Strangers on a train: The dark bargain that destroyed the Republican Party

CNN screenshots

Kirk Swearingen,

 Salon
July 24, 2021

This article first appeared in Salon.

As the Republican Party continues on its march toward fascism, it's easy to find yourself making political connections — even when you are trying your best not to think about politics.

Recently I was reading about astrophysics (understanding only an infinitesimal amount) and saw the Republican Party's implosion into Trumpism as akin to the formation of a black hole in space, where truth (instead of light) is unable to escape the event horizon.

I found myself in the same frame of mind while watching Alfred Hitchcock's 1951 classic "Strangers on a Train," about a couple of men falling into a conversation and making an unholy bargain, which one of them thinks is a macabre intellectual exercise not to be taken seriously.

Falling back into the dream of the film, I could not help but see the conniving, unhinged Bruno Antony (brilliantly played by Robert Walker) as a precursor of Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, Ron Johnson and their ilk, those who have managed to kill off the old Republican Party and who are hard at work to murder majority-rule democracy — both through voter suppression and by inciting actual violence. For me, Guy Haines (played by Farley Granger) represented Republicans I understood, at least to a degree: Nelson Rockefeller, George H.W. Bush, John McCain, Mitt Romney, Liz Cheney. To me, those Republicans might have been willing to take advantage of others and perhaps stretch the law to avoid taxes or otherwise enrich themselves, but they would likely have ruminated over it and made sure to attend church service soon after banking the profits. In any case, they believed in the necessity of compromise, the work inherent in politics.

These are the so-called RINOs, or "Republicans in name only," a term which — now that I consider it — was always a form of gaslighting and projection. That term has been used to attack actual Republicans and make them seem like another group Trump voters could despise and blame for their failings and bad impulses — another "other." Newt Gingrich and his chortling crew sent the Republicans who understood that compromise was the way of politics (and who, it ought to be said, also took their oaths of office seriously) the way of the Oldsmobile. It was a Swift Boat operation done on their own people. We could all see they were Republicans, but we were told they were somehow not Republicans, or at least not real Republicans — they were RINOs. The fake Republicans pushed out the real ones.

And there it was: Gaslighting — the favored authoritarian manipulation of "don't believe what you see with your own eyes" — so named for the 1944 film "Gaslight" (directed by George Cukor with Hitchcockian flair), in which a criminal, played by Charles Boyer, purposively undermines the mental health of his wife (Ingrid Bergman, who won an Oscar for the role) by lying to her endlessly and saying that things she has seen with her own eyes are not true. You know, like Donald Trump has done to the public for years — indeed, for his entire adult life.

The overarching gaslighting that the modern Republican Party continues to perpetrate on the American public is that good old yarn about how lowering taxes for the wealthy and corporations will boost the economy — the so-called trickle-down theory, which George H.W. Bush memorably called "voodoo economics," before he was selected as Ronald Reagan's running mate, at least partly to shut him up. It always brings to mind something economist John Kenneth Galbraith wrote:
The modern conservative is not even especially modern. He is engaged, on the contrary, in one of man's oldest, best financed, most applauded, and, on the whole, least successful exercises in moral philosophy. That is the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.

The actual Republicans — who we are told by the likes of Matt Gaetz are not the actual Republicans — must have thought back in the Tea Party days that the Gingrich plan, the treat-the-opposition-as-your-enemy, shut-down-the-government, win-at-all-costs faction, would be a temporary thing, something to be countenanced for a short time. They clearly felt the same way about the antics of Donald Trump. It was all just kind of an unsettling joke, as Guy Haines thought of Bruno's proposed bargain to trade murders.

In the film, Bruno crashes a party and nearly strangles a woman while re-enacting the murder he has committed, which might remind anyone old enough both of Gingrich's crashing the GOP with his "Contract With America" (often referred to then as "Contract on America") and of the equally oddly named Grover Norquist, co-author of the "Contract," who often said he wanted a government small enough that he could drown it in the bathtub. (That phrasing seemed pretty personal — there's more than a hint of gruesome domestic violence in there.)

What Gingrich and Norquist brought to the party was the end of what used to be called "political comity" — seeing beyond different political positions and working together professionally to reach compromise. You know — pretty much the substance of politics.

There is a scene, both funny and unsettling, in "Strangers on a Train" in which Bruno and his mother (the memorable Marion Lorne, in her film debut) have a chance to catch up, and we learn a good deal about how Bruno became the person he is now. She fusses about his health and his attitude, remarking to her son that at least he had given up on his crazy earlier plan:

Mother: Now, you haven't been doing anything foolish?

[Bruno shakes his head while nuzzling her hand.]

Mother: Well, I do hope you've forgotten all about that silly little plan of yours.
Bruno: Which one?

Mother: About, um, blowing up the White House.

Bruno: Oh, ma, I was only fooling. Besides, what would the president say?

Mother [laughing with relief]: Oh, you're a naughty boy, Bruno! Well, you can always make me laugh.

When the film was made, the politics of the day were focused on the Cold War and distrust of anyone who might be sympathetic to the "other side." Looking at the film today, who could doubt that Bruno, like far too many Republicans, might be a QAnon believer, as well as a delighted supporter of Trump's Big Lie about the election, shrugging off the lack of any evidence while pointing to Chinese and Russian conspiracy websites. (In the film, Bruno works assiduously to plant evidence to tie Granger to the murder that Bruno actually committed.) Bruno would have been delighted to help with the planning for the insurrection of Jan. 6 and would have cheered others on from a discreet distance. And he would just as cheerfully deny everything he'd done. You can never pin down a psychopath. As we all know now, it is not possible to hold the shameless to account. They just cry persecution.

The images of the fight on the merry-go-round — sent into overdrive by a policeman who shoots indiscriminately, killing the carny operating the ride — are unforgettable. Granger's character, like, say, Liz Cheney and Mitt Romney, is trying desperately to hang on as Bruno kicks at his hands and the whole contraption seems about to break apart. It does, at least until a carnival employee crawls beneath the carousel to reach the controls, too late to save the ride and some of its passengers.

One story concerning the making of "Strangers on a Train," as told by Ben Mankiewicz on Turner Classic Movies, is that Hitchcock was haunted by his decision to allow the man to crawl under the frantically spinning merry-go-round. For years afterward, Hitchcock said, he got sweaty palms every time he thought about that day. If Donald Trump is directing this insurrectionist flick now in production from Mar-a-Lago Studios, he's more than happy to sacrifice anyone and everyone.

The old GOP is going the way of that merry-go-round, and even if someone were to try to get to the controls now (Who? The Lincoln Project? The Bulwark?) it seems too late to save anything worthy of a democratic republic. Conservatives who are not pro-white supremacy, pro-conspiracy, anti-science, and chock-full of grievances will need to create a new political party someday — and get themselves out of the carnival business, with its glaring lights, mesmerizing sounds and untrustworthy machinery.

No, the rich aren't like the rest of us: The secret worlds of wealth

FILE PHOTO - Amazon President, Chairman and CEO Jeff Bezos speaks at the Business Insider's "Ignition Future of Digital" conference in New York, U.S. on December 2, 2014. REUTERS/Mike Segar/File Photo

Chauncey Devega,

 Salon
July 26, 2021

Last Tuesday, Jeff Bezos, the world's richest man, soared into space in a rocket many observers compared to a penis. A week or so before that, Richard Branson also blasted himself to the edge of space in a "spaceplane" designed by his company, Virgin Galactic.

After his history-making feat, Jeff Bezos gave $100 million to CNN commentator Van Jones, and another $100 million to chef José Andrés, who has dedicated himself to providing free meals to frontline workers and others in need during the pandemic. They were asked by Bezos to use the money for charitable purposes. This beneficence was a type of "apology" for his grotesque act of hubris and ego: he and most others of his class have no sincere sense of social obligation.

In so many ways these billionaires and their space adventures, during a time of human misery and rising neofascism in America and the world, is like bad science fiction turned to life. It is as if Paul Verhoeven, Mike Judge and Roger Corman collaborated on a film and then found a way to replace reality as we once understood it with their elaborate simulation.

Bezos and Branson's antics are further evidence that America is a plutocratic pathocracy that is cannibalizing itself. In this new Gilded Age, millionaires and billionaires have enriched themselves through a political and economic system in which social parasitism and social Darwinism rule largely uncontested.

In this new world — that in many ways is an old world, with echoes of feudalism and debt peonage — neoliberalism means "socialism" for the rich and "free markets" for everyone else. Even worse, the poor, working classes and middle class directly subsidize the wealth and greed of the very rich, because the latter largely do not pay federal and state taxes.

With the billions of dollars Bezos and Branson collectively spent on their rocket rides to space, they could instead have chosen to provide vaccines for the poor around the world, rid the human race of a deadly disease, help uplift the poor and other vulnerable people worldwide, create a project to address the global climate emergency, or done other good works that would have simultaneously soothed their egos and desperate need for attention while also helping others.

With the money spent on his rocket ride and his gifts to Jones and Andrés, Bezos could have instead chosen to provide a true living wage for his employees (the very people who helped him to obtain his vast wealth) or given each of them a substantial cash bonus.
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As seen with the Biden administration's new Child Tax Credit it does not take large sums of money to substantially improve the life chances of poor and working-class people in America. Bezos and Branson could easily choose to do the same.

In response to these billionaire space flights, Deepak Xavier, who heads Oxfam International's global inequality campaign, said this:

We've now reached stratospheric inequality. Billionaires burning into space, away from a world of pandemic, climate change and starvation. 11 people are likely now dying of hunger each minute while Bezos prepares for an 11-minute personal space flight. This is human folly, not human achievement.
The ultra-rich are being propped up by unfair tax systems and pitiful labor protections. US billionaires got around $1.8 trillion richer since the beginning of the pandemic and nine new billionaires were created by Big Pharma's monopoly on the COVID-19 vaccines. Bezos pays next to no US income tax but can spend $7.5 billion on his own aerospace adventure. Bezos' fortune has almost doubled during the COVID-19 pandemic. He could afford to pay for everyone on Earth to be vaccinated against COVID-19 and still be richer than he was when the pandemic began.

Billionaires should pay their fair share of taxes for our hospitals, schools, roads and social care, too. Governments must adopt a much stronger global minimum tax on multinational corporations and look at new revenues. A wealth tax, for example of just 3 percent, would generate $6 billion a year from Bezos' $200 billion fortune alone ― a sixth of what the US spends on foreign aid. A COVID-19 profits tax on Amazon would yield $11 billion, enough to vaccinate nearly 600 million people.
What we need is a fair tax system that allows more investment into ending hunger and poverty, into education and healthcare, and into saving the planet from the growing climate crisis ―rather than leaving it.


Bezos and Branson command such vast financial resources and power that they can engage in acts of global spectacle for their own ego gratification. Why are the super-wealthy flying off to space? For reasons of personal glory, or perhaps out of collective narcissism and greed, and perhaps to flee a ruined planet — or just because they can.

In the final analysis we may all share planet Earth, but the very rich live in their own reality. Michael Mechanic, a senior editor at Mother Jones, knows this well. His new book "Jackpot: How the Super-Rich Really Live — and How Their Wealth Harms Us All" explores that private and exclusive world.

In this conversation, Mechanic explains what the wealthy and super-rich understand about money that other people do not. He shares how the lives of the wealthy and super-rich are indeed very much outside the lived experiences and reality of all other human beings. Mechanic also explains how the wealthy engage in sociopathic or antisocial behaviors, while suffering few consequences — other than their own rootlessness and unhappiness. He warns that no society with such extreme levels of wealth and income inequality is stable and that a healthy democracy needs a more balanced economy with a flourishing middle class.


This conversation has been edited, as usual, for length and clarity.

As the saying goes, there's a class war in America and the rich won. Why don't we see any mass resistance or pressure to change this unjust system?

This can partly be explained by an American ethos which emphasizes the myth of upward mobility. So many Americans actually believe, "We can be in the mansion someday, and when we get there, we don't want to be taxed too much." This pervasive wealth fantasy exists much more in America than in other countries. As compared to Europeans, for example, Americans are overly optimistic about the prospects for upward mobility. American politicians are constantly telling these rags-to-riches stories as well. Such stories ignore the structural realities of American society and the fact that upward mobility is more mythical than real. Family circumstances are the biggest predictor of a person's own economic circumstances, unfortunately.


What does the average American not understand about the very rich? What is their world like?

Here is one example. White men have much greater access to a network of people in the worlds of finance, venture capital and other lucrative industries that they can rely upon when they need a step up. If you have a friend who works in finance, you can use that relationship to get funding for your business. Even to get in the room with a venture capitalist you usually need to have a friend or other contact to arrange it. If you don't have access to that network, you are at an extreme disadvantage. Most women, in general, do not have such financial networks. Black people in America tend not to have access to those networks either. If you are a working-class Black person looking for funding for a company, good luck — whereas if you come from a wealthy white family, your dad likely knows somebody who can get you that access.

Wealth is intergenerational. There are many among the rich who actually believe that they "earned" their money through "hard work" as opposed to family money, luck and access to other resources. Donald Trump is one of the most notable examples: he received millions of dollars from his father yet brags about being a "self-made" man who got a "small loan" to start his business. Do the wealthy really believe such things?
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It varies. Donald Trump is the least self-aware person on earth. He probably believes these myths about self-reliance and that he did it himself. I believe there are wealthy people who appreciate how lucky they are. When you come from a wealthy family it is easy to downplay all of the structural and institutional factors which helped you and your family and that hurt others in terms of accruing intergenerational wealth.

What is the average day like for one of the super-rich?

There are many different types of the super-rich. There are those people that don't work, who are just socialites and go around to events and so forth. There are people who are in industry and are workaholics. But either way, people tend to travel a great deal. They have massive social calendars and many things of that nature to plan. Super-rich families actually have something called a "family office." This is a private company that handles all their personal affairs and investments, and manages all the properties and household employees, and pays the bills. But mainly, the purpose of the family office is to make you richer and to protect your wealth. The family office also helps them to avoid taxes by whatever means necessary. These family offices just perpetuate a dynastic system.


What is it like to live a life without fears or worries about not having enough money?

Many of the super-rich still care about money a great deal, even though they have a ton of it. They don't need more of it, but they use money as a scorecard for their success. It becomes a big game, a competition when you can buy anything you want and have anything you want. That is a quite surreal experience. It is spending money on stupid things. It creates a mindset of "I don't care about money, I don't need it, I can just do what I want." I believe this hurts the children of the wealthy even more because it allows them to flounder through life, never having to stick with anything.

They just wander through life aimlessly. Many children of the wealthy end up getting into the family business or doing something else to maintain a lifestyle that they do not really care about – and that makes them unhappy. To me, that is a bad way to live.


Because they travel so much, the wealthy are often away from their kids for long periods of time. These very wealthy families outsource everything. There are people who do the cooking, the cleaning, the yard work, who take care of the children, etc. There are also consultants for everything. As one of my sources told me, "I meet these super-wealthy people and they don't do anything. They just sort of live in this bubble where everything's being done for them." I believe this explains why we see the super-wealthy engaging in crazy, high-risk, high-priced adventure activities.

There is much research which suggests that the rich, especially the super-rich and the plutocrats, are more likely to be sociopaths than the average person. Did you encounter any people who fit that profile?

Psychologists have studied these questions and have shown that wealthier people, on average, are less empathetic. They are more prone to antisocial behaviors. They are less socially oriented. On the other hand, there's no data that shows the same person before and after getting these large sums of money. Thus, the question: Is it more that these types of personalities are the ones that pursue wealth, or that wealth actually has these negative impacts on a person's behavior?

Does money change people? I asked that question of many people who are sources for the book. Some of them said, "If you have $50 million and you were a jerk, you're going to be a bigger jerk. And if you are a great person, you'll have opportunity to do greater." Essentially, it amplifies your personality. One thing we do know is that children of wealthy families are at high risk for drug addiction and low-level criminal behavior. The risk is similar for very poor kids. People who are from middle-income families are at much lower risk of such behavior.

What of the children of the very rich? Do they just learn that there are no rules for people like them? Poor and working-class people can't claim that they are sick with "affluenza" when they get drunk and run over people, for example.

I do believe that is the case. There is a sense of entitlement that the rules don't apply. We see this among those who are rich but not super-wealthy as well. It is just the idea, "Oh, I can just do this thing and who cares, right? I can cut in line, whatever." It manifests across a range of small behaviors.

What do we know about new money versus old money?

Professional athletes are a classic example. It's actually getting harder and harder for poor kids to make it into the NFL and the NBA. But there is still a pretty sizable number of people who make it in professional sports and come from financially challenging circumstances. They are extremely talented and have focused like a laser beam on being successful in their sport. Then, all of a sudden, they are getting paid $2 million a month. These are crazy amounts of money. I talked with a business manager whose clients are mostly MLB and NBA players. He told me about the following: "This one kid, he's making a million or two a month. He had to hire a housekeeper. Someone to go fold his clothes, do his laundry. Because this kid had never done his own laundry. He never folded his own clothes."

Many of these professional athletes do not know how to function in normal life. They have lived in a bubble. There are all these hangers-on and others in their orbit who are trying to get money from them. It can be the coaches from before they went pro, family members and others who are trying to get these young athletes to take care of them financially.

There are a lot of athletes who fall victim to that. And if you're a big superstar like a Pat Mahomes or Steph Curry, then you can afford to behave in such a way. But as my contact told me, "If you're a backup point guard for the Grizzlies, you can't support a bunch of family members for very long or you are going to go broke." It happens. They get in serious financial trouble. If you come into all those millions of dollars without any sophisticated knowledge about what to do with it, the whole thing can be really disconcerting.

Many people fantasize about wealth. But when you get that wealth, especially all of a sudden, it really changes your relationships with people – including old friends, your middle-class friends. You want to enjoy the money, and you may also want your friends to enjoy it too. "Can I invite my middle-class friends on this fancy trip where I'm going to pay for everything?" Sure, maybe you can do it once. But what's it going to be like if you keep treating your old friends to these super high-end things? It's going to get weird. Pride's going to get in the way, or maybe you'll feel like they are freeloaders. All that money can create very weird dynamics. Family tensions get involved. Children squabble about inheritances. It can become a total mess.

What are the informal rules about wealth that old money understands and new money does not?

Put that money away to make it last. Preserve it, and do not do what the young athletes do. You do not want to be flashy. Old money? it wants nobody to know it exists. The big wealth dynasties with their family offices generally do not want to be big public figures.

Some years ago, I was acquainted with a husband and wife who won the Lotto. It was a modest sum after taxes, perhaps only $150,000. Everyone knew about it because their names were in the newspaper. I asked them a few years later about what they spent the money on. The husband told me he wished they had never won the money, because all they did was pay off some bills and buy a new pickup truck. That was it. But everyone in their family, friends, the neighborhood, their co-workers, all thought they were rich. He told me it was so much stress with everyone asking him and his wife for money that they wished they had never won it to begin with. Is that a common experience?

Yes it is. The conventional wisdom about winning the lottery is that it ruins your life. And in some cases, it really does. I interviewed a guy who was a hedge fund manager. He had a house on Lake Tahoe right next to Larry Ellison's house. And the neighbor on the other side, it was this young guy in his 20s. It turned out, the guy had won a big lottery and bought this $4 million house on Lake Tahoe. He was always up there, just partying with his friends. He didn't seem to have anything else going on in his life. One day the rich guy pulls up in his driveway and he sees the coroner's van next door. He goes over there and asks, "What happened?" They told him, "The person is deceased. This young guy killed himself."

When you have a lot of money there are issues with trusting other people. You do not know who's coming at you. There are going to be people trying to get you involved in business partnerships, pitching ideas to you or trying to become your friend. But you don't really know whether they're there for some other reason. This includes potential romantic partners.

There was a documentary a few years back about lottery winners, that showed how they got all this money and moved into a new neighborhood, and the people there did not accept them. The interviewer asked one of the Powerball winners, an older Black man who came from a working-class neighborhood, what it was like to have all this money. The man was miserable. He and his wife almost started crying. He told the interviewer, "Look around. All we have is a house full of stuff. I don't want to buy anything because I got everything. The neighbors here don't talk to us because they don't think we belong. We were poor in the projects but now we don't trust anyone. We don't have those friendships or family relationships anymore. All we got is a whole bunch of money and a house full of stuff." Then the interviewer asked the obvious follow-up and the man said, "You know what? I was happier when I was poor."

It's true. If you don't have something to give your life meaning, and if you think money is the meaning of life and you pursue that path, forget it. You are going to be miserable.

So what's the magic number in terms of income and happiness?

There is research that looked at millions of people and their self-reported happiness. Positive emotions peak at incomes over 65 grand. Your negative emotions are minimized at about 95 grand. And then there is what is known as "life satisfaction," which is a type of measure of how you view yourself relative to your peers. That maxes out at $105,000, a modest amount of money.

Once you get above the satiation point where a person knows that their needs are met, it is all just creature comforts and other bonuses in life. As you go past the satiation point, your life satisfaction starts to decrease in wealthy nations. We still do not know why that is. But one of the speculations is that in order to maintain this high-end lifestyle, a person has to work all the time and they lose their social connections. If you take a high-paying job and you're just on-call all the time and have too many responsibilities, there is less time to enjoy your life and your relationships. What good is it, right? You have a large bank account and no friends.

We know a great deal about the poor and the "underclass," but we know very little about the very rich. They are under-researched because as a rule they do not talk to outsiders. How did you get access to them?

It was a very laborious process. I had many rejections. In fact, the billionaires wouldn't talk to me at all. They'll talk to you about other things. But they are not going to talk to you regarding their feelings about wealth. But the wealthy also have lots of middlemen, the PR people and the like, who said no. I got a lot more rejections than I got acceptances, I would say. So I had to fill in the gaps by talking to people who are on the periphery of the billionaire class, people who work with them closely, in financial management, of course, but also in such varied roles as building safe rooms for hedge funders, for example. I spoke to a woman who works security for billionaires and trains their nannies in physical combat. I also spent time hanging out with luxury realtors and luxury car dealers and all manner of people who interact with these incredibly wealthy clients.

What do you want the American people to understand about the super-rich?

By and large they are not bad people. The point of writing "Jackpot" was not to disparage the wealthy, but to point out how flawed our system is in America that allows people to amass such wealth at the expense of others. The policies that enable such an outcome is driving us apart as a society. It's really tearing at the social fabric, because as the rungs of the economic ladder get wider and wider apart, we are losing empathy for the people on the other side. There is now a situation where we are a society of extreme winners versus extreme losers. A healthy society has a thriving middle class. That's what really lifts all boats.

Record-shattering heatwaves caused by pace of warming: study

The heatwave that ravaged British Columbia saw temperatures hit 49.6 degrees Celsius (121 Fahrenheit), more than five degrees above the hottest day recorded in Canada up to that point

 Handout US Forest Service/AFP/File


Issued on: 26/07/2021 -

Paris (AFP)

Heatwaves that obliterate temperature records as in western Canada last month and Siberia last year are caused by the rapid pace, rather than the amount, of global warming, researchers said Monday.

The findings, reported in Nature Climate Change, suggest that humanity is likely to see a lot more deadly scorchers in the coming decades.

"Because we are in a period of very rapid warming, we need to prepare for more heat events that shatter previous records by large margins," head author Erich Fischer, a senior scientist at ETH Zurich and a lead author of the UN climate science assessment currently under review, told AFP.

The heatwave that ravaged British Columbia saw temperatures hit 49.6 degrees Celsius (121 Fahrenheit), more than five degrees above the hottest day recorded in Canada up to that point.

Current rates of warming -- about 0.2 degrees Celsius per decades -- are likely to continue for at least another 10 to 20 years no matter how quickly humanity reduces the carbon pollution that drives global heating, the study warns.

But efforts to curb greenhouse gases over the next decade will pay off later.

"The future probability of record-shattering extremes depends on the emissions pathway that gets us to a given level of warming," Fischer said.

Up to now, research on how global warming will affect heatwaves has focused mostly on how much temperatures have risen compared to some reference period rather than on how quickly.

That is, of course, critically important, and the science has shown without a doubt that a warmer world will produce more and hotter heatwaves.

But not taking into account how quickly temperatures rise fails to capture a key part of the picture.

- Climate on steroids -

"Without climate change, one would expect record temperatures to become rarer the longer we measure," Fischer explained.

Likewise, if average global temperatures stabilise -- at, say, 1.5 degrees Celsius above mid-19th century levels, the aspirational target of the Paris Agreement -- dramatic new records would progressively become less frequent.

Fischer compares it to track and field, where the longer a discipline exists, the harder it is top a world record. The long and high jump records, for example, have stood for decades, or are only ever surpassed by a centimetre or two.#photo1

But if athletes start taking performance-enhancing drugs, as happened in US baseball during the late 1990s, records are suddenly broken often and by a lot.

"The climate currently behaves like an athlete on steroids," Fischer said.

At current rates of greenhouse gas emissions, the world is on track to continue warming at current rates to more than 3C by 2100.

"This is a very important study," commented Tim Palmer, a research professor at the University of Oxford who was not involved in the findings.

But climate models with far higher resolution -- like a camera with 64 mega-pixels rather than 16 -- are needed to simulate the monster heatwaves observed the world over the last 20 years.

"This new study shines a valuable spotlight on the high potential for record-shattering extremes," including the kind of extreme rainfall that ravaged Germany and China earlier this month, noted Rowan Sutton, a professor at the University of Reading's National Centre for Atmospheric Science, in Britain.

"Whilst it may not seem rapid to us, Earth is warming at a rate that is unprecedented in the history of human civilisation."

© 2021 AFP

Prof Prem Sikka: Pandemics destroy lives but neoliberalism is deadly too

UK politics is increasingly framed by markets, corporate profits and tax cuts rather than concerns about humanity, compassion and care, says Prem Sikka

Prem Sikka 23 July, 2021 

Most of the Covid-lockdown restrictions have been lifted, at least for the time being. Sadly, the lives of many have been torn apart by the loss of their loved ones.

There have already been nearly 153,000 officially acknowledged Covid-related deaths in the UK. Many more have died because their hospital treatment was postponed. The death-toll is more than double the number of civilians that died during the Second World War.

An independent public inquiry is needed to scrutinise the handling of the pandemic in all four home nations. It also needs to scrutinise the politics, economic and social policies which have delivered the high death-toll.

UK politics is increasingly framed by markets, corporate profits and tax cuts for a select few rather than concerns about humanity, compassion and care. This is signified by Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s reluctance to tighten Covid restrictions because ‘Covid was only killing 80-year-olds’. Some 83,000 over 80s died. Such callous politics will bring more deaths and misery.

Cutting investment in public services has become a neoliberal dogma. The National Health Service (NHS) has been starved of resources and was in a poor shape to handle the pandemic. An indication is provided by the number of beds.

As we entered the pandemic, the UK had 2.4 beds per 1,000 of the population, compared to 5.4 in France, 7.9 in Germany and 12.8 in Japan. In April 2020, NHS England had 118,510 beds to serve a population of 56 million, compared to 299,000 in 1988.

Due to low-pay and poor working conditions 38,000 nursing posts were unfilled. The lack of NHS capacity is the outcome of deliberate government decisions, which prioritised tax cuts for corporations and the rich over investment in the NHS and support services.

The pandemic has shown that poverty and inequalities destroy lives. The poor, including individuals from ethnic minorities, have figured disproportionately in the Covid death-toll. This includes hospital staff, care home workers, transport staff, retirees, zero hour contract workers and many more. People with low incomes can’t afford good food, housing, healthcare and personal space for self-isolation, and are therefore more vulnerable to disease and pandemics.

Nobody is born poor. People are made poor by political institutions. In 1976, workers’ share of gross domestic product, in the form of wages and salaries, was 65.1%. By the end of 2019, it shrank to 49.5%, a decline unmatched by any other industrialised nation. Successive governments used anti-trade union laws, zero hour contracts and austerity programmes to erode wages. The average wage had been stagnant in the decade preceding the pandemic.

Unsurprisingly, 14.5 million people, including 8.1 million in working families and 4.5 million children live in poverty. Even people in work rely upon foodbanks to make ends meet. Too many people are unable to access good food, healthcare and housing and become easy victims of disease and pandemics.

Many people tested positive for Covid but could not afford to take time off work. They also lacked a safe place to isolate as they live in cramped accommodation because they are poor. Government policies have weakened people’s resilience to pandemics.

During the current pandemic, care homes became the dumping ground as hospital managers sought to free-up beds. Local authorities in England are responsible for providing social care, but since 2010, central government grants have been cut by 38% in real terms.

This accelerated privatisation and cash extraction. In private equity owned care homes, 10.83% of the revenues vanish in servicing contrived debt. Private equity also expects a return of 12-14% on its investment. So 20-25% of the revenues disappear, leaving less for frontline services.

Care home workers have been squeezed. Of the 1.52 million workers in care homes, 50% are full-time employees. Nearly 24% are on zero hour contracts. Almost 42% of the domiciliary care workforce is on zero-hour contracts. Staff turnover is over 30%. In March 2020, the real-term median hourly pay of staff was £8.50 per hour.

In these circumstances, it is very difficult for carers to get to know patients and provide personalised care. Low-paid staff are also vulnerable because they can’t easily access good food, housing and healthcare. They can’t easily isolate or take time off to recover.

The financialisation of care homes enabled companies to pay massive dividends. Executive pay has soared to more than 120 times the pay of frontline staff, even though it delivered death and misery. Over 39,000 people have died from Covid in care homes. It is hard to recall any privatisation which has been accompanied by its impact on people’s lives or the country’s ability to resist pandemics and disease.

Pandemics destroy lives and political ideologies are deadly too. The UK’s high Covid death-toll is facilitated by neoliberal ideologies which prioritised neglect of public services, tax cuts for the few, low wages, high corporate profits, unrestrained executive pay and privatisation of healthcare.

There are no signs that such ideologies will change anytime soon. We have to demand that all government policies be accompanied by an analysis of their impact on the lives of the people.

Prof Prem Sikka: Pandemics destroy lives but neoliberalism is deadly too - Left Foot Forward: Leading the UK's progressive debate

Pink offers to pay EHF fine on Norwegian women's beach handball team

• CHELSEA HENDERSON

American singer Pink, who recently released a documentary on Amazon about her career and motherhood, told the Norwegian women's beach handball team to "keep it up" and keep fighting the EHF's "sexist" rules.

Pink has offered to pay the €1,500 fine imposed on the Norwegian women's beach handball team by the European Handball Federation.

At the bronze medal game against Spain during the Beach Handball EURO 2021 tournament, the Norwegian team made the decision to wear shorts like their male counterparts instead of bikini bottoms. The EHF declared that the shorts were "improper clothing" and "not according to the Athlete Uniform Regulations defined in the IHF Beach Handball Rules of the Game," resulting in a €150 fine per player.

Pink, whose legal name is Alecia Moore, tweeted that she was "VERY proud" of the women's team, writing "Good on ya, ladies. I'll be happy to pay your fines for you. Keep it up," after calling the EHF rules sexist.

The Norwegian Handball Association also expressed their support for the women's handball team, writing in a Facebook post: "We are very proud of these girls who during the European Championships in Beach Handball raised their voices and announced ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! We in the Norwegian Handball Association stand behind you and support you. Together we will continue to fight to change the international regulations for clothing, so that players can play in the clothes they are comfortable with!"

Revisit the Hot Press review of Pink's Amazon documentary, 'Pink: All I Know So Far,' which sheds light on how she balances her career and motherhood.

  

Singer Pink offers to pay 'sexist' clothing fine 

for  Norway's beach handball team

The American singer has offered to pay the €1,500 fine incurred by Norway's beach handball team for breaking uniform regulations. The team wore shorts instead of bikini bottoms at the European championships in Bulgaria.

American singer Pink has come out in support of Norway's women's beach handball team who took a stance against sexist clothing regulations

Throughout her career, singer Pink has shown she is not shy about speaking up for what she feels is right. Now, she has come to the aid of Norway's beach handball team after they were fined for refusing to wear bikini bottoms at the recent European championships in Bulgaria.

"I'm very proud of the Norwegian female beach handball team for protesting the very sexist rules about their 'uniform,'" Pink tweeted. "Good on ya, ladies. I'll be happy to pay your fines for you." 

The sport's rules state that female players must wear bikini bottoms, and that these must have a "close fit" and a side depth of no more than 10 centimeters (3.9 inches). Male players, however, can wear shorts.

Last week, the European Handball Federation said the Norway team had worn "improper clothing" and issued a €1,500 ($1,771) fine to the team. 

"In the bronze medal game against Spain on Sunday [July 18] the team of Norway played with shorts that are not according to the athlete uniform regulations," the federation wrote in a statement published on its website.

Team Norway are hoping the stance they took inspires long-term change in the uniform rules

On Monday, the federation announced it had donated the fine to a "major international sports foundation which supports equality for women and girls in sports." Further noting, it was lobbying the International Handball Federation for a change in the rules.

The fine has sparked a raft of criticism in Norway, with the country's handball federation praising the team's stance and the Norwegian sports minister calling the fine "totally ridiculous."

Female players have long complained of finding bikini bottoms uncomfortable and degrading. 

Responding to Pink's offer on their Instagram account, the Norway team — which previously said they were "proud about making a statement" — wrote "wow" and thanked the singer for her support.

"We really appreciate all the love we have received," they added under an image of themselves wearing their shorts. "You're the best."

jmc/js (AP, Reuters)

Pink offers to pay bikini fine for

 Norway beach handball team

Issued on: 26/07/2021 - 

Pink singing the US national anthem at the Super Bowl in February 2018 in Minneapolis, Minnesota: she has offered to pay the fines slapped on the Norwegian women's beach handball team for wearing shorts instead of bikinis during a championship match 

Rob Carr    GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP

Washington (AFP)

US pop star Pink has offered to pay a "sexist" fine levied on Norway's women's beach handball team after they refused to wear bikini bottoms during a during a game in the Euro 2021 tournament.

The European Handball Federation (EHF) ordered the team to cough up 1,500 euros ($1,768) after they wore shorts instead of the regulation swimwear in their bronze-medal match loss to Spain in Varna, Bulgaria.

Pink, a three-time Grammy Award winner, said on Twitter she would cover the fine, berating the organization and encouraging the players to carry on covering up.

"I'm VERY proud of the Norwegian female beach handball team FOR PROTESTING THE VERY SEXIST RULES ABOUT THEIR "uniform"" the "Get the Party Started" singer tweeted.

"The European handball federation SHOULD BE FINED FOR SEXISM. Good on ya, ladies. I'll be happy to pay your fines for you. Keep it up."

Norwegian sports officials had already voiced their unhappiness with the ruling.

"In 2021, it shouldn't even be an issue," said Eirik Sordahl, president of the Norwegian Volleyball Federation.

Clothing has long been a bone of contention in beach sports, with some women players finding bikini bottoms degrading or impractical.

The Norwegian team thanked supporters on social media, after an international outcry at the fine.

And the EHF, ackowledging the angry reaction to its decision, said it had donated the fine to "a major international sports foundation which supports equality for women and girls in sports."

While bikinis have not been compulsory for beach volleyball players since 2012, International Handball Federation rules state "female athletes must wear bikini bottoms" and that these must have "a close fit", be "cut on an upward angle toward the top of the leg" and a side depth of no more than 10 centimeters.

Male players wear shorts.

"It's completely ridiculous," Norway's Minister for Culture and Sports, Abid Raja, tweeted after last Monday's ruling. "What a change of attitude is needed in the macho and conservative international world of sport."

Ahead of the tournament, Norway asked the EHF for permission to play in shorts, but were told that breaches of the rules were punishable by fines.

They complied, until their last match.

"The EHF is committed to bring this topic forward in the interest of its member federations. However, it must also be said that a change of the rules can only happen at IHF level," EHF spokesman Andrew Barringer said.

© 2021 AFP

UK
Labour asks own staff to apply for redundancy as party launches employment rights charter

It comes as Labour moderates oust Corbynistas to seize key London leadership roles.

 by Joe Mellor
26 July 2021 02:07
in Politics


Labour has defended asking its own staff to apply for voluntary redundancy as Angela Rayner launched an employment rights charter described as a “fork in the road”.

It comes as the right of the party have taken control of key leadership positions in the capital after ousting a number of Corbynista members.

Campaigners declared the party is “on the mend” as largely centre-left candidates won 13 out of 16 posts that represent Constituency Labour Parties [CLPs] on the London regional board.

New deal for working people

The party’s deputy leader visited the Impact Hub co-working space in central London on Monday to unveil a “new deal for working people” which promises to “fundamentally change” the economy as the party seeks to win back traditional voters who have switched to the Conservatives.

She said Labour’s plan for workers is “the minimum” they could expect after working through the pandemic.

But she was forced to admit that the party is asking its own staff to consider taking voluntary redundancy due to a lack of funds.


The Labour List website reported last week that party reserves are down to one month’s worth of payroll, and said general secretary David Evans had told the National Executive Committee: “We don’t have any money.”

Asked about the situation, Ms Rayner said: “We are in the devastating circumstances where we have lost general elections and we have lost resources as a result of that, and our organisation has to change.

“At the moment we are asking people to take voluntary redundancy and change the way we do our work like any organisation that goes through those times.”

She said Labour will “never support or endorse or take fire and rehire as an acceptable process” and added: “It is very worrying for our staff who are going through that process. But we want to make sure that the Labour Party is in a very lean, fit position to go forward to win the next general election.

“We have got to be honest about the change that needs to happen. We can’t go through the defeats we have gone through succession after succession and not make any changes.”
Self-isolation

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer was due to join Ms Rayner on the visit in a display of solidarity following a period of turbulence but has instead been forced into self-isolation.

But ahead of the launch, he pledged to make the nation “the best place to work” and said the pandemic has “exposed the fact that millions of workers don’t have the dignity and security they deserve”.

Over the summer, Labour’s front bench will set out the five principles that its new deal for work is based on: security at work, quality jobs, a fairer economy, opportunity for all, and work that pays.

It includes pledges for a “real living wage” of at least £10 an hour, a “fair and level playing field” on tax between multinationals and local businesses, and to improve workers’ rights while strengthening trade unions.

Speaking to workers during her visit on Monday, Ms Rayner said: “Today the new deal is about… we are at a fork in the road as we come out of this pandemic… is that people in Britain shouldn’t have to go to work and really struggle to feed their families and support themselves in very low-paid, insecure work.

“Today is about making sure that everybody gets rights from day one in employment, can have the right to flexible working, not just for the employer but for the employees as well who have done so much adapting and working from home in this period, and making sure that everybody has at least a minimum of £10 an hour, a real living wage.

“I think that will really boost our economy but also give people some security and respect in work. We think that is the absolute minimum that people should expect.”

She added that the day one employment rights could include getting rid of probationary periods, saying there are “other ways” in which employers can deal with staff who are not “up to the job”.

UK

NHS: Why a 3% pay rise might be the best unions can get

Void of trade union cooperation, and with the Covid exit-wave making industrial action difficult, a 3% pay rise may well be as good as it gets, writes Alex Maguire.


Alex Maguire 
Left Foot Forward
Alex Maguire was a trade union shop steward and is now a union official.

After a farcical process on Tuesday afternoon, the government has finally announced that NHS staff will receive a 3% pay rise. Unlike the 2018 deal on NHS pay – and the 4% recently given in Scotland – this one has been imposed by pay review body and therefore is not one that trade unions can vote to accept or reject.

Most NHS trade unions and professional bodies have condemned this increase. It will however be difficult for them to change the government’s mind.

Different trade union interests

This is partly because of the lack of a unified front from trade unions during the pay review process. All the trade unions and professional bodies in the NHS represent different interests. For example, the Royal College of Nurses (RCN) is a closed union in that it only lets nurses and healthcare assistants join it, therefore it represents the interests of these workers above all others.

On the other hand, Union – the public service union – is open to anyone employed in the public sector, and most of its members in the NHS are drawn from between Band One and Band Five on the Agenda for Change payscale.

Other unions such as GMB and Unite, do not have as many members in the NHS, and they tend to be concentrated in certain areas. Most of GMB’s NHS members, for instance, are drawn from the ambulance service.

Consequently, the different unions involved in the NHS have pushed for different deals that would most benefit their members and/or their longer-term interests.

15% pay rise unattainable

For instance, GMB and Unite will have known that the 15% – the highest of all the pay claims – they are calling for is unattainable, but it benefits them to be seen to be campaigning for it, particularly for recruiting members from other unions (GMB have recently tried to off-set their falling membership by retreating from the private sector and into the public sector).

Unison and the RCN, as the two largest unions in the NHS, have more skin in the game, though the RCN’s insistence on 12.5% is surprising, even if, in their submitted evidence to the pay review body, they did provide a fully costed way that the government could provide it.

Of all the proposals, Unision’s £2,000 uplift to every NHS worker on Agenda for Change, or at least a downwardly negotiated variant, was probably the best attainable deal. However, this deal would have needed every union pushing for it, which was always unlikely to happen. The RCN cannot really push for a deal that would see a porter’s salary rise by a substantially greater proportion than a nurse, and therefore erode workplace differentials.

This is the nature of the NHS, multiple professions/occupations are organised alongside each other on the shopfloor and they all have their own rights and interests.

3% is in the ‘sweet spot’

Aside from the issue of trade union cooperation, further complicating securing a rise greater than the government’s is that 3% is in the sweet spot, both in terms of staff striking and public support for the strike. Multiple NHS trade unions have commissioned surveys of the public and they all show support for a pay rise between roughly 3 and 5%. Any higher than this and public support rapidly fades while staff willingness to strike also significantly decreases. Equally, the current Covid exit-wave makes it harder for staff to partake in industrial action, as all NHS industrial action is beset by questions of patient safety.

What happens next?

Do the RCN, emboldened by their success in Northern Ireland from December 2019-January 2020, back up their threat of industrial action? Of all the trade unions/professional bodies they have seemed the most militant and probably have the most resources to support industrial action (they have created an industrial action fund of £35,000,000).

The only way to shift the government’s position would be the industrial action/the real threat of industrial action. However, this does not mean that any industrial action would be likely to succeed, and the consequences of failed industrial action can be catastrophic.

Successful industrial action would probably require both the RCN and Unison and would therefore rely on the two agreeing a position; this is unlikely.

Thus, 3% may well be as good as it gets.

Related Posts:
The Greens have joined calls to increase the NHS pay rise
Honour your living wage promise, unions tell Boris Johnson
Angela Rayner: Labour can win another landslide if it listens to trade unions
Report: How unions are facing down the industrial impact of Brexit at work

 

UK

Competitions & Markets Authority concerned over lack of electric chargepoints ahead of 2030 ban

Image credit: Ross Campbell

The Competitions & Markets Authority (CMA) has set out measures to ensure a national network of electric vehicle chargepoints is in place ahead of the 2030 ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars.

As part of its market study into electric vehicle (EV) charging, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) examined whether the industry can deliver a comprehensive UK charging network that works competitively and that people can trust.

While some parts of this new sector are developing relatively well – including charging at locations like shopping centres, workplaces and people’s private parking (garages and driveways) – the CMA has found that other parts are facing problems which will hinder roll-out. This could impact the Government’s plans to ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030 and its wider commitment to make the UK net zero by 2050.

In particular, the CMA is concerned about the choice and availability of chargepoints at motorway service stations, where competition is limited; the roll-out of on-street charging by Local Authorities (which many drivers will rely on) is too slow; and rural areas risk being left behind with too few chargepoints due to lack of investment.

In addition, research shows that charging can sometimes be difficult and frustrating for drivers, which could stop people switching to EVs.

Concerns about the reliability of chargepoints, difficulties in comparing prices and paying for charging, risk reducing people’s confidence and trust. The CMA has set out four principles to ensure that using and paying for charging is as simple as filing up with petrol and diesel.

Charging should be as simple as filling up with petrol or diesel:

1. Working chargepoints must be easy to find – e.g. providing up-to-date availability and working status information.

2. Charging must be simple and quick to pay for – e.g. people don’t need to sign up and contactless payments are widely available.

3. The cost of charging must be clear – e.g. standard way of pricing, such as per kilowatt of energy.

4. Charging must be accessible – e.g. all chargepoints can be used by any type of EV.

The UK has around 25,000 chargepoints currently and, while there is still uncertainty, forecasts suggest more than ten times this amount will be needed by 2030.

Andrea Coscelli, Chief Executive of the CMA, said: “Electric vehicles play a critical role in meeting Net Zero but the challenges with creating an entirely new charging network should not be underestimated. Some areas of the roll-out are going well and the UK’s network is growing – but it’s clear that other parts, like charging at motorway service stations and on-street, have much bigger hurdles to overcome.

“There needs to be action now to address the postcode lottery in electric vehicle charging as we approach the ban on sales of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030.

“Our recommendations will promote strong competition, encourage more investment, and build people’s trust, both now and in the future. The CMA has also opened a competition law investigation into EV charging along motorways and will continue to work with government and the industry to help ensure electric vehicle charging is a success.”

The CMA’s key recommendations are that:

• UK Government sets out an ambitious National Strategy for rolling out EV charging between now and 2030. This must sit alongside strategies from the Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland Governments, building on the work already being undertaken by all governments. Energy regulators should also ensure that it’s quicker and cheaper to connect new chargepoints.

• Governments support local authorities (LAs) to boost roll-out of on-street charging – including defining a clear role for LAs to manage the roll-out in their area and providing funding for the expertise needed for this to happen.

• UK Government attaches conditions to its £950m Rapid Charging Fund – which it is planning to use for grid upgrades at motorway service stations – to open up competition so that drivers have a choice of charging provider at each service station.

• UK Government creates an EV charging sector that people can trust and have confidence in, including tasking a public body with monitoring the sector as it develops to ensure charging is as simple as filling up at a petrol station.