UK - Raising a child can cost parents almost a quarter of a million pounds, as expenses peak in their late teenage years due to extravagant grooming regimes. On average, parents spend £13,830 a year on their child from pregnancy until their 18th birthday, according to research by MoneyFarm, an investment platform. The most expensive period of a child’s life was between 15 and 18 years old, when parents spend £65,016 on their children. Spending on health, beauty and personal care items among this age group has reached £1,182 a year, double what it was in 2023.

USA - The two West Virginia National Guard members were ambushed and shot near the White House on Wednesday by an Afghan national who was resettled in the United States through a Biden-era program funded entirely by American taxpayers. Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, succumbed to her injuries on Thanksgiving, while Sergeant Andrew Wolfe, 24, remains in critical condition. This incident underscores a harsh reality: billions in US tax dollars have been poured into resettling tens of thousands of Afghans, some of whom pose a direct threat to American lives and security. Author and political commentator Mike Cernovich shared a post breaking down the cost and wrote, “We are being forced to fund our own destruction.”

USA - Masked terror supporters torched piles of American flags outside Philadelphia City Hall, waving Palestinian banners and chanting as the flames spread. The anti-Israel mob — about 400 strong — marched through Center City, clashing with police and leaving vandalism in its wake before several were arrested. In nearby Rittenhouse Square, activists gathered under the “All Out for Gaza” banner, some brazenly flaunting Hezbollah and Hamas symbols. Organizers promoted the events by calling the US “AmeriKKKa” and declaring Independence Day illegitimate. That this was allowed the day after a Muslim migrant from Afghanistan shot and killed National Guard troops on Thanksgiving in broad daylight in our nation’s capital is unconscionable. This wasn’t a “protest.” This wasn’t “speech.” This was a deliberate, hostile act inciting to civil war.

USA - The truth is that it is happening now… During the holiday season of 2025 wealthy Americans are literally spending money as if there is no tomorrow. But meanwhile, just about everyone else is really struggling. For a long time, we were warned that a cost of living crisis would be coming. That is happening now. For a long time, we were warned that delinquency rates would rise because consumers were piling up too much debt. That is happening now. For a long time, we were warned that foreclosure filings would surge when the current housing bubble started to burst. That is happening now. For a long time, we were warned that cryptocurrency prices would plummet. Now more than a trillion dollars in cryptocurrency wealth has been wiped out. Another thing that we have been relentlessly warned about is the weakness of the labor market. Today, we learned that “the pace of layoffs has picked up over the past four weeks”… I fully understand that the reality of what is taking place all around us is not welcome news to a lot of people out there. But IF WE ARE NOT WILLING TO FACE REALITY, we will inevitably make bad decisions. And making bad decisions is what got us into this giant mess in the first place.

CHINA - An analysis by the organization Open Doors revealed that the Bible is banned or restricted in 88 of the world's 195 countries, meaning that nearly half of all nations limit access to the Holy Scriptures. Among the most serious cases is China, where — despite its image of economic openness — state control, direct government intervention, and social surveillance mechanisms continue to persist. Additionally, Cardinal Joseph Zen has called on the faithful to “return to the catacombs,” warning that in China religious worship is not only strictly regulated, but that there is also a state-authorized form of worship. The prelate discourages attending these official churches and urges believers to practice their faith freely, remaining “faithful to the truth that makes us free.”

TURKEY - Breaking with his predecessors, Pope Leo XIV declined to pray at the Blue Mosque of Istanbul on Saturday as he continued his first international tour as the Bishop of Rome. In a show of respect, Pope Leo removed his shoes and toured the 17th-century mosque in his white socks; however, unlike Pope Benedict and Pope Francis before him, the recently selected pontiff declined an invitation to pray at the Sultan Ahmed Mosque on the third day of his Apostolic Visit to Turkey, a former Christian epicentre now comprised of 99.8 per cent Muslims. While he did not pray at the Blue Mosque, Pope Leo did pray alongside Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, during a service at the Patriarchal Church of Saint George, in a show of solidarity with the Eastern Orthodox Church and to commemorate the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, which both Churches still recognise as authoritative.

USA - AI-Powered teddy bear back on market after telling children how to start fires. Folotoy, the company behind the AI-powered Kumma teddy bear, temporarily ceased sales of the product in response to backlash over safety concerns raised by researchers. The bear’s AI chatbot was proven to instruct children on how to start fires, find knives in their homes, and how to locate prescription drugs. The Company claims the teddy bear, once again for sale, now has stronger child protections in place.

USA - The elite aren’t stupid. They can see that our society is coming apart at the seams all around us, and so they want to live some place safe. In fact, for many among the elite security has become the number one priority when choosing a new home. Unfortunately, the vast majority of us do not have the resources to move into high security communities guarded by teams of armed professionals. When things really start hitting the fan, most Americans are just going to have to deal with the chaos that is suddenly erupting all around them. But for the ultra-wealthy, one of the benefits of having so much money is being able to shut yourself off from the rest of the world.

CHINA - Beijing is reviving an uncomfortable truth: The global order belongs to the winners of World War II. The foundations of any world order are rarely found in the institutions built to represent it. They lie instead in a simple, unchanging fact: Power belongs to those strong enough to impose rules and to those who emerged victorious from history’s major conflicts. Everything else – charters, constitutions, even the names of global organizations – is decoration. A few days ago, China quietly reminded Japan of this reality by citing Articles 53, 77, and 107 of the United Nations Charter. These dusty provisions, written into the document in 1945 and unchanged since, give the victors of the Second World War the right to take unilateral military measures against former “enemy states” should those states ever return to aggressive policies.

UK - It was all a fib, a fiction, a falsehood, a fabrication. There was no black hole, and Rachel Reeves knew it. She was giving to airy nothing a local habitation and a name. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer tried to blame her tax rises on a deteriorating economy, or on 14 years of Tory rule, or on Brexit, she wasn’t just engaging in knockabout. She was cynically misleading everyone. For we now know that the £30 billion black hole which Rachel Reeves used as her excuse for raising taxes to a peacetime high did not exist. It had already been more than filled by the painful mechanism of inflation.

NIGERIA - Nigerian Catholic bishops on Tuesday issued an urgent and collective call to arms to the Nigerian government to protect the lives and property of all citizens and immediately stop the decimation of Christian communities and the abduction of hundreds of young girls and teachers. After meeting in the Nigerian capital of Abuja on Tuesday, the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria issued a statement expressing “grave concern” that several predominantly Christian communities in the northern and “Middle Belt” regions of the country have come under “repeated and brutal attacks, resulting in heavy casualties and the tragic loss of many Christian lives.” The bishops also called out local security forces for failing to respond and stop the targeted killings.

USA - An earthquake swarm has rocked Central California for the third straight day, adding to the fears that the fabled 'Big One' could be edging closer to ravaging the state. Three minor earthquakes were detected less than 30 miles south of San Jose Friday morning, striking within three minutes of each other between 10.40 and 10.43am ET. The US Geological Survey (USGS) reported that the first tremor registered as a magnitude 3.4 earthquake, and was then followed moments later by magnitude 2.6 and 2.5 quakes. No injuries or damage to local property has been reported at this time. Quakes between 2.5 and 5.4 in magnitude are often felt for several miles in all directions but typically cause only minor damage, such as knocking objects off shelves.

USA - A major earthquake hit Alaska on Thursday, with thousands of people feeling shaking near one of the state's largest cities. The 6.0 magnitude quake was detected around 8:11 am local time (12:11pm ET), with Susitna as the epicenter, about 30 miles from Anchorage, which is home to 300,000 Americans. More than 6,000 people have issued reports of shaking to the US Geological Service (USGS), and the number of reports continues to climb. There were no immediate reports of major damage or injuries. Authorities are currently assessing the impact.

USA - Medical history is filled with harmful, mainstream practices such as mercury treatments, bloodletting, lobotomies and the prescription of heroin, which were once endorsed by trusted institutions but later exposed as dangerous. These dangerous practices often persisted long after their risks were known, driven by financial incentives, institutional inertia and a blind faith in medical authority rather than evidence. The same pattern of profit and power overriding ethics continues today, with modern parallels seen in the overprescription of opioids, antidepressants linked to suicide and pharmaceutical companies hiding drug risks. Are today's treatments tomorrow's scandals?

USA - Donald Trump has revoked all executive orders signed by Joe Biden using an autopen. Since leaving office, Mr Biden has been heavily criticised for his administration’s use of the autopen, an electronic device used for replicating signatures. Mr Trump and other Republicans claim the autopen was exploited by aides to sign off on presidential orders, including pardons, without Mr Biden’s knowledge. “I am hereby cancelling all executive orders and anything else that was not directly signed by Joe Biden, because the people who operated the autopen did so illegally.”