the target to hold a vote would be a plenary session due March 11-14.
[...]
"We have to vote during the first March plenary," [Danuta] Hubner told her [constitutional affairs] committee. "The second one (due March 25-28) will be too late because after us the Council (of all EU member states) must look into this again."

The EU parliament also wants to vote only after Britain's parliament, to avoid endorsing a deal that may then get struck down in London.

Genauso kam es. Die Parlamentarier fügten sich, und die Lücke blieb. Privatflieger genießen seither speziellen Datenschutz. Das zeigt nach Meinung der EU-Abgeordneten Ana Gomes, ,,dass die Regierungen es nicht ernst meinen, wenn sie behaupten, sie machen ein Gesetz zur Bekämpfung des Terrorismus und dann bauen sie ein solches Schlupfloch ein".

Turns out you can't be a terrorist if you come with a private jet.

Frustrated with the slow transition towards open access (OA) in scientific publishing, 11 national funding organizations in Europe turned up the pressure today. As of 2020, the group, which jointly spends around €7.6 billion on research annually, will require every paper it funds to be freely available from the moment of publication. In a statement, the group said it will no longer allow the 6- or 12-month delays that many subscription journals currently require before a paper is made open-access, and it won't allow publication in so-called hybrid journals, which charge subscriptions but also, for extra fees, make individual papers open-access.

She said the "alliance" had 101,000 adherents who had signed up to the project -- billed by some media as resembling grassroots movements in Britain, France and the USA that are intent on regulating "neo-liberal" capitalism.
[...]
Nearly two-thirds of Germans (62 percent) do not believe Aufstehen will succeed in winning over disenchanted voters, according to a survey conducted by the pollster Civey for the key German online news provider t-online. Only 19.8 percent of 5,000 respondents surveyed believed the movement had a chance long-term.

archived?
Far-right AfD split over Gauland's Nazi 'bird shit' remark, June 2018

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

If "the IHRA definition does not restrict freedom of speech" as the Jewish Leadership Council asserts, then why is the JLC so irate about a "free speech caveat" that, logically on the JLC's terms, cannot affect IHRA? pic.twitter.com/v1JFhbhcWs

— Alex Nunns (@alexnunns) 4. September 2018

The US is getting incredibly petty with North and South Korea, now refusing to allow North Korean athletes who were part of a united Korean team to visit the United States. https://t.co/2g3gJgAFoz

— Tim Shorrock (@TimothyS) 5. September 2018

As anyone could have predicted Trump promptly forgot that Korea exists after he had his shiny summit.

British authorities identified the suspects as Russian nationals travelling on genuine passports under the aliases Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov.
[...]
Police released security camera images of the two suspects and outlined a three-day mission that took them from Moscow to London to Salisbury, where they sprayed poison on Skripal's door before flying back to Moscow hours later.
[...]
May's spokesman said May had briefed U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday evening. US Ambassador to Britain Woody Johnson said on Twitter the United States stood with Britain in holding Russia accountable for its "act of aggression". Britain will update the U.N. Security Council at a meeting on Thursday.
[...]
Security cameras filmed the suspects near Skripal's house, and traces of Novichok were found in their London hotel room.
[...]
A woman near Salisbury, Dawn Sturgess, died in July and her partner Charlie Rowley fell ill after Rowley found a counterfeit bottle of Nina Ricci perfume in a charity collection box and brought it home. It contained Novichok. Basu said police had no doubt the events were linked, and were discussing charges over the Sturgess and Rowley case with prosecutors.

A secret Treasury document has raised questions about "rail access to the EU" after a no-deal Brexit.

The document - snapped as it was carried into a Whitehall meeting - also reveals that Philip Hammond's department has codenamed its contingency planning "Operation Yellowhammer".

At 1.80 euros ($2.09) for a simple espresso, Starbucks (SBUX.O) will charge nearly double what Italians pay at their local bars.

... As we walk around, Mr. Abdirahman, who is single and childless, confesses: "When I came here in 1998, to me this place was paradise. Today, I wouldn't want my children to grow up here." ...

... the government, dominated by the traditionally strong Social Democrats and the centrist Moderate Party, did far too little. That left an opening for the Sweden Democrats, until recently a group relegated to the racist fringe of Swedish politics. ...

... Even if the Sweden Democrats win big on Sunday, the election might be a force for good. The Moderate Party, which is likely to take second place, might split over the question of whether to rule with them. And the Social Democrats, already under pressure to move to the left, might likewise fall apart. Sweden's party landscape, in other words, might be blown to pieces.

If the country is lucky, some parts from this explosion will bind together as a new force -- one that takes seriously the need for realism on immigration and integration, without falling for the siren song of right-wing populism.

`The decision means that we are now being seen as equals,' campaigner Jiska Stad-Ogier told reporters. `That this plan was ever dreamed up is too bizarre for words - shutting out a vulnerable group out and paying them less money while they have such high care costs.'

a 2015 decision by the French regulator requiring Google to remove results for all its search engines on request, and not just on European country sites.

CAPTION:"About one million people took to the streets of Barcelona to demand Catalan independence from Madrid on Tuesday [12 SEP], marking the region's "Diada" anniversary when Barcelona fell to Spain in 1714."

Tens of thousands of British holidaymakers could be stopped from travelling to the continent if the UK leaves the EU without a deal, government papers suggest.

Anyone whose passport has less than six months to run faces being turned away at borders when existing rules become obsolete overnight at the end of next March.

Under current arrangements, Britons can travel to Europe as long as their passport is valid to the end of their stay. But in the event of a `no-deal' Brexit they would in all likelihood be treated like travellers from non-EU countries.

Offliners fuck the Internet. pic.twitter.com/b9vFLNYS50

— Michel★Reimon (@michelreimon) 12. September 2018

France, Ipsos poll:

Approval ratings (president+party leaders):

Mélenchon (FI-LEFT): 30% (+3)
Bayrou (MoDem-ALDE): 26% (+1)
Macron (LREM-ALDE): 25% (-7)
Le Pen (RN-ENF): 24% (-1)
Hamon (G.s-S&D): 24% (+1)
Wauqiez (LR-EPP): 18% (+2)

+/- vs. July '18 pic.twitter.com/uUMUDSEzt1

— Europe Elects (@EuropeElects) 12. September 2018

"Björn Höcke dreht Hitler-Foto auf seinem Nachttisch um." Diese Schlagzeile stammt - man ahnt es fast - aus dem Online-Satiremagazin Der Postillon . Anfang März 2017 machten sich die Internet-Spötter in Wort und Bild über den AfD-Rechtsaußen lustig. "Du machst mir nichts als Ärger", lässt der Postillon Höcke zum Foto auf seinem Nachttisch sagen. Der reale Höcke hatte kurz zuvor dem Wall Street Journal ein Interview gegeben, in dem er über den Massenmörder Folgendes sagte: "Wissen Sie, das große Problem ist, dass man Hitler als das absolut Böse darstellt ... Wir wissen aber natürlich, dass es in der Geschichte kein Schwarz und kein Weiß gibt. Und dass es viele Grautöne gibt." Grautöne? Bei Hitler? Der Postillon spießte das genüsslich-satirisch auf.

Ein 27-jähriger Musiker aus München fand die Persiflage so gelungen, dass er ihr ein "Like" auf Facebook gab. Das wiederum gefiel dem Staatsschutz der Münchner Polizei überhaupt nicht: Bierernst monierte der ermittelnde Kriminaloberkommissar, das gehe ja nun überhaupt nicht, das mit dem Hitlerbild. Die Sache bekam ein Aktenzeichen. Und weil es sich bei dem "Like"-Klick für den Postillon-Hitler um einen möglichen Verstoß gegen den Paragrafen 86a des Strafgesetzbuches ("Verwenden von Kennzeichen verfassungswidriger Organisationen") handelt, leitete der Beamte den Vorgang an die Kollegen vom Kommissariat 44 weiter.

Er sagte: ,,Sie alle wissen, dass Dialekt intelligenter macht, das sieht man an der bayerischen Staatsregierung jeden Tag."

Next ...

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

archived
Ian Welsh and Norbert Haring, semiologists 2018
Parliament blocks SWIFT. 2010

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

Bounded rationality is a paradigmatic example. Early criticisms of rationality from people like Herbert Simon were broad ranging criticisms of the idea that people could even begin to behave in the way depicted by the standard utility-maximising model given that they had neither the information, the capacity to process that information, nor the ability to act upon it that would be required. Thus they would use rules of thumb, `satisfice' instead of `optimise', and and so forth.

`Imperfect information' in mainstream economics is another example: in a sense individuals have more information than under perfect information, since they know all the probabilities and possible states of the world instead of just one of the latter. And as I have previously argued, this point applies even to the name of macroeconomic models -- which claim to be Dynamic, Stochastic, General and Equilibrium, but are not really the first 3 in any meaningful sense. Critics would like to see their issue at the core of theories instead of bolted on at the end.

Costs to Yield Curve Manipulation
The Mitchell post explains why the government can set the entire yield curve. I will instead focus on the potential risks to such a posture.

    Losing the ability to influence the economy via setting interest rates.
    The political cost of changing bond prices.
    The loss of market information.
    Political cost of interest expense.

I will cover these in turn.

archived
EU Moves to Reform WTO as Trade War Escalates

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee got off to a chaotic start on Tuesday, as Democrats protested the committee's handling of records from the judge's time in the [beloved] George W. Bush White House.

Assuming the backbench is composing a complaint for any presiding judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia that must survive appellate judgment error (unless it concerns former-governor Bob McDONNELL)in order to "qualify" for Teh Writ ... on or before Mr Trump's impeachment ... right after mid-term elections, when minority partisans become majority partisans controlling the odious.

Let us not consult American Scripture for guidance from the founding fathers in this politicized time of independence, sovereignty, and republic denied.

In different words, by different authors, for different audiences, Congress again and again repeated the same message. An address "to the Inhabitants of Great-Britain" adopted on July 8, 1775, insisted that the Americans acted as the "Descendants of Britons" in defense of "glorious Privileges" for which their "gallant and virtuous Ancestors" had "fought, bled, and conquered."

Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary,issued a statement criticising the anonymous official. "The individual behind this piece has chosen to deceive, rather than support, the duly elected president of the United States," she said. "He is not putting country first, but putting himself and his ego ahead of the will of the American people. This coward should do the right thing and resign."

Reported first by the Associated Press, New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood subpoenaed all eight of New York's Roman Catholic dioceses this morning as part of a broadening civil investigation.

Citing anonymous law enforcement sources, the article describes the subpoenas as seeking documents relating to abuse allegations, payments* to victims or findings from internal church investigations.
[...]
In conjunction with the subpoenas, Underwood issued a statement Thursday that calls on state legislature to pass the Child Victims Act, which would allow all victims to file civil suits until age 50 and seek criminal charges until age 28. Under current law, victims only have until age 23 to file civil cases or seek criminal charges for most types of child sexual abuse.

Senate Bill S809: Perfected or flawed?

... PURPOSE :  This bill eliminates the statutes of limitation for prosecuting child sexual abuse crimes and filing civil lawsuits for damages against individuals, public institutions, and private institutions related to child sexual abuse. This act also creates a one-year revival period for previously time-barred civil actions which alleged conduct representing the commission of certain sexual offenses committed against a child less than eighteen years of age.
[...]
JUSTIFICATION : According to the United State Department of Justice, approximately 1.8 million adolescents in the U.S. have been the victims of sexual assault. An estimated 90t of perpetrators of sexual abuse are known to the child, with about a third being family members. As a result, disclosure of sexual abuse is often delayed, usually until adulthood. Children often avoid telling anyone because they are afraid of a negative reaction or of further abuse or harm at the hands of their abuser. ...

She encouraged any victim of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy to participate in this investigation, regardless of the statute of limitations for prosecution, noting that all victim information will be "helpful to understanding and reforming the institutional approach of the church."

Archdiocese spokesman Joseph Zwilling called it unsurprising that New York would open such an investigation."

----
* "hush money," extortion, unlawful claim to damages

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

Cynthia did not win. However, Cynthia's message of party reform did unexpectedly earn the endorsement of several county caucuses beyond NYC but within Albany spheres of "influence." Albany County is the seat of the state's capitol.

In any case, registered Democratic Party voter turn-out was ridiculously low --OR-- voter suppression was ridiculously efficient, that much is obvious.


Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

President Trump, emboldened by America's economic strength and China's economic slowdown, escalated his trade war with Beijing on Monday, saying the United States would impose tariffs on $200 billion worth of goods and was prepared to tax all imports.

<snip>

Mr. Trump's decision is a significant escalation of an already serious trade dispute -- one with seemingly no end in sight. After months of failed trade talks, top officials from China and the United States were tentatively scheduled to talk later this month in Washington. But it is unclear whether Beijing will agree to come to Washington with the new tariffs set to go into effect.

Meanwhile ...

China to take countermeasure after US imposes new tariffs

China will have to take countermeasures to respond to the US' fresh tariff decision, in a move to safeguard the country's legitimate interests and the global free trade order, the Ministry of Commerce said on Tuesday.

and have followed-up with ....

China Sets Tariffs On $60 Billion In U.S. Goods, Retaliating Against U.S. Duties

Chinese state television on Tuesday reported that the government has decided to impose tariffs of 5 percent to 10 percent on $60 billion worth of U.S. products, starting on Monday. The tariffs will apply to 5,207 items.

also saying

"The Chinese side reiterates that the aim of imposing these tariffs is to prevent trade frictions from escalating and it is a measure of last resort against American unilateralism and trade protectionism," the Chinese state television report said.

According to a White House SpokesIdiot these tariffs will result in "we'll see more production here in the United States."  SpokesIdiot didn't address the fact the US manufacturing networks have been systematically destroyed making it impossible to produce goods now made in the PRC until those networks are replaced.

She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre

A lot of the pieces rattling around my head now fit better together:
Saudi. Qatar. The UAE, the Brotherhood, Nasser, the British and French of course. Al Jazeera Arabic and English.

Some random claims from the interview:
(Noprth-)Yemen was the only independent Muslim country in the inter-war period and had a relationship with the Soviets from the 20s. They ere allied with Nasser and pan-arabism till shortly before the 1962 war.
There appears to be a lot of unexploited gas fields in Yemen and the Saudis are running out of money and oil(but we knew this since the peak-oil years).
Quatar bought a share in the Clinton(and Obama) clan and lost out.
The Brotherhood was encouraged to grow in British Egypt. Nasser threw them out since they screwed with his land reform plans. He filled the Egyptian Islamic Universities with their opponents. The Saudis jumped into the breach and founded Medina University as an alternative, stuffed with brotherhood scholars. The Brits still smarted from Suez and helped out. There was a falling out and Quatar is now the main backer of the Brotherhood and replaces Saudi as the "pure" Islam for the younger generation, growing up in the Saudi funded mosques, since the Kingdom is just too obviously corrupt.

Well, it got me to buy the book.

wiki bio for MSNBC's favorite war pusher is scathing pic.twitter.com/1w9Lz26Tgo

— Adam H. Johnson (@adamjohnsonNYC) 31 August 2018

Workers from South Africa's mainly-white Solidarity union staged a go-slow protest at the petrochemicals firm Sasol on Monday over a share scheme offered exclusively to black staff, and said they would begin a full strike on Thursday.

South African companies are required to meet quotas [!] on black ownership, employment and procurement as part of a drive to reverse decades of exclusion under apartheid. Meeting the rules makes a company more likely to qualify for government tenders.

Solidarity has been waging a challenge against racial quotas in the workplace, and lodged a complaint against the policy in 2016 with the U.N. Human Rights Commission.

Sasol, the world leader in technology that converts coal and gas to fuel, has sold 25 percent of its local operations to qualifying [?] black employees, a foundation and the black public in a 21 billion rand ($1.5 billion) deal financed [?] by the company ["out of thin air"]. ...

3. How are Black people defined in the Sasol Khanyisa Transaction?

The definition of "Black people" is contained in the B-BBEE Act, which currently means Africans [BWAH!], Coloureds and Indians who are citizens of South Africa --

• by birth or descent or
  
• who became citizens of South Africa by naturalisation before 27 April 1994;
  
• on or after 27 April 1994 and who would have been entitled to acquire citizenship by naturalisation prior to that date.
  

4. How many shares or rights to shares will each participant receive?
[...]
Employee Participants
- Sasol employees participating in Sasol Inzalo trusts:
-who are actively employed at the inception of Sasol Khanyisa;
-will each receive, at no cost to the employee, vested rights in SOL or SOLBE1 shares to the value of R100 000 (once off share award);
-this will be subject to tax when vesting takes place;
-whieh will give full ownership in 3 years' time (2021), provided that an employee is still in the employ of Sasol group [US-Eng., Restricted Stock Units]; ...

Solidarity said the scheme was discriminatory and that it would file a complaint to U.S. regulators [!]. Sasol also operates in the United States.

archived < cough, cough >
"Cynthia, where are my reparations?!"

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

I contend that we cannot understand the regulation of interracial relationships in comparative context without reference to racial ideas. An emphasis on the autonomy and influence of ideas about race will reveal a number of themes that permeate the regulation of interracial intimacies in both Canada and the United States: the transgression of gendered/raced social boundaries; the exposure of raced/gendered sexualities; the interlocking and mutually reinforcing nature of patriarchal, white supremacist and capitalist systems of domination; the threat of non-white access to white capital; the potential of mixed-race progeny; and the predicament of racial categorization precisely at the points at which categories come undone, classification schema crumble and 'race' is most clearly illustrated as a social and political construction with real consequences. Above all else, this paper will reveal the law as an important site where boundaries around identities are created and manipulated. Our purpose, among others, is to explore why the boundaries of race and gender lie where they do and to expose that the determination of inclusiveness and exclusivity of racial categorizations are neither obvious nor given.

From the start, antifa* activists have deemed Méric's death a "political killing" while right-wing extremists have claimed the accused acted in legitimate "self-defence".
[...]
The trial is scheduled to span two weeks. The accused, ultra-right-wing activists Esteban Morillo and Samuel Dufour, both 25, are charged with violence leading - involuntarily [?] - to Méric's death, committed in a group and using a weapon, brass knuckles.

The trial will address pressing questions that have hung over the case since that late-spring evening five years [!] ago: Was a weapon used and did the accused intend to kill Méric, or was his death the result of a brawl gone wrong.

The roots of the case however go back to December 2017 and are centred around India's caste politics, a powder-keg issue in a country where, it's often said, citizens don't cast their vote, they vote their caste [!]. On December 31, 2017, tens of thousands of people - primarily members of India's downtrodden Dalit community - started gathering in the small town of Bhima Koregaon near the western Indian city of Pune for the annual commemoration of the January 1, 1818 Battle of Koregaon.
[...]
"The Modi government is veering towards full Erdogan [!], arresting people in the middle of the night, detaining social activists and journalists across the country under very vague provisions of the Unlawful Activities Act merely for the possession of books written by authors deemed leftist and activist pamphlets from as far back as the 1970s. These are taken to constitute active membership in a plot," said Mira Kamdar, a Paris-based author of the book, India in the 21st Century: What Everyone Needs to Know
[...]
However when a public prosecutor revealed the "terrorist" assassination plotters were part of an "anti-fascist* front", it drew howls of laughter across the country. Wags noted that they had no idea that fighting fascism was a terror offence. The government's critics meanwhile relished the fact that the public prosecutor had inadvertently admitted that the BJP was fascist.

--
* Last week Jeffrey Toobin, cosmopolitan CNN celebrity, tried a joke at parochial US Americans' expense. He was  derided on Twitter as racist, when he said in part, "Antifa is widely perceived as an African American organization" [since  any "Black bloc" in the USA is a euphemism for African American voters' "widely perceived" uniform preference for and statistical contribution to Democratic Party candidate election]. Bad timing, wrong audience: Network operators were quick to credit "white" Americans for anti-fascist agitation or Mr Trump for "appeals to racism".

Wow. Either CNN is really really bad at their job or black antifa is just always hiding from the cameras.#AntifaSoWhite https://t.co/RpJq9IphzU

— ... (@lesilly) August 29, 2018

On Aug. 17, some 2,500 OB-GYN doctors in the country announced they would boycott all abortions, signaling a new low point in the growing discontent at the nation's 65-year-old abortion ban.

Abortion is banned in Korea by criminal law. Unlike neighboring Japan, where the abortion ban can be overruled for socioeconomic reasons, abortions are only allowed here in cases of rape, high chances of birth defects, or significant health risks for the woman.
[...]
"I'm not sure if they made this abortion boycott decision with women's health in mind," Kim [Dong-suk, head of the Korean College of OB-GYNK] said. "Designating abortions as immoral acts or declaring an abortion boycott will not stop abortions; it will just increase the number of dangerous operations that threaten women's health."
[...]
And in May this year, the Constitutional Court held a high-profile debate on the constitutionality of the abortion ban before making its decision on the issue. However, the ruling was delayed indefinitely, the Constitutional Court confirmed with The Korea Times, Thursday. And the promised government research has not been started for the past two months.
[...]
"Women who are economically better off will probably be able to go to China or Japan to get an abortion but those without money or a social network will suffer more," said Koh Kyung-sim, a retired obstetrician and a member the Physicians' Association for Humanism who testified in favor of overturning the abortion ban at the Constitutional Court in May. "If OB-GYN doctors refuse to perform the operation, many women will miss the ideal time period for a safe operation."

archived
Online abortion ads: Doctors defend right to inform patients, Aug 2018
Women rally against criminalization of abortion, June 2018
reproductiverights.org, map

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

"News": Trump Targets 401(k) Minimum Distribution Requirement
"Insights": U.S. and U.K. Changes in Pay Equity Laws Call for Employers to Look Internally to Avoid Discrimination Claims

US Social Security annals (vol. 2008)
automatic enrollment in 401(k) plans
Michelle Obama unveils Blueprint for America's Working Women and Families

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

DPRK's founding anniversary parade highlights economic development

An array of industrial workers wearing uniforms and helmets were among the participants. A slogan of "All our might to build the economy" and working scenes of agriculture, fisheries and metallurgy were among the floats.
[...]
As a sign of improving ties between Pyongyang and Seoul, the parade also featured a float under the theme of national reunification. The float was decorated with a board showing the Panmunjom Declaration, the June 15th North-South Joint Declaration and the Oct. 4 Joint Declaration.

"Criticism of Mark Knight's Serena Williams cartoon shows the world has gone too PC & misunderstands the role of news media cartoons and satire," said Charlie Hebdo, executive chairman of News Corp Australasia, which owns the Herald Sun.

Shaul Horev dropped a bombshell, but hardly anyone noticed. Horev, an Israel Defense Forces reservist brigadier general who has served, among other posts, as the navy chief of staff and chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, is currently director of the Research Center for Maritime Policy and Strategy at the University of Haifa. At the end of August, the center held a conference, to which participants from the United States were invited, to examine security issues relating to Israel and the Mediterranean region.

In an interview with the religious-Zionist media outlet Arutz Sheva, Prof. Horev noted that one topic that came up at the event was Chinese investments in Mediterranean ports, and in Israel in particular. Pointing out that a Chinese company will soon start operating Haifa Port, he said that Israel needs to create a mechanism that will examine Chinese investments to ensure that they do not put Israel's security interests at risk.

"When China acquires ports," Horev said, "it does so under the guise of maintaining a trade route from the Indian Ocean via the Suez Canal to Europe, such as the port of Piraeus in Greece. Does an economic horizon like this have a security impact? We are not weighing that possibility sufficiently. One of the senior American figures at the conference raised the question of whether the U.S. Sixth Fleet can see Haifa as a home port. In light of the Chinese takeover, the question is no longer on the agenda."

While these regimes may differ in some respects, they share key attributes: hostility toward democratic norms, antagonism toward a free press, intolerance toward ethnic and religious minorities, and a belief that government should benefit their own selfish financial interests. These leaders are also deeply connected to a network of multi-billionaire oligarchs who see the world as their economic plaything.

Those of us who believe in democracy, who believe that a government must be accountable to its people, must understand the scope of this challenge if we are to effectively confront it.

Our era will be remembered for the triumphant march of a globally unifying rightwing - a Nationalist International - that sprang out of the cesspool of financialised capitalism. Whether it will also be remembered for a successful humanist challenge to this menace depends on the willingness of progressives in the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom as well as countries like Mexico, India and South Africa, to forge a coherent Progressive International.

Massive wind and solar energy installations in the Sahara and nearby Sahel deserts would increase local temperatures, rainfall and vegetation - all benefits for the region, according to a climate-modeling study published Thursday in the journal Science [SUBSCRIPTION WAIVED].

We primarily focused on the effect of such large wind and solar farms in the Sahara region (including the most arid parts of the Arabian Desert) and the neighboring Sahel region for several reasons: (i) The Sahara is the largest desert in the world and has a great supply of solar and wind energy. (ii) The Sahara is sparsely inhabited, and thus the development of wind and solar farms would have minimal competition for land surface area against natural and other human land uses, such as agriculture (15). (iii) The Sahel is a transition region between desert and wooded savanna and, as such, is highly sensitive to land changes (18, 19, 23). (iv) Both regions are near Europe and the Middle East, areas with enormous current energy demand, and sub-Saharan Africa, which has a large projected growth in energy demand (see supplementary text). (v) Massive investment in solar and wind generation could promote economic development in the Sahel, one of the poorest regions in the world, as well as provide clean energy for desalination and provision of water for cities and food production (24). The wind and solar farms simulated in this study would generate approximately 3 and 79 TW of electrical power, respectively, averaged over a typical year (see supplementary text).

archived
desertec

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

The typhoon's top winds declined to about 167 kilometers per hour (103 mph), from 195 kph earlier, according to the U.S. Navy and Air Force's Joint Typhoon Warning Center in Hawaii. Mangkhut's structure will be ripped by wind shear, weakening its top winds as it approaches the coast to Hong Kong's west.
[...]
Mangkhut struck Cagayan province in the northern Philippines Saturday with winds of up to 269 kilometers an hour, leaving at least eight dead and sending about 206,000 people to shelters, according to data from various agencies.

fact-checking is a brain disease https://t.co/OqJ8PybPnC pic.twitter.com/KB46vajffc

— Brandy Jensen (@BrandyLJensen) 30 August 2018

China not [only] hitting crypto*, video gaming now discouraged

The authorities were having none of this and have closed a number of crypto-related groups in addition to closing down a number of blockchain news outlets on China's largest platform WeChat.

It did not stop there. According to local news reports, Chinese tech giant Baidu has now joined other major online firms Tencent and Alibaba in imposing new anti-crypto measures as Beijing toughens its stance again.

* criminalized initial coin offering (ICO) solicitation

archived
Always Read the Footnotes

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

   "Folks, there's nothing left from the Linguistics division. We lost all the indigenous languages collection: the recordings since 1958, the chants in all the languages for which there are no native speakers alive anymore, the Curt Niemuendaju archives: papers, photos, negatives, the original ethnic-historic-linguistic map localizing all the ethnic groups in Brazil, the only record that we had from 1945. The ethnological and archeological references of all ethnic groups in Brazil since the 16th century... An irreparable loss of our historic memory. It just hurts so much to see all in ashes."

Cira Gonda, translated by Diogo Almeida, about the fire at Brazil's National Museum.  

archived
"Our focus is not only on the sexual act but the relationship between two consenting adults and the manifestation of their rights under Articles 14 and 21"

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

The tenth Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) was declared on 1st August in the North Kivu province, on the north-eastern part of the country.
[...]
The total number of cases are: confirmed (91) + probable*, (30) = 121 total cases, suspect cases: 14, deaths amongst confirmed cases: 51 and 17 health staff infected (Source: Congolese MoH). The national laboratory (INRB) confirmed on 7 August that the current outbreak is the Zaire strain on the virus, the most deadly and the same that affected West Africa in 2014-2015 as well as Equateur province, in western DRC earlier in 2018 - although the virus' strain was different from an outbreak to another.
[...]
Whilst cases have decreased dramatically we cannot yet say that the epidemic has stabilized or is under control. New cases are still arriving at our treatment centre in Mangina but we are not seeing the number of suspect cases we would expect to see at this stage of the epidemic. We are concerned that this could be not only because of a reduction in the number of infections but because those patients experiencing symptoms are too afraid to access care or do not understand the importance of early hospitalisation and treatment. We also don't have a clear idea about how many unreported deaths could happen at community level.

--
*Probable refers to community deaths that have links to confirmed Ebola cases but which were not tested before burial.

archived
living lab 18 Aug

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

Water and sanitation infrastructure is collapsing. ... "The numbers are growing by the day and to date there are about over 2,000 cases, that's quite a big number," the minister said, attributing the outbreak to shortages of safe drinking water and poor sanitation. "This whole problem has arisen as a result of blocked sewers. The other problem is that garbage hasn't been collected on a regular basis. There is water problems, no water availability."

Meanwhile in Libya, $25B still burning.
NATO bombs the Great Man-Made River
Two workers killed in second attack on Libyan water plant

"An armed attack was carried out by terrorist groups on the Tazirbu site causing havoc, looting, killing and terrorizing families, children and the workers who ensure the supply of water to cities," said a statement from the Great Man-made River Project, a pipe network supplying ground water from the Libyan Sahara.

Time until someone born after 9/11 can enlist to go to war in Afghanistan: pic.twitter.com/wajIpPLrO5

— Richard White (@CheekyAmriki) 10. September 2018

I. If there is such a mode of common being as inauthenticity, then all of History is inauthentic and action in History results in inauthenticity; authenticity reverts to individualism. Conversely, if the nature of man is to be realized at the end of History, authenticity must be willed for itself as the very condition of historical struggle. Any doctrine of conversion runs the real risk of being an a-historicism. ² Any doctrine of historicity runs the real risk of being an amoralism. ¹

The thesis gets kind of sketchy, what with all the metaphorical veil waving, after that.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

SCHOLARS: If only tech had an understanding of the humanities, we wouldn't be in this situation!
ZUCKERBERG: On my honeymoon, I abandoned my wife to wander the great monuments of Rome.  Like Augustus, my country is wretched mud--but I, too, will leave it marble.
SCHOLARS: Wait no, pic.twitter.com/5M34Tdic5c

— Quantian📉 (@quantian1) 10. September 2018

Articles 11 and 13 anticipate high growth YouTube channels sales

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.