Regular readers will know I have been assessing the evolving data concerning the longer-run impacts of Covid on the labour force. As time passes and infections continue, our immediate awareness of the severity of the pandemic has dulled, largely because governments no longer publish regular data on infection rates, hospitalisations and deaths. So the day-to-day,…
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ACCORDING TO THOSE who’ve spoken to him lately, former President Donald Trump doesn’t seem to think he’s actually going to win his defamation lawsuit against ABC News and its star host George Stephanopoulos — but that’s not the point. Over the weekend, Stephanopoulos asserted that Trump had been “found liable for rape and defaming” the victim, writer E. Jean Carroll, by judges and two juries. As a factual matter, a jury found Trump defamed and sexually abused Carroll — and he was ordered to pay $83 million for defaming her again. Trump’s lawsuit claims Stephanopoulos’ comments were “false, intentional, malicious and designed to cause harm.” Behind closed doors, the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee has told confidants and lawyers that a primary purpose of the suit is to make an example of Stephanopoulos, two people with direct knowledge of the matter tell Rolling Stone.
I’ve been describing this world of ours, such as it is, for almost 23 years at TomDispatch. I’ve written my way through three-and-a-half presidencies — god save us, it could be four in November! I’ve viewed from a grave (and I mean that word!) distance America’s endlessly disastrous wars of this century. I’ve watched the latest military budget hit almost $900 billion, undoubtedly on its way toward a cool trillion in the years to come, while years ago the whole “national security” budget (though “insecurity” would be a better word) soared to well over the trillion-dollar mark. I’ve lived my whole life in an imperial power. Once, in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, it... Read more
Source: A Slow-Motion World War III? appeared first on TomDispatch.com.
That’s making the rounds all over right wing social media. I’m not kidding. With the news that ISIS is taking responsibility for the terrorist attack in Moscow (and the US intelligence agencies have confirmed it) the right is experiencing some serious confusion. This is because Trump has said repeatedly that he defeated ISIS and recently has been saying that he did it in four weeks. The truth is that the US did manage to kill al-Baghdadi and ISIS was forced to give up territory in Iraq and Syria but Trump didn’t really have much to do with that. ISIS is still operating in Afghanistan and Pakistan ad has been active against Russia for a while. Nonetheless, Trump’s lie is his one big claim to war leader fame and he’s milked it enough that his cult followers believed that he’s defeated them with his bare hands of something. They’re bewildered and creaked out so this is what they’ve come up with to soothe their damaged their psyches.
The opposition’s shadow minister for home affairs, Barnaby Joyce, has demanded that the Government launch a Royal Commission into why Channel 7 shouted alleged rapist, Bruce Lehrmann a rub n’ tug and not him. ”What sort of World do we... Read More ›
Brynn Tannehill, author of , “American Fascism: How the GOP is Subverting Democracy” wrote this twitter thread which I think is a nice succinct recitation of what awaits in a second Trump term: Someone sent me this yesterday: The basic premise is that the guardrails of US democracy are so strong that Trump couldn’t turn the US into a dictatorship even if he had 2 more terms. This is hopelessly naïve. Let’s break it down. First, a history lesson. The Weimar Republic lasted precisely 51 days between moustache-guy being named Chancellor and the Enabling Acts. Masha Gessen warned in 2016 in “Rules for Surviving Autocracy” “Your institutions will not save you.” “The system is too strong” is silly. The Philippine constitution was a near exact copy of the US constitution after WWII. Dictator Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law in 1972 using many of the same rationales used by MAGA (leftist plots, need for an autocrat) The article blows off several crucial elements in the danger. First (and already discussed briefly) is the vulnerability of the system to subversion.
Week-end Wrap – Political Economy – March 24, 2024
by Tony Wikrent
Strategic Political Economy
Global Population Set To Fall For First Time In 700 Years
[Modernity, via Naked Capitalism 03-23-2024]
Now is the time for talks that will bring us closer to peace and away from a deadly and destructive war with no end in sight. There has been a complete collapse of diplomacy between the US and Russia, and a near-total collapse between the US and China. Europe, which has made itself far too Continue reading »
Net permanent and long-term (NP&L-T) movements data published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) was recently used by the far right Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) in a highly politicised analysis of the January 2024 data on NP&L-T movements. This ‘analysis’ was naturally picked up by the Murdoch press via the Daily Telegraph with Continue reading »
The nightmare sprung to life: A gang. Worse, an Asian teen gang. An hour before dawn. I’m alone. With a bike. A dozen or more boys fired up with freedom, yahooing down the lampless highway, bashing bushes, tossing fire crackers, chiacking. Strife seems likely. There are no side roads for a speedy escape. Maybe a Continue reading »
After the Super Tuesday results signalled Trump would become the Republican presidential candidate in November, a first promise was that “We’re going to drill baby drill.” One of the most important reasons to watch American politics this year is that a Trump victory will push the world faster towards catastrophic climate heating. The global community Continue reading »
With the 2024 football season in its infancy, the official Twitter (X) account of ABC News posted a story about Scott Morrison handing back his Number 1 membership ticket to the Cronulla Sharks Rugby League Club. The opening line of the post was “The former PM is a longtime public supporter of the Sharks”. The Continue reading »
Andrew Hastie and Tony Abbott are trying to install a candidate in WA who has written a fictional book to scare people about a Chinese invasion of Australia. Western Australia exported $270 billion worth of goods in 2022-23, of which more than half, $147.7 billion worth, went to one country. Guess which one? China’s 54.6 Continue reading »
The CEO of BYD, the Chinese giant challenging Tesla as the world’s biggest electric vehicle maker, says sales of New Energy Vehicles (NEVs), including battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and plug-in hybrids (PHEVs), will make up more than half of all new cars sold in China within the next three months. “The penetration rate of NEVs Continue reading »
For all the bellyaching we all do about everything it seems like this should be something we should be more proud of.
It was sooo bad The Atlantic’s Tom Nichols has a book called The Death Of Expertise which he’s updated with a new chapter on the pandemic. He’s interviewed in the magazine: Isabel: You argue that one mistake scientists made was to take on the role of elected officials. Can you talk me through that shift? Tom: If you look back at those White House press briefings, where you had people such as Dr. Deborah Birx and Dr. Anthony Fauci standing there uncomfortably while Donald Trump ranted about bleach and lights, you can see where they and other experts felt the need to clarify useful policies in a way that ordinary people could follow, especially because elected leaders—and not just Trump—were making a mess of things. Early in the pandemic, for example, I was impressed by then–New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who seemed like a steady and capable hand on the tiller. But Cuomo—as we now know and as I discuss in the book—was desperately trying to cover up his own lethal mistakes. The scientists, people we’d mostly never heard of at the state and federal levels, stepped forward to issue guidance.
Yours truly is helping to prepare our youngest daughter with mathematics for her Swedish Scholastic Aptitude Test (Högskoleprovet) in a few weeks, and recommended this excellently pedagogical presentation on how to solve problems related to circular permutations:
Too good not to share Elaine Benes’ dancing (Seinfeld: “The Little Kicks“) was “like a full body dry heave set to music.” Her “little kicks” and the rest lost Elaine the respect of her office staff. For reasons that remain a mystery, Donald Trump’s “dancing” and cringey flag-fondling never seem to induce similar shock and revulsion among MAGA cult members. Somebody a year or so ago saw the similarities and mapped in Trump as Elaine’s dance partner. I just saw it. DON’T LOOK if you have a sensitive stomach. As the man says below, nicely done! ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● For The Win, 5th Edition is ready for download. Request a copy of my free countywide GOTV planning guide at ForTheWin.us.
Pieces of the web that make differing and complementary sense of the threat and promise of AI.
The post AI Roundup: The Bad, the Ugly, and the Pretty Cool appeared first on Zeldman on Web and Interaction Design.
From the fossil fuel-soaked legislatures to corrupt lower courts, bribery is rampant at every level of government, and other news from The Lever this week.