UK - A baking competition. Hundreds of street parties. A large military parade and beacons lit across the country. Buckingham Palace is pulling out the stops to mark Queen Elizabeth II’s 70 years on the British throne. The bumper celebration for the country’s longest-serving monarch will look to both commemorate her historic contribution to the British nation and act as a rallying point following a tumultuous few years for both the country and its monarchy.

EUROPE - When Joe Biden became president of the United States, Brussels breathed a huge sigh of relief. Gone was the unpredictable and openly Eurosceptic Donald Trump, and in was a man they could deal with. The Eurocrats must have thought there could be a return of normality and cordial relations, based on an ideological meeting of minds and trust. It has, however, turned out to be anything but. It is fair to say that the European Union had a fractious relationship with the Trump administration. There were battles over trade, finance, and pretty much everything else. Moreover, the president was an open supporter of Brexit, which no doubt infuriated the Eurocrats.

USA - Supply chain disruptions have not been resolved, and it’s not clear when they will be. You’re seeing the effects of these disruptions at the store in the forms of shortages and higher prices. Yet the supply chain is a subject that very few are familiar with beyond a superficial acquaintance. Most people think the supply chain is just part of the global economy. That’s not entirely true. The supply chain is the global economy. There isn’t a single good or service of any kind that does not arrive through a supply chain. Not one. If the global supply chain is broken, then the global economy is broken. That increasingly appears to be the case. The supply chain difficulties will grow worse. Even more troubling is the fact that the remedies will take years and sometimes decades to implement.

ITALY - Say goodbye to your freedoms. From the end of January you will need a Greenpass to enter banks in Italy. For the time being they still accept a negative test with Greenpass basic but if they ever upgrade to Greenpass Super - and I am sure they would love to - only proof of boosting will be accepted and your access to the financial system will be severely limited if you are not up to date with your quarterly shots. The Italian government has recently stated that they are not responsible if you die from vaccination because it was your choice to take the vaccines.

USA - Negotiators for the United States are planning to show up to talks with their Russian counterparts Monday with proposals to discuss the placement of missiles and scope of military exercises in Europe, according to a senior administration official and others familiar with the plans. The White House is looking to test whether Moscow is serious about ending the Ukraine crisis through diplomacy or is making unworkable demands as a delay tactic or pretext for a new invasion. The bilateral talks in Geneva - with Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman leading the US delegation and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov serving as lead representative for the Russians - come as Moscow continues to mass forces and materiel on the border with Ukraine, threatening to take military measures if Washington and its allies fail to address the Kremlin's security concerns.

USA - A Constitutional law professor has predicted that the US Supreme Court is likely to overrule Roe vs Wade. While speaking with The Catholic Spirit, University of St Thomas law professor Teresa Collett argued that abortion “has no roots in the Constitution.” “Roe is purely a judicial creation — it has no roots in the language of the Constitution, American history, or our legal traditions. As such, what the Court created, the Court can reject,” she told The Catholic Spirit. After nearly 50 years of abortion on demand, Collett said the court finally may overturn Roe. “Truth is on our side,” she said. “As a majority of the judges on the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit recognized in Planned Parenthood vs Rounds, abortion terminates ‘the life of a whole separate, unique living human being.’”

USA - Getting “vaccinated” for the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) could mean losing your life insurance coverage. According to reports, many who took the experimental gene therapy from Donald Trump’s “Operation Warp Speed” program are now coming to the realization that their death benefits have been voided. Apparently the life insurance industry considers the emergency use-authorized injections to be an “experimental medical intervention” – which is exactly what they are. Consequently, they do not qualify for a payout. Only vaccines that have undergone the normal testing and vetting process are covered…

USA - There’s a growing global potato shortage — a real problem for a planet addicted to French fries and chips. A number of popular items, including Marmite and cream cheese, have faced scarcities amid supply chain disruptions wrought by the coronavirus pandemic and extreme weather. Potatoes are the latest to join the list, becoming unevenly available in some countries and fast-food chains because of a confluence of factors. In Japan, McDonald’s locations stopped offering large and medium-size french fry orders late last month, after pandemic-related supply chain issues and floods in the Port of Vancouver delayed potato shipments. Days later, South Africa’s leading makers of potato chips warned that potatoes were in disturbingly short supply after a bad frost and excessive rains led to low local yields, on top of global sourcing shortages.

USA - With NASCAR’s move, virtually every American sport league is now actively, unashamedly pro-LGBT, committed to promoting sodomy as good, and essentially tossing the complementarity of man and woman into the dumpster of history. NASCAR, the nation’s premiere stock car competition organization featuring the biggest names in auto racing, announced Wednesday that it has partnered with an LGBTQ+ organization to “promote diversity, equity, and inclusion training.” “NASCAR is excited to partner with the Carolinas LGBT+ Chamber of Commerce,” said Brandon Thompson, NASCAR’s vice president of diversity and inclusion. “We know that fans of NASCAR look different, they love different, they’re differently able,” Thompson told radio station WFAE in December after NASCAR made “a major donation” to the Carolinas LGBT+ Chamber of Commerce. “This gives us an opportunity to let them know that we see them as well as support them.”

FAR EAST - McDonald's has run out of hash browns in Taiwan and limits fries to small-size one for a second time in Japan due to global supply chain havoc. The fast food company in Taiwan said it was running out of hash browns imported from the United States and would have to suspend sales due to 'unstable global shipping supply'. McDonald's put up signs in some storefronts announcing the suspensions while the item is listed as 'temporarily unavailable' on its menus. 'There is a shortage of hash browns in McDonald's restaurants and sales will be temporarily suspended after they are sold out,' a statement posted on the company's website said. Supply chain shortages have rippled across the globe during the coronavirus pandemic affecting everything from building materials, wood and food to books, microchips and electronics.

GERMANY - For the first time in the country's history, Germany has appointed a commissioner for the acceptance of sexual and gender diversity. Green Party lawmaker Sven Lehmann will oversee a LGBTQ national action plan: the "Federal Government Commissioner for the Acceptance of Sexual and Gender Diversity". Lehmann said "everyone should be able to live freely, safely, and with equal rights." Cologne is home to one of the country's largest gay communities. The German Society for Trans Identity and Intersexuality (dgti) also said it looked forward to working with Lehmann on the path to a "better world for all trans, inter and non-binary people."

MOROCCO - Beijing’s new deal with Rabat, which could turn Morocco into a key trade hub for Europe and Africa, shows how China is using strategic thinking rather than military muscle to extend its influence globally. Morocco is a strategically important North African country that sits at a crossroads between multiple regions of the world. To its immediate north is the Iberian Peninsula and the Mediterranean Sea. To the south and east is the rest of the African continent, and to the west is the vast Atlantic Ocean and the Americas.

GERMANY - Germany and the EU are at risk of losing out in the world's most significant growth region, business representatives warn, regarding the world's largest free trade agreement RCEP (Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership), which became effective on January 1, and is still hardly known in Germany. RCEP is a free trade agreement (FTA) between 15 countries of the Asia-Pacific region, which includes the world's second and third largest economies – China’s and Japan’s respectively. Together, the RCEP countries represent nearly a third of the global GDP. RCEP has the potential of consolidating international supply chains within its member countries, luring production sites away – also from Germany, for example – and to set globally important trade norms and industrial standards. The new free trade alliance is a structural consequence of the shift in the balance of forces from the Atlantic to the Pacific and of former colonies turning their backs on their former colonial powers. German business representatives are calling for swift action to prevent potential losses to the German industry.

USA - PragerU founder and radio host Dennis Prager discussed Facebook’s so-called “fact checkers,” telling Breitbart News in an exclusive interview that if the statement “men give birth” is considered a fact, “then the word ‘fact’ means nothing.” Prager and Breitbart News editor-in-chief Alex Marlow sat down at Turning Point USA’s recent AmericaFest conference in Phoenix, Arizona, where Marlow mentioned that Facebook has admitted their fact checks are opinion, not facts. “Well, that should be clear,” Prager said. “If ‘men give birth’ is offered as fact, then the word ‘fact’ means nothing.”

GERMANY - The thorny issue of how to face up to Vladimir Putin's Russia is one of the biggest foreign policy challenges for Germany's new chancellor, Olaf Scholz, and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock. In the coalition agreement that forms the basis for Germany's three-party government of center-left Social Democrats (SPD), Greens and pro-free market Free Democrats (FDP), there is one sentence that could spark any manner of friction and tension. It reads: "We need a resolute and substantial foreign, security, development and human rights policy that is integrated and cohesive."