10: Salman Khan

The Kalkiist Economic System

The Kalkiist Manifesto talks about a new economic system where everybody, no matter what the job, including women working at home doing household work, will make the same hourly wage that will be measured in time. So if you treat patients for eight hours, you just earned eight hours. If you took care of a child for eight hours, you just earned eight hours. You worked as prime minister or president for eight hours, you earned eight hours. When you go shopping you will similarly spend in hours, minutes and seconds. That medicine your doctor prescribed might cost you two minutes and thirty seconds. Your smartphone might cost you two hours.

The concept of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in vogue today goes out the window. Instead we start talking about a Gross Domestic Requirement (GDR). If you think about it today almost all migration is economic. In the new Kalkiist economy, that need will evaporate. You would have the same living standard in a small village as in a big city. You would have the same living standard in the United States, as in Mexico.

The Kalkiist economy will be an Age Of Abundance in every part of the world.

What is the broader context? Look at the major religions. Islam is 1,400 years old. Christianity is 2,000 years old. Sikhism is 500 years old. Budhism in 2,500 years old. Judaism is 4,000 years old. If you ask a Hindu, all these dates fall within the current age called the Kali Yuga which has gone on for over 5,000 years now. The Bible also talks of "this age," "and the age to come," although they have not been given names.

The four ages come and go like the four seasons. Each lasts thousands of years.

Kali Purush, known as Satan by the Christians, Msulims and Jews, approached King Parikshit 5,000 years ago and asked for some more space where to live and was granted money and gold. And the Kali Yuga started. That is why ending the Kali Yuga is about creating a moneyless society.

King Parikshit was the son of Abhimanyu who died on the battlefield of the Mahabharata. Abhimanyu was the son of the valiant warrior Arjuna and nephew to Lord Krishna.

No character in either the Ramayana or the Mahabharata has been called a Hindu. Hindu is very much a term that came to use during this Kali Yuga. Instead the ancient scriptures talk of the Sanatana Dharma. It basically means the eternal religion. Because God is eternal, humanity's relationship with God has always been, always will be. No argument there.

Writing was invented after the onset of the Kali Yuga because people realized they were getting dumber and dumber. Otherwise in the previous ages people could simply store an entire epic in their heads and would pass them on from generation to generation orally.

So when the new age begins in about 20 years, the best of all four ages, humanity will find it is now more capable of spiritual knowledge, and God will say something new. When God Himself is ruling on earth directly ("Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as in heaven.") the debate about this or that religion goes out the window. It was never about religion, it was always about God. Yes, every religion that originated in the Kali Yuga will go join the mainstream of the Sanatana Dharma, the eternal religion. But it has to be noted that the Hindus of India suffer from the same affliction. The Kali Yuga has also made them less capable of knowing.

The imminent Satya Yuga will not be a repetition of the last Satya Yuga, the Age Of Truth. For one, the global population is much, much larger.

Lord Kalki is the Messiah the Jews have been waiting for. Lord Kalki is who the prayer Thy Kingdom Come has been addressed to for 2,000 years now in churches around the world. Prophet Muhammad himself is back but is unaware of his true identity. He is the long-awaited Imam Mehandi. Lord God will let him know his true identity at the right time. And Imam Mehadi will accept Lord Kalki's leadership, for He is Allah, or God.

But of course God can come to earth in human form. There are simply no limits to what God can do. You don't see Google's data center. You only see that tiny search box. God in human incarnation is like a shadow of the divine God who is omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient. That divine God is still very much there as Arjuna saw and got scared upon seeing and begged Lord Krishna to come back into human form.

Like the Koshi, Gandaki, and Sharada all go mix into the River Ganga, all the religions that were born in this Kali Yuga will go become one with the Santana Dharma. But that can only happen when the Kali Yuga has been ended. Right now Hindus and Muslims riot on simple issues like whether or not it is right and okay to worship God in statues of stone, so shallow are the understandings.

And that is why The Kalkiist Manifesto makes no mention of religion or God. It only talks of an alternative, highly attractive economic system that will replace the current one. I think the idea that everyone will have the same hourly wage is going to be highly attractive to masses around the world, regardless of religious background.

The idea is out as a book. Anybody can debate and discuss it. Nepal has been chosen as the pilot project country. All world will get to see the Kalkiist economy in action in Nepal. That should generate more debate and discussion. And then India and China will be next. Ultimately it will go to every country on earth. It is possible the United States might choose to adopt it last. You can see in the roadmap for adoption that free will is being respected to the utmost. People will choose the new economic system as acts of free will.

Many characters from the Bible and the Mahabharata are back and are human beings in different parts of the world. At the right time they will join efforts with the project.

This below is Lord God the Holy Father in human incarnation. He was Buddha 2,500 years ago, Krishna 5,000 years ago, Rama 7,000 years ago. His brother Laxman from 7,000 years ago who was Balaram 5,000 years ago also is back. Sita of 7,000 years ago and Radha of 5,000 years ago is also back.

I myself am Jesus come back as promised. My role is that of Hanuman 7,000 years ago. I am here to assist Lord Kalki every way I can. I am here to stand shoulder to shoulder with humanity and worship Lord God. Holy Father Vishnu, Holy Son Bramha, Holy Spirit Shiva. And indeed God is One, for the three exist in perfect harmony.

The prayer Thy Kingdom Come was taught by me 2,000 years ago. It is obviously not addressed to me but to Lord God the Holy Father. Lord Rama was King of Ayodhya 7,000 years ago. Lord Kalki will be king of all earth in about 20 years.

He is King. I am Commander.

The new age will last thousands of years.

7: NamaShaitan Movement

7: Niger

War, Mediation or Silence? Coup Leaders in Niger Face Decision Time A bloc of other West African nations gave the military junta a deadline to reinstate the ousted president. That limit is about to run out.

The Chip Titan Whose Life’s Work Is at the Center of a Tech Cold War At 92, Morris Chang, the founder of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, can no longer stay in the shadows.

In California, a Math Problem: Does Data Science = Algebra II? After faculty protests and a debate over racial equity, the state’s public universities reconsider whether high school students can skip a foundational course.
‘Barbie’ Reaches $1 Billion at the Box Office, Studio Says No movie in Warner Bros. history has sold so many tickets so fast, the studio said of the movie directed by Greta Gerwig........ “Barbie,” directed by Ms. Gerwig from a script she wrote with her partner, Noah Baumbach, will finish the weekend with more than $1 billion in ticket sales at the global box office ...... No movie in the studio’s 100-year history has sold so many tickets so fast, said Jeff Goldstein, Warner’s president of domestic distribution. As of Sunday, “Barbie” had been playing in theaters for 17 days. (“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2” was previously the fastest to $1 billion, at 19 days.)



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Putin’s Forever War
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‘I Don’t Think Harvard Was Good for My Soul’ What’s up with America’s misguided obsession with Ivy League schools?

A Revolution Is Coming to Medicine. Who Will It Leave Out?

7: India

6: Imran Khan

6: Samvidhaan

6: Bharatvarsh

Acharya Salil

मैं जय जी के दोकान मैं बैठा था। तो वो एक वीडियो सुनने लगे। तो जो बोल रहे थे वो कहने लगे एक हैं कल्कि अमेरिका में रहते हैं नेपाल से हैं। तो मैंने थोड़ा गौर किया। अरे ये तो आप के बारे में बात कर रहे हैं। कौन हैं ये? तो बात आगे बढ़ी। एक हैं आचार्य सलील। उनसे दो मिनट बात भी हुइ। तो वो कहने लगे मैं महाभारत के समय का संजय। मैंने ही धृतराष्ट्र को सारी कहानी सुनाइ। मैंने भी अपना परिचय दिया। बाइबल के सबसे प्रख्यात पुस्तक गॉस्पेल ऑफ़ जॉन के प्रथम दफा में ही कहा गया है जीसस सृष्टिकर्ता। तो आप के समझ में सृष्टिकर्ता कौन? ब्रम्हा। अर्थात जिस कदर विष्णु के मानव अवतार राम, और कृष्ण, उसी तरह ब्रम्हा के मानव अवतार जीसस। लोग इंतजार कर रहे हैं कि फिर आएंगे। वो मैं आ गया। और मेरा रोल है हनुमान जी का। मेरा काम है भगवान कल्कि को उनके काम में पुरा सहयोग करना। लेकिन न वो न हम परिचय की बात कर रहे हैं। पुरा फोकस काम पर है। काम शुरू हो चुका है। काम है कलि युग की समाप्ति और सत्य युग का शुरुवात। तो काम कर रहे हैं। लेकिन छिपे नहीं हैं। कोइ जिज्ञासा प्रकट करें तो उनको परिचय भी दिया जा रहा है जैसे कि आप को। तो परिचय स्थापित होती है भविष्यवाणी पुरा होने से। मेरा भी। उनका भी। 

ढेर सारे लोग हैं सब कह रहे हैं मैं हुँ कल्कि, मैं हुँ जीसस। शायद सयकडों। तो वो सबके सब पाप कर रहे हैं। महापाप। घोर कलियुग चल रहा है। जो कह रहे हैं मैं हुँ कल्कि मैं हुँ येशु उनसे पुछिए, आप ने कौन कौन भविष्यवाणी पुरी की, आगे कौन कौन भविष्यवाणी पुरा करने जा रहे हैं? आप क्या काम करने आए हैं? वो काम कैसे करेंगे? दुध का दुध पानी का पानी हो जाएगा। 

भगवान बुद्ध एक टाइटल था। नाम तो सिद्धार्थ गौतम था। उसी तरह भगवान कल्कि टाइटल है। नाम है उनका जय साह। भगवान बुद्ध लुम्बिनी में पैदा हुवे। भगवान कल्कि मटिहानी में पैदा हुवे। जनकपुर के पास है। जानने वाले जानते हैं। कहा गया है भगवान कल्कि पवित्र मिट्टी पर पैदा होंगे। भविष्यवाणी है। मटिहानी का मिटटी इतना पवित्र माना जाता है कि सीता जी के स्वयंवर के लिए वहाँ से मिट्टी ले जाया गया था। कहा गया है दुध के नदी के किनार पैदा होंगे। मटिहानी दुधमती नदी के किनार पर है। 

शम्भल के बारे में ढेर सारा कन्फ्युजन है। एक शंकराचार्य का एक वीडियो है। उसमें वो कह रहे हैं जिस शम्भल शहर में भगवान कल्कि पैदा होंगे वो ओरिसा नहीं उत्तर प्रदेश में है। मैं उनके बात का बुरा नहीं मानता। कमसेकम वो उस भविष्यवाणी को समझने का प्रयास तो कर रहे हैं। लेकिन शम्भल शहर नहीं देश कहा गया है। भविष्यवाणी ५,००० साल पुराना है लेकिन भारत में शम्भल नाम के जितने शहर हैं उनमें अधिकांश का नामाकरण पिछले पाँच हजार साल के भितर हुवा है। कि शहर का नाम शम्भल रख दो भगवान विष्णु को मजबुर हो के यही पैदा होना पड़ जाएगा। वैसा भी होता है कहीं? 

तो शम्भल शहर नहीं देश है। शम्भु का देश, पशुपतिनाथ का देश। अर्थात नेपाल। राम पैदा हुवे अयोध्या। कृष्ण मथुरा। बुद्ध लुम्बिनी। कल्कि मटिहानी। चारो नाम काव्यात्मक हैं। 

आचार्य सलील ने कहा जय जी को, "आप के आवाज में एक अग्रेशन है। थोड़ा नरम बोलिए।" 

भीष्म पितामह मृत्यु शैया पर लेटे हुवे थे। भगवान कृष्ण उनसे मिलने गए। पितामह ने कहा, "आप तो ईश्वर हैं न?" कृष्ण जी ने कहा, "मैं तो आप का पौत्र हुँ।" 

"तो ये गलत उदाहरण नहीं हुवा?" पितामह ने कहा। यानि कि कभी आप छल भी करते देखे जाते हैं। क्या ईश्वर का वैसा करना शोभा देता है? 

भगवान कृष्ण ने कहा, "ये तो आप ने कुछ भी नहीं देखा। कलि युग में तो और क्या क्या करने होंगे।" 

कुछ लोग सोंचते हैं महापापी के सामने शायद ईश्वर इम्मोबिलाइज़ हो जाते हों। वो बात सही नहीं हैं। जिस ईश्वर को मानव अवतार में एक करोड़ रावण का सामना करना हो उनके आवाज में अग्रेशन नहीं होगा तो क्या होगा? 

कल्कि वो जो कलियुग को समाप्त कर दें। तो अभी रोडमैप सामने आया है। एक पुस्तक है। कोइ ये प्रमाणित कर दें कि उस पुस्तक में जो रोडमैप दिखाया गया है उस रास्ते कलि युग ख़त्म नहीं होगा तो उस व्यक्ति को २०,००० डॉलर पुरस्कार। लेकिन प्रश्न कार्यक्रम में आ के करनी होगी। अमेरिका में जगह जगह कार्यक्रम होने जा रहा है। उसी के लिए हम न्यु यॉर्क छोड़ फ़िलेडैल्फ़िया  आ गए हैं। 

ईश्वर तो सारे ब्रम्हाण्ड के ईश्वर। स्वाभाविक है सारे पृथ्वी के ईश्वर एक। राम राज्य सिर्फ अयोध्या में था। कल्कि राज्य सारे पृथ्वी पर होगा। किसी से छुपी बात नहीं रहेगी। इस शुभ काम का आरम्भ नेपाल से होगा। नेपाल में जो अगली चुनाव होगी वो सत्य युग समाज पार्टी स्वीप करेगी। 

दुनिया भर के चर्च में दो हजार साल से प्रार्थना करते आ रहे हैं कि हे ईश्वर धरती पर तेरा प्रत्यक्ष शासन चाहिए। तो वो भगवान कल्कि का इंतजार है। यहुदी को जिस मसीहा का इंतजार है वो भगवान कल्कि ही हैं। 

महाभारत में रामायण में किसी को हिन्दु कहा गया है क्या? तो ईश्वर कुछ नया कहने जा रहे हैं। उसके लिए पहले इस कलि युग को समाप्त करना होगा। अभी तो लोगों की क्षमता ही कम है। कलि युग में वैसा होता है। क्षमता में ह्रास आ जाती है। 

ईश्वर को मानव अवतार में पहचानना आसान काम नहीं है।  

4: Ukraine

3: AI

The most serious Trump indictment yet – a criminal law scholar explains the charges of using ‘dishonesty, fraud and deceit’ to cling to power
Trump indicted in Jan. 6 case – but his 3 upcoming trials may not keep him off the campaign trail
What happens if someone dies in space?
The Art of Self-Awareness: A Founder’s Guide to Assessing Strengths and Weaknesses
Hit the Emotional Gym — The Founder's Framework for Emotional Fitness

2: Gary Vee

On this 8th birthday of #Ethereum, a little throw back to May 2, 2015, in Tokyo🇯🇵, just before #ETH was officially born. @VitalikButerin stayed in my apartment in Tokyo during this trip. He was already working on and talking about ETH non-stop. And I still missed (didn't buy)… pic.twitter.com/84B6KN73Qf

— CZ 🔶 Binance (@cz_binance) July 30, 2023

We will never allow right-wing extremists to erase American history in order to appease their fragile egos.

— Hakeem Jeffries (@RepJeffries) July 30, 2023

The U.S. cities the most people have moved out of since Jan 2023 according to USPS:

7. Dallas, TX
6. Miami
5. Austin, TX
4. New York City
3. Los Angeles
2. Chicago
1. Houston, TX

🤔

LA and NY seem obvious due to a higher population than the other cities. Interesting to see so…

— Alex Friedman 🤠 (@heyalexfriedman) July 30, 2023

This is horrific.

40% of US adults report having less than $1,000 of savings.

The perfect storm of no financial education in schools and government-led destruction of the US dollar. pic.twitter.com/h9Ops3ojFA

— Pomp 🌪 (@APompliano) July 30, 2023

A growing Twitter audience is an asset to any Solopreneur.

I've added 399,478 followers in the last 21 months.

Here are 7 very simple things I did:

— Justin Welsh (@thejustinwelsh) July 30, 2023

3. A Step-by-Step Thread Once Weekly:

Weekly threads power my growth.

I gained thousands of followers by sharing detailed threads.

My goal is to walk someone step-by-step through something critical in solopreneurship. https://t.co/vgtTvxu63g

— Justin Welsh (@thejustinwelsh) July 30, 2023

29: Italy

Elon Musk’s Quixotic Quest to Turn X Into an ‘Everything App’ Mr. Musk, the owner of Twitter, is the latest Silicon Valley mogul to pursue an all-in-one app, the kind that has thrived in Asia but not elsewhere. ........ Mr. Zuckerberg tried it. So did Dara Khosrowshahi, the chief executive of Uber. Evan Spiegel, the head of Snap, said he wanted to go for it, too. ......... China’s WeChat, Japan’s Line and South Korea’s KakaoTalk. ........ Weeks before closing his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter in October, he tweeted that his purchase would be “an accelerant to creating X, the everything app.” ......... In November, Twitter filed paperwork with the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network to become a payments processor, and employees have been building a payments service. ........ In Japan, people use Line, the country’s dominant messaging platform, to store vaccination cards and shop for clothes. In South Korea, people turn to KakaoTalk, which started as a messaging service, to send money and request taxi rides. ......... None have been as successful as Tencent’s WeChat, a messaging, social media and payments app used by more than one billion people, mostly in China. WeChat dominates the mobile internet and is a one-stop shop to read news, talk with friends, order pizza or pay the landlord. ..........

“WeChat is effectively the operating system of daily life in China.”

......... In 2019, following Uber’s initial public offering, Mr. Khosrowshahi echoed the super app mantra. He said he saw his ride-hailing app as the “Amazon of transportation” and wanted it to be the “operating system for your everyday life in a city.” .......... Mr. Musk responded that the questioner didn’t know what he was talking about, before asking for the next question, the two attendees said. ......... “If done right,” he said in a recent podcast interview, X could become “half of the global financial system.” .......... “X is the future state of unlimited interactivity — centered in audio, video, messaging, payments/banking — creating a global marketplace for ideas, goods, services, and opportunities," she tweeted on Sunday. “Powered by A.I., X will connect us all in ways we’re just beginning to imagine.” .

Buying Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the everything app

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 4, 2022

Twitter was acquired by X Corp both to ensure freedom of speech and as an accelerant for X, the everything app. This is not simply a company renaming itself, but doing the same thing.

The Twitter name made sense when it was just 140 character messages going back and forth – like…

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 25, 2023

X is the future state of unlimited interactivity – centered in audio, video, messaging, payments/banking – creating a global marketplace for ideas, goods, services, and opportunities. Powered by AI, X will connect us all in ways we’re just beginning to imagine.

— Linda Yaccarino (@lindayacc) July 23, 2023

This is the last day for Twitter.

A new app will take its place: X - The Everything App.

Here's 10 features that are coming for The Everything App (X): pic.twitter.com/qcntfAt2zo

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

The new domain will be: https://t.co/tAlNjLvHcI

The domain currently redirects to Twitter.

The Bird Logo will be blowtorched off the Headquarters building.https://t.co/1ydaLvSqhW

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

1. Creator Payments

The first payouts has been processed.

Some updates:

• You no longer need to have a subscription button
• You no longer need 5M impressions per month
• You will soon get paid for profile visits pic.twitter.com/C780c7vGgT

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

Creators will be paid from the moment they requested Creator Verification.

Ad sharing will be available in over 100 countries.https://t.co/CF0102r3JP

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

2. Followers

The term followers will be changed.

Possibly to "viewers". pic.twitter.com/mB69qcTCbv

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

3. Bookmark Changes

The bookmarking feature is underwhelming and is receiving updates:

• Bookmark straight from timeline
• Search feature for bookmarks
• Weekly email with saved bookmarks pic.twitter.com/dx3uzqPq3J

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

4. Highlights Tab

This has been implemented but not many people use it.

Twitter's Designer has also come out and said she doesn't love it.

Very likely we will see changes to it soon.
https://t.co/ugq3RpLCvb pic.twitter.com/8BQwqZqA7r

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

5. Shadowbans

Shadowbans are an issue on Twitter.

Elon confirmed Twitter will show shadowbans directly on user's profiles.

It will include:

• The active shadowban
• The reason for the ban
• Potentially a solution pic.twitter.com/IadCUHrXrF

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

6. Videos

Updates have been made to videos on the platform.

The maximum video length is 10 hours.

Picture-in-picture video watching is enabled.

Livestreaming video has a high priority and will be implemented soon.

A Smart TV App is also in the making. pic.twitter.com/nsWdbXMY30

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

7. Easy scam reporting

The current reporting system is very long and cluttered.

It will be made easier to report accounts.

Abuse will be heavily punished. pic.twitter.com/xFX86zXbqV

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

8. Platform Color Default

The default platform colour might change from White to Black.https://t.co/5J2yJOIr0H pic.twitter.com/Ud1QOZJ096

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

9. Financial Institution

"If done right, X would become half of the global financial system."

The vision is to create the most efficient database for the thing that is money.

Goals:

• Least amount of fraud
• Everything real time
• Seamless integration pic.twitter.com/guQurqpZCL

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

10. New Like Animation

My personal favourite is the new animation when you like a tweet.

Try it out here👇https://t.co/r07qjZHfAU

— zaimiri ✏️ (@zaimirii) July 23, 2023

The Whales Gathered in a Heart Shape. Experts Feared What Would Come Next. A pod of nearly 100 pilot whales displayed unusual behavior before beaching themselves in Australia. More than 50 died, and the rest were later euthanized. ......... On Tuesday afternoon, researchers’ fears were confirmed. The pod of almost 100 long-finned pilot whales rushed to the shore, stranding themselves on Cheynes Beach near Albany, in southern Western Australia. ......... By Wednesday, 52 of the whales had died ........ However, that afternoon, the whales re-stranded themselves further along the beach ....... Another reason could be that they were disoriented by a loud offshore underwater noise ......... The country’s deadliest such event occurred in 2020, when 470 whales were beached on a coastline in Tasmania, with most of them dying. Two years to the day, another 230 washed up along roughly the same stretch of coast. .

Biden Orders U.S. to Share Evidence of Russian War Crimes With Hague Court The step signals a major shift in American policy and ends months of resistance by Pentagon officials who feared setting a precedent that could pave the way for the court to prosecute U.S. troops....... Before the International Criminal Court was created, the United Nations Security Council relied on ad hoc tribunals to address atrocities in places like the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. Many democracies welcomed the idea of creating a standing body at The Hague and signed the 1998 treaty, known as the Rome Statute, including close American allies like Britain. ........ tensions again flared after top prosecutors for the court in 2017 tried to investigate the torture of detainees during the Bush administration as part of an inquiry into the war in Afghanistan. The Trump administration imposed sanctions on the court’s personnel, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo denounced it as corrupt. .

The Life and Death of American Cities Though he believed in private enterprise, he knew that private enterprise depended on public works. ....... in a systemic crisis, such as the changes to urban commuting patterns brought on by Covid, dispersed global investors will not save cities......... “I take the subway at least twice a day,” Mr. Ravitch told reporters upon his 1979 appointment to the M.T.A. He saw for himself the conditions that were causing New Yorkers to leave. ......... Uber flooded Manhattan’s streets with tens of thousands of new cars with one passenger each, bringing gridlock to the worst levels on record. Uber also destroyed the city’s decades-old taxi regulation system, which had been created to control the number of vehicles on dense urban streets, forcing New York City to spend the past half-decade painstakingly rebuilding it. ......... Consider Airbnb, another placeless global tech firm whose executives glibly promised over the past decade to help New Yorkers lower housing costs by enabling them to rent out their spare rooms to earn extra money. The broader reality is that Airbnb has helped increase housing costs by enabling the illegal conversion of tens of thousands of condos and rental apartments into long-term, unregulated hotel suites. ......... From transit to policing, much of day-to-day American life happens at the state and local levels. But today’s aspiring political stars of both parties see New York City and San Francisco just as places to raise and give national money. ........... As all politics becomes nationalized, the political compromises that Mr. Ravitch excelled at become harder. Mr. Ravitch was a Democrat, but he worked with Republicans, including the New York senator Al D’Amato and President Ronald Reagan, because he needed them to help the M.T.A. ......... Mr. Ravitch wasn’t interested in the thrill of going on national TV to slam the Reagan administration for not caring about cities. Instead, he worked quietly with Mr. D’Amato to convince Mr. Reagan to devote a portion of the gas tax — which Mr. Reagan increased — to transit.

The Conditions Are Ripe for a Third Party in 2024. Is No Labels It?

Nobody Ever Read American Literature Like This Guy Did Inflamed, impertinent and deeply insightful, D.H. Lawrence’s “Studies in Classic American Literature” remains startlingly relevant 100 years after it was originally published. ........ With its one-sentence paragraphs (“Flop goes spiritual love.”), jabbing exclamations (“Freedom!”), semi-rhetorical questions (“But what of Walt Whitman?”) and heavy use of italics and all-caps, the book can read like a scroll of social-media rants. ....... Lawrence harangues his subjects in the second person (“Nathaniel!”), and subjects them to parodic paraphrase and withering, ad hominem judgment. “I do not like him,” he says of Benjamin Franklin. Benjamin Franklin! ............. Lawrence’s bristling, inflamed, impertinent language provides a reminder that criticism is not just the work of the brain, but of the gut and the spleen as well. .......... breathtaking conceptual leaps from history to myth and back again ......... “Damn all ideas and all ideals,” he rails, seeing such abstraction as an impediment to authentic human connection: “If only people would meet in their very selves.” But this idea of authenticity is bound up with a mystical ideology of race, sex, blood and destiny that is apt to trouble 21st-century sensibilities. ........... His critique of America, where he had traveled in the early 1920s, living for a time in Taos, N.M., was a broadside against the nation’s progressive traditions. ........ “The artist,” he writes in one of the most frequently quoted passages, “usually sets out — or used to — to point a moral and adorn a tale. The tale, however, points the other way, as a rule. Two blankly opposing morals, the artist’s and the tale’s. Never trust the artist. Trust the tale.” ......... The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic and a killer. It has never yet melted. ................. What Lawrence saw in his eccentric, passionate reading of that literature was division, polarization and contradiction. Not so much among factions, parties, regions or races — ordinary politics doesn’t really enter his field of vision — as within individual hearts and the collective soul. Every American is “a torn divided monster,” he writes at one point. ....... And elsewhere, a century ago that might as well have been last week: “America has never been easy, and is not easy today.”

The English Countryside Is a Place of Profound Inequality The house was old and four miles from any kind of shop. But to me, it was idyllic. It had an open coal fire, a huge walk-in pantry and bay windows. A story — probably apocryphal — had it that there had been an upstairs but the landowner didn’t like the way it ruined his view, so he just sliced it off, like a layer of Victoria sponge cake.......... for the landless who work and belong to the British countryside but do not own a piece of it, it’s a place of profound inequality. Damp, cold and underresourced but beautiful. ............. Rural Britain, long a scenic playground for the rich, is in danger of becoming only that, for tourists, second-homers and wealthy retirees.......... Many of the village homes are vacation rentals or second homes, empty for most of the year, pushing the prices higher for the few homes that do go up for sale. There were always bus trippers, but the streams of tourists at this time of year, its busiest, make it feel a bit like a rural Disneyland. .......... In the early 2000s, when a lot of the big landowners were starting to realize how profitable renting property to these visitors could be, Graythwaite Estate decided not to employ a forester anymore. Dad became self-employed, and we started paying market rent. The farm and other houses on the estate started to become vacation cottages; some became beautiful wedding venues. Eventually, Mum and Dad moved to a terraced house in a nearby town. It had a yard, not a garden, but it was theirs. ........... In some of the villages around where I grew up, as many as 80 percent of the houses are second homes ............ a schoolteacher told The Guardian that her family was evicted by a landlady who admitted that she could make four times as much by renting their home to tourists ........ These visitors spend money in the local shops, but they don’t put children in the school. They don’t become part of the church congregation. A way of life slowly suffocates. .............. In my dreams, though, I am often in the garden of the old house, in the shade of the big trees. Comfy as a dandelion in the dirt.

What’s Happening in Italy Is Scary, and It’s Spreading her often extreme rhetoric ........ But the comforting tale of a populist firebrand turned pragmatist overlooks something important: what’s been happening in Italy. Ms. Meloni’s administration has spent its first months accusing minorities of undermining the triad of God, nation and family, with dire practical consequences for migrants, nongovernmental organizations and same-sex parents. Efforts to weaken anti-torture legislation, stack the public broadcaster with loyalists and rewrite Italy’s postwar constitution to increase executive power are similarly troubling. Ms. Meloni’s government isn’t just nativist but has a harsh authoritarian streak, too. ......... Allies of Ms. Meloni are already in power in Poland, also newly legitimized by their support for Ukraine. .......... Taking aim at one of the government’s main targets, L.G.B.T.Q. parents, party leaders have called surrogate parenting a “crime worse than pedophilia,” claiming that gay people are “passing off” foreign kids as their own. ........ her call for “births, not migrants” ......... aggressive opposition to migration has been the centerpiece of her administratio ........... A law passed in April forces asylum seekers to live in state-run migrant centers while their claims are considered — a process that can last up to two years — all without legal advice or Italian-language classes. .............. As prime minister, Ms. Meloni has referred to Italy’s postwar antifascist culture as a repressive ideology ....... The Brothers of Italy aims to create a directly elected head of government and a strong executive freer of constraint. ........... For all its Mussolinian roots, this government is no return to the past. Instead, in galvanizing the political right behind a resentful identity politics, it risks becoming something else entirely: Europe’s future. .......... The more disturbing truth is that they are no longer parties of protest, but increasingly welcome in the mainstream. For proof, just look to Washington on Thursday.

The Future Is Italy, and It’s Bleak . describes itself as “post-fascist” ........ Early elections, due in the fall, could open the way for the Brothers of Italy to become the first far-right party to lead a major eurozone economy. For Europe and the country, it would be a truly seismic event. ....... It would also mark a remarkable rise for a party that in 2018 secured just 4 percent of the vote. At its heart is Ms. Meloni, who skillfully blends fears of civilizational decline with folksy anecdotes about her relationships with her family, God and Italy itself. ........ Ms. Meloni presents herself as an unusually down-to-earth politician. ........... But the Brothers of Italy doesn’t just owe its success to toning down its message. It’s also the beneficiary of a much wider breakdown of the barriers between the traditional center-right and the insurgent far right, playing out across Western Europe and America. .........

Heavily indebted, socially polarized and politically unstable, Italy is just the country where the process is most advanced.

......... It was, of course, the first country to be taken over by fascists, falling to Mussolini 100 years ago. ........ Central to that rise, for all the party’s focus on tax cuts and pro-business talk, is Italy’s endemic economic malaise........ And not just in Italy. For example, the Vox party in Spain, a far-right force steeped in apologia for the Franco regime that has risen to 20 percent in the polls, regards Ms. Meloni as an inspiration. Appearing at a Vox campaign event in June she neatly encapsulated the contours of their shared politics, thundering in Spanish, “Yes to secure borders! No to mass immigration!” The speech — which reached its crescendo with Ms. Meloni shouting, “Yes to our civilization! And no to those who want to destroy it!” — could well have been given by Marine Le Pen, whose National Rally is now the chief force on the French right.

29: Ukraine

we melted rocks applied electrons and got intelligence

— Sam Altman (@sama) July 28, 2023

New water deluge system to protect against the immense heat & force of Starship launch pic.twitter.com/JMnBIH8UTM

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 28, 2023

Interbrand launches 2023 Breakthrough Brands Report revealing the emerging brands disrupting the global market