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In Italy, where more than 30,000 people die annually because of air pollution, the town of San Vitaliano banned the use of wood-burning pizza ovens. A British man in Kyrgyzstan was arrested on suspicion of racial hatred after he compared a sausage dish to a horse’s penis, and a priest in the Philippines was suspended by the Catholic Church for using a hoverboard during Christmas Eve Mass. China’s Communist Party released an official rap song featuring President Xi Jinping. “Corruption,” he rapped, “must be punished.” Read more...

Christmas was banned in Somalia, and a ban on wearing "hats or clothes that resemble Santa Claus" continued in Brunei. Canada experienced a shortage of peppermint candy canes. A man in England dressed as Santa climbed through the window of a KFC wielding a knife, and it was reported that the number of people giving guns as Christmas gifts had increased since last year. "It is a significant gift," said a gun-shop owner, "to arm the people that you love."

A visit to the heart of African Paris

Greenwich Village Then and Now, illustrations, by Julia Wertz, of three blocks in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village neighborhood, as they appeared in the 1930s and today. View all...

France’s National Front party, whose president, Marine Le Pen, recently compared Muslims praying in public to Nazi occupiers and was acquitted of hate-speech charges, won a record 6.8 million votes in regional elections. Danish legislators considered a measure that would allow authorities to seize jewelry, cash, and other valuables from refugees. Public schools in Los Angeles and Nashua, New Hampshire, were closed because of bomb threats, and a poll found that 30 percent of Republican primary voters support bombing Agrabah, the fictional city from Disney’s Aladdin. Continue reading...

Donald Trump calls for a ban on Muslims entering the United States; Dorothy Thompson wonders who is most susceptible to Nazism.

Is George Orwell's Animal Farm based on the work of a nineteenth-century Russian writer?

“The treaty is miraculous and horrible. It neither gives enough to the most vulnerable nor takes enough from the profligate, but it shifts the arrangement between them for the better.”

"I was confident the French weren’t going to follow the bad example from overseas and start a 'war on terror' à l’américaine. But November 13 changed the equation."

A survey of U.S. special-operations personnel found that 64 percent of male respondents believe women are not mentally tough enough to serve in commando units, and 20 female politicians won municipal office in the first Saudi Arabian election in which women were allowed to vote. A Norwegian study found that men have a better sense of direction than women, and a Florida man who was running from the police waded into a lake and was eaten by an alligator. “It’s not a bad idea,” said an officer, “to go into the water.”

Barack Obama meets with the nations most threatened by climate change; Tuvalu plans for the future of its sinking islands

"Indigenous people from Indonesia to Alaska have come to the Paris climate summit in the hundreds, perhaps even the thousands, to defend their lands and their people from erasure."

Alan Lightman, John Darnielle, Art Spiegelman, Anne Carson, and more.

The perils of translating Primo Levi

"There is this idea that writing beautifully or writing powerfully is somehow separate from clear thinking," says Ta-Nehisi Coates, author of Between the World and Me. "It’s not."

The porn actress known as Stoya accused the porn actor James Deen of rape. A 19-year-old named Bud Weisser was arrested for trespassing at a Budweiser brewery in Missouri; and, in Florida, an expert on driving under the influence was arrested for driving under the influence. Reddit users launched a campaign to deliver Christmas cards to the only child attending school on the Scottish island of Out Skerries.^. The president of Mauritania was suspected of ending a championship soccer game out of boredom. Read more...

"Looking at the detailed Russian timeline of what happened," says defense analyst Pierre Sprey, "I'd say the evidence looks pretty strong that the Turks were setting up an ambush."

"If a wealthy country won’t contemplate tapering down a relatively new industry, then what are we to say to Kuwait, Iraq, Venezuela, and Saudi Arabia, whose economies rely hugely on fossil fuel?"

New Orleans reckons with its legacy of slavery 

Rebecca Solnit reports from the Paris climate summit

Greenpoint Then and Now, illustrations, by Julia Wertz, of three blocks in Brooklyn’s Greenpoint neighborhood, as they appeared in the 1920s and today. View all...

Officials in Turkey said they would not apologize for shooting down a Russian Sukhoi Su-24 fighter jet that was traveling through Turkish airspace near the Syrian border. Saudi Arabia announced that its Justice Ministry would sue a Twitter user who criticized its decision to execute a poet for apostasy as “ISIS-like.” The Islamic State killed four police officers in a drive-by shooting in Egypt, beat to death a 17-year-old Austrian girl in Syria who was attempting to flee the group, and launched an anti-smoking campaign. “Smoking,” reads the campaign slogan, “killed millions.” Read more...

From entries made since 2009 to the U.S. Protocol Gift Unit Federal Register Report, which records items given by foreign dignitaries to federal employees.

The Food and Drug Administration approved genetically engineered salmon for human consumption. Ethiopian Airlines operated its first flight staffed entirely by women, Salt Lake City elected its first openly gay mayor, and two 35-year-old men became the first gay couple to wed in Ireland. The National Institutes of Health announced that it would end its use of chimpanzees in biomedical experiments, and an animal-rights group sued a Louisiana amusement park for allowing a chimpanzee named Candy to smoke cigarettes and drink Coca-Cola. Read More...

The Islamic State's influence grows; James Harkin interviews its fighters, enemies, and potential recruits

After more than half a century of socialist revolution, Cubans exemplify sustainable living—whether they want to or not.

The Clintons' so-called charitable enterprise has served as a vehicle to launder money and to enrich family friends.

The Canadian Judicial Council was reviewing a judge’s behavior in a 2014 trial in which a 19-year-old woman alleged she had been sexually assaulted. “Why,” the judge had asked the woman, “couldn’t you just keep your knees together?” In Ontario, a woman was arrested for drunk driving after her nine-year-old son, who was in the car with her, called the police; in Ohio, a man was arrested after he forced a nine-year-old neighbor to drive him to a gas station to buy barbecue sauce; and in Florida, an officer scheduled to receive an award from Mothers Against Drunk Driving arrived at the ceremony too drunk to accept it. Read more...

Alexandra Kleeman subjects herself to a week of bed rest, Nat Segnit celebrates Waterloo’s bicentennial, Charlotte Dumas documents Japan’s endangered horses, and more