When the magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 earthquakes tore through northern Venezuela on June 24, 2026, the most haunting images weren’t cracked walls — they were entire apartment towers reduced to flat stacks of concrete slabs, floor pressed on floor with almost no open space between them. Engineers have a name for this: pancake collapse. So … Read more
A magnitude 6.9 earthquake struck off Japan’s northeast coast on June 25, 2026, rattling the Tohoku region hard enough to suspend Shinkansen bullet train service and prompt the government to set up an emergency response team. Given Japan’s history with devastating tsunamis — most notably the catastrophic 2011 Tohoku disaster — many people braced for … Read more
On the evening of June 24, 2026, Venezuela was hit by two massive earthquakes within 40 seconds of each other — a magnitude 7.2 foreshock followed almost immediately by a magnitude 7.5 mainshock. Buildings collapsed across Caracas, a tsunami threat was briefly issued for Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the United States … Read more
Greater Manchester is heading into an unplanned mayoral by-election on July 30, 2026, after Andy Burnham gave up the post to take his seat in Parliament. The vacancy is a direct consequence of Burnham’s decisive win in the June 18 Makerfield by-election, and it marks the first time anyone other than Burnham has held the … Read more
Britain has gone through prime ministers faster than almost any other stable democracy in modern history. Since 2016 alone, the country has had five different occupants of 10 Downing Street — and a sixth change is now underway, with Keir Starmer having confirmed his resignation on 22 June 2026 and Andy Burnham the clear favourite … Read more
As Keir Starmer’s premiership hangs by a thread, one name keeps surfacing as his most likely successor: Andy Burnham. The Greater Manchester mayor just won a parliamentary seat in a by-election explicitly engineered to bring him back to Westminster — the first time that’s happened in Britain since 1965. Here’s who he is, how he … Read more
Status update (June 19, 2026): The MOU is no longer tentative. Presidents Trump and Masoud Pezeshkian signed the memorandum on June 17 at the Palace of Versailles, and Vice President JD Vance confirmed on June 18 that the formal 60-day negotiation window has begun. The Strait of Hormuz is reopening to commercial traffic, and the U.S. … Read more
In February, the Supreme Court demolished the legal foundation of Donald Trump’s signature economic policy, ruling that emergency powers do not let a president impose tariffs. Four months later, the tariffs are still here — the revenue, by the Treasury’s account, essentially unchanged — and the administration is methodically rebuilding the entire system on different … Read more
US inflation hit 4.2% in May — the highest reading since April 2023 — and President Trump’s response has been consistent: the number is the war, and the war is about to end. After canceling the June 11 strikes and declaring a deal with Iran imminent, he argued that recent figures point to an even … Read more
On Sunday evening, an Octagon will stand on the White House South Lawn. Fighters will walk to the cage from the Oval Office. The Zac Brown Band will sing the national anthem, roughly 125,000 guests will fill the grounds, and 85,000 more fans will watch from The Ellipse — all of it streamed live on … Read more