British Member of Parliament Nigel Farage, leader of the political party Reform UK, was testifying Wednesday before the House Judiciary Committee on free speech when Democratic Georgia Rep. Hank Johnson pressed him on his connections to President Donald Trump. The congressman asked Farage whether he considered Trump his “mentor,” something the British politician promptly shut […]

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This is Logan. He loves trains, always has. And now, he’s one of the youngest licensed train drivers in the whole of the UK. For some children, the question “what do you want to be when you grow up” is mulled over in a fit of anxious uncertainty. For others, it’s as easy as responding […] The post Boy Follows Track in His Heart to Dream Job ‘I’ve Always Loved trains–Now I’m Qualified to Drive O ne ‘ appeared first on Good News Network.

News Twilight All Five Twilight Films Will Stream On YouTube for Free… For a Week It’s Edward and Bella all day and all night. By Vanessa Armstrong | Published on September 4, 2025 Screenshot: Lionsgate Comment 0 Share New Share Screenshot: Lionsgate Have you ever wanted to watch all five Twilight films back to back in a continuous loop for a week straight? If so, you’re in luck: Lionsgate is doing just that on it’s on the official Twilight YouTube channel starting on September 7 from 12 p.m. PT through September 17 at 11:59 p.m. PT. Lionsgate is doing this as part of its promotional efforts to celebrate twenty(!) years since the first novel by Stephenie Meyer was published. What followed was a phenomenon that spawned five films starring Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart as Edward and Bella, the sparkly vampire and the human (to begin with) who loved him, and changed San Diego Comic-Con forever. This isn’t the only re-emergence of Twilight into our lives. Last year, we found out that Meyer’s book, Midnight Sun, will be adapted into an animated series for Netflix. The 2020 book, for those who don’t know, covers the same story from the original Twilight books but from the point of view of the vampire Edward rather than his human lover, Bella.   The streaming marathon also revitalizes the official Twilight YouTube channel, which you can check out here. That channel was recently relaunched, and fans can find more Twilight content there, including a two-hour video that is just ambient rain noise that plays while you gaze at a photo of the Cullen’s family residence. More content will undoubtedly go up there as this twenty-year anniversary continues. Subscribe and enjoy, if you want to. [end-mark] The post All Five <i>Twilight</i> Films Will Stream On YouTube for Free… For a Week appeared first on Reactor.

John Hendrix’s magically illustrated biography tells the tale of one of literature’s greatest friendships. Show, don’t tell, say the masters of literature. But in “The Mythmakers: The Remarkable Fellowship of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien,” author/illustrator John Hendrix asks the question, why not both? In the format of a graphic novel, or more precisely, a work of graphic non-fiction, the book chronicles the friendship that forged modern fantasy literature. Without Lewis and Tolkien’s partnership, neither “The Chronicles of Narnia”or “The Lord of the Rings” would have come to be. Hendrix has a clear love for both men, attempting to illuminate their story for a youth audience. In this he has succeeded, but I think that adults, even those with less literary inclinations, will find it easy to wander through this book for a few hours. “The Mythmakers” interweaves illustrations and prose, with a pair of illustrated characters, Mr. Lion and Wizard, forming a frame story around the narrative. These two are obvious stand-ins for Lewis and Tolkien respectively, and they take turns giving context to the philosophy and passion of both men. The illustrations are masterful. But the standout surprise for me is how effortlessly this book flows. When I picked it up, I was expecting the reading experience to have a jerky quality, with the illustrated sections speeding by before thudding into a few pages of dense prose. But the illustrations are intricate and detailed, and I often found myself slowing down to appreciate them. The prose was exceptionally well-written and gilded with illustration. Overall, Hendrix shows meticulous care and research, distilling the story of these two masters into an imminently readable format.   Often-overlooked moments of their lives emerge from the page. Toddler-aged Tolkien was bitten by a large spider in South Africa, possibly inspiring Ungoliant and Shelob. Lewis was born with only one joint in each thumb, limiting his ability to play sports and contributing to the loneliness of his childhood. 16-year-old Tolkien met his lifelong wife in the group home for orphans where they both lived. For his entire life, Lewis carried shrapnel from the shell that nearly killed him in a dismal trench in the First World War. A coin toss between the two men led to Lewis writing the first book of his Space Trilogy, “Out of the Silent Planet,” the protagonist of which is likely based on Tolkien. “The Hobbit” nearly went unpublished, until the ten-year-old son of the publisher demanded his father print it. Like all great friendships, theirs sparked capabilities in each other that they never would have had separately. Tolkien, ever meticulous and hesitant, needed the bold Lewis to encourage him and keep him going. Lewis needed Tolkien’s spiritual grounding to connect his impulses and desires to reality. Although their work was magical, these men were no strangers to tragedy. They had seen loneliness, violence, and death. The more mundane sadnesses and disappointments of life were not far away either. As the years wore on, changes in the Inklings (their informal literary club), the diverging trajectories of their work, and Lewis’ unconventional marriage came softly and silently between them. By the time of Lewis’ death, they had drifted apart. The culmination of Mr. Hendrix’s frame story with Mr. Lion and Wizard gives us some closure in this regard. I won’t spoil it. I’ll only say that it is hopeful, but the kind of hopeful that rings true. For readers, great stories are about great relationships. For authors, great relationships give rise to great stories. Of course, the friendship of Lewis and Tolkien is the focal point of “The Mythmakers.” But there is a second friendship at play here, the one that forms the heart of this book. It is the friendship between John Hendrix and his subjects. Every illustration and every paragraph exudes a sense of gratitude and kinship towards these men who have given so much to his art. When I closed the book, I couldn’t help but feel some of that gratitude myself. This review is part of a series highlighting emerging young adult and children’s literature for conservative families. If you have a work or publisher to recommend, please contact the author at mark.guiney@heritage.org.  Photos credit Mark Guiney. The post The Lewis-Tolkien Biography… For People Who Don’t Want to Read a Lewis-Tolkien Biography appeared first on The Daily Signal.

China may have stolen data from nearly every American, including President Donald Trump, a yearslong joint investigation by multiple intelligence agencies has concluded.   The group “Salt Typhoon,” which has ties to the Chinese Communist Party, reportedly hacked phones Trump and Vice President JD Vance used last year during the presidential campaign.   The investigation has uncovered information related to a yearlong, elaborate cyberhack conducted by entities with ties to the CCP. The hack is reported to have targeted more than 80 countries.   “People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-sponsored cyberthreat actors are targeting networks globally, including, but not limited to, telecommunications, government, transportation, lodging, and military infrastructure networks,” according to a joint statement issue by the investigators last week.   Numerous nations, including the U.S., Canada, Finland, Germany, and Japan signed onto the statement, which is intended to shed light on China’s actions. Chinese “actors focus on large backbone routers of major telecommunications providers, as well as provider-edge and customer-edge routers, they also leverage compromised devices and trusted connections to pivot into other networks,” according to the joint statement. “These actors often modify routers to maintain persistent, long-term access to networks.”  Cynthia Kaiser, a former top official in the FBI Cyber division, oversaw the investigations into the Chinese hacking and said she could not “imagine any American was spared, given the breadth of the campaign,” according to The New York Times.   The large and meticulous cyberhack reveals “patient, state-backed campaigns burrowed deep into the infrastructure of more than 80 countries, characterized by a high level of technical sophistication, patience, and persistence,” said Jennifer Ewbank, a former CIA deputy director for digital innovation, according to The Times.   The data China has stolen “ultimately can provide Chinese intelligence services with the capability to identify and track their targets’ communications and movements around the world,” according to the joint security report detailing the Chinese cyberhack.   China linked cyber-actors, including Salt Typhoon, “exhibit tactics and target selection that extend beyond traditional cyberespionage or intelligence-gathering operations,” according to the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.   Chinese backed entities have carried out the hack in such a way that allows hackers to “disrupt critical functions at a time of their choosing,” CISA says.   In response to the hack, CISA says it is working with various government agencies and other partners to counter “the evolving cyberthreats posed by PRC state-sponsored actors.”  “CISA is fostering a more secure cyberspace, making it increasingly difficult for PRC threat actors to execute large-scale compromises,” according to the agency.   The post China May Have Stolen Your Data—and Even Trump’s, Multiyear Probe Finds appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Federal Judges Complain (Anonymously) About the Supreme Court

If politics can be said to be a team sport, then MSNBC host and Thursday Morning Joe panelist Al Sharpton is the coach who puts the ball on the tee, and Rep. Jamie Raskin is the batter who takes the easy swing. Sharpton asked if a federal judge ruling President Trump illegally withheld funding from Harvard proves that his anti-DEI policies are political, and Raskin dutifully replied they are, going so far as to label them “Stalinist.” Sharpton wondered: I want to ask you, following up what you just said. Do you feel that the whole fight around DEI, which in many cases have been distorted, now can have a clear view that this is something that the administration is politicizing and that the academic community has been trying to deal with more on a balanced way, not an advocacy way, and that this ruling can help bring that forward, even though it will likely be appealed by the president and go to a Trump Supreme Court, at least that's what they'll try to do?     Of course, Raskin agreed, “Yeah, I think that's right. Obviously, Trump has wanted to attack any kind of diversity or equity initiative at the colleges and universities and made common cause with the most right-wing forces in the country to try to dismantle it. Of course, if there were any race discrimination or gender discrimination going on, then people should bring those as lawsuits.” Raskin then claimed that if the federal government, which is charged with enforcing civil rights law, were to involve itself in those controversies, that would be akin to Soviet dictator and mass murderer Joseph Stalin, “But otherwise the federal government should back off and allow the colleges and universities to govern themselves. We don't need the Trump Administration and Stephen Miller and Donald Trump micromanaging the admissions process of colleges and universities across the country. We're talking about thousands of campuses, and you know, we don't need to have Stalinist-style control.” The only response from the six-person panel was from former MSNBC host Chris Matthews, who could be heard snickering and seen smiling in agreement. However, the question surrounding Harvard is whether or not it has an institutionalized anti-Semitism problem and whether Trump’s blocking of funding is an appropriate response to that, not its admissions or even its DEI initiatives. But speaking of Harvard, admissions, and federal judges, the judge that ruled against Trump is Allison Burroughs, the Obama appointee who previously upheld Harvard’s admission standards before the Supreme Court overruled her and banned affirmative action. Here is a transcript for the September 4 show: MSNBC Morning Joe 9/4/2025 9:02 AM ET AL SHARPTON: Yes, I want to ask you, following up what you just said. Do you feel that the whole fight around DEI, which in many cases have been distorted, now can have a clear view that this is something that the administration is politicizing and that the academic community has been trying to deal with more on a balanced way, not an advocacy way, and that this ruling can help bring that forward, even though it will likely be appealed by the president and go to a Trump Supreme Court, at least that's what they'll try to do? JAMIE RASKIN: Yeah, I think that's right. Obviously, Trump has wanted to attack any kind of diversity or equity initiative at the colleges and universities and made common cause with the most right-wing forces in the country to try to dismantle it. Of course, if there were any race discrimination or gender discrimination going on, then people should bring those as lawsuits. But otherwise the federal government should back off and allow the colleges and universities to govern themselves. We don't need the Trump Administration and Stephen Miller and Donald Trump micromanaging the admissions process of colleges and universities across the country. We're talking about thousands of campuses, and you know, we don't need to have Stalinist-style control.