STATUS UPDATES
A week in which Trump turns out to be a firefighter’s prophecy, and a surgeon stitches a teddy bear
PREORDAINED The election of Donald Trump in 2016. This according to The Trump
Prophecy, a movie telling the story of former firefighter Mark Taylor. The film, which debuted this week, explains he received a message from God in 2011, while seeing Trump on TV: “You are hearing the voice of the next president.”
FIXED A vote for homecoming queen. A cheerleader was caught handing out pot brownies as part of an attempt to buy student votes at a Michigan high school. Authorities plan to interview the suspect but, worryingly, they have only recovered three of 12 brownies.
LIKED An Instagram post, endorsed by Manchester United captain Antonio Valencia. The post was calling for the team’s manager, Jose Mourinho, to be fired. It was a picture of himself with the caption: “It’s time for Mourinho to go.” Somehow, Valencia claimed he hadn’t read the text. Pundits feel the sacking is inevitable.
UNLOVED Rosmah Mansor, wife of Najib Razak, the disgraced former Malaysian PM. Mansor was arrested on suspicion of money laundering. Known for designer handbags and a $27.3-million (U.S.) pink diamond pendant and necklace, she’s denied all charges.
RESTITUTION Demanded by Venice’s mayor from four university students. They were captured on camera vandalizing a landmark lion statue guarding the side of St. Mark’s Basilica. Mayor Luigi Brugnaro wants them to do community service to deter copycats, who “will be caught and they will be made an example of.”
RECONSTITUTION Provided by a Halifax surgeon to a teddy bear. Dr. Daniel McNeely agreed to an experimental procedure when the bear’s owner, 8-year-old Jackson McKie, was heading into surgery of his own. Tweets of the bear operation went viral, while boy and patched-up bear were doing well.
STARTED A research program by the U.S. military looking at bugs as weapons. Specifically, it could aim to deploy insects to alter plants’ genes. The military research agency says it is trying to protect the nation’s crop supply, but in a paper in Science, the authors say it could be seen as a potential biological weapon.
ENDED A decades-old treaty affirming friendly relations between the U.S. and, of all countries, Iran. The Trump administration said it would terminate the largely symbolic (if that’s the word) Treaty of Amity from 1955, signed when the two countries were allies. But couldn’t it have simply been renamed the Treaty of Enmity?