Headline

Biden Turns 81 As Voters Show Concern About Age

Published

2 years ago

November 20, 2023

…poll says 54 percent of Americans say Biden no longer competence for the job

Joe Biden joked about his age as he celebrated his 81st birthday on Monday, but the issue is no laughing matter for many voters as he seeks reelection next year.

His birthday renews the focus on the fact that the Democrat is the oldest president in American history — and that if he wins a second term next year he will be 86 by the time he leaves.

While his aides regularly lash out at those who cast doubt on whether he is too old to be commander-in-chief, Biden likes to suggest that age brings wisdom, or simply takes a light hearted approach.

“It’s difficult turning 60,” the president said with a chuckle at the annual Thanksgiving turkey pardoning ceremony at the White House on Monday, the same day as his birthday.

“This is the 76th anniversary of this event — and I want you to know I wasn’t there for the first one,” he quipped.

But a moment in which he mixed up US singers Taylor Swift and Britney Spears is likely to reinforce impressions among voters who have been concerned by a recent series of trips and slip-ups.

Footage of Biden losing his balance on the stairs of Air Force One has gone viral — he now uses a shorter flight of stairs — and he has occasionally given rambling answers during press conferences.

Worse for Biden, voters don’t so far have the same concerns about his likely election rival Donald Trump, despite the fact that Trump is 77 and has been known to make similar slip-ups.

Trump warned in a speech in September, for example, that the United States was on the verge of “World War II,” and recently said Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban was the leader of Turkey.

Lucid

Biden is “not doing a lot wrong” but is struggling to change perceptions on his age — as well as other issues like the economy — said David Karol, who teaches government and politics at the University of Maryland.

“He is lucid, but people just have this perception,” Karol told AFP.

The White House has been dismissive of opinion polls, with Democrats notching up a series of recent electoral successes. They also point to the fact that Biden beat Trump in 2020 despite Biden being 77 himself at the time.

Yet the numbers make grim reading for the party. Seventy-four percent of people said Biden would be too old to serve a second term, compared to 50 percent for Trump, a recent ABC/Washington Post poll showed.

A Yahoo/YouGov poll found that 54 percent of Americans say Biden no longer has “the competence to carry out the job of president,” up from 41 percent before the 2020 election.

Some analysts say Biden’s age should not matter.

The issue in general has been unfairly “weaponized” in US politics, said S. Jay Olshansky, a longevity researcher at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

“Aging is not what it used to be,” Olshansky told AFP.

“There are very large segments of the population that survive to their eighth decade perfectly capable of being president, or doing whatever they like.”

Super-Agers

Biden — and Trump for that matter — are both likely to be “Super-Agers,” a term coined by researchers to describe a small group of people who keep their full faculties until late in life, said Olshansky.

His research has also found that for US presidents, “biological time seems to tick at a slower pace” than for other people, as they apparently thrive on the stress of the job.”

That said, Biden’s campaign has taken to highlighting Trump’s own slip-ups.

Nevertheless, the Democrat’s age is bound to come under even deeper scrutiny during a grueling election campaign.

Republicans have trained their fire on the person who is just a heartbeat away from the presidency, should the worst happen: Vice President Kamala Harris.

Harris blazed a trail as the first woman, Black person and person of South Asian descent to hold the vice president’s office, but her approval ratings are as bad as her boss’s, at under 40 percent.
AFP

Headline

Morocco Jails French Rapper Maes For Kidnapping Bid

Published

11 hours ago

November 26, 2025

Editor

A Moroccan court has sentenced French rapper Maes to seven years in prison on charges including the formation of a criminal gang and attempted kidnapping, local reports said Wednesday.

Maes, who has roots in Morocco and whose real name is Walid Georgey, was arrested upon landing in Morocco in January after fleeing the United Arab Emirates, where he feared he could be extradited to France, the reports said.

French authorities had issued an international arrest warrant for him over a separate criminal case.

He appeared in court late Tuesday and was found guilty of “forming a criminal organisation, attempted abduction and unlawful confinement” of a rival in Morocco, news website TelQuel reported.

The rapper with over a billion views on his YouTube channel was accused of tasking a gang and hitmen with killing the rival, but the plot was foiled, TelQuel added.

Maes has denied all charges, with his lawyers calling the case “empty” and “arguing that no evidence linked him to the other defendants”, TelQuel added.

Ten other people were sentenced as part of the case, with terms ranging from one to 10 years, according to news website Media24.

AFP was unable to independently verify the reports as prosecutors were not immediately reachable for comment.

In 2020, when Maes was one of France’s most-streamed rappers, he fell victim to extortion attempts in his native Sevran, a suburb north of Paris, according to reports.

He retaliated by opening fire with weapons he had at home, leading to a shootout. He then fled to Dubai with his family, according to an interview with French YouTube channel LEGEND.

Following the killing of his manager in 2022, he was suspected of ordering reprisals against those he believed were behind the murder, according to reports.

AFP

Headline

UK Court Clears Comedy Writer Of Harassing Transgender Woman

Published

11 hours ago

November 26, 2025

Editor

A London court on Tuesday cleared Emmy award-winning comedy writer Graham Linehan of harassing a transgender activist online but found him guilty of criminal damage to their mobile phone.

Linehan, who co-created the popular 1990s sitcom “Father Ted” but has more recently become well-known for his gender critical views, had been accused of sending Sophia Brooks “abusive and vindictive” messages on social media.

He was also charged with criminal damage after deliberately knocking a phone out of Brooks’s hand as they filmed him on the sidelines of a London conference.

Ruling on the case, District Judge Briony Clarke said she was not convinced Linehan’s conduct “was oppressive and unacceptable beyond merely unattractive, annoying or irritating”.

Clarke also concluded Brooks was not “as alarmed and distressed as they portrayed themself to be”.

But convicting Linehan of criminal damage, the judge ruled he was “angry and fed up” and did not use “reasonable force” when the phone was taken from Brooks.

Clarke fined him £500 ($655) and ordered him to pay costs of £650 and a statutory surcharge of £200.

The Irish writer, who also co-created the popular sitcoms “Black Books” and “The IT Crowd”, became embroiled in a free speech row in Britain earlier this year over his anti-transgender stance.

It followed his arrest at London’s Heathrow Airport by armed police over accusations of inciting violence with his X posts insulting transgender people.

The arrest sparked a backlash and claims of state overreach, including from US tech billionaire Elon Musk. But in October, UK prosecutors said they would take “no further action” in that case.

AFP

Headline

Prosecutors Seek Jail For Italian Influencer Ferragni In Fraud Case

Published

11 hours ago

November 26, 2025

Editor

Italian prosecutors asked a court on Tuesday to sentence fashion influencer Chiara Ferragni to one year and eight months in prison if found guilty of alleged fraud over charity endorsement deals.

The Instagram star and businesswoman has been on trial since September for aggravated fraud over promotions of a pandoro cake — a Christmas treat similar to a panettone — and Easter eggs, which purported to raise money for charity or social causes.

The 38-year-old, who is based in Milan, told the court during the closed-door hearing on Tuesday that she denied the charges and had always acted “in good faith”, her lawyer Giuseppe Iannaccone said.

Leaving the audience, Ferragni told a throng of journalists that she felt “confident… I can’t say anymore”.

A verdict is expected in January.

Aggravated fraud carries a jail term of between one and five years.

But Ferragni has chosen a fast-track trial, which gives defendants a sentence reduction — meaning she cannot receive more than a maximum penalty of two years and three months, according to a source close to her team.

In Italy, people sentenced to prison for less than two years rarely serve jail time.

Ferragni started out with a fashion blog, The Blonde Salad, in 2009, and in 2017, Forbes magazine named her its top fashion influencer.

Chronicling her glamorous lifestyle and being paid to promote high-end brands, she built the blog into a lucrative business, then used it as a springboard to launch her own eponymous label with stores around the world.

Her trailblazing story even became a Harvard Business School example of how social media fame can be monetised.

But the fraud accusations have hit her reputation and her endorsements.

Outside court for a hearing earlier this month, Ferragni acknowledged to journalists that it was a “difficult phase of my life”.

The allegations relate in part to Ferragni’s 2022 endorsement of a pandoro cake purportedly to raise funds for children undergoing treatment at a Turin hospital.

In December 2023, Italy’s communications watchdog (AGCOM) fined two of Ferragni’s companies one million euros ($1.2 million) for unfair commercial practices for the “Pandoro Pink Christmas” promotion — around the same sum they had made in the deal.

Shoppers were led to believe that buying the special edition cake made by Balocco would benefit the hospital, but it only received a single 50,000-euro donation from the company.

Balocco was fined 420,000 euros at the same time.

AGCOM also investigated Ferragni-branded Easter eggs from 2021 and 2022, linked to a social enterprise initiative.

Ferragni and her husband, rapper and music producer Fedez, who were one of Italy’s most famous celebrity couples, split in 2024.

AFP