Rally held in support of opponents of planned police training facility near Atlanta after attorney general's sweeping indictmentNearly five dozen people indicted on racketeering (Rico) charges related to protests against a planned police and firefighter training facility near Atlanta appeared in court on Monday as their supporters rallied outside the courthouse.Protests against the proposed training center - dubbed Cop City" by opponents - have been going on for more than two years. Continue reading...
House speaker says in clip he and son use Covenant Eyes, which bills itself as a tool that helps you live porn-free with confidence'Mike Johnson, the hardline conservative and outspoken Christian who was elected House speaker in October, has raised eyebrows after he admitted using an app which bills itself as a tool to help people quit porn".A year-old clip posted online over the weekend showed Johnson discussing how he and his son use Covenant Eyes, an app which tracks users' phone and computer use, to monitor each others' online activity. Continue reading...
About 500 demonstrators including artist Nan Goldin attend protest on Monday in New York CityHundreds of protestors staged a sit-in demonstration at New York's Statue of Liberty on Monday afternoon demanding a ceasefire in Gaza.About 500 members and supporters of Jewish Voice for Peace-New York City (JVP-NYC) waved flags and banners and sang pro-peace songs, according to a spokesperson for the group. Continue reading...
Donald Trump is threatened with being thrown out of court and says he was too busy as president to review financial documentsFormer president Donald Trump, who faces criminal charges for alleged election meddling, decried the trial as election interference" during one of his testy digressions. Trump got onto the topic of election chicanery by saying this case is a disgrace." He then said that James was more concerned about sitting in court despite everybody being killed on the streets of New York." Then came Trump's mention of the 2024 race. We sit here all day - it's election interference, because you want to keep me in the courthouse!"After the trial proceedings concluded, Trump spoke briefly to reporters outside the courtroom and called for the case to be dismissed. I think it's a very sad day for America," Trump said. This is a case that should've never been brought and it's a case that should be immediately dismissed."Trump very much took issue with any suggestion that his wealth was not as he claimed. According to James' suit, Trump secured favorable loan and insurance terms by puffing up the value of his assets, including real estate. When Wallace noted that several loan agreements required he maintain a $2.5bn net worth, Trump said: I could have given them a few assets which were worth more than $2.5 bn." Trump also wanted to make clear he was liquid. I've had a lot of cash for a long time.The ex-president also feigned ignorance about details of financial transactions. He said, for example, that a loan for his project in Chicago was paid off recently, but couldn't recall when. Wallace asked him: Are you aware that the Trump Chicago loan was paid off last week?" Trump said, I heard it was...I don't know if it was last week. I know it was recently." He claimed that son Eric Trump made the call to pay off the loan early.Judge Arthur Engoron, whom Trump has repeatedly bashed as a political operative and other smears along those lines, threatened to throw him him off the witness stand for not answering questions succinctly. Engoron said to the ex-president's lawyer Chris Kise: I beseech you to control him. If you can't, I will; I will excuse him and draw every negative inference that I can." Not surprisingly, Trump groused: This is a very unfair trial ... and I hope the public is watching."Trump in effect accused Engoron - who determined the ex-president's real estate valuations were fraudulent - of being a fraud. The fraud is on behalf of the court," Trump ranted. He says that I'm a fraud ... He's the one that didn't value property correctly." He also told Engoron: You're wrong."The core of attorney general Letitia James's civil fraud trial is Trump's inflation of real estate assets so, it's noteworthy that he seemed to recognize that his Trump Tower triplex might have been overstated. Asked about the fact that the triplex had been listed as 30,000 sq ft on financial statements - but was only about 10,000 sq ft - Trump said it could have been a miscalculation. Whoever came up with the square footage, Trump said, just tripled the floor space for each floor. But, they didn't take out elevator shafts" and other non-usable square footage, he surmised.Trump told the court he was too busy" as president to review a financial document related to real estate valuation. Were you involved in the preparation of the 2021 statement?" prosecutor Kevin Wallace asked. No," Trump said. I hadn't seen it. I was so busy in the White House." He added: My threshold was China, Russia and keeping our country safe."Trump showed some self-awareness in court this morning when describing his political ascent. While insisting that his net worth was not overstated, Trump repeatedly pointed to the value of the Trump name. The most valuable asset was the brand value," he said. If you look at the companies, the brand value is a very big part of the asset value of the company." Shortly thereafter, he said: I became president because of my brand."James spoke outside the court before the hearing. She said she expected Trump to engage in name-calling and taunts and race-baiting, and call this a witch-hunt". James said the former president has repeatedly and consistently misrepresented and inflated the value of his assets." But at the end of the day, the only thing that matters are the facts and the numbers - and numbers, my friends, don't lie," she added.James stood by the prosecution's work after a contentious day with Trump in court. At the end of the day, the documentary evidence demonstrated the fact he falsely inflated his assets to basically enrich himself and his family," she said. She said the former president chose to engage in distractions" while on the stand. I will not be bullied," James said. Continue reading...
The real obstacle has been Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been in power for nearly half the time since the idea was floatedThe two-state solution could do with a rebrand.The optimism that greeted the Oslo peace accords between Israel and the Palestinians three decades ago has long since given way to eye rolling and grimaces among politicians and diplomats at any mention of the peace process". For years, they have been obliged to pay lip service to the vision while, in practice, many were resigned to the two-state solution as a byword for failure and a cover for inaction. Mostly they tried to avoid talking about it at all. Continue reading...
Man pleads guilty in case that centers on how his son, accused of killing seven people last year, obtained gun licenseThe father of a man charged in a deadly Fourth of July parade shooting in suburban Chicago pleaded guilty to seven misdemeanors on Monday in a case that centered on how his son obtained a gun license.Robert Crimo Jr entered the plea as his trial was about to start in Lake county court, in Waukegan, Illinois. He was immediately sentenced by Judge George Strickland to 60 days in jail, starting next week, and 100 hours of community service. Continue reading...
New York Times/Siena College survey shows president trailing 44% to 48% in five of six key states he won in 2020Senior Democrats have sounded the alarm after an opinion poll showed Joe Biden trailing the Republican frontrunner Donald Trump in five out of six battleground states exactly a year before the presidential election.Trump leads in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania, with Biden ahead in Wisconsin, according to a survey published on Sunday by the New York Times and Siena College. Biden beat Trump in all six states in 2020 but the former president now leads by an average of 48% to 44% across these states in a hypothetical rematch. Continue reading...
Outrage and horror after 22 rounds fired in incident in which four other children and one adult injuredCincinnati officials are expressing outrage and horror at a drive-by shooting that sent more than a score of bullets into a crowd of children, killing an 11-year-old boy and striking four other children and an adult.The boy was identified on Monday by the Hamilton county coroner's office as Dominic Davis. Continue reading...
Ice examined implications of expelling foreign nationals from the US for their political beliefs, unsealed documents showDuring Donald Trump's presidency, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) considered the implications of expelling foreign nationals from the US for their political beliefs, newly unsealed documents have revealed.The two memos were written and revised by the US immigration enforcement agency and top White House lawyers in the Trump administration and recently obtained by Columbia University's Knight First Amendment Institute via a Freedom of Information Act (Foia) lawsuit filed in 2017. Continue reading...
Hungry for innovation that will change our ailing world, we're blind to hubris, misguided egos and wishful thinkingOn Thursday night, mere minutes after I finished reading the last few pages of Michael Lewis's book about the dramatic rise and fall of erstwhile crypto king Sam Bankman-Fried, we were all presented with an addendum to the last chapter.In Manhattan federal court, a jury of nine women and three men convicted Bankman-Fried of wire fraud and conspiracy to launder money. The 31-year-old had used his house-of-cards empire - FTX and its sister company, the hedge fund Alameda Research - as a flimsy front for rampant, irresponsible risk-taking, they found. The charges against him could carry a maximum sentence of 110 years (his sentencing is set for 28 March 2024 and he still maintains his innocence). Continue reading...
About 45,000 Portland students out of class as union follows lead of UAW and WGA in action over pay and conditionsRoughly 45,000 students have been out of class in the Portland public school district since Wednesday, when the Portland Association of Teachers (PAT) kicked off its first-ever strike, enlivening dozens of locations in the city with picket lines.It's the latest union action in a growing movement of US workers who are striking as a bargaining tool to secure higher wages and improvements in their working conditions. Continue reading...
As society has renewed its desire to be cruel, we turn inward to our comforts, looking for warmthA few weeks ago, I moved out of the crumbling home I'd built for myself in a dilapidated Sydney sharehouse, and found myself living alone for the first time. The shock of being by myself was bruising. I walked around the rooms of my new home, idly picking things up and putting them down again. I was, quite suddenly, forced to confront something I'd long known, but tried to ignore - sometimes you have nowhere to turn but yourself.I don't think I'm alone in that reckoning. The vibes, as they say, are bad out there - the world appears to have renewed its desire to be cruel. And so many of us turn inward, seeking shelter, and instead finding, terrifyingly, us. Faced with that gnawing ache of self-reflection, unsure of what else to do, I put on the 2008 motion picture Mamma Mia!Sign up for a weekly email featuring our best reads Continue reading...
Tyson Foods makes decision over dinosaur-shaped Fun Nuggets out of abundance of caution'A US food company is recalling 13 and a half tonnes of dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets after customers reported finding metal pieces in the product.One individual in the US is said to have suffered a minor mouth injury after eating the Fun Nuggets. Continue reading...
The artist and activist from the African side of the moon' is running an anti-war, pro-love campaignAt least fifteen other people are running for president in 2024, but none of them look like Brooklyn's Paperboy Love Prince. When the artist, rapper, and non-binary activist filed to run in the New Hampshire primary last month, they showed up wearing a voluminous brocade jacket, gold pantaloons, and MSCHF's Big Red Boots, Super Mario-esque shoes made by the designers behind Lil Nas X's Satan sneakers.They looked like a cartoon character. It's all part of the act. Continue reading...
American political analyst behind Richard Nixon's electoral southern strategy' who later became an author and columnistThe whole secret of politics is knowing who hates who," Kevin Phillips told the journalist Garry Wills during the 1968 US presidential campaign.Phillips, who has died aged 82, was the political analyst behind Richard Nixon's southern strategy", aimed at exploiting racial tensions to draw to the Republican side the more conservative voters in the south, where the Democrats had dominated since the American civil war primarily because Abraham Lincoln had been a Republican. Continue reading...
Atrium Health in North Carolina is one of likely thousands of hospitals using extraordinary' collection measures, report findsTerry and Sandra Belk's medical bills began to pile up after a series of illnesses - including breast cancer, prostate cancer and gallbladder surgery - repeatedly sent them to the largest hospital system in Charlotte, North Carolina, Atrium Health.Despite having commercial insurance, the Belks received bills for tens of thousands of dollars. When the couple couldn't pay, Atrium sued them through North Carolina's civil courts. Continue reading...
US secretary of state to talk to foreign minister Hakan Fidan in latest stop of diplomatic tour as US nuclear-powered submarine heads through Suez canal
by Gabriel Baumgaertner, Bryan Armen Graham and Nicho on (#6G55S)
The college basketball season tips off on Monday across the United States. Who will stand out? Who will surprise? Our writers weigh inWho's next in women's hoops. Last year's national title game between LSU and Iowa was watched by a record 9.9m people, another sign for the surging popularity of women's basketball. The social media era has helped popularize talents like LSU's Angel Reese and Iowa's Caitlin Clark, whose play would have never made it into nightly highlight packages of years past. This increased visibility has grown several bonafide stars like Breanna Stewart, A'Ja Wilson, Kelsey Plum and Sabrina Ionescu over the past decade. I'm just looking forward to who is next. GB Continue reading...
The Chelsea coach will leave the WSL at the end of the season and is expected to take over the four-time World Cup champions. The job is far from an easy oneFew people on the Earth are as qualified as Emma Hayes to be the US women's national team coach.The Englishwoman built a juggernaut at Chelsea. She gained experience for that job by coaching and consulting in the USA, where she helped to assemble a Western New York Flash team that won the last WPS championship. She's a frequent presenter at the annual United Soccer Coaches convention, also in the US. No one has a better understanding of where US players stand in comparison to their international peers. Continue reading...
The Minnesota Vikings quarterback had five days to get to grips with his new team's offense. That didn't turn out to be a problem on SundayYou'd need to be a genius to learn a new NFL offense and its dozens of plays in five days. Luckily, Joshua Dobbs is. The quarterback's academic exploits are the stuff of legend and internet memedom. He graduated from the University of Tennessee with a perfect grade-point average and a degree in aerospace engineering, and instead of going on to a career in rocket science - which he'd have been plenty qualified for - he settled into a different life: that of the journeyman backup. Dobbs has been around the league since 2017, when the Pittsburgh Steelers made him a fourth-round pick. But the last few weeks have turned out to be his big breakthrough.Dobbs started the year with his seventh franchise in seven seasons of pro ball: the Arizona Cardinals, who are playing for little more than an early draft pick next spring. So when the Minnesota Vikings lost starter Kirk Cousins for the year with a torn achilles last week, they chatted with Arizona and swung a deal for Dobbs. That was Tuesday. On Sunday, Dobbs wasn't expecting to play but he was summoned from the bench when Jaren Hall was injured in the first quarter. He duly delivered a masterclass in being a quick study: Dobbs completed 20 of 30 passes for 158 yards and two touchdowns, and despite coughing up a few fumbles to the Atlanta Falcons, he brought the Vikings back from the abyss. Continue reading...
by Oliver Laughland, Tom Silverstone and Laurence Top on (#6G547)
Despite facing multiple criminal charges, Donald Trump remains the frontrunner in the 2024 Republican presidential primary. But in South Carolina, a traditionally conservative southern state, a split is opening up between Trump loyalists and more moderate Republicans who are fearful of what their party has become. The Guardian's Oliver Laughland and Tom Silverstone investigate Continue reading...
Amid the destruction, people are working with artists and engineers to honour their sorrow and ensure we don't forgetIn Shevchenko City Garden, in Kharkiv, eastern Ukraine, there is a new memorial to the children killed by invading Russians. Officially unveiled this summer by the first lady, Olena Zelenska, the bronze assemblage depicts a young boy and girl in the guise of angels, apparently embarking on a winged ascent to heaven. To my taste, it is a triumph of kitsch, whose sentimentality is out of step with the profound tragedies it commemorates. Still, when I visited, little offerings of toys had been left at the statue's base: evidence that many people disagreed, and found it a useful focus of contemplation.Ukraine's landscape of memory is in a state of flux. On one hand, history is being rapidly reassessed. While many public sculptures in the capital and other cities are sandbagged and protected from missiles, Pushkinopad, or Pushkin-fall, is the name given to the steady removal of statues of the Russian poet from Ukrainian streets and squares. Over the past century, the author of Eugene Onegin has been so thoroughly appropriated as a metonym for the Russkiy mir, or Russian political and cultural space, and so consistently instrumentalised as a marker of Russian power and influence, that he has fallen foul of new Ukrainian decolonisation laws. Pushkin Park in Kyiv, for instance, is now Ivan Bahrianyi Park, named after the 20th-century Ukrainian novelist and dissident. Continue reading...
Some will understandably be wary of these marches, but people feel so strongly about this issue for many reasonsAs the streets fill with ever-increasing numbers of pro-Palestine supporters - and with a large protest planned in central London next weekend - British politicians and commentators are coming up with new ways of describing what is happening: from hate marches", in the words of home secretary Suella Braverman, to empty displays of virtue signalling". The prime minister, Rishi Sunak, has already called next weekend's march, which coincides with Armistice Day, provocative and disrespectful". But each attempt to cast this movement as menacing is really a refusal to try to understand what is going on. The truth is that a large number of people in Britain can feel strongly about the situation in Gaza while not being obsessed" with Palestine or motivated by terrorist sympathies.Some will be wary of these marches in good faith, and understandably so. Reported antisemitic hate incidents in Britain are rising, and Hamas's 7 October atrocities have shaken a Jewish diaspora, which saw its mourning immediately eclipsed by sympathy for Gaza. Support for Palestine might seem suspect from a public that does not turn out for many other similar causes. Why does this one issue bring so many out on to the streets, when so many other injustices around the world are met with silence?Nesrine Malik is a Guardian columnistDo 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...
New poll shows Biden ahead in Wisconsin, but Trump leading in Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania and MichiganDemocratic Senator Richard Blumenthal said on Sunday that the party has its work cut out for us" in response to new polling that shows President Joe Biden trailing Donald Trump in five of six swing states.The survey by the New York Times and Siena College of voters in six battleground states, was released with 365 days to go until the 2024 presidential election.Reuters contributed to this report Continue reading...
In his strongest words in the 30-day war, Vermont senator demands end to killing of innocent men, women and children'Bernie Sanders has stepped up his calls for a humanitarian pause in Gaza, demanding an immediate stop to Israeli bombing and an end to the killing of thousands of innocent men, women and children" in the enclave.In some of his strongest words in the 30-day war, the independent US senator from Vermont decried the 7 October Hamas attack inside Israel. He labelled Hamas as an awful terrorist organization" that had slaughtered 1,400 people in cold blood", reiterating his belief that Israel had the right to defend itself. Continue reading...
Turkish police fired water cannon and tear gas as a large crowd of pro-Palestine protesters attempted to storm the Incirlik airbase which houses US troops in the southern Turkish province of Adana. The demonstration was organised by the humanitarian aid agency IHH, calling for the base to be closed down following the outbreak of war between Israel and Hamas. The organisation's president called on attendees not to attack the police, but said 'Our rage is huge. We cannot hold it in.' The demonstration was organised in advance of Antony Blinken's scheduled visit to Ankara where the US secretary of state is expected to meet his Turkish counterpart, Hakan Fidan, to discuss the situation in Gaza
Polls continue to show both presidential frontrunners as tied as tied can be', with third-party candidates tying for a distant thirdAmericans are one year away from a presidential election that's shaping up to be a historically unpopular rematch between the oldest ever sitting president, Joe Biden, a Democrat, and his Republican predecessor, the twice-impeached, serially indicted Donald Trump.With less than 10 weeks to go before Iowa's caucuses launch the 2024 Republican nominating contest, much can still change. As it stands, the country appears to be hurtling toward an election few Americans want - but that might be one of the most consequential in modern US history. Continue reading...
Well-worn legal playbook in recent weeks has brought former president victories in court that have buoyed and emboldened himDonald Trump has appeared at times angrily under siege as he stews over his predicament in the New York civil fraud case, according to people close to the former president, particularly furious in recent weeks with the witness testimony that could result in the end of the Trump Organization empire.The rulings from the presiding New York state supreme court justice Arthur Engoron, who found that Trump and co-defendants were liable for fraud and ordered all of Trump's adult children to testify at the ongoing trial, for instance, have taken a toll. Continue reading...
A deadly blaze in 2018 leveled the area, but now residents are dreaming of a different future in the rapidly developing communityStephen Murray drives the streets of Paradise, California, each day, navigating through roadwork and traffic as he takes in the neat dirt lots and gleaming modern farmhouses on his way to job sites.Construction is constant in the Golden state's fastest growing town. Paradise has a revamped high school, thousands of new homes, recently installed emergency alert sirens and plans for miles of freshly paved roads and underground infrastructure. Continue reading...
A reformed Palestinian Authority or a multinational force have been mooted as solutions for security in the territory, but both proposals have met resistance
After a few months of hormone replacement therapy, I thought my menopausal mood swings were under control. Did the experts really disagree?I started HRT in August and whoa, it's good stuff. I said a few weeks in that I was still very angry, but my oestrogen level has now risen to the point where I found a pile of dishes soaking" in the sink recently and instead of spitting ancestral curses at my husband, I thought: I know - I will model good kitchen practices by calmly washing these." Then I did! My anxiety has stabilised to a level where emails and calls excite only the standard mild-to-moderate dread and my brain fog has dissipated so much I even turned a column in early once - an unprecedented event. It was worth going through another coil insertion (I could explain why but I'll spare you) - the highest endorsement, as anyone who has experienced that particular jabby delight can confirm.Why am I talking about HRT again? I don't particularly want being menopausal" to be my thing - I'm more interested in why Edith, my hen, has decided to live in a tree. But things keep coming up (much like Edith) and here we are. Just this week I read a news report that HRT should not be prescribed to ease symptoms of anxiety and depression in menopausal women", according to landmark new guidelines", with experts saying there was little evidence that HRT helped to improve low mood, anxiety and mood swings".Emma Beddington is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
by Lorena Figueroa in El Paso and Ciudad Juárez on (#6G4MR)
Puppet depicting migrant Syrian girl has walked halfway around to the world, now at border comforting refugees and asylum seekersAfter two years of walking halfway around the world searching for her mother and a new home, a 10-year-old Syrian girl made it to the US-Mexico border.She reached gate 36 of the port of entry in the border fence, where crowds of asylum seekers and refugees have crossed into the US. Continue reading...
The former president will take the stand in Manhattan on Monday - and the future of his corporate empire is at stakeYou can't con people - at least not for long," Donald Trump observed in his 1987 bestseller The Art of the Deal. You can create excitement, you can do wonderful promotion and get all kinds of press, and you can throw in a little hyperbole. But if you don't deliver the goods, people will eventually catch on."The former president spent decades trying to create excitement with wonderful levels of promotion, getting all kinds of press, and throwing in more than a little hyperbole. But did he have the goods? Continue reading...
Despite a warning from the state, board supervisors threaten to sue if Shasta county registrar uses voting machinesIn Shasta county, California, voters will decide this week on a school board race, the formation of a new fire department and a local tax. What observers in California and across the US are watching most is not what they will choose - but how their votes will be counted.In the past months, Shasta has come to play an outsize role nationally as officials in this rural region of northern California have taken center stage in the election denial movement, which proposes fixes" like the sole use of manual tallies to enhance election integrity" based on the lie that the presidency was stolen from Donald Trump. Continue reading...
I may be in denial about my computer being on the blink, but after another hot and muggy Halloween, one thing is frighteningly clearI fear the Apple Store. It's a disorienting cross between a Los Angeles hotel lobby, the place where everyone over 30 gets killed in Logan's Run and the headquarters of Hydra TM (R). The protocols for attracting a staff member seem inexplicably opaque, like the rules for bidding in an auction, or initiating a new friendship. They induce mild panic attacks and my heart flutters as groomed twentysomethings, who could be customers or staff, waft by me, geishas for Steve Jobs's ghost. Why aren't there any queues? Can I just sit in here quietly and eat the things from my bag? Is there a duty free section?In the Apple Store, I never know if a commercial transaction is taking place, or if I am just involved in a continuing discussion about my needs", a situation I admittedly find replicated in my dealings with my therapist and people generally. And there is now a raised area at the rear of the Regent Street branch in London that suggests a ziggurat. Here, ancient Aztecs tore out people's hearts to appease Quetzalcoatl, a sacrifice still less demanding than the financial one required buy a new Apple laptop. When I mentioned, to the charming young man attending me, that the shop design made me think of the death rituals of the winged serpent worshippers, he just smiled, as if I were complimenting Apple's bold aesthetics. But I will have to go to the Apple Store again. Soon.Basic Lee tour dates are here; a six-week London run begins 9 December at Leicester Square theatreDo 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...
When political solutions lose out to vengeance, in Aeschylus's words, Where will it end?'Watching the tragedy unfold in Israel and Palestine has sometimes felt like reading the Oresteia backwards. A trilogy of plays by Aeschylus, written in the fifth century BC, the Oresteia tells of the transformation of ancient Greece from a society rooted in blood and revenge into one shaped by justice.The Oresteia begins with the return home from the Trojan war of Agamemnon, the leader of the triumphant Greeks. He is brutally murdered by his wife, Clytemnestra, in furious revenge for his having ritually sacrificed their daughter Iphigenia on the eve of conflict to placate the gods. Continue reading...
A female-centred workplace is a more appreciative one, Swedish research finds, but with a gender gap of 8%, nice doesn't cut it with payWe got the official data on UK earnings last week. It included the joyful reminder that last year our pay didn't keep up with rising prices, for the ninth year in the 14 years since 2010. Something we used to think almost never happened, has become painfully normal.But you all know your wages aren't going as far as they used to, so let's focus on what the data tells us is going on gender pay gap-wise. Among full-time employees it's 8%. On the positive side, that's way down from an absolutely staggering 36% in 1971, but it hasn't budged much in recent years. The remaining gap is largely about workers aged 40-plus, which is the age at which the very different impacts of having children kick in on mothers' and fathers' careers.Do 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...
Kaoru Nakajima's lavish birthday party in Palermo follows Google's annual summer camps' that seek to convey credibility and longevitySicilians were bewildered last week to see a Japanese billionaire, Kaoru Nakajima, block booking entire sections of their city for his extended birthday party. Palermo's most deluxe hotels were completely occupied by Japanese celebrants. The seating of the grand Politeama theatre was rearranged so that his 1,400 guests could also dine and dance. The opera house, Teatro Massimo, was closed for a private performance of Don Giovanni, with Riccardo Muti conducting.These pharaonic festivities caused consternation and controversy because Sicily is all about beguiling simplicity. There's immense panache to the island, of course, but it's sometimes at the spit-and-sawdust end of the spectrum. So Sicilians perceived something profoundly inauthentic, even unfair, about thousands of jet-setters renting their city for a lavish, gargantuan party. Continue reading...
Silicon Valley tech showmen like Elon Musk and Sam Bankman-Fried can blind us with science. A little more scepticism would not go amissGreat wealth has always signified status, but today tech wealth also signifies having special futuristic insights denied the rest of us, which the Silicon Valley billionaires are all too ready to dispense and we are too ready to receive. Thus the spectacle of the British prime minister fawning over the banal utterances of the world's richest man as prophecies from an entrepreneurial god who deigns to walk among us. On the same day, a bizarre hi-tech huckster, once no less fawned over, was convicted of a $10bn fraud and faces imprisonment for up to 110 years. This bewildering world has robbed everyone from limelight-seeking political leaders to greedy investors of their senses. There has been a collective loss of our sceptical faculties.The obstacle to any such scepticism is that amid the hype, banality, self-deception and sometimes outright fraud is the truth that, on occasion, real wealth and technological breakthroughs are being created at dizzying speed. Elon Musk, interviewed in that notorious fireside chat" by Rishi Sunak after the prime minister had hosted the world's first AI safety summit at Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire last week, owes the bulk of his $200bn-plus fortune to the success of his electric car producer, Tesla. It has sold more than a million Model 3 vehicles, helping to deliver the death knell to the petrol engine and with it the age of fossil fuels. Continue reading...
Frankie Dettori, Ryan Moore and William Buick all produced memorable winning ridesHere comes Cody's Wish, taking on National Treasure, who fights back right on the wire .... PHOTO!Off and running in the Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile! Continue reading...
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