With apologies for so many Brexit postings, but, especially after Theresa May’s pathetic encounter with the EU ministers yesterday, I suspect that any thinking, patriotic and informed person who saw her or his country make such a mindless, incompetent hash of an unnecessary political red herring would also want to express her or his deep anguish. …
Continue reading ‘The EU and an intelligent person’s despair’ »
“Some wounds never heal of their own accord. One such wound is America’s legacy of slavery and racial injustice. It is the “original sin” that lies behind many of the continuing divisions in US society – and it’s time the country properly atoned for it. I used to be against the idea of slavery reparations …
Continue reading ‘Making reparations to the descendants of slaves’ »
Interserve is a giant UK outsourcing company, which employs over 65,000 people worldwide including 45,000 in the UK. It has thousands of government contracts, including for hospital cleaning, probation services, school meals and the maintenance of military bases, benefitting from the Tory off-loading of the duties of a civilised modern government. Interserve now has ended up …
Continue reading ‘Neoliberalism should be consigned to the same deep pit as communism’ »
So what exactly does the House of Representatives H.R.1 bill do that Republicans find so horrifying? It creates a national system for automatic voter registration and expands early voting and same-day registration. It makes Election Day a holiday for federal employees and encourages private businesses to also take the day off to encourage voting. It …
The most vexing problem with Brexit is Northern Ireland and its open border with the Republic of Ireland to its south. Northern Ireland was always an anomaly. It has been a pain the neck since Cromwell imported a bunch of extreme Protestant settlers from Scotland into Ireland centuries ago. If it were not for these …
Continue reading ‘A radical (explosive?) answer to Brexit and the future of Great Britain’ »
Continued from yesterday: The Trump administration is, in fact, experiencing increasing difficulty finding allies ready to join a new Coalition of the Willing to confront Iran. The only two charter members so far, Israel and Saudi Arabia, are, however, enthusiastic indeed. Last month there was a rally in Warsaw to promote war, featuring Netanyahu as …
(The following 3 paragraphs are by Tom Engelhardt, editor of Tom Dispatch, the inside, go-to publication for military affairs, edited for length. Go to tomdispatch@nationinstitute.org It is possible that the next U.S. military disaster of the twenty-first century might be Iran. That country has, of course, had a significant spot on Washington’s war-making to-do list since …
The posting below about Big Soda trying to persuade the government that consuming excessive sugar is fine as long as you take plenty of exercise raises the issue of Liberty. The Obama Administration was taken to task for what some regarded as too many regulations protecting consumers, the environment etc. The current Administration is scrapping swathes …
Continue reading ‘Liberty and licence: a moral and ethical question.’ »
Consumer groups in the US have accused Coca Cola of trying to alter the policy of the Centers for Disease Control in relation to sugar consumption by donating $1 million to the CDC Foundation and pressing the CDC to downplay sugar consumption as a cause of obesity and bad health (diabetes, heart attacks, strokes and …
Continue reading ‘Big soda altering government policies in their own commercial interest’ »
“The U.S. Department of Education is sending emails to about 15,000 people across the country telling them: You’ve got money. “These are former students — and some parents of students — who took out loans for colleges that shut down between Nov. 1, 2013, and Dec. 4, 2018. About half attended campuses run by Corinthian …
In February more than 76,000 migrants crossed the Southern border without authorization, an 11 year high. 76,000 illegal immigrants in one month! This blog is liberal in outlook, and is even run by an immigrant! However, such a big number is shocking. Apparently, while the majority of Latino migrants used to be men, now they …
There has been much debate over the profiteering and mismanagement at British privatised enterprises, such as Carillion, a “stark, rotting symbol of everything that has gone wrong with the privatisation of local public services”. What has had little attention is the sell-off of public lands in the UK that started with Margaret Thatcher about 39 …
Continue reading ‘Privatising publicly owned land in Britain’ »
Polls show that many Americans think doctors should be allowed to help terminally ill patients end their lives. The AMA’s Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs spent two years reviewing resolutions, not so much on whether to support the practice but on whether to take a neutral stance. On 2018 the council recommended that the …
Continue reading ‘Physician- assisted suicide: the attitudes of doctors are changing, slowly.’ »
Austerity policies have dragged on the UK economy to the tune of £300 per household, per month since the Conservatives came to power, according to the New Economics Foundation thinktank. Its analysis says that under the programme of cuts first introduced by a Tory coalition with the Liberal Democrats, the economy has been left £100bn …
Continue reading ‘Steadily getting poorer – the legacy of Tory government’ »
There is now a proposed minimum entry fee into Venice of $2.85, rising to $5.00 and $10 in peak periods, if you haven’t booked into a hotel or paid a $6.00 tourist tax. The reason? 30 million visitors annually. Poor Venice! Overwhelmed by hordes of noisy tourists, groups from cruise ships, frequent flooding (75% of …
Between 2010 and 2020, local councils in yhe UK will have lost 60p out of every £1 the Government had provided for services. Councils have gone to great lengths to ensure the savings they have been forced to make have as little impact as possible on the quality of services provided to their residents. They …
Continue reading ‘In the UK: a never- ending series of cuts in local government funding’ »
President Trump has picked David Bernhardt, a former energy lobbyist, to be the Interior Department’s next secretary. Bernhardt, whose past clients include oil companies and others with business before the Interior Department, will lead an agency that oversees about 500 million acres as well as the energy production on that land. It has 70,000 employees …
Continue reading ‘The revolving door in the Republican administration’ »
The UK and Switzerland have signed a deal to continue trading after Brexit as they did before it. The “continuity agreement” – based on the EU’s existing free trade deal with Switzerland – was ratified on Monday. Around £32bn of trade is done between the UK and Switzerland each year, with 15,000 British exporters involved. …
It seems to me plausible to imagine that Trump could default on the US national debt. He could quite likely stand up at a rally when things get bumpy for him and say, “we don’t actually owe China that money,” Everywhere he goes Trump finds things that people trust and he undermines them e.g the …
In today’s divided Washington there is one thing the Left and Right agree about: that some companies have grown too powerful. Even conservatives were disgusted by the way states recently showered perks on Amazon in the hope of winning the right to host its new headquarters. “The richest man in the world just got $2bn …
