Below are some of the ideas that have been put forward to deal with gun violence: Background checks There are several major bipartisan bills drawing renewed attention in the Senate at the moment, aiming to expand background checks for gun sales. The Fix NICS Act corrects failures in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, provides …
”Hell, yes, we’re going to take your AR-15, your AK-47.” So exclaimed Beto O’Rourke during the recent Democratic primary debate, endorsing the idea of mandatory buy-backs of assault weapons. It has become “the newest purity test” for Democratic candidates, but have they thought about the consequences of enforcing such a policy? “There could be as …
Continue reading ‘Military-style guns – why do they need them?’ »
The Democrat governor of New York has a plan for a “Trump-proof” reopening of the Big Apple. Andrew Cuomo has apparently hired “high-powered consultants” who will scientifically analyse the “key data points” to work out how to free up the region’s economy. And who are these brilliant consultants? McKinsey & Company, of course – a …
Continue reading ‘You should know better than this, Governor’ »
The scientific evidence that has underpinned No 10’s response to Covid-19 will not be made public until the pandemic ends, the government chief science adviser has told MPs. Sir Patrick Vallance said that the minutes of meetings of the Scientific Advisory Group on Emergencies (Sage) — the government’s most senior team of expert advisers — …
The Observer (editorial) The World Economic Forum’s annual Davos shindig “became a laughing stock a long time ago”, says The Observer newspaper. All those denunciations of global inequality by “corporate captains clinking champagne glasses” in the snow at shareholders’ expense have long seemed ridiculous. But the penny seems finally to be dropping that the game …
The chaos of the last several weeks have put a few things into stark relief. Two of the most obvious: who actually does the work essential for our world to function and how little value the wealthy put on this work. In industries like meatpacking, the corporations that our wealthy run are forcing a mostly …
Over the summer of 2019 the president indicated that his team thought low-income families were getting a too greedy about food. He announced a new plan designed to exclude hundreds of thousands of people from the food stamp program. This was done last December by tightening work requirements for able-bodied adults with no dependents, the U.S. …
Slipped into the recent corona virus relief package was a $170 billion tax cut for the wealthy that will give people earning over $1 million a year an average tax cut of $1.6 million per year. In 2020 alone, taxpayers will pay $90 billion for this wealth transfer to just 43,000 millionaires, 20 percent more than Congress …
Continue reading ‘What a relief! Help for deserving, struggling millionaires.’ »
Shake Shack is returning a $10 million federal loan after the Paycheck Protection Program that was meant to help small businesses ran put of money in less than two weeks of operation. The burger chain and other large businesses were able to get the money because the program covers any company with fewer than 500 …
Between 1980 and 2018, research shows, the tax obligations of America’s billionaires, measured as a percentage of their wealth, have fallen 79 percent. Since last year at this time, the ranks of U.S. billionaires have increased from 607 to 614, their collective wealth from $3.111 to $3.229 trillion. We have here in the United States today …
Teams in China are racing to discover which wild animal at a Wuhan food market was the source of the corona virus: snakes, pangolins or bats? We don’t know yet. What is clear is how seriously China is now clamping down on the trade in wildlife. Recently, the country’s highest authorities enacted a permanent ban. …
Across America, people have been told to take refuge at home and to venture out only to get things they really need, like groceries, prescription drugs and petrol. But should weapons also be on that list? Gun rights advocates think they should. They’ve now achieved a federal shutdown-order exemption for gun shops( guns and ammo) …
Continued from yesterday: The core promise of the American dream has always been that you can do better than your parents. But we have to deal with the fact that our values have been hi-jacked. We decided that we needed more democracy in our politics. What better way to do that than to allow people to …
Over the past 50 years, lots of things have changed in the United States. Here are a few examples. 1) A child’s chance of earning more than his or her parents has plummeted from 90 to 50 percent. 2) Earnings by the top 1 percent of Americans nearly tripled, while middle-class wages have been basically …
Continue reading ‘An autopsy of the American dream, part 1’ »
MPs in Britain have rejected an attempt to force the Government to seek continued membership of the Erasmus+ programme, which funds the studies of 16,000 British students in Europe a year. The vote on a Lib Dem-backed amendment to the withdrawal agreement bill was lost by 254 to 344 votes. However, the Government says it …
The following are just a few of the reversals of environmental protection laws in the last three or so years. 1. Pulling out of the Paris climate accord. 2. Easing of the regulation of methane emissions. 3. Scale-back of requirements for storing and releasing waste from coal-fired power plants 4. Increase in allowable levels of …
Continue reading ‘Fifty years of environmental regulations scrapped’ »
Recently, the World Economic Forum launched 1t.org, a plan to plant a trillion trees. Even Donald Trump, who has withdrawn the US from the Paris agreement, has backed the initiative. But can trees store enough carbon to buy us time to act on climate change? A recent paper said 0.9 billion hectares could lock up …
The EU is turning a blind eye to a giant “scam” in eastern Europe, says The New York Times. Hungary’s nationalist PM, Viktor Orbán, was the first to spot the opportunity: his government sold huge tracts of state-owned land to oligarchs and political allies, ensuring their support by enabling them to claim vast sums in …
You’d never have guessed it from the recent election campaigns, but Britain has a major problem with its pensions. It’s this: as the U.K. population ages, the state pensions of ever more retirees are having to be financed by ever fewer people in work. Hence the sensible plans to raise the pensionable age for …
Continue reading ‘Failing to face the reality of an ageing society’ »
The outlook for wildlife would be grim even if the world wasn’t warming. According to a major report last year, 1 million species could soon be wiped out – a sixth mass extinction. The main cause at present is the loss of habitat, but over this century the changing climate is expected to push ever …
The recent death of Kobe Bryant in a helicopter crash wasn’t just a tragedy for his family and for basketball fans. It was also “a sign of the times”: that even the rich and famous now can’t avoid “the traffic hellscape that American cities have created for their residents”. Like everyone else in southern California, …
In the words of Lucretius: “..we are all born from the same celestial seed; all of us have the same father, from which the earth, the mother who feeds us, receives clear drops of rain, producing from them bright wheat and lush trees, and the human race, and the species of beasts, offering up the foods with which all …
“The brakes may at last be coming off the “micromobility” revolution. This month, UK ministers are due to begin a consultation on legalising the use of electronic scooters on British roads. Not before time. There’s no justification for the current ban on these devices. A fast, heavy bike poses much more of a threat to …
Continue reading ‘Electric scooters: the opinion of The Guardian’ »
The educational under-performance of Britain’s white working-class males is “desperate”. Less then 10% of white boys from deprived backgrounds go to university, the lowest share of any demographic group. Boys lag behind girls at all stages of schooling – in few other areas, says the Higher Education Policy Institute, is there “such a big gender …
Continue reading ‘White, working class boys are performing badly academically’ »
The year 2019 saw the continuation of “the world’s most bizarre financial experiment ever”, said Merryn Somerset Webb on MoneyWeek.com – “negative interest rates”. The European Central Bank and the Swiss National Bank were among those charging investors for the privilege of holding their bonds. There are now $16trn-worth of negative-yielding government bonds in the …
