HERE ARE THE TOP STORIES
We’ve got a little more than 90 days until the US presidential election. Here’s the latest.
US President Barack Obama called Donald Trump’s claims that the presidential election could be rigged “ridiculous” and likened the Republican nominee to a child losing a game on the playground.
Senate minority leader Harry Reid warned Democrats not to get “overconfident.” He also thinks Hillary Clinton should campaign in Arizona and Georgia.
Republican vice presidential nominee Mike Pence has delayed an exonerated man’s pardon request for more than two years.
You won’t believe this but Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine doesn’t like talking about himself.
And Melania Trump, potentially the next first lady of the US, is facing questions about her immigration status when she first arrived in the country. How did this all happen? And Trump supporters don’t care that Melania might have worked illegally in the US.
Then there’s Trump himself
Donald Trump isn’t going to change and Republicans know it. There’ll be no pivot. Interventions will fail. The ticket isn’t changing. It won’t get better. That’s the reality many Republicans are resigning themselves to this week while they watch, in helpless despair, as their newly minted presidential nominee blunders across the national stage criticizing the parents of a slain US soldier and picking pointless fights with members of his own party.
Trump never saw a “top secret” video of the US sending money to Iran.
This is what it’s like to watch hate and fear grow after the attack in Nice, France.
“The terrorist who drove a truck through the crowd in Nice attacked the only place in my hometown where people from all walks of life could co-exist. Now hate speech is on the rise,” BuzzFeed News’ Jules Darmanin writes.
“‘Paris’s motto is ‘Fluctuat nec mergitur,’ an elegant Latin phrase that means ‘Tossed, but not sunk.’ The Niçois equivalent is ‘M’en bati, sieu nissart,’ a saying in the local dialect that literally means ‘I don’t give a fuck, I’m from Nice.'
“We tend to get used to the violence and the hatred that is slowly swallowing the world we know. It’s a familiar meme until it hits home. Then, we wonder when and where it will happen next.”
DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THIS?
The Bank of England cut interest rates for the first time since 2009. But why should you actually care?
The Bank cut its base rate to a historic low of 0.25% on Thursday, in an effort to boost the UK economy after a worrying six weeks following the country's decision to leave the European Union. BuzzFeed News’ Simon Neville and Patrick Smith have more:
The base rate is what the Bank charges financial institutions to deposit funds overnight. It also influences commercial and retail lending and has effects across the economy.
Some mortgage-holders will get a (very small) payment cut as a result and (hopefully) banks and other financial institutions will be more eager to lend to people and businesses, who will then spend more money.
And a little extra
The Bank is acting now because confidence is down across the vital services, construction, and manufacturing industries, and some people are worried a recession is on the way. The Bank’s governor, Mark Carney, lowered the UK's growth forecast for 2017 from 2.3% to 0.8%. He also said unemployment would rise. But unlike some people, he’s not forecasting a recession just yet.
Smartphones are one of the best ways to give women in the developing world access to banking, a new study says.
Only 50% of women in the developing world have a bank account, compared with 59% of men. But smartphones are helping to close this economic gender gap, BuzzFeed News’ Hamza Shaban writes.
Despite an uptick in access, women and other marginalized groups — like refugees and people living in poverty — are still at risk of being left “unbanked,” without access to lines of credit, savings accounts, and secure ways to transfer money.
But by 2020, the number of smartphone connections is expected to increase from about 4 billion to 6 billion.
Do you know what happened in the news this week? Take the BuzzFeed News quiz!
Quick things to know:
In the UK: A 19-year-old Norwegian man of Somali origin has been arrested on suspicion of murder after an American woman was killed and five other people were injured in Wednesday’s stabbing attack in London. Police said there was no evidence he had been radicalised or motivated by terrorism. And activists have blocked traffic outside London’s Heathrow Airport as part of nationwide Black Lives Matter protests.
LGBT news: Police raided Uganda pride on Thursday and detained several well-known LGBT activists. Here’s a look at all the ways same-sex couples are killing it in Australia. And people can’t get enough of this Facebook post about a trans person’s positive airport security experience.
In tech: Apple’s first-ever bug bounty will pay hackers to crack its operating system and its cloud services. Designers are backing Apple in its $548 million Supreme Court case against Samsung. And what’s the deal with Nick Jonas’s Instagram about taking a Lyft to the Hamptons?
Pokémon Go craze: This taxi firm in Edinburgh, Scotland, is running a Pokémon Go tour called Pokécab. And this Pokémon Go player just became the very first to catch 'em all worldwide.
Rio 2016: The opening ceremony for the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro kicks off tonight. Click here for all your Olympics content.
POTUS on feminism
Back in June, President Obama addressed 5,000 attendees at the White House’s United States of Women Summit and told the crowd, “This is what a feminist looks like.” He’s the first sitting president ever to call himself a feminist. Now, in a new article for the September issue of Glamour magazine, Obama outlines why “it is absolutely men’s responsibility to fight sexism” and “we need to work hard and be deliberate about creating truly equal relationships.”
