Francis 🇾🇪 🏳️‍🌈 🏳️‍⚧️ @francis@greenplenty.social

Given the long term policy of the pensions 'triple lock' has lifted many pensioners out of relative poverty (even if our pensions remain low by international standards), it make sense to suggest that a similarly long-term political commitment on child poverty is required - a 'child's lock' commitment to raise child-related benefits to a higher level & track them to rises in earnings & inflation.

Whether Labour will commit to this is another Q.

#childpoverty #inequality
https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/may/25/next-government-urged-to-wake-up-to-uks-shocking-levels-of-child-poverty

Sunak's Election strategy writ large

#UkPolitics #Sunak #Hanoi #Frit

When I say that the proliferation of "AI" bullshit being sold as fact-finding or truth-certifying machines is going to get people killed, "Google's GPT System Tells Someone To ['Use Bleach And Vinegar' (I.e. A Two Things Which In Mixture Make Chlorine Gas)] To Clean Their Washing Machine" is exactly the kind of thing I mean

“In one of those moments that you can’t believe is not satire, Antony Blinken met with Arab-American leaders and warned them that if Palestine got statehood, the US would defund the United Nations and potentially the World Food Program, plunging the developing world into starvation. It wasn’t enough for these fascists to starve innocents in Palestine, they’re now threatening to do it across the world. They would really rather kill millions more than stop doing genocide.”

https://www.councilestatemedia.uk/p/blinken-suggests-the-world-food-program

Toxic Gaslighting: How 3M Executives Convinced a Scientist the Forever Chemicals She Found in Human Blood Were Safe
==

Decades ago, Kris Hansen showed 3M that its PFAS chemicals were in people’s bodies.

Her bosses halted her work.

As the #EPA now forces the removal of the chemicals from drinking #water, she wrestles with the secrets that 3M kept from her and the world.

#News #Science #Chemistry #Safety #Environment #Minnesota #PFAS #ForeverChemicals

https://www.propublica.org/article/3m-forever-chemicals-pfas-pfos-inside-story?utm_medium=social&utm_source=mastodon&utm_campaign=mastodon-post

To those Americans getting offended that their president and country are being criticised for arming a genocide may I just remind you that there is something a tad more offensive than being criticised for arming a genocide which is arming a goddamn genocide. Get some fucking perspective.

If you think “overpopulation” is at the root of environmental crises like climate change and you won’t acknowledge that the problem is actually an economic system that promotes relentless resource extraction, consumption, and externalizing costs to the environment, then you need to answer my follow-up question of “how many people do you think need to be genocided and which ones?”

It’s a fair question and you should show you’ve thought through your position.

/1

Labour is making a virtue of the fact that its plan for office is to manage a steady ship where nothing will change. That would be a great policy if all was going well, but everything is falling apart all around it, and that means that the actual message is that it has no idea what to do about that fact.
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2024/05/20/stabilty-is-not-change-its-acceptance-of-a-failing-status-quo/