In the Middle East, a deal is coming together to reopen the Straight of Hormuz. But it could come at a price, effectively cementing Iran's control over what had been an open international waterway. The agreement that's being worked out is between Iran and Oman, the countries on either side of the strait. Officials familiar with the talks say what's being discussed is a setup in which ships heading into the straight would go through a channel controlled by Iran and ships coming out would go through a channel controlled by Oman. Iranian officials say those ships would be charged a service fee. The deal would give Iran vastly more leverage over the strait than it had before the war. For his part, President Trump has said little about the emerging agreement, which would go against his administration's repeated demands that the strait be reopened with no restrictions. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has warned that if Iran takes control of the international waterway, it could set a dangerous precedent for other countries to do the same around the world. But for Trump, it's important politically to get ships moving again since the closure has ratcheted up global energy prices, and Americans are feeling it. The administration had tried to reopen the strait by force using heavy bombing campaigns to try and prevent Iran from being able to attack ships in the waterway, but according to officials, the head of US Central Command has said those American strikes have reached the limit of their effectiveness. One Middle East expert at a nonprofit think tank told the Times that quote, "Trump's options are between an unwininnable war and an unpalatable peace. Meanwhile, with the future of the Straight of Hormuz still up in the air, roughly 6,000 sailors remain stranded in the waterway, according to the International Maritime Organization. While many ships that were trapped at the beginning of the war have sailed out during pauses in the fighting, for example, or by being guided by the US military, others haven't been able to get through or don't want to take the risk. An official with a union representing some of the sailors still in the Gulf told the Times they feel quote absolutely abandoned, absolutely unprotected. Shipping experts say that crew members can ask to be taken off the ships and flown home, but those evacuations are rare.

I was disappointed with Janine Piro. Really disappointed with Janine Piro. She folded like an umbrella. President Trump openly railed against Janine Piro, the Fox News personality he appointed as US attorney for DC, saying she shouldn't have dropped a series of vandalism charges in the Reflecting Pool case. Piro, who has been a longtime ally of Trump's, publicly contradicted him in a recent court filing when she said problems with the pool were due to shoddy construction work, not left-wing radicals with knives, as Trump has claimed. Prosecutors have now dropped charges against four defendants accused of vandalism. You're reconsidering her role. You're I don't know what you You don't You're fake news. Don't Don't ever talk again. You're fake news. One of the one of the When asked whether Piro would keep her position, Trump lashed out at the reporter. Later, Piro came to the White House for a meeting with the president in the Oval Office. According to two people briefed on the outcome, she wasn't fired, nor did she offer her resignation. And a second update now, the Times has been looking at a pot of money the Trump administration isn't spending. For decades, the federal government has issued big grants to communities all over the US for public transit projects. Railroad tracks, train stations, better bus service, etc. They're called capital investment grants. Congress has designated funds for that purpose. But right now, under this administration, more than $7 billion haven't been allocated to any project. There are a lot of communities that say they could use this money. For example, Utah is trying to get ready to host the Winter Olympics in 2034, which sounds far off, but adding more rail infrastructure to shuttle people around takes time. And one county in Maryland is asking for money to help revamp traffic signals and sidewalks along a busy stretch of road where several pedestrians have died. They're waiting to see what will happen with their requests. But so far, the Trump administration hasn't signed a single new agreement under the program. In Trump's first term in office, his administration proposed eliminating this funding altogether. Congress funded it anyway. This new tactic is more subtle. Instead of terminating grants, which often ends up in court, it's just quietly not giving out new ones. The absence of action is harder to trace and harder for communities to contest. In response to questions from the Times about the unspent money, the Department of Transportation said that projects were working their way through the multi-stage grant process required by law.

few days ago in New Zealand, crowds gathered for what was the last greyhound race in the country. The government banned the races amid growing concerns about the dog's well-being. An official from New Zealand's Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals said for years there had been high rates of serious injuries and deaths, as well as concerns about the dogs being given banned substances. New Zealand is following in the footsteps of almost every other country in the world where greyhound races have been banned. The government has acknowledged this will be a challenge for the people working in the industry including breeders, kennel staff, and race officials. And it has set aside money to help with job training among other things, as well as finding new homes for roughly 1,400 dogs. Some industry workers told the Times though that they would leave New Zealand to keep racing greyhounds. That could take them to one of just four countries where the sport is still legal. Australia, the UK, Ireland, and the US. But even within those countries, the sport is disappearing. In the US, for example, Greyhound racing used to draw tens of millions of spectators in the 80s and '90s when it was at its height. That was more people than came out annually to watch hockey or tennis. Now though, there are just two tracks left in the country, both in West Virginia. And lawmakers in Congress have been moving this year to ban the sport in the US altogether.

over the last few years living in New York City, on random walks through different neighborhoods, I've found myself noticing musicians kind of playing in odd places and not performing for money. Um, I would see a saxophone player playing on the Williamsburg waterfront, a kid playing tuba on a picnic bench in Queens, and the ones I really couldn't miss were the bagpipe players. Andrew Kay covers life in New York City for the times. He says he realized musicians behind big loud instruments face a unique challenge in the city. How do you practice your instrument without ruining your neighbors lives? So he tagged along to see how some bag pipers solve that problem. I got to speak to a bagpipe player named Christopher Rodriguez who's sort of wellversed in this. He has gotten into altercations on the street. He has been threatened with violence by his neighbors. He's had the police called on him. And all of that sort of forced him to find these places where he could play out of earshot of his neighbors. He has a spot in Evergreen Cemetery in Brooklyn. He plays among the tombstones in the hills there. He has found a hidden deadend street in Elmherst, Queens that overlooks the Brooklyn Queens Expressway. And with the sort of hum of the cars there, it creates just enough sort of sound cover to not disturb the entire neighborhood. Basically, all of these players understand that this is an instrument kind of designed for the battlefield to be played on these wide open spaces. And I think as a result, they all kind of daydream about moving to the suburbs or the countryside and kind of just living a life where they're not constantly on the run from people that they might potentially bother. But at the same time, there's this culture of bagpiping in New York City. We have parades, funerals, weddings, graduations. These are all sort of occasions that use the sort of emotional resonance that a bagpipe provides. And so these guys, you know, despite their daydreams of open space, they all say that they couldn't imagine living anywhere else.