'The American people see through it'

What do we have going on in Boston

His many credits included television and film

In one of the more remarkable marches of human progress, Bangladesh has reached the point of near-universal electricity access for its citizens. Coupled with the rapid electrification has been one of the greatest single declines in the poverty rate of a nation ever seen, falling from 44.2% in 1991 to 18.7% in 2022. In 1991, […] The post Over the Last 3 Decades, Nearly Everyone in Bangladesh Gained Access to Basic Electricity appeared first on Good News Network.

Movies & TV Outlander Outlander’s Unflinching Season 7 Finale “A Hundred Thousand Angels” Gets Delightfully Weird Outlander’s Faith mystery means we need season 8 yesterday. By Natalie Zutter | Published on January 21, 2025 Credit: Starz Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: Starz I’m really glad that the Outlander season seven part two finale didn’t spend overlong on Denzell performing a dangerous operation on Claire following her gunshot wound. We know she wasn’t going to die, so making it the focus of the episode would have been disingenuous. And yet, it went so smoothly that I kept watching Claire’s first night of recovery for clues that she was hallucinating a better outcome (à la Yellowjackets’ devastating season two delivery episode) or that Chekhov’s kidney would burst. But while Claire Beauchamp Randall Fraser (Grey) was protected as the series protagonist, those in her orbit were not so lucky. “A Hundred Thousand Angels” is named for a lovely reason—young Fannie describing how their late mother told her and Jane to regard the aurora borealis, and to wave at the heavens—but death cast a dark shadow over this finale, with some truly bleak moments… followed by a bonkers cliffhanger for the final season. Spoilers for Outlander Season 7, Episode 16 “A Hundred Thousand Angels,” as well as content warnings for suicide, pet death, and stillbirth/baby loss. First, I’ll get the other timeline out of the way: Brianna and the kids reunite with Roger and Buck in 1739 (thanks to the letter he leaves her through the magic of time travel and secret desk compartments), and the MacKenzies contemplate whether they want to return to 1980 or find their way back to Frasers Ridge in 1778. The answer seems clear, and I think Jamie and Claire will gladly welcome back the only one of their children they seem to have a solid relationship with. Credit: Starz But first, Brianna must have her own winking conversation with a relative who doesn’t recognize her, being out of time as she is. Roger got a brief heart-to-heart with his soldier father (displaced in 1739) and even got the dramatic catharsis of whispering “I love you” before sending him back through the stones, even if it didn’t change his father’s fate or give them more time together in Roger’s childhood. But Bree can’t risk a paradox or any confusion for Brian, which might be part of what made their exchange not quite work for me. She’s holding herself at a clear emotional distance yet offering just enough warmth beyond what a stranger would and constantly pointing out parallels between herself and her grandmother Ellen, not to mention alluding to Brian as her namesake. What the scene best achieves is setting up Brian and Ellen’s love story for the Outlander: Blood of My Blood prequel. Claire’s recovery dovetails nicely with tying up various loose ends (or at least resolving to), thanks to a revolving door of characters. She has a bizarre dream of Master Raymond, the time-traveling apothecary from Paris, visiting her bedside begging forgiveness. For what? “Someday you will know.” Hmmmm.  Credit: Starz Speaking of more immediate forgiveness, Lord John Grey stops by. He and Jamie seem to have reached a detente in which they both agree they have nothing more to discuss, which hopefully means no more blows to administer. But bygones are far from being bygones, and there’s a clear distance between them now. Claire makes sure to thank John—in front of a twitchy Jamie, who nonetheless seems like he’s starting to get it—for saving her life, to which he responds that they saved each other’s lives. There’s no hug or even a hand clasp between the men; the goodbye feels very final, which would be such an upsetting note to end that friendship on. And yet, I admire the show for sitting in that tension. It’s the least upsetting part of the finale, which picks up speed as William arrives to ask Jamie’s help in breaking Jane out of jail. Because of martial law, she won’t get a trial after confessing to killing Captain Harkness (to protect him from raping her little sister Fanny) so these two are her only hope. Except that when they get there, Jane is already gone; she’s slit her wrists with a glass bottle, rather than be hanged. In an inverse of the Claire sequence, I listened closely for a faint breath, but no—she’s gone. Credit: Starz It’s brutal, to see William confront his inability to protect both sisters as he had promised. To watch Fanny a few days later, searching wildly through the unmarked graveyard for her sister, unable to see her or properly say goodbye. To wonder if, had they succeeded in breaking Jane out in time, would he and Jamie have bonded? Instead, he tells him, “I will never call you Father.” And then Rollo! Ian waking up to his beloved protector and friend dead, having passed sometime in the night. Of course our brains want to make sense of things, to create an exchange of hope for loss so that we can better cope with the absence, so Rachel and Ian comfort themselves with the knowledge that Rollo held on until they had each other and had just learned that Rachel is expecting. So, back to Fraser’s Ridge it is for them, too, even if their family has one fewer member. Credit: Starz “A Hundred Thousand Angels” does a lovely job of reminding us of what the dead leave behind, even if it’s just one object or just a sliver of their full self. Rollo’s protection. Ellen’s portrait. Jane’s account, presumably; while she initially rejected the journalist and his judgmental questions, he seemed to convince her by the end of the opening scene that he could record her telling the story in her own words, so that Fanny would hear it from her and no one else. Faith’s locket, but also Fanny’s memory of the three of them catching dragonflies. And—a song. At the end of the episode, when they’re preparing to hit the road, Claire happens upon Fanny singing an eerie song: “I Do Like to Be Beside the Seaside,” which Claire sang to her and Jamie’s stillborn daughter Faith 34 years ago in Paris… and which won’t be written until 1907. When a shaken Claire demands to know where Fanny could have heard this song, the answer is simple but also entirely fraught: “My mother taught it to me.” Her mother, Faith. Her mother, whose resemblance in the locket made Claire do enough of a double-take. Her mother, who should have no knowledge of a song from over a century in the future. And so Claire ends Outlander season seven by telling Jamie, “I think Faith lived. I think our daughter lived.” Credit: Starz Record scratch— I absolutely love this. It’s bonkers yet also poignant, and shakes up what we know about magic beyond time travel in the world of Outlander—and, honestly, maybe even the time travel itself. If we’ve reached the point where Bree can pretend that taking the kids to visit Roger is in some ways easier than boarding a plane or train, then it’s time to inject some more mystery into the mythos. I checked the timeline, and it would track for Faith to have been born in 1744, which would have made her 34 in 1778, had she lived that long—just enough time to have two daughters under 18. So it’s not as if she would have pulled a Geillis and bopped around the timeline, and yet Master Raymond might have protected her in some other way.  Author Diana Gabaldon did a finale postmortem with Parade in which she seemed to confirm that the Master Raymond visit was more likely a hallucination (they just ran out of the budget to shoot it more obviously as such). What’s more, she said that this plotline came out of an idea she threw to the writers but has not yet worked into the books canon: “When chatting with [showrunner] Matt [Roberts] about All Things plot wise, I mentioned that if I had written a second graphic novel (I didn’t, for assorted reasons), I would have shown what actually happened after Faith’s presumed death at the Hôpital des Anges, and how/why Master Raymond resuscitated and nurtured the baby secretly, but wasn’t able to come back with her before Claire and Jamie left France. So, they liked that idea and ran with it.” That said, I want to hold space for the fact that if this is what happened, it could leave a lot of fans feeling like the rug was pulled out from beneath them. Back in season two, when Claire and Jamie lost their first child, the episode “Faith” presented the loss with such care, especially in the scene of Claire singing “Seaside” (which Gabaldon clarified was a detail from the showrunners) before saying goodbye. To retcon the past five seasons and three decades could invalidate the pain of not just the characters, but the viewers who saw their own experiences mirrored back. That’s why I’m hoping there’s more to it than just a big soapy twist. But what I most like about this cliffhanger is that Outlander the TV series has caught up to Outlander the books. There’s only one current novel to adapt, 2021’s Go Tell the Bees I Am Gone, and I’m very curious to see if the show will stick to those plotlines or branch out on their own. This Faith twist is an audacious swing for the final season, one final mystery to resolve for Jamie and Claire. France was such a traumatic chapter in their lives yet was so long ago that I had to pull up the fan wiki to refresh my memory, pivotal but also overshadowed by Culloden and their twenty-year separation. Whether the Faith mystery winds up being some big cover-up or just a bizarre coincidence caused by paradoxically intersecting timelines, it’ll lead us down the road to finally saying goodbye to these time-crossed lovers. What did you think of season seven in its entirety, as well as the final moments? Are you more excited for Outlander season eight or for Blood of My Blood?[end-mark] The post <i>Outlander’</i>s Unflinching Season 7 Finale “A Hundred Thousand Angels” Gets Delightfully Weird appeared first on Reactor.

Excerpts Fantasy Read an Excerpt From TJ Klune’s The Bones Beneath My Skin There’s nothing more human than a broken heart. By TJ Klune | Published on January 21, 2025 Comment 0 Share New Share We’re thrilled to share an excerpt from The Bones Beneath My Skin by TJ Klune, a supernatural road-trip thriller featuring an extraordinary young girl and her two unlikely protectors on the run from cultists and the government—publishing with Tor Books on February 4th. In the spring of 1995, Nate Cartwright has lost everything: his parents are dead, his only brother wants nothing to do with him, and he’s been fired from his job as a journalist in Washington, DC.With nothing left to lose, he returns to his family’s summer cabin outside the small mountain town of Roseland, Oregon, to try and find some sense of direction. The cabin should be empty. It’s not.Inside is a man named Alex. And with him is an extraordinary ten-year-old girl who calls herself Artemis Darth Vader. Artemis, who isn’t exactly as she appears.Soon it becomes clear that Nate must make a choice: let himself drown in the memories of his past, or fight for a future he never thought possible. Because the girl is special. And forces are descending upon them who want nothing more than to control her. Nate had caught his reflection in a store window not that long ago and wondered who the man staring back at him was. The man with the sharp cheekbones, slightly sunken cheeks. The man whose blue eyes looked faded and cold. The man sporting three-day-old stubble on his face that made him look dirty and tired. The man with the wrinkled shirt and purple lines under his eyes and no job because he’d fucked up big-time and done something he never thought he was capable of, and here he was, a useless degree and six years on the street beat, chasing down stories that didn’t matter while daydreaming of breaking something wide open, a scandal that would rock the city to its very core. He had Pulitzer dreams on a lower-middle-class salary that barely kept him afloat in a city that bled red, white, and blue, oozing in time with the beat of a diseased heart. It had been killing him. So yeah. His brother had called him again. He’d been spinning his wheels. He’d heard cabin and truck and thought why the fuck not. He had some savings, enough to get by for a little while. He broke his lease on his tiny apartment, packed up his shit and sent most of it to storage, and headed west. Best damn idea he’d had in a long time. He’d figure things out. He’d take a few days, clear his head, and then he’d sit down and figure things out. He always did. He was good at it when he allowed himself to be. He walked to the side of the cabin, heading toward the back where the generator sat inside a small storage shed. He fumbled with the keys, the flashlight slipping slightly, the beam pointing at his feet. The gas canister sloshed against his leg. His footsteps were soft in the grass. Buy the Book The Bones Beneath My Skin TJ Klune Buy Book The Bones Beneath My Skin TJ Klune Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget He found the key he needed for the shed, thankfully marked S in the tape that wrapped around the top. There was FD for front door, BD for the back. There was one marked BH for boathouse, the wooden structure next to the dock on the lake. They’d never had a boat and had ended up only using it for storage. He’d have to take time to clean it out later. To see what had been left behind. The shed was— He stopped. The metal of the gas canister’s handle dug into the skin of his folded fingers. The padlock hung open on the shed door. The door was open slightly. Just a sliver, really. That wasn’t— He shook his head. It was fine. His mother had forgotten to latch it all the way when she’d been here last. An honest mistake. Hopefully nothing had happened to the generator in the interim. The winter had been mild, but there had been snow. And rain. He went to the shed door, setting the canister in the grass. He reached, and just to be sure, he closed the padlock. It clicked. Locked. He slid the key into the keyhole and turned it. The padlock popped open. Honest mistake. She probably had been distracted. Maybe Joy had been calling for her and she just hadn’t slid it closed before turning back toward the cabin. Except when he opened the shed door, he was hit with a wave of warm air. As if the generator had been running. Recently. He frowned. He stepped inside the shed. Reached out and touched the generator. The metal was hot to the touch. Not a fluke. Had she left it on this whole time? But that couldn’t be right. Even if she had, it would have run out of gas months ago. Even with all the lights off in the cabin. It wouldn’t have— There was the unmistakable click of a gun being cocked. Something hard pressed against the back of his head, digging into his scalp. Excerpted from The Bones Beneath My Skin, copyright © 2025 by TJ Klune. The post Read an Excerpt From TJ Klune’s <i>The Bones Beneath My Skin</i> appeared first on Reactor.

News Opus Opus Trailer Has Ayo Edebiri Deep in the Cult of Celebrity Of course John Malkovich is hosting a cult. By Vanessa Armstrong | Published on January 21, 2025 Credit: A24 Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: A24 There’s no cult like celebrity! That’s the premise of the upcoming A24 film, Opus, which sees Ayo Edebiri playing a young music journalist who’s invited to the compound of a legendary pop star, played by John Malkovich, who has been a recluse these past thirty years. There, while ostensibly waiting to hear Malkovich’s new album, she realizes she’s surrounded by a cult! Which is full of sycophants, naturally. And the other journalists on the trip with her don’t seem to see the sinister underside of things, in part because they might be too drunk to do so. I’m sure everything will be fine. The trailer released today gives us a look at the overly ornate life on the compound, where blue lobster is on the menu and all visitors must follow the compound’s full-body shaving policy. We also get a glimpse of the place’s dark side, including a shot of one journalist covered in blood wondering what the fuck is going on. In addition to Edebiri and Malkovich, Opus stars Juliette Lewis, Murray Bartlett, Amber Midthunder, Stephanie Suganami, Young Mazino, and Tatanka Means. The movie is the debut of writer-director Mark Anthony Green, and is set to premiere at Sundance this weekend. Opus premieres in theaters on March 14, 2025. Check out the trailer below.[end-mark] The post <i>Opus</i> Trailer Has Ayo Edebiri Deep in the Cult of Celebrity appeared first on Reactor.

“The golden age of America begins right now,” President Donald Trump declared at the beginning of his inaugural address Monday. Keeping with that spirit, the new president unleashed a flurry of executive orders regarding the U.S. economy at the start of his second term. On Day One of his second term, Trump ended federal government cooperation with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development global tax deal. The deal had attempted to lock American companies into paying a minimum effective tax rate of 15% on their profits. The Trump administration pointed out that the deal “not only allows extraterritorial jurisdiction over American income, but also limits our nation’s ability to enact tax policies that serve the interests of American businesses and workers.”  In his “America First Trade Policy Order,” Trump outlined his plan for navigating the eclectic economic relationships the United States has with countries around the world. In the executive order, he directed the secretaries of treasury and commerce and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to “investigate the causes of our country’s large and persistent annual trade deficits in goods, as well as the economic and national security implications and risks resulting from such deficits, and recommend appropriate measures, such as a global supplemental tariff or other policies, to remedy such deficits.” He also instructed members of the Cabinet to examine the possibility of creating an External Revenue Service to collect tariffs and duties. As he promised in his inaugural address, the new president also declared a national energy emergency on Monday. The executive order seeks to speed up the completion of energy projects through emergency measures. The order read in part that “agencies shall identify and use all lawful emergency or other authorities available to them to facilitate the supply, refining, and transportation of energy in and through the West Coast of the United States, Northeast of the United States, and Alaska.” Trump told the assembled crowd at the Capitol for his swearing-in that the United States would “drill, baby, drill.” Trump also signed an executive order withdrawing all areas of the Outer Continental Shelf from new or renewed offshore wind leasing agreements. The order does not affect “rights under existing leases in the withdrawn areas.” The president had previously argued that offshore wind turbines were “driving the whales crazy.” The installation of some kinds of wind farms can harm whales, according to Hal Whitehead, a professor of biology at Dalhousie University. Wind turbines have also been linked to bird redistribution. Trump also ordered “a comprehensive assessment and review of federal wind leasing and permitting practices.” The 47th president signed a companion order as well to explore drilling options on the outer continental shelf, and he withdrew from the Paris Agreement on climate change. It was discussed during the first Trump administration that the Obama-era federal regulations needed to meet the climate accord would cause a total income loss of more than $20,000 for a family of four by the year 2035. The president on Monday also implemented a regulatory freeze, ordering all executive departments and agencies to not propose or issue new regulations until they are reviewed by the new presidential administration. Trump empowered the director of the Office of Management and Budget to carry out the directive. He also ordered emergency price relief for Americans wherein the administration will attempt to ease the regulatory burden on Americans, including in regard to climate policies. Republican members of Congress expressed optimism about the future of the United States that Trump is presiding over.   In a statement to The Daily Signal, Sen. Steve Daines, D-Mont., said, “President Trump is wasting no time getting to work for the American people. I look forward to seeing the Day One actions he takes to unleash American energy, support mining jobs, and bring energy prices down for American families.”  Rep. Wesley Hunt, R-Texas, emphasized in his statement to The Daily Signal that this would mean lower energy prices for the American people. “For far too long, Americans have suffered under the crushing weight of [former President Joe] Biden’s disastrous energy policies and ‘Green New Scam,’” he said. “President Trump’s bold declaration of a national energy emergency marks a turning point. No longer will we hand our energy future over to rogue nations and the climate cartel. It should be the official energy policy of the United States to put American families first, and that starts by bringing down the price of energy,” Hunt said.  Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., on Monday praised the future use of tariffs to help restore American manufacturing. “President Trump created a booming economy once, and he will do it again, starting today. For too long, unfair trade policies have put American businesses last while other countries profit. President Trump is a master negotiator. As in his first term, he will use tariffs as a tool to force other countries’ hands, as well as to bring jobs and manufacturing back to the U.S.,” Tuberville said. “He will also unleash America’s energy production and ‘drill, baby, drill.’ I look forward to working with President Trump to boost the economy and create more jobs for Americans everywhere—including in Alabama,” he said.   Tuberville’s fellow Alabama Republican senator, Katie Britt, expressed hope that the new president would implement pro-family policies. “Promises made, promises kept. President Donald Trump is hitting the ground running. [Monday], he will sign numerous executive orders to make America safer, stronger, and more prosperous. He is prioritizing hardworking Americans—from farmers and manufacturers to small businesses and entrepreneurs—while protecting our families from unfair trade practices,” Britt said. “The Trump administration is ushering in a new era, in which Americans come first again, where our national and economic security and American workers are prioritized. I’m excited to work with President Trump in instituting the pro-family, commonsense agenda the American people demanded on November 5,” Britt told The Daily Signal in a statement. Trump’s executive orders represent a stark contrast to the policies of his predecessor. “From this moment on, America’s decline is over,” Trump concluded in his inaugural remarks. The post Trump’s Executive Orders Set to Unleash US Economy appeared first on The Daily Signal.

DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—Republican strategist Scott Jennings told a CNN panel Monday that many Black Lives Matter rioters avoided punishment in 2020 after liberal commentators complained about pardons President Donald Trump issued to participants of the riot at the Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump issued a blanket pardon Monday to more than 1,500 people convicted of crimes surrounding the storming of the Capitol building during the certification of the electoral votes on Jan. 6, 2021. Jennings reminded former Obama administration officials David Axelrod and Van Jones, who claimed the Jan. 6 rioters received insufficient punishment, that many of the participants in the Capitol riot had their lives “ruined,” but many of the Black Lives Matter rioters escaped punishment. “Here is what I think. Were these people punished? Yes. Were they ruined financially? Yes. Did they spend time in jail? Yes. Have their lives been ruined? Absolutely,” Jennings said. “And one of you said earlier, Van or Ax, that you think this sends a terrible signal you can get away with things like this. As though we‘ve never had a moment in recent American history when people were not punished for rampaging around when it shouldn’t have been. It was in summer of 2020.” “I see that a little bit different than you do,” Jones said, prompting Jennings to respond, “And those people were never even charged.” The riots that followed the death of George Floyd in police custody in May 2020 killed at least 24 people and caused nearly $1 billion in property damage. “I do see it differently in that I don’t like it when people tear up buildings at all. I’m not a part of some pro-riot, pro-crime lobby,” Jones said after a back-and-forth with Jennings. “But I really don’t like when people attack police officers. I really don’t like it at all. I’m the son of a police officer. My uncle is a police officer. I don’t like it at all. If you attack a police officer, before you get any lenience, before you get any support from this society, you should apologize and they didn’t. That‘s wrong. And you yourself and others said you would have a problem if the violent ones were let go.” Then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy provided then-Fox News host Tucker Carlson, a co-founder of the Daily Caller and Daily Caller News Foundation, access to over 41,000 hours of video footage of the Capitol riot, Axios reported. Video Carlson aired showed Capitol Police officers escorting one protestor, Jacob Chansley, also known as the “QAnon shaman,” through the halls of the building. “I do think it’s important to note that these people, whatever they did, whether it was just accidentally walking in or doing something much, much worse, Elliott, you can correct me if I’m wrong, most of them, if not all of them, did get punished, served some kind of time, and my assumption is virtually all of them had their lives effectively ruined,” Jennings said after a further back-and-forth with Jones. Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation The post As CNN Panel Complains About Trump’s J6 Pardons, Scott Jennings Reminds Them of Inconvenient Truth appeared first on The Daily Signal.

DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—Left-wing groups opposing Donald Trump’s second presidency had plans to “fight back” with thousands of protesters in Washington, D.C. on Monday—but that’s not what happened. The Act Now to Stop War and End Racism Coalition and the People’s Forum, who were behind anti-Israel riots last summer in the nation’s capital, organized Inauguration Day rallies that led local law enforcement to expect around 10,000 people across the town, starting at Malcolm X Park. The Daily Caller News Foundation, however, observed a different scene: a crowd of dozens standing in the snow, a pile of unused megaphones, and complaints about the icy weather. “We are here on a day that is so cold that they decided to put the inauguration indoors,” one speaker said at a podium. “But for us, we’re saying that we will be here no matter what, no matter how cold it is!” Protesters filled roughly half of the park to decry the new president’s conservative agenda while making radical demands such as the release of Palestinian criminals in Israel, labeled “political prisoners,” and “the abolition of police, prisons, and cages.” Standing with the anti-Trump protesters was, ironically, a Trump supporter wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh and a Make America Great Again hat. “I’m here to protest Israel using America,” New York resident Hugh Casey told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “I don’t like what [Trump] does with Zionism, but I do like the rest of his movement and what he’s about,” Casey said. Pointing to his keffiyeh, Casey told the Daily Caller News Foundation, “I like to show that Republicans can be for the Palestinian people, and we don’t need to just bend tail to Israel every single time.” A masked man with a wooden guillotine managed to turn some heads. The structure had fake blood and the words “come get sum” inscribed at its base. The guillotine and signs from the Malcolm X Park gathering were later seen among protesters marching through the streets, surrounded by law enforcement. After Trump was sworn in at noon, the Daily Caller News Foundation observed a separate demonstration at Lafayette Square in front of the barricaded White House by a group of around two dozen who called themselves revolutionary communists. Protesters held signs of Trump in a Ku Klux Klan hood and called the president a “bag of feces.” The scenes stood in contrast to the riots against Trump’s first inauguration in 2017 that brought clashes with police, tear gas, fires, vandalism, and more than 200 arrests in Washington. The first Trump administration dropped dozens of protesters’ charges. No arrests of protesters were reported Monday. The communist protesters talked about forming a “massive” nationwide resistance against Trump’s “fascism.” But there were ultimately more Make America Great Again hats than Marxist symbols at the square as Trump supporters passed by, heckling, grinning, filming or ignoring the group. “No one cares!” one man shouted in a sing-song tone. Andi Shae Napier and Myles Morell contributed reporting. Originally published by The Daily Caller News Foundation. The post ‘No One Cares’: Anti-Trump Inauguration Day Protests in DC Fail to Deliver appeared first on The Daily Signal.