It is a big week for ‘but’ and ‘however’, delivered with some vehemence in responses to the Federal Budget. It is also a timely reminder that simple things matter, like our tone of voice in private and public conversations. We may all be happier and more grateful if we were carefully attentive to how we Continue reading »
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Alexander Csergo, accused of ‘reckless foreign interference’, is being held in a top-security jail cell in Australia. His case is a ‘show trial’, his lawyer says, which reflects ‘an absolute hypocrisy in our approach to doing business with China’. The Australian businessman arrested in Sydney last month on the criminal charge of “reckless foreign interference” Continue reading »
Lines composed on Budget Day as Australia starts saving up for our new nuclear-powered fleet. The ocean is restless tonight. Is that the boom from cliffs at Dover Heights, With their surf unheeding? Or melancholy, long, withdrawing roar Of empire, receding? Once, a fleeing General came ashore; Took charge, returned as pledged, but then hove Continue reading »
There are numerous signs that the United States is undergoing a secular and irreversible process of decline, especially relative to China and other powerful developing nations. The global influence of the US in the military, diplomatic, economic, technological, ideological, and cultural realms is declining unabatedly. In recent years, this process has sped up and is Continue reading »
In a society built on lies, the search for truth is a game. Consider the debate surrounding alleged ‘threats’ to the BBC’s ‘independence’, even as the BBC itself reports of its outgoing chairman: ‘As for Mr Sharp’s departure, I understand conversations between the BBC and the government have been had in recent days. You’d expect Continue reading »
… as long as the victim is a designated enemy of wingnuttia The latest from the worst Governor in America: Gov. Ron DeSantis voiced his support for Daniel Penny, the Marine charged in the chokehold death of Jordan Neely, in a tweet Friday. “We must defeat the Soros-Funded DAs, stop the Left’s pro-criminal agenda, and take back the streets for law abiding citizens,” DeSantis wrote in a tweet with a fundraiser for Penny’s legal funds. “We stand with Good Samaritans like Daniel Penny. Let’s show this Marine… America’s got his back.” This is a man who wants to be president of the United States. And people keep telling me that he would be better than Donald Trump. Why? Basically, this law and order candidate is declaring that unarmed mentally ill people who make people uncomfortable can be killed with impunity. There’s a big story in the NY Times today about how DeSantis is “re-tooling” his sputtering campaign. Here’s an excerpt: In six short months from November to May, Mr. DeSantis’s 2024 run has faltered before it has even begun. Allies have abandoned him.
Looks like Erdogan demanded @elonmusk censor his political opposition a day ahead of the election and he immediately complied. Musk is either the world’s most sanctimonious hypocrite, coward and fraud or actually wants to censor the opposition to help Erdogan. Or both. If you want to buy the platform to help right wing governments around the world, just say it with your chest. It’s your money, go for it, but spare us the free speech BS. Old twitter rejected 50% of these demands, which isn’t perfect. New Twitter complies 100%. “to ensure twitter remains available” clearly means Erdogan threatened to block twitter completely if it didn’t serve his regime. @elonmusk said ok cool you got it boss. Good luck at the polls tomorrow. Originally tweeted by Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) on May 13, 2023. Musk is a right winger who is pretending to be a “free speech” absolutist. That should be obvious by now. I’m sure most of you know that Pepe the frog is an alt-right, white nationalist symbol.
The BBC confirmed via a binary code teaser tweet that a look at the Doctor Who 60th-anniversary was on the way later on today.
American economist Hyman Minsky described capitalism as a “two price” system. On one side are asset prices—both financial, like government or corporate bonds, and physical like residential or commercial property. On the other, there are consumer prices—goods and services that determine current output and consumer price inflation. In the contemporary global economy, asset prices […]
Or get busy watching freedom die Blue America‘s Howie Klein (Down With Tyranny) points to an old idea still current and still popular: FDR’s proposed Economic Bill of Rights (1944). Our political bill of rights, FDR saw, was inadequate for assuring “equality in the pursuit of happiness.” “I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished.” “The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”January 20, 1937 As a record number of people die on America’s streets, Abdul Curry fights to stay alive. Howie excerpts FDR’s speech: It is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content, no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people— whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth— is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-housed, and insecure.
So much happens at the margins The authoritarian right takes an Everything Everywhere All at Once approach to undermining, well, most everything that undergirds this democracy. A friend at Daily Kos pointed to this notice from the League of Women Voters: HARRISBURG, Pa. — Today voting rights advocates agreed to dismiss a lawsuit that pitted them against conservative activist group Judicial Watch, in a lawsuit Judicial Watch originally filed in 2020 to force three Pennsylvania counties to remove thousands of voters from the rolls ahead of the 2020 election. The settlement agreed to by the parties simply requires the Department of State to separately publish online data it already collects and publishes under Pennsylvania law. Under the settlement, the Department will carve out the data for five county defendants and publish it separately. The lawsuit did not show any failure of the state of Pennsylvania to comply with either federal or state law governing voter roll list maintenance. Judicial Watch was unsuccessful in forcing any purges of the voter rolls.
Also, rail companies and airlines could face tougher regulations, workers are challenging Amazon, a new production company takes on Big Oil, and more.
Okay, we have more to add to our ever-evolving Doctor Who theory regarding RTD & his potato emoji - and it revolves around Jonathan Groff.
On a mid-April morning, hundreds of workers from Amazon’s Browns Lane fulfilment centre in Coventry formed a picket outside of the warehouse before marching to the front gate. ‘What do we want? £15! When do we want it? Now!’ they chanted. The scene, reminiscent of the heyday of industrial conflict in the 1970s, marked a […]
Copeland’s mother, Shapearl Wells, still fights for transparency as the city blocks the release of the full inspector general investigation.
The post Update: Chicago’s Inspector General Recommends Discipline, Policy Review in Courtney Copeland Case appeared first on The Intercept.
Use to discuss topics unrelated to recent posts.
I recall, with sadness, a comment made to me by the author of a well-known textbook. Upon being asked whether he accepted my analysis of demand theory as presented first in 1948, the reply was positive. He added that it would not be included in his advanced textbook because “it would upset too many things […]
That’s sweet. My cats turn into Tasmanian Devils in the car, screaming non-stop and bouncing around like Mexican jumping beans in their carriers. And what a pretty kitty. And then there’s this story about a very big pretty kitty: Before P-22 died in December, I’ll admit I was only vaguely aware that there was a mountain lion living in Griffith Park. I had heard the name and was familiar with some of the many perils that pumas in the Los Angeles area were facing — shrinking territory and an attendant lack of genetic diversity, speeding freeway traffic and exposure to rat poison — but I didn’t know much about what made P-22 singular. Then, late last year, P-22, who had made an unlikely home in Los Angeles’s biggest municipal park for more than a decade, started behaving more aggressively. Wildlife officials took it as a sign that after a long, difficult life, his health had deteriorated and that he should be euthanized. After his death, he became inescapable. There was his feline face on a giant yellow mural at a fitness studio where I sometimes take classes.
Not exactly Philip Bump take a look at that question because of Anderson Cooper’s assertion last night on his show that it’s important the CNN audience reckon with the fact that half the country supports Trump: In recent YouGov polling conducted for the Economist, about 45 percent of respondents said they viewed Trump strongly or somewhat favorably, getting us near that half-of-Americans mark. But that “somewhat” is hazy. When Quinnipiac asked the same question in March, without the “somewhat” option, only about a third of respondents said they viewed Trump favorably — more than YouGov’s “strongly favorable” but less than the combined “strongly/somewhat.” It was the same percentage as said they considered themselves supporters of the “Make America Great Again” movement. Of course, we’re only talking about American adults here, not younger people among whom, it’s safe to assume, Trump is generally even less popular.
“Your honor, I stand before you, a fictitious character,” the New York congressman proclaimed.
“CNN’s New Hampshire town hall with DONALD TRUMP last night may have done more to...