Standing in Canada’s House of Commons in 2023, the then-prime minister, Justin Trudeau, gave an impassioned speech on the value of welcoming newcomers.
“Canadians know that immigration is one of our greatest assets. It helps us compete,” he said. “If we want to boost our economic success significantly, we need to boost immigration.”
White elephant parties – in which people are invited to steal each other’s gifts – are the last thing we need right now
Happy forced frivolity season! We have once again arrived at the eye of the storm for the holidays, where cheerfulness is mandatory and lack of goodwill towards people is punishable by stoning in the town square. Surely, I don’t have to tell you that such quaint human emotions as “happiness” and “hope” are in short supply these days. This year, of all years, no one should be blamed for plugging their ears any time Mariah Carey comes on in the lobby of the unemployment office. And yet, we carry on with the rituals of joy that seem more and more incongruous, when life feels like some never-ending episode of MTV’s Ridiculousness, where God comments on clips of the human race getting hit in the face with a plastic baseball bat.
I’m certainly making an effort to put on a pleasant facade. I’ve cobbled together some nice gifts for my friends and family. I say hello to strangers, even the ones that look like they might want to deny me my basic rights as outlined in the US constitution. And I say yes to just about every holiday party invite – save for one massive exception.
Dave Schilling is a Los Angeles-based writer and humorist
Streams of soil turn sand and surrounding water red, creating sharp contrast with blue waters of Persian Gulf
Rainfall on Iran’s Hormuz Island briefly transformed the coastline of its Red Beach into a striking natural scene this week, as red soil flowed into the sea and turned the water shades of deep red.
The beach is known for its vivid red sand and cliffs, created by high concentrations of iron oxide.
Sainsbury’s, Barclays and University College London have all drawn on themes created by IWD site run by London business with no link to UN
Nobody owns International Women’s Day, but if you asked the 193 countries, countless businesses and NGOs that mark it each year, they would probably agree it has been popularised, defined and formalised by the United Nations.
The owner of the website “internationalwomensday.com”, a London-based marketing firm, disagrees. By selling merchandise, promoting a £160 lunch to awaken attenders’ “inner goddess” and creating a series of corporate partnerships, it has also seeded its annual themes with British brands and institutions that appear to have mistaken the site for the UN, the Guardian can reveal.
Justice department must release most documents by Friday, and failure to do so would provoke a firestorm
In less than 48 hours, Donald Trump’s justice department must release most of the files related to Jeffrey Epstein in its possession. Last month, Congress passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which required the release of those materials by 19 December, except in narrow cases where they would jeopardize current investigations, harm national security or foreign policy goals, or reveal information about Epstein’s victims.
Since Trump signed the legislation, his administration has been silent on its progress. Earlier this month, a bipartisan group of lawmakers asked Pam Bondi, the attorney general, for a briefing on the department of justice’s progress, but she did not provide one. Two Democratic senators among that group subsequently pledged to block some civilian nominees, because they were concerned the administration “is gearing up to disregard the law we led the fight in the Senate to pass, which overwhelmingly passed both chambers of Congress”.
The US host city’s resolve in maintaining its ‘Pride Match’ should be commended as exactly the sort of thing this tournament is for
There are two World Cups. The product, marketed and monetized for all it will yield, and the experience.
Only one of those is the real thing. And in one case, it’s holding strong. In Seattle, the local organizing committee long ago designated the 26 June game slated for Lumen Field as the “Pride Match” to mark the city’s LGBTQ+ pride weekend celebration.
Kara Nortman, co-founder of Angel City and investor in Viktoria Berlin, says the model can drive a bright and independent future
When the billionaire American businesswoman and investor Michele Kang spoke to journalists after the Sweden international Kosovare Asllani and former Paris Saint-Germain manager Jocelyn Prêcheur had been recruited by her then WSL2 side London City Lionesses, she was candid about the significance multi-club ownership can play in women’s sport.
“I am fully aware of the negative connotation of multi-club ownership on the men’s side,” Kang said in June 2024. “But I will submit to you that multi-club ownership is a necessity, not a luxury or greed, on the women’s side because we need to invest to the level that the players deserve to deliver on the potential of the women’s game.”
This is an extract from our free email about women’s football, Moving the Goalposts. To get the full edition, visit this page and follow the instructions. Moving the Goalposts is delivered to your inboxes every Tuesday and Thursday.
Americans told ‘time to get vaccinated is now’ as concerning mutation of influenza virus circulates in US
Officials are urging doctors to vaccinate their patients and provide flu antivirals after deaths among children reached record highs and as a concerning mutation of the virus circulates in the US.
“Influenza activity is increasing in the US. The time to get vaccinated for this season is now,” Timothy Uyeki, the chief medical officer of the influenza division at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said in a call with clinicians last week.
Learning Resources is suing the administration, claiming the president’s tariffs are illegal – and millions of dollars are on the line
The conveyors whir in the massive warehouse, boxes gliding at fast clip, filling up with toys ready to be shipped out for holiday gifts across the country. They make their way to shipping trucks, nearly full with hundreds of boxes by the afternoon of a recent Thursday.
The 364,000 sq ft warehouse in the suburbs outside Chicago is just one of Learning Resources’ investments in the US. The company and its affiliated brands employ more than 500 people. They make about 2,000 different products, mostly educational toys such as children’s binoculars, cash registers and learning games.
Class Action, a grassroots network formed after the affirmative action ruling, seeks to be critical of universities in their current form
Last spring, as the Trump administration was freezing billions in federal research funding for universities and threatening the visas of thousands of international students, Emily Hettinger, a senior at Yale, joined a campus protest in defense of higher education.
It was a strange place to be for Hettinger, who had been growing disillusioned with Yale over what she saw as its elitism and disinterest in the disadvantaged community surrounding its Connecticut campus. “I remember feeling this sort of dissonance,” Hettinger said. “I wanted to defend higher education, but I didn’t want to defend it in its current form.”
In just two years, Rae has gone from star TikTok dancer to being Grammy-nominated for best new artist. She reflects on her critically acclaimed debut and how she’s learning to reclaim and relinquish control
No one in pop has had a year like Addison Rae. She may not be the biggest star – that remains Taylor Swift – or even the most commercially successful breakout act. But the dreamy dance-pop haze of her debut album, Addison, made her into an artist’s artist, loved by the likes of Charli xcx and Lana Del Rey – the leftfield pop acts who paved the way for someone like her. Like a pre-Brat Charli, or perhaps Sky Ferreira, the 25-year-old is the pop connoisseur’s choice, justly earning comparisons to Del Rey, her fellow Louisiana girl Britney Spears and Ray of Light-era Madonna, while knowing her way around her R&B and Jersey club. She’s up for best new artist at next year’s Grammy awards – and with Addison and its knowingly anaesthetised single Headphones On placing in the Guardian’s top five albums and tracks of 2025 respectively, she’s our artist of the year.
So it’s crazy to flick back just two years to when Rae wasn’t just a flop, but a punchline. In 2023, she released her debut single Obsessed, a perfectly average Benny Blanco-produced single that attracted disproportionate hatred because Rae was then just a TikTok star whose breezy dance videos had made her the platform’s fifth most-followed figure. The song flopped. Five months later came the AR EP: featuring a Charli guest verse – she asked to feature on a leaked demo that she loved – it made Rae a cult favourite. Last summer, she returned the favour, guesting on a remix of Charli’s Von Dutch: “While you’re sitting in your dad’s basement … Got a lot to say about my debut!” Rae taunted.
The scheme’s backers, which include the Guggenheim Foundation, the Basque government and local and regional authorities, had claimed the museum’s twin sites – one in the Basque town of Guernica and one in the nearby Urdaibai reserve – would help revitalise the area, attract investment and create jobs.
Study author says tech companies are reaping benefits of artificial intelligence age but society is left to pay cost
The AI boom has caused as much carbon dioxide to be released into the atmosphere in 2025 as emitted by the whole of New York City, it has been claimed.
The global environmental impact of the rapidly spreading technology has been estimated in research published on Wednesday, which also found that AI-related water use now exceeds the entirety of global bottled-water demand.
Starc heard through mic calling for Snicko to be ‘sacked’
England’s batting coach, Marcus Trescothick, described the use of the decision review system in the third Ashes Test as “not ideal”, at the end of another day of questionable spikes, dubious frame-alignment and a dismissal of Jamie Smith that echoed the confusion of the opening day.
The DRS technology in use in Australia was widely criticised on day one after Alex Carey had been wrongly reprieved by the third umpire after feathering a catch to Jamie Smith on 72. The culprit in that case appears to have been operator error involving a mismatch of sound-wave and picture frame selection.
Southern Transitional Council, backed by UAE, told it could face airstrikes after its recent huge territorial gains
As many as 20,000 Saudi-backed forces are gathering on the border of Yemen as the separatist Southern Transitional Council comes under pressure to withdraw from the huge territorial gains it has made in the last month in the vast, oil-rich governorate on Hadramaut in eastern Yemen.
The STC is using its advance to raise its demand for Yemen to revert to two states, north and south, as it had been until 1990.
Bid includes 11 new stadiums but PIF wants to cut costs
Architecture firms asked to resubmit plans, Guardian told
Saudi Arabia’s construction of stadiums for the 2034 World Cup is facing delays owing to a desire from the Public Investment Fund (PIF), the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund, to scale back costs.
The Guardian has been told that several architecture firms awarded contracts to build stadiums in Saudi have been asked to resubmit plans because their designs have been deemed too expensive, and contractors due to start work next year have been told the build will not begin on time.
The defensive end’s pursuit of the NFL sack record defies belief, raising questions about what his perpetually rebuilding team should do about it
The NFL sack record is one of those hallowed figures in professional sports. Michael Strahan’s 22.5 lingered for two decades not because pass rushers failed to get better, but because everything has to break just right for someone to reach it. You need volume. You need game scripts. You need offenses chasing points. When TJ Watt finally tied it in 2021, it felt like he had reached the outer limit. The record had been touched, but not broken.
Myles Garrett has spent this season treating that assumption with contempt. Now, he’s a couple of plays away from history.
Drop is cause for public health concern, but news isn’t all bad as acknowledging struggles is ‘a good sign’, experts say
A record low proportion of Americans rate their mental health as “good” or “excellent” according to a Gallup poll released on Thursday.
The percentage of Americans polled who rated their mental health as “excellent” dropped below 30% for the first time this year while the number who rated their mental health as either “good” or “excellent” also dropped to a record low 72%.
Across the world, incarcerated pregnant women are often held in deplorable conditions, leading some to miscarry or give birth alone inside a cell, say campaigners
Dina Hernández was 35 weeks pregnant when she was arrested near her home in San Salvador in March 2024. The 28-year-old human rights activist, who was with her five-year-old son, was accused of “illicit association” with gang members and jailed without evidence.
Three weeks later, her family received a call from the prison authorities to collect the body of her newborn baby. The cause of death has not been investigated and the family has no idea what happened, or whether Hernández – who is believed to remain in prison – received any postnatal care.
The president’s appearance and schedule have sparked speculation – perhaps fueled in part by his political fortunes
Is Donald Trump OK?
Recently, he’s looked tired. His famous fake tan is a bit more sallow than usual and seems painted on more thickly and clumsily than it was before. He appears to nod off in front of cameras more and more often, including in cabinet meetings and press events in the Oval Office. His public schedule is light: he is often at his golf clubs, has traveled around the country less frequently than at this point in his first term, and now only rarely holds the stadium rallies that once defined his preferred style of politics. He tends to sit, even when others are standing, and has shortened his daily schedule, often not conducting official duties before noon. A New York Times report found that his public appearances have declined by nearly 40% compared to his first year in office. He sometimes disappears from public view for days as he did in the late summer, and he and his administration have released unclear and conflicting information about his health. His right hand seems to be experiencing frequent injury or discoloration – it will often be covered with a band-aid or smeared with makeup; the White House has claimed, implausibly, that he is bruised from shaking too many hands. In some images, his ankles are visibly swollen.
Some traditional treats may be off the menu, but there are plenty of alternatives for a festive feast
For a festival with childbirth at its religious heart, it is perverse how much of our traditional Christmas spread isn’t recommended for pregnant women. Pre-pregnancy, this was not something I’d clocked. I was the soft cheese supremo, canape queen – at my happiest with a smoked trout blini in one hand and a champagne flute in the other. Then one day in October, two blue lines appeared on a test result and everything started to change: my body, my future and most pressingly my Christmas.
Don’t get me wrong: no present under the tree can match the gift I’ve got in store. But as a food writer who loves this season, I can’t think of a worse time to be nauseated, exhausted and forbidden by the NHS to eat, drink or do my favourite things to eat, drink or do in winter. I have no alternatives for saunas, skiing and hot baths. I do, however, know enough chefs, bartenders, retailers and producers to create a Christmas feast that is full of wonder, joy and within the NHS guidelines.
Whether your household is in the mood for singing, driving, quizzing or shouting, here are our top choices for homely holiday fun
Multiplayer hand-to-hand combat games are ridiculously good fun and there are plenty to choose from, including the rather similar Gang Beasts and Party Animals. I’ve gone for this one, however, which lets everyone pick a cake to play as before competing in food fights and taking on mini-games such as roasting marshmallows and lobbing fruit into a pie. If you ever wished that the Great British Bake Off was ever-so-slightly more gladitorial, this is the game for you.
The Reiners’ bodies were discovered on Sunday at their home in Los Angeles. Their son Nick was later arrested and charged with two counts of first-degree murder and has since appeared in court
The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner has released reports stating the cause of death of the film director Rob Reiner and his wife, the photographer Michele Singer Reiner.
Both are listed on the organisation’s website with the cause given as “multiple sharp force injuries” and “homicide” stated as the manner of death. The date of death, which had been the subject of some speculation, is given as Sunday 14 December.
Heavily armed tactical operation officers intercepted two cars on a busy street with images showing suspects cable-tied on the side of the road
Police have detained seven men in Sydney’s south-west in connection with possible planned violence.
Tactical operations police had responded to “information received that a violent act was possibly being planned” on Thursday evening, a NSW Police spokesperson said.
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