British luxury automaker's advertising campaign features models of varying ages, genders and races - but no cars.

£1.6m of British kit shipped to companies tied to Russian military despite sanctions, customs documents claim.

British farmers say they will be forced to sell farms under inheritance tax reforms.

Farmers say the tax will destroy family farms and threaten food production, while gov't says it's needed to raise funds.

Parts of the film were made in the United Kingdom, and British actress Cynthia Erivo, who plays the green witch Elphaba, said "she's finally back home".

Passengers are reporting delays, but the airline says flights are not being cancelled.

Why is a regular guy attracted to a billionaire candidate? It’s simple: Because the candidate can play to people’s fantasies. The man knows his television, loves girls, hates rules, knows how to make a deal, tells jokes, uses bad language, and is convivial to a fault. He is loud, vain, cheeky. He has a troubled relationship with his age and his hair. He has managed to survive embarrassment, marital misadventures, legal troubles, political about-faces. He’s entangled in conflicts of interest, but he couldn’t care less. His party? A monument to himself.

He thinks God is his publicist, and twists religion to suit his own ends. He may not be like us, but he makes sure there’s something about him that different people can relate to personally. He is, above all, a man of enormous intuition. He is aware of this gift and uses it ruthlessly. He knows how to read human beings, their desires and their weaknesses. He doesn’t tell you what to do; he forgives you, period.

So, how do you like Silvio Berlusconi?

Here in Italy, he loomed over our politics—and our lives—for 30 years. He created his own party in 1994 (Forza Italia, a sort of Make Italy Great Again), and a few months later, he became Italy’s prime minister for the first time. He didn’t last long, but he climbed back into government in 2001, and then again in 2008. Three years later, he resigned amid sex scandals and crumbling public finances, but he managed to remain a power broker until he died last year.

[Tom Nichols: Trump’s depravity will not cost him this election]

Silvio Berlusconi, like Donald Trump, was a right-wing leader capable of attracting the most disappointed and least informed voters, who historically had chosen the left. He chased them, understood them, pampered them, spoiled them with television and soccer. He introduced the insidious dictatorship of sympathy.

But Silvio Berlusconi is not Donald Trump.

Berlusconi respected alliances and was loyal to his international partners. He loved both Europe and America. He believed in free trade. And he accepted defeat. His appointments were at times bizarre but seldom outrageous. He tried hard to please everybody and to portray himself as a reliable, good-hearted man. Trump, as we know, doesn’t even try.

Berlusconi may have invented a format, but Trump adopted and twisted it. Trump’s victory on November 5 is clear and instructive, and it gives the whole world a signal as to where America is headed.

The scent of winners is irresistible for some people. The desire to cheer Trump’s victory clouds their view. They don’t see, or perhaps don’t take seriously, the danger signs. Reliability and coherence, until recently a must for a political leader, have taken a back seat. Showing oneself as virtuous risks being counterproductive: It could alienate voters, who would feel belittled.

American journalism—what is left of it, anyway—meticulously chronicled Trump’s deceitfulness. It made no difference, though. On the contrary, it seems to have helped him. Trump’s deputy, J. D. Vance, explained calmly in an interview that misleading people—maybe even lying to them—is sometimes necessary to overcome the hostility of the media.

I’m no better than you. I’m bad. So vote for me! This seems to be the magic new formula of American democracy. Venting and showing off flaws has become a way to reassure those voters—and there are many of them—who hate criticism. He who misbehaves is popular; those who dare to preach become unbearable. People love the Joker, not Batman—the Joker is more fun.

You don’t need to be a historian to know this; just a few history lessons are enough. The people, whether in the Athens of Plato and Demosthenes or in republican Rome, asked for leaders they could admire. This pretense lasted for centuries, in very different places and contexts. The people demanded honesty and sobriety from their leaders. They rarely got it, but at least they asked for it.  

Not even dictators escaped the rule. Italy’s own Benito Mussolini did not flaunt his excesses; he pretended to be sober and virtuous, and Italians pretended to believe it. Only autocrats and tyrants continue the farce today. A few weeks ago, the North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un got very angry when flyers rained down on Pyongyang showing his and his family’s luxuries to a very poor nation. Trump would have used them as election posters.

Aristocracy means “government by the best.” Today, we are in a kakistocracy, government by the worst. And tens of millions of American voters are proud of it, or at least happy to appear so. The copyright of this questionable political style belongs at least in part to former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Trump himself: Both, in 2016, won by proudly displaying their whims and weaknesses.

[From the July/August 2021 issue: The minister of chaos]

In his book Narrare l’Italia, the psychoanalyst Luigi Zoja wrote: “The growth of children is not guided by the rules that parents impart, but by the examples they offer. Leaders—fathers and mothers of the people—will be able to preach what they consider necessary national virtues, but they will spread them only if they are the first to practice them.” The author must admit that this has changed. Successful leaders have stopped “preaching the necessary virtues of the nation,” instead preferring to applaud its faults and consolidate their own power. It’s more rewarding.

The words Lead by example! are the soundtrack of distant childhood, for some of us. And what was asked of a firstborn or a class leader was expected of elected leaders. If they betrayed trust—and it often happened, everywhere—they lost their job and their reputation. Today, being labeled a good example or an expert is not only anachronistic; it is risky: Who do these guys think they are? How dare they show us a path, suggest a behavior? We know how to do our own research and make mistakes on our own, thank you.

Berlusconi’s shortcomings helped fuel his success, but he wasn’t proud of them. Trump wears his flaws like medals, and is appointing people to his coming administration who have the same attitude. Berlusconi would never have allowed the equivalent of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. near Italy’s department of health. An Italian Matt Gaetz would have been considered for a reality show on one of Berlusconi’s TV channels, at most.

If this is the path that democracy chose, let’s prepare for the worst. It will become impossible to get rid of a leader elected in this way and for these reasons. What do you want from me? they will reply after having disappointed and failed. I told you who I was, and you voted for me with enthusiasm. Now shut up and be good.

Since the June release of her critically acclaimed album Brat, Charli XCX has been making appearances exuding its titular ethos. Though the concept of “brat” has always been a little indefinable, all you’ve needed to do to understand it has been to look at XCX—her messy, chic black hair; pursed lips; and huge sunglasses all embody the je ne sais quoi of someone who has been out all night partying. So I was curious in the lead-up to her hosting gig on this week’s Saturday Night Live: Would she let her brat mask slip at all?

She did. Although the British pop star started with a fairly stilted, brat-focused monologue—“it’s an attitude; it’s a vibe,” she explained—she proved herself more than game to shed the aesthetic in sketches. Her performances demonstrated a range that those who are largely familiar with her Brat era might not yet know: She can be awkwardly goofy, and she can be a skilled impressionist.

[Read: The legend of Charli XCX grows]

In “Babymoon”—a follow-up to the viral skit “Bridesmaid Speech” during Ariana Grande’s episode earlier this year—XCX fit right in with a chorus of female cast members as they sang a parody of Chappell Roan’s synth-pop song “Hot to Go!” Once again, the overarching gag was that these BFFs had written a jokey song about how their pal Kelsey (Chloe Fineman) had cheated on her spouse with a man named Domingo (Marcello Hernandez)—only now she was pregnant and they were singing at her baby shower. The charm of the recurring sketch lies in its wildly inappropriate reveals, but the true joy of last night’s version was watching XCX take part in the dorky dance moves, her limbs stiffly spelling out the words of the tune.

Later, XCX was an impressive mimic in “Wicked Auditions,” a parade of impressions of celebrities ostensibly doing screen tests for the upcoming Wicked movie. Performing as Adele, XCX nailed the fellow Brit’s specific London accent but also her penchant for cackling at her own jokes. After that, XCX trotted out a take on her friend and tourmate Troye Sivan, imitating his Australian accent and affecting his laid-back posture. In a twist, she appeared with Bowen Yang, who was in costume as XCX herself.

Meanwhile, in “Here I Go,” a musical digital short with Andy Samberg, XCX played a creepily happy, pearl-wearing housewife who, along with her husband, loved to call the cops on fellow white people. XCX cheerily leaned into a Karen archetype, portraying her character’s surveillant tendencies with sinister glee. And for “Banger Boyz,” a sketch featuring a Joe Rogan–inspired podcast, XCX turned up her vocal fry to play the show’s producer—reading absurdist ad copy for fake products like Zyn Junior, a nicotine pouch for kids. She accurately captured the performatively casual tone of these kinds of shows while also differentiating herself from the room of bros; her voice implied that she was along for the ride, but her eyes suggested that she knew they were ridiculous.

XCX’s versatility shouldn’t really come as a surprise. As she mentioned in her monologue, she started performing when she was a teenager and has been pursuing her career ever since, navigating the challenges of the music industry and the boxes it tried (sometimes unsuccessfully) to slot her into. One of her first early hits was “Boom Clap” off The Fault in Our Stars soundtrack, which now seems un-brat with its teeny-bopper version of romance.

Brat exploded in part because it felt like the fullest expression of XCX’s ethos: a workhorse approach to songwriting alongside her 365-party-girl attitude toward life. Her SNL episode suggested that she’s ready to apply that industriousness to her next act—in the film world. She’s lined up for a number of movies, including I Want Your Sex, the latest from the queer provocateur Gregg Araki, and Sacrifice, from the French director Romain Gavras, which co-stars Chris Evans and Anya Taylor-Joy.

But of course, when XCX took the mic for the musical performances of her songs “360” and “Sympathy Is a Knife,” she once again put on her sunglasses. Stomping around the stage, she had the untouchable vibes of someone who truly embodies the cooler-than-thou energy that she’s created.

British news outlet The Guardian also said it would stop posting on Elon Musk's X, calling it a 'toxic media platform'.

The three men had been in unmarked graves after they were killed in the Korean War.