Author: James Martin

Boris Johnson has told nuclear industry bosses that the government wants to the UK to get 25% of its energy from nuclear power, in a move that would signal a significant shift in the country’s energy mix.Johnson on Monday met executives from major nuclear utilities and technology companies including the UK’s Rolls-Royce, France’s EDF, and the US’s Westinghouse and Bechtel to discuss ways of helping to speed up the development of new nuclear power stations.The UK generates about 16% of its power from nuclear power stations, but several reactors are slated for closure, while electricity demand is expected to rise…

“Just surviving day-to-day has become a big concern of mine — because, how in the world?” said Morgan, 65, who lives in Asheville, N.C. “Yes, I can afford what I’m doing right now, but I’m starting to panic. I’m starting to think, ‘How am I going to keep paying for everything?’ ”Story continues below advertisementRising prices are squeezing household budgets around the country and putting additional strain on its 56 million older residents ages 65 and up, many of whom rely on fixed incomes and limited savings to cover monthly costs for prolonged and unpredictable periods of time. Americans in…

The Senate judiciary committee opened confirmation hearings on Monday for Ketanji Brown Jackson, at the start of four days of potentially bruising partisan wrangling over the first Black woman to be nominated for the US supreme court in its 233 years of existence.The hearings were gavelled into session by Dick Durbin, the Democratic chairman of the committee, who set Jackson’s nomination within the long arc of American history. The senator from Illinois pointed out that when the court first sat there were almost 700,000 people enslaved in the US, with no citizenship rights or access to equal justice.“You are living…

1. Does Covid Zero mean zero cases? Yes, ideally. Beijing’s perception of Covid hasn’t changed much since the virus first emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan: It’s a public health threat that must be eliminated at all costs, whether it’s spreading via people or animals or lurking on frozen food or mail from abroad. To achieve this, China requires at least two weeks in quarantine for anyone arriving from other countries. Domestically, even the slightest flareup is met with a barrage of targeted testing, contact tracing and quarantines to nip it in the bud, with citywide lockdowns as a…

1. What are hypersonic weapons?They are normally defined as fast, low-flying, and highly maneuverable weapons designed to be too quick and agile for traditional missile defense systems to detect in time. Unlike ballistic missiles, hypersonic weapons don’t follow a predetermined, arched trajectory and can maneuver on the way to their destination, according to the Congressional Research Service. The term “hypersonic” describes any speed faster than five times that of sound, which is roughly 760 miles (1,220 kilometers) per hour at sea level, meaning these weapons can travel at least 3,800 miles per hour. At hypersonic speeds, the air molecules around…

Wildfires continued to scorch parts of Texas on Monday while a storm system moving through could bring much-needed rain but also strong winds, forecasters said.The Eastland Complex, which comprises several fires in one place, had burned nearly 85 square miles in an area about 120 miles west of Dallas and was 30% contained as of Monday morning.A National Weather Service meteorologist, Monique Sellers, told the Dallas Morning News about an inch of rain was predicted for Monday in Eastland county, which could offer firefighters a much-needed reprieve from the extreme conditions fueling the flames. But the strong winds are not…

The evidence comes from the experience of the 12 states that have refused to accept a key element of Obamacare: federal money covering the cost of expanding Medicaid to cover millions of people who otherwise couldn’t afford health insurance. The U.S. Supreme Court made the Medicaid expansion optional in its 2012 decision upholding the other parts of the law.Standard measures of jobs and personal income growth show that even Texas — the biggest of the states still rejecting the Medicaid expansion — trails the states that joined it after turning it down when it became available on Jan. 1, 2014, according to…

12.22pm EDT 12:22 Here are some scenes from outside the supreme court, where Jackson’s supporters have gathered to urge her confirmation. Supporters of Supreme Court nominee Jackson rally in front of the U.S. Supreme Court building. Photograph: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters Jackson’s supporters rally outside the supreme court. Photograph: José Luis Magaña/AP Jackson’s supporters outside the supreme court. Photograph: José Luis Magaña/AP 12.20pm EDT 12:20 Several Republicans have raised the issue of court-packing, an idea that has gained traction on the left. Senator John Cornyn, a Republican of Texas, said he was dismayed that Jackson hasn’t directly engaged with the subject while…

So the committee thinks that its potential audience is two-thirds of the nation? A third of the nation wouldn’t read a 600-word statement from a newly emerged divinity explaining what the new era of peace and enlightenment was going to be like. Even if it was illustrated with … well, I’ll leave that to your imagination. There’s no way — no way — that anything like a third of the nation, let alone two out of three people, is going to read the Jan. 6 report.This doesn’t mean the report is useless. For one thing, quite a few opinion leaders…

Egypt has fixed the price of unsubsidised bread amid a global surge in wheat prices since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.The move comes after war shut off access to cheaper wheat from the Black Sea region, particularly affecting exports to the Middle East and north African region. Egypt is the world’s biggest wheat importer, bringing in about 60% of its grain from overseas. Russia and Ukraine accounted for 80% of the country’s imports last year.The Egyptian prime minister, Mostafa Madbouly, set the price of commercially sold bread at 11.50 Egyptian pounds a kilo on Monday, which is 49 British pence. The…