The world just recorded its warmest June ever. A deadly heat wave has been baking much of Europe ― France experiencing its highest temperature on record last week, a blistering 45.9 degrees Celsius (or nearly 115 degrees Fahrenheit). Now, Alaska is enduring what for it is an ongoing heat wave.
In short, it’s hot. And scientists warn this is just a taste of what the climate crisis has in store for the Earth.
World Weather Attribution, an international organization of scientists conducting climate research, said the frequency and intensity of Europe’s heat waves have been exacerbated largely by humans.
For all the hype about the upcoming presidential election in 2020, there is something coming earlier that is much bigger, and its ramifications for the global economy will last for decades. What am I talking about? The first wave of millennials is about to turn 40.
That’s right. This super-caffeinated, highly educated generation is rapidly approaching — Wait for it! Sit down for it! Dare I say it? — middle age. The youngest of millennials, those born in 1980, are just completing college. Once we ring in 2020, the first millennials will reach four decades.
Much has been made of how different millennials are from previous generations. The reality is that many own houses and have kids and in many ways are as conventional as prior generations. Though it wasn’t easy. They’re still behind where Gen X was at this age, mainly due to coming of age during the Great Recession, an overload of student debt and the fact that many are struggling to save and generate wealth for later in life. Recent data from the Federal Reserve show that younger Americans are getting into more trouble with debt and the average American is struggling to make ends meet and build up emergency savings.
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Clemens Porikys | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty Images
“It’s good to be in something from the ground floor. I came too late for that, I know. But lately, I’m getting the feeling that I came in at the end.” —Tony Soprano
You’re wrong about that one, Tony. It may be that no TV show does anything entirely new — change always builds on change. But “The Sopranos” was as clear a marker of the beginning of an era (even if I hate the term “Golden Age”) as anything in TV.
Before “The Sopranos,” yes, TV dramas could take risks (“Twin Peaks”) and tell stories about difficult people (“NYPD Blue”). But after the ducks landed in Tony’s backyard pool in January 1999, an immense flock followed. TV series, we saw, could rely on audiences to pay close attention to a long-running story. They could have high visual and narrative ambitions. They could resist quick answers (or any answers, in the case of the Russian from “Pine Barrens”) and tidy moral conclusions.
President Donald Trump is getting an unwelcome visitor during his big boy July 4 military display in Washington, but he may not know it’s there.
Trump’s attempt to make the nation’s Independence Day an ode to himself will include military tanks, fighter jets, troops and Republican supporters in the nation’s capital, and a speech by the president from the Lincoln Memorial.
A guest is also scheduled to make an appearance: the infamous Trump baby blimp used around the world to mock the president. The National Park Service on Monday signed off on a permit by activist group Codepink to feature the balloon, but it included some caveats that might deflate the impact.
“The permit … does not allow the balloon to be filled with any helium, only air, and the permit is not in the location we requested – within line of sight of the Lincoln Memorial where President Trump will be speaking,” Codepink said in a press release obtained by USA Today.
During the president’s recent visit to the U.K., the 20-foot balloon featuring a diaper-wearing Trump soared above Parliament Square.
Trump said after seeing the blimp fly in London a year earlier that it made him “feel unwelcome.”
Signs are pointing to a coming U.S. recession, according to an economic indicator that has preceded every recession over the past five decades.
It is known among economists and Wall Street traders as a “yield curve inversion,” and it refers to when long-term interest rates are paying out less than short-term rates.
That curve has been flattening out and sloping down for more than a year, raising worries among some analysts that investors’ long-term view of the market is not positive and that an economic downturn is looming.
But on Sunday, an inauspicious milestone was achieved: The yield curve remained inverted for three months, or an entire quarter, which has for half a century been a clear signal that the economy is heading for recession in the next nine to 18 months, according to Campbell Harvey, a Duke University finance professor who spoke to NPR on Sunday. His research in the mid-1980s first linked yield curve inversions to recessions.
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The floor of the New York Stock Exchange. An economic indicator known as the “yield curve inversion” hit the three-month mark, an occurrence that has preceded the past seven U.S. recessions.
The U.S. Women’s National Team will take on the Netherlands in the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup final on Sunday, July 7 at 8 a.m. PT at the Stade de Lyon in Lyon, France.
The U.S. advanced to its third consecutive Women’s World Cup final after beating England 2-1 in the semifinal round. Christen Press, who came in for an injured Megan Rapinoe, and Alex Morgan, who was celebrating her 30th birthday, both scored again England to lead the USA to victory.
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Dutch players celebrate after winning the Women’s World Cup semifinal soccer match against Sweden at the Stade de Lyon outside Lyon, France, Wednesday, July 3, 2019. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
The same military jurors who acquitted a decorated Navy SEAL of murder in the killing of a wounded Islamic State captive under his care in Iraq in 2017 will return to court Wednesday to decide whether he should serve any jail time for the single charge he was convicted of: posing with the 17-year-old militant’s corpse.
The final step comes after the verdict Tuesday was met with an outpouring of emotion as the jury also cleared Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher of attempted murder in the shootings of two civilians and all other charges.
President Donald Trump, who intervened earlier this year to have Gallagher moved from the brig to less restrictive confinement, tweeted congratulations to the SEAL and his family.
Hey, we’re with you. Given half a chance, we’d much rather hit the road than the armchair. Nothing can replace the intensity of authentic experience. Yet experience needs shape and wisdom and behind every great adventure are the stories that inspired it. We read before we go; and after we arrive, free and clear in far-flung terrain and edgy places, we invariably find echoes of the voices that led us there.
The following list is devoted to books that offer the truest inspiration, the deepest reflection, the strongest provocation. These are books that seize imaginations and rattle sedentary lives
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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Best TV Drama
Trump’s July 4 Military Display
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Books for the Well-Read Explorer
