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‘Remarkable woman’ Weddington hailed for role in 1973 case that established right to abortionTributes were paid to Sarah Weddington after the attorney who argued and won the landmark Roe v Wade case at the supreme court, establishing the right to abortion, died aged 76.Susan Hays, a former student of Weddington’s and a Democratic candidate for Texas agriculture commissioner, announced on Twitter that Weddington died on Sunday morning “after a series of health issues”. Continue reading...

Texan lawyer and Linda Coffee won landmark 1973 case, safeguarding right now under threat from US supreme court

I asked a child psychologist if I should be worried about the extent of their make-believe worldsNever confuse fantasy and “realty”.It’s a sentence that has floated, jokingly, around my family ever since my father’s colleague uttered the bungle to him years ago. We New Yorkers, of course, never confuse fantasy and realty. But in our house we happily confuse the two all the time.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...

The US has one of the highest maternal mortality rates among developed countries. Yet Senator Joe Manchin struggles to understand why paid family leave is importantTwenty-four hours after I gave birth to my second child, my employer called to ask when I planned to return to work.It had been a high-risk pregnancy and a complicated, precarious delivery involving a breech birth. I should have remained in the hospital for several days. But my oldest child – then just a year old – needed major surgery that couldn’t be delayed. So we brought our newborn home and rushed to prepare to leave for a hospital two hours away where our oldest child would have surgery while our newborn was at home being cared for by relatives.Bobbi Dempsey is a freelance writer specializing in topics related to poverty, a reporting fellow at the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, and an economic justice fellow at Community Change Continue reading...

Covid has forced us to find new ways to relate to each other – and that has meant creative opportunities and connections we’d otherwise have missedNearly two years ago, the dawn of Covid lockdowns forced us to contend with the prospect of solitude and self-reflection. Naturally, we rushed to find other stuff to do.Alongside the endless walks and compulsive baking, the early months of 2020 saw the blossoming of an array of tech trends: virtual gathering apps like Houseparty and Clubhouse, online events from trivia nights to Zoom weddings, livestreamed performances and art exhibitions. Continue reading...

I owe my career to Twitter, but two years reporting on the pandemic has made me realise disinformation costs livesI have a fantasy and it goes like this: a political party is formed, running on an anti-social-media platform. It campaigns on a pledge to ban social media. (“SWITCH IT OFF” is its straightforward, and elegant, slogan.)The party wins a general election and at midnight, on what comes to be known as Social Media Freedom Day, the prime minister pushes a giant button that blocks all access to social media. Crowds cheer. On the anniversary of Social Media Freedom Day – which becomes a bank holiday, of course – children burn effigies of Mark Zuckerberg and dress up as the Twitter bird.Sirin Kale is a Guardian journalist Continue reading...

Committee to request contents of the call seeking to stop Biden’s certification and may subpoena Rudy GiulianiCongressman Bennie Thompson, the chairman of the House select committee investigating the Capitol attack, has said the panel will open an inquiry into Donald Trump’s phone call seeking to stop Joe Biden’s certification from taking place on 6 January hours before the insurrection.The chairman said the select committee intended to scrutinize the phone call – revealed last month by the Guardian – should they prevail in their legal effort to obtain Trump White House records over the former president’s objections of executive privilege. Continue reading...

The Chiefs and Bucs could be headed for a Super Bowl rematch after clinching their divisions. But expect the chaos of a year where no team has looked invulnerable to spill into JanuaryIf the NFL was hoping to keep more teams in the playoff hunt longer by expanding the regular season from 17 weeks to 18, well, mission accomplished. Week 16’s slate of games is nearly completed, yet much remains unsettled, particularly in the still wide-open AFC. If there’s one team that’s taken advantage of their situation, it would be the Kansas City Chiefs, who are currently the only team in the conference guaranteed a playoff spot.It feels like ages ago, but it was only late October when the preseason favorites looked to be in serious trouble. After a demoralizing 27-3 loss to the Tennessee Titans, the Chiefs had stumbled from the gate with a perplexing 3-4 record. Since then, however, they have rattled off eight straight victories and look to be in great shape to make their third straight Super Bowl. Continue reading...

Baseless claims of fraud have pushed Republicans to enact restrictive voting laws – and they haven’t stopped there2021 was the year that America’s democracy came under attack from within.Donald Trump’s effort to overturn the election results, a push that culminated in the 6 January assault on the capitol, ultimately failed. But the lies the former president spread about fraud and the integrity of the 2020 results have stuck around in a dangerous way. False claims about the election have moved to the center of the Republican party. Continue reading...

Lawyer for Thomas Sibick tells judge he can be trusted to use social media to seek job and love during confinement at parents’ houseA New York man charged with assaulting a police officer during the deadly Capitol riot has asked a judge for permission to use dating websites while confined at his parents’ house.Thomas Sibick, of Buffalo, was part of a pro-Trump mob the then president urged to “fight like hell” to overturn his election defeat by Joe Biden. Continue reading...

State says snowpack now between 114% and 137% of normal across Sierra range while southern areas get much-needed rainA major Christmas storm caused whiteout conditions and closed key highways in the mountains of northern California and Nevada, with forecasters warning that travel in the Sierra Nevada could be difficult for several days.Rainstorms also continued to hit parts of southern California. The conditions were difficult but welcome developments in a parched state where the Sierra snowpack had been at dangerously low levels after weeks of dry weather. Continue reading...

Five men are charged with conspiring to kidnap Democratic Michigan governor over coronavirus restrictionsDefense attorneys want dismissed the indictment against five men accused of plotting to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan, because of what they call “egregious overreaching” by federal agents and informants.The government alleges that the men were upset over coronavirus restrictions last year when they conspired to kidnap Whitmer, a Democrat then spoken about as a possible vice-president, even scouting her second home in northern Michigan. Continue reading...

Jayapal calls on president to continue work on social spending plan and to use executive actions to get around senator’s rejection

He was above everything a priest – albeit the funniest one I’ve ever knownI am lucky that in my life I knew Desmond Tutu, one of the greatest men of our time. This tiny giant, this impish little priest, had the dangerously insane courage of the gods. And it was through his God that he found the voice to unremittingly challenge oppressors and speak endlessly, eloquently for the beaten down, the trodden on, the innocent and poor of this world. And later, when the righteous justice of his rhetoric had come to pass, he – along with his great friend Nelson Mandela – proposed the national dignity that only forgiveness of the past and the vanquished can bestow.

Bullet fired at man suspected of assault went through dressing room wall and struck teenager, officers sayThe Los Angeles county coroner has identified the 14-year-old girl who was shot and killed by police on Thursday while in the dressing rooms of a department store in North Hollywood.Valentina Orellana-Peralta died after being hit by a bullet which went through the wall of the dressing room at the Burlington Coat Factory store, as police officers responded to a call about an assault. Continue reading...

Arrest of Erika Wulff Jones on domestic violence charge stemmed from ‘medication imbalance’, Infowars host saysThe wife of the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones was arrested on Christmas Eve on a domestic violence charge the rightwing provocateur said stemmed from a “medication imbalance”.Sheriff’s deputies booked Erika Wulff Jones into an Austin jail around 8.45pm on Friday. Jail records showed the 43-year-old faced misdemeanor charges of assault causing bodily injury to a family member and resisting arrest, search or transport. By the afternoon of Christmas Day, she had not received a bond. Continue reading...

Jared Schmeck, 35, tells Oregonian he has ‘nothing against’ president to whom he repeated ‘Fuck Joe Biden’ rightwing memeThe caller who ended a conversation with Joe Biden with the rightwing meme “Let’s go Brandon” – which means “fuck Joe Biden” – has insisted he was joking and meant no disrespect to the president.“At the end of the day I have nothing against Mr Biden,” Jared Schmeck, 35, told the Oregonian newspaper. “But I am frustrated because I think he can be doing a better job. I mean no disrespect to him.” Continue reading...

The real story this year is the explosion of digital transactions that will spawn a new economy of entrepreneurs and create trillions in wealthWhen you read about all the stories around small businesses in 2021 a few general themes quickly appear. Inflation. Supply chain. Labor shortages. Covid. All true. All relevant. All important. But all these stories are relatively short term. Inflation will, someday, be under control again. Shipping will catch up. Labor will come and go. Covid will always be around but we’ll just live with it.The reality is that there was just one story about small businesses in 2021 that’s really going to have a long-term impact. It has received much less attention and yet it will be transformational. The small business story this year is about blockchain. Because in 2021, blockchain emerged as the next big thing for entrepreneurs. It’s real and it’s happening. And smart entrepreneurs know this. Continue reading...

Like countless other adoptees in the US, outdated laws mean I still don’t know my parent’s names, ethnicities and medical historiesAt the age of 69, I am not allowed to see my original birth certificate or know the basic facts of my origin.In some private and all closed adoptions the original birth certificate is sealed by the state of California. The only way to see it is to hire a lawyer and petition the court with a “very good reason” to unseal. When I asked a clerk in Marin County, California, he couldn’t give an example of what a good reason might be, but he did say that wanting to know my origins wasn’t one of them.Anne Rudig has contributed to the New York Times and other publications. She is at work on a memoir Continue reading...

Patrick Gaspard discusses his Haitian dissident parents, meeting Mandela and protecting democracyBarack Obama could be forgiven for considering himself a big shot. But Patrick Gaspard used to keep his ego in check.“You’re of course an extraordinary historic figure but I’m sorry, this doesn’t compare,” Gaspard would joke, “meeting Nelson Mandela will always be the top of Mount Kilimanjaro for me.” Continue reading...

Harris is navigating a position that comes with great influence but few formal responsibilities – and the stakes are even higher for her compared to past vice-presidentsEarlier this month, Kamala Harris convened the inaugural meeting of the National Space Council, an important summit that brought together cabinet secretaries and top space and military officials in the sun-drenched atrium of the US Institute of Peace. Over the course of nearly two hours, the vice-president engaged the panel in discussion with real, earthly implications for national security, the climate crisis and workforce development.But attention in Washington was diverted elsewhere. At the supreme court, the justices were weighing the future of abortion rights. Republicans in Congress were threatening a government shutdown over their opposition to Covid-19 mask mandates. And as Harris spoke, public health experts confirmed the first case of the Omicron coronavirus variant in the US. Continue reading...

As the efforts continue to clean up debris, find victims and restore power, the storm’s scale of destruction is astoundingIn Mayfield, Kentucky, storm warnings had been coming for days, then came radar observations of a rotating storm of debris to the south, and finally urgent alerts to the imminent strike of a severe tornado.In the seconds it took for the “quad-state” storm to pass over the higher elevations of the city soon after midnight on 10 December, the notional separation between the man-made and natural world was effectively obliterated – as were large sections of Mayfield Continue reading...

The never-ending pandemic forces people to do their best to balance living a decent life and making responsible choicesWhen Sean Williams, 50, caught a breakthrough case of Covid-19 in November, he felt guilty and embarrassed. His 14-year-old tested positive, too; both were “double-vaxxed” and probably caught it from his 11-year-old daughter, who got it in school two days before her scheduled first vaccination.“It’s impossible to talk about without going through this whole tortured thing about how careful you were before you got it,” says Williams, who lives with his family in New York City. “Also, this horrible feeling that you have to stutter your way through a clarification that you do believe in science, you did get vaccinated, you’re, like, not a fascist, even. It’s landmines all the way down.” Continue reading...

Droughts, wildfires, bomb cyclones: it was a year of extremes – and scientists say it’s a likely taste of what’s to comeEven before summer heatwaves sent temperatures soaring across the west, lakebeds had already begun ceding ground to the cracked, dried earth.Rings showed around reservoirs where water levels fell to historic lows, verdant hillsides took on brown hues, and trees became tinder in forests primed to burn. The conditions fueled unstoppable fires that grew large and ferocious enough to create their own weather patterns.

This year’s political pantomime served up a rich cast of characters, with The Donald providing the laughs and Xi Jinping as the baddest baddie of them all (oh yes he is!)Would Donald Trump make a good pantomime dame? His orange face, crazy talk, weird hair and baggy, saggy outfits are a natural fit for Mother Goose or Widow Twankey. Choleric, chaotic, always changeable, Trump might find cross-dressing a challenge. Then again, maybe not.The future role of America’s “very stable genius” is but one of many dramatic questions marking the end of a grim year when politics frequently descended into dark farce. World leaders too often served up political pantomime, not serious, sensible statecraft. You had to laugh, or else you’d cry. Continue reading...

The California native also helped create the popular Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise in a lifetime working for MattelT Mark Taylor, artist and toy designer for the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe franchise as well as the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, has died of heart failure at his home in southern California. He was 80.He-Man was the muscled frontman for toy manufacturer Mattel’s Masters of the Universe franchise, which would later spawn an animated series that became a staple for children. Continue reading...

Warm weather could make this the hottest December on record for many cities in the region, including Dallas and New OrleansAbout 200 temperature records in the US may be broken over the next several days as warm air across Texas and the south-east is predicted to bring spring or even summer-like conditions, making Christmas Day likely to be the warmest in 50 to 100 years in some areas.The temperatures could make this the warmest December on record for many cities in the region including Dallas, Houston, New Orleans, St Louis, Kansas City and Chicago. Continue reading...

Cheap street pizza is one of New York’s charms, but could supply chain problems and inflation this spell the end?“Well, you can never go wrong with bread, cheese and tomato,” Lou Reed, poet of the New York streets, would sometimes remark as he passed by one of the city’s multitude of pizzerias.The late musician was a fan of Coney Island’s legendary Totonno’s, close to the site of of one of the first recorded pizza parlors established by Italian immigrants in the 1880s. Continue reading...

Sara Trost, from Southend, Essex, fatally wounded as she waited to show property in Coral SpringsA British woman who worked as an estate agent in Florida has been shot dead while preparing to show a property, allegedly by an evicted tenant.Sara Trost, 40, from Southend, Essex, was shot on Thursday while sitting in her Jeep outside a house in Coral Springs, 40 miles north of Miami, at about 12.33pm. Continue reading...

A historic drought and record-breaking heatwaves combined to spark blazed that burned nearly 7.7m acres this year2021 proved another disastrous fire year for the American west.Amid a historic drought and record-breaking heatwaves, wildfires that erupted across the US burned close to 7.7m acres. Some broke records that had only recently been set. And while the amount of land burned this year didn’t reach 2020 levels, a troubling new trend emerged: fires are getting harder to fight.Wildfires used to be largely confined to a four-month period but the threats are now felt through the year. By 21 June, close to 29,000 wildfires had already ignited across the US – roughly 4,000 more than average years according to the National Interagency Fire Center.The threats didn’t subside after the summer and autumn. Blazes burned through Montana and Colorado into December this year and fire weather warnings prompted power safety shutoffs in southern California over the Thanksgiving holiday in late November. Continue reading...

Whether it’s a sixpence in your pud or a buck’s fizz on Christmas morning, rituals old and new have special meaningIn uncertain times, there’s a lot to be said for Christmas traditions. Tastes and smells, like familiar tunes, can instantly transport you back to childhood. Food matters, especially at Christmas – and tradition is part of the reason why it packs such a punch.Let’s start with the stocking. Gone are white sugar mice and candy cigarettes, replaced by gummy bears and chocolate reindeer poo. But it’s good to know the traditional tangerine – usually left to rot under the bed – continues to have its place for my own kids. The chocolate coins remain. The story goes that three sisters unable to afford a dowry were doomed to be sold into loveless marriages. Wishing to keep his donation anonymous, and inspired to act, the 4th-century Saint Nicholas secretly dropped coins down the chimney into stockings they’d left drying by the fire. I’m not sure anyone knows how it turned out for the girls, but clearly a colossal fail for St Nick’s wish to remain anonymous.Sam Wydymus is a British chef, restaurateur and writer based in France Continue reading...

If someone asks me why, I reach for the word velleity – desiring things you cannot hope to getI keep a list of words that are strange to me. Any time I find one I half-know or do not recognise, it goes in the list. I find its existence reassuring, as if having more words at my disposal will make it easier to decode whatever confusing things happen to me each day.The best word on my list is velleity. I found it in Don DeLillo’s Underworld (1997), in a section where a Jesuit priest is explaining to the main character, Nick Shay, the value of knowing the names for those things in danger of being lost to eternity. The priest teaches the word “velleity” to Nick. “Volition at its lowest ebb,” he calls it. “A small thing, a wish, a tendency.” He uses it in relation to his own life, to express regret at how it has passed. He has prayed a lot, sure, but what tangible things has he done in this world?Lamorna Ash is the author of Dark, Salt, Clear: Life in a Cornish Fishing Town Continue reading...

US president and first lady’s visit was a surprise for patients and staff and was first visit to the hospital by a sitting presidentDespite surging Omicron cases of the coronavirus in the US, Joe and Jill Biden made an unannounced joint visit to a children’s hospital in Washington DC on Christmas Eve.The US president’s visit to Children’s National Hospital was a surprise for patients and staff, the White House reported, and was believed to be the first visit to the institution by a sitting president. Continue reading...

Everyday hauntings suggest that ordinary life is no less sacred than within the walls of a churchWhen you’re a kid, Christmas is about the presents. Now middle age has made me maudlin, it still is about the presents – but in a different way. It’s about people’s presence as much as the gifts they give.Cue the eye roll, sure. But I’m serious. Even if Christmas is stripped of religious significance for many Australians, our relationship with treasured gifts gives us away. If we get sentimental about our things, it’s because we treat them sacramentally – as bearers of the presence of another. So even the biggest agnostic may be kind of religious without realising it. Continue reading...

The Pacific Northwest faces a prolonged cold snap with heavy snow predicted for the mountains and even coastal citiesTwo people have died in a submerged car, evacuations have been ordered for wildfire-scarred California, and Seattle and Portland face the rare chance of snowy streets as a wave of storms rolled through the western United States.The new storms, which could drop rain and snow over much of the region into next week and plunge the Pacific Northwest into a lengthy cold snap, follow a now-departed atmospheric river that delivered copious amounts of precipitation this week. Continue reading...

The saying has became an internet sensation as a coded vulgarity among Trump supportersA vulgar anti-Biden slogan made for an awkward moment on Friday during Joe Biden’s phone calls with children tracking Santa’s flight when a father said, “Let’s Go Brandon.”The refrain, a sanitized version of “Fuck Joe Biden,” has been an internet sensation since a television journalist told race car driver Brandon Brown that a Nascar crowd shouting the vulgarity was actually saying, “Let’s go Brandon.” Continue reading...

Ruby Freeman and daughter claim they became center of unfounded conspiracy theories and were singled out by TrumpTwo former Georgia election workers have filed a defamation lawsuit against Donald Trump’s ex-lawyer Rudy Giuliani, the rightwing One America News Network and several of its senior executives, claiming the workers became the target of vote-rigging conspiracy theories that put them in physical danger and threatened their livelihoods.During the 2020 election, Ruby Freeman and daughter Wandrea “Shaye” Moss worked as poll workers counting ballots at State Farm Arena in Fulton county, Georgia. They claim they became the center of a series of unfounded conspiracy theories promoted by former New York mayor Giuliani, who was then serving as an advisor to Trump, and several top employees at the California-based OAN news network. Continue reading...

A group of students in Washington DC watch as their teacher, Kathleen Fitzpatrick, cooly makes a basketball shot from across the court. Fitzpatrick, known as 'Ms Fitz' to her students, had promised hot chocolates for all if she made the shot

With a pair of major NFL-themed releases, America’s biggest sports league is taking aim at the NBA’s Christmas crown

Female trooper said she felt ‘completely violated’ by former New York governor’s unwanted touching at event in September 2019Former New York governor Andrew Cuomo won’t face criminal charges after a female state trooper said she felt “completely violated” by his unwanted touching at an event in September 2019, a Long Island prosecutor announced.Acting Nassau county district attorney Joyce Smith said in a statement that an investigation found the allegations against Cuomo “credible, deeply troubling, but not criminal under New York law”.Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organisations. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 802 9999. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html Continue reading...

Biden had barred nearly all non-US citizens who had recently been in the countries, over concerns about the Covid variantThe Biden administration will lift travel restrictions on eight southern African countries imposed last month over concerns about the fast-spreading Covid-19 Omicron variant, the White House said Friday.Foreign nationals who are barred from the US because they have been in one of the eight countries within the prior 14 days will again be allowed on US-bound flights leaving after 12.01am US east coast time on 31 December, a senior official said, confirming an earlier Reuters report. Continue reading...

Experts call for public health measures beyond vaccines as health workers describe a ‘war zone’As the highly transmissible Omicron variant began to surge across Colorado this month, Governor Jared Polis adopted a laissez-faire tone. Asked in a radio interview about the possibility of reinstating a statewide mask mandate, he replied that, with Covid vaccines now widely available, getting sick was the “own darn fault” of the unvaccinated.But health workers at hospitals in parts of Colorado that have been overwhelmed by coronavirus patients in recent weeks say they’re bracing for even worse. Continue reading...

Black Americans had 6.7% unemployment rate in November as economists unsurprised by disparityEven as economists celebrated a job market recovery seen from the beginning of the pandemic, when unemployment peaked at 14.8%, to November when unemployment was 4.2%, Black Americans have continued to see a much higher jobless rate.In November, Black Americans had an unemployment rate of 6.7%, while the unemployment rate for white Americans was 3.5%. The gap is even more pronounced between men: Black men had an unemployment rate of 7.3% in November while white men saw an unemployment rate of 3.4%. Continue reading...

With the festive season upon us, we reflect on reasons for football fans to be thankful as the year draws to an endPicking results on a Sunday has been impossible at times with the 2021 season giving every fan at one stage or another a left-field result to revel in. Schadenfreude is very much included in your stocking this year. Detroit’s 30-12 upset thrashing of the Arizona Cardinals last week, the league’s worst team at kickoff beating the joint-best, last may be the finest, freakish morsel to be dissected ad infinitum with us forever shouting: ‘But how Jared Goff?’ into the void. But ‘tis the season so treat yourself to the one-win Jaguars beating the Super Bowl-chasing Bills 9-6 in week nine, or seek out Tennessee’s quintuple turnover tire fire from 21 November as they lost 22-13 to the ... Texans. You would prefer something a little more exquisite? Stay put in week 11 for the anti-vax bowl featuring Minnesota’s upfront pseudo-scientist Kirk Cousins going toe-to-toe with Joe Rogan’s Igor, Aaron Rodgers, in a deliciously painful shootout for the Packers. The greatest joy is the strangest results may still be waiting for us in the lead up to the expanded playoffs. The bubble still shockingly includes Seattle, Atlanta and Washington in the NFC. Stay indoors this Christmas and stare into the abyss, it looks like Ben Roethlisberger’s retirement tour added an extra date in February. Continue reading...