Flagship

Harris delivers debate blows

US Vice President Kamala Harris successfully baited ex-President Donald Trump in their debate, but fell short of a knockout blow. The pair discussed economic and foreign policy, abortion, and each other’s fitness for office, but the highest-wattage moments were when she forced him on the defensive. “Harris was often the aggressor,” Semafor’s David Weigel wrote, while Trump “struggled to make his own case consistently.” Conservative outlets lamented Trump’s missteps, with The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board saying he let Harris “off the debate hook,” and the right-wing magazine National Review characterizing him as “unfocused.” Minutes after the debate concluded, the music superstar Taylor Swift publicly endorsed Harris. Still, analysts largely agreed that polls were unlikely to shift significantly.

Signs point to Harris’ debate win

Opinion polls and market indicators suggested US Vice President Kamala Harris won the debate with ex-President Donald Trump. A CNN snap poll of debate watchers had her ahead 63-37, while betting markets downgraded his ultimate chances of victory. Other signs also suggested Haris came out ahead: The price of bitcoin — something of a proxy for confidence in Trump — fell, while pharmaceutical companies that develop abortion and fertility drugs saw their share prices rise, ostensibly on signs that Harris’ pro-abortion-rights stance was gaining in popularity. And the dollar, which usually rises on expectations of a Trump victory, was “trading on the soft side” after the debate, analysts at ING said.

Mexico passes judicial elections

Mexican lawmakers approved controversial judicial changes that will result in judges being elected by popular vote even as angry protesters broke into the Senate where the plan was up for debate. The constitutional shift was a signature proposal of outgoing President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who argued justices blocked his policies. But critics say the new system will erode checks on executive power and undermine Mexico’s democracy, warning that the election of judges will also give further power to the country’s drug cartels. As one analyst put it: “Today will be remembered as the most important day for the judiciary since 1994,” when modern Mexico held its first free and fair elections.

Global divisions deepen over Ukraine

Western pressure on Iran and China for supporting Russia’s war in Ukraine underlined deepening global divisions over the conflict. Britain, France, Germany, and the US said they would impose sanctions on Tehran for sending short-range ballistic missiles to Moscow for use against Ukraine, while Washington accused Beijing of providing “very substantial” military support to Russia — the Biden administration’s most direct criticism yet of what has widely been seen as Beijing’s implicit support for the invasion. The push by the US and its allies comes with China’s foreign minister in St Petersburg today for a meeting of security officials from the BRICS bloc of developing nations.

Beijing backs Africa renewables

China increased its backing of African clean-energy projects. New data shows Beijing’s approval of climate-related projects in the continent increased sixfold in 2023 after a lull during the pandemic, Carbon Brief reported. And at last week’s Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, where Chinese leader Xi Jinping pledged $51 billion in new loans to Africa, much of it was earmarked for clean-energy initiatives: The summit’s concluding declaration promised support for “solar, hydro, wind and other sources of renewable energy.” Africa is heavily reliant on fossil fuels, and more than 600 million people lack reliable access to electricity.

China mulls raising retirement age

Top Chinese officials this week began reviewing plans to raise the country’s retirement age. China already has some of the lowest such ages in the world — 60 for men, and between 50 and 55 for women — and is grappling with both short- and long-term economic challenges, including a shrinking workforce and pensions shortfalls. At the same time, China’s remarkable development has sharply increased life expectancy, which is set to almost double from 44 in 1960 to over 80 by 2050. “China is facing a reality that its population is not growing anymore,” a researcher at the China-based Xinhua Institute said. “That will perhaps put a long-term risk for China’s long-term development.”

SpaceX rages at Starship launch delay

SpaceX said that US regulators would keep its Starship grounded until at least November despite it being ready for a fifth test launch. In an unusually angry statement, the Elon Musk-owned company said the delay was “unreasonable and exasperating,” driven by issues “ranging from the frivolous to the patently absurd.” SpaceX hopes that Starship will be ready for launch to Mars in two years’ time. Its prior launches improved progressively and the next is intended to return safely to the launchpad. The company hoped for a swift approval, despite acknowledging the need for “rational safeguards.” Instead, it complained, the regulator has been derailed by “false and misleading reporting, built on bad-faith hysterics from online detractors.”

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Canberra plans social media age limits

Australia plans to introduce age restrictions on the use of social media. It would be among the first countries to do so, although several other jurisdictions have proposed them. Researchers disagree about the impact of smartphones and social media, with some claiming that they are driving an epidemic of mental illness and others saying the evidence for any impact is murky and ambiguous. Politicians are less circumspect, even comparing screen time’s harms to those of cigarettes, the Financial Times reported. Australia’s prime minister said parents were “worried sick” and “want their kids off their phones and on the footy field.” The policy would put a minimum age limit on social media use of between 13 and 16.

Jackman spurs steroid debate

Hugh Jackman’s shredded physique in Deadpool & Wolverine sparked a debate about the use of steroids in Hollywood. Jackman, 55, is far more ripped than when he played the character 24 years ago: He denies any chemical enhancements. Other actors, such as Alan Ritchson, star of Reacher, and Arnold Schwarzenegger, freely admit to drug use. But most who packed on muscle for a superhero role, including Chris Hemsworth as Thor, say they did so naturally. The Wrap said skeptics pointed out that high levels of muscle gain is hard, especially aged 40 and up. “It’s steroids,” one influencer wrote. “I don’t know why everyone still insists on this weird industry-wide denial… Steroids aren’t illegal. They all do it with steroids.”

Tolkien’s grief for lost worlds

JRR Tolkien’s collected poems will be published together for the first time. Tolkien is best known for The Lord of the Rings, but in early life he had ambitions of being a poet, the scholar Tom Emanuel wrote in The Conversation. The new 1,500-page, three-volume collection contains not just finished texts, but shows Tolkien’s many revisions: He was a perfectionist, as can be seen by the 17 years he took to finish TLOTR. Tolkien’s work was about disenchantment, Emanuel wrote, about modernity cutting humanity off from nature and our authentic selves, and his poetry is the same: The Sea-Bell, for instance, addresses the “grief for the passing of an ancient world.”

• Kenyan aviation workers are due to go on strike over the potential leasing of airport operations to the Indian conglomerate Adani Group.
• Iran’s president meets Iraqi officials in Baghdad on his first foreign trip since taking office.
• Americans mark the anniversary of the Sep. 11, 2001 attacks.

The (rough) number of orcas in the southern Salish Sea off the Pacific Northwest. Human activity reduced the population of killer whales in the coastal region, but this century has seen the southern population revive to around 300. The northern group’s numbers, though, have plateaued. New research suggests that noise pollution from boats is hindering their ability to hunt salmon successfully: The predators hunt using echolocation, sonar-like click noises that bounce off their prey. In noisy waters, the sound is distorted and they are less likely to both pursue prey and to catch it when they do.

Ninja Sarutobi Sasuke, by Sugiura Shigeru. Literary Hub says this first English translation of the 1969 pop-art take on a traditional Japanese story is “a joy… a gallivanting and strange adventure, full of gags, magical run-ins, and trippy sequences as the titular ninja jumps around a historic Japan that seems to be fraying at its edges.” Buy it from your local bookstore.

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• Chinese roots deepen in Africa’s last Taiwan holdout.