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Trump And The World

Circumnavigating In The Age Of Trump

He's off ...
He's off ...

—Analysis—

Back in the 16th century, it took Ferdinand Magellan"s crew more than two years to sail around the world. Yesterday, a new record was set in the prestigious Vendée Globe solo sailing race, as French skipper Armel Le Cléac'h took just 74 days to circumnavigate our planet.

When such records are set, we tend to focus on the technological progress that makes that kind of speed possible. But what may be more remarkable is that the desire to take to the open seas in a vessel powered only by wind still tugs at our imagination. It's a reminder, perhaps, that the forces of nature are ultimately beyond the control of humans, that the world has actually not gotten any smaller.

Much of our planet, nonetheless, will be connected instantaneously today to follow events in Washington D.C., where the new "leader of the free world" will take the presidential oath of office. Donald Trump"s own world appears as small as his voice is loud. The leadership that he has promised is driven by a conviction (perhaps the only fixed political idea he has) that a world moving closer is a threat to the wellbeing of the United States.

From where we sit that looks nothing like progress, neither for the United States nor for the world. Still, popular democracy — a singular mast of human progress that did not exist 500 years ago — has spoken. So hold on, batten down the hatches, and Godspeed to us all.

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Green

A DNA Bank To Save Jaguars Threatened By Mexico’s Mega Rail Project

A government mega-project could push the country’s big cats closer to extinction — an outcome that would have devastating ripple effects on the local ecosystem.

A DNA Bank To Save Jaguars Threatened By Mexico’s Mega Rail Project

A jaguar resting at the Jaguar Sanctuary in Tlacolula de Matamoros, Mexico.

Ena Aguilar Peláez

TLACOLULA DE MATAMOROS — Lamanai and Cachicamo play among the trees near a man-made pond. Roaring and bounding, they behave like any other 3-year-old jaguars. Besides the two of them, the only other sounds come from birds and bugs singing their songs in the forest they call home.

The place where these felines live has been the same almost since their birth: a wildlife simulator, which recreates their habitat and limits contact with humans, at the Jaguar Sanctuary, a center that works to protect and safeguard this endangered species. Since entering this space in 2021, Lamanai and Cachicamo have been monitored by experts. Currently, they are the only specimens in a gene-bank program designed to conserve the jaguar species.

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The program began in 2017 to track jaguar populations and their health, and it was expanded in 2023 with the creation of a backup population program to increase the number of these felines in Mexico. In 2018, there were about 4,800 specimens in the country, according to a census coordinated by the National Autonomous University of Mexico’s Institute of Ecology. These programs are increasingly urgent due to new highways and other government projects, like Tren Maya, which bring human construction and infrastructure to the big cats’ habitat, reducing their hunting territory and genetic variability, experts say.

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