Culture The Number One News Story in America and the World Forget the trade war—Madonna and Elton John are chums again! Credit: Adam McCullough/Shutterstock I do wish our society could, for once, get its priorities straight. A looming “trade war,” as all the deep thinkers call it, seems to be monopolizing our attention—that and the possibility of nuclear war—when a far more momentous development has gone virtually unnoticed. I refer to the fact that Madonna and Elton John have finally kissed and made up after what CNN calls “a notorious years-long feud that saw the two publicly trading barbs.” Well, air-kissed, anyway. Madonna, we’re told, came to watch Elton John on Saturday Night Live in early April, “later sharing a photo posing with him as proof that the pair are now friends.” It’s hard to put in words what a relief this is, even if—like me—you have no idea what came between these two. They have so much in common, not least, one must assume, their wardrobes. Maybe that is the problem. They’re too much alike, competing for the same kind of public recognition. Madonna—born Madonna Louise Ciccone—and Elton John—born Reginald Kenneth Dwight—are, or were, major pop stars, with millions of fans and gobs of money who, when seeking our attention, are only thinking of us and the joy they bring by their presence in our lives. That they quarreled sickened those of us who were aware of it, and a great burden has been lifted by the news that they are besties once again.  Apparently, at the 2012 Golden Globes—an awards show of some kind—he said Madonna didn’t “stand a f—ing chance” to win, and when she was giving her acceptance speech, “the camera cut away to John, whose look was pure daggers.” It is of course too soon to tell whether their well-publicized reconciliation will endure. “Seeing him perform when I was in high school changed the course of my life,” Madonna wrote on Instagram the other day. “I had always felt like an outsider growing up and watching him on stage helped me to understand that it was OK to be different.” In high school? This might strike some as a slight dig at Elton John’s age, though that could be just the old grumps among us, those of us who are forever shaking our heads at the younger generation and their wacky antics. Elton John just turned 78, and Madonna is only 66, so she has a point. If she is suggesting he should shuffle off the stage, making room for younger talent, there might be something to it, though it was a little harsh, if not premature. Mr. John (let’s be respectful) has much more to offer. He’s not just a pianist, after all. He has also (again to quote CNN) “found huge success producing music for Broadway shows,” including The Lion King. Not all of his efforts have succeeded, however. His production of Tammy Faye, based on the life of the make-up–smeared televangelist, debuted in November and closed the next month.  This, it appears, is our fault, not his. The musical “came out during the U.S. election and it’s all about how the integration of church and state ruined America, which Ronald Reagan did,” Mr. John has explained. “It was too political for America. They don’t really get irony.”  If Americans don’t get irony, it is only fair to ask, how in the world did we end up electing as our president the star of a reality TV show? How, before that, did we get Ronald Reagan of Bedtime for Bonzo fame, who shared top billing with a chimp? Mr. John, with all due respect, is not giving Americans anywhere the credit we deserve. But we can take a joke, and we are big enough—following the example Madonna has set—to forgive, if not forget.  The late Andrew Breitbart liked to say that politics is downstream of culture, an observation that has become known as Breitbart’s Law. We will be following the Madonna–Elton John relationship closely, reporting back on any political developments that result. It may be that politics is not only downstream of culture, but downwind of it. Call that Crawford’s Law. The post The Number One News Story in America and the World appeared first on The American Conservative.

Politics Trump’s EO on Coal Can Be the Start of Something Big Kentucky has the people, values, and infrastructure to power the Digital Age. Credit: peruphotart/Shutterstock Last year, I moved to Kentucky—not to escape the chaos of California, but to build something better. I wanted to be somewhere people still believed in work, community, and country. You feel that spirit in the coal towns etched into the hills of Appalachian Kentucky. Places where people don’t need lectures on consuming energy—they produce it. That’s why Trump’s recent executive order promoting coal harvesting stood out to me, not as a policy wonk, but as someone who’s chosen to root himself here. For the first time in years, Washington is acknowledging that the American interior matters. Our energy future won’t be engineered in Davos or Silicon Valley. It’ll be built in places like Pikeville and Hazard. But let’s not pretend an executive order alone is enough. Yes, this is a step in the right direction. It cuts through regulatory chokeholds and signals a long-overdue realignment of national priorities. Good. Now what? If the Trump administration is serious about revitalizing Kentucky—and America—this cannot be the end of the conversation. It must be the beginning. Signed on April 8, the “Reinvigorating America’s Beautiful Clean Coal Industry” order reclassifies coal as a “mineral,” streamlining permitting and opening federal lands for mining. “It is the policy of the United States that coal is essential to our national and economic security,” the order declares. That’s the clearest signal yet that the administration sees energy policy not as a climate crusade, but as imperative to national defense and lasting prosperity. The order aims to reverse the Obama- and Biden-era restrictions that crippled American coal, and mandates a 60-day review of federally managed reserves for potential extraction by public or private actors. American-produced energy is needed now more than ever. The order explains that coal-fired energy will be used for mainland steel production and artificial intelligence data centers, powering homeland industries. In theory, the executive order provides the conditions that could lead to a new Golden Age for America. But we’ve seen this story before. Let’s be blunt: No new coal-fired power plant has broken ground since 2014. A good policy doesn’t matter if no one acts on it. Rural America gets the headline. The Beltway moves on. Unfortunately for the Beltway, what happens to America’s coal fields has national and global implications. While coal still powers 16 percent of the grid, public investment has all but dried up. Plants have been decommissioned faster than they’ve been replaced, and federal policy has offered little support for modernization. Both Obama and Biden policies favored renewable energy at the expense of coal plants, helping renewables surpass coal in generating power for the electricity grid—but not without serious drawbacks. One of those drawbacks, as my native California continues to ignore, is the reliance of renewables on outside sources to power the grid. “Unlike nuclear and fossil-fuel plants, solar and wind do not produce constant power at a steady frequency, making the grid less stable,” the Institute of Energy Research observes.  This winter, California celebrated “100 days of 100 percent clean energy.” But like much of the climate conversation, this headline obscures the truth. Renewable output fluctuates and the U.S. Energy Information Administration shows fossil fuels still underpin most of the grid. Come summertime, rolling blackouts can’t become the status quo for the rest of the country. That’s where coal comes into the picture. Bringing coal to the forefront of American energy will take a dedicated effort from the states of Appalachia. Kentucky doesn’t just have the resources. It has the laws, the land, and the legacy to lead. If lawmakers pursue this correctly, Appalachia could power the next American century. The foundation isn’t theoretical; it’s sitting beneath our feet. Kentucky ranks fifth in the nation in estimated recoverable coal reserves, with substantial deposits in both its eastern and western coalfields. At its peak in 1990, Kentucky produced 173 million tons. Despite over two centuries of mining, the state still possesses an estimated 30 billion tons of remaining coal reserves, indicating its vast, underutilized energy potential. But the question is: How did a state go from producing 34.6 million tons of coal in 2000 to only 5.6 million tons within a matter of twenty-five years? We know the answers: Production declined as renewables and natural gas became increasingly popular in the marketplace. Additionally, environmental regulations and the disappearance of mainland manufacturing jobs ultimately led to the national decline of the coal industry. While past national policies have favored renewable energy and provided massive subsidies, Kentucky’s state legislature has taken measures to demonstrate a commitment to preserving and revitalizing the coal industry. In 2023, the legislature enacted laws requiring utilities to prove that they must maintain service before decommissioning coal-fired plants, ensuring the Commonwealth’s energy reliability and keeping the currently running plants operational.  Additionally, Senate Bill 89 was passed in March to adjust environmental regulations to streamline operations for coal facilities. Kentucky is signaling its priorities by shedding unnecessary regulations that hold back the coal industry, opening up pathways for coal-fired plants and mining in the Commonwealth and greater Appalachia. Legislative momentum is essential, but policy means nothing without the logistics to support it. That’s what makes Kentucky different. It doesn’t just have a friendly legislature, but also the infrastructure to match. The Commonwealth leads the region in completed segments of the Appalachian Development Highway System (ADHS), a decades-long project designed to integrate Appalachia into the national economy through its high-capacity roadways. That network expands further with the 2024 Coal Hauling Highway, which significantly overlaps the ADHS across eastern and central Kentucky. These routes connect the state’s coalfields to processing plants and industrial hubs both inside and beyond its borders. From the coal-rich hills of Pike County to intermodal terminals in Louisville and neighboring states, Kentucky has a functioning supply chain, ready to supply itself and its neighbors. Unfortunately, financing remains the coal industry’s most prominent bottleneck. For years, coal has been quietly redlined by financial institutions concerned with environmental scores and achieving the Paris Climate Accords’ “net zero” goal. No revival will succeed if Appalachian coal miners are treated like a liability. Fortunately, domestic banks may not truly be as anti-coal as they’ve claimed. Eight years after America signed onto the Climate Accords, recent reports show a number of U.S. banks are still investing in the coal industry. According to Transition Pathway Initiative, 85 percent of banks are open to financing new coal projects. American banking giants like JPMorgan and Bank of America have withdrawn from the Net Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA) pledge. Coal’s revival isn’t solely about investing in extraction projects, but in the broader infrastructure needed to make them possible. That’s where long-standing programs like the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) and their Partnerships for Opportunity and Workforce and Economic Revitalization (POWER) Initiative come in. These initiatives provide funding for job training, infrastructure, and the redevelopment of former mining communities. If paired with real energy production, they could offer a blueprint for rebuilding the Appalachian middle class. All can be achieved without outsourcing identity or dignity to the Beltway or the coasts. Kentucky has the legal, logistical, and institutional tools at its disposal. It just needs the will to execute and the vision to follow through.  President Trump’s executive order is a strong step toward reviving the coal industry, with Appalachia at the center of a broader national comeback. This is no longer the 1900s of poor mountain towns, victims of periphery extraction—this is Appalachia’s chance to harness its energy sector beyond 10, 20, or 50 years. The promise of energy independence isn’t just to power cities, but to give people in rural America an opportunity to stay rooted.  Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia do not want pity. We want purpose, permanence, and a place in the American dream. With Kentucky at the lead, coal can power the new digital age. The executive order is a start. Let’s make sure it’s not only a headline, but a foundation. The post Trump’s EO on Coal Can Be the Start of Something Big appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs An Iran War Would Consume Trump’s Presidency An imperfect deal is probably a better outcome than another open-ended military commitment. Credit: Borna_Mirahmadian The Trump administration is now starting its third set of meetings with Iranian diplomats over a possible nuclear deal. It tapped State Department official Michael Anton to lead the technical team of negotiators. Anton is considered brilliant and tough, and was the administration’s point man in explaining why killing Iranian general Quasem Soleimani was the right thing to do during the first Trump term. But he is not part of the longstanding Beltway hawk consensus, and as an early Trump supporter thoroughly gets why stopping the “forever wars”, or not starting new ones, should be a vital American interest.  It must be difficult for foreign observers, even professionals, to gauge the future policies of President Donald Trump. No one knows whether he will take the counsel of senators close to him like Lindsey Graham and Tom Cotton, the ever-present Beltway clique of hawkish think tankers, and, of course Bibi Netanyahu to take advantage of Iran’s “far weaker” military condition and “finish the job” against Iran’s nuclear program. That’s possible. He has recently broached, with seeming relish, the idea of bombing Iran “like they’ve never seen before.” What one can predict with far more certainty is that if Trump does choose war over an imperfect but seemingly achievable nuclear deal with Iran, the war will take over his presidency and overshadow whatever else he might do or hope to do.  There is an informed consensus that the only deal possible with Iran is one that monitors Iran’s nuclear enrichment, limits it, and assures that Iran will not have a nuclear weapon for the duration of a deal. That in broad outline resembles what Obama and John Kerry (and Russia, China, France, Britain, and Germany) negotiated with Iran in Obama’s second term. It was a lengthy and exhausting negotiation, chronicled in Trita Parsi’s detailed study Losing an Enemy. The deal meant that Iran could not develop a bomb while the deal was operative. Since Tehran has always insisted, honestly or otherwise, that it has no desire to build a bomb, the deal found the common ground between an Iranian regime, which desired the end of Western sanctions, and the rest of the world, which wanted assurance that no Iranian bomb would soon arrive. Obama and Kerry were barely able to neutralize opposition to the pact from AIPAC and Israel’s Netanyahu government. Iranian negotiators had their own constraints, representing a regime inclined to view the United States as inherently untrustworthy and always seeking to deceive and destroy Iran.  The JCPOA deal was, from an American perspective, far from ideal. Iran retained some centrifuges, some enriched uranium, and its knowledge of how to carry out uranium enrichment; in a worst-case scenario it could abrogate the deal, block international inspectors, and race to the bomb with an estimated breakout time of about a year. The deal only lasted 15 years, after which it could be scrapped, extended, or renegotiated. But there was no indication, as there is none now, that Iran could be threatened or persuaded to negotiate away its knowledge and ability to process uranium. Those who insisted then, as now, that Washington can get a “much better” deal leaving Iran with zero nuclear capacity are not realistically arguing for a better deal; they are arguing for an Israeli-American military strike to destroy Iran’s centrifuges and reactors and if possible its nuclear scientists and engineers.  No one can predict with certainty the outcome of such a war. As was remarked by the last century’s most evil dictator, the beginning of a war is like opening the door to a dark room. Thirteen years ago, when Geoffrey Kemp and John Allen Gay completed War With Iran with its granular military analysis, they couldn’t really know the outcome. But their knowledge of American and Israeli weapons systems and Iranian capabilities led to highly plausible conclusions. Israeli forces would have great difficulty taking out Iran’s nuclear capacity on their own, but could certainly damage it severely. America, with greater air power, could do better.  But then what? Iran had a large spectrum of ways to retaliate, and could do so at its leisure and in increments. A massive Hezbollah attack on Israel from Lebanon is less plausible than in 2013, because Hezbollah’s capacities have been considerably degraded by Israel’s exploding pagers. Israel could well be less vulnerable, in a military sense, than it was 13 years ago. On the other hand, Iran now has a far more robust arsenal of missiles and drones (the latter a word that hardly appears in the 2013 book) than it did then. It borders the Strait of Hormuz, through which Middle East oil exports pass, and could intermittently shut the strait down or make passage expensive and risky. Saudi Arabian and other gulf oil installations are within easy Iranian missile range. So are American bases in Iraq. One doesn’t know what would happen, but a solid bet is a sharp increase in oil prices, doing enormous damage to the world economy. If this were the consequence of a war that Trump and Israel initiated, who would be blamed? It’s not as if Trump has a huge, pent-up reservoir of international goodwill to spend down.  Assuming that the United States does not have the resources or desire to launch a land invasion of Iran to actually overthrow the regime, when would such a war end? The phrase Israel has used for nearly 20 years—“mowing the lawn”—to depict its periodic anti-terrorism attacks on Gaza since 2005 comes to mind, with the United States committed to a program of “retaliatory” air strikes against Iran for an indefinite future. But the lawn in this case would be a large landmass nearly four times the size of Iraq, containing 90 million people. And during this period it is more than likely that Iran would, in the most covert way it could, actually begin the race towards a bomb it has yet to commence. As John Allen Gay pointed out to me last week, American airstrikes might well “incentivize” the very nuclear bomb pursuit it was intended to stifle.  The critical question of course is not what analysts think most likely to happen, but what Trump will decide. He is being pushed to go for a no-deal outcome with Iran and eventual military action by Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, by senators he listens to, by hawks in his own administration. National Security Advisor Michael Waltz, with the neoconservative Jeffrey Goldberg on speed dial, is an Iran hawk. Several key members of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s staff who are not have recently been fired under very unclear circumstances. The pro-Israel widow Miriam Adelson, who was Trump’s largest donor before Elon Musk came around, surely favors whatever Netanyahu favors and has long had Trump’s ear. Trump jokes about that.  Trump himself is a friend and admirer of Israel, and with his Jewish grandchildren and New York real estate background, is quite plainly the most culturally Jewish president the United States has ever had. During his first term he shocked many by the extent to which he would break with American diplomatic practice to do Israel’s bidding—recognizing, as no other country has, Israel’s conquest of the Golan Heights and moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. It is obvious he cares not the slightest about the Palestinians, having ignored their national aspirations in his first term and more recently floating the idea that Gaza’s third-generation refugee population be removed to make way for a Trump Riviera in the Gaza strip.  But Trump’s closeness to American Jews does give him a perspective which many of Israel’s most ardent American backers lack, the knowledge that there is a wide spectrum of Jewish and Israeli opinion. It is a fair bet that Trump knows well and respects—as Lindsey Graham and Tom Cotton probably do not—dozens of American Jews who consider Netanyahu bad news and some of his more messianic ministers, like Itamar Ben-Gvir, genuinely unhinged. He may not know that key retired Israeli intelligence officials urged him to retain Obama negotiated JCPOA as the best deal under the circumstances, but he certainly understands that Israel’s official position does not have to be that of the United States.  Years ago, Trump’s newly appointed under-secretary of defense, Elbridge Colby, committed what might be called a Kinsley gaffe. Writing that however undesirable a nuclear-armed Iran would be, containment and deterrence would work effectively against it; that a nuclear Iran would not be some sort of existential disaster, for Israel or the United States. In the run-up to his confirmation, Colby backed away from this position, reverting to what is the only politically tenable position in Washington. That position is that Israel, which has a developed nuclear triad of deliverable nuclear weapons by plane, missile and submarine, should have a regional nuclear monopoly. That may be comfortable for Israel but is not necessarily an outcome the United States has the power to enforce in perpetuity.  How else does the Mideast and global situation differ from that when Trump arrived in the White House the first time? Israel is not directly threatened, as it was then by Hezbollah forces in Lebanon. Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states are exploring a kind of détente with Iran; in 2016 they were openly rooting for a U.S./Israeli attack on Tehran; by every indication, Saudi Arabia now considers that its own push for economic diversification from oil would be impeded by the eruption of a major war in its neighborhood.  Importantly, Israel is much less popular in the United States and globally than it was before the still-ongoing war in Gaza. You need not be one of the many who label Israel’s Gaza campaign “genocidal” or call for the eradication of Israel “from the river to the sea” to wish that Israel had succeeded more in destroying Hamas and less in rendering Gaza uninhabitable for Palestinian civilians. (It is hard to imagine that the United States would not have responded with comparable brutality, and fought, as it has in the past, by Second World War rules, after going through what Israel did on October 7.) Pollsters rarely drill down beyond the binary of favorable versus unfavorable, but opinions about Israel are far more negative among Democrats and all young people than ten years ago. Many opinions are mixed: There are certainly many who admire Israel’s achievements in science and technology, respect its intellectual vitality, are impressed and even envious of the readiness to sacrifice and absence of woke self-hatred among its citizenry. And yet they don’t want to see the United States putting its own armed forces and reputation on the line to satisfy the whims of Israel’s current leadership.  Trump may well be this sort of Israel admirer. The accusations of antisemitism leveled against the American campus left and a handful of rightwing influencers could well be overstated. But it is a virtual certainty that a joint Israeli-American war would raise the temperature in ways pleasing only to extremist accelerationists of all stripes.  An Israeli-American assault on Iran, an action with no clear endpoint and with the potential to spark a global recession and who knows what else, would eat up the Trump presidency as nothing else. One suspects that Trump knows this. His public comments when indicating a readiness to talk to Iran hardly matched Obama’s flowery outreach to the mullahs (“let us remember the words that were written by the poet Saadi”), but Trump’s “they’re great people, I know so many Iranians from this country” probably reflected a true sentiment. The pressures brought to bear against diplomacy by Israel’s hawkish friends in the coming months will be immense. But, if forced to bet, I would wager on Trump taking a deal that leaves Iran with no nuclear weapons and more than zero nuclear capability over a war which would define his presidency. The post An Iran War Would Consume Trump’s Presidency appeared first on The American Conservative.

The following article, Looking for a Brand To Call Its Own — The Democratic Party, was first published on Conservative Firing Line. These days, a lot of Democrats are feeling like Will Rogers, who said on the eve of the Great Depression, “I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat.” Today, the Democratic Party faces an identity crisis that is eroding its national appeal. Recent polls show that less than 30% … Continue reading Looking for a Brand To Call Its Own — The Democratic Party ...

‘...my journey of discover has led me to a dark place.’ COMMENT FROM VIEWER:- Brilliant! Sounds like you've finally had the necessary paradigm shift about no virus with Convid Neil. Congratulations! But it wasn't just SARS CoV-2 that never existed. I hope you are also learning from others (like Dr Mike Yeadon perhaps?) that not one "virus" for anything has ever been isolated, purified, characterised, or proven to cause any disease. I repeat not one ever. And neither has contagion ever been proven for anything and they tried really hard, especially last century. "Can You Catch A Cold?" by Daniel Roytas covers that aspect. Please keep learning. It is complex but not difficult with good teachers like Drs Andrew Kaufman, Tom Cowan, Stefan Lanka, Sam & Mark Bailey, Kevin Corbett, and websites like ViroLIEgy.com To help support the channel & get exclusive videos every week sign up to Neil Oliver on Patreon.com https://www.patreon.com/neiloliver Donate go to Neil’s Website: https://www.neiloliver.com Shop: https://neil-oliver.creator-spring.com YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@Neil-Oliver Rumble site – Neil Oliver Official: https://rumble.com/c/c-6293844 https://rumble.com/v6sgjgf-neil-oliver-the-greatest-crime.html?e9s=src_v1_ucp Instagram - NeilOliverLoveLetter: https://www.instagram.com/neiloliverloveletter Podcasts: Season 1: Neil Oliver's Love Letter To The British Isles Season 2: Neil Oliver's Love Letter To The World Available on all the usual providers https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/neil-olivers-love-letter-to-the-british-isles #NeilOliver #Trump #Wuhan #covid #lockdown #history #neiloliverGBNews #travel #culture #ancient #historyfact #explore

Every generation and decade has its slang. These days, young people often use slang terms and phrases, such as “slay,” “no cap,” and “bet,” which can be hard to understand if you’re older than 25. But, of course, that’s the point. If you think these kids are unintelligible, what do you think would happen if you sent them back in time to 1992 and they had to figure out what Pauly Shore was saying in Encino Man?Could a Gen Zer figure out what he meant when he said, “If you're edged 'cause I'm weazin' all your grindage, just chill"? Or would they know what Shore meant when he said, “The truth is, bro, life's about greasing the 'do back, buddy, and wheezin' on the buff-fest, man"? Probably not.To help remind everyone that people in the ‘90s had their own bizarre slang, too, a Redditor named @NoahtheAttacker asked folks on the AskReddit subforum, “What’s the most ‘90s slang/phrase?” and reading the responses is like taking a time machine back to the era of Bill Clinton, neon-colored clothing, and In Living Color.Here are 13 of the best responses, with our best attempt at explaining them to the older and younger generations.1. "Not!"For the uninitiated, this phrase was used to negate the sentence that came before. For example, President George Bush, who famously disliked broccoli, would say, "I love broccoli," then pause for two seconds, and say, "Not!" You must say "not" in a very obnoxious way. Or, in the song "Wayne's World Theme" from the Wayne's World soundtrack, Mike Myers and Dana Carvey sing, "The right to party is a battle we have fought / But we'll surrender and go Amish... Not!"Here's Borat trying to understand the intricacies of the "Not" joke. - YouTube www.youtube.com 2. "Talk to the hand"The complete line of this phrase is, "Talk to the hand because the face don't give a damn" and it was used in the '90s to aggressively turn down a request. For instance, if someone you didn't like asked you for a date, you would put your palm up in a stop position and say, "Talk to the hand," which means stop there; I'm not listening.3. "All that and a bag of chips"This phrase was used when referring to someone who excels at a specific activity, such as playing football or rapping. It's also used to refer to someone very attractive, as in the title of the 1999 film, She's All That, starring Rachel Leigh Cook. The "bag of chips" was added later to take things up a notch and make them even better, much like the addition of some Doritos on the side of your Subway sandwich.4. "Mad"Now, if you're a Gen Zer, you may think that adding the term "mad" to something means it's angry. On the contrary, to say someone is "mad hungry" means they are very hungry. If you are mad rich, then you are wealthier than Uncle Phil on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. If you have "mad skills," that means that you excel at a specific task.5. "As if""As if" is a shorter way of saying, "As if I would ever..." Here's an example: "You want me to choose those '80s Jordache jeans over these sweet Z Cavaricci pants? As if." Or, "You think that I would choose to date Tiffani Amber Thiessen over Pamela Anderson? As if." To take things up a notch, you could add a "whatever" after the "as if" to really drive the point home.6. "Word""Word" is a simple way to confirm something someone else had said. "You like that new bar-b-que burger at Carl's Jr.?" you'd ask your friend, and they would respond with "Word," meaning "yes." To make it even more emphatic, say, "Word up!" or to be super affirmative, "Word to your mother!"7. "Homey don’t play dat""Homey don't play dat" was the catchphrase of Herman Simpson, aka Homey D. Clown, a bitter and hostile convict with a never-ending community service sentence, on TV's sketch show, In Living Color. Whenever a child on the show would ask Homey to do something clownish, he would respond, "Homey Don't play dat," and then whop the kid over the head with a sock containing a tennis ball inside. Colloquially, it was used to turn down people's requests. For example, if someone asked if you could work late on your shift at Musicland, you could respond, "Homey don't play dat." - YouTube www.youtube.com 8. "Whatever""Whatever" is one of the most popular phrases of the '90s, and it perfectly encapsulates the Gen X mindset. It means, "I'm not impressed," "screw off," and "I don't care." It's a great way to blow someone off without having to provide a reason why. - YouTube www.youtube.com 9. "Tight!"This is a great term that remains relevant today, referring to something truly exceptional. If you perfectly execute or agree with what someone is saying, you say "tight." For example, if someone asked you, "Hey! You want to get a Pizazz pizza at Taco Bell?" You'd respond with, "Tight." Or another use would be, "Did you see Arrested Development on Arsenio Hall last night? They were so tight." - YouTube www.youtube.com 10. Cowabunga, dude"Cowabunga" is a 1960s surfer slang term that gained mainstream popularity in the 1990s after being popularized by Bart Simpson and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It basically means, "that's great" or "go for it!"11. "Extreme"In the 1990s, extreme sports were huge, whether that meant bungee jumping or wing suiting off the top of a mountain. Therefore, anything that was particularly intense, whether it was soda with a fierce flavor or nachos that were loaded higher than usual, was called extreme. Vanilla Ice's debut album, featuring the song "Ice Ice Baby," was called To the Extreme.12. Da bombIf something is really incredible, it's "da bomb." For example, you'd say, "Ahhh man, the new chili cheese fries at 7-11 are da bomb." Additionally, to make things more fun, you could say they were "the bomb diggity." 13. "Psych!" or "Sike!"This is similar to the "not!" joke referenced above. You call "psych" on something when you psyche someone out or fool them. For example, if your friend really liked a girl named Heather, you could say, "Heather was totally scamming on you at lunch today." Surprised you'd say, "really?" But then your buddy would pull the rug out from underneath you with a "Psych!" and everyone would laugh at you.

Gen Zers are often made fun of for baring their hearts online and not having the same emotional compartmentalization skills as their predecessors, but as these folks enter the workplace, especially in the healthcare field, those qualities might be just what’s desperately needed. Case and point: Jayuanna Thomas, a 25-year-old labor nurse who commemorates every birth she’s ever participated in with especially colored beads. So far, she has 211 beads in her baby bead jar.She currently has 117 beads blue for boys, and 90 pink for girls. The there are eight yellow for the sweet babies who were “born sleeping” and are “just as important as blues and pinks." Next she has one purple, for the one time (so far) that she delivered a baby entirely alone, simply because things happened too fast. Finally, she has two green, for the “special” deliveries that touched Nurse Jay’s heart in a unique way that she’d never forget. @jayuanna.lenee Here’s my baby jar! So thankful to be apart of so many special deliveries????? #babyjay #babybeadjar #laboranddelivery #laboranddeliverynurse #landdnurse ♬ Walking Around - Instrumental Version - Eldar Kedem It's such a simple idea, and yet it really hit a powerful nerve among viewers, especially those with their own “yellow bead babies.”“My daughter is someone’s yellow bead but she is forever my first pink bead.”“As the mom of a baby born sleeping, 41 years ago, 3 weeks overdue, it was the nurse I remember all of these years. She was a bright light in a dark time.” “My son was stillborn in 2018. The compassionate nurses really got me through it. Thank you for honoring the other stillborns. It means a lot.” I wonder if my Angel baby is a bead in someone's jar.”In an interview with Newsweek, Thomas shared that being an obstetrician-gynecologist (OBGYN) and delivering babies has been her dream since she was five years old."I never wanted to be anything else," she said. "One of my favorite parts of my job outside of being able to see life being brought into the world is sitting in my patients' rooms for HOURS getting to know them, their likes, dislikes, music preferences, what books they're reading etc."Thomas’ deep emotional connection to her work is made all the more evident by her baby bead jar, which is not only heartwarming, but pretty revolutionary when you think about it. Our current healthcare system, among its many flaws, often focuses more on clinical care than compassionate care. Imagine if every hospital room had a similar baby bead jar, commemorating every birth for the sacred event that it is, regardless of the outcome? A pair of hands holding another pair of hands. Photo credit: CanvaLuckily, Thomas, and many nurses just like her, find their own unique ways of going against the system to humanly care in truly wonderful ways. Seems like Gen Z has a thing or two to teach us after all.

When single mom Kayla Jo Singleterry (@miss.kaylajo) stepped into the nail salon with her newborn baby girl Hendricks Hutton, she was hoping to get a *peaceful* powder dip manicure to celebrate her birthday. But baby Hendricks had other plans.That's when a kind stranger sitting next to her saw she was struggling with her crying baby, and offered to hold her while she finished getting her nails done. The selfless stranger turned out to be Mackenzie Scott, former Miss Teen Arkansas. Singleterry shared an emotional video on TikTok of Scott holding and bouncing baby Hendricks. "This sweet girl noticed I was overwhelmed at the nail salon and offered to hold baby girl so I could get my nails done," she wrote in the video's caption. @miss.kaylajo **just uploaded a video to update you all ?** I hope you know what a rare gem you are @Kenzis979 Turns out she was Miss Arkansas Teen USA in 2023 ?? #babygirl #fyp #singlemom #babytok #baby Little did Scott know that her kind gesture was especially meaningful on that day in particular. "You may never know how much this means to me," she added. "What you didn't know is it was for my birthday and one of the first things I've gotten done for myself since I had her. I'm forever grateful for you! The world needs more of you!"In the comment section, viewers shared kind words for both women. "Sometimes our village is a complete stranger? I love this!!" one wrote. Another added, "This is girlhood✨?." One more shared, "If she isn’t a mom already, she’ll be an amazing mom in the future (if she chooses to be). I love seeing women’s natural motherly instinct kick in. Such a beautiful thing. ? What a blessing." @miss.kaylajo This is the village everyone talks about ✨?‍♀️ We’re beyond grateful for all the love and support from you all! Our hope is that this one act of kindness inspires others to do the same. A simple “I’m happy to help if you need a minute” can mean the world—even if they say no. Let’s make 2025 the year we love each other OUT LOUD! ❤️ The world needs more @Kenzis979 so let’s create more! ? Something tells me you’ll be seeing a lot more of us! ? #actsofkindness #babygirl #nailsalon #thevillage #fyp In an interview with PEOPLE, Singleterry shared more details about the interaction. "I had dip powder on my nails and was trying to hold Hendricks, but I was getting it all over her sweatshirt. I was literally sweating and on the verge of tears. I just wanted to go. But I already had the dip powder on my nails when Mackenzie walked over and offered to help," she said. Scott also told the publication that once she picked up baby Hendricks, she immediately stopped crying. For the next 45 minutes, she held her. "I’ve always loved children and enjoy babysitting, so getting to see the baby smile while her mom enjoyed getting her nails done made me so happy," Scott said.After her nails were done, she thanked Scott for her total act of kindness towards her. The two did not exchange contact information, but later that night Scott told PEOPLE that Singleterry had found her on social media and sent her a DM, asking for permission to share their story on TikTok. @kenziescot THANK YOU! @Kayla Jo #babygirl #fyp #thankful #babytok #baby #kindness #onesmallactofkindness #spreadlove "I'm a single mom. The reason I brought her is I don't have any other help," Singleterry added. "Her dad's not around. My mom was with me, and other than that, I have no one. I was so overwhelmed. It didn’t hit me until I was just laying there. I was like, 'Some random person just allowed me to do something I haven’t been able to do for myself since I had her.' "Since then, the two women have become friends. "I have been praying for this village," Singleterry shared. "Everybody talks about it takes a village. I stayed so strong throughout my entire pregnancy with Hendricks. She has a different dad than my older daughter. I've been praying for this village that people talk about or just to have her have some other support in her life. The other day I opened my Facebook messages and Mackenzie's mom had messaged me and said, 'We are here to be your village.' And I just broke down. Oh my God. I was just so grateful. I think I made some lifelong connections for sure."

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