Back in 2008, when a young senator from Illinois became the 44th president of the United States, I was so proud to be American that I hung a photocopied image of Barack Obama superimposed with the word "Hope" on the door of my Paris flat.
It was such an un-French thing to do; but even my bourgeois neighbours in the 6th arrondissement grinned when they saw it. Some congratulated me as though I had personally got Mr Obama elected. One even sent me a note: “High five. When you guys do it, you really do it right.”
That was a dozen years ago, a golden time when the White House had a cool, highly intelligent African-American man at the helm. For the first time in my many years of living abroad, I did not hide the fact I was born in the US. Mr Obama single-handedly rebranded America after the horror of the Iraq war.
Since then, my country has been assaulted at a level I never could have forecast. Every pillar of democracy is threatened to crack in two: human rights, rule of law, freedom of the press, the justice system. All are endangered.
Egged on by Donald Trump's approach and his terrifying fan base composed of right-wing militias such as the Proud Boys and conspiracy theorists such as QAnon, we've succumbed to a nastiness that is unprecedented. It has made the tribalism between Americans even more apparent; it makes me fear we could head down a road to potential civil war.
Watching President Trump's now infamous 60 Minutes interview last week, when he stormed off the set leaving veteran reporter Lesley Stahl aghast, I wondered when we let this campaign get so dirty. Shouldn't there have been a referee?
Both sides are guilty, but one side more so. The 2020 election makes Mr Trump's 2016 bellicose attacks on Hillary Clinton – the "Lock her up!" and "She's such a nasty woman" taunts – look tame.
The 2020 election has had no holds barred. Mr Trump told Ms Stahl that he was a victim of fake news; that he was bullied; that “Sleepy Joe” never had to answer tough questions; that "Potus" was shown no respect; that he was beleaguered and attacked.
What has been revealed this election season is Mr Trump’s lack of empathy, his mockery of those who are weaker: stutterers, “losers”, the poor, the disenfranchised, those who are not strong enough to become real estate sharks or marry supermodels.
Hunter Biden – an allegedly seedy character but one who deserves compassion for battling addiction, and losing his mother and sister in a childhood car crash – has been used as a centre-piece of Mr Trump's venom. Biden senior has a history of making gaffes – so he's been attacked as intellectually incompetent. The New York Times called the debates so cruel that they were "trampling decorum".
One Massachusetts voter told me she still has “PTSD” from the shock of the 2016 elections. She says she will refuse to watch the election returns this year, because they are too cruel. Instead, she will “take something strong and go to bed early”.
In 2016, a glowing Michelle Obama told the Democratic National Convention: “When they go low, we go high.” It’s been a battle cry for the bullied, the underclass, those who are subjugated. But the Democrats weren’t much better than Mr Trump this time around.
Mr Biden would not have been my choice for president – I backed Elizabeth Warren – but he is, above all, a decent man. He's suffered losses that no one should be expected to shoulder and, despite that, appears not to be broken by life. But even Mr Biden – a veteran Washington politician – seemed stunned by the vehemence of Mr Trump's malicious barbs.
FILE PHOTO: Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden answers a question as President Donald Trump listens during the second and final presidential debate at the Curb Event Center at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S., October 22, 2020. Morry Gash/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
Democratic presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe Biden waves to supporters before speaking at a Drive-In rally in Dallas, Pennsylvania. AFP
Joe Biden delivers remarks at an event in Cincinnati, Ohio. AFP
President Barack Obama awards Vice President Joe Biden the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2017.
President-elect Barack Obama, his wife Michelle, vice president-elect Joe Biden and his wife Jill arrive for an election night party in Chicago, Illinois in 2008. AFP
Jill Biden hugs husband Joe Biden at the end of the final presidential debate at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. AFP
Joe Biden, accompanied by his granddaughter Natalie Biden, speaks to people outside a campaign victory centerin Fort Lauderdale, Florida. AP Photo
Vice-President Joe Biden and his sons Hunter and Beau walk in the Inaugural Parade in 2009 in Washington, DC. Getty Images
Rose Boehle of Davenport, Iowa, becomes emotional as she and one of her granddaughters speaks with Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden at a campaign rally in Iowa. AP Photo
Joe Biden delivers remarks during a Drive-In Presidential campaign event in Tampa, Florida. AFP
"They are vicious," Mr Trump said of the "Dirty Democrats". He called Mr Biden "senile" and said House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi "sounds drunk". Meanwhile, the Lincoln Project, a group of disgruntled Republicans with a brilliant social media strategy, have cruelly gone after Mr Trump to a point where even I – who can't wait to see the end of the Trump presidency – think that he is himself being bullied. The balloons of him wearing a diaper and floating above cities were low blows. The schadenfreude when he tested positive for Covid-19 was mean-spirited. The posters of daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner in Times Square looking like idiots are a step too far.
At what point did we stoop so low? When did elections become 7th grade and full of adolescent angst and pimply aggression? So I started looking back at American history and nasty moments. I found plenty that I was not taught in history class.
US President Donald Trump listens as Nigel Farage (R) speaks during a Make America Great Again rally at Phoenix Goodyear Airport October 28, 2020, in Goodyear, Arizona. / AFP / Brendan Smialowski
U.S. President Donald Trump gives a thumbs up during a campaign rally at Phoenix Goodyear Airport in Goodyear, Arizona, U.S., October 28, 2020. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY
Democratic U.S. presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe Biden takes part in a virtual Get Out the Vote event with Oprah Winfrey in Wilmington, Delaware, U.S., October 28, 2020. REUTERS/Brian Snyder
California Senator and Democratic vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris speaks during a drive-in campaign rally in Phoenix, Arizona on October 28, 2020. / AFP / ARIANA DREHSLER
Vice President Mike Pence motions to his daughter Audrey Pence to walk on stage after he spoke during a campaign top on behalf of President Donald Trump on Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2020, in Flint, Mich. (Nicole Hester/Ann Arbor News via AP)
Jessie Dales entertains supporters as they wait in line to enter the venue where US President Donald J. Trump will speak on a campaign stop, outside the venue at Goodyear Airport in Phoenix, Arizona. EPA
Poll worker Alice Machinist, of Newton, Mass., right, wears a mask and shield out of concern for the coronavirus while assisting a voter, left, with a ballot during early in-person general election voting, at the Newton Free Library, in Newton, Massachusetts. AP Photo
Democratic U.S. presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe Biden and his wife Jill wave as they depart after casting their votes in the 2020 U.S. presidential election in Wilmington, Delaware, Reuters
Mark Swindell (R) and his daughters Ivy (L) and Ella try to keep warm at dawn while waiting in line to attend a campaign rally with U.S. President Donald Trump at Phoenix Goodyear Airport n Goodyear, Arizona. AFP
Tara Immen of Happy Valley, Arizona, wears decorative glasses while waiting in line to attend a campaign rally with U.S. President Donald Trump at Phoenix Goodyear Airport. AFP
-A truck adorned with decorations and a Mitch McConnell sign sits outside of the venue where U.S. Senate Majority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell, makes a campaign stop. AFP
Senate Majority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell stands and speaks to the press and his supporters during a campaign stop in Smithfield, Kentucky. AFP
Julian Belilty, from the Kalorama neighbourhood of the District of Columbia, casts his early vote at the Marie Reed Elementary School in the Adams Morgan Neighborhood in Washington, U.S.. Reuters
Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden speaks outside of the state building after voting in Wilmington, Delaware,. AFP
Scott Brady stands in front of his house with a Trump campaign sign in Springfield, Pa. Once a Democrat, Brady says he switched parties to vote for Donald Trump in 2016, and plans to vote for him again in 2020. AP Photo
Supporters of President Donald Trump cheer as he walks off stage after speaking during a campaign rally at Phoenix Goodyear Airport, in Goodyear, Arizona. AP Photo
In 1800, for instance, former friends and co-draftees of the Declaration of Independence John Adams and Thomas Jefferson went head to head in a most politically incorrect way. The founding fathers were decidedly not moral and decent. Jefferson called Adams “a hideous hermaphroditical character”, neither man nor woman. Adams then predicted a Jeffersonian win would be akin to Armageddon with “female chastity violated… children on pikes”. Jefferson beat the hermaphrodite; the former friends never spoke again.
In 1828, the European-educated statesman John Quincy Adams got personal. He called opponent Andrew Jackson’s mother a common prostitute “who married a mulatto man”. Herbert Hoover was more ridiculous. He smeared Al Smith in 1928, at the height of the Jazz Age, for being Catholic, and a “card-playing, cocktail-drinking [fan of] prize-fighting, divorces, novels, poodles.” In 1964, the notoriously uncouth Texan Lyndon Baines Johnson destroyed the Barry Goldwater campaign by stealing speeches and made an ad of Goldwater blowing up a little girl with an atom bomb.
But nothing came close to Richard Nixon’s renown for cold cruelty. He told his supporters to call New Hampshire voters in the middle of the night whispering that black people would be bussed in for work if they voted for his rival Edmund Muskie. Nixon stole stationery from Muskie and forged the famous “Canuck letter” showing prejudice against Americans of French-Canadian descent. The Canuck letter made Muskie publicly break down in tears.
It got even lower. Nixon also released mice at a news conference with tags on them, calling Muskie "a rat fink". We all know what happened next: Nixon won but karma and the Watergate scandal brought him down.
Mercifully, we are now close to the end of the race. Most Americans are worn out by the pandemic and the economy. The election has been an additional psychological strain. I truly believe the entire American population is suffering from moral injury from the events we have seen over the past six months.
Will we be celebrating a pandemic Thanksgiving – one of the most important American holidays – with a new man heading for the White House? Given 2016’s trauma, I am not going to make a call on who will win. I have already voted; I will wait it out.
But either way, whoever gets it, they should issue a formal apology to the American people for forcing us to endure a long, bitter and deeply unpleasant campaign: one that revealed how low people will go to cling to power.
Janine di Giovanni is a Senior Fellow at Yale University’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan al Banna, "accepted the political utility of violence"
Views of key Muslim Brotherhood ideologue, Sayyid Qutb, have “consistently been understood” as permitting “the use of extreme violence in the pursuit of the perfect Islamic society” and “never been institutionally disowned” by the movement.
Muslim Brotherhood at all levels has repeatedly defended Hamas attacks against Israel, including the use of suicide bombers and the killing of civilians.
Laying out the report in the House of Commons, David Cameron told MPs: "The main findings of the review support the conclusion that membership of, association with, or influence by the Muslim Brotherhood should be considered as a possible indicator of extremism."
ENGLAND SQUAD
Goalkeepers: Jack Butland, Jordan Pickford, Nick Pope Defenders: John Stones, Harry Maguire, Phil Jones, Kyle Walker, Kieran Trippier, Gary Cahill, Ashley Young, Danny Rose, Trent Alexander-Arnold Midfielders: Eric Dier, Jordan Henderson, Dele Alli, Jesse Lingard, Raheem Sterling, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Fabian Delph Forwards: Harry Kane, Jamie Vardy, Marcus Rashford, Danny Welbeck
While the taste of beans and freshness of roast is paramount to the specialty coffee scene, so is sustainability and workers’ rights.
The bulk of genuine specialty coffee companies aim to improve on these elements in every stage of production via direct relationships with farmers. For instance, Mokha 1450 on Al Wasl Road strives to work predominantly with women-owned and -operated coffee organisations, including female farmers in the Sabree mountains of Yemen.
Because, as the boutique’s owner, Garfield Kerr, points out: “women represent over 90 per cent of the coffee value chain, but are woefully underrepresented in less than 10 per cent of ownership and management throughout the global coffee industry.”
One of the UAE’s largest suppliers of green (meaning not-yet-roasted) beans, Raw Coffee, is a founding member of the Partnership of Gender Equity, which aims to empower female coffee farmers and harvesters.
Also, globally, many companies have found the perfect way to recycle old coffee grounds: they create the perfect fertile soil in which to grow mushrooms.
Ali Kasheif, Salim Rashid, Khalifa Al Hammadi, Khalfan Mubarak, Ali Mabkhout, Omar Abdulrahman, Mohammed Al Attas, Abdullah Ramadan, Zayed Al Ameri (Al Jazira), Mohammed Al Shamsi, Hamdan Al Kamali, Mohammed Barghash, Khalil Al Hammadi (Al Wahda), Khalid Essa, Mohammed Shaker, Ahmed Barman, Bandar Al Ahbabi (Al Ain), Al Hassan Saleh, Majid Suroor (Sharjah) Walid Abbas, Ahmed Khalil (Shabab Al Ahli), Tariq Ahmed, Jasim Yaqoub (Al Nasr), Ali Saleh, Ali Salmeen (Al Wasl), Hassan Al Muharami (Baniyas)
How Voiss turns words to speech
The device has a screen reader or software that monitors what happens on the screen
The screen reader sends the text to the speech synthesiser
This converts to audio whatever it receives from screen reader, so the person can hear what is happening on the screen
A VOISS computer costs between $200 and $250 depending on memory card capacity that ranges from 32GB to 128GB
The speech synthesisers VOISS develops are free
Subsequent computer versions will include improvements such as wireless keyboards
Arabic voice in affordable talking computer to be added next year to English, Portuguese, and Spanish synthesiser
Partnerships planned during Expo 2020 Dubai to add more languages
At least 2.2 billion people globally have a vision impairment or blindness
More than 90 per cent live in developing countries
The Long-term aim of VOISS to reach the technology to people in poor countries with workshops that teach them to build their own device
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Favourite breed of dog: All of them. I can’t possibly pick a favourite.
Favourite place in the UAE: The Stray Dogs Centre in Umm Al Quwain. It sounds predictable, but it honestly is my favourite place to spend time. Surrounded by hundreds of dogs that love you - what could possibly be better than that?
Favourite colour: All the colours that dogs come in
South and West: From a Notebook
Joan Didion
Fourth Estate
The National Archives, Abu Dhabi
Founded over 50 years ago, the National Archives collects valuable historical material relating to the UAE, and is the oldest and richest archive relating to the Arabian Gulf.
Much of the material can be viewed on line at the Arabian Gulf Digital Archive - https://www.agda.ae/en
Be honest and transparent: It is always better to own up than be found out. Tell your partner everything they want to know. Show remorse. Inform them of the extent of the situation so they know what they are dealing with.
Work on yourself: Be honest with yourself and your partner and figure out why you did it. Don’t be ashamed to ask for professional help.
Give it time: Like any breach of trust, it requires time to rebuild. So be consistent, communicate often and be patient with your partner and yourself.
Discuss your financial situation regularly: Ensure your spouse is involved in financial matters and decisions. Your ability to consistently follow through with what you say you are going to do when it comes to money can make all the difference in your partner’s willingness to trust you again.
Work on a plan to resolve the problem together: If there is a lot of debt, for example, create a budget and financial plan together and ensure your partner is fully informed, involved and supported.
Carol Glynn, founder of Conscious Finance Coaching
The UAE has a good record on gender pay parity, according to Mercer's Total Remuneration Study.
"In some of the lower levels of jobs women tend to be paid more than men, primarily because men are employed in blue collar jobs and women tend to be employed in white collar jobs which pay better," said Ted Raffoul, career products leader, Mena at Mercer. "I am yet to see a company in the UAE – particularly when you are looking at a blue chip multinationals or some of the bigger local companies – that actively discriminates when it comes to gender on pay."
Mr Raffoul said most gender issues are actually due to the cultural class, as the population is dominated by Asian and Arab cultures where men are generally expected to work and earn whereas women are meant to start a family.
"For that reason, we see a different gender gap. There are less women in senior roles because women tend to focus less on this but that’s not due to any companies having a policy penalising women for any reasons – it’s a cultural thing," he said.
As a result, Mr Raffoul said many companies in the UAE are coming up with benefit package programmes to help working mothers and the career development of women in general.
When: The one-off Test starts on Friday, May 11 What time: Each day’s play is scheduled to start at 2pm UAE time. TV: The match will be broadcast on OSN Sports Cricket HD. Subscribers to the channel can also stream the action live on OSN Play.
IF YOU GO The flights: FlyDubai offers direct flights to Catania Airport from Dubai International Terminal 2 daily with return fares starting from Dh1,895. The details: Access to the 2,900-metre elevation point at Mount Etna by cable car and 4x4 transport vehicle cost around €57.50 (Dh248) per adult. Entry into Teatro Greco costs €10 (Dh43). For more go to www.visitsicily.info
Where to stay:Hilton Giardini Naxos offers beachfront access and accessible to Taormina and Mount Etna. Rooms start from around €130 (Dh561) per night, including taxes.
When it is unveiled at Abu Dhabi Art, the Standing Tall exhibition will appear as an interplay of poetry and art. The 100 scarves are 100 fragments surrounding five, figurative, female sculptures, and both sculptures and scarves are hand-embroidered by a group of refugee women artisans, who used the Palestinian cross-stitch embroidery art of tatreez. Fragments of Sheikh Zayed’s poem Your Love is Ruling My Heart, written in Arabic as a love poem to his nation, are embroidered onto both the sculptures and the scarves. Here is the English translation.
Your love is ruling over my heart
Your love is ruling over my heart, even a mountain can’t bear all of it
Woe for my heart of such a love, if it befell it and made it its home
You came on me like a gleaming sun, you are the cure for my soul of its sickness
Be lenient on me, oh tender one, and have mercy on who because of you is in ruins
You are like the Ajeed Al-reem [leader of the gazelle herd] for my country, the source of all of its knowledge
You waddle even when you stand still, with feet white like the blooming of the dates of the palm
Oh, who wishes to deprive me of sleep, the night has ended and I still have not seen you
You are the cure for my sickness and my support, you dried my throat up let me go and damp it
Help me, oh children of mine, for in his love my life will pass me by.
There are different types of travel available for pets:
Manifest cargo
Excess luggage in the hold
Excess luggage in the cabin
Each option is safe. The feasibility of each option is based on the size and breed of your pet, the airline they are traveling on and country they are travelling to.
2. What is the difference between my pet traveling as manifest cargo or as excess luggage?
If traveling as manifest cargo, your pet is traveling in the front hold of the plane and can travel with or without you being on the same plane. The cost of your pets travel is based on volumetric weight, in other words, the size of their travel crate.
If traveling as excess luggage, your pet will be in the rear hold of the plane and must be traveling under the ticket of a human passenger. The cost of your pets travel is based on the actual (combined) weight of your pet in their crate.
3. What happens when my pet arrives in the country they are traveling to?
As soon as the flight arrives, your pet will be taken from the plane straight to the airport terminal.
If your pet is traveling as excess luggage, they will taken to the oversized luggage area in the arrival hall. Once you clear passport control, you will be able to collect them at the same time as your normal luggage. As you exit the airport via the ‘something to declare’ customs channel you will be asked to present your pets travel paperwork to the customs official and / or the vet on duty.
If your pet is traveling as manifest cargo, they will be taken to the Animal Reception Centre. There, their documentation will be reviewed by the staff of the ARC to ensure all is in order. At the same time, relevant customs formalities will be completed by staff based at the arriving airport.
4. How long does the travel paperwork and other travel preparations take?
This depends entirely on the location that your pet is traveling to. Your pet relocation compnay will provide you with an accurate timeline of how long the relevant preparations will take and at what point in the process the various steps must be taken.
In some cases they can get your pet ‘travel ready’ in a few days. In others it can be up to six months or more.
5. What vaccinations does my pet need to travel?
Regardless of where your pet is traveling, they will need certain vaccinations. The exact vaccinations they need are entirely dependent on the location they are traveling to. The one vaccination that is mandatory for every country your pet may travel to is a rabies vaccination.
Other vaccinations may also be necessary. These will be advised to you as relevant. In every situation, it is essential to keep your vaccinations current and to not miss a due date, even by one day. To do so could severely hinder your pets travel plans.
Duterte Harry: Fire and Fury in the Philippines
Jonathan Miller, Scribe Publications
The specs
Engine: 3.0-litre twin-turbo flat-six
Power: 480hp at 6,500rpm
Torque: 570Nm from 2,300-5,000rpm
Transmission: 8-speed dual-clutch auto
Fuel consumption: 10.4L/100km
Price: from Dh547,600
On sale: now
