Politics & Stuff

[Fulham Broadway 16,393]

6 minutes ago, Vesper said:

Good satire is so rare in the US

they are so goddamn black and white, no shades of grey allowed

 

Its a great diffuser and leveller, as we know. Think most of the stuff in the Simpsons goes... whoosh

[Vesper 27,318]

20 minutes ago, Fulham Broadway said:

Its a great diffuser and leveller, as we know. Think most of the stuff in the Simpsons goes... whoosh

obviously we know the political movement (one of the greatest in the past 500 years)

but the first thing that came to my mind after that was

 

 

lol

 

[chippy 342]

1 hour ago, Fulham Broadway said:

''The ugly truth is white on white crime does exist. It is a growing pandemic in the white community, and if we don’t call attention to this problem soon, there will be no more white people left to run the world.

Most of the conversation surrounding crime involves black people, who selfishly take all of the credit for being criminals. Blacks are notorious for being called thugs and gangsters, but the real MVPs (Most Violent People) are whites. Everyday in cities across the country, people die at the hands of white people. What’s more, they’re killing their own kind. According to the US Department of Justice statistics, 84 percent of white people killed every year are killed by other whites. In 2011, there were more cases of whites killing whites than there were of blacks killing blacks. Between 1980 to 2008, a majority (53.3 percent) of gang-related murders were committed by white people, with a majority of the homicide victims being white as well.

In America, whites commit the majority of crimes. What’s even more troubling is that they are also responsible for a vast majority of violent crimes. In 2013, whites led all other groups in aggravated assault, larceny-theft, arson, weapons-carrying, and vandalism. When it comes to sexual assault, whites take the forcible rape cake. They are also more likely to kill children, the elderly, family members, their significant others, and even themselves! They commit more sex-related crimes, gang related crimes, and are more likely to kill at their places of employment. In 2013, an estimated 10,076 people died in the U.S. due to drunk driving crashes. Driving while drunk is almost exclusively a white crime because everyone knows black people prefer to drink on their porches or inside their homes.

So why is white on white crime so prevalent, one may ask? Is it the music they listen to? Is it the white divorce rate, resulting in more white children coming from broken homes? Perhaps it’s the TV shows they watch or the violent sports they play. More than likely, it is a combination of all of those things, with the exact root cause unclear. What is clear, though, is that not enough people are talking about the crime plaguing the white community. We need to spread the word, holding protests and demonstrations that call attention to this growing matter. After all White Lives Matter too.

K Codette Huff Post

You can't/won't debate the uncomfortable truths, so you come out with this.😟

But I'll  answer in a straight way that's deserving of such an important issue, and one which is causing such dangerous divisions.

Yes, there are indeed lots of violent, white criminal scum and as I have made it very, very clear I have zero time for them and do not give a toss if they come to a sticky end with the Police - Again, carry gun or knife and resist arrest, then too bad if they end up dead. Further point is, nobody else ever cares when criminal white scum are killed by the Police and rightly so! However, those on the Left riot and protest over and over when Black criminal scum are killed. WHY?  

But much more sickening and hypocritical is their complete silence on all the completely innocent Black kids and toddlers being shot dead. The absolute daily mayhem in places like Southside Chicago, where last year alone there were over 120 shootings and 25 shot dead in just one weekend.  Why are the deaths of criminals more important/ more newsworthy than the deaths of innocent children?  BLM and the Lefties are playing a sick and perverted political game as I have absolutely no doubt all those so called anti racist will have no problem with a head of Police calling for racial discrimination against white people to be made legal. 

It goes without saying there are truly terrible violent scum in every racial group, BUT, it's the hugely disproportionate numbers within the Black communities which is the problem and BLM, the Lefties and MSM are trying to ignore it and cover it up.  Another recent example is when there were a couple of racist attacks on American Asians by white thugs. For a week there was a "stop Asian hate crime" movement gathering pace. That all came to grinding halt once crime figures showed that the vast majority of attacks on Asians were commited by Black Americans 

As I've said over and over, go onto the FBI website and see for yourselves the racial breakdown of crimes committed,  including white on black and black on white murders. 

Look at the figures and then take into account that Black Americans make up only 12& of the population. 

To end with. I wouldn't have known what the true crime stats were if it wasn't for the likes of Candace Owens, Officer Tatum and other Black Conservatives pointing out the grotesque lies that have been spun.

 

 

 

 

[Fulham Broadway 16,393]

43 minutes ago, Vesper said:

obviously we know the political movement (one of the greatest in the past 500 years)

but the first thing that came to my mind after that was

 

 

lol

 

Saw them a few times back in the day (cringe) - Chumbawamba were great though !

[Vesper 27,318]

18 minutes ago, chippy said:

You can't/won't debate the uncomfortable truths, so you come out with this.😟

But I'll  answer in a straight way that's deserving of such an important issue, and one which is causing such dangerous divisions.

Yes, there are indeed lots of violent, white criminal scum and as I have made it very, very clear I have zero time for them and do not give a toss if they come to a sticky end with the Police - Again, carry gun or knife and resist arrest, then too bad if they end up dead. Further point is, nobody else ever cares when criminal white scum are killed by the Police and rightly so! However, those on the Left riot and protest over and over when Black criminal scum are killed. WHY?  

But much more sickening and hypocritical is their complete silence on all the completely innocent Black kids and toddlers being shot dead. The absolute daily mayhem in places like Southside Chicago, where last year alone there were over 120 shootings and 25 shot dead in just one weekend.  Why are the deaths of criminals more important/ more newsworthy than the deaths of innocent children?  BLM and the Lefties are playing a sick and perverted political game as I have absolutely no doubt all those so called anti racist will have no problem with a head of Police calling for racial discrimination against white people to be made legal. 

It goes without saying there are truly terrible violent scum in every racial group, BUT, it's the hugely disproportionate numbers within the Black communities which is the problem and BLM, the Lefties and MSM are trying to ignore it and cover it up.  Another recent example is when there were a couple of racist attacks on American Asians by white thugs. For a week there was a "stop Asian hate crime" movement gathering pace. That all came to grinding halt once crime figures showed that the vast majority of attacks on Asians were commited by Black Americans 

As I've said over and over, go onto the FBI website and see for yourselves the racial breakdown of crimes committed,  including white on black and black on white murders. 

Look at the figures and then take into account that Black Americans make up only 12& of the population. 

To end with. I wouldn't have known what the true crime stats were if it wasn't for the likes of Candace Owens, Officer Tatum and other Black Conservatives pointing out the grotesque lies that have been spun.

 

 

 

 

like a rat you took the bait and never stopped to even think (quelle surprise)

pro tip:

IT IS SATIRE

😜

 

 

[Vesper 27,318]

17 minutes ago, Fulham Broadway said:

Saw them a few times back in the day (cringe) - Chumbawamba were great though !

 

[Vesper 27,318]

Billy Bragg - Full English Brexit

 

[Vesper 27,318]

This Is What A Pro-Trump Myanmar Coup Might Look Like Here

Trump supporters and Q adherents have publicly endorsed the idea of a Myanmar-style coup to oust Joe Biden.

https://thebanter.substack.com/p/this-is-what-a-pro-trump-myanmar

WASHINGTON, DC --- This will sound eerily familiar to you.

The democratically-elected leader of Myanmar, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, was re-elected last November with 83 percent of the popular vote. Almost immediately, military leaders there protested the election, claiming it was fraudulent but lacked any evidence to back up its allegations. Without evidence in hand, they jumped immediately to the most extreme solution.

In March, the military exploited a law allowing it to declare a state of emergency and, using the bogus pretext of a stolen election, deposed and arrested San Suu Kyi along with her entire cabinet in an obvious military coup.

In the aftermath of the coup, the people of Myanmar took to the streets in opposition to the military, and in support of San Suu Kyi. They were quickly assaulted by soldiers who proceeded to murder 600 protesters, while injuring hundreds more in a bloodbath that made world news that week. Meanwhile, American journalists have been arrested and detained as well -- imprisoned in Myanmar’s notoriously harsh gulags.

All of this should sound familiar because it’s exactly what Mike Flynn wants to do here. He and twice-impeached one-term loser Donald Trump’s Red Hat disciples are now looking to Myanmar’s military dictatorship as a template for what ought to occur in the United States. We know this because Flynn, along with Trump supporters and Q adherents, have publicly endorsed the idea of a Myanmar-style coup to oust Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and to reinstate Donald Trump.

Like the idiocrats they are, however, they might’ve accidentally revealed when this coup might go down. They’re saying August of this year, and how do we know that? Not only has Trump toadie Mike Lindell mentioned August as the period of time in which Trump will return to power, but according to Maggie Haberman at the New York Times, Trump is also telling confidants that he will regain the presidency that month...somehow. Likewise, a week or two ago during an interview with OAN, Trump explained that when diamonds are stolen from a jewellery store, the thief has to return the diamonds. In other words, he’s got it in his head that because the presidency was stolen from him (it wasn’t), it’s rightfully his and it needs to be returned. 

So, how does he think that’ll happen?

We can’t discount the notion that he’s totally clueless about the Constitution and perhaps believes there’s an article or amendment that explains what should happen when a president is butthurt from losing an election. It doesn’t exist, but it’s quite possible he either believes there’s a mechanism for reinstatement or he’s been led-on by one of his goons that such a process exists. Even if there were such a thing in our founding documents, I imagine he’d need to prove there had been a theft that took place. Yet in dozens of attempts, Trump and his team of freaks and weirdos failed to clear even the most cursory requirements for valid evidence.

But I believe he doesn’t care what the Constitution says or doesn’t say. Trump and his people don’t care about democracy. Their admiration for a military coup in Myanmar is enough proof of their disdain for our constitutional system. They’re prepared to do whatever it takes to inject his bloated ass back into the White House one way or another. And the mechanism they could be seriously entertaining is that of a Myanmar-style coup.

In order to successfully do that, though, Trump would need to have operatives inside the military at its highest levels -- high enough to have access to the White House and, more importantly, President Biden and his entire cabinet. The officers and soldiers would have to concoct some sort of flimsy-at-least pretext for arresting the entire administration. 

The Red Hat plotters, with help from the Secret Service, would have to orchestrate a plan to arrest the cabinet, the west wing staff, the Joint Chiefs, the president, and the vice president, all without being stopped by loyal members of the military. From there, we can only presume Trump would return to Washington and, with a small staff of loyalists, he’d establish a military dictatorship based at the White House, appointing himself as the generalissimo of the cabal, perhaps donning a garish, decorated military uniform. And as his first act, he’d order the arrest of everyone he suspected of being engaged in the so-called theft of the election. The arrests would then extend to members of the press and other dissidents.

I’m not saying a Trump coup would actually work. In fact, success is quite unlikely, and this could all be part of Trump’s grift -- his Save America PAC and so on. But it doesn’t mean they won’t try, and trying is where the damage occurs.

And look, I get it. It sounds outlandish, but it's not that far afield from where we are as a nation these days. Trump’s citizen army already violently invaded and occupied Congress. It doesn’t require much imagination to understand what Insurrection 2.0 might look like. Besides, this is how military coups are perpetrated around the world -- see also Myanmar -- and we can count the dead. This is how dictators rise to power. This is how they behave when they’re deposed and when they return from exile -- the ones who survive, that is. The historical truth is: most Trump-style tinpot dictators don’t get to retreat to their resort for buffet meals and rounds of golf with various ass-kissers after they’re ousted. But for some reason, our country has decided that tax evasion is enough to nab him. I’m happy for the investigations, but I don’t think it’s enough. 

This is one of many reasons why moving on from the Trump nightmare is impossible until he’s held accountable for his crimes -- not just the insurrection -- and until his millions of supporters are shamed into the margins of decent society. Once the military coup is underway, it’ll be too late.

 

Edited June 3, 2021 by Vesper

[Vesper 27,318]

6.3.21

It’s Thursday. There are 522 days until the midterm elections. Matt Gaetz appears to be in some more trouble, some good economic news and Joe Biden actually helps Americans.

Note: Helloooooo, you sexy ass patriots. We hope y’all don’t mind, but we wanted to address today’s note just to men and specifically just to men from Texas. Guys, what the fuck is going on? Now we’re not the types to get all hung up on traditional gender roles or idiotic stereotypes about what masculinity entails, after all, we’re a genderless newsletter with no discernible genitialia. But we’re definitely looking at y’all and wondering what the hell is in the water down there. Y’all are supposed to be all tough and shit and instead you got George P. Bush sewing his lips to the ass of the man who shat on his whole fucking family. If you want a Texas man to kiss your ass, all you have to do apparently is call his wife ugly or his dad a murderer. Now we’re sure there are probably still some real men down there — Beto comes to mind — but they are not being represented well. So y’all go get yourselves a 10-gallon hat of self-respect and start acting like real fucking cowboys again. And George P., well, there’s no hope for you, you gutless kiss-ass. More: MSNBC

Note two: See?! This is exactly what we’re talking about! Don’t worry Dan Crenshaw. We’re not laughing at you. We’re laughing toward you. More: Washington Post

Note three: So the orange menace is going to make his rally return this weekend, and you can feel the press getting tiny boners as their sick hero and ratings cow returns to the playing field. We’ve decided we’re going to spend the weekend seeing how many power tools we can fit in our ears instead. More: Associated Press

Note four: This Wisconsin editorial about Ron Johnson was so perfect it almost made us cry. More: Madison.com

Note five: Democrats need to realize that Trump and his ilk are never ever going to stop unless they are stopped. More: Associated Press

Note six: TWENTY! That’s right 20 Republican senators refused to meet with Officer Sicknick’s mom. Fucking disgusting. More: Washington Post

Note seven: Dear President Biden, please stop meeting with people who tried to cover up the Jan. 6 attack and definitely please stop giving shit away in negotiations with people who have zero intention of doing anything to help. More: CNN

Note eight: We frankly don’t give a fuck about any Jan. 6 report that leaves out the scumbag politicians who were involved in the coup attempt. More: CNN

Note nine: This was the story today that really made us do some thinkin’. More: Washington Post

Note 10: You gotta hand it to the White House for how creative they’ve been in trying to get everyone vaccinated. More: Washington Post

Note 11: This is just fucking insane. Kinda want to see Swalwell chase him down personally. More: CNN

Note 12: Our love for President Biden is being tested. If AG Garland is going to help Trump cover up his crimes, then Joe will make an enemy of us. This shit is unacceptable. More: Washington Post

Note 13: Go get ‘em, Vice President Harris. You got this! More: Washington Post

Note 14: This has nothing to do with politics, but it’s a story that made us smile. More: Hollywood Reporter

Note 15: Seriously. These deranged motherfuckers are never going to stop. More: Washington Post

Note 16: Ron DeSantis is truly a monster. More: Orlando Weekly

Note 17: This is gross shit but we don’t get too excited about it because President Obama gave Trump the roadmap for it. More: New York Times

Note 18: Politics is getting so fucking weird. The drone thing wasn’t us, but it definitely gave us some ideas. More: Associated Press

Note 19: The Pentagon doesn’t care that Mike Flynn is talking about a coup. Why the fuck not? More: Task and Purpose

Note 20: We hear Mueller will phone this in and then not show up at the end. More: Axios

Note 21: We literally have no idea what is happening in Israel. More: Washington Post

Note 22: This was the most disgusting, infuriating thing we read yesterday. More: Beacon Journal

Note 23: We stayed so fucking mad about this during the weekened. And guess what — we’re still mad about it. More: Media Matters

Note 24: Did y’all see that Coach K is retiring? Yeah, fuck Duke.

Note 25: Ok, rock stars, there’s some SCOTUS stuff dropping and we need to get something to eat so let’s get to the news section. We hope y’all are having a kick ass week. We love you, and we hope your slow return to normalcy is going great. Have a wonderful day.

LOL

Matt Gaetz, who thinks he can crazy his way through an investigation into whether he paid to rape a child, is not looking at possible obstruction of justice charges as he might’ve done a little witness tampering. But it’s not like he has experience doing that oh wait that’s right he did it to Michael Cohen. When is this piece of shit gonna be in cuffs? More: CNN

Woohoo

Ahead of tomorrow’s jobs report, the U.S. economy is seeing some good news. Unemployment claims fell below 400,000 for the first time since the pandemic began. Let’s hope for a great big number tomorrow. More: Associated Press

Good policy = good politics

Ya know that stimulus plan that Democrats passed with zero Republican help? Well it has done wonders for the American people. According to this NYT story, the American Rescue Plan has led to a 42 percent decline in food shortages, a 43 percent decline in gauge of financial instability and a 20 percent decline in anxiety/depression (h/t Jeff Stein). This is what good government looks like. More: New York Times

Today’s clips

Observers of Arizona’s Republican-led recount have found security gates left open, confidential manuals left unattended and quality-control measures disregarded, according to the Arizona secretary of state’s office.
More: Washington Post

A Tampa man who carried a Trump flag into the well of the Senate on Jan. 6 pleaded guilty Wednesday to one felony count of storming the Capitol to obstruct Congress’s certification of the 2020 presidential election.
More: Washington Post

[Fulham Broadway 16,393]

Psychology Today;

A new study has found that the typical right-wing authoritarian – that is, someone who is hostile to non-conformity – is a considerably less funny person than the typical person who does not share that disposition.

The study appeared  in the journal Personality and Individual Differences. It looks at the effects of right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) on humour production. The authors define RWA as a combination of factors such as submission to authority, aggression towards deviant and marginal groups, and adherence to traditional social norms.

Studies dating back to the 1950s and 1960s already found that people who score high in authoritarianism enjoy jokes that disparage low-status or marginalized groups. Likewise, they are less likely to enjoy jokes that express hostility to authority figures.

Yet researchers know very little about the links between RWA and humour production, i.e. coming up with funny ideas of one’s own. One 1957 study found that people who score low in authoritarianism wrote funnier cartoon captions, whereas a 1980 study found hardly any correlation.

But the assessment of RWA and humour production have improved in the intervening decades, prompting the researchers to revisit this question.

Measuring humour production: what makes a funny person funny?

For this study, the researchers recruited 186 adults from a university in North Carolina. The participants’ average age was 19, though they ranged in age from 18 to 53. They were 77% female, and ethnically diverse.

The researchers measured the participants’ humour production skills on several creative tasks. Throughout these tasks, the instructions encouraged them to be funny, to express themselves freely, and to feel comfortable being “weird, silly, dirty, ironic, bizarre, or whatever,” as long as their responses were funny.

In the first task, the participants generated funny captions for three cartoons. One depicted an astronaut talking into a mobile phone. Another showed a king lying on a psychologist’s couch. The third showed two businessmen, one with a gun, standing over a body on the floor.

The second task presented the participants with unusual noun combinations, such as “cereal bus” or “yoga bank,” and asked them to come up with funny definitions for them.

The final task asked the participants to complete a quirky scenario with a punchline. One scenario, for example, involved telling people about a horrible meal. The other two scenarios involved describing a boring college class, and giving feedback on a friend’s bad singing.

Eight independent raters scored the responses on a 3-point scale (not funny, somewhat funny, or funny). The raters did not know anything about the participants, including their responses on other items.

The right-wing authoritarian, openness, and conscientiousness

The researchers measured the participants’ degree of right-wing authoritarianism using a 15-item scale on which they indicated how strongly they agree or disagree with various statements. Examples include “Our country desperately needs a mighty leader who will do what has to be done to destroy the radical new ways and sinfulness that are ruining us,” or “Everyone should have their own lifestyle, religious beliefs, and sexual preferences, even if it makes them different from everyone else.”

The researchers also measured the participants’ personality traits (using the HEXACO-100 personality test). They focused on the traits of openness to experience and conscientiousness, as past research has found that these traits relate to both humor production and being a right-wing authoritarian. Some research, for example, has linked openness to creative thinking and humor. Other studies have found that conscientious people perform worse on creativity and humor tasks.

Results: your standard right-wing authoritarian isn’t very funny

Right-wing authoritarianism had a significant negative relationship with humour; people who scored high in RWA generated responses that the raters considered to be much less funny.

RWA also correlated negatively with openness to experience, and positively with conscientiousness. As the researchers expected, openness correlated positively with humor production, and conscientiousness correlated negatively with it.

These findings, the authors write, “strongly suggest that people high in RWA are less funny, defined as the ability to create humorous ideas, even when global personality traits with established ties to RWA, humour, and creativity are controlled for.”

The authors also add that their findings “should be viewed in the context of the sample, which was young, enrolled in a university, and predominantly female.”

They suggest that future studies should look more closely at the components of right-wing authoritarianism that impair humor creation. One possible mechanism is that RWA correlates with cognitive rigidity and seriousness, versus flexibility and playfulness.

In sum, the authors write, “the findings suggest that people high in RWA just aren’t very funny.”

[Vesper 27,318]

1 hour ago, Fulham Broadway said:

Psychology Today;

A new study has found that the typical right-wing authoritarian – that is, someone who is hostile to non-conformity – is a considerably less funny person than the typical person who does not share that disposition.

The study appeared  in the journal Personality and Individual Differences. It looks at the effects of right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) on humour production. The authors define RWA as a combination of factors such as submission to authority, aggression towards deviant and marginal groups, and adherence to traditional social norms.

Studies dating back to the 1950s and 1960s already found that people who score high in authoritarianism enjoy jokes that disparage low-status or marginalized groups. Likewise, they are less likely to enjoy jokes that express hostility to authority figures.

Yet researchers know very little about the links between RWA and humour production, i.e. coming up with funny ideas of one’s own. One 1957 study found that people who score low in authoritarianism wrote funnier cartoon captions, whereas a 1980 study found hardly any correlation.

But the assessment of RWA and humour production have improved in the intervening decades, prompting the researchers to revisit this question.

Measuring humour production: what makes a funny person funny?

For this study, the researchers recruited 186 adults from a university in North Carolina. The participants’ average age was 19, though they ranged in age from 18 to 53. They were 77% female, and ethnically diverse.

The researchers measured the participants’ humour production skills on several creative tasks. Throughout these tasks, the instructions encouraged them to be funny, to express themselves freely, and to feel comfortable being “weird, silly, dirty, ironic, bizarre, or whatever,” as long as their responses were funny.

In the first task, the participants generated funny captions for three cartoons. One depicted an astronaut talking into a mobile phone. Another showed a king lying on a psychologist’s couch. The third showed two businessmen, one with a gun, standing over a body on the floor.

The second task presented the participants with unusual noun combinations, such as “cereal bus” or “yoga bank,” and asked them to come up with funny definitions for them.

The final task asked the participants to complete a quirky scenario with a punchline. One scenario, for example, involved telling people about a horrible meal. The other two scenarios involved describing a boring college class, and giving feedback on a friend’s bad singing.

Eight independent raters scored the responses on a 3-point scale (not funny, somewhat funny, or funny). The raters did not know anything about the participants, including their responses on other items.

The right-wing authoritarian, openness, and conscientiousness

The researchers measured the participants’ degree of right-wing authoritarianism using a 15-item scale on which they indicated how strongly they agree or disagree with various statements. Examples include “Our country desperately needs a mighty leader who will do what has to be done to destroy the radical new ways and sinfulness that are ruining us,” or “Everyone should have their own lifestyle, religious beliefs, and sexual preferences, even if it makes them different from everyone else.”

The researchers also measured the participants’ personality traits (using the HEXACO-100 personality test). They focused on the traits of openness to experience and conscientiousness, as past research has found that these traits relate to both humor production and being a right-wing authoritarian. Some research, for example, has linked openness to creative thinking and humor. Other studies have found that conscientious people perform worse on creativity and humor tasks.

Results: your standard right-wing authoritarian isn’t very funny

Right-wing authoritarianism had a significant negative relationship with humour; people who scored high in RWA generated responses that the raters considered to be much less funny.

RWA also correlated negatively with openness to experience, and positively with conscientiousness. As the researchers expected, openness correlated positively with humor production, and conscientiousness correlated negatively with it.

These findings, the authors write, “strongly suggest that people high in RWA are less funny, defined as the ability to create humorous ideas, even when global personality traits with established ties to RWA, humour, and creativity are controlled for.”

The authors also add that their findings “should be viewed in the context of the sample, which was young, enrolled in a university, and predominantly female.”

They suggest that future studies should look more closely at the components of right-wing authoritarianism that impair humor creation. One possible mechanism is that RWA correlates with cognitive rigidity and seriousness, versus flexibility and playfulness.

In sum, the authors write, “the findings suggest that people high in RWA just aren’t very funny.”

One depicted an astronaut talking into a mobile phone.

Fucking roaming charges!!!

 

Another showed a king lying on a psychologist’s couch.

Can I get my own complex named after me? Like that short twat Napoleon.

 

The third showed two businessmen, one with a gun, standing over a body on the floor.

Well, we were likely in the red for this quarter, but this lead pipe cinches it motherfucker! (corpse bled out on the floor)

 

[Fulham Broadway 16,393]

Frances Stanley was handed a PPE contract worth £14.4 million of public money by the Tories after her husband donated £5,000 to Matt Hancock’s office. She has no previous professional experience of providing such equipment and subsequently failed to fulfil the contract.

Her application was handled on the so-called “fast lane” provided to Tory donors in order to help them jump the queue for these lucrative contracts, and we know that she is the wife of a Tory donor who received millions of pounds to provide a service she was unqualified to do, and whose failure is likely to have cost many lives.

It is time we knew exactly how many of these duff contracts have been handed out.

We need a list of all contracts that have been handed to people connected to Tory donors, stating clearly whether these contracts were handed out via the “fast lane” system, how much money was handed over, and whether the contract was fulfilled.

Then we’ll be able to start working out the depth of corruption to which our government sank while our relatives and friends were dying.

 

[Vesper 27,318]

Well, this is insane

Belgium's leading virologist has been living in a safehouse with his wife and 12-year-old son because he is being targeted by far-right asshole with sniper training, who is currently on the run "with a rocket launcher & a machine gun"

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57358492

The search for fugitive Conings began when he went on the run in mid-May

For nearly three weeks Belgium's leading virologist has been living in a safehouse with his wife and 12-year-old son, guarded by security agents.

While scientists across the world have come under attack throughout the pandemic, the threat to Prof Marc Van Ranst is more serious than most.

He has been targeted by a far-right soldier, Jürgen Conings, who has a vendetta for virologists and Covid lockdowns. The military shooting instructor is on the run with a rocket launcher and a machine gun, and Belgian police cannot find him.

"The threat was very real," Prof Van Ranst tells me from his safehouse, as he relives the night he and his family were moved into hiding on 18 May.

IMAGE COPYRIGHTMARCO VAN RANST

image captionProf Van Ranst says his son Milo has reacted bravely to the family's ordeal

"The ex-soldier, heavily armed, was on my street for three hours, right in front of my house, waiting for me to arrive home from work."

That night police say Jürgen Conings left his barracks with a selection of heavy weapons, and headed straight for the virologist's home.

 

Marc Van Ranst usually returns from work around the time the man was waiting for him. But on this occasion he came back early and was inside with his family.

"Unfortunately, he's a trained sniper with heavy armour, military-grade material and weapons. So, these are the kind of people that you would prefer not to have hunting you," he told me wryly.

'Not scared, just careful'

We had been planning to speak over Zoom, but hours beforehand I was warned we could not show his face in his current surroundings. He cannot go outside or even get close to the windows: this is how serious the security services are in keeping his location secret.

IMAGE COPYRIGHTGETTY IMAGES

image captionFor more than a year Marc Van Ranst has been the public face of Belgium's scientific response to Covid

Despite the threat to his life, and the oppressively strict circumstances he's now living in, the virologist who became Belgium's most public figure in tackling the Covid pandemic is remarkably calm. He even manages a joke about working from home, even though he admits this is taking it to extremes.

"We're not scared, we're just being careful. And my 12-year-old my son Milo, he's pretty brave about it.

"It is pretty surreal, but knowing is better than not knowing, because at least I can take these precautions. The thing that makes me mad is that my son has been inside for almost three weeks. That, I really hate."

 

Who is the man on the run?

Belgian authorities have described Jürgen Conings as a very dangerous man who wants to use violence.

He was already on a terrorist watch list in Belgium because of his extreme right-wing political beliefs. When he disappeared from his barracks, a note left no doubt that virologists were his target.

IMAGE COPYRIGHTBELGIAN POLICE

image captionBelgian police put out a warning notice to the public not to approach the suspect

"The so-called political elite and now also the virologists decide how you and I should live," it read. "They sow hatred and frustration. I cannot live with the lies."

In a time when it is easy to blame the bearers of bad news, Prof Van Ranst sees some inevitability to his surreal situation.

"If you're on television a couple of times every day for months on end, people get sick and tired of you. That's unavoidable," he says. "There are a group of people that hate science and hate scientists. Very often they are scared and uncertain."

In the days that followed Jürgen Conings' disappearance, a support group was created for the ex-soldier on Facebook. Before being closed down, it had attracted nearly 50,000 members. It's this group that worries Prof Van Ranst more than his assailant.

 

IMAGE COPYRIGHTGETTY IMAGES

image captionThousands of Belgians have expressed support for armed fugitive Jürgen Conings

He even challenged one group of Conings supporters late at night on the Telegram messaging app, later accepting it was not necessarily the smartest thing to do. But it does reveal just how angry he is.

"These are real people, who really think this man is a hero and that I deserve to die. They are people, living in your neighbourhood, who wage bets on exactly when and with how many bullets he will murder me," he told me.

Getty Images

Just because I'm sitting in a safehouse doesn't mean I'm going to allow myself to be silenced

Marc Van Ranst
Virologist, 27 May on Belgian radio

Belgian police are now embroiled in a full-scale manhunt.

Hundreds of officers, helicopters and military trucks have combed acres of land, but they appear no closer to finding him. At one point a big national park near the Dutch border was sealed off as part of the search.

'Nothing to say'

Authorities have admitted they do not know where he is, and that there has been no living sign of him since the day he disappeared. They accept he could even be in another country now. In one note he said he was prepared for a deadly battle with police, and he may no longer be alive.

They admit that mistakes have been made in the investigation so far, and that questions need to be answered about how a military man on a terrorist watch list was given access to a weapons store.

IMAGE COPYRIGHTGETTY IMAGES

image captionFor three weeks security forces have searched for the missing shooting instructor

This provides little comfort to Prof Marc Van Ranst, who remains hostage in his safehouse.

"I think you can hide pretty much forever if you really want to. There are many ways to disappear, especially if you leave the country."

When I ask if he has a message for the man who is hunting him, his answer is blunt.

"I have nothing to say to him. Why would I want to have a conversation with a person that hates me and wants to kill me?"

[Vesper 27,318]

Discourse and Communication for Sustainable Education, vol. 12, no. 1, pp. 121ñ139, 2021

From the “Greta Thunberg Effect” to Green Conversion of Universities: The Reconstructive Praxis of Discursive Mobilizations

https://www.sciendo.com/article/10.2478/dcse-2021-0009?fbclid=IwAR1Muko4jQBiAmKuRvjL3v2dicUwnS5xURk8A8V5VoqCLQGDlJFXOtrEGJI

snip

[Vesper 27,318]

Taxing global rent-seeking to spur a just recovery

The world must engage with Joe Biden’s proposal for a minimum corporate-tax rate.

https://socialeurope.eu/taxing-global-rent-seeking-to-spur-a-just-recovery

History has taught us not to have too many expectations when a new tenant is installed in the White House. We should however applaud the good initiatives of the United States administration, such as the decision last month to back patent waivers for Covid-19 vaccines so they can be produced in other countries. But that is not all. Joe Biden may also be on the verge of profoundly changing development funding, by tackling an issue he was not expected to address—taxation.

To part-finance its $1.9 trillion recovery plan, Washington wants to look for the funds where they are—in the bank accounts of the wealthiest and the multinationals. To this end, the new administration seeks, among other measures, a minimum corporate-tax rate of 21 per cent on the profits of companies abroad. This means that, for example, subsidiaries of US multinationals established in Ireland, where the rate is 12.5 per cent, will immediately pay an additional 8.5 per cent to the tax authorities in their home country.

This is, of course, a unilateral decision, but it is also a great opportunity for the rest of the world. A global minimum tax is one of the main recommendations of the Report on Financial Integrity for Sustainable Development, presented last February by a United Nations high-level panel (FACTI) of which I am a member.

If endorsed by Congress, and followed by a significant number of countries, the Biden administration’s proposals would be the biggest shake-up in corporate taxation in decades. Multinationals would no longer have an incentive to disguise their practices by artificially concentrating their profits in low- or no-tax jurisdictions. It would effectively mean the end of the ‘tax haven’ business model.

Reduced ambition

Under pressure from some countries in the European Union, and facing resistance from others such as the United Kingdom, the US  reduced the ambition for a global minimum corporate tax to a low level of ‘at least 15 per cent’. The aim was to convince the majority of the 139 countries discussing international corporate taxation within the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s ‘inclusive framework—a perverse name considering the gap between the negotiating capacities of the major powers and those of the other countries involved. Washington insists however that the US will itself be more ambitious, taxing its multinationals’ subsidiaries at 21 per cent while calling on other major capitals to follow suit.

With the G7 (the group of seven most industrialised countries) due to make an announcement on the issue this weekend in London, one would hope that France, Germany, the UK and Italy in particular will follow the US lead. We cannot give in to the blackmail of the multinationals, which claim that a 21 per cent rate would be excessive—and would apparently harm developing countries, depriving them of a valuable tool to attract investment.

This is a specious argument, although bizarrely (given its developmental role) taken up by the president of the World Bank, David Malpass. When a multinational company considers where to locate a production unit, tax advantage does not take pride of place at all on the list of criteria to be considered. In fact, it appears well behind others, such as the quality of infrastructure, the education of workers or legal security.

The minimum rate

The Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation (ICRICT), which I chair alongside such economists as Joseph Stiglitz, Thomas Piketty, Gabriel Zucman and Jayati Ghosh, believes the minimum tax rate should be 25 per cent worldwide. In the OECD negotiations, the final rate will probably be between 15 and 21 per cent.

But presenting the lower end of the range as a victory would be a big mistake. It would mean less money for health programmes, education, investment and economic recovery, after the ‘whatever it takes’ approach many governments have adopted amid the pandemic.

The European Tax Observatory, run by Zucman, just considered several scenarios, depending on a range of rates. An international agreement on a minimum rate of 25 per cent—as supported by the ICRICT—would allow the EU to raise its tax revenues by €170 billion in 2021, an increase of 50 per cent on today and equivalent to 12 per cent of EU health spending. With a 21 per cent minimum rate (Biden’s proposal), the EU would collect about €100 billion more. Moving to 15 per cent would halve that gain to €50 billion.

Equitably shared

Of course, it is imperative that the additional revenue generated by a global minimum tax be shared equitably between the home countries of multinational companies, such as the US, and the developing countries where their activities—workforces and raw materials—are sourced. We want multinationals to pay their fair share but that needs to happen everywhere—not just in the US and other rich countries. The Intergovernmental Group of 24 (G24), a body representing emerging economies such as Colombia, is requesting that, in some circumstances, these economies should have priority in taxing profits shifted to tax havens. 

Suppose a US multinational has activities in Colombia but declares its profits in Panama, where taxes are extremely low. With the system the Biden administration wants to introduce, the tax authorities should be able to recover the difference between the rate in Panama and 21 per cent. In this case, the G24 wants Colombia to take priority in taxing these profits declared in Panama, and for the US not to apply this minimum tax. That way, Colombia, the emerging economy where the multinational’s activities actually take place, would get its fair share of taxes paid, before any other countries.

To achieve this, it is obviously desirable to reach a global agreement. To obtain an equitable distribution of resources, however, it would be enough for a coalition of countries to show their willingness. Mobilising the G20 countries—the world’s top 20 powers—would change the whole picture, as they account for more than 90 per cent of global corporate-tax revenues. Here again, we hope for more ambition from the Europeans.

This would be a strong political gesture, but it can no longer be postponed. The pandemic has caused the worst combined sanitary, economic and social crisis in a century. We cannot miss the opportunity to respond to this challenge, by rebuilding societies that are not only more prosperous but also just and equitable.

[Vesper 27,318]

The City of London would be the ninth largest emitter of CO2 if it were a country

The emissions funded by the City’s banks and asset managers made the sector a bigger polluter than countries including Germany and Canada. 

https://www.newstatesman.com/business/2021/05/city-london-would-be-ninth-largest-emitter-co2-if-it-were-country

 

[chippy 342]

More concerned about the here and now than what might happen with the climate decades down the road.

Johnson, Patel and Khan are failing abysmally at protecting out boarders and at making our streets safe to walk in.

We're letting the French spit in our face and piss all over us with this migration scandal. Turned out "Boarder Force" into a  fucking Ferry service.

This last week on the streets of Greewich we've had nutters running wild having fights with massive knives in broad daylight. A mass Machete fight in fucking Hyde Park.

Police attacked by a mob in South London while responding to an emergency after a man was shot and stabbed. 

Teen stabbed to death in fight in North London with 7 men arrested.

13 year old boy stabbed to death by a gang in Birmingham.

Flower seller murdered.

 

People thought they were going to have a strong, right of centre Government, which at last was first and foremost  going to look after the interests of the British people. Instead, they've ended up with a bunch pussies who are wetter than a Liberal Democrats Party conference.

 

They have the majority to smash through any opposition and need to use that power and start dealing out the extreme justice that the violent, criminal scum deserve. 

Start dishing out 30 year sentences for anyone caught carrying a knife or gun and see what happens. I would bet my house that within a few years knife and gun crime would be a tiny fraction of what it is today.

 

 

 

 

 

[Vesper 27,318]

2 hours ago, chippy said:

More concerned about the here and now than what might happen with the climate decades down the road.

Johnson, Patel and Khan are failing abysmally at protecting out boarders and at making our streets safe to walk in.

We're letting the French spit in our face and piss all over us with this migration scandal. Turned out "Boarder Force" into a  fucking Ferry service.

This last week on the streets of Greewich we've had nutters running wild having fights with massive knives in broad daylight. A mass Machete fight in fucking Hyde Park.

Police attacked by a mob in South London while responding to an emergency after a man was shot and stabbed. 

Teen stabbed to death in fight in North London with 7 men arrested.

13 year old boy stabbed to death by a gang in Birmingham.

Flower seller murdered.

 

People thought they were going to have a strong, right of centre Government, which at last was first and foremost  going to look after the interests of the British people. Instead, they've ended up with a bunch pussies who are wetter than a Liberal Democrats Party conference.

 

They have the majority to smash through any opposition and need to use that power and start dealing out the extreme justice that the violent, criminal scum deserve. 

Start dishing out 30 year sentences for anyone caught carrying a knife or gun and see what happens. I would bet my house that within a few years knife and gun crime would be a tiny fraction of what it is today.

 

 

 

 

 

if you think global climate change's massive impacts are 'decades down the road' you truly are delusional

That said, I am not that far apart from you on immigration (I suggest you go back and look at some of my older posts on here about Sweden and the immigration nightmare we have), btw, but on most other matters we are wildly divergent, and you are obsessed with this false framing of far too many things as some sort of all-encompassing 'left-wing' cabal, replete with multiple false conspiracy theories and pantomime villains.

Many of the people you put up a paragons of virtue and/or clear, sober political philosophy and thought are simply fascist, racist, reactionary crackpots and/or apologists, or sold-out tokens shilling out for ol' massa (whom they swear is really colour blind at heart, lolol).

The UK, the US, and the EU all are having their centuries of empire coming home to roost. Then you have idiot Sweden, who felt left out of the conflagration and decided to import its own demographical nightmare the past 25 years.