#under capitalism the law is not on your side—its on the side of the ultra wealthy & corporations

[fatfemmefreaquency]

it’s always “be gay do crime” until someone wants to resist settler colonialism by any means necessary and then none of you are comfortable with armed resistance

some of yall will be like "be gay do crime!!!" but then torrenting is too scary n diy hrt/medication is too dangerous and shoplifting is too risky and i think the only crime u guys r comfortable committing is "being" illegal in a country you'll never visit who's people you've never had to recognise as actual human beings

[charcherry-weekly]

Charcherry Weekly - Issue 51

Hello everyone, Pokemon Trainer Mage of Light Nick Card here! Let's begin!

Mystery on Slowpoke Isle

Earlier this week, Rogue of Heart Charles continued investigation of the recently dubbed Slowpoke island. In his searching, he found a location that was particularly highly charged. Magical Fae Brae Emit showed up to assist with the investigation and used her magic to re-activate what had occurred here. Reportedly, this had caused what appeared to be an Ultra Wormhole to open up! Almost immediately, a red and gray figure escaped from it at high speeds! Later investigations have concluded that it is very possible that the mystery pokemon is a Hoopa, known for using an interdimensional ring portal, which can potentially summon more pokemon. It is however unknown if this is the case at this current time, as there has not been a confirmation of a Hoopa sighting, only a strong guess based upon gathered evidence.

Later on, my sibling, Prince of Time Garnett Garren, did some alchemizations with Magical Fae Brae Emit and Page of Rage Jovin, largely focusing on pokeball-based items. Later on, your dear newsletter writer also did some pokeball alchemy, largely combining various items obtained from the minecraft server.

The most commonly useful item I alchemized appears to be the pokegun, made from a minestuck rifle && a pokeball. It shoots pokeballs out, though its unknown how many it holds. I'm assuming about the same number of ammo as the minestuck rifles usually have, with the caveat of unexplainable lock-up. Thankfully the last thing has yet to occur.

A yet to be used but other potentially useful alchemized item would be the die ball, alchemized from a minestuck die || pokeball. It is assumed that it relies upon probability to work. It is also shaped like a six sided die.

A day later, your dear newsletter writer Nick Card and Magical Fae Brae Emit showed up to Slowpoke island to resume the investigation, meeting up with Witch of Time Katyleen Kitten and Rogue of Heart Charles. Brae used her abilities to try and grow a tree, so that I could slather it with honey, given to me by Katie, who had alchemized it years ago. According to some research, the honey is likely to be safe for both human and pokemon consumption. It took multiple attempts until I activated a Light fraymotif to assist Brae in fast-growing a tree, by increasing the ambient fortune in the area. Sunlight Aria notably works best in direct sunlight.

Soon enough, the tree was grown and prepared to attract pokemon, and it wound up attracting a great deal of slowpoke. I wound up catching one with my 2nd pokeball shot out of the pokegun, and Katie caught a galarian slowpoke with an ultra ball. I have become friends with the slowpoke I caught, now  named Slope. Katie's Slowpoke is called Sorenson.

Unfortunately, the honey failed to attract the mystery pokemon that very well might be Hoopa. At least I got a new friend though.

A Blogging incident

Earlier today, the late Mei of Hepi's blog was confiscated and taken over by the Capital City police. They had posted the following on her blog:

Good day to all. This account is now under possession of the Law Enforcement of the Capital City, planet Hepi. We are currently looking for the owner of this social media account, Mei with long hair, triangular markings, about 121.92 cm. Pale blue skin and a blue eye prosthetic.

Reading this and related tweets by the same account, it can be assumed that they assume that Mei of Hepi is still alive, despite being legally declared dead months ago.

In other news, an important government building on Hepi has apparently been vandalized with what appears to be countless eggs, feathers and glitter...? Apparently, at least one bystander was also covered by these efforts. The identity of the vandalist is still unknown.

Obama?!?!?!?!?

Later tonight, word had broke of a red Super Emerald having been stolen from Barack Obama's island stronghold, in an undisclosed location somewhere on starter planet. It is assumed that Mysterious pokemon Hoopa had appeared and stolen it, though this has yet to be confirmed. The blame had been shifted to the Fire Nation, as the Super Emerald was tracked to that territory in particular. From some light research, apparently a super emerald is an upgraded chaos emerald, said to have been boosted by the master emerald.

It is unknown exactly how much more powerful a single super emerald is compared to a single chaos emerald, but it is certain that Obama has considered taking action against the Fire Nation, which may prove to cause a dangerous conflict. All because some ring bearing pokemon showed up here apparently.

At this point I just want the turd to return the emerald so starter can avoid getting scarred by an unnecessary war, one that might have drone strikes in it even. I do not want starter planet to be hit by drone strikes.

I don't know what kind of weapons the fire nation has (aside from fire and bears), but Obama's potential arsenal scares me. Not to mention the fact that he apparently has multiple sets of chaos emeralds, which he could use to turn super with! As if he wasn't scary enough with just an overspent military defense budget!!

At this point, I need to go to bed soon. I can't be worrying about a fucking war on a night like this.

https://letssosl.boards.net/thread/273/charcherry-weekly-issue-51

[phroyd]

Reading this article, you see the similarity between right-Wing Orthodox Jewry and Fundamentalist Islam; THIS is why Israel has become an Apartheid, Fascist State, Right-Wing Religious Extremism! - Phroyd

BEIT SHEMESH, Israel — The slaughter of 11 Jews in Pittsburgh elicited responses in Israel that echoed the reactions to anti-Semitic killings in Paris, Toulouse and Brussels: expressions of sympathy, reminders that hatred of Jews is as rampant as ever, reaffirmations of the need for a strong Israel.

But Saturday’s massacre also brought to the surface painful political and theological disagreements tearing at the fabric of Israeli society and driving a wedge between Israelis and American Jews.

Israel’s Sephardic chief rabbi took pains to avoid the word “synagogue” to describe the scene of the crime — because it is not Orthodox, but Conservative, one of the liberal branches of Judaism that, despite their numerous adherents in the United States, are rejected by the religious authorities who determine the Jewish state’s definitions of Jewishness.

And the attacker’s anti-refugee, anti-Muslim fulminations on social media prompted some on the Israeli left — like many American Jewish liberals — to draw angry comparisons to views espoused by the increasingly nationalistic leaders who now hold sway in their governments.

The result has been a striking and lightning-fast politicization of the sort of tragedy that until now had only galvanized Jews across the world — not set them at one another’s throats.

Here in Israel, the decades-old animosity between left and right has reached new levels of enmity in recent years. Ultra-Orthodox parties that play a kingmaker’s role in the right-wing government are pressing to increase their influence and that of Jewish law on daily life, sparking bitter fights over everything from who serves in the military to whether trains can run and stores can open on the Sabbath. Jews from liberal American denominations feel increasingly alienated from Israel’s state-run religious life.

With the Israeli government, like many across Europe, also taking a decidedly nationalistic turn, the election of President Trump has only compounded that strife, widening the rift between Israeli and American Jews. Politically liberal American Jews have been repelled by Mr. Trump’s solid support for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and by Mr. Netanyahu’s effusive embrace of Mr. Trump and his granting of a wish-list’s worth of political gifts. They range from scrapping the Iran nuclear agreement to repeatedly punishing the Palestinians and recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

All of that, and more, bubbled up when one of Israel’s most influential politicians, Naftali Bennett, leader of the right-wing Jewish Home party, jumped on a plane to Pittsburgh in his capacity as minister of diaspora affairs. Mr. Bennett gave voice only to unifying ideals: “Together we stand, Americans, Israelis — people who are, together, saying no to hatred,” he told a vigil there Sunday night. “The murderer’s bullet does not stop to ask, ‘Are you Conservative or Reform, are you Orthodox? Are you right-wing or left-wing?’ It has one goal, and that is to kill innocent people. Innocent Jews.”

No sooner had Mr. Bennett’s plane departed Ben-Gurion Airport than he was assailed by liberal Israeli critics, who among other things resurfaced a 2012 Facebook post in which he had accused leftists of promoting “crime and rape in Tel Aviv” because they wanted to allow African migrants who had entered the country illegally to stay.

“Is the Trump-supporting, African-migrant-bashing Naftali Bennett really the best person to represent Israel in Pittsburgh right now?” wrote Anshel Pfeffer in Haaretz, the liberal daily.

Others cited a pro-Jewish Home party text message sent to Haifa residents in advance of Tuesday’s municipal elections. It warned Jewish voters fearful of “the flight of young Jews” and a “takeover” by “the sector”— shorthand for Israeli Arabs — to vote for the Jewish Home slate.

“That’s almost word-for-word the spirit of ‘Jews will not replace us,’” said Dahlia Scheindlin, a left-wing political consultant in Tel Aviv, recalling the chant of neo-Nazi marchers in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017.

Even Michael Oren, the American-born deputy minister from the right-of-center Kulanu party, faulted Mr. Bennett for having sided with the ultra-Orthodox Israeli rabbinate, which refuses to recognize non-Orthodox denominations as sufficiently Jewish to participate fully in Israeli religious life.

“Liberal Jews were Jewish enough to be murdered, but their stream is not Jewish enough to be recognized by the Jewish State,” Mr. Oren wrote in Hebrew on Twitter, adding: “I call on Minister Bennett not to suffice with condolences, but to recognize liberal Jewish streams and unite the people.”

On the right, veteran activists in Likud, Mr. Netanyahu’s party, circulated an email on Sunday — which Mr. Netanyahu’s aides and party leaders disavowed within hours — noting that the Pittsburgh killer had denounced the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, which “encouraged immigration” and “acted against Trump.”

“Did we or did we not say that the Left is guilty of encouraging anti-Semitism?,” wrote the email’s author, who responded to queries but declined to identify himself.

Many Israelis, of course, reacted with horror and grief as they tuned into coverage of the Pittsburgh massacre. In Beit Shemesh, a largely ultra-Orthodox city 20 minutes west of Jerusalem, Elisheva Gutman, 24, a social worker, said her parents had vacationed in Pittsburgh two weeks earlier and had attended Sabbath services down the street from the Tree of Life synagogue, the killing site. “When they go to Europe, my father takes off his kipa and puts on a hat,” for fear of attack, Ms. Gutman said. “It’s not supposed to be that way in the U.S.”

Chaim Zaid, 62, a paramedic from Kedumim, a West Bank settlement, said the shooting belied Israelis’ ideas of the United States as a “paradise” for Jews. “You think the big U.S., with the big F.B.I., will protect them, and nothing will change,” he said. “But that was a change point. My sister lives in Brooklyn and was afraid to come to my home. So Sunday morning I sent her a message: ‘Rivka, you were afraid to come to me?’”

If other Israelis were quick to score political points over the Pittsburgh killings, though, in a sense they had been preparing for this moment. The disagreements between American and Israeli Jews have been piling up.

Only last week, the Jewish Federations of North America’s yearly General Assembly drew hundreds of Americans to Tel Aviv for a three-day conference focused on the strains in the relationship, titled “We Need to Talk.”

In a provocative keynote, the head of Israel’s largest real estate company, Danna Azrieli, recited the litany of friction points. For Americans, she said, there are Mr. Netanyahu’s effusive embrace of Mr. Trump, whom most American Jews oppose; the Israeli occupation and Jewish settlements on the West Bank, which many American Jews believe block peace with the Palestinians; Mr. Netanyahu’s reneging on a deal last year to significantly upgrade and grant equal status to a mixed-gender, Reform and Conservative prayer space at the Western Wall; and Israel’s new nation-state law, which opponents call racist and anti-democratic because it enshrines the right of national self-determination in Israel as “unique to the Jewish people.”

For Israelis, Ms. Azrieli said, Americans don’t serve in the Israeli army, pay Israeli taxes or live under the threat of rockets, but also don’t let those realities stop them from trying to impose their views on Israelis.

Long as it was, that list had big omissions. Israelis on the left would add, at a minimum, the Netanyahu government’s warming up to increasingly authoritarian leaders in countries like Hungary and Poland, and its demonization of the Hungarian-born, liberal Jewish financier George Soros — who also is a frequent target of anti-Semitic attacks in the United States and Europe — for underwriting activist groups that oppose Mr. Netanyahu’s policies. Mr. Netanyahu’s own son even posted a meme attacking Mr. Soros with anti-Semitic imagery that drew praise from the likes of David Duke.

And Israelis on the right would add their lingering resentment of American Jews’ support for the Iran nuclear deal struck by President Obama, which Israelis saw as a matter of survival, according to the author Yossi Klein Halevi, a New York-born Jerusalemite.

Mr. Halevi, a senior fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, said the Pittsburgh shootings had exposed an even deeper and more worrisome divide between the two populations. “Each sees the other as in some sense threatening its most basic well-being,” he said. “American Jews don’t understand the depth of the Israeli sense of betrayal over the Iran deal. And Israelis don’t understand why American Jews regard Trump as a life-and-death threat to the liberal society that allowed American Jewry to become the most successful minority in Jewish history.”

How damaged is the relationship? In her keynote, Ms. Azrieli felt compelled to plead, “Don’t give up on our country,” adding: “Don’t walk away because your liberal sensibilities are insulted. Don’t assume that nothing can change. Things do change — just painfully, slowly, incrementally, and with all of our help.”

And yet among Israeli leaders, some already have given up on American Jews, said Mr. Oren, the deputy minister and a former Israeli ambassador in Washington, who also cited some American Jews’ opposition to President Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

“One school of thought is: ‘These are our people, we have to do everything possible to reach out.’ The second school says:, ‘It’s too late, they’re gone. After Iran, after Jerusalem, if we have limited resources we should invest in our base — evangelicals and the Orthodox.’”

“The first school, which is mine, is a beleaguered school,” Mr. Oren said. “The burden of doubt is on us; we have to prove that we’re still correct. It’s not easy.”

In Beit Shemesh, Zion Cohen, 66, a mall manager, lamented the acrimony. “I’m Likud, but what’s happened between Israel and America, I’m against it,” he said. “I know it’s painful to Jews in America how Israel acts toward them. The influence of the Orthodox and Haredim on the Israeli government is a catastrophe. And we need help from the Jews of the U.S., especially given how much anti-Semitism there is now in the world.”

He added: “We have to unite the whole Jewish people.”

Correction: October 30, 2018

An earlier version of a picture caption with this article misspelled the surname of man shown standing in front of a mall in Beit Shemesh. He is Eli Peretz, not Teretz.

Phroyd

[emblem-333]

In Retrospect, William Jennings Bryan and the Election of 1896

What we are currently seeing in the infancy of the 2020 Presidential Election is the focusing of the electorate on economics rather than foreign policy or a less pressing issue, like “honesty” and “integrity” which usually dominate campaigns. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are the favorites to win the nomination in a hotly contested Democratic primary that isn’t yet finished fielding potential candidates. But these two specifically have declared unapologetic warfare against Wall Street. They put in simple terms explaining why the middle class is in its dilapidated state is the aristocratic class hoards all the capital amassed by the proletariat. While centrist candidates Kamala Harris and Kirsten Gillibrand dance around whether they’ll dismantle the private insurance industry, Sanders is the only one decisively saying yes, he would go as far to implement his Medicare-For-All legislation.

There are many imitators, but only one O.G. What we’re seeing is the beginning stages of the fruits of the labor the Sanders 2016 campaign planted turning over the establishments apple cart and paving the way for likeminded, younger representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and IIhan Omar to carry on the mantle for his various causes like Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Delano Roosevelt did for William Jennings Bryan. Championing the cause for the downtrodden middle class and poor masses left behind by an oligarchic United States.

Before William Jennings Bryan the Democratic Party was made up of fiscal conservatives laissez-faire style of economics, strict adherent to the gold standard and primarily the party of big business. The Republicans of the late 19th century weren’t different in anyway besides treating black people objectively better than the Democrats. Though in this era Jim Crow laws ran rampant in the south and the GOP did little to resist the disengagement of blacks. Any progress accomplished by the Union winning the American Civil War, the subsequent Civil Rights Act of 1866 and 1875 and the concurrent Reconstruction Era in the South became undone completely in this time period of the 1890’s.

Just like their predecessors both parties kicked the can down the road when it came to the plight of blacks. As both parties stomaches fattened as a result of getting cozier with Wall Street, the railroad industry and the gold standard, the southern and midwestern farmer wasted away thanks to rampant inflation and bearing the brunt of the various panics and depressions in the 1870’s and 1890’s. Historians rather assume flatly Reconstruction ended because of the American people’s and the Republican Party losing collective interest in protecting blacks in the Deep South, when in actuality the Panic of 1873 cost the U.S serious capital and thus by 1877 federal troops were withdrawn from the Confederate states.

Debates ragged on whether the United State should do the unthinkable: become the first country to abandon the gold standard for a currency system favoring silver. The topic arose multiple times since the 1870s. You’d find silver leaning men in both the Republican and Democratic parties. Populist James B. Weaver won 8.5 percent of the popular vote campaigning on the free coinage of silver. But the movement truly came of age under the man William Jennings Bryan. The 36-year-old former Nebraskan representative commanded the Democratic Party and held a tight grip around its throat from 1896 up until his retirement in 1915. In those sixteen-years Bryan transformed the Democrats from a party of fiscal conservatism to pro-labor with more emphasis on aiding the yeomen farmer. While Bryan himself would never see the White House, his likeminded followers Woodrow Wilson and F.D.R carried the torch for him.

Playing the ultra-boring, but simultaneously fun “Campaign Trail” choose your own adventure game on AmericanHistoryusa.com I played as Bryan and in order to win I toned down the radical rhetoric somewhat. Instead of advocating on the unlimited free coinage of silver, I pivoted to a moderate stance of coinage at a 30-to-1 ratio to allow the treasury time to adjust to the effects of bimetallism and to avoid another run on the hoards of gold the U.S held. Taking home 248 electoral votes and 51.8 percent of the popular vote Bryan steals Illinois from the establishment candidate William McKinley to secure the presidency. The is the text the game reads upon victory.

Congratulations! You have won the 1896 election.

"The Great Commoner" will soon be President of the United States! Nobody with your political views has ever sniffed the Presidency, let alone won it, and with that in mind your supporters are rioting frenziedly in the streets. The sweetest speech of all will be your victory speech tomorrow in Lincoln, Nebraska. Prepare to enact your reform agenda and most importantly the free coinage of silver.”

Yup. I sure will. If only the game allowed you to be president after securing the Oval Office then I can try out this radical departure from the norm. But, alas, somethings are meant to be left to the imagination.

So, Jennings Bryan is President. Instantly the United States financial sectors panic and rally around opposition to halt Bryan’s measures. In the midterm election of 1898 the Democrats, fully taken over by Silverites, wrangler control of the House from the Republicans and a moderate, but nonetheless, radical change to our currency system is implemented. By 1899 the United States is off of the gold standard. Soon, Japan, Great Britain and France follows. Albeit reluctantly. This is how it happened in real life. Only the United States was the last to be brought to heel eventually in 1933 when Franklin Roosevelt did what Bryan dreamt of for so long.

Even in defeat Bryan’s hold on the party became so strong he purged the gold standard Democrats out of the party solidifying his silver coalition of politicians sympathetic towards the farmer and laborers. No reason to believe this doesn’t happen if Bryan is elected President. In fact, it probably happens sooner than it did in real-life.

Bryan was a staunch advocate of a federal income tax, which fully was realized in the certification of the sixteenth amendment in 1909 under William Howard Taft. Initially, Bryan opposed the creation of the Federal Reserve, which happened under Woodrow Wilson. Bryan worries the Fed it gave bankers too much control of the monetary system. The bill was promptly rewritten to suit Bryan’s needs and he voted for the creation of the Federal Reserve. I think this still happens in a timeline which Bryan is election and probably sooner. Swept into office amidst populistic fervor unseen since the days of Andrew Jackson Bryan, though a novice, most likely utilizes the bully pulpit and we see Henry Teller lead the charge on the Republican side and we are witnessed to the most eventful first term of a U.S President in the country’s history.

Bryan calls for the direct election of senators once in office, subtlety supports women’s suffrage and usually this is the part in alternate history articles where the radical, moralistic protagonists falls for his idealism. Except this is all happening during the Spanish-American War and Bryan could have been blind, deaf and dumb while serving in office and the U.S still decisively runs the imperials out of Cuba and the Philippians. Only Bryan had little interest in cultivating an American Empire. An anti-imperialist and pacifist, Bryan saw war as necessary but never actively sought a fight. He saw the United States as the moral arbiter in the Cubans fight for independence. If elected there is no subsequent Philippine-American War and no further bloodshed. The United States gains serious credit among future generations.

Hawaii is not annexed and probably never really is. For all the good I can say about Bryan he was an anti-imperialist, but since he and his party didn’t want to absolve any country not made up of predominantly Whites. Hawaii therefore becomes the smallest independent country on Earth... until a later administration absorbs it or some other imperialist country, like Russia, Japan or Great Britain does it. Most likely Japan. So Bryan inadvertently washes away U.S military involvement in World War Two.

The war carries Bryan to a second-term of the presidency... only to be cut short by a bullet months after his inauguration. His vice-President former Silver Republican Henry M. Teller succeeds him.

If the United States were to abandon the gold Standard, thirty-five-years prior to Japan were the first to do it, this helps the farmer and for a brief time the country recognizes Jefferson’s dream of a country built and supported off the backs of the Yeomen farmer. Again, for a brief time. The loss of their vigorous champion Bryan farmers cannot find a suitable replacement to rally around and this allows for the big business friendly, gold standard leaning Democrats to repopulate the party nominating New York judge Alton B. Parker. A moderate trust busting advocate for labor, Parker benefits from the meteoric rise of Theodore Roosevelt and swings into the presidency since both of the main parties are fractured in the aftermath of Bryan’s effects on the political scene.

No Roosevelt means no William Howard Taft. Meaning no splitting of the Republican Party in 1912. With neither close enough to sniff the presidency Wisconsin senator Robert La. Follette is nominated in 1912 and defeats Democratic Speaker of the House Champ Clark and becomes America’s first President to serve two consecutive terms since Ulysses S. Grant. Since Wisconsin is populated with German immigrants, La Follette interferes into World War One on the side of the Central Powers. Theodore Roosevelt is given the role of Secretary of State and the German Empire crushes the Allied Powers at the Marne near Paris with the help of the United States.

A victorious Germany means no rise of Adolph Hitler. No Third Reich. No Holocaust. Great Britain’s awesome power is greatly diminished, never to recover. The ninetieth century is the German century. As it originally was supposed to be.

Back to the gold versus silver debate. I am sorry.

Eventually the gold standard is readopted and the silver versus gold issue goes on until Richard Nixon flatly ditches gold in favor of neither metal backed currency. Still you see Bryan’s ideas infecting the parties for decades after his death.

Instead of Bryan’s ideas manifesting themselves in Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt, they do so in Robert La Follette. The U.S becomes an economic power house rather a military one. Perhaps we’re all better off because of this.

[tomkail]

Why isn't 99% of the entire housing market owned by 1% of the population?

Today's random topic is: Given the UK's long capitalist history and reliably high returns, why isn't 99% of the entire housing market owned by 1% of the population? I'm not an economist (like, at all; I make games), but it does surprise me, so I thought I'd throw some (un)educated guesses out.

This is something that's puzzled me since I started thinking about buying a house. Here in Cambridge, house prices have increased by ~2x the last 20 years, while wages have only increased ~1.75x. The same holds true in many many wealthy and up-and-coming areas in the UK and worldwide.

It's incredibly daunting for first time buyers to see the price of housing increase at a rate faster than they're likely to earn, especially the same statistic makes them clearly good things to own to secure a comfortable future. It seems obvious to me that if I was a rich, unscrupulous man, a good strategy would be to buy another house, rent it out, and use the profits to buy more houses. I've had enough landlords in my life to see that it seems to work at least fairly well; but this raises the question: Given this trend, and a few hundred years of relatively stable capitalist history, why isn't 99% of the entire housing market owned by 1% of the population? It's hard to find good statistics on this stuff, but it appears that land ownership in the UK behaves as expected, with 50% of land owned by ~<0.05 of landowners (note - not individuals, but still close enough). Profitable businesses follow this trend, and very rapidly; hence the need for anti-monopoly laws - laws which don't seem to have counterparts for housing.

So here's some possible solutions:

Houses are constantly being built Unlike land or business, houses are constantly being built, increasing supply and decreasing demand. The population is growing exponentially, which could be increasing supply faster than ownership can be transferred up the chain. That said, prices ARE rising, and it seems to me that supply isn't meeting demand. Further to that, why not just buy up (or simply build) all the newly built houses, driving prices up further? I don't know very much about this, but I'm under the impression that this IS happening, and in response there are government incentives in place to encourage first-time-buyers and extra taxes for those with several houses.

Changes to the law Laws are created and altered over time. These sometimes favour owners, but other times not, presenting opportunities for owners to sell. When all your assets are in housing, and it becomes 1% less profitable, perhaps you decide to sell some and diversify? Do the threat of new laws also create a damping effect? It seems entirely possible that anti-monopoly laws would be placed on housing if it became necessary. A key law that acts against investment in housing is Capital Gains Tax.

Family splitting On death, assets are split between heirs - perhaps ~2.5 children on average. Is it possible that this is dividing wealth around as fast as it's being amassed? There's probably some truth to this, but on the other hand we also have families merging through marriage, and trusts being created to store wealth for several individuals.

Relatively Low returns Houses seem like great investments to me, but perhaps for the ultra-wealthy the returns from an average house in Cambridgeshire don't compare to those in Dubai or from other investments that only they have access to. Perhaps owning houses is a game simply for those with an order of magnitude less wealth (the merely very-weathly), and they sell their assets to the slightly-less-but-still-very-wealthy as they transition to becoming ultra-weathy?

The stock IS most owned - by banks One possibility is that this has happened, to some degree. A good deal of homeowners are less "owners", and more "indebted to banks in the form of mortgage". This would include large owners too, who rely on banks to grow.

War! In t'olden days, the rich could lose it all if they found themselves on the wrong side of a war or similar event, and see it divided (perhaps not entirely equally, but still) between the victors. This would act as something as a damper. There's also the destruction of property angle to war. The UK hasn't had an internal war in a good few hundred years, but it seems likely that wars in other places would have had a negative impact on at least some of the super-rich? At the very least, major wars shorten the time-frame allowed for the exponential growth we're looking for.

Not enough time It might simply be that not enough time has passed! Feudalism is a few hundred years behind us, and it could simply be that the process of big-fish-eat-little-fish occurs too slowly in this market for it to have reached its zenith in the timeframe? Most people wouldn’t willingly sell the house they comfortable live in while still alive (at least, if not trading for another) so maybe the process of buying and selling is just very slow and deals with such small increments of the total market compared to other assets (like business or land) that we just need more time?

Houses are just too expensive! The UK housing stock is worth ~£8 trillion. That’s a BIG number - the same as about 10 years of the government’s tax revenue! There are some very rich folks out there, but with houses constantly being built trying to buy up the entire country’s housing stock you’d need very deep pockets. Ultimately, I think this is the biggest factor - they’re just too damned expensive for anyone to snap up, even compounded over several hundred years. 

Anyway, in case it’s not clear by this point, I don’t know, nor am I qualified to make an evaluation. I am still very curious though, so if you know or can point me in the direction of someone who does, I’d love to hear about it.

[curegbm]

GLOBAL 5G PROTEST WARNS OF HEALTH AND ECOLOGICAL COSTS

Olle Johansson, Newsvoice.se, Sep 5, 2020

The drive by tech giants to develop artificial intelligence envisages every facet of our lives dominated by 5G networks. The media paints it as the technology of the future but 5G is invading the public domain without public oversight.

By Olle Johansson, associate professor, retired from The Karolinska Institute Medical University, Stockholm, Sweden. Tanja Katarina Rebel, eco-philosopher, member of Stop 5G International, Cowes, Isle of Wight, UK. Brian McGavin, writer/environmentalist, Stockport, UK.

The costs are huge. Research by Greensill, a capital finance company, estimates that developing 5G globally will reach more than $2.7 trillion by the end of 2020. Operators paid almost £1.4bn for the UK government 5G wavelengths auction alone. When the world is reeling under the strain of a virus pandemic, a debt crisis, climate breakdown and economic collapse, how does it possibly make sense to throw so much money at a potentially harmful tech fantasy when we need to spend billions on a green transition to sustainability?

Claims that ‘we need 5G because 4G can’t cope’ conflicts with the millions spent looking for things to do with it. With growing pressure to disinvest in polluting fossil fuel companies, no such restraint is shown by 5G investors. The media is pumping up an unquestioning technology love-in with an IT sector that paints visions of driverless vehicles they claim are safer and more efficient than human controlled transport, offers ultra-fast streaming to mobile cell phones, virtual reality tech fantasies, internet-enabled fridges that can re-order your milk and even drone delivery of online orders to homes, to shatter what peace we have left in an overcrowded world.

Advocates point to areas where the technology might assist, perhaps in surgical procedures, but there is no sound evidence that autonomous vehicles are reducing collisions. A 2018 US study says driverless systems would have to improve ten-fold in detecting pedestrians, compared with humans. (Guardian, October 3, 2019).

As data from billions of internet-connected ‘smart’ devices grow exponentially, it is estimated that the IT industry could consume 20% of all the world’s electricity by 2025, straining power grids to feed an incessant demand from people hooked on phone screen entertainment. The Internet of Things promises to give us more. But more of what?

Wireless cell antennas galore. 5G will bring a huge increase in microwave radiation everywhere, in cities, suburbs, parks, nature reserves. Instead of cell towers every few miles, there will be small but powerful towers—in front of every third to fifth home.Atmospheric effects and use of fossil fuels. Instead of 2,000 satellites orbiting the Earth, there will shortly be 50,000, and permission has been granted for 100,000. These satellites have a short lifespan requiring more deployment. A new hydrocarbon engine to power a fleet of suborbital rockets would emit black carbon which “could cause potentially significant changes in the global atmospheric circulation” according to a 2010 Californian study. (Guardian, October 3, 2019).Astronomical observations, including asteroid collision monitoring, will be greatly harmed by plans to deploy up to 50,000 or 100,000 small satellites in preparation for 5G. (International Astronomical Union)Disruption of natural ecosystems. Thousands of peer-reviewed studies already show electrosmog to be harmful to public health and ecology, more so with pulsed 24/7 high-frequency radiation, which will be vastly more harmful to humans and wildlife, especially bees and other pollinators. Since 2000, reports of birds abandoning nests and reduced survival are common. (cf. Alfonso Balmori, biologist, and Exposure of Insects to Radio-Frequency Electromagnetic Fields from 2 to 120 GHz).More tree culling. The 5G Innovation Centre in Surrey says that “where trees are of comparable heights to masts, coverage can be reduced by as much as 70%.”New ‘microcomb’ cable fiber technologies are safer, 10 times more efficient than 5G and could be in wide use within three years. (Monash University).Impact on human health and our environment. Despite recent revision, the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection guidelines remain largely unchanged since 1998.

In 2016 The Global Union Against Radiation Deployment from Space (GUARD) wrote to US officials about the potential harm 5G will inflict – parentsforsafetechnology.orgEffects on the skin – Sweat glands may act like antennas when exposed to these wavelengths, meaning that we could become more conductive. Another study found 90% of the transmitted power is absorbed in the skin. (Dr. Ben-Ishai, Hebrew University, Israel). The skin is intimately connected to the nervous system, opening the door to an increase in neurological disorders primarily of the peripheral nervous system.Effects on plant health – millimetre waves are particularly susceptible to being absorbed by plants, which humans and animals consume as a food source; see https://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijfr/2010/836278/. Abuse of informed consent. 5G is invading the public domain without public oversight. Nowhere in its seven ‘terms of reference’ did the UK government’s consultation ‘Call for Evidence and the Road to 5G’, even mention ‘health and environmental’ concerns. It is a monumental bias to promote the tech lobby investment, oblivious to the health and ecological impact. Similar to the playbook used by tobacco, asbestos, Teflon, and other toxins, the telecom industry has neglected to disclose risks from 5G. Instead, it unabashedly asserts 5G’s safety while providing no substantive independent studies to support this claim. They are flying blind on the health and environmental effects and putting profit before people.

People are rising across the world to say no to 5G which is being rolled out without independent health or environmental impacts assessments and without informed consent, enshrined in UN Law. People should have the right to decide what kind of radiation they are exposed to and whether they want it at all without being labelled ”conspiracy theorists.” The Stop 5G movement bases its concerns about radiofrequency radiation on evidence-based independent science. Instead of peddling a one-sided ‘conspiracy’ narrative, the media needs to engage in serious debate.

On June 6, 2020, 5G protests took place across the world, including in New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, The Philippines, USA, Canada, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, The Netherlands, Ireland, Germany, Portugal, Spain, France, Greece, Bulgaria, and the UK.  A new “Stop 5G Global Protest” will take place on September 26.

***

Finally, do not get us wrong. The current exposures to other sources of electromagnetic fields and signals, such as 2G, 3G and 4G, WiFi, baby alarms, smart meters, etc., are not safe. That’s the reason why we want to – in time – address the potential health consequences as well as biological impacts of the next generations, such as 5G. But we are very well understanding the need to also warn of health and ecological costs of the earlier versions.

By Olle Johansson, Tanja Katarina Rebel, Brian McGavin

References

We can point to thousands of relevant scientific reports on environmental and linked health issues, see: https://www.powerwatch.org.uk/science/studies.asp, www.EMF-portal.org at Aachen University, and http://www.bioinitiative.org.

For more information see the “Global 5G Protest Facebook Group” and “Stop 5G International”:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/548912049259423/ and https://www.stop5ginternational.org

For further reading, see:

Johansson O, ”Associate professor: Wireless radiation – the biggest full-scale biomedical experiment ever done on Earth”, Newsvoice.se 5/8, 2018a, https://newsvoice.se/2018/08/wireless-radiation-biomedical-experiment/

Johansson O, “To understand adverse health effects of artificial electromagnetic fields…  …is “rocket science” needed or just common sense?”, In: Essays on Consciousness – Towards a New Paradigm (ed. I. Fredriksson), Balboa Press, Bloomington, IN, USA, 2018b, pp 1-38, ISBN 978-1-9822-0811-0

Johansson O, “Is the ‘electrosmog’ finally clearing?”, Newsvoice.se 4/2, 2019a, https://newsvoice.se/2019/02/electrosmog-clearing/

Johansson O, ”To bee, or not to bee, that is the five “G” question”, Newsvoice.se 28/5, 2019, https://newsvoice.se/2019/05/5g-question-olle-johansson/

Johansson O, Ferm R, ” “Yes, Prime Minister” Stefan Löfven, but no! This is not good enough!”, Newsvoice.se 3/5, 2020, https://newsvoice.se/2020/05/stefan-lofven-5g-microwave-radiation/

Santini R, Johansson O, ”If 5G is not deemed safe in the USA, and nowhere in the rest of the world, by the insurance industry … why is it by the Danish government?”, Newsvoice.se 8/7, 2020, https://newsvoice.se/2020/07/5g-not-safe-usa/

https://newsvoice.se/2020/09/global-5g-protest-warns-of-health-and-ecological-costs/

--

Joel M. Moskowitz, Ph.D., Director

Center for Family and Community Health

School of Public Health

University of California, Berkeley

Electromagnetic Radiation Safety

Website:          https://www.saferemr.com

Facebook:        https://www.facebook.com/SaferEMR

Twitter:            @berkeleyprc

[jobsearchtips02]

How a Tax Benefit for Developers Might Backfire in the Pandemic

Wealth Matters

As the coronavirus crisis pushes down realty worths and deals fall apart, financiers stand to lose millions, and might even get struck with extra penalties.

Jatin Desai, left, primary monetary officer of Peachtree Hotel Group, and Greg Friedman, its chief executive. Mr. Desai is worried about a hotel deal’s falling through as the purchasers push back the closing deadline. Credit … Audra Melton for The New York City Times

Something remarkable is percolating in the industrial real estate market: Financiers may end up losing millions in tax cost savings on gains from the sale of their properties since of the coronavirus pandemic.

Like-kind real estate exchanges, likewise referred to as 1031 exchanges (after the arrangement in the Internal Earnings Code), permit financiers to offer a business home and pay no tax on the gains as long as the money from that sale is reinvested in other real estate. It might be a comparable structure, land or perhaps air rights.

The provision was preserved in the overhaul of the tax code that was checked in 2017 by President Trump, who made his wealth in real estate development, while financial investments in other areas, like art and vintage cars, were removed of their special tax status.

To profit, real estate investors need to recognize a replacement home 45 days after the sale of the original residential or commercial property and close on the purchase within 180 days. If the criteria are met, the investors can defer taxes on the gains from the sale of the property. The deferment can extend until the investor’s death, at which point the capital gains tax is eliminated.

If the criteria are not fulfilled, the financiers face not only a huge tax expense for the gains but extra taxes for deductions taken while they owned the structure. That can amount to countless dollars for some properties.

As lockdowns made complex closing offers, the realty market lobbied the Treasury Department to get extensions on those dates, and it obliged in early April. The department said that if either the 45- or 180- day deadline fell between April 1 and July 14, it would be relocated to July 15– the brand-new due date, too, for filing income and other federal taxes for 2019 and the very first half of 2020.

But the guidance lacked clarity on some essential issues underlying catastrophe relief for like-kind exchanges, and the extension might do more damage than good to certain sectors of the industrial realty market, like selling and home entertainment, that are currently under economic pressure.

The extension of the deadlines for like-kind exchanges has led to sales being held off or canceled, purchase prices being reassessed and money from a sale staying out of reach of the property investor who may need it.

” Typically, you believe tax extensions are a favor to taxpayers,” stated Kate Kraus, a partner at the law firm Allen Matkins in Los Angeles. This one “is all murky,” she stated, adding: “The government seems not to have considered the consequences of this.”

The extension began like many others, with an interest group writing a letter requesting for relief. In this case, the Real Estate Roundtable wrote to Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary, who granted the demand.

” It looked like a good-government, reasonable thing to do,” stated Ryan McCormick, senior vice president and counsel at the group.

Investors had currently started the procedure of the exchange, he stated, but it became challenging to take a trip because of pandemic lockdowns, and they were not able to do due diligence like an appraisal. “Taxpayers were seeking some additional time to resolve that,” he said.

Once the relief was given, deals that belonged to 1031 exchanges started to fall apart.

Jatin Desai, chief monetary officer and chief investment officer of Peachtree Hotel Group in Atlanta and a member of Tiger 21, a group of ultra-high-net-worth financiers, said he had actually been approached prior to the pandemic to offer among the company’s hotels in South Florida. The 2 sides reached an offer, which was set to close before the July 15 deadline.

” When we discovered it was a 1031 purchaser, we believed they ‘d close quickly,” he said. “However when the deadline was pushed out, the purchasers said they were going to push out the closing.”

The offer had a 90 percent chance of closing before, he said, however he gave it a 10 percent opportunity now.

Nationally, smaller sized property exchanges– worth less than $3 million– have actually come to a stop, and larger ones are being delayed, stated Alex Madden, vice president of Kay Properties and Investments, an online marketplace for 1031 exchanges.

He said the variety of homes for sale nationally was down by 75 percent given that mid-March. The ones that remain appealing are residential or commercial properties that he called “coronavirus resistant,” like pharmacies and distribution centers that serve companies like Amazon or FedEx.

Investors taking advantage of exchanges are anticipated to deal with July 15 as their date to identify or close on a property. But if that date holds, it might create synthetically inflated costs for those few “coronavirus resistant” homes.

Image

Jay D. Stein of Sandor Advancement saw an advantage in the uncertainty around industrial property as high-quality residential or commercial properties trigger bidding wars. Credit … Lori Krenzen

Jay D. Stein, president of the Scottsdale, Ariz., workplace of Sandor Development, which purchases strip malls and free-standing pharmacies, had a group of purchasers signed up for four of his CVS shops that pulled out when the extension was passed. He is positive that the brand-new due date and the ongoing unpredictability around business real estate could benefit him.

” It’s very possible you can see the very best product get into bidding wars, in early to mid-July,” Mr. Stein stated. “Everybody is going after the very same stuff– high-credit quality properties with great cash flow.”

Financiers face other difficulties in finishing these deals, consisting of funding. Purchasers who require a home loan could struggle to get bank funding since of falling residential or commercial property worths or pay more for loans from private lenders. Mr. Stein stated he had sold his CVS stores with the debt in place to conserve the buyer from needing to acquire debt financing.

Updated June 5, 2020

How many individuals have lost their jobs due to coronavirus in the U.S.?

The joblessness rate fell to 13.3 percent in May, the Labor Department stated on June 5, an unanticipated improvement in the nation’s task market as hiring rebounded quicker than economists anticipated. Financial experts had forecast the joblessness rate to increase to as much as 20 percent, after it hit 14.7 percent in April, which was the greatest given that the government began keeping official data after The second world war. But the joblessness rate dipped rather, with companies adding 2.5 million tasks, after more than 20 million jobs were lost in April.

Will protests trigger a second viral wave of coronavirus?

Mass demonstrations versus police brutality that have actually brought countless people onto the streets in cities throughout America are raising the specter of brand-new coronavirus outbreaks, triggering politicians, physicians and public health specialists to caution that the crowds could cause a surge in cases. While numerous political leaders affirmed the right of protesters to express themselves, they advised the demonstrators to wear face masks and maintain social distancing, both to protect themselves and to prevent additional neighborhood spread of the virus. Some infectious illness professionals were reassured by the fact that the protests were held outdoors, stating the open air settings might alleviate the threat of transmission.

How do we begin exercising once again without harming ourselves after months of lockdown?

Workout researchers and doctors have some blunt guidance for those of us intending to return to routine exercise now: Start gradually and then rev up your exercises, also gradually. “begin at no more than 50 percent of the exercise you were doing before Covid,” states Dr. Monica Rho, the chief of musculoskeletal medicine at the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab in Chicago.

My state is resuming. Is it safe to head out?

States are resuming bit by bit This suggests that more public areas are available for use and increasingly more businesses are being permitted to open again. The federal government is largely leaving the choice approximately states, and some state leaders are leaving the choice approximately regional authorities. Even if you aren’t being told to stay at home, it’s still an excellent idea to restrict journeys outdoors and your interaction with other individuals.

What’s the threat of capturing coronavirus from a surface area?

Touching infected objects and after that contaminating ourselves with the bacteria is not usually how the infection spreads. It can happen. A number of research studies of flu, rhinovirus, coronavirus and other microbes have actually shown that breathing health problems, including the brand-new coronavirus, can spread out by touching polluted surface areas, especially in places like day care centers, offices and health centers A long chain of events has to take place for the illness to spread out that method. The best method to secure yourself from coronavirus– whether it’s surface transmission or close human contact– is still social distancing, washing your hands, not touching your face and using masks.

What are the symptoms of coronavirus?

Common signs include fever, a dry cough, tiredness and trouble breathing or shortness of breath. A few of these symptoms overlap with those of the influenza, making detection challenging, but runny noses and stuffy sinuses are less typical. The C.D.C. has likewise included chills, muscle pain, sore throat, headache and a brand-new loss of the sense of taste or odor as symptoms to watch out for. Most people fall ill 5 to seven days after direct exposure, but signs might appear in as couple of as two days or as many as 14 days.

How can I secure myself while flying?

If air travel is inevitable, there are some steps you can take to protect yourself. A study from Emory University found that during influenza season, the safest place to sit on an airplane is by a window, as individuals sitting in window seats had less call with possibly ill individuals.

How do I take my temperature level?

Taking one’s temperature level to look for signs of fever is not as easy as it sounds, as “normal” temperature level numbers can vary, however normally, watch out for a temperature level of 100.5 degrees Fahrenheit or higher. If you do not have a thermometer (they can be expensive these days), there are other ways to determine if you have a fever, or are at threat of Covid-19 complications.

Should I use a mask?

The C.D.C. has advised that all Americans wear fabric masks if they go out in public. This is a shift in federal assistance showing brand-new concerns that the coronavirus is being spread by contaminated people who have no signs

What should I do if I feel sick?

If you’ve been exposed to the coronavirus or believe you have, and have a fever or symptoms like a cough or problem breathing, call a doctor. They must give you recommendations on whether you should be tested, how to get evaluated, and how to look for medical treatment without potentially infecting or exposing others.

How do I get checked?

If you’re ill and you believe you’ve been exposed to the brand-new coronavirus, the C.D.C. advises that you call your healthcare provider and describe your symptoms and worries. They will choose if you require to be evaluated. There’s an opportunity– because of an absence of screening packages or because you’re asymptomatic, for instance– you won’t be able to get tested.

Since the value of some properties has fallen in the pandemic, purchasers who went into an agreement on a residential or commercial property as part of an exchange do not want to pay the cost they accepted before the crisis hit.

” This replacement home now has renters who are no longer paying rent– WeWork-type occupants, restaurants, tenants who might be going out of business,” Ms. Kraus said. “It’s a mess that you can’t tidy up rapidly.”

Due to the fact that some residential or commercial properties no longer make economic sense to purchase, she has advised her clients to invoke a separate stipulation that lets celebrations in an exchange get a 120- day extension if a catastrophe takes place throughout the procedure.

” They have nothing to lose,” she stated. “How much worse can it get?”

Hanging over all of these exchanges are extremely high taxes if they are not completed. A financier who did not find a replacement property would be have to pay a federal capital gains tax of 15 percent to 20 percent, stated Mr. Madden of Kay Properties. An investor might lose a $6 million advantage on the capital gains tax of the sale of a structure that nets $30 million.

However the financier would likewise go through the Medicare surtax of 3.8 percent, state capital gains taxes of as much as 13.3 percent and a depreciation recapture tax of 25 percent for diminishing the worth of the structure for annual income tax payments, he said.

The benefit– or disadvantage– is typically higher with like-kind exchanges than without. The investor can continue flipping the investment tax free until death, when the entire portfolio will be valued at that point. This so-called step-up in basis eliminates decades of embedded capital gains taxes that were never ever paid. The plan benefits the beneficiaries, although the estate taxes might still be owed.

Paying tax is a routine event for investors in the majority of other public and private markets, from stocks and bonds to hedge fund gains, however it’s a rarity in a market that benefits from generous tax reductions, deductions, deferments and decreases.

This time around, nevertheless, paying the capital gains tax now might be the better alternative because falling property worths might erase any tax advantage from the exchange.

” Given that the market did switch, we have actually seen a couple of 1031 buyers state, ‘I’m just going to pay the tax,'” Mr. Stein said. “These were buyers who never would have paid tax. I have one good friend who stated he’s frightened that he does not have sufficient money.”

Find Out More

from Job Search Tips https://jobsearchtips.net/how-a-tax-benefit-for-developers-might-backfire-in-the-pandemic/

[leftpress]

‘Straight Left’: from Tankie faction in CP to heart of the Labour Party

charliethechulo | Shiraz Socialist | March 3rd 2017

By Andrew Coates at Tendance Coatesy

Above:  Corbyn and Milne

“The hatred and contempt with which each side treats the others—as also the bewilderment and distress of the silent majority of Party loyalists—seems now to exceed that in the Labour Party at the height of Bennism. In the Eurocommunist camp, as then on the Labour Left, it ...

is typically expressed in generational terms—‘Why don’t you just die?’ was the shout of one of the new wave ‘pluralists’ when, at a recent aggregate, an old-timer attempted to speak.

Whereas in previous Communist crises, such as those of 1939–40 or 1956, the factory branches remained solid or even increased in strength, while it was the ‘intellectuals’ who were then wracked by doubt, this time it is the industrial comrades who have been ready to put their Party loyalties in question. In their majority they seem to have rallied to the Morning Star. Trade unionists—‘white, male, middle-aged’, as they were recently characterized by the Party’s Industrial Organizer, after a week at the TUC—are no longer honoured in the Party but viewed with social and even sexual disgust.

As in other political formations of the Left, political disagreement has been exacerbated by sociological discomforts which it seems increasingly difficult for a unitary organization to contain, and although the outcome is different in the Communist and the Labour Party, it does not seem fanciful to discern the same fissiparous forces at work: a simultaneous break-up of both class and corporate loyalties.”

Raphael Samuel. The Lost World of British Communism. Part 3. New Left Review I/165, September-October 1987.

This, apparently, is the atmosphere that reigned in the party, the CPGB, that some of Jeremy Corbyn’s key staff, from Seumas Milne to the new deputy director of strategy and communications,  Steve Howell, were involved with  in their – relative – youth.

The faction, “Straight Left” appears to be a common tie,

The leading ideological force in the Straight Left faction was Fergus Nicholson, who had previously worked as the CPGB’s student organiser. According to Michael Mosbacher in Standpoint magazine, the faction was “a hard-line anti-reformist pro-Soviet faction within the Communist Party”. Unlike the leadership, they supported the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia  in 1968 and Afghanistan in 1979. They also thought the party should concentrate its work in Trade Unions , and not in social movements such as feminism and environmentalism.

Because the CPGB’s rules banned the formation of factional groups, SL operated in secret. Members of the faction contributed funds to the organisation through significant monthly donations, which helped fund the groups educational gatherings, often referred to as camping weekends. Its meetings were not publicly announced, and writers in their newspaper Straight Left and their theoretical magazine Communist wrote under pseudonyms like Nicholson, whose pen-name was “Harry Steel”. The Straight Left faction also produced anonymous bulletins to try to influence CPGB Congresses usually under the heading “Congress Truth”.

The faction produced a dissident internal pamphlet entitled “The Crisis in Our Communist Party – Cause, Effect and Cure”, which was distributed nationally but not under its name. This was authored (in all likelihood in conjunction with others), by veteran miner and communist Charlie Woods, who was expelled from the CPGB for putting his name to the publication.

The reason for the sudden interest?

After Jeremy Corbyn’s campaigns chief Simon Fletcher quit his role earlier this month, it was branded a victory for Seumas Milne. Fletcher was known to have clashed with Corbyn’s director of strategy and communications on a range of issues, including the EU. Now, in a sign things are moving further in Milne’s favour, Steve Howell has been appointed as deputy director of strategy and communications.

Happily, the pair are unlikely to clash over their political views anytime soon. They are old comrades who were both involved with Straight Left, the monthly journal in the Eighties that became associated with the ‘Stalinist’, pro-Soviet, anti-Eurocommunist faction that eventually split from the Communist Party of Great Britain. Described by Standpoint magazine as ‘a hard-line anti-reformist pro-Soviet faction within the Communist Party’, the Straight Left movement was also where Milne met Andrew Murray, the first chair of the Stop the War campaign who previously called for solidarity with North Korea.

Introducing Corbyn’s new spinner: the Straight Left comrade who is Mandelson’s old communist chum. (Steerpike. Spectator).

This was also immediately noticed on the left, provoking it must be said some jealousy on the part of former members of rival factions within the defunct Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB).

Bob from Brockley  posted,

Fletcher’s replacement is Steve Howell, brought in from a PR firm in South Wales. Howell has not been politically active for a while, as far as I can see, but does have history: like Milne and Andrew Murray he was active in the Stalinist faction Straight Left. Howell, then based in Sheffield, led its Yorkshire group. Their faction was called “the artists” – most of its key figures were Oxbridge types, in contrast to the salt of the earth workerists who led the main rival tankie faction, the Communist Campaign Group.

At that point in the 1980s, hardcore Stalinists (known as “tankies” for their support for the tanks sent in by the Soviets to crush dissent in its various satellites) were fighting to keep the Communist Party of Great Britain loyal to the memory of Uncle Joe Stalin, who was seen as something of an embarrassment by its Eurocommunist leadership. Straight Left sought to re-orient the party towards operating in the Labour Party and trade union movement.

Some of the denunciations of its tactics by rival Stalinists from the time are amusing, but also a bit sinister now it finally has achieved getting some of its activists into key positions in the Labour Party.

This is from the ultra-tankie Leninist newspaper (forerunner of the Weekly Worker) in 1983:

And this is about Straight Left’s strategy of covertly using the Labour Party rather than Communist Party as the vehicle for promoting Stalinism, a strategy the Leninist denounced as “liquidationism”:

I have no idea if Howell has, like Murray, remained true to his Stalinist roots. (His schoolmate and old comrade in Hendon Young Communists, Peter Mandelson, clearly hasn’t.)

Now the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty have offered their assessment.

Corbyn’s Leader’s Office is dominated by the former Guardian journalist Seumas Milne and by people close to Andrew Murray, chief of staff of the Unite union. Milne’s political formation was in the Stalinist sect “Straight Left”.

Another Straight Lefter was Andrew Murray… Milne, like Murray, is still a Stalinist. Writing for the Guardian, as he has done for many years, he puts his views in urbane double-negative form, but he is still a Stalinist… Operators used to snuggling into the established political and media machines, ideologically imbued with and trained over decades in ‘top-down’ politics, will not serve Jeremy Corbyn, John McDonnell, and us well in opening up and revitalising the Labour Party” (Solidarity 382, 28 October 2015).

“Stalinist ideas were drilled into swathes of labour movements and the left in decades when activists could see the USSR (or Cuba, China, Albania) as practical examples of the alternative to capitalism. Today we have a more demoralised Stalinists and Stalinoids: while sometimes loud in denunciation of Tory misdeeds, they generally see no further in positive policy than what were only stepping stones for Stalinism in its heyday: economic nationalism, bureaucratic state-directed economic development…

The Article 50 fiasco, and the Labour leaders’ waffle about a “People’s Brexit”, cannot but have been shaped by nationalist anti-EU prejudices in the Stalinist-influenced left. Stalinist bureaucratic manipulation fits with the Blairite heritage: “policy development” means not debate in the rank and file leading up to conference decisions, but formulas handed down by clever people in the Leader’s Office. The office’s response to the Copeland by-election has been to get another “Straight Left” old-timer, Steve Howell, seconded from the PR company he now owns….

Martin Thomas.  The dangers of Stalinism in Labour. Alliance for Workers’ Liberty.

Of particular interest are the claims about the EU, “Fletcher was known to have clashed with Corbyn’s director of strategy and communications on a range of issues, including the EU” and “the Labour leaders’ waffle about a “People’s Brexit”.

This article, published by those Simon Fletcher is said to be close to (aka Socialist Action), which argues against the fantasy that there is a “People’s Brexit”, may help explain his departure.

There is no ‘People’s Brexit’  By Tom O’Leary. Socialist Economic Bulletin. (Published by Ken Livingstone, Simon Fletcher’s former employer)

There is no socialist or even ‘people’s Brexit’. Everyone operating in the UK will still be subject to the laws of the market. The problem will be that the market will suddenly be much smaller and less productive than the EU Single Market the UK has been participating in for the last 25 years. If the Tories continue to get their way, there will also be a stripping away of the workers’ environmental and consumer rights that were instituted under the EU’s ‘Social Chapter’. These have long been a Tory target for abolition in the UK. Post-Brexit, the economy will be operating behind a series of tariff and non-tariff barriers as others protect their markets. All of these will make the economy less competitive and will increase costs.

Of course, the pound could depreciate sharply again to offset these disadvantages, but this would lower living standards and real incomes even further. If currency devaluations alone were the answer then Britain would be an earthly paradise. In 1940 there were 5 US Dollars to the pound. Now there are 1.25. Over the same period the relative size of the UK in the world economy has shrunk dramatically in real terms, to less than one-third its proportion of world GDP, 2.3% now versus 7.3% in 1940.

There is a widespread notion on the right that Brexit will lead to ‘taking back control’ of the economy. Unfortunately, this is also shared by important sections of the left. It is a delusion. The 1930s saw a whole series of countries taking back control, in what might be called an early anti-globalisation movement. Although the authors of these policies are now widely and rightly derided their arguments will actually be very familiar.

It was said that other countries were taking our jobs, they are dumping their output on us causing our industries to fail and that those industries need protecting and government support, or state aid. Once we have done that, then we would be able to trade freely with the whole world. Of course, the more virulent version also included vile invective against foreigners, immigrants, Jews, gay men and others. When the economic policies went spectacularly wrong, the racist invective became policy.

The reason these policies failed spectacularly should be clear. Behind the protective barriers, costs rise, potential markets are closed off (especially as they respond with barriers of their own), industry becomes less not more productive, profits decline and workers are laid off. The economic crisis that ensued was finally resolved only by general rearmament.

Economics aside Milne, it is said,  is equally no friend of the politics of the internationalist supporters of Another Europe is Possible.

And he has this in his file: Seumas Milne: Charlie Hebdo Had it Coming to them.

More detailed background:

WHAT WAS STRAIGHT LEFT? AN INTRODUCTION BY LAWRENCE PARKER

Straight Left’s origins lie in the left pro-Soviet oppositions that emerged in the Communist Party of Great Britain in the 1960s. In this period, a definite ‘party within a party’ emerged, with figures such as Sid French, district secretary of Surrey CPGB, becoming key leaders. The general critique that emerged from this faction was a concern over the CPGB leadership distancing itself from the Soviet Union (such as around the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968) and other ‘socialist’ countries; a preference for a more ‘workerist’ identity (for example, the faction would have been happy with the CPGB’s paper remaining as the Daily Worker in 1966) and a concentration on workplaces/trade unions; and a sense that the party was squandering its resources in futile election contests and alienating the left of the Labour Party, with whom it was meant to be developing a close relationship on the British road to socialism (BRS), the CPGB programme. However, a significant part of the faction felt that the BRS was ‘reformist’ and ‘revisionist’ in all its guises from 1951, counter-posing a revolutionary path to the parliamentary road to socialism envisaged in the CPGB’s existing programme.

Read the rest of the article on A Hatful of History.

[crazyforcococookies]

All you ignorant people who voted for Trump, thinking he will provide a fairer opportunity for all, this is your biggest F you. Congrats. So much so for thinking poor little billionaire understands your working and middle-class strife. Your taxes go to hotel rooms Secret Service and other staff protecting his son on private business trips. #MakeAmericaGreatAgain

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When the president-elect’s son Eric Trump jetted to Uruguay in early January for a Trump Organization promotional trip, U.S. taxpayers were left footing a bill of nearly $100,000 in hotel rooms for Secret Service and embassy staff.

It was a high-profile jaunt out of the country for Eric, the fresh-faced executive of the Trump Organization who, like his father, pledged to keep the company separate from the presidency. Eric mingled with real estate brokers, dined at an open-air beachfront eatery and spoke to hundreds at an “ultra exclusive” Trump Tower Punta del Este evening party celebrating his visit.

The Uruguayan trip shows how the government is unavoidably entangled with the Trump company as a result of the president’s refusal to divest his ownership stake. In this case, government agencies are forced to pay to support business operations that ultimately help to enrich the president himself. Though the Trumps have pledged a division of business and government, they will nevertheless depend on the publicly funded protection granted to the first family as they travel the globe promoting their brand.

A spokeswoman for Eric Trump declined to make him available for an interview and did not provide answers to a list of detailed questions about the trip.

Eric Trump’s trip in early January to the coastal resort town appeared to be brief — perhaps as short as two nights, according to a review of local press clips and social media.

The bill for the Secret Service’s hotel rooms in Uruguay totaled $88,320. The U.S. Embassy in Montevideo, the capital city of Uruguay, paid an additional $9,510 for its staff to stay in hotel rooms to “support” the Secret Service detail for the “VIP visit,” according to purchasing orders reviewed by The Washington Post.

“This is an example of the blurring of the line between the personal interest in the family business and the government,” said Kathleen Clark, an expert on government ethics and law professor at Washington University in St. Louis.

Despite the use of public funds, government agencies would not provide key details connected to the trip, including the duration of the stay, the name of the hotel or the number of booked rooms. A spokesman from the Secret Service, citing security concerns, declined to comment.

The money for the hotel rooms was paid through the State Department, but a spokesman there declined to comment on the trip. He instead referred reporters to the White House and back to the Secret Service, whose spokesman once again declined to comment. The White House also did not respond to requests for comment.

“There is a public benefit to providing Secret Service protection,” Clark said. “But what was the public benefit from State Department personnel participating in this private business trip to the coastal town? It raises the specter of the use of public resources for private gain.”

Immediate family members of presidents have for decades been guaranteed taxpayer-funded safeguards, and their safety is paramount to national security, especially as they travel to foreign and potentially dangerous hot spots.

In 1917, Congress first authorized the then-Secret Service Division of the U.S. Treasury Department to protect the immediate family of the president. In 1984, a statute extended that protection for other key individuals, including the immediate family of the vice president.

Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton even authorized Secret Service protection for their adult daughters for an unspecified period of time after the presidents left office.

“The Secret Service does not have an option as to when it is, where it is, nor as to how much it costs, and whether it’s domestic or international,” said W. Ralph Basham, former director of the service. “Think about the consequences of something happening to one of the children. The security of it outweighs the expenses of it.”

While Eric Trump was in Uruguay, the full presence of U.S. security operations did not go unnoticed by the local media and paparazzi.

La Nación, an Argentine publication, began its article about the visit with a scene-setter describing two Secret Service agents inside the Punta del Este showroom. Four more agents tried, unsuccessfully, to blend in with the crowd of real estate buyers outside, La Nación wrote.

A local photographer encountered Eric Trump at La Huella, a restaurant described as the “ultimate in chic beach eating” and renowned for its grilled seafood entrees.

“He had lunch there for about an hour and a half with some friends and acquaintances,” photographer Cristian Cordoba said in an email to The Post. “Secret Service was very close by monitoring. He was very kind and courteous with everyone that wanted to say hi to him. He even shook my hand after I took his picture. He said he loved the food and the place and would love to come back.”

A well-known pop singer from Argentina, Maxi Trusso, performed at the Punta del Este party honoring Eric Trump. Trusso later told the local press that he wrote a song about Donald Trump at Eric’s request. Trusso titled the composition “Free and Stronger.” He also said that he was invited to sing at the inauguration but declined the offer.

The Trumps, who do not own the Punta del Este project, licensed their name to its developers, who have paid Trump’s company between $100,000 and $1 million, according to Trump’s financial disclosure filing in May.

The 26-story tower is under construction. Its condos — which start at $550,000 and climb to $8 million — are expected to be finished in late 2018. Tower advertisements list amenities including waterfall pools, a massage room and a private theater.

The developer, YY Development Group, did not respond to requests for comment. But the chief executive, Juan Jose Cugliandolo, told the Associated Press last month that two-thirds of the condos were sold. Cugliandolo said of Eric Trump’s trip, “It honors us that he would come this summer, days before his father takes office,” the Associated Press reported.

During an interview on the trip, Eric Trump fielded questions from the local media about political issues, including the president of Argentina and how his policies had affected the Trump property in Uruguay.

“I don’t speak politics,” he said, according to a video of the interview. “It’s not my world. I’m a business guy.”

But the reporter pressed again, and Eric Trump said that he had a favorable opinion of Argentina’s president for “opening up the country,” which had helped business and helped the economy of Uruguay and Argentina.

He was also asked about his father and if he would ever join the administration. Eric Trump told La Nación that the relationship between the Trump Organization and his father’s administration would be completely separate, like “church and state.”

Eric Trump is flanked by YY Development Group chief executive Juan Jose Cugliandolo, left, and group owner Moises Yellati outside Trump Tower, which is under construction in Punta del Este, Uruguay, on Jan. 3. Its 154 apartments plus two penthouses are scheduled to be finished in late 2018. (YY Development Group/via AP)

But ethical experts say that the steps Donald Trump announced to facilitate such a separation, including placing his business into a trust overseen by Eric, Donald Trump Jr. and a longtime company executive, are not enough to eliminate concerns about conflicts of interest.

“Having refused to sever his own personal financial interests, [the president] is now sending his emissaries, his sons, out to line his own pockets, and he’s subsidizing that activity with taxpayer dollars,” said Norm Eisen, a former Obama administration ethics adviser who is part of a lawsuit accusing Trump of violating a constitutional provision barring presidents from taking payments from foreign governments.

It is unusual, although not unprecedented, for trips of presidential family members to focus on the development of private money­making opportunities.

In 1989, Jeb Bush drew criticism after he traveled to Nigeria on a business trip less than two months after his father, George H.W. Bush, was sworn in as president.

“The president’s children should not be deprived of career opportunities just because they are members of the first family,” the White House press secretary said in 1989.

Jeb Bush, through his spokeswoman, declined an interview request.

During his interview with the media in Uruguay, Eric was asked about how his life would change under his father’s administration.

“We’re going to have an amazing company, and he’s going to do amazing things for the United States,” he said to the local media. “He’s going to be an incredible commander in chief. And I’m not going to be involved in politics, and he’s not going to be involved in the business.”

He also said that once his father moved to Washington, he would be headed back to New York to run the company with his brother. But there are early signs that Eric and Don Jr. will be spending plenty of time in Washington.

Several days ago, the brothers sat side-by-side in the front row during Trump’s White House announcement of Neil Gorsuch as his nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court. Afterward, Don Jr. posted on social media that he had enjoyed chatting with Gorsuch about their shared love for fly-fishing.

Donald Trump has a lot of potential conflicts of interest as president – but there's no law that specifically requires a commander in chief to remove themselves from all of their business interests. The Fix's Peter W. Stevenson explains why presidents usually put their assets in a "blind trust" to avoid problems. (Peter Stevenson/The Washington Post)

Later this month, Eric and Don Jr. are expected to travel to Vancouver in celebration of the grand opening of the new Trump International Hotel & Tower.

The trip is expected to bring the Trump brothers together with wealthy Malaysian developer Tony Tiah Thee Kian and his son, Joo Kim Tiah, head of the Vancouver project.

Richard Painter, a former chief White House ethics lawyer for President George W. Bush who joined Eisen in the lawsuit, called the family’s Secret Service protection a “worthwhile expenditure of taxpayer money.” But Painter said he worried that it could be misread as boosting the Trump brand.

“All of this has an air of legitimacy: The connection to the U.S. government, and the suggestion that if you do business with this company you’ll ingratiate yourself with the Trump administration,” Painter said. The implication is “if you do a good deal with us, you’ll be in good with the United States. And the Secret Service presence just exacerbates that.”

[helshades]

Good morning, my love! I wondered your thoughts on whether Le Pens would succeed in the election or not? As well as how likely a Frexit would be should she win? And maybe a little curious where all the worldbuilding is, too, *sobs*

A most excellent (although slightly terribly belated) evening to you, my dear! I answer you from the pit of the Helcave, through litres of sno... tears, in this dire hour of ailment, because I have way too tardied already, caught as I was amidst my new crepe paper flower project and the various ills that befall the imprudent cave-dweller; as the Queen of the Undead (by interim) I do command many foul things, but not the viruses, apparently.

Anyway, you sobbing, me sneezing, ‘tis not advancing the worldbuilding terribly, is it? Yeah. Thing is, I miss it too, but it seems the dry spell has got something to do with the horrid lack of new material, for such a long time. While I know I’ve more than enough to go with old notes and three movies as presently, I’d like MOAR and most of all, I’d like a rejuvenated fandom: from my corner of the Interwebz, it had become gradually impossible to work amongst the collective cries for overzealous social justice—“Loki is secretly intersex!” “Stop assigning Groot a gender!” “Why is Star-Lord white?” etc.—and the depletion of our ranks, as exemplified by one notable correspondent who went utterly fruitcake after I disagreed with her on the topic of Jane Foster being written as autistic.

In fewer words, I’m always welcoming prompts, even though I’m approximatively 5,238 ones late, but the engine is due to start running smoothly again as soon as we get a trailer for Ragnarök, or set pictures, or ANYTHING—I, for one, would love to get creative about the system of government in Asgard and how there should be a popular revolution anytime soon, shortly followed, preferably, by Loki getting thrown overboard the blooming planet by an angry mob with the Asgardian version of a pitchfork (probably golden anyhow).

Speaking of usurping tarts forming a terrible basis for government, hey, do you know the best news from Frogland ever? We don’t have to worry only about Marine Le Pen getting her grubby hands over the country! Now, with added psychological torment, enter the right wing’s champion, François Fillon! Here, a good illustration of our current main source of anguish:

Note that the true exploit behind this photo-montage wasn’t to mash up good ol’ Maggie and Tête de Fion, rather to find a photograph of him smiling in the first place. In fact, I’m pretty sure that was Photoshopped—unless a paparazzo caught him right after his early morning flagellation and got him to snicker with a cry of “À mort la Sécu !”

How to better state my thoughts... Well, let’s say that it’s not only the resistible rise of fascism in Europe we should care about, but also the considerably more pregnant and irresistible rise of Angela Merkel-friendly Ordoliberalism and the blatant annihilation of over a hundred years of hard-won social struggles. More than ever, the Right intends to rob us of healthcare, labour protection and free (quality) education—the worst thing being that most of the self-proclaimed Left wants exactly the same thing, albeit on a longer term, perhaps, but that’s about it. Yesterday, we got the results of the Primary election for the Left parties—we have primaries too, now, go figure—and the two finalists are going to be Benoît Hamon (theoretically a leftist, rather on the green sides on several accounts, did confess to great admiration for Bernie Sanders) and Manuel Valls, the only recently-resigned Prime Minister, a man whose hatred of unions was strikingly palpable, and who, a mere months ago, violated all democratic principles to force an unjust labour law on the French people. If he ends up the Left’s main man, the 2017 presidential election is going to be a real blast, and the proverbial choice between Charybdis and Scylla, the sequel, now with Scylla’s long-lost little sister Manuel.

I almost remarked that if Le Pen got elected, at least maybe we’d get something good out of it when she charts Valls back off to Spain, but upon reflection, I dare say the Spanish have suffered quite enough from authoritarianism, plus I guess it would be a poor consolation indeed. Still, I wonder: could Marine Le Pen truly become France’s very own President Trump...? In reality, I suppose she could, but a lot of people who would hesitate before voting for someone who hasn’t totally succeeded in wiping out the memory of her father yet (and quite right, too) won’t bat an eyelid before rushing to the voting booth in the name of François Fillon. Especially old money and the Catholic ultras, but that can’t be all, alas.

And while we’re on the subject of European evils, I don’t really believe in the extreme right version of a Frexit. Yes, I know the nationalists and pals aren’t too warm-hearted when it comes to European regulation, but liberalism isn’t exactly incompatible with fascism, either. I would even dare suggesting that liberalism, especially the current economic model, rapidly spiralling to deregulation and a profound dehumanisation of the peoples which nourish it, encourages the rise of fascism as it drives social classes further apart, disarming the lower ones and freeing the upper ones of any guilt...

Quoting well-known left-oriented philosopher & economist Frédéric Lordon:

‘Here is the question underlying this libellous accusation: wouldn’t leaving the European Union condemn us to sovereignist regression? There is a lot to say, here: first, I don’t regard either “sovereignist” or “sovereignism” as swearwords, unless you would belittle the idea itself—which is the ultimate modern idea. And let me be clear: I don’t say modern the way the journalist stooges of liberalism use “modern” and “archaic” every few editorial; I say modern in the historic sense, as “modernity” is a period which started in the 16th century, and which stated that peoples should not be ruled by commandments issued from any cloud-borne god, or by his Earth-bound delegates—and that the peoples had to take their own fates in hand. This is what sovereignty is about, conceptually. That one would seek to disqualify such idea says a great lot about the anti-democratic principles of the European institutions, and of all those supporting them.’

‘Besides, leaving the Eurozone doesn’t have to condemn you to the shrivelled, regressive, nationalistic and identitarian version of sovereignty—indeed, the latter is entirely possible. But we do not have to choose such regression, because nothing actually prevents us, if we so decide to abandon single currency, from developing as much as we can all relations between peoples, and for good this time. Although not, this time around, by throwing them onto and against one another because of murderous economic policies. What would stop us, out of the Euro, to do the exact same thing we once did before we got the Euro? Meaning international programmes for industrial cooperation (like Airbus, or Ariane Espace), scientific cooperation, and other things aplenty? Do we really need the straitjacket of a single currency for students to travel, for scientists to travel, for artistic exchanges to take place, as well as transversal teaching programmes on national histories and the making of a European history, for developing the translation of the literatures of Europe...? Nothing actually prevents it. It says a lot about the colonisation accomplished by neoliberal obsessions that we are now only capable of thinking that the only possible internationalism has to be this of capital and single currency.’

‘To want to relinquish the Euro doesn’t have to do with monetary fetishism. It’s not about going crazy over mere currency. What we call the Euro is much more than money, banknotes and monetary politics: the Euro is a global institutional system for economic policies. This is what we should abandon completely. In order to change the E.U. “from the inside”, we would have to see organised progressive political forces come into power simultaneously in a great number of member countries. The probability to see an actual government on the radical left is already infinitesimal, so the hypothesis of 6 or 7 at the same time is very nearly ridiculous. The Central Bank or Europe has the power, totally illegitimate, totally implicit, but totally efficient, to bring down any government that would attempt to oppose any of the European treaties...’

The current, and soon-to-be-former, government has done some work, too, to encourage most people in believing that Frexit = fascism, all the while slashing social protection and beating the occasional striker to a pulp, when the genuine article has been making vibrant spiels on poverty and labour, overall nicking a lot of arguments... from the radical left. The paradox isn’t one: both extremes join on populist propaganda, therefore the extreme right had a lot to gain from borrowing facts and ideas from the far left then grind them in its own rhetoric.

‘Labour, under the arbitrary management of the capitalist regime, is odious; people know this because they’re living it, and because they are many more still to be living it. Middle classes used to give zero fuck about the ill treatments inflected to the working class, for the first two decades of the neoliberal system. Now, unfortunately, the level of the muddy waters is rising, and all suffer.’

Sincerely, if Marine Le Pen became the Présidente this May, I’m not too sure the promised referendum on a possible Frexit would get positive results, and lead to the actual Frexit, even if it’s a UKIP-friendly kind of Frexit. People seem mostly afraid of leaving the E.U., although mostly because they keep being told it’s not possible and they shall lose everything and hordes of cutlass-chewing commies are to surge into their very homes to read some Karl Marx to their children. Also, unlike the Brits, we’ve actually got Euro coins to dispose of, you know, and it will be costly.

[nebris]

(Why) The Future is a Choice Between Two Socialisms

Why Capitalism’s Collapse Feels Weirdly a Lot Like Communism’s

Here’s a funny observation. Soviet style communism was always marked by chronic, predictable shortages. Especially for luxuries. The line for jeans, sweaters, boomboxes, and TVs, which stretched around the block, always leaving people empty-handed — while decadent Westerners simply trundled down to the store and bought them by the truckload.

But capitalism is collapsing now in a weirdly similar way. It’s marked by chronic, persistent shortages for just the opposite. Not for luxuries — but for life’s basic necessities. Medicine, hospitals, education, good schools, income, decent media, a home to live, income, jobs. Even potable drinking water (see: Flint) and decent food. In America, for example — there’s no guarantee you’ll be able to get these things, because they’re always in short supply. In fact, life seems to be designed precisely so that some people must always be at threat of going without them. How ironic, when you think about it, no — capitalism and communism both failing, in mirror images of each other? Why is that? And what does it mean?

It suggests to me that the future is a choice between two socialisms. Or it won’t be much of a future at all. The good kind of socialism — and the bad kind. And that’s because capitalism has proven to be a ruinous failure as the sole (or highest) organizing principle of a society — which is what it’s been for the last thirty years or so now. I’ll make my case — and you judge if it carries any water.

Unless you believe in cosmic coincidences, the reason that ultranationalist movements have popped up, seemingly overnight, is straightforward: economies are stagnant and so people’s lives aren’t improving, . But what does that really mean? It means life has become governed by artificial scarcity. Middle and working classes are on the brink — because capitalism makes things artificially scarce, so that it can maximize profits. What things? Healthcare. Affordable education. A mortgage an average person can pay off in a lifetime. Decent jobs themselves. For young people, marriage, having kids, and homes of their own. When insulin costs thousands, though we all know it can and should cost pennies — that’s artificial scarcity.

And yet those are the lives the middle and working classes live now — everything is artificially, not really scarce. Societies throw out tons of food. Newly built homes go to waste — while young people live with their parents. Billionaires shoot off space rockets, while young diabetics die without insulin. Society can easily afford it but it’s forbidden, under the terms of neoliberal capitalism, to allow decent lives for everyone because then profits would stop growing and “growth” might come to a halt. Someone must suffer — and suffer badly. That is how you get to the weird paradox of a “growing” economy in which life expectancy, income, trust, meaning, and happiness are all falling. There isn’t enough to go around — but keeping things at just that razor’s edge of artificial scarcity is the only way now capitalism can raise its profit margins.

Hence, for large chunks of the middle and working class, their lives are worse in many ways than a few decades ago. Unless you believe that a bigger TV is a substitute for a stable job, a raise, savings, a mortgage you can pay off, healthcare you can afford, and stability that you can depend on. The rich have grown astronomically richer — but life below the line of being super rich is something between precarious and implosive, and that is because artificial scarcity keeps the basics of a decent life just out of reach, endlessly. That’s not a bug — it’s a feature of predatory capitalism. And that is why the future is a choice between of two kinds of socialism.

(If you understand that above, then you will also see that capitalism — at least in its current incarnation, something like monopolistic, financialized, mega capitalism — has failed precisely because it is making a tiny number of people ultra rich, but only at the expense of the middle class and working class, for whom artificial scarcity is used as both a carrot and a stick. Such an economy “grows” by generating more profits — but only through maximizing artificial scarcities for things like insulin, hospitals, and decent jobs which makes life itself implode. While that bargain surely works for elites and the rich, it is ruinous for society as a whole, because no one sensible will consent to it for very long — turning instead to fascists, authoritarians, and extremists.)

So capitalism the way we practice it ends in implosive stagnation. Artificial scarcities eating aaway at life: chronic and persistent shortages, of all the basics of a decent life. Yet these ongoing shortages are ever-present, things which never get “fixed” — because they are exactly what capitalism must maximize on one side, to maximize profits on the other.

And that’s why socialism is the future now. But not all socialisms are created equal. Think of opposite poles of a spectrum. On one side, lies social democracy. On the other, lies national socialism. Which of these should we desire? Which is good, and why?

Let’s start with national socialism. What is it, really? American thinkers will dispute it even really exists — but they are not known for thinking well. National socialism is very as a form of socialism. It is simply something like “socialism for the true people” or a little more accurately, “only those with pure blood, from pure soil, deserve to share in the fruits of society’s labours.”

Think of the “good German.” He was very much a beneficiary of national socialism. He was provided a stable job, a regular income, savings, a home, healthcare, safety, security, the ability to take care of his family and children — all for the first time, really, in decades. But there was a price. Maybe his day job was a lawyer — drafting laws to take homes from Jews. Whom did those homes go to? Well, loyal Party members, of course. Maybe he was a Gestapot officer, making sure Jews wore yellow stars. He was rewarded with money to buy things, a home, healthcare, a decent life — but only if he took all that away from the wrong people, too. Do you see the mirror image, which is the problem, yet?

The good German was playing a zero-sum game. I can have a decent life, finally — but only if I take away yours. The “work” that the good German was doing was really the work of repression. Of subjugating Jews, gays, and immigrants. Of dismantling the equality, freedom, and democracy. Of perverting the rule of law, and using it as a weapon to seize people’s belongings and money and savings and possesions and homes — which then belonged to the good German. That was what the new “jobs” in Nazi Germany really were. A zero sum game of taking life away from some, to give it back to others.

That is national socialism: one tribe decides to take all that belongs to a society, and distribute it amongst itself. Perhaps that is the answer to the “mystery” of why the good German turned a blind eye. The cost of receiving the basics of a good life from the Party was that he did the very work of seizing those basics from another, a lesser human being, in the Party’s eyes.

(How else is the problem of stagnation to be solved? Do you see the link here? That is the crucial thing, and if you understand it, so you also understand the future. A society can solve stagnation — shortages of basic goods — in only two ways. The first is to dispossess some of its own people — and then give those things, that medicine, that money, those homes, to others. But who will be dispossessed, and who will possess? The impure — and the pure. Hence, national socialism is structured along lines of racial supremacy. But it is at root a way to solve the problem of stagnation, by taking from those who don’t belong, and giving that to those who do. In that way, an illusory kind of “growth,” a sense of stability, purpose, meaning, belonging, and prosperity, are produced. But the price is that such a society will never be one that is free, democratic, equal, or fair. National socialism requires people to do the work of subjugating and repressing each other — that is its price. As a zero-sum game, that becomes a negative-sum game, it can’t take societies anywhere)

Don’t we already see just that happening in America? What is ICE, really? What are all these weird new government agencies, whose sole job appears to be to repress and subjugate and harm those who are “impure,” who don’t belong, who aren’t part of the right tribe? They are effectively welfare programs for the pure, aren’t they? They are ways for a good member of the tribe, today’s good American, to get income, a job, healthcare, savings, a home — all the things that are in shortage today in America. But the price is that he must exclude, punish, and hurt little children. That is a nascent kind of national socialism — if you can do the job of dispossessing others, then the Party will reward you with all the things that you need to live a decent life. That’s a very real kind of socialism, too.

It should go without saying that national socialism is the bad choice. The one we shouldn’t want. Because it is self-destructive. It “solves” the problem of stagnation in a foolish, small, and ruinous way. When we take from some, to give what was theirs to ourselves, we have kicked off a vicious cycle that must — must — end in war, genocide, and our own sure ruin — because we cannot do that to the whole world.

Then there is social democracy. What’s the difference? In a word, everything. The fundamental way it solves the problem of stagnation is different. Not by taking money, jobs, homes, possessions, and savings, from some, and giving them to the pure, strong, and powerful. But by a society choosing to invest in itself. To build more hospitals, highways, roads, schools, universities, labs, studios, homes. To ensure everyone can have an education, an income, healthcare, insurance, safety nets. Do you see the difference? National socialism operates through expropriation — I take what was yours, and now it’s the Party’s, to reward the most cruel and vicious with. But social democracy operates through the exactly the opposite: investment — we all pool our hard-won savings, and invest them in things which benefit us all, because they are things we cannot have any other way. Even a billionaire can’t really set up a cutting-edge hospital, and keep it running for more than a few years — it takes a society to do that.

So for social democracy, “socialism” isn’t a way to merely “redistribute” things. It is a way to change what can be distribution at all — not just who gets what, but what can be had in the first place. It’s a way to expand the basic goods available in a society — to the point that they’re available to everyone. In that way, it’s a mechanism to solve the problem of predatory capitalism operating according to the law of artificial scarcity as a tool to skyrocket profits — which costs lives, at this point. Socialism is a way for a society to address shortage of basic, fundamental goods, like healthcare, education, transport, media, safety nets, retirement, pensions — which capitalism has made artificially scarce.

National socialism, on the other hand, is a way to solve predatory capitalism’s problem of artificial scarcity by making it impossible for some people, the impure, to have many things at all. Which things? Well, usually, it begins with jobs. Then it’s the right to buy thing, to go into stores. Then it’s homes. Then it’s savings. Then it’s the right to live in certain neighborhoods — ghettoes rise. Then it’s the right to live in cities — camps rise. Then, finally, it’s life itself.

Do you see the vicious spiral at work? National socialism solves the problem capitalism leaves society with, which is shortages of basic goods, in a harmful and destructive way — one must take more, from the impure, in more and more savage ways. Jobs, careers, incomes, savings, homes, neighborhoods, citizenship — life itself. That is what it takes to keep “growth” going under the terms of national socialism, because it has always been operating by taking from some, and giving it others, according to the Party’s judgment of who is purest.

But social democracy solves the problem capitalism leaves society with, shortages of basic goods, in a much more intelligent, civilized, and sustainable way. It invests, so that those shortages are turned into surpluses. Hospitals, highways, schools, universities — abundant enough for all to have access, at a relatively low price. And the “work” done is very different too. The good German, whether the lawyer, the police officer, or the accountant, was doing the work of harming others — but the social democrat, whether the doctor at the hospital, the professor at the university, or the builder of the bridge, is doing work that helps others genuinely realize themselves. And in that way, because it unlocks our higher possibilities, social democracy is the far, far better choice.

Now. This essay has been far too long already. You might say, at this point, “But all that’s obvious!!” Ah, my friend. If it were would the world be where it is today?

Umair July 2018

https://eand.co/why-the-future-is-a-choice-between-two-socialisms-fde3ca6383cc

[dani-qrt]

Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the sign-up.)

Good evening. Here’s the latest.

1. Federal regulators unveiled a sweeping plan to soften the Volcker Rule, opening the door for big banks to resume trading activities that were restricted under the 2010 Dodd-Frank law.

Jerome Powell, the Fed chairman, above, said it would streamline “overly complex and inefficient requirements.”

The changes would give big banks the freedom to engage in more complicated — and possibly riskier — trading. Consumer advocates and other financial watchdogs say that they would allow a return to the Wild West days on Wall Street.

2. President Trump weighed in on the cancellation of “Roseanne” — sort of. Referencing an apology from the parent company of ABC, Mr. Trump noted that he hadn’t gotten his own “for the HORRIBLE statements made and said about me on ABC.”

Ms. Barr wrote that she was “ambien tweeting” when she used a racist slur against Valerie Jarrett, a former adviser to President Obama. Ambien’s maker, Sanofi U.S., hit back: “Racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication.”

Mr. Trump also tweeted, in reaction to a CBS interview with a congressman, that he wished he had chosen another lawyer to be his attorney general instead of Jeff Sessions. (The president was angered when Mr. Sessions recused himself from the Russia investigation last year.) Above, Mr. Trump in Nashville on Tuesday.

3. Italy is confronting a political crisis, one that could mean big trouble for the world economy.

Our economics columnist lays out the stakes: Italy is the fourth-largest economy in Europe and has one of the largest piles of public debt in the world. A crisis there could endanger banks and investment portfolios everywhere.

In Rome, Italy’s populist parties continued their efforts to form a government. Above, Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League party.

____

4. Google’s work for the Defense Department has touched off an existential crisis at the company.

It recently won a share of the contract for the Maven program, which uses artificial intelligence to interpret video images and could be used for drone strikes.

By reviewing emails and documents and interviewing about a dozen insiders at Google, our reporters got a detailed picture of how the news fractured its work force, fueling heated staff meetings and prompting employees with moral objections to resign.

Executives now face this dilemma: Proceeding with defense contracts could drive away brainy experts in artificial intelligence; rejecting such work would deprive the company of a potentially huge business.

____

5. The ground offensive to wipe out the last pockets of Islamic State militants in eastern Syria is gaining momentum.

Kurdish commanders who had left the front lines to battle Turkish troops in the north have returned. They’re working again with their allies in the American-led military coalition to hunt down the few hundred fighters who remain. (The insurgents are quickly moving underground.)

We’re up to Chapter 7 in our new podcast, “Caliphate,” in which the reporter Rukmini Callimachi takes listeners inside the Islamic State and its fall in Mosul. Listen here.

____

6. It’s the hunger season in South Sudan.

More than four years of civil war have obliterated the economy and overrun the most productive land, and food scarcity between harvest seasons is intensifying.

Within months, millions of people potentially face acute malnutrition. Our team went to South Sudan to document the extent of hunger. They met Tafisa Nyattie, above, who lives in a refugee camp and often runs out of food rations for her children.

Juba, the capital, still has food, but the price for even a single plate of bean stew is astronomical.

7. Researchers say the May 18 attack on a school in Santa Fe, Tex., is the latest example of a copycat shooting inspired by the 1999 attack on Columbine High School in Colorado.

The gunman, a 17-year-old junior, wore a black trench coat and fired a sawed-off shotgun, the same attire and weapon used by the Columbine assailants. In dark corners of the internet, the massacre is studied and celebrated, inspiring more attacks.

Santa Fe High School reopened to students this week. We texted with a sophomore who described the day. “It was tough being there,” he wrote.

____

Mr. Babchenko and Ukrainian security officials said that a contract had been put on his life and that the only way to track down those responsible was to make it seem as if it had happened.

The Ukrainian authorities accused Russian security services of ordering the killing.

____

9. Eighteen hours and 45 minutes: That’s how long it’ll take to get from Singapore to Newark — the world’s longest commercial flight — starting in October.

Singapore Airlines will fly the Airbus A350-900 U.L.R., or ultra long range, on the route daily. (Above, a rendering.) The plane is made of a carbon fiber that is lighter than the aluminum of traditional jets.

The flights will have 161 seats — 67 in lie-flat business class and 94 in premium economy. No word yet on ticket prices.

10. Finally, everyone is sure someone is going to die in Wednesday night’s series finale of “The Americans,” on FX at 10 p.m. Eastern. But who?

Hundreds of readers have shared their predictions, which range from the simple — an-eye-for-an-eye justice — to the fittingly byzantine. Read them here, and stay tuned for our recap after the show. Above, Keri Russell, who plays Elizabeth.

Have a great night.

____

Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern.

And don’t miss Your Morning Briefing. Sign up here to get it by email in the Australian, Asian, European or American morning.

Want to catch up on past briefings? You can browse them here.

What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes.com.

The post Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing appeared first on World The News.

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[cleopatrarps]

Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the sign-up.)

Good evening. Here’s the latest.

1. Federal regulators unveiled a sweeping plan to soften the Volcker Rule, opening the door for big banks to resume trading activities that were restricted under the 2010 Dodd-Frank law.

Jerome Powell, the Fed chairman, above, said it would streamline “overly complex and inefficient requirements.”

The changes would give big banks the freedom to engage in more complicated — and possibly riskier — trading. Consumer advocates and other financial watchdogs say that they would allow a return to the Wild West days on Wall Street.

2. President Trump weighed in on the cancellation of “Roseanne” — sort of. Referencing an apology from the parent company of ABC, Mr. Trump noted that he hadn’t gotten his own “for the HORRIBLE statements made and said about me on ABC.”

Ms. Barr wrote that she was “ambien tweeting” when she used a racist slur against Valerie Jarrett, a former adviser to President Obama. Ambien’s maker, Sanofi U.S., hit back: “Racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication.”

Mr. Trump also tweeted, in reaction to a CBS interview with a congressman, that he wished he had chosen another lawyer to be his attorney general instead of Jeff Sessions. (The president was angered when Mr. Sessions recused himself from the Russia investigation last year.) Above, Mr. Trump in Nashville on Tuesday.

3. Italy is confronting a political crisis, one that could mean big trouble for the world economy.

Our economics columnist lays out the stakes: Italy is the fourth-largest economy in Europe and has one of the largest piles of public debt in the world. A crisis there could endanger banks and investment portfolios everywhere.

In Rome, Italy’s populist parties continued their efforts to form a government. Above, Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League party.

____

4. Google’s work for the Defense Department has touched off an existential crisis at the company.

It recently won a share of the contract for the Maven program, which uses artificial intelligence to interpret video images and could be used for drone strikes.

By reviewing emails and documents and interviewing about a dozen insiders at Google, our reporters got a detailed picture of how the news fractured its work force, fueling heated staff meetings and prompting employees with moral objections to resign.

Executives now face this dilemma: Proceeding with defense contracts could drive away brainy experts in artificial intelligence; rejecting such work would deprive the company of a potentially huge business.

____

5. The ground offensive to wipe out the last pockets of Islamic State militants in eastern Syria is gaining momentum.

Kurdish commanders who had left the front lines to battle Turkish troops in the north have returned. They’re working again with their allies in the American-led military coalition to hunt down the few hundred fighters who remain. (The insurgents are quickly moving underground.)

We’re up to Chapter 7 in our new podcast, “Caliphate,” in which the reporter Rukmini Callimachi takes listeners inside the Islamic State and its fall in Mosul. Listen here.

____

6. It’s the hunger season in South Sudan.

More than four years of civil war have obliterated the economy and overrun the most productive land, and food scarcity between harvest seasons is intensifying.

Within months, millions of people potentially face acute malnutrition. Our team went to South Sudan to document the extent of hunger. They met Tafisa Nyattie, above, who lives in a refugee camp and often runs out of food rations for her children.

Juba, the capital, still has food, but the price for even a single plate of bean stew is astronomical.

7. Researchers say the May 18 attack on a school in Santa Fe, Tex., is the latest example of a copycat shooting inspired by the 1999 attack on Columbine High School in Colorado.

The gunman, a 17-year-old junior, wore a black trench coat and fired a sawed-off shotgun, the same attire and weapon used by the Columbine assailants. In dark corners of the internet, the massacre is studied and celebrated, inspiring more attacks.

Santa Fe High School reopened to students this week. We texted with a sophomore who described the day. “It was tough being there,” he wrote.

____

Mr. Babchenko and Ukrainian security officials said that a contract had been put on his life and that the only way to track down those responsible was to make it seem as if it had happened.

The Ukrainian authorities accused Russian security services of ordering the killing.

____

9. Eighteen hours and 45 minutes: That’s how long it’ll take to get from Singapore to Newark — the world’s longest commercial flight — starting in October.

Singapore Airlines will fly the Airbus A350-900 U.L.R., or ultra long range, on the route daily. (Above, a rendering.) The plane is made of a carbon fiber that is lighter than the aluminum of traditional jets.

The flights will have 161 seats — 67 in lie-flat business class and 94 in premium economy. No word yet on ticket prices.

10. Finally, everyone is sure someone is going to die in Wednesday night’s series finale of “The Americans,” on FX at 10 p.m. Eastern. But who?

Hundreds of readers have shared their predictions, which range from the simple — an-eye-for-an-eye justice — to the fittingly byzantine. Read them here, and stay tuned for our recap after the show. Above, Keri Russell, who plays Elizabeth.

Have a great night.

____

Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern.

And don’t miss Your Morning Briefing. Sign up here to get it by email in the Australian, Asian, European or American morning.

Want to catch up on past briefings? You can browse them here.

What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes.com.

The post Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing appeared first on World The News.

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[party-hard-or-die]

Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the sign-up.)

Good evening. Here’s the latest.

1. Federal regulators unveiled a sweeping plan to soften the Volcker Rule, opening the door for big banks to resume trading activities that were restricted under the 2010 Dodd-Frank law.

Jerome Powell, the Fed chairman, above, said it would streamline “overly complex and inefficient requirements.”

The changes would give big banks the freedom to engage in more complicated — and possibly riskier — trading. Consumer advocates and other financial watchdogs say that they would allow a return to the Wild West days on Wall Street.

2. President Trump weighed in on the cancellation of “Roseanne” — sort of. Referencing an apology from the parent company of ABC, Mr. Trump noted that he hadn’t gotten his own “for the HORRIBLE statements made and said about me on ABC.”

Ms. Barr wrote that she was “ambien tweeting” when she used a racist slur against Valerie Jarrett, a former adviser to President Obama. Ambien’s maker, Sanofi U.S., hit back: “Racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication.”

Mr. Trump also tweeted, in reaction to a CBS interview with a congressman, that he wished he had chosen another lawyer to be his attorney general instead of Jeff Sessions. (The president was angered when Mr. Sessions recused himself from the Russia investigation last year.) Above, Mr. Trump in Nashville on Tuesday.

3. Italy is confronting a political crisis, one that could mean big trouble for the world economy.

Our economics columnist lays out the stakes: Italy is the fourth-largest economy in Europe and has one of the largest piles of public debt in the world. A crisis there could endanger banks and investment portfolios everywhere.

In Rome, Italy’s populist parties continued their efforts to form a government. Above, Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League party.

____

4. Google’s work for the Defense Department has touched off an existential crisis at the company.

It recently won a share of the contract for the Maven program, which uses artificial intelligence to interpret video images and could be used for drone strikes.

By reviewing emails and documents and interviewing about a dozen insiders at Google, our reporters got a detailed picture of how the news fractured its work force, fueling heated staff meetings and prompting employees with moral objections to resign.

Executives now face this dilemma: Proceeding with defense contracts could drive away brainy experts in artificial intelligence; rejecting such work would deprive the company of a potentially huge business.

____

5. The ground offensive to wipe out the last pockets of Islamic State militants in eastern Syria is gaining momentum.

Kurdish commanders who had left the front lines to battle Turkish troops in the north have returned. They’re working again with their allies in the American-led military coalition to hunt down the few hundred fighters who remain. (The insurgents are quickly moving underground.)

We’re up to Chapter 7 in our new podcast, “Caliphate,” in which the reporter Rukmini Callimachi takes listeners inside the Islamic State and its fall in Mosul. Listen here.

____

6. It’s the hunger season in South Sudan.

More than four years of civil war have obliterated the economy and overrun the most productive land, and food scarcity between harvest seasons is intensifying.

Within months, millions of people potentially face acute malnutrition. Our team went to South Sudan to document the extent of hunger. They met Tafisa Nyattie, above, who lives in a refugee camp and often runs out of food rations for her children.

Juba, the capital, still has food, but the price for even a single plate of bean stew is astronomical.

7. Researchers say the May 18 attack on a school in Santa Fe, Tex., is the latest example of a copycat shooting inspired by the 1999 attack on Columbine High School in Colorado.

The gunman, a 17-year-old junior, wore a black trench coat and fired a sawed-off shotgun, the same attire and weapon used by the Columbine assailants. In dark corners of the internet, the massacre is studied and celebrated, inspiring more attacks.

Santa Fe High School reopened to students this week. We texted with a sophomore who described the day. “It was tough being there,” he wrote.

____

Mr. Babchenko and Ukrainian security officials said that a contract had been put on his life and that the only way to track down those responsible was to make it seem as if it had happened.

The Ukrainian authorities accused Russian security services of ordering the killing.

____

9. Eighteen hours and 45 minutes: That’s how long it’ll take to get from Singapore to Newark — the world’s longest commercial flight — starting in October.

Singapore Airlines will fly the Airbus A350-900 U.L.R., or ultra long range, on the route daily. (Above, a rendering.) The plane is made of a carbon fiber that is lighter than the aluminum of traditional jets.

The flights will have 161 seats — 67 in lie-flat business class and 94 in premium economy. No word yet on ticket prices.

10. Finally, everyone is sure someone is going to die in Wednesday night’s series finale of “The Americans,” on FX at 10 p.m. Eastern. But who?

Hundreds of readers have shared their predictions, which range from the simple — an-eye-for-an-eye justice — to the fittingly byzantine. Read them here, and stay tuned for our recap after the show. Above, Keri Russell, who plays Elizabeth.

Have a great night.

____

Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern.

And don’t miss Your Morning Briefing. Sign up here to get it by email in the Australian, Asian, European or American morning.

Want to catch up on past briefings? You can browse them here.

What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes.com.

The post Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing appeared first on World The News.

from World The News https://ift.tt/2IYJVtY via Breaking News

[dragnews]

Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the sign-up.)

Good evening. Here’s the latest.

1. Federal regulators unveiled a sweeping plan to soften the Volcker Rule, opening the door for big banks to resume trading activities that were restricted under the 2010 Dodd-Frank law.

Jerome Powell, the Fed chairman, above, said it would streamline “overly complex and inefficient requirements.”

The changes would give big banks the freedom to engage in more complicated — and possibly riskier — trading. Consumer advocates and other financial watchdogs say that they would allow a return to the Wild West days on Wall Street.

2. President Trump weighed in on the cancellation of “Roseanne” — sort of. Referencing an apology from the parent company of ABC, Mr. Trump noted that he hadn’t gotten his own “for the HORRIBLE statements made and said about me on ABC.”

Ms. Barr wrote that she was “ambien tweeting” when she used a racist slur against Valerie Jarrett, a former adviser to President Obama. Ambien’s maker, Sanofi U.S., hit back: “Racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication.”

Mr. Trump also tweeted, in reaction to a CBS interview with a congressman, that he wished he had chosen another lawyer to be his attorney general instead of Jeff Sessions. (The president was angered when Mr. Sessions recused himself from the Russia investigation last year.) Above, Mr. Trump in Nashville on Tuesday.

3. Italy is confronting a political crisis, one that could mean big trouble for the world economy.

Our economics columnist lays out the stakes: Italy is the fourth-largest economy in Europe and has one of the largest piles of public debt in the world. A crisis there could endanger banks and investment portfolios everywhere.

In Rome, Italy’s populist parties continued their efforts to form a government. Above, Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League party.

____

4. Google’s work for the Defense Department has touched off an existential crisis at the company.

It recently won a share of the contract for the Maven program, which uses artificial intelligence to interpret video images and could be used for drone strikes.

By reviewing emails and documents and interviewing about a dozen insiders at Google, our reporters got a detailed picture of how the news fractured its work force, fueling heated staff meetings and prompting employees with moral objections to resign.

Executives now face this dilemma: Proceeding with defense contracts could drive away brainy experts in artificial intelligence; rejecting such work would deprive the company of a potentially huge business.

____

5. The ground offensive to wipe out the last pockets of Islamic State militants in eastern Syria is gaining momentum.

Kurdish commanders who had left the front lines to battle Turkish troops in the north have returned. They’re working again with their allies in the American-led military coalition to hunt down the few hundred fighters who remain. (The insurgents are quickly moving underground.)

We’re up to Chapter 7 in our new podcast, “Caliphate,” in which the reporter Rukmini Callimachi takes listeners inside the Islamic State and its fall in Mosul. Listen here.

____

6. It’s the hunger season in South Sudan.

More than four years of civil war have obliterated the economy and overrun the most productive land, and food scarcity between harvest seasons is intensifying.

Within months, millions of people potentially face acute malnutrition. Our team went to South Sudan to document the extent of hunger. They met Tafisa Nyattie, above, who lives in a refugee camp and often runs out of food rations for her children.

Juba, the capital, still has food, but the price for even a single plate of bean stew is astronomical.

7. Researchers say the May 18 attack on a school in Santa Fe, Tex., is the latest example of a copycat shooting inspired by the 1999 attack on Columbine High School in Colorado.

The gunman, a 17-year-old junior, wore a black trench coat and fired a sawed-off shotgun, the same attire and weapon used by the Columbine assailants. In dark corners of the internet, the massacre is studied and celebrated, inspiring more attacks.

Santa Fe High School reopened to students this week. We texted with a sophomore who described the day. “It was tough being there,” he wrote.

____

Mr. Babchenko and Ukrainian security officials said that a contract had been put on his life and that the only way to track down those responsible was to make it seem as if it had happened.

The Ukrainian authorities accused Russian security services of ordering the killing.

____

9. Eighteen hours and 45 minutes: That’s how long it’ll take to get from Singapore to Newark — the world’s longest commercial flight — starting in October.

Singapore Airlines will fly the Airbus A350-900 U.L.R., or ultra long range, on the route daily. (Above, a rendering.) The plane is made of a carbon fiber that is lighter than the aluminum of traditional jets.

The flights will have 161 seats — 67 in lie-flat business class and 94 in premium economy. No word yet on ticket prices.

10. Finally, everyone is sure someone is going to die in Wednesday night’s series finale of “The Americans,” on FX at 10 p.m. Eastern. But who?

Hundreds of readers have shared their predictions, which range from the simple — an-eye-for-an-eye justice — to the fittingly byzantine. Read them here, and stay tuned for our recap after the show. Above, Keri Russell, who plays Elizabeth.

Have a great night.

____

Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern.

And don’t miss Your Morning Briefing. Sign up here to get it by email in the Australian, Asian, European or American morning.

Want to catch up on past briefings? You can browse them here.

What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes.com.

The post Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing appeared first on World The News.

from World The News https://ift.tt/2IYJVtY via Today News

[newestbalance]

Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the sign-up.)

Good evening. Here’s the latest.

1. Federal regulators unveiled a sweeping plan to soften the Volcker Rule, opening the door for big banks to resume trading activities that were restricted under the 2010 Dodd-Frank law.

Jerome Powell, the Fed chairman, above, said it would streamline “overly complex and inefficient requirements.”

The changes would give big banks the freedom to engage in more complicated — and possibly riskier — trading. Consumer advocates and other financial watchdogs say that they would allow a return to the Wild West days on Wall Street.

2. President Trump weighed in on the cancellation of “Roseanne” — sort of. Referencing an apology from the parent company of ABC, Mr. Trump noted that he hadn’t gotten his own “for the HORRIBLE statements made and said about me on ABC.”

Ms. Barr wrote that she was “ambien tweeting” when she used a racist slur against Valerie Jarrett, a former adviser to President Obama. Ambien’s maker, Sanofi U.S., hit back: “Racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication.”

Mr. Trump also tweeted, in reaction to a CBS interview with a congressman, that he wished he had chosen another lawyer to be his attorney general instead of Jeff Sessions. (The president was angered when Mr. Sessions recused himself from the Russia investigation last year.) Above, Mr. Trump in Nashville on Tuesday.

3. Italy is confronting a political crisis, one that could mean big trouble for the world economy.

Our economics columnist lays out the stakes: Italy is the fourth-largest economy in Europe and has one of the largest piles of public debt in the world. A crisis there could endanger banks and investment portfolios everywhere.

In Rome, Italy’s populist parties continued their efforts to form a government. Above, Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League party.

____

4. Google’s work for the Defense Department has touched off an existential crisis at the company.

It recently won a share of the contract for the Maven program, which uses artificial intelligence to interpret video images and could be used for drone strikes.

By reviewing emails and documents and interviewing about a dozen insiders at Google, our reporters got a detailed picture of how the news fractured its work force, fueling heated staff meetings and prompting employees with moral objections to resign.

Executives now face this dilemma: Proceeding with defense contracts could drive away brainy experts in artificial intelligence; rejecting such work would deprive the company of a potentially huge business.

____

5. The ground offensive to wipe out the last pockets of Islamic State militants in eastern Syria is gaining momentum.

Kurdish commanders who had left the front lines to battle Turkish troops in the north have returned. They’re working again with their allies in the American-led military coalition to hunt down the few hundred fighters who remain. (The insurgents are quickly moving underground.)

We’re up to Chapter 7 in our new podcast, “Caliphate,” in which the reporter Rukmini Callimachi takes listeners inside the Islamic State and its fall in Mosul. Listen here.

____

6. It’s the hunger season in South Sudan.

More than four years of civil war have obliterated the economy and overrun the most productive land, and food scarcity between harvest seasons is intensifying.

Within months, millions of people potentially face acute malnutrition. Our team went to South Sudan to document the extent of hunger. They met Tafisa Nyattie, above, who lives in a refugee camp and often runs out of food rations for her children.

Juba, the capital, still has food, but the price for even a single plate of bean stew is astronomical.

7. Researchers say the May 18 attack on a school in Santa Fe, Tex., is the latest example of a copycat shooting inspired by the 1999 attack on Columbine High School in Colorado.

The gunman, a 17-year-old junior, wore a black trench coat and fired a sawed-off shotgun, the same attire and weapon used by the Columbine assailants. In dark corners of the internet, the massacre is studied and celebrated, inspiring more attacks.

Santa Fe High School reopened to students this week. We texted with a sophomore who described the day. “It was tough being there,” he wrote.

____

Mr. Babchenko and Ukrainian security officials said that a contract had been put on his life and that the only way to track down those responsible was to make it seem as if it had happened.

The Ukrainian authorities accused Russian security services of ordering the killing.

____

9. Eighteen hours and 45 minutes: That’s how long it’ll take to get from Singapore to Newark — the world’s longest commercial flight — starting in October.

Singapore Airlines will fly the Airbus A350-900 U.L.R., or ultra long range, on the route daily. (Above, a rendering.) The plane is made of a carbon fiber that is lighter than the aluminum of traditional jets.

The flights will have 161 seats — 67 in lie-flat business class and 94 in premium economy. No word yet on ticket prices.

10. Finally, everyone is sure someone is going to die in Wednesday night’s series finale of “The Americans,” on FX at 10 p.m. Eastern. But who?

Hundreds of readers have shared their predictions, which range from the simple — an-eye-for-an-eye justice — to the fittingly byzantine. Read them here, and stay tuned for our recap after the show. Above, Keri Russell, who plays Elizabeth.

Have a great night.

____

Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern.

And don’t miss Your Morning Briefing. Sign up here to get it by email in the Australian, Asian, European or American morning.

Want to catch up on past briefings? You can browse them here.

What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes.com.

The post Trump, ‘Roseanne,’ Arkady Babchenko: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing appeared first on World The News.

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