opinion
Opinion pieces from the left, right, and everyone in between.
Should Journalists Receive Awards for Covering Hard News? My Thought Is No; I’ll Tell You Why
The Way Journalists Are Rewarded Needs to Change When I worked in news, one of the strangest things to me was that people sought out awards for their coverage on topics that were deeply sorrowful, traumatic, and disturbing. I think journalists should receive something else for their hard work, especially when it comes to covering challenging topics. Let me explain.
Andrea LawrencePublished 3 days ago in The Swamp
Weapons of Mass Distraction
The element fueling economic growth is not a rare earth metal, processing power, or NFTs: It’s attention. The average American spends 11 hours per day consuming media, 65% of their waking life. Roughly 40% of that time is spent on a mobile device. Billions of dollars and millions of person-years are spent capturing and monetizing that attention. The more attention, the more data, the more money, the more relevant offering(s), the more attention … and so on and so on.
Vlad Andrei ApostolPublished 6 days ago in The SwampProfitable War
In his book, “Nineteen Eighty-Four,” George Orwell places the entire story against the backdrop of an endless war. According to Emmanuel Goldstein, a former partner of Big Brother and now enemy of the state, this is a purposely created non-ending war with either Eastasia or Eurasia in different combinations for mutual benefits of all three belligerents. Sometimes Winston Smith’s nation, Oceania, is in alliance with Eastasia fighting Eurasia; sometimes it is Oceania was in allied with Eurasia fighting Eastasia. There were also times when Eastasia and Eurasia teamed up on Oceania. Truth is it never really mattered.
Impermanent Structures
Introduction Is our current political economic system self-defeating? This question is an important one because it would be a tragedy to work so hard everyday, to buy into a system and society that at its core cannot continue in the long term. The inquiry adds to the literature on capitalism and neo-liberalism taking it further from Keynesian economics and other critical approaches. When building off the insight that Keynes gives us, it becomes painfully obvious the paradoxical nature of capitalism. Marx also points this out. But, unlike Keynes Marx advocates for leaving the capitalist system to its own devices which according to him will eventually be its own unraveling. Keynes advocates for action within the system by creating economic levers that manages the inevitable concentration of wealth produced by the neo-liberal economic system. This is a half measure that represents never healing a wound but endlessly bandaging it is not a long term strategy for the development of equitable economics. Marx’s solution of waiting around for capitalism to fall in on itself is a type of non action which ironically opens the door for inaction. The questions asked in this essay are important because for a long time now we have had massive amounts of evidence (Marx, Keynes, Schumpeter, etc...) that our modern political economic system is undoubtedly self-destructive, environmentally destructive, and alienating to our species being.
Arjuna FournierPublished 9 days ago in The Swamp
Labour Make Gains At Expense of Conservatives.
Labour made gains in the local elections last night. In Barnet, Wandsworth, and Westminster Labour took seats from the Conservatives. Wandsworth was hailed by Labour sources as a monumental loss for the Conservatives. Speaking in Barnet, Sir Keir trumpeted that Labour had "turned a massive corner".
Nicholas BishopPublished 10 days ago in The SwampThe Twenty-second Amendment
The 22nd amendment was approved on February 27th, 1951, making permanent a tradition that has had a tremendous impact on the idea of governance in the United States of America. Although this is not the most well-known amendment, its significance in American history cannot be emphasised. This is because the 22nd Amendment requires...
Zahid KhanPublished 11 days ago in The SwampIgnorance Is The Biggest Threat To Our Democracy
Full credit to Barack Obama, our 44th US President who took some time to post a long piece online this week on Medium. I'm not suggesting that Obama's sentiments were incorrect - because I have a lot of nerve, but not the nerve to do that.
Bonnie Joy SludikoffPublished 22 days ago in The SwampEvolution ALWAYS wins
Evolution on this planet works the way it needs to and the institutions and people who live here do want they feel they need to do in response. Evolution is an unstoppable force that has its own plan for us. We are simply riders upon this rock.
David GrebowPublished 25 days ago in The SwampTo Conservative Men, From a Liberal Woman
Psst. Over here It’s me, the spiky-haired liberal woman with the “SNFLAK” license plate (SNOWFLAKE: get it? See, not all of us libs take ourselves too seriously). Before you roll your eyes and turn away, let’s acknowledge one thing we have in common: you and I both get a daily drenching from the firehose that is media.
Jan M FlynnPublished 27 days ago in The Swamp
Hillsborough disaster
For those not born or not in the uk the disaster might not be so well known. It was the semi final of the fa cup and was between Liverpool and Nottingham forest. It had long been tradition for semi finals to be played at neutral grounds, now its Wembley for semi finals and final.
ASHLEY SMITHPublished 29 days ago in The Swamp
Iran Nuclear Deal
In 2015 under the Obama administrator, the United States, United Kingdom, France, Russia, China, and Germany worked with Iran to create the Iran nuclear deal or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) to limit Iran's nuclear power activities. In this deal, Iran promised to reduce its stockpiles of uranium by 98% for the next 15 years. In return, most of the sanctions that were imposed from the United Nations (UN), United States (US), and European Union (EU) were lifted to help bring economic stability. If Iran did not violate the deal, the sanctions would stay removed (BBC News, 2015), which led Iran to gain access to more than $100bn in frozen assets, resuming to sell oil, and using the global financial system for trade (BBC News, 2019).
The Clarkbar84Published about a month ago in The Swamp
President Biden Is The Greatest President the World has Ever Seen
Putin has walked down a dangerous path with no return. First and foremost, Putin's unprovoked attack on Ukraine has deeply affected the World. Putin’s implied threat of using nuclear warheads places a gun on the heads of world leaders. The world is held hostage. Putin is probably gloating over this political move. But world leaders will not forgive or forget.
Thomas S StamosPublished about a month ago in The Swamp
