Israel begins Rafah offensive after rejecting Hamas ceasefire ploy

A record number of illegal immigrants from a top foreign adversary are coming across the border in never before seen numbers, according to new figures released this week.

Watching Back to Black, the new Amy Winehouse biopic, made me want to look up footage of the late British singer to be reminded of her originality and her liveliness, which no work of fiction could hope to ever fully capture. But in the search process, I ended up staring, for an inordinate amount of time, at Funko Pop dolls. Winehouse has been sold in three versions of the ubiquitous collectible figurines. Each affixes her trademark Cleopatra makeup to the same blank, black eyes that grace the Funkos of superheroes, sports mascots, and various other figures who did not sing songs about oblivion and then die of alcohol poisoning at age 27.To say that Back to Black gives Winehouse the Funko treatment on the big screen would not quite be fair; the movie renders her life with some intelligence, mercy, and painterly craft. But it certainly partakes in the tradition of turning a complex human being into a generic image, defined by superficial traits and tics, for other people to project their feelings upon. No great entertainer ever escapes this fate, but Back to Black should be an occasion to ask why cultural canonization requires such a relentless sanitizing process, and who is served by this sugarcoating.Back to Black begins with the adolescent Winehouse (played by Marisa Abela) at home with her boisterous, working-class Jewish family, singing jazz standards together. The spicy and sad songs she writes in her bedroom soon earn her international stardom—though she’s far less interested in the fame game than in her romance with Blake Fielder-Civil (Jack O’Connell), whom the film portrays as a pub-dwelling bad boy who snorts cocaine before breakfast. Her cabbie father, Mitch (Eddie Marsan); her flinty grandmother, Cynthia (Lesley Manville); and her manager Nick (Sam Buchanan) try to steer her toward stability, while paparazzi, industry pressures, and drugs tip her toward destruction. Winehouse’s real-life trajectory was chaotic, but Sam Taylor-Johnson’s filmmaking relays the emotional beats in appealingly direct ways. During Winehouse’s exciting come-up, London’s graffiti pops colorfully in the background; later, as she sinks into drugs and isolation, the city feels dead and desaturated.Abela is a remarkable actor best known for her role on the HBO and BBC banking drama Industry. That show subverts her pageant-worthy poise and winsomeness; she plays a devil disguised as an ingenue. But in Back to Black, she’s playing an ingenue disguised as one of the most caustic and willful pop stars ever. Abela nails many of Winehouse’s mannerisms, though the mouth movements she makes while singing scat vocals do look like something Kristen Wiig would do on Saturday Night Live. The bigger problem is that her version of Winehouse is unshakably sweet and hapless, a puppy dog in smeared eyeliner. Each defiant or self-destructive choice she makes therefore feels oddly under-motivated, even arbitrary.[Read: Is old music killing new music?]This is more the fault of the script than the acting. The film does not really attempt a coherent argument about what forces created such a sui generis artist, or about the ones that drove her to doom. It touches lightly upon various themes of her story—such as the U.K. tabloid industry’s savagery—without saying much about them. The one point of emphasis is Winehouse’s pivotal and intense relationship with Fielder-Civil. Their temporary breakup inspired the lyrics of her breakthrough album, Back to Black, and the best sequence of the film depicts her recording that masterpiece while stunned numb from heartbreak. But the film fails to conjure an on-screen version of Fielder-Civil with any charm, much less a perspective. The viewer is left feeling, as many onlookers at the time were, baffled by the romance.Back to Black’s cast and crew have talked proudly about not portraying anyone as a “villain,” cutting against media narratives blaming Fielder-Civil, Mitch, or anyone else for Winehouse’s struggles. The film wants to be a counterweight to the 2015 documentary Amy, which collaged material from throughout Winehouse’s life to disturbing effect. Some viewers condemned that film for using lurid paparazzi footage of Winehouse at her lowest, and Mitch has said he was portrayed unfairly. But whatever the validity of such critiques, Amy did attempt to place Winehouse’s life within a complex web of cause and effect, personal and cultural. After all, if we are going to re-create a tragedy, should we not try to understand it?Back to Black, by contrast, just makes entertainment out of a saga that was, and should be, excruciating to witness. Winehouse is reduced to a list of traits—beehive hair, jazz inflections, inexorable addiction—that can be easily reproduced in merchandise and licensing for many more years to come. What’s especially jarring is that the film romanticizes Winehouse’s distaste for stardom, careerism, and money itself (“I ain’t no Spice Girl,” she says early on). The image of the iconoclastic, pure artist remains broadly marketable; the ideals behind that image, less so.

The U.S. Treasury levied sanctions on Russian aluminum tycoon Oleg Deripaska for an alleged sanctions evasion scheme aimed at unlocking frozen shares. Deripaska dismissed the sanctions.

Democrats admitted they were confused by the Biden administration's Israel policy after it proceeded with a weapons package after pausing a previous sale over Rafah.

Republican Rep. Jim Jordan sent a letter to New York Attorney General Letitia James demanding documents related to NY v. Trump prosecutor Matthew Colangelo.

Looking for something fun to do with kids in the D.C. area this weekend? Here are our top picks.

Glenn Kirschner described Trump's lawyer as making a "historic stumble" during Michael Cohen's cross-examination.

The Webb Space Telescope has made a new discovery, detecting the earliest known merger of black holes. One of the black holes is 50 million times more massive than the sun.

Tacos El Califa de León in Mexico City became the first ever taco stand to be awarded a Michelin star. The chef attributes his success to a simple recipe and high-quality ingredients.

Dmitry Medvedev issued a warning to other European leaders after Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico was shot on Wednesday.

Over 1,000 Taylor Swift fans flocked to a historic church in Germany last weekend for a Swift-themed worship service featuring her music.

Trump has allegedly been passing on media statements to his political supporters

The German Society for Nature Photography (GDT) just announced the winning images in its annual members-only photo competition, selected from more than 8,000 entries in seven categories, including Birds, Mammals, Other Animals, Plants & Fungi, Landscapes, and Nature’s Studio. Contest organizers were kind enough to share some of the winning and honored photographs with us below.To receive an email notification every time new photo stories are published, sign up here.

Coulter slammed Daniels' testimony during Donald Trump's hush money trial.

Her recent choices have given me pause.

The Mirage Hotel and Casino is closing on the Las Vegas Strip after it was acquired by Hard Rock in 2022.

"He was still half asleep and wasn't sure what he was seeing..." one social media user commented.

In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the funding mechanism that feeds the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is constitutional.

Elin Hughes-Jones' relief at her children making it out of the toddler phase has resonated with thousands.

"He's dead and he's healthy." Opossum is the life of the party on line for how often he plays dead. CNN's Jeanne Moos reports.

The Independent candidate is currently falling short of criteria set by CNN to appear on stage in June's televised debate.

His owner told Newsweek: "I think he liked being the center of attention."

Justice Clarence Thomas takes an unexpected face turn in CFPB v. Community Financial Services Association. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Two justices dissent. The Supreme Court delivered a firm and unambiguous rebuke to some of America’s most reckless judges on Thursday, ruling those judges were wrong to declare an entire federal agency unconstitutional in a decision that threatened to trigger a second Great Depression. In a sensible world, no judge would have taken the plaintiffs arguments in CFPB v. Community Financial Services Association seriously. Briefly, they claimed that the Constitution limits Congress’s ability to enact “perpetual funding,” meaning that the legislation funding a particular federal program does not sunset after a certain period of time. The implications of this entirely made-up theory of the Constitution are breathtaking. As Justice Elena Kagan points out in a concurring opinion in the CFPB case, “spending that does not require periodic appropriations (whether annual or longer) accounted for nearly two-thirds of the federal budget” — and that includes popular programs like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Nevertheless, a panel of three Trump judges on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit — a court dominated by reactionaries who often hand down decisions that offend even the current, very conservative Supreme Court — bought the CFPB plaintiffs’ novel theory and used it to declare the entire Consumer Financial Protection Bureau unconstitutional. In fairness, the Fifth Circuit’s decision would not have invalidated Social Security or Medicare, but that’s because the Fifth Circuit made up some novel limits to contain its unprecedented interpretation of the Constitution. And the Fifth Circuit’s attack on the CFPB still would have had catastrophic consequences for the global economy had it actually been affirmed by the justices. That’s because the CFPB doesn’t just regulate the banking industry. It also instructs banks on how they can comply with federal lending laws without risking legal sanction — establishing “safe harbor” practices that allow banks to avoid liability so long as they comply with them. As a brief filed by the banking industry explains, without these safe harbors, the industry would not know how to lawfully issue loans — and if banks don’t know how to issue loans, the mortgage market could dry up overnight. Moreover, because home building, home sales, and other industries that depend on the mortgage market make up about 17 percent of the US economy, a decision invalidating the CFPB could trigger economic devastation unheard of since the Great Depression. Thankfully, that won’t happen. Seven justices joined a majority opinion in CFPB which rejects the Fifth Circuit’s attack on the United States economy, and restates the longstanding rule governing congressional appropriations. Congress may enact any law funding a federal institution or program, so long as that law “authorizes expenditures from a specified source of public money for designated purposes.” The law funding the CFPB clears this very low bar and is therefore constitutional. Notably, the Supreme Court’s CFPB decision was authored by Justice Clarence Thomas, who is ordinarily the Court’s most conservative member. The fact that even Thomas delivered such an unambiguous rebuke to the Fifth Circuit is a sign of just how far the lower court went off the rails in its decision. Two justices did dissent: Justice Samuel Alito, the Court’s most reliable GOP partisan, and Justice Neil Gorsuch, who also dissented in a similar case that could have triggered an economic depression if Gorsuch’s view had prevailed. Alito’s dissenting opinion is difficult to parse, but it largely argues that the CFPB is unconstitutional because Congress used an unusual mechanism to fund it. Among other things, the CFPB’s funds first pass through a different federal agency, the Federal Reserve, before it lands in the CFPB’s banking account. But, as seven justices correctly conclude, the fact that CFPB’s funding mechanism is unusual does not make it unconstitutional, and judges are not supposed to simply make up new constitutional restrictions on Congress because they think that Congress acted in a way that is novel or unwise.

Relationships aren’t official until they’re Instagram official, and Dean McDermott just solidified his relationship with girlfriend Lily Calo. He shared a few photos from the couples date night at the Magic Castle where they can be seen posing together on the red carpet. Lily also made Dean an official part of her instagram page. Watch...

Angel Queener adopted her goose, Blue, about 14 months ago -- and now wants to make him an official support animal to keep him against local town rules.

“If I didn’t make it, I wanted my son, when he got older, to know that I fought to be here, that I tried my best,” the actress revealed in a heartwarming new interview.

An autopsy of a Massachusetts teen who died after participating in a spicy tortilla chip challenge says he died from ingesting a large quantity of chile pepper extract

Two voice actors say an A.I. company created clones of their voices without their permission. Now they’re suing. The company denies it did anything wrong.

Photo Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast/GettyIn late October, a mysterious nonprofit registered with the state of Delaware. Within months, it was funneling millions of dollars to conservative causes.Last week, the Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission alleging that the new group, Ardleigh Impact Corporation, bears the marks of a shell entity specifically created to pump big donors’ money into politics while masking their identities.The alleged setup, known as a “straw donor” scheme, would violate federal law, the complaint states.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Kyle Richards isn’t going anywhere. The “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” star confirmed that she is “back filming” and will appear on Season 14 of the Bravo show during an Amazon Live. Watch the full video to see what she had to say about why she considered not going back amid her tough last year....

The sharp surge in the shares began after a series of posts from Keith Gill's X account "Roaring Kitty," whose bullish posts on GameStop was a reason for the 2021 meme stocks frenzy.

Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker has been under fire for delivering a sexist, anti-LGBTQIA+ commencement speech, which has resulted in reactions from the NFL and various celebrities. Harrison took the stage at Benedictine College and railed against working women, Pride Month, abortion and other topics during his 20-minute address. The National Football League has...

Harrison Butker of the Kansas City Chiefs urged female graduates to embrace the title of "homemaker" in a controversial commencement speech. The NFL says he was speaking "in his personal capacity."

The former two-term Republican governor, who vetoed legislation in Maryland to expand abortion access, called himself “pro-choice” in an interview and said he would back a federal law to ensure access to the procedure.

Oakley the dog sat calmly as his owner's boyfriend did the nightly task of grating cheese on top of the pet's dinner.

It's going to be several more years until the school is transformed, but Sarah Collis says it looks "10 times better" already.

The U.S. military has finished installing a floating pier for the Gaza Strip as the Israel-Hamas war rages on.

Kevin Morris, Hunter Biden's sugar brother and Hollywood lawyer, will allegedly quit financing Hunter's legal defense, Morris confirmed. The post Kevin Morris Allegedly Retires as Hunter Biden’s Sugar Brother appeared first on Breitbart.

Biden’s bits of babble pale beside his predecessor’s dark, deranged fantasies.

The United Nations Security Council will meet informally Thursday to discuss the issue of Israeli hostages being held in Gaza by Hamas and ways to get them released.

"When we got there we watched some Bedouin TV and started making dinner."

MSNBC host Jen Psaki said the debates between President Biden and former President Trump may not go forward as planned, despite enthusiasm from both candidates.

The European Commission is probing whether Meta is in violation of the Digital Services Act – a sweeping law that took effect last year and requires Big Tech firms to police content on their platforms.

Intended to kick-start a new trilogy of films, 'The Strangers - Chapter 1,' starring Madelaine Petsch and Froy Gutierrez, is a weak retread of the 2008 original.

The cat's owners said that, while the police call proved to be something of a false alarm, "Sunny enjoyed the drama."

John Armour / LionsgateBryan Bertino’s 2008 The Strangers is one of the millennium’s finest horror films, and a large part of its success stems from the fact that it doesn’t cheat by making its main characters morons. Faced with a home-intrusion nightmare carried out by three silent fiends, two wearing old-timey masks and the other boasting a burlap bag over his head, its protagonists (Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman) routinely assess their situation logically and react accordingly, thereby eliciting urgent, nail-biting engagement with their plight. It’s a small-scale masterclass in orchestrating suspense through diligent plotting and staging, not to mention memorable imagery, highlighted by the repeated sight of its villains materializing in the background, their motionless muteness casting them as inexplicable and unnerving harbingers of doom.The same, alas, cannot be said about the sequel to Bertino’s gem, 2018’s clumsier The Strangers: Prey at Night, and that goes, double, triple, quadruple for The Strangers: Chapter 1, which hits theaters May 17. The first entry in a planned trilogy whose subsequent installments will be released in the coming year, Renny Harlin’s thriller is a de facto remix of the franchise’s first outing, the primary difference being that whereas Bertino’s original was sleek, sinister, and deft, this do-over is noisy, dull, and dumb as a bag of rocks. Managing to do a disservice to virtually every plot element that it borrows, it’s proof positive that horror-cinema components are far less important than the artists tasked with piecing them together.The Strangers: Chapter 1 wastes no time establishing its reliance on inanity to conjure up scares. In a forest, a businessman flees unknown assailants, and despite having an enormous head start on his pursuers (after all, they’re nowhere in sight), he carelessly trips, falls and calamitously injures himself. Another male character will later exhibit similar clichéd inelegance and suffer an ankle injury that hinders his ability to fight back—one of many examples of Alan R. Cohen and Alan Freedland’s screenplay taking the easy way out to make its characters vulnerable. Read more at The Daily Beast.

These ladies are getting down and dirty for love.

"I would take you home for Thanksgiving if it was tomorrow," Wilson tells Miller.