“We want a United States of Europe,” thundered Martin Schulz, seemingly out of nowhere, at the annual convention of his Social Democrats (SPD) on Thursday. “Let’s finally find the courage to take Europe forward,” demanded the same man who spent his recent campaign for chancellor downplaying the decades he spent in EU politics.

As recently as last month, Europe was little more than a speck on Germany’s political radar. The question of how to maneuver the EU out of its rut was largely ignored by Germany’s two largest parties during the election campaign. Most German media devoted little attention to the question of Europe’s future. After vociferously ruling out a grand coalition both before and after Merkel’s attempt to build a three-way alliance collapsed, Schulz’s credibility is at stake. Nothing less than the pursuit of a United States of Europe, it seems, would justify such an about-face.

Schulz, who was roundly criticized both inside and outside his party for not emphasizing his European credentials during the campaign, has now moved to the other extreme. If his call for a US of E weren’t enough of a jaw dropper, Schulz added that any country that refused to jump on board by 2025 should be kicked out of the EU altogether.

Despite the newfound enthusiasm for European reform among some senior political leaders, Germans at large have yet to show much appetite for the kind of grand plans outlined by the French. Nearly 55 percent of Germans reject Macron’s ideas, according to a poll published this week by the Körber Stiftung, a German foundation. Germans are particularly allergic to proposals that would require them to pay more into the EU coffers or take on additional financial risk.

Trump’s phone call to Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday, the day before he made his bombshell announcement on Jerusalem, appeared to shed new light on behind-the-scenes efforts by White House advisers to craft a peace blueprint expected to be rolled out in the first half of 2018 but which has now been thrown into doubt because of an angry outcry across the Middle East.

With Palestinians declaring it will be difficult for the United States to act as an honest broker after essentially siding with Israel on one of the central disputes in the conflict, administration officials said they expected a “cooling-off period.”

Trump’s team, led by his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, will press on with development of a plan to serve as the foundation for renewed Israeli–Palestinian negotiations, hoping the furor will blow over and that any pause in diplomatic contacts with the Palestinians will not last long, US officials said.

But amid protests in the Palestinian territories and uncertainty about whether the Palestinians will stay engaged in the peace effort, one US official said the process could still be disrupted. One US official said the Palestinians were in such a weak position that they would ultimately have no choice but to stay involved in US-led peace efforts.

Another argument that Trump’s aides will likely make to Palestinians is that having granted Israel recognition of its claim to Jerusalem, the US leader might now have more leverage for seeking concessions later on from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the US official said.

Colorado’s anti-discrimination law forbids businesses denying goods and services due to various reasons, including typical grounds like race and color, but also including sexual orientation.

A same-sex couple sued Jack Phillips when they asked him to customize a wedding cake to celebrate their same-sex marriage in 2012, at a time when Colorado did not recognize same-sex marriage or civil unions. Phillips declined on the grounds that his Evangelical Christian faith teaches that marriage is the union of a man and woman.

Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) defended Phillips on the grounds that his right to decline to celebrate same-sex marriage is protected by either the Free Speech Clause or the Free Exercise Clause in the First Amendment of the US Constitution, which trumps Colorado law.

The whistle was blown by two Australian scientists Dr Albert Parker and Dr Clifford Ollier in a paper for Earth Systems and Environment. The authors do not mince their words. They refer to these adjustments as “highly questionable” and “suspicious.” That’s because they can find no plausible scientific explanation for the adjustments.

What’s extraordinary is the desperation of scientists at what ought to be impeccably neutral and trustworthy institutions such as NASA, NOAA and PSMSL to pretend that it is. When alarmists in charge of surface temperature datasets make dishonest adjustments to exaggerate the appearance of global warming, it looks like corruption.

When alarmists in the entirely separate field of sea level measurement make precisely the same sort of dishonest adjustments in order to accord with the same global warming narrative, it starts to look like a conspiracy.

Despite criticism of an estimated £50 billion divorce payment, she also said it was 'fair to the British taxpayer'. But tempering the 'personal victory' for Mrs May, European Council chief Donald Tusk immediately started making demands about the next phase of talks. He said during a mooted two-year transition period Britain will have to keep making financial contributions and respect all EU laws, including new laws, even though it will have no say over how they are decided.

There is also set to be a backlash over the huge divorce bill and pledges to accept the power of European Courts for years to come. In a scathing assessment, ex-Ukip leader Nigel Farage said: 'A deal in Brussels is good news for Mrs May as we can now move on to the next stage of humiliation.'  

Mr Juncker's chief aide Martin Selmayr tweeted a picture of white smoke this morning - a reference to the Vatican's famous signal that agreement has been reached on a new Pope.

Schulz now wants to resurrect the decades-old idea of a federal Europe. He imagines that by 2025, the EU can be consolidated to tackle common challenges faced by the bloc, including, domestic and foreign security, asylum and monetary affairs.

“I want a European constitutional treaty that creates a federal Europe,” Schulz said at the SPD party congress in Berlin. He explained that only a determined EU can effectively combat climate change, tackle the challenge of migration, battle tax evasion, and pressure internet giants to respect rights of EU citizens, as well as curbing right-wing extremism in Europe. “Europe is our life insurance,” said Schulz. “It is the only chance we have to keep up with the other great regions of the world.”

While stating bold ambitions, Schulz failed to outline how exactly he plans to garner support for his somewhat utopian idea, at a time when the EU is facing a number of crises, ranging from austerity measures and ongoing terrorist threats to Brexit and secessionist movements in Scotland and Catalonia.

In fact, Germany itself now finds itself in the middle of its own crisis, having failed to form a coalition government following the September Bundestag election. Frustration with Angela Merkel’s incoherent migration policy has eroded her party’s popularity. At the same, time support for the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) surged, enabling it to enter parliament for the first time.

On Thursday, Germany’s Social Democrats, who secured 20.5 percent during the election, voted to start talks that could lead to a new government coalition. The SPD had twice previously joined the coalition government under Merkel.

Graphics firm Nvidia recently released results of its “image-to-image translation” which can take an outdoors photo taken in the winter and transform it into the same scene, but in the summer – with indistinguishable results.

The ramifications of this technology are enormous: the politically persecuted could soon be victims of fabricated “video evidence” presented by the mainstream media as “undeniable proof” of wrong-doing, which will be accepted without question by the general public which takes everything at face value.

“People lose the ability to distinguish between reality and fantasy,” Jean Baudrillard wrote in his book Simulacra and Simulation. “They also begin to engage with the fantasy without realizing what it really is. They seek happiness and fulfillment through the simulacra of reality, eg media and avoid the contact/interaction with the real world.”

Humanity is heading toward hyperreality, the point where consciousness is unable to distinguish what we know as reality from a mere simulation.