Curated Compositions--29 Jul 23
Brian Rendell
Leadership | Education | Business | Logistics | Talent Acquisition & Development
This week in the news:
…among many other news items.
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NORTH AMERICA
Canadian wildfires burning land at record pace
Typically Canada's fire season moves west to east as summer progresses. Fires have burned across the country simultaneously this year, straining containment efforts. A Reuters survey of all 13 provinces and territories showed Canada employs around 5,500 wildland firefighters, not including the remote Yukon territory, which did not respond to requests for information. That's roughly 2,500 firefighters short of what is needed, said Mike Flannigan, a wildfire specialist and professor at Thompson Rivers University in British Columbia, in an interview with Reuters in June 2023. This year, record fires have resulted in Canada deploying armed forces personnel and more than 3,400 international firefighters, paid for by the provinces, to beef up its stretched crews.
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How California’s weather catastrophe turned into a miracle
Californians were preparing for another year of unrelenting drought in 2023. Instead, they got months of incessant rain and some of the heaviest snowfall they have ever seen. They feared blasts of spring warmth would quickly turn snow into floods, adding to the havoc from a series of winter storms. But, until recently, temperatures remained mercifully cool, allowing for a slow and steady melt. The result: A return of water to California that has erased drought maps, poured into long-dry irrigation systems and raised expectations that, after months with water bursting from their gates, reservoirs will end the summer melt filled to capacity. It has been a stark transformation, with arid landscapes and trickling rivers replaced with swollen lakes, gushing waterfalls and snow-covered mountaintops. Instead of pumping groundwater to keep crops alive, farmers have access to brimming canals carrying more water than they could use.
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Justice Department Sues Texas Over Floating Barrier in Rio Grande
The Justice Department filed suit on Monday against the State of Texas over its installation of a floating barrier meant to stop people from swimming across the Rio Grande, arguing that the interlocking buoys placed in the river by the state violated federal law. The suit comes after Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas, who heralded the installation of the 1,000-foot barrier this month, refused a request from the Justice Department to remove the buoys voluntarily, vowing instead to fight in court to keep them in place. Mr. Abbott has blamed President Biden for the large numbers of migrants crossing the border illegally. In the lawsuit over the buoy barrier, the federal government argues that Texas is in violation of a section of the federal Rivers and Harbors Appropriation Act that prohibits the placement of structures in waterways without federal approval.
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EUROPE
Spain's conservatives miss out on all-out victory as left celebrates
Spain has entered a phase of political uncertainty that could see the country return to the polls in just a few months. Sunday's snap election failed to produce a decisive winner. The conservative People's Party (PP) won the most seats but fell short of a parliamentary majority, even with the support of the far-right Vox party. Now, the conservatives and the incumbent Socialists will both separately try to form coalitions. PP leader Alberto Nú?ez Feijóo and his rival, Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, will each begin negotiations on Monday to try to head off a fresh vote, which might take place by the end of 2023.
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Brussels bombers found guilty after long murder trial
A court in Brussels has found six men guilty of terrorist murder, more than seven years after suicide bomb attacks killed 32 people at the city's airport and a metro station in March 2016. After a long trial and 19 days of jury deliberations, the court in Brussels returned their verdicts. Several of those on trial had already been convicted of taking part in the Paris terror attacks months earlier.
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Russia Strikes Danube Port, Escalating Attacks on Ukraine Grain Routes
Russia for the first time on Monday attacked a port on the Danube River in Ukraine, close to the Romanian border, Ukrainian and Romanian officials said, destroying a grain hangar in an escalation of its efforts to cripple Kyiv’s agriculture and risking a more direct confrontation with the United States and its European allies. The assault on the port in the town of Reni, across the river from Romania, a NATO member, targeted Kyiv’s alternative export routes for grain to reach world markets, days after Russia terminated a deal that had enabled Ukraine to ship its grain across the Black Sea. The attack is the closest Moscow has come to hitting the military alliance’s territory since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year.
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Ukraine launches new push, claims gains against Russians in south
Ukrainian forces have launched a new push in their counteroffensive against Russian invaders and made advances south of Orikhiv in the country’s Zaporizhzhia region, officials said Wednesday. Kyiv’s goal is to reach the Sea of Azov, which would sever Moscow’s land bridge to occupied Crimea, a key conduit for moving Russian troops, equipment and supplies into Ukraine. Ukrainian forces remain far from the sea, which lies about 60 miles south of Orikhiv, according to a Ukrainian official familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter.
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Ukraine’s Lack of Weaponry and Training Risks Stalemate in Fight With Russia
When Ukraine launched its big counteroffensive this spring, Western military officials knew Kyiv didn’t have all the training or weapons—from shells to warplanes—that it needed to dislodge Russian forces. But they hoped Ukrainian courage and resourcefulness would carry the day. They haven’t. Deep and deadly minefields, extensive fortifications and Russian air power have combined to largely block significant advances by Ukrainian troops. Instead, the campaign risks descending into a stalemate with the potential to burn through lives and equipment without a major shift in momentum. As the likelihood of any large-scale breakthrough by the Ukrainians this year dims, it raises the unsettling prospect for Washington and its allies of a longer war—one that would require a huge new infusion of sophisticated armaments and more training to give Kyiv a chance at victory. The political calculus for the Biden administration is complicated. President Biden is up for re-election in the fall of 2024 and many in Washington believe concerns in the White House about the war’s impact on the campaign are prompting growing caution on the amount of support to offer Kyiv.
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How Ukrainian DIY Drones Are Taking Out Russian Tanks
Since the Ukrainian counteroffensive began, there’s been a dramatic increase in Ukraine’s use of cheap FPV, or first-person-view drones, to execute kamikaze-style attacks on Russian tanks and large-scale weapons.
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Biden Administration Announces Additional Security Assistance for Ukraine
Today (25 Jul 23), the Department of Defense (DoD) announced additional security assistance to meet Ukraine’s critical security and defense needs. This authorization is the Biden Administration’s forty-third drawdown of equipment from DoD inventories for Ukraine since August 2021 as the U.S. government has continuously provided Ukraine with the weapons and equipment it needs for the battlefield. Today’s commitment in security assistance, valued at up to $400 million, includes additional air defense munitions, artillery and other ammunition, armored vehicles, anti-armor weapons, and other equipment to help Ukraine counter Russia’s ongoing war of aggression.
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Where Wildfires Are Raging in Europe and North Africa
Firefighters have scrambled to extinguish blazes in at least 10 countries as a heat wave has swept the Mediterranean region. Hundreds of wildfires have burned their way through Southern Europe and North Africa this week, with residents of nearby communities forced to flee the billowing smoke and advancing blazes. Firefighters in at least 10 countries in the region have mobilized firefighting planes and trucks to douse the blazes, which have blackened thousands of acres of land, consumed buildings and killed dozens of people. With the summer season typically a popular time for tourists, visitors to the region have also been caught up in the crisis as evacuations were ordered from some coastal resorts, seaside villages and islands. Some roads have also been closed and flights suspended. Stoking the flames is a recent heat wave that has seared the land and sent temperatures to sweltering highs — creating prime conditions for the blazes to take hold and spread.
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Paris to bring back swimming in Seine after 100 years
With a year to go to the Olympics, Paris is in the final phase of a historic clean-up which will soon see swimmers and divers back in the River Seine. Banned for a century because of the filthy water, city swimming is set to be one of the major legacies of the Games thanks to a €1.4bn (￡1.2bn; $1.6bn) regeneration project universally hailed as a success. Not only are three Olympic and Paralympic events - triathlon, marathon swimming and Para-triathlon - scheduled to take place in the Seine in central Paris, but by 2025 three open-air swimming areas will be accessible from the quayside.
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MIDDLE EAST
Israel Votes to Limit Supreme Court Powers in Approving Part of Netanyahu’s Judicial Overhaul, Sparking Mass Protests
Israel’s Parliament passed a divisive judicial overhaul, defying months of protests and plunging the country further into a political crisis that has exposed rifts over its identity and raised fears about its national security. The law’s passage on Monday by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition—without any opposition support—marks a pivotal juncture for Israeli society, setting up a potential showdown with the country’s Supreme Court, the institution whose power the law was designed to curb. It presents a decisive moment for thousands of military reservists who have said they would quit and the business, union leaders and medical professionals who have threatened mass work stoppages. Voting in favor of the bill were Netanyahu’s entire coalition of 64 lawmakers, widely viewed as the most right wing, nationalist and religious in the country’s 75-year history. They cheered the law, which takes away the Supreme Court’s ability to nullify government decisions it finds “unreasonable in the extreme”—a concept they said was nebulous and allowed liberal judges to overturn the will of an increasingly right-wing electorate. It is the first in a series of laws the coalition wants to pass to limit the power of the court system. Next up is a bill that would give lawmakers more power to select judges—a move that is more contentious than the bill passed on Monday. It could be voted on in the fall.
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And in response..:
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Israeli Supreme Court to Hear Challenge to Judicial Overhaul
Israel’s Supreme Court said Wednesday that it would hear a petition challenging the constitutionality of a judicial overhaul law enacted earlier this week, setting up a possible showdown between the court and the government. The court, however, didn’t issue an immediate injunction, as petitioners had requested. Nongovernmental organizations and others filed petitions asking Israel’s highest court to overturn the law, which is akin to a constitutional amendment that does away with the court’s power to strike down government decisions it determines are extremely unreasonable. Rejecting such a quasi-constitutional law is something the Supreme Court has never done, but is now under public pressure to do. The court set a preliminary hearing, which will be heard by one justice, for September.
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Israel-Lebanon border tension raises fears of bloody escalation
Recent months have seen a growing number of incidents at the so-called Blue Line, the United Nations-patrolled boundary that separates Israel and the occupied Golan Heights from Lebanon. The UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, Unifil, says both Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah have carried out multiple breaches of international commitments at the line and beyond. And there have been more serious moments still - including rocket fire into Israel by Palestinian militants in Lebanon who have Hezbollah's backing, and Israeli artillery fire back over the wire. In recent months Israel has complained to the United Nations that Hezbollah has placed tents close to the boundary. One was on the Israeli side of the line on the occupied Golan Heights, in breach of UN resolutions, under which the group is also supposed to have disarmed. Lebanese officials in turn point to breaches by Israel, including fighter jet overflights of its territory.
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125 tombs found after chance discovery of ancient Roman-era cemetery in Gaza
Archaeologists in Gaza have unearthed at least 125 tombs, many with skeletons inside, and two lead sarcophagi at a 2,000-year-old Roman cemetery discovered there by chance last year. The narrow coastal strip has a rich history as a trading hub dating back to the ancient Egyptians through the crusades, but conflict and impoverishment in the Palestinian territory under Israeli blockade, home to around 2 million people, have hindered efforts to find and safeguard archaeological treasures.
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AFRICA
Niger military council takes over, US sees room for diplomacy
Leaders of a coup in Niger declared General Abdourahamane Tiani as the new head of state on Friday days after saying they had ousted President Mohamed Bazoum in the seventh military takeover in West and Central Africa in less than three years. African countries, Western powers and regional and international organizations have voiced support for Bazoum and called for democracy to be restored. Some officials suggested the outcome was not yet final. France's Foreign Minister Catherina Colonna explicitly referred to it as an "attempted coup" on Friday, while White House national security spokesman John Kirby said there was still room for intra-African diplomacy.
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Military mutiny in Niger comes after string of coups across region
Rebel soldiers in Niger announced the ouster of the country’s Western-allied president, Mohamed Bazoum, on Wednesday night, after imprisoning him in his palace. The coup attempt comes amid a backdrop of political upheaval, a rise in Islamist extremism and growing Russian influence across the region. f successful, Bazoum’s overthrow would add Niger to a growing list of junta-led countries, including Burkina Faso, Chad, Guinea, Mali and Sudan, that create a geographical belt of turmoil across the continent. Niger has been a key ally to the United States, which has deployed about 800 troops at a time to the country and operates drones out of a military base in Agadez. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken confirmed communication with Bazoum and the Niger government on Wednesday and said that officials “condemn any efforts to seize power by force.” U.S. laws prohibit military aid to junta regimes, and it is unclear what repercussions the ongoing events will have on U.S. military activity in the country.
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ASIA
UN in communication with North Korea over detained US soldier
The United Nations Command (UNC) and North Korea have begun discussing the case of Travis King, the American soldier who crossed into the North last week, the deputy commander of the United States-led command that oversees the Korean Armistice Agreement said on Monday. King, a US Army private serving in South Korea, sprinted into North Korea on July 18 while on a tour of the Demilitarized Zone on the inter-Korean border.
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Both Koreas mark 70th armistice anniversary in two different ways that highlight rising tensions
The truce that stopped the bloodshed in the Korean War turns 70 years old on Thursday and the two Koreas are marking the anniversary in starkly different ways, underscoring their deepening nuclear tensions. North Korea has invited delegations from China and Russia as it prepares to stage huge celebrations with thousands of citizens who have rehearsed for months to commemorate the armistice it sees as a victory in the “Grand Fatherland Liberation War.” The festivities are likely to be capped by a giant military parade in the capital, Pyongyang, where leader Kim Jong Un could showcase his most powerful, nuclear-capable missiles designed to target neighboring rivals and the U.S. mainland. The mood is more somber in South Korea, where President Yoon Suk Yeol has invited dozens of foreign war veterans to honor the fallen soldiers of the 1950-53 conflict, which killed and injured millions and set the stage for decades of animosity among the Koreas and the United States.
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China replaces foreign minister Qin after mysterious absence
China named veteran diplomat Wang Yi its new foreign minister on Tuesday, removing former rising star Qin Gang after a mysterious one-month absence from duties barely half a year into the job. Qin, 57, a former aide to President Xi Jinping and envoy to the United States, took over the ministry in December but has not been seen in public since June 25 when he met visiting diplomats in Beijing. The ministry has said he was off work for health reasons without giving details, sparking speculation and drawing attention to the secrecy often surrounding China's Communist leadership and decision making.
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Top Chinese Leaders Say Economy 'Facing New Difficulties'
China's top leaders said the economy was facing "new difficulties and challenges" in a meeting of the 24-person Politburo on Monday. The country's highest-ranking officials gather annually at the end of July to review the economic situation before their traditional summer break in August. This year, they met as the post-COVID recovery in the world's second-largest economy was running out of steam, due in large part to sluggish consumer spending. "The meeting pointed out that the current economic operation is facing new difficulties and challenges, mainly due to insufficient domestic demand, operational difficulties for some enterprises, high risks and hidden dangers in key areas, and a complex and severe external environment," a readout of the meeting on state broadcaster CCTV said. The Politburo agreed Monday that China must "implement precise and effective macroeconomic regulation, strengthen countercyclical regulation and policy reserves," according to CCTV. The meeting, headed by President Xi Jinping, also called for efforts to expand domestic consumption and "adjust and optimize real estate policies in a timely manner," CCTV said.
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Exclusive: Beijing pushes for toning down of China risks in IPO prospectuses-sources
Beijing has asked law firms to tone down the language used to describe China-related business risks in Chinese companies' offshore listing documents, warning failure to do so could cost them regulatory green light for the IPOs, three people familiar with the matter said. The move, which not been reported before, is the latest in tightening scrutiny of Chinese companies' offshore listings, and comes at a time when Beijing is stepping up controls over cross-border transfer of sensitive information. The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) on July 20 met with local lawyers and asked them to refrain from including negative descriptions of China's policies or its business and legal environment in companies' listing prospectuses, the people said.
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BOJ loosens tight grip on rates as prices rise, markets bet on bigger pivot
T he Bank of Japan slowly shifted away from decades of massive monetary stimulus on Friday as inflation and economic growth picked up, allowing the country's interest rates to move more freely. In what some analysts said could be a seismic shift for global financial markets, the BOJ made it was making its bond yield control policy more flexible and loosened its defence of a long-term interest rate cap after a two-day policy meeting.
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Thaksin to Return From Exile Amid Thai Post-Election Chaos
Former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who has lived in self-imposed exile for 15 years, is set to return to the Southeast Asian nation next month, a move likely to add to the political chaos that’s gripped the country since a May general election. Thaksin, who turned 74 on Wednesday, will arrive in Bangkok on Aug. 10, his youngest daughter Paetongtarn Shinawatra, said in an Instagram post. She is among the three prime ministerial candidates of Thaksin-backed Pheu Thai Party, which is now leading the efforts of a pro-democracy coalition to form a new government and end a near decade-long military-backed rule.
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Expat Pay Packages Jump in Singapore, Drop in Hong Kong
The cost of expat pay packages in Singapore climbed 4% last year, while those for foreign workers in Hong Kong fell, according to a new study by expat consultancy ECA International. Total pay and benefits packages for average expat middle managers in Singapore rose to $258,762, mainly due to higher rental costs. The increase narrowed the gap with rival Hong Kong, which saw typical expat packages fall 2% to $278,020. Despite the drop in real terms, Hong Kong climbed three places to become the world’s fifth-most expensive place to send expat workers. Singapore sat at 16th place in the rankings. The top spot was retained by the UK, where the average package — comprising salary, tax and benefits such as accommodation, international schooling and utilities — amounted to $441,608, though salary only made up 18% of the total. Japan, India and China took spots two, three and four in the MyExpatriate Market Pay Survey global ranking.
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OCEANA
U.S., Allies Hold Record-Setting Military Exercise in Australia in Message Aimed at China
At this military firing range in Australia’s north, American jet fighters dropped 500-pound bombs on a hillside. Korean, Australian and American artillery units opened fire soon after. A Japanese surface-to-air missile system stood nearby. The demonstration over the weekend, which involved more than a dozen artillery pieces and aircraft firing for about an hour, helped to kick off a major two-week biennial training exercise involving the U.S. and its allies that officials say is the most expansive in the exercise’s history. The broader scope and increasing complexity of the exercise, called Talisman Sabre, reflect the latest U.S. planning as Washington seeks to deter Beijing from launching military action against Taiwan, which China claims as part of its territory. To do that, the U.S. is looking to bolster its network of alliances in the region, while improving the ability of the U.S. military to operate seamlessly with friendly nations. Some 30,000 troops will be involved in Talisman Sabre, as soldiers practice amphibious landings, ground maneuvers, air combat and maritime operations. The exercise will also focus on logistics, as the U.S. tests the capabilities required to rapidly deploy troops and equipment across the Pacific.
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SPACE
SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket launches massive EchoStar internet satellite
With an ever-increasing demand for internet access, EchoStar launched a powerful new communications satellite late Friday atop a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket that will deliver broadband service across nearly 80% of North and South America.
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GOVERNMENT
New Trump Indictment Says He Ordered Mar-a-Lago Camera Footage Deleted
Donald Trump and his aides sought to have surveillance footage from his Mar-a-Lago club deleted so it couldn’t be turned over to a grand jury, special counsel Jack Smith alleged Thursday in new charges related to the former president’s retention of classified documents after he left the White House. The new indictment also charges Carlos de Oliveira, a maintenance worker at Trump’s South Florida resort, making him the third defendant in the case. The additional charges broaden an indictment brought by a Florida grand jury in June alleging the former president held on to sensitive military secrets he knew he shouldn’t have retained access to, shared them with others and directed his staff to help him evade authorities’ efforts to get them back. And they come as Trump braces for separate federal charges over efforts to undo his 2020 election loss.
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IRS announces the end of most surprise taxpayer visits
The Internal Revenue Service announced Monday that it will no longer send its revenue officers on surprise visits to taxpayers’ homes and businesses, ending a decades-old practice for collecting overdue tax debts due to concerns about employee safety. IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel announced the policy change, which is effective immediately, on a call with reporters Monday morning. Although the practice by which unarmed IRS employees visit taxpayers to collect outstanding tax debts or investigate the unexpected absence of tax return filings has been in place since the 1950s, Werfel said the Inflation Reduction Act gave the agency an opportunity to assess its continuing usefulness.
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DEFENSE
Senate passes defense bill with bipartisan support, but clash looms with House over social issues
The Senate has passed a massive annual defense bill that would deliver a 5.2% pay raise for service members and keep the nation’s military operating, avoiding partisan policy battles with an overwhelmingly bipartisan vote. Senate passage, 86-11, sets up a clash with the House, which passed its own version of the annual defense bill along party lines earlier this month after pointed debates over social issues like abortion access and diversity initiatives. The sharply partisan arguments over the House legislation veered from a bipartisan tradition of finding consensus on national defense policy. The strong bipartisan vote for the legislation in the Senate Thursday evening, just before the Senate left for its August recess, could give it momentum as the two chambers next look to settle their differences in the fall.
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North Korea Unveils Look-Alike Global Hawk, Reaper Drones
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/interpreting-north-koreas-look-alike-global-hawk-reaper-drones ?
North Korea has unveiled two new drones that appear to be almost exact visual copies of the well-known U.S.-made RQ-4 Global Hawk and MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Its state media has also provided brief videos showing both of them in flight. While the precise capabilities of these North Korean drones remain very much unclear — they are certain to fall well short of their U.S. lookalikes — the fact that Pyongyang has been plowing resources into developing them does at least point to an increasing interest in advanced UAV designs for both surveillance and attack, as well as the ability to actually realize those interests. The designations of the North Korean drones remain unknown, and, for the meantime, they are being referred to as the “Global Hawk-type” and “Reaper-type.”
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Russian Fighter Damages Another US Drone, This Time Over Syria
A Russian fighter damaged a U.S. drone over Syria earlier this week, the top Air Force commander for the region said July 25, in the latest escalation between American and Russian aircraft. “Russian fighter aircraft flew dangerously close to a U.S. MQ-9 drone on a defeat-ISIS mission, harassing the MQ-9 and deploying flares from a position directly overhead, with only a few meters of separation between aircraft,” Air Forces Central (AFCENT) commander Lt. Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich said in a statement. “One of the Russian flares struck the U.S. MQ-9, severely damaging its propeller,” according to Grynkewich. “Fortunately, the MQ-9 crew was able to maintain flight and safely recover the aircraft to its home base.”
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Allvin nominated to be Air Force’s top officer
President Joe Biden has tapped Gen. David Allvin as his nominee to serve as the next Air Force chief of staff, the White House announced Wednesday. That puts Allvin, who has served as Air Force vice chief of staff since November 2020, in line to lead the service in the midst of a massive paradigm shift to prepare its troops and equipment for a new era of war.
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Air Force Dropping ‘Vice’ Commander Title; Now It’s ‘Deputy’
The Air Force is switching up how it refers to No. 2 officers for most of its organizations, moving away from the longstanding “vice commander” title to “deputy commander” at all levels from the major commands on down, the service announced. The change is effective August 1, and is being made to better align the Air Force with the terms used by the other military branches. The change doesn’t affect the overall service’s No. 2 officer, the Vice Chief of Staff. The MAJCOMs’ No. 2 designation changed from “vice” to “deputy” commanders in 2017. No new authorities are being granted to or withdrawn from those holding these positions, and the office symbol “CD” will replace “CV” as the shorthand designation for deputy commanders.
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ECONOMY
U.S. Economy Grew at 2.4% Rate in Second Quarter
Gross domestic product, adjusted for inflation, rose at a 2.4 percent annual rate in the second quarter, the Commerce Department said Thursday. That was up from a 2 percent growth rate in the first three months of the year and far stronger than forecasters expected a few months ago. Consumers led the way, as they have throughout the recovery from the severe but short-lived pandemic recession in 2020. Spending rose at a 1.6 percent rate, slower than in the first quarter but still solid. Much of that growth came from spending on services, as consumers shelled out for vacation travel, restaurant meals and Taylor Swift tickets. Consumers didn’t carry all the weight, however. Business investment rebounded in the second quarter after slumping in the first three months of the year, and increased spending by state and local governments contributed to growth.
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Inflation and Wage Growth Ease as Fed Considers Next Move
Pay and price pressures showed fresh signs of retreating from the economy, adding to evidence that inflation is moving closer to the Federal Reserve’s goal. Employers spent 4.5% more on wages and benefits in April to June from a year earlier, the Labor Department said Friday. That marked a slowing from a 4.8% increase the prior quarter. The employment-cost index, a measure of compensation growth closely watched by Fed officials, also posted its smallest quarterly increase in two years. The personal-consumption expenditures price index, the Fed’s preferred inflation measure, rose 3% in June from a year earlier, the Commerce Department said separately Friday, down from a 3.8% rise the prior month.
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Federal Reserve Raises Interest Rates to 22-Year High
The Federal Reserve resumed lifting interest rates Wednesday with a quarter-percentage-point increase that will bring them to a 22-year high. ?Fed Chair Jerome Powell said it was too soon to tell whether the hike would conclude a series of increases aimed at cooling the economy and bringing down inflation. The central bank would decide whether to keep lifting rates based on how the economy fares in the months ahead, “with a particular focus on making progress on inflation,” he said at a news conference. The unanimous decision to raise the benchmark federal-funds rate to a range between 5.25% and 5.5% follows a brief pause in increases last month. It marks the 11th rate rise since March 2022, when they lifted rates from near zero.
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Dow Notches Longest Winning Streak Since 1987
The last time the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed for 13 straight sessions, Paul Volcker was finishing his inflation fight at the Federal Reserve. Today was Jerome Powell’s turn. ?The blue-chip index on Wednesday notched a 13th consecutive advance for the first time since January 1987, rising as the Fed increased interest rates to a 22-year high.
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U.S. Economic Growth Accelerates, Defying Slowdown Expectations
Faster economic growth this spring raises the prospect of a longer postpandemic expansion despite the Federal Reserve pushing interest rates to a two-decade high. Gross domestic product grew at a seasonally- and inflation-adjusted 2.4% annual rate in the second quarter, the Commerce Department said Thursday. That was faster than economists expected and above the 2% growth in the first three months of the year. Consumer spending cooled but rose enough to drive overall growth alongside much stronger business investment in the second quarter. Those factors combined to buck economists’ earlier expectations that a downturn would start in the middle of this year due to higher interest rates. As inflation falls from historic highs and the labor market remains strong, solid growth adds to the prospect of a soft landing—in which inflation returns close to the Federal Reserve’s 2% target without a recession.
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What Fed Hikes? Much of America’s Consumer Debt Is Still Riding Ultralow Interest Rates
Americans locked in ultralow rates on debt such as mortgages and auto loans in the decade-plus that followed the 2008 financial crisis. Though rates on some loans such as credit cards are rising with the Fed’s hikes, a huge chunk of consumer debt carries the low yields on offer a few years ago. That has allowed many households to continue spending, which has kept the economy going strong despite predictions of a recession. The U.S. economy grew 2.4% in the second quarter, the Commerce Department said on Thursday. As of the first quarter, only 11% of outstanding household debt carried rates that fluctuated with benchmark interest rates, according to Moody’s Analytics. That metric has hovered around this historically low level for over a decade. But it only started to matter when the Fed began its campaign. ?Fixed-rate debt became more common after the 2008 crisis, when lenders turned away from products such as adjustable-rate mortgages and home-equity lines of credit that played a role in the bust. Households have also spent the past decade-plus loading up on auto and student loans, which typically carry fixed rates. The prevalence of fixed-rate debt is likely blunting the impact of the central bank’s moves. Economic growth and consumer spending remain mostly solid.
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Americans in Their Prime Are Flooding Into the Job Market
The core of the American labor force is back. Americans between 25 and 54 years of age are either employed or looking for jobs at rates not seen in two decades, a trend helping to counter the exodus of older baby boomers from the workforce. Economists define that age range as in their prime working years—when most Americans are done with their formal education, aren’t ready to retire and tend to be most attached to the labor force. In the first months of the pandemic, nearly four million prime-age workers left the labor market, pushing participation in early 2020 to the lowest level since 1983—before women had become as much of a force in the workplace. Prime-age workers now exceed prepandemic levels by almost 2.2 million. That growth is taking a little heat out of the job market and could help the Federal Reserve’s efforts to tamp down inflation by keeping wage growth in check.
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European Central Bank hikes interest rates to combat inflation and leaves door open to more
The European Central Bank raised interest rates for the ninth straight time Thursday in its yearlong campaign to stamp out painfully high inflation and kept the door open to further hikes despite increasing fears of recession. ECB President Christine Lagarde had all but promised the quarter-percentage point increase and said the bank’s next moves would be determined by what the data — including inflation and job numbers — will show. Inflation in the 20 countries that use the euro currency has fallen from its peak of 10.6% in October to 5.5% in June — still well above the bank’s target of 2% considered best for the economy.
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BUSINESS
UPS, Teamsters Reach Agreement on New Contract, Averting Strike
United Parcel Service and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters have reached an agreement over a five-year labor contract, preventing a potential strike by roughly 330,000 package-delivery drivers and package sorters. The UPS-Teamsters contract is the largest collective-bargaining agreement involving a private employer in North America, and a strike could have harmed the supply chains of many companies. UPS moves approximately 5% of the nation’s gross domestic product—or roughly $3.8 billion of goods every day, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. A dispute that was holding up negotiations in recent weeks was over wages for part-time workers. The Teamsters were seeking an hourly wage for part-time workers north of $20. Under the agreement, UPS would pay new part-time workers a wage of $21 an hour, the Teamsters said. Currently, starting part-time hourly wages are $16.20 and could be higher in places where there is more competition for labor. Existing workers would get a raise of $7.50 an hour over the life of the contract, including a $2.75-an-hour pay bump this year. Workers’ wages rose roughly $5.30 an hour in the five-year deal that runs through July 31.
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Trucker Yellow Prepares to File for Bankruptcy as Customers Flee
Trucking company Yellow is preparing to file for bankruptcy, according to people familiar with the matter, heightening the threat that one of the nation’s largest freight carriers will shut down as customers abandon it amid a cash crunch and union negotiations. A bankruptcy filing by Yellow would put it at high risk of a liquidation since its customers already have started to abandon the trucker in large numbers, some of the people said. The company could seek bankruptcy court protection as soon as this week, though no decision has been made and Yellow continues to explore other options, they said. Yellow has been losing thousands of shipments to other operators because of the risk that a labor dispute will disrupt its operations, according to equity analysts and industry executives. The company averted a planned strike this week by the Teamsters union that represents most of its workforce, but the customer exodus has continued. Yellow has seen freight volumes fall 80% in recent days, according to a research report Tuesday by TD Cowen.
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Twitter blue bird has flown as Musk says X logo is here
After 17 years with an iconic blue bird that came to symbolize the broadcasting of ideas to the world, billionaire Elon Musk renamed Twitter as X and unveiled a new logo, marking a focus on building an "everything app." On Monday, a stylized white X on a black background became the new logo on Twitter's website, though the blue bird was still seen on the mobile app. Since taking over Twitter in October, Musk has said he envisions an app that could offer a variety of services to users beyond social media, such as peer-to-peer payments, an idea that mirrors the widely popular WeChat app in China.
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Meta rallies as AI-powered ad sales drive 'monster' forecast
Meta (META.O) shares surged nearly 8% on Thursday as a rosy revenue forecast showed that artificial intelligence was helping the social media giant boost engagement and ad sales even in an uncertain economy. The Facebook owner was set to add about $60 billion to its market value after strong second-quarter earnings encouraged 18 analysts to lift their target price on a stock that has already more than doubled this year.
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Samsung unveils new foldable phones to challenge Apple's premium dominance
Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) unveiled its latest foldable smartphones on Wednesday, keeping prices around the same level three years in a row as it seeks to challenge Apple's (AAPL.O) dominance in the premium market. The world's largest smartphone maker pioneered the segment in 2019, betting that it would appeal to consumers looking for a bigger screen to consume content, while its foldable displays keep the overall phone size compact.
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Why Walmart is trouncing Amazon in the grocery wars
In bricks-and-mortar, Walmart’s lead is huge. It has the largest footprint in America, with about 4,700 outlets, compared with 530 Whole Foods, 44 Amazon Fresh and 22 Amazon Go shops. Grocery accounts for most of its sales, whereas for Amazon they are a sliver. Its “everyday low prices” work: a survey by MoffettNathanson, a research firm, found equivalent products at Amazon Fresh were far pricier. Walmart’s speed of delivery matches Amazon’s. What Amazon lacks in stores, it hopes to make up for in membership of its Prime loyalty programme, which is estimated at 170m in America, compared with about 22m for Walmart+. Eventually, it hopes that online grocery shopping, combined with three different formats—Whole Foods for posh nosh, Fresh for general grub and Go for grab-and-go—will enable customers to buy everything they need via a single app. Amazon has two other advantages: a whopping marketplace platform for third-party sellers, which adds to the range of products available on its website, and an advertising business with a hefty $38bn of revenues last year, which supplements its supermarket business. Yet because shoppers like to see, feel and smell their groceries before buying them, the scarcity of stores is a problem. Dean Rosenblum of Bernstein, a broker, calculates that Amazon Fresh is accessible to just over a third of Americans. In contrast, 90% of them live within ten miles (16km) of a Walmart. If Amazon opened 50 new Fresh stores a year, in a decade’s time it would reach only the size of Whole Foods’ current tally. And that would be a “near criminally irresponsible use of Amazon capital”, Mr Rosenblum says. That view is spreading. Terry Smith, a British fund manager, recently dumped his Amazon stock, arguing that its move into grocery retail risked misallocating capital.
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Ambassador: China Will Respond in Kind to US Chip Export Restrictions
If the United States imposes more investment restrictions and export controls on China's semiconductor industry, Beijing will respond in kind, according to China’s ambassador to the U.S., Xie Feng, whose tough talk analysts see as the latest response from a so-called wolf-warrior diplomat. Xie likened the U.S. export controls to "restricting their opponents to only wearing old swimsuits in swimming competitions, while they themselves can wear advanced shark swimsuits."
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TikTok Wants to Sell Made-in-China Goods to Americans
TikTok is launching an e-commerce business in the U.S. to sell made-in-China goods to consumers, stepping up its rivalry with popular shopping platforms Shein and Temu. The video-sharing platform will make the program available in its biggest market in early August, people familiar with the plan said, as it seeks to replicate the American success of the two China-founded rivals. ?Similar to Amazon.com’s “Sold by Amazon” program, TikTok will store and ship items—including clothes, electronics and kitchen gadgets—on behalf of manufacturers and merchants in China. It will also handle marketing, transactions, logistics and after-sale services.
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Why America’s Largest Tool Company Couldn’t Make a Wrench in America
The world’s largest tool company couldn’t figure out how to make a wrench. Stanley Black & Decker built a $90 million factory on the edge of Fort Worth, Texas, intending to burnish the Made-in-the-U.S.A. luster of the Craftsman brand by forging mechanics’ tools with unprecedented efficiency. But the automated system was a bust, and the tools that were supposed to be pumped out by the million are so hard to find that some consider them collector’s items. ?In March, 3? years after breaking ground, Stanley announced it was closing the factory. The property is now being advertised for sale. The Craftsman plant was a high-profile example of a drive among U.S. manufacturers to bring offshored plants back home. Government incentives and a desire to shorten supply chains have sparked a factory-building boom. The high cost of American labor makes automation critical for plants to turn a profit. Turning manual tasks over to machines, which are supposed to churn out goods with minimal human involvement and maximum productivity, poses its own challenges. The Craftsman factory’s first-of-its-kind system was supposed to make tools so efficiently that costs would be on par with China, but ex-employees said it had problems that couldn’t be fixed before the company decided to pull the plug.
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Staying ahead: How the best CEOs continually improve performance
After the heady first years in the job, CEOs must sustain momentum and high performance. Here are four ways to avoid complacency and create even more value.
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How to develop a problem-solving mindset
Leaders today are confronted with more problems, of greater magnitude, than ever before. In these volatile times, it’s natural to react based on what’s worked best in the past. But when you’re solving the toughest business challenges on an ongoing basis, it’s crucial to start from a place of awareness. “If you are in an uncertain situation, the most important thing you can do is calm down,” says senior partner Aaron De Smet, who coauthored Deliberate Calm with Jacqueline Brassey and Michiel Kruyt. “Take a breath. Take stock. ‘Is the thing I’m about to do the right thing to do?’ And in many cases, the answer is no. If you were in a truly uncertain environment, if you’re in new territory, the thing you would normally do might not be the right thing.” Practicing deliberate calm not only prepares you to deal with the toughest problems, but it enhances the quality of your decisions, makes you more productive, and enables you to be a better leader. Check out these insights to learn how to develop a problem-solving mindset—and understand why the solution to any problem starts with you.
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ENERGY
Shell's profits tumble 56% to $5 billion as energy prices cool
Shell (SHEL.L) on Thursday reported a 56% fall in second-quarter profit to $5 billion as oil and gas prices and refining profit margins fell, prompting the energy giant to slow its share repurchase programme. The earnings, which missed forecasts, follow bumper earnings in 2022 after energy prices surged in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but were in line with its second-quarter performance two years ago. Shell said it would repurchase $3 billion in shares over the next three months, down from $3.6 billion in the previous three, while raising its dividend to $0.33 per share as previously announced in June.
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REAL ESTATE
US commercial property delinquencies rise further in July, report says
Nearly $12 billon of loans in U.S. commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) became newly delinquent, pushing the late payment rate up by 34 basis points from June to 3.93%, a report by credit rating agency KBRA said on Wednesday. The rise in the rate reflects continued stress in the U.S. commercial real estate sector as a post-pandemic environment had more people working from home or shopping online. The total rate of delinquent loans or those that entered special servicing rose in July for the fourth straight month and now stands at 6.44%, the report said.
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US Office Space Is on Track to Shrink for First Time on Record
Office buildings are poised to set records for a bad reason this year: The amount of office space in the US is declining for what is likely the first time in history. A lack of new construction and a plethora of aging office space being repurposed or destroyed will lower the amount of office space, according to Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. Less than 5 million square feet (465,000 square meters) of new offices broke ground in the US so far this year, while 14.7 million square feet has been removed, often to be converted into buildings for other uses. That would mark the first net decline in data going back to 2000, JLL reported, adding that it’s most likely the first ever.
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Equity Improves For U.S Homeowners As Housing Market Boom Shows Signs Of Revival
ATTOM, a leading curator of land, property, and real estate data, today released its second-quarter 2023 U.S. Home Equity & Underwater Report, which shows that 49 percent of mortgaged residential properties in the United States were considered equity-rich in the second quarter, meaning that the combined estimated amount of loan balances secured by those properties was no more than half of their estimated market values. The portion of mortgaged homes that were equity-rich in the second quarter of 2023 increased from 47 percent in the first quarter of 2023, to the highest point in at least four years. With home prices rebounding across the U.S., the report found that the level of equity-rich mortgage-payers went up from the first quarter of 2023 to the second quarter of 2023 in 45 of the nation’s 50 states. Equity for U.S. homeowners improved in the second quarter as prices for single-family homes and condos nationwide rose throughout most of the country, reversing a market slowdown that had run from the middle of last year to the early part of this year. Nationwide, the median home value shot up 10 percent in the second quarter to yet another all-time high of $350,000, after dropping 7 percent over the prior three quarters.
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The Luxury Home Market Confronts Its New Reality: Not Enough Buyers and Sellers
Sales of luxury homes nationwide, defined as the top 5% of homes based on estimated market value, declined by 24.13% in the three months ended June 30, compared with the same period last year, according to a new report by brokerage Redfin. Inventory of luxury homes was down 2.39% during that same period, while the median sales price for a luxury home was up by 4.55%. In many metros, homeowners appear to have pulled back on listing homes in light of the market shift. New luxury listings were down by 17.08% year-over-year in the three months ended June 30, Redfin’s data shows. Sales of nonluxury homes also fell during the same period, but that drop—19.42%—was smaller than the decline in the luxury market, according to Redfin.
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Mortgage Rates Inch Up
Mortgage rates inched up slightly after a significant decline last week. Higher interest rates continue to dampen activity in interest rate-sensitive sectors, such as housing. However, overall U.S. consumer confidence is unwavering, surging to a two-year high in the Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index for July 2023. Rising consumer confidence often leads to greater spending, which could drive more consumers into the housing market.
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Property Owners Ignore Climate Risk Amid Insurance Meltdown
When Farmers Insurance Group on July 12 said it would stop writing new homeowners policies in Florida, it became the 15th insurer in the state to take that step since early last year. Florida officials fault widespread insurance fraud for the exodus, but Farmers said it needed to “manage risk exposure” in a place where climate change threatens more natural disasters. Florida’s slow-motion insurance meltdown is happening as new people pour into the places with the greatest risk of flooding, a pattern playing out across the US. Almost 400,000 more people moved into than out of the nation’s most flood-prone counties in 2021 and 2022, double the increase in the preceding two years, according to real estate firm Redfin Corp. Counties vulnerable to wildfires and heat have also seen more people arrive than leave.
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PERSONAL FINANCE
Investors Yank $800 Million From I Bonds as Inflation Slows Down
Since the yield on Series I savings bonds dropped in May, investors have redeemed about $800 million worth of the securities, more than in all of 2021. That’s a big change from last year, when Americans piled into I bonds to shield their savings from inflation. I bonds were designed to help Americans do just that. The yield is set twice a year on the first day of May and November. It’s composed of a variable rate based on the consumer price index and a fixed rate set by the Treasury Department.
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TECHNOLOGY
The First Smart Gun Is Finally Coming to Market. Will Anyone Buy It?
Guns that use technology to ensure that they can only be fired by their owners, called smart guns, have been developed and debated since the 1990s. The Biofire Smart Gun will be the first widely available for sale if it ships in December as planned. ?Proponents tout smart guns as a way to reduce accidental shootings and firearm thefts. Gun-rights supporters have been wary, in part over concern that governments could outlaw sales of weapons that don’t have smart-gun technology. Earlier efforts to bring smart guns to market have failed, largely because of pressure from gun-rights activists or because they didn’t work as promised. As with other technologies such as electric cars that changed long-established products, the question for smart guns is whether they can work at least as well as the traditional versions they replace and find customers behind affluent early adopters. The Biofire Smart Gun costs $1,499. Similar handguns without high-tech features typically cost between $400 and $800.
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Prototype Army app identifies drone threats using phone photos?
One of the Army’s newest tech testing groups is working on an app that it says will make American service members in the Middle East less susceptible to drone attacks. Task Force 39 launched an experiment Tuesday on the CARPE Dronvm phone app, which uses pictures to identify drones and determine their flight path. The Army envisions the sky-scanning app being used by soldiers and civilians near American bases in the Middle East to report drone sightings.
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Inside Walmart’s Warehouse of the Future
Walmart plans to automate or partially automate many of its hundred-plus U.S. warehouses in the coming years. The shift means Walmart can use fewer people to process more goods and make stocking shelves at stores more efficient. To keep their jobs, many of the company’s tens of thousands of warehouse workers need to retrain for new roles. Some will leave. Warehouses will also need to hire people with new skills, such as technicians. Large companies such as Walmart and Amazon that rely on massive warehousing networks have worked for years to automate more of their supply chains to increase the volume of packages they can process and reduce labor costs. Because of Walmart’s scale, its plan to make automation standard in more of its supply chain is likely to affect how smaller competitors invest in their own facilities and what a U.S. warehouse job becomes.
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CYBER
The world's last internet cafes
When the world’s first internet cafe, Cafe Cyberia, first opened its doors in London’s West End in September 1994, its founders could never have imagined what they’d unleashed. ?Internet cafes — cheap, accessible venues where just about anyone could explore cyberspace in its infancy — spread slowly across the world at first, and then snowballed in popularity. In the spring of 1996, Sri Lanka got its first two internet cafes: the Cyber Cafe, and the Surf Board. A few months later, Kuwait’s first internet cafe launched with 16 PCs. In 1999, a travel guide promised readers a list of 2,000 cafes in 113 countries. By the 2010s, though, it was clear that internet cafes were in decline. The writing had been on the wall for years. In 2004, a Guardian article predicted that the launch of 3G meant that internet cafes “will become an increasingly rare sight, a logging-in point for students and tourists.” The launch of the iPhone and the advent of cheap data were just two more nails in the coffin.
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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Google explores AI tools for journalists, in talks with publishers
Google is exploring using artificial intelligence tools to write news articles and is in talks with news organizations to use the tools to assist journalists, a company spokesperson said late on Wednesday. The spokesperson did not name the publishers, but the New York Times reported that Google has held discussions with the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal-owner News Corp (NWSA.O) and even the New York Times, among others.
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One of the “godfathers of AI” airs his concerns
WHERE IS RESEARCH into artificial intelligence (AI) heading? Is it all beneficial for humanity, or are there risks big enough that we need to make more effort to understand them and develop countermeasures? I believe the latter is true. The human brain is a biological machine, so it should be feasible to build machines at least as intelligent. As has been argued by Geoff Hinton, with whom Yann LeCun and I shared the Turing Award in 2018 for our work on AI, once we comprehend the main principles underlying human intelligence we will be capable of building superhuman AI surpassing us in most tasks.
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EDUCATION
How Colleges Plan to Factor In Race Without Asking About Race
Colleges are rethinking what information they ask from applicants—and even which words they use to extract those details—as they react to last month’s Supreme Court ruling that dramatically limited how they can consider race when selecting students. Schools are also making changes to where they scout for potential students, how application files get reviewed, and longstanding policies governing which groups of candidates get preferential treatment. School officials say they remain committed to enrolling a diverse class of students, even if the tools they can use have changed.?They have to move quickly; most applications go live on Aug. 1. ?The Supreme Court forced a tectonic shift in college admissions when it said schools could no longer take race into account when assessing applicants or give preference to applicants based on race. But Chief Justice John Roberts said in the majority opinion that colleges can still consider applicants’ discussions of how race affected their lives, “so long as that discussion is concretely tied to a quality of character or unique ability that the particular applicant can contribute to the university.”
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Parents Hire $4,000 Sorority Consultants to Help Daughters Dress and Impress During Rush
Sorority rush at the University of Georgia kicks off in August, a lousy time to wear makeup. “You need to do it in a way that’s appropriate in southern humidity or else you’re going to have orange rivers running down your face,” said Trisha Addicks. She recommends keeping a “rush bag” with deodorant, portable fan, water and face powder. That’s the kind of practical advice Addicks gives clients of her Georgia-based sorority-consulting firm, It’s All Greek to Me. Showing up in Dr. Martens combat boots, as one client asked about, might not be putting your best foot forward in some sorority circles, she said: “During rush, you’re not going to be confident if you’re wearing them, and everybody else is wearing espadrilles.” Addicks offers a $600 seminar for women and their mothers to learn the basics about getting into a sorority; $3,500 buys unlimited access to sorority mentors who advise aspirants through every step. She is part of an industry emerging in recent years that sells tips and emotional support to women who want to avoid missteps that threaten first impressions. Sorority consultants cover such topics as what to wear, how to act, what to say and the wisdom of scrubbing potentially off-putting social media posts.
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HEALTH
Lower Your Cancer Risk With Just Four Minutes of Exercise
https://www.wsj.com/articles/even-four-minutes-of-exercise-a-day-could-cut-your-cancer-risk-8768087f
To reduce your cancer risk, you don’t need to make it all the way to the gym: You could start by bringing in the groceries. ?People who recorded just under four minutes of vigorous movement every day had a roughly 17% reduced cancer risk compared with people who didn’t log any high-intensity movement, a study published Thursday in the journal JAMA Oncology concluded. The link was stronger for cancers in which exercise has previously been connected to lower risks, including breast, colon, endometrial and bladder cancer. ?The study followed more than 22,000 people who reported that they didn’t exercise but logged minute-long bursts of activity such as walking uphill or carrying shopping bags. It adds to evidence connecting physical activity to better health, even when the movement is modest.
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HOME & AUTO
Porsche's iconic 911 to be sole survivor of automaker's combustion models
Porsche (P911_p.DE) has a plan to gradually electrify its car lineup so that electric vehicles make up 80% of sales by 2030, and it aims to make its iconic 911 the only internal-combustion engine model left standing, a top executive said.
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FOOD & DRINK
Panic Buyers Load Up on Rice Supplies as India Bans Exports
India’s move to ban certain rice exports has sparked some panic buying in various countries, with videos on social media showing bags of the staple food flying off the shelves and long lines outside grocery stores. From the US to Canada and Australia, reports of overseas Indians stocking up are going viral. Some shops have imposed buying limits, while others hiked prices to cash in on the frenzy. Indian restaurants worry about a shortage. Rice is vital to the diets of billions in Asia and Africa. India’s restrictions, which apply to shipments of non-basmati white rice, are aimed at controlling local prices, but they add to strains on global food markets that have already been roiled by bad weather and the worsening conflict in Ukraine.
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Silkworm sashimi, cricket curry on menu as bugs make a comeback in Japan
On a recent vacation in Tokyo, Takumi Yamamoto opted for a special lunch of cricket curry and silkworm sashimi, washed down with a water bug cider. The 26-year-old office worker, from the western prefecture of Hyogo, is one of scores of consumers across the world who have taken an interest in entomophagy, or eating insects, as bugs slowly become a more viable food source.
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Would You Drink Wastewater? What if It Was Beer?
Epic OneWater Brew looks like your classic hipster craft beer. The can has a sleek design with the silhouette of a city skyline, and it cracks open with a satisfying hiss. The beer, a K?lsch, has a crisp golden hue and a signature fruity taste. But there is one big difference: It is made with recycled wastewater. Epic OneWater Brew, the product of a partnership between a wastewater technology start-up and a Bay Area craft brewery, is made with treated shower and laundry water collected from a luxury high-rise apartment building in San Francisco. And it’s not the only beer of its kind.
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New Zealand’s Fruit-Rich Ice Cream Gets a Sugary American Makeover
In New Zealand, one of summer’s great pleasures is known as real fruit ice cream: a scoop of vanilla blended with fruit in a machine that produces an airy, barely sweet twirl with a buttery texture. The dessert, which likely originated in the country’s berry orchards, has become a national favorite over the last few decades, prized for its freshness and simplicity. In the United States, it’s just beginning to catch on in cities like Boston, Portland, Ore., and Austin, Texas. But along the way, the no-frills treat has undergone a full-bore makeover.
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NATURE
Last of nearly 100 pilot whales that beached on Australia’s coast are euthanized after rescue fails
he last of nearly 100 whales that beached on the southwestern Australian coast were euthanized Wednesday after a second day of frantic, but unsuccessful efforts to rescue them, authorities said. The pod of long-finned pilot whales stranded themselves Tuesday on Cheynes Beach east of the former whaling station of Albany in Western Australia state, south of the capital Perth. Despite the efforts of 100 wildlife officers and 250 volunteers wearing wetsuits to protect against the Southern Hemisphere winter cold, 52 stranded whales died on the beach. The remaining 45 were euthanized Wednesday after efforts to lead them to deeper water failed. The survivors continually returned to the shallows, the Western Australia Parks and Wildlife Service said in a statement late Wednesday.
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Toxin-secreting hammerhead worms are invading the D.C. area. How to stop them.
The hammerhead worm immediately stops you in your tracks. The striped flatworm slithers like a snake and resembles a piece of whole-wheat spaghetti, led by its mushroom-shaped head. And it also secretes tetrodotoxin, the same debilitating neurotoxin found in puffer fish. The hammerhead worm (Bipalium) is an invasive flatworm from Asia, probably spreading to many new locations through the exportation of exotic plants. A handful of sightings have been reported across the Washington area recently. According to the iNaturalist app, Arlington has 43 instances of the worms, D.C. has 16, Virginia has 248 and Maryland has 91 over the past 15 years. Research shows the genus has spread across the world, especially along the East Coast of the United States. Computer models show the Eastern United States will continue to be a suitable environment for the worms, as the climate warms. The good news is that the worm isn’t a threat to humans unless ingested or handled, biologist Amber Stokes said.
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Scientists woke up a 46,000-year-old roundworm from Siberian permafrost
A female microscopic roundworm that spent the last 46,000 years in suspended animation deep in the Siberian permafrost was revived and started having babies in a laboratory dish. ?Beyond the “wow” factor of a time-traveling nematode, there’s a practical reason to study how these tiny, spindle-shaped creatures go dormant to survive extreme environments, said Philipp Schiffer, group leader at the Institute for Zoology at the University of Cologne and one of the authors of the study. Such work may reveal more about how, at a molecular level, animals can adapt as habitats shift because of soaring global temperatures and changing weather patterns.
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FOR FUN
Rare Apple computer trainers on sale for $50,000
A pair of rare Apple trainers are being sold by auction house Sotheby's for $50,000 (￡38,969). The shoes were custom-made for employees only in the 1990s and were a one-time giveaway at a conference. A pair have never been sold to the public before
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TRAVEL
US Airlines Must Install Disability-Accessible Restrooms on Jets
US airlines must install restrooms accessible to people with disabilities on the most-popular single-aisle jetliners under a new rule adopted on the 33rd anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act. The Department of Transportation, responding to growing complaints by advocates, announced the regulation on Wednesday. The requirement will be phased in over several years under the final rule. Newly built airliners with more than 125 seats must have lavatories large enough to accommodate people in wheelchairs after three years. Carriers will not have to retrofit accessible lavatories onto existing aircraft until restrooms are replaced.
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‘Oppenheimer’ mania pushes Army to warn of long tourist lines at Trinity atomic test site
The U.S. Army said its upcoming open house of the Trinity Site is expected to receive “a larger than normal crowd” due to the overwhelming popularity of Universal’s “Oppenheimer.” The Trinity Site on White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico is where the world’s first atomic bomb was tested. The film “Oppenheimer,” which premiered Friday and earned $82.4 million over the weekend, tells the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the American physicist who oversaw the Manhattan Project that produced the bomb and launched the world into the atomic age.
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Americans Will Need to Apply Online to Enter Europe Starting in 2024
For years, non-E.U. travelers have been told that Europe is changing its entry rules. Well, now it seems to finally be happening. When the implementation of the European Travel Information and Authorization System (ETIAS) was first announced in 2019, many panicked and incorrectly misinterpreted “travel authorization” as a visa—but it’s not. And it’s nothing to worry about. Basically, all it means is that travelers from visa-exempt countries, which includes the United States, only need a travel authorization to enter 30 European countries. And you can easily get the authorization online for a minimal fee. This change was scheduled to begin in 2021, then 2022, then November 2023–and now it has been pushed back to 2024. Meanwhile, another border control scheme, the Entry/Exit System (EES), is also coming into effect next year in Europe, where travelers will be asked to share their biometrics when entering or exiting European countries.
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‘Attenzione, Pickpocket!’ A TikTok Star Watches Out for Tourists in Italy
You probably don’t know Monica Poli’s face, but you might recognize her voice. Deep, booming and coming from your phone during a late-night TikTok scroll. “Attenzione, borseggiatrici! Attenzione, pickpocket!” Ms. Poli, 57, who lives in Venice, has become prominent on social media for patrolling the streets of her hometown, calling out would-be pickpockets to tourists. She is part of a group known as the Cittadini Non Distratti — the undistracted citizens — who wander the city shouting at people whom they believe to be thieves plucking wallets, passports and other items from the pockets of passers-by. Sometimes Ms. Poli and her fellow amateur watchdogs will report these suspected pickpockets to the police. In 2019, The Economist reported that the group was responsible for a third of all pickpocket arrests made in Venice.
NOTE: A friend of mine recently visited Rome, and while on the Rome Metro heard someone yell “Pickpocket, pickpocket!” while pointing to a woman who they had seen surreptitiously take another person’s cell phone. The situation eventually resulted in the police getting involved.?I’m glad to see people getting involved like this.
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ENTERTAINMENT
Celebrities mourn Tony Bennett's death: 'Truly one of the greats'
Singer and musician Paul Young, actors George Takei and Josh Gad, songwriter and musician Nile Rodgers and other stars paid tribute to Bennett on social media Friday following his death at age 96. Bennett, a pop and jazz singer whose career spanned over 70 years, died Friday in New York City after being diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2016.
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Sinéad O’Connor, acclaimed Dublin singer, dies aged 56
Irish singer Sinéad O’Connor has died at the age of 56, her family has announced. In a statement, the singer’s family said: “It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved Sinéad. Her family and friends are devastated and have requested privacy at this very difficult time.” The acclaimed Dublin performer released 10 studio albums, while her song Nothing Compares 2 U was named the number one world single in 1990 by the Billboard Music Awards. Her version of the ballad, written by musician Prince, topped the charts around the globe and earned her three Grammy nominations.
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Randy Meisner, founding member of the Eagles and singer of ‘Take It to the Limit,’ dies at 77
Randy Meisner, a founding member of the Eagles who added high harmonies to such favorites as “Take It Easy” and “The Best of My Love” and stepped out front for the waltz-time ballad “Take It to the Limit,” has died, the band said Thursday. Meisner died Wednesday night in Los Angeles of complications from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, the Eagles said in a statement. He was 77.
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‘Swift Quake’: Taylor Swift Fans Shake Ground During Seattle Concert
A Taylor Swift concert in downtown Seattle last weekend shook the ground so hard, it registered signals on a nearby seismometer roughly equivalent to a magnitude 2.3 earthquake, seismologists said. “It’s certainly the biggest concert we’ve had in a while,” said Mouse Reusch, a seismologist at the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network, which monitors earthquake activity in the Pacific Northwest. “We’re talking about 70,000 people and all the music and paraphernalia associated with the concert.” The so-called “Swift Quake” recorded a maximum ground acceleration of roughly 0.011 meters per second squared, said Jackie Caplan-Auerbach, a seismologist at Western Washington University. Seismometers can pick up ground vibrations of all types — including from cars and stampeding cattle — but the magnitude of the “Swift Quake” has drawn comparisons to the pro football “Beast Quake” of 2011. That seismic activity was triggered when Seattle Seahawks fans roared in celebration following a last-minute touchdown by Marshawn Lynch, the running back whose nickname is “Beast Mode.” The shaking of the ground was more than “twice as hard” as at the 2011 Seahawks game, Caplan-Auerbach said. While this was 0.3 magnitude greater than in 2011, that’s a twofold difference under the Richter scale, which is logarithmic.
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Buckle Your (DeLorean) Seatbelt: ‘Back to the Future’ Lands on Broadway
In adapting a beloved franchise for the stage, the creative team sought to develop the story for new audiences while remaining true to the spirit of the films.
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Spotify raises premium subscription price for millions
Spotify is raising the price of its single-account premium plan for the first time since 2011 and hiking other services as well. In the UK, subscriptions will rise by ￡1 a month to ￡10.99 for an individual plan, ￡14.99 for a premium duo plan and ￡17.99 for a family plan. The price of a student plan remains unchanged at ￡5.99. It follows other streaming services which have also increased subscription costs. Similar price hikes also apply to the US, Canada and 49 other territories. In the US, the cost will go up from $9.99 to $10.99 (￡8.57) for those with an individual plan. The premium duo service will increase from $12.99 to $14.99, the family plan from $15.99 to $16.99, and the student plan from $4.99 to $5.99.
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SPORTS
Jonas Vingegaard Wins Tour de France Again After Vanquishing His Rival
When Tadej Pogacar slipped behind Jonas Vingegaard on the Col de la Loze mountain pass through the Alps on Wednesday, eight kilometers and a world away from the top of the hot, punishing climb, it was only briefly unclear why. Pogacar’s own voice, over his team’s radio and broadcast on television during the Tour de France’s 17th stage, provided an immediate explanation for the rare sight of him being left behind like a mere mortal. “I’m gone,” he told his team. “I’m dead.” It was an astonishing bit of television, a moment that will be replayed on every Tour broadcast for decades. Most of Pogacar’s teammates did not wait for him. They did not try to help him. What would have been the point? There was no saving his race. Pogacar, the 24-year-old from Slovenia who usually rides with a smile on his face, perpetually unbothered, tufts of hair peeking out of his helmet, was gone. Vingegaard quickly rode away from him, and rode away with his second consecutive Tour victory.
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Kosovo bridge divers overcome fear to 'fly' in annual competition
With arms outstretched like bird's wings in the traditional "swallow style", Evald Krnic plunged more than 20 metres from a bridge in southern Kosovo into the cold White Drin river. "You don't just jump; you fly," he told Reuters after winning first place in the bridge-diving competition, an annual event held for the past 73 years and drawing both amateurs and professionals.?The primary emotion is that of being alive. If you're not afraid, you can't jump, as there's no adrenaline rush, and you might end up making mistakes that could lead to injuries," Krnic said. "The beauty of this sport lies in conquering that fear and taking the leap." Krnic was also the winner last year in the Bosnian town of Mostar where he jumped 22 meters from an old bridge into the river below.?Florid Gashi, who has won first prize in years past, also said the fear makes the sport so thrilling: "The moment that you are out of the water and you are not hurt that is the biggest thing.”
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Women’s World Cup 2023: Live scores, fixtures, results, tables and top scorers
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FOR FUN
Microsoft has created a pizza-scented Xbox controller
I’m fairly sure most Xbox controllers give off a bit of a sweaty pong after hours of gaming, but Microsoft has now created one that’s supposed to smell like pizza from the get-go. The “world’s first ever pizza-scented controller” is part of a marketing effort for the upcoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem movie.
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Have a great weekend!
The Curator
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Two resources to help you be a more discerning reader:?
AllSides?-?https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news??
Media Bias Chart?-?https://www.adfontesmedia.com/??
Caveat:?Even these resources/charts are biased.?Who says that the system they use to describe news sources is accurate??Still, hopefully you find them useful as a basic guide or for comparison.
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