Aurelia Butler

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    Read President Yoon’s Speech Declaring Martial Law in South Korea

    Honorable citizens, as President, I appeal to you with a feeling of spitting blood.Since the inauguration of our government, the National Assembly has initiated 22 impeachment motions against government officials, and since the inauguration of the 22nd National Assembly in June, it is pushing for the impeachment of 10 more. This is a situation that is not only unprecedented in any country in the world, but has never been seen since the founding of our country.It is paralyzing the judiciary by intimidating judges and impeaching a number of prosecutors, and it is paralyzing the executive branch by trying to impeach the Minister of the Interior, the Chairman of the Communications Commission, the Chair of the Board of Audit, and the Defense Minister.The handling of the national budget also undermined the essential functions of the state and turned Korea into a drug paradise and a public order panic by completely cutting all major budgets for cracking down on drug crimes and maintaining public security. The Democratic Party cut 4.1 trillion won from next year’s budget, including 1 trillion won for disaster preparedness reserves, 38.4 billion won for child care support allowances, and a project to develop a gas field in the city for youth jobs.They even put the brakes on funding to improve the treatment of military officers, including raising salaries and allowances for entry-level officers and increasing on-call duty fees.This budget outrage is nothing short of manipulating the national finances of the Republic of Korea. The legislative dictatorship of the Democratic Party, which uses even the budget as a means of political struggle, did not hesitate to impeach the budget. The government is paralyzed, and the people’s sighs are growing.This trampling of the constitutional order of the free Republic of Korea and the disruption of legitimate state institutions established by the constitution and laws is an obvious anti-state act that plots insurrection. The lives of the people are of no concern, and the government is in a state of paralysis due to impeachment, special investigation, and the defense of the opposition leader.Our National Assembly has become a den of criminals and is attempting to paralyze the nation’s judicial administration system through legislative dictatorship and overthrow the liberal democracy system. The National Assembly, which should be the foundation of liberal democracy, has become a monster that collapses the liberal democracy system. Now, Korea is in a precarious situation where it would not be surprising if it collapsed immediately.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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    Patagonia C.E.O.: Corporate Responsibility Still Matters

    Companies continue to invest in sustainability, though many are no longer broadcasting it.This personal reflection is part of a series called Turning Points, in which writers explore what critical moments from this year might mean for the year ahead. You can read more by visiting the Turning Points series page.Turning Point: Some of the world’s largest financial firms pulled out of a group committed to fighting climate change.It’s been a tough year for companies wanting to do the right thing. In addition to managing a turbulent global economy, brands have faced backlash from a handful of activists on everything from climate and diversity commitments to supporting Pride events and even encouraging people to vote. More than 100 laws against environmental, social and governance principles have been introduced in Congress and state legislatures since 2023, and right-wing politicians and activists continue to force companies that value corporate responsibility into a culture war by smearing them as “woke.”When a few companies got skittish and pulled back on their diversity or climate efforts, headlines crowed about the demise of corporate responsibility as a whole.This is what happens when sound bites and taglines replace the real work needed to make progress. It seems impossible to find a product now that doesn’t claim to be “green” or “sustainable” or made responsibly. Although some businesses are putting in the time and work to back up those claims, others are confronting the reality that their investors and customers are paying close attention, and the bill to produce results is past due.As I look back on 2024, I think the backlash against corporate responsibility — and sustainability in particular — has been overstated. But while some companies are talking less about their commitments, I’m heartened that many are still quietly setting ambitious targets to reduce emissions, care for their employees and create inclusive communities. They’re doing the work to get there, and they’re pressing ahead in the face of disgruntled pundits and social media trolls.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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    Biden Turns to an Unlikely Ally to Help Protect His Legacy: Republicans

    President Biden wants to make it more difficult for President-elect Donald J. Trump to repeal his signature legislation, which sent money flowing to Republican districts nationwide.President-elect Donald J. Trump has promised to unravel President Biden’s major legislation when he takes office next month, but Mr. Biden is hoping to salvage his most prized policies with help from an unlikely source: Republicans.With just weeks left in office, Mr. Biden and his aides have emphasized that his signature economic legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act, overwhelmingly benefits Republican districts, in the hopes that Mr. Trump would face blowback from his own party if he repealed it.The administration is also racing to award hundreds of millions of dollars in grants and finalize environmental regulations to lock in Mr. Biden’s economic agenda, including ramping up domestic manufacturing of clean energy products and semiconductors.“They are not going to want to undermine those jobs and those businesses that we know for the first time are really strong in so many districts around the country that have been left behind under trickle-down policies,” Lael Brainard, Mr. Biden’s national economic adviser, said in an interview.Roughly 80 percent of new clean energy manufacturing investments announced since the Inflation Reduction Act passed in 2022 have flowed to Republican congressional districts, according to data from Atlas Public Policy, a research firm.Mr. Trump and his allies have attacked the legislation, which provides at least $390 billion over 10 years in tax breaks, grants and subsidies for wind and solar power, electric vehicle battery production and other clean energy projects. More

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    Bloomberg Says RFK Jr. Would Be ‘Beyond Dangerous’ as Health Secretary

    Michael R. Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor, launched a lengthy broadside on Tuesday against Robert F. Kennedy Jr., using his opening remarks at a public health conference to warn that installing Mr. Kennedy as health secretary would be “beyond dangerous,” and tantamount to “medical malpractice on a mass scale.”Mr. Bloomberg, speaking at the two-day Bloomberg American Health Summit in Washington, called on Senate Republicans to persuade President-elect Donald J. Trump to “rethink” his choice of Mr. Kennedy for health secretary. If Mr. Trump cannot be persuaded, he said, the Senate has “a duty to our whole country, but especially to our children,” to vote against confirming him.Mr. Bloomberg also assailed Mr. Kennedy for discouraging measles vaccination during an outbreak in the island nation of Samoa, where 83 people died.“Parents who have been swayed by vaccine skepticism love their children and want to protect them, and we need leaders who will help them do that,” he said, “not conspiracy theorists who will scare them into decisions that will put their children at risk of disease.”Mr. Bloomberg has spent billions of dollars promoting public health, both through his charity, Bloomberg Philanthropies, and through donations to the School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University, which now bears his name. The school and the charity hosted the health summit, with the theme of “advancing public health in uncertain political times.”Like Mr. Kennedy, Mr. Bloomberg has fought battles against processed foods and has tried to promote healthy eating. But that, it appears, is where their like-mindedness ends.Among other things, Mr. Bloomberg chided Mr. Kennedy for “nutty conspiracy theories,” including making the “outrageous false claim” that the Covid-19 shot was the “deadliest vaccine ever made.” He said Mr. Trump deserved credit for Operation Warp Speed, the fast-track initiative that produced coronavirus vaccines in record time, noting that studies have shown that the vaccines have saved an estimated 20 million lives around the world.With experts warning of a possible bird flu outbreak in humans, Mr. Bloomberg said senators would face some hard questions: “With the nation facing a possible bird flu outbreak, are they really prepared to roll the dice on the lives of their constituents, by placing someone in charge of public health who has made it clear that he will prevent the approval of lifesaving vaccines?” More

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    Gotham Awards Go to ‘A Different Man’ and ‘Sing Sing’

    The kickoff to awards season has a mixed record but can help lift small films like the two surprise winners.“A Different Man,” a dark indie comedy starring Sebastian Stan, was the surprise best-feature winner at the 34th annual Gotham Awards, which took place Monday night at Cipriani Wall Street in New York.Directed by Aaron Schimberg, the film stars Stan as an actor with neurofibromatosis who undergoes an experimental surgery to remove tumors from his face, giving him a more conventional appearance. That makeover puts him in danger of losing a leading role to a local bon vivant (Adam Pearson) who also has neurofibromatosis but owns his appearance without shame.Though “A Different Man” is distributed by the hot studio A24, it was considered the lowest-profile contender in its category. Most pundits expected the Palme d’Or winner “Anora” to cruise to victory here and even Schimberg was caught off-guard by the win. “I think I’m not the only person in the room who’s totally stunned by this,” the director said onstage, admitting he had not prepared a speech in advance, fearing it would be “hubris” to do so.In a very fluid Oscar season, the Gotham win could raise the chances of Stan, who also stars in the Donald Trump biopic “The Apprentice,” and Pearson, a dark-horse supporting-actor candidate. Though the Gothams’ effectiveness as an Oscar bellwether can fluctuate, three of the four most recent films to triumph there — “Past Lives,” “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and “Nomadland” — also went on to be nominated for best picture at the Oscars.The Gothams are most valuable when it comes to helping smaller films like “A Different Man” that rely on an awards-season run to stay in the conversation. Though the ceremony recently lifted its $35 million budget cap for eligible contenders, its nominating juries, which are mostly made up of a handful of film journalists, still tend to favor movies that were made on a shoestring.That includes “Sing Sing,” a prison drama that won the night’s lead and supporting-performance honors for Colman Domingo and Clarence Maclin. (The Gothams are gender-neutral.) “Let’s keep doing work that really matters, that makes a difference,” Domingo, who starred in “The Color Purple” and “Rustin” last year, told the audience. “That’s what we can do right now. That can be a light in the darkness.”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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    World Bank Warns of Record Debt Costs for Developing Countries

    The World Bank warned in a new report that poor countries will be stuck in economic “purgatory” without debt relief.Soaring inflation saddled developing countries with a record $1.4 trillion in debt servicing costs last year, the World Bank said in a report published on Tuesday, detailing the precarious state faced by the world’s most vulnerable economies since the pandemic.As central banks around the world raised interest rates to slow rising prices, poor countries with already high debt burdens saw the interest payments on the money that they owed to creditors balloon. While principal balances held steady at around $951 billion, interest payments jumped by a third, to $406 billion. That has left more countries facing fiscal crises and struggling to avoid default.“These facts imply a metastasizing solvency crisis that continues to be misdiagnosed as a liquidity problem in many of the poorest countries,” Indermit Gill, the World Bank’s chief economist, wrote in the report. “It is easy to kick the can down the road, to provide these countries just enough financing to help them meet their immediate repayment obligations. But that simply extends their purgatory.”More than a dozen sovereign nations defaulted on their debt in the last three years, and more than 30 of the world’s poorest countries have experienced “debt distress,” according to the United Nations. In 2023, Belarus, Ghana, Lebanon, Sri Lanka and Zambia were all in default, according to Fitch Ratings.Global financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund have been working with international lenders to help developing countries restructure their debt, but the process has been slow and painstaking. China, the world’s largest creditor, has been particularly reluctant to alter the terms of its loans as it grapples with its own economic challenges.The Biden administration has been critical of China’s lending practices. Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen described them as “opaque” in an interview with The New York Times in October in which she called for accelerating debt relief. She also raised the idea of helping nations find new sources of borrowing by creating coordinated aid packages for “high-ambition countries” that want to invest in clean energy projects.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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    Rihanna Steals the Fashion Awards

    And a dozen other looks that made news at Britain’s Met Gala of style.She wasn’t even nominated, and Rihanna still stole the show Monday night at the Fashion Awards in London.Arriving last, as has become her wont at events like the Met Gala and the Alaïa show, and there as a plus-one to support her partner, ASAP Rocky, who received the Cultural Innovator award, the artist and Fenty mogul made her entrance in a turquoise wrap coat and faux fur hat from Christian Lacroix’s fall 2002 couture collection. With that she wore a black corset, black leather opera gloves and sheer black tights. The effect was kind of haute Flintstone meets the Folies Bergère.As for ASAP Rocky, he wore Bottega Veneta — a navy chore coat, matching pants and a red leather tie — and called the honor “surreal.” That was also an accurate description of the Royal Albert Hall, where the awards were held and where a crimson disco ball cast a new light on a familiar scene. But it was Rihanna’s enormous hat, jauntily tilted and visible from every vantage point, that summed up the point of the night: The business of fashion may be serious, but wearing it should be fun.Her look was as laudable as the actual winners, who included Alex Consani as model of the year, the first trans woman to receive the recognition; Grace Wales Bonner as British men’s wear designer of the year; Simone Rocha as British women’s wear designer; and Jonathan Anderson of Loewe and JW Anderson as designer of the year for the second year in a row.That choice wasn’t a big surprise, especially given Mr. Anderson’s moonlighting this year as the costume designer on the Luca Guadagnino films “Queer” and “Challengers” and the multiple wild rumors surrounding his future job prospects, but some of the other outfits were. Here’s what else caught our eye.More Method DressingNicola Coughlan of “Bridgerton” wore a Gaurav Gupta gown.Gareth Cattermole/Getty ImagesAnd Simone Ashley wore Prada.Scott A Garfitt/Invision, via Associated PressWe 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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    Israeli Officials Welcome Trump’s Demand to Free Hostages Before Inauguration

    President-elect Donald J. Trump has threatened to take unspecified action unless the hostages held in Gaza are released before he takes office in January.Senior Israeli officials have welcomed President-elect Donald J. Trump’s demand that hostages taken in the Hamas-led attack on Israel be released from Gaza before his inauguration in January, and his threat that there will be “hell to pay” in the Middle East if they are not.Mr. Trump’s social media post on Monday did not elaborate on what action would be taken if the hostages are not released by Jan. 20, when he will be sworn in. Still, some Israeli officials appeared to be reassured by Mr. Trump’s remarks, which suggested the onus was more on the militants holding the hostages than on Israel to free the captives.“Thank you and bless you Mr. President-elect,” President Isaac Herzog of Israel said in a post on social media. “We all pray for the moment we see our sisters and brothers back home!”Mr. Herzog’s position is largely ceremonial. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, seen as the main Israeli decision maker in the war against Hamas in Gaza, has not publicly commented on Mr. Trump’s remarks, nor have leaders of the Israeli military.Mr. Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform on Monday that “there will be ALL HELL TO PAY in the Middle East, and for those in charge who perpetrated these atrocities against Humanity,” if the hostages aren’t released before his inauguration.“Those responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America,” he said. “RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW!”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