In shops, offices and bars across Spain, a single story has been monopolising conversation, said Enrique Aparicio in El Público (Madrid). The case of 25-year-old Noelia Castillo, whose life was ended by euthanasia in a Barcelona hospital last month, has “stirred the entire country”, sparking a fierce debate about an assisted-dying law introduced in 2021.

Castillo had had a troubled life; she'd spent her teen years in state-run foster care, had suffered several sexual assaults, and in 2022 was gang raped by three men. Days after that, she threw herself out of a fifth-floor window. The suicide attempt left her paralysed and in chronic pain with depression: insisting that her life was no longer worth living, she asked that it be ended. However her father, backed by a religious advocacy group called Christian Lawyers, claimed that given her fragile mental state, she was in no position to give meaningful consent to an assisted death.

‘Unnecessary suffering’

It's appalling the way in which Castillo was denied the right to a dignified death, said El País (Madrid). Her euthanasia had been unanimously approved, as the law requires, by two doctors, a lawyer and a review and oversight body; and it had been scheduled to take place on 2 August 2024. But then the legal challenges started to roll in, and it was only on 10 March this year, when the European Court of Human Rights rejected the final appeal by Christian Lawyers, that they came to an end. And so her “unnecessary suffering” was prolonged for a “devastating” 601 days, and in the full glare of media attention.

No, that puts everything the wrong way round, said Javier Redondo in El Mundo (Madrid). The assisted-dying law was supposed to provide a “dignified death” for terminally ill patients languishing “bedridden, paralysed and intubated; in agony”. It was not meant for young people like Castillo, who “lacked hope for the life ahead”. This case has fundamentally shifted the “boundaries of euthanasia”.

‘Abandoned’ by society

Indeed, the noise of this scandal should reverberate “far beyond the borders of Spain”, said Laurent Frémont in Le Figaro (Paris). It lays bare a society that no longer knows how to look after its most needy citizens. At every turn, Castillo was failed by the state: it took her from her family when she was a teenager and put her in foster care; she was still in the state's care when she was gang raped; and finally, instead of providing the psychiatric care she so badly needed, the state granted her a medically assisted death. In short, she was “abandoned by the institution” meant to take her family's place.

We need to be careful here, said Pedro García Cuartango on ABC (Madrid). I myself am morally opposed to euthanasia, and I too view Noelia Castillo's death as a societal failure. Yet we must acknowledge that the assisted-dying law was passed by an absolute majority in parliament and thus has full political legitimacy. We may hate the outcome, but in the clash between the law and our moral convictions, we in the end have to accept the law.

“WE GOT HIM!” Donald Trump’s announcement on Sunday that the second of two US airmen had been rescued from “deep inside” Iran struck a “triumphant” tone, said Jonathan Sacerdoti in The Spectator – and no wonder.

The rescue brought to an end an episode that had begun on Friday, when a US air force F-15E Strike Eagle was shot down over southwestern Iran – the first time a US fighter jet had been downed by hostile fire since the 2003 Gulf War. Both crew members had “ejected safely”. But while one was quickly recovered by US forces, the second, a weapons systems officer, was stranded for 36 hours, as the two sides raced to find him.

Iran, eyeing a propaganda victory, offered a £50,000 reward for his capture, said Paul Nuki in The Telegraph. Washington, in turn, was desperate to avoid a humiliation evoking memories of the botched US attempt to rescue 53 embassy staff held hostage by Iran in 1980. In the end, Trump was able to celebrate what he called “one of the most daring search and rescue operations in US history”.

“Deep behind enemy lines”, seriously hurt, and armed only with a pistol, the officer had been in a terrifying position, said Guy Adams in the Daily Mail. But his “survival, evasion, resistance and escape” (SERE) training kicked in, and he scaled a 7,000ft ridge in the Zagros Mountains, before hiding in a crevice and using a satellite device to report his location.

The CIA, meanwhile, hatched a “deception plan”, spreading word in Iran that it was moving the airman out of the country on the ground, said Greg Jaffe in The New York Times. Then, on Saturday night, the US launched a “vast and complex” rescue mission. Two MC-130 troop planes carrying more than 100 special forces commandos landed on a disused airfield near Isfahan, which they used as a forward operating base. Drones and jets provided air cover, striking Iranian forces that came near. Then commandos used mini-helicopters to reach the mountains, extract the weapons officer, and fly him back to the airfield.

It was here that a major hiccup occurred, said Dan Sabbagh in The Guardian. The troop carrier planes became bogged down in the soil and had to be destroyed by the US to avoid them falling into enemy hands, while new planes were flown in. Although the US did get all its troops out, suffering no casualties, it lost hardware worth about $250 million (£185 million). The episode as a whole was a reminder that, for all America’s military superiority, Iran “can fight back” – and it would only need to “get lucky once” in this asymmetric conflict to secure a major propaganda victory.

Might the war in Iran “do what even Vladimir Putin couldn’t and blow up the North Atlantic Treaty alliance”, asked The Wall Street Journal. It’s “no longer an idle question”. Last week, President Trump vented his deep frustration with Nato, dismissing it as a “paper tiger” and declaring he is now “strongly considering” pulling the US out. If he does, it would be the “dumbest alliance breakup in modern history” – and it would be Europe’s fault.

‘Two-way street’

Spain and Italy blocked US military flights from their bases and Emmanuel Macron prevented use of France’s airspace. “Add its reluctance to help clear the Strait of Hormuz, and Europe is playing into every Maga stereotype about a one-sided Western alliance.” Europe’s reluctance to get involved is understandable, given Trump’s erratic policies and his failure to consult allies about the war. But it could have been more helpful. After all, it has its own interests to protect in the Middle East, and it would have shown that the alliance is “a two-way street”.

Our so-called “allies” have spent decades “free-riding on the US security umbrella”, said Josh Hammer in Newsweek: Trump is just saying so plainly. The “imbalance is staggering”: US defence spending accounts for 60% of Nato’s total. It’s clear that the “status quo is no longer defensible – and deep down, everyone knows it”.

Despite America’s frustrations, maintaining the alliance is still in its interests, said Con Coughlin in The Daily Telegraph. Nato gives the US access to a large network of naval, air and ground force bases – Nato’s top commander in Europe, an American, has gone so far as to say that US power projection depends on its European allies. Nevertheless, European leaders must convince the Trump administration that it is in Washington’s interests to stay in.

Damage is done

The severity of the threat should not be underestimated, said Roland Oliphant in the same paper. The US is not just the biggest member, it is “the lynchpin”, around which the whole edifice is constructed. It has capabilities, in satellite and signals intelligence, in missile defence, that the rest rely heavily on. If it abandons the alliance, the chances of Putin taking a gamble on attacking Europe “would increase substantially”.

“In literal terms, it would be near-impossible” for Trump to leave Nato, said The Independent. In 2023, Congress passed a law that means the US can only leave with the approval of the Senate, and there is little appetite among Republicans for this. But that wouldn’t prevent the US from “quiet quitting”. It could withdraw troops from Germany or simply “ignore its Article 5 duties to defend, for example, Estonia”.

The damage is already done, said Rafael Behr in The Guardian. Trump hasn’t just undermined Nato’s collective security guarantee; he has betrayed Ukraine and threatened to invade Greenland. “Trust is gone.” Europe must build up its own security arrangements immediately. There is no guarantee that Europe “will have an ally across the Atlantic” again any day soon.

A chorus of high-profile right-wing figureheads including Tucker Carlson, Megyn Kelly and Alex Jones recently criticized President Donald Trump’s ongoing Iran war. The president responded by denouncing them as “NUT JOBS” and “TROUBLEMAKERS” in a lengthy social media statement, essentially making them persona non-MAGA. But as the president struggles to contain blowback from his Middle Eastern adventurism, the MAGA fault lines are only growing.

The ‘biggest break thus far’

After several MAGA figures denounced the president’s actions in the Middle East and, in some cases, his presidency overall, Trump responded with a “blistering” 482-word Truth Social post that insulted them in “starkly personal terms,” The New York Times said. Trump’s missive came after “weeks of criticism” from the consortium of conservative figureheads, which he had “largely ignored” before this latest outburst. Jones, Kelly, Carlson and former Charlie Kirk collaborator Candace Owens are the “opposite of MAGA,” Trump said, before he began “insulting the pundits personally,” said The Hill.

Trump has “repeatedly dismissed suggestions” of an alleged “fissure in his MAGA coalition,” Forbes said. But criticism from MAGA notables “intensified” after Trump “threatened to wipe out Iranian civilization,” NBC News said. There is now a “growing schism within Trump’s base” over the Iran war, “particularly” given his campaign pledge of “no new wars.”

While Carlson in particular has been “highly critical” of the Iran conflict and “somewhat more gently critical of Trump the man, at least publicly,” the “gloves were off” this week “like never before,” said CNN. The result is “perhaps the biggest break thus far” between Trump and a “leading conservative influencer,” even as the GOP has “done its best to forestall these kinds of splits.” Carlson’s critiques won’t “suddenly equally divide Trump’s base,” but they are an “inauspicious sign” and “not helpful” for the party.

‘Deep anger’ and ‘quick rebukes’

Trump’s attacks on this batch of newly minted detractors reflect what seems to be a “deep anger” at once-loyal supporters, said Politico. The opprobrium runs both ways, as the targets of his ire offered “quick rebukes” to Trump’s attacks. “It may be time to put Grandpa up in a home,” Owens said in a “one-line quip” on X, said Forbes. “I’m just so sad that whatever’s happened to him has totally changed the man he once was,” said Jones in a video response on the same platform.

Iran has clearly “emerged as a growing weakness” for Trump, said CNN. While some MAGA supporters are “overwhelmingly on board,” the president’s wider base is “increasingly on a different page.” For Trump, the danger in rebukes by Carlson and other media figures is that it gives Republicans “skeptical of the war license to tilt into outright opposition to him.”

Visiting a public garden is one of the best ways to get outside. You feel the sun’s warmth on your skin as you stroll by the trees and flowers in bloom, appreciating every leaf and petal. Give yourself the gift of fresh air and time well spent by taking a trip to one of these splendid gardens.

Edward James Sculpture Garden, Las Pozas, Mexico

During the 1960s, “eccentric” British poet and Surrealist art patron Edward James traveled to the Mexican rainforest and created this “otherworldly” sculpture garden, said The New York Times. More than 30 “elaborate” and often “nonsensical” statues and structures, with curious names like “The House of Three Stories That Could Be Five,” are scattered about, surrounded by massive ferns, orchids and waterfalls. Every area vies for your attention; exploring this topsy-turvy landscape feels like “stepping into a dream.”

Gardens by the Bay, Singapore

A 250-acre “fantasy land” of “space-age biodomes” and “whimsical sculptures,” Gardens by the Bay is known for its over-the-top features, said Lonely Planet. The “astonishing” Cloud Forest, with its 114-foot waterfall and aerial walkways through the trees, feels straight out of the tropics, while the Flower Dome “replicates the dry Mediterranean climates found across the world.” Once the sun sets, the giant trees of the Supertree Grove slowly illuminate for Garden Rhapsody, a nightly light and music show.

The High Line, New York City

Manhattan’s urban landscape is on “full display” at the High Line, said Condé Nast Traveler. This former freight rail turned “elevated, mixed-use public park” is a prime example of New York City “cleverly” turning “old spaces into exactly what you want them to be.” More than a dozen garden zones can be found along the 1.45-mile-long stretch, where perennials, grass, trees and shrubs come together in “perfect unkempt harmony.”

Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden, Cape Town, South Africa

This trailblazing botanical garden, established in 1913, was the first in the world to focus solely on indigenous plants. It sits in a lovely spot on the eastern slope of Table Mountain, and though the garden “showcases more than 7,000 species,” a “high priority” is given to plants in the fynbos biome, like “stiff, structured proteas” and “shaggy, flowering ericas,” said The New York Times. Get a bird’s-eye view by taking the Tree Canopy Walkway, a curved bridge that offers “mountain vistas and sweeping forest views.”

Longwood Gardens, Kennett Square, Pennsylvania

Conservatories, topiaries, aquatic plants, meadows, dazzling fountains and more await at the spectacular 1,100-acre Longwood Gardens. The collection of plants is “incredible,” as is the main conservatory filled with “lush” displays that change seasonally, said USA Today. Variety is key to Longwood Gardens’ success, as visitors have plenty of sections to wander, including the spacious new Orchid House, tranquil Bonsai Courtyard, verdant Waterlily Court and the modern Cascade Garden, designed by Roberto Burle Marx.

Marqueyssac Gardens, Vézac, France

Nearly four miles of pathways wind their way through this enchanting garden, where more than 150,000 boxwood trees are “meticulously laid and manicured” to “create mesmerizing patterns,” said Veranda. Marqueyssac sits on a cliff overlooking the Dordogne Valley and offers impressive views of the land and river below. Peacocks roam freely and are often spotted enjoying the garden’s beauty.

Royal Botanic Garden Sydney, Sydney, Australia

Pack a picnic, don comfortable walking shoes and prepare to spend all day at Australia’s oldest botanic garden. Spread across 74 acres, Royal Botanic Garden Sydney is home to more than 5,000 native and international species and “adorned with ornamental plants, rolling lawns and ancient trees,” said Condé Nast Traveler.

Highlights include the Cadi Jam Ora garden, which “shares native, Aboriginal plants and those brought from Europe by Britain’s First Fleet,” and The Calyx, a “living art gallery” and one of the largest green walls in the southern hemisphere. Leave enough time to see the ancient Wollemi pine, one of the rarest plants on Earth.

Wrest Park, Bedfordshire, England

The grand gardens at Wrest Park date back hundreds of years, giving visitors the chance to go on a “journey through three centuries of landscape design,” said The Times. The formal gardens showcase English, French, Dutch and Italian landscaping styles and “ornate” sculptures, but “venture beyond the pretty parterres and perfumed borders” and you’ll find far less manicured woodland trails. For fans of “Bridgerton,” if the grounds look familiar, that’s because scenes for season two and three were filmed on the property.

‘I’m a WNBA player. Don’t use athletes like me to exclude trans women.’

Brianna Turner at USA Today

The IOC “recently announced a binding policy requiring every woman who seeks to compete in the Olympics to undergo sex verification testing,” but the “final hurdle to represent your country should not be proving to a panel of strangers that you are the woman you say you are,” says Brianna Turner. This mandate “ignores established medical and human-rights guidance, and rejects the science that says physical appearance, chromosomes or individual traits do not determine athletic performance.”

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‘New England considers the nuclear option’

Andrew Fowler at The Wall Street Journal

A “bipartisan coalition of all six New England governors has reached a conclusion that until recently would have been politically unthinkable: renewable energy alone can’t deliver the affordable, reliable power the region needs,” says Andrew Fowler. Against “this backdrop, nuclear energy is re-emerging as a practical solution.” New England’s “nuclear facilities such as Connecticut’s Millstone Power Station help maintain grid stability,” but “regulatory barriers have long limited the development of new nuclear capacity.” That is “beginning to change.”

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‘Power, minerals and the AI race — America must win in Africa’

John Giordano at Newsweek

The United States “must secure the critical mineral and energy supply chains that advance economic prosperity,” says John Giordano. One “such jurisdiction, and potentially one of the most consequential on the African continent, is Namibia.” The country is a “model for governance and stability on the continent, operating with regulatory frameworks capable of supporting large-scale development.” It “holds an outsized position on the global minerals and energy map,” but “supply security ultimately rests on infrastructure.”

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‘The ethics of using AI in newsrooms: a work in progress’

Jim Boren at The Seattle Times

The public is “looking for clear guidance on how newsrooms are using AI to report the news,” but “most news organizations are still developing their policies, and few have fully resolved these complex questions,” says Jim Boren. AI “can free journalists to focus more on investigation, verification and storytelling,” but “most newsrooms draw a firm line: AI should not be used to write stories.” This “reflects a broader concern that AI systems can produce convincing but inaccurate or misleading information.”

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Elon Musk always does things in a big way. The same is true of his plans to take SpaceX public. But how investors will make out could depend on how much they like him. As Musk works to convince buyers that his rocket company could be valued at as much as $2 trillion, SpaceX is earmarking up to 30% of shares for “nonprofessional, noninstitutional investors” and “banking on the popularity” of the tech billionaire to help it raise as much as $75 billion from the stock offering, said The Guardian. And the so-called “retail” trade by his fans will be a “critical part of this and ​a bigger part than any IPO in history,” Chief Financial Officer Bret Johnsen told a meeting of bankers on April 6, per Reuters.

SpaceX is more than just rockets. It now includes xAI, Musk’s artificial intelligence company, along with Starlink, Grok and the X social media network. Money raised from the IPO would help SpaceX finance “launching artificial intelligence data centers into orbit, creating a colony on the moon and getting humans to Mars,” said The New York Times. But those are “expensive and unproven” technologies that could take “years and billions of dollars to achieve.”

What did the commentators say?

IPOs “used to fund growth,” Brad Badertscher said at The Conversation. Going public helped “young, cash-strapped companies” like Amazon and Apple get traction, and “much of their dramatic growth” happened afterward. These days, most companies “can now raise billions privately” and, like SpaceX, only go public after they have entrenched themselves in the marketplace. Investors are not getting in on the ground floor. Most “explosive growth in corporate value” comes while “companies are still private.”

The SpaceX IPO could “showcase the free market at its best,” Matthew Lynn said at The Washington Post. The company is “pioneering innovative technologies and generating jobs and wealth.” Bringing along ordinary investors might add to those accomplishments. Giving regular people ownership of stocks gives them a “stake in the free market” and makes them “far more likely to support the system.” Musk’s stock offering could convince Americans that “free-market, risk-taking entrepreneurship isn’t such a terrible thing after all.”

A “bumper crop of mega initial public offerings” is expected over the next year, Jonathan Levin said at Bloomberg. History suggests investors should “tread very, very carefully” when evaluating companies like SpaceX, OpenAI and Anthropic. Mega IPOs have “underperformed the market” on average in recent years. But some investors will inevitably decide that Musk’s company and its peers “are in a league of their own.”

What next?

SpaceX “could trade like a meme stock” after the IPO, said MarketWatch. Stocks driven by “social media trends” are often prone to “high trading volumes and price volatility.” The Musk-helmed company “clearly has some of the ingredients” to fit that profile, Roundhill Investments CEO Dave Mazza said to the outlet.

The countdown to the closure of the SAVE plan has at last begun. The student loan repayment plan, which aimed to offer lower monthly payments and a faster path toward forgiveness for borrowers, almost immediately faced pushback when introduced by the Biden administration in 2023, with several Republican-led states suing. For a while, this ongoing legal battle left borrowers in limbo. But with the recent arrival of a decisive, plan-ending judgment, followed by a deadline set by the Trump administration for those who are enrolled to exit, borrowers are now in a position where they must take action.

What is happening to the SAVE plan?

After a roughly two-year legal battle, a decisive judgment has arrived for the federal SAVE, or Saving on a Valuable Education, plan. As of March, the “Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals put an end to a legal challenge of the SAVE student loan repayment plan and instructed a district court to approve a proposed settlement between the Trump administration and the state of Missouri that would end the program,” said Yahoo Finance. In short, the program is “permanently eliminated.”

Following this, the Department of Education sent out a notice informing borrowers “they would need to switch to a different federal repayment plan by the end of September,” said NerdWallet. As of that announcement, “over 7 million borrowers” were still enrolled in the plan, which “offered lower monthly payments than other income-driven repayment plans,” as well as the opportunity for faster loan forgiveness.

What will happen to borrowers enrolled in SAVE?

Up until this point, while litigation has been ongoing, borrowers enrolled in the SAVE plan have been in “an administrative forbearance without payments due since the plan was challenged in court in the summer of 2024,” said CNBC, though interest began accruing in August 2025. But as of July 1, these remaining enrollees can expect to receive an email from their servicer instructing them to leave the SAVE plan and offering instructions for how to enroll in another repayment option. They will have 90 days to do so, or until the end of September.

Those who do not switch over will be automatically enrolled in the 10-year standard plan, “which would result in considerably higher payments in many cases,” said U.S. News & World Report.

What alternative repayment plan options do borrowers have?

With SAVE now officially off the table, borrowers have the option of existing income-based repayment plans, which can offer more affordable payments than the standard 10-year repayment plan. Another option is to wait to enroll in RAP, or the Repayment Assistance Plan, a new repayment plan established under Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act. This plan moderates payments based on income, though a minimum payment is required, and offers forgiveness after a longer period of 30 years.

Regardless of the option borrowers choose, “it’s likely that any new plan will mean higher payments,” said U.S. News & World Report. The SAVE plan “was the most affordable option for most people.”

What happened

Two once-harmonious groups of chimpanzees in Uganda’s Kibale National Park suddenly became estranged and have spent the past eight years engaged in a bloody conflict, according to a study published Thursday in the journal Science. This first-ever observation of animal “civil war” indicates that “group identities can shift and escalate into lethal hostility in one of our closest living relatives” without the “cultural markers often thought necessary for human warfare,” the researchers wrote.

Who said what

Researchers are “still trying to figure out what set off the conflict” in 2015 between the rival chimpanzee factions in the park’s Ngogo area, The New York Times said. But by 2018, “the hostilities began in earnest,” The Wall Street Journal said. The smaller Western cluster “launched coordinated lethal attacks” against their Central cluster rivals, killing at least 28 males, including infants.

One theory is that the schism came after “several male chimps who had bridged cliques within the larger group died from disease, weakening social ties,” said the Journal. It’s also possible “the apes were victims of their own success,” seeing “increased competition for food and mates” even though “resources were abundant.”

What next?

Further study of the Ngogo chimpanzees “may shed light on the roots of warfare in our own species,” the Times said, though the Trump administration’s proposed budget cuts have “cast doubt on whether the research will continue.”

What happened

First lady Melania Trump on Thursday denounced “unfounded and baseless lies” connecting her with “the disgraceful Jeffrey Epstein,” calling unspecified reports and online images “mean-spirited attempts to defame my reputation.” Addressing reporters at the White House, she also called on Congress to hold a “public hearing specifically centered around the survivors,” allowing those who wish to have their sworn testimony “permanently entered into the congressional record.”

Who said what

The first lady’s “seemingly out-of-the-blue” remarks caught “the White House — and indeed, all of Washington’s political world — by surprise,” The Associated Press said. It was “not clear why she chose to speak out now,” The New York Times said, but her comments are “sure to supercharge” a “scandal” her husband “has been struggling to make go away since last summer.”

The Epstein controversy had been “fading from public discourse amid the war with Iran,” CNN said, and some White House officials were “stunned by the timing of the remarks, which sparked rumors that the first lady was trying to get out ahead of something.” Sources close to Trump insisted she was just “increasingly frustrated by the online chatter.”

What next?

Congressional Democrats and some Republicans welcomed the call to let Epstein’s survivors speak. “We encourage” GOP leaders to “respond to the first lady’s request and schedule a public hearing immediately,” said Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) on social media.

What happened

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., on Thursday threw out Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s revised effort to restrict press access at the Pentagon, saying the Defense Department “cannot simply reinstate an unlawful policy under the guise of taking ‘new’ action.” Suppression of “political speech is the mark of an autocracy, not a democracy,” U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman wrote in his opinion, siding with The New York Times for the second time in a month in its challenge to Hegseth’s restrictions on reporters’ access to Pentagon sources and information.

Who said what

Almost all reporters in the Pentagon press corps walked out in October after Hegseth tied their credentials to an agreement to “publish only information preapproved by Department of Defense channels,” Politico said. Friedman found that unconstitutional in a March 20 ruling, and on Thursday he “voided the key parts of the revised policy,” including banning all unescorted movement through the Pentagon and evicting reporters from their longtime Correspondents’ Corridor offices to an “annex that has yet to be opened.”

“The curtailment of First Amendment rights is dangerous at any time, and even more so in a time of war,” Friedman said. Hegseth is trying to “dictate the information received by the American people” and “control the message” they “hear and see,” he added. “The Constitution demands better. The American public demands better, too.”

What next?

Frieman ordered the Pentagon to “fully restore Times reporters’ access,” The Washington Post said, and to “file a sworn declaration from a department official by April 16 detailing compliance.” A Pentagon spokesperson said the department will appeal the ruling.

Find out how closely you’ve been paying attention to the latest news and other global events by putting your knowledge to the test with our Quiz of The Week.

Recent violence in the Middle East had some of Dubai’s wealthy British expats rushing to bunkers, but in the longer term they might be seeking shelter in a famous Italian city.

Milan is becoming the preferred destination for the wealthy who are “abandoning” Dubai because of tensions and violence in the Gulf region, said British Asian newspaper Eastern Eye.

Restlessness and reinvention

Italy’s flat-tax regime means that foreign residents can pay €300,000 (£259,620) a year on all overseas income, which is “small change for the world’s wealthiest”, said The Guardian. Even prior to the fighting in Iran, interest in Italy took off after Britain scrapped its non-dom status and Portugal tightened its own rules.

But “tax policy alone does not explain the surge”, said the Economic Times. Italy’s “strong legal framework, EU membership, and relatively stable economy” make it a “compelling choice” for the privileged.

As wealthy families move to “safer European bases”, Milan is enjoying “historic spikes” in luxury real estate sales, from its “renovated palazzi to modern high-end apartments”. Property prices in Milan have risen by 38% over five years.

“Unlike more poetic cities like Rome or Venice”, Milan “actually works” and doesn’t have an issue with “overtourism”, said The Times. Its “strategic location” offers “easy access to the lakes, mountains and coast” and there’s a “restlessness” and an “obsession” with “reinvention”, meaning there’s “always something new to see or do”. It is home to the Borsa Italiana stock exchange, leading banks and global fashion houses.

A new “superfast” railway links the city centre and Linate airport, you can “whizz around the city quicker than ever” on the “tap-in tap-out” metro, and there are new hotels, restaurants, bars and private members’ clubs, which are “cranking up the standards of hospitality” from “perfectly good” to something closer to those of London or New York.

Tax dumping

Can Milan really dethrone Dubai in the affections of the “global elite”? That “remains to be seen”, said The Guardian. Armand Arton, who helps multimillionaire and billionaire families to relocate through investment citizenship schemes, said he’s “positive” that Dubai will “rebound from the current question of doubt around security”.

There are “still questions” about “how far Italy can push its advantage”, said the broadsheet, and the former French prime minister François Bayrou accused Italy of “tax dumping”, an allegation that Giorgia Meloni dismissed as “utterly baseless”.

Italy is not fully replacing Dubai, said Eastern Eye, but it has become a “strategic second home for global elites”. Experts believe the Italian city “offers a compelling alternative for those prioritising European stability”.

Is Viktor Orban about to lose power? Why are stalking offences on the rise? And would you choose to be dissolved after death?

Olly Mann and The Week delve behind the headlines and debate what really matters from the past seven days.

A podcast for curious, open-minded people, The Week Unwrapped delivers fresh perspectives on politics, culture, technology and business. It makes for a lively, enlightening discussion, ranging from the serious to the offbeat. Previous topics have included whether solar engineering could refreeze the Arctic, why funerals are going out of fashion, and what kind of art you can use to pay your tax bill.

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The deep, blue sea is becoming deeper — in color, that is. Climate change, along with human development, has reduced how much light can filter through the water. Reduced light can significantly disrupt the marine food chain as well as lead to the large-scale worsening of climate change.

Zoning issues

Ocean darkening occurs when “changes in the optical properties of the oceans reduce the depth to which sufficient light penetrates to facilitate biological processes guided by sunlight and moonlight,” said a 2025 study published in the journal Global Change Biology. The color shift can make the water look more opaque. The part of the ocean that sunlight is able to penetrate is called the photic zone and it is “home to 90% of marine species,” said the World Economic Forum. Organisms like phytoplankton also “convert sunlight and CO2 into energy, producing nearly half the planet’s oxygen and absorbing vast amounts of carbon emissions” in the photic zone.

Rather than just some patches of darkening, the phenomenon has affected “large, connected regions,” Tim Smyth, a marine scientist at Plymouth Marine Laboratory and co-author of the study, said to New Scientist. “Roughly one‑fifth of the world’s oceans have darkened in some way.” Already, the depth of the photic zone has reduced by more than 10% “across 9% of the global ocean,” said the study.

In coastal areas, darkening is “closely linked to changes in the rivers that flow into the sea,” Smyth said. “Shifts in land use affect what becomes dissolved or suspended in the water, which, in turn, alters the optical quality of the water entering the ocean.” In addition, “fertilizers used in industrial agriculture are washed into rivers, stimulating phytoplankton growth,” which reduces “how deeply light can penetrate the water column.”

However, darkening is not limited to the coast. The open ocean has also increased in opacity, which “may be linked to shifts in phytoplankton blooms driven by climate change.” There have been “rising ocean temperatures, more frequent marine heatwaves and changes in salinity in some regions.” Such changes “influence large‑scale ocean circulation patterns.”

Light direction

Dark oceans are bad news and the consequences have already begun to appear. As the photic zone shrinks, “many marine species are forced to move closer to the surface in order to survive,” said Diario AS. This “pushes large numbers of organisms into a much smaller space, increasing competition for food, raising biological stress and leaving them far more exposed to predators, including human fishing vessels.”

Along with disrupting the marine food chain, ocean darkening hinders the ocean’s ability to perform photosynthesis, weakening the “ocean’s role as a carbon sink, its natural capacity to capture and store the carbon dioxide that warms the planet.” If the ocean isn’t helping to sequester carbon from the atmosphere, climate change will worsen at a faster rate.

Some of the main culprits of ocean darkening are “sediment runoff from agriculture, deforestation and development,” especially in coastal regions, said the World Economic Forum. Improved land management can play a large role in reducing the level of darkening. This includes reducing fertilizer use as well as encouraging conservation efforts. In the open ocean, the problem is much more difficult to tackle as “even if global emissions dropped to net zero tomorrow, the ocean would take decades, if not centuries, to respond,” said Smyth. The good news is that the ocean “still has a remarkable capacity to heal itself. Give marine ecosystems a little room to recover and they often respond with surprising speed.”

As part of AI company Anthropic’s Project Glasswing initiative, the new general-purpose model Mythos is uniquely powerful in the artificial intelligence industry and is causing concern among even people who are normally trusting of AI. The company, which also makes the AI model Claude, has claimed that Mythos is currently too advanced for public release, and is instead entrusting the model to cybersecurity experts for the time being. Some are worried this could pave the way for even more nefariousness in the AI space.

‘New era of hacking’

Mythos’ AI programming is able to find potential weaknesses in cybersecurity, and it can “detect thousands of high- and critical-severity bugs and software defects, with vulnerabilities identified in most major operating systems and web browsers,” said NBC News. Some of these vulnerabilities “had been undiscovered for decades,” according to Anthropic’s experts. The company found that Mythos’ “cybersecurity capabilities in particular were surprisingly advanced” compared to similar general-purpose AI models.

But there are also fears that Mythos “could usher in a new era of hacking and cybersecurity,” said NBC News. Mythos is “capable of advanced reasoning,” which could allow it to “identify and exploit a growing number of software vulnerabilities” if it were to fall into the wrong hands. To stave off these fears, Anthropic is allowing certain tech firms to access Mythos. But the company “does not have plans yet to release Mythos to the general public,“ said Bloomberg, a move that will ensure the AI ends up “in the hands of defenders first,” officials with Anthropic said.

The tech firms are expected to use Mythos as part of a project called Glasswing to “hunt for flaws in their products and share findings with industry peers,” said Bloomberg. It is a notable change because it will be the “first time a leading AI lab has built a frontier model and simultaneously decided the public cannot use it,” said Forbes. Anthropic’s position remains “straightforward: The model’s cyber capabilities are too dangerous for general availability.”

‘Humanity’s most devious behaviors’

In addittion to hacking vulnerabilities, some experts are concerned about Mythos’ capabilities. Anthropic released a safety evaluation for Mythos that shows a “striking leap in scores on many evaluation benchmarks,” the company said. In some instances, the evaluation “reads like a thriller about an AI that has learned some of humanity’s most devious behaviors,” said Axios.

At least one of the tests performed by Anthropic showed Mythos “acting like a cutthroat executive,” said Axios, doing things like “turning a competitor into a dependent wholesale customer, threatening to cut off supply to control pricing and keeping extra supplier shipments it hadn’t paid for.” The AI had instances where it “used a prohibited method to get an answer, then tried to ‘re-solve’ it to avoid detection,” though these were limited to “less than 0.001% of interactions.”

These issues have not stopped companies from working with Mythos, as “approximately 40 organizations involved in the design, maintenance or operation of computer systems are said to have joined Glasswing,” said The Guardian. This includes major firms like Amazon, Apple, Google, JPMorganChase and Microsoft. And while Anthropic has previously sparred with the Trump administration about its implementation in the Defense Department, the company has also “had discussions with the U.S. government regarding Mythos.”

‘What the verdict against Meta and Google says about the way we live now’

Jeannie Suk Gersen at The New Yorker

For “decades, the understanding was that social media companies were essentially immune from legal liability,” says Jeannie Suk Gersen. If parents “have in the past felt they were competing with bad influences on children — questionable friends, shady neighbors or profanity-laced music among them — the core anxiety in this era is that algorithms have made it so that there is no competition at all, undermining parents’ opportunity to steer their children right.”

Read more

‘In Texas and beyond, a political impulse: If you don’t like it, leave.’

Mark Z. Barabak at the Los Angeles Times

There is “no end of hurdles” that “would have to be surmounted for a partial Texas-New Mexico merger to occur,” says Mark Z. Barabak. But the “impulse to bust up, break away and move on is as old as America itself and, at the same time, as fresh as the latest provocation to pass the lips of the nation’s frothing commander-in-chief.” Secession “has long been the dream of dissenters, of the discontented and those who feel put upon.”

Read more

‘Freedom itself is at stake in Hungary’

Martin Wolf at the Financial Times

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán is “not a man of small influence,” and “for many so-called ‘national conservatives,’ notably in the U.S., he defines a successful and admirable form of right-wing politics,” says Martin Wolf. That “makes the parliamentary elections on Sunday far more important than the modest size of Hungary would suggest.” The “defeat of the man who embraced the notion of ‘illiberal democracy’ might mean a great deal for the survival of the threatened ‘liberal’ version.”

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‘Less than 10% now smoke, but we’re still far from finished’

Mario Danek at The Hill

The U.S. “crossed a milestone that sounds like the beginning of the end for cigarette smoking: Fewer than 10% of American adults now smoke,” says Mario Danek. But “percentages can obscure as much as they reveal.” Even at “9.9%, that still represents tens of millions of Americans who continue to smoke.” The “progress is real and should be applauded. But the harder question is what it will take to reach those still smoking and whether we’re ready for that.”

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President Donald Trump loves raging against the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, regularly chiding the military partnership for alleged financial delinquencies while at the same time boosting the interests of NATO’s primary antagonist, Russia. Now, as the U.S.’s war on Iran continues, NATO’s ostensible neutrality in that conflict has prompted him to renew his threat of leaving the organization altogether. Trump often tries to dictate reality by presidential fiat, but the legal process for leaving NATO is largely out of his hands and in Congress.’ The result is a Trump who’s more constrained on paper but not without a toolbox of other, less absolute options.

Why can’t Trump just leave NATO?

Trump has often threatened to leave the military alliance, but he has his own Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, to thank for the legal inability to do so. In 2023, Congress enacted what “appears to be the first statute prohibiting the president from unilaterally withdrawing from a treaty (specifically, the North Atlantic Treaty),” said the government’s Congressional Research Service in a February 2026 report. This “might be understood as a rejection” of the position that presidents possess “exclusive power over treaty withdrawal.”

The bill ensures presidents cannot exit NATO “without rigorous debate and consideration by the U.S. Congress with the input of the American people,” said co-sponsor Rubio in a statement on Senator Tim Kaine’s site; Kaine (D-Va.) was the amendment’s other sponsor. Before this, any member nation could exit the treaty one year after notifying the U.S., which would then “inform the governments of the other parties of the deposit of each notice of denunciation,” said the NATO charter.

Per the bill, a bipartisan effort for which Rubio partnered with Kaine and others from across the aisle, a president may only exit NATO “by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, provided that two-thirds of the senators present concur or pursuant to an Act of Congress.” This is a virtual impossibility, given the Democrats’ current holdings in the upper chamber.

The 2023 effort was “spurred by worries that Trump, if he returned to power, might try to quit the alliance,” said The Washington Post. Fast forward three years, and Trump “insists he would be able to do it anyway,” said Deutsche Welle.

What can he do then?

While it’s possible a constitutional challenge to Rubio’s 2023 bill would “likely favor the power of a president,” there are still “plenty of ways” Trump could “kneecap” the treaty “without leaving” or complying with the congressional restrictions, said DW. Even without an “official exit,” Trump’s “increasingly hostile stance toward the alliance may leave it weakened,” said CBS News.

If other member nations “can’t trust” that the U.S. will honor the treaty’s Article 5 mutual defense pact, then the alliance is “already broken in the way that matters most,” said political scientist Ian Bremmer on X. As soon as the group’s mutual defense pact is “questioned,” NATO “loses its potency” as a Russian deterrent, said Politico. Trump has, in that respect, “turned doubting NATO into official policy.”

The president is also “considering a plan to punish” some NATO member nations he deemed “unhelpful” during the U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran, said The Wall Street Journal. This would involve relocating some of the 84,000 American troops stationed in Europe and deploying them to “countries that were more supportive,” including Greece, Lithuania, Poland and Romania.

Trump could also withdraw American military assets entirely and shut off funding for NATO operations. Or if he wants to be “very dramatic,” he might even “decide not to staff the position of Supreme Allied Commander Europe,” a post traditionally reserved for American officers, said DW.

The president could “just downgrade our participation,” said Jim Townsend, a former Pentagon official who oversaw Europe and NATO policy, to Politico. He could skip summits, and the secretary of defense “won’t go to defense ministerials.”

With the “language” of its 2023 bill, Congress has “prevented” a “total” and “formal withdrawal from NATO,” said Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) to Politico. But the U.S. could “still be in NATO” with a president grasping “many different levers” so that the country’s impact would nevertheless be “diminished significantly.”

In a world full of influencers and trending aesthetics, figuring out your personal style has become both easier and overwhelming. While there is nothing wrong with taking inspiration from fashion icons, finding your signature aesthetic requires a touch of introspection. Here are some tips for navigating the personal journey toward landing on your own, very individual style.

Start with your closet

Your first thought may be to buy new clothes, but before you start refreshing your closet, take stock of what you already have. Begin from the “left side of your wardrobe and commit to wearing each item every day,” CNN said. Consider whether to “save it for evening wear or chuck it altogether.” This will give you a “clearer view of what does and doesn’t work, as well as what you’re missing.”

Everyone has a go-to outfit, “something you know works and makes you feel good,” Vitor Arruda, a personal stylist and content creator, said to The Guardian. Once you identify that outfit, “figure out what it is that makes you like it so much,” the outlet said. After you figure that out, you can search for “clothes that look or feel similar.”

Go window shopping

Shopping sprees can be fun, but they aren’t “always productive to finding your style,” said The Every Girl. There are “crowds and long lines for dressing rooms,” and sometimes the “chaos can make you pick up things you don’t actually love.”

Instead, spend your time “looking at clothes, not buying clothes.” Pick a day and “commit yourself to not swiping your credit card.” Instead, spend a “no-pressure day getting a better grasp of what you like.” You can also “test drive new pieces” by using a clothing rental service like Armoire, Nuuly and Rent the Runway. This way, you can “bring some of your style inspiration to life” without needing to “commit to new pieces that might not actually resonate with you in the long run."

Make a mood board

Mood boards and Pinterest are great ways to visualize your style ideas. If you’re a “tactile person,” you can “absolutely print and paste pictures, words, vibes together,” said The Good Trade. If you’re more tech-savvy, you can do this in Photoshop or Canva. Laying your inspirations out visually is a “great way to see commonalities in who and what you are drawn to.” Any kind of media or color swatches that catch your eye can be included. Once you put your vision board together, “you can see what aligns with what you already own and what feels far off.”

Don’t hyperfixate on your body

Many of us are conditioned to “believe that our body shape and size dictate what we wear,” said The Guardian. But this undermines the premise of personal style. Fashion advice devoted to dressing for your body type “creates a misconception that your body is wrong or that you have to hide certain parts,” Arruda said. When you do this, “you’re dressing with shame and fear,” which will “never allow you to be your true self and develop a style.”

It’s hard to “build perspective” when your “top concern is that every garment you wear makes it clear exactly how your waist is shaped,” or if you’re “worried about looking short in a long coat,” Lizzie Wheeler, a vintage expert, said to The Guardian. Don’t be afraid to experiment with shape, volume and proportion.

Learn to ride the wave

Personal style isn’t “something you find overnight,” Amanda Murray, a creative consultant, said to CNN. “It’s something you arrive at.” Over time, through “living, failing, heartbreak, love, wanting, shedding,” you will “understand what feels true on your body and what doesn’t.”

Your aesthetic is not just a reflection of your current life but “the life you’re aspiring to or think you deserve,” Jalil Johnson, writer of the fashion Substack Consider Yourself Cultured, said to CNN. Much like our “ever-evolving and changing lives,” our style “evolves too, and that evolution is not only natural but necessary.”

Several thousand people have been killed in Iran since the U.S.-Israeli war broke out, and the conflict has created an additional humanitarian crisis: delays and shortages of medical supplies. Hospitals and health care clinics throughout the Middle East are reporting critical lapses in supplies, which experts fear could lead to a surge in deaths even as the U.S. agreed to a temporary ceasefire.

What did the commentators say?

With the war in a state of flux, humanitarian centers “across the Middle East, Asia and Africa are facing the risk of running out of basic medication and food” due to the “restriction of shipments in the Strait of Hormuz,” said NPR. Some of this food, especially dry and canned goods, can “be stored for a long time,” Bob Kitchen, the vice president of emergencies and humanitarian action with the International Rescue Committee, said to NPR. But health care supplies are a different story, as most of the “medicines or treatments for malnutrition will expire.”

Many of these countries rely almost entirely on foreign aid for medical supplies. Sudan, for example, has “no manufacturing capacity and is entirely dependent on imported medication,” Omer Sharfy of Save the Children in Sudan said to NPR. This means health care workers “won’t be able to find alternatives in the local market.” The war has also “disrupted the movement of medical supplies from WHO’s global logistics hub in Dubai,” said the World Health Organization. By March 11, just 12 days into the war, over “50 emergency supply requests, intended to benefit over 1.5 million people across 25 countries,” were “affected, resulting in significant backlogs.”

Even countries far away from the conflict are bearing the brunt of these scarcities. Fears of syringe and IV shortages in South Korea are “spreading through Korea’s health care sector, prompting authorities to urge medical providers to refrain from stockpiling,” said The Korea Times. The problem is not that the Persian Gulf countries are “major drug producers. They’re not,” said health care news nonprofit Healthbeat. But these nations do “form ‘a critical pharmaceutical transit hub,’ where drugs and their basic ingredients from India, Europe and China routinely pass before heading to Africa, Asia and the United States.”

What next?

Some are hopeful that the two-week ceasefire, announced by President Donald Trump and initially agreed to by Iran, will allow the flow of medicine to restart. But while the U.S. has backed a ceasefire, Israel has continued its assault on the region, carrying out a series of strikes in Lebanon. Iran reclosed the strait in “response to Israeli attacks against the Hezbollah militant group,” said The Associated Press. Iran later accused the U.S. of also violating the deal and claimed that a long-term ceasefire was “unreasonable.”

Even before the strait was closed again, experts say it is unlikely its opening would have made a huge difference in moving global medical supplies. The ceasefire deal would not lead to a “‘mass exodus’ of ships through the Strait of Hormuz,” said The Guardian. The deal also allows Iran and Oman to “charge a fee of up to $2 million a ship on vessels transiting through the strait,” which could further limit the amount of supplies that are able to pass.

With no end to the larger skirmish in sight, fears persist that the shipment of medical supplies could remain at risk. All of these events are happening in an industry that was “decimated by funding cuts from the United States and Europe last year,” said The Washington Post, and is “now straining to meet demand that grows with each additional day of war.”

We’ve recently checked off another year of inaction on the sinking ship known as Social Security, said Brenton Smith in MarketWatch. New projections from the Congressional Budget Office reveal that the trust fund will now run out of money by 2032, “resulting in benefit cuts of 22.5% in 2033.” As they’ve done for the past 40 years, our lawmakers are likely to continue to react to this slow-moving disaster “with the rhetoric of empty politics” and no real solutions. Voters, too, have consistently “responded with systemic denial.” Seniors continue to “recycle the tired cliché of indifference, ‘We paid for our benefits,’” and resist any effort to protect future generations. A 2% increase in the payroll tax in 2005 would have extended the program for another 75 years. Now the cost to achieve the same result is 4%. “If fixing Social Security were easy, it would already be done.” But hard choices must be made.

Here’s one way to “help restore sanity to a program millions of Americans depend on,” said The Washington Post in an editorial. “There’s no reason” Social Security should be sending $100,000 checks to wealthy Americans. But the way the program is constituted, couples who have continually met the taxable maximum on their earnings can become eligible for the maximum benefit, upward of $101,000. The rising costs of living will only “keep boosting payments” as time goes on. A “Six Figure Limit,” as proposed recently by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, “is the right idea.” A $100,000 cap would erase “one-quarter of the shortfalls and save $190 billion over the next decade,” said Shawn Tully in Fortune. But that would only delay insolvency by seven years. “It will take additional modest, and also more radical, fixes to bridge the yawning gaps.”

“OK, now take a breath,” said Pat Regnier in Bloomberg. Solving the shortfall may come down to a “nail-biter,” but few experts expect Congress to allow dramatic cuts to this “wildly popular” program. If the Six Figure Limit isn’t enough, other solutions “are simple in terms of math if not politics.” Lawmakers can make up for the shortfall with taxes, such as by raising the amount of income subject to a payroll tax (currently $184,500). Or they can reduce benefits “by raising the age for full retirement” again, or “changing the formulas for calculating benefits or cost-of-living adjustments.” But those nearing retirement should not panic. Even if the trust fund runs out in 2032, “major benefit reductions likely would be gradual and not kick in for at least a decade.” Social Security is going to last, but “having an aging society is expensive no matter what, and it’s going to leave a mark somewhere in the coming decades.”

The fuel crisis sparked by the war in Iran has reached the airline industry, said Will Gottsegen in The Atlantic. In addition to oil and gas, much of the world’s supply of kerosene—the base product for jet fuel—passes through the Strait of Hormuz. But with the waterway effectively closed since early March, jet fuel prices have soared by more than 58%. Airlines, “which have always had razor-thin margins,” immediately felt the strain. They have already needed to reroute many flight paths away from the war-torn Middle East, “using up more fuel and putting more pressure on airlines to compensate elsewhere.” Travelers are now seeing the turmoil show up in their ticket prices. United Airlines chief executive Scott Kirby this week warned fliers to book their “summer travel as soon as possible, before prices go even higher.”

The jet fuel crisis is so dire that “airlines are drawing up plans to cancel flights” if the war drags on, said Christopher Jasper in The Telegraph (U.K.). There is particular concern about the ability for some planes to refuel after long-haul flights to southeast Asia, a major Gulf oil importer, “potentially leaving aircraft stranded” at far-flung locales. “Because no one has a crystal ball, what this all means for travelers is up in the air,” said Aarian Marshall in Wired. But if the war continues for weeks or even months, “bigger changes—and inconveniences—might be headed to an airline near you.” Carriers could raise ticket prices, eliminate less profitable routes, or experiment with new fees—as they did during 2008’s “major and sustained” fuel shock, when charging passengers for luggage became the norm.

Wondering about the war’s impact on vacations “might seem distasteful,” said Andrea Felsted in Bloomberg. But it’s a serious problem for the tourism industry, which was “already at risk from a slowdown following the post-Covid travel boom.” Certain tourist spots like Dubai, the fifth-most visited travel destination last year, are a no-go now with the war happening. Another important global tourist spot, Mexico, is simultaneously witnessing “a wave of violence” following the killing of a Jalisco cartel leader, which will undoubtedly give travelers more pause. “While the super-wealthy will continue to travel, the simply comfortable might vacation closer to home, or not at all, particularly if the cost of energy deepens the cost-of-living crisis.”

The travel industry’s problems run deeper than the cost of jet fuel, said Ganesh Sitaraman in The New York Times. In recent weeks, travelers have endured thousands of canceled flights, hours-long lines at TSA checkpoints, and multiple safety crises, including a tragic crash at LaGuardia Airport. “Flying hasn’t always been like this,” and the culprit for America’s mess in the skies is deregulation. The Airline Deregulation Act of 1978 eliminated route and price regulation, setting the stage for the current era of “fortress hubs dominated by just one airline” at the
expense of smaller communities, as well as the relentless cost cutting that has made flying miserable. “Politicians need to learn the lessons of hundreds of years of infrastructure policy” and embrace “a regulatory and industrial policy that will once again make our air transportation system the envy of the world.”

What happened

Rex Heuermann, the Long Island architect long suspected of the so-called Gilgo Beach killings between 1993 and 2010, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to strangling seven women and dismembering some of them. He also confessed to murdering an eighth woman, Karen Vergata, in 1996. Heuermann initially pleaded not guilty following his 2023 arrest. The remains of several of the women were found near Long Island’s Gilgo Beach in 2010 and 2011.

Who said what

Wednesday’s guilty pleas “bring finality to a case that bedeviled investigators, tormented victims’ families and tantalized a true-crime obsessed public for years,” The Associated Press said. The investigation was long “delayed by dysfunction, disarray and corruption,” The New York Times said. It finally ended with Wednesday’s “extraordinary proceeding,” where Heuermann “maintained a normal demeanor, as if having a morning chat,” while confessing to serial murders. He “walked among us play-acting as a normal suburban dad” while “obsessively targeting innocent women for death,” Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney said at a post-hearing press conference.

What next?

Heuermann will be sentenced in June to life in prison with no possibility of parole. As part of his plea deal, he also agreed to be interviewed by the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Units profilers, potentially helping “investigators hunt down others with similarly violent minds,” the Times said.

What happened

The Justice Department on Wednesday told the House Oversight Committee that ousted Attorney General Pam Bondi will not honor its bipartisan subpoena to sit for a deposition on her handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files, citing her firing last week. The notification “set off frustration” among lawmakers “clamoring for answers” about why she had not, “in their view, fully complied with the Epstein Files Transparency Act,” USA Today said.

Who said what

Bondi “cannot escape accountability,” Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) said on social media. The subpoena “was for Bondi by name, not by title.” If Bondi “defies the subpoena, we will begin contempt charges,” Rep. Robert Garcia (Calif.), the committee’s top Democrat, said in a statement. “The survivors deserve justice.”

Mace and four other Republicans “joined Democrats to force the subpoena” over the objection of committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.), and lawmakers were “concerned” Bondi “would try to avoid the deposition” even before President Donald Trump fired her, The New York Times said. Comer last month promised to honor the subpoena, but according to sources, he and Bondi “had been quietly working together to avoid the deposition.”

What next?

The committee will contact Bondi’s “personal counsel” about “scheduling her deposition,” a spokesperson said.

What happened

The two-week ceasefire announced by President Donald Trump and Iranian officials earlier this week faltered Wednesday as the U.S., Iran and Israel argued over whether it covered the Israel-Hezbollah fight in Lebanon. Iran also accused the U.S. of violating several tenets of the agreement, and closed the Strait of Hormuz in response to Israeli strikes on Lebanon that killed at least 254 people and wounded 1,100 more.

Who said what

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, a key mediator of the ceasefire, said it applied to “everywhere, including Lebanon.” Israel said Lebanon was not included, and President Donald Trump agreed Wednesday. U.S. allies, including the leaders of France, Australia and Spain, said Lebanon needed to be covered by the ceasefire.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Lebanon was included, and the “ceasefire terms are clear and explicit: the U.S. must choose — ceasefire or continued war via Israel.” Vice President JD Vance called the dispute a “legitimate misunderstanding.” Iran likely “thought that the ceasefire included Lebanon, and it just didn’t,” he told reporters, adding that Israel nonetheless “actually offered to be — frankly, to check themselves a little bit in Lebanon.”

In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “faced swift criticism from political opponents on the left and right” over the U.S.-Iran deal, Politico said. “The ceasefire stopped the Israeli military campaign much sooner than Israel wanted,” and while Netanyahu had “no choice but to go along,” he can claim ongoing Lebanon strikes “as a victory with the Israeli public.”

What next?

Despite Wednesday’s “dueling threats to resume attacks if the ceasefire fell apart,” The New York Times said, Trump “seemed determined to plow ahead” with diplomacy, saying Vance would lead a delegation to Islamabad for peace talks starting Saturday.

For a play that famously ends with the suicides of its two teenage protagonists, Robert Icke’s production of “Romeo & Juliet” feels “outlandishly joyful” and “profoundly alive”, said Alice Saville in The Independent.

Fuelled by fizzing performances from its “duo of stars”, Sadie Sink (from “Stranger Things”) and Noah Jupe (“Hamnet”), this is a “richly emotional, brilliantly intelligent take on a classic – one that’ll plunge a knife into your heart so skilfully that you hardly notice the pain”. Sink, already a Broadway veteran at 23, is “magnificent” – with a “steely passion”, quick wit and unguarded physical abandon, said Nick Curtis in London’s The Standard. And she’s well matched by Jupe, who makes a consummately assured stage debut as a boyish and impetuous Romeo.

The two leads are terrific, agreed Houman Barekat in The New York Times. So sincere and touching are their performances that we almost forgive the quirks that threaten to overbalance the play.

In “Romeo & Juliet”, “fate is a matter of bad timing”: the young lovers are confounded by bad luck as much as warring clans. “Urgent communications don’t get through; realisations come too late.” Icke draws attention to this with a giant digital clock, counting down the hours, that appears above the actors; at times it rewinds, and scenes replay with slight variations. It’s all rather “gimmicky”, generating only a “cheap, slightly hammy suspense”.

There are a lot of distractions in this modern-dress staging, agreed Clive Davis in The Times. It too often lapses into broad comedy; at times it seems as if we’ve stumbled into “an entirely new play called ‘Two Geezers of Verona’”. Kasper Hilton-Hille’s Mercutio “can’t stop baring his bottom”, and there’s “precious little sense of a city at war with itself”.

It would have made for a more elegant production had Icke not made so many directorial “interventions”, said Andrzej Lukowski in Time Out – but “auteurs are gonna auteur”. And the cast is truly excellent: from the leads to Clare Perkins’ Nurse, and Clark Gregg as Juliet’s father Capulet, through to the minor characters. Reined in a little bit, this could have been an all-time great “Romeo & Juliet”. Instead, “we’ll have to settle for one that’s merely very good”.

Harold Pinter Theatre, London SW1. Until 20 June.

“No other film this year will make you feel as uncomfortable as ‘The Drama’,” said Clarisse Loughrey in The Independent. It’s a “provocative and compulsively watchable” romcom – albeit one that “obliterates the very meaning of the word”.

Zendaya and Robert Pattinson star as Emma and Charlie, a pair of gorgeous young Bostonians who meet in a café, fall in love and are now in the run-up to their wedding. So far so good, until “an idle, drunken conversation” one night with their closest friends (Mamoudou Athie and Alana Haim) leads to a round of confessions about the worst thing they’ve ever done. It’s all laughed off – until Emma’s turn. Without giving away any spoilers, “what she says next immediately sucks the air from the room”.

People are going a “little cuckoo” over this movie, said David Fear in Rolling Stone. Emma’s bombshell is “the point of no return for the characters” – and, for some audiences, the moment “The Drama” “loses them”. It certainly walks “a thin line between thought-provoking and trolling”; you do wonder “if the sudden introduction of an issue much, much bigger than the film itself isn’t simply a shock value masquerading as shock therapy”.

The film is also tonally uneven, said Nicholas Barber on BBC Culture. Oddly, it devotes more energy to “awkward cringe comedy” than to the characters and their feelings; it’s hard to believe, for instance, that Emma and Charlie would only have “a few faltering chats” about her confession, rather than discussing it properly.

Still, ‘The Drama’ is “beautifully made”, and most people who see it “will end up having in-depth debates, even if the characters themselves don’t manage it. The first great cinematic conversation-starter of 2026 is here.”

Alan Bennett once said that “if you live to be 90 in England and can still eat a boiled egg, they think you deserve the Nobel Prize”. Well, here he is at 91, serving up “another volume of his punctiliously kept and endlessly diverting diaries”, said Nick Curtis in The Independent.

“Enough Said” covers the years 2016 to 2024: “the pandemic, the rise of populism, and the likely last spurt of his formidable creative output”, with the play “Allelujah!”, the film “The Choral” and the novella “Killing Time”.

The general theme is of loss and “diminution”, as deafness, lack of mobility, cataracts and other medical problems intrude.

The “dramatis personae of his life” are dying off: Maggie Smith, his “adored” friend and collaborator; Jonathan Miller, an old friend and rival from his “Beyond the Fringe” days; and Queen Elizabeth II, his subject in the play “A Question of Attribution”. Revolted by Brexit and Boris Johnson, Bennett feels that his version of England is dying too, “its libraries closing and its churches unappreciated”. But he and his partner Rupert Thomas “still rummage through junk shops”, “frequent out-of-the-way churches” and eat fish and chips.

More than once, Bennett “apologises to the reader for saying things he’s said many times before”, said Philip Hensher in The Spectator. And he certainly does often return “to his most treasured material – family, and his exemplary standing as the grammar school boy who brought off an Oxford first”. (“Does it mean you’ve come top?” his mother asked when the results arrived.)

His memories of his Yorkshire boyhood are “wonderfully evocative of a lost world”. Rather less rewarding “are his highly conventional opinions” on politics, which “are precisely the same” as those of every other millionaire Londoner “living between Primrose Hill and Hampstead Garden Suburb”.

But his “relish” for spoken language is still there. He notes a woman in a Yorkshire newsagent, seeing news of a lightning strike, admitting cheerfully: “I love it when they have it nasty down south.”

Even as a young man, Bennett was a bit of a fogey, said Johanna Thomas-Corr in The Sunday Times. Back in the 1980s, he wrote about the elderly “with piercing tenderness” in his “Talking Heads” series. “So old age feels like a homecoming, a phase for which he has been practising all of his life.” Yet he’s still suffering “adolescent doubts”. When he enters a room full of people, he feels about 16. He worries about whether he has made his mark; he fears being remembered as a “chronicler of the toasted teacake”. “In an age of curated self-belief, his vulnerabilities feel refreshing, his reticence almost radical.”

The countdown has begun to the introduction of new rules on how pensions are treated after someone dies.

In the “biggest shake-up of inheritance rules in a generation”, said The Telegraph, the value of a pension will, from April 2027, form part of someone’s estate after they die.

This could mean an inheritance tax bill for one in five households, said The Times, so “the countdown is on to protect their family wealth”.

What is the pensions death tax?

Putting money into a pension has traditionally been “one of the most tax-efficient ways to pass wealth on to loved ones”, said Rest Less. But any unused money in the pot from next year will fall into the scope of inheritance tax, “potentially reducing the amount families receive when someone dies”.

The proposals were announced in the October 2024 Budget by Chancellor Rachel Reeves. They aim to address concerns, said Dentons, that pensions were “increasingly being used as vehicles for inheritance planning, rather than for their primary purpose of providing retirement income”.

Who will be affected?

Inheritance tax is paid on the value of an estate above £325,000. Additionally, there is a £175,000 allowance for your main residence.

The tax “isn’t going to be an issue for most people”, said Royal London, but you may be affected if you own your own home and the value of your pension is added due to the potential total amounts.

The changes will still affect “most individuals” who have unused pension benefits when they die, said Tax Adviser. This means pensions can no longer be relied on as an “efficient means of passing” on wealth such as to your children. This could apply to millions who were previously free of it.

Inheritance tax receipts have already been rising due to “years of property price growth, asset inflation and frozen tax thresholds”, said The Times, so including pensions “will accelerate the trend”.

Beyond the potential charge, “of greatest concern”, said Wedlake Bell, is that payment of inheritance tax on pension assets will remain six months from the end of the month when the deceased died and interest on unpaid inheritance tax is currently running at 7.75%. The government has rejected calls to give bereaved families more time to pay.

Many families could face paying interest, said MoneyWeek, “due to administrative jams” involved in finding pension information and getting the right valuations.

How to prepare for the changes

If you are retired “it might make sense” to prioritise taking money from your pension before other assets, said Grovely Financial, especially if your goal is “inheritance tax mitigation”.

Another option, said MoneyWeek, is to “give away money while you are alive” so you can watch your loved ones enjoy it.

Up to £3,000 per tax year can be given as a financial gift, and tax-free gifts can be made to your children worth up to £5,000 for a wedding or civil partnership or £2,500 for a grandchild or great-grandchild.

Any money given outside of the gifting allowances is tax-free as long as you live for seven years after transfer. Gifting allowances can be used to pass cash on to loved ones, or alternatively, for extra net income.

Alternatively, there are life insurance policies that pay out to cover the cost of inheritance tax. They work in a similar way to other life insurance products: you pay premiums while you are alive “and there will be a payout when you die”, said The Independent.

After five weeks of war, Donald Trump has claimed “total and complete victory” over Iran. Tehran begs to differ. Agreeing to the conditional two-week ceasefire, Iranian officials said their country had dealt a “crushing historic defeat” to the US and Israel.

Meanwhile, commentators are pointing to real, quiet wins for both China and Pakistan, whose behind-the-scenes roles in pushing for the ceasefire have increased their global standing.

What did the commentators say?

Benjamin Netanyahu “looks set to be the biggest loser” of the conflict, said The Guardian’s senior international correspondent, Peter Beaumont. Pressuring Trump to agree to his decades-long goal of neutralising Iran has “turned out to be a bust”. The “political consensus” between Israel and the US is “visibly crumbling”, and there’s “domestic fallout” for Netanyahu in the run-up to an election.

Trump has also emerged as a “strategic loser”, said the South China Morning Post. Washington failed to achieve regime change in Tehran, and Iran retained control of the Strait of Hormuz, the conflict’s “most strategic asset”. Meanwhile, the US has used up “sophisticated air-defence missiles” intercepting “far cheaper Iranian drones and projectiles”. Iran’s nuclear programme has survived, along with the “stockpile of enriched uranium” from which it could “potentially produce a viable weapon”, said The Times’ Middle East correspondent, Samer Al-Atrush. That “will not be given up easily”.

Tehran’s blocking of the Strait of Hormuz was a “high-risk” strategy that “paid off”, said DW. It “secured a ceasefire without conceding defeat”, which it “can present as proof that it withstood the US and all its military might”. The Iranian regime “survived, and bought time to try to shape” the phase of negotiations “on more favourable terms”.

In the longer term, it is actually Beijing that most “stands to gain”. America has “moved many military assets to the Middle East to protect shipping”, which “leaves fewer resources for the Indo‑Pacific, where Washington and Beijing compete for influence”. China has also had the chance to present itself “as a responsible global actor”, with its power brokers widely credited with pushing Iran to agree to the ceasefire.

China is “shaping up to be the big winner”, said Roger Boyes, The Times’ diplomatic editor. Unlike the US, it expected Iran to seize the strait and “amassed large oil reserves”, making itself “more resilient” to an energy crisis. “As a significant exporter” of other goods, it was still initially “hit hard” by the strait’s closure but then the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps ordered that China-bound vessels could pass through “toll-free”.

Pakistan’s credentials have been burnished, too. Its role in brokering the ceasefire was “unexpected” but the Islamabad Accord is the country’s “most consequential diplomatic moment in a decade”, said former UN peacekeeper Anil Raman on NDTV. Capitalising on its good relations with both the US and Iran, Islamabad will “press hard to consolidate” this “return to global relevance”.

What next?

J.D. Vance is due to lead a US delegation in negotiations with Tehran in Pakistan this weekend. The White House said the ceasefire between the US and Iran has created an “opening for a diplomatic solution and long-term peace”.

But the specifics of the terms to be discussed “remain murky”, said the BBC, “as is the current state of shipping traffic” through the Strait of Hormuz. Iranian forces have warned that ships would be “destroyed” if they tried to sail through without permission.

A British computer scientist who pioneered a forerunner of cryptocurrencies has denied reports that he is Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin.

An investigation by The New York Times used biographical details and writing style comparisons to make the case that Adam Back was the cryptocurrency’s enigmatic founder.

Who is Adam Back?

Back, a 55-year-old computer scientist from London, “has long been seen as a potential candidate to be Nakamoto”, said The Times. “A pioneer of early digital asset research in the 1990s”, he “has a long-standing background in cryptography, the techniques used to secure and verify digital information”. This includes developing Hashcash, “a proof-of-work system that later influenced Bitcoin” and was referenced by Nakamoto in his Bitcoin “white paper”.

Back dismissed The New York Times’ use of writing analyses to link him to the elusive Nakamoto as “a combination of coincidence and similar phrases from people with similar experience and interests”. In reference to the claim that he disappeared from Bitcoin message boards when “Satoshi” was at his busiest, Back insisted that he “did a lot of yakking” on the forums at the time. “I’m not Satoshi,” he said.

Why is Nakamoto’s identity a secret?

Since Bitcoin launched in 2008, Nakamoto has chosen to stay anonymous. All their communication was written under their pseudonym and no verifiable personal details have ever been released or revealed. Since 2011, they have given no public statements at all, their seeming disappearance giving them a “cult-like status among crypto enthusiasts”, said The Times.

This anonymity was very on-brand for Bitcoin. The cryptocurrency was designed to have no central authority; if the identity of a real person were known they could become a leader or figurehead, which might contradict the founding principle of decentralisation. There is a security element, too: Nakamoto is thought to own $78 billion worth of bitcoin, so remaining anonymous lessens the risk of extortion or kidnapping.

It’s also possible that the mysterious founder is not one person, but rather a team of developers or cryptographers. Either way, the years of speculation have added to Bitcoin’s profile and acted as a useful indirect marketing tool.

Has anyone else been suggested?

In 2014, Newsweek identified a Japanese-American systems engineer called Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto as the creator of Bitcoin. He disputed this, and the claim has “largely been debunked”, said the BBC.

The following year, Wired suggested Nakamoto could be a pseudonym for Australian computer scientist Craig Wright. Unlike Back and Dorian Nakamoto, Wright went public to assert he was indeed Nakamoto, until a UK High Court judge ruled he was not the Bitcoin founder and barred him from continuing to claim he was.

In 2024, an HBO documentary claimed that Canadian crypto expert Peter Todd was the real Nakamoto, a suggestion he described as “ludicrous”.

Donald Trump’s political rivals have denounced him as an “unhinged madman” and a “dangerous and mentally unbalanced individual” after he directed a string of expletives at the Iranian regime. “Open the F***in’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell!” the US president said on his Truth Social platform .

But Trump is far from the only potty-mouthed politician, and trends suggest that swearing in politics is increasingly going from taboo to mainstream.

‘Profanity seal’

Woodrow Wilson “broke the profanity seal” in 1919, when the then president recalled a time he made a “conspicuous ass of himself”, said Joseph Phillips, a politics lecturer at Cardiff University. “Since then, presidents, their seconds-in-command, and presidential hopefuls have used profanity at least 692 times” – but the vast majority of curse words, 87%, occurred in the last 10 years.

We’ve “come a long way from our shock” at John Major, not knowing he was being recorded, using the word “bastards” while prime minister in 1993, said Robert Crampton in The Times. Although “tough talk is nothing new in politics”, leaders “long avoided flaunting it”, said The Independent. But now, public vulgarity is “in vogue”. During a political rally in 2025, Trump “used profanity at least four times”. J.D. Vance has also sworn publicly, and former vice president Kamala Harris “earned a roar of approval from her audience” last October when she said of the Trump administration that “these mother******* are crazy”.

Members of Congress and the Senate have also sworn as a “volley of vulgarities underscores an ever-coarsening political environment” on social media. Posts that “evoke the strongest emotions are rewarded with the most engagement”.

‘Anti-intellectualism’

There’s a “misguided belief” that “profanity is more ‘honest’ or ‘authentic’ than polite speech”, said Solomon D. Stevens in the Illinois paper the Journal-Courier. This suggests that politicians who swear are “telling it like it is” or “being real”, while those who don’t must be “holding back and not telling the truth”. But “politicians who swear are just politicians who swear. They can lie just as easily as those who don’t swear.”

There’s also “an anti-intellectualism at work”, as politicians who swear imply that those who don’t are “putting on airs”. While some intellectuals can “certainly be pretentious”, “refraining from coarse language” is not in itself a sign of that.

Trump’s “disinhibited language” sounded like a “tantrum”, said Melanie Phillips in The Times. It “suggested that he’d lost self-control because Iran wouldn’t do what he wanted”. Swearing points to an “emotional release and thus a loss of reason”.

The president’s recent profanity also distracted from “the message itself”, said the Deseret News. A “rousing and well-crafted argument” could have “built a compelling case for ousting the country’s ruling regime”, because “when it comes to war, calm self-assurance speaks louder than ranting expletives”.

Politicians aren’t “bawling swear words because they can’t contain their outrage”, said Barton Swaim in The Wall Street Journal. They do it because, “like preteen boys trying to sound tough”, they believe “the odd public expletive enhances their authenticity” and gives them “an air of pugnacity apropos to the moment”. But they are mistaken. “Most Americans still prefer their leaders to talk like grown-ups.”

Nevertheless, Democrats are pushing back against the right, using bad language themselves and embracing more confrontational and crass tactics. They see it as a way to beat Maga at its own game, attempting to “step outside the bounds of the political correctness that Republicans have accused Democrats of establishing”, said The New York Times.

Having kids is a decision with a lot of gravity, literally. Scientists have found that sperm in space can’t find their direction during their pursuit to fertilize an egg. Such digressions could pose a problem in the future as the possibilities of human colonies in space become more likely.

Spacing out

A lack of gravity “impaired directional navigation and fertilization capacity” of human sperm cells, said a study published in the journal Communications Biology. “This is the first time we have been able to show that gravity is an important factor in sperm’s ability to navigate through a channel like the reproductive tract,” Nicole McPherson, a senior lecturer at Adelaide University’s Robinson Research Institute and the senior author of the study, said in a release.

Researchers tested human, pig and mouse sperm by putting them into a “microgravity simulation chamber designed to mimic the female reproductive tract and tested the swimmers’ ability to navigate,” said Scientific American. The results showed a “significant reduction in the number of sperm that were able to successfully find their way through the chamber maze in microgravity conditions compared to normal gravity,” said McPherson. The results repeated “across all models, despite no changes to the way sperm physically move.” The sperm’s directional loss “was not due to a change in motility but other elements.” In the case of human sperm, “less than 20% of them reached the finish line in near weightlessness,” compared to 50% in Earth’s conditions,” said Smithsonian Magazine.

There may be a way to lead sperm in the right direction: the hormone progesterone. “Progesterone works as a chemical signal, a kind of biological homing beacon that the egg releases around the time of ovulation,” McPherson said to Scientific American. “Sperm have receptors on their surface that detect this signal and use it to orient themselves and swim toward the source.” However, the progesterone only helped at concentrations “considerably higher” than those found in nature, so it is not yet a “simple fix for fertility in space.”

A new home

Having babies in space may be a necessity in the future as humans aim to establish settlements on the moon and Mars. The human body “evolved over ​millions of years to function optimally in Earth’s environment, including its gravity,” said Reuters. “Trekking beyond Earth’s confines causes many physiological changes that affect human health.” Until now, research had not been done about “whether the cells can successfully navigate the female reproductive tract and fertilize eggs,” said Smithsonian Magazine.

Despite the potential to get lost in space, “many healthy embryos were still able to form even when fertilized under these conditions,” McPherson said. “This gives us hope that reproducing in space may one day be possible.” The next research step is to investigate “how varying gravitational environments, such as those on the moon, Mars and proposed artificial gravity systems, impact sperm navigation and early embryo development,” said the release. As of now, “NASA and other governmental space agencies maintain that no one has ever had sex in space,” said Scientific American. “But future human spacefarers may want to have families and reproduce while in a microgravity environment.”

A new dating service has sprung up in Japan, aiming to get around the country’s ban on married couples having different surnames.

In a series of match-making events held this spring, every participant shared the same family name. The concept, the organisers said, is simply that “two people who already have the same last name won’t have to agonise over which one to use after marriage”.

Are you a Sato, Suzuki, Tanaka or Ito?

Japan’s current civil code, which dates back to the 19th century, specifies that a husband and wife must use the same family name. While there is no stipulation which name the couple adopts, in the country’s male-dominated society it is the man’s in 95% of cases. While critics claim this affects women’s employment prospects and contributes to Japan’s low birth rate, conservatives maintain that any change would undermine the traditional family unit and cause confusion among children.

Either way, it leaves young couples with an added pressure when trying to find a life partner. Four in-person gatherings in Tokyo, each focusing on one of Japan’s most popular surnames – Suzuki, Tanaka, Sato or Ito – “offer a rare opportunity for people who share a surname to meet someone they could legally marry without either person having to change names”, said news site The Mainichi.

It is not hard to see the appeal. A recent survey conducted by Asuniwa, a Tokyo-based association that advocates for a selective separate surname system and co-organises the events, and dating app Pairs, polled 2,500 people in their 20s and 30s. They found 36% of women and 46% of men “felt resistance” about changing their surname, while a smaller proportion had misgivings about their partner changing their name. Around 7% said they would break up if neither partner wanted to change their surname, while just under 6% said they would “wait until the (separate surname) system is legalised” to tie the knot.

“I hadn’t given much thought to the idea of marrying another Suzuki, but I can see now why it’s a safe option,” Taisho (not his real name) Suzuki, a 33-year-old company employee, told The Guardian. “I don’t want to give up my surname when I marry, and I know a lot of women feel the same about their names.”

For others it is more of a novelty. “To be honest, I’m not too fussed about keeping my maiden name, but I thought it would be fun to meet another Suzuki,” said Hana (not her real name) Suzuki, a 34-year-old nurse.

‘Bump in the app before you bump in bed’

For would-be couples in Iceland, the problem is being related to your partner. With a population of just 330,000, the risk of pairing up with someone genetically similar to you is high.

“Now, as social media and apps expand the dating pool”, many people are turning to a website “to ensure they aren’t swimming in the same gene pool,” said The Wall Street Journal.

Tracing a person’s lineage in Iceland is “especially challenging because last names are no indicator of historic family lineage”. Usually, a person’s last name is the father’s first name, followed by “son” or “dottir”.

“Íslendingabók”, or the Book of Icelanders, is an online database that contains the full genealogy of 720,000 Icelanders, living and deceased. While the historical work dating from the 12th century was not originally designed for dating, it led to a spin-off app that allows users to bump their phones together to instantly trace whether their family trees are intertwined, sparking the tagline “bump in the app before you bump in bed”.

China’s parent trap

In China, meanwhile, some parents are taking matters into their own hands to find partners for their children.

There is a long tradition of in-person outdoor “marriage markets”, where parents display handwritten CVs of their unmarried children in the hope of finding suitable partners.

Many are now “increasingly turning to ‘find a daughter-in-law’ or ‘find a son-in-law’ platforms online, turning partner-seeking into direct negotiations between parents”, said South China Morning Post.

“Instead of trying to persuade single young adults who resist matchmaking”, a few “sharp-eyed businesses” are now “directly targeting a different demographic: anxious parents with strong purchasing power”.

Quarterly membership costs 399 yuan (£43), for an online profile with an individual’s age, education, occupation and income, as well as home ownership status and expected timeline for marriage, prioritised above personality traits, hobbies, and interests.

Whether you are considering a move to a new apartment or reevaluating how to allocate your budget, you may be wondering how much is reasonable to shell out each month for rent. Of course, the cost of housing is a non-negotiable — after all, you need a place to live — but it is also typically among the biggest regular expenditures a person has. It is also an expense you must commit to, at least for a certain period of time, when you sign a lease.

Before you sign on the dotted line and agree to pay a portion of your income every month, it is important to have an understanding of the guidelines for rent spending, as well as what factors influence the amount that is actually right for you and your budget.

What percentage of your income should ideally go to rent?

These two common rules of thumb can give you a rough idea of what is reasonable to spend on rent each month, at least according to financial experts:

The 30% rule: This rule “says that you should limit what you spend on rent to 30% or less of your gross monthly income,” with the cost of rent also including “other housing costs, such as renters insurance, utilities, parking and more,” said Rocket Mortgage.

The 50/30/20 rule: This is a “more comprehensive rule that takes all of your expenses into account, as well as savings goals,” said Rocket Mortgage. Here, the benchmark is to spend a maximum of 50% of your income on essentials and financial obligations, like rent, and then 30% on wants, meaning discretionary spending. The remaining 20% goes into savings.

What factors affect the cost of renting?

The above rules can be a helpful starting point, but they do not necessarily account for the myriad factors that can quickly throw a wrench in those calculations.

Location, as you might expect, is a big one. For instance, the 30% rule can be “hard to follow in a place like New York City or San Francisco, where median rents are well over $3,500 for a one-bedroom apartment,” said NerdWallet, citing 2025 Zillow rental market summaries. Where you live also shapes housing inventory, and the “law of supply and demand means landlords can charge more in areas where there’s a shortage of rental properties,” said Experian.

It is also important to look at the one-time and recurring costs as they relate to the place you rent. Some landlords include utility costs in the price of rent, in which case it may make sense for you to pay a bit more. Or, an apartment building could “have an on-site gym or a washer and dryer in-unit, which might make your rent payments higher,” but you will “save money on membership fees and laundromats,” said NerdWallet. Another consideration is commuting costs: While you may save by living further from the city center, how much will you then have to shell out to get to work every day?

How can you determine how much rent you can afford?

Rather than focusing on this one number, it is important to zoom out and consider your broader financial situation. The “biggest factors are your income and fixed monthly bills, such as utilities, loan payments, health insurance and other costs you must cover,” said Rocket Mortgage. This will shape how much you actually have leftover in your budget to cover the cost of rent.

If you find that the resulting calculations are out of line with the above rules of thumb, consider whether you can cut back in other areas or if you are open to exploring ways to pay less in rent, such as getting a roommate.

“Incel” is a portmanteau of “involuntary” and “celibate.” Over the past decade, the once-fringe community has gained prominence in popular culture, largely through the vector of online influencers like self-described incel and Nazi sympathizer Nick Fuentes. Incels are, typically, extremely online men who have given up on ever having sexual relationships with women and who have crafted an elaborate and insular worldview to justify and rationalize their lack of success or interest in dating.

Though some of these terms are used in other parts of the online “manosphere,” they go a long way toward helping understand the strange and toxic atmosphere of incel culture, which has been linked to acts of violence including the 2014 mass shooting perpetrated by Elliot Rodger.

Ascending

An incel who has “ascended” is someone who is able to “leave the bounds of inceldom and have sex with a woman (without payment being given),” said Safeguarding Network. Some incels use the term in a derogatory fashion, believing those who aspire to ascension are delusional.

Alpha and Beta

“Alpha,” or alpha male, is a term derived from discredited research about wolf packs by evolutionary biologists. An alpha is “in charge, has his pick of sexual partners and has ultimate control, both of themselves and others,” said The Conversation. A “beta” is “number 2 in the wolf pack or the baboon troop,” said The New York Times. An incel believes himself to be in the latter group, although some aspire to join the former.

Becky

A “Becky” is a comparatively plain or unglamorous woman, as compared to a “Stacy” who is more conventionally attractive and successful with men. “Incels feel they’re ‘owed’ sex and relationships from Beckys, as they’re seen as inferior” to higher-status women, said Education Against Hate.

Blackpilled and redpilled

This is the concept that forms the bedrock of the destructive incel ideology. It refers to a “nihilistic world view among incels that one’s romantic prospects are biologically determined; that inferior men have no chance of ever having sexual relationships with women,” said UN Women. The concept is akin to a gateway drug in terms of an individual’s descent into this community. Someone who is “blackpilled” accepts that they are hopelessly consigned to Beta status, as opposed to someone who is “redpilled” and merely recognizes the existence of these dynamics but believes that they can escape them by securing a higher status.

Chad

A “Chad” is someone who meets the standards of a prototypical alpha male. It refers to “​​muscular, popular men who are presumed to sleep with lots of women,” said Vox. If you consider yourself an incel, you definitely don’t think of yourself as a Chad. The term was appropriated from ’90s-era Chicago culture, where a “Chad” was a wealthy but basic North Sider who went to a Big Ten school and then worked in finance or law.

Foid

A combination of “female” and “humanoid,” the term “foid” is used by incels to degrade and debase women. The term is “derogatory and is used to reduce women to a subhuman group,” said the Anti-Defamation League. Another way of expressing this concept is to use the term “femoid.”

Gymcel

“An incel who is trying to ascend” and is doing so by “going to the gym as much as possible,” said Vice. Such a person is engaging in gymmaxxing and is thought to be redpilled rather than blackpilled, given their hope that transforming their body can allow them to join the Chads and Alphas on top of the social hierarchy.

Hypergamy

Another theory burbling around incel circles, “hypergamy” refers to the idea that “women are more sexually selective and will leave less suitable men for men who are more physically attractive and have a better socioeconomic standing,” said the Journal for Deradicalization and Democratic Culture. It is part of the community’s belief ecosystem and is meant to discourage its members from trying — and failing — to join or rejoin normie society.

Looksmaxxing

The phenomenon of looksmaxxing is brought to us by a “cohort of painfully online young men who obsess over physical self-improvement in the hope that it’ll improve their dating odds,” said GQ. Popularized by the racist, misogynist influencer Braden Peters, aka “Clavicular,” it refers to the idea of going to great lengths to look as perfect as possible. Looksmaxxers may use something called the PSL Scale, which “seeks to provide a supposedly empirical assessment of facial attractiveness,” said GQ.

Jestermaxxing

Another piece of incel jargon that has “broken containment to normies,” jestermaxxing is “being pushed by people who are chasing dollars, not just lols,” said Business Insider, including clippers who snip and caption existing videos for clicks and influence. It means “using humor to gain the attention of women,” said The Atlantic, and it is one of the many reasons that “we can shed the pretense that internet life is reasonable, level-headed or healthy.” The term is sometimes used interchangeably with “jestergooning.”

Mewing

Redpilled incels will sometimes engage in the practice of mewing, or “putting pressure on the roof of your mouth with your tongue to try and change the shape of your face,” said Vice, presumably to give yourself better or more chiseled cheek bone structure. To say that this idea is scientifically dubious is putting it lightly.

MGTOW

An acronym that means “Men Going Their Own Way,” it is an expression of a kind of male separatism and is representative of the hopeless nihilism of incel culture. It is an “online community of male supremacists who advocate self-empowerment by eschewing most relationships with women,” said the Southern Poverty Law Center. They “embrace a toxic form of traditional masculinity and define themselves by their lack of relationships and hatred of women.”

Mogging

A word that is sometimes attached as a suffix to others to create new jargon (like frame-mogging), “mogging” comes from the initialism AMOG, which means “alpha male of the group.” And to be “mogged is to be shown up by another more masculine male,” said NPR. Frame-mogging is a term associated with — who else? — Clavicular to describe being photographed with someone who is better looking than you.

Normie

“Normie” is not a term that is unique to incel culture, and it has a fairly well-established meaning in broader society. But for incels, it simply refers to someone outside of the community who lives a normal life as most people would understand it. Normies have not been blackpilled and are living a lie according to incel dogma.

Sexual Market Value (SMV)

Calculating your “Sexual Market Value” is a way of figuring out where you stand in what incels call the “sexual marketplace.” For incels, this is the “primary measure of an individual’s worth,” said the Journal for Deradicalization and Democratic Culture.

Soy boy

A “soy boy” is a man who subscribes to leftist or feminist beliefs about relations between men and women or lacks the qualities that incels ascribe to alpha males. “There is some reported connection” between the term and the scientifically dubious “idea that soy products increase men’s estrogen levels,” said The Independent. A similar idea is expressed by the term “simp.”

Stacy

The counterpart of a Chad, a “Stacy” is a woman deemed conventionally attractive in the warped worldview of incel culture. A “Stacy” is an “idealized, highly attractive woman that is considered unattainable,” by incels, said UN Women. In the original Chicago slang that produced Chad, the female counterpart was typically a Trixie rather than a Stacy.

Wagecuck

Wagecucks are men with conventional jobs and, presumably, conventional lifestyles and home lives. It refers to “someone who works for a living,” as opposed to the supposedly entrepreneurial influencer lifestyle promoted by people like Clavicular, said The New York Times. Removing oneself from the workforce is, however, unlikely to be a successful ascending strategy.

White knighting

An intellectual cousin of the idea of “virtue signalling,” another idea that migrated from far right to mainstream spaces, “white knighting” is an insult lobbed at men who defend women or espouse feminist or progressive ideas. Incels believe that “men who treat women more respectfully” are “putting on a mockable façade of chivalry,” said Jia Tolentino at The New Yorker

The United States under President Donald Trump is, for the time being, the brightest star in a growing network of ultra-nationalist governments hoping to reshape the global order in their authoritarian mold. While MAGA America is the powerhouse, it’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s Hungary that has been the backbone of the worldwide lurch rightward. Yet as Hungarians prepare to vote on April 12, Orbán and his Fidesz party seem headed for an electoral upset that could send shock waves across hard-right spheres.

Government ‘revered by authoritarians everywhere’

A “pro-Kremlin, anti-EU strongman” who has spent nearly two decades “building a template for Christian nationalist rule,” Orbán is now the “cornerstone of President Trump’s vision for Europe,” Axios said. In the 16 years since he was first elected, Orbán forged a “state apparatus — courts, media, election administration — loyal to his party” and has “never lost under the system he built.”

As the “center of the Trump administration’s shifting policy toward Europe,” Orbán’s Hungary “firmly” aligned itself with “far-right parties and immigration restrictionists in countries such as France and Germany,” said Al Jazeera. While this has “mired relationships in Europe,” it has also been a “source of inspiration for the U.S.”

“Whatever Hungary decides will resonate throughout Europe,” said Argentine President Javier Milei, a South American nationalist, during his address at last month’s Conservative Political Action Conference in Budapest. Orbán is a “beacon” for those who “refuse to accept that the West’s destiny is one of managed decline.”

CPAC-Hungary, where Milei spoke, has become an “important calendar event for Euro-Atlantic hard-right networking,” said Balkan Insight. The event hosted “667 foreign guests from 51 countries” who heard from “prominent European political figures” such as far-right Dutch PVV leader Geert Wilders and Alice Weidel of Germany’s ultra-nationalist AfD. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, while initially scheduled to appear in person, instead sent a “warm message of support” in pretaped remarks played on the conference’s first day, Cleveland Jewish News said.

Orbán is “revered by authoritarians everywhere,” said Salon. But as a “path-breaking autocrat” who has demonstrated a “new soft fascism,” his potential loss is making many of those same authoritarians “nervous.”

Effects that would ‘reverberate well beyond Hungary’

Should Orbán’s government fall, the “dreams” of his authoritarian admirers in the MAGA movement “might be shattered” as well, said Vox. As a “close Russian ally,” Orbán’s loss would be a “considerable boon to the Ukrainian war effort — and a significant blow to the Kremlin.” Cumulatively, then, Hungary’s elections are “not just like any other vote,” and could end up as “one of the most significant elections of the entire year, and perhaps even the decade.”

An Orbán loss would prompt authoritarian allies to ask “what it could mean for them,” said Salon. “After all,” his “anti-democratic” domestic policies were designed to “not only prevent a defeat from happening” but to “keep people from ever wanting it to happen.” Such a defeat would “reverberate well beyond Hungary,” calling into question the “durability of a political system” marked by “hardline nationalism and an erosion of democratic checks” and “touted as a blueprint for reshaping Western democracy” by many conservatives, said Reuters.

“I am here for a simple reason,” Vice President JD Vance said at a pro-Orbán rally in Budapest this week: “I admire what you are fighting for.” But Vance’s visit may have ultimately done “more harm for Orbán than good,” The Guardian said. By asserting that the Trump administration would work with any eventual Hungarian elected leader, the vice president seemingly undercut Orbán’s campaign promise that “he — and his connections — were the only means of keeping Hungary safe in a volatile world.”

For some observers, Vance’s visit is unlikely to change the electoral calculus in Hungary, where “domestic issues such as the ⁠cost of living dominate the election,” said Reuters. No matter what happens in Hungary’s immediate future, Orbán’s global footprint will surely be felt for years to come.

Nothing about these impeccably designed hotels is ordinary. With their architecture, decor and aesthetics, each property welcomes you into a thoughtfully curated world. Every detail tells a story and enhances your stay.

Ashford Castle, Cong, Ireland

Go back in time at Ashford Castle. Built in 1228, the estate was purchased by the Guinness family in the 1800s and used to “entertain guests — among them, George V — and display the family’s wealth and influence,” said Country Life. Now part of the Red Carnation Hotel Collection, Ashford Castle remains “luxury personified,” its common spaces filled with “rich fabrics” and “glittering chandeliers.” The 83 guest rooms each have their own individual designs. A standout is the King’s Room, featuring “plush” seating, a “sumptuous” velvet four-poster bed, dramatic floral wallpaper and a fireplace.

Hotel Château Du Grand-Lucé, Loire Valley, France

This “impressive” 18th-century chateau is a shining example of neoclassical architecture, where “grandeur is still the order of the day,” said the Michelin Guide. Think extravagant toile and damask wallpaper, limestone and French white oak flooring, crystal chandeliers and heavy curtains tied back with impressive tassels.

No two rooms are alike, with the Barron Suite being the crown jewel. It boasts 17-foot-tall ceilings, a private library filled with classic French literature and the marvelous Salon Chinois, a sitting room named in honor of the chinoiserie-style paintings by prominent French artist Jean-Baptiste Pillement that adorn the walls.

La Valise San Miguel, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico

Tucked away in a “vibrant” corner of San Miguel de Allende is La Valise San Miguel, a “surrealist sanctuary” designed to “pay tribute” to the city’s history of art and culture, said Condé Nast Traveler. The property’s bold blend of “psychedelic installations and famous furnishings” by Mexican artist Pedro Friedeberg mixes seamlessly with mid-century furniture and “rich textiles.” Guests have six “completely unique” suites to choose from, and each one has a “standout” design feature, like a domed shower or white-stucco fireplace “adorned with Aztec monkeys.”

L'oscar, London, England

With Oscar Wilde serving as his inspiration, French interior designer Jacques Garcia gave new life to an old Edwardian baroque-style church, turning it into an exquisite boutique hotel dripping in gilded decor and rich silk, damask and velvet fabrics. Both Wilde and Garcia are “known for decadence, in different ways,” and L’oscar is “nothing if not decadent,” said the Michelin Guide.

The 39 guest rooms and suites and common areas are decorated in “hyper-saturated jewel tones,” with objets d’art on every surface and gorgeous Lalique bird-shaped lights illuminating the corners. Some original details remain, like opulent plastered ceilings and terra-cotta panels.

Leela Palace Jaipur, Jaipur, India

The attention to detail at Leela Palace Jaipur is extraordinary. Inspired by “Indian royal heritage,” the property is all about “opulence,” with marble corridors, hand-painted ceilings, frescoes and “impressive” flower displays” in the rooms and common spaces, said The Independent.

Even dinner is an extravagant affair. Jamavar (formerly known as Mohan Mahal) is the hotel’s signature restaurant, filled with 3,500 hand-cut mirrors that make the candlelight dance. The menu focuses on traditional Rajasthani cuisine with a modern twist, and between the food and ambiance, dining here is a “truly spectacular experience.”

Mandarin Oriental Bangkok, Bangkok, Thailand

When you arrive at the Mandarin Oriental Bangkok, expect to “nearly strain your neck trying to take in all the splendor,” said Condé Nast Traveler. The hotel opened in 1876 as The Oriental, and over time the property has expanded while retaining much of its original charm.

The lobby alone is a dream, with its “lattice woodwork, cascading florals, giant birdcage-style chandeliers and printed sofas.” Inside the rooms, you’ll find a “British East Indies aesthetic” based on “Bermuda pink, sea green or creamy yellow,” along with teak and leather furnishings and fresh orchids.

Romeo Roma, Rome, Italy

Rome’s past and present blend together beautifully at Romeo Roma. Zaha Hadid Architects transformed the 16th-century patrician mansion into a “striking” hotel where materials include “polished Macassar ebony,” and steel and glass are “teased into a riot of swirling, curving and overlapping forms,” said The Telegraph.

Contemporary art work, frescoes and artifacts discovered during the property’s restoration, including a marble head of the Roman empress Livia Drusilla, are also on display. You can get a glimpse of ancient times in the pool — it has a transparent base so swimmers can look down at the archaeological remains of Ripetta port.

Royal Palms Resort and Spa, Phoenix, Arizona

Desert decadence looks different at Royal Palms Resort and Spa. The 1929 Spanish Colonial mansion anchoring the property “stands in sharp contrast” to the “bland, corporate architecture” of area chain hotels, said the Michelin Guide. Hand-painted tiles, antique furnishings and oriental rugs “defy the usual pastel Southwesternisms” and give the resort a “distinctly Mediterranean feeling.” The grounds are just as stunning, and even on the hottest summer day guests feel at ease walking through the lush, shaded gardens planted nearly 100 years ago.

Spier Hotel, Stellenbosch, South Africa

The recently renovated Spier Hotel puts a chic spin on farmhouse style. It’s clear the design “prioritizes comfort,” with “plush linens” and gas fireplaces in rooms plus a “curated selection of artworks” like “delicate botanical drawings” and “mosaic murals,” said Travel and Leisure. Nearly every item and material, down to the jacquard throws and table placemats, was made in — or sourced from — South Africa. Spier Hotel is part of the Spier Wine Farm, and check-in takes place in its wine bar.

Endorsements are designed to help a candidate win. But President Trump’s endorsement this week of California gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton may have the paradoxical effect of keeping Golden State power in Democratic hands.

Trump’s decision to back Hilton could keep Democrats “from an embarrassing lockout” in the June primary election, said Politico. Candidates from both parties compete together in the primary election, with the top two — regardless of party — advancing to the November general election. Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco had a chance of creating a “Republican-on-Republican general election,” but Trump’s endorsement seems likely to send GOP voter support mostly to Hilton, away from Bianco, and give Democrats an opening for the second slot. It is “weird to feel thankful for a Trump action,” said the anonymous head of a Democrat-aligned group to Politico.

The Hilton backing is the latest twist in an “unusually messy” campaign to replace outgoing Gov. Gavin Newsom, said The New York Times. Aside from Hilton and Bianco, the slate includes “eight prominent Democrats” who created a field “so fractured that no clear front-runner has emerged.” The result: Democrats were “increasingly panicked” about the possibility of a GOP-only November election. Trump “may have solved their problem.”

What did the commentators say?

GOP voters are “badly outnumbered in California” Matthew Hennessey said at The Wall Street Journal. Democrats have twice the number of registered voters as Republicans in the state. The key to pulling off a Democratic lockout, then, was “keeping the split between the two Republicans relatively even” while letting their opponents divvy up voters eight ways. The president’s endorsement means the “dream of a complete Democratic lockout is probably over.”

Trump forgot that one should “never interrupt your opponent while he’s making a mistake,” Noah Rothman said at the National Review. Two Republicans facing off to win the governorship of a famously Democratic state would have produced the “funniest of all possible results” for conservatives. That was an “unlikely” outcome, but the prospect might have forced Democrats to spend millions to avoid it. The president’s intervention means the California campaign is much “less interesting” than it might have been. “It was funny while it lasted.”

California is already in the midst of the “weirdest campaign for governor in recent history,” Dan Waters said at CalMatters. But Trump’s support for Hilton “does not absolutely close the door” to an all-GOP general election. The “top tier” of Democrats includes Rep. Eric Swalwell, former Rep. Katie Porter and billionaire Tom Steyer. Without a breakthrough by one of them, Republicans could still win both slots despite “Trump’s tactically foolish intervention.” Time is running short. “The clock is ticking.”

What next?

Trump’s endorsement will help Hilton “coalesce conservative support” in the primary but could “become a liability” in a general election campaign against a Democrat, said The Associated Press. Hilton remains a long shot anyway: GOP candidates have “not won a statewide election in California in two decades.”

‘The ripple effects of NASA’s Artemis mission could be bigger than you think’

Scott Solomon at The Washington Post

“As influential” as Apollo’s “developments were for the second half of the 20th century, NASA’s Artemis program could eventually be more consequential,” says Scott Solomon. A “major objective” is to “develop and test technologies enabling a sustained presence in space that is less reliant on resupply missions from Earth,” and the “ripple effects of these plans will echo long into the future.” If “subsequent generations are born on other worlds,” they “could evolve into new human species.”

Read more

‘Deepfake nudes are haunting America’s teens’

Jessica Grose at The New York Times

The “creation of deepfake nudes of minors” is “arguably much worse now that AI image generation tools are ubiquitous, and the images they create are even more realistic,” says Jessica Grose. Social media companies “could be doing a far better job of prioritizing the problem.” Parents can “have a conversation with your children about the fact that AI with nudifying capabilities exists,” but it “should not be the responsibility of individual parents to patrol the entire internet.”

Read more

‘Are Native Americans birthright citizens? It’s no April Fool’s joke.’

Paul Rosier at The Philadelphia Inquirer

Pending “court decisions loom large in the debate over Native people’s ability to exercise their American citizenship to protect their Indigenous citizenship,” says Paul Rosier. Native Americans “have fought hard throughout the 20th century and into the 21st to first gain, and then defend, those dual citizenship rights.” At stake “for Native people is their ability to challenge threats to long-standing treaty rights, which preserve their ancestral homelands, cultural identity and religious freedom, their ability to be both Native and American.”

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‘The disillusioned college grads turning to the labor movement’

Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein at The New Republic

The “story of a highly educated yet disillusioned generation has been told repeatedly since roughly 2011,” says Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein. Why “are unions now appealing to the college-educated?” Many “college grads assumed they would work in jobs that harnessed their passions.” One “appeal of unions for the college-educated is the crumbling of the narrative that pushed people into universities: Upon close inspection, the story about college being an unimpeded good begins to look more like a fairy tale.”

Read more

‘Bully’ by Ye

★★

The artist formerly known as Kanye West is “probably the most contentious figure in all of popular music,” said Kelefa Sanneh in The New Yorker. So, after 2025’s flashes of blatant antisemitism and his more recent published apology, who is Ye now? “Listening to Bully, it can be hard to tell,” because on this 12th album from the 48-year-old hip-hop groundbreaker, “many of the tracks resemble fragments or sketches, with bits of singing and rapping that sound unusually tentative.” While several songs “seem designed to remind listeners of his older, less incendiary incarnations,” Ye seems “not quite sure how to give his listeners what they want.” In truth, “some of it still hits,” said Peter A. Berry in Complex. “‘All the Love’ sounds like Lion King in Space” and “‘Preacher Man’ features a nice blend of charisma and cinema.” Unfortunately, the album is “plagued by lethargic vocals, drab choruses, and trite lyricism.” You sense that Ye is unsure how to reattain excellence, and “the biggest tell” is how many songs evoke classic Kanye tracks without recapturing what worked. “Ultimately, Bully feels like Kanye searching through the crates for past glory.”

‘This Music May Contain Hope’ by Raye

★★★

“Our story begins at 2:27 a.m. on a rainy night in Paris. Cue the thunder!” That’s the British belter Raye, narrating the first few seconds of her latest album, “an epic autobiography of romantic despair,” said Rob Sheffield in Rolling Stone. Over arrangements packed with “show-tune razzle-dazzle, big-band swing frills, retro ’60s R&B, and the occasional club beat,” the 28-year-old Grammy nominee laments her serial heartbreaks with “mighty pipes” that are “as unstoppable as her flair for mascara-melting melodrama.” Whether she’s soothing herself with Edith Piaf records and chocolate cake or falling yet again for a disappointing Romeo, Raye conjures a limitless supply of “glamorously tragic scenarios.” Raye has been dogged by “endless Amy Winehouse comparisons,” said Will Hodgkinson in The Times (U.K.). But she’s “far more florid and theatrical, matching Shirley Bassey for searing drama and operatic bombast.” While her lyrics here can be “excessively on the nose,” Raye also shows ample ambition and welcome flashes of wit, and “the end result is unquestionably dynamic—the musical equivalent of seeing one’s life as a movie.”

‘Honora’ by Flea

★★★

The first bona fide solo album of Flea’s career “sounds nothing like the music that made him famous,” said Sadie Sartini Garner in Pitchfork. Anyone expecting the “screwball energy” of the bassist’s wildest Red Hot Chili Peppers contributions “may be disappointed.” Yet the 63-year-old’s idiosyncratic melodic sense informs the entire project, which features Flea on both bass and trumpet, an instrument he studied as a child. For an album whose six original compositions sound indebted to Miles Davis and Wayne Shorter, “jazz is as apt a descriptor as any.” The record also includes a wan instrumental interpretation of Frank Ocean’s “Thinkin Bout You” and a “strikingly beautiful” cover of Funkadelic’s “Maggot Brain.” Even in the company of such L.A. jazz luminaries as guitarist Jeff Parker, Flea proves “capable of holding his own,” said Janne Oinonen in The Line of Best Fit. “Morning Cry,” the fifth track, “tips its hat to bebop” while “the 10-minute ‘Frailed’ pitches Flea’s atmospheric trumpet against a minimalist electronic pulse with hypnotic results.” At one point, Flea shouts, “This shit is real”—and “that could apply to the whole of this surprising debut.”

‘Judy Blume: A Life’ by Mark Oppenheimer

“Writing the first big biography of Judy Blume had to come with enormous pressure,” said Kate Tuttle in The Boston Globe. Blume is “a treasure, an icon”: Her books, mostly written for young adults, have sold 90 million copies and earned widespread adoration because, at a fortuitous time, she was “a wild and bold truth teller” about pivotal adolescent experiences that many adults didn’t like to talk about, including menstruation, sex, divorced parents, and loneliness. Mark Oppenheimer, a veteran journalist and author, confesses at the end of his new book that he fears he may have under-delivered. But “he is being too hard on himself.” He has written a “thoughtful, thorough” biography in which Blume comes across as a breakthrough cultural figure “firmly shaped by the time, place, and culture of her birth.”

Oppenheimer’s book is at its best in its “lucid, sensitive evocations of Blume’s suburban girlhood,” said Katy Waldman in The New Yorker. Born in 1938 to a middle-class Jewish family in New Jersey, Blume was encouraged by her parents to read broadly, exercise her creativity, and live without any shame about the human body. When she began writing after college, marriage, and early motherhood, those attitudes shaped her run of early blockbusters, beginning with 1970’s Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, but we benefit from also having learned of the conflicts and sorrows that shaped Blume’s coming of age. In describing Blume’s best work, Oppenheimer “can be overly besotted.” But he also includes biographical material “that Blume might have bristled at,” including the abortions she had at 39 and 41. It has been reported that Blume, now 88, stopped speaking to Oppenheimer when he was well into the project, but nothing in the book seems out of place in any serious biography.

The book is strong in its general insights as well, said Meghan C. Kruger in The Wall Street Journal. “Though Blume was gifted and prolific, Oppenheimer suggests that two revolutions enabled her superstardom.” First, her early books coincided with the rise of paperbacks and mall bookstores, allowing young readers to purchase a Blume novel for just $1.25 in 1972 (the equivalent of less than $10 today). Also, the cultural moment was right. Though there were always some objections to the explicitness of Blume’s novels for both teens and adults, parents of the ’70s were more open than their predecessors to messages about body positivity, and the era’s media was less likely than today’s to judge her marital infidelity and divorces as disqualifying for a public figure guiding teens’ life choices. In the end, “Blume might seem prickly,” but “she also comes across as witty, optimistic, devoted to her craft, and sincere in her desire to nurture relationships with readers.”

What happened

Ben Roberts-Smith, Australia’s most decorated living veteran, was arrested on Tuesday and charged with two counts of “war crime — murder” and three counts of abetting such crimes, according to documents presented in court on Wednesday. The charges relate to the killings of five unarmed civilians while he was the patrol commander of an elite Special Air Service Regiment in Afghanistan from 2009 to 2012.

Who said what

Roberts-Smith is “only the second Australian veteran of the Afghanistan campaign to be charged with a war crime,” said The Associated Press. He has “consistently denied all wrongdoing,” said the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. But his “public image was shattered in 2018,” when several newspapers published articles accusing him of killing Afghan civilians, The New York Times said. He sued for defamation and lost. Australian Federal Police Commissioner Krissy Barrett said in a statement that the five Afghans at the center of the charges were unarmed, “under the control” of the Australian military and “not taking part in hostilities at the time of their alleged murder.”

What next?

Roberts-Smith’s trial could become the “most consequential military prosecution” in Australian history, said the Times. The maximum penalty for each charge is life in prison.

What happened

Republican Clay Fuller on Tuesday night won the special election to fill former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R) seat in Georgia’s heavily Republican 14th Congressional District. But he beat Democrat Shawn Harris by only about 12 percentage points, far short of President Donald Trump’s 37-point margin in 2024. That 25-point shift was the “largest leftward swing in a special election since the start of 2025,” The New York Times said. In Wisconsin, Democratic-backed Judge Chris Taylor won a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, and Democrat Alicia Halvensleben narrowly won the mayoral race in Waukesha, a GOP-leaning Milwaukee suburb.

Who said what

Republicans were relieved to bolster their narrow House majority in Georgia’s “deep red” 14th District, The Associated Press said, while Democrats were hopeful this latest in their string of better-than-expected electoral results “will create momentum toward November’s midterm elections.” Democrats “notched their best Trump-era overperformance” even after “national Republicans made the remarkable decision to actually spend money on the race,” said CNN.

What next?

Taylor’s victory over Republican-backed Judge Maria Lazar means “liberals will have a 5-2 edge on the swing state’s highest court, putting the majority out of reach for conservatives until at least 2030,” NBC News said.

What happened

President Donald Trump on Tuesday evening said he had agreed to a two-week ceasefire with Iran, subject to a “COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz.” The announcement defused his threat from earlier in the day that “a whole civilization will die tonight” absent a deal.

Iran said it would abide by the ceasefire, proposed by Pakistan, but maintain control of the Strait of Hormuz. Israel also agreed to stop attacking Iran, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday morning the “ceasefire does not include Lebanon,” contradicting an earlier statement from Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.

Who said what

Iranian state TV said Trump had accepted Iran’s terms in a “humiliating retreat.” Trump told APF that the ceasefire was “100%” a “total and complete victory” for the U.S. His “apocalyptic threat” of civilizational erasure “certainly helped him find” the “offramp he had been seeking for weeks,” said The New York Times. But his “down-to-the-wire tactical victory” resolved “none of the fundamental issues that led to the war.”

The ceasefire’s terms were “clouded in uncertainty,” The Associated Press said. Trump said on social media that Iran’s 10-point plan was “a workable basis on which to negotiate.” But that plan appears to cross several of Trump’s red lines. Notably, Iran and Oman “plan to charge transit fees for vessels passing through the Strait of Hormuz,” CNN said, something that wasn’t in place before the war. Iran’s caveat that “safe passage” through the strait was contingent on “coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces” and “technical limitations” means Iran will keep the “power to speed up passage, or slow it down,” The Wall Street Journal said. The U.S. will be “helping with the traffic buildup in the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump posted. “Big money will be made,” and “Iran can start the reconstruction process.”

What next?

The “ceasefire appeared shaky in its early hours,” Politico said, with Iran firing missiles at Gulf Arab countries and Israel continuing to strike Iran. The U.S. and Iran “are expected to hold peace talks on Friday in Islamabad,” Axios said.

Nearly 20 so-called scream clubs have opened across the U.S. over the past year, enabling club members to get together at outdoor spots and shriek out their various frustrations. In seven words or fewer, come up with a snappy advertising slogan for a club recruitment poster.

How to enter: Submissions should be emailed to contest@theweek.com. Please include your name, address, and daytime telephone number for verification; this week, please type “Scream slogan” in the subject line. Entries are due by noon, Eastern Time, Tuesday, April 14. Winners will appear on the Puzzle Page of the April 24 issue and at theweek.com/contest by April 17. In the case of identical or similar entries, the first one received gets credit. All entries become property of The Week.

Click or tap here to see last week's contest: Spiked sheets

“In the end, cooler heads prevailed – at least for now,” said North America Correspondent Anthony Zurcher on BBC News. After Donald Trump’s threats to launch attacks on Iran that would wipe out the “whole civilisation” in the country, both countries agreed a two-week ceasefire.

The President has since claimed that this could lead to a “Golden Age of the Middle East!!!”, while Vice-President J. D. Vance called the ceasefire a “fragile truce”.

As peace talks are expected to take place in Pakistan, both sides have claimed the ascendancy, though uncertainty surrounding key elements of the agreement, such as the Strait of Hormuz and Iranian nuclear capabilities, have left many sceptical of continued peace.

What did the commentators say?

This ceasefire move is “check, not checkmate”, said Jonathan Sacerdoti in The Spectator. In fact, we shouldn’t even consider this a proper ceasefire; it is merely a “fragile” and “conditional” “pause” in the conflict, which is “already under strain”.

“Beneath the surface, fundamental disagreements persist” in a logistical sense. There has been “no clearly defined start time” and “key uncertainties” remain. The proposed 10-point plan issued by Iran contains “discrepancies” between its Farsi and English versions, “most notably” over the state of uranium enrichment, as well as ambiguity surrounding movement through the Strait of Hormuz. “If this is the Third World War, it is not over.”

“It’s TACO Tuesday!”, said David Charter in The Times, using the Trump Always Chickens Out acronym coined last year during Trump’s “on-off tariff threats”. Even if the ceasefire holds, the US has “left in place a cadre of battle-scarred leaders, no doubt harbouring thoughts of revenge”.

As “king of the ultimatum”, Trump has “played fast and loose in pursuit of his goals”, isolating himself from “shocked” allies, who are now “on their guard” more than ever before. The “reckless” flip-flopping could have “far-reaching consequences for America’s standing in the world”. On the world stage, countries may come to fear America’s “increasingly unpredictable behaviour” more than its “terrifying” military might.

“Both sides have good reason to hope the talks succeed, despite the obstacles,” said The Economist. For the US, the war is “deeply unpopular at home”, and Trump is “keen to have it finished” before his mid-May summit with Xi Jinping in China. “For Iran, renewed fighting would be catastrophic,” with America and Israel expected to continue striking key economic assets. The only outlier may be Israel, which maintained that the ceasefire does not include Lebanon.

“Diplomatic jujitsu” will be required to bridge the gap between the views of a final peace agreement held by Iran and the US, said David E. Sanger in The New York Times. It is hard to imagine that a settlement between the nations could be reached in “two years, much less two weeks”. Neither Trump’s “tactic of escalating his rhetoric to astronomical levels” or the “down-to-the-wire” negotiations have resolved the “fundamental issues that led to the war”. It took the Obama administration two-and-a-half years to negotiate the 2015 nuclear accord – which Trump tore up in 2018 – “and that was in peacetime”. Notwithstanding, “this negotiation will be held under the sword of a possible resumption of hostilities.”

The last-minute ceasefire is “in theory, a victory for real-estate geopolitics”, said Senior Foreign Correspondent Adrian Blomfield in The Telegraph. However, “as any real estate agent knows”, the devil is in the detail, and “closer inspection suggests Mr Trump’s triumph may not be quite as unalloyed as he claims”. Iran’s position is stronger than before the war, and has now “agreed to allow shipping through the chokepoint”, but “on its own terms and has not relinquished its claim to control it”. The country may have agreed to a ceasefire, but its negotiating position, “rhetorically at least, is now more hardline than before the war began”.

What next?

“What is certain is that the clock has been reset yet again,” said Sacerdoti in The Spectator. Providing the ceasefire holds, the “decisive moment” will come in two weeks’ time, when the “temporary pause” ends and the “question of whether it can be extended, or gives way to renewed fighting, will be answered”.

“The talks in Islamabad will be complicated, to say the least,” said The Economist. Significant work needs to be done, as the positions of both sides “could not be further apart”. “If both sides stick to their current positions, the talks could end up at the same impasse they reached just before the war in February.”

If talks were to fail, we would likely see an “uneasy return to the status quo”. Iran would face American sanctions and the continued “threat of further American strikes”, as well as remaining a “menace” in the Gulf region, and have “strong motivation to build a bomb”. “That would be a bad outcome for everyone: a weakened, hostile regime; an impoverished Iran; and a lingering threat to the global economy.”

The TV adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” was so “relentlessly bleak”, I had to stop watching, said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. Now, the showrunner behind the original series, Bruce Miller, has brought Atwood’s Booker-Prize-winning sequel to the small screen. “Brace yourselves.”

“The Testaments” picks up a few years after the events of the first book, when we meet the “next generation of Gilead women”. Agnes (Chase Infiniti) is the daughter of a Commander, attending an “elite preparatory school” run by the formidable Aunt Lydia. “Yes, that Aunt Lydia.” Ann Dowd resumes her role from “The Handmaid’s Tale” as a “genuinely savage Miss Trunchbull”.

Agnes is put in charge of new student Daisy (Lucy Halliday), a “Pearl Girl” brought to the school by Gilead missionaries and “generally suspected by the other pupils” of spying for the teachers. The two girls’ increasingly “close and complicated” relationship forms the “backbone” of the series.

Like its predecessor, “The Testaments” is a “disturbing” watch, said Aramide Tinubu in Variety. An “exemplary” follow-up to the original show, this is both a powerful tale of “girlhood, survival, rage and friendship”, and a “magnificent coming-of-age” story.

The teenagers are waiting for their first menstrual period, when they will become “officially eligible for the marriage market”, graduating from Plums to Greens and “eventually into the teal blue of the Gilead wives”. Despite the “palatial houses” and manicured gardens, “something horrific is always just within frame”.

Following her starring role in “One Battle After Another”, Infiniti brings “electric A-lister aura” to Agnes, said Ed Power in The Telegraph, while Aunt Lydia is the “same disturbing mix of contradictions” she always was. Despite its dark subject matter, there is “fun to be had watching young people navigate the trials of growing up”. The school might be “hell on earth, but it’s also ‘Mean Girls’ with a dystopian twist”.

“The Handmaid’s Tale” became “murky and frenetic” but this sequel “pops” with the pupil’s jewel-coloured robes, said Nick Hilton in The Independent. The tone is lighter and the pace quicker but it keeps intact the depiction of how a society can “backslide into regression and repression”. This is a “young adult epic for the ages”.

“There’s no case of sequel-itus here,” said Vicky Jessop in The Standard. “‘The Testaments’ feels just as urgent as its predecessor – and just as darkly enjoyable.”

Space programmes cost billions. By 2028, when the fourth mission in its current Artemis programme lands astronauts back on the Moon, Nasa will have spent $105 billion (£78 billion) – which is “a chunk of change”, said USA Today.

Spending so much seems puzzling “when we already did” the Moon thing: are “science, exploration and the possible value of moon materials” really worth it? Or would that all public money be better spent on ”healthcare or tax cuts”?

‘Futile pursuits of prestige’

“It’s absolutely self-evident to me that space exploration is pointless,” said Zoe Williams in The Guardian. And the more crises there are “besetting this planet we live on, the more pointless it becomes”. The US, “of all nations”, has got bigger issues right now, so “seriously, Nasa, can you not just knock it off”?

Ordinary Americans are tired of “these absurd expressions of vanity, these futile pursuits of prestige”, said space historian Gerard DeGroot on UnHerd. Even the Apollo missions in the late 1960s “were not as popular as Nasa pretended”: opinion polls showed “support was consistently below 50%”, with women, people of colour and the poor, in particular, questioning the “obscene cost”.

The current Artemis enterprise “reeks” of Elon Musk: his SpaceX Starship will have increasing involvement as the missions progress and, although the details of the deal are “shrouded in mystery”, it’s “safe to suspect that some quid pro quo is involved”. We know that SpaceX has received $17 billion (£12.6 billion) in government funding already.

Images to ‘catch the breath’

I've always thought the so-called “choice” between “advancing to the stars and solving problems back on earth” to be “a false one”, said Séamas O'Reilly in The New Statesman. Yes, the Artemis budget “may seem hard to justify” for what appears to be “a few rocket launches” and some “charming zero gravity footage of bulky astronauts surrounded by floating pens” but “this elides the truth” of the “titanic boost to science, technology and economies back home”.

Nasa’s Apollo programme “returned around $7 to the US economy for every $1 spent”. In all our homes, we can see “developments made at the bleeding edge of space”: if you have a laptop, a camera phone or a memory foam mattress, “you have Nasa to thank”. The same goes for advancements in water purification, landmine removal and artificial limbs – “not to mention the invention of ear thermometers and CAT scans”.

If those images beamed back from the Artemis II this week didn’t “catch the breath” in your throat, you can’t “be fully alive”, said Sam Leith in The Spectator. “The experience of seeing the Earth photographed from space” has “an effect on our collective imaginations”. The Apollo 8 “Earthrise” image, for example, is widely thought to have “kickstarted the modern environmental movement”.

Artemis II is “one small step towards living in deep space”, said evolutionary biologist Scott Solomon in The Washington Post. I see parallels between “establishing an enduring human presence” on the Moon (and, ultimately, Mars) and “the processes by which animals and plants” arrive on Earth’s islands and “evolve into new species”. Future generations living on other planets will “gradually become different from people on Earth”. And that will be “a giant leap for all humanity”.