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On Tuesday, Donald Trump referred to Kamala Harris as a “nasty woman”, referencing her 2018 grilling of Brett Kavanaugh over allegations – denied by Kavanaugh – that the now supreme court justice attempted to rape Dr Christine Blasey Ford when they were teenagers. Nasty or “not nice” seem to be words Trump reserves for women who hold men in power to account: Trump similarly insulted Hilary Clinton during the 2016 election race, when she hinted at his reluctance to publish his tax returns. Trump also ordered female reporters who question him to “be nice” and has previously said it was...

Human-caused climate change amplified the damages and suffering associated with Hurricane Harvey in several different ways. First, sea level rise caused by global warming increased the storm surge and therefore the coastal inundation and flooding from the storm. Second, the warmer atmosphere holds more water vapor, which intensifies extreme precipitation events like the record-shattering rainfall associated with Harvey. Third, warmer ocean waters essentially act as hurricane fuel, which may have made Harvey more intense than it would otherwise have been. We can take some steps to adapt to rising sea levels, but denying the problem by rolling back regulations aimed...

Nizar Rayan, who was assassinated on Thursday in Gaza by a bomb dropped from an Israeli warplane, was a man of the street, but also considered one of Hamas's top five decision-makers. Many considered the 49-year-old as more significant than the Hamas prime minister in Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh, and indeed other key leaders such as Mahmoud Zahar.

This might be the first time Freepers and Kossacks have agreed on anything. From the conservative website Free Republic to the liberal Daily Kos, Internet users of all ideologies are uniting in opposition to federal regulation of political blogs. As early as this afternoon, the Federal Election Commission will publish regulations that, for the first time, could put limits on what bloggers can do and say in support of political candidates. The FEC is trying to define the line between offering political opinions and operating as part of a political campaign. The full commission is expected to vote Thursday on...

Tony Blair told President George Bush that he was "solidly" behind US plans to invade Iraq before he sought advice about the invasion's legality and despite the absence of a second UN resolution, according to a new account of the build-up to the war published today. A memo of a two-hour meeting between the two leaders at the White House on January 31 2003 - nearly two months before the invasion - reveals that Mr Bush made it clear the US intended to invade whether or not there was a second resolution and even if UN inspectors found no evidence...

Just lately (noticeably since the US election result) there seems to be an awful lot of anti-British sentiment on here (there always was a little but I put that down to a handful of xenophobic kiddies) What I would like to know is do most Freepers now share the low opinion that some (many) on here seem to have of our nation or is it just a small (but very vocal) minority of morons? I've enjoyed this forum (for the relatively short time that I've contributed) and have always liked Americans in general, but I now find myself reconsidering my...

As a member of the Manhattan intelligentsia, novelist Tom Wolfe seems a lonely defender of George Bush's conservative values. But, he tells Ed Vulliamy, he's bewildered by a sex-mad society and tired of being lectured to at dinner parties. So is he voting for Dubya tomorrow? He's not quite telling Tom Wolfe casts his gaze across America at this election time, with eyes that change mood in a nanosecond, with a flicker. For the most part, they exude an amused elegance befitting the hallmark white suit and dandy-ish two-tone brogues. But then the look suddenly changes, to become scalpel-sharp, mischievous,...

I was flipping around the channels and stopped at CNN because Lou Dobbs was talking about the missing ammo in Iraq (he hadn't gotten the NBC memo yet). Anyways, after the interview with the woman, he intros the next story: To paraphrase: "Next, you won't believe what a paper in England said about President Bush. Stay tuned for what The Guardian said." Que the graphics to lead to commercial. Lou Dobbs (mic still on): "I love The Guardian." Female Guest: "Oh God!"

In Saturday's Guardian, Charlie … concluded his analysis of the presidential election thus: "On November 2, the entire civilised world will be praying, praying Bush loses. And Sod's law dictates he'll probably win, thereby disproving the existence of God once and for all. The world will endure four more years of idiocy, arrogance and unwarranted bloodshed, with no benevolent deity to watch over and save us. John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr — where are you now that we need you?" Well, wherever they are, they're probably saying: "Why bring us into it? When ol' Lee Harvey...

Special Dispatch Series - No. 805 October 26, 2004 No.805 Saudi Government Daily Editorial:'Bush the Nazi'   The Saudi government daily Al-Riyadh recently published an editorial titled "Bush the Nazi," referring to allegations that President George W. Bush's family had ties with the Nazis. The following are excerpts from the editorial: [1] Did President Bush's Grandfather Collaborate with the Nazis? "[The British newspaper] The Guardian published what it contends are documents incriminating the president's grandfather of collaboration with the Nazis and bringing [Adolf] Hitler to power, and that his wealth was an outcome of agreements with the Nazis, and...

Note: In late september / early october, the UK Guardian had a letter writing campaign. The purpose of this campaign was to influence the voters in the swing state of Ohio to vote for John Kerry. Over 10,000 people requested the address list, and I am sure that those writing wrote at least one or more letters to the citizens of ohio. The article that follows is Guardian printing some of the letters. Dear wonderful, loving friends from abroad, We Ohioans are an ornery sort and don't take meddling well, even if it comes from people we admire and with...

· You will recall that the Diary's very own brand new conspiracy theory (which held that Kerry's tanking presidential campaign was a deliberate Democratic feint aimed at giving Hillary Clinton a clear run in 2008) was rather anticipated by those crazy rightwing nerds at freerepublic.com, who had already posted several threads to that effect before we could bestir ourselves to come up with a username and password. In fact, much of the internet-friendly hard right seems to believe that Hillary is working diligently for a Bush victory by supplying the Kerry campaign with forged documents. You have to get up...

George Jr sent out of Texas by father as a 'drunken liability' The US president, George Bush, was transferred to the Alabama National Guard during the Vietnam war because his drunken behaviour was a political liability to his father in Texas, the wife of one of his father's former confidants revealed yesterday. Linda Allison told the political website Salon.com that throughout the time Mr Bush was in Alabama she never saw him in uniform and had no idea he was supposed to be in the National Guard. "Georgie was raising a lot of hell in Houston, getting in trouble and...

Bush's gesture politics suggest a man seriously worried about his career The 1980s movie The Ploughman's Lunch took its title from an early example of what we have now come to know as spin. Ian McEwan's script took its central image from the fact that the bread-and-cheese snack that claimed to link yuppies in pubs to their ancestors who toiled on the soil was an invention of the contemporary advertising and catering trades. In Richard Eyre's film, this fraudulent food became a metaphor for political lying and pretence at the time of the Falklands war. If anyone makes a similar...

So who did invite him? George Bush's visit is a nightmare for Tony Blair - but not for the White House, which badly wanted it Jonathan Freedland Wednesday November 12, 2003 The Guardian We all know the feeling. You glance at the diary and realise you have guests coming to stay next week, when nothing could be less convenient. They're coming from abroad, expecting to be entertained for several days and it's far too late to cancel. This is the last thing you need. So spare a thought for Tony Blair, as he scans the calendar and sighs. There are...

With the turning of every year, we expect our lives to improve. As long as the economy continues to grow, we imagine, the world will become a more congenial place in which to live. There is no basis for this belief. If we take into account such factors as pollution and the depletion of natural capital, we see that the quality of life peaked in the United Kingdom in 1974 and in the United States in 1968, and has been falling ever since. We are going backwards. The reason should not be hard to grasp. Our economic system depends upon...

The future looks bright Language can help to shape the way we think about the world. Richard Dawkins welcomes an attempt to raise consciousness about atheism by co-opting a word with cheerful associations Saturday June 21, 2003 The Guardian I once read a science-fiction story in which astronauts voyaging to a distant star were waxing homesick: "Just to think that it's springtime back on Earth!" You may not immediately see what's wrong with that, so ingrained is our unconscious northern hemisphere chauvinism. "Unconscious" is exactly right. That is where consciousness-raising comes in. I suspect it is for a deeper reason...