Aurelia Butler

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    A Trip to New York

    Expert advice to make the most of a New York City vacation.The window displays at Bergdorf Goodman beckon. There’s a new riverside ice rink in Williamsburg. Buildings, brownstones and bodegas across the city pop with decorations. A woman I saw holding court on the 6 train last week was accessorized with felt antlers, a gaudy Christmas sweater and three large dogs also wearing holiday sweaters.But the crowds these days, and oh, the prices! The cost of everything, from sandwiches to hotel rooms, has soared. And the city expects to get nearly 65 million visitors this year, this close to prepandemic levels. In recent days, it has felt as if all of those people are on the sidewalks of Midtown, furiously trying to elbow their way into Bryant Park’s holiday market.In today’s newsletter, I’m going to share eight tips for enjoying New York — whether you’re visiting for the holidays or any other time of the year — without going broke or getting lost in the crowd.The Louis Vuitton flagship store during the holidays this year.Katherine Marks for The New York Times1. The city that never sleeps tends to wake up late. Crowds are sparse in the early mornings across all the boroughs, even at the top tourist spots. So grab a bodega coffee and enjoy Rockefeller Center at 5 a.m., when the Christmas tree lights up daily, or walk across the Brooklyn Bridge at sunrise.2. You need to book that table, reserve that slot, buy those tickets in advance. This is crucial for the must-do activities on your itinerary, including fine dining (here is The Times’s list of New York City’s 100 best restaurants), some Broadway shows and even visits to Santa at Macy’s. You may pay less for off-peak times, or reservations might even be free, but you’ll still need a reservation.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Google’s Sundar Pichai on Antitrust, Trump and A.I.

    Google’s chief executive spoke with Andrew Ross Sorkin at the DealBook SummitGoogle got a head start in the artificial intelligence race, and at the DealBook Summit on Dec. 4, its chief executive, Sundar Pichai, snapped back at suggestions that it should be more competitive considering its vast resources.Whereas A.I. startups rely on tech giants for processing power, Google uses its own. The company’s products, like YouTube and Gmail, give it access to mountains of data, and its A.I. researchers have made huge breakthroughs, with two of them winning a Nobel Prize this year. That gives Google an advantage in all three of what Sam Altman, the chief executive of OpenAI, earlier in the day called “key inputs” to A.I. progress: compute, data and algorithms.Microsoft’s chief executive, Satya Nadella, has said that Google should have been the “default winner” in A.I. At the DealBook Summit, Pichai responded, “I would love to do a side-by-side comparison of Microsoft’s own models and our models any day, any time.” Microsoft largely depends on OpenAI for its A.I. models.Pichai also defended his company’s competitiveness. He said that although he thought A.I. progress would slow in the next year (speaking earlier, Altman had a different take), Google’s search engine “will continue to change profoundly in ’25.”He said he expected search to become more, not less, valuable as the web is flooded with content generated by A.I.Pichai also touched on the company’s antitrust lawsuits, the second Trump administration and how artificial intelligence is affecting the way he hires. Here are five highlights from the conversation.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How Biden Should Spend His Final Weeks in Office

    The days are dwindling to a precious few before President Biden relinquishes his tenancy at the White House to Donald Trump. Four years ago, in his inaugural address, Mr. Biden promised to “press forward with speed and urgency, for we have much to do in this winter of peril and possibility.” The peril remains, but so do the possibilities.Last week he announced that he was commuting the sentences of nearly 1,500 people and pardoning 39 others convicted of nonviolent crimes. Eleven days earlier, in a decision widely criticized, Mr. Biden pardoned his son Hunter, who was awaiting sentencing on gun possession and income tax charges.There is still much the president can do before he repairs to Delaware. He can spare federal death row prisoners from the fate some almost certainly will face when Mr. Trump returns. He can make the Equal Rights Amendment a reality after decades of efforts to enshrine it in the Constitution. He can safeguard magnificent landscapes that might otherwise be desecrated. He can protect undocumented immigrants facing deportation, alleviate crushing student debt facing millions of Americans and protect the reproductive rights of women. And more.New York Times Opinion contributors share what they hope President Biden will accomplish during his remaining time in office.Yes, time is running out for Mr. Biden’s presidency, but he can still repair, restore, heal and build, as he promised he would do on the January day four years ago when he took the oath of office. Here are a few suggestions:Commute the sentences of the 40 federal inmates on death rowBy Martin Luther King IIIBy commuting all federal death sentences to life, Mr. Biden would move America, meaningfully, in the direction of racial reconciliation and equal justice. In 2021 he became the first president to openly oppose capital punishment. Since his inauguration, the federal government has not carried out a single execution.If Mr. Biden does not exercise his constitutional authority to commute the sentences of everyone on federal death row, we will surely see another spate of deeply troubling executions as we did in the first Trump administration. A majority of those executed — 12 men and one woman — were people of color; at least one was convicted by an all-white jury and there was evidence of racial bias in a number of cases; several had presented evidence of intellectual disabilities or severe mental illnesses. The same problems were features in the cases of many of the 40 men on federal death row today, more than half of whom are people of color.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How Might the Rebels Govern Syria? Their Ruling History in Idlib Offers Clues

    The Islamist rebels who ousted Syria’s dictator ran a pragmatic and disciplined administration in the territory they controlled. They also jailed their critics.Every fall, when farmers across the rolling, red dirt hills of Idlib Province in northern Syria harvest their olive crops, they routinely find at least one representative of the local tax authority stationed at any oil press.The tax collector takes at least 5 percent of the oil, and farmers grouse that there are no exceptions, even in lean harvest years.The collectors work for the civilian government established under Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the rebel movement that just spearheaded the swift overthrow of the 54-year Assad dynasty. The Islamist group has administered much of opposition-held Idlib Province since 2017.Measures like the olive oil tax, introduced in 2019, have prompted protests and even occasional armed clashes and arrests.Yet the Syrian Salvation Government, as the Idlib administration was known, persisted. It taxed goods entering its territory and generated revenue by selling fuel and running a telecom company. It also controlled the local economy through licensing regulation programs that looked a lot like a conventional government’s and proved that it was fairly adept at managing those finances to build up its military operations and provide civil services.The portrait of the rebel group detailed in this article was gleaned from interviews with experts, representatives of humanitarian or other organizations working in the territory under its control, local residents and reports by the United Nations or think tanks.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Israel Strikes Military Targets in Syria

    The Israeli military hit weapons depots and air defenses, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Israel has said it aims to keep military equipment out of the hands of extremists after rebels seized power a week ago.Israel struck multiple Syrian weapons depots and air defenses overnight and into Sunday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, in what appeared to be the latest in a series of airstrikes that Israel has said are aimed at keeping military hardware and infrastructure out of the hands of extremists after rebels seized power a week ago.In all, Israel struck its neighbor 75 times in attacks that began Saturday night near the Syrian capital, Damascus, and the cities of Hama and Homs, said the Observatory, a Britain-based monitoring organization that has long tracked the conflict in Syria.Israel has struck Syria more than 450 times since the collapse of the al-Assad regime a week ago, according to the Observatory, destroying Syria’s navy and dozens of ammunition depots, air bases and other military equipment.Israel’s military has also seized and occupied an expanse of territory in Syria over the de facto border between the two countries, giving no timeline for its departure apart from saying that it would stay until its security demands are met.There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military about its latest strikes in Syria.Neither the previous Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad nor the new authorities in Damascus have attacked Israel, and Arab countries and France have called on Israel to withdraw and respect Syria’s sovereignty.Israeli officials, however, say that the raids are necessary to secure the border and to keep Syria’s weaponry from falling into the hands of extremists while the country remains unstable.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    The Trouble Began Where #MeToo Became #ChurchToo

    When did we know that the #MeToo moment was truly over?At its most compelling, #MeToo tried to change a culture that both concealed and enabled the illegal abuse of women and imposed hypocritical double standards, holding women to one standard of behavior while celebrating and elevating unscrupulous men.But events in 2024 have told us loudly and clearly that the moment has passed.Perhaps it was when reports emerged that Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s choice to be the next secretary of defense, had paid an accuser to settle a sexual assault claim. He denies wrongdoing, but his defense — that he had consensual sex with a married woman — was still dreadful. His philandering and mistreatment of women have been so egregious that his mother called him an “abuser of women,” in an email to him (she has since disavowed her statement) — and yet somehow his chances of being confirmed by the Senate appear to be increasing.Perhaps it was when Robert F. Kennedy Jr. who is married to the actress Cheryl Hines, allegedly had an improper “personal relationship” via smartphone with Olivia Nuzzi, a political reporter who is much younger, and she lost her job while he was picked to run the Department of Health and Human Services.But I think it happened earlier, when a jury found Donald Trump responsible for sexual abuse, and he was ultimately re-elected to the presidency. After years of rightfully arguing that combating sexual assault and sexual abuse can’t override due process, many conservatives not only disregarded the jury verdict, they actually reveled in how little his voters cared about the scandal, or just dismissed it as another instance of “lawfare” against Trump.I distinctly remember the mood on the right when the #MeToo movement got going. There was a sense of schadenfreude. The morally bankrupt, sexualized culture of Hollywood and the liberal media had finally been exposed. For all their talk about feminism and respecting women, many famous liberals proved to be dangerous hypocrites — or much, much worse.Yes, there was leakage into right-wing media. Roger Ailes was pushed out at Fox News in 2016, and Bill O’Reilly suffered the same fate after my Times colleagues Emily Steel and Michael Schmidt reported that O’Reilly or Fox had paid $13 million to settle claims of sexual misconduct made by five different women against him.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Devin Nunes, Pugnacious Trump Loyalist, to Lead Espionage Advisory Board

    As chair of the House Intelligence Committee, he attacked the Russia inquiry and Donald J. Trump’s first impeachment. Now, Mr. Nunes runs Mr. Trump’s social media company.President-elect Donald J. Trump announced on Saturday that he would appoint Devin Nunes, a former member of Congress who had used his role as chairman of the House Intelligence Committee to try to delegitimize the Trump-Russia investigation, to head an independent advisory board on espionage policy.The organization — the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board — dates back to the early Cold War and consists of private citizens with top-level security clearances who are supposed to help the White House analyze spy agency effectiveness and planning. Its members do not need Senate confirmation, so presidents can pick whomever they want for it.In a statement, Mr. Trump praised Mr. Nunes — who is currently the chief executive of the Trump Media & Technology Group, which runs the Truth Social platform — for his counterinvestigation into the Trump-Russia inquiry in 2017-18, when Mr. Nunes led the House Intelligence Committee as a Republican congressman from California.“While continuing his leadership of Trump Media & Technology Group, Devin will draw on his experience as former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, and his key role in exposing the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, to provide me with independent assessments of the effectiveness and propriety of the U.S. Intelligence Community’s activities,” Mr. Trump wrote in his announcement.Some members of the advisory board also serve on a presidential Intelligence Oversight Board, which was created in the 1970s after a congressional investigation into abuses by national security agencies and which tries to ferret out illegal spying activities. That group typically includes the larger board’s chair, so it is likely that Mr. Nunes will participate in it as well.The work products of the two boards are usually kept secret. A rare exception came in 2023, when the Biden administration publicly released a report in which the two panels urged Congress to extend an expiring law that authorizes a warrantless surveillance program, but also called for new limits on the F.B.I.’s ability to use information gathered under the program.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ABC to Pay $15 Million to Settle a Defamation Suit Brought by Trump

    The outcome of the lawsuit marks an unusual victory for President-elect Donald J. Trump in his ongoing legal campaign against national news organizations.ABC News is set to pay $15 million to settle a defamation lawsuit brought by Donald J. Trump.The agreement was a significant concession by a major news organization and a rare victory for a media-bashing politician whose previous litigation efforts against news outlets have often ended in defeat.Under the terms of a settlement revealed on Saturday, ABC News will donate the $15 million to Mr. Trump’s future presidential foundation and museum. The network and its star anchor, George Stephanopoulos, also published a statement saying they “regret” remarks made about Mr. Trump during a televised interview in March.ABC News, which is owned by the Walt Disney Company, will pay Mr. Trump an additional $1 million for his legal fees.The outcome is an unusual win for Mr. Trump, who has frequently sued news organizations for defamation and frequently lost, including in litigation against CNN, The New York Times and The Washington Post.Several experts in media law said they believed that ABC News could have continued to fight, given the high threshold required by the courts for a public figure like Mr. Trump to prove defamation. A plaintiff must not only show that a news outlet published false information, but that it did so knowing that the information was false or with substantial doubts about its accuracy.“Major news organizations have often been very leery of settlements in defamation suits brought by public officials and public figures, both because they fear the dangerous pattern of doing so and because they have the full weight of the First Amendment on their side,” said RonNell Andersen Jones, a professor of law at the University of Utah.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More