Samantha Masunaga, Reporter - Los Angeles Times
Stephan: In the midst of the deception, lies, and corruption, that has infected the United States, it is easy to overlook, or not even notice other trends that in their own way are as powerful. Climate change is one, of course, but there are others, and in my estimation one of the most pressing is the robotization of the American workforce.
More jobs are being created now, but the best research I can find suggests to me that this is a short-lived phenomenon. The long term trend is much less promising for those voters. Here's one take on what is coming.
Credit: Shutterstock
More than a third of U.S. jobs could be at “high risk” of automation by the early 2030s, a percentage that’s greater than in Britain, Germany and Japan, according to a report released Friday. (emphasis added)
The analysis, by accounting and consulting firm PwC, emphasized that its estimates are based on the anticipated capabilities of robotics and artificial intelligence, and that the pace and direction of technological progress are “uncertain.”
It said that in the U.S., 38% of jobs could be at risk of automation, compared with 30% in Britain, 35% in Germany and 21% in Japan.
The main reason is not that the U.S. has more jobs in sectors that are universally ripe for automation, the report says; rather, it’s that more U.S. jobs in certain sectors are potentially vulnerable than, say, British jobs in the same sectors.
For example, the report says the financial and insurance sector has much higher possibility of automation in the U.S. than in Britain. That’s because, it says, American finance workers are less educated […]
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Sarah Jones , Senior White House Correspondent - PoliticusUSA
Stephan: I think we are in the early days of the unraveling, despite a massive attempt to keep it suppressed, of what increasingly looks like a bloodless coup organized by a cell within the Republican party, and funded by billionaires. The attempt I wrote about yesterday to revise the Constitution is another facet of this scheme. Long in the planning, who played what role is not yet clear, but there has never been a greater need for a free press committed to objective investigative reporting.
Credit: Politicus
This is truly mind-blowing.
Perhaps you’ve been wondering how establishment Republicans were so happy ignoring the looming treason scandal of their President. It very well could be because they, too, have something Russian to hide.
So it wasn’t Donald Trump alone who had ties to the Russians during the 2016 campaign. It turns out that the Republican National Committee used a firm with ties to Russian intelligence to dig up dirt on Hillary Clinton.
The RNC used former CIA officers’ firm the Hamilton Trading Group, which has “particular expertise” in Russia, to dig up dirt on Clinton according to a Politico report.
“RNC officials and the president and co-founder of Hamilton Trading Group, an ex-CIA officer named Ben Wickham, insisted the payments, which eventually totaled $41,500, had nothing to do with Russia,” Kenneth P. Vogel and Eli Stokols reported.
The RNC claimed the payments were for “security.”
“But RNC officials now acknowledge that most of the cash — $34,100 — went towards intelligence-style reports that sought to prove conflicts of interest between […]
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Stephan: First it was the Canadian Girl Guides, now Toronto, the largest school district in Canada, is cancelling school trips to the U.S..
Imagine: Canada does not feel it is safe to send their children to America. What are we becoming?
Credit: Christopher Furlong
Canada’s largest school board is cancelling new school trips to the United States until further notice. (emphasis added)
The Toronto District School Board announced the decision citing “uncertainty” with regards to who may be affected by US President Donald’s Trump’s latest travel restrictions.
Twenty-five already scheduled trips will go ahead as planned.
The school board joins the Girl Guides of Canada and a few other schools in temporarily halting travel to the US.
Under the new US travel ban, citizens from Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen would not be permitted to enter the US, unless they have already been issued valid visas, for a 90-day period.
However, the ban is suspended pending a number of court challenges.
In a statement released on Thursday, Director of Education John Malloy said that the district school board faced “a difficult choice”.
“We strongly believe that our students should not be placed into these situations of potentially being turned away at the border,” said Mr Malloy.
“For the trips that will be continuing, should […]
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Erick Trickey, - Politico Magazine
Stephan: Trump in one of his first actions essentially killed California's plan to develop high speed passenger rail; a remarkably short-sighted and stupid decision. But one consistent with about about 50 years of social policies concerning rail in which we have sacrificed what was once a hall mark of American technology. The unintended consequence of that policy has been to isolate large sections of U.S.
I spent four years living in a Bluebird, a special kind of motor home, making eight, months long, crossings of the U.S.. There are states in the middle of the country where I have driven down virtually every road on the map, and I can tell you that except for long hall truckers there are large stretches of this country where you can drive all day and see only a handful of automobiles, and no passenger trains. When was the last time you, or anyone you know, drove or took a train to Jonesboro, Arkansas?
Trains bring people together, even people relatively proximate to one another to begin with. Here's an example of what I mean. If we are going to rebuild infrastructure -- which I think is at best a 50-50 probability -- we would do well to think about creating social wellbeing and not just profit.
A Somalian woman enters the train at Cedar Riverside, a stop on the Blue Line.
Credit: Mark Peterson/Redux Pictures/Politico Magazine
ST. PAUL, Minn.—When the first light-rail trains set out between Minneapolis and St. Paul, the two cities threw a party 11 miles long. At the ribbon-cutting in downtown St. Paul, politicians proclaimed their hopes that the new Green Line would re-twin the Twin Cities, bridging an old rivalry. At a stop on the University of Minnesota’s campus in Minneapolis, Minnesota Vikings cheerleaders mingled with the crowd, and the university’s Goldy the Gopher mascot posed for photos. And along St. Paul’s University Avenue, at the stations that almost didn’t get built, people of every color joined the party: a Hmong dance troupe in St. Paul’s Little Mekong district and African-immigrant restaurateurs in a tented food-court stop two miles west.
More than 45,000 people rode the Green Line on its first day, June 14, 2014—the first time trains had connected the Twin Cities’ downtowns in more than 60 years. The $957 million […]
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Saturday, March 25th, 2017
Jacob Sugarman , - Alternet
Stephan: Today the incompetence of the Republican Party, and the political naivete of Donald Trump, combined to give us some breathing space on healthcare. But don't think we can rest on our oars; this game is just beginning. Tom Price the head of Health and Human Services, a true Trump zombie, working with the profit oriented insurance companies is going to do everything he can to sabotage Obamacare to make it blow up.
Now those of us who really care about America getting real healthcare must push for single payer wellbeing oriented health care like the rest of the world's democracies.
But that's just part of it. The fascists are going to try and literally rewrite the Constitution. Here's the story.
All eyes are fixed on Capitol Hill as Republicans attempt to pass an American Health Care Bill that’s still being revised as of this writing. The recklessness of the party’s leadership can’t be overstated—14 million Americans’ insurance and countless essential health benefits hang in the balance—and yet a meeting scheduled next week in the Wisconsin legislature may possess even more terrifying ramifications for the future of the country.
According to Wisconsin.gov, Republican lawmakers will hold a public hearing on Tuesday, March 28, to determine whether Wisconsin will call for a constitutional convention. While a subject of legal debate, changes to America’s governing document can be made in one of three ways: Three-quarters of the states can ratify an amendment that Congress has passed with supermajorities in both houses; three-quarters of the states, with majority votes in each, can bypass Congress by invoking Article 5 to approve an amendment; or two thirds of the states can simply use Article 5 to call a “Convention of the States” and rewrite the document as they see fit (three-quarters of the states would then need to approve their changes).
A “Convention of the States” has never been invoked […]
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