Linkage

 Arrayed around a long mahogany table in the White House state dining room last week, the CEOs of the most powerful financial institutions in the world offered several explanations for paying high salaries to their employees — and, by extension, to themselves.

“These are complicated companies,” one CEO said. Offered another: “We’re competing for talent on an international market.”

But President Barack Obama wasn’t in a mood to hear them out. He stopped the conversation and offered a blunt reminder of the public’s reaction to such explanations. “Be careful how you make those statements, gentlemen. The public isn’t buying that.”

“My administration,” the president added, “is the only thing between you and the pitchforks.” 

We looked for the origins of clippings from 14 articles that were published between 1894 and 2022, most of which we found in newspaper archives.

A meme shows clippings of 14 real articles that were printed between 1894 and 2022, all of which show people expressing variations of, "Nobody wants to work anymore."

The end product of today’s Western capitalism is a neo-rentier economy—precisely what
industrial capitalism and classical economists set out to replace during the Progressive Era
from the late 19th to early 20th century. A financial class has usurped the role that landlords
used to play—a class living off special privilege. Most economic rent is now paid out as
interest. This rake-off interrupts the circular flow between production and consumption,
causing economic shrinkage—a dynamic that is the opposite of industrial capitalism’s original
impulse. The “miracle of compound interest,” reinforced now by fiat credit creation, is
cannibalizing industrial capital as well as the returns to labor.

The political thrust of industrial capitalism was toward democratic parliamentary reform to
break the stranglehold of landlords on national tax systems. But today’s finance capital is
inherently oligarchic. It seeks to capture the government—first and foremost the treasury,
central bank, and courts—to enrich (indeed, to bail out) and untax the banking and financial
sector and its major clients: real estate and monopolies. This is why financial “technocrats”
(proxies and factotums for high finance) were imposed in Greece, and why Germany opposed a
public referendum on the European Central Bank’s austerity program.

It's remarkable how swiftly Moms for Liberty became such an albatross organization. As many Pennridge parents complained to Salon, much of the initial media coverage of the group was credulous, buying into the false narrative that it's a grassroots group of normal parents who are simply "concerned" about liberal "excesses." In reality, the group was founded in 2021 by the wife of the chair of the Florida Republican Party and was immediately so well-resourced and fully staffed that it could only be they were propped up by secretive, wealthy donors. 

The suspicious aura of money around the group was interesting to journalists, but what really damaged Moms for Liberty was that they underestimated the intelligence of the people in the communities they were targeting. The parents of Pennridge were not fooled by attempts to characterize literary fiction as "pornography." Local residents also feared that rewriting history classes to adhere to right-wing mythologies would ultimately harm the school's reputation, which could hurt both their property values and the ability of their kids to get into good colleges. Above all, multiple parents expressed a belief that schools should be preparing kids for the real world. They worried that right-wing whitewashing of history, social studies and other courses would leave kids without the basic skills necessary to thrive in a diverse, dynamic society.

On Monday, Hearst — whose magazine titles include Esquire, Cosmopolitan and Town & Country — sent staffers an email announcing the new restrictions, which were detailed in an internal document that employees were encouraged to sign.

“We should be careful to consider the impact that a controversial statement on a hot-button issue may have on Hearst’s reputation,” the policy reads, according to a copy of the text of the document shared with The Washington Post.

[…] 

While violations could result in “termination,” according to the document, the policy doesn’t include examples of what qualifies as rule-breaking material. However, it does warn that posts about even seemingly “apolitical” or local topics could be contentious enough to be a problem.

“Many social movements are politically charged, and apolitical events and movements can quickly become controversial and political,” the policy reads. “Even local community organizations can become politicized.”

When I was living in Coffs Harbour, string concertos and opera were used to torment anybody who tried to get too comfortable around the boarded-up shops on the short stretch of highway that the council considered to be the town centre.

The City of Bunbury had been playing Hot Potato on loop, in a bid to drive rough sleepers away from the Graham Bricknell Music Shell in the city's centre.

While the city initially defended its use of music as a valid public safety response, the music was switched off on Thursday afternoon after The Wiggles publicly intervened.

"The Wiggles' music is created to bring joy and happiness to children and families around the world," a spokesperson for the band said.

"We are deeply disappointed to hear that it is being used any other way."

[…] 

It's not the first time the council has used music as a deterrent at the venue, with Peter Allen's I go to Rio the song of choice in 2016.

Please nobody tell them about Coles Radio.

People leaving share houses during the pandemic lockdowns in search of more space are touted as one key reason behind the rise in low vacancy rates and high rents.

But community manager at Flatmates.com.au, Claudia Conley, said the trend is reversing.

“The volume of traffic we’ve seen in October we don’t usually see until December, indicating that demand for share accommodation is heating up well ahead of our peak season,” Conley said.

As the housing crisis continues to push people into homelessness, Everybody’s Home is calling for an ambitious plan of making one in 10 dwellings social housing over the next decade.

e360: I’m intrigued that, in talking about such matters, you don’t generally speak about “restoring nature.” You speak instead of something you call “regenerative design.” What’s the difference?

Orff: Restoring nature is trying to bring back nature for nature’s sake. As much as I, too, am guilty of that desire at times, this is simply not possible because our water quality has changed, and our air and water temperatures have changed. What I’m trying to do is rebuild natural systems in a strategic way that reduces climate risk for communities.

The latest data from the Queensland Department of Housing reveals that 546 people over the age of 80 are on the waiting list for public housing in the state.

The figures, released in August, show 25,363 applications on Queensland's public housing waiting list.

Around a third of the more than 41,000 people on the waiting list are homeless.

There were 3,608 people over the age of 65 on the public housing register, up from 2,990 in November 2019.

The average waiting time for people with "high" and "very high" needs is 19 months.

Ukaraine? That's somwhere's near Africa, ain't it? Din't Disney make a fillum 'bout it a yar or two bayack?

NBC is reporting that US and European officials have already broached the possibility of a peace deal with Zelensky. They’re even reporting that Ukraine is having trouble recruiting soldiers and the public are angry at the open-ended conscription requirements. They have suggested that more urgent peace talks will begin at the end of the year, but any peace deal will surely be worse for Ukrainians than the one agreed last year, which shows the foolishness of fighting on.

On the one hand, it’s good the dying is coming to an end, but the US is currently arming Taiwan to the teeth with the apparent aim of doing this all over again with China.

US officials are admitting that funding for Ukraine is running out, and many Republicans only seem interested in approving funding for Israel because they see Ukraine as Biden’s failed war. The US has even suggested Ukraine is running out of soldiers and you need to stop and think about what that means. It means a generation of young men have been decimated: all of this to fight over “inches” of territory.