What the Times Misses about Poverty

The root of much American dysfunction isn’t a failure of work but of family dissolution.

It’s an affecting story. Matthew Desmond, writing in the New York Times Magazine, profiles Vanessa Solivan, a poor single mother raising three children. Vanessa works as a home health aide, yet she and her three teen children are often reduced to sleeping in her car, a 2004 Chrysler Pacifica. In the morning, she takes her two daughters and one son to her mother’s house to wash and get ready for school. Vanessa has diabetes. Her work brings in between $10 and $14 per hour depending upon the health coverage of the mostly elderly patients she cares for. But because of her responsibilities to her children, Vanessa works only 20 to 30 hours per week. That doesn’t provide enough to keep this family of four above the poverty line.

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Why Afghanistan is more dangerous than ever

Since the US-led invasion in 2001, Afghanistan has never been as insecure as it is now. The Taliban control more territory than at any point since the removal of their regime 17 years ago.

The Afghan war has already become the longest war in US history. With the passage of time, the conflict has not only become more intense – it has also become more complicated. The attacks are becoming bigger, more frequent, more widespread and much deadlier. Both sides – the Taliban and the US/Nato-backed Afghan government – are trying to gain the upper hand.

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Stereotypes Are Often Harmful, and Accurate

…First, stereotypes are not bugs in our cultural software but features of our biological hardware. This is because the ability to stereotype is often essential for efficient decision-making, which facilitates survival. As Yale psychologist Paul Bloom has noted, “you don’t ask a toddler for directions, you don’t ask a very old person to help you move a sofa, and that’s because you stereotype.”

Our evolutionary ancestors were often called to act fast, on partial information from a small sample, in novel or risky situations. Under those conditions, the ability to form a better-than-chance prediction is an advantage.

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The Palestinian Victimhood Narrative No Longer Sells

After decades of accepting the idea that Palestinians deserve American financial assistance without offering anything in return, President Trump has finally said, “Enough.” Fed up with their lies and obduracy, he decided the Palestinians are not entitled to US taxpayer dollars to pay terrorists, support phony refugees, and line the pockets of corrupt leaders who enrich themselves, their families, and their cronies.

Cutting aid to UNRWA was long overdue because UNRWA is a poster child for the fraudulence of Palestinian claims.

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‘It can’t be more absurd!’ German man who liked satire post taunting Hitler scrutinized by police

A Facebook post by a German satire magazine ridiculing a right-wing politician and Hitler received a solid like from a Munich student. Despite being among thousands of users who also liked the post, he was scrutinized by police.

Law enforcement has now launched an inquiry into Johannes Koenig, a 27-year-old student from Munich, local media reported, saying the case has been passed on to the local police department, Commissariat 44, which deals with far-right offences.

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Venezuela’s socialist miracle now has an annual inflation rate over 100,000 percent

Venezuela introduced a new currency on Aug. 20 as a hopeful solution to the country’s rapidly devaluing currency and skyrocketing inflation rates, but after just a few weeks, Venezuela is already seeing 100 percent inflation.

The Venezuelan government issued the new currency, called the “sovereign” bolivar, to replace the “strong” bolivar, NPR reported on the day of the rollout.

The new bolivar is worth about 100,000 of the old bolivars, and is pegged to the government’s cryptocurrency, the petro.

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Swedish SJW whose flight disruption of Afghani’s deportation went viral now faces charges

The Swedish student who livestreamed her onboard protest against the deportation of an Afghan asylum seeker over the summer is being charged with violating Sweden’s Aviation Act, broadcaster SVT reported on Friday.

Student activist Elin Ersson protested against the Swedish government’s policy of deporting some rejected asylum seekers to Afghanistan by boarding an Istanbul-bound flight that carried an Afghan man who was to be returned home after being denied asylum.

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Jian Ghomeshi’s essay in The New York Review of Books draws fire

Disgraced former CBC Radio host Jian Ghomeshi penned a personal essay in The New York Review of Books that drew swift backlash on Friday, with many social media users questioning why he was given such a prestigious platform to detail his life post-trial.

Ghomeshi was acquitted in March 2016 of four counts of sexual assault and one count of choking involving three complainants. In May 2016, he apologized to a fourth complainant and signed a peace bond that saw another count of sexual assault withdrawn.

Link to piece.

Twitter – lots of angry feminists

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Protests outside Vancouver court ahead of Marrisa Shen murder suspect appearance

A man accused of murdering 13-year-old Marrisa Shen appeared briefly in court on Friday.

Ibrahim Ali is charged with first-degree murder in connection with Shen’s death.

Ali wore a light red jail uniform and spoke quietly with an Arabic interpreter but did not address the court, only glancing momentarily at the crowd gathered in the room.

The Chinese community made a good showing today, It made the reporter sad.

h/t lolwut

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Conrad Black: Ford invoking the notwithstanding clause was what Canada needed

The imposition of the notwithstanding clause of the Canadian Constitution by Ontario Premier Doug Ford is the best thing that has occurred in Canadian politics since the defeat of the Parti Québécois in the provincial election in Quebec four years ago. The significance of the decision to vacate a judicial decision to prevent the premier’s shrinkage of the Toronto city council from 47 to 25 councillors vastly transcends the technical issue: 25 councillors is quite enough. It is with great reluctance that I take issue with Justice Edward Belobaba of the Ontario Superior Court (who once sustained me very generously in a libel case and his judgment was almost textually replicated by the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada). He is a fine and learned judge but I do not agree that a modest reduction of the number of city councillors by the provincial government, which has constitutional authority to organize municipal governments within each province, infringes, as the justice found, freedom of expression of voters or councillors.

h/t RM

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