Skip to content

The of course here exists so as to show that does he Hell mean like of course

There is a close relationship between the Trump era and violence – not just the attempts on his life but also the violence his administration has unleashed on the world, the violence his ICE and border patrol agents have caused inside America, the violence he has incited among his followers. (A few of Saturday night’s guests at the correspondents’ dinner were in Congress on 6 January 2021 when Trump’s supporters attacked the US Capitol.)

The violence of the Trump administration has resulted in thousands of deaths and injuries. That is no justification for Saturday night’s attack, of course, but it is part of what he has wrought in America. He has changed the script in Washington. He has ushered in an America that is more divided, distrustful and hostile; an America where political opponents are enemies to be overcome and destroyed instead of debated and challenged at the ballot box.

Of course, this sort of thing was only done by the fascists in Argentina

Andreas Laake, the head of a victims’ association for “stolen children in the GDR”, estimates the total number of forced adoptions over the state’s 40-year existence to be as high as 8,000, and has recorded 2,000 infant deaths that his organisation suspects could be disguising forced adoptions. In five of these cases, the association has been able to confirm that the deaths were falsely reported. But a state-commissioned report published at the start of this year insists that they were isolated incidents: “A systematic, planned and explicitly politically motivated endeavour on behalf of the state within the adoption procedures could not be proven,” it says. Proof of the opposite would probably oblige the German state to pay compensation to thousands of victims.

The Good Socialists would never have done something like that.

Democracy, eh?

The only reason to change the rules on indefinite leave to remain in the UK, as she is doing, is to use migrants already in this country with legal permission as weapons in Labour’s war to fight off the threat from far-right political parties.

Those “far-right” political parties are gaining a lot of political support because they are proposing policies which a substantial fraction of the electorate would like to see happen. Whether the electorate should think that way or not is a different question. Clearly, that substantial portion do.

Isn’t that supposed to be what democracy does? Makes politicians enact the policies the electorate desires? Or is democracy limited in some manner, to only those policies Spud approves of?

As I like to point out

Inequality is lower than commonly measured:

Councils are offering benefit claimants discounts on nights out, beauty parlours and beach huts under a spiralling “welfare culture” taking hold in Britain.
A Telegraph investigation has found Universal Credit and mental health benefits claimants can receive concessions for drinks at bars, massages and eyebrow treatments via local government schemes, with discounts for jobless claimants also extending to football matches, comedy clubs, cinemas, saunas and spas.
Concessions offered by councils or independent businesses even apply to white water rafting, rowing clubs, yoga classes and ice skating.
Local authorities are also providing benefit claimants discounts on weddings and at leisure centres, while taxpayers foot rising bills.

None of these bennies count as income. Therefore they are not counted when measuring how many people are living on incomes less than 60% of median. So, that relative poverty is over-measured.

How important this is is another matter but it’s definitely true.

When BiS is right about Pigou Taxes

It wants eVED to be the successor to fuel duty. But the numbers don’t add up. Pay-per-mile will raise £7bn a year by 2050-51, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR). That’s less than a third of the current £24bn tax take earned from fuel duty.
It seems inevitable that a dramatic increase in eVED charges will be needed to make up the shortfall. What starts as 3p per mile could soon be 10p.

A chunk of current fuel duty is that Pigou Tax upon emissions. If no emissions are being made then that tax – and that tax revenue – should not exist. But here we’ve the politcos insisting that the same revenue must be raised even if there aren’t those emissions that should be brutally taxed.

BiS is quite right that this is a problem with Pigou Taxes. No, I don’t know what the solution is. Other than yes, taxing petrrol is better than giving MadEd a free hand…..

Again?

A gunman stormed a security checkpoint armed with “multiple weapons” in an apparent attempt to assassinate Donald Trump at a major event in Washington.

The US president was rushed off stage by his security detail after several gunshots rang out at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Saturday.

Grainy footage released by Mr Trump showed the gunman, Cole Thomas Allen, from California, charging through a Secret Service checkpoint.

Agents drew their guns and managed to stop the suspect from reaching the ballroom entrance. One law enforcement officer was shot but was in “great shape”, Mr Trump said

Of course, it could have been the press he was after…..

Not wholly, no

Lesley Fitt, who was wearing a gas mask to make her point, said: “The dangers of glyphosate are well known.

I know there are many who claim such dangers but I’m unaware of any actual ones. You know, other than “Chemicals, nasty!” type statements.

You could be right Andy

Rightwing populism is littered with broken promises. Its opponents need to make those failures count
Andy Beckett

Of course this is trivia as compared to left wing populism. Those extravagant promises of the 1940s have left us saddled, 80 years later, with one of the worst health care services in Western Europe for example….

He’s not a world leading energy economist

He’s a very naughty boy:

The oil crisis triggered by the Iran war has changed the fossil fuel industry for ever, turning countries away from fossil fuels to secure energy supplies, the world’s leading energy economist said.

Fatih Birol, the executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), also said that, despite pressure, the UK should forgo much of its potential North Sea expansion.

Speaking exclusively to the Guardian, Birol said a key effect of the US-Israel war on Iran was that countries would lose trust in fossil fuels and demand for them would reduce.

Or more accurately he’s an international bureaucrat with a very definite agenda.

As an example:

Birol said: “It is up to the government, but these fields would not change much for the UK’s energy security, nor would they change the price of oil and gas. They would not make any significant difference to this crisis.”

He also cautioned against granting exploration licences for further new fields on commercial grounds.

“They won’t provide any significant quantities of oil and gas for many years to come,” Birol said. “They will not lower the bills, the UK will remain a significant importer and price taker on international markets. I am not even talking about the climate change effects – just from a business point of view, making a major investment in exploration might not make business sense.”

Who will carry the expense? The oil copmpanies. Who will make a profit is oil is found? The Treasury. That’s a one way bet. He’s weighting the argument in favour of a particular, ideological, outcome.

This is not, in fact, true

If consumers spend less, as falling confidence suggests is likely, and businesses see a downturn in activity and, as a result, invest less, the unavoidable consequence is that the government will have to borrow more. This is what the sectoral balances suggest is inevitable, and they represent an unbreakable accounting identity that must always hold true, a fact seemingly unknown to almost any Chancellor in history.

For there is a fourth sector, the foreign.

Tsk.

My word

And, despite the outcome of the election in Hungary, far-right nationalist populism is still on the rise, threatening democracy as well as principled, far-sighted policies on climate, energy, trade, technology and migration.

The people who disagree with The Guardian’s progressives are unprincipled, eh?

So what is the answer? Most of the thinkers we spoke to believe it lies in a stronger Europe.

Kick policy up to where it’s controlled by Guardian-type progressives and so immune from democracy, eh?

But when it comes to Europe’s future, optimism on its own is not enough to kickstart change. It must give way to activism – grounded in the conviction that a stronger Europe not only can, but must, be built.

Yep, that’s the plan.

Umm

In the months after the invasion, Essar entered into complex offshore arrangements that appear to have enabled the group to keep dealing with a Russian bank under sanctions from the west.

Essar shifted billions of dollars in loans, provided by the Kremlin-controlled lender VTB, from Cyprus to a subsidiary in the tax haven of Mauritius, where sanctions did not apply.

The Cyprus and Mauritius entities that took part in the transfer included subsidiaries of Essar’s UK arm, Essar Energy.

Essar said that UK sanctions law did not apply to the transaction and that it complied with all applicable sanctions law after taking advice from a leading law firm. But the restructuring “raises red flags in relation to possible [sanctions] circumvention”, according to a leading expert.

If something’s legal, it’s legal, right?

Truly glorious

First, as The Economist notes, the global energy system is not adjusting smoothly through price signals, as orthodox economic models suggest it should. Instead, market demand is being propped up by policy intervention, most especially through short-term inventory depletion. Politicians are maintaining the pretence that all is “normal”.

So, as Spud doesn’t go on to say, don’t use politics and politicians to fuck up market responses.

The reality is we need fuel rationing, and we need it now.

So, let’s fuck up markets and market pricing with politics and politicians.

So, it works then?

Weight loss drugs transformed our sex life
A couple who lost 17st between them say Mounjaro gave them more than weight loss, restoring confidence and closeness

I am reminded of a story – a story, not something fact checked.

A farmer’s wife – and of the size and shape of a proper farmer’s wife – decided she desired to lose weight. Further, that the manner of doing so was to have lots and lots of sex. She was rural, but not that rural, so this required the cooperation of hubby. Which duly arrived and everything was fine – she lost weight.

As happens with these things so did he lose weight and apparently he was 6 stone when he fainted off his tractor.

Obviously not fact checked because who would want to destroy a story that good?

Just can’t get the staff these days

The former private secretary of billionaire philanthropist Judith Neilson has been charged with dozens of counts of fraud after she allegedly used a business credit card to make more than $1m worth of purchases, including luxury clothing, artwork and jewellery.

Annalouise Spence, 50, was refused bail at a local court hearing on Thursday after being charged with 68 counts of dishonestly obtaining property by deception.

When will government solve the Servant Problem?

To answer the Spud question

Hence, the Richard Murphy Question: If governments create the money that sustains our economies, and if we have the real resources to provide security, care and a livable future free from fear, why do we continue to organise society as if we cannot afford to do so?

Because we do not share Spud’s priorities? Because to allow spud to design society would be a disaster?

Don’t think it’ll work

Sir Keir Starmer must invest billions more in the military after decades of “over-reliance” on the United States allowed Britain to “neglect” its Armed Forces, an ex-Nato chief has warned.

Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, a former Nato secretary general, said Downing Street must “reassess” its “outdated and unhelpful” special relationship with the US.

He’s right, but I doubt it will happen. The thing the Americans really provide is lift and logistics. The actually important things in a full on war. And they’re expensive, really, really, expensive. No British government – I propose – would be willing to spend enough to provide lift and l;ogistics at the scale required. Nor would any other European govt.

Wish it were not so but feeding the lanyards is far more electorally important.

They’re getting desperate

Democracy is under mounting threat from the climate crisis, with new analysis documenting how elections are increasingly shaped not only by political forces but also by floods, wildfires and extreme weather.

Democracy is good! So, if we can link climate change to ani-democracy then hugs all around! Except Xir who is non-tactile. We win!