Former White House physician and Republican Representative Ronny Jackson has hit out against US President Joe Biden, arguing that his declining mental state poses a danger to the entire country.

"It's TERRIFYING for our country that Biden is our commander-in-chief," Jackson wrote on Twitter on Saturday. "He doesn't know where he's at half the time and every day he brings us closer to an all-out war with Russia and China. His cognitive decline is going to get people KILLED!!"

Jackson, who served as the White House Physician to the President under Barack Obama and Donald Trump until 2018, has previously criticized the current US administration for failing to disclose the truth about Joe Biden's mental health.

Earlier this month, the White House issued a summary on the status of Biden's health based on a medical history review and a "detailed physical examination," which found that the president was a "healthy, vigorous, 80-year-old male" who was fit to execute his duties.

If you don't live online, you may have missed the controversy over Hogwarts Legacy, the latest computer game to have been spun out of the multi-billion Harry Potter franchise.

A small but amazingly vocal band of activists launched a vicious campaign against the game because of its connection to 'transphobe' J.K. Rowling. Then the game came out and was instantly a phenomenal success - the most popular game ever on the streaming platform Twitch, physical sales of 12 million in its first two weeks of release, earning its makers $850 million (£709 million) in revenue. These cold, hard, commercial facts are like a glass of cold water in the face. The balance sheet shows that we have a very skewed understanding of the popularity and reach of 'woke'.

Elsewhere, we see the smash West End success of Steven Moffat's play The Unfriend, despite its star turn by notorious 'Terf' ('trans-exclusionary radical feminist') Frances Barber. A friend showed me a hilarious social media post from a true swivel-eyed woke believer who apologised to his followers for attending, and said that, though he'd loved the show, he'd made a point not to applaud Barber at her curtain call. Outside the worlds of showbiz and entertainment, we have recently witnessed the spectacle of Nicola Sturgeon self-destructing after her gender reform bill smashed into reality.

One dares to hope: is woke dead? We keep waiting for a tipping point that never tips. There have been so many false dawns, hefty straws that you think will surely break the camel's back then don't.

A global pandemic, it was believed, would make people appreciate that gender pronouns are not humanity's most pressing concern. But Covid-19 quickly established its own culture wars, as keyboard warriors began arguing about which marginalised groups were suffering most. A major land war in Europe should have been serious enough to bind the progressivist fist for a month or two. But the conflict in Ukraine has barely touched the sides. Even the recent possibility of an alien invasion doesn't seem to be having much effect on concentrating the crazed human hive mind.

But hang on. Maybe it's a case not of sudden death, but of a gradual recalibration, a slow unwinding of the sense that 'woke' matters that much.

Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) is much worse than he, his wife and staff are telling the public. It is only through whispered leaks to the media that the public learns the truth and that is only after events prove the lies. He has a bad heart, which wasn't disclosed until his debilitating stroke last May. The stroke was much worse than his campaign let on until his one debate in late October. He's battled depression all his life, but that wasn't disclosed until ten days ago when he was hospitalized for clinical depression.

Photos taken three months apart, November 2022 and February 2023 show Fetterman's decline:
Video of Fetterman at the State of the Union shows his shirt collar is loose, indicating weight loss.

Ian Fleming's original James Bond novels have been "rewritten" to remove racist remarks ahead of a coming re-release, The Telegraph has reported.

Ahead of a coming re-release to mark the 70th anniversary since the release of Ian Fleming's Casino Royale novel, the first in the James Bond series, the publication reports that the works have been "rewritten" to appease woke sensibilities.

The revelation comes after a week of controversy surrounding recent reprints of Roald Dahl's books, with it being revealed that the works of fiction have been edited in order to change or remove language deemed problematic.

According to The Telegraph, this practice of editing problematic content, supposedly to appeal to modern audiences, has now extended to Fleming's work, with so-called "sensitivity readers" being drafted in to examine the novels.

As a consequence, the 70th-anniversary edition reprints due out in April are to sport a number of major changes compared to the original, as well as a trigger warning at the beginning warning readers of each book's contents.

"This book was written at a time when terms and attitudes which might be considered offensive by modern readers were commonplace," the disclaimer will read.

Depleted fruit and vegetable supermarket aisles are to last for weeks in Britain. The government cannot say it was not warned.

There were specific warnings by the farming industry body the National Farmers' Union (NFU) last year. This week Tory environment secretary Therese Coffey was booed and heckled at the NFU conference.

The NFU is in no way a union akin to a trade union. It is dominated by large farmers and agribusiness. That makes it all the more striking that there was such deep anger at Coffey for claiming that the crises facing food production and supply do not indicate a failure of the market mechanism that she worships like an idol. She is, for example, relaxed about agribusiness poisoning Britain's rivers.

Months after the raid on former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, the FBI has suffered another public relation hit. A former FBI agent pleaded guilty late last year to allegations that he purposely destroyed evidence to frame a pro-Trump state lawmaker in Arkansas.

The guilty plea was part of a bargain between prosecutors and the former agent Robert Cessario, who was charged with "corrupt destruction of record in an official proceeding" in connection to the corruption trial of former state Sen. Jon Woods of Springdale.

A federal judge sentenced Cessario to three years of probation for destroying evidence in the corruption case that sent three men to federal prison.

Arkansas Online reported:

"Cessario must spend the first six months of probation in home detention, although no electronic monitoring will be required, according to U.S. District Judge P.K. Holmes. Holmes also ordered Cessario to pay a $25,000 fine. Cessario's presentencing report says federal guidelines would require at least five months in prison. The crime Cessario admitted to — corrupt destruction of an object in an official proceeding — carries a minimum recommended sentence of 10 months in prison.

"The sentence can be mitigated by cooperation, according to federal guidelines. The federal sentencing report notes Cessario acknowledged his crime, accepted a plea, and has no prior criminal history. He served in the FBI for 17 years, according to statements by Alan Jackson, the government's attorney in the case. Defense attorney John Everett of Farmington told Holmes that Cessario's conviction renders his client unemployable in any kind of law enforcement or security capacity."

Polymetallic nodules, sand mafias and e-waste hazards

From the position of the archaeologist, technology is a neutral term. From flint hand axes to sickles, antler harpoons to fish traps, the earliest forms of technology leverage efficiency and capability at the interface between the human and the rest of the world. There is nothing unnatural about this - crows, otters, monkeys, even crocodiles make use of manipulated objects to exploit their dietary niche. Where there are concerns about how modern technology functions, they shouldn't be framed as a dichotomy between 'good' and 'bad', but rather at the specific problems created. Too often what counts for academia today will position any discussion of technology in a framework of 'neoliberalism' and 'systems thinking'. Some will talk of the Anthropocene, barely suppressing their glee at the control such definitions bring. What I want to do here is outline some concrete and non-systemic threats that specific technologies pose. It is my contention that only through approaching risks to the natural world in this way will we actually retain the ability to tackle them. Beyond the nebulous outlines of international agreements and porous commitments lies the bulwark of the nation state and its capacities, let us not be shy in demanding it makes use of them.

Mining the Sea-Floor: Polymetallic Nodules

The new Green Revolution and its consequences are rolling like a tidal wave across the world. One of its most insidious children is the 'net-zero' mining industry. To be absolutely clear, the new eco-friendly techno-complex of electric cars, wind and solar generated energy and the vast new infrastructure of batteries needed to support these relies precariously on this industry's ability to extract unprecedented amounts of raw minerals. According to the World Bank's 2020 report: Minerals for Climate Action, the increase in mineral production includes a staggering 488% increase in demand for lithium, 460% for cobalt, 231% for indium and a 189% increase for vanadium. The projections for the UK to meet its target for electric cars would require the world's current output of neodymium, almost twice the world's production of cobalt and three-quarters of the global lithium production. With two of the main countries for nickel, cobalt, manganese and copper being China and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the race has started to find alternatives mining venues. European nickel mines are one option, but by far the most enticing is the prospect of under sea mining.

NPR will lay off about 10% of its current staffers and stop filling most vacant positions as it contends with a $30 million revenue shortfall, the media nonprofit's CEO John Lansing told staffers this week.

Lansing warned that NPR's "financial outlook has darkened considerably over recent weeks" due to a weakening advertising market and a "sharp decline" in revenue from corporate sponsors.

The plunge in sponsorship dollars hammered NPR's expensive podcast division, which is home to popular shows such as All Things Considered and Fresh Air.

The cuts will impact about 100 employees in total, according to NPR reporter David Folkenflik.

The activists sued after member Alison Hair was banned from meetings after reading passages of a sexually explicit book available in the school library to her son.

A group of Georgia moms have won $100,000 from a school board that banned them from reading an X-rated book at a meeting - even though the same tome is available in its libraries.

The 'Mama Bears' group sued Forsyth County School District after one of its members, Alison Hair, was barred from school board meetings for defiantly reading passages from controversial book Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.

It contained graphic descriptions of oral sex, which the Mama Bears deemed inappropriate.

After being silenced during the February 2022 meeting, they claimed their First Amendment right to free speech had been violated. A court agreed. The Mama Bears were awarded just under $18 in nominal damages - but Forsyth County was also ordered to pay their $100,000 legal fees.

The protest group have said they're delighted with the result - and explicit books have now been removed from the district's school libraries.

I gather trigger warnings are in at the moment, so here's mine: this article may contain opinions that vegan students find hard to swallow, much like my last brush with a nut burger.

Yesterday we learned that - in response to "climate and biodiversity crises" - Cambridge University student union has voted to: "initiate talks with central catering services about removing all animal products from its cafés and canteens." The aim, they say, is to create a sustainable and 100 per cent plant-based menu. Almost three-quarters of students who voted backed the plan.

As a doctor I find this worrying on many levels. Freedom of choice aside, I'm married to a GP who tells me that she regularly sees young people - especially girls - who have embraced faddy diets, including veganism. As a result, they end up tired, anaemic and underperforming. Is this the outcome we want at one of the world's best universities?