Economic power has resulted in feedback loops of political power, in which elites make rules that bolster further concentration
Wealth distribution is vastly more unequal, yet economic growth is slower & more chaotic than during the era of managed capitalism
Daily life has become more of a struggle for hundreds of millions of ordinary decent people
The economic collapse of 2008 was the result of the deregulation of finance, costing the US economy upwards of $15 TRILLION (vastly more globally)
Free-market theory presumes that innovation is necessarily benign. But much of the financial engineering of the deregulatory era was self-serving, opaque, & corrupt—the opposite of an efficient & transparent market
The existential threat of global climate change reflects the incompetence of markets to accurately price carbon & the escalating costs of pollution
The entrenched political power of extractive industries & their political allies influences the rules & the market price of carbon
The grand neoliberal experiment of the past 40 years has demonstrated that markets in fact do not regulate themselves
Democracy itself is under threat: increasingly authoritarian & antidemocratic legislation is being introduced in supposedly democratic countries like Britain.
It's not simply the neoliberalism of outsourcing, privatization, & shrinking the state. The US Libertarian-right billionaire project, now playing out in the UK as well as the US, is nothing less than a permanent alteration power relations: dismantle democracy & install #oligarchy
🚨How did Britain get here?
🚨What has been the true cost to British people?
🚨And most importantly, WTAF are we going to do about it?
🚨If we don't take decisive action NOW, it may well be too late.
The European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) was a response to the atrocities of WWII and the Holocaust, designed to prevent such horrors reoccurring.
Withdrawing risks weakening human rights, international isolation, destabilised peace agreements, and authoritarian drift.
Adopted in 1950 by the Council of Europe, the ECHR was a collective response to the Holocaust, during which about 11 million people, including 6 million Jews, were systematically exterminated, exposing the urgent need for a legal framework to prevent such horrors from recurring.
The Council of Europe, established in 1949 to promote democracy, rule of law, and human rights, made the ECHR a cornerstone of its mission.
Influenced by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), the ECHR ensured states uphold fundamental rights.
Comparing political rhetoric across eras is a sensitive task, as context, intent, and historical outcomes differ vastly.
In 1990, Ivana Trump said her husband Donald owned a copy of “My New Order” – a printed collection of Hitler's speeches – which he kept by the bedside...
Some of Trump’s statements have been noted by historians, critics, and media for echoing themes or phrasing used by Adolf Hitler, particularly in their dehumanizing language, scapegoating of groups, and authoritarian undertones.
Below, with @grok's help, I’ll provide examples of Trump’s quotes that have been cited as resembling Hitler’s rhetoric, alongside Hitler’s statements for comparison, drawing from credible sources, focusing on specific language & themes, ensuring accuracy, & avoiding exaggeration.
Most people know very little about Trump's new best friend, El Salvador’s strongman leader, Nayib Bukele, who's been sat in the White House being adored by Trump and his team of fawning, dangerously unhinged sociopathic bootlickers...
Read this excellent article by Professor of International Politics at Lancaster University, Amalendu Misra, the author of seven critically acclaimed monographs on conflict and peace, whose primary research concerns violence in the political process.
Trump has unleashed a string of controversial policies since returning to the White House that have put his administration at odds with most of the world. He's also forged an alliance with one country that is willing to do his bidding abroad: El Salvador.
The techno-dystopia many have warned about looks a lot closer today, after @WIRED revealed that Peter Thiel's #Palantir (which has a £500 million contract with #NHS England to manage our patient data across NHS trusts) is involved in Elon Musk’s DOGE.
If you're unaware of who unhinged billionaire tech-bro Peter Thiel is, and why he should have nothing to do with the UK or our #NHS, or how he groomed and installed his protégé JD Vance in the White House, or how he's not keen on democracy, read this:
The BMA are concerned about patient data privacy & Palantir’s ties to US intelligence.
DOGE, Palantir, & IRS representatives have been collaborating to build a single API layer above all IRS databases at an event previously characterized as a “hackathon.” publictechnology.net/2023/11/22/hea…
🧵 A scholar who specialises in how Universities respond to authoritarian pressure across different political systems, cultural contexts & historical moments warns that compliance with the Trump administration will not protect their funding & independence. theconversation.com/universities-i…
Many American universities, widely seen globally as beacons of academic integrity and free speech, are giving in to demands from the Trump administration, which has been targeting academia since it took office.
Even before seizing power in 1933, the Nazi Party was closely monitoring German universities through nationalist student groups & sympathetic faculty, flagging professors deemed politically unreliable – particularly Jews, Marxists, liberals & pacifists.
The claim that 11,300 millionaires fled the UK due to Labour has been widely reported & discussed—even by ministers.
Just one problem: it’s extremely unlikely to be true.
A 🧵 about wealth, truth, propaganda, our broken news media, & how citizenship became a commodity.
This 🧵is about how the ultrarich use news media to oppose constraints on their wealth & power, & to break free from well-established legal, democratic & ethical norms, manifested in debate around what some have called the 'commodification of citizenship'. eprints.lse.ac.uk/123961/2/Commo…
The sheer volume of unreliable or false information spreading around the world has caused some scholars to refer to this phenomenon as a ‘disinfodemic’, which involves the spread of harmful, misleading and dangerously polarizing misinformation and disinformation.