Author: NY TIMES

Gimel Hooper, 49, who is Black, didn’t want to show “Frozen” to his daughter for similar reasons. But after she received an Elsa doll for her 4th birthday from a friend’s mother, it became his daughter’s favorite toy. “We couldn’t turn left or right without seeing ‘Frozen’ something,” said Mr. Hooper, whose daughter is now 10. “That song was constantly playing,” he added of “Let It Go.” “Every kid knew it.”While Elsa sings in the dress, she appears to gain a sense of invincibility, and some parents described Elsa costumes as having a similar effect on their children.Mr. Hemmig said…

As negotiations to end the long legal brawl between Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder, and the United States reached a critical point this spring, prosecutors presented his lawyers with a choice so madcap that a person involved thought it sounded like a line from a Monty Python movie.“Guam or Saipan?”It was no joke. His path to freedom, he was told, would pass through one of the two American-held islands in the blue expanse of the Pacific Ocean.Mr. Assange, who feared being imprisoned for the rest of his life in the United States, had long insisted on one condition for any…

Chloe Hurst dons a black veil to keep the bugs out of her eyes while planting flowers that would be at home in a Tim Burton film: black hero tulips, New York Night hellebores and black mamba petunias.She sees her garden as a reflection of herself. “I’m a Scorpio, so I’ve always been spooky,” said Ms. Hurst, a 29-year-old graphic designer. She said she began reconnecting with her earlier emo days through landscaping after purchasing her home in Ottawa, Canada, six years ago.Many of her plants are dark red or purple. Ms. Hurst also has a potted vegetable garden with…

On the morning of April 5, 2010, a tall, thin man with a shock of silver hair walked up to a lectern at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. He’d been operating an obscure news website out of Iceland for four years, trying and failing to find a scoop that would set the world on fire. Many of the 40 or so journalists (myself included) who showed up had barely heard of him.Still, it was hard to ignore his pitch. Three days earlier, we had received an email promising a “previously unseen classified video” with “dramatic proof and new…

Ever since scientists discovered influenza infecting American cows earlier this year, they have been puzzling over how it spreads from one animal to another. An experiment carried out in Kansas and Germany has shed some light on the mystery.Scientists failed to find evidence that the virus can spread as a respiratory infection. Juergen Richt, a virologist at Kansas State University who helped lead the research, said that the results suggested that the virus is mainly infectious via contaminated milking machines.In an interview, Dr. Richt said that the results offered hope that the outbreak could be halted before the virus evolved…

Did you ever see a performer that made you think, Whoa, I have to wrap my head around this? What do you mean?Was there ever anybody that made you feel like, I’ve got to understand what this person’s doing? Oh, you mean someone that came after me and went to the next level, and I was like, Whoa? No, never. I haven’t witnessed the next level. The ceiling of the whole art form, standup comedy, that’s Richard. And the ceiling for movies, for me, is Chaplin. I haven’t seen anyone come along that was better than Chaplin.I always wondered if…

A reformist candidate critical of an Iranian law that requires women to wear head scarves will compete next week against a hard-line conservative in a runoff election for the country’s presidency, state media said on Saturday, following a special vote after the previous leader was killed last month in a helicopter crash.A second round of voting, which will pit the reformist, Masoud Pezeshkian, against Saeed Jalili, an ultraconservative former nuclear negotiator, will take place on July 5. The runoff was in part the result of low voter turnout and a crowded field of four candidates, three of whom competed for…

They first appeared as a cloud of dust on the horizon. A few seconds later, the motorcycles carrying Russian soldiers sped into view, zigzagging across a field, kicking up dust, attempting a noisy, dangerous run at a Ukrainian trench.“They moved fast, they spread out and they swerved,” said Lt. Mykhailo Hubitsky, describing the Russian motorcycle assault he witnessed. It’s a type of attack that has been proliferating along the frontline this spring, adding a wild new element to the already violent, chaotic fighting.Russian soldiers riding motorcycles, dirt bikes, quadricycles and dune buggies now account for about half of all attacks…

Megan Stalter has lost almost every piece of jewelry she’s ever owned.But she’s determined to flip the script on the Scorpio signet ring that she wore for a recent interview with The New York Times. Ms. Stalter’s girlfriend wears the another ring just like it.Ms. Stalter found the matching rings at a store in Hollywood that sells jewelry, greeting cards and crystals. She was looking for a piece she could wear to pay homage to her girlfriend while filming “Too Much,” a forthcoming Netflix series by Lena Dunham, in which Ms. Stalter has a starring role.Ms. Stalter also stars as…

The Republican-led House voted on Friday to strip President Biden’s homeland security secretary and secretary of state of their salaries. It approved measures banning military installations from having drag queen story hours for children. And it passed legislation prohibiting paid leave for Pentagon employees who get an abortion.The provisions were included in three spending bills to fund the Departments of Defense, State and Homeland Security that House Republicans muscled through largely along party lines — even though none of them have any hope of becoming law.With a government funding deadline looming at the end of September and a high-stakes election…