Arnold Schwarzenegger was recently named in a poll of British adults as the most suitable public figure to lead humanity in the event of an alien invasion. “I am ready to serve,” tweeted the 73-year-old action star and former California governor. (The Week, April 2, 2021) My moment: Phew!……What a relief. Now we’ll be o.k.
Southern Sweden may be home to big cities like Stockholm and Gothenburg, but the North is fast emerging as our nation’s industrial powerhouse. The lithium-ion battery cell factory in Skellefrea keeps taking new orders, the State-owned metals company LKAB has made giant investments in its Northern iron mines, and a zero-emissions steelworks has opened in …
Continue reading ‘News from Sweden. Nothing is simple or easy.’ »
US Attorney General Merrick Garland recently ordered a moratorium on federal executions and a Justice Department review of the death penalty. The move followed a decision by the Trump administration Justice Department to revive federal executions by lethal injection in 2019, using a one-drug protocol. The federal government then carried out 13 executions from July 2020 …
David Cameron might have been a disaster when it came to Brexit, but he did absolutely the right thing with the Unexplained Wealth Order. This is a government programme to uncover the crooks and thieves who use London to cover up corruption and theft in their home countries and to relieve them of dubious investments, …
On June 19th Americans celebrated Juneteenth, a holiday commemorating the anniversary of June 19th, 1865, and the end of slavery in the United States. Many believe Juneteenth is a celebration of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, However, the document was actually signed in 1863. The real cause for celebration came two years later in …
Gun violence has become an epidemic in America. Over 38,000 people are killed every year because of deadly weapons. Over 38,000! And a huge proportion of the population doesn’t appear to care. Or maybe they really think that this what the Founders intended? There is no reason why anybody needs a weapon of war. My …
The Supreme Court has recently declined to hear a case on the constitutionality of the male-only military draft, framed as “end[ing] gender-based [draft] registration.” The petition expanding the draft to women does speak of “further[ing] the goal of military readiness” but concentrates upon the unfair imposition of “selective burdens on men”. The Pentagon has “unequivocally acknowledge[d] …
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Critical race theorists often comment upon ithe underlying structures and biases of legal systems and arguments. In one famous paper, for instance, then-Harvard Law professor Derrick Bell argued that the famous Supreme Court decision Brown vs. Board of Education may not have been so much about high-minded legal principle but rather the perceived self-interest of …
In 2020, CEOs made 320 times as much as an average worker. Yet employees who work day in and day out to help these businesses flourish, are awarded either the deeply-flawed subminimum tipped wage, the minimum wage of $7.25, or other wages that are less than $15 an hour despite the climbing cost of basic …
Epicurus may not have approved of politicians, and there is a good reason for that. The current furore over voting rights should be alarming to everyone who cherishes the American system, imperfect as are most of the works of humanity. The ruthless pursuit of power and refusal to compromise is un- Epicurean. The The following …
The message from the reader: “Sorry, but it was the President and Chief negotiator of the European Commission who caused the crisis. “ If, immediately following the results of the vote on the 23rd June 2016, the President of the EU had acknowledged the dissatisfaction of a proportion of the British (mainly English) electorate and …
Continue reading ‘An answer to a reader who thinks Brexit is the fault of the EU’ »
The mighty US dollar continues to reign supreme in global markets. But the greenback’s dominance may well be more fragile than it appears, because expected future changes in China’s exchange-rate regime are likely to trigger a significant shift in the international monetary order. For many reasons, the Chinese authorities will probably someday stop pegging the …
Continue reading ‘The future of the dollar (a bit long, but important)’ »
Fossil fuel companies in the US received billions of dollars in tax benefits through government coronavirus relief measures, but laid off tens of thousands of workers, figures show. A group of 77 firms received $8.2bn in tax-code changes under the massive stimulus bill passed by Congress last last year, and some benefited from the paycheck …
Discomfort among European leaders this week after Joe Biden’s surprise proposal of a temporary patents waiver to boost the supply of Covid vaccines for poorer countries. Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission boss, said the EU was open to the idea, but at a summit in Porto, Germany and France gave it a cool …
The U.K. government is facing a backlash from some of the country’s most prominent artists and writers after revealing plans to slash funding for higher education arts courses by 50%. The budget cuts follow a six-week consultation by Education Secretary Gavin Williamson and the Office for Students, the independent regulator for higher education in England, that …
