China: Problems Persist Despite Trade Talks
On October 10, President Donald Trump unveiled plans for a 100% tariff on Chinese imports and new export controls on software. But just weeks later, talks between top US and Chinese officials shifted the narrative again, offering a glimpse of a potential deal that could avert deeper conflict—at least for now.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on October 26 that negotiators had forged a trade framework that could forestall the 100% tariff increase. The framework could also delay China’s rare earths export restrictions for a year while it reconsiders its policy. The talks occurred against the backdrop of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, an event at which Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping were scheduled to meet at press time.
Vina Nadjibulla, vice president for research and strategy at the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, pointed out that the US tariffs were being framed in China as the chief culprit for its economic slowdown—but she noted the country’s troubles go beyond tariff wars.
“The reality is that China’s slowdown is overwhelmingly driven by domestic, structural issues: a prolonged property bust that’s sapping household wealth and confidence, weak consumption, local-government debt, and private-sector caution after years of regulatory churn—problems that predate the latest tariff rounds,”
Vina Nadjibulla, vice president for research and strategy at the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada
While the US tariffs have undoubtedly disrupted Chinese exports, China, for its part, has adapted in some ways. For example, it’s no longer as reliant on the US as it once was, according to Wei Liang, a professor at Middlebury Institute of International Studies.
After all, high tariffs have been in place since 2018, Trump’s first term. “Today, the largest trading partner of China is not the US, but Southeast Asia and the EU,” Liang says. So, the potential escalation of tariffs from 25% to 100%, she explains, would have had a limited impact anyway.
And while Bessent expects a tariff truce with China to extend beyond the November 10 deadline, the tension between both nations has intensified and will likely persist. What will change that? “Different leadership,” Liang adds. New leaders, both in the US or in China, “might choose different strategies and better manage their bilateral differences.”
Notre Dame beats Laguna Beach in Division 3 playoff opener
For its Southern Section Division 3 football playoff opener on Friday night against Laguna Beach, Sherman Oaks Notre Dame brought in a “ringer” assistant coach this week to get its running backs a little tougher.
Former UCLA coach DeShaun Foster dropped by to offer lessons, particularly to his sophomore stepson, Noel Washington.
“He helped a lot,” Washington said. “Having him here means a lot. He’s been making us practice a lot harder.”
And what was the impact? Washington had touchdown runs of 35, two and 32 yards to help Notre Dame (6-5) come away with a 44-28 victory and advance to a home game next week against Chino Hills. He finished with 83 yards in 11 carries.
Safety Tahj Skinner of Sherman Oaks Notre Dame is happy after getting his sixth interception of the season.
(Craig Weston)
Junior quarterback Jack Hurst of Laguna Beach and West Virginia-bound senior quarterback Wyatt Brown of Notre Dame kept making plays all night. Hurst completed 32 of 51 passes for 417 yards and four touchdowns. Brown completed 16 of 31 passes for 232 yards and one touchdown. He ran for 61 yards and one touchdown.
The most important completion for Brown came with 7:38 left on third and 17 with Notre Dame clinging to a 34-28 lead. He found sophomore Emmanuel Pullins for a 19-yard completion. Then Pullins made a 31-yard catch. It set up a 21-yard field goal by Nico Marliani for a 37-28 lead with 2:22 left.
“Huge,” Notre Dame coach Evan Yabu said of the third-down reception.
“I just saw him one on one with no safety coverage,” Brown said.
Said Pullins: “I’m ready for those situations. Before the game, I promised myself to go for the ball.”
It became a wild game in the second half because Laguna Beach (9-2) refused to go down without a fight. After Andre Gamboa picked up a fumble on a high Laguna Beach snap to score a touchdown to start the third quarter, Notre Dame looked ready to pull away with a 28-14 lead.
Hurst responded with a four-yard touchdown pass to Grant Regal. Brown ran 10 yards for a touchdown and a 34-21 Notre Dame lead. Back came Hurst, who fired a 40-yard touchdown pass to Otis Boultinghouse.
“We knew it wasn’t going to be easy,” Brown said. “They throw a punch, we throw a punch back.”
In defeat, Laguna Beach made clear it will be a team to reckon with next season. Two freshmen, lineman Luke Bogdan and running back Charlie Christian, kept making plays like they will be future stars. The receiving corp made up mostly of juniors kept making catches for Hurst, who finished the season with 45 touchdown passes. The Breakers were hurt by two fumbles and an interception.
“It was a fun game,” Washington said. “They are tough and play hard.”
A mistake by Brown late in the first half helped Laguna Beach get back into the game. Brown had a pass intercepted by Will Kimball with 1:01 left on a scramble with Notre Dame leading 21-7. Hurst drove the team down to score on a four-yard touchdown reception by Kimball with four seconds left to make it 21-14 at halftime.
Two touchdown runs by Washington and a 25-yard touchdown reception by Luc Weaver accounted for the Knights’ first-half scores.
Tahj Skinner of Notre Dame picked up his sixth interception of the season. Notre Dame lost its standout nose tackle, Chris Colon, for next week’s game after being ejected for two 15-yard personal foul penalties.
Orbán seeks to revive Trump-Putin summit in White House visit
Nov. 7 (UPI) — Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán visited the White House Friday for a summit with President Donald Trump and lavished praise on the president while disparaging former President Joe Biden.
“The reason why we are here, to open a new chapter between the bilateral relation between the United States and Hungary basically because during the Democrat administration everything was rigged,” Orbán said, according to The Hill.
“Everything was basically broke, ruined, cancelled. A lot of harm done by the previous administration,” he said. “You’ve improved the bilateral relationship. You repaired what was done badly by the previous administration, so now we are in quite a good position to open up a new chapter. Let’s say a golden age between the United States and Hungary.”
Orbán wants Trump to come to Budapest and to meet with Russia President Vladimir Putin about the Ukraine war. Trump has already canceled one meeting, saying he didn’t want to “have a waste of time.”
Orbán also came to the White House to ask Trump to give Hungary an exception to the sanctions on buying Russian oil. The president said he might exempt Hungary from those sanctions.
He also called on European leaders to be more respectful of Orbán, who has faced battles with them over migration, democracy and rule of law.
“I think they should respect Hungary and respect this leader very, very strongly because he’s been right on immigration,” Trump said.
Hungary claims it must buy Russian oil because it has no other viable source.
“We’re looking at it because it’s very difficult for him to get the oil and gas from other areas,” Trump said. “It’s a big country, but they don’t have sea. They don’t have the ports. And so they have a difficult problem.”
He also accused other European countries of buying Russian oil and gas. They “don’t have those problems, and they buy a lot of oil and gas from Russia. And, as they know, I’m very disturbed by that.”
Trump and Orbán are both conservative leaders who share similar values, including a dislike of immigration.
“Look what’s happened to Europe with the immigration. They have people flooding Europe,” Trump said. “You go to some of the countries, they’re unrecognizable now because of what they’ve done. And Hungary is very recognizable.”
Orbán defended his migration policies, blaming Europe.
“This is the absurd world we are living in now in Europe,” Orbán said. “We are the only government in Europe which considers itself as a Christian government. All the other governments in Europe are basically liberal leftist governments.”
In September, Trump lifted travel restrictions against Hungarians, readmitting them to the Visa Waiver program. Biden had added restrictions against Hungarians when he learned that Budapest was granting Hungarian citizenship without adequate security measures.
The Guardian reported that at Friday’s meeting, Orbán was expected to try to set up another meeting between the two leaders not only to broker peace in Ukraine, but to also boost his own standing as a statesman.
Citing insiders, the news outlet said the far-right leader is facing stiff opposition ahead of April’s parliamentary elections, and a visit from Trump would potentially boost support among conservatives.
“Orbán wants Trump to come to Budapest before the elections,” an unnamed source working in the Hungarian government told The Guardian. “This is a top priority. They will discuss the Russian gas issue, but the thing Orbán cares about the most is the elections.”
In a post on X on Thursday, Orbán said Trump’s first 10 months back in office have repaired the relationship between the United States and Hungary. He said the Biden administration damaged that relationship through “politically motivated sanctions.”
“Our goal is to establish a strategic partnership that includes energy cooperation, investments, defense collaboration, and discussions on the post-war landscape following the Russia-Ukraine conflict,” Orbán wrote.
“We are working on an agreement based on mutual benefits — one that serves the interests of every Hungarian citizen.”
Trump told reporters last week that Orbán wants an exemption from the oil and gas sanctions.
“We haven’t granted one, but he has asked,” Trump said aboard Air Force One. “He’s a friend of mine. He’s asked for an exemption.”
Woman critical after ‘unprovoked attack’
Chloe Hughes and
Amy Cole,Birmingham
BBCA woman is in a critical condition after being stabbed in the neck in an “unprovoked attack” in Birmingham city centre.
A man in his 20s has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder after the attack on Friday night.
West Midlands Police said officers were called to Smallbrook Queensway shortly before 21:00 GMT.
A woman in her 30s suffered a serious neck injury and is in hospital in a critical condition, the force said.
It said a man was arrested close to the scene and remained in custody.
Officers are currently carrying out inquiries near the scene, which is in an extremely busy part of the city centre near to the Bullring shopping centre.
A police tent remains on the pavement, just outside the Bullring and opposite the main entrance to New Street railway station.
“We believe this was an unprovoked attack and are working to understand why it happened,” said Det Insp James Nix.
“We will have officers in the area today to continue our investigation and provide reassurance.
“We are not currently looking for anyone else in connection with this incident.”
The force has appealed for witnesses, and urged anyone who knows more to contact 101.
St Martin’s Queensway westbound has been closed from Moor Street Queensway to Smallbrook Queensway.
Buses are being diverted onto Moor Street.
The cordon is expected to be in place all day, the BBC has been told.
Big Brother star breaks huge record with eviction live on air as fans make same complaint
Viewers had one major complaint about Big Brother as a live eviction saw one housemate break a huge record on the show but not everyone was happy with the coverage
Big Brother star Nancy Nocerino broke a major record on the show as she evicted on Friday. As the 22-year-old graduate sat down to discuss her exit with show hosts AJ Odudu and Will Best, she appeared unfazed as they revealed to her that with 26 nominations she was the most nominated housemate of the series so far.
AJ then confirmed that she is also the most nominated BBUK housemate since 2013. Nancy took on the information, giggling and doing a victory dance as she exclaimed, “you’re joking,” before AJ asked her, “Why do you think that is?”
Nancy then responded, “well, I don’t know, I think it’s just, jealousy, maybe,” as she cheekily poked out her tongue and turned to look at the audience. She was given the boot in a double eviction alongside fellow controversial housemate, Caroline, who has been slammed for her treatment of Richard.
Fans of the show watching the exit interviews then took to X to slam AJ and Will for their interview technique as they failed to really address the issues surrounding the two housemates. Many then shared the same viewpoint, calling for the return of former hosts Emma Willis or Davina McCall to conduct the interviews.
One viewer wrote, “AJ and Will are terrible interviewers. They’ve not remotely tried to hold Caroline to account for her vile bullying of Richard.”
A second uploaded a picture of former host Emma and posted, “We needed her tonight for that Caroline interview #BBUK.”
A third commented, “Sorry but AJ and Will were very weak with Caroline there. They did not call her out on anything, no way would Davina or Emma have been so pathetic. #BBUK #BBLL.”
A fourth social media user shared, “Davina was fantastic, she was Big Brother. She happily handed the batton to Emma Willis who is one of the best with people and at asking the right questions, a true fan too. AJ and Will do not cut it at all, chaotic and bland #BBUK.”
The criticism continued with more viewers slamming AJ and Will as another scathed, “I really wanted AJ and Will to learn from the past few years of presenting this show and thought they would press both members of the clique but they just lauded both of them. No pressing questions, no challenges at all. God i miss Emma Willis #BBUK.”
However, some viewers were positive, with one writing: “This is so funny watching AJ & Will just tell Nancy she was wrong. Every thought she had in the house, was wrong. #BBUK.” A second said: “Obsessed with AJ calling Nancy out for flashing the British public on live tv #bbuk.”
A third tweeted: “AJ fighting for her life right now and trying to stay impartial #BBUK #BBLL.”
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Britain’s ‘most picturesque village’ has one of best roast dinners with tasty gravy
If traditional British cuisine is your thing, you might want to head to this pretty village in the north east
Tucked away in the northeast of England lies one of Britain’s most picturesque villages.
Sitting high above the North Yorkshire Moors, the seaside treasure of Staithes was formerly a thriving fishing harbour in the North East.
Rich in heritage, Staithes is also home to one of the area’s best Sunday roasts, dished up at The Captain Cook Inn.
The Captain Cook Inn boasts an enviable location, set amongst the clifftops with sweeping views across the charming cobbled lanes and peaceful shoreline beneath.
Customers have flocked to Tripadvisor to sing the praises of the pub’s roast dinners, reports the Express.
One delighted customer declared: “Had a fabulous Sunday Roast, plenty of it and the beef was so tender and very moreish!”.
Sharing this view, another guest commented: “The meal was absolutely delicious. The meat was so tender and the vegetables were al dente. Just how we like them. Big fluffy Yorkshire and rich gravy. Could have eaten a whole plate of their roast potatoes.”
Alongside the celebrated roast, the establishment serves traditional favourites including steak pie, scampi and chips, and golden whitebait for starters.
Ale lovers can enjoy a range of brews, including the signature tipple, Northern Navigator, produced specially for the inn by the North Yorkshire Brewery, just 15 miles down the road.
Little wonder that The Captain Cook Inn received Tripadvisor’s Travellers’ Choice Award. Visitors to the village can delve into its rich history, which is dominated by its most famous historical figure – Captain James Cook.
The Staithes Heritage Centre and Captain Cook Museum offer a trip back in time, recreating the shop where the famed explorer once worked as a grocer’s apprentice.
This delightful centre is filled with a collection that includes books, letters, and medals, transporting visitors back to the era of Captain Cook.
Staithes, also known for its vibrant artistic heritage, was once home to a significant group of artists known as the “Staithes group” or the “Northern Impressionists”.
Today, the pride of the village, the Staithes Gallery, showcases an impressive range of contemporary artwork, including paintings, photographs, and sculptures, all inspired by the charming village and its scenic surroundings.
For those interested in prehistoric discoveries, Staithes sits on the renowned Dinosaur Coast, offering plenty of opportunities for uncovering the past.
Tucked away within the village’s harbour is the sheltered Staithes Beach; when the tide goes out, it reveals a captivating world of rockpools filled with fossils and tiny sea creatures, providing endless fascination for any keen fossil hunter.
Further escapades await along the Cleveland Way National Trail, a 109-mile stretch that offers breathtaking views, from dramatic moorlands to historic coastal castles and quaint fishing villages, running from Filey to Helmsley.
After your adventures, relax at the quayside at the Cod and Lobster pub, renowned for its extensive seafood menu including its signature dish: a delicious pan-fried Cod Fillet served with a rich Lobster Bisque, homemade Potato Rosti and spinach, topped with a juicy Lobster tail or Claw.
Not to be overlooked, the Cod and Lobster also serve up mouth-watering hot and cold sandwiches alongside traditional pub favourites.
Finally, end your day with a visit to Dotty’s Vintage Tearoom, where you can enjoy a taste of yesteryear with their delightful homemade cheese or fruit scones, hearty toasties, and a comforting brew.
Staithes, while being acknowledged as one of the most picturesque villages, also boasts a rich history, exciting adventures, and first-rate cuisine.
I went to the Portuguese city known for its very phallic pastries
JUST an hour away from Porto in Portugal lies a historic riverside city with a curious culinary tradition.
Amarante, perched on a bend of the Tamega river, has become widely known for its pastries — not because of their flavour or filling, but their shape.
The treats, named bolos de Sao Goncalo after the local patron saint, are baked to look like a particular part of the male anatomy.
Many believe they are a nod to Saint Goncalo’s success as a matchmaker, after he supposedly helped scores of single women and widows find husbands.
But the pastries’ story actually dates to medieval times.
As I tour the Sao Goncalo Church and Monastery, I learn that the shape is reminiscent of the ancient rituals and traditions related to prosperity and the fertility gods.
Over time, the cakes gradually became associated with Saint Goncalo, and even though they were banned during Portugal’s dictatorship, which ended in 1974, they have since been embraced by the people of Amarante as a proud symbol of local identity.
People who are looking for love or hoping to start a family still visit the monastery today, reciting a hopeful prayer while clutching the rope belt on his statue.
Decorated inside with ornate gold leaf carvings and traditional Portuguese tiles, the beautiful 400-year-old building is worth a visit, regardless of your hopes for love.
But I was more interested in sampling the phallic pastries.
Confeitaria da Ponte, the city’s oldest bakery — so named because of its proximity to the bridge — is a great place to try the much- loved bakes.
Owner Joana Machado tells me that Amarante delicacies are generally made with lots of egg yolks.
This includes their house speciality — a moist, round, bite-sized confection coated with sugar that is also called a bolo de Sao Goncalo, although this one looks far less phallic.
“The recipes began in the monastery,” she explains. “Nuns used the egg whites to iron the clothes, so they used the yolks for baking.” The famous pastel de nata, or Portuguese custard tart, is another example of a “conventual” sweet (meaning originating in a convent).
At riverside cafe Casa dos bolos de Sao Goncalo, on Rua 31 de Janeiro, the classic penis cake has been given a modern update.
The choux pastry case is filled with pistachio cream and topped with a drizzle of green chocolate in an apparent nod to the Dubai chocolate trend that has recently taken the world by storm.
I can’t help but giggle as I slice a piece off the top of the golden brown treat.
Tasty souvenirs
The pastry is crunchy on the outside and chewy in the middle, while the pistachio filling adds a sweet, nutty flavour.
I can certainly see why these cheeky cakes have been popular for centuries!
You’ll want to dine on more than just sugary treats, though — and there are plenty of places to do that.
Northern Portuguese cuisine is more meaty than in the south, where seafood reigns supreme, and the regional speciality, slow-roasted veal, does not disappoint.
Lusitana is an excellent spot that was recommended to me by the staff at my hotel, Casa do Ribeirinho. Here, thick slices of tender, juicy meat are served with roasted potatoes and rice. The hearty meal is affordable, too.
Mains for two, a shared goat’s cheese starter and chocolate mousse for dessert with two glasses of wine costs €24 each (around £21).
For a slightly more upmarket dinner, try Ze da Calcada, which also serves regional dishes such as chicken with chestnuts, mushrooms, sweet potatoes and green beans, as well as local wines from the Douro valley.
Mains are typically €16 each (around £14).
Before you depart Amarante, be sure to visit the stall outside the Municipal Museum Amadeo de Souza Cardoso.
Dedicated to the modernist painter after whom it is named, it is currently closed for renovations.
But the stall is a great place to stock up on tasty souvenirs.
It is laden with phallic cakes of all different sizes, some of which are crunchy like biscuits and individually wrapped with colourful ribbons.
More robust than the choux pastry variety, they make the perfect take-away treat for yourself — or a great tongue-in-cheek gift for someone who needs a bit of luck in the love department.
GO: AMARANTE
GETTING THERE: The nearest airport is Porto. Ryanair flies from Stansted to Porto from £35 return. See ryanair.com.
STAYING THERE: Rooms at Casa do Ribeirinho cost from around £68 per night. See casadoribeirinho.pt.
Boxing: Ishmael Davis wants to use his troubled past to be a role model
“I’m born alone and I’m going to die alone, so go on your own journey.”
That statement from British light-middleweight Ishmael Davis might appear blunt at face value, but his harsh view on life was developed through some difficult formative years.
By the age of 14, Davis had been kicked out of school, kicked out of his childhood home and was adapting to the responsibility of caring for newborn twin sons.
“I had a bit of a rough upbringing,” Davis tells BBC Sport.
“I was living with my first baby’s mum at 14, went into a hostel until I was 15 and then I got my own flat.
“Because I wasn’t making money it was hard. I was only getting around £100 every two weeks. It was a hard time in my life but these are the things I’ve had to come through.”
Davis, now 30, first stepped into a boxing gym aged 12 and took part in an unlicensed amateur fight the following year, but any dreams of pursuing the sport further were shelved as he tried to provide for his children.
Despite still being a child himself, Davis turned to the streets of Chapeltown in Leeds to make ends meet.
“I was year nine when I had my first kids. After that I wanted to be out on the streets all the time and I got into gangs,” Davis says.
“Because I had kids young, I started selling drugs.”
Davis would land himself in prison not long after and was on the path some of his closest friends and family were walking.
On 15 November he faces Sam Gilley for the British and Commonwealth light-middleweight titles on the undercard of Chris Eubank Jr v Conor Benn at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium as he looks to get his career back in track after three losses in his past four fights.
Davis discusses how differently his life could have been if not for boxing and his personal drive.
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Published On 8 Nov 2025
Army Sets Out To Buy A Million Drones By 2028
The U.S. Army has set a goal of buying one million new drones of all types over the next two to three years. This comes as senior officials within the service have acknowledged that it continues to lag behind global trends when it comes to fielding uncrewed aerial systems, especially weaponized types within smaller units. The Army’s planned drone shopping spree could also include large numbers of longer-range one-way attack types, something TWZ laid out a detailed case for doing just a few months ago.
Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll talked about his service’s new drone acquisition plans in a recent phone interview with Reuters from Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey. The service also hopes the purchases will foster an industrial base that can churn out uncrewed aerial systems at similarly high rates for years to come.
“We expect to purchase at least a million drones within the next two to three years,” Driscoll told Reuters. “And we expect that at the end of one or two years from today, we will know that in a moment of conflict, we will be able to activate a supply chain that is robust enough and deep enough that we could activate to manufacture however many drones we would need.”
The report from Reuters does not provide a detailed breakdown of what might be included in that million-drone bundle. It does indicate that Driscoll was talking primarily about smaller weaponized types, such as first-person view (FPV) kamikaze drones and ones configured to drop small munitions. These kinds of uncrewed aerial systems have existed in various forms for years, but have now been fully thrust into the public consciousness by their daily use on both sides of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.
“Driscoll and Picatinny’s top commander, Major General John Reim, spoke to Reuters about how the United States was taking lessons from Russia’s war in Ukraine, which has been characterized by drone deployments on an unprecedented scale,” according to that outlet. “Ukraine and Russia each produce roughly 4 million drones a year, but China is probably able to produce more than double that number, Driscoll said.”
“Driscoll said he fundamentally wanted to change how the Army saw drones – more like expendable ammunition rather than an ‘exquisite’ piece of equipment,” Reuters‘ story added.
This latter point is also directly in the stated aims behind a sweeping array of drone policy and other changes the Pentagon announced back in July. The main focus of that initiative, described as “unleashing U.S. military drone dominance,” is to accelerate the fielding of huge numbers of uncrewed aerial systems, especially weaponized types, across the entire U.S. military, as you can read more about here.
All this being said, the Army’s plans to buy at least a million new drones could easily include a wide array of types intended to perform an equally diverse set of missions. As mentioned, long-range kamikaze drones in the vein of the Iranian-designed Shahed-136 could be part of this equation, as well. Russia also regularly uses variants and derivatives of that design, including ones it now produces domestically, in attacks on targets in Ukraine. Forces in Ukraine have been moving to field their own comparable designs, among many other one-way attack types.
Directly influenced by Israeli kamikaze drones, the Shahed-136 has become something of a global standard for uncrewed aircraft of this type, with similarly-sized delta-winged designs steadily emerging globally, including in the United States and China. Developments out of China include the Feilong-300D from state-run conglomerate North Industries Group Corporation, which is reportedly particularly geared toward low-cost, high-volume production. So far, the examples being built in the United States have been sold largely as training aids reflecting growing threats to friendly forces. TWZ‘s feature in September delved deeply into the benefits they could offer to the U.S. military as operational weapons in line with broader long-range fires initiatives across the services.
“Absolutely,” Maj. Gen. James “Jay” Bartholomee, head of the Army’s Hawaii-based 25th Infantry Division, said in response to a question from our Howard Altman about interest in Shahed-like drones at the Association of the U.S. Army’s (AUSA) annual symposium in October. “We are behind on long-range sensing and long-range launched-effect strike.”
“I think we do,” Army Lt. Gen. Charles Costanza, commander of V Corps, which has its main headquarters at Fort Knox in Kentucky and a forward command post in Poland, said separately at the AUSA gathering in response to a similar question from Howard Altman about the need for Shahed-type drones.
Costanza also offered a blunt assessment of the service’s work to field various tiers of drones, as well as capabilities to counter the growing threats they pose.
“We’re behind. I’ll just be candid. I think we know we’re behind,” the V Corps commander said. “We aren’t moving fast enough.”
“And it really took Russia’s invasion of Ukraine [in 2022], and the way they’re innovating, and Ukrainians are innovating, to realize, hey, we need to move fast,” he added.
For Ukraine, moving fast has become a matter of life or death, and rapidly iterating capabilities has become critical because of the speed at which countermeasures are also developed.
Army units in Europe have been very much at the forefront of current efforts to accelerate and expand the fielding of new weaponized drones, as well as counter-drone systems. However, some of those activities have drawn criticism for how much they still appear to be behind the curve, especially compared to what is regularly seen on battlefields in Ukraine.
Army Secretary Driscoll’s million-drone plan is clearly a new push toward a real paradigm shift, in line with the direction from the Pentagon in July. At the same time, there are significant questions about whether the service will be able to even come close to reaching its new procurement goals, especially when it comes to funding, contracting processes, and the capacity of the U.S. industrial base. The policy changes rolled out earlier this year did include several aimed at simplifying contracting processes.
Just today, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced further plans for even more sweeping changes to acquisition processes across the U.S. military. The goal here is also to fundamentally change how the Pentagon works with the U.S. defense industrial base, all with an eye toward moving things along faster.
“This relates to the whole industrial base, and most importantly, to the large primes [prime contractors] that we do business with today,” Hegseth said in a speech earlier today. “These large defense primes need to change, to focus on speed and volume and divest their own capital to get there.”
As TWZ often notes, there has been steadily growing interest across the U.S. military in recent years when it comes to engaging with smaller or otherwise non-traditional companies, including to help meet complex requirements on aggressive timelines.
“Instead of partnering with larger defense companies, he [Driscoll] said the Army wanted to work with companies that were producing drones that could have commercial applications as well,” according to Reuters.
“We want to partner with other drone manufacturers who are using them for Amazon deliveries and all the different use cases,” Driscoll said.
Whether or not the Army ultimately acquires a million new drones in the next few years, and what is included in that mix, remains to be seen. However, Secretary Driscoll has started the clock now on what could be a transformational shift for the service when it comes to fielding unrewed aerial systems.
Contact the author: [email protected]
Hailey Bieber reveals bare bum in tiny thong bikini and makes out with husband Justin in steamy pics on private island
HAILEY Bieber revealed her bare bum in a tiny thong bikini before making out with husband Justin in steamy pictures.
The couple are holidaying on a private island but Hailey, 28, gave fans a glimpse of what they had been up to in a new Instagram post.
Hailey posted a montage of pictures and simply captioned them: “Hell yeah!”
The first picture saw the model posing in a green thong bikini with a lilac headscarf around her hair.
Turned to the side, Hailey showed off her peachy derriere as she stood close to the beach.
Another picture in the montage offered an even closer up view of her bum as she posed in a black thong bikini.
Read More on Hailey Bieber
With her back to the camera, she glanced over her shoulder with her wet hair hanging around her shoulders.
Husband Justin, 31, clearly couldn’t get enough of his hot wife, and in one black and white snap, the couple were seen kissing.
Justin had his back to the camera and had hold of his wife’s waist, while Hailey cupped his face with one hand, and placed the other around the back of his head.
The singer showed his appreciation for his wife’s pictures by commenting: “Oh my f***in god”.
Hailey was also seen posing with her friend Kendall Jenner – who was celebrating her 30th birthday on the island – and looked stunning in a backless animal print mini dress.
Hailey and Justin have been married since 2018 and share son Jack, one, together.
Their trip for Kendall’s birthday comes just a few days after The U.S. Sun exclusively revealed how the couple were taunted by fans at a baseball game.
The stars were in the stands watching the LA Dodgers play the Toronto Blue Jays in Los Angeles.
Canadian Justin proudly rocked a Blue Jays jersey for his favorite team as he and Hailey, watched the game – which was not well received by the die-hard Dodgers fans in their home city.
Justin first irked Dodgers fans by loudly booing player Shohei Ohtani after he hit a home run, giving the home team a 2-0 lead.
Soon, Justin started being “heckled by fans,” an onlooker exclusively told The U.S. Sun.
“He was really heavily taunted for wearing a Blue Jays jersey,” the eyewitness said, adding that his vocal disapproval of the home run didn’t help matters.
Argentina: Grabbing A US Lifeline
On October 9, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced a $20 billion currency swap line with Argentina’s central bank and said that the US had begun directly purchasing pesos in foreign exchange markets to prop up the country’s currency. Six days later, he announced the Treasury was arranging an additional $20 billion facility with private banks and sovereign wealth funds. In recent weeks, the Trump administration has spent around $400 million buying pesos in multiple interventions.
The main objective of the rescue effort is to support Milei, whose libertarian reform agenda has earned enthusiastic backing from Trump. And Milei has delivered impressive results since taking office in December 2023, slashing monthly inflation from 25% to 1.5%, achieving a fiscal surplus in his first month, cutting 15% of the federal workforce, and reducing the poverty rate by around 10 percentage points.
However, Milei’s currency policy has become his Achilles heel. His attempts to defend exchange rate bands that keep the peso artificially strong—a strategy that’s drained Argentina’s dollar reserves and fueled capital flight. A heavy loss in Buenos Aires province elections in early September triggered a run on the peso that sent it plunging to record lows, and bond yields soared, precipitating US support.
Despite Trump’s efforts, the peso’s recovery was brief and continues to hover near its lows. Forward contracts indicate investors are betting on post-election devaluation. The intervention has triggered political backlash in the US with critics questioning why Washington is bailing out a country whose soybean farmers compete directly with those in the US. The results of the October 26 midterm election, where Milei’s La Libertad Avanza party won half the seats in the Chamber of Deputies and a third of the seats in the Senate, will only strengthen his reform agenda.
The post Argentina: Grabbing A US Lifeline appeared first on Global Finance Magazine.
High school football: City and Southern Section playoff scores
FRIDAY’S RESULTS
CITY SECTION
First Round
DIVISION I
#1 Venice 38, #16 Bell 0
#8 Franklin 35, #9 Westchester 15
#5 Marquez 17, #12 Granada Hills 12
#13 Van Nuys 36, #4 Wilmington Banning 15
#3 Eagle Rock 62, #14 Taft 37
#11 Dorsey 26, #6 El Camino Real 8
#7 Gardena 30, #10 L.A. Hamilton 26
#2 South Gate 47, #15 Lincoln 21
DIVISION II
#1 Cleveland 24, #16 Legacy 3
#9 North Hollywood 42, #8 Sylmar 35
#5 L.A. University 16, #12 Washington 12
#4 Fairfax 55, #13 Panorama 22
#14 Chatsworth 40, #3 L.A. Roosevelt 12
#10 Arleta 35, #7 Huntington Park 32
#2 San Fernando 33, #15 South East 14
DIVISION III
#1 Santee 40, #16 Locke 8
#8 Maywood CES 34, #9 Fremont 16
#5 Contreras 35, #12 Sun Valley Poly 28
#4 Jefferson 57, #13 Canoga Park 7
#3 L.A. Wilson 42, #14 Rancho Dominguez 14
#11 Chavez 36, #6 Manual Arts 14
#7 Roybal 34, #10 Verdugo Hills 14
#2 Hawkins 34, #15 Los Angeles 0
SOUTHERN SECTION
First Round
DIVISION 2
Murrieta Valley 35, Corona del Mar 14
Rancho Cucamonga 45, Tustin 8
Los Alamitos 35, Yorba Linda 28
San Juan Hills 28, Downey 27
San Clemente 38, Beaumont 21
Vista Murrieta 36, Damien 31
Leuzinger 34, Crean Lutheran 17
Chaparral 63, Chaminade 42
DIVISION 3
Bishop Amat 28, Murrieta Mesa 9
Oxnard Pacifica 42, Oak Hills 21
Sherman Oaks Notre Dame 44, Laguna Beach 28
Chino Hills 42, Mira Costa 35
Dana Hills 27, Aquinas 26
Palos Verdes 42, Valencia 34
Edison 31, Huntington Beach 19
Inglewood 40, Capistrano Valley 16
DIVISION 4
Charter Oak 17, Muir 14
San Jacinto 30, Bishop Diego 29
Great Oak 38, Cajon 15
Villa Park 28, Westlake 24
Oaks Christian 16, St. Bonaventure 13
Paraclete 54, Long Beach Wilson 48
Cathedral 40, Western 21
La Habra 41, El Modena 7
DIVISION 5
Redondo Union 21, Torrance 14
St. Paul 38, Etiwanda 19
Bonita 31, Northview 19
Loyola 17, Newbury Park 14
Aliso Niguel 7, Millikan 6
La Serna 7, Lakewood 0
Rio Hondo Prep 50, Thousand Oaks 34
Troy 49, Orange 27
DIVISION 6
Eastvale Roosevelt 33, Crespi 24
Burbank 52, Lancaster 43
St. Pius X-St. Matthias Academy 35, Alta Loma 6
Upland 42, Los Altos 21
Orange Vista 50, El Toro 31
Agoura 35, Summit 7
Ventura 42, Salesian 31
Moorpark 31, Riverside King 28
DIVISION 7
Palm Springs 33, Claremont 7
Hart 52, Mayfair 24
Barstow 34, Serrano 12
La Canada 30, West Covina 14
Apple Valley 21, North Torrance 20
Victor Valley 34, Segerstrom 14
Saugus 22, Schurr 19
Calabasas 31, El Segundo 24
DIVISION 8
Palm Desert 31, Marina 7
Patriot 48, Elsinore 28
Beckman 41, La Mirada 21
Fullerton 38, La Quinta 21
Irvine 24, Temecula Valley 7
Quartz Hill 41, Santa Ana Calvary Chapel 0
Brea Olinda 21, Mary Star of the Sea 12
St. Monica 28, St. Genevieve 18
DIVISION 9
Ramona 21, Silverado 14
Cerritos 16, Fillmore 7
Hesperia 27, Moreno Valley 21
Norte Vista 28, Vista del Lago 24
Warren 17, Norwalk 7
Cerritos Valley Christian 29, Chino 6
San Dimas 24, Rowland 22
Riverside Poly 34, Corona Santiago 24
DIVISION 10
Oak Park 17, Village Christian 15
Tahquitz 39, Heritage Christian 12
Brentwood 13, Portola 3
Santa Monica 42, Pasadena 16
Garden Grove Pacifica 35, El Rancho 14
Liberty 42, West Torrance 35
St. Margaret’s 16, Redlands East Valley 15
Hillcrest 41, Monrovia 14
DIVISION 11
El Monte 18, St. Anthony 13
Western Christian 27, Bell Gardens 20
Baldwin Park 42, Maranatha 28
Shadow Hills 37, Jurupa Hills 0
Gahr 21, Chaffey 16
Valley View 24, Dominguez 3
Palmdale 39, Diamond Bar 20
South Pasadena 42, San Marcos 17
DIVISION 12
Yucca Valley 43, Costa Mesa 17
Grace 28, Rialto 27
Perris 51, Citrus Hill 22
Coachella Valley 38, Banning 35
Bellflower 14, Nogales 7
Colton 73, Ganesha 53
Santa Paula 27, Ocean View 7
Arroyo Valley 26, Desert Christian Academy 24
DIVISION 13
Saddleback 21, Pacific 17
Santa Rosa Academy 35, Heritage 21
Woodbridge 28, Desert Hot Springs 13
Buena 42, Nordhoff 40
La Puente 26, Kaiser 19
Linfield Christian 47, Hacienda Heights Wilson 20
Montebello 19, Rancho Alamitos 17
DIVISION 14
South El Monte 46, Channel Islands 7
Indian Springs 27, Vasquez 20
Ontario 21, Bolsa Grande 0
Miller 39, San Jacinto Valley 13
Alhambra 25, Bassett 0
Trinity Classical Academy 47, Gabrielino 35
Pioneer 42, Godinez 21
8-MAN
CITY SECTION
Quarterfinals
#1 Sherman Oaks CES 66, #8 USC Hybrid 0
#4 East Valley 28, #5 Valley Oaks CES 22
#2 Animo Robinson 66, #7 New Designs University Park 21
SOUTHERN SECTION
First Round
DIVISION 1
Avalon 45, Thacher 14
DIVISION 2
Cal Lutheran 52, Maricopa 22
Desert Christian 34, Malibu 7
Hesperia Christian 26, Academy of Career and Exploration 13
Lancaster Baptist 57, Downey Calvary Chapel 14
54 injured in bombing at Jakarta high school mosque
Police bomb squad officers inspect the site of an explosion inside a school mosque in Jakarta, Indonesia, Friday. At least 54 people were injured in an explosion at a mosque inside a school compound during Friday prayers, according to the police. Photo by Mast Irham/EPA
Nov. 7 (UPI) — Explosions at a mosque on a high school campus in Jakarta, Indonesia, have injured at least 54 people, most of them students.
The injured have been taken to hospitals and have injuries that range from minor to serious, said Jakarta City Police Chief Asep Edi Suhaeri, the Independent reported.
Police have identified the alleged attacker as a 17-year-old student, who was also injured.
The explosions happened at 12:15 p.m. WID during Friday prayers.
Indonesia Police General Listyo Sigit Prabowo said an investigation is underway, “including how the suspect assembled and carried out the attack.”
One student told the Indonesian government-owned news agency Antara that a student brought in a homemade bomb. The boy had often been bullied by students, the BBC reported.
Other students told Indonesian news outlets that the boy had been a “loner” who often drew violent pictures. They said they saw him lying on the ground after the explosion happened.
Antara’s images appear to show objects that looked like guns, but Indonesian politician Lodewijk Freidrich Paulus said the photos depicted “a toy gun, not a real gun.”
On one of the alleged “toy guns,” it said, “14 words. For Agartha,” and, “Brenton Tarrant. Welcome to Hell,” the BBC reported.
Tarrant is the attacker in the 2019 shooting at a New Zealand mosque that killed 51 people.
Paulus also told the public not to assume that the blast was a terrorist act because detectives were still investigating.
Is Ukraine a Viable State?
The Ukrainian parliament has disclosed that its public debt of over $190 billion will require close to four decades to repay—but this assumes the country remains viable as a “state,” the EU agrees to keep funding its budgets, and the IMF doesn’t balk at extending further loans.
There are valid reasons for concern over new Finance Ministry figures revealing that Ukraine’s public debt has expanded to unprecedented levels, requiring decades to extinguish.
The Finance Ministry’s latest report indicates Ukraine’s public and government-guaranteed debt surged to 8.02 trillion hryvnia ($194.2 billion) as of September 30. The pace and scale of borrowing have shocked MPs, who now face the grim reality that interest payments alone will drain more than 3.8 trillion hryvnia ($90.5 billion) from the state treasury over the coming decades.
IMF Concerns
The IMF last month updated its forecasts for Ukraine’s public debt level, now expecting it to reach 108.6% of GDP by the end of 2025 and rise further to 110.4% in 2026. The IMF has revised its projections for Ukrainian debt higher despite the successful restructuring in 2024 of $20.5 billion in Eurobond securities. However, the same year, the country’s budget deficit reached $43.9 billion.
A recent report by Ukraine’s KSE Institute estimates the country’s budget gap for 2025-2028 at $53 billion per year, a sum that foreign sponsors would have to cover. These figures do not include additional military financing.
The Economist recently estimated that Ukraine will require around $400 billion in cash and arms over the next four years to continue fighting and cover essential domestic costs.
The European Union’s plan to leverage frozen Russian sovereign funds to support Ukraine has hit a roadblock, with Belgium refusing to back the proposal due to legal risks. The EU had hoped to use the frozen assets, worth around $300 billion, as collateral to secure further loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for Ukraine. However, Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever has opposed the plan, describing it as “sort-of-confiscation” that exposes Belgium to significant financial and legal risks.
The EU’s failure to approve a $160 billion “reparations loan” has significant implications for Ukraine, which remains heavily reliant on Western aid to support its war effort. Ukraine’s $15.5 billion IMF program is set to expire in 2027, and the country has requested an additional $8 billion in funding. However, talks have stalled due to concerns about Ukraine’s economic viability.
EU officials are reportedly concerned that the IMF may not grant further funding to Ukraine unless the EU approves the new loan. This could trigger a cascading loss of confidence in the country’s economic viability. The IMF program’s approval is seen as crucial in signaling to investors that Ukraine remains solvent, and its rejection could have far-reaching consequences for the country’s economy.
Keeping Ukraine afloat financially is largely expected to fall to the EU given decreased American involvement. However, such a prospect has faced internal opposition. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that “there’s no one else left willing to pick up the tab.” Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico voiced equal opposition to Brussels’ plan to continue financing Kiev’s war. And just this week, the new Czech Republic President Andrej Babiš made good on his campaign promise to advocate against more funds and arms being transferred to Ukraine.
Orbán, a longtime critic of aid to Ukraine, criticized Brussels for seeking new funding through frozen Russian assets and fresh loans, rejecting the plan as not Hungary’s responsibility.
A Failed State?
It is worth noting that a case can be made that Ukraine was not a thriving state prior to February 2022.
After his 2019 election, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy assumed the leadership of a state suffering from economic malaise, low natality, and high rates of graft and corruption. Ukraine’s population, after peaking at 52 million in 1993, had already fallen to 45.5 million by 2013—it is 32 million today, with UN estimates concluding that it would fall by a further 20% by 2050. More than 28 million now reside outside the country.
Widespread emigration has plagued Ukraine, which was suffering from extensive brain drain well before the war. Emigration and population decline are parts of a vicious cycle—citizens leave countries due to political instability or low economic prospects, which tends to exacerbate the problems.
In addition to a declining birthrate and negative net migration, Ukraine’s economy has floundered since the nation achieved independence in 1991. Ukraine is one of the poorest countries in Europe—before the war, its GDP per capita was comparable to that of Iraq, and unemployment was about 10 percent. Ukraine’s economy is the second-most corrupt in Europe. This corruption and lack of opportunity fueled Ukraine’s pre-war emigration and poverty.
The invasion and subsequent Russian military strikes have severely degraded Ukraine’s already weak economy. Infrastructure has been devastated, with an estimated $176 billion in damage. Power systems, roads, and other critical assets have been left in ruins. Ukrainian agricultural production, which made up 41 percent of Ukraine’s exports, has fallen by a third. Finally, Russian minefields and artillery attacks have also left much of eastern Ukraine inundated with unexploded ordnance, the effects of which will continue to be felt for decades.
Moreover, many of the 6.9 million refugees and 3.7 million internally displaced persons are either unable to contribute to the country’s war effort or dependent on state resources for survival. Many who fled will likely not return; a significant number of refugees have effectively assimilated within host communities in Germany and Poland—many have built lives in other countries. Those least likely to return are individuals with high education and key skills, fostering the flight of valuable human resources.
Even if the EU continues to fund Ukraine, its difficulties will only increase. With Russia already controlling 20% of Ukraine’s territory and continuing to gain ground, the most it can hope to achieve is a stalemate until peace terms are mutually agreed upon. Continuing to resist the Russian onslaught could take years, which would further damage and depopulate eastern Ukraine. Moreover, its economy would continue to be strangled by the displacement of workers, infrastructure damage, and investor fatigue and uncertainty. Protracted warfare may achieve political and moral objectives, but the loss of wartime unity and foreign aid, combined with the high cost of rebuilding and resettling ($524 billion), is likely to create further political instability. Even in peace, Ukraine’s future is bleak.
Western leaders should be well aware of the consequences that protracted warfare can have on a state—their experiences in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan all resulted in massive human costs and the destruction of economic and governmental institutions. Regardless of what happens at the peace table, Europe, the UK (and under Trump, to a lesser extent, the U.S.) will be forced to reckon with the specter of both a failed state dependent on foreign aid as well as a protracted migrant crisis, which Europe already faces with the Middle East and North Africa. The crisis is building, and it soon could be at the West’s doorstep.
‘Little Amélie or the Character of Rain’ review: Stunning, mature animation
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It’s the one-two punch of an earthquake and a piece of scrumptious white chocolate from Belgium, a country famous for its sweet confections, that awakens 2½-year-old Amélie (voiced by Loïse Charpentier) to the wondrous and perilous world around her.
Rambunctious and astute, the toddler heroine of the sublimely beautiful animated film “Little Amélie or the Character of Rain” first communicates in voiceover from the void of nothingness before birth. She declares herself a powerful deity and explains that God is essentially a “tube” that constantly ingests and secretes experiences and things. That description could also apply to human existence in a general sense if you take away the philosophical complications that give us meaning. (We are, thankfully, more than all-consuming vessels.)
But until she’s stirred by the earthquake and chocolate, Amélie refuses to engage with reality, observing without making any effort to move or talk, as if displeased with having been born. Her absolutist views of what it means to be alive slowly peel away in the life-affirming first feature from co-directors Liane-Cho Han and Maïlys Vallade, a screen adaptation of Amélie Nothomb’s autobiographical 2000 novel “The Character of Rain,” popular in French-speaking countries.
Akin to impressionistic paintings, the animation here decidedly lacks intricate designs and opts for flat hues coloring figures without visible outlines. The stylistic choices result in a striking, distinctly pictorial aesthetic in line with earlier projects that Han and Vallade worked on, such as “Long Way North” and “Calamity,” both directed by Rémi Chayé.
The third child of a Belgian family living in 1960s Japan, young Amélie develops an endearing relationship with housekeeper Nishio-san (Victoria Grobois). While her parents have their hands full with her older siblings, Amélie explores nature and becomes enamored with Japanese culture. That the affectionate Nishio-san doesn’t impose her perspective on the girl, but quite literally tries to perceive each moment from her height, signals a bond that’s closer to one between mutuals.
It’s through Amélie’s gaze — or, more precisely, how these filmmakers interpret it visually — that we begin to understand her invigorating whimsy. Early on, it seems like her rapidly changing moods affect the weather; later, Amélie steps into the ocean and it parts as it did for Moses (if only in her restless imagination). A person her age is inherently self-centered, unaware that she is part of a bigger whole.
To illustrate Nishio-san’s account of how she lost her family during World War II, animators Han and Vallade zero in on the dish she is cooking: Chopped vegetables fall into a pot like missiles, a gust of pot steam represents a fiery aftermath, rice under water shows how Nishio-san had to dig her way out of being buried alive. The gruesome subject matter is translated into immediate household imagery that someone Amélie’s age could grasp.
When Nishio-san shares with Amélie that the Japanese word “ame” means rain (so close to her own name), the girl takes this as confirmation that her kinetic, unbridled and visceral impulses are natural. Her feelings of kinship with precipitation are transmuted into a delightfully conceived scene in which little versions of Amélie appear inside every falling raindrop. These fanciful instances benefit from Mari Fukuhara’s score, a drizzle of aural luminosity.
Amélie’s rowdy approach becomes more nuanced when she is confronted with a loved one’s death, as well as her own mortality in the aftermath of two accidents. Han and Vallade also make room for her realizations about life’s unfairness and the inevitability of sorrow — all communicated via flights of fancy that only animation can materialize.
In turn, it comes as a shock for Amélie to learn that she is not Japanese, even if that’s the country she considers home. Her future may be determined by Kashima-san (Yumi Fujimori), the landlady who owns the house Amélie’s family is renting and who brought Nishio-san on to help them. Kashima-san distrusts westerners — her wounds of wartime haven’t healed — and to see Nishio-san smitten with Amélie feels like a betrayal.
The larger implications of her presence escape the little one, but the fact that Amélie, even at her age, is able to empathize with Kashima-san’s despair speaks to the thematic richness and emotional maturity that Han and Vallade channel in their brisk, arresting feature. The gently transcendent, tear-inducing conclusion that “Little Amélie” reaches suggests that memory serves as our only remedy for loss. As long as we don’t forget, what we cherish won’t become ephemeral.
‘Little Amélie or the Character of Rain’
In French, with subtitles.
Rated: PG, for thematic content, peril and brief scary images
Running time: 1 hour, 17 minutes
Playing: In limited release Friday, Nov. 7
Where’s hot in December? Best winter sun holidays and warm getaways from the UK
As temperatures drop and frost sets in, Brits are dreaming of winter sunshine escapes. Discover the best destinations for warm winter sun getaways this December
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Holly Aitchison – I want to inspire like Finn Russell in women’s game
Arriving at Sale Sharks as part of a high-profile revamp, Holly Aitchison has made one big move this summer.
She is adamant she won’t be making a second.
“[England head coach] John Mitchell has made it pretty clear to me that I can cover different positions, but I am a 10,” she told BBC Sport.
“And I won’t be seen as anything else.”
A year ago, the question wouldn’t have been asked.
At WXV in Canada, Aitchison was the Red Roses’ starting fly-half, steering them to title-clinching victories over New Zealand and Canada.
Her playmaking and running abilities were a key part of diversifying England’s threat, ensuring that, come the Rugby World Cup in England, they would have more cutting edges than a bandsaw.
It didn’t turn out like that.
Zoe Harrison edged in front as first-choice 10, with Aitchison shifted into the centres or on to the bench.
An ankle injury in the run-up to the Rugby World Cup meant Aitchison struggled to challenge for her spot, only appearing in the knock-out stages and then being deployed as a midfield replacement in the semi-final and final victories over France and Canada respectively.
But the 28-year-old is resolute in sticking to her position and her philosophy.
“I want to dictate,” she said.
“Obviously I got that ankle injury before the World Cup, but we were definitely moving in the more expansive direction.
“That’s something that I champion, that’s what I bring as a 10.
“I want to inspire the backline, I want to play this brand of rugby that attracts viewers.
“In the men’s game, I think of players like Finn Russell – you buy a ticket to watch him.
“I want that kind of hype around players in the women’s game where we’re creating that style of brand that people want to watch.”
At Sale, she hopes she has found the stage to do that.
The team finished last in PWR last season, but they have invested and improved.
Aitchison’s England team-mate Amy Cokayne and Scotland wing Rhona Lloyd were also signed over the summer while England’s Morweena Talling and the United States’ all-action lock Erica Jarrell-Searcy are part of an exciting back five in the pack.
Sale co-owner Michelle Orange had earmarked this season, after the Rugby World Cup, as a chance to lure some of England’s players back to the north and strengthen a struggling team.
Aitchison, born and raised on Merseyside, was a top target.
“Holly was on my hit-list, not just as a poster girl for the Red Roses, but for the North West and women’s rugby in general,” Orange tells BBC Sport.
“She is a perfect fit coming in. We are so lucky to have Katy Daley-Mclean – one of England’s best ever fly-halves – heading up our women’s programme and Holly follows in her mould.
“I love Holly’s style, her sass, the way she puts herself out on social media and identifies with her fanbase, this is exactly who we want in our team to bring some extra X-factor and complement the girls we have already got.”
US Supreme Court allows Trump to block $4bn in food aid to families in need | Food News
Forty-two million face food aid delays after the nation’s top Court lets US president pause full SNAP payments.
Published On 8 Nov 2025
The United States Supreme Court has allowed President Donald Trump’s administration to temporarily withhold about $4bn in federal food aid for November, leaving 42 million low-income Americans in need uncertain about their benefits amid the nation’s longest-ever government shutdown.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson issued the administrative stay on Friday, giving a lower court more time to assess the administration’s request to only partially fund the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), better known as food stamps.
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The SNAP programme supports Americans whose income falls below 130 percent of the federal poverty line. For the 2026 fiscal year, the maximum monthly benefit is $298 for an individual and $546 for a two-person household.
The Supreme Court order pauses a ruling by a federal judge in Rhode Island that had required the government to immediately release the full amount of funding.
The stay will remain in place until two days after the 1st US Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston rules on whether to block the lower court’s decision. SNAP typically costs between $8.5bn and $9bn each month.
Earlier this week, District Judge John McConnell, appointed by former President Barack Obama, accused the Trump administration of withholding SNAP funds for “political reasons”. His ruling ordered the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) to use money from a separate child nutrition fund, worth more than $23bn and financed through tariffs, to cover the shortfall in food assistance.
‘Judicial activism at its worst’
The administration had planned to provide $4.65bn in emergency funding, half the amount needed for full benefits. It argued that McConnell’s ruling would “sow further shutdown chaos” and prompt “a run on the bank by way of judicial fiat”, according to filings by the Department of Justice.
US Attorney General Pam Bondi praised the Supreme Court’s intervention, calling McConnell’s order “judicial activism at its worst”.
The 1st Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday refused to immediately halt McConnell’s ruling before the Supreme Court’s stay was announced. The USDA had already informed state governments that it was preparing to distribute full SNAP payments, triggering confusion among officials and recipients as the administration appealed.
SNAP benefits lapsed at the start of November, for the first time in the programme’s six-decade history. Many recipients have since turned to food pantries or cut back on essentials like medication to stretch their limited budgets.
The next hearing in the 1st Circuit is expected soon, while millions of families wait to see whether full benefits will resume.
In her dying moments, a stranger changed my life | Women
Maverick’s story
It was a cold November morning, and I had travelled with my family to our ancestral temple in a village in Tamil Nadu. My sister’s 11-month-old baby was to be tonsured for the first time – a religious head-shaving that in Hinduism is a way of discarding the evil eye and removing any negativity from past lives; a new start.
My wife drove, but asked me to park the car while she went inside with our son and her parents. I walked around the front of the vehicle and slid into the passenger seat. But when I tried to park, I felt resistance. As I pressed down on the accelerator, I noticed a middle-aged man running towards me, waving his arms frantically as he yelled for me to move the car backwards.
My mind raced as I reversed. I prayed silently that I hadn’t hurt anyone.
It was only when I got out of the car that I saw her. The thin, frail woman who now lay on the ground, shaking and murmuring. Panicked, my mind tried to make sense of how she’d come to be there – she must have sat down, assuming I’d already parked – and how badly injured she was. She curled into a foetal position as I sat down beside her and gently placed her head on my lap.
“Does it hurt anywhere, paati (granny)?” I asked.
She nodded, pointing to her leg.
I slowly pulled back the torn sari near her knee. The flesh was missing.
“You’ve been hurt, but we’ll take care of it,” I promised.
“No one will take care of me … just let me sit,” she pleaded.
Villagers started to gather, but kept their distance. One man said the woman slept on the streets near the temple and was often seen begging. A woman chided her for always sitting too close to cars. “If you don’t do something now, no one will take care of her, and she’ll die,” a man muttered before leaving.
Between groans, the woman told me her name: Chinnammal.
“Can you find my bag, thangam?” she asked, using a Tamil term for a loved one that translates to “gold”. She was in pain, but speaking to me, the person who had caused it, with such kindness.
I looked around and found her old cotton bag. It was stuffed to the brim with an open packet of chips, a half-eaten bun, a few 10-rupee notes, and some clothes.
The ambulance arrived, but there was only the driver, and it would take at least three people to lift her safely; we needed another pair of hands. There were close to 25 people around us, but no one moved.
“No one will come to lift her. She’s from a different caste. I have come to do temple rituals – otherwise, I would help,” a priest explained before hurrying away.
My wife, who had by now seen the commotion and approached, stepped forward to help, and together, we lifted Chinnammal into the ambulance. I climbed in with her.
I could see from her face that the pain came in waves. I sat next to her, one arm under her shoulders, in a kind of half-hug.
“My bag?” she asked, looking relieved when I placed it beside her hand.
“You are the first person to take me in a car,” she told me, her voice trembling.
She called me saami, a Tamil term that translates to God. I couldn’t understand how she could show me such love and respect. I asked for her forgiveness, but she simply asked me to help her sit up.
When we pulled into the hospital, two nurses in neatly pressed white uniforms appeared with a stretcher. I helped the ambulance driver lift Chinnammal onto it and wheeled her into the hospital. I told the nurses what I knew of her injuries, while they exchanged uneasy glances. When Chinnammal lurched forward and vomited, the nurses scolded her and backed away in disgust.
Inside the emergency room, the nursing manager explained that Chinnammal’s blood pressure and heart rate were high, but she was stable. She had two major injuries – a broken hip and severe grazing that would require skin grafts. Her leg, he said, was not so serious and would heal quickly.
Chinnammal reached for my hands. Hers were small and bony, but her grip was firm. Her eyes flickered, drifting in and out of focus. A soft-spoken doctor told me it was a miracle she was stable after sustaining such serious injuries.
She quietly listened to the doctor speak, but when he mentioned it would take three months for her hip to heal, Chinnammal started to wail.
“I will visit you every weekend, paati,” I reassured her.
The hospital staff took Chinnammal for an electrocardiogram, and when she returned, now hooked up to a heartbeat monitor, she grasped my hands again. She tugged on one. I leaned in. “Ask them to give me medicine to die,” she said.
I assured her that the doctors would take good care of her and that I would be there to make sure of it.
“They won’t,” she replied.
Then she looked into my eyes and lost consciousness.
I grabbed hold of her hand, but it was limp. I fell to the floor, sobbing.
Chinnammal was pronounced dead at 8.30 am on November 20, 2022. She was about 75 years old.
Chinnammal’s story
Chinnammal didn’t always live on the streets. As a younger woman, she was impeccably dressed, with flowers woven into her neatly plaited hair.
She hadn’t always begged for handouts either. She worked hard to farm a piece of land for her family, but her married life was difficult. Her husband was an alcoholic, and Chinnammal had to raise her daughter, run the house, and farm their land with little help.
She doted on her daughter and was happy when she married a man from a nearby village. A few years after her daughter married, Chinnammal’s husband died. Chinnammal adapted easily to life as a widow. She enjoyed visiting her daughter and son-in-law and would take them homemade sweets. When they struggled to conceive, Chinnammal worried, but she was overjoyed when they decided to adopt. She loved watching her grandson grow. He became her “everything”.
That joy was short-lived. Chinnammal’s daughter fell ill with a severe form of diabetes. When Chinnammal wasn’t at her daughter’s bedside, she was at the temple, praying for her, or concocting various treatments from herbs that she hoped would help.
But nothing worked, and Chinnammal watched her daughter slowly die.
That was the moment Chinnammal’s life changed. She stopped interacting with people. Some villagers started to harass and steal from her. She once filed a police complaint against a drunk neighbour who harassed her, but the police refused to help. Late one night, when she caught the man near her home, she threatened him with a sickle.
In her grief, Chinnammal no longer cared where she slept, what she ate, or how she dressed. She started to sleep by the temple, clutching her cloth bag close to her.
After Chinnammal’s death
A few hours after Chinnammal’s death, I went to the local police station and handed myself in.
A police officer contacted Chinnammal’s son-in-law to release her body and begin the family’s settlement case against me.
Her son-in-law initially refused to claim her body. The investigating officer told me he’d said, “She should have died a long time ago. She was just a burden … You can ask them to bury her and move on.”
But the officer insisted, and the man reluctantly came to the station.
When he arrived, I gave Chinnammal’s bag to the police officer, who inventoried its contents and shared the details with her son-in-law. His demeanour changed. He wanted to claim the body and register himself as her closest living relative, he explained.
“There was close to two lakhs ($2,250) in the bag you surrendered, and now this guy is trying to claim it and the compensation that the government might pay,” the police officer told me.
Chinnammal’s death felt like losing a loved one. I knew I had caused it. But she had shown no anger or animosity towards me. In her final hours, she had treated me with kindness and compassion. She had shared her love for her daughter and grandson with me, held my hand, and spoken tenderly to me despite her pain.
At the hospital, a doctor had tried to console me. “What if you had hit a child?” he’d asked. “Could you live with yourself?”
“She had lived her life,” he reasoned. But his reasoning made no sense to me.
The following day, I went to the temple to help the police with their investigation. As I stared at the spot where my life had changed, a priest interrupted my thoughts.
“You did a good job,” he said. Thinking he was chastising me, I apologised.
“No, I mean it,” he responded. “Nobody used to go near her. Local drunks used to steal the money she collected. So she used to cuss and throw stones at anyone who came near her. She had absolutely no one in this world.”
Even the temple staff used to chase her away, he explained.
“I think she chose to go through you. Through you, she died with dignity, the dignity that was denied to her in life,” he said, urging me to be at peace.
But nothing could give me peace.
I stopped driving. For a year, I withdrew from friends and family. I couldn’t sleep and, when I did, I’d see Chinnammal in my dreams. Whenever I was alone, I would think about her, replaying that day in my mind and wondering what might have happened had I done something differently.
Nearly a month after her death, I was able to track down the contact information for Chinnammal’s 19-year-old grandson. I called to ask for his forgiveness, and he asked me about the last moments I spent with her.
Three months later, at the court hearing, I was found negligent and ordered to pay a fine of 10,000 rupees ($115) to the court. At the hearing, I met Chinnammal’s grandson. I hugged him, and though he barely spoke, I could feel the warmth of his forgiveness – just like that of his paati’s.
In her dying moments, Chinnammal taught me the value of life – every life.
Chinnammal means “small mother”.
A neighbour who had known her said, “She spent her whole life caring for her daughter, and, even in death, she ensured that her family was taken care of [with her savings]. Her mind and body may have given in, but she never stopped being a mother.”
This story was told to Catherine Gilon by Maverick Prem. Information about Chinnammal’s life was gathered from interviews with her former neighbours, who asked not to be named. Her family declined to be interviewed for this story.
Maverick continues to pay his respects to Chinnammal at the temple grounds where she spent her final years. In addition to the court fine, he made a voluntary donation to Chinnammal’s grandson.