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Permanent jewelry business pops-up in Elgin
ELGIN — Permanent jewelry has found a footing in Northeastern Oregon. Shawna Vaughn, with assistance from her mother, Joeli Hansen, opened Løven Permanent Jewelry in April in Elgin. The mobile […]
'De Zerbi is in an impossible position'
Tottenham's Roberto de Zerbi as well as Xabi Alonso of Chelsea are in an "impossible position" this season, believes The Observer's Rory Smith. The managers took charge of their clubs in the spring and oversaw a lot of activity in the transfer window, with Chelsea and Spurs ending the summer as the second and third highest spenders respectively. Smith says the changes to their squads is why De Zerbi and Alonso need time to build coherence in their sides.
NC seats join Democrats’ battleground list + Candidate gets unlikely endorsement
Democrats target more races for the NC Senate.
Pasco university launches Florida’s first 93-credit bachelor's degree
The three-year business analytics program aims to cut the time and cost of earning a degree by nearly 25%.
Lunch Break Lecture: Keith Hebert to discuss the history of sports entertainment
BY ANN CIPPERLYFOR THE OBSERVER OPELIKA— Keith Hebert, the Draughon Professor of Southern History at Auburn University, will speak at the Lunch Break Lecture Series at noon on Sept. 30 at the Museum of East Alabama.He has published several award-winning books on the history of the Civil War, including “Cornerstone of the Confederacy,” which won […]
Sarasota CPA firm plans leadership transition
The longtime managing shareholder of Kerkering, Barberio & Co. will retire at the end of 2026.
Sarasota CPA firm plans leadership transition
The longtime managing shareholder of Kerkering, Barberio & Co. will retire at the end of 2026.
Summer spending put Alonso in 'impossible position'
Chelsea's Xabi Alonso as well as Roberto de Zerbi of Tottenham are in an "impossible position" this season, believes The Observer's Rory Smith. The managers took charge of their clubs in the spring and oversaw a lot of activity in the transfer window, with Chelsea and Spurs ending the summer as the second and third-highest spenders respectively. Smith says the changes to their squads is why Alonso and De Zerbi need time to build coherence in their sides.
When a powerful NC Democrat pleaded guilty to tax evasion
In this look at N&O archives: a powerful politician pled guilty to tax evasion in 1996, and tobacco market prices good in 1926.
Jiang Feng: The Unravelling of German & European Politics
A state election in eastern Germany has become a revealing test of the changing political landscapes of Germany and Europe, writes Jiang Feng, Professor and Chairman of the Council of the Shanghai Academy of Global Governance and Area Studies (SAGGAS) at Shanghai International Studies University. His analysis follows the decisive victory of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) (which has been classified as right-wing extremist by German authorities)in the state of Saxony-Anhalt on 6 September, in which it finished far ahead of its mainstream rivals. Jiang previously served as Minister-Counsellor at the Chinese Embassy in Berlin. The following article was published on 8 September 2026 on huanqiu.com, the online platform of the Global Times. On 6 September, the results of the state election in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany, were announced. The Alternative for Germany (AfD), classified as far-right by German authorities, made history by becoming the largest party in the state parliament, winning 43.8 per cent of the vote — twice its share in the previous election. The Christian Democratic Union (CDU), which had governed the state continuously for 24 years, won just 17.2 per cent, its worst result ever in Saxony-Anhalt. On the night the results were announced, the atmosphere at the CDU gathering was unusually calm. There was neither shock nor argument, as if the defeat had long been expected. Several veteran party members who had spent years working in the state government said: “Defeat is not a bad thing. It is time to make changes.” This state election has not only upended Saxony-Anhalt’s political landscape, but also laid bare the deep tensions between Germany’s traditional party structure and model of governance, on the one hand, and an increasingly polarised society on the other. Its repercussions are already being felt at the federal level, making Saxony-Anhalt a useful case study of the broader trend towards political polarisation and realignment in Europe. Governing Difficulties after Electoral Victory The most immediate consequence of the election is a historic setback for the mainstream party order that took shape in post-war Germany. In Saxony-Anhalt, the AfD has leapt from a peripheral party to the largest political force in the state. Its electoral base has expanded beyond the traditional category of “marginal protest voters” to take on the characteristics of a cross-class coalition. The party has not only consolidated its support in rural areas, but also attracted many middle-class voters and even members of the social elite with stable jobs, their own homes, and substantial incomes. It has thus evolved from a “protest party” into one with the potential to govern. Despite its commanding lead in the vote, however, the AfD faces an institutional obstacle to governing the state: the mainstream parties’ long-standing “firewall” against it. Neither of the two potential routes to forming a government appears likely to break the current political deadlock. The first would be a coalition of establishment parties, led by the CDU and bringing together the Social Democratic Party (SPD), the Greens, the Left Party (Die Linke) and the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) in a cross-camp government. In terms of parliamentary arithmetic, such a coalition could prevent the AfD from forming a government and preserve the outward stability of the traditional political order. Yet these parties are fundamentally divided over key issues including immigration, the energy transition, economic management, and cultural and education policy. Coalition negotiations would therefore be extremely difficult, and even if a government could be formed, it would most likely prove short-lived. More importantly, an alliance of establishment parties aimed at keeping the largest party out of government would play directly into the AfD’s narrative that “political elites are suppressing public opinion”. It could deepen perceptions of political unfairness, further strengthening the AfD’s political capital, and creating a dynamic in which “the more it is suppressed, the more people vote for it”. Ulrich Siegmund, the AfD’s candidate for state premier, has said that if efforts to form a government fail because other parties refuse to cooperate, the AfD will push for a fresh election, which he believes could deliver the party an absolute majority of seats. This points to more intense political battles ahead. The second option would be a coalition between the AfD and the BSW. Together, the two parties would command a simple majority in parliament, making this, on paper, the quickest route to forming a government. The BSW is the only elected party that has not ruled out cooperation with the AfD, and the two parties share some common ground, including on policy towards Russia. There is therefore a degree of political basis for cooperation. Were such a coalition to materialise, Germany would see its first state government jointly formed by a party defined as far-right and one with a far-left background, creating what might be called a “bipolar anti-establishment alliance”. Such an outcome would fundamentally break with the ideological boundaries of post-war German party politics. It is worth noting that even if the AfD ultimately fails to enter the state government, its roughly 47 per cent share of parliamentary seats would give it a powerful blocking minority. Without its consent, major decisions requiring a two-thirds majority — including constitutional amendments, significant budgetary adjustments, and state-level institutional reforms — would be extremely difficult to pass. Therefore, whoever ultimately forms the government, the AfD will be an unavoidable force in Saxony-Anhalt politics, with a direct influence on the state’s legislative process. Systemic Failures in Germany’s Governance Model The Saxony-Anhalt election result reflects a systemic failure of Germany’s post-war mainstream-party model of governance to adapt to rapidly changing socioeconomic conditions. It stems from multiple, mutually reinforcing structural tensions and highlights the existing political system’s difficulty in adapting to “an increasingly polarised society First, collective anxiety has replaced individual material hardship as a central driver of political mobilisation. The rise of the AfD can no longer be explained simply by poverty or social marginalisation. Its increasingly cross-class electoral base suggests that what is driving voters towards the party is, above all, concern about the broader direction of society. This anxiety about the future of the political community goes beyond individual gains and losses. In political discourse, economic anxiety has become closely intertwined with immigration, while immigration and refugee issues are, in essence, questions of social fairness. This perception turns conflicts over the distribution of social resources into negative assessments of governing parties, providing a broad social basis for far-right political narratives. Second, regional disparities and East German identity have undermined the strategy of addressing eastern Germany’s structural challenges at the regional level. More than three decades after German reunification, eastern states such as Saxony-Anhalt have experienced periods of economic growth, but their underlying economic structures remain weak, and household incomes and wealth remain significantly below those in western Germany. At the same time, they continue to face population outflow, an ageing population, labour shortages, and other structural challenges. At a deeper level, historical experiences — including the collapse of the former East German economic system, mass unemployment during the transition, and the westward shift of decision-making power over major issues — have left some residents with a sense of being “second-class citizens” and of being excluded. For years, the German government treated the “syndrome” of reunification as a regional problem to be gradually addressed at the local level. That approach is becoming increasingly unsustainable, as regional development disparities emerge as a core structural factor shaping national politics. Third, the erosion of institutional trust is perhaps the most decisive factor. AfD supporters tend to distrust establishment institutions, including parliament, government, and the mainstream media. Their concerns about economic security, pensions, and social fairness are significantly greater than the social average. Increasingly, their support for the AfD reflects not an expectation that the existing system can be improved, but a search for an alternative to the current political order. Such a systemic deficit of trust will be extremely difficult for the traditional parties to repair in the short term. Fourth, a generational shift in political mobilisation has amplified political polarisation. Unlike traditional parties, which rely heavily on offline rallies and mainstream media coverage, the AfD has developed a social-media mobilisation strategy built around “raising an issue — identifying who is responsible — offering a simplified solution — building a shared identity”. It turns complex social tensions into concise political narratives, rapidly channelling public sentiment into political support. The contrast on the eve of the election was particularly telling. The establishment parties, together with trade unions and churches, organised an offline march attended by more than 10,000 people, but its reach was largely confined to those present and to traditional media coverage. The AfD held a much smaller indoor event, yet livestreaming on TikTok, YouTube, and other platforms, combined with the involvement of online influencers, gave it a reach and mobilising capacity far beyond that of the march. The contrast illustrates how the traditional parties’ methods of political mobilisation are increasingly struggling to keep pace with a political environment transformed by changes in media technology. A Microcosm of Structural Political Change in Europe The shockwaves from the Saxony-Anhalt election quickly travelled beyond the state to the federal level. Calls for political accountability followed immediately after the results were announced. The governing CDU and SPD are now under enormous pressure, while Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Vice Chancellor Lars Klingbeil face an unprecedented test. Political polarisation in Germany is no longer simply a regional phenomenon. The post-war model of multiparty government by establishment parties is breaking down and being reshaped. Viewed in a broader European context, the Saxony-Anhalt election is part of a continent-wide wave of party polarisation, mainstream-party decline, and rising right-wing forces. Far from an isolated phenomenon, it is a microcosm of the structural political changes unfolding across Europe. Weak economic growth, cultural tensions over immigration, and declining trust in institutions are fuelling the rise of right-wing forces in several countries, challenging the liberal internationalist order established in post-war Europe. As a core member state of the European Union, Germany’s ability to adapt its political system and the direction of its politics will have profound implications for both European integration and the evolution of the international order. Subscribe [ Pekingnology China’s Germany watchers take stock of Berlin’s uneasy turn On 7 December 2025, nearly 50 Chinese scholars and policy researchers gathered in Beijing for the 2025年德国形势年终研讨会 “2025 Year-End Seminar on the Situation in Germany… Read more 9 months ago · 31 likes · 1 comment · YIRUI LI and Yuxuan JIA ](https://www.pekingnology.com/p/chinas-germany-watchers-take-stock?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web&embedding_publication_id=1151841) [ Jiang Feng on Germany's 2025 and beyond: no easy exit ](https://www.eastisread.com/p/jiang-feng-on-germanys-2025-and-beyond) Yirui LI and Yuxuan JIA · Jan 24 The following is an op-ed by Jiang Feng, published on 29 December 2025 at Shanghai Observer 上观新闻, the digital platform of Jiefang Daily, the official newspaper of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC). [ Read full story ](https://www.eastisread.com/p/jiang-feng-on-germanys-2025-and-beyond)
Chicago Blackhawks Coach Makes his Stance Clear on Analytics
One of the great debates when looking at the modern NHL game has been how much to rely on analytics when it comes to assessing on-ice play. While analytics can provide more usual information that may be missed by the casual observer, there are often flaws with how these models function. Sometimes, the old school […] The post Chicago Blackhawks Coach Makes his Stance Clear on Analytics appeared first on HEAVY.
The Fed Moved. The Borrowing Math Changed for Businesses.
Citizens’ Mark Valentino and Eric Merlis unpack the business implications of the Federal Reserve’s latest rate hike, examining what the new borrowing environment means for investment and financial …
$3M hotel renovation complete in Lakewood Ranch
Hyatt Place underwent a multimillion-dollar update.
Letters to the Editor: Deer season brings ticks, and November brings politics
The following are Letters to the Editor published in the print edition of the Star-Observer this past week.
Women’s Brain Health Is Philanthropy’s Next Big Bet
Maria Shriver, founder of the Women’s Alzheimer’s Movement, makes the case for treating women’s brain health as a philanthropic investment priority. Shriver argues that targeted investment in women…
Will Anwar’s coalition in Malaysia implode amid Loke exit, Najib house arrest?
Observers say the numbers in cabinet remain in Anwar’s favour for now, but warn that a DAP walkout could embolden rival Umno.
45th annual Health Fair and Expo brings free screenings to Mountain Home on Oct. 7
Twin Lakes area residents can get free health screenings, lab test vouchers and time with local providers on Wednesday, Oct. 7, when the Health Fair and Expo returns for its 45th year. Baxter Health and KTLO, Classic Hits and The Boot present the fair, which runs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the gymnasium
Duke football report card: Grading Blue Devils after Stanford victory
How did Duke football perform against Stanford? We hand out grades for the Blue Devils in their beatdown win over the Cardinal.
What is Dave Doeren’s buyout as NC State football coach
Following N.C. State football's stunning loss at Vanderbilt, here's contract info on coach Dave Doeren, including his buyout.
Russian election observer loses consciousness during arrest by police, opposition party says
The three-day election, which began Friday and ends Sunday, features virtually no opposition and is all but certain to secure the Kremlin’s political dominance.
100 years ago, NC rate dispute was over cost of a telegraph
In this look at The N&O’s archives, a dispute over telegraph prices, and the Raleigh police union wants to oust the chief.
Live updates, scores from Week 5 of high school football
High school football season in NC rolls into the final week of nonconference play with a full slate of matchups. Follow here for scores, highlights.
The Politics of Religion
Good afternoon. We're some 45 days away from the 2026 midterms. Most media observers - recalling with well-earned humility how they felt after the "red wave" of 2022 turned into a mild reddish ripple ...
Candidates Balkcom and Buckhout campaign with Trump in moment on national stage
Plus, polls show widespread support for the constitutional amendments on the ballot.
Sitrin Health Care Center cuts ribbon on 75 years serving the Mohawk Valley
Sitrin Health Care Center celebrated 75 years with ribbon-cutting ceremony Sept. 9 sponsored by Greater Utica Chamber of Commerce.
Sponsored: From Belfast to Lakewood Ranch
Darren Shore turned a passion for the bar business into a growing restaurant career built on hard work, resilience and relationships.
See where Durham’s red wolf pups and parents are heading in conservation swap
The Museum of Life and Science says they will get a new breeding pair in the exchange for seven.
CASCADES: A Journey Along Greenland’s Coast Where Ocean Meets Ice
CASCADES is an international, multidisciplinary expedition bringing together glaciologists, marine-mammal observers, microbiologists, geologists, and biogeochemists.
Whatley campaign event featured sex offender + Ruling allows weaker NC governor
A panel of the Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 against Stein.
What Does the Science of Climate Change Really Look Like?
Editor’s Note: This is the second in a three-part series on how the Right should think about environmental and climate policy. Read Chris Barnard on Reclaiming Environmental Policy from the Left. More than a decade ago, the world’s governments negotiated and signed the Paris Climate Agreement, committing to hold global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius. In the following years, climate had immense cultural power. Greta Thunberg emerged. Fortune 500 companies established net-zero plans. The U.S. got the Inflation Reduction Act. Then the pendulum swung back. President Donald Trump returned to the Oval Office, speaking of green energy as a “scam” and carbon footprints as a “hoax” and on all matters of international policy emphasizing bilateral engagement and power over globalism and cooperation. The technology companies that had been at the forefront of net-zero pledges and green leadership discovered the importance of all-of-the-above power to their visions for artificial intelligence and began quietly postponing or removing their targets. On the left side of the political spectrum, rising concerns about inflation and cost pushed climate lower down in the stated priorities of voters and stump speeches of politicians. The moment is ripe for a reset on the politics of climate change and for conservatives especially to chart a course that acknowledges and addresses the real challenges in plausible ways. So what should we think about climate change as we enter a post-peak climate era? If it is neither an apocalypse nor a hoax, what will hold up as a durable view of climate change? And how does it project onto the concerns and priorities of the right-of-center’s emerging coalition? New to Commonplace_? Subscribe below to get the magazine in your inbox._ Subscribe A Solid Foundation As the politics and economics of climate careened over the past ten years, the physics carried on regardless. In 2015, the year the Paris Climate Agreement was adopted, the world emitted 41.2 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide. By 2025, emissions had risen only 2.4%, to 42.2 gigatonnes, because falling emissions from land use offset increasing emissions from fossil fuels. But slow growth in annual emissions is not rapid decline, let alone net-zero, so carbon dioxide kept accumulating in the atmosphere, going from 399 to 426 parts per million. Global temperature kept rising too, from about 1.1 degrees Celsius above the 1850–1900 average in 2015, to 1.4 degrees above it in 2025. None of this should surprise anyone. Even most prominent skeptics, like the authors of the 2025 report commissioned by the Trump administration’s Department of Energy, accept the basic physics. Carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere at industrial volumes accumulates and traps heat that would otherwise escape to space. That heat warms the upper ocean and increases temperatures at the surface. Increased ocean heat and melting of land ice cause sea levels to rise. Changes in the climate become noticeable to us as subtle shifts in temperature and precipitation, seasons arriving early or late, changes in the surrounding ecosystem, and weather extremes. The much more meaningful debate is not about whether these things are happening, but about what it all means for human societies. (While it is a proxy measure of overall risk, no one experiences global surface temperature.) This debate invokes at least three interesting questions: how much today’s warming is showing up in regional climate trends, how much more warming we should anticipate, and how extreme weather events can be understood in the context of climate change. Recent scientific advances give us new insights into each of these, but there is still much to learn. This is the context in which the next generation of conservative leaders will be the first to deal with significant climate change as a fact, not a forecast. It will be with them for their entire careers. Our evolving scientific picture of climate change will come from weather and climate records stretching further into the past, new kinds of observations in the present, better modeling tools for the future, and simply more time to observe the emergence of climate signals and their tangible effects on ecosystems and communities in the United States and around the world. The policy landscape will be shaped by not only the impacts of changes in the climate, but also by the ways in which societies respond and by the emergence of new technologies for both altering the trajectory of emissions and adapting to new climate realities. Global climate records now show the fingerprints of warming in different phenomena around much of the world. The IPCC, in its most recent assessment report, documents warming trends over all land regions, even as natural variability adds substantial variance to local trends. And the highest temperature extremes have become more intense and frequent, almost everywhere, since the 1950s. Scientists are highly confident that these changes are attributable to human influence. But confidence in detecting trends and attributing them to human influence degrades across heavy precipitation events; drought trends are heterogeneous and not attributable to human activity with great confidence. For hurricanes, tornadoes, and other severe storms there is even less confidence in trends or their relationship to climate change. In general, a fair summary of the evidence is that for well-observed phenomena, like surface temperature or heavy rainfall, with a clear relationship to warming, our multidecadal observations are consistent with human influence overcoming natural variability over long time periods and extremes increasing. For regions that are sampled more sparsely, or phenomena with a higher noise-to-signal ratio, we will need to observe them longer to understand the magnitude of the climate signal or improve dynamical understanding using models and observations together. But for Climate For those who can’t wait, we also have new techniques that attempt to understand the role climate change has in influencing particular extreme events. When the climate is changing and disaster strikes, it is natural to ask whether that disaster was somehow “caused” by climate change. For scientists and policymakers acting in good faith, answering that question helps develop a more accurate picture of the problem, how it may be getting worse, and what preparations we should be making to respond to it. It may, at some point, give some weight to how liability is assigned by courts or adaptation funding is distributed by society. But how we ask this question is extremely important. It is easy to get the analysis wrong by discounting the role that meteorology plays. As meteorologist Theodore Shepherd explained in a clear 2016 review of climate attribution methods, “if a weather or climate event is truly extreme in the present climate, then perforce it requires unusual meteorological conditions, which means that climate change is at most a contributing factor.” Share Scientists have two ways to probe climate as a contributing factor, both of which have entered media coverage of extreme weather events. One asks a probabilistic question: How much more likely is a particular event (e.g., a temperature record over a particular area) amid global warming? The answer involves using historical records and computer simulations to estimate the likelihood of such an event in both a changed and a preindustrial climate. The findings are less about the specific event, and more about events of that nature. The other question is: How has the changed climate affected the specific event in question? Here, scientists try to understand what a similar event would have looked like in the preindustrial climate. This is sometimes called the storyline approach, where the story is the specific meteorological details of the event. These methods offer ways to test the intuition of scientists about real weather extremes. In late June and early July of 2021, a persistent high-pressure ridge, or heat dome, set up over the Pacific Northwest and an extraordinary heat wave affected the area from Oregon to British Columbia. For six days, it shattered temperature records across the region and hundreds died from heat-related causes, in an area where such high, and persistently high, temperatures were well outside of experience and many live without air conditioning. Scientists have studied its connection to climate change using multiple approaches. This specific event was created by a rare combination of meteorological factors, a strong high-pressure ridge created the conditions for extreme heat, which occurred on top of higher average temperatures in the region from global warming. Probabilistic analyses showed that climate change increased the likelihood of such an event by at least 8-fold to more than 100-fold. One standout example found that such an event had effectively zero probability of occurring in the preindustrial climate. The enormous range in these assessments reflects how hard it is to estimate probabilities of events at the tail of the historical record. Estimates of the effect on the temperature of the event are more clustered. A recent review paper documents how multiple methodologies have found a positive influence, roughly 1-2 degrees Celsius of an anomaly that exceeded 15 degrees, of climate change on the temperature magnitude of the event. Multiple studies have investigated and found some positive influence of climate change in other extreme events. Attribution studies found climate likely increased the heavy rainfall that accompanied Hurricane Helene in North Carolina and surrounding regions in 2024. The extensive fires that struck Los Angeles in 2025 illustrate how the causal chain can become messy, though. Studies do detect a positive influence of climate on the event’s likelihood, but while climate change likely contributed to underlying aridity, it would not have played a role in the heavy winds or land practices that preceded disaster. These event attribution studies will become more common for extreme, or damaging, weather events. They can be produced quickly, and often are reported before peer review. As the Pacific Northwest heatwave example shows, when multiple methods converge on a positive attribution, the finding should probably carry some weight even if you have to be careful about accepting the results from a single study. I expect that as climate change proceeds and the climate thus departs further from a preindustrial counterfactual, the influence will become more detectable across a variety of extreme events and more easily identified. This will be used to cast blame, but can also be used to inform how communities and society adapt to ongoing change. We May Still Be Surprised One positive development, insofar as less climate change is better, has been that our central estimates for future climate change should probably be revised downward. Mostly, that is because the high-end warmings that scientists regularly analyzed about ten to 20 years ago, driven by high emissions throughout the twenty-first century, now appear to be somewhere between unlikely and impossible. At one time, the upper end of mainstream climate projections extended well into 4 to 6 degrees Celsius of warming by the end of this century, which, models suggest, would have wrought enormous real-world damage. Current energy and policy trends now point toward 2.5 or 3 degrees. Damages and risks are commonly modeled as increasing steeply with more warming, so this is already a better-than-previously-expected outcome for the climate (which is independent of the physical response to emissions). But we should maintain a wide range for plausible outcomes and prepare for the possibility of being surprised. Emissions trajectories are subject to deep uncertainty, the physical climate response is still developing, and whatever change occurs in the climate will then be mediated through unpredictable economic, social, and political institutions. Over the past decade, the pace of warming surprised some keen observers and appeared to accelerate, though not yet outside the range of expectation provided by climate models. The reasons for that apparent acceleration are being actively studied (as was the apparent pause in warming from 1998 to 2012), but no single driver has emerged. Some blame it on the El Niño, variability which would have no bearing on climate. Some think it is a result of factories in East Asia and global shipping fleets cutting aerosol emissions, which in the strongest version of the argument would indicate higher climate sensitivity to carbon-dioxide emissions. Others are more measured, not yet ready to draw solid conclusions as to whether climate projections require revision. We will have to see. Long-Term Thinking Climate change asks us to think over long time scales. But the pace of human-driven warming is compressing a large global change into a century. Changing weather patterns and extreme events are already causing adjustment costs and damages and will do more. Adaptation will help, but it is not free. For some communities, these costs will erode livelihoods and well-being, and may force migration. Are we prepared for large-scale managed retreats in the United States? Thankfully, American wealth, geographical diversity, and moderate climates may leave us better prepared than many around the world. But wealthy countries can still suffer serious disruption from narrowly concentrated costs, even if they appear entirely manageable in aggregate. Readers of Commonplace are familiar with the challenges of rapidly adapting to economic forces. The displacement that came from the China Shock is barely perceptible in aggregate GDP and employment data, but it affected millions of people and those people were far less mobile than economic models tended to assume. Deindustrialization rippled through the nation with enormous effects for not only our economic vitality, but also our national security. The forces surrounding climate change may not be so different; the world gets richer and must accept some diffuse costs. Those may be modest overall, but cause all manner of unpredictable effects with which policymakers must cope. In the case of the China Shock, our faith in a growing pie served us poorly. We’ll need to do better on climate. Leave a comment
Small businesses unleash big dreams on Longboat Key
Three of the newest additions to the Longboat Key small business community are up for a new award from the Longboat Key Chamber of Commerce.
New York launches measles dashboard as cases rise statewide
The New York State Department of Health launched a new measles dashboard that tracks cases by county and date
Raleigh is putting up signs marking the ‘4th Ward Entertainment District.’ What is it?
Find out more about Raleigh’s newest district.
Ocean Science Consulting Release Second Edition of Marine Mammal Observer Handbook
Ocean Science Consulting Ltd. (OSC) has announced the official launch of OSC Publishing House, a dedicated publishing division established…
Lakewood Ranch Business Alliance promotes nonprofits
The first Community Impact Showcase was hosted by the alliance to bring the nonprofit and business communities together.
Lakewood Ranch Business Alliance promotes nonprofits
The first Community Impact Showcase was hosted by the alliance to bring the nonprofit and business communities together.
Dallas senator, Democratic AG candidate Nathan Johnson wants to break from the past
Johnson is facing Mayes Middleton, a Republican who has pledged to continue pushing conservative priorities if elected.
In a reversal, NC Health Plan moves some Atrium hospitals to mid-tier for 2027
A dozen Atrium hospitals will no longer be designated as “non-preferred” under the plan’s new tiered network, taking effect Jan. 1, 2027.
Nine athletes highlight the 910Preps Athlete of the Week poll
Another week of high school sports has concluded. Here are nine Fayetteville-area nominees for 910Preps Athlete of the Week for Sept. 7-13.
UNC vs Clemson | Odds, injuries, predictions and key matchups
Everything you need to know for UNC vs. Clemson, including kickoff time, TV channel, injury updates, betting odds, predictions and storylines.
Baxter Health honors nurse Sara Phelps with Heroes with Halos award
Sara Phelps, a licensed practical nurse on Baxter Health's 5 South unit, has received the health system's Heroes with Halos Award. The recognition honors Baxter Health providers, employees, volunteers and departments nominated by grateful patients and families. Phelps was nominated by a patient she cared for after back surgery in mid-July. "She showed genuine kindness and
Europe built its medical science around male bodies – and women are paying the price
Just consider this - after almost four decades of EU-funded research, just 10 projects out of 145,983 have focused specifically on endometriosis, a condition affecting an estimated 10-15 percent of women of reproductive age, writes Renew Europe MEP Billy Kelleher.
$50M technical school opens in Lee County
The institute will offer career and technical education to about 500 students from across the region.
UNC vs East Tennessee State live updates: Score, highlights, analysis
UNC plays East Tennessee State in the Tar Heels' home opener. Follow live score updates, highlights, injury news, key plays and instant analysis.
Pinecrest at South View football kickoff delayed due to lightning
With lightning seen from Randy Ledford Field at South View, the Tigers' football game against Pinecrest is under delay.
Group says Floridians are owed $48 billion in unclaimed funds
The national organization Reclaim.org says despite state's efforts to connect people with their money, 13 million accounts are unclaimed.
Apple’s foldable iPhone poses a $1,999 question: Who is it for?
Apple's new foldable iPhone launched on Wednesday with impressive features and a premium price tag, starting at $1,999 in the U.S. market. But some observers in the packed room at the launch event in Cupertino, California, were left questioning its appeal beyond wealthy tech enthusiasts.
Apple’s foldable iPhone poses a $1,999 question: Who is it for?
Apple's new foldable iPhone launched on Wednesday with impressive features and a premium price tag, starting at $1,999 in the U.S. market. But some observers in the packed room at the launch event in Cupertino, California, were left questioning its appeal beyond wealthy tech enthusiasts.
Legal troubles mount as REIT founders indicted for stealing from employees
Already facing an SEC lawsuit and state investigation, the founders of RAD Diversified REIT have been charged with raiding employee benefit programs.
Live updates, scores from Week 4 of high school football
Follow along here for scores and highlights from Week 4 as Terry Sanford takes on Jack Britt, Seventy-First faces former coach at Hoke, and more.
What public records of local elections meeting texts show + tax limits opposition
Read our Under the Dome politics newsletter to stay up to date, including what public records of elections meeting texts show.
New Anita Earls campaign ad + protest outside NC Supreme Court
Read our Under the Dome newsletter to stay up to date on North Carolina politics, delivered to your inbox.
Company that pledged 200 jobs in Charlotte leaves town for SC, loses NC incentives
The company, known for brands like Dirt Devil, announced a $5 million investment in 2015.
Southern Union names Pike dean of health sciences
CONTRIBUTED BY SUSCC OPELIKA — Southern Union State Community College has named Dr. Richard Pike as dean of health sciences. Pike assumed the position Sept. 1 following the retirement of Dean Rhonda Davis. A graduate of Southern Union, Pike earned an associate in science degree and his emergency medical technician certification from the college. He […]
Joint Observations with Swift removed from IXPE GO Cycle 4
The IXPE Guest Observer (GO) Program solicits proposals for investigations in any area of astrophysics (not constrained to IXPE’s prime science areas).
In 12 years, Triangle man missed only 1 health insurance payment. He lost coverage
A mistake setting up autopay proved costly for this Morrisville family. Here’s what happened — and how you can avoid it.
‘Texas is the center of political conversation,’ according to MS NOW host Jen Psaki
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72nd Annual Decatur BBQ Fest promises flavor, fun, and free family entertainment on Sept. 12
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Four Lake Norman hospitals seek approval for 3D body scanner. Only one will get it
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NC Senate race sparks AI deepfake debate after mistake on Cabarrus County mailers
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Mental health services being offered at two schools
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Letters to the Editor: Constitutional amendment, state and local races
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ILWACO — The Ocean Beach Health Foundation has launched a community-wide campaign to raise $500,000 toward the purchase of a permanent Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) system for Ocean Beach Health, […]
The Casual Observer: Georgia's musical talent
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North Hills, Hillsborough Street and Pittsboro restaurants go out of business
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Feld Entertainment CEO on prioritizing innovation, challenging assumptions
To foster innovation, Feld Entertainment, under CEO Juliette Feld Grossman, prioritizes creating an environment that allows people to take risks and challenge assumptions.
Feld Entertainment CEO on prioritizing innovation, challenging assumptions
To foster innovation, Feld Entertainment, under CEO Juliette Feld Grossman, prioritizes creating an environment that allows people to take risks and challenge assumptions.
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SUNY Fredonia graduate takes FCS science job
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Health officials warn of possible rabies exposure at Durham County events
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2 downtown Raleigh additions and Chapel Hill’s first entertainment district
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Greenland research institutions halt new US collaborations citing mistrust
Although US President Donald Trump still harbours ambitions to take over Greenland, for US researchers his actions seem to have had the opposite effect. Over the summer, Greenland’s two largest research institutions, the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources and the University of Greenland, both announced policies of not starting new research projects with US researchers.Both institutions cite a mistrust of the US as a motivation for the decision. At the University of Greenland, the change of policy has already led to the rejection of specific proposals for new collaborations, rector Mari Kleist told Science|Business. “The reason is the changed political situation between the US and Kalaallit Nunaat [Greenland], and the uncertainty that the American interest in Kalaallit Nunaat has created,” she said.For the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, a partially state-funded environmental research institution, the decision was also prompted by a lack of trust in US intentions. In a July interview with local broadcaster KNR, director Josephine Nymand cited concerns about data ownership, US “influence operatives” and social media monitoring of researchers entering the US.The Greenland Institute of Natural Resources has long collaborated with the US National Science Foundation (NSF). The policy change will not affect these existing partnerships but will apply to collaborations with new, “unknown” partners, Nymand said. At the University of Greenland, the policy is the same.The changes come amid proposals of severe cuts to the NSF, which would likely also see the US research presence in Greenland reduced. In spite of this, when asked about the Greenlandic policy change, the NSF remained optimistic of its continued presence in Greenland.“We are grateful to our partners in Greenland for their collaboration in advancing scientific knowledge and training the next generation of researchers. NSF remains committed to the long-term collaborations with Greenland that enable scientific research near communities and on Greenland’s ice sheet,” an NSF spokesperson told Science|Business.Fewer US researchers in GreenlandMost research published on Greenland is on natural science topics such as the cryosphere, ice dynamics, permafrost and climate change. In recent years, US researchers have been the most prolific publishers on Greenland.The US research presence in Greenland goes far beyond the capital of Nuuk, where the two research institutions are located. It includes the Pituffik Space Base in northwest Greenland, various projects in settlements and research stations along the coast, as well as research stations on the Greenland ice sheet itself.The largest of these sites, Summit Station, is located at the highest point of the Greenland ice sheet, about 3,200 metres above sea level, and since the 1980s it has been used for drilling cores out of the ice sheet. These ice cores provide valuable information on the global climate going back at least 100,000 years. About 30 kilometres from Summit Station, the Danish-led Greenland Ice-core Project (Grip), funded by the European Research Council, is also drilling ice cores. Although they initially competed, the relationship between the two research teams has “long been amiable,” Jørgen Peder Steffensen, a Danish researcher who has been part of Grip for more than 40 years, told Science|Business.However, since Trump took office in early 2025, Steffensen has noticed a reduction in US research in the country. “Several of our American partners did not make it into the field this year. Their field seasons were cancelled because they lacked the budget,” he said.He ascribed part of the reduction in US researchers to a renovation of Summit Station. “A very large share of NSF funding has gone into renewing the station. Money has been taken from research and allocated to rebuilding it,” he said.A report published in August by Arctic Hub confirms Steffensen's observations of fewer US researchers. It shows that US research publications on Greenland took a dip towards the end of the period spanning 2015 to 2024. In 2024, before Trump took office, the number of publications had fallen from an average of about 250 articles a year, to just 164, second behind Canada at 169.Data from the NSF logistics provider Battelle also shows a reduction in US research presence in Greenland in recent years. In 2023, Battelle counted 48 projects across 78 locations, but in 2025 that number had fallen to 40 projects across 38 locations. And while relations with US personnel in Greenland have remained strong, some tensions have arisen since Trump took office. “On a personal level, there is nothing. But it’s hanging in the air. It hangs unspoken,” Steffensen said.Cutting ties with US researchers entirely would come at a higher cost for the ice core researchers than the Nuuk-based institutions. To get cargo to and from their bases, both Grip and Summit Station rely on unique, ski-equipped Hercules LC-130 aircraft operated by the New York Air National Guard. Without these, maintaining a research base on the Greenland ice sheet would not be viable on current budgets, Steffensen said. “[If the Hercules planes were not available], we would have to think outside of the box. We would have to use smaller planes, and we would have to build a base closer to the coast. But staying in our current location would be too expensive and it would create a huge carbon footprint,” he said.Suspicious people in NuukIn her explanation of the severed US ties, Greenland Institute of Natural Resources director Josephine Nymand compared the decision to past situations when the institute had to cut ties with China and Russia, the latter due to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. And although the current situation is less severe, the comparison reflects the seriousness with which Nuuk sees the US threats. “From Greenland’s perspective, the US may not look so different from Russia right now: a much larger neighbouring power threatening to invade,” Lin Alexandra Mortensgaard, a researcher of international politics in the Arctic at the Danish Institute for International Studies, told Science|Business. “From a European perspective, it is not a comparable situation, because we are entangled with the US on all possible fronts and do not want to destroy more than is absolutely necessary. But from Greenland’s side, there may well be a need to send a clear signal to the US,” she went on. Suspicions have been fuelled by instances of Trump-affiliated people in Greenland trying to persuade Greenlandic citizens to support a US takeover. The most prolific among them is Tom Dans, a former venture capitalist and pecan farmer who was appointed by Trump as the chair of the United States Arctic Research Commission. Observers fear that he is now using research to achieve a US takeover.“Greenland is a small society with a small population, so when Americans with unclear affiliations wander around, trying to be good friends with people, and you don't know what they want, that creates mistrust. This probably played into the research institutions taking these drastic steps,” Mortensgaard said.Related articles:The US ‘golden age’ science strategy: what Europeans need to knowEU polar research melts into the backgroundAnchor Greenlanders in Arctic climate research, experts tell EU ahead of policy updateAnd although Greenland’s population is small at just 57,000, for Mortensgaard, it serves as a microcosm for the geopolitical situation as a whole: global powers fighting for their interests to the detriment of the common interest. Arctic research already suffered when collaborations with Russia broke down in 2022, she said, so a split with the US would be a serious hit to climate science.“The Arctic climate system does not respect borders or geopolitical divides. When collaboration across those lines suddenly becomes impossible, it is a huge problem for knowledge production,” she said. European alternatives?The Greenland Institute of Natural Resources is funded partly by research grants from external sources like the NSF. To replace the US funding, the institute will have to look for alternative revenue sources, and Nymand said that she is looking to Europe for those. Aside from Denmark, of which Greenland is formally a part, she also noted increased interest in research collaborations from the UK, France and Switzerland. Kleist of the University of Greenland told Science|Business that it was too early to say if the severed US ties would lead to more collaborations with Europe. Meanwhile, Mortensgaard believed that the tensions in Arctic research could well leave room for closer European partnerships, or stronger links with Canada. “I spoke to Canadian researchers who had long-standing relationships with American colleagues and who collaborated with the US Navy, but who had gotten worried that their data on sea ice could be used if Trump suddenly decided to follow through on his threats of invading,” she said. “Like Canada, I think Greenland is considering creating closer ties to Europe and I think European capitals will be open to this,” she said.
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Critics of the shutdown are organizing, and invoking the lunch counter sit-ins of the Civil Rights Movement.
GOP eliminated NC’s minority business office. Where does that leave companies?
Critics of the shutdown are organizing, and invoking the lunch counter sit-ins of the Civil Rights Movement.