Quiz of The Week: 21 – 27 January | The Week UK

As the conflict between Russia and Ukraine entered its 12th month, a long-awaited decision by Western nations has offered fresh hope to Kyiv.

Following months of hesitancy, Germany this week agreed to send 14 of its sought-after Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine and gave allies permission to send theirs too. The US is also sending 31 of its highly advanced Abrams tanks.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy welcomed the announcements, but stressed that the timing of the tanks delivery would be “critical”. After a slight lull in the conflict at the start of the year, battles are raging not only between the traditional militaries but also private military companies (PMCs) enlisted by both sides, with the Wagner Group leading the way in Russian attacks.

With both Zelenskyy and the Kremlin warning that a peaceful resolution is unlikely to be reached any time soon, the world is watching to see how Western tanks may change the course of the war.

To find out how closely you’ve been paying attention to the latest developments in the news and other global events, put your knowledge to the test with our Quiz of The Week

Need a reminder of some of the other headlines over the past seven days?

Reactions to Cristiano Ronaldo's 'explosive' interview with Piers ...

Weeks after being dropped by Manchester United for refusing to come on as a substitute against Tottenham, Cristiano Ronaldo has dramatically broken his silence by giving his side of the story about life at Old Trafford.

Speaking in a 90-minute interview to be broadcast this week on TalkTV’s Piers Morgan Uncensored show, the 37-year-old revealed that he feels “betrayed” by the way he’s been treated by the Premier League club and also spoke out against current United manager Erik ten Hag and former team-mate Wayne Rooney.

The Portugal star, who will captain his country at the Fifa World Cup in Qatar, has given “by far” his “most explosive” interview, Morgan wrote in The Sun. Ronaldo “has had enough” – he’s had enough of “the sniping, the sneering, and the endless blame-game bulls*** that’s been flung at him over the past few months”.

The fans “should know the truth”, Ronaldo told the presenter. “I want the best for the club”, but “nothing has changed” and there has been “no evolution” since Sir Alex Ferguson retired in 2013. “I love Manchester United. I love the fans, they’re always on my side. But if they want to do it different… they have to change many, many things.”

Ten Hag ‘doesn’t show respect for me’

Now in his second spell at United, Ronaldo returned in August 2021 after nine seasons at Spanish giants Real Madrid and three in Italy with Juventus. First departing in 2009, the forward’s future once again looked likely to be away from Old Trafford after United missed out on the Champions League, but he failed to secure a move in the summer transfer window.

This season has been a turbulent one for the five-time Ballon d’Or winner and he was dropped by Ten Hag after his refusal to come on against Spurs. Ronaldo admits that he does not respect the Dutch coach because “he doesn’t show respect for me”.

Other United officials, past and present, to be on the receiving end of Ronaldo’s ire include ex-boss Ralf Rangnick, who he had “never heard” of, and former team-mate Wayne Rooney, who Ronaldo said had criticised him “probably because he finished his career and I’m still playing”.

Breaking Fergie’s ‘golden rule’

Ronaldo’s explosive interview has “shocked the football world”, said Max Mathews in the Daily Mail. In speaking out “so publicly against his current employers”, Ronaldo has also broken legendary former boss Ferguson’s “golden rule” – that “no player can be bigger than the manager”.

Sky Sports pundit Gary Neville, who played with Ronaldo at United, had previously called for the relationship between the player and club to end. United are a “better team without him”, Neville said, they score “more goals without him” and they win “more points without him”. Former Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher, Neville’s Sky Sports colleague, tweeted that “99% of United fans” will be on the side of Ten Hag, which shows “how badly Ronaldo has handled this”.

Andy Mitten, who is the editor of the United We Stand magazine, told BBC Radio 5 Live that Ronaldo has not been forced out, he “wanted to leave in the summer and thought he was leaving, but there was a shortage of suitors”. Ronaldo has done an interview that’s “his version of the truth” and there’s “often more than one version of the truth in life”. Mitten doesn’t think United fans would be “hugely concerned” if he didn’t play for the club again.

Piers Morgan Uncensored: 90 Minutes with Ronaldo will be shown over two nights on TalkTV at 8pm on Wednesday and Thursday.

Ghislaine Maxwell trial: will jurors' sex abuse revelations lead to a ...

Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyers have called for a retrial after a second juror revealed that they were sexually abused as a child and spoke of the experience during deliberations.

Days after a first juror said that his story of childhood sexual abuse helped to quell jury room doubts over why accusers waited years before coming forward, a second juror told The New York Times (NYT) that they also disclosed the abuse they suffered as a child.

A former federal prosecutor told The Times that the situation is “an absolute train wreck”, adding: “I believe that it’s likely going to result in a mistrial.” Here is what we know.

What have the jurors said?

The second unnamed juror told the NYT that they had been sexually abused as a child and that they “discussed the experience during deliberations” which “appeared to help shape the jury’s discussions”.

The news came days after another juror, identified only by his first and middle names as Scotty David, gave a series of media interviews in which he said he had helped sway the deliberations by recounting his own trauma as a result of childhood sexual abuse.

“I know what happened when I was sexually abused. I remember the colour of the carpet, the walls. Some of it can be replayed like a video,” he told the jury, according to The Independent.

“I can’t remember all the details, there are some things that run together. When I shared that, they were able to sort of come around on, they were able to come around on the memory aspect of the sexual abuse,” he added, said the BBC.

What will happen now?

Maxwell’s lawyers have indicated that they plan to appeal for a mistrial, stating in two letters to the court that their client would seek a new trial and that the judge “can and should order” one without holding a hearing.

They said that Maxwell planned to make her request under a federal rule that grants a judge the power to order a new trial when the “interest of justice so requires”.

Judge Alison Nathan has agreed to hear Maxwell’s motion for a new trial, setting a deadline of 19 January for the defence to file a motion to “vacate the sex-trafficking conviction”, The Telegraph said.

Much will now hang on whether the jurors “honestly” identified themselves as survivors of sexual abuse on a jury questionnaire, The Times said.

According to The Telegraph, Scotty David incorrectly told the court he had not been a victim of sexual assault. A source with knowledge of the case told the paper that the juror had answered “no” to the question of whether they had ever been a victim of such a crime.

Scotty David has retained attorney Todd Spodek after he was advised by the US government to seek legal representation.

Arlo Devlin-Brown, a former federal prosecutor, told the NYT that “generally there is nothing wrong with jurors bringing their personal experiences into deliberations”.

However, he added that “dishonesty during the selection process goes to the very integrity of the proceedings and credible allegations of such are taken very seriously”.

Maxwell was convicted on five charges relating to the trafficking and transportation of teenagers who were sexually abused by the late financier Jeffrey Epstein.

The jury deliberated for more than 40 hours. A date for her sentencing has not yet been set but she faces up to 65 years in prison.

Ten Things You Need to Know Today: 24 January 2023 | The Week ...

Two probes over BBC chair appointment

The selection of Richard Sharp as BBC chair is now the subject of two separate investigations. Following claims that he helped Boris Johnson secure a loan of up to £800,000 weeks before he was recommended for the job by the then PM, Sharp’s appointment is being probed by the commissioner for public appointments, and by the corporation itself. Sharp’s detailed denial that he had acted in any way improperly, “has failed to assuage anger among BBC workers”, said the i news site, with a number telling the website that Sharp’s presence “now undermines his own insistence that the broadcaster must be unimpeachable on impartiality”.

Princes William and Harry blast 'culture of exploitation' after BBC ...

BBC “lies” fuelled Princess Diana’s “fears and paranoia” in the final years of her life, Prince William has claimed following the release of a damning report on the methods used to obtain the infamous Panorama interview with his late mother.

Martin Bashir’s 1995 interview was a “major” contributing factor in making his parent’s relationship “worse”, the Duke of Cambridge said in a broadcast statement to the BBC’s rival ITV News. “It effectively established a false narrative which, for over a quarter of a century, has been commercialised by the BBC and others,” William added.

The royal rebuke is “unprecedented”, says The Times, and piles further pressure on the national broadcaster after Lord John Dyson’s inquiry found that Bashir “deceived” Diana’s brother, Earl Charles Spencer, to secure an introduction to her.

The independent investigation by retired judge Dyson concluded that the journalist breached BBC rules by using fake bank statements that suggested a member of Spencer’s staff was leaking stories to the press, in order to gain his trust.

Yet an internal BBC inquiry in 1996 cleared Bashir of any wrongdoing.

Around 23 million people worldwide tuned in to watch his world-exclusive interview with Diana, during which she revealed intimate details of her life including her struggles with bulimia and self-harm.

Prince William argues that the “deceitful” methods of “BBC employees” who “lied and used fake documents” to secure the interview “substantially influenced what my mother said”.

The Royal described his “indescribable sadness” over how “the BBC’s failures contributed significantly to her fear, paranoia and isolation, that I remember from her final years with her”, adding: “What saddens me most is that if the BBC had properly investigated the complaints and concerns first raised in 1995, my mother would have known that she’d been deceived.”

Prince Harry has also spoken out about his mother following the publication of Dyson’s report. In a separate statement, the Duke of Sussex said that the “ripple effect of a culture of exploitation and unethical practices ultimately took her life”.

Unethical practices in the media “are still widespread today”, he continued, warning that the problem was “bigger than one outlet, one network or one publication”.

Was Dominic Cummings' BBC interview a mistake? | The Week UK

Dominic Cummings has escalated his war of words with Boris Johnson by using a televised interview to reveal that he plotted to oust the prime minister just weeks after their 2019 election victory.

In a BBC News Special broadcast last night, the former Downing Street adviser told Laura Kuenssberg that he and his Vote Leave allies hatched the plan after clashing with Johnson’s now-wife Carrie, who was “trying to get rid of us and appoint complete clowns to certain key jobs”.

In the end, of course, it was Cummings who was forced to leave, in November 2020. Since then he has been lobbing what the media have dubbed “Domshells” back at his former boss.

But if he thought his first TV interview would provide the chance “to settle scores with his many enemies, the very opposite proved to be the case as viewers got the chance to stare into his soul”, writes Gordon Rayner in The Telegraph.

“The more he spoke, the more he resembled a crazed cult leader as he revealed his grandiose plans to overthrow the system” - and while he repeatedly painted the PM as a fool, “it was Mr Cummings himself who was utterly diminished by the interview”, Rayner concludes.

The Financial Times’ Robert Shrimsley agrees, tweeting yesterday that “this may be the most self destructive interview since Prince Andrew”.

“On and on it went,” says Sean O’Grady in The Independent. “Boris Johnson possesses the leadership skills of a broken shopping trolley? He’s so bad we wanted to oust him within days of the 2019 general election?”

Cummings also claimed - again - that Johnson had “no plan” for the Covid-19 pandemic, and that the PM had to be warned off meeting the Queen in the early stages of the outbreak. And as far as Johnson’s general game plan as leader goes, the “only agenda is to buy more trains, buy more buses, have more bikes and build the world’s most stupid tunnel to Ireland”, the ex-aide added.

Yet the fact is that “Cummings would still be perfectly content to be in No, 10 and trying to steer the wobbly shopping trolley if only - as he portrays it - Carrie, now Mrs Shopping Trolley, hadn’t got involved”, writes O'Grady.

Shamima Begum and the 'Canadian spy' who smuggled her into ...

Shamima Begum, the British schoolgirl who left the UK to join the Islamic State group, was smuggled into Syria by a spy working for Canadian intelligence, and Britain later conspired to cover up Canada’s role in the operation, a book has claimed.

Scotland Yard was allegedly told that Begum, then 15, and her two school friends, 16-year-old Kadiza Sultana and 15-year-old Amira Abase, were trafficked into Syria by a smuggler who was working as a double agent for Islamic State and Canadian intelligence.

As the Metropolitan Police launched a huge international search for the schoolgirls, Canada failed to inform the UK of its role in the affair. Canadian intelligence admitted its involvement only after it feared being exposed, and then asked the British to cover up its role.

The alleged cover-up is detailed in a new book, The Secret History of the Five Eyes (a reference to the intelligence alliance comprised of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and the US), by Richard Kerbaj, a former security correspondent at The Sunday Times.

What are the allegations?

The book claims that Canada, worried about its own young people being urged to join IS, recruited IS human trafficker Mohammed al-Rashed as an intelligence agent when he applied for asylum at the Canadian embassy in Jordan.

Al-Rashed is said to have helped organise the travel of dozens of jihadists and their brides into Syria from the UK. The double agent then “photographed their passports on the pretext that he needed proof of identity to buy domestic transport tickets and then forwarded the images to his handler with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) at the Jordan embassy”, said The Times.

Kerbaj’s book claims that the Canadians were silent as the Metropolitan Police launched an urgent hunt for the girls. But when al-Rashed was arrested in Turkey in 2015 and found to have travel documents as well as bus tickets belonging to the British schoolgirls, the CSIS realised its cover could be blown.

According to the book, one Five Eyes source said: “The CSIS officers knew that Scotland Yard had a live investigation into the three schoolgirls and also knew that sooner or later the finger would point at them.”

Prince Harry's 'bombshell' memoir: what might he reveal? | The ...

Since stepping down from royal duties along with Meghan Markle in January 2020, the prince hasn’t held back when discussing his experiences of being part of the UK’s most famous family.

The Sun reported that the book’s publication risks stoking “new rifts with the Royal Family” and that insiders “worry” that references to the life of his mother, Princess Diana, will cause tension with his “step-mum Camilla, who has been named future Queen Consort”.

While he is expected to avoid any overt criticism of his grandmother, the Queen, The Telegraph said Harry is “expected to follow his numerous excoriating television and podcast interview accounts of his upbringing with an equally frank version in writing”.

“I’m writing this not as the prince I was born but as the man I have become,” said Harry, now 37, in a statement included in the same release. He added that he was “excited” for the public to read an account of his life “that’s accurate and wholly truthful” – a nod to his long-term battles with the media which he spoke about during his bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey in March 2021.

Prince Harry plans to donate proceeds from his as yet unnamed book to charity, a figure which Page Six , the New York Post’s celebrity news site, said would be at least $20m (£14.7m).

An official press release issued last year said the Duke of Sussex’s book promises to share “for the very first time” his experience of living life in the public eye “from childhood to the present day”. It is set to cover everything from his time in Afghanistan as part of his military duty to “the joy he has found in being a husband and father”.

The “bombshell memoir” was completed by ghostwriter JR Moehringer – a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer – earlier this summer and a finished manuscript has now been signed off by lawyers, according to The Sun .

Prince Harry’s highly-anticipated memoir is set to be released before the end of the year, with publishers Penguin Random House hoping to get the book on US shelves in time for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

When speaking to Winfrey, Harry revealed that he felt “trapped” in the construct of the institution and that his father had stopped taking his calls. Two months later, speaking on the Armchair Expert podcast, the Prince openly discussed his family’s “genetic pain and suffering” and said he wanted to “break the cycle” for his children.

Racism in the Royal Family

One of the biggest talking points to come out of Harry and Meghan’s TV interview with Winfrey was the couple’s claim that an unnamed member of the Royal Family questioned “how dark” baby Archie was going to be “and what that would mean or look like”. At the time, the Duchess of Sussex would not name names as she said it “would be very damaging to them”.

But Charlie Lankston in the Daily Mail said “Harry may well choose to name the person involved in his memoir – which would no doubt spark a furious backlash, and could well prompt an investigation into that royal’s behaviour”.

Bullying allegations

The prince might also want to put forward his wife’s side of the story on allegations that she “faced a bullying complaint made by one of her closest advisers” while working as a royal, as reported by The Times.

Sources told the paper at the time that she had been accused of driving “two personal assistants out of the household” and “undermining the confidence of a third staff member”.

His relationship with William

Meanwhile, Harry’s fractured relationship with his brother, thought to be triggered by his decision to step down from royal duties, has been widely reported on – but little is known about the precise details of the pair’s painful fallout.

This upcoming memoir “could well offer much more detail about his relationship with his brother – and finally bring to light the Prince's views on what exactly sparked the fall-out in the first place”, said Lankston in the Mail.

“If the project gives the Duke of Sussex an unfettered opportunity to give his side of the story of ‘Megxit’ – the couple’s 2019 decision to step back from royal duties – or settle the score on how the death of his mother, Princess Diana, was handled by the royals, it will doubtless make history,” added Page Six.

Will the Royal Family see the book before it’s published?

It has been reported that the Queen was the only member of the Royal Family who was told about Harry’s memoir before it was publicly announced, with sources close to the Prince of Wales telling The Times last year that Prince Charles and Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall, were “surprised” at the news.

The Telegraph said that the neither the Royal Family nor their lawyers “have yet had sight of the completed manuscript”.

By convention, “those potentially defamed in writing – including the Royal Family – are usually given a right to reply to accusations ahead of publication, with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex regularly asserting their own legal rights when it comes to articles about them”, added the paper.

While the Daily Mail said it is understood Harry “is keen for the book to show his grandmother in a positive light”, The Sun reported last year that the Royal Family is “getting lawyered up”. Senior palace aides are thought to be in talks with libel experts about the possibility of sending legal warnings to Penguin Random House.

Royal author Christopher Andersen told The Daily Beast that “Prince Charles’ operatives” had been “scrambling for months to find out what other bombshells await, but to no avail”.

“No one expected Harry’s book to be a valentine to his relatives,” Andersen continues. “But you get the sense in the wake of the jubilee that now the gloves are truly off.”

Can Donald Trump and Nigel Farage save GB News? | The Week UK

Donald Trump hinted he might run again for the US presidency, criticised Meghan Markle and professed his love for the Queen in a “freewheeling” interview with Nigel Farage for GB News.

The former president was at his Mar-a-Lago home in Palm Beach, South Florida, where he was joined by one-time Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage, now a broadcaster for the beleaguered news station, in what was billed as a “world exclusive”.

It was an interview that “broke little new ground”, said The Guardian, “beginning with the twice-impeached, one-term Republican president repeating the lie that the 2020 presidential election” was stolen from him. This was followed by further “gripes and complaints about his successor” Joe Biden, while he also “took aim” at UK targets including Boris Johnson and Meghan Markle, “whom he believes exploited her position in the royal family”.

“I’m not a fan of hers. I wasn’t from day one. I think Harry has been used horribly and I think some day he will regret it, he probably does already,” Trump told Farage. “I think it’s ruined his relationship with his family, and it hurts the Queen.”

The former president also criticised Johnson’s plans for the UK to become a leader in harnessing offshore wind energy, which he branded “a big mistake”.

“But I like him, I always got on with him [although] he’s gone a little on the liberal side,” he added.

Farage touched on the Capitol Hill attack, in which thousands of Trump supporters stormed the government building, but it was largely dismissed by the man himself, who claimed that “the insurrection took place on November 3 [election day]”.

A ‘box office’ night for GB News

The UK’s newest TV channel has got off to something of a “volatile start punctuated by technical gaffes and the noisy exit of its chairman and lead presenter Andrew Neil”, said The Telegraph.

But despite some “positive signals” – some flagship shows have begun to beat Sky News in certain time slots – GB News has yet to attract a significant audience, infamously “nursing zero viewers for some programmes shortly after launch”, said the paper. This begs the question: “can Trump’s blockbuster billing help GB News capitalise on its green shoots of growth?”

“Nigel’s certainly earning his fee”, said political blog Guido Fawkes, which thought the interview had been “box office” for the news channel. It reported seeing figures that show the interview pulled in “the largest GB News viewership since its original opening night”.

“For two whole hours between 7pm to 9pm, GB News beat the BBC’s average by 155,600 viewers to their 118,200, with Sky News some distance behind on 60,500. The interview reached 208,500 just after 7pm and held steady for the next hour,” reported the Westminister gossip site.

Lloyd Evans in The Spectator added that Farage had “delivered the shortest hour-long interview in TV history”.

GB News may have cleared 60 minutes of its schedule for Trump’s “bombshell” appearance, but “viewers soon realised that Farage had spent relatively little facetime with the former president” in an interview that was “bulked out… with snatches of personal analysis and Zoom calls with American pundits”.

For Whitehall correspondent Mikey Smith in The Mirror, the interview amounted to “two elderly guys whining at each other for an hour” as Farage occasionally “tossed his softball questions in return for a few scraps of news”.

“Perhaps Farage’s greatest triumph,” Smith concluded, “was to stretch what appeared to be a 15-minute sit-down interview into a full hour on the broadcast schedule.”

'Dominic Cummings was right': where government went wrong on ...

The government made “big mistakes” in its handling of the coronavirus pandemic according to a highly critical report from MPs.

“Groupthink” among ministers, scientific advisers and civil servants meant that the government was “not as open” as it should have been to introducing measures that had been successful in other nations, such as “earlier lockdowns, border controls and effective test and trace”, said the report from the cross-party health and science select committees.

The delays in introducing measures like lockdowns and social distancing in the early weeks of the pandemic rank as “one of the most important public health failures the United Kingdom has ever experienced” and earlier interventions could have saved thousands of lives, said the report.

The 150-page document is a result of a joint inquiry by the health and science select committees into the government’s pandemic response. MPs interviewed more than 50 witnesses, including former health secretary Matt Hancock, the government’s chief scientific adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, England’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, and former No. 10 adviser Dominic Cummings.

Cummings right in ‘groupthink’ criticism

The findings reveal Boris Johnson’s former aide Cummings to be “at least partly correct” in his criticism of the government that it was too slow to respond to the initial threat of the virus, said The Guardian. Cummings had previously accused ministers and officials of being hampered by a tendency towards what he called “false groupthink”.

Tory MP Greg Clark, chair of the science and technology committee, said it was “right” to view Cummings’ criticisms as having been endorsed by the report, telling the paper: “One of the regrets that he disclosed to the committee was that he had felt intimidated and stayed his hand in terms of challenging the early assumptions.”

Clark continued that Cummings’ difficulty in breaking away from consensus meant there was a need to “institutionalise challenge more” in the government response to a crisis, which allows for differing perspectives to be heard, including from different countries.

Pandemic response failures

Further failures highlighted in the report included the government’s approach to pandemic planning, which it said was “too narrowly and inflexibly” based on a model for a flu-type illness, resulting in “detailed preparations was for what turned out to be the wrong type of disease”, said the report.


Enter the haggis: South Jersey venues pay tribute to poet Robert ...

John Howard Fusco

Special to the Cherry Hill Courier-Post

In 1801, a tradition started when a few close friends of the beloved Scottish poet Robert Burns gathered together to celebrate his life (he had passed a few years prior), read his works, eat haggis and drink a little.

More than two centuries later, this supper continues to be held in locations throughout the world on or around Jan. 25, the birth date of Burns.

The suppers have a ritual that include the reading of Burns’ “Address to a Haggis” as the infamous Scottish delicacy is presented to the table, toasts to the lads and lassies, and the singing of “Auld Lang Syne.”

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Even here in South Jersey, you can find multiple Robert Burns celebrations taking place:

The South Jersey Celtic Society will hold its 14th annual Robert Burns Supper on Saturday, Jan. 19. This was the supper that used to be held at High Street Grill in Mount Holly, but now has moved to O’Connor’s American Bar & Grille in Eastampton. There will be singing, dancing, poetry reading, bagpipes and of course, dinner with haggis as one of the options. Beer is being provided locally by Spellbound Brewing in Mount Holly and Third State Brewing in Burlington. Seating is at 6:30 p.m., and tickets for the event are $80 per person and $150 per couple. 1383 Monmouth Road, Eastampton. sjceltic.org/events.html.

The new owners at The British Chip Shop in Haddonfield carry on the tradition of holding a Robert Burns Night on Jan. 25. Along with the Scottish fare (haggis, cock-a-leekie soup, neeps ‘n tatties), the evening is BYOW, as in bring your own whiskey. Now you could bring a Scottish single malt, or, you could try a locally-made whiskey. There’s Train Wreck Distillery’s Super Chief Straight Bourbon Whiskey or Fenwick’s New Salem Single Barrel Rye Whiskey from Pine Tavern Distillery. Both can be found in area liquor stores. Robert Burns Night will be from 6 to 9 p.m. 146 E. Kings Hwy., Haddonfield. (856) 354-0204. thebritishchipshop.com.

Earlier:Keep calm: British Chip Shop will carry on

Just opened last year, Josie Kelly’s Public House in Somers Point is hosting its own Burns Night Supper on Jan. 25th from 7 to 10 p.m. Food for the evening is a three-course meal the includes haggis as a main course, but you can choose to go with Scottish salmon or a garden pie (if you are going the vegetarian route). For an additional cost, you can include a Scotch single malt whisky tasting with selections from Jura Distillery located on the Isle of Jura. 908 Shore Road, Somers Point. (609) 904-6485. www.josiekellys.com.

And then there’s the biggest celebration of “Rabbie” in South Jersey - the Exit Zero Burns Dinner taking place down in Cape May on Jan. 26. Once held at The Ugly Mug, the event has gotten so big that the festivities have been moved to the Cape May Convention Hall. The evening’s meal includes a vegetarian version of haggis, as well as a shepherd’s pie if the haggis thing is not speaking to you. Doors open at 5 p.m., and the festivities start at 6:30 p.m. 714 Beach Ave., Cape May. (609) 770-8479. https://ezstore.us/burns-supper.

ALSO IN SOUTH JERSEY:


World population hits eight billion: why the milestone matters | The ...

On 31 October 2011, the human population hit 7 billion. Today, the world passed another significant milestone as we add another billion people to that tally.

The chosen date is an approximation based on modelling by the United Nations, but the symbolism is important. The figure of 8 billion people is precisely double what the world’s population was just 48 years ago.

And there are more of us on the way too. According to the UN’s projections the world will be home to about 9.7 billion humans in 2050 and around 10.4 billion by the 2080s.

These statistics raise questions that are “profoundly worrying”, said population and environmental health scientist Maureen Lichtveld in The Conversation, central among which is “will we have enough food for a growing global population?”

This question is not easy to answer, said Michael Le Page in New Scientist. Estimates on how many people can live sustainably on the planet “vary widely”. One 2020 study found that current food systems can properly sustain only 3 billion. But others have suggested that simply by reducing meat consumption and food waste we could feed up to 10 billion.

Many experts believe that our concerns about the demands on resources based on simple population figures slightly miss the point, said The Japan Times. Instead of a fear of overpopulation, we should be worried about overconsumption by the wealthiest among us.

“Our impact on the planet is driven far more by our behaviour than by our numbers,” Jennifer Sciubba, a researcher at the Wilson Center think tank in Washington told the newspaper. “It’s lazy and damaging to keep going back to overpopulation,” she added, because it allows people in wealthier nations to blame the world’s problems on developing countries where population growth is highest.

A burgeoning global population is not all doom and gloom, according to Dr Elin Charles-Edwards, a population geographer and demographer at the University of Queensland.

“As a demographer, we’re really optimistic people because we’ve seen massive change over the past 100 years,” Charles-Edwards told Australia’s national broadcaster ABC. “Everyone’s living longer, fewer babies are dying, fewer women are dying. Across a whole range of metrics, we’re doing better than we did. We’ve seen lots of small actions creating massive change for people.”

Indeed it is important to keep our fears about overpopulation in check, agreed Frank Jacobs in Big Think. There may be 8 billion of us, but “let’s correct the navel-gazing so typical of our species and appreciate the wider perspective”.

Most of Earth’s biomass is made up of plants (82.5%). The second largest is bacteria (12.8%), and then fungi (2.2%). Humans, meanwhile, account for no more than 0.01% of total biomass.

“That’s less than half compared to all the world’s mollusks,” Jacobs said. “But then again, those mollusks don’t all want a car, a fridge, and a million other things all wrapped in plastic.”

This article first appeared in The Week’s Global Digest newsletter. Sign up for a preview of the international news agenda, sent to your inbox every Monday.

Is climate change reversible? | The Week UK

The words “extreme”, “intolerable” and “record-breaking” are cropping up more and more in news headlines about our planet’s climate. The Pakistani city of Jacobabad recently officially surpassed the temperature threshold that humans can withstand - “albeit briefly”, The Telegraph notes. Days later, experts in the US reported that a “heat dome” was to blame for blistering temperatures in the Pacific Northwest that saw the mercury hitting 46.6°C in the Oregon city of Portland. On the other side of the Atlantic, more than 150 people have died as a result of extreme flooding in Germany, with hundreds more missing, and further flood-related fatalities reported in neighbouring Belgium. And in Asia, authorities in Henan province issued the highest level of weather warning this week as torrential rain swept across wide swathes of north and central China. Each of these extreme weather events has triggered fresh warnings from scientists and politicians about the ever-increasing threat posed by climate change. As Germany and Belgium, along with parts of the Netherlands and Luxembourg, reeled from the effects of days of intense rainfall there, Potsdam-based climatologist Dieter Gerten told National Geographic that the situation was “not so surprising” to scientists. “The increase of extreme events is something we’ve seen in climate model projections," he added. So what can science tell us about the current course of climate change, and whether it can be slowed - or even reversed? Heating up Human activities have been heating the planet since the Industrial Revolution, a period commonly used as a baseline against which global temperatures are monitored. Global average temperatures increased rapidly in the second half of the 20th century, and “this warming has been particularly rapid since the 1970s“, says the Met Office. This acceleration has triggered calls for united action by world leaders. The “historic, durable and ambitious” goals set out in the 2015 Paris Agreement were lauded as “the world’s greatest diplomatic success” by The Guardian at the time of the signing. But on the treaty's fifth anniversary, in December 2020, the president of this year’s COP26 summit, Alok Sharma, told national leaders to be “honest” with themselves and admit that “as encouraging as all this ambition is, it is not enough”. Skip advert

In May, World Meteorological Organization (WMO) secretary-general Professor Petteri Taalas warned that new research findings had delivered “yet another wake-up call” about the need to fast-track commitments to slash greenhouse gas emissions and achieve carbon neutrality. According to a WMO climate update, there is a 90% chance that one of the years between 2021 and 2025 will become the hottest on record, and a 40% likelihood that the annual average global temperature will temporarily reach 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels in the same period. A separate WMO report published in April warned that monitoring showed that global greenhouse gas emissions increased in 2020, “despite setbacks from Covid-19” to industrial processes. And the decade from 2011 was the warmest on record, the report said. Future outlook Signatories of the Paris Agreement committed to limiting global warming to well below 2C and pursuing efforts to limit it to 1.5C. As the World Resources Institute (WRI) noted back in 2018, this difference of “half a degree of warming matters - a lot”. The London-based think tank pointed to research from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a group of the world’s leading climate scientists, which found that with a 2C increase, 37% of the world’s population would be exposed to severe heat waves at least once in five years, compared with 14% at 1.5C of warming. And “at 2C warming, 18% of insects globally, 16% of plants and 8% of vertebrates are projected to lose more than half of their ranges”, said the WRI. “With 1.5C of warming, this is reduced by two-thirds for insects, and by half for plants and vertebrates.” The difference of half a degree could also prove crucial in the Arctic, where global warming is triggering rising sea levels, sea ice loss and changes to permafrost. “Over the past 49 years, the Arctic has warmed three times faster than the world as a whole,” according to the latest annual update from the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme, which predicts that “the first ice-free September in the Arctic could occur as early as 2040”. Global warming is also expected to lead to an increase in the frequency and severity of extreme weather events. Freak weather “such as abnormally heavy rainfall, prolonged droughts, desertification, environmental degradation, or sea-level rise and cyclones, are already causing an average of more than 20 million people to leave their homes and move to other areas in their countries each year”, says the UN Refugee Agency. Climate change has major implications for the production of goods and services needed to sustain communities too, especially in industies such as agriculture. A report published in The Lancet recently warns that “both labour supply and productivity are projected to decrease under future climate change in most parts of the world, and particularly in tropical regions”. Skip advert


The Doomsday Clock reveals how close we are to...doom | CNN

CNN —

The Doomsday Clock has been ticking for exactly 75 years. But it’s no ordinary clock.

It attempts to gauge how close humanity is to destroying the world.

On Thursday, the clock was set at 100 seconds until midnight – the same time it has been since 2020.

The clock isn’t designed to definitively measure existential threats, but rather to spark conversations about difficult scientific topics such as climate change, according to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, which created the clock in 1947.

“One hundred seconds to midnight reflects the Board’s judgment that we are stuck in a perilous moment – one that brings neither stability nor security. Positive developments in 2021 failed to counteract negative, long-term trends,” said Sharon Squassoni, co-chair of the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board, which sets the clock. Squasson is also a research professor at the Institute for International Science and Technology Policy at The George Washington University.

What is the Doomsday Clock?

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists was a group of atomic scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project, the code name for the development of the atomic bomb during World War II.

Originally, it was conceived to measure nuclear threats, but in 2007 the Bulletin made the decision to include climate change in its calculations.

Over the last three-quarters of a century, the clock’s time has changed, according to how close the scientists believe the human race is to total destruction. Some years the time changes, and some years it doesn’t.

The Doomsday Clock is set every year by the experts on the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which includes 11 Nobel laureates.

Although the clock has been an effective wake-up call when it comes to reminding people about the cascading crises the planet is facing, some have questioned the 75-year-old clock’s usefulness.

“It’s an imperfect metaphor,” Michael E. Mann, climate scientist at Pennsylvania State University, told CNN, highlighting that the clock’s framing combines different types of risk that have different characteristics and occur in different timescales. Still, he adds it “remains an important rhetorical device that reminds us, year after year, of the tenuousness of our current existence on this planet.”

Theoretical physicist and former member of the Bulletin’s Board of Sponsors Lawrence Krauss said it can be difficult to take the clock’s results seriously since it’s been ticking dangerously close to the end of civilization in the last few decades. Each year, he said, as the clock nears midnight, scientists would have to gauge how much available “real estate” is left before deciding on how much farther to move the clock.

“Now, it ticks in seconds; it used to be minutes,” Krauss told CNN. “It is clearly not a quantifiable scientific assessment, more of a qualitative one. What has always been important is the movement of the clock, not its absolute value.”

Every model has constraints, said Eryn MacDonald, analyst with the Union of Concerned Scientists’ Global Security Program, adding that the Bulletin has made thoughtful decisions each year on how to get the people’s attention about existential threats and the required action.

“While I wish we could go back to talking about minutes to midnight instead of seconds, unfortunately that no longer reflects reality,” she told CNN.

What happens if the clock reaches midnight?

The clock has never reached midnight, and Rachel Bronson, Bulletin president and CEO, hopes it never will.

“When the clock is at midnight, that means there’s been some sort of nuclear exchange or catastrophic climate change that’s wiped out humanity,” she said. “So we never really want to get there and we won’t know it when we do.”

How accurate is the clock?

The clock’s time isn’t meant to measure threats, but rather to spark conversation and encourage public engagement in scientific topics like climate change and nuclear disarmament.

If the clock is able to do that, then Bronson views it as a success.

When a new time is set on the clock, people listen, she said. At the COP26 climate talks in Glasgow, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson cited the Doomsday Clock when talking about the climate crisis the world is facing, Bronson noted.

Bronson said she hopes people will discuss whether they agree with their decision and have fruitful talks about what the driving forces of the change are.

It’s still possible to move the clock back with bold, concrete actions. In fact, the hand has moved farthest away from midnight with a whopping 17 minutes before midnight in 1991, when President George H.W. Bush’s administration signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with the Soviet Union. In 2016, the clock was at three minutes before midnight as a result of the Iran nuclear agreement and the Paris climate accord.

What can an individual do to turn back time on the clock?

Don’t underestimate the power of talking about these important issues with your peers, Bronson said.

“You might not feel it because you’re not doing anything, but we know that public engagement moves (a) leader to do things,” she said.

For climate change, look at your daily habits and see if there are small changes you can make in your life such as how often you walk versus drive and how your home is heated, Bronson explained.

Megan Marples Rachel Ramirez
Megan Marples
Rachel Ramirez

Doomsday clock 2022: Scientists say it's still 100 seconds to midnight

It's still only 100 seconds to midnight.

Ongoing nuclear risks, the threat of climate change, disruptive technologies and the seemingly endless coronavirus pandemic have brought us as close to doomsday as we've ever been, according to the annual Doomsday Clock announcement Thursday in Washington, D.C.

The countdown point is the same as last year's. The clock remains closer to destruction than at any point since it was created in 1947.

The 2022 Doomsday Clock statement explains that the “decision does not, by any means, suggest that the international security situation has stabilized. On the contrary, the clock remains the closest it has ever been to civilization-ending apocalypse because the world remains stuck in an extremely dangerous moment.”

Rachel Bronson, president and CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists said the clock "continues to hover dangerously, reminding us about how much work is needed to be done to ensure a safer and healthier planet. We must continue to push the hands of the clock away from midnight."

Each year, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a nonprofit group that sets the clock, decides whether the events of the previous year pushed humanity closer to or further from destruction. The clock “conveys how close we are to destroying our civilization with dangerous technologies of our own making," according to the group.

The closer to midnight we are, the more danger we're in, according to the bulletin. The clock uses the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and a nuclear explosion (countdown to zero) to convey threats to humanity and the Earth.

'HISTORIC WAKE-UP CALL' IN 2021: After a brutal 2020, Doomsday Clock is still 100 seconds to midnight

The furthest the clock has been from midnight was 17 minutes in 1991, at the end of the Cold War.

The clock has been maintained by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists since 1947. The group was founded in 1945 by Albert Einstein, J. Robert Oppenheimer and University of Chicago scientists who helped develop the first nuclear weapons in the Manhattan Project.

100 SECONDS TO MIDNIGHT IN 2020:We're closer to destruction than ever before

And even though the Cold War ended three decades ago, nuclear risks remain a grave threat to humanity. "Signs of new arms races are clear," the Bulletin's Scott Sagan said Thursday.

“The clock is not set by signs of good intentions, but by evidence of action or in this case inaction."

Climate change, caused by the burning of fossil fuels such as oil, gas and coal, is also among the major threats cited by the Doomsday clock authors.

Doomsday clock reset to 100 seconds to midnight, world's destruction

The closer to midnight we are, the more danger we're in.

The clock has been maintained by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists since 1947.

"We are now expressing how close the world is to catastrophe in seconds – not hours, or even minutes."

The world is 100 seconds to "midnight," according to the Doomsday Clock, closer to destruction than at any point since the clock was created in 1947.

Each year, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a nonprofit group that sets the clock, decides whether the events of the previous year pushed humanity closer to or further from destruction. The clock “conveys how close we are to destroying our civilization with dangerous technologies of our own making," according to the group.

This year, the group moved the clock from two minutes to 100 seconds to midnight. The closer to midnight we are, the more danger we're in, according to the Bulletin.

“We are now expressing how close the world is to catastrophe in seconds – not hours or even minutes," said Rachel Bronson, president and CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. "It is the closest to Doomsday we have ever been in the history of the Doomsday Clock.

"We now face a true emergency – an absolutely unacceptable state of world affairs that has eliminated any margin for error or further delay."

In a statement, the Bulletin said, “Humanity continues to face two simultaneous existential dangers – nuclear war and climate change – that are compounded by a threat multiplier, cyber-enabled information warfare, that undercuts society’s ability to respond.

"Civilization-ending nuclear war – whether started by design, blunder or simple miscommunication – is a genuine possibility," the group said. "Climate change that could devastate the planet is undeniably happening. And for a variety of reasons that include a corrupted and manipulated media environment, democratic governments and other institutions that should be working to address these threats have failed to rise to the challenge."

The furthest the clock has been from midnight was 17 minutes in 1991, near the end of the Cold War.

Nuclear threat:Nuclear war between India and Pakistan could kill up to 125 million and launch a global climate catastrophe

The Doomsday Clock has moved closer to midnight in three of the past four years. The Doomsday Clock did not move in 2019 after its minute hand was set forward in 2018 by 30 seconds, to two minutes before midnight.

The clock has been maintained by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists since 1947. The group was founded in 1945 by University of Chicago scientists who helped develop the first nuclear weapons in the Manhattan Project.

The scientists created the clock in 1947, using the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and a nuclear explosion (countdown to zero) to convey threats to humanity and the Earth.

The decision was made by the board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, along with input from a board of sponsors that includes 13 Nobel Laureates.

The announcement was made Thursday morning at the National Press Club in Washington.

Climate change:Were the predictions we made about climate change 20 years ago accurate? Here's a look

Doomsday clock ticks closer to midnight, now two minutes away

Scientists moved the hands of the symbolic "Doomsday Clock" closer to midnight on Thursday amid increasing worries over nuclear weapons and climate change.

The clock is now two minutes to midnight. “Because of the extraordinary danger of the current moment, the Science and Security Board today moves the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock 30 seconds closer to catastrophe," said Rachel Bronson, president of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. "This is the closest the Clock has ever been to Doomsday, and as close as it was in 1953, at the height of the Cold War.”

Each year, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a non-profit group that sets the clock, decides whether the events of the previous year pushed humanity closer or farther from destruction.

The symbolic clock is now the closest it's been to midnight since 1953. It was also two minutes to midnight in 1953 when the hydrogen bomb was first tested.

"We've made the clear statement that we feel the world is getting more dangerous," said Lawrence Krauss, chair of the Bulletin's Board of Sponsors and director of Arizona State University's Origins Project. "The danger of nuclear conflagration is not the only reason the clock has been moved forward."

The announcement was made in Washington, D.C., at the National Press Club.

Scientists blamed a cocktail of threats ranging from dangerous political rhetoric to the potential of a nuclear threat as the catalysts for moving the clock closer toward doomsday.

The statement explaining the resetting of the time of the Doomsday Clock notes: “In 2017, world leaders failed to respond effectively to the looming threats of nuclear war and climate change, making the world security situation more dangerous than it was a year ago — and as dangerous as it has been since World War II.

"The greatest risks last year arose in the nuclear realm. North Korea’s nuclear weapons program appeared to make remarkable progress in 2017, increasing risks for itself, other countries in the region, and the United States," the statement continued.

"Hyperbolic rhetoric and provocative actions on both sides have increased the possibility of nuclear war by accident or miscalculation."

"On the climate change front, the danger may seem less immediate, but avoiding catastrophic temperature increases in the long run require urgent attention now. The nations of the world will have to significantly decrease their greenhouse gas emissions to keep climate risks manageable, and so far, the global response has fallen far short of meeting this challenge,” the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists said.

"Today’s Doomsday Clock announcement must serve as an urgent wake-up call — and could be the last one we get," said Derek Johnson, the executive director of Global Zero, a group that wants to eliminate nuclear weapons.

“Last year, the Clock ticked forward largely in response to candidate Trump’s alarming campaign rhetoric. But the reality of a nuclear-armed President Trump running loose in the world is worse than we feared, and that is clearly a central factor in this decision," Johnson said.

The closer to a setting of midnight it gets, the closer it's estimated that a global disaster will occur. The farthest it's been from midnight was in 1991 as the Cold War ended when the clock was 17 minutes to midnight.

The clock has been maintained by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists since 1947. The group was founded in 1945 by University of Chicago scientists who had helped develop the first nuclear weapons in the Manhattan Project.

The scientists created the clock in 1947 using the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero) to convey threats to humanity and the Earth.

Doomsday Clock ticks closer to apocalypse and 1 person is to blame

Mary Bowerman

USA TODAY Network

Scientists moved the hands of the Doomsday Clock closer to midnight on Thursday amid increasing worries over nuclear weapons and climate change.

Each year, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a nonprofit that sets the clock, decides whether the events of the previous year pushed humanity closer or further from destruction. The symbolic clock is now two-and-a-half minutes from midnight, the closest it's been to midnight since 1953, when the hydrogen bomb was first tested. Scientists blamed a cocktail of threats ranging from dangerous political rhetoric to the potential of nuclear threat as the catalyst for moving the clock closer towards doomsday.

“This year’s Clock deliberations felt more urgent than usual…as trusted sources of information came under attack, fake news was on the rise, and words were used by a President-elect of the United States in cavalier and often reckless ways to address the twin threats of nuclear weapons and climate change,” Rachel Bronson, the executive director and publisher of Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, said in a statement.

While many threats played into the decision to move the clock 30 seconds forward from where it was in 2016, one person in particular prompted the scientists to act.

"Never before has the Bulletin decided to advance the clock largely because of the statements of a single person. But when that person is the new president of the United States, his words matter," David Titley and Lawrence M. Krauss of the Bulletin wrote in an New York Times op-ed.

The Bulletin pointed to President Trump's careless rhetoric on nuclear weapons and other issues as well as his troubling stance on climate change.

“Current political situation in the U.S. is of particular concern,” Titley of the Bulletin Science and Security Board said. “The Trump administration needs to state clearly, unequivocally it accepts climate change caused by human activity…There are no alternative facts here.”

Last year, the clock remained at three minutes from midnight. It was moved to three minutes in 2015 where it was previously at five minutes to midnight.

Manhattan Project scientists, concerned about the first atomic weapons, founded the nonprofit Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists in 1945. They created the clock two years later, and update its minute hand each year.

This CEO got laser eye surgery to prep for an apocalypse

According to the group, the clock “conveys how close we are to destroying our civilization with dangerous technologies of our own making.”

The threat of nuclear warfare plays heavily into the time on the clock, as do the dangers of climate change the threat from cyber technology, according to the group’s website.

The decision is made by the board of the nonprofit Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists' along with input from a board of sponsors which includes 15 Nobel Laureates, according to the group.

Follow Mary Bowerman on Twitter: @MaryBowerman

Doomsday Clock: 'Three minutes' left until the apocalypse

Josh Hafner

USA TODAY

The Doomsday Clock, a symbolic countdown to the world’s end, stands still at three minutes until midnight, scientists announced Tuesday.

It remains at the position it moved to one year ago.

That the clock moves no closer to midnight, the indicated end of humanity, remains "grave" news, its makers stressed.

"Unless we change the way we think, humanity remains in serious danger," said Lawrence Krauss of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the nonprofit that sets the clock.

"Action now can reduce these threats," he said at an announcement in Washington, "but only if we recognize them honestly and face them head-on."

Manhattan Project scientists, concerned about the first atomic weapons, founded the nonprofit Bulletin in 1945. They created the clock two years later, and update its minute hand each year.

Just how the minute hand moves is determined by the Bulletin’s boards of directors and sponsors, which include environmental scientists, physicists and 18 Nobel Laureates, its site notes.

Krauss, a physicist who chairs the group's Board of Sponsors, said Tuesday that progress over the past year including America's nuclear deal with Iran and the Paris accord to slow climate change balanced out negative developments including tension between the U.S. and Russia and North Korea's pursuit of nuclear weaponry.

The clock remains at the closest it has pointed to mankind’s doom since 1984 amid the Cold War. The reasoning for its move there last year: rampant climate change and an ongoing threat of nuclear weapons.

“The probability of global catastrophe is very high,” Kennette Benedict, the Bulletin’s publisher at the time, said. “This is about the end of civilization as we know it."

The closest point it had been as of Tuesday morning was two minutes, in 1953, when the U.S. and Soviets had tested hydrogen bombs.

But the Doomsday Clock isn’t bound by time, and as such, can move backwards.

In 2010, an optimistic Bulletin did move the minute hand backwards, from five minutes to midnight to six, citing improved relations and nuclear talks between the U.S. and Russia and small advancements to address climate change.

In 1991, with the Cold War over, the clock moved back a full 17 minutes from midnight.

Follow Josh Hafner on Twitter: @joshhafner

5 things you need to know Tuesday

Editors

USA TODAY

The dig-out and the flight cancellations continue

The fallout from this past weekend’s storm continues Tuesday. At least 546 of the day’s flights have been canceled, bringing the tally of canceled flights due to the massive storm that hit the East to 13,400. Meanwhile, millions of Americans will continue to dig out from the 6.6 trillion cubic feet of snow that fell. Adding to Tuesday's complications: more showers are expected to hit the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast.

Has iPhone's success reached its peak?

When Apple CEO Tim Cook reports Tuesday on Apple's sales for the end of 2015, investors will be watching closely for any hints about how Apple's iPhone is faring in the current quarter. Sales usually fall somewhat after the holiday shopping season. But analysts say it appears Apple has cut production orders from key suppliers in recent weeks, suggesting it's lowered its own forecasts. If iPhone sales show an abrupt decline from the same period a year earlier, it will be the first time ever for the company that makes most of its money from the signature smartphone.

The final USA TODAY's GOP rankings are coming

Watch Tuesday morning for the final installment of the USA TODAY GOP Power Rankings — final because since actual voting begins next week, we no longer need to ask our panel of experts who is leading the Republican field. Instead we asked them to reflect on the lessons of a campaign season that has surprised everyone — or nearly everyone. Spoiler alert: Trump is still on top. See our penultimate installment here.

Presidential campaigns hit up Iowa

Which of the presidential candidates will be found in Iowa on Tuesday? Almost everyone. Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee, Marco Rubio, Carly Fiorina, Donald Trump and Ben Carson will all crisscross the the state on the Republican side. For the Democrats, Bernie Sanders will speak to a union while Hillary Clinton holds three "get out the caucus" events. The candidates are trying to woo voters with the Iowa caucuses only six days away.

Doomsday clock continues its tick down

Scientists will announce Tuesday their latest decision about how close the world is to global catastrophe … by announcing where they will place the hands on the so-called Doomsday Clock. The closer the clock is set to midnight, the closer it is estimated that a global disaster will occur. The symbolic clock has been maintained by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists since 1947. Last year, the clock was set to three minutes to midnight because of climate change and the ongoing threat of nuclear weapons.

And the essentials:

Weather: The East gets hit with showers on Tuesday and another round of rain soaks the Pacific Northwest.

Stocks: China’s benchmark index plunged more than 6% Tuesday, and U.S. stock futures pointed lower.

TV Tonight: Wondering what to watch tonight? TV critic Robert Bianco looks at Brooklyn Nine-Nine's special guest and Mine Wars.

If you missed Monday's news, we've got you covered.

Need a break? Try playing some of our games.

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Contributing: The Associated Press

The Short List: Doomsday clock ticks again; Brady on Deflategate ...

Cara Richardson and Alia E. Dastagir

USA TODAY

Tick, tick, tick: When the clock strikes 12, we're toast

Maybe those people on Doomsday Preppersaren't that off base. We are dangerously close to the end of the world, scientists said today as they moved the hand of the symbolic Doomsday Clock two minutes closer to midnight. They cited unchecked climate change and the threat of nuclear weapons. Some stark words you really don't want to hear from a lady who speaks for a group of atomic scientists: "The probability of global catastrophe is very high. This is about the end of civilization as we know it," said Kennette Benedict, the executive director and publisher of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. The Doomsday Clock was created in 1947 by scientists who had helped develop the first nuclear weapons in the Manhattan Project. Three minutes is the closest to midnight the clock has been since 1984, during the Cold War. The closest it has ever been to midnight — two minutes— was in 1953, when the hydrogen bomb was first tested. The closer to a setting of midnight it gets, the closer it's estimated that a global disaster will occur. So, are we doomed? Maybe. Meanwhile, we're stockpiling bottled water, Cheetos and blankets. Actually, we guess that's kind of our normal stash at #shortlistHQ. Let's hope we're all still here in the next millennium — and hey, maybe we'll give you #theshortlistin hologram form.

Today at Davos: Merkel's impeccable timing, sex and the prince, topless protester

The coordinated timing of news today at Davoscould be the making of a great conspiracy theory, writes USA TODAY editor-in-chief David Callaway. Here's what happened: In its most aggressive move yet to rouse the listless eurozone economy, the European Central Bank agreed today to buy 60 billion euros ($68.4 billion) a month in bonds to hold down interest rates and pump cash into the banking system. Merkel was speaking to the world's financial elite at the World Economic Forum when that announcement was supposed to happen. But the big reveal was delayed, and it was only as the German chancellor was smiling, waving and walking off stage that the headlines began pouring in from Frankfurt (Germany has opposed the ECB's stimulus package). Also at Davos, Britain's Prince Andrew denied the shocking allegations that he had sex with an underage American girl, as claimed in a Florida civil lawsuit. It was the first public appearance by the Duke of York, the second son of Queen Elizabeth II, since the allegations surfaced two weeks ago. And of course, it wouldn't be a meeting of global powers without a topless protester or two. Catch up on #Davos2015 here.

Tom Brady: Deflategate isn't ISIS

Quarterback Tom Brady had a press conference on Deflategate today, and he didn't really say much. What, did you expect him to confess to — him and Gisele lurking in the bowels of Gillette Stadium, sticking needles in the game footballs with a pressure gauge to make sure they were the perfect 9.8 PSI? Brady said he "didn't alter any football in any way," and stressed that he was way more focused on the game than on the pressure of the balls. He said the integrity of the game "is a very important issue," but also dropped "this isn't ISIS ... no one's dying." The presser came hours after his coach, Bill Belichick, held his own fascinatingly defiant press conference in which he denied all involvement and seemed to hang Brady out to dry (when Brady was asked about Belichick's comments during his own presser, he didn't bite). USA TODAY's Nancy Armour finds it hard to believe that "control-freak" Belichick has no idea how all of those footballs suddenly lost air pressure Sunday night. So, to recap, we didn't really learn much today at either press conference. But Gillette didn't mind.

Uber releases its first report on its drivers

Today Uber released a study that looks at who its drivers are and how much they make. The report showed the company's 160,000 drivers make an average of $16,000 a year. That might not seem like a lot, but the survey also found that roughly 52% of Uber drivers are part-time workers and that nearly a third of drivers have full-time jobs, and drive for extra cash. Uber has complete control over fares, which it's been reducing in many cities to attract new customers. That's irked some drivers, who protested the fare cuts. They said they were being paid less than minimum wage after expenses and compared Uber to retailer Walmart. You can read the full 28-page study here.

Senators want to know more about this spooky radar gun that can see through walls

Earlier this week, we told you about radar devices that can see into your home. Kiiiiinda gave us the heebie-jeebies. Apparently, they bothered some lawmakers, too, because the devices were the topic of a letter the Senate Judiciary Committee sent to Attorney General Eric Holder today. At least 50 U.S. law enforcement agencies have secretly equipped their officers with the technology, with little notice to the public or the courts. The devices work like very fine motion detectors, capable of determining whether someone is inside a building by detecting movement as slight as human breathing. The technology raises legal and privacy issues because the U.S. Supreme Court has said officers generally cannot use high-tech sensors to tell them about the inside of a person's house without first obtaining a search warrant. Sens. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, and Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the chairman and ranking Democrat of the Senate Judiciary Committee, raised questions about the radar and the sophisticated use of cellphone monitoring. They asked for a briefing by Feb. 13.

This just in: Saudi King Abdullah dead at 90.

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Put on your Potter glasses because you may have to read this one twice: Draco Malfoy (the actor) was sorted into Gryffindor.

Want to know what Mike Huckabee thinks about gay marriage? He talked to Susan Page on USA TODAY's Capital Download.

From the archives: Where to go to get weird.

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This is a compilation of stories from across USA TODAY.

Contributing: Doyle Rice, David Callaway, Brad Heath, Paul Davidson, Kim Hjelmgaard, Donna Leinwand Leger, Kaja Whitehouse, USA TODAY; Nancy Armour, Chris Chase, Nina Mandell, USA TODAY Sports

MSU's president resigns and No Oprah 2020: Thursday's Short List

Editors

USA TODAY

The Nassar domino: MSU president steps down

Now that Larry Nassar’s “death warrant” is signed with a prison sentence of 40 to 175 years, who else will be held accountable for the sexual abuses by the ex-Team USA Gymnastics doctor? Hours after his sentencing, we got an answer. Michigan State University President Lou Anna Simon announced her resignation. Many criticized Simon and MSU, where Nassar had worked. “It is only natural that I am the focus of this anger,” said Simon, who will get a generous benefits package that includes lifetime free tickets to MSU football games. While she denied a coverup, the U.S. Olympic Committee will investigate how Nassar’s abuses went on for so long. Ex-gymnast Lindsey Lemke said coach John Geddert, a longtime friend of Nassar's, should also go to prison for his alleged abuses.

Oprah 2020? Nope.

Oprah Winfrey has spoken: She’s not running for president. But she does think the Oprah 2020 mugs are “cute,” Winfrey told InStyle. Being president “is not something that interests me,” she said in the interview published Thursday. “I don’t have the DNA for it.” Fans became enamored with the idea of a Winfrey run after her inspiring speech at the Golden Globes this month focused on women, equality and sexual harassment. Fun fact: Even President Trump has said Winfrey could be a great force in Washington — as his vice president. The TV mogul continues to be a powerful voice for minorities, appearing on Vanity Fair’s 2018 Hollywood issue with others pushing for gender equality.

Car sick? It might be your Ford Explorer’s fault

A growing number of drivers have reported dizziness, nausea and vomiting that may be linked to carbon monoxide leaks in their Ford Explorer SUVs. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is evaluating safety complaints from more than 1,300 Explorer owners. The investigation is in the last stages before the agency can formally demand a recall, which could affect as many as 1.33 million Explorers from model years 2011-2017. Ford says its cars are safe, but customers can bring their vehicle to a local Ford dealer for a free service if they’re worried.

The Doomsday clock inchescloser to apocalypse

Things aren't looking good, friends. Scientists moved the hands of the symbolic "Doomsday Clock" closer to midnight on Thursday amid increasing worries over nuclear weapons and climate change. The clock is now two minutes until midnight, which is the closest it's been since 1953, when the hydrogen bomb was first tested. Each year, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a non-profit that sets the clock, decides whether events of the previous year pushed humanity closer to destruction. This year the clock was moved forward for various reasons, including North Korea's nuclear and missile threats. Cough, cough, President Trump. Is there anything we can do? The clock serves as a "wake-up call," which means there's time to change.

Nearly 20 years later, the XFL gears up for Season 2

Congratulations XFL fans, if you’re still out there, your patience is finally being rewarded. World Wrestling Entertainment founder Vince McMahon announced Thursday that he is relaunching the XFL — a professional football league independent of the NFL. McMahon’s plan to make the XFL great again has its skeptics. Which seems fair since the 2001 XFL was a dismal failure that survived only one season.

This is a compilation of stories from across USA TODAY.


Quiz of The Week: 21 – 27 January | The Week UK

As the conflict between Russia and Ukraine entered its 12th month, a long-awaited decision by Western nations has offered fresh hope to Kyiv.

Following months of hesitancy, Germany this week agreed to send 14 of its sought-after Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine and gave allies permission to send theirs too. The US is also sending 31 of its highly advanced Abrams tanks.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy welcomed the announcements, but stressed that the timing of the tanks delivery would be “critical”. After a slight lull in the conflict at the start of the year, battles are raging not only between the traditional militaries but also private military companies (PMCs) enlisted by both sides, with the Wagner Group leading the way in Russian attacks.

With both Zelenskyy and the Kremlin warning that a peaceful resolution is unlikely to be reached any time soon, the world is watching to see how Western tanks may change the course of the war.

To find out how closely you’ve been paying attention to the latest developments in the news and other global events, put your knowledge to the test with our Quiz of The Week

Need a reminder of some of the other headlines over the past seven days?