Bonnie Tyler — the smoky-voiced Welsh belter who turned heartbreak into arena-sized bombast with “Total Eclipse of the Heart” — died Wednesday in a Portuguese hospital. She was 75. The singer, born Gaynor Hopkins in the coal-mining village of Skewen, Wales, had been battling an illness and passed away in Faro, where she’d made her home for decades, her family confirmed in a Facebook post. Her road to that final night was tough. Back in May, Tyler underwent emergency surgery on a perforated intestine, was placed in an induced coma, and spent weeks fighting for her life in intensive care before doctors believed she was turning a corner. Tyler’s raspy, whiskey-and-cigarettes voice — the product of throat surgery she had in 1977 to remove vocal nodules — became one of pop’s most distinctive instruments, and she leaned into it hard. “I can’t help it if I’ve got a husky voice,” she once shot back at critics who compared her to Rod Stewart. That voice found its perfect vehicle in 1983’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart,” a Jim Steinman-penned monster originally dreamed up for a Nosferatu musical. The song was practically destined for Meat Loaf — until he lost his voice during recording and Tyler swooped in. The track shot to No. 1, sold millions, and hasn’t left the culture since, still racking up karaoke nights and eclipse-season streaming spikes more than four decades later. “ “After it was a hit,” she remembered, Meat Loaf “always used to say: ‘Dang. That song should have been mine!’” She told The Telegrapgh last year, “How can you ever possibly imagine it would still be so big today and people who weren’t even born then would be singing it at karaoke?” Tyler followed up with “Holding Out for a Hero,” the synth-pop banger that soundtracked “Footloose” and blared out of gyms and movie screens throughout the ’80s. She racked up three Grammy nominations along the way, though she never took one home. The daughter of a coal miner and one of six kids, Tyler credited her mother with instilling the grit that carried her out of Wales and onto the world stage, once recalling her mom’s blunt advice: believe in yourself, because nobody else will do it for you. She went on to represent the United Kingdom at Eurovision in 2013, released more than a dozen albums across her career — her last, “In Berlin,” dropped in 2024 — and was honored with the Order of the British Empire in 2022 for her contributions to music. Tyler is survived by her husband, Robert Sullivan, a former Olympic judo competitor turned property developer, whom she married back in 1973. A full list of survivors was not immediately available.

During Wednesday’s hearing, the family of slain conservative Charlie Kirk pushed for greater transparency, urging the court to publicly release interviews in-full with the transgender romantic partner of Kirk’s accused killer. Jeffrey Neiman, attorney for Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, asked Judge Tony Graf Jr. to allow the full audio of Lance Twiggs’ interviews to be played in open court rather than a heavily redacted version. Twiggs, who was granted “use immunity,” is cooperating with prosecutors and is expected to be an important witness in the case. Prosecutors say Robinson admitted to murdering Kirk in text messages to Twiggs after the shooting and left behind a handwritten note expressing his intent to kill Kirk before the attack. LISTEN: The Trial of Tyler Robinson“The Kirk family believes strongly that if the evidence is being admitted in this preliminary hearing, it should be made public for the world to see,” Neiman said to Judge Graf. “No redactions.” “This court has tools at its disposal to make sure the defendant receives a fair trial,” he continued. “You’ll use them if you find that you need to.” “To not be transparent here, to not be open, to not let the world see what happened, will create doubt and distrust in the judicial system, and that’s not what anybody wants,” Neiman added. “That’s not what any of us believe should happen here. And we’d ask the court to consider the position of the family in making its ultimate decision.” Full Statement from Kirk Family Representative, Jeffrey Neiman, regarding transparency around the Lance Twiggs interview recording: “The Kirk family believes strongly that if the evidence is being admitted in this preliminary hearing, it should be made public for the world to… https://t.co/OkbHz0HJLz pic.twitter.com/y5C03suSFh — Andrew Kolvet (@AndrewKolvet) July 8, 2026 Graf ultimately ruled that portions of Twiggs’ interviews would be redacted before being presented during the preliminary hearing, meaning the public will hear only portions of the interviews. The judge also said that he would personally review the complete, unredacted interviews when determining whether prosecutors have established probable cause to send Tyler Robinson to trial for Kirk’s murder. Notably, the ruling currently applies only to the preliminary hearing and does not determine what evidence a jury may ultimately see or hear at trial. Twiggs could also testify in person at Robinson’s trial. As highlighted by The Daily Wire, the weapon believed to have been used to murder Kirk was wrapped in a towel that contained DNA from Robinson and Twiggs, according to the FBI. A screwdriver recovered from the rooftop where Robinson allegedly fired also contained DNA from both males, the state said at the hearing. Robinson was living with Twiggs at the time of Kirk’s assassination. DNA breakdown on towel and screwdriver where Lance Twiggs’ and Tyler Robinson’s DNA was found from Amanda Bakker, DNA analyst: Towel: Twiggs 5% Robinson 95% Screwdriver: Twiggs 11% Robinson 89% — Lynden Blake (@LyndenBlake) July 7, 2026 Related: The Never-Before-Seen Tyler Robinson Footage Haunting His Defense

One of the most common pieces of dating advice for men is something you’ve probably heard before: “Just be yourself.” While doubtlessly told with the best of intentions, it has a fatal flaw. What if “yourself” is someone who spends all of his time playing video games, scrolling Instagram reels, reading alone, or engaging in some other activity that doesn’t involve meeting new people? It’s from there that the question arises: Should you do new things for the express purpose of meeting women? That question has been the subject of a good deal of debate online. For example, a “tier list” by popular dating coach Blaine Anderson that ranked hobbies for single men recently sparked discussion on X. Activities such as “social dancing” and “volunteering” ranked highly, while “video games” was placed at the bottom. Some of the responses cannot be repeated in polite company, but a representative one said, “This narcissist thinks men’s hobbies exist to make her happy.” As a former student of Blaine’s, I can’t plead complete impartiality. But in my view, she’s a good deal closer to the truth than her critics. Consider the old riddle: If a tree falls in the woods and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound? On its face the answer is clearly “yes” since the physical mechanics of sound work the same regardless of whether anyone is nearby. However, a more interesting way of framing the question is this: “If tree falls in the woods and nobody is around to hear it, does it matter if it makes a sound or not?” If you’re the best person in the world who’d be the most wonderful partner to someone, does that actually matter if you’re never putting yourself in a position to meet someone? Unfortunately, the answer to that is “no.” Just as in marketing, you can have the best product in the world, but it won’t sell if nobody knows about it. Of course, doing things just to meet women isn’t going to go any better. A man who takes a feminist knitting class is almost certainly not going to get what he wants out of it. To give a less extreme example, if you’re doing Pilates primarily to meet women, you likely won’t be much good at Pilates because you don’t actually care about it that much. Women will pick up on that and read you as inauthentic, and then you’re done. The reason for that is a lack of integrity — not in the sense of a moral failing, but because you’re not being forthright about your intentions and that activity isn’t being done for itself. So that’s the conundrum: If you do things you enjoy that don’t allow you to meet women, you won’t. If you do things you don’t enjoy for the sake of meeting women, you probably won’t go anywhere unless you’ve been successful with women elsewhere, in which case, why bother with the new activity? What’s a man to do? There’s been a lot of discourse around how Americans are increasingly isolated and less likely to have friends, be dating, or have sex. An underrated reason for this is that it’s become much easier to have hobbies that don’t put you around other people. The path of least resistance, increasingly, is to be alone. But people can have more than one hobby, and you don’t need all of the ones on the list to maximize your social potential. In fact, having hobbies that make you happy and fulfilled is one of the most attractive things there is — as long as you’re still getting in front of the right people.  The key, then, is to find something that you enjoy that also makes you interact with other people. So you can do Pilates or knitting … if you genuinely enjoy those things enough that you would do them absent the potential of meeting someone. Now, that may mean getting out of your comfort zone and trying something new. Pilates was several bridges too far for me, so I decided to try picking up pickleball and social dancing. Pickleball I found to be boring and a poor imitation of tennis. I found myself resenting the time it was taking out of my day, and so I stopped.  Dancing, on the other hand, was a different story. It gave me something to do with my nights, forced me to get comfortable with talking to and interacting with women in a low-stakes environment, and was genuine fun once I got out of my shell. If it doesn’t deserve to be at the top of the tier list, it should be close — notwithstanding some of the criticism its placement received. “If your man has listed ‘dancing’ as a hobby, he is gay,” said one critic. If only; my love life would be so much easier if I were! That being said, I can think of a good many things that are less heterosexual than dancing with the opposite sex. So, here’s the nuanced take: Having some hobbies that are just for you is fine. But if you care about meeting people, some of your hobbies need to get you in front of people. And maybe you don’t want to! That’s fine, but if you do, you should be realistic about the trade-off you’re making. Dancing may not be your thing, but there are so many other good options. The reason that hobbies are one of the best ways to make connections is that you have at least one thing in common with everyone there, and you’re able to see them repeatedly and regularly. You’re likely to be leaving a lot of good matches on the proverbial table by not taking advantage of that. By all means, do what makes you happy. But if you’re trying to find your person and it hasn’t happened yet, what makes you happy might just be a new hobby that makes it easier, even if it means taking a step outside your comfort zone. *** Stephan Kapustka is a writer at the American Spectator. Follow him on X @SteveKapustka. This article is part of Upstream, The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.

In between parties for our nation’s 250th birthday party, I spent some time over the weekend opening six new Trump Accounts for my six children, ages three to 12. They aren’t eligible for the $1,000 baby bonus for opening the accounts, but the younger four will receive $250 each from the Dell Foundation, available to children age 10 and under in most zip codes in the country. The older two may be eligible for a share of SpaceX stock after SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell announced, on the day the accounts launched, that she would gift two million shares to America’s children between the ages of 11 and 17. During his speech at the launch in the Oval Office, Texas Senator Ted Cruz hit on one of the most important parts of the program: a new government initiative that doesn’t make Americans dependent upon the government. Comparing the program to the New Deal, Cruz explained, “Instead of having the government taking care of everyone, Trump Accounts are about making every child and every American a capitalist. Every one of our kids is now going to be an owner of one of the biggest producers in our country.” As the power of the Democratic Socialists of America rises, parents and children more than ever need to understand the power and opportunity that comes in a capitalist society. President Donald Trump understands that nothing can turn you into a capitalist faster than watching the market make your money grow. Americans have been ill-served in the school system, most notably in reading and math, for a myriad of reasons. One aspect of that poor education that’s little discussed is in financial literacy. In most schools in the country, public or private, the topic of investments never comes up. Americans don’t know how to save for their future, for college, or for their retirement. Most assume that investing is only for the super rich, that the only way they can grow their net worth is in a low-interest savings account offered at their local bank. The education component is one of the most powerful assets of the Trump Accounts. Housed within a simple and easy-to-use app, the accounts allow Americans to dive into a crash course on investing. The app offers a dozen four-minute reads on topics such as “The power of compounding,” “What is a stock?” and “What is a fractional share?” Americans can watch the seed money they’ve received grow in real time in their accounts. For the millions of Americans without financial accounts outside of a basic checking and savings account, this is their first chance to see how compounding works in action, encouraging further research into other kinds of investment accounts. The Trump Accounts can and should serve as a gateway drug into Americans opening a 529 account with their state or their own brokerage accounts with a firm like Schwab or Fidelity. On the app, they can load projections based on the average growth of the market based on their child’s age and a sample monthly contribution.  I can easily see how a $50 per month contribution would transform my three-year-old’s account into almost $15,000 by the time he’s 18 and over $433,000 by the time he’s 60. For my 12-year-old, that looks like over $4,000 when she’s 18 and over $231,000 when she’s 60. That sends a powerful message: the greatest gift of compounding is time. The earlier you invest, the better. But also, it’s never too late. That’s not to say that from a tax perspective, the Trump Accounts are the perfect vehicle for growth and sheltering. Critics have argued that other kinds of accounts, such as 529 savings accounts and Uniform Transfers to Minors Act (UTMA) accounts, may be better options. But depending on individual circumstances, the benefits for many Americans are clear: Employers (including parents who own their own S-Corp companies) and family members can easily invest in a child’s account. Philanthropists like the Dells and SpaceX can contribute and ensure that their fortunes are helping the next generation of American children instead of sinking into useless nonprofits claiming to fight climate, racism, or poverty. They can make a tangible impact fighting poverty instead of paying for office space and consultants. Despite growing up poor (single mom on disability in a single-wide trailer park poor), I learned from my mom the basics of financial management. As a bored 22-year-old recent college graduate barely scraping by at my first job, I taught myself the stock market and used extra money I’d have spent on lunches to buy several stocks. Almost 20 years later, those investments have grown over 1,000%, from $3,600 to over $43,000. I’ve similarly watched my children’s 529 college savings account grow astronomically. After some seed money from family at birth and regular contributions, my four-year-old’s account has already grown from $29,000 to $40,000. The value of my older three kids’ accounts has doubled. After I got a taste of how I could make investing work for me and my family, I was hooked. Watching a few thousand dollars grow into tens of thousands has a way of doing that. Millions of Americans are going to get their first taste of the thrill of investing and the power of capitalism thanks to the Trump Accounts. That lesson is priceless, and we’ll watch its impact compound for decades to come. *** Bethany Mandel (@bethanyshondark) is a homeschooling mother of six and a writer. She is the bestselling co-author, with Karol Markowicz, of “Stolen Youth: How Radicals Are Erasing Innocence and Indoctrinating a Generation.” This article is part of Upstream, The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.

Good news, everyone. We may not need children after all. That’s the comforting conclusion one could draw from a growing body of economic research on declining birthrates. Yes, fertility is falling. Yes, populations are aging. Yes, workforces are shrinking. But don’t worry. Artificial intelligence, robotics, and automation will make each remaining worker so much more productive that the economy will keep humming along just fine. In fact, a recent paper by Nobel laureate Daron Acemoglu and his colleagues concludes that shrinking populations have historically increased output per worker enough to offset the economic drag of having fewer workers. Productivity rises. GDP survives. Crisis averted. It’s an important finding. It may even be right. But it answers only the smallest of the questions before us. Economists have asked whether we can continue producing enough with fewer people. They should also ask what happens when there are fewer people to buy, build, dream, invent, marry, raise families, volunteer in churches, coach Little League, start companies, and imagine tomorrow. They may have solved the supply equation. The harder question is whether they’ve forgotten the demand side. And the human side. Henry Ford did not build the American middle class by finding ways to manufacture automobiles with the fewest possible workers. He built it by producing cars that millions of ordinary Americans could afford to buy, and by paying his workers enough so they could buy the products they were making. His genius was not merely industrial efficiency. It was democratizing prosperity. An economy is not simply a factory. It is also a marketplace. Artificial intelligence can manufacture products. It cannot manufacture customers. Nor can it create families, neighborhoods, or churches that lift their eyes toward God. Every generation smaller than the last means fewer first homes purchased, fewer refrigerators sold, fewer restaurants opened, fewer startups launched, fewer schools filled, and fewer neighborhoods built around young families. Productivity can compensate for fewer workers. It cannot indefinitely compensate for fewer consumers. Economists assume that productivity can replace people because they think of people primarily as workers. But people are also customers, neighbors, parents, inventors, volunteers, taxpayers, soldiers, worshippers, and citizens. A child is not merely another future employee. He or she is another participant in the life of a nation. But even that misses the larger point. The greatest cost of depopulation is not economic. It is civilizational. A society is more than its GDP. Growth creates more than wealth. It creates optimism. Every child born is a vote of confidence in the future, a choice to sacrifice for another, and a desire to leave a legacy. Every empty cradle is, in its own quiet way, a vote of declining confidence. We are increasingly living in the selfish, secular, materialistic, hedonistic future imagined by liberal elites. Walk through too many American cities today, and you notice something missing. Schools struggle to stay open while luxury apartment towers multiply. Dog parks overflow while playgrounds grow quiet. Marriage becomes one lifestyle choice among many, rather than the institution around which communities once organized themselves. Family formation is postponed, then reconsidered, then quietly abandoned. None of this shows up in quarterly GDP reports, but all of it matters. The irony is that our technological success may be making this transformation easier to ignore. If robots can build our products, AI can perform our cognitive work, and automation can compensate for labor shortages, perhaps we really can continue growing richer with fewer people. But for what exactly are we becoming richer? Increasingly, we seem to be constructing a society optimized for affluent, highly educated professionals living comfortably in a digitized service economy. We automate what can be automated. We import enough workers to perform the jobs that we cannot. Care for the elderly. Care for the children. Walk the dogs. Though increasingly, we seem to prefer euthanizing the first, having fewer of the second, and treating the third as substitutes for the children we never had. That may sound harsh. Reality often does. For generations, America’s greatest achievement was not creating billionaires. It was creating millions of middle-class families. American companies grew rich by serving an expanding nation of ordinary people who married, had children, bought homes, joined churches, coached baseball, and expected their children to live better than they did. Scale mattered because people mattered. Today, much of our economy seems increasingly comfortable pursuing extraordinary wealth by serving smaller numbers of affluent customers with remarkably few workers. From a spreadsheet’s perspective, that may be brilliant. From a civilization’s perspective, it is the path to decline. The economists may well prove right. Artificial intelligence may sustain productivity. Robots may compensate for labor shortages. GDP may continue growing long after birthrates have fallen below replacement. But GDP is not the measure of a civilization. Hope is. The first command in Genesis was not to optimize productivity. It was to “be fruitful and multiply.” Whether one reads those words as divine instruction or timeless wisdom, they capture something our economic models cannot. Human beings are not merely units of production or consumption. We are the authors of the future. The question before us is not whether artificial intelligence can replace workers. It is whether anything can replace children. We don’t believe anything can. *** Bobby Jindal is the former Governor of Louisiana and Chair of the Center for a Healthy America at America First Policy Institute. Alex Castellanos is a co-founder of Purple Strategies, a bipartisan public affairs firm, and appears regularly on Fox News.