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A personal digest of news and stuff which interests me
Discontinued
This blog is now discontinued, since I’ve incorporated it into Putney Debater – http://www.putneydebater.com
Posted in: Latest
Government faces calls to overhaul visa rules for foreign performers
March 21, 2011
Government faces calls to overhaul visa rules for foreign performersDemands of ‘creative and sporting’ category of points-based immigration system leading to cancelled events, say organisers… A survey by the Greater London Assembly showed that a quarter of all artists who were hired in 2010 to open an exhibition, take part in festivals or play a […]
Stirling success for classical music scheme
March 17, 2011
…since 2008 an audacious project to change the future for Raploch’s young people by immersing them in classical music has been working with 80% of children at nursery and primary schools. And now a new report commissioned by the Scottish government has concluded that the project, Sistema Scotland, has the potential “to achieve social transformation”… […]
Posted in: Cultural Politics, Music
Detroit Symphony Orchestra Strike
March 11, 2011
DSO musicians are now starting the sixth month of a strike that began October 4. The walkout was provoked by management’s massive concession demands, including a more than 30 percent pay cut, cuts in health and pension benefits and drastic changes in working conditions. Last month, Detroit Symphony musicians unanimously rejected a “final offer” presented […]
Nailing Tory Lies
January 7, 2011
Ed Miliband has come out fighting in today’s Times arguing that “a great deceit designed to damage Labour has led to profoundly misguided and dangerous economic decisions”. The truth is uncomfortable for the Government. Ed Miliband writes (£): “What is this deceit? It is that the deficit was caused by chronic overspending rather than a […]
Posted in: Capitalism, This England
An example to us all
January 7, 2011
Subject: Senior moment – A 98 year old woman in the UK wrote this to her bank. The bank manager thought it amusing enough to have it published in the Times. Dear Sir, I am writing to thank you for bouncing my cheque with which I endeavoured to pay my plumber last month. By my […]
Posted in: Miscellany, This England
Politics on the brain
January 5, 2011
Politics on the brain Conservatives are dinosaurs. That, at least, was the implication of a story on Radio 4 the other morning. Guest editor Colin Firth (himself a disenchanted Lib Dem, though Mr Darcy was undoubtedly a Tory) had asked scientists at University College London to discover whether political attitudes are hardwired into people’s brains. […]
Posted in: Brain
Capitalism And The Importance of Lying
December 27, 2010
The experience of Wikileaks has shown what has long since been known, but rarely discussed. Capitalism depends upon systematic lying. Over recent weeks we have had a succession of politicians and State bureaucrats from all the Capitalist states appear on TV, and tell us how terrible it is that their duplicity has been exposed. Of […]
Posted in: Capitalism
Confidential occupations document – april 2009
December 27, 2010
confidential occupations document – april 2009 The following leaked document had disappeared from the public domain due to the website which it was previously hosted on going down. It is a briefing for heads of university administrations on dealing with student occupations. It may assist activists in gaining some idea of the perspective of senior […]
An Iranian Director’s Impassioned Defense
December 23, 2010
An Iranian Director’s Impassioned Defense thelede.blogs.nytimes.com Jafar Panahi, an internationally celebrated Iranian filmmaker who supported opposition protesters after last year’s disputed presidential election, delivered an impassioned defense of his work at his trial in Tehran last week. http://www.facebook.com
Michael's Digest 
June 14, 2011
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