Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.
- Jon Henley reports on new research showing that adopting right-wing policies does nothing to help left-of-centre parties win votes (while producing disastrous effects in shifting the spectrum of political options).
- Laura Weiss discusses why U.S. Democrats need to acknowledge and present a plan to deal with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic rather than buying into denialism. Eric Topol calls out the decision-makers who are living in a fantasy world rather than responding to an immediate and important crisis. And Lindsay Clark highlights how the limited information now being made available shows that many countries are on the precipice of another devastating COVID wave.
- Joy Buolamwini writes about the need for regulation to protect biometric privacy - and the dangers that either insufficient or corporate-friendly rules will leave citizens vulnerable. And David Moscrop points out the need to dismantle Canada's telecom oligopoly which had left consumers in provinces without Crown-sector alternatives to face deteriorating services and soaring prices.
- Moscrop also writes about the continued concentration of wealth and erosion of standards of living for Canadian workers - together with the need for a policy response to end the new gilded age.
- Finally, the Eurasia Group's grim set of top risks for 2024 starts with the danger of a sharp U.S. slide away from democratic governance. And lest anybody think the spread of reality-averse politics stops at the border, Luke LeBrun exposes how the Cons are actively helping to shape and propagate outlandish conspiracy theories.
On that first item--I could have told them that. Indeed, I have made that exact claim, repeatedly. Nice to have a study, annoying that it's necessary (and at that, will probably be ignored).
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