Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow? “No,” says the man in Washington, “it belongs to the poor.” “No,” says the man in the Vatican, “it belongs to God.” “No,” says the man in Moscow, “it belongs to everyone.” I rejected those answers; instead, I chose something different.

• Claude in the near future, probably

American voters are doing their part to “help,” crying about “high” fuel prices (less than half of what they are here) when one of the big issues is that undertaxation of petrol has led to underinvestment in alternatives.

Oh my bad, I interpreted the comment as saying it should be a general requirement.

ArXiv uses an endorsement system so that not everyone can post there. However, sometimes dubious “scientists” manage to slip through the cracks, which is why there is moderation for cases such as these.

ArXiv is a place where researchers put papers before they are accepted and peer reviewed (“preprints”). Requiring this would defeat the purpose of arXiv, which is to allow fellow researchers to see material that is not peer reviewed before it is published. Before arXiv, this happened only through informal discussions and meetings during conferences.

Just “speaking English” typically won’t get you a job unless you have a degree to back it up.

H₂O molecule insists water isn’t wet after torrential storm.

Get ready for people losing all that was in their wallets.

Sounds like every crypto firm.

There are already some nationwide restrictions on ads for alcohol, though not (yet) a complete ban.

I guess it wasn’t part of this specific initiative, since it was aimed at carbon-polluting industries, whereas alcohol is a different type of problem.

UBI doesn’t exist anywhere nationwide (except for the elderly), minimum income guarantees however have been implemented in many countries. For example, in my home country the minimum allowed income for a legal resident in a single-person household is just over 1900 USD per month. Meaning: if your income is below this, you have a right to supplemental income from the government.

This is literally what every prosperous society already does.

That remains to be seen. Hungary is the least democratic and one of the most corrupt countries in the EU, but it still has a higher standard of the rule of law than certain other countries.

I agree with your points. Just sayin’ that while it may be true the EU has done too little, it’s not true they’ve done “nothing.”

They already did something about it (froze funds), it’s one of the reasons the opposing candidate is leading in the polls.

An unveiling of a statue of Robert E. Lee is planned for next week.

Petrol is still cheap (here it’s over $10 per gallon), and so long as the US continues to severely undertax it, the US (and global) economy is going to keep paying the price.

Have you noticed how ancient religious texts like the Bible often heavily focus on financial themes, especially debt and inequality? This was long before capitalism existed. The existence of markets (capitalist or not) tends to lead to inequality. In fact, modern capitalist societies were the first to have the ability (though not necessarily the will…) to adequately address this issue using progressive taxation, as opposed to the older methods like the Jubilee, bans on usury, and later feudalism (all of which have severe drawbacks).

Systemic issues that have gone largely unaddressed (by Democratic admins) or have been exacerbated (by Republican admins). And the economy has suffered as a consequence.

No matter how good the economy is doing, privatized Healthcare is going to cause issues.

In fact, several universal health care systems rely less on public health care spending than the US system does.

Coming out of the pandemic the US had one of the best looking economies.

You sure about that? A devastating health care crisis with life expectancy of an African country, poverty and violent crime rates 5-10 times higher than many industrialized nations, an employment rate more than 10 percentage points below the top countries, rampant homelessness, a staggering prison population, massive public debt, crumbling democratic institutions…

Above average, sure. The Trump admin made things significantly worse, sure. But if there ever was a time when the US had “one of the best-looking economies,” it was many decades ago.

Is this even the worst he is publicly known to have done? The 2020 coup attempt and aiding the GRU in attacking domestic targets (both of which are outright treason) rank higher in my view, and would be slam-dunk convictions in any country with a functioning legal system and a modicum of democracy.