Del.icio.us links for February 21st through February 28th:
- what’s the story « the m john harrison blog – I feel contempt for the “story” of things. It is a horrible, patronising, 90s notion. Being told stories is precisely what led to my electoral apathy in the first place. Not to say my sense that the contemporary fourth estate, with its desperate profusion of narratives, narratives of narratives & meta-narratives of those narratives, is more trouble to the user than it’s worth.
Tags: stories fiction politics apathy hyperreality - On ruling class anti-racism – Occasionally, if you open the Economist or the FT, you’ll read an argument that runs something like this: people shouldn’t be bigoted toward immigrants, because by they do jobs that British workers won’t do for pay that British workers won’t accept. In a similar way, you often hear members of the Institute of Directors or the CBI explain that ‘globalisation’ and international outsourcing is an excellent thing because it gives jobs to hard-working people in Third World countries who work much harder, and are much less demanding, than spoilt, recalcitrant Western workers. This is the zenith of ruling class anti-racism, and it’s just another argument for exploitation. And it is, of course, deeply racist toward the recipients of its supposed benediction.
Tags: exploitation classwar economics labour marxism - Liberal Conspiracy » The Greens have changed their approach to science – There has been an ongoing “re-evaluation” of Green Party policy around scientific evidence recently. This came about mainly due to a few journalists helpfully letting us know that there was some deeply dodgy stuff in policy. It certainly came as a shock to many of us who had not thoroughly read our voluminous policy documents.
Tags: greenparty uk electoralpolitics policies science - Tracy Residents Now Have To Pay For 911 Calls – Tracy residents will now have to pay every time they call 9-1-1 for a medical emergency. But there are a couple of options. Residents can pay a $48 voluntary fee for the year which allows them to call 9-1-1 as many times as necessary. Or, there’s the option of not signing up for the annual fee. Instead, they will be charged $300 if they make a call for help.
Tags: economics stupidity libertarianism - Adam Holloway: An end to steely-eyed killing machines – What we call the Taliban are, in fact, hundreds of groups, most of whom are no more than traditional Afghan Muslims, the sons of local farmers. The same was true when I spent time in Afghanistan in the 1980s, but then I travelled with what we called “the resistance”. Now, as then, they are united not by Islam but by the presence of foreign troops on their soil, and a hatred of external governments. Deadly ideological extremists are the smaller but growing part. Approximately 80 per cent of those we call the enemy die within 20 miles of where they live: does that tell you something about who we are really fighting?
Tags: afghanistan imperialism war resistance - The Please & Thank Yous on MySpace Music – Kinda fun!
Tags: band music - Stream four new songs from Yesterday’s Ring – Vinyl Collective is streaming four songs from the upcoming Yesterday’s Ring LP, Chasers, including a cover of the popular Against Me! song “Sink, Florida, Sink.” The nine-song record is being self-released by the band, and once out it’ll follow up 2009′s Diamonds in the Ditch. You can click Read More to check out the stream.
Tags: band music