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In 1982, a peculiar commercial aired on televisions across Japan. An actress in a pink floral dress and an updo drops paint on her hand and futilely attempts to wipe it off with toilet paper. She looks into the camera and asks: “Everyone, if your hands get dirty, you wash them, right?” “It’s the same for your bottom, deserve to be washed, too.” ...43yrs later, Japan has overwhelmingly accepted Toto’s innovation. Washlet-style bidets, sold by Toto and a few smaller rivals, are a common feature in Japan’s offices and public restrooms and account for >80% of all household toilets, according...

‘Nothing is zero impact’: Should we ditch toilet paper to help the environment? Going to the toilet is universal but how often do we take the time to reflect on the environmental impact of our bathroom habits? Talking about your toilet exploits would not get you many invites to dinner parties, but what we do in there has significant effects on the environment and our health. It has also changed drastically throughout history. Until the last century, going to the toilet was not the cosy comfort that most of Europe knows today. Researchers believe that fragments of ceramic known as...

President Joe Biden will not attend the election night watch party of his vice president and current Democrat nominee, Kamala Harris. Biden will be watching the results just two miles away, in what appears to be the latest snub between the president and Harris. “Tonight, the president and First Lady will watch election results in the White House residence with longtime aides and senior White House staff,” a White House official told the Washington Examiner. “The president will receive regular updates on the state of races across the country.” Harris’ election night watch party is being held at her alma...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden turns 81 on Monday, a milestone likely to draw attention to his status as the oldest person to ever occupy the Oval Office, with opinion polls showing Americans worried he is too old for the post he is seeking reelection to. Biden has addressed those who worry that he is too old for the rigors of the White House with humor and an attempt to convince voters that his age and experience over a half-century in public life is an asset in tackling America's problems. "I know I'm 198 years old," Biden joked...

Joe Biden on Friday evening made a mysterious trip to his Delaware home for a few hours and the White House refuses to say why. Earlier Friday a reporter asked White House spox Olivia Dalton: “What’s the reason for the president’s trip to Delaware this afternoon?” “The president is making a brief stop at home,” Oliva Dalton told reporters aboard an Air Force One gaggle on Friday. Biden spent a few hours in Philly speaking to a crowd at the Tioga Marine Terminal. After spending a couple of hours in Philly, Joe Biden arrived to New Castle, Delaware at 4:55...

Pope Emeritus Benedict VXI (sic), who died last Saturday at 95, and the Vatican requested that President Joe Biden not attend Benedict's funeral, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Tuesday. Benedict made the request prior to his death. The U.S. will send Joe Donnelly, ambassador of the Holy See, "in line with the wishes of the late Pope and the Vatican. This is what their requests were. This is what their wishes were," Jean-Pierre said when asked if Biden would attend the funeral, which is being held Thursday in St. Peter's Square. 'Well why do you think? You tell...

President Biden delivered remarks Wednesday on democracy, political violence and the midterm elections in a televised address from Washington’s Union Station. The following is a transcript of his remarks, as recorded by The New York Times. Good evening, everyone. Just a few days ago, a little before 2:30 a.m. in the morning, a man smashed the back windows and broke into the home of the speaker of the House of Representatives, the third-highest-ranking official in America. He carried in his backpack zip ties, duct tape, rope and a hammer. As he told the police, he had come looking for Nancy...

Jackson's water crisis is latest in history o Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg announced a large grant that'll be used to dismantle a highway built to destroy a Black community. And there's more. The Biden administration is capping off the president’s recent trip to Michigan, focused largely on worker rights and transportation innovation, by handing out its first federal grant to dismantle a highway built to perpetuate racial discrimination. The move is part of the Biden administration’s broader effort to remake America’s infrastructure to be more equitable, including addressing racist roads that were designed to facilitate white flight and deprive Black...

Rank-and-file FBI agents are accusing the Biden administration of exaggerating the threat of White supremacists and pressuring agents to cook up domestic terrorist cases involving racist extremists. Current and former FBI agents told The Washington Times that the perceived White supremacist threat is overblown by the administration. They said top bureau officials are pressuring FBI agents to create domestic terrorist cases and tag people as White supremacists to meet internal metrics. “The demand for White supremacy” coming from FBI headquarters “vastly outstrips the supply of White supremacy,” said one agent, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “We have more...

This week, we begin a new phase in our COVID-19 response. We are launching a new vaccine – our first in almost two years – with a new approach. For most Americans, that means one COVID-19 shot, once a year, each fall. Starting this week, at tens of thousands of convenient pharmacies, doctor’s offices, and community health centers, and other places, Americans age 12 and older can go get this new fall COVID-19 vaccine. The new vaccines provide the strongest protection from the new Omicron strain of the COVID virus, which did not exist when the original vaccine was developed....

A heckler accused President Joe Biden of stealing the 2020 election while he was delivering remarks during a rally. During a rally on Thursday in Rockville, Maryland, the heckler could be heard shouting, “You stole the election! You stole it! You stole it…!” After the crowd began booing, Biden said, “No, no, no, no! Let him go. Let him go. Let him go. That’s okay.” Addressing the crowd a few moments later, Biden added, “Folks! Folks! Folks! Ignorance knows no boundaries.” The president received applause from the crowd. Biden continued to shout, “But we never gave up!” He added, “We...

The Kremlin said Friday that it's open to talking about a possible prisoner exchange involving American basketball star Brittney Griner but strongly warned Washington against publicizing the issue....Lavrov said Moscow was "ready to discuss" a prisoner swap but that the topic should only be discussed via a dedicated Russia-U.S. channel that President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to establish when they met in Geneva in June 2021."If the Americans again try to engage in public diplomacy and make loud statements about their intention to take certain steps, it's their business, I would even say their problem," Lavrov...

Neither of the senior House Democrats running against each other in Manhattan’s 12th Congressional District were willing to back President Joe Biden’s re-election in 2024 when given the chance Tuesday night. Manhattan Reps. Carolyn Maloney and Jerrold Nadler, both of whom were first elected in 1992, squared off alongside challenger Suraj Patel in a lively debate, which was co-sponsored by WNYC and Spectrum News NY1. About halfway in, co-moderator Errol Louis asked the three candidates a direct question: “Should President Biden run again in 2024?” Patel, who worked on President Barack Obama’s advance team and is pushing himself as a...

FNC anchor Bret Baier said Monday on Fox News Channel’s “The Five” that President Joe Biden has had a “couple of good weeks” because the U.S. military killed Al Qaeda leader Ayman Al Zawahiri. ..... Snip..... Co-host Jesse Watters said, “Well, obviously a great win for the United States and a clear victory over terrorism. Politically for the president, we’ve just talked about it in the A-block, how the administration and some in the media have been framing this as the resurgence of the Biden presidency and a few things about to be passed in Congress. And now this big...

During a meeting between President Joe Biden and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Friday, the Palestinian Authority’s honor guard welcomed Biden with a poor rendition of the Star Spangled Banner. “Just the Palestinian Authority’s honor guard completely butchering the American National Anthem…” tweeted Kassy Dillon, the U.S. Bureau News Editor for Jewish News Syndicate. Just the Palestinian Authority's honor guard completely butchering the American National Anthem… pic.twitter.com/dfcJjMj8Ff— Kassy Dillon (@KassyDillon) July 15, 2022 The brutal performance elicited mockery and criticism on Twitter, with some even suggesting that the Palestinian orchestra played poorly on purpose. Christopher Bedford, senior editor at The...

IRVING, Texas – ExxonMobil today released the following statement in response to a letter from President Biden.We have been in regular contact with the administration to update the President and his staff on how ExxonMobil has been investing more than any other company to develop U.S. oil and gas supplies. This includes investments in the U.S. of more than $50 billion over the past five years, resulting in an almost 50% increase in our U.S. production of oil during this period. Globally, we’ve invested double what we’ve earned over the past five years -- $118 billion on new oil and...

“What I don’t want to do, and I’m not being facetious, is I don’t want to emulate Trump’s abuse of the Constitution, and constitutional authority,” President Joe Biden told Jimmy Kimmel today of why he hasn’t inked an Executive Order to try to stop the murderous gun violence that America has tragically seen in Buffalo and Uvalde, Texas, to name a few, in recent weeks. “I often get asked, well the Republicans don’t play it square, why do you play it square,” Biden added in his first live in-studio late night sit-down since taking office in January 2021. “Well, guess...

WASHINGTON — In a rare evening address, President Joe Biden on Thursday made an emotional plea to the nation about gun control in the wake of several mass shootings. Biden also asked Congress to take immediate action, saying “Enough, enough.” Read the transcript below: “Memorial Day, this past Monday, Jill and I visited Arlington National Cemetery. As we entered those hallowed grounds, we saw rows and rows of crosses among the rows of headstones and other emblems of belief, honoring those who paid the ultimate price on battlefields around the world. The day before, we visited Uvalde — Uvalde, Texas....

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration plans to freeze federal student loan payments through Aug. 31, extending a moratorium that has allowed millions of Americans to postpone payments during the coronavirus pandemic, according to an administration official familiar with the White House’s decision-making. Student loan payments were scheduled to resume May 1 after being halted since early in the pandemic. But following calls from Democrats in Congress, the White House plans to give borrowers additional time to prepare for payments. The action applies to more than 43 million Americans who owe a combined $1.6 trillion in student debt held by the...

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