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It's National Smoothie Day, which means it's time for a sweet treat ... like this gallery of sexy celebs sippin' on their favorite fruity beverages!!! Stars like Heidi Klum, Winnie Harlow and Sabrina Carpenter clearly
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Oliver Tree's family can now rest a little easier ... because his body has been returned to the United States after the tragic helicopter crash that took his life last weekend. A tribute post popped
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Donald Trump Blonde Woman in Late-Night Post Identified ... Mother of Republican Chairwoman Published June 21, 2026 3:30 PM PDT President Donald Trump's late-night post of a blonde woman sparked confusion online ... and led
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President Donald Trump says work is already underway to repair what he described as a heavily vandalized Reflecting Pool after he reportedly personally inspected the damage. Trump took to Truth Social to share his reaction
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Travis Kelce Races Down to S.D. for NASCAR ... After Partying in L.A. Published June 21, 2026 2:49 PM PDT Travis Kelce is approaching the checkered flag on his boys weekend ... pulling up to
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Play video content Britney Spears says she's keeping her fingers crossed to have another chance at motherhood telling fans she wants to have a ... baby one more time. The singer-songwriter shared a video of
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It began, as the most consequential quarrels often do, with something faintly absurd: a photograph that may or may not have been asked for. Two leaders on a small sofa at the Hotel Royal in Évian-les-Bains, a G7 session on artificial intelligence just adjourned, a handshake, a parting. From that single, unremarkable frame has unspooled the most public rupture between Washington and a European capital in years. The match was struck on a telephone line. Speaking to the Italian broadcaster La7 after the summit — and raising the subject himself — US President Donald Trump cast Italy’s prime minister as a supplicant. “She begged me to take a photo with her. She wanted a photo with me so badly — I could have skipped it, but I felt sorry for her,” he said. Pressed afterwards by NBC, he declined to retreat an inch: “That’s true. She wasn’t there for us.” One word did the damage. Beg. Giorgia Meloni’s reply, filmed and posted within hours, dispensed with three years of careful deference. “Donald Trump’s statements are completely fabricated. I’m frankly stunned,” she began, before sliding the blade in with a diplomat’s smile: she could only regret, she said, that he “doesn’t have the same determination with the enemies of the West ... with leaderships with which he instead appears much more accommodating.” Then the sentence that Italians of every stripe would carry like a banner: “But you must remember one thing: neither I nor Italy ever beg.” Trump, who guards the last word the way other men guard oxygen, was back on Truth Social by Saturday. “Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni asked, over and over, for a picture with me during the G-7 meeting in France,” he wrote, before widening the grievance: “She wouldn’t even let us use Italy’s landing strips or runways, a great logistical inconvenience, and this despite the fact the U.S. contributes hundreds of Billions of Dollars a year to protect Italy, and other ‘so-called’ NATO Allies.” The sign-off was pure Trump: “Now, after the United States defeated Iran militarily, she wants to be friends again in order to get her ‘numbers up.’ No thanks!!!” Meloni did not blink. “President Trump, these constant, unprovoked attacks are senseless,” she answered on Instagram, before delivering the cut that travelled furthest: “As for my popularity, being your friend certainly has not helped it ... My popularity is none of your concern. I suggest you focus on yours.” The photograph was only the spark; the powder had been laid for months. The friendship was, once, genuine and conspicuous. Meloni was the lone European leader at Trump’s second inauguration; he had called her a “fantastic woman” who was “really taking Europe by storm,” and his circle returned the warmth — Don Jr. wrote a foreword for the English edition of her memoir, JD Vance another for the sequel. Then came the strains: tariffs that left a 15% levy on most EU goods despite Rome’s lobbying; Trump’s musings about annexing Greenland; and, decisively, the US-Israeli war on Iran. Meloni refused to let American warplanes refuel at the Sigonella base in Sicily and declined to call the campaign anything but illegal. When Trump turned his fire on Pope Leo XIV for condemning the war, she broke her silence to call the attack on the pontiff “unacceptable.” He retorted that she “lacked courage.” The sofa at Évian was meant to be the reconciliation. It became the detonator instead. To understand why a photo caption could rupture a friendship, look at the two principals. Meloni was forged in Garbatella, a working-class quarter of Rome built for rail and dock workers — abandoned by her father before she was two, sleeping as a child on a mattress on her grandparents’ floor after a house fire. Grit, her sister has said, is what that childhood bequeathed her. She built a brand — “I am Giorgia, a woman, a mother, an Italian, a Christian” — on the politics of dignity and national honour. For a leader who learned her English from Michael Jackson records and her defiance from being the outsider in every room, beg is not an insult; it is a desecration. As one Roman political scientist put it, for a nationalist honour is never merely personal but political — to slight the leader is to slight the flag. Trump is the photographic negative of all this. Where Meloni trades in honour, he trades in dominance and the ledger. His instinct is to recast every encounter as a favour bestowed — “I could have skipped it,” “I didn’t have to talk to her” — and every ally as a fan whose usefulness has lapsed. Loyalty, in his grammar, flows one way; the moment Rome declined to lend its runways, the warm adjectives curdled. He is, above all, transactional, with a documented habit of converting personal pique into economic pressure. That is what makes this more than theatre. There is a reason the insult landed across Italy’s entire political spectrum, drawing even opposition senators who cannot abide Meloni to her defence, prompting Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani to brand the remarks an offence to “all of Italy” and cancel his Washington trip, and moving Deputy Premier Matteo Salvini to declare that whoever attacks Meloni attacks every Italian. A post that paints a sovereign nation’s elected leader as a fawning beggar does not wound one woman; it reduces a country to a posture of servility before a watching world. Strip away the personalities and a hard truth remains: to depict another nation’s head of government as a supplicant is to spit, however casually, on its flag. Pride, once punctured in public, demands an answer — which is precisely why this one will not subside on command. Where, then, does it go? In the short run, paradoxically, the quarrel may be a gift to Meloni. Long mocked at home as Trump’s vassal in Europe, she now wears the role of the smaller nation’s leader standing up to the bully — a narrative tailor-made for an election season in which the firebrand Roberto Vannacci is hunting her right flank. The longer game is bleaker. Her foreign policy, built on being Washington’s bridge to Brussels, lies in tatters; she must rebuild it without appearing to flip-flop, for voters remember the MAGA hats. And looming over everything is a trade relationship worth some $120bn and a president whose tariff machinery has, before now, run on grudges. The photograph at Évian has been printed, dubbed and disowned. What it develops into — a passing squall or the first frost of a longer estrangement — will be decided not by who begged whom, but by whether a man who never apologises and a woman who never begs can each, somehow, find a way to look away. The writer is Deputy Managing Editor, Gulf Times.
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Alan Greenspan, the longtime US Federal Reserve chief who presided over an unprecedented period of American economic expansion but was faulted for failing to rein in markets ahead of the 2008 global financial crisis, has died aged 100. Greenspan guided the world’s biggest economy through a stock market crash in 1987 as he first took up his post, the Mexican and Asian financial crises, the dotcom boom and bust, and the September 11, 2001 attacks. A native New Yorker who excelled at math as a child but initially studied music before pivoting to economics, Greenspan spent decades in the inner circles of power in Washington, ultimately leading the Fed for presidents of both political parties. Greenspan was hailed by some as the greatest central banker the world has ever known, winning praise for his steady hand and cool demeanor. Supporters admired his willingness to cut interest rates and keep them low even as unemployment rates fell, which conventional wisdom said would cause inflation to spiral out of control. But his impenetrable prose — used to avoid committing to any particular course — and his confidence in unfettered markets and institutions to correct themselves frustrated critics, who believed the US economy needed stronger guardrails. And after the world sank into crisis in 2008, soon after his retirement in 2006, his decision not to do anything to rein in the mortgage markets was viewed as naive. Born on March 6, 1926, Greenspan grew up an only child raised mostly by his mother after she separated from his stockbroker father. Initially, rather than going to college, he attended the elite Juilliard School to study music. After he was declared unfit to serve in the military due to a lung issue, he went on to play clarinet and saxophone in a band. Greenspan earned $62 a week — more than his mother was making in her job at a department store, according to biographer Sebastian Mallaby, who wrote The Man Who Knew: The Life and Times of Alan Greenspan in 2016. He read books on finance in his free time and helped his bandmates with their taxes. In 1945, he quit music to attend New York University, where he would eventually earn a PhD in economics. Greenspan started a consulting firm where he delved into economic and manufacturing data, a habit that would become the trademark — he was known for poring over statistics in his bathtub. His thinking evolved during his career, but he never fully relinquished his Randian support of laissez-faire economies free from government intervention. Greenspan entered politics in the late 1960s as an adviser to Richard Nixon during his successful campaign for president, but initially declined to take a job in the Republican administration. When he did accept the post of White House economic adviser, he was not confirmed until after Nixon resigned in disgrace, and working for Gerald Ford. In 1987, another Republican president, Ronald Reagan, named Greenspan to serve as chair of the Federal Reserve. It was a position he would hold until January 2006 serving under four presidents — Reagan, George H W Bush, his Democratic successor Bill Clinton and George W Bush. Greenspan was tested early in his new post — on “Black Monday” in October 1987, the benchmark Dow Jones Industrial Average collapsed by nearly 23 percent — still the biggest single-day percentage drop in the index’s history — as part of a global market crash. The new Fed chair issued a terse statement promising central bank support, and the Fed pumped liquidity into the financial system. It worked. Rather than another Great Depression like the one that followed the 1929 crash, markets recovered quickly.
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Lionel Messi rewrote the World Cup record books on Monday, becoming the tournament's all-time leading scorer with both goals in Argentina's 2-0 victory over Austria that secured the holders' passage to the last 32. (Reuters)
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Qatar players train ahead of their decisive FIFA World Cup Group B clash against Bosnia and Herzegovina in Seattle on Wednesday. Qatar and Bosnia and Herzegovina go into their final World Cup Group B game on Wednesday in Seattle knowing they realistically must win to progress, with a possible last-32 clash against co-hosts the United States the prize on offer. The two sides began their tournaments well enough as Qatar, whose only previous finals appearance was on home soil in 2022, snatched a late equaliser against Switzerland while Bosnia held Canada to a creditable draw. Their disastrous second matches, however, leave them targeting third in Group B, which could set up a knockout game against the US in San Francisco on July 1 - but only if one of them can grab all three points in Seattle. Qatar were simply blown away, already 2-0 down when Homam al-Amin was sent off to open the floodgates in a 6-0 drubbing. Bosnia held out for more than 70 minutes until the wheels fell off in a 4-1 defeat by the Swiss. The hefty margins of defeat severely damaged their goal difference, which could hamper their chances of progress if they are level on points with rival third-placed teams. With two points surely not enough to qualify, a draw is no use to either side and could make for an open game. Neither nation have made it out of the group before, though, and are more comfortable setting up to defend and counter. Qatar will miss both al-Amin and Assim Madibo after they were sent off against Canada, with Madibo's rash challenge leaving Ismael Kone with a broken leg. Their coach Julen Lopetegui sought to emphasise the positives after last week's hammering, saying Qatar still had everything to play for. "There are other countries, big countries, they are looking at the World Cup on TV - and we are here," he said after the Canada game. "Now we have one final in front of us." Bosnia - who defeated Italy on penalties to qualify - will be strong favourites, but are without highly-rated 23-year-old defender Tarik Muharemovic after his straight red against Switzerland. Coach Sergej Barbarez said Muharemovic would be missed for the must-win game, but added: "I don't like whining. I think we have a sufficient number of good players to replace him." With Canada and Switzerland occupying the top two places, victory is essential for either side to boost their chances of progressing as one of the tournament’s eight best third-placed teams. Goal difference could prove crucial, with Canada leading the group at +6, ahead of Switzerland (+3), while Bosnia (-3) and Qatar (-6) face a difficult challenge. A positive result would keep Qatar firmly in contention heading into the final phase of qualification calculations. Related Story
