Julian Popov@julianpopov is an ex Bulgarian Environment Minister. His tweet below I thought worthy of a wider audience! The year is 2192. The British Prime Minister visits Brussels to ask for an extension of the Brexit deadline. No one remembers where this tradition originated, but every year it attracts many tourists from all over the… Read more
Category:
Society
Government without principle
Amid all the surreal fantasy that Brexit has given us, the fact that the government can maintain that the people just want to ‘get it done’ at the same moment that there about a million people outside the Parliamentary gates asking for a second referendum ranks as some of the most brazen lying of the… Read more
Undermining Voting Rights
The appalling Conservative idea of having to possess ‘identity’ in order to vote is straight out of the US Republican scheme of how to reduce votes, effectively from people who do not like you… There is in fact, virtually no election fraud in mainland UK with just one prosecution in the last period. It is… Read more
Fascism and how to avoid it
This Channel Four interview with Professor Timothy Sneider of Yale University is so good I provide no comment, but suggest simply that is well worth its ten minute viewing time…. Read more
Double dealing and dealing double…
I don’t usually link to a Craig Murray article, because, although I consider him always interesting, I’m less sure of his occasional speculations. Here though, I suggest, as an ex insider – indeed Ambassador, in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, he gives genuine insight into current events. A certain Mrs Sacoolas, implicated – or at… Read more
Economics as ‘moral science’
There was an fascinating recent edition of Renegade Inc on the Book by Dr Jonathan Aldred of Cambridge University entitled ‘Licence to be Bad’ – how economics corrupted us. He starts by suggesting that people used to admire ‘doing your bit’, which is basically an indication of a contribution to a collective, co-operative task. Nowadays… Read more
Misusing the Monarch …
This was recent letter to the Times which makes a very good point: The Cummings Johnson constitutional wrecking ball would appear to be being used again – and Her Maj is collateral damage – again. It is deliciously ironic that her least favourite PM will have been a Tory. But it is rather worrying that,… Read more
Rock paper scissors
I never really liked the game rock-paper-scissors, because it seemed, well, ‘kind of random’. But there is another story that is rather interesting. This simple game provides us with an abstract framework to walk through complex questions such as whether the supreme court ruling on the prorogation of the UK parliament was appropriate or not…. Read more
Organising money and society
There are three (not strictly related) TED talks that are worth highlighting; one by the well-travelled journalist, Johann Hari, another by the social psychologist, Paul Piff and the third by the billionaire, Nick Hanauer. All, I think, are well worth watching and only about 15 minutes each. All I’d suggest, show that we have a… Read more
Trying to counter fascist talk
This from Jonathan Lis in ‘Prospect Magazine’ is pretty chilling: And yet Johnson could do none of this [inflammatory language] on his own. He depends entirely on his enablers. The Tory party unmasked itself this week, finally and for all time. Hundreds of its MPs gathered in the Commons. They heard their leader traduce parliament,… Read more