EU drops plans to hit American bourbon with retaliatory tariffs

Amid the economic maelstrom of Donald Trump’s trade war, drink makers might take a small drop of comfort: the EU has dropped plans to hit American bourbon with retaliatory tariffs.Bourbon and other US whiskeys have escaped EU countermeasures after heavy lobbying from the EU’s drinks-producing countries – such as whiskey-making Ireland and the wine behemoths Italy and France – who feared their alcohol industries would become casualties of a global trade war.Bourbon and wine have been removed from a draft list of US goods that will be subject to EU retaliatory tariffs in response to Trump’s duties on steel and aluminium announced last month, according to a leaked list first reported by Reuters.EU member states will vote on the final list on Wednesday, which targets €21bn goods, down from €26bn originally foreseen, after talks with the EU’s 27 member states and many industry bodies. The list of potential targets facing mostly 25% retaliatory tariffs now ranges from almonds to yachts, via diamonds and dental floss, soya beans and steel parts

Reeves tries to soothe market jitters after sell-off driven by Trump tariffs

Rachel Reeves stepped in to soothe stock market jitters on Tuesday amid signs that the punishing global sell-off triggered by US trade tariffs was starting to ease.The chancellor told parliament she had spoken to Andrew Bailey, the governor of the Bank of England, who confirmed “markets are functioning effectively and that our banking system is resilient”.Reeves’s comments came as stock markets in the US and Europe entered positive territory on Tuesday. Some investor optimism has returned after heavy falls as a result of Donald Trump’s “liberation day’” tariff announcements last Wednesday.Shares rallied after the US Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, said that he believed the US could reach “some good deals” with trading partners

AI piano analogy does not play well for me | Brief letters

John Hinkley says artificial intelligence “is a tool – like a piano is to a composer” (Letters, 31 March). I don’t find this a realistic comparison. No matter how many times a pianist uses her piano to compose or to play her own or others’ works on it, the piano will never appear alone on stage, playing its own compositions and taking the pianist’s place. It seems likely that this does not hold for AI within the creative industries.Jill WallisAston Clinton, Buckinghamshire A general leaflet from Reform UK soliciting my vote at next month’s county council elections smuggled itself into my abode recently

Mining of authors’ work is nothing new – AI is just doing what creative humans do | Letter

Authors say they are angry that Meta has used their material to train its artificial intelligence (Authors call for UK government to hold Meta accountable for copyright infringement, 31 March). But hasn’t that been going on for thousands of years? Isn’t all human thought an iteration of what has gone before? Artists and scientists have been mining the work of others for generations; that’s how human thought evolves.Ian McEwan was influenced by LP Hartley’s The Go-Between. George Orwell’s Nighteen Eighty-Four was inspired by Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We. Did Richard Osman invent the genre of cosy crime? The publishing industry as a whole is guilty of putting out bandwagon books, which ape the style, themes and tropes of a hit

The Cowboys have a brilliant scouting network. They also have Jerry Jones

Dallas have a proven ability to pick up talented players in the draft. But their owner doesn’t help when it comes to free agencyWell, Jerry Jones has done it again – and not in a good way.The Dallas Cowboys’ owner, president, and general manager has once again waited too long to re-sign one of his key players, and he’s going to pay for it as a result. At the 2025 NFL owners’ meetings in early April, Jones was asked about edge-rushing superstar Micah Parsons, and how to keep him on the team.Parsons is probably the Cowboys’ best overall player at this point, and 2025 will mark the final season of his rookie contract

The Breakdown | Premiership clubs’ European debacle illustrates growing French and Irish strength

Four English clubs conceded 215 points on a calamitous weekend with French clubs poised to improve furtherAnd then there was one. Good luck to English club rugby’s sole survivor Northampton, who still have a winnable home Champions Cup quarter-final against Castres this Saturday, but otherwise the flag of St George hangs limply at half‑mast. To suggest the Premiership’s contenders had an underwhelming weekend is like saying global share prices have taken a slight dip.If you’re squeamish about needle-sharp disappointment, look away now. Between them Saracens, Harlequins, Leicester and Sale conceded 215 points in their last-16 ties