“I no longer love blue skies. In fact, I now prefer gray skies. The drones do not fly when the skies are gray.” That’s what a young Pakistani boy named Zubair told members of Congress at a hearing on drones in October 2013. That hearing was during the Obama years at a time when the government had barely even acknowledged that an American drone warfare program existed. Two years earlier, however, a Muslim cleric, Anwar Al-Awlaki and his 16-year-old son Abdulrahman, both American citizens, were killed by U.S. drone strikes in Yemen just weeks apart. Asked to comment on Abdulrahman’s killing, Obama campaign senior adviser Robert Gibbs said: “I would suggest that you should have a far more responsible father if... Read more
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Something even worse than government run by politicians is government run by politics, writes AC Grayling
In 2021, it was announced that Dan Slott would be writing a series of Doctor Who one-shots from Titan Comics, with Tenth Doctor and Martha,
The collapsing school buildings scandal has exposed how the Government failed to 'fix the roof while the sun was shining'
Congratulations on your new offspring. I’ve been preparing for this ever since you started waking up to pee every hour. Are you getting tons of sleep advice but no actual sleep? I’m here to help. Trust me, no one is more invested in getting you the rest you need than me, your sleep paralysis demon.
I know you’re not the biggest fan of lying immobilized while I sit on your chest and hiss incantations into your ear or hold a scythe over your sleeping spouse, but things are tough right now, and I need your help. Work exploded during the pandemic. Clinical anxiety and alcohol use were off the charts, and I was working my entire repertoire from multiple demonologies. But before long, every lesser demon with a stage cough was trying to get in the game. Now, the labor market is still saturated, but our client base is dwindling as humans go to therapy and take CBD gummies by the handful. I’m down to you and Mr. Aquino across the street, and the only thing that scares him is his mother-in-law.
The European Court of Human Rights is there to safeguard us against our own worst impulses – calls to leave its jurisdiction are deeply troubling, writes Alexandra Hall Hall
In the BBC's Doctor Who, our hero's constant death & rebirth may be a show-saving gimmick, but it's also what makes the show deeply beautiful.
One of the most widespread myths in economics, but also in sociology and political science, is that game theory provides “tools” that can help solve concrete problems in these branches – especially in economics. Introductory and advanced textbooks thus often speak of the “applications” of game theory that are being made, giving the impression that […]
How Warren Buffett’s billionaire son, Howard Buffett, took over a U.S. city and made it his personal playground.
An analysis looks at whether developing countries are facing pressures similar to those in the 1980s, when higher interest rates helped trigger a wave of defaults in sovereign debt.
The MVC team digs into the film adaptation of John Steinbeck’s Depression-era masterpiece.
Proposals aimed at protecting children could force tech platforms to choose between freedom of speech and the right to privacy, a new briefing by digital rights campaigners, Open Rights Group and EFF has warned. The Online Safety Bill requires sites that allow user generated content, such as Facebook, Tik Tok, and even Wikipedia, to prevent […]
Australian novelist Yang Hengjun has been awaiting the verdict on his case in China for more than two years after being accused of spying. Now he fears he may die in detention
I’m not going to go into why that is a load of bullshit. The economy hummed along, no thanks to him but rather the recovery from 2008 finally reaching its stride. Our relationship with the world was nearing catastrophic. The border was a nightmare under him. We were still mired in Afghanistan and every day was some kind of chaotic catastrophe because this miscreant didn’t know what he was doing. This really takes some chutzpah: Not really. There are many more jobs now, manufacturing is coming back and the world is no longer terrified that the president is going to do something really stupid. But really, let’s take a look at where we were exactly three years ago today, shall we? When the pandemic hit he and his band of losers couldn’t even get masks and gowns to NY City while the morgues were filling up because he put his son-in-law in charge of “logistics” and he was clueless. Trump, meanwhile, was saying it was no big deal and if we got it we should take snake oil cures and inject disinfectant. On September 3, 2020: Trump’s answer to all that? On September 3, 2020 he had a rally in Pennsylvania.
The federal Opposition has condemned the Government over their decision to implement 60 day prescriptions, a move which will drop the price of medication, helping pensioners, but affecting chemists. ”Where does Anthony Albanese get off,” fumed Opposition leader Peter Dutton.... Read More ›
The demagogue liar Vivek is the future of the GOP, god help us. But AOC is the future of the Dems — and they are very lucky to have her: Ocasio-Cortez, who at 29 became the youngest woman and youngest Latina to serve in the House of Representatives, is now 33, twice re-elected and comfortable in her political skin. She could hardly be described as an old hand but nor does she channel the shock of the new. She deploys social media with enviable authenticity; she grills congressional witnesses like a seasoned interrogator; she is an object of perverse fascination for Fox News and rightwing trolls; she has been around Washington long enough to draw charges of “co-option” and “selling out”. “AOC Is Just a Regular Old Democrat Now,” ran a headline on New York magazine’s Intelligencer website in July.
There seems to be quite the competition developing between two of the worst Repub licans in the country for the exalted position of Trump’s VP: MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE and Kari Lake have been locked in what one source close to Donald Trump describes to Rolling Stone as a “death race” to become his 2024 vice presidential pick. In public, the far-right congresswoman from Georgia and the failed Arizona GOP gubernatorial candidate are happy to present an image of calm unity in their cause to return Trump to the White House. But behind the scenes, the two view one another with intense distrust and disdain, each seeing the other as direct competition for Trump’s political affections, according to four people with knowledge of the matter. Exacerbating the situation is the fact that Greene and Lake are the two leading contenders in a very narrow lane in the race to secure Trump’s VP slot, should he win the 2024 Republican nomination next year.
‘EU and Mercosur leaders ignore the voice of the people to push forward with toxic deal’ declared the Stop EU – Mercosur campaign alliance, a coalition of more than 450 organisations from Latin America and Europe, including trade unions, farmers organisations, social movements, animal activists and environmentalists. The alliance held a two-day meeting in Brussels on 17 and 18 July in parallel to the summit of EU leaders and leaders from the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), at which a conclusion of the highly controversial EU – Mercosur ‘free’ trade agreement was also discussed. Around 80 representatives of Stop EU – Mercosur members from Latin America and Europe gathered in Brussels to discuss the problems with the proposed treaty, explore alternatives as well as co-ordinate their strategies to stop that treaty to be concluded, ratified and implemented. In this blog post, I will report on several key conclusions by the Stop EU – Mercosur alliance.
Michael Luttig makes the case that the question of whether the 14th Amendment precludes Trump from running again will be decided shortly by the Supreme Court: I don’t doubt the Supreme Court will decide this. I do doubt that they will uphold the idea that Trump is disqualified from running. It would be the most shocking decision ever. And I don’t think anyone can even guess what it might mean politically. I have my doubts that it would end well but who knows?
In the last few months events have occurred globally which indicate an astonishing, but not unexpected, acceleration in the pace of climate change. The world has now entered a new era of extremely dangerous climate impacts which are already proving catastrophic in many parts of the world. The factors which hitherto have constrained warming, such Continue reading »
The major barrier to health reform is the power of providers or at least their assumed power. Recently the Australian Pharmacy Guild told us that 665 pharmacies would close if the Government proceeded with its 60 day dispensing policy. It was all widely exaggerated doom. Fortunately the Minister for Health stood his ground. It was Continue reading »