This section aims to snapshot big stories – or often just the story of the day amid a mass of headline overload. I’ll aim to use it to link to front pages or editorial cartoons.
(This page picks up from a previous ‘Latest’ page which was taking too long to load, since it ran back a couple of years)
The States of Play Substack is here; or you can just read the baseball posts for the 2026 season here.
For up-to-date baseball news and standings via MLB.com, click here.
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October 21:
- Ukraine’s Fate Will Be America’s Shame – October 20
Donald Trump’s megalomania is just one of his steadily worsening characteristics. None of them bode well for the nation.
“There is, as Phillips O’Brien recently put it, no more pretense.
“Donald Trump has been serially disloyal and unfaithful to every person in his life, except for Vladimir Putin. He craves the affection and approval of the Russian dictator, loves talking with him, loves doing Putin’s bidding and, most of all, loves being with him.”
The personal relationship between the two men notwithstanding, it has been the case since Trump was returned to office that the tectonic plates of global diplomacy are shifting – not in the direction of democracy and not, crucially, in a way that will be easy to reverse, regardless of who might succeed the current US president.
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October 20:
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October 16:
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October 15:
None of any of this is a coincidence…
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October 12:
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October 10:
If we were really in any doubt by this stage that Nato was in tatters due to Donald Trump, confirmation came with the president’s “birthday gift” to Vladimir Putin of a deal to release Russia from US sanctions so it could sell diesel fuel to the US and the world market.
The Guardian reported:
“In a move likely to create a fresh crisis with Washington’s Nato allies, Trump announced the deal with Putin on his Truth Social network, saying it was essential to reduce fuel prices in the US, which have soared as a result of his decision to go to war against Iran.”
Trump’s move was widely criticised in Ukraine, the US and among what’s left of their “allies”.
Lionel Barber wrote that the move was a “stab in the back” and that the “dirty deal … further guts America’s moral authority.”
“Trump’s dirty deal offers Putin relief just as Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil refineries were starting to hurt and the wider war brought home to the Russian public. Now the administration has threatened to cut off vital intelligence sharing if Kiev continues to target Russian energy installations. These are tactics worthy of the Corleones designed to break the spirit of the Zelensky government.
“Moreover, the timing is profoundly suspect. Not so much a gesture aimed at appeasing American farmers and truckers worried about energy cost ahead of the November mid-term elections; more a signal that Trump has abandoned any pretense of even-handedness in the charade otherwise known as Ukraine-Russia peace talks.”
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October 8:
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October 6:
‘Ship Of Fools Heads For The Rocks’
And the captain won’t change course.
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October 3:
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September 29:
Oh dear, Sen Eric Schmitt. Oh dear…
Jason Hancock, at Schmitt’s home-state paper the Missouri Independent, wrote:
“In the year before Schmitt launched his Senate campaign, he used “radical left,” “tyranny” or “tyrant” on Twitter twice, according to an analysis by St. Louis Magazine. In the following year, he used them more than 100 times.
“Last year, he said opponents of the president’s mass deportation program had nothing left but “the Marxist playbook, which is political violence,” and that federal money was flowing to a “radical ecosystem” of nonprofit groups and activists “working to undermine our civilization.”
“At the National Conservatism Conference last year, he rejected the idea of America as a creed anyone can adopt. He waved off the notion that its meaning lies in a Statue of Liberty poem or in “all men are created equal.” America, he said, is a people and a homeland handed down by particular ancestors, and he described Americans as descendants of Europe’s Christian pilgrims.
“Then he drew the line. Of the “radicals” he accused of tearing down statues and mocking American history, he said: “America doesn’t belong to them — it belongs to us.”
Maybe Schmitt and VPJD deserve each other.
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September 28:
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September 26:
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September 25:
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September 24:
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September 23:
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September 22:
States of Play post –
‘I Don’t Want Them Here…’ – Trump’s tantrum ban on three news outlets heads to court.
“Trump has long both hated the media’s scrutiny yet craved its attention and this latest incident is just part of a familiar pattern.”
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September 18:
The legal battle continues over the Kennedy Center. A judge ruled that the president can’t literally tear it down, but it still seems that’s what he wants to do.
This is AI (obviously) but makes a change for the Slopmeister-in-Chief to be on the receiving end. (via Scott Horton)
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September 17:
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September 16:
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September 15:
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September 14:
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September 13:
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September 11:
The Pain Persists – 9/11 in New York City.
Just as Donald Trump was undeserving of being president for America’s 250th birthday, he is far from worthy to stand alongside the families of those lost in the deadliest terror attack on its shores. He has served only to distract from the remembrance and honor of them.
More than ever right now, America needs someone who might at least try to bring the country together, not actively seek to divide it and put himself ahead of it at every opportunity.
Matt Davies for Newsday
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September 8:
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September 7:
States of Play post – ‘Things Happen’
VPJD Vance’s reaction to the Kuhestak incident has been far from the only dissembling on the part of the administration since the war began. Donald Trump once more claimed this week that the US is in control of the Strait of Hormuz – even suggesting that it be renamed the Trump Strait – when the situation there remains dangerously volatile.
Worse still, the president had the gall to call his war “small potatoes”.
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September 6:
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Go to previous ‘Latest’ page.
