RESCUE WILDLIFE

“When Mundy first arrived in Georgia, she was kept apart from the other elephants by a fence. Carol Buckley, who cares for the animals here, says she wasn't sure how the others would react. But one of them, called Tara, took an interest right away. She picked up her food and brought it right over to the fence line here so she could be eating with Mundy.”

“Elephants are intelligent and social. They especially respond to reunions, the birth of a new calf, or the death of a loved one. They're capable of complex emotions, and Buckley says they're sensitive to what's happening around them. They feel all the vibration and energy that comes into their area, which is one of the reasons we're not open to the public.”

“The dominant political story of the year has been the 270-day-long speakership of Representative Kevin McCarthy, whose slim majority in the House of Representatives has enabled a far-right rebellion to exert more weight over the lower chamber. The battle between the rebellious Freedom Caucus and McCarthy has been at the heart of an averted debt ceiling crisis.”

“The rise of artificial intelligence and large language models dominated not only the economy but has also been at the root of a Hollywood double strike conducted by Writers Guild of America and a SAG APTRA strike. These were part of a larger phenomenon of labor strikes across the country, in which such large diverse groups, such as Teamsters and Auto Workers, won new contracts.”

“2023 also saw the roots of a global banking crisis arise out of four American regional banks, the two largest being Silicon Valley Bank and First Republic Bank. 2021's inflation surge moderated in 2023, while the Federal Reserve continued to raise its interest rates in the first half of the year.”