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Last month, a man on Long Island died after he was pulled into a magnetic resonance imaging scanner by a large metal chain he was wearing around his neck. It’s not the first time an MRI scanner has proved to be a death trap.

In this latest case, according to media reports, the man had accompanied his wife to the MRI center and was waiting outside the exam room while her knee was being scanned. When the procedure was completed, she called him over so that he could help her stand up. The man entered the MRI room, and a 20-pound chain he was wearing around his neck for weight training was immediately attracted to the magnet in the MRI. It pulled the man’s body with it, hurled him against the scanner, and trapped him there. He sustained serious injuries and was pronounced dead at a hospital the following day.

How could this happen? An MRI scanner uses magnetic fields generated by metal coils in its core, and other fields are then added in pulses. In simple terms, a static magnetic field orients the nuclei of hydrogen atoms in the body so they’re all facing the same direction; the magnetic pulses briefly redirect the nuclei, and then they align themselves in parallel again. The scanner detects these shifts and uses them to create images of the tissue.

In terms of safety, the problem is that, as current flows through the device, it becomes a huge and extremely powerful electromagnet. Ferromagnetic materials—which, at room temperature, include iron, cobalt, nickel, and some metal alloys—are attracted to it with a great deal of force. That means metallic objects that come close to a switched-on MRI can become dangerous projectiles.

So there’s a good reason why metal parts are taboo in and around MRI machines. In preparation for a scan, patients are asked to remove any metal objects they are carrying. When people don’t follow this instruction, serious accidents can occur. In 2023, a Brazilian man took a loaded firearm into the MRI room where he was accompanying his mother. The magnet pulled the gun out of his waistband, and a shot went off when it hit the scanner. The bullet hit the man in the abdomen, causing a fatal injury. Similar weapon discharges have also occurred in the U.S., fortunately with less serious outcomes, including a 2012 incident in New York State that involved an off-duty police officer.

Before a patient is brought in for a scan, they’re asked whether they have any medical or cosmetic implants containing metal in their body. These can include pacemakers, stents, piercings, and screws in bones. Metal residue from gunshot wounds must also be reported. The staff then check whether the objects could cause problems. In the end, most metal objects inside the body pose no danger to patients. But if they’re overlooked, things can get ugly.

Projectile fragments and metal shavings that have penetrated the tissue as a result of gunshot wounds or accidents may travel a few millimeters during the scan. Doctors consider very carefully whether an MRI is too risky in the presence of such foreign bodies and then switch to other imaging procedures if necessary. Small metal particles also sometimes move back and forth around their own axis and in confined spaces. This can cause them to heat up dangerously.

There can even be problems with tattoos that contain certain metallic inks. In one case, a tattooed professional football player sustained burns during a pelvic MRI scan. “At-risk” tattoos are those with black pigment or any other pigments containing iron oxide, as well as those with a design that displays loops, large circular objects or multiple adjacent points.

In one extreme example of internal metal objects causing damage during an MRI scan, a woman wore a sex toy into the MRI without the knowledge of the clinic staff. Most of these toys are made of silicone, a plastic that should be unproblematic in the magnet, but to the surprise of those present, especially the woman being examined, this one did contain ferromagnetic material. As a result, she suffered unspecified internal injuries and had to be admitted to a hospital.

In general, MRIs are very safe when used properly. Technicians perform tens of thousands of scans every year without causing any damage to those being examined. Serious accidents involving overlooked or unreported ferromagnetic materials are very rare. But it’s important that MRI patients follow one cardinal rule: leave the metal outside the scanning room.

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Monty Rakusen/Digital Vision

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Donald Trump has said he will meet with Vladimir Putin to discuss the war in Ukraine next week and said an end to the three-and-a-half-year war would have to involve “some swapping of territories”.

Trump said he planned to meet the Russian president next Friday in Alaska. He announced the location in a brief post on his Truth Social site.

Russian state media agency Tass confirmed the date and location of the meeting, citing Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov.

Earlier in the day, Trump told reporters in the White House the meeting “would have been sooner, but I guess there’s security arrangements that unfortunately people have to make”.

The US president also said “there’ll be some swapping of territories to the betterment of both” Ukraine and Russia, and that the issue would be discussed soon, but he gave no further details.

Bloomberg reported on Friday that the deal could cement some of Putin’s territorial gains in Ukraine, in effect freezing the battle lines in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions. Putin has claimed four Ukrainian regions in their entirety, although much of their territory remains under Ukrainian control.

US and Russian officials were working on a deal under which Russia would halt its offensive in exchange for the territorial concessions, making it a politically fraught proposal in Ukraine, Bloomberg said.

Trump’s comments came after Poland’s prime minister said a “freeze” in the conflict could be close, after speaking with the Ukrainian leader, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who has communicated with Trump and European leaders in recent days.

“There are certain signals, and we also have an intuition, that perhaps a freeze in the conflict – I don’t want to say the end, but a freeze in the conflict – is closer than it is further away,” Donald Tusk said during a news conference. “There are hopes for this.”

Tusk said Zelenskyy was “very cautious but optimistic” about the ceasefire, Reuters reported. Ukraine was keen that Poland and other European countries play a role in planning for a ceasefire and an eventual peace settlement, Tusk said.

Trump has previously expressed his readiness to meet Putin one-on-one without preconditions, including direct negotiations between Putin and Zelenskyy, stoking fears that Ukraine may be left out of negotiations for the framework of a potential ceasefire.

If the summit happens, it would be the first US-Russia summit since 2021, when former president Joe Biden met Putin in Geneva.

Zelenskyy has responded by speaking with European leaders, including the German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, and the French president, Emmanuel Macron, who are key conduits to Trump.

The US envoy Steve Witkoff had proposed a three-way meeting with Trump, Putin, and Zelenskyy, but the Kremlin had ignored that suggestion, said the Putin aide Yuri Ushakov, and was “focusing on preparations for a bilateral meeting with Trump in the first place”.

Putin has said he is not ready to meet Zelenskyy, even as the Kremlin claimed preparations were under way for a bilateral summit with Trump next week.

“I have nothing against it in general; it is possible, but certain conditions must be created for this,” Putin said of a meeting with Zelenskyy. “But unfortunately, we are still far from creating such conditions.”

Last month, Trump issued an ultimatum for Putin to agree to a ceasefire or face secondary sanctions, with the deadline set for this Friday. That deadline appeared in place despite plans for the summit, although the White House has not said what secondary measures it could enforce.

Trump did target India with a 25% tariff hike for purchasing Russian oil this week, singling out one of Moscow’s economic enablers in a move that New Delhi complained was unfair and selective.

Trump had grown frustrated with Putin in public in recent months as the war dragged through its third year and Putin continued to launch nightly missile and drone strikes on Ukrainian cities despite Trump’s insistence that he could strike a deal within 24 hours of becoming president.

“Putin … talks nice and then he bombs everybody in the evening,” Trump said last month. “So there’s a little bit of a problem there.”

At this dangerous moment for dissent

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you close this tab, I wanted to ask if you could support the Guardian at this crucial time for journalism in the US.

When the military is deployed to quell overwhelmingly peaceful protest, when elected officials of the opposing party are arrested or handcuffed, when student activists are jailed and deported, and when a wide range of civic institutions – non-profits, law firms, universities, news outlets, the arts, the civil service, scientists – are targeted and penalized by the federal government, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that our core freedoms are disappearing before our eyes – and democracy itself is slipping away.

In any country on the cusp of authoritarianism, the role of the press as an engine of scrutiny, truth and accountability becomes increasingly critical. At the Guardian, we see it as our job not only to report on the suppression of dissenting voices, but to make sure those voices are heard.

Not every news organization sees its mission this way – indeed, some have been pressured by their corporate and billionaire owners to avoid antagonizing this government. I am thankful the Guardian is different.

Our only financial obligation is to fund independent journalism in perpetuity: we have no ultrarich owner, no shareholders, no corporate bosses with the power to overrule or influence our editorial decisions. Reader support is what guarantees our survival and safeguards our independence – and every cent we receive is reinvested in our work.

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Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in 2017. According to reports, a US-Russia deal could allow Putin to keep some of the Ukrainian territory his troops have captured. Photograph: Jorge Silva/Reuters

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President Donald Trump’s global tariffs, ranging from 10 to 50 percent, took effect on Thursday, igniting fear among consumers, companies and investors about potential price hikes.

Everyday items ranging from coffee to Toyotas, home furnishings to Gap jeans, are expected to become more expensive as companies adjust their prices to counteract the impact of tariffs. While the president has asked companies to absorb any increases in costs, many cannot forever.

Even luxury items such as Range Rovers, French wines, or Rolex watches are likely to face prices hikes as they navigate 10 percent, 15 percent, and 39 percent tariffs, respectively, from the president.

While Trump wants tariffs to promote domestic production and purchasing, Americans will most likely bear the cost. Economic experts agree that sweeping tariffs on goods from countries could lead to supply chain issues, price spikes, or even inflation.

Here are some of the goods expected to cost more.

Alcohol

Consumers of French, Italian, or Spanish wines, Scotch whiskey, and aperitifs such as Aperol, can expect to see the price of their favorite alcoholic beverage rise due to the 15 percent tariff on the European Union.

The E.U. is a major exporter of wines and spirits to the U.S. In 2024 alone, the E.U. accounted for $3.4 billion worth of imported spirits.

Despite pleas from the beverage industry, the president’s trade deal did not create exemptions for alcohol, which will likely drive up the price of imported wine or liquor – either in stores or restaurants.

“Without productive negotiations reducing reciprocal tariffs on wine and spirits, American wine retailers anticipate a significant decline in sales on top of the already difficult market, as well as significant job losses and subsequent business closures,” Tom Wark, the executive director of the Association of Wine Retailers, said.

A letter to the president from the Toast Not Tariffs Coalition, a group of 57 associations representing the U.S. alcohol industry and related industries, said tariffs on the E.U. could result in 25,000 American job losses, and nearly $2 billion in lost sales.

Diageo, the maker of Guinness, Bailey’s, Johnnie Walker, and more, said the company expects to see a $200 million slump as a result of the tariffs.

Cars and car parts

Already, consumers have seen cars and car parts become more expensive over the last few months as a result of Trump’s tariffs because the U.S. relies heavily on its trading partners for auto parts.

Cox Automotive, an industry service and technology provider, expects the sticker price of vehicles to rise anywhere from four-to-eight percent by the end of the year. That means the average car price would be above $50,000

While the president struck several deals with countries, many of them still make imported vehicles more expensive.

Imported cars from the U.K., such as Range Rovers, are subject to a 10 percent tariff.

Japan, which sells more cars to the U.S. than any other country, is facing a 15 percent tariff rate, which is expected to cause major disruption.

Toyota said on August 7 it expects a $9.5 billion profit loss for the year.

“It’s honestly very difficult for us to predict what will happen regarding the market environment,” Takanori Azuma, Toyota’s head of finance, said.

But given that many car parts are imported from Japan, the tariffs are likely to hurt U.S. carmakers as well.

General Motors projects a $4 billion loss, Stellantis, the maker of Jeeps, said it anticipates tariffs will add $1.7 billion in expenses, and Ford, which builds more cars in the U.S. than any of its rivals, said it expects tariffs to cause a $2 billion loss this year.

Clothing

Clothing is expected to see one of the most significant price increases since the U.S. is the largest single importer of apparel, and much of it comes from countries in Asia.

“The 2025 tariffs disproportionately affect clothing and textiles, with consumers facing 40% higher shoe prices and 38% higher apparel prices in the short-run,” the Budget Lab at Yale, a nonpartisan policy research center, said in a recent analysis. Shoes and apparel could remain 19 percent and 17 percent higher, respectively, in the long run, the report added.

Vietnam, one of the largest exporters of appear to the U.S., has agreed to a 20 percent tariff. Brands such as Nike, Adidas, Zara, and Gap manufacture much of their clothing in Vietnam. While many can absorb some of those costs, even raising prices 10 percent would make a $65 pair of shoes $71.50, without tax.

Bjorn Gulden, the CEO of Adidas, said the tariffs “will directly increase the cost of our products for the U.S.”

Other countries that are high producers of clothing face significant tariffs as well. Bangladesh has a 20 percent tariff, while Indonesia and Cambodia both face a 19 percent tariff.

India, also a large producer of apparel, faces a steep tariff of 25 percent, and Trump has threatened to increase that to 50 percent by the end of August if the country does not stop importing Russian oil.

While the U.S. also imports a large portion of clothing from China, which is still negotiating a trade deal, Trump’s decision to get rid of the de minimis exemption will make it more costly for consumers to purchase cheap clothing from stores like Shein or Temu.

Coffee

The U.S. relies heavily on Brazil to import coffee for the 165 million people who need their daily caffeine fix, but Trump’s 50 percent tariff threatens the long-term availability and price of the drink.

“When people go to their local coffee shop, whether it’s Starbucks or something else, by and large they will likely be buying some form of Brazilian coffee,” Monica de Bolle, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, told NPR.

“A 50 percent tariff will kill that market.”

Household products: appliances, cookware, furniture

Everyday household items made with steel or aluminum, such as cookware, appliances, furniture, and more, are likely going to be impacted by Trump’s steep 50 percent industry tariffs.

The U.S. relies heavily on its trading partners, particularly Canada and Mexico, for steel and aluminium imports.

Nearly half of the aluminum used in the U.S. is imported, while less than a quarter of steel is imported. But that doesn’t mean consumers won’t see price increases.

One small business, Heritage Steel, a family-owned cookware manufacturer in Tennessee, told NBC News that they recently received a tariff bill of $75,000 on an order of handles – and they’re anticipating higher bills in the future.

Since the U.S. does not have many specialized steel manufacturers, Heritage Steel imports approximately 75 percent of its raw material. Unlike other cookware manufacturers, they only import raw material and create their products in the U.S.

Danny Henn, the vice president of operations for Hertiage Steel, told NBC News that the company wants to keep its products moderately priced, but at the same time, cannot absorb the new price of steel. They’ve raised their prices approximately 15 percent to make up for it.

“We’re happy and proud to be a provider of really high-quality cookware, but one that’s more affordably priced than some of the others on the market,” Henn said. “We want to continue to offer the best price we can, given our constraints.”

Watches

Although imported watches are not an everyday essential, luxury wristwatches made in Switzerland are likely to see significant price increases thanks to the 39 percent tariff imposed on the country on Thursday.

That means Americans looking to purchase a watch from recognizable brands such as Rolex, Breitling, Patek Philippe, Omega, or TAG Heuer may have to pay significantly more.

An analysis of the impact, conducted by Bob’s Watches, a secondhand watch retailer, found that a $9,900 stainless steel Breitling could rise to $11,080.

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Astronomers have found nearly 6,000 exoplanets orbiting other stars. But for every confirmed detection, there are countless mere hints, inconclusive observations that could just as well be blips of cosmic noise or glitches in a telescope. Most are too tenuous to take seriously, but every so often, one of these candidate planets is so tantalizing and potentially transformative that it can’t be ignore.

That’s certainly the case for one recently spotted by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) around a sunlike star called Alpha Centauri A, part of the nearest star system to Earth. If the finding were confirmed to represent a planet—and not instead a clump of dust or some instrumental aberration—it would be a gas giant, akin to a warmer version of our own Saturn. It would orbit within Alpha Centauri A’s habitable zone, the starlight-bathed region where liquid water can persist on a planet’s surface. But the world itself would likely be lifeless, smothered beneath thick layers of gas. Any accompanying moons, however, could have better chances for harboring oceans—and perhaps even life.

Announced on August 7 and described in two preprint papers that have been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, the candidate and its possibilities call to mind worlds from science fiction, such as the jungle moon of Pandora in James Cameron’s Avatar films—which, incidentally, orbits a gas giant called Polyphemos around, yes, Alpha Centauri A. But there’s still a chance that the real-world JWST discovery will prove to be a mirage.

“If it’s real, it’s amazing,” says Elisabeth Matthews, an exoplanet-focused astrophysicist at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany. “It’s a really exciting candidate—quite an intriguing candidate,” she says. “The authors work hard to make a case for why this, frankly, small and faint blob of light is believable, but I think there are still some open questions that need to be answered to really be 100 percent sure.”

The finding has been nearly a decade in the making, says Charles Beichman, an astronomer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the California Institute of Technology and a co-author of the two new papers. In 2017, nearly half a decade before JWST would launch, he sent an e-mail to scientists positing that the telescope’s giant 6.5-meter mirror, paired with its Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), might be able to see planets orbiting Alpha Centauri A. “When you stop laughing, let’s think about doing this project,” Beichman told them.

It was a bold suggestion, particularly when JWST was still on the ground, he admits. The telescope “was never really meant to look at a star that’s this bright, moving this fast and located, as Alpha Centauri is, right in the middle of the galactic plane, where there’s thousands of stars,” Beichman says.

Despite those obstacles, the appeal was irresistible. Alpha Centauri A is about the same size and age as our sun. And the star and its two companions, the slightly smaller Alpha Centauri B and the tiny red dwarf star Proxima Centauri, comprise the nearest stellar system to our own—just about four and a half light-years away. Because the Alpha Centauri system is spitting distance from us, astronomically speaking, it’s a bright, perennially popular target for scientists who may not be able to conduct similar observations on dimmer, more distant stars.

This is especially true for direct imaging, the technical term for when astronomers actually manage to take an exoplanet’s picture. Most exoplanetary discoveries instead arise through far more indirect means, such as the dip in a star’s light caused by a world passing between its sun and our telescope or the tiny wobbling of a star caused by an orbiting planet’s gravitational tug. Only in rare cases can astronomers truly see an alien world; typically, a planet needs to be very big and bright—as well as rather far from its sun—to offer any hope for astronomers to glimpse it against the overwhelming glare of its star.

But because Alpha Centauri A is cosmically close, Beichman and his colleagues thought that they could use JWST’s stunning power to accomplish the feat even for a planet that orbits relatively close to the star, within just a few times the distance between Earth and our sun. “Alpha Centauri just lets us cheat because it’s closer than everybody else,” Beichman says.

Although proximity makes for easier studies, this is counterbalanced against the system’s vexing complexity. Alpha Centauri A is the brightest star of the three in the system, but its stellar companion Alpha Centauri B is still quite bright—and quite close, crowding into telescopes’ field of view. Although JWST is equipped with a coronagraph—a masking tool to block out the glare from one star—it can’t do much to curtail this second, planet-obscuring source of light.

For Aniket Sanghi, a Ph.D. student in astrophysics at Caltech and a co-author of the two new papers, that difficulty only made the task more alluring. “I was looking for the next challenging object to work on, and Alpha Centauri A turned out to be one of the most challenging objects,” Sanghi says.

Faced with the brightness of not one but two stars overpowering JWST’s exoplanet-hunting optics, the researchers turned to a surprising strategy: enlisting yet another star. They found a particularly nondescript star that they could use as a stand-in. By observing this other star centered on and blocked by the coronagraph and then off-center and unmasked, the researchers were able to model how its light flowed through JWST’s optics. This created a template by which Alpha Centauri B’s light could then be subtracted out from the precious images of Alpha Centauri A.

And when the researchers tackled the feat in August 2024, they found exactly what they hoped for: a faint blob of light nestled near the blocked-out Alpha Centauri A. “As a direct imager, you’re always confounded by artifacts,” Sanghi says. “You’re very skeptical of anything you see. But this one just popped out so clearly.”

Sanghi and his colleagues tried to undermine their own data, striving to explain how the blob could be stray light within JWST’s optics or a background object in the sky, but nothing quite stuck.

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Dear GEP,

My 8-year-old has been begging me for a puppy, and I worry I am losing my resolve. Part of me thinks it could be sweet and give him some good company; part of me thinks it will ruin our lives. Are pets really worth it? Could we just get goldfish or what?

I have a photographic memory of the Christmas morning when a 10-year-old me was given the gift she’d been begging for — a Chinese box turtle we named Ping — carried down to the living room in his then-squeaky-clean glass enclosure like a little prince on parade. Despite Ping later being set free by the well-meaning people who had graciously inherited him (and likely killed within five minutes of freedom), Ping had a good life. He ate his lettuce pieces and chicken bits, swam in his plastic pool, occasionally scuttled across our kitchen floor. But, looking back, it’s not like my life was necessarily greatly enhanced by Ping — or by Dandelion the rabbit, or the pair of newts who lived in our bathroom, or Mei Li, the cat who hated people. Which is probably why, as an adult, I have never thought of pets as more than a nuisance.

Given my early cat trauma, I have often cited some combination of landlord restrictions and vague allergies whenever my kids brought up pets. But when we moved out of our two-bedroom apartment into a larger house last fall, I began to run out of excuses. I also began to wonder if I was missing out on something. We had been a little family, not stable by any means but at least consistent, for years now. Couldn’t we stand growing a bit? Around Christmas, I indulged myself in looking at the available cats at the local animal shelter. I imagined something simpler than my kids but more rewarding than my Peloton. In January, we brought home a 6-month-old tuxedo cat we named Midnight. (Sorry, shelter volunteers, but “Jerry” is not a cat name.) I am almost embarrassed to tell you how much I love this cat.

And when I asked my son, who gets easily anxious and dysregulated easily, why he was seeming so chill lately, he answered immediately: “Midnight.” Far from ruining our lives, our kitty does provide the company you are speculating a dog might — he snuggles with the kids when they are upset, provides me with the maternal adoration my children are slowly losing, and regularly serves as a peace offering when we hurt each other. I don’t know that the leopard gecko we tried to talk our kids down to would have achieved all this. With all due respect to goldfish, my experience tells me that they mostly just swim in circles.

But every family is different, and our experience is just our own. I surveyed a few dozen parents, with and without pets, to see what was going on in their households. Plenty of parents are ambivalent about family pets or fully against getting them. Angela, a mom of two, put it like this: “the last thing I need is another dependent!” Other parents who have said no to pets cited being at the limits of caretaking already (“Aren’t kids enough unpaid labor??”), as well as space issues, the expense and logistics of caring for them when traveling, and for one mom, the smell. (After 30 years, I can still perform olfactory teleportation and conjure the rankness of Ping’s cage.) One mother, Kate, admitted that she regrets adopting a cat for her kids: Like Mei Li, the cat’s love language is attacking humans, and Kate’s kids are now begging for a dog instead.

More of the parents I spoke to, however, believed that their animals, and what their animals meant to their children, were well worth it.

When Margaret and Brent, parents to 5-year-old Tycho, first started dating, a central component of their courtship was texting each other pictures of pit bull puppies. But after they had their son, Margaret felt overwhelmed by the idea of taking on another responsibility. “What if we end up with a dog who has medical complications or serious behavioral issues?” she wondered. When she pushed through her worries and adopted Phoebe, a sweet brown pit bull mix, they gained an essential family member. Tycho, who is autistic, took to Phoebe instantly, running alongside her at the beach and adding her name as one of his first spoken words. Phoebe is not only like a sibling to Tycho, whose older half-brothers are out of the house, but she helps him through transitions, something that can often cause him great distress. “If he gets to hold the leash,” Margaret admits, “he’ll kind of go anywhere.”

Several of the parents I surveyed used the terms “sibling” or “best friend” to describe their kids’ relationship with their pets (usually dogs or cats), in all the good and challenging ways, the latter often leading to growth, especially for only children. As one parent of a 19-month-old put it: “Sometimes she wants to smother [the dog] in love, other times she is frustrated by his presence. But he is teaching her to tolerate the existence of another being in our family that requires attention, care, and love.” Another parent referred to their dog as “screen-free entertainment.”

As far as having another dependent, for us, a cat feels like a good balance. Do the kids actually help? Studies are inconclusive, but my anecdotal experience is don’t count on it. While I was surprised to hear from my mom that I was actually a dutiful cleaner of Ping’s cage and attender of his vet appointments, my kids have been a real disappointment in terms of practical help with Midnight. Despite having had a democratic chore-picking session when we first got him, they have pretty much done zero daily feeding or cleaning. But they do care for him on their own unhelpful but sweet timelines, brushing him when they’re in the mood or clearing out his litter box when it feels like a game.

But other kids, it seems, are better than mine! Kim, father to Oscar, 7, and dog-father to Zazzie, claims that Oscar completes dog-related chores each morning. Darina’s 8-year-old actually walks one of their dogs! And Joy’s 9-year-old daughter not only feeds the dogs twice a day (“90% of the time, and only complains/drags her feet some of the time”) but also feeds and cleans the cage of her bearded dragon.

Of course, we couldn’t have had Midnight in our old apartment (there’s the space thing), and he’s already set us back a few hundred bucks. (Margaret told me, unapologetically, that she’s spent at least $10,000 on Phoebe’s medical bills.) But we were gifted a feeder by my sister, we bought some very cheap secondhand toys, and we are hoping keeping him inside will help.

Did my cat solve all my problems as a parent? Definitely not. (As if any one parenting move would!) But the family pet did accelerate progress on some of my parenting goals: to engage my kids in the practice of care (notice I say “practice” in a way that is divorced from any actual outcome), to have some mutual interests, and to build play into our daily life as a way to offset some of the nagging, fighting, and yes, screens.

It’s good that you’re thinking, my friend, about whether to get a pet. I have seen too many impulsive puppy decisions go awry! And you’re right: It might be a pain in the butt, or completely neglected, or a total psycho that corners you and then jumps up at your face, clawing away (sorry, I really should work through that). But you might be satisfied or find a kind of joy that sits right next to your parenting joy, but has a slightly different character. Like all things parenting, it might be a bust, but I bet something interesting will happen along the way. I can’t imagine my life without these 10 pounds of feline flesh.

I’ll admit, though, we do all smell a bit like cat now, but like most people in love, we hardly notice.

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Romper

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President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he will impose a 100% tariff on computer chips, raising the specter of higher prices for electronics, autos, household appliances, and other essential products dependent on the processors powering the digital age.

“We’ll be putting a tariff of approximately 100% on chips and semiconductors,” Trump said in the Oval Office while meeting with Apple CEO Tim Cook. “But if you’re building in the United States of America, there’s no charge.”

The announcement came more than three months after Trump temporarily exempted most electronics from his administration’s most onerous tariffs.

The Republican president said companies that make computer chips in the U.S. would be spared the import tax. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a shortage of computer chips increased the price of autos and contributed to higher inflation.

Investors seemed to interpret the potential tariff exemptions as a positive for Apple and other major tech companies that have been making huge financial commitments to manufacture more chips and other components in the U.S..

Big Tech already has made collective commitments to invest about $1.5 trillion in the U.S. since Trump moved back into the White House in January. That figure includes a $600 billion promise from Apple after the iPhone maker boosted its commitment by tacking another $100 billion on to a previous commitment made in February.

Now the question is whether the deal brokered between Cook and Trump will be enough to insulate the millions of iPhones made in China and India from the tariffs that the administration has already imposed and reduce the pressure on the company to raise prices on the new models expected to be unveiled next month.

Wall Street certainly seems to think so. After Apple’s stock price gained 5% in Wednesday regular trading sessions, the shares rose by another 3% in extended trading after Trump announced some tech companies won’t be hit with the latest tariffs while Cook stood alongside him.

The shares of AI chipmaker Nvidia, which also has recently made big commitments to the U.S., rose slightly in extended trading to add to the $1 trillion gain in market value the Silicon Valley company has made since the start of Trump’s second administration.

The stock price of computer chip pioneer Intel, which has fallen on hard times, also climbed in extended trading.

Inquiries sent to chip makers Nvidia and Intel were not immediately answered. The chip industry’s main trade group, the Semiconductor Industry Association, declined to comment on Trump’s latest tariffs.

Demand for computer chips has been climbing worldwide, with sales increasing 19.6% in the year-ended in June, according to the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics organization.

Trump’s tariff threats mark a significant break from existing plans to revive computer chip production in the U.S. that were drawn up during the administration of President Joe Biden.

Since taking over from Biden, Trump has been deploying tariffs to incentivize more domestic production. Essentially, the president is betting that the threat of dramatically higher chip costs would force most companies to open factories domestically, despite the risk that tariffs could squeeze corporate profits and push up prices for mobile phones, TVs, and refrigerators.

By contrast, the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act that Biden signed into law in 2022 provided more than $50 billion to support new computer chip plants, fund research, and train workers for the industry. The mix of funding support, tax credits, and other financial incentives were meant to draw in private investment, a strategy that Trump has vocally opposed.

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President Donald Trump makes an announcement about Apple in the Oval Office, Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon) © The Associated Press

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A little-known illness called Legionnaires’ disease has infected at least 58 people in New York City’s Central Harlem neighborhood in the past two weeks. Two people have died during the outbreak, which has been tied to cooling towers that tested positive for the disease-causing bacterium Legionella pneumophila, according to a statement from city health officials on August 4.

The disease is a severe pneumonia and one of two infections caused by bacteria in the genus Legionella, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (The bacteria can also cause a milder illness called Pontiac fever, which can manifest with fever, muscle aches, and headaches.) When diagnosed early, Legionnaires’ can be treated successfully with antibiotics.

Health care providers report about 6,000 cases of Legionnaires’ disease annually in the U.S., although some cases are likely mistaken as other types of pneumonia. In addition, the infection often does not cause symptoms in healthy people. Individuals who are aged 50 or older, as well as current or former smokers and people with underlying lung or immune issues, are most vulnerable to Legionnaires’. The disease became five times more prevalent between 2000 and 2018 for reasons experts have struggled to identify.

Legionnaires’ does not typically spread between people directly; instead, people catch the infection by inhaling mist that contains the pathogen. The bacterium particularly thrives in stagnant water between 77 and 113 degrees Fahrenheit (25 and 45 degrees Celsius). Water systems such as cooling towers, large air-conditioning systems, spas, and hot tubs can then aerosolize the microbe, making bacterial control in these types of structures a vital prevention measure.

When the current outbreak was first identified, New York City health officials directed an investigation into all cooling towers in the affected neighborhood. These towers evaporate water to dispel heat, and they are a common feature in large buildings in the city. But such structures have long been known to cause some of the largest Legionnaires’ outbreaks on record. New York City laws require cooling towers to be registered, tested, and disinfected regularly to reduce the presence of Legionella bacteria.

Legionnaires’ was first identified at a convention of the American Legion’s Department of Pennsylvania (hence the name) that was held in late July 1976. Scientists who helped identified the Legionella bacterium that caused an outbreak among at least 221 people at the convention called the detective work “one of the largest and most complex investigations of an epidemic ever undertaken” in an article published in the October 1979 issue of Scientific American.

Scientists had to rule out potential causes, including foodborne pathogens and metal poisoning, among other challenges, before managing to identify the previously unknown bacterium. Simultaneously, investigators pored through reports of other then recent, mysterious outbreaks of pneumonialike diseases, piecing together an image of an infection that “has turned out to be not very rare after all,” the researchers wrote in their 1979 article.

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Fluctuations in shape are an inevitable part of being alive, and while few have access to the resources of Rihanna—including super-stylist Jahleel Weaver—anyone navigating a changing body (bear with me) could take a cue from her latest maternity look: a spring summer 2001 Issey Miyake dress made from semi-sheer pleats in a gradient of sorbet tones with a shoulder-engulfing neckline. She paired the dress with neon green and silver Ottolinger X Puma Mostro sneakers, a blossoming pink rose ring, and silver floral earrings.

Originally worn by a straight-sized model in Miyake’s September 2000 show—staged in collaboration with Japanese electronic duo Silent Poets, and inspired by a futuristic tribe—the look reinforces the late designer’s interest in seeing the body as something fluid, rather than fixed. It’s why his designs—in particular his Pleats Please line—are that rare thing in luxury fashion: accommodating of bigger bodies. “Few brands have done what Issey Miyake has in the luxury designer space,” writer Tracy Achonwa wrote British Vogue in March. “Catering to women who want the best plus-size, high-end clothing, [the brand] boasts a cleverly designed textile that expands with accordion-like pleats.”

Not everyone will get it. “Rihanna steps out in odd attire,” read one tabloid headline. Her own fans weren’t much kinder: “What is up with what she’s wearing?” But tell me, what is the point of being one of the world’s most famous billionaires if you can’t step outside the margins of what’s considered normal, and wear things others wouldn’t? Now pregnant with her third child, Rihanna is leaning full tilt into these sorts of bizarro-chic silhouettes—like the so-called “condom dress” from Pieter Mulier’s fall 2025 collection for Alaïa, which she recently wore to dinner at her favorite restaurant of all time, Giorgio Baldi—as her own form shifts. Good for her. To quote Miyake himself: “The space created between the clothes and the body is what interests me and communicates the most.”

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Walmart, Apple, and Amazon, the most successful companies in the U.S., base their corporate strategies on data: consumer behavior data, market research, financial, product, and competitive analysis data.

Any CEO who deliberately relied on falsified data, or who demanded cooked books, would be fired immediately — and likely sued by the Board of Directors.

Any CEO of any company who tried to manipulate the appearance of short-term success for his own personal gain, at the expense of long-term viability for the company, would also be fired and likely sued for malfeasance, and worse.

A successful CEO knows that falsifying economic or financial data can lead to charges of securities fraud, wire fraud, and other financial crimes, because false data can ruin investors, corporations, and markets overnight.

Enter Donald Trump, whose self-proclaimed governing philosophy is “running the country like it’s a business.” Debunking the lie of his own manufactured image as a “successful businessman,” last Friday, Trump angrily fired the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Commissioner because he didn’t like her data, even as he wears 34 felony convictions for falsifying records.

Dr. Erika McEntarfer, a widely respected statistician, enjoyed bipartisan support, including confirmation votes from Marco Rubio and JD Vance. Appointed commissioner under the Biden administration, she holds a Ph.D. in economics from Virginia Tech, and served at the Census Bureau for two decades under both parties prior to her BLS appointment.

By federal law, McEntarfer’s appointment ends in 2028. Trump fired her anyway because he was embarrassed by jobs data that didn’t match his own hype. In May, the White House said that April’s jobs report “proved” that Trump was “revitalizing” the economy. In June, Trump posted, “GREAT JOBS NUMBERS.” After the Labor Department released revised jobs figures for those months — a common practice because jobs reports are sample projections that get adjusted when actual employer data come in — Trump fired the messenger.

Trump’s penchant for hiding and falsifying data has put American corporations and the economy in more danger. Just as he scrubbed government websites of climate data to bolster his fossil fuel donors, just as he ordered the Smithsonian to remove an exhibit accurately reflecting his own impeachments, Trump thinks reality is whatever he says it is.

As he fantasizes about returning America to the Gilded Age, where robber barons extracted the earth’s resources for unimaginable profit while laborers worked for starvation wages, he’s forgetting that his oligarch donors need accurate economic data too. At least oligarchs creating real products and delivering real services—as opposed to merely speculating- in Trump’s image—need real, reliable, and uncooked data.

McEntarfer should sue

When Trump fired McEntarfer in a social media post, he declared that her numbers were “phony.” He wrote on Friday, “In my opinion, today’s Jobs Numbers were RIGGED in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad,” adding: “But, the good news is, our Country is doing GREAT!”

He said the numbers had been manipulated for political purposes and announced he fired McEntarfer as a result.

Trump also baselessly accused McEntarfer of manipulating jobs numbers before the November election to advantage Kamala Harris. Trump said to reporters, “I believe the numbers were phony, just like they were before the election, and there were other times. So you know what I did? I fired her, and you know what? I did the right thing.”

When asked what his source was, he said, “my opinion,” confirming that there was no evidence to back up his reckless claims, claims that permanently tanked the reputation of a celebrated career professional.

Presidents are not immune from civil prosecution

No doubt Trump slurred McEntarfer based on his own “opinion” to avoid defamation liability, but an opinion that implies a false fact is still defamatory, it is still actionable, and presidents are not immune from civil lawsuits for defamation.

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NASA could soon go nuclear on the moon.

The space agency’s acting administrator, Sean Duffy, has issued a directive to expedite building a nuclear reactor on the lunar surface. Duffy, a former Fox News host, is also head of the U.S. Department of Transportation, and he took over leadership of NASA in July after the Trump administration pulled its nomination of private astronaut and businessperson Jared Isaacman.

The directive, first reported by Politico, would accelerate NASA’s long-simmering—and, to date, largely fruitless—efforts to develop nuclear reactors to support space science and exploration.

The space agency has pursued various projects over the years, most recently in 2022, when it awarded three $5-million contracts to companies to craft designs for small space-ready reactors meant for lunar operations in the mid-2030s. Inspired in part by a space policy directive issued by President Donald Trump during his first term, those reactors were intended to produce 40 kilowatts of power—enough to sustain a small office building—and to weigh less than six metric tons. Duffy’s directive is more ambitious: it calls for NASA to solicit proposals for reactors that would yield at least 100 kilowatts of power and be ready for launch by late 2029. The space agency is tasked with appointing an official to oversee the effort within 30 days and to issue its solicitation within 60 days.

Lunar nights are very long—two Earth weeks—and perilously cold, making nuclear power desirable for surface operations. But according to the directive, the greater impetus for the fast-tracked plan is a burgeoning partnership between China and Russia to build a nuclear-powered outpost near the moon’s south pole by the mid-2030s. The sun never crests high above the horizon there, leaving some craters in permanent shadow—and valuable deposits of water ice lacing their eternally dark floors. Despite its cryogenic chill, this lunar region is hotly contested, with NASA’s Artemis program also targeting crewed landings there as early as 2027 as part of the Artemis III mission.

Besides providing abundant electricity for surface operations, a nuclear reactor on the moon could also allow for a strategic lunar land grab. Ownership of otherworldly territory is prohibited, according to the United Nations Outer Space Treaty, but the treaty also obliges spacefaring powers to exercise “due regard” in their activities, meaning that they should not encroach on or interfere with sensitive infrastructure built by others. A nuclear reactor placed on the lunar surface, therefore, could allow the declaration of what Duffy’s directive calls a “keep-out zone.”

Although the Trump administration’s acceleration of NASA’s nuclear-power efforts may be welcomed by many space-exploration advocates, it comes alongside other proposals from the White House that seek to radically reshape the space agency and that could be at cross-purposes with the new directive. These include plans for extraordinarily deep cuts to NASA’s science programs, as well as an active and ongoing culling of the space agency’s workforce. The president’s budget request for fiscal year 2026 notably zeroes out funding for a joint program between NASA and the Department of Defense to develop nuclear rocketry. It would also wind down the space agency’s ability to build and deploy radioisotope power sources, which offer nuclear-derived heat and electricity sans complex and heavy reactors for robotic missions to the outer planets and other sunlight-sparse parts of the solar system.

The biggest question facing NASA’s latest nuclear foray, however, may be what these notional new reactors would actually power. Many experts say a 2027 launch for Artemis III is unlikely and citing factors such as the ongoing difficulties of developing a requisite lunar lander based on SpaceX’s Starship rocket. With each logistical misstep or schedule delay, additional Artemis missions that would put more meaningful and power-hungry infrastructure on the moon slip further over the horizon, potentially making the entire program more vulnerable to additional rounds of budget cuts—or even outright cancellation by future administrations.

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