This time last year, Britain was in the midst of the largest wave of strikes in decades. Energy bills were through the roof. Inflation was skyrocketing. The squeeze on living standards was at its worst since the 1950s. Workers were seeing pay packets that had stagnated for years shrink even further, and they saw no […]
Reading
During the 1980 us presidential election Ronald Reagan asked a rhetorical question of his audience: ‘Are you better off now than you were four years ago?’ Reagan as Republican candidate went on to win a landslide victory against the Democratic incumbent Jimmy Carter. The Labour Party has recently adopted this rhetorical tactic. ‘Ask yourself this,’ […]
The era of easy money is officially over. Central banks around the world have spent the last two years steadily raising interest rates, making borrowing more expensive for everyone — including governments — in an effort to bring down inflation. After a decade of low interest rates, during which time we were told there was no money […]
In Victorian London, King’s Cross was a crucial industrial hub. At one point, the former coal depot along Regent’s Canal handled 1,000 tons of coal a day. But, like many parts of the country, the area was hit hard by deindustrialisation. Warehouses handling coal and goods that were once transported by trains from the North […]
Journalist Nick Davies talks to Alan Rusbridger and Lionel Barber in Prospect magazine's 'Media Confidential’ podcast about the new revelations from the settlement by News Group Newspapers
After several previous abortive attempts at ‘retirement’, Ken Loach announced earlier this year that he would be retiring from cinema. The 87-year-old’s latest release, The Old Oak — said to be his last — brings to a close a career spanning seven decades and dozens of films, documentaries, and television dramas. In 1966, Loach’s breakthrough came with […]
A Texas Tornado of it “Telegraphing” is a euphemism for unconsciously signalling your intentions. Telegraphing a punch in the boxing ring. Like a player’s “tell” in poker. Donald Trump must be the worst player in either arena. Arrogance works like that. Where once he spoke in code like a mob boss, now Trump speaks like an aspiring dictator. When Trump promised Waco, Texas rallygoers in March, “I am your retribution,” collaborators began singing his song like a Greek chorus (ABC News): “We will go out and find the conspirators not just in government, but in the media,” said former Defense Department official Kash Patel during an appearance on Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast. Patel, who served as chief of staff in the Department of Defense during the Trump administration and Trump’s counterterrorism adviser on the National Security Council, was asked by Bannon if he would be able to deliver “serious prosecution and accountability” against their political opponents during a second Trump presidency.
During the general election campaign of 1997, Tony Blair, in an article in The Times titled ‘We Won’t Look Back to the 1970s’, reassured readers that the changes to trade union laws being proposed by New Labour would ‘leave British law the most restrictive on trade unions in the Western world’. The opinion piece was […]
‘Where is Ahmad?’ Israeli military forces demanded after boarding a bus from Ramallah headed towards Jerusalem. They were looking for me. I was on a religious pilgrimage to pray at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, but as a Palestinian dual national with a Palestinian ID, I cannot visit areas of occupied Palestine without a special permit called […]
‘My biggest worry is where my next job will come from,’ says Antonio, a fast-food delivery driver. He is one of the millions of workers in the UK in what has become known as the ‘gig economy’: a form of work based on short-term and temporary jobs, particularly those accessed through digital platforms which connect […]
When we go for drinks with friends, we don’t always think about the work that makes this possible. Often that’s the point. Hospitality workers are encouraged to make customers’ experiences smooth, with smiles and nods. But our good nights out can also be someone else’s thirteen-hour shift, their aching feet and lower backs, their time […]
In 2021, Spain passed pioneering legislation against the use of bogus self-employment in on-demand delivery work. The Riders’ Law took aim at the gig economy model of hiring couriers as freelancers for per-delivery pay — a practice which had allowed digital platforms like Deliveroo and Uber Eats to massively drive down labour costs but left workers […]
‘This international gay and lesbian solidarity represents the recognition that the equality we are fighting for is a universal human right — the right to sexual choice and self-determination — which overrides national boundaries, political systems, and cultural traditions.’ Writing for Tribune on the twentieth anniversary of the Stonewall riots of June 1969, gay rights […]
Anthony Minghella’s sumptuous drama The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), based on the 1955 psychological thriller by Patricia Highsmith, scans almost as a manual for faking your way into the upper echelons of the American elite. Tom Ripley (Matt Damon), a lowly Manhattan piano tuner, dons a borrowed Princeton jacket at a black-tie fundraiser and convinces […]
The scale of Detroit’s ongoing transformation is staggering. There are new hockey and basketball stadiums, a streetcar system, and dozens of luxury apartment complexes. New storefronts showcase the wares of companies like Nike, Under Armour, and Whole Foods. Reconverted corporate skyscrapers look down on the city. A century ago, Detroit turned itself into a mecca […]
In 2020 the Labour Party issued a press release in which its deputy leader, Angela Rayner, ripped into the Conservative government over ‘reports that lobbyists have been secretly serving as advisers to government ministers and departments’ and other revelations of ‘cronyism’ around ‘businesses and individuals with close links to the Conservative Party’. Rayner said it […]
Rachel Reeves, the self-proclaimed next chancellor of the exchequer, says Labour will fight the next election on the economy. But which economy might that be? The one the Tories have so comprehensively trashed? Or the better one — the ‘fixed’ one — Labour is promising to deliver? A wish list was set out in the shadow chancellor’s […]
Charles I’s neck bone, Queen Victoria’s armpit, and other fabulously gruesome medical tales.
The post History’s Five Best Body Part Stories appeared first on Nautilus.
Editor’s note: This essay originally appeared December 23, 2020 and is slightly modified.
by Brian Czech
With Christmas two weeks out, folks are making tough decisions about Christmas presents. The public is rattled by inflation, credit card debt is through the roof, and gift-giving is a real strain for many. My advice for anyone stressing out over Christmas presents is simple: Take a break from the shopping!
The post Christ Didn’t Shop for Christmas Presents (Much Less Jets and Guns) appeared first on Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy.
David Tennant's Doctor & Neil Patrick Harris' Toymaker face off in this clip from the Doctor Who 60th-anniversary special, "The Giggle."
On the morning of December 7, Benjamin Zephaniah departed this world. In the rush of establishment figures to associate themselves with this world-renowned figure of truth and depth, the radicalism that drove and shaped his life’s work is in danger of being sidelined – we cannot let that be the case.
Bernard Lietaer (1942-2019) was a former professor of international finance and president at the Central Bank of Belgium. One of our greatest monetary thinkers, and contrary to Krugman et consortes, he dared to talk about — and question — our monetary system!