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Tag: director

  • Commentary: Tulsi Gabbard is supposed to keep America safe. She’s only looking out for herself

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    Tulsi Gabbard’s political journey has been anything but straightforward.

    As a teenager, she worked for her father, a prominent anti-gay activist, and his political organization, which opposed same-sex marriage. In 2002, she was elected to Hawaii’s House of Representatives, becoming — at age 21 — the youngest person to serve in the Legislature.

    Gabbard was a Democrat and remained so for two decades, as she cycled from the statehouse to Honolulu’s City Council to the U.S. House of Representatives.

    In 2020, she ran for president, renouncing her anti-LGBTQ views and apologizing for her earlier stance. She was a Bernie Sanders acolyte and a fierce critic of Donald Trump and, especially, his foreign policy. She denounced him at one point for “being Saudi Arabia’s bitch.”

    Now, Gabbard is MAGA down to her stocking feet.

    Despite no obvious qualifications — save for her fawning appearances on Fox News — Trump selected her to be the director of national intelligence, the nation’s spymaster-in-chief. Despite no earthly reason, Gabbard was present last week when the FBI conducted a heavy-handed raid at the Fulton County elections office in Georgia, pursuing a harebrained theory the 2020 election was stolen from Trump.

    Instead of, say, poring over the latest intelligence gleanings from Ukraine or Gaza, Gabbard stood watch as a team of flak-jacketed agents carted off hundreds of boxes of ballots and other election materials.

    That’ll keep the homeland safe.

    But as bizarre and unaccountable as it was, Gabbard’s presence outside Atlanta did make a certain amount of sense. She’s a longtime dabbler in crackpot conspiracies. And she’ll bend, like a swaying palm, whichever way the prevailing winds blow.

    Some refer to her as the “Manchurian candidate,” said John Hart, a communication professor at Hawaii Pacific University, referring to the malleable cipher in the famous political thriller. In a different world, he suggested, Gabbard might have been Sanders’ running mate.

    “It does take a certain amount of flexibility to think that someone who could have been the Democratic VP is now in Trump’s cabinet,” Hart observed.

    The job of the nation’s director of national intelligence — a position created to address some of the failings that led to the 9/11 attacks — is to act as the president’s top intelligence adviser, synthesizing voluminous amounts of foreign, military and domestic information to help defend the country and protect its interests abroad.

    It has nothing whatsoever to do with re-litigating U.S. elections, or tending to the bruised feelings of an onion-skinned president.

    The job is supposed to be nonpartisan and apolitical, which should go without saying. Except it needs to be said in this time when all roads (and the actions of each cabinet member) lead to Trump, his ego, his whims and his insecurities.

    There were ample signs Gabbard was a spectacularly bad pick for intelligence chief.

    She blamed NATO and the Biden administration for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. She claimed the U.S. was funding dangerous biological laboratories in the country — “parroting fake Russian propaganda,” in the words of then-Utah Sen. Mitt Romney.

    She opposed U.S. aid to the rebels fighting Bashar Assad, met with Syria’s then-dictator and defended him against allegations he used chemical weapons against his own people.

    She defended Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, who were indicted for masterminding two of the biggest leaks of intelligence secrets in U.S. history.

    Still, Gabbard was narrowly confirmed by the Senate, 52 to 48. The vote, almost entirely along party lines, was an inauspicious start and nothing since had dispelled lawmakers’ well-placed lack of confidence.

    Trump brushed aside Gabbard’s congressional testimony on Iran’s nuclear capabilities — “I don’t care what she said” — and bombed the country’s nuclear facilities. The putative intelligence chief was apparently irrelevant in the administration’s ouster of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

    Her bizarre presence in Georgia — where Gabbard reportedly arranged for FBI agents to make a post-raid call to the president — looks like nothing more than a way to worm her way back into his good graces.

    (Separately, the Wall Street Journal reported this week that a U.S. intelligence official has filed a whistleblower complaint against Gabbard, which is caught up in wrangling over sharing details with Congress.)

    California Sen. Adam Schiff said it’s “patently obvious to everyone Gabbard lacks the capability and credibility” to lead the country’s intelligence community.

    “She has been sidelined by the White House, ignored by the agencies, and has zero credibility with Congress,” the Democrat wrote in an email. She’s responded by parroting Trump’s Big Lie “complete with cosplaying [a] secret agent in Fulton County and violating all norms and rules by connecting the President of the United States with line law enforcement officers executing a warrant. The only contribution that Tulsi Gabbard can make now would be to resign.”

    Back in Hawaii, the former congresswoman has been in bad odor for years.

    “It started with the criticism of President Obama” — a revered Hawaii native — over foreign policy “and a sense in Hawaii that she was more interested in appearing on the national media than working for the state,” said Colin Moore, a University of Hawaii political science professor and another longtime Gabbard watcher.

    “Hawaii politicians have, with a few exceptions, tended to be kind of low-drama dealmakers, not the sort who attract national attention,” Moore said. “The goal is to rise in seniority and bring benefits back to the state. And that was never the model Tulsi followed.”

    In recent years, as she sidled into Trump’s orbit, Hawaiian sightings of Gabbard have been few and far between, according to Honolulu Civil Beat, a statewide nonprofit news organization. Not that she’s been terribly missed in the deeply Democratic state.

    “I’ve heard some less-charitable people say, ‘Don’t let the door hit your [rear end] on the way out,” said Hart.

    But it’s not as though Gabbard’s ascension to director of intelligence was Hawaii’s loss and America’s gain. It’s been America’s loss, too.

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    Mark Z. Barabak

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  • Roger Allers, director who worked on several Disney classics, dies

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    Roger Allers, director who worked on several Disney classics, dies

    Updated: 6:06 PM EST Jan 18, 2026

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    Roger Allers, a famous director who worked on several Disney classics, has died. He was 76.Allers was known for working on several Disney animated films, such as “The Lion King,” where he was the co-director.He also worked on “Aladdin,” “The Little Mermaid” and “Tron.” CEO of Disney, Bob Iger, posted a statement on Instagram saying, “Roger Allers was a creative visionary whose many contributions to Disney will live on for generations to come. He understood the power of great storytelling — how unforgettable characters, emotion, and music can come together to create something timeless. His work helped define an era of animation that continues to inspire audiences around the world, and we are deeply grateful for everything he gave to Disney. Our hearts are with his family, friends, and collaborators.”

    Roger Allers, a famous director who worked on several Disney classics, has died. He was 76.

    Allers was known for working on several Disney animated films, such as “The Lion King,” where he was the co-director.

    He also worked on “Aladdin,” “The Little Mermaid” and “Tron.”

    CEO of Disney, Bob Iger, posted a statement on Instagram saying, “Roger Allers was a creative visionary whose many contributions to Disney will live on for generations to come. He understood the power of great storytelling — how unforgettable characters, emotion, and music can come together to create something timeless. His work helped define an era of animation that continues to inspire audiences around the world, and we are deeply grateful for everything he gave to Disney. Our hearts are with his family, friends, and collaborators.”

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  • Zelensky works yet again to break Putin’s hold on Trump

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    WASHINGTON — Standing alongside President Trump at his Palm Beach estate, Volodymyr Zelensky could only smirk and grimace without overtly offending his host. “Russia wants to see Ukraine succeed,” Trump told reporters, shocking the Ukrainian president before claiming that Vladimir Putin is genuine in his desire for peace.

    It was just the latest example of the American president sympathizing with Moscow in its war of conquest in Europe. Yet Zelensky emerged from the meeting Sunday ensuring once again that Ukraine may fight another day, maintaining critical if uneasy support from Washington.

    Few signs of progress toward a peace agreement materialized from the meeting at Mar-a-Lago, where Zelensky traveled with significant compromises — including a plan to put territorial concessions to Russia before the Ukrainian people for a vote — in order to appease the U.S. president.

    But Zelensky won concessions of his own from Trump, who had for weeks been pushing for a ceasefire by Christmas, or else threatening to cut off Ukraine from U.S. intelligence that would leave Kyiv blind on the battlefield. “I don’t have deadlines,” Trump said Sunday.

    Over the course of Trump’s first year in office, Zelensky and other European leaders have repeatedly worked to convince Trump that Russia’s President Putin is, in fact, an aggressor opposed to peace, responsible for an unprovoked invasion that launched the deadliest conflict in Europe since the Second World War.

    Each time, Trump has come around, even going as far over the summer as to question whether Ukraine could win back the territories it has lost on the battlefield to Russia — and vowing to North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies, “we’re with them all the way.”

    Yet, each time, Trump has changed course within a matter of days or weeks, reverting to an embrace of Putin and Russia’s worldview, including a proposal that Ukraine preemptively cede sovereign territories that Russia has sought but failed to occupy by force.

    Zelensky’s willingness to offer concessions in his latest meeting with Trump has, at least temporarily, “managed to keep President Trump from tilting further towards the Russian position,” said Kyle Balzer, a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “But Trump’s position — his repeated insistence that a deal is necessary now because time is not on Ukraine’s side — continues to favor Putin’s line and negotiating tactics.”

    U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that Putin’s revanchist war aims — to conquer all of Ukraine and, beyond, to reclaim parts of Europe that once were part of the Soviet empire — remain unchanged.

    Yet Trump’s director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, whose own sympathies toward Russia have been scrutinized for years, recently dismissed the assessments as products of “deep state” “warmongers” within the intelligence community.

    On Monday, hours after speaking with Trump, Putin ordered the Russian military to push toward Zaporizhzhia, a city of 700,000 before the war began. The city lies far outside the Donbas region that Moscow claims would satisfy its war aims in a negotiated settlement.

    “Trump’s instincts are to favor Putin and Russia,” said Brian Taylor, director of the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs at Syracuse University. “Ukraine and its European partners still hope to convince Trump of the obvious fact that Putin is not interested in a deal that doesn’t amount to a Ukrainian surrender.

    “If Trump was convinced of Putin’s intransigence, he might further tighten sanctions on Russia and provide more assistance to Ukraine to try to pressure Putin into a deal,” Taylor added. “It’s an uphill battle, one might even say Sisyphean, but Zelensky and European leaders have to keep trying. So far, nearly a year into Trump’s second term, it’s been worth it.”

    On Monday, Moscow claims that Ukraine orchestrated a massive drone attack targeting Putin’s residence that would force it to reconsider its stance in negotiations. Kyiv denied an attack took place.

    “Given the final degeneration of the criminal Kyiv regime, which has switched to a policy of state terrorism, Russia’s negotiating position will be revised,” Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister since 2004, said in a Telegram post.

    Another senior Russian official said the reported attack shocked and infuriated Trump. But Zelensky, responding on social media, said that Russia was “at it again, using dangerous statements to undermine all achievements of our shared diplomatic efforts with President Trump’s team.”

    “We keep working together to bring peace closer,” Zelensky said. “This alleged ‘residence strike’ story is a complete fabrication intended to justify additional attacks against Ukraine, including Kyiv, as well as Russia’s own refusal to take necessary steps to end the war.”

    “Ukraine does not take steps that can undermine diplomacy. To the contrary, Russia always takes such steps,” he added. “It is critical that the world doesn’t stay silent now. We cannot allow Russia to undermine the work on achieving a lasting peace.”

    Frederick Kagan, director of the Critical Threats Project, which collaborates with the Institute for the Study of War to produce daily battlefield assessments on the conflict, said that the meeting did not appear to fundamentally shift Trump’s position on the conflict — a potential win for Kyiv in and of itself, he said.

    “U.S.-Ukraine negotiations appear to be continuing as before, which is positive, since those negotiations seem to be getting into the real details of what would be required for a meaningful set of security guarantees and long-term agreements to ensure that any peace settlement will be enduring,” Kagan said.

    Gaps still remain between Kyiv and the Trump administration in negotiations over security guarantees. While Trump has offered a 15-year agreement, Ukraine is seeking guarantees for 50 years, Zelensky said Monday.

    “As Trump continues to say, there’s no deal until there’s a deal,” Kagan added. “We’ll have to see how things go.”

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    Michael Wilner

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  • The country’s largest all-electric hospital is about to open in Orange County

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    A new hospital at UC Irvine opens Wednesday and it will be all-electric — only the second such medical center, and the largest, in the country so far.

    People live through some of the toughest moments of their lives in hospitals, so they need to be as comfortable as possible. Hospitals traditionally connect with natural gas lines several times bigger than those connected to residential homes, to ensure that rooms are always warm or cool enough and have sufficient hot water.

    But burning that natural gas is one of the main ways that buildings cause climate change. The way we build and operate buildings is responsible for more than one-third of global greenhouse gases.

    UCI Health–Irvine will include 144 beds and will be entirely electric.

    The difference is manifest in the hospital’s new kitchen.

    Yes, said principal project manager Jess Langerud on a recent tour, people are permitted to eat fried food in a hospital. Here, the fryer is electric. “After all, you still have to have your crunchy fries, right?”

    He moved over to an appliance that looked like a stove but with metal zigzagging across the top instead of the usual burners. “I can still put your sear marks on your steak or burger with an infrared grill that’s fully electric,” said Langerud. “It’ll look like it came off your flame-broiled grill.”

    The kitchen, though, is relatively minor. One of the real heavy hitters when it comes to energy use in any new building, and especially in hospitals, are the water heaters. At UCI Health–Irvine, that means a row of 100-gallon water heaters 20 feet long.

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    Art work lines the hallways shown with the nurses station in the foreground at UCI Health - Irvine hospital building

    1. Four electric water heaters service the hospital building. It’s a 144-bed facility, with no natural gas or fuel. (Gary Coronado/For The Times) 2. Art lines the hallways near the nurses’ station. (Gary Coronado/For The Times)

    “This is an immense electrical load we’re looking at right here,” said Joe Brothman, director of general services at UCI Health.

    The other heaviest use of energy in the complex is keeping rooms warm in winter and cool in summer. For that, UCI Health is employing rows of humming heat pumps installed on the rooftop.

    “The largest array, I think, this side of the Mississippi,” Brothman said.

    A floor below, indoors, racks of centrifugal chillers that control the refrigerant make him smile.

    “I love the way they sound,” Brothman said. “It sounds like a Ferrari sometimes, like an electric Ferrari.”

    While most of the complex is nonpolluting, there is one place where dirty energy is still in use: the diesel generators that are used for backup power. That’s due in part to the fact that plans for the complex were drawn up six years ago. Solar panels plus batteries have become much more common for backup power since then.

    The Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center and Ambulatory Care building

    The Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center and Ambulatory Care building, left, with the San Joaquin Marsh and Wildlife Sanctuary, right, next to the UCI Health–Irvine hospital.

    Blackouts are bad for everyone, but they are unacceptable for hospitals. If an emergency facility loses power, people die.

    So four 3-megawatt diesel generators sit on the roof of the facility’s central utility plant. Underground tanks hold 70,000 gallons of diesel fuel to supply them. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the National Fire Protection Assn. have codes that require testing the generators once a month at 30% power for half an hour, Brothman said.

    The emissions from burning that diesel are real, he conceded. But “it’s not something that you want to mess around with.”

    Normally a central utility plant for a large facility like this would be “very noisy. It’s grimy. Usually there’s hazardous chemicals,” said Brothman, who has managed physical plants for many years. “Here there’s no combustion. No carbon monoxide.”

    Tony Dover, energy management and sustainability officer at UCI Health, said the building project team is currently applying for LEED Platinum certification, the highest level the U.S. Green Building Council awards for environmentally sustainable architecture.

    Most of the energy and pollution savings at the hospital come from the way the building is run. But that tells only part of the story. The way the building was constructed in the first place is also a major consideration for climate change. Concrete is particularly damaging for the climate because of the way cement is made. Dover said lower-carbon concrete was used throughout the project.

    A tunnel from the UCI Health–Irvine hospital building leading to the Central Utility Plant

    Jess Langerud, principal project manager for the hospital, stands inside a tunnel leading from the hospital to the central utility plant.

    Alexi Miller, a mechanical engineer and director of building innovation at the New Buildings Institute, a nonprofit that gives technical advice on climate and buildings, said the new UCI hospital is a milestone and he hopes to see more like it.

    There are things Miller thinks could have been done differently. He’s not so much worried about using diesel generators for backup power, but he did suggest that a solar-plus-storage system might have been better than what UCI ended up with. Such systems, he said, “refuel themselves.” They would be “getting their fuel from the sun rather than from a tanker truck.”

    One area Miller believes UCI could have done better: the hot water heaters, which, despite being new, utilize an older and relatively inefficient technology called “resistance heat,” instead of heat-pump hot water heaters, which are now used regularly in commercial projects.

    “It’s a little surprising,” he said. “Had they chosen to go with heat-pump hot water heaters, they could have powered it roughly three times as long, because it would be three to four times as efficient.”

    But overall, “I think we should applaud what they’ve achieved in the construction of this building,” Miller said.

    There are other all-electric hospitals on the way: In 2026, UCLA Health plans to open a 119-bed neuropsychiatric hospital that does not use fossil fuels. And an all-electric Kaiser Permanente hospital is set to open in San Jose in 2029.

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    Ingrid Lobet

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  • Builders launch portal to make fire rebuilds faster and more affordable

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    People who lost homes in the Palisades and Eaton fires can now go online to pick vetted residential templates that could save them money and be ready as early as next year.

    Builders Alliance, a nonprofit organization formed in response to the fires, on Friday launched a portal that offers survivors a selection of homes, filtered by lot size, price range and other preferences.

    “We’re trying to create an ‘easy’ button for homeowners,” said Lew Horne, the chairman of Project Recovery, a group of academics and real estate industry experts who had created a road map for recovery.

    Construction crews work on rebuilding a home and properties after the federal cleanup in Altadena on Sept. 10.

    (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

    Project Recovery’s March report — which was compiled by professors in the real estate graduate schools at USC and UCLA, along with the Los Angeles chapter of the Urban Land Institute, a real estate nonprofit education and research institute — said an alliance of builders could work together for economies of scale to speed up reconstruction and make it more affordable and predictable.

    The web portal is the latest stop on the report’s road map. It makes it easy for those who lost their homes to pick templates and receive competing bids from builders who have been vetted by Project Recovery.

    “We’re keeping a close eye” on the builders, Horne said. “Buyers are going to have a quality home at a quality price in a time frame they can count on.”

    Horne is head of the Los Angeles chapter of the Urban Land Institute and president of real estate brokerage CBRE for Southern California. Other leaders of Project Recovery include Stuart Gabriel, director of the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate, and Richard Green, director of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate.

    Homeowners using the portal can match their address to home choices that include pre-designed turnkey residences at costs equal to or below average insurance proceeds, Horne said. Owners can also choose more custom builds.

    The new Builders Alliance consists of 10 licensed homebuilders, ranging in size from small boutique firms to larger companies such as Richmond American Homes and Brookfield Residential.

    Brookfield built more than 200 homes in the La Vina gated community in Altadena, 52 of which burned down, Chief Executive Adrian Foley said.

    “Obviously, we were devastated by all of the loss that’s taken place here,” he said. “We wanted to lean in and do anything we could to help out.”

    Foley said the consortium was devised to get large and small builders working together to “procure the right material costs and procure plans and specifications that would be appealing to the end user so we could collaborate to beat down costs, be more efficient, and hopefully drive a higher percentage of rebuilding.”

    The consortium expects to complete some homes by the third quarter of 2026.

    The foundation of the Builders Alliance portal is a digital representation that maps every residential parcel in the Palisades and Eaton fire areas. It uses AI technology and is powered by Canibuild, which provides site-planning software for the residential construction industry.

    The portal’s map is trained on local zoning regulations and pairs each lot with extensive menus of designs and costs. Property owners enter their address and can filter options by preferences such as square footage, bedrooms, bathrooms and price.

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    Roger Vincent

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  • 6-7 becomes word of the year. What does it mean?

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    6-7 becomes word of the year. What does it mean?

    Today’s class is in session and we’re learning to speak fluent gin alpha. Our instructors, PE teacher Aidan Worzea. Be in the middle school, um, we got 900 kids here. Uh, we have over 50 in every PE class here, so I’m constantly around them. Hadley. He did get on that one. I’ll give you that one. Today’s lesson translating the ever evolving middle school dictionary. Do you agree with what’s on the board so far? He did like kind of *** good job. According to Mr. Worzea, the top tier terms are locked, rage bait, hu, and their ultimate favorite, 67. So I give the 67 there. 67 is the most. Um, I hear clock it now recently *** ton. I see clock it and before you can even instruct once you say 6, you know it’s 7 and they’re going to interrupt. What does it? Mean? I believe it came from *** basketball player, the Ball family, LeAngelo Ball, I think, came up with the song of it, um, and then I heard that it was, they asked how tall was he? and they’re like, I don’t know, maybe 6 or 7. I think it really like popped off when like *** kid, Mason said 67. Just when you thought you had those, the kids hit you with *** new 1, 41, the opposite hand motion, and then bop. That’s like someone who’s had multiple girlfriends or boyfriends. It’s like, you’re *** bop. Got it. Don’t be *** bop. And then there’s Italian brain rock. Characters. So if you look up, there’s like burper Bata bump, shore. Um, ballerina cappuccino and perhaps the strangest one, it’s just like something people like to say like they’ll just like go around and be like, stop digging in your *** twin, which means nothing. random stuff on the internet. Huzz is *** new one as well. I hear it. I got some mixed emotions, but what I think it means is like crush. Maybe next week I’ll be told *** new one from one of the students, but uh. Uh, I learned from them and, uh, right now this is the main ones that I’m hearing for sure. Translation, just smile, nod, and clock it. Any advice for parents? I would say just if you’re hearing some of these different words, let’s make sure we kind of ask the meeting, um, because we don’t want our kids to go around, uh, saying things that they don’t know the meaning of it, um, and also that the meeting is, you know, good, something we want to be sharing out for sure.

    A new internet slang meme taking over children’s vocabulary, 6-7, is now Dictionary.com’s 2025 Word of the Year.The meme is pronounced “six seven,” not “sixty seven,” like most would think, and has become a cultural phenomenon for Gen Alpha. Children have been saying the two numbers together with a hand gesture that someone would use to weigh two options. The phrase has gone viral on TikTok, with many people confused about its meaning. However, the meme itself has no real meaning and is said in a variety of ways. “It’s part inside joke, part social signal and part performance,” Steve Johnson, director of lexicography for the Dictionary Media Group at IXL Learning, said to USA Today. “When people say it, they’re not just repeating a meme; they’re shouting a feeling. It’s one of the first Words of the Year that works as an interjection – a burst of energy that spreads and connects people long before anyone agrees on what it actually means.”The meme started when Skrilla released his song “Doot Doot,” where he raps, “6-7, I just bipped right on the highway.”From there, people began using the lyrics “six seven” from the Skrilla song as background audio in videos. One video in particular that went viral said NBA player LaMelo Ball plays basketball like he’s 6 feet, 2 inches tall instead of his height of 6 feet, 7 inches.After that one video went viral, 6-7 became all the rage for the kids, and now it is being said everywhere.

    A new internet slang meme taking over children’s vocabulary, 6-7, is now Dictionary.com‘s 2025 Word of the Year.

    The meme is pronounced “six seven,” not “sixty seven,” like most would think, and has become a cultural phenomenon for Gen Alpha. Children have been saying the two numbers together with a hand gesture that someone would use to weigh two options.

    The phrase has gone viral on TikTok, with many people confused about its meaning.

    However, the meme itself has no real meaning and is said in a variety of ways.

    “It’s part inside joke, part social signal and part performance,” Steve Johnson, director of lexicography for the Dictionary Media Group at IXL Learning, said to USA Today. “When people say it, they’re not just repeating a meme; they’re shouting a feeling. It’s one of the first Words of the Year that works as an interjection – a burst of energy that spreads and connects people long before anyone agrees on what it actually means.”

    The meme started when Skrilla released his song “Doot Doot,” where he raps, “6-7, I just bipped right on the highway.”

    From there, people began using the lyrics “six seven” from the Skrilla song as background audio in videos. One video in particular that went viral said NBA player LaMelo Ball plays basketball like he’s 6 feet, 2 inches tall instead of his height of 6 feet, 7 inches.

    After that one video went viral, 6-7 became all the rage for the kids, and now it is being said everywhere.

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  • Suspects arrested over the theft of crown jewels from Paris’ Louvre museum

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    Suspects have been arrested in connection with the theft of crown jewels from Paris’ Louvre museum, the Paris prosecutor said on Sunday, a week after the heist at the world’s most visited museum that stunned the world.The prosecutor said that investigators made the arrests on Saturday evening, adding that one of the men taken into custody was preparing to leave the country from Roissy Airport.French media BFM TV and Le Parisien newspaper earlier reported that two suspects had been arrested and taken into custody. Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau did not confirm the number of arrests and did not say whether jewels had been recovered.Thieves took less than eight minutes to steal jewels valued at 88 million euros ($102 million) last Sunday morning. French officials described how the intruders used a basket lift to scale the Louvre’s façade, forced open a window, smashed display cases and fled. The museum’s director called the incident a “terrible failure.”Beccuau said investigators from a special police unit in charge of armed robberies, serious burglaries and art thefts made the arrests. She rued in her statement the premature leak of information, saying it could hinder the work of over 100 investigators “mobilized to recover the stolen jewels and apprehend all of the perpetrators.” Beccuau said further details will be unveiled after the suspects’ custody period ends.French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez praised “the investigators who have worked tirelessly, just as I asked them to, and who have always had my full confidence.”The Louvre reopened earlier this week after one of the highest-profile museum thefts of the century stunned the world with its audacity and scale.The thieves slipped in and out, making off with parts of France’s Crown Jewels — a cultural wound that some compared to the burning of Notre Dame Cathedral in 2019.The thieves made away with a total of eight objects, including a sapphire diadem, necklace and single earring from a set linked to 19th-century queens Marie-Amélie and Hortense.They also took an emerald necklace and earrings tied to Empress Marie-Louise, Napoleon Bonaparte’s second wife, as well as a reliquary brooch. Empress Eugénie’s diamond diadem and her large corsage-bow brooch — an imperial ensemble of rare craftsmanship — were also part of the loot.One piece — Eugénie’s emerald-set imperial crown with more than 1,300 diamonds — was later found outside the museum, damaged but recoverable.

    PARIS —

    Suspects have been arrested in connection with the theft of crown jewels from Paris’ Louvre museum, the Paris prosecutor said on Sunday, a week after the heist at the world’s most visited museum that stunned the world.

    The prosecutor said that investigators made the arrests on Saturday evening, adding that one of the men taken into custody was preparing to leave the country from Roissy Airport.

    French media BFM TV and Le Parisien newspaper earlier reported that two suspects had been arrested and taken into custody. Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau did not confirm the number of arrests and did not say whether jewels had been recovered.

    Thieves took less than eight minutes to steal jewels valued at 88 million euros ($102 million) last Sunday morning. French officials described how the intruders used a basket lift to scale the Louvre’s façade, forced open a window, smashed display cases and fled. The museum’s director called the incident a “terrible failure.”

    Beccuau said investigators from a special police unit in charge of armed robberies, serious burglaries and art thefts made the arrests. She rued in her statement the premature leak of information, saying it could hinder the work of over 100 investigators “mobilized to recover the stolen jewels and apprehend all of the perpetrators.” Beccuau said further details will be unveiled after the suspects’ custody period ends.

    French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez praised “the investigators who have worked tirelessly, just as I asked them to, and who have always had my full confidence.”

    The Louvre reopened earlier this week after one of the highest-profile museum thefts of the century stunned the world with its audacity and scale.

    The thieves slipped in and out, making off with parts of France’s Crown Jewels — a cultural wound that some compared to the burning of Notre Dame Cathedral in 2019.

    The thieves made away with a total of eight objects, including a sapphire diadem, necklace and single earring from a set linked to 19th-century queens Marie-Amélie and Hortense.

    They also took an emerald necklace and earrings tied to Empress Marie-Louise, Napoleon Bonaparte’s second wife, as well as a reliquary brooch. Empress Eugénie’s diamond diadem and her large corsage-bow brooch — an imperial ensemble of rare craftsmanship — were also part of the loot.

    One piece — Eugénie’s emerald-set imperial crown with more than 1,300 diamonds — was later found outside the museum, damaged but recoverable.

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  • Suspects arrested over the theft of crown jewels from Paris’ Louvre museum

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    Suspects have been arrested in connection with the theft of crown jewels from Paris’ Louvre museum, the Paris prosecutor said on Sunday, a week after the heist at the world’s most visited museum that stunned the world.The prosecutor said that investigators made the arrests on Saturday evening, adding that one of the men taken into custody was preparing to leave the country from Roissy Airport.French media BFM TV and Le Parisien newspaper earlier reported that two suspects had been arrested and taken into custody. Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau did not confirm the number of arrests and did not say whether jewels had been recovered.Thieves took less than eight minutes to steal jewels valued at 88 million euros ($102 million) last Sunday morning. French officials described how the intruders used a basket lift to scale the Louvre’s façade, forced open a window, smashed display cases and fled. The museum’s director called the incident a “terrible failure.”Beccuau said investigators from a special police unit in charge of armed robberies, serious burglaries and art thefts made the arrests. She rued in her statement the premature leak of information, saying it could hinder the work of over 100 investigators “mobilized to recover the stolen jewels and apprehend all of the perpetrators.” Beccuau said further details will be unveiled after the suspects’ custody period ends.French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez praised “the investigators who have worked tirelessly, just as I asked them to, and who have always had my full confidence.”The Louvre reopened earlier this week after one of the highest-profile museum thefts of the century stunned the world with its audacity and scale.The thieves slipped in and out, making off with parts of France’s Crown Jewels — a cultural wound that some compared to the burning of Notre Dame Cathedral in 2019.The thieves made away with a total of eight objects, including a sapphire diadem, necklace and single earring from a set linked to 19th-century queens Marie-Amélie and Hortense.They also took an emerald necklace and earrings tied to Empress Marie-Louise, Napoleon Bonaparte’s second wife, as well as a reliquary brooch. Empress Eugénie’s diamond diadem and her large corsage-bow brooch — an imperial ensemble of rare craftsmanship — were also part of the loot.One piece — Eugénie’s emerald-set imperial crown with more than 1,300 diamonds — was later found outside the museum, damaged but recoverable.

    PARIS —

    Suspects have been arrested in connection with the theft of crown jewels from Paris’ Louvre museum, the Paris prosecutor said on Sunday, a week after the heist at the world’s most visited museum that stunned the world.

    The prosecutor said that investigators made the arrests on Saturday evening, adding that one of the men taken into custody was preparing to leave the country from Roissy Airport.

    French media BFM TV and Le Parisien newspaper earlier reported that two suspects had been arrested and taken into custody. Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau did not confirm the number of arrests and did not say whether jewels had been recovered.

    Thieves took less than eight minutes to steal jewels valued at 88 million euros ($102 million) last Sunday morning. French officials described how the intruders used a basket lift to scale the Louvre’s façade, forced open a window, smashed display cases and fled. The museum’s director called the incident a “terrible failure.”

    Beccuau said investigators from a special police unit in charge of armed robberies, serious burglaries and art thefts made the arrests. She rued in her statement the premature leak of information, saying it could hinder the work of over 100 investigators “mobilized to recover the stolen jewels and apprehend all of the perpetrators.” Beccuau said further details will be unveiled after the suspects’ custody period ends.

    French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez praised “the investigators who have worked tirelessly, just as I asked them to, and who have always had my full confidence.”

    The Louvre reopened earlier this week after one of the highest-profile museum thefts of the century stunned the world with its audacity and scale.

    The thieves slipped in and out, making off with parts of France’s Crown Jewels — a cultural wound that some compared to the burning of Notre Dame Cathedral in 2019.

    The thieves made away with a total of eight objects, including a sapphire diadem, necklace and single earring from a set linked to 19th-century queens Marie-Amélie and Hortense.

    They also took an emerald necklace and earrings tied to Empress Marie-Louise, Napoleon Bonaparte’s second wife, as well as a reliquary brooch. Empress Eugénie’s diamond diadem and her large corsage-bow brooch — an imperial ensemble of rare craftsmanship — were also part of the loot.

    One piece — Eugénie’s emerald-set imperial crown with more than 1,300 diamonds — was later found outside the museum, damaged but recoverable.

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  • The Trump loyalist who picked up where Musk left off with slashing federal workforce: ‘We’re having fun’

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    WASHINGTON — It has been four months since Elon Musk, President Trump’s bureaucratic demolition man, abandoned Washington in a flurry of recriminations and chaos.

    But the Trump administration’s crusade to dismantle much of the federal government never ended. It’s merely under new management: the less colorful but more methodical Russell Vought, director of Trump’s Office of Management and Budget.

    Vought has become the backroom architect of Trump’s aggressive strategy — slashing the federal workforce, freezing billions in congressionally approved spending in actions his critics often call illegal.

    Now Vought has proposed using the current government shutdown as an opportunity to fire thousands of bureaucrats permanently instead of merely furloughing them temporarily. If any do return to work, he has suggested that the government need not give them back pay — contrary to a law Trump signed in 2019.

    Those threats may prove merely to be pressure tactics as Trump tries to persuade Democrats to accept spending cuts on Medicaid, Obamacare and other programs.

    But the shutdown battle is the current phase of a much larger one. Vought’s long-term goals, he says, are to “bend or break the bureaucracy to the presidential will” and “deconstruct the administrative state.”

    He’s still only partway done.

    “I’d estimate that Vought has implemented maybe 10% or 15% of his program,” said Donald F. Kettl, former dean of the public policy school at the University of Maryland. “There may be as much as 90% to go. If this were a baseball game, we’d be in the top of the second inning.”

    Along the way, Vought (pronounced “vote”) has chipped relentlessly at Congress’ ability to control the use of federal funds, massively expanding the power of the president.

    “He has waged the most serious attack on separation of powers in American history,” said Elaine Kamarck, an expert on federal management at the Brookings Institution.

    He’s done that mainly by using OMB, the White House office that oversees spending, to control the day-to-day purse strings of federal agencies — and deliberately keeping Congress in the dark along the way.

    “If Congress has given us authority that is too broad, then we’re going to use that authority aggressively,” Vought said last month.

    Federal judges have ruled some of the administration’s actions illegal, but they have allowed others to stand. Vought’s proposal to use the shutdown to fire thousands of bureaucrats hasn’t been tested in court.

    Vought developed his aggressive approach during two decades as a conservative budget expert, culminating in his appointment as director of OMB in Trump’s first term.

    In 2019, he stretched the limits of presidential power by helping Trump get around a congressional ban on funding for a border wall, by declaring an emergency and transferring military funds. He froze congressionally mandated aid for Ukraine, the action that led to Trump’s first impeachment.

    Even so, Vought complained that Trump had been needlessly restrained by cautious first-term aides.

    “The lawyers come in and say, ‘It’s not legal. You can’t do that,’” he said in 2023. “I don’t want President Trump having to lose a moment of time having fights in the Oval Office over whether something is legal.”

    Vought is a proponent of the “unitary executive” theory, the argument that the president should have unfettered control over every tentacle of the executive branch, including independent agencies such as the Federal Reserve.

    When Congress designates money for federal programs, he has argued, “It’s a ceiling. It is not a floor. It’s not the notion that you have to spend every dollar.”

    Most legal experts disagree; a 1974 law prohibits the president from unilaterally withholding money Congress has appropriated.

    Vought told conservative activists in 2023 that if Trump returned to power, he would deliberately seek to inflict “trauma” on federal employees.

    “We want the bureaucrats to be traumatically affected,” he said. “When they wake up in the morning, we want them to not want to go to work.”

    When Vought returned to OMB for Trump’s second term, he appeared to be in Musk’s shadow. But once the flamboyant Tesla chief executive flamed out, the OMB director got to work to make DOGE’s work the foundation for lasting changes.

    He extended many of DOGE’s funding cuts by slowing down OMB’s approval of disbursements — turning them into de facto freezes.

    He helped persuade Republicans in Congress to cancel $9 billion in previously approved foreign aid and public broadcasting support, a process known as “rescission.”

    To cancel an additional $4.9 billion, he revived a rarely used gambit called a “pocket rescission,” freezing the funds until they expired.

    Along the way, he quietly stopped providing Congress with information on spending, leaving legislators in the dark on whether programs were being axed.

    DOGE and OMB eliminated jobs so quickly that the federal government stopped publishing its ongoing tally of federal employees. (Any number would only be approximate; some layoffs are tied up in court, and thousands of employees who opted for voluntary retirement are technically still on the payroll.)

    The result was a significant erosion of Congress’ “power of the purse,” which has historically included not only approving money but also monitoring how it was spent.

    Even some Republican members of Congress seethed. “They would like a blank check … and I don’t think that’s appropriate,” said former Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

    But the GOP majorities in both the House and Senate, pleased to see spending cut by any means, let Vought have his way. Even McConnell voted to approve the $9-billion rescission request.

    Vought’s newest innovation, the mid-shutdown layoffs, would be another big step toward reducing Congress’ role.

    “The result would be a dramatic, instantaneous shift in the separation of powers,” Kettl said. “The Trump team could kill programs unilaterally without the inconvenience of going to Congress.”

    Some of the consequences could be catastrophic, Kettl and other scholars warned. Kamarck calls them “time bombs.”

    “One or more of these decisions is going to blow up in Trump’s face,” she said.

    “FEMA won’t be capable of reacting to the next hurricane. The National Weather Service won’t have the forecasters it needs to analyze the data from weather balloons.”

    Even before the government shutdown, she noted, the FAA was grappling with a shortage of air traffic controllers. This week the FAA slowed takeoffs at several airports in response to growing shortages, including at air traffic control centers in Atlanta, Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth.

    In theory, a future Congress could undo many of Vought’s actions, especially if Democrats win control of the House or, less likely, the Senate.

    But rebuilding agencies that have been radically shrunken would take much longer than cutting them down, the scholars said.

    “Much of this will be difficult to reverse when Democrats come back into fashion,” Kamarck said.

    Indeed, that’s part of Vought’s plan.

    “We want to make sure that the bureaucracy can’t reconstitute itself later in future administrations,” he said in April in a podcast with Charlie Kirk, the conservative activist who was slain on Sept. 10.

    He’s pleased with the progress he’s made, he told reporters in July.

    “We’re having fun,” he said.

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    Doyle McManus

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  • Roseville man becomes first in Placer County to die from West Nile virus this year

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    A Roseville man has become the first person to die this season from West Nile virus in Placer County, the Placer Mosquito & Vector Control District said Monday.“We’re saddened to learn of this individual’s passing, and extend our sympathies to their loved ones,” said Dr. Rob Oldham, health officer and director of Health and Human Services, in a news release. “Simple steps can help prevent mosquito bites. Let’s keep up those habits, together.”While the man was not identified, he is the fifth West Nile-related death reported in California this year, the district said. Of the 54 confirmed human cases, five of those cases came from Placer County.How to avoid West NileThe virus is transmitted by a mosquito bite.The district shared the following information to reduce the likelihood of contracting West Nile.Eliminate all sources of standing water. Mosquitoes lay their eggs on standing water, including on flowerpots, old tires, rain gutters and pet bowls. You can call the district at 916-380-5444 to report a swimming pool that is not being properly maintained.Use repellents approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that contain DEET, picaridin, oil of lemon eucalyptus or IR3535. Wear proper clothing and repellent when outside in the early morning and evening.Residents can also call the district for any help controlling mosquitoes around their home.See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel

    ROSEVILLE, Calif. —

    A Roseville man has become the first person to die this season from West Nile virus in Placer County, the Placer Mosquito & Vector Control District said Monday.

    “We’re saddened to learn of this individual’s passing, and extend our sympathies to their loved ones,” said Dr. Rob Oldham, health officer and director of Health and Human Services, in a news release. “Simple steps can help prevent mosquito bites. Let’s keep up those habits, together.”

    While the man was not identified, he is the fifth West Nile-related death reported in California this year, the district said. Of the 54 confirmed human cases, five of those cases came from Placer County.

    How to avoid West Nile

    The virus is transmitted by a mosquito bite.

    The district shared the following information to reduce the likelihood of contracting West Nile.

    Eliminate all sources of standing water. Mosquitoes lay their eggs on standing water, including on flowerpots, old tires, rain gutters and pet bowls. You can call the district at 916-380-5444 to report a swimming pool that is not being properly maintained.

    Use repellents approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that contain DEET, picaridin, oil of lemon eucalyptus or IR3535. Wear proper clothing and repellent when outside in the early morning and evening.

    Residents can also call the district for any help controlling mosquitoes around their home.

    See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel

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  • Former National Philharmonic music director awarded almost $400K in damages after 2024 dismissal – WTOP News

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    A former music director and conductor is being awarded hundreds of thousands in damages from the National Philharmonic after a hearing found the organization was responsible for breach of contract and wrongful termination.

    Former music director and conductor at the National Philharmonic Piotr Gajewski. (Courtesy Piotr Gajewski)

    A former music director and conductor is being awarded hundreds of thousands in damages from the National Philharmonic after a hearing found the organization was responsible for breach of contract and wrongful termination.

    Piotr Gajewski founded in 1984 what would become the National Philharmonic, a staple of orchestral performances with the Music Center at the Strathmore in North Bethesda, Maryland, since 2004.

    After 40 years at the helm, Gajewski and the National Philharmonic “parted ways” in 2024, when he was informed he would no longer serve as music director. Last week, an arbitrator ruled the reasons for Gajewski’s dismissal, as noted in his termination letter, were “lacking merit both factually and legally.”

    Arbitrator Jerry Goldstein also found that Gajewski could only be terminated by a vote of the National Philharmonic board, which did not occur.

    “It was essentially done by the action of two Board members acting on their own violation” of the National Philharmonic’s bylaws, Goldstein wrote in his findings.

    “While I am happy about the vindication through this verdict, I will be forever heartbroken that my 40-year tenure with the National Philharmonic, an organization I created and nurtured for a very long time, ended the way it did,” Gajewski said in a statement.

    Gajewski was awarded $391,402 in damages for breach of contract, wrongful termination and violation of Maryland Wage Payment and Collections Law.

    Fundraising concerns have impacted the National Philharmonic since before the COVID-19 pandemic.

    In 2019, WTOP reported on the group’s pending closure, followed by an urgent request for donations, then a successful last-minute fundraising effort to raise $500,000 to save the organization.

    “NatPhil musicians and audiences have meant so much to me over the years. It was made clear to me during the arbitration that, since my departure, the organization has been weathering difficult times. I truly wish them well, so I plan to approach this issue responsibly in the hope that the National Philharmonic can thrive again soon,” Gajewski said.

    The organization is currently selling tickets for it’s 2025-2026 season with its next concert on Oct. 25.

    Get breaking news and daily headlines delivered to your email inbox by signing up here.

    © 2025 WTOP. All Rights Reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.

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    Valerie Bonk

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  • Trump and Hegseth declare an end to ‘politically correct’ leadership in the US military

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    President Donald Trump revealed that he wants to use American cities as training grounds for the armed forces and joined Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Tuesday in declaring an end to “woke” culture before an unusual gathering of hundreds of top U.S. military officials who were abruptly summoned to Virginia from around the world.Hegseth announced new directives for troops that include “gender-neutral” or “male-level” standards for physical fitness, while Trump bragged about U.S. nuclear capabilities and warned that “America is under invasion from within.”“After spending trillions of dollars defending the borders of foreign countries, with your help we’re defending the borders of our country,” Trump said.Hegseth had called military leaders to the Marine Corps base in Quantico, near Washington, without publicly revealing the reason until this morning. His address largely focused on his own long-used talking points that painted a picture of a military that has been hamstrung by “woke” policies, and he said military leaders should “do the honorable thing and resign” if they don’t like his new approach.Meetings between top military brass and civilian leaders are nothing new, but the gathering had fueled intense speculation about the summit’s purpose given the haste with which it was called and the mystery surrounding it.Video below: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gives remarks in QuanticoAdmirals and generals from conflict zones in the Middle East and elsewhere were summoned for a lecture on race and gender in the military, underscoring the extent to which the country’s culture wars have emerged as a front-and-center agenda item for Hegseth’s Pentagon, even at a time of broad national security concerns across the globe.‘We will not be politically correct’Trump is used to boisterous crowds of supporters who laugh at his jokes and applaud his boasts during his speeches. But he wasn’t getting that kind of soundtrack from the generals and admirals in attendance.In keeping with the nonpartisan tradition of the armed services, the military leaders sat mostly stone-faced through Trump’s politicized remarks, a contrast from when rank-and-file soldiers cheered during Trump’s speech at Fort Bragg this summer.During his nearly hour-long speech, Hegseth said the U.S. military has promoted too many leaders for the wrong reasons based on race, gender quotas and “historic firsts.”“The era of politically correct, overly sensitive don’t-hurt-anyone’s-feelings leadership ends right now at every level,” Hegseth said.That was echoed by Trump, who said “the purposes of America military is not to protect anyone’s feelings. It’s to protect our republic.″″We will not be politically correct when it comes to defending American freedom,” Trump said. “And we will be a fighting and winning machine.”Loosening disciplinary rulesHegseth said he is loosening disciplinary rules and weakening hazing protections, putting a heavy focus on removing many of the guardrails the military had put in place after numerous scandals and investigationsHe said he was ordering a review of “the department’s definitions of so-called toxic leadership, bullying and hazing to empower leaders to enforce standards without fear of retribution or second guessing.”The defense secretary called for “changes to the retention of adverse information on personnel records that will allow leaders with forgivable, earnest, or minor infractions to not be encumbered by those infractions in perpetuity.”“People make honest mistakes, and our mistakes should not define an entire career,” Hegseth said. “Otherwise, we only try not to make mistakes.”Bullying and toxic leadership has been the suspected and confirmed cause behind numerous military suicides over the past several years, including the very dramatic suicide of Brandon Caserta, a young sailor who was bullied into killing himself in 2018.A Navy investigation found that Caserta’s supervisor’s “noted belligerence, vulgarity and brash leadership was likely a significant contributing factor in (the sailor)’s decision to end his own life.”Gender-neutral physical standardsHegseth used the platform to slam environmental policies and transgender troops while talking up his and Trump’s focus on “the warrior ethos” and “peace through strength.”Hegseth said the department has been told from previous administrations that “our diversity is our strength,” which he called an “insane fallacy.”“They had to put out dizzying DEI and LGBTQE+ statements. They were told females and males are the same thing, or that males who think they’re females is totally normal,” he said, adding the use of electric tanks and the COVID vaccine requirements to the list as mistaken policies.Hegseth said this is not about preventing women from serving.“But when it comes to any job that requires physical power to perform in combat, those physical standards must be high and gender neutral,” he said. “If women can make it excellent, if not, it is what it is. If that means no women qualify for some combat jobs, so be it. That is not the intent, but it could be the result.”Hegseth’s speech came as the country faces a potential government shutdown this week and as Hegseth, who has hammered home a focus on lethality, has taken several unusual and unexplained actions, including ordering cuts to the number of general officers and firings of other top military leaders.Hegseth has championed the military’s role in securing the U.S.-Mexico border, deploying to American cities as part of Trump’s law enforcement surges, and carrying out strikes on boats in the Caribbean that the administration says targeted drug traffickers.

    QUANTICO, Va. —

    Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth summoned hundreds of U.S. military officials to an in-person meeting Tuesday to declare an end to “woke” culture in the military and announce new directives for troops that include “gender-neutral” or “male-level” standards for physical fitness.

    Hegseth and President Donald Trump had abruptly called military leaders from around the world to convene at the Marine Corps base in Quantico, near Washington, without publicly revealing the reason until this morning. Hegseth’s address largely focused on his own long-used talking points that painted a picture of a military that has been hamstrung by “woke” policies, and he said military leaders should “do the honorable thing and resign” if they don’t like his new approach.

    Meetings between top military brass and civilian leaders are nothing new, but the gathering had fueled intense speculation about the summit’s purpose given the haste with which it was called and the mystery surrounding it.

    Admirals and generals from conflict zones in the Middle East and elsewhere were summoned for a lecture on race and gender in the military, underscoring the extent to which the country’s culture wars have emerged as a front-and-center agenda item for Hegseth’s Pentagon, even at a time of broad national security concerns across the globe.

    Video below: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gives remarks in Quantico

    During his nearly hour-long speech, Hegseth said the U.S. military has promoted too many leaders for the wrong reasons based on race, gender quotas and “historic firsts.”

    “The era of politically correct, overly sensitive don’t-hurt-anyone’s-feelings leadership ends right now at every level,” Hegseth said.

    He said he is loosening disciplinary rules and weakening hazing protections, putting a heavy focus on removing many of the guardrails the military had put in place after numerous scandals and investigations

    Hegseth said he was ordering a review of “the department’s definitions of so-called toxic leadership, bullying and hazing to empower leaders to enforce standards without fear of retribution or second guessing.”

    He called for “changes to the retention of adverse information on personnel records that will allow leaders with forgivable, earnest, or minor infractions to not be encumbered by those infractions in perpetuity.”

    “People make honest mistakes, and our mistakes should not define an entire career,” Hegseth said. “Otherwise, we only try not to make mistakes.”

    Bullying and toxic leadership has been the suspected and confirmed cause behind numerous military suicides over the past several years, including the very dramatic suicide of Brandon Caserta, a young sailor who was bullied into killing himself in 2018.

    A Navy investigation found that Caserta’s supervisor’s “noted belligerence, vulgarity and brash leadership was likely a significant contributing factor in (the sailor)’s decision to end his own life.”

    Hegseth used the platform to slam physical fitness and grooming standards, environmental policies and transgender troops while talking up his and Trump’s focus on “the warrior ethos” and “peace through strength.”

    Hegseth said the department has been told from previous administrations that “our diversity is our strength,” which he called an “insane fallacy.”

    “They had to put out dizzying DEI and LGBTQE+ statements. They were told females and males are the same thing, or that males who think they’re females is totally normal,” he said, adding the use of electric tanks and the COVID vaccine requirements to the list as mistaken policies.

    Hegseth said this is is not about preventing women from serving.

    “But when it comes to any job that requires physical power to perform in combat, those physical standards must be high and gender neutral,” he said. “If women can make it excellent, if not, it is what it is. If that means no women qualify for some combat jobs, so be it. That is not the intent, but it could be the result.”

    Hegseth’s speech came as the country faces a potential government shutdown this week and as Hegseth, who has hammered home a focus on lethality, has taken several unusual and unexplained actions, including ordering cuts to the number of general officers and firings of other top military leaders.

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  • ‘Definitely rattling’: Fishermen encounter humpback whales up close

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    Two humpback whales came dangerously close to a boat off the coast of New Hampshire on Tuesday.An exclusive video sent to News 9 shows the whales breaching before one surfaced for air and swam directly under the vessel. Captain Dale Sprague and his first mate, Matt Hamilton, said they were haddock fishing about six or seven miles past the Isles of Shoals when they spotted the whales.”Just really kind of bottom fishing, so sitting around, and whales were all over the place, and then they started to get a little bit closer, it seemed,” Hamilton said.Both said they have seen whales before, but being this close was rattling.”Pretty good-sized whale jumping to the right of us. And then as that one landed, another one kind of to the left, very close to the boat. And then as we looked behind, we could see one kind of coming at us. And that’s when I got a little freaked out,” Hamilton said. The fishermen’s boat was a fraction of the whale’s size. “That whale seemed to be about probably three times the size of what we had,” Sprague said. The team quickly pulled in their lines and moved farther away. “It definitely will rattle you, to go get some life jackets and think about what can actually happen,” Sprague said. Experts said seeing humpbacks breach is rare.”You’re considered lucky if you see it,” said Ashley Stokes, director of Marine Mammal Conservation. “They’ll sometimes do it as a method of play and then on top of that, they may also be doing it to rid themselves of parasites or skin irritants.”While breaching is not a sign of aggression, Stokes advises anyone out on the water to stay aware of whales in the area.Despite the close encounter, Sprague and Hamilton said it won’t keep them off the water.Last July, a humpback whale crashed into a boat in Portsmouth Harbor. Both of the fishermen on board had to be rescued by people nearby. They were uninjured.

    Two humpback whales came dangerously close to a boat off the coast of New Hampshire on Tuesday.

    An exclusive video sent to News 9 shows the whales breaching before one surfaced for air and swam directly under the vessel.

    Captain Dale Sprague and his first mate, Matt Hamilton, said they were haddock fishing about six or seven miles past the Isles of Shoals when they spotted the whales.

    “Just really kind of bottom fishing, so sitting around, and whales were all over the place, and then they started to get a little bit closer, it seemed,” Hamilton said.

    Both said they have seen whales before, but being this close was rattling.

    “Pretty good-sized whale jumping to the right of us. And then as that one landed, another one kind of to the left, very close to the boat. And then as we looked behind, we could see one kind of coming at us. And that’s when I got a little freaked out,” Hamilton said.

    The fishermen’s boat was a fraction of the whale’s size.

    “That whale seemed to be about probably three times the size of what we had,” Sprague said.

    The team quickly pulled in their lines and moved farther away.

    “It definitely will rattle you, to go get some life jackets and think about what can actually happen,” Sprague said.

    Experts said seeing humpbacks breach is rare.

    “You’re considered lucky if you see it,” said Ashley Stokes, director of Marine Mammal Conservation. “They’ll sometimes do it as a method of play and then on top of that, they may also be doing it to rid themselves of parasites or skin irritants.”

    While breaching is not a sign of aggression, Stokes advises anyone out on the water to stay aware of whales in the area.

    Despite the close encounter, Sprague and Hamilton said it won’t keep them off the water.

    Last July, a humpback whale crashed into a boat in Portsmouth Harbor.

    Both of the fishermen on board had to be rescued by people nearby. They were uninjured.

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  • Robert F. Kennedy Jr. faces congressional grilling amid CDC turmoil

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    U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., facing pointed bipartisan questioning at a rancorous three-hour Senate committee hearing on Thursday, tried to defend his efforts to pull back COVID-19 vaccine recommendations and explain the turmoil he has created at federal health agencies.Kennedy said the fired CDC director was untrustworthy, stood by his past anti-vaccine rhetoric, and disputed reports of people saying they have had difficulty getting COVID-19 shots.A longtime leader in the anti-vaccine movement, Kennedy has made sweeping changes to agencies tasked with public health policy and scientific research by laying off thousands of workers, firing science advisers and remaking vaccine guidelines. The moves — some of which contradict assurances he made during his confirmation hearings — have rattled medical groups and officials in several Democratic-led states, which have responded with their own vaccine advice.Medical groups and several Democrats in Congress have called for Kennedy to be fired, and his exchanges with Democratic senators on the panel repeatedly devolved into shouting, from both sides.But some Republican senators also expressed unease with his changes to COVID-19 policies.The GOP senators noted that Kennedy said President Donald Trump deserved a Nobel Prize for the 2020 Operation Warp Speed initiative to quickly develop mRNA COVID-19 vaccines — and that he also had attacked the safety and continued use of those very shots.”I can’t tell where you are on Operation Warp Speed,” said Republican North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis.Tillis and others asked him why the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was fired last week, less than a month into her tenure.Kennedy said she was dishonest, and that CDC leaders who left the agency last week in support of her deserved to be fired.He also criticized CDC recommendations during the COVID-19 pandemic tied to lockdowns and masking policies, and claimed — wrongly — that they “failed to do anything about the disease itself.””The people at CDC who oversaw that process, who put masks on our children, who closed our schools, are the people who will be leaving,” Kennedy said. He later said they deserved to be fired for not doing enough to control chronic disease.Democrats express hostility from the startThe Senate Finance Committee had called Kennedy to a hearing about his plans to “Make America Healthy Again,” but Democratic senators pressed Kennedy on his actions around vaccines.At the start of the hearing, Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon tried to have Kennedy formally sworn in as a witness, saying the HHS secretary has a history of lying to the committee. The committee’s chair, Sen. Mike Crapo of Idaho, denied the Democrat’s request, saying “the bottom line is we will let the secretary make his own case.”Wyden went on to attack Kennedy, saying he had “stacked the deck” of a vaccines advisory committee by replacing scientists with “skeptics and conspiracy theorists.”Last week, the Trump administration fired the CDC’s director — a Trump appointee who was confirmed by the Senate — less than a month into her tenure. Several top CDC leaders resigned in protest, leaving the agency in turmoil.The ousted director, Susan Monarez, wrote in The Wall Street Journal on Thursday that Kennedy was trying to weaken public health protections.”I was told to preapprove the recommendations of a vaccine advisory panel newly filled with people who have publicly expressed antivaccine rhetoric,” Monarez wrote. “It is imperative that the panel’s recommendations aren’t rubber-stamped but instead are rigorously and scientifically reviewed before being accepted or rejected.”Kennedy told senators he didn’t make such an ultimatum, though he did concede that he had ordered Monarez to fire career CDC scientists. Monarez’s attorneys later responded that she stood by the op-ed and “would repeat it all under oath.”Kennedy pushed back on concerns raised by multiple Republican senators, including Tillis and Sens. John Barrasso of Wyoming and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana. Both Barrasso and Cassidy are physicians.Shouting matches and hot comebacksThe health secretary had animated comebacks as Democratic senators pressed him on the effects of his words and actions.When Sen. Raphael Warnock, of Georgia, questioned Kennedy about his disparaging rhetoric about CDC employees before a deadly shooting at the agency this summer, Kennedy shot back: “Are you complicit in the assassination attempts on President Trump?”Kennedy called Sen. Ben Ray Lujan of New Mexico “ridiculous,” said he was “talking gibberish” and accused him of “not understanding how the world works” when Lujan asked Kennedy to pledge to share protocols of any research Kennedy was commissioning into autism and vaccines.He also engaged in a heated, loud exchanges with Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Tina Smith of Minnesota.”I didn’t even hear your question,” Kennedy replied to Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto as the Nevada Democrat repeatedly asked what the agency was doing to lower drug costs for seniors.He also told Sen. Bernie Sanders that the Vermont independent was not “making any sense.”Some senators had their own choice words.”You’re interrupting me, and sir, you’re a charlatan. That’s what you are, ” said Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Washington Democrat. “The history on vaccines is very clear.”As the hearing neared its end, Kennedy pulled his cellphone from his pocket and then tapped and scrolled as Wyden asked about mifepristone, a drug used for medication abortion.Kennedy disputes COVID-19 dataIn May, Kennedy announced COVID-19 vaccines would no longer be recommended for healthy children and pregnant women, a move opposed by medical and public health groups.In June, he abruptly fired a panel of experts that had been advising the government on vaccine policy. He replaced them with a handpicked group that included several vaccine skeptics, and then shut the door to several doctors groups that had long helped form the committee’s recommendations.Kennedy has voiced distrust of research that showed the COVID-19 vaccines saved lives, and at Thursday’s hearing even cast doubt on statistics about how people died during the pandemic and on estimates about how many deaths were averted — statistics produced by the agencies he oversees.He said federal health policy would be based on gold standard science, but confessed that he wouldn’t necessarily wait for studies to be completed before taking action against, for example, potential causes of chronic illness.”We are not waiting for everything to come in. We are starting now,” he said.A number of medical groups say Kennedy can’t be counted on to make decisions based on robust medical evidence. In a statement Wednesday, the Infectious Diseases Society of America and 20 other medical and public health organizations issued a joint statement calling on him to resign.”Our country needs leadership that will promote open, honest dialogue, not disregard decades of lifesaving science, spread misinformation, reverse medical progress and decimate programs that keep us safe,” the statement said.Many of the nation’s leading public health and medical societies, including the American Medical Association, American Public Health Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics have decried Kennedy’s policies and warn they will drive up rates of vaccine-preventable diseases.___Stobbe reported from New York. Associated Press writer Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.___The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

    WASHINGTON —

    U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., facing pointed bipartisan questioning at a rancorous three-hour Senate committee hearing on Thursday, tried to defend his efforts to pull back COVID-19 vaccine recommendations and explain the turmoil he has created at federal health agencies.

    Kennedy said the fired CDC director was untrustworthy, stood by his past anti-vaccine rhetoric, and disputed reports of people saying they have had difficulty getting COVID-19 shots.

    A longtime leader in the anti-vaccine movement, Kennedy has made sweeping changes to agencies tasked with public health policy and scientific research by laying off thousands of workers, firing science advisers and remaking vaccine guidelines. The moves — some of which contradict assurances he made during his confirmation hearings — have rattled medical groups and officials in several Democratic-led states, which have responded with their own vaccine advice.

    Medical groups and several Democrats in Congress have called for Kennedy to be fired, and his exchanges with Democratic senators on the panel repeatedly devolved into shouting, from both sides.

    But some Republican senators also expressed unease with his changes to COVID-19 policies.

    The GOP senators noted that Kennedy said President Donald Trump deserved a Nobel Prize for the 2020 Operation Warp Speed initiative to quickly develop mRNA COVID-19 vaccines — and that he also had attacked the safety and continued use of those very shots.

    “I can’t tell where you are on Operation Warp Speed,” said Republican North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis.

    Tillis and others asked him why the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was fired last week, less than a month into her tenure.

    Kennedy said she was dishonest, and that CDC leaders who left the agency last week in support of her deserved to be fired.

    He also criticized CDC recommendations during the COVID-19 pandemic tied to lockdowns and masking policies, and claimed — wrongly — that they “failed to do anything about the disease itself.”

    “The people at CDC who oversaw that process, who put masks on our children, who closed our schools, are the people who will be leaving,” Kennedy said. He later said they deserved to be fired for not doing enough to control chronic disease.

    Democrats express hostility from the start

    The Senate Finance Committee had called Kennedy to a hearing about his plans to “Make America Healthy Again,” but Democratic senators pressed Kennedy on his actions around vaccines.

    At the start of the hearing, Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon tried to have Kennedy formally sworn in as a witness, saying the HHS secretary has a history of lying to the committee. The committee’s chair, Sen. Mike Crapo of Idaho, denied the Democrat’s request, saying “the bottom line is we will let the secretary make his own case.”

    Wyden went on to attack Kennedy, saying he had “stacked the deck” of a vaccines advisory committee by replacing scientists with “skeptics and conspiracy theorists.”

    Last week, the Trump administration fired the CDC’s director — a Trump appointee who was confirmed by the Senate — less than a month into her tenure. Several top CDC leaders resigned in protest, leaving the agency in turmoil.

    The ousted director, Susan Monarez, wrote in The Wall Street Journal on Thursday that Kennedy was trying to weaken public health protections.

    “I was told to preapprove the recommendations of a vaccine advisory panel newly filled with people who have publicly expressed antivaccine rhetoric,” Monarez wrote. “It is imperative that the panel’s recommendations aren’t rubber-stamped but instead are rigorously and scientifically reviewed before being accepted or rejected.”

    Kennedy told senators he didn’t make such an ultimatum, though he did concede that he had ordered Monarez to fire career CDC scientists. Monarez’s attorneys later responded that she stood by the op-ed and “would repeat it all under oath.”

    Kennedy pushed back on concerns raised by multiple Republican senators, including Tillis and Sens. John Barrasso of Wyoming and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana. Both Barrasso and Cassidy are physicians.

    Shouting matches and hot comebacks

    The health secretary had animated comebacks as Democratic senators pressed him on the effects of his words and actions.

    When Sen. Raphael Warnock, of Georgia, questioned Kennedy about his disparaging rhetoric about CDC employees before a deadly shooting at the agency this summer, Kennedy shot back: “Are you complicit in the assassination attempts on President Trump?”

    Kennedy called Sen. Ben Ray Lujan of New Mexico “ridiculous,” said he was “talking gibberish” and accused him of “not understanding how the world works” when Lujan asked Kennedy to pledge to share protocols of any research Kennedy was commissioning into autism and vaccines.

    He also engaged in a heated, loud exchanges with Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Tina Smith of Minnesota.

    “I didn’t even hear your question,” Kennedy replied to Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto as the Nevada Democrat repeatedly asked what the agency was doing to lower drug costs for seniors.

    He also told Sen. Bernie Sanders that the Vermont independent was not “making any sense.”

    Some senators had their own choice words.

    “You’re interrupting me, and sir, you’re a charlatan. That’s what you are, ” said Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Washington Democrat. “The history on vaccines is very clear.”

    As the hearing neared its end, Kennedy pulled his cellphone from his pocket and then tapped and scrolled as Wyden asked about mifepristone, a drug used for medication abortion.

    Kennedy disputes COVID-19 data

    In May, Kennedy announced COVID-19 vaccines would no longer be recommended for healthy children and pregnant women, a move opposed by medical and public health groups.

    In June, he abruptly fired a panel of experts that had been advising the government on vaccine policy. He replaced them with a handpicked group that included several vaccine skeptics, and then shut the door to several doctors groups that had long helped form the committee’s recommendations.

    Kennedy has voiced distrust of research that showed the COVID-19 vaccines saved lives, and at Thursday’s hearing even cast doubt on statistics about how people died during the pandemic and on estimates about how many deaths were averted — statistics produced by the agencies he oversees.

    He said federal health policy would be based on gold standard science, but confessed that he wouldn’t necessarily wait for studies to be completed before taking action against, for example, potential causes of chronic illness.

    “We are not waiting for everything to come in. We are starting now,” he said.

    A number of medical groups say Kennedy can’t be counted on to make decisions based on robust medical evidence. In a statement Wednesday, the Infectious Diseases Society of America and 20 other medical and public health organizations issued a joint statement calling on him to resign.

    “Our country needs leadership that will promote open, honest dialogue, not disregard decades of lifesaving science, spread misinformation, reverse medical progress and decimate programs that keep us safe,” the statement said.

    Many of the nation’s leading public health and medical societies, including the American Medical Association, American Public Health Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics have decried Kennedy’s policies and warn they will drive up rates of vaccine-preventable diseases.

    ___

    Stobbe reported from New York. Associated Press writer Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.

    ___

    The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • CDC Director Susan Monarez Leaves After Less Than a Month

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    Monarez’s lawyers claim this attack reflects a broader “dismantling of public health institutions”

    Dr. Susan Monarez testifies during a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing on her nomination to be Director of the CDC, at the U.S. Capitol, in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, June 25, 2025.
    Credit: Sipa USA via AP

    After less than a month on the job, the newly appointed director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Susan Monarez, is no longer with the agency. The Department of Health and Human Services confirmed the change on its X account. HHS officials offered no explanation as to why Monarez is no longer holding the position.

    On Wednesday evening, Monarez’s lawyers Mark Zaid and Abbe David Lowell issued a statement to the Associated Press claiming she had neither resigned nor been told she was fired.

    “When CDC Director Susan Monarez refused to rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives and fire dedicated health experts, she chose protecting the public over serving a political agenda. For that, she has been targeted,” the attorneys wrote.

    “This is not about one official. It is about the systematic dismantling of public health institutions, the silencing of experts, and the dangerous politicization of science. The attack on Dr. Monarez is a warning to every American: our evidence-based systems are being undermined from within,” they added.

    Her departure this week coincided with the resignations of at least four top CDC officials, according to the AP. Among them is Debra Houry, deputy director, who mentioned the negative effects of planned budget cuts, reorganization and firings in an email seen by an AP reporter. Former director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, Demetre Daskalakis, resigned after Monarez’s departure as well, publishing a letter that denounced political interference, data manipulation and what he called a decline in scientific integrity.

    Scroll to continue reading

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    Elizabeth Ahern

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  • CDC Director Susan Monarez Is Out After Less Than A Month On The Job – KXL

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    FILE – A sign stands at an entrance to the main campus of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia, Friday, Feb. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Amy, File)

    NEW YORK (AP) — The director of the nation’s top public health agency is out after less than one month in the job, U.S. officials announced Wednesday.

    “Susan Monarez is no longer director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. We thank her for her dedicated service to the American people,” the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services wrote on social media.

    HHS officials did not explain why Monarez is no longer with the agency.

    Before the department’s announcement, she told The Associated Press: “I can’t comment.”

    Monarez, 50, was the agency’s 21st director and the first to pass through Senate confirmation following a 2023 law. She was named acting director in January and then tapped as the nominee in March after Trump abruptly withdrew his first choice, David Weldon.

    She was sworn in on July 31 — less than a month ago, making her the shortest-serving CDC director in the history of the 79-year-old agency.

    Her short time at CDC was tumultuous. On Aug. 8, at the end of her first full week on the job, a Georgia man opened fire from a spot at a pharmacy across the street from CDC’s main entrance. The 30-year-old man blamed the COVID-19 vaccine for making him depressed and suicidal. He killed a police officer and fired more than 180 shots into CDC buildings before killing himself.

    No one at CDC was injured, but it shell-shocked a staff that already had low morale from other recent changes.

    The Atlanta-based federal agency was initially founded to prevent the spread of malaria in the U.S. Its mission was later expanded, and it gradually became a global leader on infectious and chronic diseases and a go-to source of health information.

    This year it’s been hit by widespread staff cuts, resignations of key officials and heated controversy over long-standing CDC vaccine policies upended by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

    During her Senate confirmation process, Monarez told senators that she values vaccines, public health interventions and rigorous scientific evidence. But she largely dodged questions about whether those positions put her at odds with Kennedy, a longtime vaccine skeptic who has criticized and sought to dismantle some of the agency’s previous protocols and decisions.

    The Washington Post first reported she was ousted, citing unnamed sources within the Trump administration.

    More about:

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    Grant McHill

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  • Los Angeles approves plan to spend nearly $425 million in ‘mansion tax’ money

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    The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday approved a plan to spend nearly $425 million collected from Measure ULA, directing the money to a series of affordable housing and homelessness programs.

    The spending plan for the 2025 fiscal year that started Tuesday is the largest yet under Measure ULA, also known as the mansion tax.

    The voter-approved measure, which taxes property sales above about $5 million, has drawn criticism from the real estate industry for years and recently been the subject of several reports that found it has limited property sales and thus reduced property tax revenue and the construction of new housing.

    Backers, however, tout the measure as providing crucial dollars to affordable housing and homelessness prevention programs at a time when the state and county have cut funding.

    In all, the 2025 ULA spending plan is greater than all other years combined.

    “Don’t believe the hate from big-money real estate or their lies appearing all over the media,” Joe Donlin, director of United to House LA, said in a statement. “Measure ULA is doing the steady work to create stable homes and good jobs for Angelenos.”

    Under the plan approved Tuesday, more than $100 million is set to flow to homelessness prevention programs, including income support for at-risk tenants and eviction defense.

    The majority of the 2025 funds, more than $288 million, is to be spent on the production and preservation of affordable housing.

    Since voters passed the measure in late 2022, the tax has collected more than $702 million, according to the city’s Housing Department.

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    Andrew Khouri

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  • Column: America’s last presidential bellwether ends its winning streak

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    The bellwether rings true no more.

    For nearly a quarter-century, voters in Clallam County, Wash. — a lush green dot in the far corner of the country — have gone with the winner in 11 straight presidential elections. That’s an unmatched level of precision among more than 3,000 counties nationwide.

    But the streak, dating to 1980, ended on Tuesday as voters favored Vice President Kamala Harris over former President Trump, by a decisive 53% to 44% margin. While there are still votes to be counted, Harris’ lead appears certain to hold.

    That means there are no bellwether counties left in America; heading into the 2020 election there were nearly 20. After that, Clallam County — roughly balanced politically between its three small population centers and sparsely populated rural reaches — stood alone.

    (Yours truly visited the county and took the measure of voter sentiments in September, just after the Trump-Harris debate: At the time, neither candidate was running away with the contest and virtually everyone was firmly dug into their positions.)

    Marc Abshire, director of the Port Angeles Chamber of Commerce and a Harris supporter, said he was proud the county went for the Democratic ticket “but also disappointed we’re losing our bellwether status because of it.”

    “Out here, we just didn’t have the grievance vote that most of the rest of the country seemed to have,” Abshire said.

    Setting aside any bruised pride, he said there are plenty of reasons to visit the region, beyond its former political prescience.

    “We’re lucky to live in one of the most beautiful places in the nation, if not the world,” Abshire said. “We have the sea and mile-high mountains all in our front and backyards. Our weather is always temperate.”

    People will just have to start looking elsewhere for a political barometer.

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    Mark Z. Barabak

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  • Netflix’s Rebel Moon director’s cut, A Quiet Place: Day One, and every movie new to streaming this week

    Netflix’s Rebel Moon director’s cut, A Quiet Place: Day One, and every movie new to streaming this week

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    Each week on Polygon, we round up the most notable new releases to streaming and VOD, highlighting the biggest and best new movies for you to watch at home.

    This week, A Quiet Place: Day One, starring Lupita Nyong’o and Joseph Quinn, arrives on VOD along with Maxxxine, the third installment in Ti West’s horror series starring Mia Goth. That’s not all there is to watch this weekend. The long-awaited director’s cut of Zack Snyder’s sci-fi epic Rebel Moon finally come to Netflix alongside the “Minus Color” version of Godzilla Minus One, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes struts onto Hulu, and Luca Guadagnino’s Challengers makes its streaming debut on MGM Plus.

    Here’s everything new that’s available to watch this weekend!

    New on Netflix

    Rebel Moon director’s cut

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix

    Image: Netflix

    Genre: Sci-fi epic
    Run time: 3h 21m (Chapter 1); 2h 53m (Chapter 2)
    Director: Zack Snyder
    Cast: Sofia Boutella, Djimon Hounsou, Ed Skrein

    Zack Snyder is back, this time with the “true” version of his critically-panned sci-fi epic Rebel Moon. Set in a galaxy ruled by a tyrannical empire known as the Motherworld Imperium, the film follows Kora (Sofia Boutella), a former Imperium soldier who recruits a band of warriors to defend a small lunar farming colony from an oncoming invasion.

    The question is: Will these versions be it any better than the ones released last year? Only one way to find out!

    Godzilla Minus One/Minus Color

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix

    A black-and-white shot of Godzilla roaring in the ruins of a destroyed city in Godzilla Minus One/Minus Color.

    Image: Toho

    Genre: Kaiju drama
    Run time: 2h 4m
    Director: Takashi Yamazaki
    Cast: Ryunosuke Kamiki, Minami Hamabe, Yuki Yamada

    Godzilla Minus One, the Oscar-winning kaiju drama from director Takashi Yamazaki, was surprise added to Netflix back in June. Now, the “Minus Color” version of the film, which screened for a limited time in theaters early this year, is now available to stream on Netflix starting this weekend. Having seen both in theaters, I can confidently say that no matter which version you happen to choose, the film itself is phenomenal.

    Tarot

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix

    A woman with long dark hair sits at a table with tarot cards and a lit candle in front of her in Tarot.

    Image: Screen Gems/Sony Pictures Releasing

    Genre: Horror
    Run time: 1h 32m
    Directors: Spenser Cohen, Anna Halberg
    Cast: Harriet Slater, Adain Bradley, Avantika, Jacob Batalon

    From the screenwriter of Moonfall, Tarot follows a group of friends who find a mysterious cursed tarot deck… and after using it, the figures from the cards that they drew all start to manifest and brutally murder them. They must race to figure out the secret of the tarot deck before they all get picked off one by one. All to say — maybe don’t use creepy tarot decks while in a strange mansion.

    Saving Bikini Bottom: The Sandy Cheeks Movie

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix

    (Left to Right) a cartoon squirrel in a diving suit with a bubble helmet standing next to a sponge in square pants holding a jellyfish net in Saving Bikini Bottom: The Sandy Cheeks Movie.

    Image: Netflix

    Genre: Adventure comedy
    Run time: 1h 22m
    Director: Liza Johnson
    Cast: Carolyn Lawrence, Tom Kenny, Clancy Brown

    Sandy, the Texan squirrel, takes the lead in the new SpongeBob movie. And this time, the underwater denizens venture to the surface — Sandy finally gets to visit home and see her whole family! But they all have to join forces to save Bikini Bottom from an evil CEO.

    New on Hulu

    Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu

    A gorilla from Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes snarls at the camera

    Image: 20th Century Studios

    Genre: Post-apocalyptic sci-fi
    Run time: 2h 25m
    Director: Wes Ball
    Cast: Owen Teague, Freya Allan, Kevin Durand

    Picking up 300 years after the events of Matt Reeves’ War of the Planet of the Apes, this new installment in the franchise follows Noa (Owen Teague), a young ape who embarks on a journey to rescue his tribe from Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand), a maniacal ape who has twisted Caesar’s legacy to create an empire built on conquest and slavery.

    From our review:

    As a story, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes rarely reaches above narrative competence. But because of its almost single-minded focus on the apes, its technical prowess in their rendering is always front and center. It is frankly incredible what the team at Wētā FX has done in conjunction with all of the film’s other effects artists to bring the apes to life, to give them all distinct body language, and to faithfully transpose actors’ every tic and subtle expression onto their faces. These are some of the most soulful digital creations ever seen in a blockbuster action movie, and it’s incredible to see them in a film that is so pedestrian.

    New on MGM Plus

    Challengers

    Where to watch: Available to stream on MGM Plus

    Teenage tennis champion Tashi (Zendaya) leans back on a hotel bed and stares lustily up at the camera in Challengers

    Image: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures/YouTube

    Genre: Sports drama
    Run time: 2h 11m
    Director: Luca Guadagnino
    Cast: Zendaya, Josh O’Connor, Mike Faist

    Luca Guadagnino’s sensual sports drama, about a love triangle in professional tennis, has set certain circles of the world on fire since its release in late April and is one of the best movies of the year. Now, you can enjoy it at home.

    From our review:

    That script is a terrific three-course meal for Faist and O’Connor. They get to trade off face and heel roles from scene to scene and era to era, as Art and Patrick help and hurt each other in equal measure. But it’s an absolute smorgasbord for Zendaya, who even in starring roles has never been given this much room to stretch. Tashi is a gratifyingly rich character, both righteously angry over the thwarting of her ambitions and cruelly angry at all the men who have the nerve to keep on playing the game that was taken away from her. She’s hungry for affection and withholding it at the same time, by turns sensually curious and coldly dispassionate, ambitious and exhausted, conflicted and confident. She’s the kind of character that media master’s theses are made of, and unpicking Tashi’s conflicting motives and how she integrates them is likely to become a pop culture obsession in the months to come.

    New on Metrograph

    New Strains

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Metrograph

    A man with glasses and a moustache stares into a camera lense with a woman in a red robe standing in the background in front of a wall with painted flowers in New Strains.

    Image: Parori Productions/Film Emporium Insurance Services

    Genre: Romcom
    Run time: 1h 18m
    Directors: Prashanth Kamalakanthan, Artemis Shaw
    Cast: Artemis Shaw, Prashanth Kamalakanthan

    This quirky independent romcom follows a bickering couple as they attempt to navigate their relationship, and retain their sanity, in the midst of a global pandemic. Shot on a Hi8 camcorder, New Strains is an authentic slice-of-life story from the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

    New to rent

    Maxxxine

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    Maxine (Mia Goth), a mask airbrushed across her face and her hair teased out into a big blonde cloud, dances in a group of strangers at a nightclub in Ti West’s Maxxxine

    Photo: Justin Lubin/A24

    Genre: Horror
    Run time: 1h 41m
    Director: Ti West
    Cast: Mia Goth, Elizabeth Debicki, Moses Sumney

    The third installment in Ti West’s trilogy of period-specific horror films stars Mia Goth, this time reprising her role as Maxine Minx from 2022’s X. Set six years after surviving the terrifying ordeal that transpired in rural Texas, Maxine now lives and works in Los Angeles as an adult film star and erotic performer on the verge of her first big break in an upcoming horror film. But when a mysterious stalker and an unscrupulous private investigator begin to hound her around town, and harm those closest to her, Maxine will have to summon every ounce of her cunning in order to come out on top.

    From our review:

    Maxxxine is sharper, slicker, faster-paced, and more direct than the other two films in the series, and it’s certainly entertaining, for those who can stomach its purposefully challenging, envelope-pushing gore. But this time around, it feels like West has, as Kurt Vonnegut would put it, become what he was formerly just pretending to be. That isn’t just a matter of taxonomy, irrelevant to everyone but nitpickers and librarians trying to figure out which shelf Maxxxine goes on. It winds up affecting the story in some frustrating ways.

    A Quiet Place: Day One

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    Lupita Nyong’o, covered in white dust, gasps and looks up while being held by another man in shadows in A Quiet Place: Day One

    Image: Paramount Pictures

    Genre: Horror
    Run time: 1h 39m
    Director: Michael Sarnoski
    Cast: Lupita Nyong’o, Joseph Quinn, Alex Wolff

    Lupita Nyong’o stars in the prequel to 2018’s A Quiet Place as Samira, a cancer patient living in New York who witnesses first-hand the arrival of the blind extraterrestrial creatures who overtake the planet. With the help of Eric (Joseph Quinn), a law student, and Henri (Djimon Hounsou), a fellow survivor, Samira must find a way to escape the city alive.

    From our review:

    A Quiet Place: Day One isn’t so much a spinoff and prequel of John Krasinski’s 2018 horror movie as it is a riveting drama that plays in the series’ sandbox. You can spot the odd bit of new world-building here or there, about just how and why there are so many damn echolocating aliens, but these tidbits are just background noise (shh, not so loud!) to a much more interesting human story. A Quiet Place and A Quiet Place Part II are rural sci-fi horror, but Day One — from Pig director Michael Sarnoski — moves the setting to New York City and crafts its story in the vein of large-scale disaster cinema. It’s likely the best Manhattan mayhem film since Cloverfield, and it’s also a downright excellent Hollywood blockbuster, if an entirely unexpected one.

    The People’s Joker

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    Vera Drew as a version of Todd Phillips’ Joker in The People’s Joker

    Image: TIFF

    Genre: Parody comedy
    Run time: 1h 32m
    Director: Vera Drew
    Cast: Vera Drew, Nathan Faustyn, Kane Distler

    This DC Comics parody follows the story of Vera, a trans woman from Smallville who moves to Gotham City to break into stand-up comedy under the name “Joker the Harlequin.” Together with her friend The Penguin (Nathan Faustyn), Vera forms an anti-comedy troupe and goes head to head with her abusive partner Mr. J (Kane Distler) and a tyrannical vigilante known as the Batman (Phil Braun).

    From our review:

    The film isn’t entirely a comedy in-joke, however — which is good, because the story of Vera/Joker’s “anti-comedy” career is the most straightforward and least memorable aspect of the film. Lengthy discussions about the role of comedians as truth-tellers between Joker and the Penguin are standard stuff for podcasts and documentaries about the art form. Comedic first-person trans coming-of-age narratives, particularly ones where the transition is accomplished by falling into a vat of feminizing hormones, are more rare. Dedicated “to mom and Joel Schumacher,” The People’s Joker is also a sincere exploration of Vera’s journey toward self-realization, beginning with her childhood as a “miserable little girl” trapped in a boy’s body in Smallville.

    Daddio

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    A male cab driver look at a female passenger with platinum blonde hair in the backseat of his cab in Daddio.

    Image: Phedon Papamichael/Sony Pictures Classics

    Genre: Drama
    Run time: 1h 40m
    Director: Christy Hall
    Cast: Sean Penn, Dakota Johnson

    Remember Locke, that 2013 chamber piece starring Tom Hardy as a construction foreman who talks to himself and several off-screen characters while driving on the freeway? Well, Daddio is kinda like that, but there’s a crucial difference: Instead of one, there are two on-screen characters talking to each other! Dakota Johnson stars as a woman who has a frank conversation with Clark (Sean Pean), a cab driver who gives her a ride to her apartment in Manhattan from JFK International Airport. What do they talk about? Oh y’know, life and love and vulnerability and stuff like that.

    The Vourdalak

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    An emaciated, ghoulish figure bites into the neck of a child in a nightdress in The Vourdalak.

    Image: Oscilloscope

    Genre: Horror fantasy
    Run time: 1h 31m
    Director: Adrien Beau
    Cast: Kacey Mottet Klein, Ariane Labed, Grégoire Colin

    If you, like me, are chomping at the bit to see Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu when it premieres later this year, you might consider sinking your teeth into this new supernatural horror movie from director Adrien Beau.

    Kacey Mottet Klein stars as the Marquis Jacques Antoine Saturnin d’Urfe, an emissary of the King of France in 18th-century Europe, who is welcomed to stay at the home of a man named Gorcha, who has left to fight against the Turks. When Gorcha fails to return after six days, his family fears that he has been transformed into a Vourdalak — a breed of vampire that feeds on the blood of their family members.

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    Toussaint Egan

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  • As Los Angeles plans to take less water, environmentalists celebrate a win for Mono Lake

    As Los Angeles plans to take less water, environmentalists celebrate a win for Mono Lake

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    City leaders in Los Angeles have announced plans to take a limited amount of water from creeks that feed Mono Lake this year, a step that environmentalists say will help build on a recent rise in the lake’s level over the last year.

    The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power said it plans to export 4,500 acre-feet of water from the Mono Basin during the current runoff year, the same amount that was diverted the previous year, and enough to supply about 18,000 households for a year.

    Under the current rules, the city could take much more — up to 16,000 acre-feet this year. But environmental advocates had recently urged Mayor Karen Bass not to increase water diversions to help preserve recent gains and begin to boost the long-depleted lake toward healthier levels. They praised the decision by city leaders as an important step.

    “It’s a historic decision in the history of Mono Lake,” said Mark Gold, director of water scarcity solutions for the Natural Resources Defense Council. “I think it’s the first major environmental accomplishment for water in the Bass administration.”

    Aggressive and impactful reporting on climate change, the environment, health and science.

    DWP officials detailed their expected water diversions from the region of the Eastern Sierra in an annual plan for the runoff year, which began in April.

    Environmentalists said it’s the first time in 30 years that city officials have announced plans to take less water than the maximum amount allowed under a 1994 decision by the State Water Resources Control Board. However, DWP said in the plan that it will review water conditions in November, and at that point could still decide to export additional water if deemed necessary, up to the limit of 16,000 acre-feet.

    “Major kudos to the Bass administration for not taking all the water that they’re entitled to,” Gold said.

    “I think it’s the ultimate olive branch to the environmental community,” he said, and a “show of good faith on the part of the city.”

    Gold and other advocates sent a letter to Bass in March, saying that not increasing water diversions this year would be a “meaningful action” the city can take at a time when supplies are ample following the very wet winter of 2023 and this year’s substantial snow and rain. They also said doing this would complement efforts toward long-term solutions for Mono Lake.

    City leaders agreed.

    “Mayor Bass has been clear that building a greener Los Angeles is one of her top priorities and protecting water resources certainly falls into that,” said Nancy Sutley, deputy mayor of energy and sustainability.

    Sutley said in an email that the mayor and DWP “are working together to implement new ways to protect the environment in sustainable and efficient ways.”

    The city has been diverting water from the Mono Basin since 1941, transporting it south through the Los Angeles Aqueduct.

    For decades, the withdrawals of water from the area’s creeks led to dramatic declines in the lake. As the saline lake retreated, rock formations called tufa, which had formed underwater, were left exposed along the shorelines.

    A 1994 ruling by the state water board called for raising the lake level to 6,392 feet — about 8 feet above the current level.

    The lake’s level has risen about 5 feet since the start of 2023, when the historic snowpack in the Sierra Nevada sent large quantities of runoff streaming from the mountains.

    The decision by city leaders this year will help preserve those gains, said Geoffrey McQuilkin, executive director of the Mono Lake Committee.

    “Mono Lake will be three vertical inches higher than it would have been if DWP were to take the full 16,000 acre-feet of allowed export,” McQuilkin wrote in a blog post.

    He said the step shows Bass’ “commitment to a sustainable relationship” between the city and Mono Lake, and a renewed commitment to achieve the lake level target mandated by the state water board 30 years ago.

    “And though it is just a fraction of the 8 feet separating Mono Lake today from its required healthy level, the inches quickly add up as the years go by,” McQuilkin said.

    The goal, he said, is to get Mono Lake back to a level that allows the ecosystem to thrive.

    Mono Lake provides habitat for imperiled shorebirds such as Wilson’s phalaropes, which stop at saline lakes during their long migrations, feeding on brine flies and other invertebrates.

    The decision by city leaders “opens the door to have that conversation about how do we go forward in the years ahead and make sure we achieve the protection at Mono Lake that we’ve all agreed on implementing,” McQuilkin said.

    Bruce Reznik, executive director of Los Angeles Waterkeeper, said the decision represents a big shift for the city and DWP.

    “In the coming years, I would like to see more of the same,” Reznik said. “I’d like to see the city as they move forward, even if we’re not in as wet a year, do what they can to minimize what the take is from Mono Lake. Let it come back to health inch by inch.”

    Reznik says California now has an opportunity to restore one of its ecological treasures while also lessening L.A.’s dependence on water imported from hundreds of miles away.

    “We have to be more cognizant of local resilient water supplies that make us more water secure,” he said. “Let’s take this win, and see if we can build on it — on our move toward more local resilient water.”

    Conservation efforts in recent years have helped reduce overall water use in Los Angeles. The shift to more local water supplies can be accelerated, Reznik said, through investments in capturing more stormwater, cleaning up contaminated groundwater and recycling wastewater.

    “The more we accept the mindset that we just can’t keep taking water from everywhere, and that we need to invest locally, the more I think we’re going to see all the benefits,” he said.

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    Ian James

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