The federal government brands magnets in toys a deadly hazard to children because the tiny, powerful objects can fall out and cause serious, even fatal, internal injuries when swallowed.

Yet the Consumer Product Safety Commission has not taken steps to regulate even more powerful magnets when they are sold in loose form as backings on children's earrings, the Tribune has found.

The earrings consist of a small decorative part -- such as a cupcake, a faux diamond, a dolphin -- with a magnet inside. They are held in place by putting a loose magnet behind the earlobe.

Independent tests of more than a dozen magnetic earrings done for the Tribune showed that the earring magnets all were at least as powerful as magnets found inside toys that have caused the death of one child and scores of other injuries. Some of the magnetic earrings were more than five times more powerful.

But because the earrings are not considered toys, new regulations for magnets do not apply. If they did, the jewelry could not be legally sold, according to a CPSC spokesman, Scott Wolfson.

The Tribune found reports of more than two dozen instances in the U.S. and Europe in recent years where magnets from earrings have been swallowed, aspirated into the lungs or become stuck together on either side of a child's nose cartilage. Those youngsters had used the earrings to mimic nose, tongue and even navel piercings.

Most of these injuries did not result in hospitalizations. But, given the precedent of serious injuries caused by magnets in toys, some leading physicians are wondering why the CPSC is not taking action anyway.

"It's clear what the risks of magnets are," said Dr. Garry Gardner, a physician from suburban Darien who is chairman of the American Academy of Pediatrics' committee on injury, violence and poison prevention. "I don't care whether they call it a toy or not, these are still a risk. Any magnet that can be aspirated or swallowed is dangerous."

But the CPSC says it has not received enough reports of injuries linked to magnets in jewelry to warrant further action at this time. The agency's national injury database shows there were seven such incidents from 2002 to 2004 and none in the following two years. (Data for 2007 are unavailable.) One incident in 2003 required the child, a 2-year-old boy, to be hospitalized.

"The number of incidents compared to the number of products is very low," said Julie Vallese, spokeswoman for the CPSC. "The known risk has not risen to a substantial product hazard."

But even a toy industry official expressed concern about the jewelry.

"We should not have to wait for catastrophic incidents to address it," said Arthur Kazianis, vice president of quality assurance for Hasbro Inc. and the head of a private panel that is developing standards for magnets in toys.

For years the CPSC had received reports of children injured after swallowing magnets that fell out of toys, but not until a child died in 2005 after ingesting magnets from a Magnetix building set did the agency move to recall the product and push for tougher standards. Following a Tribune investigation of Magnetix and the agency's slow response, published in May, the CPSC expanded its recall and in August added magnets as No. 1 on its list of top five "home hazards." Its news release noted that such magnets "can be very small and powerful making them popular in toys, building sets, and jewelry." But that's as far as the agency has gone to address magnetic jewelry.

In that release, the CPSC also noted that injuries from ingesting magnets are "hard to diagnose. Parents and physicians may think that the materials will pass through the child without consequence, but magnets can attract in the body and twist or pinch the intestines, causing holes, blockages, infection, and death, if not treated properly and promptly."

Doctor: 'It is a hazard'

Dr. Marsha Kay, a pediatric gastroenterologist at The Cleveland Clinic who has written about the dangers of magnets, said she considers magnetic earrings to be as big a threat to child safety as magnets in toys.

"These things are marketed for kids, and it is a hazard," she said. "How many kids have to get hurt before someone pays attention to it?"

Just as with magnetic toys, Kay said, a danger is that older children will play with the product and leave behind magnets that younger children can swallow.

A new industry standard taking effect next month calls for warning labels on toys that include magnets and are small enough to be swallowed. Already, many magnetic toys include warnings about the danger of internal injuries. In addition, the new standard requires all toys with magnets to undergo tests to ensure the magnets won't fall out with regular use.

The new standard does not apply to magnetic jewelry, even if it is marketed to children.

"Magnetic jewelry has come up and we have talked about it, but our commission is focused on toys," Kazianis said. "A toy has play value. A piece of jewelry does not. It appears to fall through the cracks.

"It's possible that the jewelry industry could follow our standards for toys," he added. "I have repeatedly stated we need to figure out a way to communicate to them."

Michael Gale, spokesman for the Fashion Jewelry Trade Association, said he did not believe magnetic jewelry is dangerous.

"Anything that could affect the safety of children is a concern to the fashion jewelry industry," he said. "I am not aware of any cases of magnets associated with jewelry" causing any injuries.

The new magnetic toy standard applies to magnets that have a "flux index," the measure of its power, of 50 and higher.

The Tribune asked Joe DiMarco, an engineering physicist at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, to test the magnetic earrings as well as the type of Magnetix toys blamed for the death of Kenny Sweet on Thanksgiving Day 2005.

The tests showed the magnets from a Magnetix toy had a flux index of just above 50. The tests of the magnetic earrings showed a flux index on all of them above 50, and most were above 100 -- more than twice as powerful as the Magnetix.

Magnetic earrings sold by Schylling, a Massachusetts toy firm, had a flux index of more than 100, the Fermi tests found. The magnetic earrings carry a choking warning for children under age 3, but no other warnings. The earring packaging states that they are for ages "5+."

Schylling did not return telephone calls.

Earrings sold by Claire's also tested well above the toy standard of 50 and in one case was more than five times higher than the toy standard. Claire's did not return calls seeking comment.

DiMarco noted that the flux index increases when more than two magnets get stuck together. "If you combine more than a couple of these together, you could easily get something much worse."

One brand, Magna Stud, sold by BeWild.com, carries a warning against use by anyone under age 13 and warns specifically that the jewelry poses "an inhalation and aspiration hazard. ... Keep out of reach of infants." The jewelry also warns against wearing more than one magnet in the nose.

Brian Cohen, owner of BeWild.com, said he had never noticed the warning until the Tribune brought it to his attention. "Somebody wanted to make sure nobody got injured," he said. "Anything small like this should be kept away from kids, and magnets make it worse."

Complaints to the CPSC about magnetic jewelry include one incident that sent a 2-yar-old boy to the hospital after swallowing a magnetic earring. Other incidents involved boys and girls ranging from 8 to 13 years old. One 13-year-old boy used magnet jewelry to mimic a tongue piercing and swallowed the magnet. A 13-year-old girl "sniffed magnet earring backs into nose," according to the agency's database.

Dr. Anthony Magit, a pediatric otolaryngologist in California, described how quickly a child can be injured.

"The magnets are fairly strong and instead of just holding the earrings on the outside of both sides of the nose, they pull together and get embedded in the septum and they can't get them out," he said. "It can happen in a day. The magnets burrow into the septum and cannot be pulled apart. They are so strong, you have to take them to the hospital to get them removed.

"There needs to be a warning."

The CPSC was informed earlier this year of the medical community's concerns about magnets -- in toys as well as jewelry -- when Dr. Alan Oestreich, a pediatric radiologist at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, addressed an agency symposium.

"I emphasized that it was not just magnetic toys, but magnets in jewelry," he said in an interview. "I think people should be informed that this is a danger."

Doctors aren't the only ones pressing the CPSC to take further action. When U.S. PIRG, a federation of state public-interest research groups, issued its 2007 toy safety report in November, some magnetic earrings were on its list of dangerous products.

"Our contention is that magnetic jewelry poses the same hazard to children as magnetic toys," said Edmund Mierzwinski, consumer program director and author of the report. "Just because something is not a toy does not mean it's not a hazard. If it's cheap children's jewelry, it's a hazard."

That also is the conclusion of at least one retailer. In the pre-Christmas rush in 2006, Diana Nelson, owner of Kazoo & Co. , a Denver toy store, enthusiastically sold magnetic jewelry, telling an industry publication that magnetic earrings were a top-selling item.

A year later, after becoming aware of the dangers of magnets in toys, Nelson has concluded that magnetic jewelry should not be sold to children.

"We sold a lot of them, but when we sold out, I decided I wouldn't order them again," she said in a recent interview. "They shouldn't be anywhere near little ones."


Its premium lifestyle division, which includes Cruise and USC and makes up around 6pc of the business, reported a 13pc drop in sales after it closed loss-making stores. Despite challenging trading, the sportswear chain recently bought a new Oxford Street store for its upmarket fashion brand Flannels, for £108m.

Last week Mr Ashley made another move in his long running campaign with Findel, the online and catalogue retailer.

He has backing from Schroders and Toscafund to be made chairman of Findel and replace the outgoing chairman David Sudgen. Sports Direct owns a 30pc stake in the company and has been pushing Findel's Express Gifts subsidiary to channel Sports Direct's portfolio of sports goods brands.

However, Findel has said it will need to consult minority investors and Mr Ashley will need approval from the Financial Conduct Authority.

Meanwhile Mr Ashley has missed out on his hopes of buying Debenham's Irish business, and his assault on the US market with a joint bid for US retail chain Sports Authority failed after it agreed a $15m (£11m) deal with Dick's Sporting Goods.

Summary: Mike Ashley has publicly insisted he has no plans to take Sports Direct private despite repeated speculation that the sportswear tycoon would use its depressed market value as an opportunity to do so.


New York City kids who want hoverboards for Christmas might have to zip around indoors, because the gadgets are illegal on the Big Apple’s streets and sidewalks.

An NYPD spokesman confirmed that hoverboards are illegal on NYC sidewalks, because they are motor vehicles that can’t be registered. Hoverboarders caught zipping around on sidewalks, streets, or parking lots could face a fine of up to $200, according to the New York Daily News. Hoverboards don’t actually levitate, they’re more like electric scooters without handles, but they’ve become the subject of increasing fascination.

A silver lining to this disappointing news? Thrill-seekers can still use their hoverboards in parks.

Summary: You could get a $200 fine


More important to an NFL prospect: Understanding complex defensive schemes or an Oedipal complex?

In the pantheon of crazy NFL Scouting Combine questions arises “Do you find your mother attractive?,” which has surfaced again this year after a former NFL player reported he was asked the same thing in 2010.

Dana Brugler of CBS Sports highlighted the hot-for-mom question as the strangest one he’s heard so far at the Combine, after Austen Lane, a former defensive end with Jacksonville, Detroit and Chicago, said he was asked it when he was just out of Murray State.

The questions at the combine, in which players are put through the physical ringer and measured athletically in every way conceivable, are as prying as they are silly. Teams try to learn as much about their potential investment as they can — without any question filter, apparently.

The combine questions have taken on a sort of mythology, as intrusive teams conduct their own psychoanalysis of players before the NFL Draft. A football team of 53 players from different backgrounds, whose success is hinged upon the meshing of these personalities, wants to find players who can help on and off the field.

How they do this investigating, though, is either hilarious or infuriating, depending upon the question’s target. Cowboys receiver Dez Bryant was infamously asked if his mother was ever a prostitute.

Questions that have been passed around this year are not quite as biting, but just as bizarre.

Western Michigan OT Willie Beavers said the Falcons asked if he'd rather be a cat or dog. He said dog.

— Josh Katzenstein (@jkatzenstein) February 24, 2016

#Baylor OT Spencer Drango said 1 team at combine asked "Would u share your internet history w/ us?"

Drango: "Sure. I search a lot of food."

— Gregg Bell (@gbellseattle) February 25, 2016

This 1 may beat asking if your Mom is hot for weirdest Combine question: If you were going to kill somebody, would you use a gun or a knife?

— Steve Andress (@ColtsReporter) February 25, 2016

The inanity even started a hashtag: #Combinequestions.

Summary: More important to an NFL prospect: Understanding complex defensive schemes or an Oedipal complex? In the pantheon of crazy NFL Scouting Combine questions arises “Do you find your mother attra…


Despite high prices and lack of Wi-Fi, hundreds line up in Beijing to buy Apple’s smartphone

Nobody camped out overnight and the lines didn’t stretch for whole city blocks, but an hour before the iPhone was set to make its official debut in China, reporters in Beijing counted nearly 300 customers queued up to buy it, according to ChinaNews.com.

The first sale was scheduled to be made at 6:30 p.m. Friday Beijing time following an elaborate launch ceremony at the “The Place,” China Unicom’s flagship store. Apple vice president Greg Joswiak spoke at the event, calling it “an extraordinary day.”

The line at Apple’s all-glass store in the Village at Sanlitun retail development was smaller, but at one point grew to at least 150 customers long, according to a late update on MobileCrunch. Customers at the Sanlitun store told reporters they hoped to get better service by buying directly from Apple.

Although China is the world’s largest cellphone market with more than 700 million subscribers, Western press reports have suggested that China Unicom CHU might have trouble attracting buyers under the terms of the deal it struck with Apple AAPL . Due to restrictions imposed by the Chinese government, the iPhones being sold Friday won’t have a Wi-Fi receiver.

They also cost from 4,999 yuan ($730) to 6,999 yuan ($1,025) for a 32 gig iPhone 3GS without a service plan. That is 20% more than the 5,700 yuan ($835) street merchants are changing for an unlocked gray-market 32 gig iPhone 3GS with Wi-Fi. China Unicom’s iPhones are much cheaper — in some cases, free — when purchased with a long-term service contract.

Earlier this week, iPhonAsia‘s Dan Butterfield reported that China Unicom is offering an amnesty program to entice the estimated 1.5 to 2 million gray-market iPhones already in China to sign up for its services. Under the “upgrade to 3G” program, owners of older iPhones can sign a contract and pop in a Unicom 3G sim card to take advantage of the carrier’s WCDMA speeds and a variety of new 3G services

At the ceremony Friday, China Unicom officials announced that they now have more than 1 million iPhone 3G subscribers.

[Follow Philip Elmer-DeWitt on Twitter @philiped]

Summary: Despite high prices and lack of Wi-Fi, hundreds line up in Beijing to buy Apple's smartphone Nobody camped out overnight and the lines didn't stretch for whole city blocks, but an hour before the iPhone was set to make its official debut in China, reporters in Beijing counted nearly 300 customers queued up to buy…


It is clear after the Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s victory in the Republican presidential primaries that electorates are revolting against the relatively open economic policies that have been the norm in the United States and Britain since World War II.

If further evidence is needed, one need only look to the inability of Congress to pass legislation on immigration reform and the observation that the last four candidates left standing in the US presidential contest all oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Populist opposition to international integration is also on the rise in much of continental Europe, and has always been the norm in much of Latin America.

The question now is: What should be the guiding principles of international economic policy? How should the case be made by those of us who believe that the vastly better performance of the global system after World War II than between World War I and World War II was largely due to more enlightened economic policies?

The mainstream approach to these questions generally starts with some combination of rational argument and inflated rhetoric about the economic consequences of international integration. Studies are produced about the jobs created by trade agreements, the benefits of immigration and the costs of restrictions on trade.

In most cases, certainly including the cases for TPP and against Brexit, the overall economic merits are clear. But in this advocacy there is a kind of Gresham’s Law (the economic principle that bad money drives out good), whereby bolder claims drive out more prudent ones, causing estimates to often be exaggerated and delivered with far more confidence than is warranted. Over time, this has caught up with the advocates of integration.

While there is a strong case that the United States is better off than it would have been if the North American Free Trade Agreement had been rejected, the most extravagant predicted benefits have not materialized. And it is also fair to say that claims that China’s accession into the World Trade Organization would propel political liberalization have not been borne out. In any event, the willingness of publics to be intimidated by experts into supporting cosmopolitan outcomes appears, for the moment, to have been exhausted.

The second plank of the mainstream approach is to push for stronger policies to resist inequality, cushion economic disruptions and support the poor and middle class, then argue that if domestic policies are right, the pressure to resist globalization will be attenuated. The logic is right, and certainly, measures such as the GI bill, the government’s assurance of available mortgages and the interstate highway system were part of the political package that permitted the United States to underwrite an open international system through the 1960s. But the past eight years have seen the United States at last make significant progress toward universal health insurance, expand a variety of support programs for the poor and bring unemployment below 5 percent. Even still, trade has become ever less popular. It is not that strong domestic policies are unnecessary to undergird global integration; it is that they are insufficient.

A new approach has to begin from the idea that the basic responsibility of government is to maximize the welfare of citizens, not to pursue some abstract concept of the global good. Closely related to this is the idea that people want to feel that they are shaping the societies in which they live. It may be inevitable that impersonal forces of technology and changing global economic circumstances have profound effects. But it adds insult to injury when governments reach agreements that further cede control to international tribunals of one sort or another. This is especially the case when, for legal reasons or reasons of practicality, corporations have disproportionate influence in shaping global agreements.

If the Italian banking system is badly undercapitalized and the democratically elected government of Italy wants to use taxpayer money to recapitalize it, why should some international agreement prevent it from doing so? Why shouldn’t countries that think, likely wrongly, that genetically modified crops are dangerous get to shield their customers from such crops? Why should the international community seek to prevent countries that wish to limit capital inflows from doing so? The issue in all these cases is not the merits. It is the principle that intrusions into sovereignty exact a high cost.

What is needed is a responsible nationalism — an approach where it is understood that countries are expected to pursue their citizens’ economic welfare as a primary objective but where their ability to damage the interests of citizens of other countries is circumscribed. With such an approach, the content of international agreements would be judged not by how much is harmonized or by how many barriers to global commerce are torn down but by whether people as workers, consumers and voters are empowered.

This does not mean less scope for international cooperation. It may mean more. For example, tax burdens on workers around the world are as much as a trillion dollars greater than they would be if we had a proper system of international coordination that identified capital income and prevented a race to the bottom in its taxation. And taxes are only the most obvious area in which races to the bottom interfere with the achievement of national objectives. Others include labor and financial regulation, along with environmental standards.

Reflexive internationalism needs to give way to responsible nationalism — or else we will only see more distressing referendums and populist demagogues contending for high office.

Former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers wrote this piece for The Washington Post.

Summary: It is clear after the Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s victory in the Republican presidential primaries that electorates are revolting against the relatively open economic policies that have been the…


By Dave Quinn and Chris Harris

07/19/2016 AT 04:10 PM EDT

Netflix announced Monday it is in production on more episodes of

about a murder in Wisconsin and the controversial conviction of two people for the crime.

Following the announcement, Laura H. Nirider, the lawyer for Brendan Dassey, the nephew of Stephen Avery who was convicted of the 2005 murder of Theresa Halbach along with Avery, tells PEOPLE Dassey, now 26, is "hopeful." Dassey is still behind bars and is challenging his imprisonment as unlawful, and is hoping to receive a new trial, Nirider says.

"He is hopeful," Nirider explains. "What gives him hope is the letters of support he receives from people all around the world. Those letters and his family are the reasons he gets up nowadays. He is hopeful and grateful."

Nirider says she was happy about the news of the show's second season. "The whole world saw what happened to him over the course of season one. People are rightfully up in arms about what happened to him, and we are grateful a spotlight will continue to be shown on his case," she says.

She adds that Dassey was surprised by the success of the show. "I think everybody's been taken aback by how popular the series was, and we are incredibly grateful for the focus it has put on this case."

focus on "the high-stakes post-conviction process, as well as the emotional toll the process takes on all involved," Netflix's press release stated.

"The new installments will take fans of the acclaimed documentary series back inside the story of convicted murderer Steven Avery, and his co-defendant, Brendan Dassey, as their respective investigative and legal teams challenge their convictions and the State fights to have the convictions and life sentences upheld," it continued.

The popular docuseries prompted fans to call for the

in an effort to exonerate Avery and Dassey.

"We are extremely grateful for the tremendous response to, and support of, the series,"

added in the release. "The viewers' interest and attention has ensured that the story is not over, and we are fully committed to continuing to document events as they unfold."

No timeline was given as to when the new episodes would be made available on Netflix.

The Netflix Show Making a Murderer is on the cover of this week's PEOPLE

Since the show was released, Avery has

asking for "every forensic test possible" to prove his alleged innocence. (He reportedly has not been allowed to watch the Netflix show).

Third visit WCC: SA thrilled about chance of new forensic testing--like innocent men always are.#MakingAMurderer pic.twitter.com/7p2JwaJoYt

In February, Ricciardi and Demos said they had been in conversations with Kathleen Zellner – Steven Avery's new lawyer – about continuing to film the process, and had continued to record phone call conversations with Avery. At the time, they had not yet returned to film in Two Rivers, Wisconsin, where

had been divided about the show and the case's verdict.

"There is a lot of hostility toward these two women [the filmmakers] in Wisconsin,"

. "The theory is that [they] have played Wisconsin unfairly. But among those people who think and are a little more educated and thoughtful about these sorts of issues, there is appreciation."

Summary: Steven Avery and Brendan Dassey's stories will continue in the second season of Netflix's Making a Murderer


Caitlyn Jenner said Wednesday that she found it easier to come out as transgender than as a Republican.

Jenner, speaking at a breakfast aimed at including the LGBT community in the Republican Party, said President Obama has helped LGBT Americans make some progress, the Associated Press reports. She praising his administration’s decision to allow transgender people to serve openly in the military, and said Democrats have generally been better on such issues.

And after an uproar earlier this year about transgender bathroom access, she said the issue has been politicized for years and that she’s never had a problem.

Summary: She said transgender bathroom access has been politicized for years


The former N.B.A. forward Kermit Washington faces allegations that he embezzled about a half-million dollars in charitable donations meant to help the needy in Africa.

An indictment unsealed Wednesday alleged that Washington took money that had been donated to a charity he founded, Project Contact Africa, and used it to pay for jewelry and vacations, among other things. He was charged with counts including interfering with internal revenue laws.

Washington was charged in an indictment filed in Kansas City, Mo., on Monday. He was arrested Tuesday in Los Angeles, said Tammy Dickinson, the United States attorney for the western district of Missouri.

A lawyer who prosecutors said would be representing Washington did not return a message seeking comment.

Washington, 64, played in the N.B.A. in the 1970s and 1980s for several teams, including the Los Angeles Lakers, the Boston Celtics and the San Diego Clippers. He is perhaps best known for, as a Laker, throwing a punch that fractured the face of the Houston Rockets’ Rudy Tomjanovich during a game in 1977.

STAYING ANOTHER YEAR Kris Jenkins, who made a buzzer-beating 3-pointer in Villanova’s championship victory over North Carolina, and guard Josh Hart will return to the program next season rather than leave for the N.B.A., which had set Wednesday as the deadline for players to decide if they would enter its draft.

The Rangers rookie Nomar Mazara, the youngest player in the majors, hit the longest home run of the season as Texas beat the visiting Los Angeles Angels, 15-9.

Mazara, 21, drove a pitch high into the second deck in right field at Globe Life Park, a ball that would have traveled an estimated 491 feet had it landed unimpeded.

Rougned Odor, Mazara’s Texas teammate, drove in three runs in what may have been his last game before a suspension for punching Toronto’s Jose Bautista during a bench-clearing brawl on May 15. A decision on his appeal is expected before Friday’s game against Pittsburgh.

ARRIETA REMAINS UNBEATEN Jake Arrieta allowed four runs for the first time in nearly a year but still captured his ninth win of the season as the Chicago Cubs won at St. Louis, 9-8.

Kris Bryant hit a three-run homer, and Jason Heyward and Ben Zobrist each drove in two runs in support of Arrieta, who became the second nine-game winner in the majors, after the Chicago White Sox’ Chris Sale.

BRADLEY’S STREAK CONTINUES Jackie Bradley Jr. extended his major-league-best hitting streak to 29 games, and Boston beat visiting Colorado, 10-3, as the Red Sox won their fourth straight. The Red Sox have scored eight or more runs 10 times in their last 14 home games.

And Bradley is not the only hot player for Boston: Xander Bogaerts homered to put his hitting streak at 18 games.

AROUND THE MAJORS Brandon Crawford hit a run-scoring single with two outs in the 10th inning, and the surging San Francisco Giants beat the visiting San Diego Padres, 4-3, for their 13th win in 14 games. Matt Duffy singled off Brad Hand (1-2) with one out and advanced on a wild pitch one out later before Crawford drove a pitch past Padres center fielder Jon Jay. • Cleveland roughed up a top White Sox pitcher for the second straight game and beat host Chicago, 4-3. A day after sending Chris Sale to his first loss after a 9-0 start, the Indians scored three runs and had five hits against Joel Quintana, who had entered the game with a 1.98 E.R.A. • Andres Blanco stole home, and Philadelphia avoided a sweep by winning at Detroit, 8-5. • Miguel Sano hit a go-ahead two-run homer, and host Minnesota staved off another series sweep by beating Kansas City, 7-5.

The New England Patriots have joined Tom Brady’s court fight against the N.F.L. and Commissioner Roger Goodell for the first time.

In an eight-page friend-of-the-court brief filed with the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, the Patriots said they “stand to lose their All-Pro quarterback for 25 percent of the upcoming regular season based on a severely flawed process” undertaken by the league in its so-called Deflategate investigation.

Brady was suspended last May for four games for what Goodell said was a scheme to use improperly inflated footballs in the A.F.C. championship game in January 2015. The Patriots went on to win the Super Bowl.

The suspension was overturned by a federal judge before the 2015 regular season, but a circuit court panel ruled, 2-1, last month that Goodell had been within the rights granted to him by the collective bargaining agreement.

BILLS’ G.M. SOFTENS REMARKSBuffalo Bills General Manager Doug Whaley said he had used “a poor choice of words” in saying Tuesday that he did not think football was intended to be played by humans. Whaley, a former college safety, said he had been trying to make the point that football is a physical game and that injuries are a part of it.

All tickets for Sunday’s 100th running of the Indianapolis 500 have been sold, and for only the third time in history, local fans will be able to watch the race live on television.

The race has traditionally been televised on tape delay in the Indianapolis television market. It has not been televised live locally since the 1950s.

Between 350,000 and 375,000 spectators are expected.

Darlington Nagbe scored his first international goal on a volley in the 90th minute, and the United States beat Ecuador, 1-0, in an exhibition in Frisco, Tex., before next month’s Copa América.

Bobby Wood headed a pass to Nagbe, who controlled the ball with his chest and scored on a right-footed shot from 8 yards.

The United States will play an exhibition against Bolivia on Saturday and then open the Copa América against Colombia on June 3.

Summary: Federal prosecutors said Washington had traded on his celebrity to solicit donations that he then embezzled from the charity he founded, Project Contact Africa.


The Belgian is open to a return to Stamford Bridge, despite the fact Chelsea have not qualified for the Champions League. But, like Morata, he is also being chased by United and PSG.

Chelsea’s talks over Lukaku also include central defender John Stones, with the Blues keen to push Everton into giving them a combined asking price for the pair.

Whether or not a £100m double deal for Lukaku and Stones could be negotiated remains to be seen, with Manchester City expected to make their opening offer for Stones within the next fortnight.

Other than a striker and a central defender, Conte is keen to sign a new energetic midfielder. Roma’s Radja Nainggolan is his top choice, with Leicester City’s N’Golo Kante, who has a £20m release clause, another option.

Summary: Chelsea’s determination to land a top-class forward this summer has seen the Blues join Arsenal in expressing an interest for Alvaro Morata while also exploring the possibility of re-signing Romelu Lukaku.


John Harris’s article “Money for nothing” (G2, 14 April) is a welcome change from the screeds we read on corruption and excessive payouts. The idea of a social wage or universal basic income (UBI) has been around for some time, as he points out. Now it seems to be moving from utopian ideal to the realm of politics and practical life. This surely is to be wished for by all concerned in questions of social justice. A central belief of contemporary capitalism is that the labour of the worker is a commodity like any other in search of a buyer. In various ways the law alleviates this (eg the minimum wage) but does not change the basic thinking. Now there is the possibility that the livelihood of every member of society, independent of work availability and wage levels, is recognised and assured. Let us hope the idea is explored publicly and allowed to fructify.John ThomsonForest Row, East Sussex

• The most shocking statement in John Harris’s piece was that only six [now seven] Labour MPs signed up to Caroline Lucas’s early-day motion on universal basic income. Do the other 222 think Labour stands for unremitting toil and inexorably growing inequality? Even the SDP considered backing a citizen’s income back in the 1980s. Equality and the Ownership Question (Tawney Society Paper no 34, 1986) addressed the issue of how the population at large could share in national wealth in a time of growing differentials between an inordinately overpaid elite and an insecure underpaid serfdom.

Ideas floated in the 80s included variants on a social dividend, whereby publicly listed companies would be required to issue a percentage of new shares each year (a process known as equity dilution) to be lodged in a citizen’s trust that would provide all citizens with a growing dividend on the profits of the whole economy, thus converting monopoly capital into equitable income. Its dividend issues might start modestly with each new cohort reaching the age of 18 and expand upwards, allowing other parts of social welfare to be focused on groups who would never benefit.

Such a scheme would put a brake on the accumulation of unearned wealth, and be safe from the whims of chancellors. Of course, a government in a hurry might decide to prime the equality pump by first freezing, then top-slicing, the billions in assets hidden away in tax havens under British jurisdiction. Richard GravilPenrith, Cumbria

Related: Should we scrap benefits and pay everyone £100 a week?

• Thanks for a great article on UBI. The next step is to integrate this with a shift towards expenditure taxation, so the basic income acts as a tax allowance, a sort of “tax cashback”, which gives the expenditure tax a progressive nature and also is harder for the multinationals and the rich to avoid. Dr Jon MulbergFelixstowe, Suffolk

• Is this idea exclusive to Britain? What about eastern Europe, Africa, Latin America and practically everywhere east of Suez? If we all have a standard UBI, what do we suppose that income might buy? If Harris were my age, he might remember that, as computerisation moved into the workplace, the talk then was of work-share, and further education was considered necessary for the future. As we have increased the numbers at university, the numbers of graduate baristas has risen disproportionately.

If a universal basic income is not to be the badge of people who can’t get their heads around the idea of a rational economy, anyone talking UBI has first to make the sums add up.Martin LondonHenllan, Denbighshire

• I strongly support the implementation of a universal basic income, but feel that it should be paid only to citizens who have lived in the country for 16 years. Those born here would receive it at 16, which would support them with their further education, higher education and apprenticeships. It should be set at the same level as the living wage, and would replace the old age pension and the jobseeker’s allowance. Other benefits would be paid on top for those in need. Trevor RandallGreat Missenden, Buckinghamshire

• UBI already exists: it’s called the state pension. It should be easy to see how it works and affects enterprise and the labour market. It would also be possible to extend it progressively to younger ages, until some adverse effect was observed, or it met child benefit and became effectively universal. Odd that recent governments want to raise pensionable age until it meets age at death, and becomes extinct. David BowlerPerth

• The citizen’s wage sounds a wonderful idea, if only to lower the anxiety many have. But how do we make sure that the disabled have the extra income they need? Who will be willing to do the hard work of childcare, and looking after the elderly, for very little extra? These problems need working out but should not stop the whole idea.Christina Naylor Languenan, Brittany, France

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Summary: Letters: The idea of a universal basic income has been around for some time. Now it seems to be moving from utopian ideal to the realm of politics and practical life


A state watchdog agency on Wednesday signaled its support for Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center’s plan for closer ties with two hospitals, part of the health system’s effort to compete more aggressively against Partners HealthCare and other providers.

Beth Israel Deaconess is seeking a clinical affiliation with MetroWest Medical Center, which would allow it to expand specialty medical services at MetroWest while gaining a new source of patient referrals from the Framingham-based hospital. It also wants to add MetroWest and New England Baptist Hospital to its affiliated network of health care providers that negotiates contracts with insurers.

The Massachusetts Health Policy Commission indicated that it would not take steps to try to stop the new relationships because they could lead to improved care and more competition.

The commission does not formally approve or reject health care deals. Rather, it studies how deals are likely to affect the broader market and refers any serious objections to the attorney general.

In this case, the commission said the tie-ups could result in “small to moderate” increases in medical spending, about $4.5 million a year. But it also said there is potential for savings if the Beth Israel Deaconess network maintains its moderate prices and successfully diverts patients from higher-priced providers, such as Partners. The deals also could improve the quality of care delivered to patients, the commission found.

The findings were a sharp contrast to the commission’s earlier reports on proposed acquisitions by Partners, the parent company of Massachusetts General and Brigham and Women’s hospitals. When it studied those deals, the agency raised strong objections, arguing that allowing Partners to acquire South Shore Hospital and Hallmark Health System would raise spending as much as $49 million a year while giving Partners, the state’s largest health system, even greater market power. Partners later dropped both deals.

But on Wednesday, commissioners noted that the growth of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Beth Israel Deaconess Care Organization, or BIDCO, could be a good thing. BIDCO is a network of affiliated doctors and hospitals that negotiates contracts with insurers and gives its members set budgets under which to manage patient care.

“To me, big is not necessarily bad,” said Marylou Sudders, the state secretary of health and human services, who sits on the commission. “Shouldn’t Massachusetts have... a strong competitor to what is the largest and most expensive health system?”

The commission said that by adding MetroWest and the Baptist to its network, BIDCO will solidify its place as the state’s second largest provider network. But it will remain much smaller than Partners, with about 13 percent of all hospital discharges, compared to 29 percent for Partners.

Jeffrey Hulburt, BIDCO’s chief executive, said he was pleased with the commission’s findings. “They came to the conclusion we had hoped they would come to,” he said. “Their report shows that both transactions we asked to bring forward are really unlikely to impact health care costs in the market.”

Dr. Stan Lewis, chief system development and strategy officer at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, said the commission was “very complimentary” of the hospital’s strategy to create a network that contains costs while improving the coordination of care.

Leaders at MetroWest and the Baptist also said they were encouraged by the commission’s findings.

Summary: A state watchdog agency on Wednesday indicated support for Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center’s efforts to become a stronger counterpoint to the Partners HealthCare by adding two hospitals to its contracting network.


I AM an inveterate consumer of peanuts and peanut butter, and to the extent that I can integrate either into my cooking, I do so. Which makes this West African soup, which I first ate in Paris years ago, an ideal dish since it has both.

It’s also about as different from a traditional European chicken-in-a-pot type of soup as you can get, flavored with ginger, garlic and chilies (sounds Chinese, yes?), and containing vegetables like sweet potatoes and kale. Then of course there are the peanuts.

Mark Bittman finds a new use for peanut butter in a hearty, exotic chicken soup.

At first I made this with water, because I figured the flavors were so warm and strong that it would be a waste to use chicken stock. Then, however, I included stock in the soup and it became downright luxurious. So let me say this: refrain from using canned (or boxed) stock; if you have real stock — chicken, vegetable, even beef — by all means use it. Otherwise water is fine, because the chicken and vegetables will make it plenty rich enough.

When it comes to the peanut butter, I favor what now seems quaintly called “natural” peanut butter, made from peanuts and salt, nothing else. (The peanut butter with which most of us grew up usually contains sugar and added fat, for “creaminess.”) Whether you have chunky or creamy doesn’t matter much; in either case, it will add creaminess to the soup, and the chopped peanuts will give you crunch.

Finally, if you can finesse it, it’s nice to time the cooking so that the sweet potatoes do not quite fall apart. But having made this a good half-dozen times, I can tell you that that’s easier said than done. Sometimes they do, and sometimes they don’t; the soup is wonderful either way.

Summary: A soup as different from a traditional European chicken-in-a-pot as you can get, incorporating ginger, garlic, chilies, sweet potatoes and kale.


Online harassment and abuse is “stifling debate and ruining lives”, according to Yvette Cooper, who is calling on police and prosecutors to follow the Guardian’s lead in unmasking the true extent of the problem.

The senior Labour MP warned that misogyny, racism and homophobic abuse were all growing online, as was revenge pornography, in which people distributed sexual photos or videos of former partners without permission.

It came as the former cabinet minister Maria Miller, who now chairs parliament’s women and equality committee, said the time had come for a “wholesale review” of the laws that govern online activity.

The comments come after the Guardian launched a major series called the Web We Want, which revealed the darker side of online comments on its own website.

Cooper called for online threats, harassment and stalking to be included in the Crime Survey for England and Wales, and said other media providers should carry out research similar to that done by the Guardian.

She welcomed a Crown Prosecution Service consultation on cyber-related offences, but said there was still no regular reporting of stalking, harassment or threatening behaviour of a criminal nature.

“In the 1970s and 80s women across Britain and across the world took to the streets to ‘Reclaim the Night’. Women and men campaigned together for safer streets, for stronger action to stop physical violence against women, and to argue that there should be no no-go areas for women – the streets and public spaces should belong to everyone,” she said.

Cooper argued that abuse on the internet was today’s equivalent, and she has launched a campaign called Reclaim the Internet, which will hold a conference in late May.

Miller said there was now an urgent need for legislation that would support police work in an online age, and said MPs were planning to get together to try to drive forward the agenda.

“There needs to be a wholesale review of the way the law works for the most prevalent online crimes, and that includes online abuse,” she said.

She said that a new law around revenge pornography introduced a year ago had given people confidence to bring forward complaints, driving up the numbers from a handful of cases to regular reporting of the issue. The challenge, argued Miller, was to help the police by identifying types of abuse online so they did not have to rely on a “patchwork of law” to deal with different issues.

“There is growing recognition that a laissez-faire approach ... isn’t working,” she added.

But Polly Vernon, the author of Hot Feminist, who suffered a steady stream of low-level abuse online, said it wasn’t just about things that were unlawful.

She said she “felt dehumanised, mildly depressed, anxious and body dysmorphic” after an outpouring by her critics, who she said were “swept up in the sport of being cruel on Twitter”.

“What they do isn’t high-level trolling, of the kind Cooper’s concerned with; it isn’t death or rape threats, it isn’t anonymous,” she said, arguing that people felt it was admissible to attack her after columnists wrote negatively about the book.

“I think people don’t entirely realise that what they are doing is bullying, shaming, piling in en masse on one individual who may well suffer badly as a result of that treatment. I did.”

Vernon said that she was now utterly disinclined to write with honesty about her life experiences and admitted it took therapy to help her get over it. “I have almost disengaged from Twitter now. It’s the only way I can bear to write and publish things I truly think, feel and behave.”

Cooper agreed that there was a risk that people were being driven offline when the internet ought to be a “forum for wild and wonderful debate, passionate argument and free speech”.

She said the silencing of women daring to speak their mind ought to be of great concern. Cooper’s campaign is cross-party and will focus on how police and prosecutors can tackle hate crimes, threats and intimidation.

It will also look at the responsibilities of social media platforms, which have taken action to improve reporting and blocking mechanism, but which could do more to counter hate speech. Cooper said the Guardian had led the field with the Web We Want series, but said it wasn’t just journalists who were targeted.

The conference will also look at what individuals can do when faced with abuse. The MPs involved want to make sure that the next generation do not think that online misogyny is acceptable.

Summary: Senior Labour MP says police and prosecutors should do more to unmask extent of online misogyny, racism and homophobic abuse


ROME—Italy’s anti-immigrant and euroskeptic Northern League will start a petition calling for a law that allows a referendum on whether the country wants to exit the European Union, its leader said on Friday.

In a news conference following the announcement of the U.K.’s decision to leave the EU, Northern League’s head Matteo Salvini said that it...


Khi ngôi sao quần vợt Mỹ Serena Williams đến Rio Olympics tháng này, cô không đi một mình. Tháp tùng cô là một đoàn được trả tiền gồm các nhân viên, huấn luyện viên và những người bảo trợ đã giúp cô suốt chặng đường của mình.

Williams, ước tính có giá 150 triệu USD (nhiều nhất trong số các vận động viên nữ theo Forbes), tập luyện 30 giờ/tuần nhưng không bao giờ phải làm thêm một nghề thứ hai để đủ sống và chi trả cho con đường thể thao của mình. Cô là một trong số ít ỏi vận động viên Olympics được như vậy.

Ở làng vận động viên ở Rio bạn thường dễ gặp hơn những người như vận động viên Canada Donna Vakalis. Để tranh giải 5 môn phối hợp, cô tập ít nhất 30 giờ một tuần về đấu kiếm, bắn súng, bơi, cưỡi ngựa và chạy việt dã. Và khi không tập thì người phụ nữ 36 tuổi này theo học bằng tiến sỹ ngành xây dựng ở trường đại học Toronto và làm một số nghề để hỗ trợ giấc mơ Olympics của mình.

Cô ước tính chi phí rèn luyện thi đấu 5 môn phối hợp phải khoảng 39.000 USD một năm. Tuy nhiên do môn này ít được khán giả Canada xem (và bị Hội Đồng Olympic Quốc Tế xếp hạng thu nhập thấp nhất) nên có sự thiếu hụt về tài trợ giữa khoản tiền hỗ trợ của Chính Phủ mà cô nhận được (3.450 USD năm ngoái) với khoản tiền cô cần trang trải.

Vakalis nói rằng đội tuyển quốc gia chi gần hết số tiền cho huấn luyện viên và điều kiện luyện tập đối với nhiều môn thể thao Olympics. Nhưng với 5 môn phối hợp thì không.

“Chúng tôi tự trả tiền cho huấn luyện viên, tiền cho việc vào tập ở trung tâm thể thao, tiền cho vật lý trị liệu và mát xa, nghĩa là phải chịu gánh nặng tài chính cao hơn,” cô nói.

Vì thế Vakalis phải góp nhặt các khoản tiền từ các công việc làm thêm như trợ giảng, trợ lý nghiên cứu, nói chuyện tạo nguồn cảm hứng tại các hội nghị và làm video cho một kênh YouTube bậc đại học. Cô cũng làm đơn xin kinh phí vận động viên (nhiều nhất có thể được cấp là 4.620 USD) và tạo ra cuộc vận động quần chúng góp tiền, như trang “đăng ký vận động viên” để những người ủng hộ mua giúp đồ thể thao cho cô như thể người ta giúp vật dùng cho gia đình cho người mới cưới.

Không chỉ riêng Vakalis ở tình thế khó khăn về tài chính. Một báo cáo mới đây cho biết các vận động viên hàng đầu Canada chi tiêu hàng năm 14,920 đô la Canada (11.395 USD) nhiều hơn tiền mà họ thu được về thể thao do liên bang và tỉnh tài trợ, với 20% số vận động viên mắc nợ với số tiền trung bình là 40.000 đô la Canada. Các vận động viên Olympics Canada mắc nợ tổng cộng một năm là 27,5 triệu đô la Canada. Các gia đình vận động viên ở Mỹ trước đây phải nộp đơn xin bảo hộ khi bị phá sản do nợ nần do chi phí khi tập luyện, đi lại và các khoản khác khác lên quá cao.

Hiện có hơn 100 người hy vọng thăng tiến ở Olympics từ Mexico đến Libya hiện dùng trang mạng GoFundMe để vận động xin tài trợ từ quần chúng. Và có con số lớn bất ngờ những vận động viên đã tập luyện để thi đấu ở Rio nhưng đồng thời làm các nghề không liên quan tới thể thao.

Những vận động viên Olympics này có thể sẽ rời Rio trong một vài tuần tới với tên tuổi của những người nổi tiếng tạm thời của thế giới, nhưng nhiều người trong số họ đến Rio như những người bình thường với các khoản nợ khủng khiếp.

Vận động viên bơi lội người Úc Matthew Abood chỉ thiếu 0,02 giây để đủ điểm dự Olympics London 2012. Không những anh bị vỡ mộng mà đột nhiên chính phủ Úc ngưng ngay tài trợ cho anh.

“Tôi nhớ tự hỏi mình: “Mình đang làm gì thế này? Mình chẳng có nghề gì, mình không học tập gì. Mình không có kinh nghiệm gì để làm việc,” Abood kể lại. Do vậy anh đã tiếp cận Ngân Hàng Thịnh Vượng Chung của Úc với một “kế hoạch 4 năm” để không những quay trở lại con đường tới Rio mà còn để có được một nghề hỗ trợ cho việc tập luyện.

Abood đã làm việc khoảng 2 ngày một tuần trong 4 năm qua với tư cách là nhà phân tích phát triển kinh doanh cho ngân hàng này. Anh nói thu nhập ổn định này giúp tài trợ cho chế độ tập luyện để đưa anh, hiện 30 tuổi, tới được Rio. Anh sẽ thi 2 môn, bơi tự do 50 m và bơi tiếp sức tự do 4x100.

Không giống các vận động viên ở phần lớn các nước khác, vận động viên Mỹ không được chính phủ liên bang hỗ trợ. Thay vì thế, họ dựa vào sự hỗ trợ gián tiếp từ tài trợ của tư nhân cho môn thể thao mình theo đuổi và khối tư nhân chọn để bảo trợ.

Quỹ Vận động viên Mỹ (một cơ quan quản lý tiền quyên theo môn thì đấu đã cấp cho các vận động viên Rio Olympics 150.000 USD) với ước tính rằng tiền thanh toán trực tiếp cá nhân của vận động viên cho việc huấn luyện, thiết bị và đi lại tới các sự kiện trên khắp thế giới có thể trong khoảng từ 12.000 USD đến 120.000 USD một năm, tùy theo môn thể thao. Nhưng họ nói rằng chỉ 10% của tổng tiền chi tiêu của Ủy ban Olympics Hoa Kỳ là hỗ trợ trực tiếp cho các vận động viên.

Ủy ban Olympics Hoa Kỳ (một tổ chức nhà nước hỗ trợ, hướng dẫn tham gia thi đấu và giám sát đoàn thể thao Mỹ) nói 72% thu nhập của họ là chi tiêu cho vận động viên và tạo lập chương trình, nhưng họ không trả lời câu hỏi của BBC Capital muốn biết rõ trong số tiền đó thì phần tiền trực tiếp chi cho vận động viên là khoản nào.

“Tiền không được chuyển tới các vận động viên ở mức cần thiết để họ có thể sống đầy đủ, có xe ô tô, mà không phải sống tháng nào biết tháng đó,” Augie Wolf, một cựu vận động viên đẩy tạ và người sáng lập Quỹ Vận động viên Mỹ, nói. Ông nói rất nhiều vận động viên Olympics hàng đầu của Mỹ sống chật vật, xin tiền, đi vay tiền và phụ thuộc vào sự hào phóng của những người khác.

“Nhiều vận động viên Mỹ chung với nhau, ở với 3 vận động viên khác trong một căn hộ 2 phòng ngủ,” ông nói. Quỹ Vận động viên Mỹ tập trung hỗ trợ tài chính vào các môn điền kinh mà ở đây 50% vận động viên trong số 10 người hàng đầu của đất nước ở môn thể thao của họ chỉ nhận dưới 15.000 USD hàng năm từ thể thao, theo một cuộc khảo sát của Hiệp hội Vận động viên Điền Kinh.

Những người mà nghiệp thể thao của họ không đủ tiền sống thì thường tìm một công việc linh hoạt về giờ giấc để làm khi rảnh rỗi vì lịch tập luyện bất thường và thường xuyên phải đi lại để thi đấu. Chẳng hạn, chuỗi cửa hàng bán lẻ đồ thể thao Dick’s Sporting Goods đã phát động Chương Trình Người Thi đấu vào năm thuê 200 người thi đấu có triển vọng của Olympics và Paralympics vào làm ở khắp 106 cửa hàng ở Mỹ. Những vận động viên Olympics khác thì luyện tập khi làm việc tại các nơi như McDonalds, bán bất động sản hoặc khi ở trong quân đội Mỹ.

Mặc dù rất nhiều người lần đầu tiên là vận động viên Olympics gặp khó khăn để sinh sống khi được tuyển chọn đi Olympics, những năm gần đây tình hình có khả quan hơn, Mark Dyreson, sử gia thể thao và giáo sư môn vận động học của Pennsylvania State University, nói.

“Mãi tới những năm 1980 tính không chuyên là tiêu chuẩn tại Olympics và nếu bạn được tài trợ hoặc được trả tiền để tham gia vào môn thể thao của bạn thì bạn sẽ không hợp lệ.”

Ngày nay ta có những vận động viên Olympics triệu phú như Usain Bolt người Jamaica và vận động viên bơi Michael Phelps. Phelps có hơn 55 triệu USD theo trang mạng Celebrity Net Worth.

Đối với vận động viên trẻ, chỉ để tới được Olympics (không tính những người giành được huy chương để có được hợp đồng bảo trợ) đã là thử thách vô cùng gian nan. Không những đó là cam kết riêng tư nhiều năm ròng và cam kết tài chính mà đó còn là một việc đầu tư rủi ro mà không chắc có thu lại được gì hay không.

Cơ hội để làm ra tiền đối với nhiều vận động viên lần đầu tiên tới Olympics sẽ chỉ tới khi Thế vận hội kết thúc. Đó là lúc họ có thể chuyển sự nổi danh mới có thành cơ hội được tài trợ béo bở và gặt hái được vinh quang mà họ giành được tại Olympics này.

Bài tiếng Anh đã đăng trên BBC Capital

Summary: Có thật là tất cả vận động viên Olympics đều có hợp đồng tài trợ béo bở hay nhiều người phải làm thêm các nghề khác để đủ sống?


One week ago, against the advice of its political establishment, Britain narrowly voted to leave the European Union. Within a few days, that establishment was in the process of a full-scale implosion: the country is effectively without government or opposition, shorn of leadership, bereft of direction. As the pound crashed and markets tanked, the chancellor of the exchequer went missing for three days while Boris Johnson, the most prominent member of the Leave campaign, spent the weekend not sketching out a plan for the nation’s future, but playing cricket and writing his column for the Telegraph. Having asserted its right to sovereignty, the country can now find nobody to actually run it.

Meanwhile, the very prize won in the referendum – to leave the EU – remains unclaimed. Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty sets out the process for leaving the EU. Once invoked, a country has two years to negotiate the terms of the divorce. But no one will touch it. Prime Minister David Cameron, who led the losing campaign to remain in the EU, announced his resignation within hours of the result, insisting that his successor should be the one to pull the trigger. Johnson, who is favoured to replace Cameron, protests that there is “no need for haste”. During the campaign, our departure from the EU had many proud and pushy parents. In victory it is an orphan.

Cutting the figure not so much of a failed state as a state intent on failure, the nation’s credit rating was downgraded, its currency devalued and its stock market depleted. On polling day the Leave campaign reminded us that we were the fifth-largest economy in the world and could look after ourselves. By the following afternoon our currency was sufficiently decimated that we had fallen to sixth, behind France.

Related: Brexit: a disaster decades in the making

In the ensuing panic, some politicians argued that we could simply ignore the referendum result: David Lammy, the Labour MP for Tottenham, suggested it was “advisory and non-binding”, and urged parliament to call another referendum, in order to avert economic catastrophe. A huge number of people petitioned the government to do the same – while the eminent barrister Geoffrey Robertson insisted a second referendum was not necessary to overturn the result: parliament could just vote it down. “Our democracy does not allow, much less require, decision-making by referendum,” he wrote. “Democracy has never meant the tyranny of the simple majority, much less the tyranny of the mob.”

It was argued that we could not leave the final word on such momentous decisions to ordinary voters: they didn’t know what they really wanted, or they had been tricked into wanting something that would hurt them, or they were too ignorant to make informed choices, or maybe they quite simply wanted the wrong thing. A significant portion of the country was in the mood for one big do-over – a mood enhanced by considerable class contempt and the unmistakable urge to cancel the universal franchise for “stupid people” incapable of making the right decisions.

Everything had changed – we had decided to end a more than 40-year relationship with our continental partners and the consequences were far-reaching. In Scotland independence was once again in play; in Westminster, resignations from the shadow cabinet came by the hour; in the City, billions were wiped off by the day. Indeed, one of the few things that didn’t budge was the very issue that had prompted it all: our membership of the European Union. The only thing we know for sure is that we don’t know how and when we will actually leave it. We are simultaneously in freefall and at a standstill, in a moment of intense and collective disorientation. We don’t know what is happening and it is happening very fast.

But the only thing worse than the result and its consequences is the poisonous atmosphere that made it possible. The standard of our political discourse has fallen more precipitously than the pound and cannot be revived as easily. This did not happen overnight, and the sorry conduct of the referendum campaign was only the latest indication of the decrepit state of our politics: dominated by shameless appeals to fear, as though hope were a currency barely worth trading in, the British public had no such thing as a better nature, and a brighter future held no appeal. Xenophobia – no longer closeted, parsed or packaged, but naked, bold and brazen – was given free rein. A week before the referendum, an MP was murdered in the street. When the man accused of killing her was asked his name in court he said: “Death to traitors, freedom for Britain.”

On the day after the referendum, many Britons woke up with the feeling – some for better, some for worse – that they were suddenly living in a different country. But it is not a different country: what brought us here has been brewing for a very long time.

The thing people often forget about Aesop’s fable of the boy who cried wolf is that in the end, there really was a wolf. Indeed, the story wouldn’t have its moral if the wolf didn’t show up and ravage the shepherd boy’s flock. Lying has consequences that last far longer than individual acts of deception: it ruins the liar’s ability to convince people when it really matters.

The source of the mistrust between the establishment and the country isn’t difficult to fathom. Next week the Chilcot inquiry will publish its findings into the Iraq war. After Iraq, we faced an economic crisis that few experts saw coming until it was too late. Then followed austerity; now the experts said this was precisely the wrong response to the crisis, but it happened anyway.

When leaders choose the facts that suit them, ignore the facts that don’t and, in the absence of suitable facts, simply make things up, people don’t stop believing in facts – they stop believing in leaders. They do so not because they are over-emotional, under-educated, bigoted or hard-headed, but because trust has been eroded to such a point that the message has been so tainted by the messenger as to render it worthless.

This was the wolf we were warned about. It is now mauling our political culture and savaging our economic wellbeing. We were warned of it by leaders in whom we had no confidence. So we all chose the facts we liked, and we all suffered. The wolf does not discriminate. As Aesop reminds us at the end of the fable: “Nobody believes a liar, even when he’s telling the truth.”

When leaders choose only the facts that suit them, people don’t stop believing in facts – they stop believing in leaders

This distrust is both mutual and longstanding, prompting two clear trends in British electoral politics. The first is a slump in turnout. In 1950, 84% of Britons voted in the general election; by last year it was 66%. The decline has not been uniform, but the general trajectory has been consistent. Between 1945 and 1997 turnout never went below 70%; since 2001 it has never reached 70%.

The second is a fracturing in political allegiance. For most of the postwar period, British electoral politics was effectively a duopoly. In 1951, 97% of votes were cast either for Conservatives or Labour. By last year, the combined total was 67%. Fewer people want to vote, and fewer voters want the two major parties. With a first-past-the-post system, designed to ensure that one of those parties wins a majority, our governments now preside with diminished legitimacy over a splintered political landscape. Cameron’s Tories were elected last year with only 24% of the eligible vote. In 1950, Winston Churchill was defeated even though 38% of eligible voters backed him.

These trends had similar consequences for the tactics of the two major parties. Under Cameron, the Conservatives, who had lost two prime ministers to the question of Europe, were able to abandon the most nativist elements of their base in order to pursue votes in the centre, rebranding themselves as the sensible party of British modernity. No longer “the nasty party”, the Conservative leadership embraced gay marriage, aggressively sought non-white spokespeople, and took a more moderate line on Europe than its members felt comfortable with.

Labour could also reposition itself, in the knowledge that it could keep winning elections even as it kept losing voters. Those who voted for Brexit tended to be English, white, poor, less educated and old. With the exception of the elderly, these have traditionally been Labour’s base. But the party has been out of touch with them for some time. The New Labour project made the party’s appeal both broader and shallower: there was a sharp pivot rightward, made with the conscious calculation that its core supporters had nowhere else to go.

The coalition of metropolitan liberals, city-dwellers, ethnic minorities, union members, working-class northerners and most of Scotland slowly began to fray. Poverty went down and inequality went up. Appeals to class politics gave way to more aspirational messaging. While covering the 2001 election, I recall the indifference that met Tony Blair on the campaign trail. He would appear in front of small, curious crowds, and then wave over their heads into the middle distance for the cameras. They voted for him – the alternative was William Hague running around in front of a pound sign – but they were not remotely engaged or inspired by him or his party.

The leave campaign did not invent racism. The deployment of bigotry to suit electoral ends has a longstanding tradition

In areas that Labour once had a stranglehold on, its vote slumped. Blair took his third victory in 2005 with only 9.5 million votes – fewer than Neil Kinnock managed when he lost to Margaret Thatcher in 1987. As long as the economy was doing well, a significant proportion of voters just stayed home – and there was no way to tell how soft the remaining support was until it was tested. Now those tests have come: in Scotland from the SNP, and in England and Wales from Ukip.

It may seem a minor matter in the wake of this referendum to say that our political parties are failing in their historic mission, but we would not have arrived here were they not doing so. The party set up by trade unions to represent the interests of workers in parliament no longer commands the allegiance of those people. True, almost two-thirds of Labour voters did vote remain – but an overwhelming number of the working-class, the poor, and the left-behind put their faith in leave. Meanwhile, the party of capital and nation has presided over a painful blow to the City and the Union. Neither party is fit for purpose.

The leave campaign did not invent racism. The deployment of bigotry to suit electoral ends has a longstanding tradition in this country, which is often denounced even by those who have done exactly that. Neglect, both benign and malign, and indulgence, both covert and overt, left those prejudices open for opportunists to exploit for their own ends. This was one such opportunity.

Liberal commentators have come to automatically identify poorer Britons with an ingrained loathing of foreigners, but in fact the British working class has a distinguished history of anti-racism: from the Lancashire mill workers boycotting cotton picked by slaves in the American Confederacy to the battle against fascism at Cable Street, and the campaigns of the Anti-Nazi League and the Anti-Apartheid Movement. In the last year, thousands of ordinary people have made their way to Calais with supplies for refugees.

Like all classes in Britain, however, it also has a bleak history of racism, which can make the journey from the street to the ballot box. Sometimes this has taken the form of open calls for white racial solidarity against non-whites. Sometimes it has taken organised forms, in the shape of Oswald Mosley’s New Party, the National Front, or the British National Party. And at other times, it has been neatly folded into the fabric of mainstream politics.

The National Front rose to prominence in the 1970s, but saw its advance blunted by Margaret Thatcher, who promised to be tough on immigration, and expressed sympathy for people who “are really rather afraid that this country might be rather swamped by people with a different culture”. Then came the BNP, which triggered a brief period of intense scrutiny and concern when it won a council seat in the Isle of Dogs, east London, in 1993. By 2003, the party had 17 councillors, and by 2008, more than 50 around the country. By increments, the BNP became a constant, if contested, fact of British municipal life. In the 2009 European elections, the party’s leader, Nick Griffin, won one of two BNP seats in the European parliament. That same year, Griffin found himself on BBC1’s Question Time. The rise of Ukip would later suck up all the oxygen on the far right, and Griffin would disappear, only to be replaced by Nigel Farage. More blokey and garrulous, less abrasive and boorish, Farage narrowed the focus to Europe and, by doing so, widened the far right’s appeal.

The divisions such movements sow have always posed a particular challenge for Labour, since the party’s core base of support is vulnerable to social and economic change to start with. That is why nativist parties always play best during times of recession, when resources are scarce and people are looking for someone to blame. In a letter from 1870 that, with a few words changed, could have been written any time in the past few years, Karl Marx vividly described this dynamic: “Every industrial and commercial centre in England possesses a working class divided into two hostile camps, English proletarians and Irish proletarians. The ordinary English worker hates the Irish worker as a competitor who lowers his standard of life … This antagonism is artificially kept alive and intensified by the press, the pulpit, the comic papers, in short by all the means at the disposal of the ruling classes.”

The Tories have consciously fanned these flames. In 2005, when the Tory leader Michael Howard ran his whole general election campaign on immigration, with the insidious slogan “Are you thinking what we’re thinking?”, the party’s MP in Castle Point, on the Essex coast, asked in one leaflet: “What bit of ‘send them back’ don’t you understand Mr Blair?” During that election, I drove from the least diverse constituency in the country – St Ives in Cornwall – to the most, which was in east London. In Cornwall, the Liberal Democrat MP, Andrew George, said the racism he was hearing was a particular worry. “It’s the one resonance issue that’s favouring the Tories,” he told me. “On the doorstep people aren’t saying: ‘I’m voting Conservative because of their tax spending plans.’ People have been saying, ‘We only came down here to get away from the blacks,’ and there was no self-consciousness about saying it out loud. I’m very disturbed about it. Maybe they’re not playing the race card. But they’re playing the immigration card and that’s right next to the race card in the deck.”

This week, David Cameron condemned “despicable” xenophobic attacks in the wake of the EU referendum. But just last month he was galvanising the Tory faithful in London with claims that the Labour mayoral candidate, Sadiq Khan, was in cahoots with an imam who, Cameron alleged, supported Isis. That claim was so utterly false that if the prime minister did not enjoy parliamentary privilege against charges of defamation, he would have had to pay damages to the imam, as the defence secretary Michael Fallon was forced to do when he repeated the remarks outside the House of Commons.

With a few notable exceptions, Labour’s response has been less crass but no less calculated. Labour tends to condemn outright bigotry before clothing it in the cosy blanket of understanding and concern for the bigot. It protests and then it panders. It routinely points out that racism is bad, but is rarely brave enough to make the case for why anti-racism is good. This leads to the worst of all worlds. Racism and xenophobia are condemned but never challenged, which leaves those who hold such views feeling silenced and ignored, but never engaged. This, in turn, leaves them prey to hucksters like Farage, who can claim to speak for them.

After his party lost a seat in Smethwick, West Midlands, in 1964 to a notoriously racist campaign, the Labour minister Richard Crossman concluded that: “It has been quite clear that immigration can be the greatest potential vote-loser for the Labour party.” This view was shared by Tony Blair’s government. Blair chose the white cliffs of Dover for a 2005 election speech on refugees and immigration – when it was time for the photo call, there wasn’t a black face to be seen. In 2006, as the Iraq war descended into chaos, home secretary John Reid turned his focus on the enemy within – intolerant Muslims. “This is Britain,” Reid told the party conference. “We will go where we please, we will discuss what we like, and we will never be browbeaten by bullies. That’s what it means to be British.” A few years later Jack Straw lectured Muslim women on what to wear when they came to his surgery.

The effect was not to blunt the rise of organised racism but to embolden it, making certain views acceptable and respectable. It was embedded in our political language and institutions and then left to fester.

We have yet to see a general election in which race and immigration are the defining issues. If that were the case, one would expect to see Ukip do far better that it has previously. At an election, people vote for parties that they believe, on balance, identify with their concerns on a range of issues. But this was not a general election. It was a referendum on membership in an unloved institution that was the source of mass migration on a scale that the government had not anticipated, and that most Britons were not prepared for.

Although much has been made, since the referendum, of results showing that areas with little migration were most opposed to it, we should not underestimate the jolt that accompanied the effects of free movement within a newly enlarged European Union. I left Britain for America in 2003, before it opened its borders to the east. After a few trips back in 2005, I simply stopped assuming that white people in London spoke English any more. The transformative potential was clear even then: states may import workers, but it is people who actually come. My parents came from Barbados in the 1960s, planning to stay for a few years, make some money and head back “home”. Instead they had kids and stayed. I saw no reason why many of these new immigrants wouldn’t do the same – and I wondered how the language we used to talk about race and migration would change now that there were so many new arrivals who were white but not British.

In the past, pollsters and politicians had elided the two issues – considering “race/immigration” as a single area of concern. That was never true or accurate, but the new situation made it even more clear that we needed to have a sophisticated conversation about migration and race. Not the conversation that politicians always claim we are avoiding, about the dreadful impact of migration – but a conversation about our needs as an ageing nation, about our economic and foreign policies, about how immigrants contribute far more in taxes than they take in benefits, and about the fact that there are considerably fewer of them than British people think. (For instance, in a recent Ipsos Mori poll, on average, respondents thought that EU immigrants accounted for 15% of the population – the true figure is about 5%.) But that is not all: we needed to have a conversation about the resources that communities require to accommodate an influx of new arrivals – school places, hospital beds, housing – and about who was responsible for cutting the budgets that used to provide these things.

But that is not the conversation we are having. It is not even the conversation we have never had. It is the conversation our leaders have desperately and wilfully avoided. For decades, the issue of race (the colour of people) and immigration (the movement of people) have been neatly interwoven, as though they are one and the same thing – as though “British” people are not also black and black people are not British.

It has been profitable for politicians – and not only Nigel Farage – to sow confusion about the difference between migration from the EU and elsewhere, or the distinction between economic migrants and asylum seekers. The argument that this was a vote about “economic” issues – since the hated European migrants were not brown or black – is belied by the deliberate commingling of every type of foreigner. It was not an accident that the “Breaking Point” poster, revealed by Farage on the morning of Jo Cox’s murder, showed Syrian refugees coming into Slovenia, an image with almost no relevance to the issue on the ballot. Xenophobia and racism are easily blended, and they become an especially potent toxin among a population that no longer trusts its own leaders.

To describe this as a working-class revolt against the elites is to give the elites more credit than they are due. With both sides run by Old Etonians and former Bullingdon boys, the elites were going to win no matter who you voted for.

It would be more accurate to say that the results reflected an ambivalence toward the elites on both sides. When leaders who you believe don’t care about you – and can do nothing for you – tell you what is in your best interest, it’s reasonable to ignore them. People who were told they would lose out in the recession to come felt they didn’t have much to lose; people who were told that belonging to the EU gave them certain rights and advantages did not see they had any value. It would be as much of a mistake to assume these people consciously voted for Faragism as to think they could never be tempted by it.

On this point, those who voted remain should, at the very least, concede that had we voted to stay in, the country would not be having this conversation. If remain had won, we would already have returned to pretending that everything was carrying on just fine. Those people who have been forgotten would have stayed forgotten; those communities that have been abandoned would have stayed invisible to all but those who live in them. To insist that they will now suffer most ignores the fact that unless something had changed, they were going to suffer anyway. Those on the remain side who felt they didn’t recognise their own country when they woke up on Friday morning must spare a thought for the pensioner in Redcar or Wolverhampton who has been waking up every morning for the last 30 years, watching factories close and businesses move while the council cuts back services and foreigners arrive, wondering where their world has gone to.

Many of those who voted leave will undoubtedly feel that they have had their say after years of being ignored. But they are beginning to discover that they have been lied to. Even when it feels that there is nothing left to lose, it turns out that things can always get worse. And even when it feels like nobody tells you the truth, it turns out that some factions of the elite can and will do more damage to your life than others.

One of the defining illusions of the populist rightwing agenda is that it possesses a unique ability to rally the poor on the basis of race and nation – but even here, it cannot deliver on its own terms. The leaders of the leave campaign have been in a furious retreat since their moment of triumph: they have walked back promises to control immigration, to quit the single market, and to “give our NHS the £350m the EU takes every week”. Leaving the EU does not diminish the power of the multinationals that moved manufacturing jobs overseas, or the financiers whose recklessness led to the closure of libraries and the shrinking of disability benefits. We have not opted out of global capitalism. Something will now be done about the free movement of labour – but capital will still have the run of the place.

The anger that has been unleashed is not being directed at the elites. Instead it is flying every which way to alarming effect: black people are being abused in the street; a Polish community centre has been defaced; eastern European children are being taunted in schools. Liberals are blaming the poor, Cameron is blaming Boris, the Daily Express is blaming the EU (“Brexit Vote is EU’s Fault: Ignoring Britain was Big Mistake”), business is blaming Cameron and Boris, Scotland is blaming England, London is blaming the rest of England, children are blaming their parents, and the EU is blaming all of us.

On 31 December 1999, as American television viewers watched around-the-clock coverage of the arriving millennium, one time zone at a time, the ABC newsreader Peter Jennings offered an appraisal of recent British history as he watched the fireworks light up the sky over the Thames. “This country has been through so much,” he said. “In 1900, when Queen Victoria was on the throne, Britain ruled over one-fifth of the world’s population. But for all this fantastic show, Britain’s possessions have dwindled to … Well, Hong Kong has gone now and, well … The Falklands are still British.”

Ever since the Suez crisis, Britain has struggled with its place in the modern world. Nostalgic about its former glory, anxious about its diminished state, forgetful about its former crimes, bumptious about its future role, it has lived on its reputation as an elderly aristocrat might live on his trust fund – frugally and pompously, with a great sense of entitlement and precious little self-awareness.

Related: Trident: the British question | Ian Jack

Once great, now not so great, it has struggled to find a status in its post-colonial iteration that fits its size and budget. We punch above our weight culturally, have significant clout economically and suffer painful delusions of grandeur militarily (let’s not talk about football). Where foreign policy and defence are concerned, Britain’s desire to be taken very seriously is the chief obstacle to it being taken more seriously. One of the central reasons for keeping the Trident weapons system, we are told, is so that we can keep “a seat at the table”. Our military involvement in Syria was intended not to be decisive but to send a message. And then there was Iraq. In most cases Britain craved a role for itself as the sole reliable conduit between America and Europe. Peripheral to the action; central to the process.

The fact that our ability to fulfil that function for the US has been severely diminished – President Barack Obama asked us to remain and we wouldn’t even listen to him – may be one of the few good things to come out of this whole mess. Indeed, our lesser status has already become clear from the attempts that have been made to negotiate ourselves out of the situation we just voted ourselves into.

While we were in the EU, Europe was prepared to try and make it work, even though we were a severe irritant. Now that we’ve voted out, they just want us gone. The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, could not have been clearer. She’s not interested in Britain holding another referendum, and is not inclined to give it any special favours. There would be no “cherry-picking. There must be and there will be a palpable difference between those countries who want to be members of the European family and those who don’t.” In other words, we will now be treated like any other country – which is precisely what we assumed we weren’t.

This melancholic grasping for our former glory has not served our politics well and is a key to understanding how this happened. In the absence of any substantive argument about how “taking back control” might look in the 21st century, we got men like Farage and Johnson waving flags and pounding their chests.

The route map out of this sorry situation will not be achieved by reversing the results of an election (even if that were desirable) or renegotiating a deal with the EU (even if that were possible). It will come through some broader reimagining of Britain that pays more attention to work, fairness, community and equality, than to flag, nation, anthem and culture. For the last 15 years, governments and the press have stoked fears about whether British culture could withstand the integration of Muslims – of whom 70% voted for remain – when they should have been worried about how to integrate the white working class into the British economy.

Brexit didn’t create these problems. It exposed them and will certainly make them worse. The decision as to whether we live in or out of the EU has been made. The choice before us now is whether we are finally ready to confront the issues that we have blissfully denied and engage with the communities we have carelessly ignored.

Follow the Long Read on Twitter at @gdnlongread, or sign up to the long read weekly email here.

• This article was amended on 30 June 2016. An earlier version referred to Slovakia where Slovenia was meant.

Summary: The Long Read: On the day after the referendum, many Britons woke up feeling that the country had changed overnight. But this was a disaster decades in the making


Now that the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal has been finalized, the Obama administration is telling anyone who will listen that it has the strongest protections for workers of any trade agreement in history. But nothing we know now about the TPP gives me any confidence that workers will end up with the good jobs and protections they deserve.

There’s been a lot of talk about winners and losers in various aspects of this deal. Spoiler alert: Corporations seem to win at every turn at the expense of working people. As my friend Steelworker President Leo Gerard said, “TPP may be the final blow to manufacturing in America. Our producers and workers are under siege from other nations’ massive overproduction, foreign currency devaluation, our own lack of long-term infrastructure investment and the strong dollar.”

1. Omitting currency rules from TPP will undermine all of its touted market-opening benefits. Currency manipulation has already caused thousands of U.S. factories to close and millions of workers to lose their jobs. A TPP without currency rules turns a mighty river of offshoring into a tsunami.

2. The inclusion of corporate courts (for investor-to-state dispute settlement) is a win for global business. Giant firms who use the U.S. as a flag of convenience but produce little here can now invest in Australia, Japan and Malaysia, then sue over laws and regulations they don’t like. They will be able to collect billions from taxpayers to compensate for lost profits.

3. It could hurt U.S. automakers. Japanese auto manufacturers are thrilled with the new rules because TPP will reduce U.S. tariffs on cars and trucks Japan sends to the U.S. Those cars may have a Japanese name on the outside, but everything that actually makes it a working car could be Chinese. I don’t know how U.S. Trade Representative Mike Froman can look at any auto supply chain worker in the U.S. (or Canada or Mexico for that matter) and tell them with a straight face that TPP is a good deal.

4. It’s unclear whether the labor provisions will benefit workers. While there may be some small improvements to the labor chapter, we have first-hand experience that rules are worthless without enforcement. Until we see the actual text, we won’t know how much these promises live up to their hype.

Sadly, terrible trade deals have affected working people for the past four decades. Based on past performance, those who believe the same old promises will suffer, while those who wish to abuse and exploit workers with little pushback from governments will profit.

Summary: Here are 4 ways it benefits corporations over employees


CHENNAI, India—India’s most popular action hero once starred as a robot driven mad by love.

In one scene, he jumps from a speeding Mercedes convertible and flies through the back window of a police car, pulling the driver through the windshield and riding him like a surfboard down the road. Then he vaults back into his car before the next round...

Summary: At 65 years old, the movie actor Rajinikanth may have lost a step or two in real life—but on-screen, he packs theaters with his gravity-defying cinematic stunts and steely cool.


Vermont utility Green Mountain Power recently became the first U.S. utility to sell batteries from electric car company Tesla to its customers. With the batteries, homeowners can tap into back-up power if the grid goes down or pair the batteries with solar panels so they can use solar energy at night.

While a handful of utilities plan to buy energy from large battery banks manufactured by Tesla, the Vermont utility is unique in its decision to sell small home batteries to regular homeowners. The move is particularly unusual because the U.S. market for home batteries is the smallest—and most over-hyped—part of the emerging grid battery market.

According to GTM Research, only 4 megawatts worth of batteries have been deployed by U.S. homeowners to date. That’s tiny, compared with the 164 MW worth of batteries that are estimated to be installed in the U.S. in 2015, mostly in large projects for utilities or in commercial and industrial buildings.

The home battery market is very small because it often doesn’t pay off for the customers who buy the batteries. In contrast, businesses can use batteries to shift electricity for their buildings over to batteries during times of day when grid electricity is expensive. Doing so can save businesses significant money on their monthly energy bills. At the same time, utilities see batteries as a cheaper alternative to building and using expensive peaker power plants that are only turned on during peak times of day.

So what does the Vermont utility know that others don’t? Here’s three reasons why Green Mountain Power is taking this unusual move to sell 500 Tesla batteries to its customers:

1). A progressive utility: As The New Yorker wrote earlier this year, Vermont’s main electricity provider is operated by a rare utility executive who has an entrepreneurial background. While many regulated utilities see their customers as a sea of electricity meters, CEO Mary Powell runs her utility more like a customer-focused tech company such as an Apple [fortune stock-symbol=AAPL] or a Google [fortune stock-symbol=GOOG].

Powell has eagerly embraced new technologies that can deliver clean power, and low carbon products, to her progressive customer base, but at the same time she has mostly kept electricity rates flat. Tesla’s Powerwall battery is another technology perk that Powell can offer her customers if they want it. The company proudly touts the battery on the its website’s home page.

2). Off grid storm season: One of the main reasons why U.S. homeowners would want to buy a battery is for back up power. In that way Tesla’s home battery is competing with backup generators. Vermont, with its many rural areas, and harsh winter seasons, is one region of the U.S. where back up power can be attractive and worth investing in. A typical power outage in winter in Vermont can last 2.5 hours.

3). Smart home experiment: Green Mountain Power has been helping its customers modernize their homes, using digital energy technology, and adding solar panels, smart appliances, thermostats, and heat pumps. The utility can use this upgraded energy network to turn down the home’s air conditioner or water heater during peak times of electricity use. In the energy world this called “demand response.”

A Tesla battery is just another asset that the utility could potentially tap into to make the grid and home smarter, and to help the utility better manage its network. If Green Mountain Power customers agree to share their batteries with the utility, the customers will pay significantly less than if they had complete control over the battery, notes Greentech Media.

To learn more about why Tesla is making batteries for homes and businesses, watch this Fortune video:

Summary: A progressive utility sees value in a smarter network, shared batteries and backup power in storms.


Thanks to Burger King, we now have something called Mac n’ Cheetos in our world. It’s exactly what you think: basically a giant, crunchy Cheeto stuffed with oozy macaroni and cheese.

Also thanks to Burger King, we can say goodbye to our waistlines, because these look to be both ridiculously addictive-tasting and also crazily artery-clogging. Take your pick: satisfied taste buds, or health? Burger King may say we can have it our way, but these odds are stacked against us.

Early reviews suggest they taste a bit like the fried mac-and-cheese balls you can pick up at places like Trader Joe’s or Cheesecake Factory. But of course, these are Cheetos instead of just regular cheese and breadcrumbs.

It’s a limited-time product that’s currently only available at select locations, which is probably a good thing for our collective cholesterol. Given the early feedback, though, Burger King might have no choice but to plan a bigger national roll-out, as it looks like they’ve hit on a winner:

Summary: Introducing the Mac n' Cheetos


A man charged with murdering Mohammed Haddara in Melbourne seven years ago blames the shooting on a person previously acquitted of the crime.

Mr Haddara, a member of a well-known crime family, was shot dead outside his parents' home in Altona North on the night of June 20, 2009. He was 28.

A 36-year-old man was charged with one count of murder in June.

The Brooklyn man, who cannot be named, appeared in the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Thursday and his matter was set down for committal hearing next year.

Among the 13 witnesses listed to testify is Ahmed Hablas, who was tried and acquitted for Mr Haddara's murder in 2011.

Mark Gumbleton, barrister for the newly charged man, said defence would cross-examine Mr Hablas "extensively" when the hearing happens in April.

Defence will argue Mr Hablas is responsible for the killing, not their client, the court heard.

"The correct shooter, we say, is Mr Hablas," Mr Gumbleton said.

During his trial, Mr Hablas claimed he falsely confessed to Mr Haddara's murder because he was protecting the man now charged with the crime, the court heard.

Two undercover police operatives will also give evidence via video link during the five-day hearing from April 4 next year.

The accused man has been remanded in custody.

Summary: A man accused of gunning down a member of a well-known crim family has appeared in a Melbourne court.


08/21/2016 AT 01:35 PM EDT

"I hope he found some peace," Timberlake, 35,

on Sunday. "God bless and RIP, Lou Pearlman."

The well-wish follows a tumultuous relationship between the boy band and Pearlman. The Timberlake-fronted group filed a lawsuit against Pearlman in the early 2000s, alleging that their contract was unfair.

Pearlman died from an undisclosed illness. He was one of most successful producers of the 1990s, creating boy bands like NSYNC,

, took to Twitter to pay his respects to the late music producer and manager.

I hope he found some peace. God bless and RIP, Lou Pearlman.

"Word is that #LouPearlman has passed away," Bass, 37, wrote on a tweet on Saturday. "He might not have been a standup businessman, but I wouldn't be doing what I love today [without] his influence RIP Lou."

tweeted that he has "mixed emotions" about Pearlman's death. And

, who sued Pearlman in 2002, wrote in a

Many emotions at the news of Lou's passing. Without Lou I wouldn't have met my four brothers or had the opportunity of a lifetime. RIP.

"#LouPearlman my old manager died in prison," the 28-year-old wrote. "Rip Lou not the best business guy really at all but he did discover me."

The Backstreet Boys was the first of Pearlman's creations to sue him as a result of an alleged faulty contract.

remembered the late music producer in a tweet, writing that he has "Many emotions at the news of Lou's passing."

Word is that #LouPearlman has passed away. He might not have been a stand up businessman , but I (cont) https://t.co/nsczUEVOOQ

#LouPearlman my old manager died in prison... Rip Lou not the best business guy really at all but he did discover me karma is real

"Without Lou I wouldn't have met my four brothers or had the opportunity of a lifetime. RIP," McLean, 38,

After finding himself the subject of several lawsuits, things went further south for Pearlman when he defrauded investors out of more than $300 million in a Ponzi scheme.

He pleaded guilty to several charges related to the crime and in 2008 was sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Summary: Other NSYNC and Backstreet Boys members also took to Twitter to pay tribute to Lou Pearlman


will.i.am (L) and Fergie of The Black Eyed Peas

09/01/2016 AT 11:25 AM EDT

are back with a new spin on an old classic.

The group released an updated version of their 2003 breakout song "Where Is the Love" late Wednesday night. Called "#WHEREISTHELOVE" ft. The World, the song features additional vocals from

and a 40-member children's choir.

The Black Eyed Peas, made up of

, said in a statement: "â¦ if you only have love for your own race/ Then you only leave space to discriminate/ And to discriminate only generates hate" – and encourage us to keep asking: '#WHERESTHELOVE'?"

The video for the song, also released late Wednesday night, shows appearances from family members affected by gun violence (Alton Sterling's aunt Sandra, Pilando Castile's mother Valerie), police officials (Dallas Police Chief David O. Brown, Officer Miguel Salcedo, and more), and many celebrities including

Years later and the message still holds true. @bep shares #WHEREStheLOVE feat. The World https://t.co/dKIMAv6jPU pic.twitter.com/FhW1lqjpkn

See a full list of participants below.

The question still remains: WHERES THE LOVEhttps://t.co/65kqw1joDg pic.twitter.com/WrDzGYEiDi

The track and its video are available via

and will go wide to other digital retailers Thursday night. All proceeds will go towards the i.am.angel Foundation, a non-profit foundation founded by Black Eyed Peas frontman will.i.am.

Summary: The new version is called "#WHERESTHELOVE" ft. The World