Matar um elefante

Posteriormente, é claro, travaram-se discussões intermináveis a propósito da morte do elefante. O dono do animai estava furioso, mas como não passava de um simples indiano, ficou sem poder fazer coisa alguma. Além do mais, eu havia procedido de maneira inteiramente legal, pois um elefante frenético deve ser morto, assim como um cão danado, se o dono não consegue controlá-lo. Entre os europeus, as opiniões se dividiam. Os velhos achavam que eu havia procedido com acerto; os mais jovens, que era uma grande estupidez matar um elefante só porque ele havia massacrado um cule imigrante, já que um elefante vale infinitamente mais do que um miserável cale drávida. E a bem dizer eu estava muito alegre pelo fato de o cule haver sido morto; isso me colocava dentro dos preceitos legais e oferecia-me pretexto suficiente para matar o elefante. E não raro eu me perguntava  se os outros tinham percebido que eu só fizera aquilo para não passar por imbecil. (George Orwell, 1936)

Escutas

Adults in the room

The making of Donald Trump

Human population through time

Hiroshima

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1946/08/31/hiroshima

Science in the age of selfies

http://www.pnas.org/content/113/34/9384.long

History of tax havens

1. This paper examines the historical development of tax havens. The case for regulating tax havens has become an increasingly prominent issue for policy makers worldwide, especially in light of the current financial crisis.
2. Modern tax havens can be organized into three groups: UK-based or British Empire- based tax havens, European havens, and thirdly new tax havens from the transitional economies in South America and Africa.
3. Tax haven strategy developed piece by piece in different locations, often for reasons which had little to do with their ultimate use. Tax havens are a distinctly modern phenomenon, whose origins lie at the earliest in the late nineteenth century. Only during the second phase of their development, from the end of the First World War, did countries begin to develop comprehensive policies to become a tax haven.
4. Since then, tax havens can be viewed as a distinct developmental state strategy that could have evolved only in the context of a robust international system of statehood, respectful of the sovereign right of states to write their own laws and within an integrated world market.
5. Statistics suggest that tax havens have an extremely prominent role in the global financial system. They have become an important instrument of tax evasion worldwide and constitute the single largest drain on developing countries' economies.
6. Today, the key issue regarding tax havens is their lack of transparency. Tax havens need to be regulated by an internationally agreed code of conduct that ensures the transparency of ownership and traceability of assets to their ultimate owners.

http://www.historyandpolicy.org/policy-papers/papers/history-of-tax-havens 

L’écologie de l’attention

http://www.culturemobile.net/visions/yves-citton-ecologie-attention

Les Usurpateurs

Chasing the scream

People powered money

http://www.neweconomics.org/publications/entry/people-powered-money

Berlim, Julho de 1945

Pigs at the Trough

Ivory Tower

The affects of capitalism

Creating a Learning Society

Print Less but Transfer More: Why Central Banks Should Give Money Directly to the People

Rather than trying to spur private-sector spending through asset purchases or interest-rate changes, central banks, such as the Fed, should hand consumers cash directly. In practice, this policy could take the form of giving central banks the ability to hand their countries’ tax-paying households a certain amount of money. The government could distribute cash equally to all households or, even better, aim for the bottom 80 percent of households in terms of income. Targeting those who earn the least would have two primary benefits. For one thing, lower-income households are more prone to consume, so they would provide a greater boost to spending. For another, the policy would offset rising income inequality. 

http://www.markblyth.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Print-Less-but-Transfer-More.pdf 

What about me?

Education under attack

1. http://hechingerreport.org/content/qa-dana-goldstein-yesterdays-teacher-wars-explain-todays-education-battles_17399/
2. http://m.thenation.com/article/181762-venture-capitalists-are-poised-disrupt-everything-about-education-market
3. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/29/neoliberalism-economic-system-ethics-personality-psychopathicsthic?CMP=fb_gu
4. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/dc8bb3b4-29f2-11e4-914f-00144feabdc0.html
5. https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/clare-sambrook/goves-own-operation-trojan-horse-privatisation-of-our-schools