Some Republicans question what they see as the local Saginaw party's obsessive focus on conspiracy theoriesDebra Ell opened her Trump Shoppe in a dingy Saginaw strip mall back when establishment Republicans and TV pundits were still scoffing at the man who was about to remake US politics.Ell latched on to Donald Trump as a winner not long after he declared his run for the presidency in 2015. But she understood that the key to his success in her corner of swing state Michigan was to keep a distance from the local Republican party, which Ell regarded with almost as much hostility as she did the Democrats. Continue reading...
Israel says heavy fighting' is under way as it targets Hezbollah. Plus, the Picasso in the cellarGood morning.Israeli forces crossed the border into southern Lebanon early on Tuesday morning, the first Israeli ground invasion into the country since 2006.Why is Israel launching the offensive now? It comes after two weeks of airstrikes, which killed the Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Friday, and a series of deadly explosions to pagers and walkie-talkies that Israel hopes has weakened the agility and organization of Hezbollah. There is also little political incentive for Benjamin Netanyahu to let up, as targeting Hezbollah has given the embattled Israeli prime minister a political boost.What does the invasion mean for the stability of the region? Fears of a wider regional conflict, sparked by the Hamas attacks on 7 October, are closer than ever. The US has called for de-escalation. But, as Joe Biden prepares to leave the White House, Israel's strongest ally appears to have little leverage. Meanwhile, the reformist-led government of Hezbollah's backer Iran said it had no plans to send troops to Lebanon, but it was coming under domestic pressure from hardliners.Follow our live blog here.What are the workers pushing for? Hourly pay under the contract that expired on Monday range from $20 to the top wage of $39. The union seeks raises of 77% over the six-year contract to a top rate of $69 an hour by 2030. Continue reading...
The pair, who have had sharp words for each other at a distance, will debate in close quarters at CBS event TuesdayTim Walz and JD Vance, the US Democratic and Republican candidates for vice-president, will face off on Tuesday in what is likely to be the last debate showdown between the two parties' election tickets before polling day in exactly five weeks' time.The pair - who have had sharp words for each other at a distance - will engage in verbal combat in close quarters at a CBS-hosted event in New York, with the stakes raised by polling evidence that shows the contest between the two presidential nominees, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, poised on a knife edge. Continue reading...
Washington's first-round pick is having one of the best rookie quarterback seasons ever. And there are plenty of signs his success will continueThere are times in life when the second shall be first.In the 2023 draft, the Carolina Panthers made a major trade with the Chicago Bears to jump up and take Alabama quarterback Bryce Young with the No 1 overall pick. The Houston Texans were second, and they took Ohio State's CJ Stroud.Daniels' EPA per dropback (a reliable indicator of per-play efficiency) of 0.32 is the highest for any rookie quarterback in Weeks 1-4 since at least 2000, and Daniels leads the NFL in passing EPA overall at +50.7. That's some distance ahead of Josh Allen, who is second at +36.7.Daniels' completion rate of 82.1% is the highest for any quarterback over a four-game stretch at any point in a career (minimum 100 pass attempts) since at least 1950.The Commanders have had 23 scoring drives this season, and Daniels has just 19 incompletions. The 1973 Los Angeles Rams are the only other team in NFL history to have more scoring drives than incompletions in the first four games of a season.The 2024 Commanders have the second-highest EPA per drive through the first four games of a season in NFL history. The 2007 New England Patriots, widely regarded as the best offensive team ever, are the only team with a higher overall efficiency. Continue reading...
Though the Freedom party has won the biggest share of the vote, other parties can and should form alliances to sideline itFor the last few years the radical right Freedom party of Austria (FPO) has dominated opinion polls, outpacing historically mainstream parties such as the People's party (OVP) and Social Democratic party (SPO). After devastating floods wreaked havoc in eastern Austria in early September, it appeared that the FPO might face renewed competition from the governing OVP, which presented itself as the chief manager handling the floods, and the Green party seemed poised for a resurgence. However, the recent national elections have yielded results that even the most pessimistic observers might not have anticipated.In a historic first, the FPO under the leadership of Herbert Kickl won the national elections with 28.8% of the vote, surpassing the previous record held by his mentor Jorg Haider in 1999. This is the first time in postwar Austrian history that a party originally established by ex-Nazis, for ex-Nazis, won the national parliamentary elections. Kickl, the party's leader and a hardline ideologue with a family history tied to Nazism, pledged to become Austria's volkskanzler (people's chancellor), a term that has its roots in Nazi rhetoric. By openly advocating for what he calls remigration" - the idea of pressuring people of colour to return to their perceived homelands - he presents the new right's ideology in more palatable language. In addition, Kickl skilfully mobilised growing public discontent stemming from the management of the pandemic, as well as soaring inflation rates, to gain traction among disillusioned voters. Continue reading...
Neal Slavin's images of people grouped together - from fencers to Star Trek fans, models to Bible collectors - have been entrancing viewers for half a century Continue reading...
The rule, in effect from September 2025, will block colleges from giving preference to pupils close to alumni and donorsCalifornia became the fifth state in the US to ban universities from admitting students based on their family connections, and the second state, after Maryland, to extend the ban to private, non-profit universities.Hard work, good grades and a well-rounded background should earn you a spot in the incoming class - not the size of the check your family can write or who you're related to," Phil Ting, the Democratic state assembly member, who authored the legislation, said in a statement. Continue reading...
National Transportation Safety Board says operators could be unaware of components that may pose safety risksThe US National Transportation Safety Board on Monday said more than 40 foreign operators of Boeing 737 airplanes may be using planes with rudder components that may pose safety risks.The NTSB last week issued urgent safety recommendations about the potential for a jammed rudder control system on some Boeing 737 airplanes after a February incident involving a United flight. Continue reading...
Fulton county judge issues order that abortions must be regulated as they were before law took effect in 2022A Georgia judge on Monday struck down the state's six-week abortion ban, ruling that the ban is unconstitutional and blocking it from being enforced.In a 26-page opinion, the Fulton county superior judge Robert McBurney ruled that the state's abortion laws must revert to what they were before the six-week ban - known as the Life Act - was passed in 2019. The ban was blocked as long as Roe v Wade was the law of the land, but went into effect after the US supreme court overturned Roe in 2022. Continue reading...
Caroline Rose Giuliani decries destructive' Trump and calls relationship with father cartoonishly complicated'Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, has won the endorsement of Rudy Giuliani's daughter, who declared: I've been grieving the loss of my dad to [Donald] Trump. I cannot bear to lose our country to him too."Caroline Rose Giuliani was writing in Vanity Fair, where she lamented how her father, who was once the former president's personal attorney and trusted adviser, became caught up in the destructive trail" and chaos of the Trump administration and its aftermath. Continue reading...
Biden says he will visit North Carolina after devastating storm destroys entire communities across several statesAs the south-east US continues recovery efforts after Hurricane Helene's devastation, the storm's death toll keeps climbing, with more than 120 killed across several states.Joe Biden will visit North Carolina, where the western part of the state has been devastated by flooding, on Wednesday. Continue reading...
New rules bar asylum when border is deemed overwhelmed as White House tries to show hard stance on border securityThe Biden administration said on Monday it was making asylum restrictions at the southern border even tougher, as it is increasingly eager to show voters uneasy over immigration that it is taking a hard stance on border security.The new rules, which toughen restrictions announced in June, bar people from being granted asylum when US officials deem that the southern border is overwhelmed. Continue reading...
Jaime Tran, 30, pleaded guilty in June to hate crimes with intent to kill and discharging firearm during violent crimeA California man was sentenced on Monday to 35 years in prison for shooting and wounding two Jewish men as they left synagogues in Los Angeles last year, federal prosecutors said.Jaime Tran, 30, pleaded guilty in June to two counts of hate crimes with intent to kill and two counts of discharging a firearm during a crime of violence, the US attorney's office said in a statement. Continue reading...
Democrats aim for state court to block the rule requiring officials to hand-count ballots cast on election dayDemocrats sued the Georgia state election board on Monday over a new rule requiring officials to hand-count ballots cast on election day, asking a state court to declare it unlawful and block it from going into effect.The suit, filed in Fulton county superior court by both the Democratic National Committee and the Democratic party of Georgia, takes aim at a rule adopted in a 3-2 vote by the state election board on 20 September. The rule requires the poll manager and a team of two other workers in each voting precinct to separate ballots into stacks of 50 and hand-count them. They must all agree on the total count and ensure that it matches the totals from the machine tabulation. If there is an inconsistency, they are required to determine the reason and correct it, if possible. Continue reading...
Velazquez was incarcerated for decades for a 1998 murder he didn't commit before starring in award-winning A24 filmA New York judge on Monday formally vacated the homicide conviction of a man incarcerated for almost 24 years before starring in the award-winning movie Sing Sing about the rehabilitative effects of a prison arts program.Jon-Adrian JJ" Velazquez fought back tears as he hugged friends and family outside the Manhattan district courtroom where he was exonerated for the 1998 murder of a retired policeman during an armed robbery at an illegal gambling den in Harlem. Continue reading...
After dismissal of case against Alec Baldwin in July, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed's lawyer challenged charges against herA judge has denied a request from Rust armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed to appeal her involuntary manslaughter conviction.After the shock dismissal of the case against actor Alec Baldwin in July, Gutierrez-Reed's lawyer challenged the conviction against her, arguing prosecutors withheld potentially critical evidence. But on Monday, the New Mexico judge, Mary Marlowe Sommer, denied the motions requesting a new trial or a dismissal of the charges, as well as her release from prison. Continue reading...
Republican nominee's proposal at Pennsylvania campaign rally compared to dystopian horror film The PurgeDonald Trump has been accused of invoking plotlines similar to The Purge - a dystopian horror film in which officially sanctioned murder is occasionally legal - as a possible solution to crime in the US after saying it could be eradicated in one really violent day".In what was seen as an extreme display of demagoguery even by his standards, Trump drew cheers from an audience in Erie, Pennsylvania, with a picture of an out-of-control crime spree that he said could be ended immediately" with one real rough, nasty day", or one rough hour". Continue reading...
Ryan Routh appears in court in Florida and pleads not guilty to federal charges including attempted assassinationThe man who authorities say spent 12 hours camped outside Donald Trump's golf course before the Secret Service spotted him with a rifle pleaded not guilty on Monday to attempting to assassinate the former president as well as other federal charges.Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, appeared briefly in the federal courthouse in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Monday, days after a grand jury handed down a five-count indictment stemming from the second attempt on Trump's life since July. Continue reading...
No other musician could have landed a helicopter in Johnny Cash's yard to deliver a new tune, or renounced a debut in praise of the Vietnam war with decades of activist songs
Montana's Tim Sheehy claims he and wife lived in poverty but own book reveals he had $400,000 to build companyAt a recent campaign event in Whitehall, Montana, the Republican US Senate candidate Tim Sheehy told voters that a decade ago, when he set up the aerial firefighting company through which he made his fortune, he and his wife were living below the poverty line".My wife and I homeschool our kids," Sheehy said. We made that decision several years ago. She's a Marine, naval academy graduate, she could have a great job and even when our company was tiny, and we ... were below the poverty line and making no money, we said: No ... the most important job in the world is being a mother.' And she's doing that every day." Continue reading...
It would be a risky move, but some in Iran now see building a nuclear bomb as the only way to fend off Israeli attacksLast week, Iran's leaders found themselves in a familiar position. The Israeli airstrike that killed Hezbollah's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was the latest in a series of assassinations of senior figures with ties to the regime.In a short statement eulogising Nasrallah, Iran's supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, declared that Israel had not become victorious" by carrying out the strike on Nasrallah, which he described as an atrocity". Khamenei insisted that Israel would face more crushing" blows in retribution. But those blows are to come from the groups of the resistance front" and not from Iran itself.Esfandyar Batmanghelidj is the founder of the Bourse & Bazaar Foundation, a thinktank focused on economic policymaking in the Middle East and Central AsiaDo 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...
Second of Trump's four national security advisers says his boasts are a real myth - it's a real misunderstanding of war'A former US national security adviser during Donald Trump's presidency has dismissed the Republican White House nominee's boasts that he would broker an end to Russia's war in Ukraine if elected in November as a real myth".I don't really buy it," HR McMaster said Sunday on CBS's Face the Nation. I think it's a real myth - it's a real misunderstanding of war - to assume that you can get a favorable political outcome without a favorable military outcome. Continue reading...
Parents are under too much pressure to make every meal an organic delight, but healthy, affordable produce would helpI made a rediscovery last week: cucumbers can actually taste of something. After years of eating insipid, watery, condom-clad specimens from supermarkets, I had all but stopped buying them. That is, until my husband's colleague gave us some from his allotment, and a childhood memory of snaffling cucumber sandwiches was suddenly reactivated. Fresh white bread, salted butter, pepper, cucumber: it's a combination once so delicious Oscar Wilde made them a running joke in The Importance of Being Earnest.And so to the story that children are struggling to name common vegetables, with less than a third of primary school-age children able to identify a courgette or a beetroot. This didn't come as a surprise, really: what is there to get excited about when the taste is barely memorable? Supermarket courgettes suffer from a similar issue to cucumbers: they don't taste of anything. Don't even get me started on tomatoes. Many of us have become so wholly detached from our food's origins that we are, for some reason, happy to accept this, as well as forgetting - and not passing on the knowledge - that fruit and veg comes from the trees and the earth. Continue reading...
At least a dozen department employees are believed to have improperly viewed the files, prompting an investigationA criminal investigation is under way after staff at the US Department of Veterans Affairs illicitly accessed the medical records of Tim Walz and JD Vance, the Democratic and Republican vice-presidential nominees.At least a dozen employees - including one doctor and one contractor - at the department's healthcare body, the Veterans Health Administration, are believed to have improperly viewed the files, according to the department's investigators. Continue reading...
Another thumping home defeat highlights a weak club that did not know what it wanted in the summer, or lacked the nous to get what it wanted over the line
Democrat Elissa Slotkin worries about Harris's chances as mail-in voting has begun in swing state Biden won in 2020A Democratic representative in a key battleground Senate race in Michigan told supporters she was concerned about Kamala Harris's chances in the state's presidential election.I'm not feeling my best right now about where we are on Kamala Harris in a place like Michigan," Elissa Slotkin said at a fundraiser earlier this month, according to Axios. We have her underwater in our polling." Continue reading...
He has sold gold sneakers, Bibles, commemorative coins and digital trading cards - and now the former president is flogging a range of timepiecesName: Donald Trump's watch collection.Age: Brand spanking new. Continue reading...
The Freedom party hasn't only harnessed discontent at home - it is drawing on once-fringe ideas that have spread around the worldWe will kick upwards and clamp down on those who don't mean well for us", said Herbert Kickl in May 2023. Under Kickl's leadership, the Austrian Freedom party (FPO) has scored its biggest election victory since it was founded in 1956 by Anton Reinthaller, an Austrian Nazi who had served as a lieutenant general in the SS. Not only is the FPO now more popular than ever, it is also at the height of its radicalism.The FPO's victory in Sunday's national elections is being celebrated by far-right movements and influencers across Europe. No wonder: it demonstrates how successful they have been at normalising and internationalising their extreme ideologies, conspiracy myths and policy proposals.Julia Ebner is an Austrian academic and author who leads the Violent Extremism Lab at the University of Oxford's Centre for the Study of Social Cohesion. She is also a senior fellow at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue and author of The Rage, Going Dark and Going MainstreamDo 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...
US vice-presidential candidates will be on their biggest debate stages of their careers for the CBS-hosted eventWhen Tim Walz and JD Vance square off as vice-presidential picks on Tuesday, it will be the biggest debate stage for both of the politicians who are newly becoming household names.Walz, the Democratic governor of Minnesota, and Vance, a Republican senator from Ohio, have been honing their public speaking skills - and their pointed barbs at each other - in TV appearances and at events around the country in the past few months. Continue reading...
As Republicans spew lies about Haitian residents, the city is drawing armed strangers and opportunistic politiciansFor decades, Springfield, a small city in Ohio, adjacent to a highway that runs from Maryland thousands of miles west to Utah, was a place where no one especially felt the need to visit.But not today. Continue reading...
After an inauspicious start, the Ohio senator has become a tribune for Trump's biggest issues: immigration and the economyWhen Donald Trump tapped JD Vance, the US senator and never-Trumper turned Maga superstar, as his vice-presidential pick, the Rust belt populist was in for a rude awakening.In a viral video, the Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz called Vance and the Maga movement just weird", an insult that quickly became a meme. The reintroduction of his past remarks on the impropriety of childless cat ladies" being involved in government spread almost as fast as an online joke about the Ohioan having intimate relations with a couch. Continue reading...
The worst bit was the maths. I'm 49 and haven't worked out two-thirds of anything since 1992Common sense is not that common: a recent study from the University of Pennsylvania concludes the concept is somewhat illusory". Researchers collected statements from various sources that had been described as common sense" and put them to test subjects. The mixed bag of results suggested there was little evidence that more than a small fraction of beliefs is common to more than a small fraction of people".It's no surprise that there are few universally shared notions of what stands to reason. People took a horse worming drug to cure Covid! They think low-traffic neighbourhoods are a communist plot and call the police about KFC running out of chicken! We all think those other guys are the stupid ones.Emma Beddington is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
There are problems with the road trip documentary following the comedian and an old friend who is transitioning, but there's honesty and messiness that people should seeLet's admit it: cisgender people are really curious about us trans women. They want to know things such as: what's it like to have a surgeon rearrange your genitals? How did you know you were really a girl all along? Does it suck having to be on the downside of sexism now?For our own part, trans women are curious about cisgender folk, too. We want to know things like: do you actually think I'm female, or am I just a deluded guy in a dress to you? If I try to have a beer at your bar, will you violently assault me? Am I ever going to get to use a public bathroom again? Continue reading...
The Super Bowl champions are off to an unbeaten start. But turning Patrick Mahomes into a checkdown artist seems reductive at bestAny coach in any sport will tell you that a win is a win: no matter how you get there, it's a good thing. But how good can the defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs feel about their 4-0 start this season after Sunday's scratchy 17-10 win over the Los Angeles Chargers?Yes, the Chiefs are undefeated, but their point differential of +20 shows just how vulnerable they've been and they could easily be 1-3 - or worse - if a few plays had gone differently in each of their games this season. This Chiefs team looks like last season's, when they had to hope for Patrick Mahomes to get hot at the right time in an uneven offense with mystery receivers. Continue reading...
New cars are no longer being equipped with CD players - who can doubt that the end of the format is nigh?Music formats die slow, lingering deaths. The CD has been succumbing for more than two decades - sales peaked in 2000 - but now it may have suffered its final, fatal blow: the last model of car to include a CD player has already been built. According to Which magazine, as of this year Subaru Forester SUVs will no longer accommodate CDs, and the only new vehicle you can buy with a CD player in it is the Isuzu D-Max, which is actually a truck.Because they are replaced infrequently, cars have always extended the life of old audio technology, serving as travelling museums of sound. The first car with a factory-installed dashboard CD player appeared in 1985, but it would take many of us years to catch up. Long after my family had switched to exclusively CDs in the house, our secondhand car still just had a cassette player, and its door wells were filled with classic tapes such as The Wheels on the Bus and Other Songs. When that car finally went for scrap the cassettes went with it, and an era abruptly came to an end.Tim Dowling is a regular Guardian contributor Continue reading...
Existential threat' is a thin excuse: the out-of-control force that is pushing the Middle East to the brink is Israel itselfA common defence of Israel's belligerence, both within the Palestinian territories and in the wider region, is the claim that it must act in this way because it is surrounded by countries that are trying to annihilate it. Like many of the arguments that attempt to justify Israel's disproportionate response to 7 October, it is not only incorrect but also an inversion of reality. The events of the last few months and the assault on Lebanon over the past few days demonstrate that it is Israel which is a threat to its neighbours.On last Monday alone, Israeli airstrikes killed 558 people in Lebanon - half the number who died in a whole month of war between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006. Among the dead were 50 children, as well as humanitarian workers, first aid responders and government employees. Lebanon's prime minister, Najib Mikati, says a million people could soon be displaced. The strike that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Friday levelled six apartment blocks in Beirut. A Gaza in microcosm is quickly unfolding - thousands fleeing for safety, traumatised children, high casualties, an escalation where there is no limit on the civilian lives that can be sacrificed to achieve Israel's goals. Continue reading...
VP and Trump are making frequent stops in state, with Harris visiting two days after visiting US-Mexico borderKamala Harris held a rally in Las Vegas on Sunday night as the state, with six electoral college votes, becomes increasingly important in a presidential race that polls show is barely moving to favour either candidate.Both the vice-president and Donald Trump have been making frequent trips to Nevada, but Harris's rally takes place two days after she visited the US-Mexico border, a vulnerable issue for Democrats that Harris is looking to defuse. Continue reading...
The US country singer and actor has died aged 88. The Texas-born Grammy winner wrote songs including Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down and Me and Bobby McGee. He was a member of the supergroup the Highwaymen and starred in 70 films over his career Continue reading...
It will be complicated recovery' in five states, says disaster relief agency, with hurricane killing at least 91 people so farThe head of the US disaster relief agency has called Hurricane Helene, which has killed nearly 100 people, a true multi-state event" that caused significant infrastructure damage" and had been made worse because of global heating.The storm killed at least 91 people, according to state and local officials in South Carolina, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina and Virginia. Officials feared more bodies would be discovered. Continue reading...
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