archived
"Some lies are so fantastical...
An ancient 'Great Leap Forward'
not that one, the other one.
Zimbabwe Land Takeover, a Golden Lining

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

ever
Poland: Post-WWII assaults on minorities
1919-1953, occupation, communists, expulsions, and Potsdam waivers
Why do Polish officials want more?

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

Italy's League grows in popularity as 5Star support falls

Corriere della Sera, a daily, published an Ipsos poll showing that the League, which is headed by firebrand Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, is edging away from its coalition partner. In the poll, 34.7 percent of Italians said they would vote for the League -- a huge rise from the 17.4 percent who actually voted for the party in March's general election.

However, 28.7 percent said they would vote for the 5Stars, down from the 32.7 percent that voted for the party in March.

The news comes at a time of significant tension between Rome and Brussels over the Italian national budget, as well as growing divisions within the government.

5Star leader Luigi Di Maio, who is also a deputy prime minister, addressed those tensions in an interview with Corriere della Sera on Saturday. "We signed a government contract that needs to be respected by both sides," he said, referring to policies promised by his party that are now encountering resistance from the League.

Any bet that the Lega will respect the contract?

Kevin Kühnert sieht Angela Merkels Rückzug vom Vorsitz der CDU als Chance für die SPD. "Viele Menschen haben in den letzten Jahren das Gefühl gehabt, dass Union und SPD mehr zwei Flügel einer Partei sind, und darüber gibt's eine Moderatorin Angela Merkel, die sorgt dafür, dass das funktioniert", sagte der Juso-Vorsitzende dem ARD-"Morgenmagazin". Das höre jetzt auf, wenn diese Moderatorin langsam aus dem Spiel rausgehe.

Als Merkel-Nachfolger favorisiert Kühnert einen konservativen Kandidaten. So werde der Kontrast zwischen beiden Parteien deutlicher. Es sei ihm lieber, wenn die Union ein deutliches Zeichen gebe, dass es für sie nun "ins Konservative breiter zurückgeht, weil ich glaube, das ist das, was dort viele an der Basis tatsächlich auch wollen."

What is the Atlantic Council doing running ads on Ukraine in a South Korean newspaper? It opens to this: https://t.co/cwlfzWPty5 @MarkAmesExiled @yashalevine pic.twitter.com/kcRCQNAcrD

— Tim Shorrock (@TimothyS) November 5, 2018

An Ifop poll published on Sunday showed Macron's centrist movement with 19 percent of voting intentions compared to 20 percent in the last poll at the end of August, while far-right leader Marine Le Pen's RN -- formerly the National Front -- rose to 21 percent from 17 percent previously.

Together with the seven percent score of sovereignist Nicolas Dupont-Aignan and one percent each for "Frexit" parties led by former Le Pen associate Florian Philippot and Francois Asselineau, far-right and anti-European Union parties won a combined 30 percent of voting intentions, up from 25 percent at the end of August.

The poll, conducted on Oct. 30-31, asked nearly 1,000 French people who they would vote for if the European Parliament elections were to be held the next Sunday.

Note that in the 2014 EP elections, the FN also received the most votes in France, with 24.86%, ahead of the UMP (now rechristened LR) - 20.8%, and the PS - 13.98%. The FN (now RN) claimed to be "France's biggest political party".

This question also goes in the delicate territory of the extent to which the Weimar hyperinflation, far from being the condign punishment for wild spending, was deliberate German policy to stiff the French. (Below from @MkBlyth's Austerity book) pic.twitter.com/s3bcWgSvDD

— Gabriel U. (@_gabriel_U) 1. November 2018

"We have tremendous allies," she said. "I mean, we immediately took the name 'women' out of the walkout because we had so much support from men. And we wanted this to feel really inclusive, and for this to be about a bigger thing than one executive payout.

[Temple University labor law professor Brishen] Rogers said the Google walkout resembled the teacher strikes earlier this year.

archived
empowered billionairs, weakened labor and (upper-)middle class resentment...
"survivor" island UPDATE 2


Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

area known as Crystal City. It's a large residential and office complex in Arlington, Virginia, just south of Washington

related
Fascism is Real, But the "Resistance" is Mostly Fake
archived liturgy
Is this how y'all stimulate economies?

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

After Clinton noted how she adores Booker, Swisher asked the former secretary of state what she thought about this "kick them" remark.

"Eric Holder, oh, Eric Holder, sorry," Swisher said.

"Yeah, I know they all look alike," Clinton quipped to a wave of laughter and applause in the room.

If Trump is not a fascist, this is only in the precise sense that he is not even a fascist. He strikes a fascist pose, and then issues generic palliative remarks and denies responsibility for his words and actions. But since total irresponsibility is a central part of the fascist tradition, it is perhaps best to give Trump his due credit as an innovator.
(The Guardian)

archived
Federal Judge Will Order Georgia Officials to Accept Absentee Ballots
Nse Ufot must be new here, background reportinig

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

The people have been busy. I found 10 referendum questions on the ballot, of which 2 alteration to the state's constitution (adding budget mandates for public school infrastructure).

What I did not find was Mr Trump's name. Instead Larry "mag-lev" Hogan sacrificed himself to my big, fat ballpoint pen of abstract death.

BOOOO-YAH!

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

archive cost/benefit comments
eurotrib

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

Business Insider reports that on October 9, scientific engineer Sergey Savitsky attacked Oleg Beloguzov with a kitchen knife and is now facing what are likely the first attempted murder charges in Antarctic history. The pair had worked together for four years at the Bellingshausen station on King George Island before Savitsky rushed Beloguzov in the station's canteen.

The two had taken to reading books from the station library in their time on the remote island, a part of the South Shetland island group. Russian investigators reported that Beloguzov "kept telling his colleague the endings of books before he read them" and that this appears to have triggered the altercation.

Brian Mier PODCAST: If there is an African world and it has eyes, they are fixed upon Brazil this week where a genuine fascist has come to power in the person of Jair Bolsonaro, who has vowed to hand over Brazilian pensions to the private sector and bring Breazil's bloody handed military torturers and Chicago boys back into power.

archived
The main cause of the election result ...

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

Mark Harris, a former pastor who stepped down from his congregation in 2017, is the GOP nominee in North Carolina's 9th District, which runs along the state's southern border below Charlotte and Fayetteville. Harris defeated three-term GOP Rep. Robert Pittenger in a May primary and is now facing Democrat Dan McCready. CNN rates the race toss-up, the most competitive designation.

Harris, as the senior pastor of Charlotte's First Baptist Church, claimed Islam was "dangerous" and the work of Satan. He also said peace between Israel and the Palestinians could not be achieved until Muslims and Jews accepted Jesus Christ as their savior.

A prominent Orthodox rabbi said the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre was caused by the circumcision ceremony of a gay couple's son that he believed took place on that day.

"This is a brit milah [ceremony] in a Conservative shul and the two men adopted the boy and did the brit milah, and you wonder why there was a massacre?" asked Rabbi Mordechai Aderet during a taped sermon last Sunday, which has been viewed more than 11,000 times on Facebook.

Voters in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia have rejected a bid for independence.

Final results showed that 56.4% chose to remain part of France while 43.6% voted to leave - a tighter result than some polls had predicted.

Turnout was about 81%. The vote was promised by a 1988 deal that put an end to a violent campaign for independence.

Tensions have long run deep between pro-independence indigenous Kanaks and descendants of colonial settlers who remain loyal to Paris.

Over the past decade, relations between the two groups have improved markedly, but the no vote outcome was well below some early polls, which could encourage nationalists to try for a new referendum in coming years.

During a visit to the archipelago in May, Macron acknowledged the "pains of colonisation" and saluted the "dignified" campaign for autonomy led by the Kanaks. He and his administration sought to strike a neutral tone on the vote.

New Caledonia's economy is underpinned by French annual subsidies of some €1.3 billion ($US1.48 billion), nickel deposits that are estimated to represent 25% of the world's total, and tourism.

It enjoys a large degree of autonomy but depends heavily on France for matters such as defence and education. Its position gives France a foothold in the Indo-Pacific region where China is expanding its presence.

Brazilian judge Sergio Moro presides over the 'Car Wash' investigation, one of the largest corruption scandals in history. Now he is joining the government of President-elect Jair Bolsonaro as justice minister. @peterprengaman reports: https://t.co/eMNAGXYJsT

— The Associated Press (@AP) November 1, 2018

archived
Many Cameroonians skeptical as elections approach
post-colonial mischief

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

Located some 18,000 kilometres (11,000 miles) from the French mainland, New Caledonia is home to a quarter of the world's known supplies of nickel -- a vital electronics component -- and is a strategic foothold for France in the Pacific. Some 175,000 people were eligible to vote, with officials reporting turnout at over 80%.

Britannica
For the first four decades of the 20th century, the Melanesian population was fairly stable, but by the mid-1980s it had doubled. Migration into and out of the country has been an important factor in the size of the non-Melanesian communities.
[...]
New Caledonia's economy depends heavily on services, the mining of nickel, and subsidies from France. Agriculture, forestry, and fishing ... have had little impact on the economy because of the small local market.
[...]
Although the gross domestic product (GDP) per capita is one of the highest in the South Pacific, the distribution of wealth between ethnic groups is unequal: Melanesian households earn on average only about one-fourth the income of European households. The distribution of land resources on the main island is also uneven. Although thousands of Melanesian families depend on agriculture, two-thirds of the land is in the hands of European families, only a few of whom are engaged in agriculture or cattle raising.

There were fears the referendum could inflame tensions between Kanaks, who tend to favour independence, and the white population, which boiled over into deadly violence in the 1980s. The quasi-civil war claimed more than 70 lives. It led to the 1998 Noumea Accord which paved the way for the steady devolution of powers as well as Sunday's referendum. Under the 1998 deal, two further referendums on independence can still be held before 2022.

The new estimate of the massacre of wildlife is made in a major report produced by WWF and involving 59 scientists from across the globe. It finds that the vast and growing consumption of food and resources by the global population is destroying the web of life, billions of years in the making, upon which human society ultimately depends for clean air, water and everything else.

Humanity is devouring our planet's resources in increasingly destructive volumes, according to a new study that reveals we have consumed a year's worth of carbon, food, water, fibre, land and timber in a record 212 days.

As a result, the Earth Overshoot Day - which marks the point at which consumption exceeds the capacity of nature to regenerate - has moved forward two days to 1 August, the earliest date ever recorded.

"This is to announce that I am proud to have become a Muslim," she wrote on Twitter on October 19. "This is the natural conclusion of any intelligent theologian's journey. All scripture study leads to Islam. Which makes all other scriptures redundant."

A man who was shot in the torso by his pet dog has said the animal "didn't mean to do it" and is "very loving".

Sonny Gilligan, from New Mexico, was about to make his way to a jackrabbit hunt with his three dogs, Charlie, Scooter and Cowboy when the accident occurred.

Speaking to ABC News, Mr Gilligan said he loaded his pickup truck with his shotgun and dogs in the back and was sitting in the driver's seat when he was shot.

Investigators believe that Charlie, a 120-pound Rottweiler mix, slipped and got his paw caught in the trigger of the gun and fired a shot at his unsuspecting owner.

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.