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Veterans at a nursing home also evacuated, as well as residents of at least 1,100 houses, as firefighters battle two firesVeterans at a nursing home were evacuated, joining residents from more than 1,000 homes, as firefighters and emergency workers battled two massive wildfires Sunday in an area of the Florida Panhandle that was still recovering from destruction caused by a category-5 hurricane more than three years ago.The 8,000-acre Bertha Swamp Road fire and the 841-acre Adkins Avenue fire threatened homes and forced residents of at least 1,100 houses in Bay county to flee over the weekend. Continue reading...

US vice president takes to Edmund Pettus Bridge in Alabama as congressional efforts to restore the 1965 Voting Rights Act falterUS vice president Kamala Harris visited Selma, Alabama on Sunday to commemorate a defining moment in the fight for the right to vote, making her trip as congressional efforts to restore the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act have faltered.Under a blazing blue sky, Harris took the stage at the foot of the bridge where in 1965 white state troopers attacked Black voting rights marchers attempting to cross. Continue reading...

Four also injured after deadliest storm since 2008 touched down in area south-west of state capital Des MoinesSeven people were killed Saturday, including two children under the age of five, when a tornado swept through central Iowa, damaging buildings and knocking down trees and power lines, in the deadliest storm to hit the state since 2008, authorities said.Emergency management officials in Madison county said four were injured in addition to those killed when the tornado touched down in the area south-west of state capital Des Moines at about 4.30pm. Among those killed were children and adults. Continue reading...

The ‘people’s convoy’ of around 1,000 vehicles threaten a week of traffic disruptions around US capitalA long line of huge semi-articulated trucks, recreational vehicles and cars was circling Washington DC, on Sunday, in preparation for what their protesting drivers have pledged will be a week of traffic disruption around the US capital aligned around a loose collection of demands, including the end to all coronavirus pandemic-related restrictions.From its temporary base at a speedway vehicle racing site in Hagerstown, 80 miles north-west in Maryland, organizers of what they term the “People’s Convoy” of around 1,000 vehicles have said they plan to welcome the new work week by driving slowly around Washington on the already notoriously-congested Beltway, or ring road, at the minimum legal speed in an attempt to get their message across to national politicians. Continue reading...

Speaking from Moldova, US secretary of state warns Russia holds military advantage that western allies are finding hard to counter

Secretary of state says Biden has convened a meeting of his National Security Council on the subject

Polish people are hosting Ukrainians in their apartments, driving them to places, or simply giving them money to cover basic needs

Small businesses say they are struggling but the economy is poised to bounce back from the pandemic in 2022Small businesses today are struggling and their optimism is waning. Or are they?Yes: the closely watched Small Business Optimism Index from the National Federation of Independent Businesses dropped in January to a level of 97.1, well off its recent peak of 102.5 in June 2021. Yes: when you ask small businesses about their challenges they’ll name quite a few, from rising costs and supply chain problems to finding and retaining people in this tight labor market. Continue reading...

The 1MDB swindle is one of the most remarkable cases to hit New York’s justice system in years – but the trial poses a number of unanswered questionsIt started, at least in terms of the public’s recognition, with a giant spending spree that reads like a Christmas wishlist for a billionaire.Picasso’s Women of Algiers for $179m; $100m to fund the production budget of Martin Scorsese’s The Wolf of Wall Street and a $600,000 Oscar statuette given to Marlon Brando for best actor in On the Waterfront – a gift for the movie’s star Leonardo DiCaprio. But it did not stop there: there was also a custom-built megayacht; a Beverly Hills hotel; a $415m stake in EMI music publishing; and a transparent grand piano. Continue reading...

The Long Ryders song Ivory Tower once sparked a brief, urinal-based encounter between me and the Russian oligarchSuperyachts seek safe havens. Property portfolios dissolve. Lawyers are engaged, accountants contracted. Politicians confect plausible denials over ostentatious donations. Tory party co-chairman Ben Elliot deletes online boasts of his company’s “15 years’ experience providing luxury lifestyle management services to Russia’s elite and corporate members”. It seems there were oligarchs everywhere, all along. We’ve been living in an oligarchy, and no one knew, except all the silenced journalists and stifled inquiries that tried to tell us.Six years ago, after meeting him at a urinal, I briefly befriended the now penitent oligarch Roman Abramovich. Ten songs into a brilliant set by Americana legends the Long Ryders at Under the Bridge, the venue attached to the football ground Abramovich owned, I dashed to the gents, just after Ivory Tower and during The Light Gets in the Way, my prostate gland and my enthusiasm for plangent country rock in mortal combat.Rescheduled national 2022 dates of Stewart’s 2020 tour, Snowflake Tornado, are on sale now; as are Edinburgh fringe shows. The Long Ryders return to Under the Bridge, London, on 17 and 18 June Continue reading...

Thirty-one Democrats, a modern record, are stepping down as the party risks bleak midterms. But leaders say hope remainsFor the Michigan congresswoman Brenda Lawrence, it was a question from her husband: “When is our time?” For the North Carolina congressman David Price, it was the judgment that “the time has come” to step down.Some retiring Democrats have blamed the gridlock and dysfunction on Capitol Hill while others point to the redrawing of congressional maps. Still, others cite the rise of political extremism and the deteriorating relations between members of Congress, particularly in the wake of the January 6 insurrection. Announcing his decision to retire last year, the Wisconsin congressman, Ron Kind, was frank: “The truth is, I’ve run out of gas.” Continue reading...

Many welcome the change as a ‘return to normalcy’ that will support restaurants and bars, but others worry it’s too soonTyler Hollinger, owner of Festivál Cafe, a “farm-to-bar cocktail cafe” in New York City, said he recently started learning Brazilian jiu-jitsu because of physical altercations with visitors who are unvaccinated against Covid-19.The reason for the fights isn’t that Hollinger is a crusader for the city’s requirement that people show proof of vaccination to sit inside at bars and restaurants. Continue reading...

The west fell asleep on Cold War sentry duty and thought Putin couldn’t be serious, but he was. The question remains, is Nato?‘War comes very early to the theatre,” said the Soviet writer Ilya Ehrenburg. “Then he stands around waiting in the wings.” This time too. For a few years, there has been something, somebody, moving in the shadow of the stage curtain. Only a few people felt they recognised it.But language noticed. Even 10 years ago, big-power war in Europe was “unthinkable these days. Do try and keep up!” Then, somehow, it became “well, in theory, but just utterly unlikely”. So, thinkable again. Hard to say when that mental border was crossed; perhaps after the Yugoslav wars, perhaps in 2014 when Vladimir Putin annexed Crimea and sponsored proxy war in the Donbas region. And now they ask: “What sort of European war is this going to be? And how nuclear? And where will the next one start?” Continue reading...

Everyday sexism exists even among the political eliteThere’s a short video I keep watching of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen waiting in a ceremonial receiving line with European Council President Charles Michel and Emmanuel Macron to have photographs taken with dignitaries at the EU-Africa summit. The Ugandan foreign minister, General Jeje Odongo, enters, walks straight past her with a microscopic nod and greets Michel and Macron with vigorous handshakes. Macron gestures to Odongo, indicating Von der Leyen. Odongo does nothing; Macron insists, at which Odongo turns towards her with a small, stiff bow – still no handshake.Another slight against Von der Leyen went viral last year. In “Sofagate”, President Erdogan and Charles Michel (yes, again) take the two chairs ceremonially arranged for discussion and photo ops at a summit in Ankara; left seatless, Von der Leyen coughs and gestures in impotent, angry incredulity, before awkwardly perching on a nearby sofa. Continue reading...

Western democracies will be sucked into this conflict. It’s time they threatened Vladimir Putin with a no-fly zone

A year ago no one foresaw a Russian invasion as the president’s top issue but US approval for his handling of the crisis is risingWhen Joe Biden made the struggle between democracy and autocracy the lodestar of his presidency, it was widely assumed that his principal antagonists would be China’s Xi Jinping abroad and America’s own Donald Trump at home.But it is Vladimir Putin of Russia who has made the contest more immediate and literal than anyone expected, launching a bloody invasion of Ukraine that threatens to bring down a new iron curtain in Europe. Continue reading...

More than a thousand vehicles in so-called ‘People’s Convoy’ gather at speedway though exact plans are unclearMore than a thousand large trucks, recreational vehicles and cars are gathering on the outskirts of Washington as part of a protest against Covid-19 restrictions that threatens to roll on the US capital in the coming days.The so-called “People’s Convoy”, which originated in California and has drawn participants from around the country, is calling for an end to all pandemic-related restrictions. It was inspired by demonstrations last month that paralyzed Ottawa, Canada’s capital city. Continue reading...

The Kyiv Death Match of 1942 has resonance in the present context of conflict but its significance is complexJosef Kordik was sitting in a cafe in Kyiv when a bedraggled man on the street caught his eye. That, he was sure, was Myklova Trusevych, the great Dynamo goalkeeper. He rushed outside. It was spring 1942, a few months after the city had fallen to the Nazis.Kordik was a Moravian who had been left behind after fighting for Austria-Hungary in the first world war. He had not enjoyed his new life and watching football had been his only joy, but the occupation had meant opportunity. He had falsely claimed Volksdeutsch status and been installed as manager of Bakery Number 1. Continue reading...

President made a ‘desperate plea’ for military aid to more than 280 senators and representatives as Congress works on $10bn package• Ukraine crisis liveVolodymyr Zelenskiy, the president of Ukraine, urged US lawmakers to help provide aircraft to defend the country against Russian invasion during a video meeting with members of Congress on Saturday.Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, said Zelenskiy “made a desperate plea” for the military aid, which would include planes, drones and anti-aircraft missiles. The Ukrainian president praised sanctions placed upon Russia during the meeting but pressed US lawmakers to go further by banning oil imports from Moscow. Continue reading...

After the Ukraine invasion, his former defenders are rushing to distance themselvesThe worst people in the west were pro-Putin. They excused his imperialist ideology and crimes against humanity and never paid a price for bootlicking a dictatorship. On the contrary, they took Britain out of the European Union and took over the Labour party. They won the presidencies of the United States and the Czech Republic and seized control of politics and the media in Hungary.The savagery of Vladimir Putin’s assault on Ukrainian democracy has sent them into headlong retreat. Nothing better illustrates their panic than Marine Le Pen having to deny that she had ordered the destruction of 1.2m election leaflets that featured pictures of her giving Putin a firm handshake, as if to thank him for all the money he had loaned her. Continue reading...

The Russian president’s Orthodox faith is central to his worldview but he has used it to justify invasion and violence in God’s nameWith Russia invading Ukraine, its president, Vladimir Putin, has been painted by many in the western media as the most evil man in the world.Commentators are asserting that this premeditated act is evil. I do not disagree. To see a war in Europe nearly 80 years after the end of the second world war is unthinkable. What other words describe such violence and the man who singlehandedly has authorised this assault? Now that Putin has twice raised the chilling proposition of nuclear weapons – referring to Russia as “one of the most powerful nuclear states” and later ordering that nuclear forces be placed on “special alert” – the global images of a trip wire to nuclear armageddon are disturbing our equanimity. What other word but evil captures this? In contemplating this I think there has been a missing dimension in naming Putin’s messianic and religious pretensions. And as a minister of the gospel, this perspective has caused me deep heartache. Continue reading...

Research shows that while progress has been made in terms of attitudes towards women’s rights, there’s still a long way to goSince it’s almost International Women’s Day, shall we play a quick themed quiz? Question number one: does gender inequality exist? Continue reading...

The world that is coming is something we can work toward but not something we can foreseeI can’t say I have confidence in the future, but I have a lot of confidence in its unpredictability, based on the fact that the past has regularly delivered surprises. It’s easy to forget in retrospect how astonishing the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Velvet Revolution were in 1989, or the arrival of the Zapatista army on the world stage in 1994 or how marriage equality seemed like a long shot just before it became a reality in countries all over the world not long ago or how Ireland and Argentina recently legalized abortion. The terrible too comes along without warning. Often a major event – this unforeseen global pandemic, the invasion of Ukraine – then itself has indirect consequences that matter. The pandemic led to a radical shift in the US labor market, including rising wages, worker walkoffs and refusals that at times have seemed tantamount to a general strike, and remarkable labor organizing against some of the most resistant low-wage employers.Both the pandemic and the invasion have significant consequences for climate politics. First of all they should shake loose the expectation that we know what will happen, that the world of next week will be pretty much the same as last week. Second they should mean that people stop saying we can’t make dramatic changes because 2022 seems to be as much about sudden and profound worldwide change as 2020 was. Continue reading...

People are fleeing in search of food, freedom and safety resulting from the economic and humanitarian catastrophe caused by 20 years of US occupationIn my home country of Afghanistan, winter is harsh and children are hungry. Almost every parent faces the torture of not having enough food to feed their families. Across the country, 5 million children are on the brink of famine. Many young people are in despair; suicide is on the rise.The rapid escalation of war in Ukraine is set to make this crisis even worse. We fear now that soaring prices of wheat – reaching their highest level since 2008 as a result of the invasion – could multiply the impact of a famine in Afghanistan.Selay Ghaffar is a feminist political activist from Afghanistan Continue reading...

Ketanji Brown Jackson can expect little support from across the aisle but Republicans are wary of overreach before midtermsThe photograph is a study in contrasts. On the left, standing stiffly and staring glumly, is Mitch McConnell, 80, the Republican minority leader in the Senate accused of committing professional fouls when confronting judicial confirmations.On the right, at a slightly awkward distance from McConnell, is Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, 51, chosen by a Democratic president to be the first Black woman on the US supreme court, smiling warmly at the camera, her posture more relaxed than the senator’s. Continue reading...

Officials to allow bear-hunting in three sanctuaries due to ‘increased human-bear interactions’ – but opponents say plan is a ‘disaster’A decades-long ban on bear hunting in parts of North Carolina has been overturned by the state’s wildlife resources commission, in a move that has sparked outcry from local residents and American animal rights groups.The North Carolina commission voted to allow bear hunting in three bear sanctuaries, encompassing an area of 92,500 acres of mountainous forest in the southern US state. The sanctuaries, established to protect and preserve North Carolina’s black bear population, are set to open to hunters later in 2022, despite thousands of people signing a petition against the move. Continue reading...

In 1972, the former Black Panther was facing the death penalty. Five decades after the campaign for her release went global, she still believes people are the ‘motors of history’The last time Angela Davis was in Birmingham, Alabama, she caught up with childhood friends and her Sunday school teacher. While many of us would reminisce about favourite classes and first kisses, they discussed bombs.“We talked about what it was like to grow up in a city where there were bombings all the time,” she says. Most notoriously, in September 1963, the Ku Klux Klan bombed the 16th Street Baptist church, killing four girls. It wasn’t a one-off, says the legendary radical feminist, communist and former Black Panther. “People’s homes were bombed, synagogues were bombed, other churches were bombed. People think of that as a single event, but it was more indicative of the pervasive terror at that time in Birmingham.” Continue reading...

The Russian president’s ‘strong man’ image and disdain for liberals has turned him into a hero for white nationalists“Can we get a round of applause for Russia?” asked Nick Fuentes, on stage last week at a white nationalist event. Amid a roar of applause for the Russian president, just days after he invaded Ukraine, many attendees responded by shouting: “Putin! Putin!”It would be easy to dismiss the America First Political Action Conference (AFPAC) in Orlando, Florida, as a radical fringe. But speeches by two Republican members of Congress – one in person, the other via video – guaranteed national attention and controversy. Continue reading...

Ex-president said he would join crowd to US Capitol but his schedule indicates he deliberately lied to his supportersDonald Trump was aware long before he took the stage at the “Save America” rally on 6 January that he would not march to the Capitol to protest the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s election win, according to his White House private schedule from that day.The former president started his nearly 75-minute long speech at the Ellipse by saying he would go with the crowd to the Capitol, and then repeated that promise when he said he would walk with them down Pennsylvania Avenue towards the Capitol. Continue reading...

Papini’s 2016 disappearance was long cloaked in confusion, as a friend raised funds for a ‘reverse ransom’Sherri Papini seemed to be just another small-town northern California mom, when, a little over five years ago, she disappeared in the woods. By her own account, she was abducted, chained to a pole for three weeks, half-starved, beaten, branded and burned and then – for no apparent reason – released again by the side of a busy highway.Now, after an exhaustive search for her captors, the US government has concluded that Papini made up the whole story. Continue reading...

Andrew Lyons is facing voluntary manslaughter and assault charges for killing Ryan Twyman while he was in his carThe Los Angeles district attorney has filed manslaughter charges against a former sheriff’s deputy who fatally shot an unarmed man in 2019, an extremely rare prosecution for an on-duty officer killing in the US.Andrew Lyons, 37, is facing charges of voluntary manslaughter and two counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm for the 6 June 2019 killing of Ryan Twyman, in Willowbrook in south LA, the district attorney’s office announced on Thursday. Continue reading...

The Republican senator doubled down on his Thursday comments as lawmakers on the right and left react with dismay and outrageLindsey Graham has attracted widespread condemnation after the South Carolina senator suggested Vladimir Putin should be assassinated in order to end Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.Graham first made the suggestion in an appearance on Fox News host Sean Hannity’s show on Thursday evening, and he then repeated the idea in a tweet that quickly went viral. Continue reading...

Court upholds Trump justice department’s challenge to overturning of death sentence for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev in 6-3 voteThe US supreme court on Friday reinstated the convicted Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s death sentence for his role in the 2013 attack that killed three people and wounded more than 260 others, ruling in favor of the federal government.In a 6-3 decision, the justices sided with the justice department’s challenge to a 2020 lower court ruling that had upheld Tsarnaev’s conviction but overturned his death sentence. Continue reading...

Washington Post report, based on unseen film footage, also says Stone, 69, said Jared Kushner ‘needs to have a beating’Close Donald Trump ally Roger Stone raged at the former US president in the aftermath of the failed attempt to overturn the 2020 election, according to a report from the Washington Post, telling a friend that Trump was a “disgrace” who would go to prison and adding: “He betrayed everybody.”The Post said it had viewed 20 hours of footage of the political operative that had been shot for a forthcoming documentary. The footage, it said, showed Stone:Meeting and corresponding with members of a far-right militia since indicted for seditious conspiracy over the Capitol riot on January 6.Discussing a plan in which Trump would issue a blanket pardon to co-conspirators in the attempt to overturn the election, Senator Ted Cruz and congressman Jim Jordan among them.Saying Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and close adviser, should be “punished” in a way that would leave him “braindead”.Suggesting violence against protesters for racial justice would be possible with the election out of the way. Continue reading...

The uneasy friendship and ties that bind China and Russia counter long-standing issues of mistrust over the yearsIn just a few days, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has upended decades of international relations thinking and practices. Nothing will be the same as before. Even the 5,000-word statement on “international relations in a new era” issued by China and Russia just a month ago in Beijing – to make the world safe for autocracy – has been overtaken by events. In this ugly Russian quagmire, China’s role and behaviour merit close attention, not least as we wonder whether Ukraine today may be Taiwan tomorrow.China and Russia have been getting closer for some time. The binds are visible in bilateral trade, which has more than doubled since 2015 to almost $150bn. China is Russia’s biggest trade partner. While Russia is almost a rounding error in China’s global exports, the two countries collaborate in military exercises, regional security arrangements and technology trade. These binds go some way to counter other differences and long-standing sources of mistrust, for example over Russian far east and central Asia. Yet, the biggest bind of all is geopolitics. Continue reading...

Select committee investigating Capitol attack also receives records from former vice-president Mike PenceThe US National Archives has delivered White House visitor logs from Donald Trump’s administration to the congressional committee investigating the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol by extremist supporters of the then president, the committee said on Friday.The National Archives also turned over records from former vice-president Mike Pence, meeting a 3 March deadline. Continue reading...

Sorokin, in federal custody with the threat of deportation, claims multiple requests for vaccine booster dose were deniedAnna Sorokin, the woman who scammed victims out of hundreds of thousands of dollars by falsely posing as a German heiress, has sued Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), saying she contracted Covid after officials denied her multiple requests for a booster shot.According to the class-action lawsuit filed in federal court on Tuesday by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Sorokin, along with three other plaintiffs, filed the suit against Ice’s acting director, Tae Johnson, the Department of Homeland Security and its secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, reported NBC News. Continue reading...