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Britons, Work Like the Chinese! (Or Else)
Right-thinking Tory Secretary of State for Health Jeremy Freudian-Slip has announced today that the decent, honest, noble, compassionate Conservative Party would like to encourage the poor to work as hard as the Chinese and Americans.
How they'll achieve this is novel and exciting.
A previous Labour government introduced a system of Tax Credits for people in work with families (i.e. children to feed) but on low incomes which, without the tax credits, would mean that they were in poverty. So, the idea is it pays to work hard.
Note that we are talking about tax credits - a rebate of some of your Income Tax (a tax discount) - not a hand-out for "scroungers."
This is the good part. Those intellectual giants of the Conservative Party reason that, if they abolish Tax Credits (which are only paid to those on a gross annual income of under £16,500 or $25,000) those people will be so motivated and empowered that they will move into better-paid jobs!
“There’s a pretty difficult question that we have to answer, which is essentially: are we going to be a country which is prepared to work hard in the way that Asian economies are prepared to work hard, in the way that Americans are prepared to work hard? And that is about creating a culture where work is at the heart of our success.”
Hunt also suggested in the interview that those reliant on tax credits and benefits lacked self-respect. “Dignity is not just about how much money you have got ... officially children are growing up in poverty if there is an income in that family of less than £16,500. What the Conservatives say is how that £16,500 is earned matters.
Meanwhile, in this brave, new, flexible and empowered labour market of short-term and zero-hours contracts, hard-working Britons are so scared of being off sick at places like Sports Direct that they're being taken away by emergency ambulance.
Work harder for your crumbs, plebs.
Disclaimer: I've never voted Labour (or Tory) in my life. But I do always vote.
Last season's anime (incomplete list)
This is a reposted submission with editing.
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Incomplete list.
Overlord. (13 episodes) Too short. Ending yelled "our production budget is too small". Really, felt like an advertisement to learn WRITTEN japanese, and buy the raw manga from amazon.co.jp; to find out what happens next.
Chaos Dragon. (12 episodes) Beautifully dark; at least for the first few episodes. The "happily ever after" ending felt tasteless and disgusting. Doesn't anybody know how to write a good tragedy anymore ?
Normally, I wouldn't submit trash like this; but the queue's empty, so . . .
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Ironic Moding
Throughout the Great Charter School Debate on SoylentNews recently, I was amazed that I retained a 50 point karma standing, in spite of showing no mercy to mercenaries, and fellow travellers of the John Birch variety. But recently I did criticize a certain Soylentil, and saw my karma drop precipitiously. I suspect a mod-bombing, but my home-boy the Mighty Buzz has recently posted a diary https://soylentnews.org/~The+Mighty+Buzzard/journal/ saying that such things are not happening on the SoylentNews. Who am I to argue that.
But that is not why I am writing this. I write this to suggest to Soylentils everywhere that we slightly modify our modification. As is well know, and lauded in the annals of the internet, it is the member modification of slashdot that made it great. That is, until they started pushing ads. We are heirs to that greatness. And well it has worked so far, especially as judged by the numbers of Sad Puppies, GamerGaters, and Libertarians who complain that nobody likes them. (Hint, guys: it is just that nobody likes you!) But for my suggestion: when you find a poster that is patently offensive, or moronic, and is outraged that the rest of us do not see what they are so outraged about, may I suggest a mod of "funny". Kind of deflates the whole thing, which in the case of the GamerGaters is both a double entendre and a sad state of affairs.
And if, when you find someone has totally failed to understand a refutation of their position, the type of thing one would normally use a "whoosh" mod for, consider using Touché, just to preserve the irony of the moment. Other variants no doubt exist, using "interesting" for something that is obviously not, "insightful" for things that are not (but maybe this will not work, since the target will never understand the irony). Work some out on your own. Use "disagree" for flat-earthers, just for yucks. Use "Troll" for actual beings who live under bridges and turn to stone if exposed to sunlight. (I recommend the Fremont Troll as an example.) And we could go on from there, but, I will not. Stay critical, my friends. Do not believe anything but that your own understanding tells you it is true. Or a ex-prince from Nigeria.
Torches and Pitchforks
The inexorable rise of property prices in the UK, especially London, due to a lack of supply of new builds, buy-to-let investments, the selling off of social housing and large numbers of new builds being bought by foreign speculators is finally causing the torches and pitchforks to come out.
In places like London, it's becoming nearly impossible for a "normal" person on an average income to live since renting even the smallest of properties (e.g. a studio flat or a room in a house share) is out of reach, Forget being a teacher, nurse, police officer or fire fighter and living there. It's just not going to happen. Social housing has mostly gone, so the poor renting privately are finding their monthly rents doubling over night and having to leave.
The good Christian Irritable Duncan Syndrome brought in cuts to housing benefit just to remind the poor, sick and disabled that they're a filthy burden on the rest of us. And they can jolly well cut back on food and heating to pay their rent.
So some "motivated" protesters have got out the torches and pitchforks and completely got it wrong.
You couldn't make it up.
What a miserable society it is that can't look after its poor, sick and disabled. Let the bleeding hearts amongst the Little People look out for them, we'll just take our money away and laugh.
Mind you, the other side have got a new leader and they're thinking about changing things.
Persecuted for Being Athiest
The BBC has an article about ex-Muslim Britons who are being persecuted for becoming atheists.
The persecution often comes from close family and friends.
Ayisha (not her real name) from Lancashire was just 14 when she began to question Islam after reading the Koran. She started rebelling over wearing the hijab, but eventually decided she wasn't a Muslim and the situation at home rapidly got worse.
"My dad threatened to kill me by getting a knife and holding it against my neck and saying: 'We might as well do it if you're going to bring this much shame to the family.'"
He used to beat her so badly that eventually she called the police and he was convicted of child cruelty. Ayisha hadn't anticipated the shock of being immediately cut off from her mother and siblings.
Many of the victims are young, vulnerable and powerless. The local authorities where the victims live are often wary of offending Muslim culture and belief which may have hindered efforts to help people in this situation.
London Cereal Café Attacked By Anti-Gentrification Protest
Saudi prince arrested at LA mansion for alleged sex crime
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-34358380
Los Angeles police said Majed Abdulaziz al-Saud, 28, was arrested on Wednesday and released the following day after posting a $300,000 (£197,000) bond. He is scheduled to appear in court on October 19 to face a charge of "forced oral copulation". Al-Saud does not have diplomatic immunity, police said.
Republican Debate #2
http://www.cnn.com/ (right on the front page, no Fox BS)
Or an audio stream.
Starts at 5:10 PM PT, 8:10 PM ET.
The undercard broadcast took place at 3 PM PDT, while the main card broadcast will occur at 5 PM PDT. The candidates in the main debate are Donald Trump, Ben Carson, Carly Fiorina, Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, Mike Huckabee, Chris Christie, and John Kasich. The candidates in the undercard debate are Bobby Jindal, Lindsey Graham, Rick Santorum, and George Pataki. Rick Perry suspended his campaign on September 11, effectively ending his candidacy. The two-tiered CNN broadcasts will be consecutive, with the primetime debate planned to immediately follow the second-tier broadcast. The moderator is Jake Tapper of CNN, with side-by-side participation by Hugh Hewitt of Salem Radio.
Other stuff:
Taco Bell to Serve Alcohol
Pushing To Attract Millennials, Taco Bell Will Offer Beer And Wine
On Tuesday, Taco Bell announced it is launching a new concept that "redefines fast food experience." The first of these "experiences" will open in Chicago next week, and another one will follow later this month in San Francisco.
In a statement, the company says:
"Taco Bell Cantina restaurants will be the first and only Taco Bell restaurants to serve alcohol to customers who are of legal drinking age. The San Francisco restaurant will serve beer and wine only, while Wicker Park will serve, beer, wine, sangria and twisted Freezes. Cantina restaurants will also feature a new tapas-style menu of sharable appetizers — including nachos and rolled tacos — during designated hours each evening, in addition to the standard Taco Bell Menu."
These new cantinas won't have drive-throughs and will have open kitchens, according to a press release. They will also have digital menu boards, television monitors and an option for customers to use a mobile app to order and pay for their food.
[...] As USA Today reports:
"The company knows that its Millennial customers increasingly are attracted to urban areas, where real estate is pricey. Company officials think that selling a stiffer drink might pad the receipts — the typical Taco Bell receipt is in the $7 range — and in turn help make their urbanization push more doable.
" 'To put in a drive-thru you need land,' Neil Borkan, the Taco Bell franchisee who will operate the Chicago test location, told USA TODAY. 'Can you imagine buying an acre of land in a neighborhood like [Chicago's] Wicker Park? You couldn't afford it. As real estate becomes more and more expensive, this kind of concept makes more sense.'
"Taco Bell is treading carefully into booze. While quick-service rival Starbucks recently announced it would accelerate its push of its beer and wine program and has applied for liquor licenses for hundreds of stores across the USA in recent months, Taco Bell spokesman Rob Poetsch said the company could potentially open 10 locations selling hard drinks next year."
The drug lord who championed the poor
After his arrest, I wrote to Nem in prison and asked if he would speak to me. He agreed. The story that emerged was fascinating: once he reached the top, Nem was, in effect, mayor, police chief and director of the chamber of commerce for a community estimated at 100,000 residents. With the receipts from the cocaine trade, he ran a business that supported nearly 1,000 people. He also channelled some of his profits into a basic welfare state. He could do this because he paid close attention to accounting and budgetary matters.
“The food baskets and the support we gave to extracurricular school activities, such as the Thai boxing or capoeira classes, were all accounted for as part of our business expenses,” he explained. “But the burials, prescription costs or if anyone who couldn’t afford it needed gas, these were all extra payments.”
In the absence of any regular police, law was maintained by 150 armed men, most in their teens and early 20s. But while the man known locally as Mestre, or master, decided over life or death, he usually opted for the former. Under his rule, homicide rates dropped by more than two-thirds.
This was part-calculation, part-intuition. Rocinha was so profitable for the cocaine trade because it is surrounded by the three richest areas of Rio – Leblon, São Conrado and Gávea. By turning Rocinha into the safest and most attractive favela in Rio, business boomed. “He was not a man of violence,” said Detective Bárbara Lomba, who led the three-strong team that patiently investigated the Rocinha drugs operation for four years. “He had a policy of avoiding confrontation wherever possible and of not facing down the police. Rather the opposite, he was in contact with them in a corrupt relationship.”
Nem’s policy paid off. Rocinha became a fixture on the tourist route; Brazil’s biggest pop stars such as Ivete Sangalo and Claudia Leitte were happy to include the favela on their tours, boosting their popularity with Brazil’s poor. Politicians including former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and the current incumbent, Dilma Rousseff, were keen to tour, as were members of Brazil’s national football side. Above all, the youngsters from the surrounding middle class areas went to buy coke.
Beltrame knew that he would have to “pacify” Rocinha because of its symbolic power and its location. As the World Cup and the Olympics approached the pressure grew. But by taking Nem out of the equation, Rocinha’s character has changed. The relationship between the police and residents is uneasy at best. In July 2013, a group which included the chief of Rocinha police murdered an innocent bricklayer, and the favela came close to open insurrection.
Since then the drug cartel has been edging its way back and there are sporadic shootouts with the police. Homicides remain at historic low levels but domestic violence, rape, assault and burglary have increased fourfold.
![[Image]](http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2015/09/15/taco-bell-ap_custom-48825c060d56b72574435868acb114f8fc4fc2ad-s800-c85.jpeg){kind=link}