Thursday, May 24th 2012
The Government, in signing the Fiscal Treaty, has effectively committed itself to introducing up to €6 billion more in tax increases and spending cuts in the medium-term, over and above what it has already planned. While the news in the short-term will, understandably, focus on whether a referendum will be necessary, once attention starts honing [...]
This article was originally published in the journal.ie last night.
How many speculators does it take to change a light bulb? The answer is none. They still think the broken one works.
The business model of asset price speculation - the model that broke the world - informs the National Assets Management Agency (NAMA), and it is [...]
On Saturday, the Irish Times devoted a full page to the question of whether austerity is working, on foot of the letter by 60 prominent public figures. International commentators such as Joseph Stiglitz and Nouriel Roubini and domestic commentators Terence McDonagh from UCG, Brid O’Brien from the Irish National Organisation of the Unemployed and businessperson Brian [...]
Conflict of interest is so deeply embedded in Ireland, no one seems to notice
The cops were very swift to close down the demonstration in the NAMA building that Unlock NAMA occupied on Saturday the 28th. They haven’t been as swift though to investigate Anglo Irish Bank. A big blow to that investigation is due, apparently, [...]
Can We Still Write Big Question Sorts of Books? | David Graeber
David Graeber and the model of his ‘popular’ yet scholarly book Debt: The First 5000 Years
So: what was to be the model for a big questions sort of book, and how to write a book that would still be scholarly, but not academic?
This is [...]
In the presence of the gentry, Old Kenny the peasant, doffed his cap, crooked his knee, arranged his face in an expression of obsequious servility and said: ‘Savin’ yer presence, yer honours, but sure ’tis all our own fault, for we’re a feckless nation an’ not used at all at all to the ways of [...]
Translation of an article by Manuel Castells, originally published in La Vanguardia, 21st January 2012.
The indignados movement that burst forth in 2011 in Spain, Europe and the United States is a breath of fresh air in a world that smells rotten. They set out in social networks and in acampadas what many people think: that it was banks [...]
There was no need for Mario Draghi’s words to understand that the crisis has already reached an irreversible threshold in Europe. A crisis of “systemic dimensions” was what Jean-Claude Trichet said a couple of months ago. Now Draghi, his successor at the European Central Bank, tells us that “the situation has worsened” (January 16th). It is [...]
Irish ‘SOPA law’ another under the radar attack on digital rights by a craven government pandering far too easily to corporate interests
Very strong and accurate piece from Karlin Lillington in the Irish Times today, making no bones about the motivations behind the changes in copyright law that Sean Sherlock and the Irish government are trying to [...]
Davos dilemma | Michael Roberts
The majority of those at Davos think that Capitalism isn’t working, but don’t feel there is a need to change anything because its working rather well for them. It’s up to those not in the 1% then to change it.
The strategists of capital are attending their annual jamboree in the [...]
