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Report also shows president is up to date on recommended vaccines as health secretary sows doubts on their efficacyDonald Trump - the oldest person to ever be elected US president - controls high cholesterol with medication and has elevated blood pressure but is fully fit", White House physician Sean Barbella said in a report released on Sunday.The US navy captain's report was published two days after Trump underwent a routine physical. It also said he was up to date on all recommended vaccines - despite his national health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr having spent years sowing doubt about the safety and efficacy of vaccination. Continue reading...

Former PM says governments should team up to create global rescue plan' that counters US president's tariffsGordon Brown has accused Donald Trump of weaponising" the global trading system with steep import tariffs that threaten a breakdown" in the global economic order.The former prime minister said governments and central banks should come up with a global rescue plan" comparable to actions taken during the global financial crisis of 2008, including synchronised interest rate cuts to cushion the blow from tariffs. Continue reading...

Michigan governor criticized for appearance, including for blocking her face with binders while her photo was takenThe Michigan governor, Gretchen Whitmer - considered to be a 2028 White House Democratic contender - was trying to distance herself from a recent Oval Office appearance alongside Donald Trump, which saw her get photographed while blocking her face with binders.Whitmer visited the Republican president on Wednesday alongside a bipartisan delegation to discuss a northern Michigan ice storm, the state's defense assets and tariffs, among other issues. Following the meeting, Whitmer was brought into the Oval Office where she - as the New York Times described - stood glumly" during a press conference that saw Trump sign several executive orders that targeted his political opponents. Continue reading...

I've been called worse,' says top trade adviser after Musk said he was a moron' and dumber than a sack of bricks'Peter Navarro, a top trade adviser to Donald Trump, said he and Elon Musk are great" after the president's multi-billionaire business adviser publicly called him a moron" who was dumber than a sack of bricks".I've been called worse," Navarro said Sunday on NBC's Meet the Press in some of his most extensive remarks about the insults Musk directed at him days earlier. Praising Musk's role in the so-called department of government efficiency" (Doge), Navarro added: Everything's fine with Elon." Continue reading...

As they reel from Trump's policies, companies say volatile freight costs and congestion are now the normThe container ship was halfway across the Atlantic when Donald Trump, during his first term in office, levied tariffs on steel and aluminium imports to the US from most countries.At the stroke of a pen on a US presidential executive order, about 100,000 was added to the cost of one of the shipments onboard, from the UK advanced materials manufacturer Goodfellow, destined for a US customer. Continue reading...

Despite the turmoil it helps to put things into perspective with a look at some fundamental indicatorsThis week was enough to make anyone worried about their stock market savings. As a certified public accountant, I don't give investment advice. But I'm comfortable leaving my money in the stock market. Why? Let's put things into perspective. Continue reading...

US Vermont senator's tour with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been drawing record-breaking crowds since FebruaryThe Vermont senator Bernie Sanders drew a record-breaking crowd at his rally in Los Angeles on Saturday, which included musical acts from Joan Baez and Neil Young, who encouraged the crowd to take America back".Sanders's Fighting Oligarchy: Where We Go from Here tour has been drawing massive crowds. Aided by the progressive New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the team set the record in Tempe, Arizona, for biggest-ever political rally in that state three weeks ago. In Denver, Colorado, more than 34,000 people showed up - a career-high crowd for the 83-year-old Sanders. Saturday in Los Angeles saw another record: at least 36,000 people packed a downtown park. Continue reading...

Aircraft crash that killed all six people on board was on its eighth tour flight of the day, federal investigators sayThe helicopter that crashed into New York City's Hudson River on Thursday - killing all six on board, including three children - lacked flight recorders, said the US's National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).It was also on its eighth tour flight of the day, having already completed seven, according to federal investigators.Reuters contributed reporting Continue reading...

Tens of thousands of people attended an anti-Trump rally in Los Angeles on Saturday, when the Vermont senator Bernie Sanders and New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez urged the crowd to fight against authoritarianism and oligarchy during their 'Fighting Oligarchy' tour across the US

From Paltrow talking about KPIs to Meghan waxing lyrical about entrepreneurship, it's not surprising famous women are cashing in on the world's obsession with their brandsI expect certain things from a Gwyneth Paltrow interview. Breathless outfit details. Her cooking something unexpectedly indulgent for the interviewer, or appearing more laid-back than her image suggests. Spacey pronouncements. What I don't expect to read is: I need to optimize EBITDA" (that's earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation, for the non-business-speaking people) or impacting my P&L" (profit and loss). These quotes come from Paltrow's recent Vanity Fair profile, in which she also referred to recent layoffs from her wellness empire, Goop, as a reorg" and described its sexual wellness clients as: Not the best customers from an LTV perspective," which I learn means lifetime value" - having bought the notorious vagina egg for a laugh, they don't come back for cashmere and casserole dishes.Tempting as it is to linger in the Goop-verse - so fragrant, so self-actualised - I'm mostly interested in Paltrow's uninhibited adoption of biz-speak. It was unexpected in a glossy feature with her looking a billion dollars, accessorised with two equally fabulous borzois. Normally, if I wanted to hear someone talk about EBITDA, I'd turn off my noise-cancelling headphones and eavesdrop on my husband's work calls. But Paltrow has always had a shrewd eye for the zeitgeist, so I'm wondering: does this herald the second coming of the out-and-proud girlboss?Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

The reluctance of religious organisations to offer recompense for the lives ruined fits a pattern of denial and evasionThere are some stories so horrifying that their details embed themselves in your flesh and haunt you for the rest of your days. The suffering of the women and babies - an estimated 170,000 of them - who were incarcerated and abused in the Magdalene laundries and mother-and-baby homes that housed fallen women" is one such story. It is a scandal that is difficult to read about without experiencing an overwhelming feeling of disgust, from the testimonies of abuse and forced adoption, to the mass grave at the former St Mary's mother-and-baby home near Tuam, County Galway, which contained 796 bodies of babies and children. The nuns put many of them in a septic tank. There were no burial records.The efforts of survivors, campaigners and historians to bring these stories to light in the face of obstruction and indifference has been the work of decades. The Irish government made a formal apology in 2021 after a judicial commission report. Yet this story, and the human misery it has caused, is not over: the last home closed in 1996. There are living survivors, and people who are descended from the victims. The exhumation of the children's remains, so that they can be identified if possible and given a proper burial, is continuing. And then there is the question of redress.Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett is a Guardian columnist and authorDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

World Trade Center healthcare program for people affected by attacks is in turmoil over Trump officials' overhaulA program that provides free healthcare to first responders and survivors of the World Trade Center terror attacks has been in turmoil for months, with services cut, restored and cut again as part of the Trump administration's restructuring" of the federal health department.Following the most recent cuts, groups representing survivors and even Democratic US senators say they have no clarity on how the program will continue to provide benefits. Continue reading...

Economic inequality breeds resentment and a desire to get even. That's what fuels support for even incompetent regimesHe's really gone and done it this time. Now everyone can see what a disaster he is." How many times have we heard this about Donald Trump? And how many times has it been proved wrong? Well, maybe this time he really has overstepped. After all, his clowning around with tariffs, sparking trade wars, then suddenly reversing his position, could provoke a global recession, perhaps even a depression. Surely his supporters will disown him? But I'm not banking on it, and this is why.Already, Trump has waged war on everything that builds prosperity and wellbeing: democracy, healthy ecosystems, education, healthcare, science, the arts. Yet, amid the wreckage, and despite some slippage, his approval ratings still hold between 43 and 48%: far higher than those of many other leaders. Why? I believe part of the answer lies in a fundamental aspect of our humanity: the urge to destroy that from which you feel excluded.George Monbiot is a Guardian columnistThe Invisible Doctrine: The Secret History of Neoliberalism, by George Monbiot and Peter Hutchison, was published in paperback earlier this month Continue reading...

Dr Peter Marks, forced to resign by Trump administration, sees no possible way' to determine cause by SeptemberThe US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, should not offer false hope" to families by boasting he can figure out what causes autism as soon as September, says the physician who resigned as the nation's top vaccine official amid what he called anti-vaccination misinformation from the Trump administration cabinet member.In an interview during which he alluded to his help helming Operation Warp Speed - the initiative that took only about nine months to develop, manufacture and distribute the vaccines protecting the public from Covid-19 - Dr Peter Marks warned that autism is an incredibly complicated issue". Continue reading...

Residents in the auto industry's heartland respond to the chaotic start to the president's signature economic policyThe General Motors Flint Assembly plant is a hulking symbol of American auto industry might, a 5m-sq-ft factory stretching as far as the eye can see down Van Slyke Road, and it hums: three shifts almost daily crank out the Silverado truck, the automaker's most popular product.The plant weathered decades of industrial disinvestment in Flint, a blue-collar city of about 80,000 in mid-Michigan, the nation's auto capital. Flint Assembly remains an economic cornerstone of a Rust belt region filled with working-class swing voters who helped propel Donald Trump to his second term. Continue reading...

Amid a series of sadistic expulsions, the White House says Trump has reflected kicking Americans out of the countryThey're rounding people up, and you could be next. The Trump administration has largely dispensed with due process rights in deporting immigrants, who are now being targeted for their protected speech, having their visas or green cards summarily cancelled without process and sometimes without notice, and getting kidnapped off the streets and hustled into vans so that they can be shipped to detention centers" too far away for their loved ones, or their lawyers, to visit them.Some immigrants are being targeted for disappearance because they oppose Israel's genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, an opinion that it is now physically dangerous, instead of merely unpopular, to hold. But others the government seems to be seizing almost at random. More than 200 Venezuelan nationals have been seized and deported to a mega-prison in El Salvador, rendered outside of US jurisdiction in defiance of judges' orders demanding that their deportation flights be stopped. Of those Venezuelans, most had no criminal record. Other deportees, like the Maryland father and sheet metal worker Kilmar Abrego Garcia, seem to have been deported by mistake; the Trump administration says that Abrego Garcia, who they admit they did not mean to deport, will not be brought back to his family in the United States. Conveniently, the fact that they have deported him to a foreign prison is supposed, in the Trump administration's logic, to absolve them of responsibility for putting him there. We suggest the judge contact [Salvadoran] President Bukele because we are unaware of the judge having jurisdiction or authority over the country of El Salvador," the White House said, obnoxiously, after a judge ordered them to bring Abrego Garcia back. Continue reading...

Trump ended the de-minimis' rule while launching a trade war with China - which will make retail giants such as Temu more expensive, experts sayAfter a chaotic week of flip-flopping tariff policies, cheap clothes from China are nearly certain to face a steep price hike soon - prompting concern among fast fashion retailers and potentially pushing consumers to look for other alternatives.As part of a package of global tariff policies announced on liberation day" last week, Donald Trump signed an executive order that ended a duty-free exemption for low-priced goods to enter the US from China and Hong Kong. Known as the de-minimis" rule, packages under $800 do not qualify for any taxes or tariffs on the goods and are inspected minimally at the border. Continue reading...

In the court of King Donald, Sam Peckinpah's flawed 1973 western finally makes sense to meI first saw the Danish Dogme 95 film Festen in 1998 when I was 30. You had to go to the cinema to see films in those days, when small boys ran barefoot on a conveyor belt to turn the reels, and it's possible I watched its depiction of a family torn apart by violence, resentment, alcoholism and sexual abuse in horror while crunching popcorn, eating hotdogs and drinking a big bucket of Fanta TM (R). No wonder I was sick on the old Danish woman next to me. Luckily, in Denmark, being vomited on by a stranger is considered good luck, and we began a torrid affair.But I watched Festen again in my 50s and found it hilarious, laughing out loud at its grim affirmation of bleak inevitability. But the film hadn't changed. So what had the world done to me in the intervening years to make my sense of humour so black? Or had all that bacon and pastry I ate in the 00s somehow made me more sensitive to the Danish sensibility? Similarly, once I drank only Yorkshire Tea for a week and briefly became both resentful and ingenious.Stewart Lee vs the Man-Wulf until spring 2026 with a Royal Festival Hall run in July. Sign up here to be kept up with future developments for everDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 250 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at observer.letters@observer.co.uk Continue reading...

What is happening is, quite simply, annihilation. Yet our politicians keep funding it and media outlets normalize itWhere do I even start? In recent weeks I've sat down to try and write about Gaza and, every time I steel myself to write about one atrocity, another atrocity is committed. Palestinian journalists have been burned alive, babies have frozen to death, medics have been executed and buried in mass graves, kids are being killed in their sleep. Meanwhile, in the US and Germany, speaking out about dead Palestinian babies can land you on a deportation list. Arguing that international human rights law should be respected can put you at risk of being snatched off the street and stuck in a detention centre.I don't know where to start and I don't know what is really left to say at this point. After 18 months of endless carnage, it should be clear to everyone that this is not a war. That this is not self-defence. What is happening in Gaza is, quite simply, annihilation. A litany of genocide experts have stated this. Respected international organizations like Amnesty International have concluded that Israel is committing genocide - and yet our politicians are still funding this. Continue reading...

In a triumph of bling over restraint, the bride will get a hen do in space and a party on a super-yachtWell done us. It can't be long before Jeff Bezos personally extends his thanks, as he did when we - Amazon employees and Amazon customers - paid for his flight to sub-orbital space, but let's not wait. As soon as Monday, when his fiancee, Lauren Sanchez, is due with five friends on a rocket trip, Amazon givers could be witness, again, to the kind of unfettered excess that is only possible if everyone, at every level, contributes, even if it's only via permanent surveillance and a surrendered toiletbreak.But no one puts it better than Jeff, the founder and chief executive of Amazon, did himself, after he took his inaugural Blue Origin space trip in 2021. You guys paid for all this." More recently, we provided funds - that might not exist without the company's pitiless working conditions - for Sanchez's pink diamond engagement ring, proudly exhibited, estimated value, $3m. The billionaire delivered it, an enchanted Vogue writer reported, in the sweetest way, on his massive new yacht, hiding the ring under her pillow after a starlit dinner a deux". Few passions have been as exhaustively documented as that between these seasoned lovebirds.(Favourite saying: Love you to space and back.") And this week, prior to funding the solemnisation of that love - a June wedding in Venice - it will duly be our privilegeto watch Lauren's hen flight slip thesurly bonds of Earth. Continue reading...

Employees are choosing to opt out of a new era of corporate malignity, epitomised by Elon MuskAlmost any workplace study in the last decade will tell you that the death of productivity - and the death of profits - is a direct result of having miserable, overworked and micromanaged employees. In an attempt to make themselves feel in control, bosses delude themselves into believing that a tight grip will yield big results from their staff.Overwhelmingly though, the reality is the opposite: that relaxed, empowered workers (with plenty of free time) are the ones who manage to do the best work, often in shorter days than 9-5. Continue reading...

With $1.5bn ploughed in by SSG, Jay Monahan and co have plenty of money and no need to agree a deal with LIVThe Ryder Cup could become the next piece to move in the apparently never-ending game of elite golf's three-dimensional chess. Multiple sources have confided during the Masters that PGA Tour Enterprises, a commercial body set up almost two years ago, is seriously considering an offer to take part ownership of the United States element of the Ryder Cup. That domain is controlled by the PGA of America, which also runs the US PGA Championship. Any such deal would cost PGA Tour Enterprises hundreds of millions of dollars.PGA Tour designs on the Ryder Cup are nothing new. Indeed, it has been a longtime frustration of the PGA Tour that the five key elements in the sport - the four majors plus the biennial joust between Europe and the US - are run by other organisations. PGA Tour Enterprises now offers an avenue to do something about that. Continue reading...

After attaining comfort and a shift in the culture, high heels have returned - for some a symbol of retrogressive femininity, for others a protestI mean, it sounds mad now. I know this even as I write, it sounds impossible, like a weird lie you tell kids to show them how good they have it, but listen: in the late 1990s and early 2000s when I worked in a fancy underwear shop, I had to wear heels that were at least 3in high every day, no sitting down allowed. And then, and then, in my leisure time, instead of easing myself into, say, a bath of Uggs, I also wore a heel. Eva," I hear you say, Did somebody hurt you? I hope you have someone to talk to." But - it was normal. It was normal! I wore a spike-heeled boot, a massive platform, or sometimes for comfort, as a treat, a 1940s mule.It was about fashion, yes, but it was also about growing up, and about authority, and about swagger. Also, I lived at the top of a very steep hill and the angle of a heel was sometimes helpful when walking home. Heels have never been about just one thing. Their meaning, pain and politics, move and merge. Continue reading...

Economically, the trade war may be bad news for Xi Jingping, but ideologically and politically it is a giftLast week, Mao Ning, head of China's foreign ministry information department, posted a blurry black-and-white clip of a moment in history. In 1953, Chairman Mao made a defiant speech of resistance to what he called US aggression in Korea.Kim Il-sung, the North Korean leader and founder of the Kim dynasty, now in its third generation, had invaded US-backed South Korea. When Kim's attempt to unite Korea by force appeared to be failing, China threw nearly 3 million volunteers" into the war and succeeded in fighting to the stalemate that has prevailed ever since. Continue reading...

US president exempts host of electronics from tariffs regime; US military allowed more direct role' in securing border with Mexico - key US politics stories from Saturday 12 April at a glanceBig tech has gained a major exemption from Donald Trump's trade war after the US president exempted smartphones, computers and other electronics from the 125% levies imposed on imports from China as well as tariffs imposed on other countries.Experts had previously warned tariffs would cause electronic consumer prices to spike in the US, with Apple reportedly chartering cargo flights to bring in 600 tons of iPhones from India rather than China amid the cratering trade ties between the two countries. Continue reading...

Defending champion and usual frontrunner could not challenge Rory McIlroy after a good round of bad golfFor a small man, Rory McIlroy casts a long shadow. On Saturday, it covered every single one of the 52 other men in the field at the Masters, so that even the world's No 1 golfer, Scottie Scheffler, found himself playing in the shade. Scheffler is a popular golfer, and a particular favourite with the fans around here after winning the tournament twice in the past three years, but as McIlroy's round went on, Scheffler's gallery started to thin quicker than Jordan Spieth's hair. By the time he made the turn, you could pretty much take your pick of the positions around whichever green he was on. The centre of gravity was with McIlroy, back on the previous green.Scheffler was a frontrunner during both of those victories, he led the field from the second round right through to the finish both times. Which means that this year he's in the unfamiliar position of trying to scrap his way up past McIlroy, and everyone else in his way, into first place. He's the tortoise chasing the hare. He scored an even-par 72, which left him five under par, and well off McIlroy's lead. Continue reading...

Rory McIlroy started the day with six straight threes, Bryson DeChambeau ended it with a birdie rake to trim the gap at the top to two. What a Moving Day!An extremely smiley Bryson DeChambeau has a chat with CBS Sports. If I can just keep it in the fairway ... iron shots into the green ... I watch a lot ... see what players are doing ... where the pin locations are ... how people are playing it ... trying to get comfortable with that ... get my day started off a little late on purpose ... feel comfortable like I'm just getting up, getting ready to go play some golf and have a good time ... I'm excited ... it's gonna be a lot of fun!"Shot of the week at 12 by Denny McCarthy! At the 155-yard par-three, he lands his ball five feet in front of the flag. A couple of tiny bounces take it a couple of feet closer, but no further. That's a kick-in birdie, though. The 32-year-old from Florida, whose best finish here was a modest tie for 45th last year, moves into the red at -1 overall. So close there to only the fourth ace at 12 in Masters history. The others: the two-time US Open champion Curtis Strange in 1988, the amateur Bill Hyndman in 1959, and Claude Harmon, Butch's dad, in 1947 (a year before his victory). Continue reading...

Administration fails to show they have taken any steps to facilitate the return of Kilmar Abrego GarciaThe Trump administration on Saturday confirmed to a federal judge that a Maryland man who was wrongly deported last month remains confined in a notorious prison in El Salvador.However, the White House filing did not address the judge's demands that the administration detail the steps it was taking to return Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the United States. The White House only confirmed that Garcia was under the authority of the El Salvador government. Continue reading...

It's time to fashion a new global trade order without the USThe game-changing geopolitical event last week was the near collapse of the immense $29tn market in US government debt, threatening the stability of the American and global financial system and the safe-haven status of dollar assets.The US president boasted as the collapse unfolded that world leaders were queueing to kiss his arse". Twelve hours later, he was in the same humiliatingly weak position as the then British prime minister Liz Truss found herself after her tax-slashing mini-budget" in 2022. The markets had forced him to pause for 90 days the swingeing range of reciprocal" tariffs that he announced on what he proclaimed liberation day"; instead he lowered all of them, bar that on China, to 10%. Continue reading...

The open door of American democracy is slamming shut faster and louder than we could have imaginedOn Friday afternoon, a federal immigration judge in Louisiana ruled that Mahmoud Khalil, the lawful permanent resident who was arrested last month for his advocacy for Palestinian rights at Columbia University, was removable - that is to say, deportable - under the law.Let's be absolutely clear about how outrageous this decision is. The judge, Jamee Comans, had given the Trump administration a deadline to produce the evidence required to show that Khalil should be deported. In a functional state, such evidence would rise to a standard of extreme criminality necessitating deportation. Continue reading...

Announcement says tariffs - including those imposed on China - will also not apply to other electronic devicesDonald Trump's presidential administration has exempted smartphones and computers from the 125% levies imposed on imports from China as well as other reciprocal tariffs, which experts had cautioned might cause electronic consumer prices to dramatically spike in the US.The announcement was made late on Friday in a US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) notice that said the devices would be excluded from the 10% global tariff that Trump recently imposed on most countries, along with the much heftier import tax on China. Continue reading...

Two-time champion said the tournament was instrumental in him becoming a Christian after missing the cut on FridayYou expect to find Jim Nantz waiting for the Masters champion in Butler Cabin on Sunday evening, but it must be a surprise to find God is in there with him, too. But, as Bernhard Langer explained after finishing his 136th and final competitive round at the Masters on Friday evening, apparently that's what happened to him when he won the tournament for the first time in 1985, back when it was Brent Musburger asking the questions on CBS. In one of the more extraordinary revelations, Langer told the press that he saw the light right by the side of the 18th green here at Augusta National.I never mentioned it to the public but this tournament actually was very instrumental in me becoming a Christian," Langer said, in a somewhat incongruous reply to a question about the fact that he was the last man to win a major using a persimmon driver. Apparently the club went by the name the Last Supper", which must have been what got him thinking about it. I grew up Catholic, and I thought I was a Christian. But I basically used Jesus Christ in a very bad way in my first interview in Butler Cabin." Continue reading...

Order allows armed forces to take direct roll' in securing southern border, which Trump memo says is under attack'Donald Trump has authorized the military to take control of land at the US-Mexico border as part of the president's broader efforts to crack down on undocumented immigration.The authorization came late on Friday in a memorandum from Trump to interior secretary Doug Burgum, defense secretary Pete Hegseth, homeland security secretary Kristi Noem and agricultural secretary Brooke Rollins which outlined new policies concerning military involvement at the US's southern border. Continue reading...

The president's gambit to bring the production of goods such as iPhones back to the US ignores huge supply chain complexitiesDonald Trump's tariff strategy has at least one biblical connection: like the peace of God, it passeth all understanding" (Philippians 4:7). Rival attempts to extract a rationale from the chaos include the idea that he is trying to devalue the dollar, or that he is seeking to reshore" the manufacturing capacity that the US lost through decades of globalisation. My own hunch is that he just wants to show who's the big boss around here - or as British science fiction author Charles Stross puts it, that he expects individual nations to come to him, hat in hand, like terrified shopkeepers pleading for mercy from a mafia don".Cue the UK's very own Trump whisperer, Keir Starmer, who, according to Politico, plans to put a review of online safety rules on the table in trade talks" with the US. Which, translated, means that things such as the Online Safety Act and copyright rules that hinder US AI companies from looting the intellectual property of the British creative sector may soon become history. The only remaining question is whether Starmer possesses a suitably distressed hat for his penitent journey to Washington. Continue reading...

My resident blue tit is grumpy, and with avian numbers decreasing at an alarming rate who can blame him?Brian sits, puffed up with his own importance, glowering at me through the kitchen window. He wants to come in and occasionally lunges at the window to make his point. I'm not even sure what he is grumpy about - it's a great week for Brian. Because blue tit sightings (sorry, did I mention Brian is a blue tit, or Cyanistes caeruleus as he'd put it on his LinkedIn?) in gardens were up almost 10% on the previous year in the RSPB 2024 Big Garden Birdwatch. Meanwhile, Cosmopolitan magazine insists sky blue is the must-have hue" for spring.Maybe Brian is crotchety because, despite his beauty and soprano trill, he remains in the No 2 slot of most-spotted birds, another year trailing to the frankly rather drab house sparrow. Or maybe he's in a flap because all media attention has focused on the collapse in starling numbers - the lowest since counting began in 1979. Continue reading...

Video captured one person robbing corpse on idling train before another person robbed and sexually assaulted itA man sexually violated a corpse on a New York City subway train after stealing from the body, becoming the second of two people to rob that particular dead person, authorities said recently.One of the more grotesque US crime stories of late unfolded on a southbound R train near the Whitehall Street station in Manhattan at about 12.20am on Wednesday, when an unidentified individual had sexual contact with an unconscious and unresponsive adult male" in plain view of surveillance cameras, according to a police statement. Continue reading...

Number of Brits crossing Atlantic down 14.3% from 2024 - and the travel industry fears decline could continueAfter backpacker Rebecca Burke was arrested and locked up for nearly three weeks by US immigration officials in February, she started urging people not to travel to America.Britons seem to have listened: UK residents visiting the US were down 14.3% in March compared with the same month in 2024, official figures show. Continue reading...

A bill in the US state would allow public schools to deny undocumented children the chance to enrollYou've probably seen this quote from an Alabama pastor called Dave Barnhart. It goes viral all the time. But I'm resurfacing the quote because it is another day that ends with y" in America, which means it is relevant once again. Continue reading...

Matt Meyer finds himself playing Whac-A-Mole as he deals with Trump's capricious actions while pursuing an ambitious agenda of his ownWhen Matt Meyer was elected as governor of Delaware last year, the outgoing US president called with congratulations - and a warning. Joe Biden did tell me that I had to do my job and do it well or in four years he's running against me," Meyer said, smiling. He's a Delawarean and I don't doubt that he would run."Now 82, Biden has retired to Delaware after leaving the political stage. At 53, Meyer is among a new generation of Democrats trying to navigate a post-Biden world in which Donald Trump is eviscerating the federal government, stress-testing the rule of law and prosecuting a global trade war. Continue reading...

Researchers have catalogued the British words and phrases most used in US conversation, sparking delight and frustrationThe Americani(s)zation of British English is often described as a linguistic disaster - frustrations over imported words or usages, from awesome" to ATM", are well documented.But in recent years, there's been growing interest in the opposite phenomenon: Britishisms that have made their way into American English. These days, it's not uncommon to hear Americans describing a single event as a one-off" or noting that a perfect assessment is spot-on".Amongst (rather than among"), whose use has nearly quadrupled in the US over the past four decadesQueue, whose frequent use on tech platforms such as Netflix has given its British meaning - what Americans would generally call a line" - new life in the USWonky, meaning a bit offCheeky, meaning a bit naughty or indulgent, as frequently used by Mike Myers (a Canadian with English parents) on Saturday Night Live in the 1990sSnarky, often used to describe early internet discourse and sites such as GawkerCheers, which has long been used while clinking glasses in the US but has started to mean thanks" in some contextsKeen, meaning enthusiasticMaths, rather than just math, which has become more familiar in the US due to international academic work and social mediaNil, meaning zero, which is turning up in online gaming Continue reading...

Resurgence could be on horizon as outbreaks pick up speed in US and abroad amid public health program cutsAs tuberculosis outbreaks pick up speed in the US and abroad amid deep cuts in funding for local, state and international public health programs, a resurgence of the deadliest infectious disease - including drug-resistant tuberculosis - could be on the horizon.Increasing funding for public health responses could end tuberculosis (TB) altogether, says James Brookes, an IT specialist from Idaho, who told this to his representatives in Congress on Wednesday. Continue reading...

Discontent with government handling of diplomatic crisis rises as Pete Hegseth says US troops moved to countryPanamanian opposition politicians have accused the US of launching a camouflaged invasion" of the country, amid simmering discontent over the government's handling of the diplomatic crisis.After a three-day visit by the US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump appeared to confirm that US military personnel had been deployed to the Central American country on Thursday, telling reporters: We've moved a lot of troops to Panama." Continue reading...

Nothing is certain under this president - as seen in the inconsistent implementation of tariffs. And it has a longer-term economic costMinutes after Donald Trump unveiled a climbdown on tariffs, softening an extraordinary US attack on trade from much of the world, his press secretary scolded reporters at the White House.Many of you in the media clearly missed The Art of the Deal," said Karoline Leavitt, referring to the 1987 bestseller which laid the foundations of the president's reputation as a consummate dealmaker. Continue reading...