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Trump continues to exert a massive gravitational pull on the party while the president forges ahead with ambitious agenda For Democrats it has been a hundred days of sweeping legislation, barrier-breaking appointments and daring to dream big. For Republicans, a hundred days in the political wilderness. The party that just four years ago controlled the White House and both chambers of Congress now finds itself shut out of power and struggling to find its feet . As Joe Biden forges ahead with ambitions to shift the political paradigm, Republicans still have a Donald Trump problem. Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/32OsQtV

Researchers are going on a bear hunt, using AI and radar to spot dens and track the threatened Arctic predators Genghis Khan got his dying wish: despite attempts by archaeologists and scientists to find the Mongolian ruler’s final resting place, the location remains a secret 800 years after his death . The search for his tomb, though, has inspired an innovative project that could help protect polar bears. “I randomly tuned into the radio one night and heard an expert talking about the use of synthetic aperture radar [SAR] to look for Genghis Khan’s tomb,” says Tom Smith, associate professor in plant and wildlife sciences at Brigham Young University (BYU) in Utah. “They were using SAR to penetrate layers of forest canopy in upper Mongolia, looking for the ruins of a burial structure.” Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/3dVqZu0

From abandoned car plants to poisoned and dried-out lakes, Travis Fox’s bird’s eye views of the US capture the nation’s terrifying pace of change Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/3sX7zJj

Witnesses will be asked to respond to claims the ’Ndrangheta has laundered billions of euros in City of London In a high-security, 1,000-capacity courtroom converted from a call centre, Italy’s largest mafia trial in three decades is under way in Lamezia Terme, Calabria. About 900 witnesses are set to testify against more than 350 defendants, including politicians and officials charged with being members of the ’Ndrangheta, Italy’s most powerful criminal group. Several of the defendants will be asked to respond to charges of money laundering over establishing companies in the UK with the alleged purpose of simulating legitimate economic activity. Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/3sUZbKm

Committee says regulations are muddled and discriminatory while large fines ‘criminalise the poor’ Coronavirus – latest updates See all our coronavirus coverage All 85,000-plus Covid fines issued in England during the pandemic should be reviewed, MPs and peers have said, after more than a quarter of prosecutions in the first two months of the year for breaching the regulations were shown to have been wrongly brought. The joint committee on human rights said coronavirus regulations, which have been changed at least 65 times since March last year, were muddled, discriminatory and unfair. Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/32OtEiH

Tory insiders add weight to ‘let the bodies pile high’ allegations … Lex Greensill had no contract to work at No 10 … and does free will really exist? Hello, Warren Murray happy to be with you again. Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/3vlL0iX

From Quito to Kathmandu, millions will be endangered by cuts affecting planning for floods, earthquakes and fires, experts say UK aid cuts to a programme working to reduce the disaster risk to poor communities around the world could endanger millions of lives and slam shut a brief window of opportunity to build safer cities for centuries to come, experts have warned. Professor John McCloskey, from Edinburgh University, said the 70% cut to this year’s budget for the Tomorrow’s Cities project was an act of “vandalism” that had wrecked the past two years of collaboration with scientists, NGOs, authorities and communities in Ecuador’s capital Quito, Nairobi, Kathmandu and Istanbul. Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/3aKzA0i