In a historic case, the city of San Francisco is suing 10 major ultraprocessed-food companies, alleging that they have saddled governments with excessive public-health costs.
… The suit accuses manufacturers of knowingly selling products that harm consumers while marketing them as being “wholesome” or “convenient” in a violation of California’s public-nuisance and unfair-competition laws.
China intends to keep playing in the U.S. backyard, Latin America.
The Trump administration took veiled swipes at China in its national-security strategy with the vow to “restore American pre-eminence in the Western Hemisphere” and “deny non-Hemispheric competitors.”
Less than a week after the release of the U.S. strategy in December, Beijing issued a little-noticed policy paper on Latin America and the Caribbean that geopolitical analysts say foreshadows more U.S.-China jostling for regional influence.
Although Prime Minister Mark Carney scrapped the consumer carbon tax in 2025, he is on a mission to make Canadians’ lives more expensive by jacking up industrial carbon taxes in 2026.
Carney wants Canadians to believe businesses can somehow be taxed without those costs being passed on to consumers.
New research has found an increase in the number of Britons who believe that a person must be born in the country to be considered truly British, with a significant number tying national identity to race and ancestry. So, are we witnessing the rise of ethnic nationalism in modern Britain?
A YouGov poll carried out on behalf of the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) found that 36% of the public thought a person had to be born in Britain to be truly British — almost double the 2023 figure of 19%. Ethnic and ancestral conceptions of nationhood are the norm among supporters of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, which continues to lead in the polls. While seven in 10 Reform supporters said that having British ancestry was a prerequisite for someone to be truly British, six in 10 believed the nation was an ethnic — not a civic — community. More than a third of Reform UK voters (37%) said they would be prouder of Britain if there were fewer ethnic-minority people in 10 years’ time, with one in 10 holding the view that it was important to be white to be considered a good British citizen.
The dire warnings about AI keep coming.
Eric Schmidt, former chief executive of Google, says that within a few years, millions of independent AI agents working together “will develop their own language.” And “we won’t understand what they’re doing.” They will have escaped human control.
The University of Montreal computer scientist and AI pioneer Yoshua Bengio told The Guardian this week that AI models were showing signs of self-preservation, the capacity to evade guardrails and to inflict harm on humans. Without controls, he said, AI systems will be free to operate like hostile extraterrestrials.
Zohran Mamdani signed an executive order in his first day as mayor on Thursday revoking all orders issued by former Mayor Eric Adams after his indictment on federal corruption charges, including two that he had touted as support for Israel.
One of the revoked orders, signed last month by Mr. Adams, barred city agencies from boycotting or divesting from Israel. Another that the former mayor signed last June adopted an expansive definition of antisemitism that equates some forms of anti-Israel criticism, like opposition to Israel’s ethnically Jewish character, with antisemitism.
Mr. Mamdani did not revoke the creation of the city’s office to combat antisemitism, which Mr. Adams created in May.
A sure sign of a city’s decline is the election of a Khan, Chow or Mamdani.
Not everything needs to make sense in life, but when a situation seems inexplicable, it may well be that we simply don’t want to admit the truth. The answer to what bedevils us is usually staring us in the face.
A Biologist or Chemist would try different tests and computations before proving out their theory, and that would be that; for the Political Scientist, there comes a point where so much evidence has piled up that only unconscious bias — or the dangerously naive hope that good faith motives are omnipresent — will prevent you from admitting the truth.
David Lammy has agreed to pay an Islamist double-killer £7,500 in compensation and cover the £234,000 legal costs of his human rights claim.
Fuad Awale, who also held a prison officer hostage while serving a life sentence for shooting two men in the head in 2011, said he suffered “severe depression” when he was denied contact with other inmates.
Canada’s economy faced significant shocks in 2025 due to a trade conflict with the United States, and the ripple effects are expected to carry into 2026.
Several factors are still in play, including Ottawa’s increased spending to stimulate growth and its efforts to diversify trade beyond the United States. At the same time, the outcome of ongoing trade negotiations with Washington—and any relief they might bring—remains unpredictable.
It also remains to be seen whether Ottawa’s Budget 2025 plan to create corporate incentives will attract investment, and whether this is enough to offset concerns about Canada’s lagging productivity and regulatory and tax burden.
Cats with most unique meows 😻😻 pic.twitter.com/dtneZtlFoz
— cuteness overload (@cutecattoX) December 30, 2025
“I thought my little brother was inside so I came and tried to break the window to help people to exit, and after that I went in.”
The 18-year-old man, who did not want to give his name, was speaking to the BBC after a huge fire at a New Year’s Eve party in the Swiss resort of Crans-Montana rapidly turned what was an evening of celebration into a nightmare.
Police say around 40 people died when the blaze broke out in a bar called Le Constellation at around 01:30 local time (00:30 GMT) on Thursday. A further 115 more were injured, mainly with severe burns.
#SWITZERLAND #SUISSE #SUIZAhttps://t.co/SlXyshTVog
Footage showing the beginning of the fatal fire at the Le Constellation Bar in Crans-Montana
🔴 SWITZERLAND :📹 MOMENT THE TRAGIC FIRE STARTED AT THE CLUB IN CRANS-MONTANA#Fire #Incendio #Incendie pic.twitter.com/WPROMhCKDu
— LW World News (@LW_WorldNews) January 1, 2026
Happy New Year! 👇@fancypants_s https://t.co/wZFgVagzeb
— Auntie Polly (@auntie_polly) January 1, 2026
While Ottawa debates affordability, defence spending and investment incentives, millions of Canadians are struggling with stagnant wages, weak unemployment benefits and growing economic insecurity, which is a disconnect economist Lars Osberg says is having serious social consequences.
“The big missing link is that we don’t have much of a social safety net in Canada,” the Dalhousie University economics professor said. “We haven’t had it for quite a while and we’re facing an enormous amount of economic insecurity and a long period of stagnant real wages.”
US President Donald Trump has warned Iran’s authorities against killing peaceful protesters, saying Washington “will come to their rescue”.
In a brief post on social media, he wrote: “We are locked and loaded and ready to go.” He gave no further details.
A senior adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, responded by saying Trump should “be careful” if he intervened, warning of potential chaos across the Middle East.
The newly installed statue of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi toppled in Ardabil, northwest Iran, just days after its unveiling. pic.twitter.com/WF4agGuStP
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) January 1, 2026
New York Times “reporters” say they don’t exist.
Think Tank “analysts” say they’re irrelevant.
Keyboard “activists” say they’re bots.
But here they are, Iran’s bravest, chanting “Long live the King” in the face of their oppressors.
2026 will be the year of their vindication. pic.twitter.com/xhDJTyzWtG
— Cameron Khansarinia (@khansarinia) January 1, 2026
