00:00what does spongebob squarepants have to do with america's war in iran the cartoon character
00:05popped up in a propaganda video posted by the white house on social media earlier this month
00:10there was a clip of him repeatedly saying do you want to see me do it again spliced with footage
00:15of u.s missiles blowing up iranian jets and trucks this is just one of several videos put together
00:22by the white house hailing american military successors in iran the videos which have been
00:27viewed and shared millions of times draw heavily on video games action movies and cartoons to
00:34present the operation in a way that experts say is completely unprecedented some critics are calling
00:40it the gamification of war one video depicts the war as a nintendo game mixing footage of missile
00:46strikes with images from wii sports but the videos have proved controversial one iraq war veteran
00:53conor crehan wrote on x that war isn't a video game i wish we didn't treat it with such a
00:59cavalier
00:59approach analysts say the videos might go down well with president trump's base but they're a turn-off
01:05for independent voters who are anyway unconvinced about the wisdom of this war
01:17will rachel reeve's plan to boost uk growth by moving closer to the european union really work the
01:24short answer is no or at least not without paying into eu coffers and accepting free movement of
01:31people but those are lines that this government still says it doesn't want to cross closer alignment
01:37with eu rules would cut border bureaucracy for uk exporters and encourage investment into the uk
01:44the uk is looking for a reset with the eu but it's based on so-called dynamic alignment in just
01:50two
01:51sectors food and drink regulations and carbon pricing that is estimated to boost long-term uk gdp
01:58by just 0.24 that's only a tiny fraction of the four percent that the office for budget responsibility
02:05still believes will be the hit to long-term uk gdp from brexit and that matters because the share of
02:14goods in uk exports is falling in fact the gap between uk goods exports and imports was the widest on
02:21record in 2025 government departments continue to talk about dynamic alignment the potential for that to be
02:28extended to other sectors and at times they've mentioned chemicals um for us also seeing that as
02:34as they say as the panacea to all of the trade friction and cost related to uk eu market access
02:42we don't believe the route they're pursuing with regard to chemicals will do that it won't do that
02:46we're still going to be faced with this duplication of cost duplication of of data rachel reeves talks
02:53enthusiastically about the power of alignment to boost economic growth but industry warns that
02:59unilaterally aligning with eu rules while still outside the single market will not cut much of
03:05the red tape thrown up by brexit the most pragmatic solution here is a swiss style arrangement switzerland
03:11retains that relationship with the european union it has the option where it feels strongly enough to
03:17diverge in practice it doesn't very much but what also is the benefit of that is it doesn't set up
03:24a regime for swiss producers to generate all loads of data that duplicate whatever has been generated out
03:32of out of brussels and the wider european union eu officials say the uk cannot expect to have enhanced
03:38access to the eu single market unless it accepts greater obligations in return switzerland has access
03:45but it accepts free movement of people and payments into the eu's budgets optimists say that rachel
03:51reeves is sending a clear signal of intent that she wishes to engage more deeply with brussels but
03:57something will have to give probably around free movement of people and payment into eu budgets for
04:03now the mood in brussels is definitely one of caution
04:10so angela rayner was schmoozing the city this week but it wasn't just about trying to gain credibility
04:15with fund managers and persuade them she's not going to massively try and shift to the left if she ever
04:20takes the reins part of this was about earning a hefty fee five figures we learned in order to try
04:28and
04:28pay off the hmrc settlement that might be due soon yes that's right the hmrc are still investigating the
04:34circumstances around her purchase of a flat in hove and her under payment of tax and there's a
04:39possibility at the end of this investigation there could be a fine on top of that and what we're told
04:43by allies of uh angela rayner is that over the next few months she hopes to make at least a
04:48100 000
04:49pounds either from doing paid public speaking gigs like the one you just mentioned bmp paribas
04:55um she's done a whole series incidentally of talks to city folks where she's killing two birds with
04:59one stone which you alluded to there lucy she's earning a bit of money at the same time meeting
05:04a whole load of city people and trying to reassure them that she'll be rock solid on the economy if
05:09she were to become labor leader but her people say that she will have easily enough money to settle
05:14her bill with the hmrc they're still waiting for the investigation to conclude the sooner the better
05:18obviously from their point of view but i was speaking to one cabinet member this week who said that
05:23the febrile ometer has been moved up a notch and there's definitely a sense now that hundred
05:28rain is gearing up to go for it what does this snowy patch of land tell us about america's housing
05:40shortage this 3.8 acre plot will provide 120 new homes for people on low and middle incomes here in
05:51the
05:51swing state of bethlehem pennsylvania it's the first large-scale affordable housing development in more
05:58than 10 years since the 2008 global financial crisis too few homes have been built in the us and that's
06:07true here in bethlehem too at the same time prices have surged outstripping rises in people's wages
06:16the affordability crisis is a key issue for donald trump and his republican party
06:21ahead of midterm elections in november particularly in swing states like pennsylvania the trump administration
06:29has vowed to ban big institutional investors from buying up houses in bethlehem that has been one of
06:36the things that's exacerbated a shortage of homes and pushed up prices in some ways the town is a victim
06:44of its own success the blocks that are being built to aim more at the luxury market great for those
06:51new
06:51workers who need somewhere to live but for residents feeling the crunch a sign of exclusion
07:00the financial times has just published the ranking of the top global online mba programs and one school
07:06has taken the top spot for the fourth year in a row online mba's have grown rapidly in recent years
07:12allowing professionals to study for a business degree while continuing to work in third place
07:16is warwick business school the school is top for career progress a metric based on the progression in
07:22the alumni's level of seniority and the size of organization they work for now in second is imperial
07:27business school with the highest average alumni salary at almost 254 000 the school which is based in the
07:35uk is placed second for research reflecting the strength of its academic output and in first place
07:41is ie business school in madrid keeping the first place in this ranking for four consecutive years
07:46its alumni have the highest salary increase and completion of the mba to now of 42 percent a big
07:52surprise this year is bays business school entering the ranking for the first time in fourth place
07:57and the university of porto ranked the sixth overall which is top for value for money overall european
08:03schools dominate the top of the table which shows both the region's strength in business education and also
08:08the growing demand for flexible online mba programs this unassuming weapon may just be the future of
08:17warfare it's cheap quite often lethal and frankly pretty low-tech it's an iranian shahad a one-way attack
08:25drone iran as it fights the u.s and israel is launching shahads in huge numbers hitting u.s diplomatic
08:31posts airports and energy facilities in the gulf this is a shahad hitting a u.s naval base in bahrain
08:39the shahad 136 costs only about 20 to 30 thousand dollars to make compared to the roughly two million
08:46dollars a u.s tomahawk cruise missile costs shahads have a distinctive triangular shape and a two-stroke
08:52engine like the ones on motorcycles giving them a trademark buzzing sound
08:58so why are they so effective they're made of cheap off-the-shelf parts sometimes from china
09:03making them easy to mass produce so rand can launch them in groups or swarms even if only a few
09:11get
09:11through they can cause huge damage and can evade radars by flying low or slowly the drones can be
09:17pre-programmed or remote controlled with a claimed range of up to two and a half thousand kilometers
09:23they can be fitted out with electronic guidance systems night vision or other bits of tech
09:29military analysts say the drones are part of a paradigm shift for warfare that began in ukraine
09:34russia makes its own version of the shahad and the u.s has its own low-cost drone known as
09:40the lucas
09:41ukrainians have learned at great cost how to defend against shahads by using interceptor drones or guns
09:47even lasers to disable them or jamming the gps signal they're using expensive air defense systems
09:54to shoot down shahads as some gulf countries have been doing is probably overkill ukraine has sent
10:00teams of drone warfare specialists to the middle east bringing with them lower cost ways of shooting
10:05down shahads a precision drone interceptor can cost as little as a few thousand dollars compared to the
10:12millions it costs to deploy a patriot air defense system or to launch missiles from fighter jets
10:16it's one more way that drones and defense against them may change the face of this war and other wars
10:24is yet to come
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