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China with its axis of authoritarians is only growing stronger under Trump
As Donald Trump prepares to depart for China to meet Xi Jinping, it is a moment for America’s traditional allies to reflect on a sobering fact: the balance of power is rapidly shifting against the United States. Since becoming president, Trump’s actions have fractured America’s alliance system just as Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin have consolidated theirs. As if to underscore this, the Russian president will likely arrive in Beijing days after Trump. His will be a red carpet welcome. Donald Trump’s will be far more exposing – and we all know why. Instead of a mighty demonstration of American firepower, his Iran war has exposed huge vulnerabilities. And less discussed but no less consequentia… |
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5 year old girl swept into ocean off Laguna Beach is identified and mourned
The body of a 5-year-old girl who was swept into the ocean with her family in Laguna Beach before vanishing in dangerously high surf has been recovered. The girl’s body was spotted during an aerial coastline survey about 1:30 p.m. Thursday near Christmas Cove, about a quarter of a mile away from where she was initially lost at Treasure Island Beach, the city announced in a news release. The child was later identified as Amada Mia Brown of San Bernardino, said Sgt. Lizbeth Gwisdalla of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department. Amada’s father, Aaron Brown, described his daughter as full of life and “a sweet little baby” in an interview with NBC. “She loved the beach and she wasn’t afraid of wate… |
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Why is Iran bombing Gulf states while avoiding US naval assets and Israel
As the United States escalates its strikes on Iran, Tehran is hitting back, targeting military and civilian infrastructure across the Gulf states and Jordan while avoiding attacks on US naval assets deployed near its coast and on Israel – a strategy that analysts say is intended to pressure US President Donald Trump without expanding the scope of the war. While Washington has struck railway stations, power facilities, telecommunications networks and drinking-water infrastructure in Iran, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has responded by attacking civilian airports and water and power stations in Kuwait and Bahrain. Military analysts said there’s a logic to this strategy. Targetin… |
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Is A Human Journey To Mars Feasible
For more than half a century, Mars has functioned less as a destination than as a promise. It is the place we gesture toward when Earth feels politically exhausted, environmentally strained, or philosophically cramped. Mars is invoked when budgets swell, when rockets roar, when speeches reach for grandeur. It has become the cosmic equivalent of a clean slate, a second chapter written in rust-red dust. But promises are easy to make when they sit 225 million kilometers away. The idea of sending humans to Mars has migrated from science fiction to press release to business plan, and now to something like cultural assumption. The question is no longer “Should we?” but “When?” That shift alone sho… |
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How the fight for public land around Los Angeles hinges on saving one parcel at a time
Over the last year, activists have organized droves of people across the United States to protest and petition Congress over concerns that the Trump administration will sell off our most beloved outdoor spaces. We’ve worried about general threats to public lands, such as whether the 700,000-acre Angeles National Forest or the 150,000-acre Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area will remain pristine protected landscapes. We’ve also seen specific examples of what activists have cautioned could happen: a large mining operation that could open just outside Joshua Tree National Park and a large housing development proposed at the border of Yosemite National Park. And although that attenti… |
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AI companies accused of copyrighted infringement
Opinion | Editorial The open letter signed by Scarlett Johansson and hundreds of other creatives didn’t land because it was polite. It landed because it said the quiet part out loud: training commercial AI systems on copyrighted work without permission is theft dressed up as inevitability. The industry has spent years insisting this was a philosophical debate about progress. It isn’t. It’s a business choice—and a corrosive one. The letter, organized through the Human Artistry Campaign, rejects the soothing language that has insulated AI companies from accountability. “Learning,” “absorption,” “transformation.” These words are doing legal work, not descriptive work. They exist to blur a simpl… |
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Kids Used To Walk Home Alone
It was late afternoon when the school doors opened and the children spilled into the street like a sudden bright tide. Their uniforms flashed white and blue in the sun, their voices rose and fell in quick laughter, and in a moment the quiet pavement was alive with movement. Some mounted bicycles that seemed almost too large for them; others set off on foot in loose wandering groups, swinging their schoolbags as though the weight of the day had already been forgotten. My daughter stood beside me watching them. She is seven years old, an age at which the world is still full of small astonishments. A stray cat slipping beneath a plastic chair can hold her attention as firmly as any grand specta… |
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Nvidia CEO Huang denies he is unhappy with OpenAI says 'huge' investment planned
Business TAIPEI, Jan 31 : Nvidia plans to make a "huge" investment into OpenAI, probably its largest ever, CEO Jensen Huang said on Saturday, denying he was unhappy with the ChatGPT maker. The chipmaker in September announced plans to invest up to $100 billion in OpenAI, a deal that would give OpenAI the cash and access it needs to buy advanced chips that are key to maintaining its dominance in an increasingly competitive landscape. The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that the plan had stalled after some inside the chip giant expressed doubts about the deal. The report said Huang had privately underlined to industry associates in recent months that the original $100 billion agreement … |
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Former lieutenant governor of Virginia kills wife and himself
Virginia’s former lieutenant governor, Justin Fairfax, has shot and killed his wife before taking his own life in an apparent murder-suicide, according to authorities in the United States. The 47-year-old politician and his wife, 49-year-old dentist Cerina Fairfax, were found dead in their home in the Washington, DC, suburb of Annandale in northern Virginia. Their teenage son called the police shortly after midnight to report the crime. Fairfax County Police Chief Kevin Davis said on Thursday that the incident appears to have been related to the couple’s ongoing divorce. “It’s very sad for this community,” Davis said. “A lot of people who know the Fairfax family. Everybody’s shocked. We’re s… |
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Trump and US officials targeted by accused shooter
WASHINGTON — Federal authorities are investigating what they describe as a targeted attack near the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner after a man opened fire Saturday evening outside the secured perimeter of the event, prompting a rapid response from Secret Service agents and other law enforcement. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said Sunday that investigators believe the suspect intended to target President Donald Trump and members of his administration who were attending the annual dinner, one of Washington’s highest-profile political gatherings. According to Blanche, the suspect traveled from California to Washington, D.C., by train, passing through Chicago along the way… |
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Oil prices are skyrocketing but companies will not rush to drill in California
If you are an oil producer with wells in California and global oil prices have risen to over $100 a barrel in the last week, are you going to drill new wells? It’s a question that touches the lives of hundreds of thousands of Californians who either live near oil wells or receive royalty checks as mineral rights owners. Experts said probably not, given this state’s aging fields and the unpredictability of global prices. It’s too early for data that will show if companies have ordered more drilling rigs on their fields — known as the rig count — since the U.S. and Israel invaded Iran and sent oil prices soaring. But analysts and producers say only if prices stay above $80 for at least a year … |
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The Lost Promise of MSN News
There was a time when MSN felt like a gateway to the world. It offered curated access to reporting, a sense of connection to serious journalism, and the promise that a portal could simplify the chaos of the internet. For many readers, MSN was the homepage that greeted them each morning—a digital front page that seemed to carry authority. But that promise has been abandoned. What remains today is a hollowed-out shell of journalism, a site that has traded substance for tricks, rewrites, and endless clickbait. The decline of MSN is not just a story about one portal—it is a warning about what happens when corporate media prioritizes ad impressions over trust. The Mechanics of Decline The tactics… |
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US Secret Service opens fire on shooter near White House
The US Secret Service fired fire at a shooter near the White House, injuring him and causing a short lockdown. The incident occurred on Monday and the Washington DC Metropolitan Police Department has initiated an investigation. The incident follows an alleged attempt to assassinate United States President Donald Trump at the White House journalists' luncheon last month. Secret Service Deputy Director Matthew Quinn said the incident happened after plainclothes officers recognized a “suspicious individual” they suspected was armed. Agents chased the man a short distance and asked for assistance. When uniformed Secret Service personnel showed up there, the suspect tried to run, and they shot. A… |
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Michael Caine Biography
When Michael Caine led a squad of English gangsters to participate in an ambitious heist of gold from Italy in the film "Italian Job" (1969), it became another famous film of the 1960s. Later on, the film was recreated, and it became famous for the chase scenes that included Mini Coopers. Although he was born Maurice Joseph Micklewhite, he chose the stage name Michael Caine later in his career. With a voice that is distinctly associated with the working class, Michael Caine is widely considered to be one of the most famous English actors of the post-war era. He has appeared in more than one hundred films. On March 14, 1933, Michael Caine was born in Rotherhithe, which is located in London, E… |
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What Delay Looks Like When You are Absorbing the Cost
Halenews Editorial Delay is often described as prudence. From a distance, waiting can look reasonable, even wise. But distance matters. When you live close to the edge, delay is not neutral time—it is pressure. For families already stretched thin, rising energy prices are not a debate about markets; they are a calculation about heat. Flooding is not an environmental statistic; it is a ruined home. Healthcare access is not a policy disagreement; it is a postponed diagnosis that becomes irreversible. Those most affected by delay rarely appear in policy discussions except as data points. Their lives are summarized, averaged, and footnoted. Meanwhile, decisions are postponed to avoid political r… |
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LA Olympics chief Wasserman issues Maxwell apology but denies Epstein ties
Los Angeles 2028 Olympics chief Casey Wasserman has apologized for communicating with whom convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell more than 20 years ago, after the publication of a series of personal emails between the two. New files related to late financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, Maxwell’s former boyfriend, published by the United States Department of Justice on Friday, included flirtatious email exchanges between Wasserman, who was married at the time, and Maxwell dating from 2003. Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence after being found guilty in 2021 by a jury in New York on charges including sex trafficking of a minor. Epstein died in jail in 2019 while awaiting tr… |
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Back to the Future
Back to the Future is a 1985 science fiction film about teenager Marty McFly accidentally traveling back to 1955 and struggling to ensure his parents fall in love to preserve his own existence. • Rejected over 40 times: Co-writers Bob Gale and Robert Zemeckis had their script turned down by major Hollywood studios (including Disney, Columbia, and Universal) more than 40 times before it finally found a home at Amblin Entertainment. • "Spaceman from Pluto": Universal Pictures president Sid Sheinberg hated the original title and tried to rename the film "Spaceman from Pluto". Zemeckis and Gale saved the name after executive producer Steven Spielberg sent a memo pretending he thought Sheinberg's… |
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Trump says US will not allow Iran to reach enriched uranium
In an interview with the syndicated TV show Full Measure that aired on Sunday, Trump appeared to play down the significance of the uranium, which is believed to be buried under the rubble of nuclear facilities, remaining in Iran for now. “We’ll get that at some point, whenever we want. We have it surveilled,” Trump said. “I did a thing called Space Force, and they are watching. If somebody walked in, he could tell you his name, his address, the number of his badge … If anybody got near the place, we will know about it, and we’ll blow them up.” Iran’s highly enriched uranium is one of the major sticking points between Washington and Tehran in ceasefire negotiations to end the 10-week US-Israe… |
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Pope Leo not afraid of Trump and we should not be either
This is read by an automated voice. Please report any issues or inconsistencies here. “I’m not afraid.” With these three words Sunday morning, Pope Leo XIV offered as powerful a rebuke of President Trump and everything he has wrought on the world as anyone ever has. Three words to inspire all good people to fight against Trump — because if a mild-mannered man of God such as Leo isn’t afraid, no one should be. Pope Leo’s words thrilled me as an American—becauseially as a Catholic. His quiet, confident witness since becoming pontiff in May had already reignited a spiritual light in me to adhere closer to the faith I was brought up in. Rather than cower before a despot who makes the Pharaoh in … |
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Why Brad Pitt and Jude Law are not as cool as they think they are
The two actors and Oasis man Noel Gallagher have far younger partners and bask in it, thinking that it’s somehow avant-garde. But it’s not, says Charlotte Cripps. It’s just what older men have been doing since the dawn of time In case you’ve been living under a rock, Brad Pitt, 62, has a Swiss jewellery executive girlfriend, who is half his age – Ines de Ramon, 33. The couple graced social media in early July after four years together – on her hairstylist’s Instagram page – looking glamorous in matching black outfits ahead of Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s wedding ceremony at Madison Square Garden in NYC. They have since been spotted looking loved-up at the quarter-final World Cup match bet… |