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Boris Johnson has summoned tech companies to Downing Street to order them to do more to tackle online abuse, amid mounting criticism of the government after black England players were deluged with racist posts in the aftermath of their Euro 2020 defeat.

The England footballer Tyrone Mings has criticised the home secretary, Priti Patel, for her condemnation of the racist abuse faced by his teammates, after she called players taking the knee gesture politics.

He said Patel did not get to stoke the fire ahead of the tournament and then pretend to be disgusted when the very thing were campaigning against, happens.

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Johnson will meet executives from the social media firms in person, and will ask them to hand over the details of those who posted racist content online to the police.

His official spokesperson said Johnson would reiterate the urgent need for action ahead of tougher laws coming into force in the online harms bill and that there was no question that abuse was upsetting, unfair and must be stamped out.

Asked whether No 10 agreed with a government source who said the perpetrators should have their details handed over so that they can be made an example of, they said: Yes, we expect social media companies to do everything they can to identify these people.

The police already have a range of powers to identify and pursue those who use anonymity to spread hatred, but we have committed to strengthening the criminal law in this area.

Concern is growing among some Conservative advisers and MPs that the strategy of pivoting towards the culture wars was backfiring.

One senior Tory called the situation embarrassing and highlighted the Conservative MP Lee Anderson who said he would not watch the team because they took the knee. It was absolutely tragic, its a laughing stock, they said.

I think there needs to be a serious realisation soon in government that people simply dont care about the culture war crap. They care about the cost of living, NHS and crime. They dont want to see us starting fights with Marcus Rashford.

The former Conservative minister, Johnny Mercer, tweeted of Mings: The painful truth is that this guy is completely right.

Mercer said more of his Conservative colleagues should speak out. We have some great colleagues in the party who reflect this I am in no way alone. But more must have the courage to speak up, instead of remaining silent in some weird attempt to curry favour.

Ged Grebby, the chief executive of Show Racism the Red Card, applauded Mings for highlighting the hypocrisy of some politicians and government ministers.

Tyrone hit the nail on the head, he said. When the players made a stand against racism by taking the knee at the beginning of the tournament, government ministers like Boris Johnson and Priti Patel did not support their stance and in fact they spoke against it, he added.

It is no good condemning racism after it has happened when you did not support the players at the beginning it is now a case of jumping on the bandwagon, he continued.

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Tech chiefs called in to No 10 over racist posts to England players - The Guardian

The Republican faithful flocked to Dallas for the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) over the weekend as the GOP strategizes ahead of the 2022 and 2024 election cycles.

The confab marked an opportunity for the grassroots to rub shoulders with leaders of the GOP, including former President TrumpDonald TrumpOvernight Defense: Top US commander in Afghanistan departs | US sends delegation to Haiti after request for troops | Senate Dems propose .3B for Pentagon in Capitol security bill Fauci and Birx warned Scott Atlas was 'dangerous' Report: RNC chief counsel called 2020 Trump legal efforts 'a joke' MORE, who are jockeying for position with activists and voters ahead of reelection bids next year as well as potential presidential campaigns three years from now.

The bash also highlighted the issues that are currently animating the party's base six months into the Biden administration, including gripes over the 2020 election, critical race theory and more.

Hereare five takeaways from the weekends conference.

Trumps popularity remains strong

Trumps popularity among the GOP base was proven again during CPACs straw poll taken of its attendees, underscoring his ongoing role as the de facto head of the party.

Trumpled the straw pollof potential 2024 contenders, with 70 percent of respondents saying they would vote for him in the Republican primary if it were held today. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantisRon DeSantisPompeo on 2024: 'I want to continue to have an impact' Five takeaways from the CPAC conference in Dallas Noem hits fellow GOP governors over COVID-19 mandates MORE (R) came in second with 21 percent, while no other candidate polled above 1 percent.

The showing marked a jump from the 55 percent support he enjoyed in the same type of straw poll at CPAC Orlando in late February.

"I want to personally thank each and every one of you for your incredible support," Trump said during a speech at the conference shortly after the results were announced.

The result was particularly promising for Trump after a straw poll at the Western Conservative Summit in Denver last month showed DeSantiswith a slight edge.

Last weekends survey was in line with several other public polls showing Trump with substantial sway among GOP voters.

The former president has forecast that he will use his influence to play the role of Republican kingmaker, doling out endorsements for candidates and campaigning across the country heading into the 2022 midterms, including in some instances against incumbent Republicans he views as insufficiently loyal to him and his agenda.

Conspiracy theories linger among the base

Conspiracy theories around the 2020 election and the Jan. 6 insurrection abounded at the conference, underscoring the depths to which the base has internalized Trumps unfounded claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

Attendees chanted four more years while the former president was on stage, and Trump repeated the allegation that widespread fraud and other irregularities swayed the November contest away from him and toward President BidenJoe BidenPoll: Biden approval on coronavirus slips 2 percentage points Overnight Defense: Top US commander in Afghanistan departs | US sends delegation to Haiti after request for troops | Senate Dems propose .3B for Pentagon in Capitol security bill Protests escalate US-Cuba tensions MORE an assertion for which hes provided no substantive evidence.

This must never happen to another partys presidential candidate again, it can never happen. We are a laughingstock all over the world, a laughingstock, he said.

Trump also took aim at media outlets that point out that he has not presented evidence, claiming to applause the instances of fraud are out there for supporters to see.

Every time the media references the election hoax, they say the fraud is 'Unproven! And while there is no evidence ...' No evidence? No evidence? There's so much evidence, he said.

Elsewhere at CPAC, merchandise was being sold topromote the baseless QAnon conspiracy theory, which posits that Trump will oversee a military takeover to oust from power a cabal of satanic child sex traffickers.

Recent polls have shown the extent to which conspiracy theories surrounding the election and other issues have seeped into the Republican mainstream.

A Morning Consult-Politico poll released last month showed that a slim majority of Republican voters believe that state-level reviews of the 2020 presidential election will reveal new information and reverse the outcome of the contest.

Noem comes out swinging

While much of the attention centered around Trump at the weekend conference, South Dakota Gov. Kristi NoemKristi Lynn NoemLawyers group criticizes Noem, Abbot on National Guard to border Five takeaways from the CPAC conference in Dallas Noem hits fellow GOP governors over COVID-19 mandates MORE (R), another potential 2024 contender, also drew headlines over her remarks about other states restrictions during the coronavirus pandemic.

Noem specifically took aim at other Republican governors for putting in place what she suggested were overly harsh measures aimed at combating the spread of the virus.

We've got Republican governors across this country pretending they didn't shut down their states; that they didn't close their regions; that they didn't mandate masks. ... Now I'm not picking fights with Republican governors. All I'm saying is that we need leaders with grit. That their first instinct is the right instinct, she said during her speech.

Noem has leaned into her approach to handling the pandemic to bolster her conservative bona fides, repeatedly highlighting in recent months her refusal to impose a mask mandate in South Dakota, among other things.

The buzz around her policies has put her name in the conversation of potential 2024 contenders. However, she still faces headwinds in a potentially crowded field, netting only 1 percent support in CPACs straw poll.

Culture war issues dominate

The CPAC conference underscored just how animated the GOP base is by a handful of culture issues, including claims equating Democrats to socialists, immigration, the debate over critical race theory and so-called cancel culture.

Trump made sure to hit on several of those issues during his speech, ensuring they will remain front-of-mind for GOP voters moving forward.

This is a very, very special place and were going to keep it the way it is, he said. With the help of everyone here today, we will defeat the radical left, the socialist, Marxist and the critical race theorists.

We will secure our borders, we will stop left-wing cancel culture, we will restore free speech and fair elections, and we will make American great again, he said.

The remarks come as Republicans rail against Bidens decision to remove Trump-era immigration restrictions, claiming the presidents policies are leading to a spike in attempted border crossings, and ongoing recriminations over the 2020 race.

However, it is critical race theory, which posits that racism is deep-seated in the history of the United States and its current laws, that has become the leading front in the culture wars.

The issue has roiled school boards across the country and led Republican governors to sign laws banning the teaching of it in public schools, even though schools in those states were not teaching it.

COVID-19 plays outsized role

The conference also put partisan divides over the coronavirus pandemic and vaccination efforts into stark relief.

Surveys and research have already shown that Democrats are more likely than Republicans to get vaccinated and that counties that supported Trump in 2020 are lagging behind their Biden-backing counterparts in their vaccination efforts.

The refusal by swaths of the Republican base to get vaccinated was accentuated by applause at the conference in response to a comment about the governments headwinds toward expanding vaccinations among the public.

The government was hoping that they could sort of sucker 90 percent of the population into getting vaccinated. And it isnt happening, conservative author Alex Berenson said over the weekend, sparking applause from the audience.

The trend undercuts a key Democratic argument heading into the midterms, which is that voters will be grateful to the Biden administration for its efforts to put the pandemic in the rearview mirror and back Democrats in 2022.

But more than that, health officials warned, it could prolong the fight against the virus and lead to more infections, variants and deaths.

Its horrifying. I mean, they are cheering about someone saying that its a good thing for people not to try and save their lives. I mean, if you just unpack that for a second, Jake, its almost frightening to say, Hey, guess what, we dont want you to do something to save your life. Yay! Everybody starts screaming and clapping, Anthony FauciAnthony FauciFlorida county mayor asks residents to wear masks regardless of vaccination Fauci and Birx warned Scott Atlas was 'dangerous' Overnight Health Care: FDA adds new warning to J&J COVID-19 vaccine | WHO chief pushes back on Pfizer booster shot | Fauci defends Biden's support for recommending vaccines 'one on one' MORE, the governments leading infectious diseases expert, told CNN host Jake TapperJacob (Jake) Paul TapperFive takeaways from the CPAC conference in Dallas Eric Adams to meet with Biden on curbing gun violence Israel offering third Pfizer dose to adults with weak immune systems MORE over the weekend. I just dont get that, and I dont think that anybody whos thinking clearly can get that. What is that all about? I dont understand that, Jake.

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Five takeaways from the CPAC conference in Dallas | TheHill - The Hill

Ive spent the better part of a decade trying to elucidate why one of our major political parties went crazy and decided to worship Donald Trumpwith that knowledge in hand, we have the potential to begin healing both the party and America.

Trump was able to take over the Republican Party for many reasonsmost of which reflect Republican failings. But there is another perspective that is not widely understood or appreciated. According to Kevin Drum, the liberal journalist formerly with Washington Monthly and Mother Jones, It is not conservatives who have turned American politics into a culture war battle. It is liberals.

Its a counterintuitive observation. Arent Republicans the ones who are staking out extreme positions? Since roughly the year 2000, according to survey data, Drum writes, Democrats have moved significantly to the left on most hot button social issues [here, he cites immigration, guns, taxes, abortionand even religion] while Republicans have moved only slightly right. So, ask yourself this question: Was Trumps rise to power a product of a Republican backlash to Democratic provocation?

Democrats dont comprehend how it feels to stand athwart history, yelling Stop! All. The. Damn. Time. Its something akin to how it feels to be a soccer goalie. Conservatives are constantly on defense. Progressives are always coming for more. Betsy Rosss flag. Theodore Roosevelt statues. Goya foods. This constant barrage, to summarize Drums hypothesis, drives conservatives crazy. Thats whyin lieu of actually winning most policy battlesso many conservatives have radicalized.

For most people, losing something is far more painful than the pleasure of gaining something of equivalent value, Drum explains. And since conservatives are losing the customs and hierarchies that theyve long lived with, their reaction is far more intense than the liberal reaction toward winning the changes they desire. This produces more outrageous behavior from conservatives even though liberals are actually the ur-source of polarization.

Of course, one mans provocation is another mans progress. Should Democrats feel bad that they won the gay marriage debate? Today, most Republicans support it. But putting aside the deep substantive questions, we are still left with other, more technical, complications. Lets start with the survey data on which Drum premises his piece. Polling is always subject to criticism about things like margins of error and the way questions are framed, not to mention selection bias. But the most legitimate pushback concerns sample size. By starting his analysis in the year 2000, he conveniently ignores the Reagan and Gingrich revolutions. In this regard, Drums hypothesis feels consistent with criticism that Trumps more nationalistic supporters lodged at the conservative movementsaying we have conserved nothing.

A simple left-right analysis of shifts in public opinion from 2000 to 2021 also ignores the GOPs reordering from Bush compassionate conservatism to Rovian gay marriage bashing to Tea Party anti-bailout/anti-Obamacare revolt to cultish authoritarian Trumpism (mixed in with heightened focus on race/immigration/transgender issues but less focus on traditional fiscal conservatism). Still, despite all the messiness and the caveats, Drum is on to something.

Trumps presidency was preceded by an Obama era that many of us felt was relatively anodyne. While racial backlash likely contributed to some of the rights radicalization that occurred during that time, many religious conservatives saw the controversies involving Hobby Lobby (trying to force a Christian company to provide contraception) and Little Sisters of the Poor (trying to force a religious order to provide contraception) as a direct attack on religious liberty. Others resented Obamas executive order on DACA (which he previously said was unconstitutional) and his trolling of Trump during the 2016 presidential race (ostensibly to accelerate the GOPs looney lurch so they would lose the election). That did not work out as planned.

Democracy works best when we have two sane centrist parties. Right now, we have one half of one party that fits this description. Therefore, its in everyones best interest to encourage Democrats to reel it in a bit, to save themselves, and to help the GOP recover from the cancer that elected Trump.

That means avoiding crazy ideas like defund the police. That means avoiding rhetoric that essentially labels all white Americans as white supremacists. It means not imposing the kind of litmus test that would force even Joe Biden to flip-flop on taxpayer funding of abortion. It means fellow Democrats condemning rhetoric like we saw from Squad member Cori Bush over the Fourth of July. It means having Biden finally have his Malarkey Moment, where he defends America and calls out the left-wing of his party for such egregious rhetoric.

All this to say that Democrats would benefit from some introspection, adult leadership, and a bit of humilityjust acknowledging that they dont have a monopoly on virtue or good ideas. Sometimes liberals are right about big things (e.g., civil rights) and sometimes conservatives are right about big things (e.g., the Cold War). Democracy is messy, but we eventually hash things out and (usually) arrive at the right place. But it takes us all working (and sometimes fighting) together.

The crux of my message to Democrats is that you should resist the siren call of radicalism, which the GOP has not, but also the temptation to run up the score while youre in power. If the countrys well-being isnt an adequate motivator, maybe self-preservation is. Drum makes the pragmatic case that Democrats have stoked the culture wars by getting more extreme on social issues and Republicans have used this to successfully cleave away a segment of both the non-college white vote and, more recently, the non-college nonwhite vote.

Cards on the table: I am an American conservative because I believe that liberal democracy is precious and worth conserving. I believe in reformnot revolution. And it strikes me that in these crazy times, radical left-wing ideas are dangerous not just on their own merits, but also because they spur contentious right-wing backlash.

Now, you may assert that other peoples revanchist (over)reactions arent your problem. But if you care about thwarting Donald Trump and the next Donald Trumpand if you care about holding this country together and preserving this tenuous experimentI say they are.

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Dems Helped Give Us TrumpThey Shouldn't Repeat That Mistake - The Daily Beast

Press release

For the first time, the internationally renowned chess tournament Dortmund Chess Days will host a special match between legends Vladimir Kramnik and Viswanathan Anand playing the No-Castlingchess format. The rich, creative possibilities of this chess variant were recently explored by the ground-breaking artificial intelligence system AlphaZero, created by world-leading AI company DeepMind. Online audiences will now get to experience novel AlphaZero insights first hand in the post-match commentary of the no castling tournament, as part of DeepMinds support for Dortmund Chess Days.

Demis Hassabis [pictured], DeepMind Founder and CEO, says:

Its been incredibly exciting to see world-class players like Vladimir Kramnik use AlphaZero to explore new possibilities for the game of chess. Im looking forward to seeing two former world champions play the no castling variant in Dortmund and hope the games - and AlphaZeros insights - inspire chess players everywhere.

Event director Carsten Hensel said:

The Dortmund Chess Days has found a growing audience online, which we would like to develop in the coming years. We hope the inclusion of the no-castling variant and the inclusion of cutting-edge AI analysis from AlphaZero will further reinforce Dortmund as a ground-breaking tournament and will attract people from around the world to watch what will surely be a remarkable and historic match.

The tournament will see Vladimir Kramnik and Viswanathan Anand play four games against each other with classical thinking time, but with no option of castling. This tiny rule change will force the players to deviate from memorized opening lines, encouraging new creative play without deviating from the games familiar rules and patterns.

Plans for the 2022 event, which will be sponsored by DeepMind, are already underway with the hope that the no-castling format will become a regular fixture and an audience favourite, thanks to dynamic and entertaining play.

Master Class Vol. 12: Viswanathan Anand

This DVD allows you to learn from the example of one of the best players in the history of chess and from the explanations of the authors how to successfully organise your games strategically, consequently how to keep your opponent permanently under press

Anand and Kramnik playing the World Chess Championship in 2008

DeepMind is a multidisciplinary team of scientists, engineers, machine learning experts and more, working together to research and build safe AI systems that learn how to solve problems and advance scientific discovery for all.

Having developed AlphaGo, the first program to beat a world champion at the complex game of Go, DeepMind has published over 1000 research papers including more than a dozen in the journals Nature and Science and achieved breakthrough results in many challenging AI domains from StarCraft II to protein folding.

DeepMind was founded in London in 2010, and joined forces with Google in 2014 to accelerate its work. Since then, its community has expanded to include teams in Alberta, Montreal, Paris, New York and Mountain View in California.

The purpose of the association founded in the year 2019 is the promotion of chess. IPS is realizing this goal by the organization of chess events in the fields of sport, art, science, education, cultural and chess history. The outstanding project of the IPS is the Sparkassen Chess Trophy International Dortmund Chess Days, with its famous history since 1973. TheIPS is developing a modern concept and pay considerable attention to the digital requirements of today, especially regarding the topic of chess and its modern development.

Master Class Vol.11: Vladimir Kramnik

This DVD allows you to learn from the example of one of the best players in the history of chess and from the explanations of the authors (Pelletier, Marin, Mller and Reeh) how to successfully organise your games strategically, consequently how to keep y

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AlphaZero to analyse no-castling match of the champions - Chessbase News

Texass Republican governor, Greg Abbott, has vowed to arrest Democrat lawmakers who have fled the state in an attempt to stop an overhaul of election laws that they say damages the right to vote, especially for communities of color.

Private planes carrying more than 50 Democrats left Austin for Washington DC on Monday, skipping town just days before the Texas house of representatives was expected to give early approval to sweeping new voting restrictions in a special legislative session.

The move denied the Republican-led legislature a quorum, leaving it with too few lawmakers in attendance to conduct business. That means it could not, at least for now, vote on the bill.

Even though Democrats cannot stop the Republican legislation, bringing the legislature to a halt might give them some kind of leverage in negotiating over the bills, as the Guardian previously reported. Walking out also signals to constituents how far Democrats are willing to go to try to stop Republican efforts to make it harder to vote.

In response Abbott told an Austin television station he would simply keep calling special sessions of the legislature through next year if necessary, and raised the possibility of Democrats facing arrest upon returning home.

As soon as they come back in the state of Texas, they will be arrested, they will be cabined inside the Texas capitol until they get their job done, Abbott said.

The cross-country exodus was the second time that Democratic lawmakers have staged a walkout on the voting overhaul, a measure of their fierce opposition to proposals they say will make it harder for young people, people of color and people with disabilities to vote.

But like last months effort, there remains no clear path for Democrats to permanently block the voting measures, or a list of other contentious GOP-backed proposals up for debate.

The Texas bills would outlaw 24-hour polling places, ban ballot drop boxes used to deposit mail ballots and empower partisan poll watchers.

The measures are part of a Republican drive across America rush to enact new voting restrictions in response to former president Donald Trumps false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. More than a dozen states this year have passed tougher election laws but only in Texas have Democrats put up this kind of fight.

Texas Democrats, shut out of power in the state capitol for decades, last fled the state in 2003 to thwart a redistricting plan. They ultimately lost that fight.

Trump won Texas easily in 2020 and it is already one of the hardest places to vote in the US. It does not have online voter registration nor allow everyone to vote by mail. Texas was also among the states with the lowest turnout in 2020.

But it has been trending Democratic in recent election cycles, pushed in part by changing demographics, and the Republican effort is seen by many as a way of seeking to offset that change by making it harder to vote for groups who traditionally vote Democrat.

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Governor vows to arrest Democrats who fled Texas to block voting restrictions - The Guardian