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Shoppers across the US are seeing higher charges at grocery store checkouts as a new phase of a carryout bag law tied to 2026 environmental goals takes effect, increasing the minimum fee for plastic bags statewide. Under the law, which took effect on January 1, retailers and restaurants must now charge at least 12 cents for each plastic film carryout bag, up from the previous 8-cent fee, according to the Washington State Department of Ecology. The minimum charge for paper carryout bags remains unchanged at 8 cents. The fee is part of legislation passed in 2020 aimed at reducing the...

[Catholic Caucus] Cardinal Roche Doubles Down on ‘Traditionis Custodes’In an undelivered consistory address, the prefect for the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments reiterated that the 1969 Missal of Paul VI should be ‘the sole expression’ of the Roman Rite liturgy.In an undelivered address to cardinals last week, Cardinal Arthur Roche planned to voice opposition to the traditional Roman Rite, which he sees as a concession that needs to be eventually phased out in favor of the post-Vatican II liturgy as the unique expression of the Latin Rite.In a two-page text on Traditionis Custodes (Guardians of...

What began as a casual lunch between five Twin Cities software engineers quickly escalated into a frightening encounter after the men were misidentified as undercover federal agents and protesters were alerted to the Minneapolis restaurant where they were dining. AlphaNews obtained video and spoke with one of the men, Lee, a software engineer from Plymouth, who described how the situation unfolded. Group chat alert allegedly triggered protest Lee said the group was eating lunch at Clancy’s Deli, near 38thStreet and Grand AvenueSouth, when one of the men — who belongs to an anti-ICE Signal chat—received a message from a group...

[Catholic Caucus] Schism fears arise as Catholic Church in Germany aims to put laity on ‘same level’ as bishops'This Synodal Conference will have decision-making power and be able to introduce changes to doctrine by majority vote,' reported Italian journalist Nico Spuntoni.As Pope Leo XIV meets with his Apostolic Nuncio for Germany, Monsignor Nikola Eterovic, on Saturday, the very real possibility of schism with the Catholic Church in Germany looms.“It’s alleged the German Church wants to put the German laity on the same level as the bishops and also let them control the cash,” according to a report in the Italian...

The abduction and trafficking of women and girls from religious minority communities in Muslim dominated countries is widely recognized by concerned groups as a major problem for these communities. This came to the world’s attention for a time in 2014 when 276 school girls were abducted in Chibok, Borno State, Nigeria, which gave rise to a world-wide movement for their recovery. At least 130 of these girls have been recovered, but the remainder are still missing. This is actually a substantial recovery rate relative to what can be expected where abduction is a problem. Commonly, a young woman is targeted...

More than one million Chinese with U.S. citizenship who grew up in communist China will soon start voting in American elections, #1 New York Times bestselling investigative journalist and Breitbart News Senior Contributor Peter Schweizer reveals in his new book, The Invisible Coup: How American Elites and Foreign Powers Use Immigration as a Weapon. In his explosive new book, Schweizer details how Chinese elites have exploited America’s birthright citizenship policies by engaging in a practice known as birth tourism, whereby Chinese mothers intentionally travel to the United States give birth on American soil so that their newborn children will automatically...

Gene Hackman was still alive the last time I wrote about him here, in a column about Arthur Penn's 1975 neo-noir Night Moves. But early last year, news broke – a confused story that was revealed piecemeal in a series of sordid details – that Hackman, his wife Betsy and their dog had been found dead in their home outside Santa Fe, New Mexico. Hackman, who suffered from Alzheimer's and was quietly estranged from the children of his first marriage, had been dead for eight days and had been alone in the house with their three dogs for at least...

Australia’s most prominent neo-Nazi organisation has announced it will disband ahead of sweeping federal laws coming into effect - but not without taking a parting shot at the government.

Democratic Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib went on an emotional rant about the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recruitment posts on social media during a Friday shadow hearing in Minnesota. The hearing, chaired by Democratic Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar and Democratic Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, discussed the recent heightened presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations in Minnesota and the fatal shooting of Renee Good. When it was Tlaib’s turn to speak, she used her time to passionately suggest that recent DHS social media posts evoked “neo-Nazi” and “white nationalist” imagery. Tlaib held up a printed Jan. 9 social media...

Keir Starmer has said Donald Trump’s decision to impose 10% tariffs on the UK and seven other European countries over Greenland was “completely wrong”. The US president said the levies would apply from 1 February to Nato members – including the UK, France and Germany – who have deployed troops to the territory in response to growing uncertainty over its future. Trump said the tariffs would rise to 25% on 1 June if a deal to buy Greenland had not been reached. In a Truth Social post, Trump said: “Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, The United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and...

The U.S. Army has acknowledged missing its 2025 deadline for fielding the first U.S. Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon, officially known as Dark Eagle, Bloomberg reports. "Fielding activities include the required integration, safety, and readiness steps to ensure soldiers receive a system that is reliable, sustainable, and effective in operational environments and are on track for completion in early 2026," an Army statement said. "As the Army moves toward completion of fielding, it remains focused on rigorous testing, training, and system maturity to support successful operational employment." The system was originally supposed to reach the field in 2023. The Army blew past...

On this Special Report, Anisha Mathur and Pranay Upadhyay discuss a horrific grooming gang incident in London's Hounslow area. A 15-year-old Sikh girl was allegedly abducted, stalked, and abused by a gang of six Pakistani-origin men. The situation escalated when approximately 200 members of the Sikh community took matters into their own hands to rescue the child from a flat after claiming police inaction. Anisha Mathur notes that the girl was 'stalked, trapped and raped and on camera' while community members confronted the accused. The programme highlights the outrage within the Sikh community over the recurring nature of such crimes...

The Virginia state Senate on Friday greenlit a constitutional amendment that would clear the way for the Democrat-controlled legislature to redraw the state's U.S. House maps ahead of this year's midterm elections. The move by state senators, following a similar vote on Wednesday in the state House, was the final step needed to send the amendment to Virginia voters. If the ballot measure is approved this spring, the legislature, rather than the current non-partisan commission, would redraw the state's congressional maps through 2030. Virginia is the latest battleground in the ongoing high-stakes battle between President Donald Trump and Republicans versus...

The State Department will officially terminate foreign assistance to Somalia after the African nation’s government demolished a warehouse containing 76 metric tons of food donated by America, a senior administration official told The Daily Wire. On January 3, “at the direction of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud (HSM) and the Federal Government of Somalia (FGS), authorities at Mogadishu Port demolished the World Food Programme (WFP) Emergency Response Warehouse with no prior notification or coordination with international donor countries, including the United States,” a diplomatic cable from the United States Embassy in Somalia dated January 6 said. The move “likely resulted in...

The Iranian government is reportedly planning to permanently sever its citizens from the global internet — confining them instead to a state-run system as part of a continued crackdown on dissent following the Islamic regime’s slaughtering of thousands of protesters. Filterwatch, a digital rights monitoring project which has tracked Iranian internet censorship since 2012, says info it obtained indicates Tehran is moving toward “absolute digital isolation.” The Islamic Republic is abandoning its old model of “mass internet censorship” in favor of a “permanent shift” toward a “sealed intranet” while “access to the outside world is granted only to those with...

Der Tiger (Amazon)

This post is the first in a series drawn from a new book entitled Martyrs of Blood, Martyrs of Sweat: The Letters of Saint Andrew Kim Dae-geon and Venerable Father Thomas Choe Yang-eop, as translated and edited by Brothers Anthony and Han-yol of the Community of Taizé, published by Arx Publishing. This engrossing work contains all of the extant correspondence of these first two native Korean Catholic priests. Andrew Kim would go on to be martyred and later canonized a saint. Thomas Choe perished of exhaustion and sickness after ministering in his native land for over a decade. During their...

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday said authorities “must break the back of the seditionists” and blamed US President Donald Trump for “casualties” after the Islamic Republic’s bloody crackdown on a protest wave against the country’s clerical authorities. Iranian authorities have repeatedly blamed the US for the mass demonstrations they have called “riots” and “terrorist” operations. Trump had threatened to strike Iran if it did not stop killing protesters, but starting Wednesday sounded a more conciliatory tone, saying he was assured the killings would stop. In a speech broadcast by state television to mark a religious holiday, Khamenei...

Explanation: Apollo 14's Lunar Module Antares landed on the Moon on February 5, 1971. Toward the end of the stay astronaut Ed Mitchell snapped a series of photos of the lunar surface while looking out a window, assembled into this detailed mosaic by Apollo Lunar Surface Journal editor Eric Jones. The view looks across the Fra Mauro highlands to the northwest of the landing site after the Apollo 14 astronauts had completed their second and final walk on the Moon. Prominent in the foreground is their Modular Equipment Transporter, a two-wheeled, rickshaw-like device used to carry tools and samples. Near...

An open-source developer has posted Wine patches that remove one of the last blockers for Adobe Creative Cloud installers on Linux. With the patched Wine build, Adobe Photoshop 2021 and Adobe Photoshop 2025 are reported to install under Linux.