Senior hospital doctors have gone on strike for the first time since 2012, leading to the postponement of tens of thousands of appointments. NHS executives say the 48-hour walkout will be even more disruptive than other strikes, as many junior medical staff will be unable to work without supervision from experienced consultants. Rishi Sunak has criticised the EU for referring to the Falkland Islands by their Argentinian name, "Islas Malvinas", in a joint statement signed by Latin American countries. A spokesman for the PM says Brussels has since clarified that its position on the Falklands has not changed. An escaped lioness is believed to be on the loose in Berlin. Residents of the city's southwestern outskirts have been urged to stay inside after reports emerged of a big cat chasing a wild boar through a wooded area. |
Eisenhower: a champion of America's engagement with the world. Getty |
US voters will decide Ukraine's fate |
When I interviewed Joe Biden on CNN recently, says Fareed Zakaria in The Washington Post, I asked why he was seeking another term as president, rather than letting a younger generation of Democrats take over. He responded by speaking "solely about foreign policy", saying he wanted to continue tackling the challenge to the world order from autocracies like China, Russia and Iran. The stakes are certainly high: for the first time since World War II, the "basic issue" of America's leading role in geopolitics is becoming a partisan one. Polls show that support for Ukraine and Nato is far higher among Democrat voters than Republicans; 60% of Democrats think the US should be "active in world affairs" compared to just 29% of Republicans. Many of the American right's most powerful figures, among them Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis and Tucker Carlson, are noted isolationists. |
In a way, the Republican Party is "returning to its roots". It bitterly opposed America's entry into World War II until Pearl Harbor. And even after the war, Dwight Eisenhower offered not to run against Robert Taft, "the leading Republican of his day", for the 1952 GOP presidential nomination – as long as Taft endorsed Nato. Taft refused, so Eisenhower ran, and went on to be president, to preserve US engagement with the world. Alas, "there is no Eisenhower to redirect the Republican Party today", and the biggest risk to the international order may lie not in Ukraine or the Taiwan Strait, "but rather on the campaign trail in the United States". |
🇺🇸 Rarely has a US presidential election contained such "divergent possible outcomes for the state of the world", says Edward Luce in the FT. If Biden is re-elected, the world can expect some continuity in US foreign policy until 2028. If Trump, the likely Republican nominee, returns to power in 2025, it could "destroy Western unity". |
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TikTokers are going wild for the "wrong shoe" trend, says Vogue: basically, choosing the most unlikely footwear possible to go with your outfit. It started off rather subdued, like pairing a feminine summer dress with chunky New Balance trainers. Celebs including Elle Fanning and Jennifer Lawrence took it up a notch at the Cannes Film Festival, accessorising sharp tailoring and massive ball gowns with poolside flipflops. So this winter, prepare to wear "padded après ski-chic boots" to work with a "girlboss skirt suit", or a bodycon dress on a night out with some "gardening-friendly mules". |
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"Expensive dentistry, designer manbags and more corporate gobbledygook than an episode of Succession," says Henry Deedes in the Daily Mail. "Welcome back folks to Tony Blair's ludicrously titled 'Future of Britain' jamboree... a merry-go-round of smugness and self-importance." During Keir Starmer's inevitable speech, the audience "slipped into a gentle coma", says Tim Stanley in The Daily Telegraph, until Blair joined him on stage for a chat. With "mad eyes, white hair and alarming teeth", Blair at 70 looks as if he has been "raised from his tomb after a bunch of teenagers, sheltering from a storm, found an ancient book beneath a floorboard and read from it backwards". Still, the "master of the dark arts" proved as compelling as ever. And giving Starmer his blessing won't hurt. |
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An elderly rhesus macaque. Frank Bienewald/Getty |
Injecting a protein naturally produced by the kidneys into elderly brains could reverse mental decline, says Ars Technica. In a recent study, Yale boffins injected old monkeys with the "Klotho" protein, named after the ancient Greek goddess "responsible for spinning the thread of life". A single jab gave the primates a two-week boost in memory function, indicating a "promising avenue" for tackling cognitive decline in aging humans. |
Gen Zs getting married. Getty |
Gen Z may save the Tories |
Popular opinion among political types is that "you're more likely to find a red squirrel than a young Tory in London these days", says Imogen Sinclair in The New Statesman. Writing in the FT, data whizz John Burn-Murdoch suggests millennials – those between 25 and 40 – are the "least conservative" generation in recorded British history. Critics and supporters of the Tories alike talk of the "extinction" of the party, beginning at the next election. "I wouldn't be so sure." Those forecasting the Conservatives' demise ignore that first-time voters – those born in the late 1990s and early 2000s – are nowhere near as left-wing as millennials. |
Young people aren't enticed by the "classical liberal orthodoxy" of the 1990s and 2010s. Their economics isn't the free market kind, but "Tory in the Disraelian sense": preferring domestic production to imports, and prioritising "respect for the dignity of labour". Even more distinctive is the Gen Z attitude towards cultural questions. They avoid casual sex; some go to church; many find the "messy millennial approach" to life and love "cringeworthy". Plenty of youngsters long for marriage and "parochial life", and think that the state should support families and encourage them to stay together, with as many babies as they can afford. If Tory doom-mongers took a step back, they'd see that chasing millennials is a pointless exercise. "Rather than disappearing, like paganism did as Christianity spread through the Roman Empire, conservatism may find itself rejuvenated by Generation Z." |
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Probably better on a big screen: Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer |
Only 30 cinemas in the world have the right kit to project the new Oppenheimer movie in full IMAX glory, says The Wall Street Journal. So cinephiles are having to go the distance if they want to see the blockbuster as director Christopher Nolan intended. One film buff in Milwaukee is taking the day off work to drive five hours to the nearest IMAX cinema screening the movie with a "perfect 1.43:1 aspect ratio"; another is considering a nine-hour drive from North Carolina to Indiana. Europeans don't have it any easier: Anderson Souza plans to fly from Lisbon to London for the same reason. As one fan puts it: "Some people go to synagogue or to church, I go to IMAX." |
Lord Palmer, who has died aged 71, came from a family that made its money in biscuits, says The Times's Patrick Kidd on Twitter. In 2021, he secured a debate in the Lords on food waste, in which his sole contribution was: "Sell-by dates are far too cautious. I remember once eating a biscuit that was 20 years old. It was perfectly edible." |
It's the newly opened Surat Diamond Bourse building, which has just stolen the Pentagon's title as the world's largest office. The sprawling 15-storey complex is built across more than 35 acres in north India's Gujarat state, and its nine interconnected structures can accommodate more than 65,000 workers in Surat's diamond trade. The £300m project also has 131 lifts, and nine courtyards complete with water fountains for socialising. |
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"Many people would sooner die than think. In fact, they do." Bertrand Russell |
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