Meta is ending its fact-checking program for Facebook and Instagram in the United States as part of a bigger shift to expand freedom of speech.  |
- Meta is ending its fact-checking program for Facebook and Instagram in the United States as part of a bigger shift to expand freedom of speech.
- President-elect Donald Trump would not rule out using military or economic coercion to take control of the Panama Canal and Greenland.
- The House of Representatives has passed the Laken Riley Act, which requires the Department of Homeland Security to detain illegal immigrants who have committed certain crimes, such as theft, burglary, or shoplifting.
- A fast-moving wildfire erupted in the Southern California coastal city of Pacific Palisades, about 20 miles west of Los Angeles, destroying homes in one of the nation's wealthiest communities and forcing 30,000 residents to evacuate.
- After the news: the secret to maintaining a happy marriage.
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Mark Zuckerberg (Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times) |
Meta is ending its fact-checking program for Facebook and Instagram in the United States and replacing it with community notes, similar to the system used by Elon Musk-owned social media platform X. The change is part of a larger package of reforms announced by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Tuesday. Meta will also begin to display more political content on its platforms, adjust its filters to focus on severe violations, and work with President-elect Donald Trump to resist censorship pressure from foreign nations. "It's time to get back to our roots around free expression on Facebook and Instagram," Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a video. The fact-checkers "have become too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they created, especially in the U.S.," Zuckerberg said. After Trump was elected in 2016, Meta started a fact-checking program. Third parties would review content, leading to posts being removed or flagged. Community notes are based on feedback from users. Notes that receive a certain number of votes across people with different ideologies are displayed under posts. The notes "empower their community to decide when posts are potentially misleading and need more context, and people across a diverse range of perspectives decide what sort of context is helpful for other users to see," Joel Kaplan, Meta's chief global affairs officer, said in a Jan. 7 blog post. Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and WhatsApp, is also simplifying its content policies by removing rules related to topics such as immigration and gender. While Meta will still act the same when it comes to severe violations for topics such as drugs, the company will only act against posts that are deemed low severity if people report the post. In the past, Meta used its systems to scan the platform for violations and took action against posts that violated its policies. The change will result in fewer bad posts being taken down but will also reduce accidental takedowns, Zuckerberg said, as mistakes have been made.
"Even if they accidentally censor just one percent of posts, that's millions of people. And we've reached a point where it's just too many mistakes and too much censorship," Zuckerberg said. (More)
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President-elect Donald Trump (Scott Olson/Getty Images) |
President-elect Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he would not rule out the possibility of using military or economic coercion to take control of the Panama Canal and Greenland, emphasizing their strategic significance to U.S. national security. Responding to a question on the topic during a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago residence, Trump said that he "cannot assure" that military or economic coercion would not be used to take control of these two strategic locations. "No, I can't assure you on either of those two, but I can say this, we need them for economic security," Trump responded. "It might be that you'll have to do something. Look, the Panama Canal is vital to our country. It's being operated by China. We gave the Panama Canal to Panama. We didn't give it to China, and they've abused it. They've abused that gift." Trump, in recent social media posts, expressed his frustration over China's expanding influence in the canal, despite it having been built by the United States more than 110 years ago at great financial and human cost. The Panama Canal, which opened in 1914 after a decade of construction led by the United States, was gradually handed back to Panama under a 1977 treaty signed by President Jimmy Carter. While the canal is controlled by Panama, the ports at either end of the passage are operated by a subsidiary of a Hong Kong conglomerate, which has prompted national security concerns among U.S. lawmakers and experts. China expanded its Orwellian national security laws in Hong Kong. (More) More on Territorial Expansion |
- Trump said on Tuesday that he intends to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.
- Donald Trump Jr. arrived in Greenland on Jan. 7 as his father repeated calls for the United States to acquire the northern Atlantic country.
- "There isn't a snowball's chance in hell that Canada would become part of the United States," Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on social media platform X on Jan. 7. Trudeau was responding to Trump's suggestion that the two countries get rid of their "artificially drawn" border.
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- President Joe Biden met with Venezuelan opposition leader Edmundo Gonzalez at the White House on Monday, just days before Nicolas Maduro is due to be sworn in for a third term as president of the South American nation.
- Trump vowed to replace the current head of the National Archives amid the agency's role in a classified documents case that was brought against him.
- Trump announced a $20 billion foreign investment to construct new data centers across the United States. Emirati billionaire businessman Hussain Sajwani said he has waited for four years to bolster investments in the United States.
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Fire personnel respond to homes destroyed while a helicopter drops water as the Palisades Fire grows in Pacific Palisades, Calif., on Jan. 7, 2025. (David Swanson/AFP/Getty Images) |
A fast-moving wildfire erupted in the Southern California coastal city of Pacific Palisades, about 20 miles west of Los Angeles, destroying homes as Santa Ana winds ripped through the region on Jan. 7. The Palisades Fire burned an unknown number of homes in the city as 30,000 residents were forced to evacuate. The fire had grown to about 2 square miles by 3 p.m. and was continuing to spread throughout the residential area. Many homes could be seen burning and there were reports of police and fire crews rescuing people from burning buildings. Traffic slowed nearly to a halt on the Pacific Coast Highway as residents attempted to evacuate. Some opted to exit their cars and start walking out of the area. (More) More U.S. News |
- Getty Images and Shutterstock are merging to form a $3.7 billion media company.
- U.S. corporate bankruptcy filings have soared to a 14-year high as U.S. businesses continue to face pressure from tighter credit conditions and softer consumer demand.
- "Shark Tank" investor Kevin O'Leary has backed efforts to acquire social media platform TikTok less than two weeks before the video-sharing platform is set to be banned across the country.
- Following the August 2024 release of a U.S. government report linking higher levels of fluoride in drinking water to lower IQ in children, a new review conducted by the National Institutes of Health appears to confirm those findings.
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Pierre Poilievre (The Canadian Press/Sean Kilpatrick) |
Pierre Poilievre, the leader of Canada's Conservative Party, is polling at his historic best, with more than 40 percent picking him as their preferred candidate for prime minister in a new survey. The findings of Nanos Research's latest weekly ballot tracking indicate that Poilievre is far and away the preferred choice. Of the 1,021 Canadians surveyed last week, 40.5 percent chose Poilievre as their pick for prime minister. This is up 0.5 percentage points over the previous week, 5.7 percentage points from three months ago in early October 2024, and more than 9 percentage points from a year ago. A total of 17.5 percent chose Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in the latest poll, which was done the week ending Jan. 3, before Trudeau announced his intention to step down on Jan. 6. Just 13.9 percent chose New Democratic Party leader Jagmeet Singh. Those in favor of a change in Canada got closer to their wish on Jan. 6 when Trudeau announced he would step down as prime minister and Liberal Party leader as soon as his replacement is chosen. The announcement came after three weeks of heightened turmoil within the party following former Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland's resignation from cabinet on Dec. 16. Her strongly worded resignation letter was critical of Trudeau and escalated public calls by Liberal Party lawmakers for him to step down. (More) More World News: |
- The World Health Organization said that the risk of bird flu to the general population remains low after the first death from the disease was recorded in the United States.
- South Korea's transport minister announced on Tuesday his intention to step down from his post over the fatal plane crash at Muan International Airport last month.
- The United Kingdom is leading a military operation to track threats to undersea infrastructure and monitor Russia's "shadow fleet."
- Ontario is launching an initiative to bolster border security with the United States as the country faces tariff threats from the incoming U.S. administration.
- Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder of France's National Front party, died on Tuesday at the age of 96.
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Emil Stach / Ritzau Scanpix / AFP |
According to studies, couples who go on regular dates are more likely to have happy marriages. (Biba Kayewich) |
If there was a simple way to improve communication, commitment, intimacy, stability, and overall happiness in a marriage, who wouldn't take advantage of it? Yet, over half of married people report that they don't make use of this one simple habit to bolster their relationship with their husband or wife. The simple habit is continuing to regularly date your spouse even after marriage. A landmark study by W. Bradford Wilcox and Jeffrey Dew of the National Marriage Project found that regular date nights between married couples are associated with better relationships and lower divorce rates when compared to those couples who don't date. Building on these results, Wilcox and Dew set about breaking down the benefits of an ongoing dating life. They identified five areas of impact. Communication—By carving out time and space free from children, work, and other responsibilities and distractions, couples are more free to discuss the things that matter to them. Novelty—Dating, especially dating in new and exciting ways, can help overcome the problem of familiarity and routine in marriage. Eros—Continuing to date your spouse and making the effort to see them as the attractive, exciting, and unique person that they are, nurtures the flame of romance. Commitment—Frequent dating proclaims to yourselves and to the world that you and your spouse are committed to one another, dedicated to deepening and preserving your relationship through the joys and sorrows of life, decade after decade. De-stress—An enjoyable time with one's spouse is an excellent means of relieving stress, and thus protects the marriage.
Read the full article by our colleague Walker Larson here.
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