theguardian--2020-05-02--Active Measures review: how Trump gave Russia its richest target yet

The president-elect arrived in Washington under a cloud manufactured in Moscow and St Petersburg .
Less than a month after Donald Trump took office , the national security adviser Michael Flynn was ousted for lying to the vice-president about a conversation with Russia ’ s ambassador .
All that , however , was prelude to the firing of the FBI director James Comey and years of resulting turmoil .
The Kremlin had succeeded beyond its wildest dreams .
Under the subtitle The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare , Thomas Rid helps remind us how we reached this morass @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Czarist Russia and the Bolshevik revolution .
To be sure , the US can use all the help it can get as it navigates the current election cycle and the lies , rumours and uncertainty that shroud the origins of the coronavirus pandemic .
Rid was born in West Germany amid the cold war .
The Berlin Wall fell when he was a teenager .
He is now a professor at Johns Hopkins .
So what are “ active measures ” ?
Previously , Rid testified they were “ semi-covert or covert intelligence @ @ @ @ @ @ @ political decisions ” .
“ Almost always , ” he explained , “ active measures conceal or falsify the source.
” The special counsel ’ s report framed them more narrowly as “ operations conducted by Russian security services aimed at influencing the course of international affairs ” .
Add in technology and hacking , and an image of modern asymmetric warfare emerges .
Rid travels back to the early years of communist Russia , recounting the efforts of the government to discredit the remnants of the ancien régime and squash attempts to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the secret police , hatched a plot that involved forged correspondence , a fictitious organization , a fake counterrevolutionary council and a government-approved travelogue .
Words and narratives morphed into readily transportable munitions .
The émigré community was declawed and the multi-pronged combination deemed “ wildly successful ” .
The project also “ served as an inspiration for future active measures ” .
A template had been set .
Fast forward to the cold war and the aftermath of the US supreme court ’ s landmark school desegregation case .
The tension between @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Declaration of Independence was in the open again .
Lunch-counter sit-ins and demands for the vote filled newspapers and TV screens .
The fault lines were plainly visible – and the Soviet Union pounced .
In 1960 , the KGB embarked on a “ series of race-baiting disinformation operations ” that included mailing Ku Klux Klan leaflets to African and Asian delegations to the United Nations on the eve of a debate on colonialism .
At the same time , Russian “ operators posed as an African American organization agitating against the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ later , Russia ran an updated version of the play .
Twitter came to host the fake accounts of both “ John Davis ” , ostensibly a gun-toting Texas Christian and family man , and @ BlacktoLive ” , along with hundreds of others .
The Internet Research Agency ( IRA ) , a Russian troll factory , organized pro-Confederate flag rallies .
As detailed by Robert Mueller , the IRA also claimed that the civil war was not “ about slavery ” and instead was “ all about money ” , a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ among Trump supporters and proponents of the “ liberate the states ” movement .
According to Brian Westrate , treasurer of the Wisconsin Republican party , “ the Confederacy was more about states ’ rights than slavery.
” Depicting West Germany as Hitler ’ s heir was another aim .
At the time , “ some aging former Nazis still held positions of influence ” , Rid writes .
In the late 1960s , “ encouraging ‘ anti-German tendencies in the West ’ was very much a priority ” .
In 1964 , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Operation Neptun , sinking Nazi wartime documents to the bottom of the ominous sounding Black Lake , near the German border .
The cache was then “ discovered ” – media pandemonium ensued .
Four years later the mastermind of the scheme , Ladislav Bittman , defected to the US .
Prior to 2016 , Russia ’ s most notable active measure using the US as a foil was the lie that Aids was “ made in the USA ” .
In retaliation for US reports of Soviet use of chemical weapons in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , a multi-platformed campaign that falsely claimed “ Aids was an American biological weapon developed at Fort Detrick , Maryland ” .
Central to the effort was the earlier publication of an anonymous letter with a New York byline by an Indian newspaper .
The forged missive claimed “ Aids may invade India : mystery disease caused by US lab experiments.
” Rid writes that the letter was “ a masterfully executed disinformation operation ” , an amalgam of “ 20 % forgery and 80 % fact ” .
The reality was that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ new types of biological weapons in densely populated areas of the US and Canada ” , and conducted research on disease and psychotropic drugs on an array of human guinea pigs .
The KGB doubled down and published a reworked version of the story in an English-language Soviet publication .
At the same time and without any apparent nexus to the Soviet campaign , the Amsterdam News , a paper with a readership base in New York ’ s African American community , opined that Aids was a likely result of US @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mistrust helped weaponize a concocted narrative .
To be clear , Russian “ active measures ” did not tip the 2016 election to the Republicans .
On that score , the FBI and Comey had a greater impact .
Instead , the Russians caused the US to stare into a mirror , red and blue Americans each seeing what they expected .
Nor is an end in sight .
According to the Senate intelligence committee , “ Russian disinformation efforts may be focused on gathering information and data points in support of an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ US presidential election ” , with an emphasis upon “ gathering personal information ” from “ US-based audiences sympathetic to Russian disinformation topics ” .
America remains mired in a cold civil war .
Active Measures is another book for such troubled times .

The president-elect arrived in Washington under a cloud manufactured in Moscow and St Petersburg. Less than a month after Donald Trump took office, the national security adviser Michael Flynn was ousted for lying to the vice-president about a conversation with Russia’s ambassador. All that, however, was a prelude to the firing of the FBI director James Comey and years of resulting turmoil. The Kremlin had succeeded beyond its wildest dreams.
Under the subtitle The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare, Thomas Rid helps remind us how we reached this morass, one with antecedents reaching back to Czarist Russia and the Bolshevik revolution. To be sure, the US can use all the help it can get as it navigates the current election cycle and the lies, rumours and uncertainty that shroud the origins of the coronavirus pandemic.
Rid was born in West Germany amid the cold war. The Berlin Wall fell when he was a teenager. He is now a professor at Johns Hopkins.
So what are “active measures”? Previously, Rid testified they were “semi-covert or covert intelligence operations to shape an adversary’s political decisions”.
“Almost always,” he explained, “active measures conceal or falsify the source.”
The special counsel’s report framed them more narrowly as “operations conducted by Russian security services aimed at influencing the course of international affairs”. Add in technology and hacking, and an image of modern asymmetric warfare emerges.
Rid travels back to the early years of communist Russia, recounting the efforts of the government to discredit the remnants of the ancien régime and squash attempts to restore the monarchy. The Cheka, the secret police, hatched a plot that involved forged correspondence, a fictitious organization, a fake counter-revolutionary council and a government-approved travelogue.
Words and narratives morphed into readily transportable munitions. The émigré community was declawed and the multi-pronged combination deemed “wildly successful”. The project also “served as an inspiration for future active measures”. A template had been set.
Fast forward to the cold war and the aftermath of the US supreme court’s landmark school desegregation case. The tension between reality and the text and aspirations of the Declaration of Independence was in the open again. Lunch-counter sit-ins and demands for the vote filled newspapers and TV screens. The fault lines were plainly visible – and the Soviet Union pounced.
In 1960, the KGB embarked on a “series of race-baiting disinformation operations” that included mailing Ku Klux Klan leaflets to African and Asian delegations to the United Nations on the eve of a debate on colonialism. At the same time, Russian “operators posed as an African American organization agitating against the KKK”.
More than a half-century later, Russia ran an updated version of the play. Twitter came to host the fake accounts of both “John Davis”, ostensibly a gun-toting Texas Christian and family man, and @BlacktoLive”, along with hundreds of others.
The Internet Research Agency (IRA), a Russian troll factory, organized pro-Confederate flag rallies. As detailed by Robert Mueller, the IRA also claimed that the civil war was not “about slavery” and instead was “all about money”, a false trope that continues to gain resonance among Trump supporters and proponents of the “liberate the states” movement. According to Brian Westrate, treasurer of the Wisconsin Republican party, “the Confederacy was more about states’ rights than slavery.”
Depicting West Germany as Hitler’s heir was another aim. At the time, “some aging former Nazis still held positions of influence”, Rid writes. In the late 1960s, “encouraging ‘anti-German tendencies in the West’ was very much a priority”.
In 1964, with Russian assistance, Czech intelligence mounted Operation Neptun, sinking Nazi wartime documents to the bottom of the ominous sounding Black Lake, near the German border. The cache was then “discovered” – media pandemonium ensued. Four years later the mastermind of the scheme, Ladislav Bittman, defected to the US.
Prior to 2016, Russia’s most notable active measure using the US as a foil was the lie that Aids was “made in the USA”. In retaliation for US reports of Soviet use of chemical weapons in Afghanistan, the KGB unfurled Operation Denver, a multi-platformed campaign that falsely claimed “Aids was an American biological weapon developed at Fort Detrick, Maryland”. Central to the effort was the earlier publication of an anonymous letter with a New York byline by an Indian newspaper. The forged missive claimed “Aids may invade India: mystery disease caused by US lab experiments.”
A picture taken in 1990 shows Soviet police officers standing in front of the KGB building in Moscow, now the headquarters of the FSB. Photograph: Alexander Nemenov/AFP/Getty Images
Rid writes that the letter was “a masterfully executed disinformation operation”, an amalgam of “20% forgery and 80% fact”. The reality was that the Pentagon and the CIA had tested “new types of biological weapons in densely populated areas of the US and Canada”, and conducted research on disease and psychotropic drugs on an array of human guinea pigs.
The KGB doubled down and published a reworked version of the story in an English-language Soviet publication. At the same time and without any apparent nexus to the Soviet campaign, the Amsterdam News, a paper with a readership base in New York’s African American community, opined that Aids was a likely result of US bacteria warfare. Once again, social mistrust helped weaponize a concocted narrative.
To be clear, Russian “active measures” did not tip the 2016 election to the Republicans. On that score, the FBI and Comey had a greater impact. Instead, the Russians caused the US to stare into a mirror, red and blue Americans each seeing what they expected.
Nor is an end in sight. According to the Senate intelligence committee, “Russian disinformation efforts may be focused on gathering information and data points in support of an active measures campaign targeted at the 2020 US presidential election”, with an emphasis upon “gathering personal information” from “US-based audiences sympathetic to Russian disinformation topics”.
America remains mired in a cold civil war. Active Measures is another book for such troubled times.


theguardian--2020-05-02--Coronavirus US live: Trump hails Senate return and says Pelosi 'crazy' for not reopening House – as

Coronavirus US live: Trump hails Senate return and says Pelosi 'crazy' for not reopening House – as it happened

Joe Biden has waded into the dispute between the US women ’ s national soccer team and the US Soccer federation .
On Friday , US district judge R Gary Klausne threw out the players ’ unequal pay claim against US soccer ’ s governing body .
“ Don ’ t give up this fight , ” Biden wrote on Twitter on Saturday .
“ This is not over yet.
” The presumptive Democratic candidate for president then turned his attention to US Soccer .
“ To @ USSoccer : equal pay , now , ” he wrote .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , you can go elsewhere for World Cup funding.
” In March 2019 , 28 members of the USWNT filed a lawsuit in California seeking equal pay and treatment , in addition to damages of $ 66m including back pay .
The group , which included some of the best players in the world such as Megan Rapinoe , Alex Morgan and Carli Lloyd , also sought compensation for any player who has appeared for the US since February 2015 .
“ We are shocked and disappointed with today ’ s decision , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hard work for equal pay , ” Molly Levinson , spokeswoman for the women ’ s players , said on Friday after the decision .
“ We are confident in our case and steadfast in our commitment to ensuring that girls and women who play this sport will not be valued as lesser just because of their gender.
” Klausne said the USWNT players had rejected a chance to be paid under the same terms as their male counterparts .
“ The history of negotiations between the parties demonstrates that the WNT rejected @ @ @ @ @ @ @ same pay-to-play structure as the MNT , and the WNT was willing to forgo higher bonuses for benefits , such as greater base compensation and the guarantee of a higher number of contracted players , ” Klausner wrote .
The judge did , however , allow allegations that the USWNT were subject to discriminatory working conditions , and those claims will now go to trial in federal court next month .
Klausner left intact allegations the USWNT players received inferior travel , accommodation and medical treatment compared to the men .
The US @ @ @ @ @ @ @ last summer , retaining the title they captured in 2015 .
The US men ’ s team , who have supported the USWNT lawsuit , failed to qualify for the 2018 World Cup .

Bryan Armen Graham in New York (now), Amanda Holpuch,   Tom Lutz   and Martin Pengelly (earlier)

2 May 2020 23.58 BST Donald Trump has appeared to confirm that Kim Jong Un is “alive and well” after weeks of speculation over the North Korean leader’s health. “I, for one, am glad to see he is back, and well!” Trump wrote, quote-tweeting North Korean state media photos of Kim attending a ribbon cutting ceremony at the Sunchon Phosphatic Fertilizer Factory. I, for one, am glad to see he is back, and well! https://t.co/mIWVeRMnOJ — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 2, 2020 The photos appear to document Kim’s first public appearance in more than three weeks.
2 May 2020 23.20 BST Presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden has reiterated his denial of Tara Reade’s allegations in an interview with MSNBC’s Al Sharpton that was recorded on Friday night but aired this afternoon. “It’s not true,” Biden said. “I’m saying unequivocally, it never happened, period. Believing a woman means taking her claim seriously when she steps forward and then vetting it, looking into it. That’s true in this case as well. Women have a right to be heard and the press should rigorously investigate the claims like these and I’d always uphold those principles. But in the end, in every case, the truth is what matters. And in this case, the truth is these claims are false.” Joe Biden reiterates his denial of Tara Reade’s allegations in an interview with MSNBC’s Al Sharpton that was recorded on Friday night but aired today. pic.twitter.com/AQ3F6LfL3d — Bryan Armen Graham (@BryanAGraham) May 2, 2020 Biden went on to field a number of topics in the wide-ranging interview, including a harsh criticism of the armed protesters in Michigan who gathered inside the state capitol in protest of Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer’s shutdown orders. “They’re armed and I’m told one or two of them had Nazi flags or Confederate flags – I don’t know which it was, I can’t swear to that, I didn’t see it,” Biden said. “Such an attempt to intimidate is just beyond the pale and the president should be speaking out and say it’s totally inappropriate to … intimidate a governor who is doing one heck of a job. She’s listening to the scientists, she’s listening to the docs, she’s listening to the experts and that’s her judgment and it should be sustained and not have a bunch of people coming in, in numbers, with loaded weapons sitting in the hallways of the legislative body.”
2 May 2020 22.42 BST A man in Florida has been arrested after he was discovered quarantining on a shuttered Disney World island, telling authorities it felt like a “tropical paradise.” Richard McGuire, 42, was found by Orange County sheriff’s deputies Disney’s Discovery Island on Thursday, telling authorities that he began camping on the island earlier in the week. “Richard stated that he had made entry to the island to go camping on Monday or Tuesday and had planned on staying on the island for approximately one week,” the police report said. McGuire claimed that he didn’t know the island, once the site of a zoological park before it was closed to the public in 1999, was restricted despite the closed gates and multiple “no trespassing” signs in the vicinity. “Richard stated that he was unaware of that and that it looked like a tropical paradise,” the report stated. Orange County Marine deputies on Bay Lake said they used a public address system to tell McGuire he was not allowed to be on the property after his presence was discovered, but the Alabama native claimed he didn’t hear them because he was asleep in a building.
McGuire was arrested on a trespassing charge, banned from all Disney properties and taken to jail without incident. Disney World has been shut down since March due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Updated at 22.43 BST
2 May 2020 21.52 BST Tara Reade, the former Senate staffer who alleges Joe Biden sexually assaulted her 27 years ago, has disputed today’s Associated Press story in which she was quoted as saying her original report against the Democrats’ presumptive presidential candidate did not accuse him of assault. “This is false,” she said on Twitter, referencing the AP story pushing several hours earlier. This is false. https://t.co/w4yXGI1DQm — taratweets ( Alexandra Tara Reade) (@ReadeAlexandra) May 2, 2020 Reade had spoken with the wire service after it had discovered transcripts and notes from interviews with the former Biden staffer last year in which she said she “chickened out” after going to the Senate personnel office.
“I remember talking about him wanting me to serve drinks because he liked my legs and thought I was pretty and it made me uncomfortable,” Reade said. “I know that I was too scared to write about the sexual assault.” Reade did not specify which elements of the AP story were incorrect beyond her three-word tweet, though she did follow up shortly after with another brief statement. “No survivor be fearful to come forward,” she tweeted. “And I did file a complaint.”
2 May 2020 21.16 BST As Florida’s leaders move to reopen beaches, restaurants and retail stores as part of the governor Ron DeSantis’s phase one, the state’s department of health confirmed 735 new cases of Covid-19 on Saturday morning, bringing the overall total of confirmed cases to more than 35,000. The Miami Herald reports: Saturday’s daily total of 35,463 brings the number of newly confirmed cases back under 1,000, which had been a weeklong trend until Friday’s report topped out at 1,038. There were also 50 new deaths announced, bringing the statewide death toll to 1,364 — a bump of four more than the health department had reported on Friday morning. Of those latest deaths, 18 were in South Florida. Nine more people died in Miami-Dade, bringing the county’s death toll to 367, the highest in the state. Five more people died in Broward, raising the county’s death toll to 204. Palm Beach County reported four new deaths, bringing the county’s count to 195. Monroe had held steady at three deaths in the Florida Keys. The number of deaths being reported by the state Department of Health may be incomplete. The list of coronavirus deaths being compiled by Florida’s medical examiners has shown the death count was up to 10 percent higher than what the Florida Department of Health has released. In addition to the 18 new deaths in South Florida’s tri-county area, the other 32 people who tested positive and died from Covid-19 were in Charlotte, Clay, Escambia, Flagler, Manatee, Nassau, Orange, Pinellas, St. Lucie, Suwannee and Volusia counties. Of the statewide total of Covid-19 confirmed cases, 34,555 are Florida residents — a rise of 726 since Friday — and 908 are non-residents who were diagnosed or isolated in the state. That’s nine more non-residents in the count since Friday.
2 May 2020 20.13 BST The question of when to reopen schools has been widely discussed over the last few weeks. The closing of schools has not only disrupted education but has also added strain on parents who must look after children who would usually be in a classroom. While fatality rates from Covid-19 are significantly lower among children than adults, Austin Beutner, the superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District, told CNN on Saturday that it is not just students who would be taken into consideration. “One school with 500 individuals [is] connected to a quarter million people,” Beutner told CNN. “We don’t want the quarter million people bringing the virus into the school and the school to spread and be a petri dish to share with the rest of the community.” California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, has discussed reopening the state’s schools in July or August. But Beutner said such a move would be complicated. “It’s not just as simple as spreading the desks apart,” he said.
2 May 2020 20.01 BST There has been beautiful spring weather across much of the east coast today and the US Navy Blue Angels and US Air Force Thunderbirds completed a flypast over several cities - including Atlanta, Baltimore and Washington DC – in tribute to healthcare workers during the Covid-19 pandemic. Drivers stopped on a freeway in Atlanta to observe the flypast but there were concerns that crowds, already boosted by the good weather, could help the spread of Covid-19. In DC, people flocked to the National Mall to watch the planes overhead. Not a lot of social distancing happening on the National Mall right now ahead of the Blue Angels flyover.
Not sure this is exactly the best way to honor COVID workers but... pic.twitter.com/tanVB5c82d — Justin McCarthy🌹🌅 (@jaymac1893) May 2, 2020
2 May 2020 19.48 BST Tara Read says original complaint did not accuse Biden of assault The former Senate staffer who claims Joe Biden sexually assaulted her in 1993 says the original complaint against the Democrats’ presumptive presidential candidate did not accuse him of assault. Tara Reade. Photograph: Donald Thompson/AP “I remember talking about him wanting me to serve drinks because he liked my legs and thought I was pretty and it made me uncomfortable,” Reade told the Associated Press. “I know that I was too scared to write about the sexual assault.” She added: “The main word I use – and I know I didn’t use sexual harassment– I used ‘uncomfortable.’ And I remember ‘retaliation.’” The distinction is important because if the original report resurfaces it will not reflect her current allegation, that the former US vice-president sexually assaulted her. Reade says that in 1993 Biden pushed her against a wall and assaulted her, penetrating her with his fingers. Three people close to Reade have said she mentioned the incident to them in the past. Last year, Reade and seven other women publicly accused Biden of gestures that made them uncomfortable. Reade did not then mention the alleged assault. On Friday, in a Medium post, Biden said the claims “aren’t true. This never happened.” He also spoke to MSNBC, and appealed to the National Archives to find the complaint Reade mentioned. The Archives said it wouldn’t have the report, which it said would rest with the Senate. The Trump campaign accused Democrats of a “double standard”, comparing their defence of Biden with their approach to a sexual assault claim against Trump supreme court nominee Brett Kavanaugh in late 2018. Trump has faced multiple claims of sexual misconduct and assault. At a White House briefing on Friday, new press secretary Kayleigh McEnany sought to portray the claims, which the president denies, as old news. Who is Tara Reade and what are her allegations against Joe Biden? Read more
Updated at 00.26 BST
2 May 2020 19.19 BST Joe Biden has waded into the dispute between the US women’s national soccer team and the US Soccer federation. On Friday, US district judge R Gary Klausne threw out the players’ unequal pay claim against US soccer’s governing body. To @USWNT: don’t give up this fight. This is not over yet.
To @USSoccer: equal pay, now. Or else when I'm president, you can go elsewhere for World Cup funding. https://t.co/XK6t9oM94k — Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) May 2, 2020 “Don’t give up this fight,” Biden wrote on Twitter on Saturday. “This is not over yet.” The presumptive Democratic candidate for president then turned his attention to US Soccer. “To @USSoccer: equal pay, now,” he wrote. “Or else when I’m president, you can go elsewhere for World Cup funding.” In March 2019, 28 members of the USWNT filed a lawsuit in California seeking equal pay and treatment, in addition to damages of $66m including back pay. The group, which included some of the best players in the world such as Megan Rapinoe, Alex Morgan and Carli Lloyd, also sought compensation for any player who has appeared for the US since February 2015. “We are shocked and disappointed with today’s decision, but we will not give up our hard work for equal pay,” Molly Levinson, spokeswoman for the women’s players, said on Friday after the decision. “We are confident in our case and steadfast in our commitment to ensuring that girls and women who play this sport will not be valued as lesser just because of their gender.” Klausne said the USWNT players had rejected a chance to be paid under the same terms as their male counterparts. “The history of negotiations between the parties demonstrates that the WNT rejected an offer to be paid under the same pay-to-play structure as the MNT, and the WNT was willing to forgo higher bonuses for benefits, such as greater base compensation and the guarantee of a higher number of contracted players,” Klausner wrote. The judge did, however, allow allegations that the USWNT were subject to discriminatory working conditions, and those claims will now go to trial in federal court next month. Klausner left intact allegations the USWNT players received inferior travel, accommodation and medical treatment compared to the men. The US won the Women’s World Cup last summer, retaining the title they captured in 2015. The US men’s team, who have supported the USWNT lawsuit, failed to qualify for the 2018 World Cup.
2 May 2020 18.59 BST CNN has revealed that Michael Caputo, a spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services and a staunch ally of Donald Trump sent multiple sexist and derogatory tweets over the last few years. He has since deleted them. Caputo, who worked on Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and is now central to the government’s messaging on Covid-19, called multiple women “dogface” and told another one to “go f**k yourself”. He called Alexandra Chalupa, a Democratic consultant, a “crone” and a “nutty hag”. Caputo responded to CNN’s investigation by telling the broadcaster: “I stopped caring about what handwringing, virtue signaling leftists think of me after their 59th death threat against my family. Have fun with this while I’m fighting a deadly pandemic 24/7.” Thank you Michael. You also! https://t.co/VFi6Nhj3zG — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 2, 2020 Trump did not address the CNN story directly but did respond to a tweet from Caputo on Friday calling the president “a fearless man”. Trump wrote on Saturday: “Thank you Michael. You also!”
2 May 2020 18.43 BST A Fox News reporter, John Roberts, has tweeted that a senior intelligence source tells him Covid-19 was created in a Wuhan lab. A Senior Intelligence Source tells me there is agreement among most of the 17 Intelligence agencies that COVID-19 originated in the Wuhan lab. The source stressed that the release is believed to be a MISTAKE, and was not intentional. — John Roberts (@johnrobertsFox) May 2, 2020 The tweet lends support to a theory long put forth by Donald Trump, although the US president has repeatedly declined to provide details to back up his assertion. In a follow-up tweet, Roberts said: “Sources say not all 17 intelligence agencies agree that the lab was the source of the virus because there is not yet a definitive “smoking gun”. But confidence is high among 70-75% of the agencies.” On Thursday, a rare on-the-record statement from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated no such assessment has been made and continues to “rigorously examine” whether the outbreak “began through contact with infected animals or if it was the result of an accident at a laboratory in Wuhan”.
2 May 2020 17.51 BST The organization that runs the Auschwitz memorial has condemned the appearance at an anti-lockdown rally in Chicago’s Loop district of a picket sign bearing a Nazi slogan displayed above the entrance of the concentration camp. A demonstrator attending the rally, where hundreds of people protested against the state’s lockdown and social distancing measures, was photographed carrying a sign bearing the words “Arbeit macht frei, JB”. The German phrase translates as “work sets you free”, with JB referring to the Illinois governor, JB Pritzker, who is of Jewish descent. At the ‘Re-open Illinois’ rally, these two signs were seen.
Pritzker,
Who is being called Hitler with a swastika next to his name, is Jewish.
‘Arbeit Macht Frei’ translates to ‘work sets you free’ - it’s literally from the ithe Auschwitz concentration camp.
This is just.... pic.twitter.com/K4FhmwYla2 — Sana Saeed (@SanaSaeed) May 2, 2020 The font of both instances of the letter “B” on the picket sign bore a striking resemblance to the shape of the letter “B” on the sign above the gates of Auschwitz, the largest of the German Nazi concentration camps and extermination centers, where more than 1.1 million men, women and children were murdered. The official Auschwitz memorial Twitter account condemned the gesture, writing: “‘Arbeit macht frei’ was a false, cynical illusion the SS gave to prisoners of Auschwitz. Those words became one of the icons of human hatred. It’s painful to see this symbol instrumentalised and used again to spread hate. It’s a symptom of moral and intellectual degeneration.”


theguardian--2020-05-02--Michael Lewis: ‘Trump is like a psycho dad to America’

Back in December , the bestselling author Michael Lewis was asked by the Observer what it would take for America to want a leader who understood the importance of scientific knowledge .
“ I think a pandemic might do it.
” he replied .
“ Something that could affect millions of people indiscriminately and from which you could not insulate yourself even if you were rich.
” Lewis has a long track record for spotting trends .
He was ahead of the game in his 1989 debut book Liar ’ s Poker , which revealed the scandalous risk-taking practised on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ document the monomaniacal ambition of Silicon Valley ( The New New Thing ) and the fledgling business of sports analytics ( Moneyball ) , but never has his cultural antenna tuned into the future with greater accuracy than that particular remark .
Now that the coronavirus is here , Lewis has further predictions .
He says that financial speculators will be looking to the White House for tips to exploit the economic crisis that the pandemic has unleashed .
“ Given what we know about Trump and his network of cronies , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ how many of them are out there with some advanced notice of what he ’ s going to say , and are taking advantage of it.
” While he may not be overly concerned with the complexities of good governance , Trump has maintained a firm focus on a much more visible , if volatile , yardstick of success : the US stock market .
On 12 February , the main US stock indexes recorded all-time highs , and the president was a happy man .
Less than two weeks later , as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ approaching pandemic , there was a spectacular crash , followed by a series of further reversals .
Suddenly , Trump ’ s chief selling point looked as vulnerable as his hairdo .
But every stock market crash is an opportunity for the canny speculator .
Lewis ’ s bestselling book , The Big Short , later turned into an Oscar-winning film , was a classic on the subject .
It told the story of the hedge fund managers and traders who bet against the market leading up to the 2007-8 financial crisis .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ will surely be studying Trump ’ s Twitter account .
“ There are bound to be smart hedge funds or high-frequency traders who have figured out how to time the tweets and the market reactions .
Trump has the ability to move sectors up and down by recommending a drug or saying that he ’ s solved the problem between the Saudis and the Russians , and the oil market ’ s going to recover .
“ I keep waiting for the story that they found the guy or guys who are doing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ all Trump ’ s many missteps , the political impact of Covid-19 remains far from certain .
The US leads the world with over a million cases and more than 60,000 deaths .
But has it awoken the American public to their president ’ s methodical shortcomings ?
Or has it simply reinforced the ideological sectarianism that is a feature of a deeply divided country ?
“ It has been party politicised , ” says Lewis , “ but less successfully than anything else that ’ s come down the pike .
You @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
You see friction between Trump and Republican legislators .
He should ’ ve had a big spike up in his poll numbers .
Instead , he ’ s drifting down.
” Liberal critics have come to realise that challenging Trump often serves only to rally his supporters .
But , in recent weeks , tactical circumspection has been completely abandoned .
In a piece in the latest issue of The Atlantic , entitled We Are Living in a Failed State , the respected commentator George Packer writes : “ The crisis demanded @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and collective .
The United States reacted instead like Pakistan or Belarus — like a country with shoddy infrastructure and a dysfunctional government whose leaders were too corrupt or stupid to head off mass suffering.
” The nature of that shoddiness and dysfunction was the issue that Lewis explored in The Fifth Risk , his coruscating exposé of the depletion of US government agencies by the Trump administration .
The book , published in 2018 , sought to educate Americans in the many vital roles the much-pilloried federal bureaucracy performs – from maintaining @ @ @ @ @ @ @ weather forecasts .
Nowhere was ignorance of these responsibilities quite as glaring as within the Trump camp when it walked into the White House .
The presidential team had next to no interest in studying the outgoing Obama administration ’ s painstaking transition documents .
And ever since , Trump has displayed a barely concealed indifference to the government he is supposed to lead , either leaving key posts vacant or appointing ill-suited hangers-on or business people with obvious conflicts of interest to head up different departments , agencies and regulatory bodies .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ has left him ill-prepared to mobilise a coordinated national response to Covid-19 .
Lewis rates Trump ’ s performance at the outset of the pandemic as “ appallingly bad ” , not least because he had already dismantled a programme called Predict that was designed to anticipate the movement of viruses around the world .
“ But the big thing he did , ” Lewis adds , “ was to remove the pandemic response team from the White House .
So he cost us time in the beginning , and time is lives @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than an ordinarily inept man would ’ ve cost us because , in addition to being inept , he dug his heels in and pretended for weeks that he wasn ’ t inept .
And those weeks were expensive.
” Trump ’ s downplaying or outright denial of the Covid-19 threat is well-documented .
From mid-January to mid-March , he seemed to view it as something that could be talked away , as though it would disappear through the sheer force of his bluster .
Since then he has been forced by events @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , though , has been rather muddled : one moment he emphasises the need to support the lockdown , the next he encourages protesters to reject individual state restrictions .
“ He should be speaking for the whole country and he ’ s not , ” says Lewis , “ but having said that , he hasn ’ t been as hostile to science as he might have been.
” By this , Lewis means that Trump has largely stood by Anthony Fauci , the key member of the White House coronavirus task @ @ @ @ @ @ @ most popular man in America ” .
The celebrated immunologist has certainly spearheaded a much-needed revival of expertise , but nonetheless Trump ’ s newfound support for science is not an obvious improvement on his previous hostility .
After all , the cause of empirical research was hardly advanced by his suggestion that injecting disinfectant could be the answer to the pathogen .
Lewis concedes the point , yet sees signs that Trump , or those around him , are trying to scramble together a functioning operation to deal with the pandemic , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ alternative .
“ It ’ s interesting to watch , ” Lewis says , “ because I think he ’ s figuring out in his reptilian brain that he actually has to solve a problem , rather than just let it all happen and then make up a story after the fact.
” The problem for Trump , whose speciality is presidential edict by tweet , is that he ’ s never had much respect for policy and planning .
The degradation of federal planning and infrastructure is not a new development .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ s day , but Trump has rapidly accelerated the process .
He is , says Lewis , “ the last station on the Reagan Express ” .
An illustrative example of his approach to government was his appointment of Rick Perry as the head of Department of Energy – a huge bureaucracy that , among other things , is responsible for nuclear weapons and waste .
Perry ’ s main claim to relevance was that , as an unimpressive presidential candidate , he promised to close down the Department of Energy , without @ @ @ @ @ @ @ also unsuccessfully sought to install Barry Myers , CEO of AccuWeather , as head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration , which oversees the National Weather Service ( NWS ) .
At AccuWeather , which his family owns , Myers had lobbied to undermine the NWS .
“ I don ’ t think it ’ s quite as cynical as Trump auctioning off the government to business interests , ” cautions Lewis .
“ It ‘ s more that he had no interest whatsoever himself , paid no attention to it , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to put the right people into the various positions .
Who then comes rushing in ?
The people who have a financial interest.
” Such behaviour has led Lewis to conclude that Trump never expected to become president .
The campaign was just a brand-building exercise .
“ He ’ s the dog who caught the car , ” he says .
But if that were the case , wouldn ’ t he welcome the release of electoral defeat in November ?
“ I ’ m guessing he ’ s worried about going @ @ @ @ @ @ @ control the White House , ” Lewis says .
What ’ s clear is that Trump has confounded , not to say dumbfounded , many experienced observers .
At the outset , the received wisdom was that the established processes of the American political system , and the sheer weight of responsibility , would force the maverick to conform to presidential expectations .
Not only has that not proven the case , but Trump has redefined the whole concept of presidential politics .
The fact that no one knows what he ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ all his advisers , has become the means by which the White House operates .
“ The model I have in my head right now for our society is the model of a family with kind of a psycho , alcoholic dad , ” says Lewis .
“ It is the story of how the country compensated for its president , which is a really bizarre story to tell about an American crisis .
If you go back in history , it ’ s usually a president who in some ways leads the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is being dragged along.
” But being forced in the direction he never wanted to go is not a role that a man of Trump ’ s outsized ego will readily accept .
He knows that if he is to avoid being the Neville Chamberlain of the pandemic , he has to wrest control of the narrative .
To that end , he has directed fire at China ( which does , indeed , have questions to answer ) and dog-whistled the growing libertarian revolt .
Ultimately , however , he will be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his favoured Dow Jones index – though that doesn ’ t look great at the moment – but of the death count of Americans .
As Lewis puts it : “ If this pandemic does not wake Americans up to the importance of good government , then nothing will.
” Michael Lewis is the author of The Fifth Risk , published by Penguin .
The new season of his Against the Rules podcast show launches on 5 May

Back in December, the bestselling author Michael Lewis was asked by the Observer what it would take for America to want a leader who understood the importance of scientific knowledge.
“I think a pandemic might do it.” he replied. “Something that could affect millions of people indiscriminately and from which you could not insulate yourself even if you were rich.”
Lewis has a long track record for spotting trends. He was ahead of the game in his 1989 debut book Liar’s Poker, which revealed the scandalous risk-taking practised on Wall Street. He went on to document the monomaniacal ambition of Silicon Valley (The New New Thing) and the fledgling business of sports analytics (Moneyball), but never has his cultural antenna tuned into the future with greater accuracy than that particular remark.
Now that the coronavirus is here, Lewis has further predictions. He says that financial speculators will be looking to the White House for tips to exploit the economic crisis that the pandemic has unleashed.
“Given what we know about Trump and his network of cronies,” he says, “you just wonder how many of them are out there with some advanced notice of what he’s going to say, and are taking advantage of it.”
While he may not be overly concerned with the complexities of good governance, Trump has maintained a firm focus on a much more visible, if volatile, yardstick of success: the US stock market.
On 12 February, the main US stock indexes recorded all-time highs, and the president was a happy man. Less than two weeks later, as Wall Street realised the dimensions of the approaching pandemic, there was a spectacular crash, followed by a series of further reversals. Suddenly, Trump’s chief selling point looked as vulnerable as his hairdo.
But every stock market crash is an opportunity for the canny speculator. Lewis’s bestselling book, The Big Short, later turned into an Oscar-winning film, was a classic on the subject. It told the story of the hedge fund managers and traders who bet against the market leading up to the 2007-8 financial crisis. Now, says Lewis, such people will surely be studying Trump’s Twitter account.
“There are bound to be smart hedge funds or high-frequency traders who have figured out how to time the tweets and the market reactions. Trump has the ability to move sectors up and down by recommending a drug or saying that he’s solved the problem between the Saudis and the Russians, and the oil market’s going to recover.
“I keep waiting for the story that they found the guy or guys who are doing this,” he says.
For all Trump’s many missteps, the political impact of Covid-19 remains far from certain. The US leads the world with over a million cases and more than 60,000 deaths. But has it awoken the American public to their president’s methodical shortcomings? Or has it simply reinforced the ideological sectarianism that is a feature of a deeply divided country?
“It has been party politicised,” says Lewis, “but less successfully than anything else that’s come down the pike. You see friction between Trump and Republican governors. You see friction between Trump and Republican legislators. He should’ve had a big spike up in his poll numbers. Instead, he’s drifting down.”
Liberal critics have come to realise that challenging Trump often serves only to rally his supporters. But, in recent weeks, tactical circumspection has been completely abandoned, and strong accusations of shoddiness and dysfunction have been levelled. The nature of that shoddiness and dysfunction was the issue that Lewis explored in The Fifth Risk, his coruscating exposé of the depletion of US government agencies by the Trump administration. The book, published in 2018, sought to educate Americans in the many vital roles the much-pilloried federal bureaucracy performs – from maintaining nuclear waste to assembling the data for weather forecasts.
‘I think Trump’s figuring out in his reptilian brain that he actually has to solve a problem.’ Photograph: Carlos Barría/Reuters
Nowhere was ignorance of these responsibilities quite as glaring as within the Trump camp when it walked into the White House. The presidential team had next to no interest in studying the outgoing Obama administration’s painstaking transition documents.
And ever since, Trump has displayed a barely concealed indifference to the government he is supposed to lead, either leaving key posts vacant or appointing ill-suited hangers-on or business people with obvious conflicts of interest to head up different departments, agencies and regulatory bodies.
It’s a laissez-faire attitude that has left him ill-prepared to mobilise a coordinated national response to Covid-19. Lewis rates Trump’s performance at the outset of the pandemic as “appallingly bad”, not least because he had already dismantled a programme called Predict that was designed to anticipate the movement of viruses around the world.
“But the big thing he did,” Lewis adds, “was to remove the pandemic response team from the White House. So he cost us time in the beginning, and time is lives. He cost us much more time than an ordinarily inept man would’ve cost us because, in addition to being inept, he dug his heels in and pretended for weeks that he wasn’t inept. And those weeks were expensive.”
Trump’s downplaying or outright denial of the Covid-19 threat is well-documented. From mid-January to mid-March, he seemed to view it as something that could be talked away, as though it would disappear through the sheer force of his bluster. Since then he has been forced by events to change tack. The strategic line, though, has been rather muddled: one moment he emphasises the need to support the lockdown, the next he encourages protesters to reject individual state restrictions.
“He should be speaking for the whole country and he’s not,” says Lewis, “but having said that, he hasn’t been as hostile to science as he might have been.”
By this, Lewis means that Trump has largely stood by Anthony Fauci, the key member of the White House coronavirus task force, whom Lewis calls “the most popular man in America”. The celebrated immunologist has certainly spearheaded a much-needed revival of expertise, but nonetheless Trump’s newfound support for science is not an obvious improvement on his previous hostility. After all, the cause of empirical research was hardly advanced by his suggestion that injecting disinfectant could be the answer to the pathogen.
Lewis concedes the point, yet sees signs that Trump, or those around him, are trying to scramble together a functioning operation to deal with the pandemic, if only because there is now no alternative.
“It’s interesting to watch,” Lewis says, “because I think he’s figuring out in his reptilian brain that he actually has to solve a problem, rather than just let it all happen and then make up a story after the fact.”
The problem for Trump, whose speciality is presidential edict by tweet, is that he’s never had much respect for policy and planning. The degradation of federal planning and infrastructure is not a new development. It extends back to Ronald Reagan’s day, but Trump has rapidly accelerated the process. He is, says Lewis, “the last station on the Reagan Express”.
An illustrative example of his approach to government was his appointment of Rick Perry as the head of Department of Energy – a huge bureaucracy that, among other things, is responsible for nuclear weapons and waste. Perry’s main claim to relevance was that, as an unimpressive presidential candidate, he promised to close down the Department of Energy, without actually knowing what it did.
Trump also unsuccessfully sought to install Barry Myers, CEO of AccuWeather, as head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which oversees the National Weather Service (NWS). At AccuWeather, which his family owns, Myers had lobbied to undermine the NWS.
“I don’t think it’s quite as cynical as Trump auctioning off the government to business interests,” cautions Lewis. “It‘s more that he had no interest whatsoever himself, paid no attention to it, and so he had no positive motivation to put the right people into the various positions. Who then comes rushing in? The people who have a financial interest.”
The US reacted [to the pandemic] like a country whose leaders were too corrupt or stupid to head off mass suffering. Michael Lewis
Such behaviour has led Lewis to conclude that Trump never expected to become president. The campaign was just a brand-building exercise. “He’s the dog who caught the car,” he says. But if that were the case, wouldn’t he welcome the release of electoral defeat in November?
“I’m guessing he’s worried about going to jail if he doesn’t control the White House,” Lewis says.
What’s clear is that Trump has confounded, not to say dumbfounded, many experienced observers. At the outset, the received wisdom was that the established processes of the American political system, and the sheer weight of responsibility, would force the maverick to conform to presidential expectations.
Not only has that not proven the case, but Trump has redefined the whole concept of presidential politics. The fact that no one knows what he’s going to do next, least of all his advisers, has become the means by which the White House operates.
“The model I have in my head right now for our society is the model of a family with kind of a psycho, alcoholic dad,” says Lewis. “It is the story of how the country compensated for its president, which is a really bizarre story to tell about an American crisis. If you go back in history, it’s usually a president who in some ways leads the response. In this case, he is being dragged along.”
But being forced in the direction he never wanted to go is not a role that a man of Trump’s outsized ego will readily accept. He knows that if he is to avoid being the Neville Chamberlain of the pandemic, he has to wrest control of the narrative.
To that end, he has directed fire at China (which does, indeed, have questions to answer) and dog-whistled the growing libertarian revolt. Ultimately, however, he will be judged on the numbers. Not of his favoured Dow Jones index – though that doesn’t look great at the moment – but of the death count of Americans.
As Lewis puts it: “If this pandemic does not wake Americans up to the importance of good government, then nothing will.”
Michael Lewis is the author of The Fifth Risk, published by Penguin. The new season of his Against the Rules podcast show launches on 5 May


theguardian--2020-05-03--Arguing with Zombies review: Paul Krugman trumps the Republicans

The Nobel-winning economist and New York Times columnist is at the top of his game in eviscerating those who have dragged America down The New York Times columnist Paul Krugman has four essential rules for successful punditry : • None Don ’ t be afraid to talk about motives Those maxims have consistently made Krugman the most intelligent and the most useful New York Times pundit , at least since Frank Rich wrote his final must-read column 11 years ago .
A new collection of Krugman ’ s pieces , therefore , is a timely reminder that actual knowledge and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ rarest qualities in mainstream journalism today .
Krugman ’ s enemies are the “ zombie ideas ” of his book ’ s title , especially the belief that budget deficits are always bad and the notion that tax cuts for the rich can ever benefit anyone other than the plutocrats who never stop pleading for them .
The same tired arguments in favor of coddling the rich have been rolled out over and over again , by Republican presidents from Ronald Reagan to Donald Trump , even though there has never been a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
These relentless efforts over five decades culminated in the Trump tax cut , memorably described by the political consultant Rick Wilson as a masterwork of “ gigantic government giveaways , unfunded spending , massive debt and deficits , and a catalogue of crony capitalist freebies ” .
Wilson also identified the billionaires ’ effect on the nation ’ s capital .
Washington , he wrote , has become “ the drug-resistant syphilis of political climates , largely impervious to treatment and highly contagious ” .
Krugman ’ s columns act like a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ restoring the importance of the economic sciences that have been so successfully displaced by brain-dead Republican ideology .
Very few political columns are worth reading 12 months after they are written – the New York Times grandee James Reston accurately titled one of his collections Sketches in the Sand .
But Krugman ’ s book proves that he , a Nobel-prize winning economist , shares two rare qualities with George Orwell , the novelist who also wrote much of the best journalism of the 20th century : deep intelligence and genuine prescience .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ : “ When you ’ re confronting bad-faith arguments , the public should be informed not just these arguments are wrong , but they they are in fact being made in bad faith.
” It ’ s “ important to point out that the people who predicted runaway inflation from the Fed ’ s bond buying were wrong .
But it ’ s also important to point out that none of them have been willing to admit that they were wrong.
” Krugman also writes that “ even asking the right questions like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ ” will spur quite a few conservatives to “ denounce you as un-American ” .
And it ’ s worse for climate scientists , who face persecution for speaking the truth about our continued dependence on fossil fuels , or social scientists studying the causes of gun violence : “ From 1996 to 2017 the Centers for Disease Control were literally forbidden to fund research into firearm injuries and deaths.
” The history of the last half-century is mostly about how the unbridled greed of the top 1 % has perverted American @ @ @ @ @ @ @ almost impossible to implement rational policies that benefit a majority of Americans .
To Krugman , an “ interlocking network of media organizations and think tanks that serves the interests of rightwing billionaires ” has “ effectively taken over the GOP ” and “ movement ‘ conservatism ’ is what keeps zombie ideas , like belief in the magic of tax cuts , alive .
“ It ’ s not just that Trump has assembled an administration of the worst and the dimmest .
The truth is that the modern GOP doesn ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , whatever their politics .
It prefers charlatans and cranks , who are its kind of people.
” Even now , as the incompetent kleptocrats who have filled up the White House and every federal agency confront the greatest worldwide health emergency of modern times , they have maintained their laser-like focus on the interests of the rich .
As the Guardian has reported , “ Millionaires and billionaires are set to reap more than 80 % of the benefits from a change to the tax law Republicans put in the coronavirus economic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ some of the nation ’ s wealthiest to avoid nearly $ 82bn of tax liability in 2020.
” And as the great labor reporter Steven Greenhouse pointed out this week , with Trump ’ s latest executive order to keep meatpacking plants open regardless of the consequences to their employees , the president is literally “ marching many meatpacking workers off to slaughter ” .
Never before in modern American history has the plutocracy so blatantly embraced the idea that profits matter much more than people – especially when the idiotic reopening of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it ’ s safe will clearly kill more poor people than anyone else .
When I was 15 , I acted as the translator for my uncle Jerry ’ s family on a tour of the grand chateaux of the Loire Valley .
As we traipsed through one spectacular example of conspicuous consumption after another , my deeply progressive uncle kept repeating the same question : “ What took them so long to start the revolution ?
” If our present calamity is finally enough to force the climate-change-denying , poor-people-hating Republican party @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , one can only hope the popular imagination will be stirred as it was in Paris in 1793 .

The New York Times columnist Paul Krugman has four essential rules for successful punditry:
Stay with the easy stuff
Write in English
Be honest about dishonesty
Don’t be afraid to talk about motives
Those maxims have consistently made Krugman the most intelligent and the most useful New York Times pundit, at least since Frank Rich wrote his final must-read column 11 years ago. A new collection of Krugman’s pieces, therefore, is a timely reminder that actual knowledge and ordinary common sense are two of the rarest qualities in mainstream journalism today.
Krugman’s enemies are the “zombie ideas” of his book’s title, especially the belief that budget deficits are always bad and the notion that tax cuts for the rich can ever benefit anyone other than the plutocrats who never stop pleading for them.
The same tired arguments in favor of coddling the rich have been rolled out over and over again, by Republican presidents from Ronald Reagan to Donald Trump, even though there has never been a shred of serious evidence to support them.
These relentless efforts over five decades culminated in the Trump tax cut, memorably described by the political consultant Rick Wilson as a masterwork of “gigantic government giveaways, unfunded spending, massive debt and deficits, and a catalogue of crony capitalist freebies”.
Wilson also identified the billionaires’ effect on the nation’s capital. Washington, he wrote, has become “the drug-resistant syphilis of political climates, largely impervious to treatment and highly contagious”.
Krugman’s columns act like a steady stream of antibiotics, aimed at restoring the importance of the economic sciences that have been so successfully displaced by brain-dead Republican ideology.
Very few political columns are worth reading 12 months after they are written – the New York Times grandee James Reston accurately titled one of his collections Sketches in the Sand. But Krugman’s book proves that he, a Nobel-prize winning economist, shares two rare qualities with George Orwell, the novelist who also wrote much of the best journalism of the 20th century: deep intelligence and genuine prescience.
The modern GOP doesn’t want to hear from serious economists, whatever their politics. It prefers charlatans and cranks Paul Krugman
Krugman is at his Orwellian best here: “When you’re confronting bad-faith arguments, the public should be informed not just these arguments are wrong, but they they are in fact being made in bad faith.”
It’s “important to point out that the people who predicted runaway inflation from the Fed’s bond buying were wrong. But it’s also important to point out that none of them have been willing to admit that they were wrong.”
Krugman also writes that “even asking the right questions like ‘what is happening to income inequality’” will spur quite a few conservatives to “denounce you as un-American”. And it’s worse for climate scientists, who face persecution for speaking the truth about our continued dependence on fossil fuels, or social scientists studying the causes of gun violence: “From 1996 to 2017 the Centers for Disease Control were literally forbidden to fund research into firearm injuries and deaths.”
The history of the last half-century is mostly about how the unbridled greed of the top 1% has perverted American democracy so successfully, it has become almost impossible to implement rational policies that benefit a majority of Americans.
To Krugman, an “interlocking network of media organizations and think tanks that serves the interests of rightwing billionaires” has “effectively taken over the GOP” and “movement ‘conservatism’ is what keeps zombie ideas, like belief in the magic of tax cuts, alive.
“It’s not just that Trump has assembled an administration of the worst and the dimmest. The truth is that the modern GOP doesn’t want to hear from serious economists, whatever their politics. It prefers charlatans and cranks, who are its kind of people.”
Donald Trump, Mike Pence and Trump’s economic adviser Peter Navarro look on during a coronavirus briefing. Photograph: Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images
Even now, as the incompetent kleptocrats who have filled up the White House and every federal agency confront the greatest worldwide health emergency of modern times, they have maintained their laser-like focus on the interests of the rich. As the Guardian has reported, “Millionaires and billionaires are set to reap more than 80% of the benefits from a change to the tax law Republicans put in the coronavirus economic relief package … the change will allow some of the nation’s wealthiest to avoid nearly $82bn of tax liability in 2020.”
And as the great labor reporter Steven Greenhouse pointed out this week, with Trump’s latest executive order to keep meatpacking plants open regardless of the consequences to their employees, the president is literally “marching many meatpacking workers off to slaughter”.
Never before in modern American history has the plutocracy so blatantly embraced the idea that profits matter much more than people – especially when the idiotic reopening of the economy weeks before health experts say it’s safe will clearly kill more poor people than anyone else.
When I was 15, I acted as the translator for my uncle Jerry’s family on a tour of the grand chateaux of the Loire Valley. As we traipsed through one spectacular example of conspicuous consumption after another, my deeply progressive uncle kept repeating the same question: “What took them so long to start the revolution?”
If our present calamity is finally enough to force the climate-change-denying, poor-people-hating Republican party from the White House and the Senate, one can only hope the popular imagination will be stirred as it was in Paris in 1793.


theguardian--2020-05-03--'Are you a spoiler?': why critics fear Amash's Libertarian bid may ensure a Trump win

“ He has no idea what ’ s gon na hit him as a third-party challenger , ” says Ralph Nader , who knows better than most after running for US president four times .
“ The public has bought into ‘ the spoiler ’ .
The public wants to vote for a winner.
” Nader is considering the prospects of Justin Amash , a congressman from Michigan who announced this week he is seeking the Libertarian nomination for the White House .
Amash reasoned that millions of Americans do not feel well represented by either major party or their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Democratic nominee Joe Biden .
The 40-year-old , who quit the Republican party to become an independent and voted for Trump ’ s impeachment , told the Associated Press : “ It ’ s important that we present them with that alternative … The first step to moving toward no political parties or all independent candidates is to provide some big challengers to the main two parties right now.
” It is not controversial to assert that Amash has no chance of winning .
But it is also notable that in 2016 in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Trump took a key electoral college win over Hillary Clinton by 10,704 votes , or less than a quarter of a percentage point .
Gary Johnson , the Libertarian , won 172,136 votes – or 3.6 % .
Even Jill Stein , for the Green party , took 51,463 and 1.1 % .
Amash could make a big difference .
The parlour game of the week for Washington pundits , therefore , involved trying to weigh whether Amash ’ s candidacy would hurt Biden or Trump more .
He also follows in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have struggled to break through in a society that prizes choice but has been slow to embrace the type of multiparty democracies seen in Europe .
The only third-party candidate to gain more than a quarter of the vote was a man who had already occupied the White House .
Having been denied the Republican nomination in 1912 , former president Theodore Roosevelt ran as a Progressive or “ Bull Moose ” party candidate and won 27 % , not enough to deny Woodrow Wilson the presidency .
Robert La Follette , Strom @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Ron Paul are among those who tried and failed to break the duopoly .
In 1992 , Ross Perot , an eccentric Texan billionaire , took 19 % of the vote , arguably denying George HW Bush a second term and putting Bill Clinton in the Oval Office .
Perot ran again in 1996 but only garnered 8 % .
In 2000 , Nader ’ s Green Party bid took less than 3 % of the vote but was widely blamed for having cost Democrat Al Gore vital support and contributed to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , a fork in the road that had dizzying implications for the Iraq war , climate crisis and the entire shape of the 21st century .
Bob Shrum , a senior adviser for the Gore campaign , said this week : “ I haven ’ t forgiven him .
I think whatever good he did in the early part of his life is more than made up , for example , by the Iraq war .
He hurt because he attacked Gore from the left : that was his argument .
I don @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the same position .
The assumption that he would take votes from Biden rather than Trump seems dubious to me at best.
” Now 86 , Nader is a consumer advocate who still follows politics closely , firing off columns and newsletters .
He denies that his candidacy handed the presidency to Bush .
“ There are all kinds of other reasons that the Democrats lost , ” he said .
“ Gore doesn ’ t blame the Green Party at all .
He said : ‘ It ’ s us .
We @ @ @ @ @ @ @ state of Tennessee .
We bungled it in Florida.
’ On and on .
“ And then George Bush wasn ’ t elected , he was selected by five out of nine supreme court justices in a judicial coup d ’ etat [ following a dispute over the count in Florida ] .
The only way the Democratic party can explain its constant loss to the worst Republican party in history is to scapegoat the Greens .
It ’ s built into their DNA.
” Nader ran in 2004 and 2008 but polled @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Campaigning could be a frustrating experience , he recalls .
“ Almost all the interviews had nothing to do with my agenda , which was a precursor to Bernie Sanders ’ agenda – universal healthcare , free tuition , living wage , cracking down on corporate crime .
All they wanted to ask about was ‘ spoiler ’ and that ’ s partly because the Democratic party is much more scapegoating toward the small left parties than the Republican party is to the Libertarian party .
“ I don ’ t know whether @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by far the Democrats are much more aggressive to get third-party candidates like the Green Party off the ballot , harassing them , calling them spoilers and setting the media ’ s agenda for spoilers .
“ Even the European media would call me up and say : ‘ Do you think you ’ re helping George W Bush ?
Are you a spoiler ?
’ And I ’ d say : ‘ Spoiler ?
I ’ m trying to fight a spoiled political system.
’ A multi-party system creates more meaning for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and choices.
” Nader welcomes the entry of Amash and others as an expression of first amendment freedoms but is uncertain about the likely political consequences .
“ If he plays his cards right and he basically is viewed as the lawmaker who stood up to the foul mouth , snarling , lying , bungling betrayer of his own voters , then he will take more from Trump , ” he said of Amash .
“ But if he tries to appeal to all voters , then it ’ s another equation and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ happen.
” Johnson , a former governor of New Mexico , came third in 2012 and did so again in 2016 .
But it was the Green candidate , Stein , who was accused of robbing Clinton of the presidency after gaining more votes in Michigan and Wisconsin than Trump ’ s margin of victory in both states .
In Utah in 2016 , Evan McMullin , a former CIA operations officer , finished third in his home state with 21 % of the vote .
Now executive director of the pro-democracy group @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ You take criticism from both sides when you run as a third-party candidate or as an independent .
There are committed partisans on both sides , but there are also millions of Americans who are fed up with the two-party system and who don ’ t feel well-represented by either party .
They ’ re looking for something new.
” McMullin would like to see America move beyond the two-party system .
“ We need more parties and more open ballot access so that voters have more choices , ” he said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of such abundant choices in every aspect of our lives .
“ But when it comes to politics , we ’ re offered only two .
It doesn ’ t serve our country well to have only flavour A and flavour B and that ’ s it .
That won ’ t help us overcome modern challenges in healthcare , information warfare , employment and the national debt .
We need more competition and more ideas.
” Amash could prove attractive to small-government Republicans who already lean libertarian .
But the former Illinois @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in this year ’ s Republican primary , argues that this is not the time .
“ I think it ’ s a huge mistake , it ’ s the wrong thing to do , ” he said .
“ It will help get Trump elected .
Amash and I are friends , we ’ re colleagues , but he ’ s clearly putting what ’ s best for Justin Amash ahead of what ’ s best for the country .
If he does it , it ’ s a selfish thing for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ disappointing .
“ Disaffected Republicans and conservatives who don ’ t want to vote for Trump , if their only option is Biden , they ’ re going to have to hold their nose and vote for Biden .
But if these disaffected Republicans and conservatives now have another option , they ’ ll do it .
It will take votes away from Biden .
Here ’ s the thing : Amash knows that Donald Trump is an existential threat to this country .
He voted to impeach Trump.
” Walsh , who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it as a cult , looks forward to the day of multiparty democracy .
But first , he argues , Trump is the clear and present danger .
“ Justin Amash and I , we ’ re brothers in that we agree on almost all the issues .
I agree with Justin that both political parties suck .
I agree that our political system is broken .
But not this year .
“ This year , the biggest threat to the country is Donald Trump and all of us , from libertarians like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ta come together to make sure Trump loses .
And the we can start a third party or a fourth party or do whatever .
“ But right now , the only job for all of us is to get rid of Trump .
”

“He has no idea what’s gonna hit him as a third-party challenger,” says Ralph Nader, who knows better than most after running for US president four times. “The public has bought into ‘the spoiler’. The public wants to vote for a winner.”
Nader is considering the prospects of Justin Amash, a congressman from Michigan who announced this week he is seeking the Libertarian nomination for the White House. Amash reasoned that millions of Americans do not feel well represented by either major party or their candidates: Republican Donald Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.
The 40-year-old, who quit the Republican party to become an independent and voted for Trump’s impeachment, told the Associated Press: “It’s important that we present them with that alternative … The first step to moving toward no political parties or all independent candidates is to provide some big challengers to the main two parties right now.”
It is not controversial to assert that Amash has no chance of winning. But it is also notable that in 2016 in Amash’s home state, Michigan, Trump took a key electoral college win over Hillary Clinton by 10,704 votes, or less than a quarter of a percentage point. Gary Johnson, the Libertarian, won 172,136 votes – or 3.6%. Even Jill Stein, for the Green party, took 51,463 and 1.1%.
Amash could make a big difference. The parlour game of the week for Washington pundits, therefore, involved trying to weigh whether Amash’s candidacy would hurt Biden or Trump more.
He also follows in a long tradition of third-party campaigns that have struggled to break through in a society that prizes choice but has been slow to embrace the type of multiparty democracies seen in Europe.
The Democratic party is much more scapegoating toward the small left parties than Republicans are to the Libertarians Ralph Nader
The only third-party candidate to gain more than a quarter of the vote was a man who had already occupied the White House. Having been denied the Republican nomination in 1912, former president Theodore Roosevelt ran as a Progressive or “Bull Moose” party candidate and won 27%, not enough to deny Woodrow Wilson the presidency.
Robert La Follette, Strom Thurmond, George Wallace, Eugene McCarthy and Ron Paul are among those who tried and failed to break the duopoly. In 1992, Ross Perot, an eccentric Texan billionaire, took 19% of the vote, arguably denying George HW Bush a second term and putting Bill Clinton in the Oval Office. Perot ran again in 1996 but only garnered 8%.
In 2000, Nader’s Green Party bid took less than 3% of the vote but was widely blamed for having cost Democrat Al Gore vital support and contributed to George W Bush’s narrow win, a fork in the road that had dizzying implications for the Iraq war, climate crisis and the entire shape of the 21st century.
Bob Shrum, a senior adviser for the Gore campaign, said this week: “I haven’t forgiven him. I think whatever good he did in the early part of his life is more than made up, for example, by the Iraq war. He hurt because he attacked Gore from the left: that was his argument. I don’t know that Amash is in the same position. The assumption that he would take votes from Biden rather than Trump seems dubious to me at best.”
Ralph Nader speaks at Boston University in November 2000. Photograph: Amy E Conn/AP
Now 86, Nader is a consumer advocate who still follows politics closely, firing off columns and newsletters. He denies that his candidacy handed the presidency to Bush.
“There are all kinds of other reasons that the Democrats lost,” he said. “Gore doesn’t blame the Green Party at all. He said: ‘It’s us. We did it. I lost my home state of Tennessee. We bungled it in Florida.’ On and on.
“And then George Bush wasn’t elected, he was selected by five out of nine supreme court justices in a judicial coup d’etat [following a dispute over the count in Florida]. The only way the Democratic party can explain its constant loss to the worst Republican party in history is to scapegoat the Greens. It’s built into their DNA.”
Nader ran in 2004 and 2008 but polled less than 1% both times. Campaigning could be a frustrating experience, he recalls.
“Almost all the interviews had nothing to do with my agenda, which was a precursor to Bernie Sanders’ agenda – universal healthcare, free tuition, living wage, cracking down on corporate crime. All they wanted to ask about was ‘spoiler’ and that’s partly because the Democratic party is much more scapegoating toward the small left parties than the Republican party is to the Libertarian party.
“I don’t know whether that will happen this year, but by far the Democrats are much more aggressive to get third-party candidates like the Green Party off the ballot, harassing them, calling them spoilers and setting the media’s agenda for spoilers.
“Even the European media would call me up and say: ‘Do you think you’re helping George W Bush? Are you a spoiler?’ And I’d say: ‘Spoiler? I’m trying to fight a spoiled political system.’ A multi-party system creates more meaning for voters because it gives them more voices and choices.”
‘We need more parties’
Nader welcomes the entry of Amash and others as an expression of first amendment freedoms but is uncertain about the likely political consequences.
“If he plays his cards right and he basically is viewed as the lawmaker who stood up to the foul mouth, snarling, lying, bungling betrayer of his own voters, then he will take more from Trump,” he said of Amash. “But if he tries to appeal to all voters, then it’s another equation and nobody knows what’s going to happen.”
Johnson, a former governor of New Mexico, came third in 2012 and did so again in 2016. But it was the Green candidate, Stein, who was accused of robbing Clinton of the presidency after gaining more votes in Michigan and Wisconsin than Trump’s margin of victory in both states.
Evan McMullin campaigns in Draper, Utah, in October 2016. Photograph: Rick Bowmer/AP
In Utah in 2016, Evan McMullin, a former CIA operations officer, finished third in his home state with 21% of the vote.
Now executive director of the pro-democracy group Stand Up Republic, he said: “You take criticism from both sides when you run as a third-party candidate or as an independent. There are committed partisans on both sides, but there are also millions of Americans who are fed up with the two-party system and who don’t feel well-represented by either party. They’re looking for something new.”
McMullin would like to see America move beyond the two-party system.
It doesn’t serve our country well to have only flavour A and flavour B and that’s it Evan McMullin
“We need more parties and more open ballot access so that voters have more choices,” he said. “We live in a country of such abundant choices in every aspect of our lives.
“But when it comes to politics, we’re offered only two. It doesn’t serve our country well to have only flavour A and flavour B and that’s it. That won’t help us overcome modern challenges in healthcare, information warfare, employment and the national debt. We need more competition and more ideas.”
‘A huge mistake’
Amash could prove attractive to small-government Republicans who already lean libertarian. But the former Illinois congressman Joe Walsh, who challenged Trump in this year’s Republican primary, argues that this is not the time.
“I think it’s a huge mistake, it’s the wrong thing to do,” he said. “It will help get Trump elected. Amash and I are friends, we’re colleagues, but he’s clearly putting what’s best for Justin Amash ahead of what’s best for the country. If he does it, it’s a selfish thing for him to do. It is very disappointing.
“Disaffected Republicans and conservatives who don’t want to vote for Trump, if their only option is Biden, they’re going to have to hold their nose and vote for Biden. But if these disaffected Republicans and conservatives now have another option, they’ll do it. It will take votes away from Biden. Here’s the thing: Amash knows that Donald Trump is an existential threat to this country. He voted to impeach Trump.”
Walsh, who has quit the Republican party, describing it as a cult, looks forward to the day of multiparty democracy. But first, he argues, Trump is the clear and present danger.
“Justin Amash and I, we’re brothers in that we agree on almost all the issues. I agree with Justin that both political parties suck. I agree that our political system is broken. But not this year.
“This year, the biggest threat to the country is Donald Trump and all of us, from libertarians like me and Amash to liberals, gotta come together to make sure Trump loses. And then we can start a third party or a fourth party or do whatever.
“But right now, the only job for all of us is to get rid of Trump.”


theguardian--2020-05-03--We must honour those brave souls… working with Ricky Gervais | Stewart Lee

Every Tuesday at 8.45pm , I stand in the silent lane alone and bang my Le Creusets in support of a group of brave people who must never be forgotten ; unsung martyrs who , through no fault of their own , have found themselves working at the very heart of a terrible unfolding disaster of an unprecedented scale – the cast of the second series of Ricky Gervais ’ s After Life ( Netflix ) .
Denied proper support or protection , in the form of three-dimensional characters or plausible dialogue , these simple actors , almost two of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ forced instead to mouth lines apparently designed merely to cement public perceptions of their author ’ s own genius , like old beggars under sacks .
And yet they solider on , the real heroes of our times , discharging their duties with professionalism and dignity , lions led by a dong .
At the going down of the sun , and in the morning , we shall remember them .
I ’ m joking of course !
But should anything be off-limits for humour , especially during the horror of The Corona @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ™ ® Co Ltd ) ?
It ’ s a question answered by Ricky Gervais himself in a syndicated Press Association interview provided free to the Aberdeen Evening Express , and newspapers nationwide , in March .
The “ Wokefinder General ” ( Sarah Vine , Daily Mail ) concluded : “ There is no better tool to get you through bad things… than with a sense of humour.
” I am sure this was a sentiment shared privately by his cast every day during the filming of After Life ( Netflix ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ humour , especially during the horror of The Corona Virus ( Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Smoothies and ’ Shakes ™ ® Co Ltd ) , then is it acceptable to joke that After Life ( Netflix ) is the first successful post-truth TV programme ?
Manifestly ill-equipped to fulfil its chosen function , mixing callous cruelty with saccharine sentimentality , claiming it was only joking whenever its intentions are questioned , and buoyed artificially by the support of a loyal Twitter following and its attendant algorithmic significance , After Life ( Netflix ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ News ) of comedy dramas .
But at least After Life ( Netflix ) hasn ’ t recommended drinking Dettol ( Reckitt Benckiser Group plc ) .
But is it appropriate to laugh at Donald Trump ( Fox News ) during the horror of The Corona Virus ( Wuhan Battered Bat and Pangolin Fingers ™ ® Inc ) ?
Did the time for laughing end when Donald Trump ( Fox News ) , who has the codes to a nuclear holocaust in his man bag , recommended the ingestion of cleaning fluids ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the world to collectively crap its pants and cry , instead of laughing and carrying on ?
I ’ m joking of course !
Nothing should be off-limits for humour , even during the horror of The Corona Virus ( Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Party Bites ™ ® Ltd ) !
!
People should , and indeed must , be free to enjoy the Wokefinder ’ s After Life ( Netflix ) if they wish to do so , irrespective of the opinions of the gatekeepers of the temples of culture .
And @ @ @ @ @ @ @ should also be free to drink or mainline cleaning fluid if they so desire , whatever the so-called “ cleaning fluid manufacturers ” of the liberal elite and their gender-fluid friends say .
Vice-president Mike Pence ( The Koch Network ) explained that he was the only one not wearing a mask when touring a coronavirus clinic because he wanted to be able to look medical workers in the eye .
But medical masks cover the mouth , not the eyes and thus would not prevent eye-to-eye contact .
All the medical mask @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The Koch Network ) from thanking medical workers by kissing them full on the mouth , and then gratefully tonguing them to climax .
Perhaps Mike Pence ( The Koch Network ) is confusing medical masks with the full-head rubber gimp mask he is forced to wear during his private Oval Office meetings with Donald Trump ( Fox News ) .
Nothing should be off limits for humour , but is it appropriate to joke that Mike Pence ( The Koch Network ) is regularly sodomised by Donald Trump ( Fox News ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ especially during the horror of The Corona Virus ( Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Home Masseuses ™ ® Ltd ) ?
Or will it seem like a distasteful joke when this actually turns out to have been the case , and that the Russians have it on film ?
It is worth remembering this .
That which does not kill us makes us stronger , but that which does kill us actually does kills us .
Dead !
And Dettol ( Reckitt Benckiser Group plc ) , whether drunk or injected , will kill @ @ @ @ @ @ @ inject it sarcastically , having been recommended to drink or inject it in a “ sarcastic ” way by the leader of the free world .
But is it appropriate to be sarcastic during the horror of The Corona Virus ( Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Escort Service ™ ® Intl ) ?
Donald Trump ( Fox News ) was quick to dismiss accurate transcripts of his exact comments about how you should drink or inject Dettol ( Reckitt Benckiser Group plc ) as “ fake news ” , a concept I experienced personally @ @ @ @ @ @ @ when I became the subject of a failed meme attempt .
A clickbait entity circulated a plausible-looking BBC news page online , featuring a photograph of “ comedian ” Stewart Lee claiming he wanted lockdown to last at least two years .
I have never said this , but if anything I think two years isn ’ t long enough , and that Richard Branson ’ s unpaid taxes should be used to fund all British citizens ’ locked-down leisure , in full , indefinitely , even after the virus is eliminated .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ free copy of the German experimental band Faust ’ s second album for Virgin , 1973 ’ s Faust IV , so they can dream away the lotus days in a haze of fuzzy krautrock .
I ’ m joking of course .
But After Life is trending and Matt Handcock is dissembling .
And a baby , a baby !
Is this a civilisation that deserves to be saved ?

Every Tuesday at 8.45pm, I stand in the silent lane alone and bang my Le Creusets in support of a group of brave people who must never be forgotten; unsung martyrs who, through no fault of their own, have found themselves working at the very heart of a terrible unfolding disaster of an unprecedented scale – the cast of the second series of Ricky Gervais’s After Life (Netflix).
Denied proper support or protection, in the form of three-dimensional characters or plausible dialogue, these simple actors, almost two of them from an ethnic minority, are forced instead to mouth lines apparently designed merely to cement public perceptions of their author’s own genius, like old beggars under sacks. And yet they solider on, the real heroes of our times, discharging their duties with professionalism and dignity, lions led by a dong. At the going down of the sun, and in the morning, we shall remember them.
I’m joking of course! But should anything be off-limits for humour, especially during the horror of The Corona Virus (Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Snack ™ ® Co Ltd)? It’s a question answered by Ricky Gervais himself in a syndicated Press Association interview provided free to the Aberdeen Evening Express, and newspapers nationwide, in March. The “Wokefinder General” (Sarah Vine, Daily Mail) concluded: “There is no better tool to get you through bad things… than with a sense of humour.” I am sure this was a sentiment shared privately by his cast every day during the filming of After Life (Netflix).
If nothing should be off-limits for humour, especially during the horror of The Corona Virus (Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Smoothies and ’Shakes ™ ® Co Ltd), then is it acceptable to joke that After Life (Netflix) is the first successful post-truth TV programme? Manifestly ill-equipped to fulfil its chosen function, mixing callous cruelty with saccharine sentimentality, claiming it was only joking whenever its intentions are questioned, and buoyed artificially by the support of a loyal Twitter following and its attendant algorithmic significance, After Life (Netflix) is the sociopathic Donald Trump (Fox News) of comedy dramas. But at least After Life (Netflix) hasn’t recommended drinking Dettol (Reckitt Benckiser Group plc).
But is it appropriate to laugh at Donald Trump (Fox News) during the horror of The Corona Virus (Wuhan Battered Bat and Pangolin Fingers ™ ® Inc)? Did the time for laughing end when Donald Trump (Fox News), who has the codes to a nuclear holocaust in his man bag, recommended the ingestion of cleaning fluids? Was this in fact the time for the world to collectively crap its pants and cry, instead of laughing and carrying on?
I’m joking of course! Nothing should be off-limits for humour, even during the horror of The Corona Virus (Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Party Bites ™ ® Ltd)!! People should, and indeed must, be free to enjoy the Wokefinder’s After Life (Netflix) if they wish to do so, irrespective of the opinions of the gatekeepers of the temples of culture. And, in the same way, people should also be free to drink or mainline cleaning fluid if they so desire, whatever the so-called “cleaning fluid manufacturers” of the liberal elite and their gender-fluid friends say.
That which does not kill us makes us stronger, but that which does kill us actually does kill us
Vice-president Mike Pence (The Koch Network) explained that he was the only one not wearing a mask when touring a coronavirus clinic because he wanted to be able to look medical workers in the eye. But medical masks cover the mouth, not the eyes and thus would not prevent eye-to-eye contact. All the medical mask would do is prevent Mike Pence (The Koch Network) from thanking medical workers by kissing them full on the mouth, and then gratefully tonguing them to climax.
Perhaps Mike Pence (The Koch Network) is confusing medical masks with the full-head rubber gimp mask he is forced to wear during his private Oval Office meetings with Donald Trump (Fox News). Nothing should be off limits for humour, but is it appropriate to joke that Mike Pence (The Koch Network) is regularly sodomised by Donald Trump (Fox News) while wearing a rubber gimp mask, especially during the horror of The Corona Virus (Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Home Masseuses ™ ® Ltd)? Or will it seem like a distasteful joke when this actually turns out to have been the case, and that the Russians have it on film?
It is worth remembering this. That which does not kill us makes us stronger, but that which does kill us actually does kills us. Dead! And Dettol (Reckitt Benckiser Group plc), whether drunk or injected, will kill you, even if you drink or inject it sarcastically, having been recommended to drink or inject it in a “sarcastic” way by the leader of the free world.
But is it appropriate to be sarcastic during the horror of The Corona Virus (Wuhan Bat and Pangolin Escort Service ™ ® Intl)? Donald Trump (Fox News) was quick to dismiss accurate transcripts of his exact comments about how you should drink or inject Dettol (Reckitt Benckiser Group plc) as “fake news”, a concept I experienced personally myself last week for the first time when I became the subject of a failed meme attempt.
A clickbait entity circulated a plausible-looking BBC news page online, featuring a photograph of “comedian” Stewart Lee claiming he wanted lockdown to last at least two years. I have never said this, but if anything I think two years isn’t long enough, and that Richard Branson’s unpaid taxes should be used to fund all British citizens’ locked-down leisure, in full, indefinitely, even after the virus is eliminated. And that every household should receive a free copy of the German experimental band Faust’s second album for Virgin, 1973’s Faust IV, so they can dream away the lotus days in a haze of fuzzy krautrock.
I’m joking of course. But After Life is trending and Matt Handcock is dissembling. And a baby, a baby! Is this a civilisation that deserves to be saved?