Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, died Tuesday at the age of 91, and I’ll confess to being somewhat shocked at how muted the reaction in the US press has been. His obituaries of course mention his achievements: bringing free speech and elections to the Soviet Union, allowing its vassal states in…
Read More “Mikhail Gorbachev and the lonely crusade of changing the system from within” »
This week, one of the more interesting charities out there, GiveDirectly, announced it had a new leader: Rory Stewart. He is the British writer and politician who formerly led the UK’s foreign aid department and ran against — and lost to — Boris Johnson in the race to become Conservative Party leader and prime minister…
Deaths from Covid-19 are at some of their lowest rates in the United States since the start of the pandemic, but they’re still alarmingly high, according to some health officials. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported this week that, on average, close to 400 people are dying of the disease every day. The…
Read More “Why Covid-19 death rates remain stubbornly flat” »
The water system in Jackson, Mississippi, the state’s capital and largest city, failed earlier this week. On Tuesday, most of the city’s 150,000 residents were without safe drinking water, prompting the state’s Republican governor, Tate Reeves, to declare a state of emergency. He warned that there wasn’t enough running water “to fight fires, to reliably…
The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday authorized new Covid-19 vaccines for emergency use for the first time since the original vaccines were approved in December 2020. The new boosters from Pfizer/BioNTech and from Moderna are targeted at the BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants of the omicron variant. They’re also the engine of a new vaccine…
The 67th Filmfare award took place last night and awarded some of the most talented artists in the Hindi film industry. Actors like Kriti Sanon and Ranveer Singh took home the Best Actors award while Sidharth Malhotra’s Shershaah and Vicky Kaushal’s Sardar Udham also won big. Check out the complete list of 67th Filmfare Award…
The Kashmir Files was one of the biggest hits of 2022 and surprised everyone as it became one of the highest-grossing Hindi movies of the year. The movie also received widespread crucial acclaim but also had its fair share of criticism as the makers were accused of spreading Islamophobia. Directed by Vivek Agnihotri, The Kashmir…
Over the last year months, the craze for South Indian films has taken over India with the release of movies like Pushpa: The Rise and RRR. The craze is now also being reflected in the 11-da festival of Ganesh Chaturthi as Ganesh Idols inspired by Allu Arjun’s character in Pushpa and Ram Charan, Jr NTR’s…
It hasn’t been a great year for Aamir Khan as his latest release, Laal Singh Chaddha underperformed at the box office. The movie ended up earning only Rs. 60 crores at the domestic box office during its theatrical run. As per reports, the makers of Laal Singh Chaddha have incurred huge losses of over Rs….