I've always thought it would be good to acquire an old warehouse in every town throughout the land and convert it into low-rent community workspaces for artists, local charities and small businesses getting off the ground. A kind of people's WeWork. What would others do with a humungous, but not unlimited, pile of dosh to benefit society? Roland Freeman, West Yorkshire Send new questions to nq@theguardian.com.
Adisturbing number of the oligarchs responsible for the mess we're in are not very smart. I realize that this seems like a minor complaint when so many of them are also evil, incompetent, and causing enormous amounts of human suffering. (Though perhaps it's better that they're dimly lit, because who knows how much worse things would be if they were truly evil geniuses?)
Since September 30, 2025, the Italian government has undertaken a major operation to offer a future for Gaza's students. While evacuation to Italy was previously available to Palestinians only for medical treatment and family reunification, the Italian government has now taken the unprecedented step of opening the nation's universities under the Italian Universities for Palestinian Students project, allowing Gazan students to pursue their studies abroad away from the war.
We have an urgent responsibility. Our existing economic system is incapable of addressing the social and ecological crises we face in the 21st century. When we look around we see an extraordinary paradox. On the one hand, we have access to remarkable new technologies and a collective capacity to produce more food, more stuff than we need or that the planet can afford. Yet at the same time, millions of people suffer in conditions of severe deprivation. What explains this paradox? Capitalism.
At Monday night's Q&A at the Mission's Cultura y Arte Nativa de las Americas, State Sen. Scott Wiener, District 1 Supervisor Connie Chan, and former Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez staffer and tech multi-millionaire Saikat Chakrabarti all worked to establish their progressive bona fides. In addition to making it clear they would be most excited to join the Progressive Caucus if elected, the three candidates all called for accountability for fossil fuel companies, abolishing ICE and Medicare for All.
Following recent violent events in Minneapolis, a San Francisco bakery is selling cookies with anti-ICE messages on them, alongside Valentine's cookies with traditional Valentine's heart candy abbreviations on them. Devil's Teeth Baking Company, which has locations in the Outer Sunset, Outer Richmond, and in the Financial District, is selling cookies that say "Fuck ICE" and "ICE" with a line through it. And, all proceeds from the sale of the cookies is going to Community Action Network Minnesota.
Robert Fico, one of the few EU leaders to frequently support Trump's stance on Europe's weaknesses, was concerned about the U.S. president's "psychological state," two of the diplomats said. Fico used the word "dangerous" to describe how the U.S. president came across during their face-to-face meeting at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida on Jan. 17, according to two of the diplomats.
Hollywood [is] sort of the epicenter of the woke left. I don't think they're doing the Democratic Party any favors, the comedian said. I think if Democrats want to win elections in the future, job one, tell the celebrities to Just shut the f**k up. You're not helping. You don't strike people in most of the country as sensible or in touch with reality.'
Bernie Sanders was just a skinny, gap-toothed kid from Brooklyn in the autumn of 1953, when Vermont opened an information bureau at 1268 Avenue of the Americas, next door to Radio City Music Hall. The Green Mountains beckoned! Under a shop sign that read " VERMONT," a wide storefront window exhibited seasonal dioramas that trapped pedestrians like chipmunks in a sap bucket. Inside, you could find out about snow conditions and fishing holes, inspect a woodstove,
Co-founder Arthur Clifton, a former leading figure in Just Stop Oil, explained the first strategy would involve a series of "take backs". Speaking to roughly 200 activists, he said: "We have seen that food is locked behind skyrocketing prices. Less and less people can afford less and less food. "So what we do is actually pretty obvious - we go in there, we take it out and we redistribute it to the local community. This is what we are going to be doing in March."
Germany's far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has long sought close ties to the Trump administration in its quest for powerful international allies and an end to its political isolation at home. But as public sentiment in Germany increasingly turns against U.S. President Donald Trump and his foreign interventionism - in particular his talk of taking control of Greenland and his seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro - AfD leaders are recalibrating, putting distance between their party and a U.S. president they previously embraced. "He has violated a fundamental election promise, namely not to interfere in other countries, and he has to explain that to his own voters," Alice Weidel, one of the AfD's national leaders, said earlier this week.
Gerry Gable, who has died aged 88, was one of the most formidable and persistent figures in the postwar fight against fascism and the extreme right in the UK. He combined activism, investigative journalism and clandestine intelligence-gathering in a way that reshaped how anti-fascism was practised in Britain and far beyond. As the founder of Searchlight, the investigative anti-fascist magazine, he played a central role in exposing, disrupting and ultimately weakening generations of fascist and neo-Nazi organisations.
Then, a veteran Japanese co-worker came up and told him that he didn't understand the true nature of karaoke. He told me, It doesn't matter if you sing well or sing badly. What matters is that your guests have a good time, remembers Stevenson on the terrace of Yurt Cafe, a feet feet from the home he bought in Limehouse very close to where he was born, with a view of the Citigroup tower
Maher on Monday told reporter Maya Sulkin that Uygur and people with similar views are stooges. Anybody who thinks they're a social justice activist which these people do and your number one issue isn't gender apartheid in the Muslim world you're a joke. You're a joke, Maher said. It's so obvious where the biggest amount of oppression is, you people who hate oppression so much.
There's nothing anti-feminists love more than using their platforms-afforded to them by decades of feminist activism-to tell other women that, actually, feminism is what's holding them back, and not the powers, institutions, or male politicians that be. Every headline I've read this year where someone like Megyn Kelly-or, more recently, Erika Kirk-suggests feminism is the root of society's ills has morphed me into a frantic medieval torture rat, desperately clawing my way into someone's abdomen to escape the heated metal cage placed over my body.
The Raging Grannies are part of an international collective of women whose mission is to use performance art to deliver pointed anti-corporation and political messages, a movement that began in Victoria, British Columbia, in the late 1980s and has since spread to cities across the United States. The Palo Alto chapter, known as the Raging Grannies Action League, shows what activism can look like in older age.
In 2026, our aim is to do more than ever before-but we need your support to make that happen. Through December 31, a generous donor will match all donations up to $75,000. That means that your contribution will be doubled, dollar for dollar. If we hit the full match, we'll be starting 2026 with $150,000 to invest in the stories that impact real people's lives-the kinds of stories that billionaire-owned, corporate-backed outlets aren't covering.
One of the great mysteries about the rise of populism, in both the United States and Europe, is why it has benefited the political right so much more than the left. For years, American progressives have been trying to get people worked up over rising rates of economic inequality, with the expectation that this anger could fuel greater support for the Democratic Party.
Over the past year you've read writers like Elie Mystal, Kaveh Akbar, John Nichols, Joan Walsh, Bryce Covert, Dave Zirin, Jeet Heer, Michael T. Klare, Katha Pollitt, Amy Littlefield, Gregg Gonsalves, and Sasha Abramsky take on the Trump family's corruption, set the record straight about Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s catastrophic Make America Healthy Again movement, survey the fallout and human cost of the DOGE wrecking ball, anticipate the Supreme Court's dangerous antidemocratic rulings, and amplify successful tactics of resistance on the streets and in Congress.
