Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro says, “I am still president,” as he pleads not guilty to drug trafficking and other charges in his first appearance at a New York court
He and his wife Cilia Flores were seized from their Caracas compound on Saturday and flown to the US as part of a special forces operation – here’s what happened
Today’s hearing ended with a tense exchange between a member of the public and Maduro, who said he was a “prisoner of war”, our reporter in court says
Outside, protesters have been gathering, with some brandishing placards – one reads “USA Hands-off Venezuela”, while another says “Thank You President Trump.”
Earlier, dramatic images showed the pair being transferred to the courthouse in handcuffs, surrounded by armed officers
Meanwhile, Delcy Rodríguez, while being sworn in as Venezuela’s interim president, has praised Maduro and his wife as “heroes”. You can read BBC Mundo’s live Spanish coverage here.
At the rainy border between Colombia and Venezuela, I’ve been speaking to more Venezuelans about their feelings about what’s happening.
Glendys Quiroz, 28, tells me she crosses the border regularly to pick up groceries, noting that it feels quieter than usual today.
“We know Maduro has been captured, but we don’t know what’s going on or what’s going to happen,” she says.
She says she supports the US action and wants Maduro and his government to “pay for [what] they’ve done”, adding that there is a “long list of people” who should also face action.
She adds that she wants opposition leader María Corina Machado to run the country.
With no cameras allowed inside the New York courthouse, we rely on artists to give us a glimpse inside.
Jane Rosenberg’s drawing shows Nicolás Maduro standing, while his wife Cilia Flores sits nearby.
They both wear headphones to listen to a translation of proceedings, and both wear the same blue prison outfits.
We’ve been hearing from people in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, about what life is like there since the US action and what they want for the country.
A 33-year-old masseuse who asks not to be named says she is still waiting at home today to see how things develop. “There’s so much fear in the streets and in our homes,” she says.
She does not support Venezuela’s new leader, Delcy Rodríguez, but says “if this is the price we have to pay for a government transition, then I accept it”.
“If it wasn’t this way, then we could have a rebellion, and we can’t forget the armed groups,” she adds.
She says she hopes there will be lasting change for Venezuela. “They gave the people the scraps while keeping the feast for themselves,” she says of Maduro’s regime.
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Venezuela’s seized President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores attend their arraignment with defense lawyers Barry Pollack and Mark Donnelly
“War,” the Prussian military thinker Carl von Clausewitz wrote, “is a mere continuation of policy by other means.” If there is one line that virtually every Army officer learns from Clausewitz’s posthumously published 1832 book, “On War,” it’s that description of the purpose of armed conflict.
Those words were among the first that popped into my head when I woke up Saturday morning to the news that the American military had attacked Venezuela, seized its dictator, Nicolás Maduro, and brought him to the United States to face criminal charges.
The reason those words occurred to me was simple: The attack on Venezuela harks back to a different time, before the 19th-century world order unraveled, before two catastrophic world wars, and before the creation of international legal and diplomatic structures designed to stop nations from doing exactly what the United States just did.
One of the most important questions any nation must decide is when — and how — to wage war. It’s a mistake, incidentally, to view Clausewitz as an amoral warmonger. He wasn’t inventing the notion he describes; he was describing the world as it was. His statement is a pithy explanation of how sovereign states have viewed warfare for much of human history.
When a strong state operates under the principle that war is just another extension of policy, it is tempted to operate a bit like a mob boss. Every interaction with a weaker nation is tinged in some way with the threat of force: Nice little country you have there — shame if something happened to it.
This is not fanciful. In a telephone conversation with The Atlantic’s Michael Scherer, President Trump threatened Venezuela’s new leader, Delcy Rodríguez, who served as Maduro’s vice president. “If she doesn’t do what’s right,” Trump said, “she is going to pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro.”
Diplomacy and economic pressure are almost always still a first resort for powerful nations, but if they fail to achieve the intended results, well, you can watch footage from the American strike in Venezuela to know what can happen next.
But the Clausewitzian view isn’t the only option for nations and their leaders. There is a better model for international affairs, one that acknowledges the existence of evil and the reality of national interests but also draws lines designed to preserve peace and human life.
Carl von Clausewitz, meet Thomas Aquinas.
In the Summa Theologica, written in the 13th century, Aquinas outlined three cardinal requirements of what came to be known as just war theory.
First, war must be waged through the lawful operation of a sovereign and not through the private adventurism of ambitious individuals.
Second, the war must be based on a just cause. National self-defense or collective self-defense are obviously just, for example.
Third, there must be a just purpose, namely the advancement of good and the avoidance of evil.
One way to think about the shifting patterns of warfare is that humanity seesaws between Clausewitz and Aquinas. Strong nations impose their will on the weak and then — eventually — try to impose their will on one another. When catastrophe results, as it invariably does, they turn back to Aquinas.
You can actually see the results of this shifting approach across the sweep of history. An analysis of global deaths in conflict shows that war is always with us, but its intensity waxes and wanes. Periods of extreme suffering and death are followed by periods of relative quiet, followed again by an age of horror.
Consider history since World War I. After the ongoing slaughter of trench warfare, the world attempted to ban aggressive warfare and to establish an international institution — the League of Nations — to keep the peace.
The League failed, in part because the United States refused to join, and after an even more horrible world war, the world tried again, this time under American leadership.
Echoes of Aquinas are all over the U.N. Charter. Article 2 of the United Nations Charter bans aggressive warfare (taking away a key tool in the Clausewitz toolbox), Article 51 permits individual and collective self-defense to keep great powers in check, and Chapter V established a body (the Security Council) that’s designed to keep the peace.
Song Sung Blue is a biographical musical drama written, co-produced, and directed by Craig Brewer. It is based on the 2008 documentary film of the same name by Greg Kohs. Song Sung Blue premiered at the AFI Film Festival on October 26, 2025, and was released in the United States by Focus Features on December […]
Ultimately, optimism is just a fantastic, natural mood booster. It gives you that quiet confidence that even if things get tough, you have the inner strength to handle it, and a better day is always ahead. You don’t get stuck in the negativity loop; you gently move past it. This sense of resilience and hopeful […]
Ultimately, optimism is just a fantastic, natural mood booster. It gives you that quiet confidence that even if things get tough, you have the inner strength to handle it, and a better day is always ahead. You don’t get stuck in the negativity loop; you gently move past it. This sense of resilience and hopeful […]
Woodpeckers operate at an extreme level, boring through solid wood with forces more than 30 times their own weight and drilling up to 13 times a second. How do they never miss a beat while head banging so hard?
It turns out that the birds tense up their entire body to smash through wood, letting out short, explosive grunts with each strike, report Brown University biologist Nicholas Antonson and his colleagues in the Journal of Experimental Biology. “Woodpeckers really are nature’s hammer in a sense,” Antonson says.
To study how the birds tap, the researchers first humanely captured eight wild Downy Woodpeckers and carefully inserted electrodes into their muscles in the laboratory. The electrodes fed into a tiny, fitted backpack that recorded electrical signals from contracting muscles as the birds pecked. They also checked whether the woodpeckers held their breath during exertion (like weight lifters tend to do) or exhaled (like tennis players) while striking the wood by examining airflow through the birds’ air sacs—small, balloonlike structures that help them breathe in and out. By matching these measurements with high-speed videos, the scientists tracked the woodpeckers’ taps down to every four milliseconds.
Instead of using a single muscle to control the action, woodpeckers activated “every muscle from the head to the tail,” Antonson says. The birds used their powerful hip flexors to push forward, clenched their tail and abs to prepare for the strike, and stiffened the back of their head and neck on contact—similar to the way you might stiffen the back of your wrist when you hammer a nail. They then engaged a different set of hip and neck muscles to draw back.
The birds also perfectly paired their pecks with sharp exhalations “as another means of stabilizing their core muscles and powering through those strikes,” Antonson explains. “To be able to breathe out 13 times per second and inhale on the order of 40 milliseconds is really impressive.” Songbirds, which aren’t closely related to woodpeckers, are the only other birds known to so precisely time their breaths, which they do as they sing.
“Pecking is a full-body exercise,” says University of Alabama biologist Nicole Ackermans, who studies brain damage in woodpeckers and head-butting sheep. Coordinating “micro breaths” with muscle clenching and creating “this hammerlike structure in their whole body is such a unique approach,” she adds.
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Tapping woodpeckers harness their muscles more like tennis players than like weight lifters. Diana Robinson Photography/Getty Images
If your New Year’s resolution is to cut back on or quit alcohol, Dry January is a great place to start, especially since you won’t be alone in giving up alcohol for the month. However, you may be wondering: Are there any health benefits that come with swapping alcoholic drinks for nonalcoholic beverages for only one month? We have good news: The answer is yes, and these are the following advantages you may experience from a wellbeing standpoint.
Please note: While Dry January can help you temporarily reduce your alcohol intake and improve your health, if you need help cutting back on drinking or think you might have an alcohol dependency, visit the National Institute for Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism for additional resources.
Benefits of Dry January
It’s absolutely no secret that alcohol can take a toll on your body. Alcohol can affect virtually all of your organs, from your brain to your heart to, of course, your liver. Alcohol consumption is linked to certain cancers, suppressed immunity, digestive problems, and more.
Reducing or eliminating alcohol consumption can improve your health in many ways — but it might sound silly to give up alcohol for a month, because what can 31 days do? However, research suggests that taking short breaks from alcohol can do wonders for your health.
If your New Year’s resolution is to cut back on or quit alcohol, Dry January is a great place to start, especially since you won’t be alone in giving up alcohol for the month. However, you may be wondering: Are there any health benefits that come with swapping alcoholic drinks for nonalcoholic beverages for only one month? We have good news: The answer is yes, and these are the following advantages you may experience from a wellbeing standpoint.
Please note: While Dry January can help you temporarily reduce your alcohol intake and improve your health, if you need help cutting back on drinking or think you might have an alcohol dependency, visit the National Institute for Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism for additional resources.
Benefits of Dry January
It’s absolutely no secret that alcohol can take a toll on your body. Alcohol can affect virtually all of your organs, from your brain to your heart to, of course, your liver. Alcohol consumption is linked to certain cancers, suppressed immunity, digestive problems, and more.
This story is part of 12 Days of Tips, helping you make the most of your tech, home, and health during the holiday season.
Reducing or eliminating alcohol consumption can improve your health in many ways — but it might sound silly to give up alcohol for a month, because what can 31 days do? However, research suggests that taking short breaks from alcohol can do wonders for your health.
If you try Dry January, you might experience:
Improved sleep
More alertness and reduced daytime fatigue
Fewer headaches
Better focus and productivity
Improved exercise performance
More good moods and fewer mood swings
Weight loss
Stronger immune system
Increased hydration
Why do people do Dry January?
People choose to do Dry January for a variety of reasons. You might consider trying Dry January if:
You’re trying to reach a health-related goal. For instance, avoiding alcohol may help you lose weight and improve physical fitness performance.
You want to reevaluate your relationship with alcohol.
You’ve been drinking more than usual lately and want to reset.
You’re supporting a friend or family member who wants to quit drinking alcohol.
You just want to see how it feels to be sober for a month.
How to do Dry January
In theory, Dry January sounds simple: Just stop drinking alcohol, right? However, even people who reserve booze for special occasions might struggle to make it a full month with no alcohol.
Try these tips to make Dry January go smoothly:
Commit to the month with a friend (or a few). You can all help hold each other accountable.
Inform your friends and family that you’re participating in Dry January ahead of time, and keep reinforcing it so they know not to offer you drinks — because sometimes, saying “no” is the hardest part.
Stock up on non-alcoholic beverages (listed below) to enjoy in place of your favorite alcoholic beverages.
Choose different activities to fill the time you’d normally spend drinking. For example, instead of watching TV and drinking wine, try playing a board game, reading a book, completing a puzzle, calling a loved one, or drawing a picture. Learning a new skill can help you stay occupied.
Invite your friends to non-alcoholic outings, such as hikes, craft sessions, movies, or dinner dates.
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Even a month of giving up alcoholic drinks can give your health a boost. Getty Images
When people find that they are having a hard time making new friends, they often blame their own awkwardness — some failure on their part. As a sociologist who studies how people connect, I’ve interviewed more than 150 people about friendship. One woman told me a typical story: She had moved to a new town after college and said that the conversations she struck up at coffee shops, work, and yoga didn’t seem to go anywhere. Forging new relationships felt hopeless. “I’m not good at it,” she said.
Yet she, like most of us, could pinpoint times in her life when making friends seemed easier. Across two decades of studying friendship, I’ve found that people’s ability to make new friends doesn’t come and go at random. Instead, it reflects, in large part, the strength of what I call the “friendship market” they are in.
In a thriving friendship market, a majority of people in a particular setting are interested in “buying” or “selling” friendship. For example, middle schoolers merging into a new high school, or first-year students arriving at college. New connections abound.
But we spend much of our lives in weaker friendship markets, where people are open to conversation, but not connection. A parent shows up at a P.T.A. meeting, and even if others are friendly, they keep their distance. Or people moves to a new city for work, and acquaintances don’t turn toward their bids for connection. Even intentionally putting yourself out there doesn’t inspire reciprocation if a friendship market has closed: Others already have fully formed friend groups.
In adulthood, open friendship markets become harder to find. But there’s a key to finding new ones: a shifting sense of self. We define ourselves through our relationships with friends. These connections help us to construct our desired selves, who we are, and who we are becoming.
The key, then, is not just to start an activity or join a club so you can meet new people. It’s to join one related to a new sense of self or an identity you’re looking to deepen. Pregnant women, for example, will look for friendships in prenatal classes — not only to find people who understand their experience but also to reaffirm their emerging identity as a mom.
Milestones make friendship markets easier to find, but markets exist for all sorts of identities, big and small. One woman I spoke to heard about a coffee club as she was starting to consider herself a coffee aficionado. Another found friendship in a pride club; although she had come out as gay years before, she felt that her queer identity was becoming a more important part of who she was. Friends connected to emerging identities bring out new sides of us. One interviewee told me that she was not religious growing up. As she started to explore Christianity, she joined a Bible study group and said she was her most “upbeat” and “cheery” self with the friends she made there.
We’ve all seen how much closer you can feel to someone when your identities change together. I worked in an office for five years with someone whom I did not know well until we were both pregnant together, both first-time moms with the same due date. We ended up taking walks, having lunches, and getting to know each other as we talked through our excitement and worries about the ways our lives would change. As our identities shifted, our friendships did as well.
Even embracing less favorable identities opens up new markets. Several people I interviewed told me about a group for single parents. Remembering the challenging period after their breakups, club members went out of their way to welcome new entrants. One member noted how her new friends offered her support as she raised a child on her own. Eventually, she got married, which booted her from the club, but two people she met there remained among her closest friends years later.
To be clear, being aware of “friendship markets” does not mean that those friendships are transactional. Friendships are not commodities or disposable. But they are also not always readily available. Everyone needs to make sure to seek them out, optimizing the possibility of connection in our busy, sometimes isolated-feeling lives.
I recommend a New Year’s resolution: Do the work to find new friendship markets in 2026, rather than waiting passively for new connections to find you. Even those with active social lives and healthy friendships benefit from new relationships that reaffirm who they are. These connections have been proven to bring us joy, fulfill our basic need to connect, and help us to live healthier, longer lives.
So the next time making new friends feels challenging, remember the structural role of friendship markets rather than blaming yourself. If you take a class not just to learn a new skill but also to deepen a part of yourself, you may find your people.
Film and Writing Festival for Comedy. Showcasing best of comedy short films at the FEEDBACK Film Festival. Plus, showcasing best of comedy novels, short stories, poems, screenplays (TV, short, feature) at the festival performed by professional actors.
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