Siobhan Brett

2 weeks ago | thecurrency.news | Siobhan Brett

For those of us in the United States unlucky or foolhardy enough to still be in receipt of the “news alert”, the flood of notifications in recent weeks has been destabilising. I’m struck, again and again (and again, and again) by how poorly the news media – of which I am a very low-profile member – has managed to move with these frenzied times.

1 month ago | thecurrency.news | Siobhan Brett

We’re in a bizarre new era for international diplomacy in the US. The Gulf of Mexico, depending on who you ask, is no more. There’s suddenly an opening for a 51st state, if not a 52nd, with a few hopefuls in the mix (no, they’re not the ones doing the hoping). The Panama Canal is reportedly in the process of being “reclaimed”. It was against this profoundly unsettling backdrop that the old St Patrick’s Day show had to go on last week.

2 months ago | thecurrency.news | Siobhan Brett

Money, money, money. By midweek last week, the leading headlines of each of the major American newspapers had cash in common. Gone, at least temporarily, the hand-wringing over other popular themes: autocracy, authoritarianism and fascism. Dizzy speculation regarding the fate of democracy or the fate of the union itself had to take a backseat. What exactly defines a “coup”? We’ll have to come back to that. Would that it were for a good reason.

2 months ago | independent.ie | Siobhan Brett

‘Hippy dippy’ types have made strange bedfellows with anti-vaxxers under the ‘Make America Healthy Again’ agendaTallow was neither a word nor a substance I often encountered growing up, if I encountered it at all. These days, however hard I try, I can’t seem to get away from the hard fat of grazing animals. A friend tells me about a new balm that has transformed her skin like nothing ever has (“Why are people smearing beef fat on their face?” I will later hear the public radio station NPR ask).

Nov 2, 2024 | thecurrency.news | Siobhan Brett

When it comes to the running of the country, to the fate of the nation, a lot of people in America feel as though nothing matters any longer. Not the polling. Not the debates between candidates, whether they are subjected to real-time “fact checks” or not. Not the fantastical policy proposals. Not the endless stumping, with Clintons, Obamas, Hulk Hogan and others flanking either side, not the endorsements (even by Taylor Swift!), nothing.