England invests far less in wind turbines than Scotland | Karsten Würth, UnSplash
5 April 2021 (openDemocracy) In late 2019, an organism on the edge of life appears to have made the journey from the body of a bat into the bloodstream of a human, and shut down the global economy. Whatever else we may have learned from the pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, it has taught us that, before anything else, we are biological beings. Our lives and deaths are bound to the beings around us.
This lesson isn’t new. As capitalism has drilled into the boundaries of the life systems of our planet, we have had numerous reminders in recent years that we are not just individuals. All creatures on earth depend on each other.
NationofChange
The Leadership Institute: Conservative PR school
Trumpism, most unfortunately, is still with us as is The Leadership Institute with its arch right-wing operation, now extending globally.
We’re familiar with Fox, the TV propaganda arm of the Trump administration remaining a far right-wing outlet under Rupert Murdoch and his mission of using media to push an arch-conservative agenda.
And we’re becoming aware of other radical right efforts to use media to indoctrinate people. There’s the right-wing Sinclair Broadcast Group seeking to buy up more local TV stations to deceive and lie from, and One America News and Newsmax TV.
Yves here. As much as the UK Government looks determined to drive into the nation into a ditch rather than climb down from its negotiation overreach, and the Tories’ pro-finance, austerity policies have hurt Scotland, Wales, and the hollowed out North, it sadly doesn’t necessarily follow that breaking up Britain would make things better in less than a generation.
As Chris Grey has stressed, one of the problems with Brexit is the UK is too small to go it alone in a world of regional trade blocks, particularly since it depends on a lot of imported goods. This problem goes double for an independent Scotland, which would also have to set up all of the elements of a true national government that it currently lacks (start with trade negotiators!). How about health service? Scotland’s NHS contracts for medicines through the UK. How long would it take to get those sorted? And what happens to people who need insulin in the meantime?