According to David Cameron, London is a floodplain.
This from Miles King:
[The PM] rejected the idea that it was a bad idea to build on floodplains claiming that London was a floodplain. Only a tiny proportion of London sits in the floodplain of the Thames, perhaps he was confusing Westminster with London.
That simple observation holds the key to explaining the post-79 era in British politics. How do you win an election? Inflate the property market. How do you mimic economic growth? Encourage housing equity withdrawal.
In savvier parts of the establishment, that relationship is now tacitly accepted. The latest Economist has a discussion on household debt in the UK that concludes: “It remains unsustainable for household debt to rise relative to incomes indefinitely … But for the time being rising debt may not be a bad thing … The British economy may be somewhat unbalanced, but at least it is growing.” This is the house journal of the departure-lounge capitalist class admitting that the British economy may be tapped out, but at least we can keep borrowing.
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Ministers had targeted a 25% cut in carbon emissions from government buildings and travel in 201 4-15 , compared to 2009-10, but achieved 22%. The failure was largely due to the Ministry of Defence, which accounts for half of all government emissions and cut its emissions by 19%.
A wide array of different approaches to a Basic Income have been proposed over the years. But perhaps one of the most credible and immediately possible proposals has recently emerged in a new report by the RSA.
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“The Hostile Use of Drones by Non-State Actors Against British Targets,” a new report by the Oxford Research Group’s Remote Control Project.
Chris Abbott, the lead author of the report and visiting research fellow at Bradford University’s School of Social and International Studies, said: “The use of drones for surveillance and attack is no longer the purview of state militaries alone. A range of terrorist, insurgent, criminal, corporate and activist groups have already shown their desire and ability to use drones against British targets.”
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The Ministry of Defence told the Sunday Herald that it will not investigate reports of deaths on the ground in Syria and Iraq – from anyone but UK military personnel, and ‘local forces’ deemed friendly.
The UK Government is being urged to launch an immediate investigation after independent monitoring group Airwars reported between 72 and 81 civilian deaths in Iraq could be linked to British air strikes.
The US Air Force won’t lift weight restrictions on F-35 pilots until 2018 — at the earliest — as more testing needs to be done to address safety issues with the jet’s ejection seat, Defense News has learned. …
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When the squadron has enough planes and trained pilots and maintainers, the air force can declare the first J-20 unit “combat-ready”—a milestone most analysts expect sometime in 2017. At that time, China will join an exclusive club—as only the second country to field a fleet of frontline radar-evading jets. The American F-117, the world’s first stealth warplane, entered service with the U.S. Air Force in 1983. The U.S. B-2 stealth bomber followed in 1997, the supersonic F-22 stealth fighter in 2005, and the F-22’s smaller cousin the F-35 in July 2015.
By the 2030s, the Pentagon could possess as many as 1,700 F-35s plus 180 or so F-22s and 20 B-2s.
No other country has war-ready stealth warplanes, although Russia is working on one—and eight U.S. allies have ordered the F-35, with several more planning on also buying the plane in the near future. But while it’s pretty certain China will soon deploy J-20s, it’s not clear why—or how effectively—it will do so. Continue reading
A good brief summary of Realism approach to foreign policy by Stephen Walt:
To remind you: Realism sees power as the centerpiece of political life and sees states as primarily concerned with ensuring their own security in a world where there’s no world government to protect them from others. Realists believe military power is essential to preserving a state’s independence and autonomy, but they recognize it is a crude instrument that often produces unintended consequences. Realists believe nationalism and other local identities are powerful and enduring; states are mostly selfish; altruism is rare; trust is hard to come by; and norms and institutions have a limited impact on what powerful states do. In short, realists have a generally pessimistic view of international affairs and are wary of efforts to remake the world according to some ideological blueprint, no matter how appealing it might be in the abstract.
This is quite remarkable:
Here’s a summary of the anti-ISIS bombing campaign: 30,000 fighters – 20,000 killed = 30,000 fighters…
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More than 10,000 vacancies for nursing posts in London went unfilled in 2015, new figures from the Royal College of Nursing have shown.
The shortage of nurses worsened last year, with 17% of all London’s registered nursing jobs vacant, up from 14% in 2014 and 11% in 2013.
The figure is much higher than the national average of 10%.
A very good profile on Bernie Sanders.
Sanders prefers hating the rich. When Hillary Clinton was asked in a debate if corporate America should love her, she responded, “Everyone should. I want to be the president for the struggling, the striving, and the successful.” Sanders does not. When asked before a speech in Keene, N.H., what he would say to reassure the Bloomberg Businessweekreaders who work on Wall Street, or have millions of dollars, or run a hedge fund, and might be afraid he wants to tax them back to the Carter Age, Sanders puts down the manila folder containing his talk, which he delivers without a TelePrompTer. “I’m not going to reassure them,” he says. “Their greed, their recklessness, their illegal behavior has destroyed the lives of millions of Americans. Frankly, if I were a hedge fund manager, I would not vote for Bernie Sanders. And I would contribute money to my opponents to try to defeat him.” Then the only socialist ever elected to the U.S. Senate goes back to working on his prepared remarks.
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Figure 7: Acceleration of private debt and change in unemployment (Correlation coefficient -0.82)
David Cameron’s governments have overseen the sale of over £5.6 billion of military licences to Saudi Arabia since 2010, according to new research published by Campaign Against Arms Trade.
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ProPublica pored over more than 200 audits, special projects and inspections done by SIGAR since 2009 and built a database to add up the total cost of failed reconstruction projects. Looking at the botched projects collectively — rather than as one-off headlines — reveals a grim picture of the overall reconstruction effort and a repeated cycle of mistakes.
- In just six years, the IG has tallied at least $17 billion in questionable spending. This includes $3.6 billion in outright waste, projects teetering on the brink of waste, or projects that can’t — or won’t — be sustained by the Afghans, as well as an additional $13.5 billion that the average taxpayer might easily judge to be waste. Exhibit A for “You be the judge”: $8.4 billion was spent on counter-narcotics programs that were so ineffective that Afghanistan has produced record levels of heroin — more than it did before the war started.
So true.
Molly Scott Cato MEP:
In an economy where money is created in the private sector based on debt, a banking licence represents an extraordinary power granted to a small number of corporations by the state. Strict regulation of their activities, particularly when their risks are guaranteed by the public, is therefore essential.
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‘Kill-Em-All With Airstrikes’ Is Not Working
http://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2016/01/kill-em-all-airstrikes-not-working/124946/
Why Bernie Sanders Doesn’t Want Your Vote
http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-bernie-sanders-fundraising/
F-35 Ejection Seat Fix Delayed to 2018; Pilot Restrictions Continue
http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/2016/01/08/f-35-ejection-seat-fix-delayed-2018-pilot-restrictions-continue/78519892/
UK should prepare for use of drones in terrorist attacks, says thinktank
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jan/11/drones-terrorist-attacks-security-thinktank
Revealed: British government refusing to accept evidence of civilian fatalities in UK air strikes
http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/14193998.Revealed__British_government_refusing_to_accept_evidence_of_civilian_fatalities_in_UK_air_strikes/
Revealed: UK military doesn’t know the number of people it has killed in airstrikes
https://www.commonspace.scot/articles/3121/revealed-uk-military-doesn-t-know-the-number-of-people-it-has-killed-in-airstrikes
What Would a Realist World Have Looked Like?
https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/01/08/what-would-a-realist-world-have-looked-like-iraq-syria-iran-obama-bush-clinton/
The IMF Confirms That ‘Trickle-Down’ Economics Is, Indeed, a Joke
http://www.psmag.com/business-economics/trickle-down-economics-is-indeed-a-joke
Note To Joe Stiglitz: Banks Originate, Not Intermediate, And That’s Why Aggregate Demand Is Stuffed
http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevekeen/2016/01/06/note-to-joe-stiglitz-banks-originate-not-intermediate-and-thats-why-aggregate-demand-is-stuffed/
Congress offers Christmas cheer to F-35 and F/A-18 programmes
https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/congress-offers-christmas-cheer-to-f-35-and-fa-18-p-420170/
Is Britain a nation of debt bingers? History tells a different story
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/12/britain-nation-debt-bingers-history-household-credit
Will a Basic Income turn us all into entrepreneurs?
https://www.crunch.co.uk/blog/small-business-advice/2016/01/11/will-a-basic-income-turn-us-all-into-entrepreneurs/
The man who exposed the lie of the war on drugs
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/dec/26/man-who-exposed-lie-war-on-drugs-roberto-saviano-ed-vulliamy
Britain Has Sold £5.6 Billion Of Arms To Saudi Arabia Since David Cameron Came To Power
http://www.buzzfeed.com/alanwhite/britain-has-sold-ps56-billion-of-arms-to-saudi-arabia-since#.aa70bBL3r
UK, US buying made-in-Pakistan weapons
http://nation.com.pk/islamabad/12-Jan-2016/uk-us-buying-made-in-pakistan-weapons
Airbnb lists properties in illegal Israeli settlements
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jan/12/airbnb-listings-illegal-settlements-israel-palestine-west-bank
UK government misses own green targets
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/jan/11/uk-government-misses-own-green-targets
Hard Evidence: this is the Age of Dissent – and there’s much more to come
https://theconversation.com/hard-evidence-this-is-the-age-of-dissent-and-theres-much-more-to-come-52871
BoE official oversaw FCA retreat from inquiry into banking culture
https://next.ft.com/content/414f6e0c-b918-11e5-b151-8e15c9a029fb
Renew Trident? It’d make more sense to put Dad’s Army on the case
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/13/renew-trident-dads-army-jeremy-corbyn-labour
Made in Britain
http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2016/01/13/elliot-murphy/made-in-britain/
Davos and Its Threat to Democracy
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/01/17/davos-and-its-threat-democracy
Blimey: TfL to take over most of London’s rail network, says government
http://www.citymetric.com/transport/blimey-tfl-take-over-most-londons-rail-network-says-government-1765
Just Who Exactly Benefits Most from the Global Giving of Billionaires Like Bill Gates?
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/01/20/just-who-exactly-benefits-most-global-giving-billionaires-bill-gates
Ultra-Rich ‘Philanthrocapitalist’ Class Undermining Global Democracy: Report
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/01/15/ultra-rich-philanthrocapitalist-class-undermining-global-democracy-report
Philanthropy: Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/01/15/philanthropy-looking-gift-horse-mouth
Is Britain’s media biased against the left?
https://www.opendemocracy.net/uk/greg-philo/is-britains-media-biased-against-left
Dark Money review: Nazi oil, the Koch brothers and a rightwing revolution
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jan/17/dark-money-review-nazi-oil-the-koch-brothers-and-a-rightwing-revolution
It is wrong to blame China for the global economy’s woes
http://www.primeeconomics.org/articles/3wytec2ja3q7ulxrgrlqeuam5tykbb
No, it’s not time for Britain to be intensely relaxed over household debt
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/no-it-s-not-time-for-britain-to-be-intensely-relaxed-over-household-debt-a6817926.html
Richest 62 people as wealthy as half of world’s population, says Oxfam
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/jan/18/richest-62-billionaires-wealthy-half-world-population-combined
Meet Chengdu’s Ace Fighter Designer
http://thediplomat.com/2016/01/meet-chengdus-ace-fighter-designer/
UK most unequal country in the West
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk-most-unequal-country-in-the-west-1329614.html
We’ve been conned by the rich predators of Davos
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/19/davos-super-rich-wealth-inequality
The Return of Public Investment
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/public-infrastructure-investment-sustained-growth-by-dani-rodrik-2016-01
Big Pharma’s worst nightmare
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/jan/26/big-pharmas-worst-nightmare
UN report into Saudi-led strikes in Yemen raises questions over UK role
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/27/un-report-into-saudi-led-strikes-in-yemen-raises-questions-over-uk-role
You Won’t Like It, But Here’s the Answer to ISIS
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/176091/tomgram%3A_peter_van_buren%2C_how_to_resolve_the_isis_crisis
Type 45 destroyers: UK’s £1bn warships face engine refit
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-35432341
The Forgotten Benefits of Offshore Balancing
http://lobelog.com/the-forgotten-benefits-of-offshore-balancing/
Cameron desperate to stop scandal as secret plans to sell the NHS are discovered
http://www.thecanary.co/2016/01/27/conservatives-block-access-secret-nhs-privatisation-documents/
Brimstone missiles target the British public, not Islamic State
http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/brimstone-missiles-target-british-public-not-islamic-state-1698303657
More Bad News for the Snakebit F-35
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/2016/01/29/More-Bad-News-Snakebit-F-35
The U.S. May Build 500 Jets Before Finding Out If the F-35 Works
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-01-29/pentagon-risks-building-500-f-35s-before-completing-combat-tests
We came, we saw, he died
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n03/jackson-lears/we-came-we-saw-he-died
The World’s Favorite New Tax Haven Is the United States
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-27/the-world-s-favorite-new-tax-haven-is-the-united-states
Martin Luther King Jr. Celebrations Overlook His Critiques of Capitalism and Militarism
https://theintercept.com/2016/01/18/martin-luther-king-jr-celebrations-overlook-his-critiques-of-capitalism-and-militarism/
Dr. King’s Antiwar Legacy
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-hartung/dr-kings-antiwar-legacy_b_9014048.html
Henry A. Giroux | Gun Culture and the American Nightmare of Violence
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/34349-gun-culture-and-the-american-nightmare-of-violence#14549852864731&action=collapse_widget&id=0&data=
How does NHS spending compare with health spending internationally?
http://www.kingsfund.org.uk/blog/2016/01/how-does-nhs-spending-compare-health-spending-internationally
Behold: How the US blew $17 billion in Afghanistan
http://www.pri.org/stories/2015-12-18/behold-american-taxpayer-what-happened-nearly-half-billion-your-dollars
A new book by Roberto Saviano:
The realisation that cocaine capitalism is central to our economic universe made Escobar the Copernicus of organised crime, argues Saviano, adding: “No business in the world is so dynamic, so restlessly innovative, so loyal to the pure free-market spirit as the global cocaine business.” It sounds simple, but it isn’t – it is revolutionary and, says Saviano, it explains the world. …
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Foreign arms sales by the United States jumped by almost $10 billion in 2014, about 35 percent, even as the global weapons market remained flat and competition among suppliers increased, a new congressional study has found.
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It’s an idea whose adherents over the centuries have ranged from socialists to libertarians to far-right mavericks. It was first proposed by Thomas Paine in his 1797 pamphlet, Agrarian Justice, as a system in which at the “age of majority” everyone would receive an equal capital grant, a “basic income” handed over by the state to each and all, no questions asked, to do with what they wanted. …
Utrecht, one of the largest cities in the Netherlands, and 19 other Dutch municipalities, a tentative step towards realising the dream of many a marginal and disappointed political theorist is being made. …
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Tipping Point North South 