although others see it as a healthy deflation of an overheated market.

The price of oil briefly fell below $40, good news for drivers and people who live in heating-oil country, but the stock market takes that as an indication that demand is down and the world economy is slowing.

Part of the instability has been caused by China, which devalued its currency to give a vitamin B shot to its foreign trade. Instead it gave stock investors the jitters around the world, fearing a weakening in the Chinese economic powerhouse.

DefCon: Representatives of North and South Korea met today at the Panmunjom truce village to try to defuse a clash threatening to grow into armed conflict. The North has threatened action if the South doesn’t turn off its giant loudspeaker systems blaring propaganda toward the North. The deadline set by the North passed without incident.

Permawar: The White House says the number two leader of the Islamic State has been killed in a US military strike in northern Iraq. The administration says Fadhil Ahmad al-Hayali was killed in an attack on his car in Mosul. American officials say al-Hayali’s death will interrupt ISIS operations, but the death of an estimated 10,000 ISIS fighters has failed to weaken ISIS.

Police Beat: An 18-year-old man killed by St. Louis police who said he pointed a gun at them was shot square in the back, according to the medical examiner. There were street disturbances almost immediately after the shooting of Mansur Ball-Bey.

Police Chief Sam Dotson said, “We are still in the early stages of the investigation, and the new facts by themselves do not paint a complete picture.”

>A mistrial was declared yesterday in the trial of a white North Carolina police officer charged with voluntary manslaughter for killing a black man looking for help after a traffic accident. Back in 2013 Jonathan Ferrell, a former Florida A&M football player, wrecked his car and banged on the door of a home, whose owner called the police. Officer Randall Kerrick said Ferrell charged at him and he 12 shots, hitting Ferrell 10 Times.

Pack Mentality: California wildlife officials have spotted a pack of wolves in the state for the first time since 1924. Remote cameras captured images of two adults and five pups near the Oregon border. A couple of lone wolves were previously spotted, but the sighting of a pack suggests that the wolf population is returning. Wolves were hunted nearly to extinction in the West in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries.

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