When citizens of 13 EU member states were asked which of 35 countries they would be willing to offer financial help to in a crisis, the UK came below all but Colombia and Tunisia. On average, the UK received a net score of -8%, compared with 30% for Italy, 29% for Spain, and 17% for …
In 2012 Amy Coney Barrett told a class at the University of Notre Dame that a “legal career is but a means to an end……and that end is building the Kingdom of God.” As one Senator said of Barrett in 2017, she has “a long history of believing that religious beliefs should prevail.” Does she …
“Young people are fuelling the coronavirus.” So suggested the World Health Organisation last month, after youngsters defying distancing rules were blamed for rising infection rates across Europe. In Preston, UK, councillors even urged local youth not to “kill granny”. But the young are not to blame for this pandemic. They are its “forgotten victims”. UK …
Continue reading ‘The young will suffer most long- term from the pandemic’ »
“How old were you when you realised that hard work and sacrifice weren’t worth it? Some realise it at retirement, when, after a lifetime of indispensability and missed weekends, they have failed to reach the top and are smoothly replaced and forgotten within a month or two. For others the revelation strikes later. ‘I wish …
Yesterday, my brother-law, Martin Dean, died of heart failure in a hospital in Taunton, England. He had been in poor health for quite a long time. He was an economic historian, a tourism officer and local Council employee, and author of a book on railways. Rest in peace, Martin. We will miss you. (Forgive me, …
It is well established that people in stable relationships tend to have better mental and physical health than singletons. Now, scientists have discovered a possible explanation for this: it seems that sharing a bed promotes good sleep. Humans sleep in cycles, shifting between rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep – during which vivid dreams occur – and non-REM …
“When state governments consider raising taxes on rich people, rich people in those states like to claim that if their taxes are raised too much, they’ll just pack up and leave for another state with lower taxes. If this were true, states raising taxes on rich people would end up losing tax revenue at the …
Continue reading ‘The myth attached to raising taxes on the super-rich’ »
The top 1% of Americans have taken $50 trillion from the bottom 90%. This has been done by way of unemployment, scant benefits, unfair tax laws, and lopsided investment and political give-aways of our money. Now, the RAND Center has put a number on just how much wealth the top 1 percent has stolen from …
“Numquam autem recte faciet, qui cito credit, utique homo negotians.” No one, especially in business, can prosper if he believes what he is told . Petronius, Satyricon , 43. LX V
“Between 2014 and 2016, Republicans removed almost 17 million voters off the voter rolls. In addition to the voter registrations being invalidated before the current election, Republicans are enacting a plan to disenfranchise the black vote by rejecting their mail-ballots. It doesn’t get much worse than this. “Mail-in ballots by black voters are being rejected at the …
Bromsgrove, Worcestershire, UK Far-right activists have been filming themselves storming hotels that are being used by the Home Office to accommodate asylum seekers, confronting residents in their rooms, and demanding to know which countries they are from. In a series of videos posted on social media, activists with the group Britain First can be seen …
Continue reading ‘Race hatred is not at all confined to the US’ »
The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (Cares) Act, the 2 trillion dollar bill passed last March, granted forgivable loans to “qualifying businesses and non- profits”. The Small Business Administration, which administered part of the Act, declared ( but tried to keep it quiet) that houses of worship and religious private schools qualified under the …
We’re frequently exhorted to get off our sofas and get active, but it seems such public health campaigns are not having enough impact. A pan-European study has found that since 2002 people have tended only to become more sedentary. In 2002, just over 49% of Europeans displayed “sedentary behaviours” – meaning they spent more than …
Why on earth is Boris Johnson illegally revoking the EU withdrawal treaty which he himself so enthusiastically signed, claiming it gave Britain an “oven-ready” Brexit? Polly Toynbee’s theory is that he is trying to shift the blame for the pain that would follow crashing out of the EU without a deal – on top of …
“Thousands of demonstrators – many of them carrying placards proclaiming Covid-19 to be a “hoax” or a “scam” – recently gathered in Trafalgar Square in London to protest against lockdown restrictions. Among the speakers was Piers Corbyn, the older brother of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who was fined £10,000 for his part in organising …
Dawn on an early March morning. The still, silver surface of the sea Merges softly with the morning mist, Confounding the division between earth and sky. A tropical sun peeps above the sea, Likes what it sees, and hurries up, Wreathed in purple, gold and white, Catching the masthead of an anchored yacht Swinging lazily …
Continue reading ‘A second version of a poem called “Dawn”’ »
“Are Republican leaders really willing to throw in their lot with demented conspiracy theorists? “The answer, for the moment, would seem to be yes. President Trump tacitly endorsed the far-right QAnon cult the other day, saying its followers were patriots who “love our country” and, more importantly, “like me very much”. When a reporter pointed …
Britain has the least happy teenagers in Europe, at least that’s what a new survey by The Children’s Society tells us. Why might this be? The charity’s chief executive, Mark Russell, believes he knows the reason. It’s down to “the increase in child poverty”, he says. There are two big problems with this explanation. The …
Continue reading ‘Addendum to yesterday’s post: Unhappy teenagers’ »
“While other kids ate candy for breakfast, we had to have cereal, egg and toast. When others had a Pepsi or a Twinkie for lunch, we had to eat sandwiches. And you can guess, our mother fixed us a dinner that was different from what other kids had, too. Mother insisted on knowing where we …
Information collected by a University of Ottawa team using data collected over a 115 year period and covering 66 bumblebee species, show that bumblebees are in drastic decline across Western Europe and North America, owing to higher and more extreme variations in temperature. The likelihood of the bee population surviving has declined by 30% in …
Not exactly on the forefront of our minds at the moment, but we may be closer to defeating Covid 19’s less deadly cousin – the common cold. A vaccine that protects against one of the most common cold viruses could be available as soon as 2024, after it has proved safe and effective in clinical trials. …
One in three children around the world have enough lead in their blood to endanger their long-term health, scientists have found. The Unicef-published report, based on blood tests performed on hundreds of thousands of children worldwide, estimates that around 800 million under-19s have at least five micrograms of lead in their blood per decilitre – …
President Macron has condemned the defacing of a memorial to the victims of a notorious Nazi massacre in the Limousin. In 1944, SS troops stormed into the village of Oradour-sur-Glane, and killed nearly all of its 642 inhabitants. The men were shot in the legs and then set alight; the women and children were burnt …
Dawn A still, warm, and breathless tropical night, Before the birds awake and fishes stir. There is no breeze or whisper from the palms, Only a gunmetal gloom and swish of waves Gently shifting seaweed on the sand. I lie on a hammock counting intervals Between the flashing lights of marker buoys, …
Continue reading ‘An Epicurean Poem ( about peace of mind)’ »
When you read about the Holocaust consideration is mainly given to anti-semitism. Added is often the information that “millions of others” were also killed. In reality Nazi racism extended to Roma and Sinti people, (Gypsies, as they are otherwise known). In the former Czechoslovakia 90% of the Roma and Sinti people were murdered, and those …
Continue reading ‘The holocaust was not only about Jewish people’ »
