99 Percent Invisible: Usonia the Beautiful

In the years that followed, Wright built a number of Usonian homes around the country. None of these were as inexpensive as the first, though. And once the Great Depression was over, Wright became busy with other projects. A group of Wright’s apprentices would be the ones to push Wright’s vision forward, by establishing an entire community shaped by these ideals, right outside of New York City. [...]

This design project was unique not only in its layout and architecture but also in its legal structure: it was based on a communal mortgage. Residents would pay for the houses together, which would be built on land they all owned. Those who joined the community faced shared risks and challenges, including social ownership and construction costs, the latter of which grew beyond initial projections.[...]

And when people did decide to sell their homes, prospective buyers were thrown off by the cooperative nature of the village — in the first decades of Usonia, members didn’t even own their homes. A compromise was eventually reached: the land would remain communal but the houses would become individually owned (thus easier to sell).

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UnHerd: How long can Trump hang on to the evangelicals?

Couched in his familiar inflammatory rhetoric was Trump’s concern that this reliable conservative base might not turn out because he himself was not on the ballot. It was pure Trump, of course, but it was also quite possibly true. In 2016, he had won 81% of the evangelical vote. In 2018, that number had dwindled, but only slightly. He is still viewed favourably by 71% of them – as opposed to some 45% of the American public. [...]

The baffling thing for many people, of course, was the fact that they even turned out in the first place. Here was a man who had supported abortion rights, and who lived a life antithetical to evangelical values. He was thrice divorced; he boasted about his sexual conquests and paid hush money to a porn star. He had also invested in gambling and incurred enormous debts, both of which were anathema to evangelicals. Further, he clearly knew nothing about the Bible.[...]

From 1996 to 2000 over 65% voted for Republican candidates for president. From 2004 to 2012, their vote was in the mid-to high 70%. They had voted for John McCain, who had denounced Falwell, and then for a Mormon, Mitt Romney, whom they didn’t consider Christian. Today they make up about a third of Republican voters.[...]

Many Christian Right leaders say flatly that they voted for Trump in spite of his personal life. Robert Jeffress, a Houston pastor, and one of Trump’s earliest supporters, said after the revelation about the porn star, “Americans knew that they weren’t voting for an altar boy.” Peggy Nance, the head of Concerned Women for America, said, “We weren’t looking for a husband. We were looking for a bodyguard.” They and other sophisticates saw the relationship as transactional, but many in the pews plucked stories from the Bible to justify their choice: King Cyrus was a heathen, but he defended Israel; King David was an adulterer, but he was never impeached.

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Social Europe: Italy Points The Way For Western Right-Wing Nationalists But Avoids EU Exit

Italy has become a leading example of a perilous western trend encompassing authoritarian, racist, and demagogic movements and attitudes. Developments are showing us what the anti-immigrant interior minister and deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini ideologically hates most –the European Union, solidarity, anti-racism and anti-fascism. His aim is to dismantle any successful form of integration of migrants within the country (see here), while fighting internationally the EU’s normative framework in the hope of leading a Eurosceptic wave to victory in the 2019 European Parliament elections. [...]

Moscovici predictably compared Italy to an illiberal member state such as Hungary for their (apparently) similar xenophobic and anti-EU policies. All this is happening when the country’s focus should instead be on remembering the 80th anniversary of the promulgation of the infamous fascist anti-Semitic laws which discriminated against Italy’s Jewish community. Instead, racially-motivated abuses are on the rise. Italian President Sergio Mattarella expressed concern on Italy becoming a new “Far West”. This is a further lesson for US politics and society: the far right’s active involvement in democratic institutions does not always lead to its moderation or “normalization.” Even if the League has been in Silvio Berlusconi’s coalitions since the 1990s, this time it is virulently radicalizing the governmental agenda – making it more in line with fellow extremists in the US, Eastern Europe, and Russia. When they do not share the same ideas, Prime Minister Conte and the 5s seem mere puppets in Salvini’s hands. The other vice premier Luigi Di Maio, following a similar line, suggested migrants should be excluded from the proposed basic income.

Despite this abundant evidence, all deny any racism on the part of their government. Hardly surprising if we consider that this is a political elite set on changing the EU legislation with the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. The paradox is that Orbán is opposing the very refugee redistribution quotas which would help Italy to deal with this humanitarian emergency. The truth is that without “easy targets” such as migrants, Islam, and blacks, the transatlantic far right would have only a few other minor mobilization flags. Immigrants, minorities and/or “foreign” traditions and cultures such as Islam represent the perfect enemies: they are “different” and challenge the “purity” of a given community. As non-white, and at times non-Christian, they cannot belong to any narrowly ethnically or culturally-defined Western society. In this sense, “Mexican” and “Muslim” are an easily interchangeable foe.

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Social Europe: The SPD May Deal The Final Blow To Angela Merkel’s Chancellorship

The spiral downwards for the ruling CDU/CSU and the SPD was confirmed by an EMNID opinion poll on 27 October where 24 per cent said they would vote for the CDU/CSU in the next federal elections and 15 per cent for the SPD. The Greens were on 20 per cent and the AfD on 16 per cent, both ahead of the SPD.

The AfD is the party that has benefited most from the migration policy of Merkel and from her move to the centre of German politics leaving a gap on the right. The key to the party’s rise in 2014-15 was the establishment status it received from its early champions, who included a former culture editor of the Frankfurter Allgemeine, a professor of economics at the University of Hamburg, and – most significant – a former IBM executive and president of the Federation of German Industry, Hans-Olaf Henkel, who privately financed the party’s early activities. [...]

The Greens and the AfD are the only parties that have continued to improve their electoral position since the federal elections in 2017, where the Greens only came in sixth place. The Greens pose a threat to Germany’s two traditional political Volkspartei. The Social Democrats are losing young, metropolitan and pro-European supporters to the Greens. The Greens have also been able to appeal to many centrist supporters of the CDU/CSU who have become uncomfortable with their shift to the right. In the German state of Baden-Württemberg, the Greens are the senior partner in the coalition with the CDU.

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ArguingFromIgnorance: The 2018 US Midterm Elections Explained

The 2018 US Midterm Elections are finally here. This video will explain the electoral map for the House, Senate and gubernatorial races, give a brief overview of the ballot initiatives for each state and highlight some of the more interesting races to watch.

UnHerd: Why don’t we remember these 100 million dead?

In France, where I live, there are more than 170,000 monuments to the First World War. To my knowledge, there is only one to the 1918 influenza pandemic. A simple stone cross, it stands at Lajoux in the Jura Mountains, close to the border with Switzerland.

This relative neglect of the 1918 pandemic is almost understandable in France, which lost approximately six times as many citizens to the war as it did to the flu. But that neglect is repeated in almost every country in the world, and globally it is much harder to explain. The pandemic is estimated to have killed between 50 and 100 million people worldwide, compared to around 18 million for the war. Why, then, do we commemorate the war but not the flu? Is a death from disease less important than a death by combat, and if so, shouldn’t that trouble us?

I think it should, and not for purely moral or philosophical reasons. The threat of pandemic is no historical artefact; in fact, another flu pandemic is almost inevitable. The World Bank estimates that if a strain of the influenza virus as dangerous as the one that triggered the 1918 pandemic were to emerge in future, it could kill 33 million people in the first six months of the ensuing pandemic, and trigger a major recession. Yet governments are not making the relatively small investments that would render healthcare systems resilient to such a disaster, and vaccine hesitancy is on the rise in many parts of the world.

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The Guardian: Britain’s arrogant attempts to hoodwink the EU have sacrificed all trust

There is a reason why Britain is being dragged kicking and screaming from the backstop to the withdrawal agreement. Since the start of this process, our government has confirmed every European fear and British stereotype. The UK has sought to divide and rule, bypassing the European commission and playing member states off against one another; ceaselessly demanded unique privileges unavailable to either members or non-members; and continued to insist upon fantasy technology at the Irish border to prevent the return of all-too-real sectarian violence.

Our long reputation has always preceded us but, immediately after the referendum, the EU held out genuine hope that the government might behave reasonably. Certainly, Britain’s official narrative centred around building goodwill and demonstrating good faith. But, in reality, Theresa May quickly compounded tactical errors with pointless offence. The 2016 “citizens of nowhere” conference speech horrified EU diplomats, who also objected to the threatening tone of the Lancaster House speech and Article 50 letter. In May 2017, the prime minister even accused “bureaucrats of Brussels” ​of meddling in the UK election. Boris Johnson’s rhetoric about punishment beatings and whistling for money, and Jeremy Hunt’s likening of the bloc to a Soviet prison did little to help.

The EU expected domestic Tory theatre, but ministers’ hostile language has also bled into personal relationships. Johnson, David Davis and Dominic Raab have all been deemed abrasive figures, and EU officials report numerous breaches of courtesy and protocol. Character and personality matter, and British arrogance has not won friends or influence.

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Al Jazeera: Saudis tampered with CCTV cameras after Khashoggi murder: report

According to the report, on October 6, at 1am local time, a consulate member staff went into the police security post outside the Saudi consulate to access the video system.

Sabah reported that the staff member put in a digital lock code into the system, which did not dismantle any cameras, rather the code was to prevent access to any videos showing movement at the entrance, including Khashoggi's arrival at the consulate.

Al Jazeera's Andrew Simmons reporting from Istanbul said that their attempt was, in any case, irrelevant because the police had already deciphered the coding and accessed the system, retrieving a copy of the video well before the attempted tampering. [...]

Cavusoglu added that Turkey has further evidence regarding Khashoggi's killing which they have yet to share with the public and that details of his case will continue to be reported to the public until the investigation is complete.

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The Huffington Post: Hungary’s Anti-George Soros Campaign Is A Cautionary Tale For The U.S.

CEU’s billionaire founder, George Soros, believed that the region, with the university as its engine, could become a powerhouse for democracy and truly vibrant societies. In the subsequent years, CEU became a global hub, attracting about 1,400 students from more than 100 countries. When I worked there, from 2010 until 2012, it was a place of incredible promise. Students held human rights workshops, faculty led classes on extremism and nationalism, speakers from around the world came to the ’90s-era auditorium to lecture on bioethics and Ottoman history. Roma students were given opportunities to access higher education they have long been denied.[...]

It’s Hungarians and Hungary who stand to lose the most from CEU’s departure. As one of Hungary’s highest-ranked educational institutions, in 2015 alone CEU drew 9 billion forints (over $30 million) in research funds into the country and calculated in-country expenditures of over $35 million. The university just completed a multimillion-euro renovation project in the heart of Budapest’s historic downtown. While the university says it will continue some operations in Hungary, it’s clear the local economy will take a massive hit when it decamps to Vienna. [...]

It’s part of a pattern that seems to be consuming Eastern and Central Europe: In 2017, the democracy-monitoring NGO Freedom House gave Hungary the lowest ranking of the nations it monitors in Central Europe, and lowered its overall democracy scores for 18 of the 29 countries in Eastern Europe and central Asia. And it’s all a little too familiar for anyone watching from the United States, where attacks on the press, electoral suppression and xenophobia have led us into a very dark moment.

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