Throughout its history, citizens of the United States have gathered to commemorate George Washington’s birthday in honor of his service to the nation. See how these celebrations have changed in the more than 280 years since Washington’s birth.
George Washington, 1792 by Ceracchi in morning light contemplating this great country of ours. Happy 4th! #america pic.twitter.com/Z00nbcwUQf
— Gibbes Museum of Art (@theGibbesmuseum) July 2, 2016
I now make it my earnest prayer, that God would have you, and the State over which you preside, in his holy protection; that he would incline the hearts of the citizens to cultivate a spirit of subordination and obedience to government; to entertain a brotherly affection and love for one another, for their fellow citizens of the United States at large, and particularly for their brethren who have served in the field; and finally, that he would most graciously be pleased to dispose us all to do justice, to love mercy, and to demean ourselves with that charity, humility, and pacific temper of mind, which were the characteristics of the Divine Author of our blessed religion, and without an humble imitation of whose example in these things, we can never hope to be a happy nation.
I have the honor to be, with much esteem and respect, Sir, your Excellency’s most obedient and most humble servant.
–George Washington
Head-Quarters, Newburg,
8 June, 1783.
April 11, 1796, Washington writes artist Gilbert Stuart agreeing to sit for the famous Lansdowne Portrait. #OTD pic.twitter.com/kyHsVcPWNH
— Mount Vernon (@MountVernon) April 11, 2016
Washington went on to express his gratitude for the support of “my countrymen” and the “army in general.” This reference to his soldiers ignited feelings so intense, he had to grip the speech with both hands to keep it steady. He continued: “I consider it an indispensable duty to close this last solemn act of my official life by commending the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty God and those who have the superintendence of them [Congress] to his holy keeping.”
For a long moment, Washington could not say another word. Tears streamed down his cheeks. The words touched a vein of religious faith in his inmost soul, born of battlefield experiences that had convinced him of the existence of a caring God who had protected him and his country again and again during the war. Without this faith he might never have been able to endure the frustrations and rage he had experienced in the previous eight months.
Washington then drew from his coat a parchment copy of his appointment as commander in chief. “Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the great theater of action and bidding farewell to this august body under whom I have long acted, I here offer my commission and take leave of all the employments of public life.” Stepping forward, he handed the document to Mifflin.
This was — is — the most important moment in American history.
The man who could have dispersed this feckless Congress and obtained for himself and his soldiers rewards worthy of their courage was renouncing absolute power. By this visible, incontrovertible act, Washington did more to affirm America’s government of the people than a thousand declarations by legislatures and treatises by philosophers.
Thomas Jefferson, author of the greatest of these declarations, witnessed this drama as a delegate from Virginia. Intuitively, he understood its historic dimension. “The moderation. . . . of a single character,” he later wrote, “probably prevented this revolution from being closed, as most others have been, by a subversion of that liberty it was intended to establish.”
Read it all (emphasis mine).
1/On December 23, 1783, George Washington addressed the Congress of the Confederation at the State House in Annapolis, Maryland, to resign his commission as commander-in-chief of the Continental army. Fresh off the victory of the Revolutionary War, Washington was… pic.twitter.com/7gj6uzRaHI
— Dave Troy (@davetroy) February 19, 2024
Every February, Americans take a day off of work to celebrate the presidents — the chief executives whose ideas, policies and foibles have helped to shape our history. So it’s only fitting that you take a moment to test your knowledge about these 44 prominent Americans with a 20-question quiz from “Presidential,” the Washington Post podcast that explores the presidents’ lives and legacies….
Who was the only president to be elected to more than two terms in office?
Theodore Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
John Adams
John Quincy Adams….
Extremely large and awesome statue of George Washington kneeling – NJ pic.twitter.com/0vy2wKSeZO
— Sue M. LaShomb (@Lavendar77) February 19, 2024
By the article establishing the executive department it is made the duty of the President “to recommend to your consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient.” The circumstances under which I now meet you will acquit me from entering into that subject further than to refer to the great constitutional charter under which you are assembled, and which, in defining your powers, designates the objects to which your attention is to be given. It will be more consistent with those circumstances, and far more congenial with the feelings which actuate me, to substitute, in place of a recommendation of particular measures, the tribute that is due to the talents, the rectitude, and the patriotism which adorn the characters selected to devise and adopt them. In these honorable qualifications I behold the surest pledges that as on one side no local prejudices or attachments, no separate views nor party animosities, will misdirect the comprehensive and equal eye which ought to watch over this great assemblage of communities and interests, so, on another, that the foundation of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality, and the preeminence of free government be exemplified by all the attributes which can win the affections of its citizens and command the respect of the world. I dwell on this prospect with every satisfaction which an ardent love for my country can inspire, since there is no truth more thoroughly established than that there exists in the economy and course of nature an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness; between duty and advantage; between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity; since we ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained; and since the preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny of the republican model of government are justly considered, perhaps, as deeply, as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.
Happy birthday (observed) George Washington! The park is open today. pic.twitter.com/YiAc4mP1H5
— IndependenceNPS 🇺🇸 (@INDEPENDENCENHP) February 19, 2024
Washington’s Birthday was celebrated on February 22nd until well into the 20th Century. However, in 1968 Congress passed the Monday Holiday Law to “provide uniform annual observances of certain legal public holidays on Mondays.” By creating more 3-day weekends, Congress hoped to “bring substantial benefits to both the spiritual and economic life of the Nation.”
One of the provisions of this act changed the observance of Washington’s Birthday from February 22nd to the third Monday in February. Ironically, this guaranteed that the holiday would never be celebrated on Washington’s actual birthday, as the third Monday in February cannot fall any later than February 21.
Contrary to popular belief, neither Congress nor the President has ever stipulated that the name of the holiday observed as Washington’s Birthday be changed to “President’s Day.”
Portrait of George Washington by Charles Wilson Peale, 1779. #July4 #Independanceday pic.twitter.com/v42bckYPOE
— Dr. Peter Paul Rubens (@PP_Rubens) July 4, 2017
The Archbishop of Canterbury, concluding his five-day visit to Ukraine on Friday, said: “We must long for peace — but not peace that increases the likelihood of more war.”
The UK, he said, “needs to show that we are committed as a nation to justice, to peace, to reconciliation on the basis of security, and respect for international law”, but he was “not capable of trotting out an answer that would probably be wrong” about exactly how this could be achieved.
Asked whether he thought the trip had been worth the time, expense, and risk, he said that he saw it as a “biblical and theological imperative to stand — as much as one is able — with those who are oppressed” and to say: “You’re not forgotten: we love you.”
Our reporter @PhrancisMartin joined the Archbishop of Canterbury @JustinWelby on his pastoral visit to Ukraine last week https://t.co/eE5vplLG7P
— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) February 14, 2024
Why is the global economy so oblivious to the new world disorder? High interest rates have managed to bring down inflation from a peak of more than 10% across the rich world to about 6%. This not only raises households’ purchasing power; it also raises their spirits. Indeed, having hit an all-time low in 2022, rich-world consumer confidence has risen sharply. Higher borrowing costs have been muted by the fact that a lot of household and corporate debt is on fixed interest rates.
There is also a more intriguing possibility: after so many shocking global developments, the world no longer minds chaos as much as it once did. This is consistent with academic evidence, including a recent paper by two researchers at the Federal Reserve, which suggests that the hit to output from a spike in economic uncertainty fades after a few months.
Good economists remain vigilant. Higher interest rates may have a delayed impact on growth. Escalation in the Russia-Ukraine war or the Red Sea could provoke another round of shocks to energy supply, feeding into inflation. All bets are off if Xi Jinping decides to move on Taiwan. Yet on the flipside, falling inflation and a potential boost to productivity from generative artificial intelligence could prompt gdp to accelerate. Moreover, the global economy has already demonstrated its resilience. Polycrisis, what polycrisis?
Read it all (registration or subscription).
Why is the global economy so oblivious to the new world disorder? https://t.co/EWpg2dGdg4 ⬇️
— The Economist (@TheEconomist) February 13, 2024
The United States has informed Congress and its allies in Europe about Russian advances on a new, space-based nuclear weapon designed to threaten America’s extensive satellite network, according to current and former officials briefed on the matter.
Such a satellite-killing weapon, if deployed, could destroy civilian communications, surveillance from space and military command-and control operations by the United States and its allies. At the moment, the United States does not have the ability to counter such a weapon and defend its satellites, a former official said.
Officials said that the new intelligence, which they did not describe in detail, raised serious questions about whether Russia was preparing to abandon the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, which bans all orbital nuclear weapons. But since Russia does not appear close to deploying the weapon, they said, it is not considered an urgent threat.
The intelligence was made public, in part, in a cryptic announcement on Wednesday by Representative Michael R. Turner, Republican of Ohio and the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. He called on the Biden administration to declassify the information without saying specifically what it was.
Such a satellite-killing weapon could destroy civilian communications, surveillance from space and military command-and control operations by the United States and its allies. At the moment, the USA does not have the ability to defend its satelliteshttps://t.co/y4MKjFV6Kk
— Lucia Alessi (@lucialessi) February 15, 2024
Russia, China and other U.S. adversaries are using the newest wave of artificial intelligence tools to improve their hacking abilities and find new targets for online espionage, according to a report Wednesday from Microsoft and its close business partner OpenAI.
While computer users of all stripes have been experimenting with large language models to help with programming tasks, translate phishing emails and assemble attack plans, the new report is the first to associate top-tier government hacking teams with specific uses of LLM. It’s also the first report on countermeasures and comes amid a continuing debate about the risks of the rapidly developing technology and efforts by many countries to put some limits on its use.
The document attributes various uses of AI to two Chinese government-affiliated hacking groups and to one group from each of Russia, Iran and North Korea, comprising the four countries of foremost concern to Western cyber defenders.
"#Russia, #China & other U.S. adversaries .. using .. #ArtificialIntelligence tools to improve their #Hacking abilities & find new targets for online espionage, according to a report Wednesday from @Microsoft .. close business partner @OpenAI." @josephmenn https://t.co/V06CVI0Mvw
— Christina Ayiotis, Esq., CRM, CIPP/E (@christinayiotis) February 15, 2024
The number of farms in America is shrinking as growers get older and producing crops gets a lot more expensive.
The US had 1.9 million farms in 2022, a 6.9% drop from five years ago and the lowest since at least 1992, according to data from the US Department of Agriculture’s Census of Agriculture released on Tuesday. The total acreage used in farms dropped about 2.2%.
The survey, conducted every five years, shows an increasingly challenging outlook for food production in the US as the population grows. The high cost of land and equipment has raised the bar of entry into agriculture, making it more expensive for the next generation to produce crops.
Meanwhile, the average age of producers continued to climb, reaching 58.1 years in 2022.
The number of farms in America is shrinking as growers get older and producing crops gets a lot more expensive, according to the USDA’s Census of Agriculture https://t.co/DZgnTtvkdr
— Bloomberg (@business) February 13, 2024
In his first six months in office last summer, the mayor of Denver, Mike Johnston, managed to get more than 1,200 homeless people off the streets and into housing. That seemed like a fitting feat for a city that prides itself on its compassion.
It would turn out to be a footnote compared with the humanitarian crisis that Denver would soon face as thousands of migrants flooded the city, many of them bused from the southern border by Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas and almost all of them in need of shelter and support.
By last month, Denver, a city of 750,000, had received nearly 40,000 migrants, the most per capita of any city in the nation, even as the flow of migrants slowed in the deep chill of winter. And the city has begun to feel the same sort of strains that have confronted New York and Chicago as they contended with their own migrant influxes.
This is such an astonishing figure: Denver, a city of 750,000 people, has received *40,000* migrants.
In roughly proportionate terms, that's as if Philly received 80,000 or Chicago received 140,000 or LA received 200,000 or NY received half a million.https://t.co/wL7N6LgJw1
— Alec MacGillis (@AlecMacGillis) February 13, 2024
Hardship and poverty are often associated more with urban than with rural areas. Rural hardship in the north Cotswolds, for example, is often hidden, because of inequalities and the relative affluence experienced by the majority, and the high levels of tourism in the area.
This is a problem, because the significant minority who experience hardship are more hidden. This means that rural hardship is often not adequately addressed by local and national policy-makers and community leaders.
This is the focus of the exhibition “Hidden Hardship”, which Coventry Cathedral is hosting until 26 February, and which is part of my new participatory research project at Coventry University. This has sought to understand hardship in the north Cotswolds better.
The exhibition consists of illustrations by the artist Beth Waters, based on the research participants’ interviews and diaries of their experiences of hardship and/or responding to hardship. It focuses on people’s experiences of rural hardship, their coping strategies, and the barriers to their improved well-being.
Read it all (registration or subscription).
Hardship is a rural problem, too
In areas that appear more affluent, poverty is often hidden, writes @SJ_Denninghttps://t.co/8T0KmRxzFZ
— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) February 9, 2024
In a cavernous production hall in Düsseldorf last fall, the somber tones of a horn player accompanied the final act of a century-old factory.
Amid the flickering of flares and torches, many of the 1,600 people losing their jobs stood stone-faced as the glowing metal of the plant’s last product — a steel pipe — was smoothed to a perfect cylinder on a rolling mill. The ceremony ended a 124-year run that began in the heyday of German industrialization and weathered two world wars, but couldn’t survive the aftermath of the energy crisis.
There have been numerous iterations of such finales over the past year, underscoring the painful reality facing Germany: its days as an industrial superpower may be coming to an end. Manufacturing output in Europe’s biggest economy has been trending downward since 2017, and the decline is accelerating as competitiveness erodes.
“There’s not a lot of hope, if I’m honest,” said Stefan Klebert, chief executive officer of GEA Group AG — a supplier of manufacturing machinery that traces its roots to the late 1800s. “I am really uncertain that we can halt this trend. Many things would have to change very quickly.”
🇩🇪 #Germany’s Days as an Industrial Superpower Are Coming to an End – Bloomberghttps://t.co/F0E4eUlAXA pic.twitter.com/DCJWqTqSPI
— Christophe Barraud🛢🐳 (@C_Barraud) February 10, 2024
Nextgov/FCW: Talk about how you prepared for the water-systems security hearing today and any major takeaways from it.
Clancy: We met with the majority and minority staff ahead of the hearing to get a sense of their objectives. Of course, MITRE has a diverse set of sponsors in these areas, so we engaged with them to make sure we were representing a whole-of-government view across the sectors.
My big message is what I said in my opening statement. A lot of these policy fixes on the fringes are not going to deal with the scale of the threat that we face. So if you want to continue to fight against harassment campaigns from nation states…the sorts of solutions people were talking about are probably okay, but I think the big point I want to get across that didn’t get enough air time is that the threat has really changed.
We’ve got maybe three years to figure this out before China does an all-out attack against our critical infrastructure. We’re going to have to train and prepare to disconnect our operational technology systems from our information technology systems ahead of a major attack from China.
Expect China to attack US infrastructure within 3 years, MITRE CTO says https://t.co/zWHBOAn8uH
— Defense One (@DefenseOne) February 11, 2024
Some Democrats inside and outside of Biden’s bubble were privately anxious about what’s next for the campaign. The report came during a week when Biden made a number of high-profile flubs, confusing current and past world leaders. He didn’t help matters when he referred to the Egyptian president as the president of Mexico in his remarks on the counsel’s report Thursday night, and his decision to forego a high-profile interview ahead of Sunday’s Super Bowl has also drawn scrutiny.
“Anytime his age and capacity is front and center is bad for his re-election prospects. That said, it does provide an opportunity to more forcefully deal with this issue which they have to do,” said Brian Goldsmith, a Biden donor and a Democratic consultant based in Los Angeles. “The right response is that Biden is a better president because of his age and wisdom and experience, not despite his age and wisdom and experience.”
“They need to find a way to jujitsu this and turn it from a negative into a positive because it is not going away,” Goldsmith said. He added: “Avoiding the Super Bowl interview is a mistake.”
Democrats’ anxiety over Biden’s age spilled out into the public this week after a special counsel report
https://t.co/g8V3TcFRAG via @WSJ— Dan Whitcomb (@DanWhitcomb) February 9, 2024
I will take comments on this submitted by email only to KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com.
Spending on safety net programs such as Social Security and Medicare continues to grow even as their trust funds face the prospect of being depleted in the next 10 years.
“Also boosting deficits are two underlying trends: the aging of the population and growth in federal health care costs per beneficiary,” Mr. Swagel said. “Those trends put upward pressure on mandatory spending.”
The national debt is likely to be even larger than the budget office is predicting, as its forecast assumes that the 2017 tax cuts that Republicans enacted will fully expire even though lawmakers are already considering extending many of the measures, including lower individual income tax brackets.
For the second time in less than a year, the budget office said it now expected Mr. Biden’s efforts to wean the nation from fossil fuels to be more popular with the public — and more expensive for taxpayers — than initially estimated.
New: U.S. Debt on Pace to Top $54 Trillion Over Next 10 Years w/ @jimtankersley https://t.co/VZ9wDWn5l2
— Alan Rappeport (@arappeport) February 7, 2024
A 7% increase in the National Minimum Stipend (NMS), set to come into effect in April, has been welcomed by the trade union Unite.
The increase, agreed by the Archbishops’ Council, acting as the Central Stipends Authority (CSA), will see the minimum stipend jump from £26,134 to £28,670.
Last July, the CSA announced a five-per-cent increase for 2024. The greater uplift to seven per cent has been made possible because dioceses, which will have to fund the stipends, need pay less into the Church of England pensions scheme. In December, the Pensions Board announced a drop in the contribution rate by three percentage points from April this year: to 25 per cent of the previous year’s National Minimum Stipend.
A seven-per-cent increase in the National Minimum Stipend (NMS), set to come into effect in April, has been welcomed by the trade union Unite https://t.co/jroZM9yEUY
— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) February 7, 2024
There’s a striking disconnect between the widely shared pessimism among Americans and measures that show the economy is actually robust. Consumers are spending briskly—behavior that suggests optimism, not retrenchment. Inflation has tempered. Unemployment has been below 4% for 24 straight months, the longest such stretch since the 1960s.
The disconnect has puzzled economists, investors and business owners. But press Americans harder, and the immediate economy emerges as only one factor in the gloomy outlook. Americans feel sour about the economy, many say, because their long-term financial security feels fragile and vulnerable to wide-ranging social and political threats.
Reliable steps up the economic ladder, such as a college degree, no longer look like a good investment. War overseas, and an emboldened set of hostile nations, have made the world feel dangerous. Uninspiring leaders at home, running a government widely seen as dysfunctional, have left people without hope that America is up to the challenge of fixing its problems.
The broad reasons for America’s dim outlook suggest that even further improvement in the economy might not be enough to lift the nation’s mood. In an election year, that is shaping up as one of President Biden’s biggest impediments to winning a second term. He has received little credit so far for an economy that has foiled predictions of a recession and instead grew 3.1% in the past year, far ahead of the pace in 2022.
Inside the disconnect between gloomy Americans and a robust economy. “There’s a sense it could all go away in a second.” https://t.co/SUUx0JqudF https://t.co/SUUx0JqudF
— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) February 7, 2024
The NTSB said the door plug was opened at Boeing’s Renton factory so a team from supplier Spirit AeroSystems of Wichita, Kan., could repair damaged rivets adjacent to the door plug on the 737 MAX 9 jet.
The fix required removal of insulation and interior panels at that location and the opening of the door plug. After the rivets were repaired, a Boeing team worked to restore the interior.
Federal regulations require that every manufacturing job that goes into assembly of an airplane be documented. And critical tasks have to be signed off by quality inspectors.
A month after the blowout, though, Boeing has not provided the NTSB with documentation about who opened and re-closed the door plug, how exactly it was done and with what authorization.
Read it all (my emphasis).
A Boeing 737 MAX 9 was missing key bolts when it was delivered to Alaska Airlines, the National Transportation Safety Board says in a preliminary report on Flight 1282's blowout over Portland. https://t.co/1ygq2zDdmg
— The Seattle Times (@seattletimes) February 7, 2024
Most emerging economies struggle to live within their means; China struggles to live up to them. Even in the best of times, the combined spending of its households, firms and government is not enough to buy all that it can produce, leaving a surplus that must be exported: the country has run a trade surplus for 34 of the past 40 years. And these are not the best of times. China is enduring its longest spell of deflation since the Asian crisis over a quarter-century ago. An epic stock market rout since late 2022 has seen investors lose $2 trillion.
Behind that panic lies a deeper fear among investors and officials, namely that China no longer has a reliable driver of growth. The property boom is over. Cash-strapped developers are afraid to build flats and households are afraid to buy them. The infrastructure mania has run out of road: indebted local governments lack the funds. Exporting goods to the rest of the world, which China relied on for decades to escape poverty, is getting harder as protectionism rises and Western countries become wary of relying on authoritarian states.
Much therefore rests on one remaining source of growth: boosting the spending of China’s 1.4 billion people.“The Chinese market, with its vast space and growing depth, will play an important role in boosting aggregate global demand,” Li Qiang, China’s prime minister, told the World Economic Forum in Davos last month. A new imf review of China’s prospects published on February 2nd contains 61 references to the word “consumption”.
As China’s markets crash, its consumers cower https://t.co/ue3QhEh3pS | $AMD $MSFT $T $QQQ $SPX $SPY $ING $GLE $NFLX $DB $BABA $RIVN $NIO $AMD $PACW $PENN $LCID #AEX $NCLH $QQQ $SAVE $SOFI $MARA $AAL $NVO $DIS $AMZN $JPM $CCL $TSLA #CAC #DAX $AMZN $AMC $SPY $AAPL $META $TEAM $X…
— 🇫🇷 🇪🇺 🇩🇪 European Investors News 💯🇩🇪 🇨🇰 (@EuropeanTraders) February 7, 2024
Christians have a duty “to follow the example of Jesus, who, throughout the Bible, focuses his love and care on the most vulnerable and marginalised people in society”, the Bishop of Chelmsford, Dr Guli Francis-Dehqani, has said.
She was writing in The Daily Telegraph on Monday in response to comments from senior political figures — including two former Home Secretaries, Suella Braverman and Dame Priti Patel — who have questioned the involvement of churches and members of the clergy in the asylum process.
The subject came to the fore after it was reported that the suspect in last week’s alkali attack in Clapham, south-west London, submitted that he had converted to Christianity before his asylum claim was approved (News, 2 February). The suspect, Abdul Shokoor Ezedi, is an Afghan national who is believed to have arrived illegally in the UK in 2016 and to have received support from church communities for his application to settle in the country.
Read it all (registration or subscription).
Bishop challenges former Home Secretaries’ talk of churches’ ‘facilitating’ bogus asylum claims https://t.co/TMxbAqT8IE
— Simon Sarmiento (@simonsarmiento) February 6, 2024
Russia’s electoral authority has moved to ban the only anti-war candidate, who has garnered more support than anticipated, from running against Vladimir Putin in presidential elections in March.
The Central Election Commission found a 15 per cent error rate in the signatures collected by the campaign of Boris Nadezhdin, he wrote on Telegram on Monday. This exceeds the five per cent threshold that is allowed under electoral rules for a candidate to be registered.
While a final decision about his candidacy is due on Wednesday, the error rate and a smear campaign in state-controlled media highlighted the Kremlin’s concern about the unexpected show of support for the 60-year-old pacifist.
Russia moves to ban presidential candidate from running against Vladimir Putin https://t.co/zoM3SkWxPm
— Dan Azzi (@dan_azzi) February 6, 2024
First popularised by a 2017 article in Cosmopolitan magazine, it describes a casual romance between two people that has some of the hallmarks of a formal relationship but without the commitment.
Dating experts say situationships are the natural result of apps such as Tinder, which make it easier for those seeking convenience rather than commitment. And big brands are attempting to capitalise on the trend.
Ahead of February 14, the US makers of Sweethearts — a treat similar to the Love Hearts sold in the UK — released “Situationships” boxes with the usual loved-up messages such as “true love” and “only you” printed in a blurry font.
The Spangler Candy Company said it wanted to “speak to all the people out there in hard-to-read relationships”, and judging by the sales there are plenty of customers. A limited first run of the sweets went on sale last month and was snapped up in four minutes, while another batch made available on Thursday also quickly sold out.
Read it all (subscription).
'“The ambiguous territory that lies between friendship and a committed relationship offers a preferable alternative to the stark solitude of being entirely single and alone.”
Chan said this apprehension has led to the creation of new terms such as “hesidating” and “Foda” (fear…
— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) February 5, 2024
What the families want is atonement. When something goes wrong, there is a need, buried deep within the human psyche, or even deep within the structure of the universe, for atonement — for someone to pay a price for what has happened.
And this is what the families need: some kind of atonement for what has been done wrong. They long for some sign of remorse, repentance even, on behalf of those who bear responsibility. Yet it does not come. The serried ranks of smart suits remain silent — maybe understandably so in this setting, but, without that sign, the pain continues.
There is deep anger about the fire brigade’s advice — families were told to stay in their flats until the firefighters put out the fire — without which, it seems, many of those who died would still be alive today. There is equally deep anger about the cladding draped around the building a few years before, which was dangerously flammable. It was the combination of these two factors which led to the deaths of their loved ones.
Who will atone for the wrongs of Grenfell?
More than six years since the tragedy, no one has yet admitted responsibility, writes @gtomlinhttps://t.co/1V4lJDUI46
— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) February 2, 2024
The global footprint of criminal groups from China1 has expanded along with China’s economic and geopolitical presence around the world. North America’s fentanyl crisis thrust China-linked criminal networks and their expanding international connections, such as with the Sinaloa Cartel, to U.S. policy forefront.
However, the scope of organized crime from China extends far beyond global drug trafficking and money laundering. Internationally, Chinese criminal groups engage in poaching and wildlife trafficking, cybercrime, and elaborate fraud and scams, also featuring people trafficking and enslavement. Long experienced in illegally bringing people to the United States and Canada, criminal networks from China have intensified activities at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Chinese fishing vessels, often illegally devastating protected marine areas and other countries’ exclusive economic zones, can facilitate drug trafficking and serve as the Chinese government’s maritime militia proxies in extraterritorial claims and military confrontations. They can also augment Chinese espionage around the world.
China-linked criminal networks in 2024 are likely to expand their geographic reach and deep role in various illegal economies.
Read more from @VFelbabBrown @Diana_Paz99 & Vibha Bajji:https://t.co/dNlE3qnpUg
— Brookings Foreign Policy (@BrookingsFP) February 2, 2024
For Belinda Mosby, the nightmares started in March.
Mosby had been working at Carelon Behavioral Health, one of the new 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline hotline centers in New Hampshire, for two months. When Mosby started the job in January 2023, she said she was enthusiastic. After 25 years working in the mental health industry as a prison behavioral health specialist, substance abuse counselor and mobile crisis responder, she knew how dire the crisis was. She also said she knew she could help.
“I’m 25 years of preparing for this,” Mosby told ABC News of her thinking at the time.
But quickly, she said she felt overwhelmed. Callers were in such severe distress, she told ABC News. Call after call, Mosby said she began to feel a discomfort set in that she couldn’t shake.
As 988 centers struggle to hire, burnout plagues some crisis staff.
Data obtained by @ABC News found that, in some states such as Oklahoma and Colorado, more than one-third of employees left within months of taking their first call. https://t.co/9wAjHSUZxB
— ABC News (@ABC) February 1, 2024
Black Swan author Nassim Nicholas Taleb said the US deficit is swelling to a point that it would take a miracle to reverse the damage.
“So long as you have Congress keep extending the debt limit and doing deals because they’re afraid of the consequences of doing the right thing, that’s the political structure of the political system, eventually you’re going to have a debt spiral,” he said Monday night at an event for Universa Investments, the hedge fund firm he advises. “And a debt spiral is like a death spiral.”
Taleb defined the ballooning debt load as a “white swan,” a risk that’s more probable than a surprise “black swan” event. While he didn’t identify specific outcomes in markets, he did say white swans include both the US deficit and an economy that’s far more vulnerable to shocks than in prior years.
The reason for that, he said, is that the world is far more interconnected due to globalization, with issues in one region able to ricochet around the world.
Black Swan author Nassim Nicholas Taleb says as long as you have a government continually extending the debt limit and doing deals because they're afraid of the consequences of doing the right thing, then eventually you're going to have a debt spiral. https://t.co/pQFrtVNqus
— Ben Woodward, CFA (@BennettWoodman) January 31, 2024
Less than a third of Americans say they would be willing to vote for someone nominated by their party who is over the age of 80 or has been charged with a felony or convicted of a felony by a jury. Somewhat more, but still less than half of Americans, say they would consider backing someone nominated by their party who is a socialist….
Should Biden and Trump emerge as their parties’ presidential nominees this year (as they are on track to do, by virtue of their dominance in their respective primary fields), voters would face a choice between two of the most objectionable characteristics to Americans of those measured — someone who has been charged with a felony (Trump) and someone who is older than 80 (Biden).
An analysis of the responses of those answering both of these questions suggests that a slight majority of Americans (52%) would be unperturbed by the choice between Biden and Trump. These individuals indicate they would be comfortable voting for either someone who is over 80 (23%) or who has been charged with a felony (21%), or would feel comfortable with both types of candidates (8%).
On the other hand, 43% of respondents asked about voting for someone over 80 and someone charged with a felony say they would not vote for either type of candidate, while the remaining 5% are unsure about both.
Americans express broad willingness to vote for candidates from several gender, racial and religious backgrounds that largely haven’t been represented in the White House.https://t.co/W6JC0DaFFo
— GallupNews (@GallupNews) January 27, 2024
I will take comments on this submitted by email only to KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com.
It looked like a military campaign. The farmers called it “Operation Paris Siege,” while the French interior minister ordered an “important defensive system” to protect the capital and its airports.
On Monday, angry agriculturalists and their allies deployed their tractors in an attempt to surround Paris, choking major roadways and disrupting not only traffic and trade, but also politics and normal life.
Farmers are emerging as the protest movement of the moment. In multiple countries across Europe, they have been driving their combines and harvesters into the streets to oppose cuts to subsidies and new regulations, some of them designed to reduce climate-changing emissions.
France, of course, is deeply familiar with protests. But as Paris prepares to host the Olympics this summer, and as the country’s ruling political centrists gird for a challenge from the far right in European Parliament elections, the farmer protests have the potential to be particularly destabilizing.
French farmers deployed their tractors to choke major highways, disrupting not only trade and traffic, but also politics and normal life, to protest subsidy cuts and new regulations. https://t.co/I0TVeKa6aq
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) January 30, 2024