T P WILKINSON—Now if we shift to a completely different part of the world, we can begin to imagine the contradictions and parallels. Hong Kong has been subjected to terrorism quite obviously sponsored by the main instigators of such foreign disruption — the CIA (NED) and most certainly other agencies of HM Government. In the scheme of things — as opposed to the ludicrous “internet of things” — it is impossible to say who is agitating in Hong Kong against the local government and the authority in Beijing. However, if we take the long view; e.g., back to the Opium Wars, the patterns are recognisable.
BRITISH DEVIOUSNESS
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Let’s say it unequivocally: Downton Abbey romanticizes servanthood and the plutocratic order.
8 minutes readVOLPONE REDUX—No matter how we look at it (provided we have not been seduced by the pyrotechnics concocted by its creator, Julian Fellowes, a proud hidebound reactionary) Downton Abbey (DA) is and will remain an artifact to offer rancid midlebrow entertainment and effective propaganda for a rotten bourgeois status quo artfully camouflaged as a peek into the private lives of a supposedly vanished aristocracy. I say “supposed” because the aristos are still very much alive and thriving in this world. Their widely proclaimed demise one of their greatest and most successful tricks in deflecting social and political criticism in a world that abounds in gross injustices and which currently—despite the existence of “democracy”—registers one of the most outrageous levels of inequality in centuries.
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In a hole and still digging: the left and Brexit
70 minutes read“The fighting party of the advanced class need not fear mistakes. What it should fear is persistence in a mistake, refusal to admit and correct a mistake out of a false sense of shame”.1 Thus Lenin, writing on the eve of the Russian Revolution. But his warning echoes down through the decades for the benefit of all revolutionaries. It is the contention of this article that the traditional left in Britain has committed a colossal mistake in its approach to Brexit, and is making matters worse by an obstinate refusal to correct it.
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PEPE ESCOBAR—What’s actually happening right now in the Persian Gulf is way more entertaining. As I confirmed with energy traders in Doha late last month, demand for oil right now is higher than in 2018. And in consequence Iran continues to sell most of its oil.
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T J COLES—In 2012, Britain joined the US’s imposition of economic sanctions on Iran. Then-UN Secretary-general Ban Ki-moon described “significant effects on the general population, including an escalation in inflation, a rise in commodities and energy costs, an increase in the rate of unemployment and a shortage of necessary items, including medicine.” Britain’s then-Defence Secretary, Philip Hammond, informed the Iranians: “We can definitely make the pain much greater.” (Hammond is now working as a Member of Parliament to block Britain’s no-deal exit from the European Union, ironically in fear of food and medicine shortages. Fine for Iranians to suffer, but not us, thank you very much.)