Police seize 171 Lego sets worth thousands from Pike Place seller accused by police of knowingly selling stolen goodsPolice in Seattle went undercover to break open what they said was a trafficking ring involving the sale of expensive stolen goods: Lego, taken from an Amazon store.Saying they had seized 171 sets, police released a picture showing the boxes stacked together. Continue reading...
Ron DeSantis says he wants to give bonus to officers from other states who have lost jobs by refusing government mandatesThe Republican governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, plans to offer $5,000 bonuses to lure police officers from other states who resist vaccine mandates.“We’re actually actively working to recruit out-of-state law enforcement,” DeSantis told Fox News. Continue reading...
Host urges Covid vaccination and tells viewers: ‘I cannot stress this enough – it’s not about left or right’The Fox News host Neil Cavuto has “begged” viewers to toss out political talking points about Covid-19 vaccinations and get the shot.“My God, stop the politics,” he told the network’s Media Buzz show. Continue reading...
Mothers tend to assume the majority of child-rearing responsibility. But without communities and multigenerational living setups we wouldn’t have survived as a speciesMy husband, Dave, and I welcomed a third child into the family in July, and spend much of our days flinging kiddos back and forth, relying heavily on a network of relatives and paid help, and plotting Nasa-level strategies to get out the door. The other morning, as Dave was on his first business trip in almost two years, I found myself nursing the baby while scrambling eggs for my kindergartner and cajoling my preschooler to stop sucking on her marshmallow scratch-and-sniff marker. As I deftly transferred the eggs to a plate, ever so lightly steaming the back of the baby’s head, I flashed back to a conversation I’d had before he was born.Back then, during the early days of the pandemic, we’d moved in with my parents, something decided upon after their doctor forbade my mother and father from passing the door jamb. We quarantined separately, then hunkered down together for six months. Despite its complications, the experience was wonderful for all three generations, and particularly so for us in the middle, who can always use extra sets of loving hands for baby wrangling. When I found out I was pregnant again, and with the impending tsunami of three-on-two parenting headed my way, I started poking around to see how other people were doing it.Sophie Brickman is a contributor to the New Yorker, the New York Times and other publications, and the author of Baby, Unplugged: One Mother’s Search for Balance, Reason, and Sanity in the Digital Age Continue reading...
Students at historically Black college in DC say conditions are deplorable and would rather sleep at student center than dormsMold. Rats. Cockroaches. Mushrooms growing under the sink. For undergraduate students attending Howard University, a historically Black college in Washington, these and other conditions have prompted students to protest, staging a sit-in and sleeping at the university’s main student center for the past two weeks.Organizing on social media apps like Instagram and TikTok under the #Blackburntakeover, as many as 150 students have been staging a sit-in at Howard’s Blackburn University Center, described as the “social hub of the university” by Howard. Continue reading...
The majority of Americans support legal abortion. Redistricting has allowed extremism to flourish without fear of repercussionAmerica is at a crossroads when it comes to abortion. In 2021, state legislatures have passed an unprecedented 106 anti-abortion bills. State lawmakers in five states are preparing legislation similar to Texas’s SB 8, an effective total abortion ban that enshrines a new kind of vigilantism directed at medical providers and private citizens.In this dangerous moment, supporters of legal abortion must understand that raising our voices is not going to change anything unless we also push for major, immediate democratic reforms including ending the filibuster, enshrining federal voting rights, expanding the supreme court, and establishing fair redistricting.Meaghan Winter is a freelance magazine writer and author of the book All Politics is Local: Why Progressives Must Fight for the States Continue reading...
In just one term, Trump was able to appoint 33% of US supreme court justices and 30% of US appellate judges. They’ll serve for lifeFor many Americans, Donald Trump will be remembered as the first US president to be twice impeached, to have supported, or even incited, an insurrection against democracy, and for allowing thousands to die due to his abject failure to lead the nation in fighting the Covid-19 pandemic. But for many other Americans, his true legacy will be his enduring impact on the third branch – the federal judiciary.The expansion of executive power, and the diminishment of legislative power due to partisan gridlock, is a well-known story. Governing by executive order has become the new normal. But it is the stealthy and steady rise of the power of the judicial branch that has caught many Americans off-guard. Continue reading...
While training as a chaplain and caring for society’s most vulnerable, I learned that spiritual care is an act of social justiceThe patient, who I’ll call RL, was homeless and came into Bellevue’s psychiatric ward experiencing hallucinations. His struggle with severe mental illness was similar to many of the other homeless people I saw on my daily commute through New York.It was July 2020, and I had just started my year as a chaplain-in-training on the ward. Already, I was struggling to help him. He couldn’t hold a conversation, slept most of the day, and whenever awake, would stare blankly at the television in the activity room and talk to himself. Yet occasionally, when I spoke to him, his eyes would light up and I’d catch him in a moment of clarity. We’d talk for a minute about barbecue or baseball, two subjects I knew he liked, before the light clicked off and he walked away. Continue reading...
Andy Reid’s team could always afford to make mistakes on defense because of their brilliant offense. But even that is starting to splutterWhen the NFL season began, the question was whether anybody in the AFC could topple the Kansas City Chiefs. Now the question is very different: are we entirely sure the Chiefs are even a good team? The Tennessee Titans humiliated the Chiefs 27-3 on Sunday, in a loss that could propel Kansas City into an identity crisis.At the moment they look nothing like the team that went to two straight Super Bowls, winning one of them. Their record this season stands at 3-4, and they face the very real possibility of missing the playoffs. Continue reading...
Recordings from a 2019 panel discussion of the Council for National Policy reveal tax cuts were sparked by personal conversationsDocuments and recordings obtained by the Guardian shed new light on a powerful and secretive rightwing network and the influence it was able to exert on Trump administration policies favoring the super-rich.The recordings include speeches given to the Council for National Policy (CNP) by conservative media stars including Dennis Prager, emerging Republican power players such as Charlie Kirk, and close economic advisers to Donald Trump. Continue reading...
Bank announces share buyback programme of up to $2bn as results beat City forecastsHSBC’s profits rose 74% in the third quarter as improving economic conditions allowed the bank to release hundreds of millions of pounds originally set aside for a potential jump in loan defaults during the pandemic.The London-headquartered bank said pretax profits rose to $5.4bn (£3.9bn) in the three months to 30 September, up from $3.1bn a year earlier. It easily beat City forecasts for profits of $3.8bn for the quarter. Continue reading...
James Michael Tyler, most famous for playing Gunther, the manager of Central Perk in the hit sitcom Friends, has died aged 59.In an interview with NBC in June, Tyler announced that he had stage 4 prostate cancer, which was diagnosed in 2018
‘Atmospheric river’ expected to bring record-breaking rainfall, strong winds and to wreak havoc across northern part of stateA powerful storm has roared ashore in California, flooding cities, toppling trees and causing mud flows in areas burned bare by recent fires.After months of drought, the darkened clouds collecting over the state this weekend were a welcome sight to some. But rather than the much-needed drizzle residents and officials hoped could end a disastrous fire season and dampen dried landscapes, the state got a deluge. Some areas are forecast to see more than 10in (25cm) of rain and thousands across the state have lost power. Continue reading...
Government’s chief medical adviser makes prediction after FDA review panel finds that benefits for group outweighs risksVaccines to protect children ages five to 11 from Covid-19 will be available in the US in early to mid-November, Dr Anthony Fauci, the government’s chief medical adviser, predicted on Sunday.A review panel of the US food and drug administration (FDA) found last week that the benefits of Pfizer-BioNTech shots for the younger age group outweighed the risks, setting up an advisory meeting on Tuesday of outside FDA experts who are expected to recommend emergency use authorization. Continue reading...
Democratic infighting has threatened to upend Biden’s ambitious domestic agenda less than a year after taking officeHouse speaker Nancy Pelosi expressed confidence on Sunday that a deal between Democrats to salvage Joe Biden’s ambitious social agenda was “pretty much there”, paving the way for a possible vote in Congress later this week.Her upbeat words came as the president was meeting in Delaware with the Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and Democratic holdout Joe Manchin to put the finishing touches on what has become a scaled-back package central to Biden’s Build Back Better initiative. Continue reading...
‘RIP Kobe’ notifications informed Vanessa Bryant of husband’s death in air crash, according to court documentsThe widow of the basketball superstar Kobe Bryant has testified that she learned about the death of her husband and daughter in a helicopter crash when she saw “RIP Kobe” notifications on her phone.Bryant, his daughter Gianna, 13, and seven others were killed in January 2020 when the helicopter they were in on their way to a basketball tournament, crashed in the hills west of Los Angeles in foggy weather. Continue reading...
Home side can take heart from aspects on and off the pitch despite New Zealand’s crushing 1874 Cup win in MarylandWith minutes to go at FedEx Field the scoreline stood at 14-92. Like Columbus, the All Blacks had wreaked havoc upon the new world. They didn’t stop there, though, scoring twice in the dying moments, for 16 tries and 104 points on the board.It was a shadow team, too. Unsurprisingly, it was hard to get much from the coach, Ian Foster, and captain, Sam Whitelock, about what the game might mean in terms of tougher Tests to come in Europe. Continue reading...
Republican state senator Mark Koran encourages donations to family after four members charged in 6 January riotA Minnesota politician has promoted a fundraiser for several constituents who are charged with participation in the deadly 6 January attack on the US Capitol, saying they come from a “good family”.The Republican state senator Mark Koran, who represents the town of Lindström, made this entreaty for the Westbury family in a Facebook post on Friday. Continue reading...
In New York, a haunted house for adults gave me only a minor chill - but the real horror was not immediately recognisableA friend has tickets to a Halloween attraction in downtown New York, marketed as a haunted house for adults and featuring chambers of horror that include a “killer clown room”, “the crypt”, and something called “maggot invasion.” It sounds, simultaneously, horrible and lame, and if I hadn’t spent every Friday night for the past 18 months on my sofa, mindlessly scrolling, I would have turned her down in an instant. As it is, it seems churlish to reject the offer to do something new. “Terrific,” she says, and sends me a note from the organisers: guests are advised not to wear white because of all the fake blood.I love horror movies, and zombies, but I am unfun about Halloween, which in the US seems to go on for weeks. One of the upsides of Covid was the cancellation of indoor trick or treating, which in our apartment building traditionally involves dozens of kids fighting to get in the elevator to have first crack at the candy on each floor. (There are two wings of 20 floors in our building-enough sugar to ensure the onset of what might politely be called instability.) This year, the trick or treating will be outside again, a definite improvement, but the Halloween parties are back on and the time suck of ensuring my children are happy in their costumes – this year I have a vampire queen, and a “cat-dinosaur” – is as much of a drag as it ever was. It is in this spirit that I take the subway downtown.Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
Rebound of sexually-transmitted infections the result of sluggish testing, changing behaviors and persistent issues with educationHealth officials in the US are concerned about how to divert key resources to combatting a rise in sexually-transmitted infections (STI) that is now continuing despite the social restrictions of the coronavirus pandemic and is now in its sixth consecutive year of increase.America has continually combatted rising STI rates pre-pandemic, one of many poor public health outcomes in the US, despite massive spending on healthcare. But, following an artificial dip in STI rates during the Covid-19 pandemic, STI rates are now on the rise again while health funding is still being allocated to address the pandemic. Continue reading...
by Gabrielle Canon in Napa, California on (#5R2TF)
Armed with ‘golden seeds’, Leonardo Urena is part of an elite group of global growers – and this year produced California’s largest specimenIt starts with a tiny seed.Leonardo Urena opened his palm to show a small plastic bag containing a single special specimen. Smooth and white, it wasn’t yet remarkable, but it will be, because it has the potential to sprout a squash as heavy as a walrus. Continue reading...
The progressive senator is close to realizing many of his policy goals – but can he unite the party behind Biden’s plan?When making the case for progressive policy, the veteran leftwing senator Bernie Sanders often cites public opinion. “Poll after poll,” he’ll say, before running through a list of ambitious initiatives that the “vast majority of the American people want”, from lowering the cost of prescription drug prices to expanding Medicare, establishing paid family and medical leave and confronting the climate crisis.Versions of these programs – initiatives once considered nothing more than liberal pipe dreams – are at the heart of Joe Biden’s sprawling domestic policy bill pending before Congress. But despite the popularity of the specific proposals, the legislation has a polling problem. Poll after poll shows that most Americans have no idea what’s actually in the bill. Continue reading...
I’m sceptical of ‘happily ever after’. Platonic love is the key to wellbeingThe importance of romantic love is drummed into us from early childhood. Popular culture and advertising conspire to tell us that there’s one route to a fulfilled life: finding the love of your life, who holds the key to your happily ever after.Modern trends in romantic relationships get anxiously picked over through the cliche of happily ever after: people settling down and having children later, the fact that twice as many marriages end in divorce today than they did in 1970. But these trends don’t tell us that romantic happiness has become more elusive. Instead, they reflect social progress and the dismantling of taboos and that the belief in romantic love as the route to fulfilment is more myth than reality for many. Continue reading...
In the swampy surrounds of South Carolina’s low country, the scandal involving the wealthy, powerful Murdaughs is billowing – but if people know things, they’re not sayingIt’s a story as thick and unctuous as South Carolina’s low country mud. Those in the know aren’t talking, and those who don’t know are. But with six active investigations, including a murder inquiry, the case of Richard “Alex” Murdaugh, a 53-year-old tort lawyer and scion of one of the state’s most powerful families, has gripped America.Last week, Murdaugh appeared in court in Columbia, the state capital, on a bond hearing over charges he misappropriated $3.5m in insurance settlements relating to the death of the family’s longtime housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield. The defense and prosecution approved the bond request. Judge Clifton Newman denied it. Continue reading...
by Josephine Walker and Safia Abdulahi in Richmond, V on (#5R2JJ)
Former president warns against complacency in ‘blue’ state amid race seen as indicator of Democrats’ congressional hopesBarack Obama vehemently warned Virginia voters on Saturday against any complacency that what was now a “blue” state would stay that way, as he spoke at a rally to support Terry McAuliffe in the tightening race for governor.The former president urged supporters to turn out, despite this being an off-year election, in order to keep Democrats in control of not just the state but ultimately the nation. Continue reading...
The transportation secretary is ‘at work’ like the heroic workaholic he is – but that undermines the whole point of parental leaveBrace yourself, because what I’m going to say next may shock you. Here we go: an American man adopted newborn twins and then had the audacity to take some time off work to look after them! No, I can’t believe it either. No self-respecting, red-blooded man should be spending time with his tiny babies. He should be in the office, missing those early months, so he can focus on what’s really important. Forget bonding with your vulnerable newborns, there are urgent emails to be sent.Arwa Mahdawi’s new book, Strong Female Lead, is available for pre-order Continue reading...
Increasingly, authoritarians are likening ‘genderism’ to ‘communism’ and ‘totalitarianism’In June, the Hungarian parliament voted overwhelmingly to eliminate from public schools all teaching related to “homosexuality and gender change”, associating LGBTQI rights and education with pedophilia and totalitarian cultural politics. In late May, Danish MPs passed a resolution against “excessive activism” in academic research environments, including gender studies, race theory, postcolonial and immigration studies in their list of culprits. In December 2020, the supreme court in Romania struck down a law that would have forbidden the teaching of “gender identity theory” but the debate there rages on. Trans-free spaces in Poland have been declared by transphobes eager to purify Poland of corrosive cultural influences from the US and the UK. Turkey’s withdrawal from the Istanbul convention in March sent shudders through the EU, since one of its main objections was the inclusion of protections for women and children against violence, and this “problem” was linked to the foreign word, “gender”.The attacks on so-called “gender ideology” have grown in recent years throughout the world, dominating public debate stoked by electronic networks and backed by extensive rightwing Catholic and evangelical organizations. Although not always in accord, these groups concur that the traditional family is under attack, that children in the classroom are being indoctrinated to become homosexuals, and that “gender” is a dangerous, if not diabolical, ideology threatening to destroy families, local cultures, civilization, and even “man” himself. Continue reading...
The onus is on white people to change things for those of us working behind the scenes, but Black creators also hold swayIn the eight years I’ve worked in the music industry, career highs have been offset by instances of racism. I’ve often been confused with other Black people who work in the industry at events, meetings and panels – at a gig one evening, it happened three separate times.For the first part of my career, I worked in the independent sector, which is not known for its diversity. My isolation as one of the few Black people working in this area was often explained away by my white counterparts: I’ve been told that Black people just don’t listen to alternative music, but this doesn’t explain why white people are overrepresented when working in Black music. When I am asked about my perspectives, I’m often then required to do the heavy lifting, as though structural racism is a problem that Black people should fix rather than the white perpetrators of it. When I was starting out in the industry – younger, more insecure about my race and attempting to get my bearings in a sea of white faces, my attempts to assimilate were often overwhelmed by a sense of otherness.Michelle Kambasha works in the music industry Continue reading...
The rightwing group outgrew its origins on campuses to hobnob with Republican operatives and donors – despite some discomfort in the partyThe powerful conservative youth group Turning Point USA, which has forged strong ties to Donald Trump and his son Don Trump Jr, has raised tens of millions of dollars from super rich donors and secret backers while pushing disinformation about Joe Biden’s win in 2020, Covid-19 vaccines and other extremist and rightwing issues.The group is campaigning on college campuses across the US, as well as expanding into rightist media and faith activities and – through its campaign arm – is getting directly involved with elections, where it often supports pro-Trump and conservative candidates. Continue reading...
A post-pandemic labor shortage has given workers leverage but experts doubt it will lead to a sustained rise in union membershipUS labor unions have been on the defensive for decades but this October there has been a surprising burst of worker militancy and strikes as workers have gone on the offensive to demand more. Experts are predicting more actions to come but whether “Striketober” can lead to permanent change remains an open question.The scale of industrial action is truly remarkable. Ten thousand John Deere workers have gone on strike, 1,400 Kellogg workers have walked out, as well as a walkout threatened by more than 30,000 Kaiser Permanente workers, all inflamed by a profound disconnect between labor and management. Continue reading...
The US president hopes to be a transformational figure like FDR but inaction on voting rights, the climate crisis and social policy has fuelled frustrationWhen Joe Biden huddled with a group of historians in March, the conversation revolved around thinking big like one of his predecessors, Franklin Roosevelt, architect of the New Deal. Biden, it seemed, wanted to join him in the first rank of transformational US presidents.Six months later, a very different gathering took place this week outside the White House gates. Five young climate activists, holding signs and sitting on folding chairs, began an indefinite hunger strike. It was a visceral expression of disgust at what they see as Biden’s willingness to think small and break his promises. Continue reading...
Lev Parnas was accused of making donations to cozy up to powerful RepublicansA New York jury on Friday convicted Lev Parnas, a former associate of Rudy Giuliani who gained close access to Donald Trump, of making illegal campaign contributions.The verdict was returned in Manhattan federal court, where the Soviet-born Florida businessman was accused of using other people’s money to pose as a powerful political broker and cozy up to Trump and other leading Republicans. Continue reading...
The former US president Barack Obama has paid tribute to Angela Merkel in a farewell video during what was expected to be the outgoing chancellor of Germany’s final meeting in Brussels. 'Thanks to you, the centre has held through many storms,' Obama said in the video aired in the summit room in the Europa building. 'So many people, girls and boys, men and women, have had a role model who they could look up to through challenging times. I know because I am one of them. Danke schön'
After voting rights defeat, president expresses mounting frustration over rule that allows 41 senators to block legislationJoe Biden has given the strongest indication yet that he is willing to end or whittle down the Senate filibuster as a means of overcoming Republican intransigence and moving ahead with reforms to voting rights, the debt ceiling and possibly more.Speaking in Baltimore a day after Senate Republicans yet again blocked legislation designed to secure access to the ballot box for all Americans, Biden expressed mounting frustration at the filibuster, which effectively gives the conservative minority a stranglehold over large swaths of policy. Continue reading...
Health officials say millions more Americans can get a booster shot and choose a different vaccine for the extra doseMillions more Americans can get a Covid-19 booster and choose a different company’s vaccine for that next shot, federal health officials said on Thursday.Certain people who received Pfizer vaccinations months ago already are eligible for a booster and now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says specific Moderna and Johnson & Johnson recipients qualify, too. And in a bigger change, the agency is allowing the flexibility of “mixing and matching” that extra dose regardless of which type people received first. Continue reading...
The House voted to hold Trump’s former chief strategist in contempt of Congress over refusal to comply with committee investigating 6 January attackGood morning,In a 229 to 202 vote yesterday, the House found Donald Trump’s ally Steve Bannon in criminal contempt of Congress over his refusal to comply with a subpoena issued by the select committee investigating the 6 January attack on the US Capitol.With the House referral, the attorney general, Merrick Garland, and the Office of Legal Counsel are required by law to weigh a prosecution and present the matter before a grand jury.Bannon could face up to a year in federal prison and $100,000 in fines should the justice department secure a conviction – but even then that would not guarantee his compliance. Continue reading...
