Nautilus Magazine: Why Poverty Is Like a Disease

Now, new evidence is emerging suggesting the changes can go even deeper—to how our bodies assemble themselves, shifting the types of cells that they are made from, and maybe even how our genetic code is expressed, playing with it like a Rubik’s cube thrown into a running washing machine. If this science holds up, it means that poverty is more than just a socioeconomic condition. It is a collection of related symptoms that are preventable, treatable—and even inheritable. In other words, the effects of poverty begin to look very much like the symptoms of a disease.

That word—disease—carries a stigma with it. By using it here, I don’t mean that the poor are (that I am) inferior or compromised. I mean that the poor are afflicted, and told by the rest of the world that their condition is a necessary, temporary, and even positive part of modern capitalism. We tell the poor that they have the chance to escape if they just work hard enough; that we are all equally invested in a system that doles out rewards and punishments in equal measure. We point at the rare rags-to-riches stories like my own, which seem to play into the standard meritocracy template.[...]

n human children, epigenetic changes in stress receptor gene expression that lead to heightened stress responses and mood disorders have been measured in response to childhood abuse.4 And last year, researchers at Duke University found that “lower socioeconomic status during adolescence is associated with an increase in methylation of the proximal promoter of the serotonin transporter gene,” which primes the amygdala—the brain’s center for emotion and fear—for “threat-related amygdala reactivity.”5 While there may be some advantages to being primed to experience high levels of stress (learning under stress, for example, may be accelerated6), the basic message of these studies is consistent: Chronic stress and uncertainty during childhood makes stress more difficult to deal with as an adult.  [...]

The science of the biological effects of the stresses of poverty is in its early stages. Still, it has presented us with multiple mechanisms through which such effects could happen, and many of these admit an inheritable component. If a pregnant woman, for example, is exposed to the stresses of poverty, her fetus and that fetus’ gametes can both be affected, extending the effects of poverty to at least her grandchildren. And it could go further.[...]

The standard American myth of meritocracy misinterprets personal narratives like mine. The accumulated social capital of American institutions—stable transfer of power, rule of law, and entrepreneurship—certainly create economic miracles every day. But these institutions are far more suited to exponentially growing capital where it already exists, rather than creating new capital where society needs it. Stories such as mine are treated as the archetype, and we falsely believe they are the path to escape velocity for an entire segment of the population. In doing so, they leave that population behind. I am the face of the self-made rags-to-riches success story, and I’m here to say that story is a myth. The term “meritocracy” was coined in 1958 as a mockery of the very idea of evaluation by merit alone. We’ve forgotten to laugh, and the joke is on us.

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openDemocracy: The ruling class that drove Brexit

After Trump’s election, millions of words were typed about how ‘blue collar’ areas had turned out to vote Republican. Yet Clinton led by 11% among voters who earn less than $50,000. Trump secured his victory by winning among those who earn $50-200,000. Much the same can be said for the far right in Italy, whose core support is in the wealthier – though now de-industrialising – north, rather than in the more impoverished south; or about Brazil, where 97% of the richest areas voted for the fascist Bolsonaro, whilst 98% of the poorest neighbourhoods voted for the Workers’ Party candidate, Haddad.

We see a similar distortion in debate about Brexit. After the vote, journalists went on endless tours of deprived areas to report on how working-class people voted Leave (which many did). However, they somehow forgot to mention that wealthy counties like Wiltshire backed Brexit, while some of the poorest areas of the UK – the western parts of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, as well as Liverpool and Leicester – voted Remain. Academics who studied the class breakdown of the Brexit vote found ‘the Leave vote to be associated with middle class identification and the more neutral “no class” identification. But we find no evidence of a link with working class identification.’ [...]

To put it another way: the decade since the financial crisis has accelerated the emergence of a new global oligarch class. With growing wealth has come growing power and a growing ability to shape political debate through the dominant communications technology of the era: TV and the internet. As has long happened with right-wing movements, they have done so in close collaboration with military and security networks. Because the era is neoliberalism, those networks are largely privatised, made up of mercenary firms with names like Palantir, Arcanum, SCL, AggregateIQ and Cambridge Analytica. [...]

Cook himself lives in a semi-detached house in suburban Glasgow, which is probably worth less than the value of the donation his group gave the DUP, and appears unlikely to be the source of the cash. He denies any wrongdoing. The UK electoral regulator is supposed to know where the DUP cash comes from, and claims that it does, even if it isn’t allowed to tell us. But recent court documents have cast doubt on its confidence: its investigations seem to have amounted to asking Richard Cook where he got the money, and then believing his answers. A country doesn’t become the world centre for money laundering by employing inquisitive officials.[...]

A few years after Thiel founded Palantir, he wrote a now-notorious essay in which he argued that the extension of the franchise to women has ‘rendered the notion of “capitalist democracy” into an oxymoron’ and therefore that his fellow libertarians must focus on developing the technology that will ensure that it is capitalism, rather than democracy, which wins the struggle: ‘The fate of our world may depend on the effort of a single person who builds or propagates the machinery of freedom that makes the world safe for capitalism.’

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Political Critique: Paweł Adamowicz: A Very Political Death in a Country Torn by Culture Wars

Contrary to some reports, Adamowicz wasn’t a figure of the left. He had, until 2015, been a member of the centre-right Civic Platform (PO), currently the biggest opposition party. With that said, he was known for taking positions that were highly controversial in Poland – including among the anti-PiS opposition. He welcomed refugees while the PiS-controlled national broadcaster ran almost daily stories about the ‘Muslim threat’ descending upon Europe. He supported the growing feminist movement as the powerful Polish Catholic Church declared war on the so-called ideology of gender. He carried a rainbow flag during local Pride parades when even fellow PO-backed mayors were distancing themselves or outright trying to ban them. No wonder he was a hate figure of the radical right.[...]

Equally significant is the event during which the assassination took place. The Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity is an annual gala which raises millions for hospital equipment. In recent years, the event has been the target of a smear campaign by the right-wing press. The popularity of the charity and of its charismatic founder, Jerzy Owsiak, is seen as a threat to PiS’ agenda. Vocally pro-choice, supportive of LGBT rights and religious minorities and critical of the influence of the church, he represents the very cosmopolitan values that PiS defines itself against. Owsiak’s catch phrase “róbta co chceta” (do what you want) has been interpreted as an endorsement of promiscuity and moral relativism and the charity itself as a secular alternative seeking to undermine catholic charities. Why hospitals need to rely on charity at all is rarely discussed in a country without a major left force.[...]

The success of PiS – which still regularly exceeds 40% support in opinion polls – lies in bringing together a broad coalition of support: from radical right ideologues to a large number of working class families, rooted in a patriotic-catholic tradition but more concerned about putting food on the table. A few headline redistributive policies, such as the famous “500+” child benefit programme, have undeniably lifted people out of poverty – but they come in a package, with a narrative about protecting the traditional family and the great Polish nation from what threatens it – Muslims, atheists, queer people.

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UnHerd: How the gilets jaunes could save Macron’s skin

President Emmanuel Macron, stunned at first by the vehement hatred of the gilets jaunes, is fighting back. He is rising in the opinion polls for the first time in nine months (although his popularity remains at historically low levels). His performances at a series of marathon debates with small town mayors have been impressive. A man who glided serenely to the highest position in the nation before the age of 40 might yet survive, even learn from, his first great ordeal by public loathing. [...]

What is evident, driving around France in recent days, is that the movement has wilted in its rural and outer-suburban heartlands. In mid-November, 40% of the cars in my part of Normandy displayed yellow high-vis vests on their dashboards. My own unscientific poll of the yellow splodges in car windscreens in rural Calvados now averages 14 per cent. [...]

They insist that they are peaceful but they refuse to condemn the violence at the weekend protests in Paris and other cities. Like the more militant yellow vests, they see the movement not as a protest but as an uprising that will end when they have overturned existing democratic institutions. [...]

There is an undoubted influence from the far-Right: several prominent gilets jaunes “spokespeople” have connections or sympathies. Absurd anti-semitic and alt-right conspiracy theories proliferate on gilets jaunes social media. France has been “sold” to the United Nations. Alsace and Lorraine have been ceded to Germany. The Russian economy boomed after Vladimir Putin threw out the Rothschild banks.

There is also an attempted hijacking by the ultra-Left. Some gilets jaunes leaders speak of the movement as a “class war”. The most violent of the “weekends only” protesters are bourgeois, metropolitan youths who belong to antifascist, anticapitalist militias. [...]

The latest polls show his party jumping ahead by five points to recapture the lead in the European elections in May from Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National. If part of the gilets movement does run candidates of its own, they will take votes away from the far Right and the far Left. The great beneficiary would, paradoxically, be Emmanuel Macron. In other words, the French part of the EU-wide poll in May will be the most interesting European elections in European history.

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New Scientist: We may finally know what causes Alzheimer’s – and how to stop it

However evidence has been growing that the function of amyloid proteins may be as a defence against bacteria, leading to a spate of recent studies looking at bacteria in Alzheimer’s, particularly those that cause gum disease, which is known to be a major risk factor for the condition.

Bacteria involved in gum disease and other illnesses have been found after death in the brains of people who had Alzheimer’s, but until now, it hasn’t been clear whether these bacteria caused the disease or simply got in via brain damage caused by the condition.  [...]

In the new study, Cortexyme have found the toxic enzymes that P. gingivalis uses to feed on human tissue – called gingivains – in 96 per cent of the 54 Alzheimer’s brain samples they studied. They also found the bacteria themselves in all three Alzheimer’s brains whose DNA they examined.[...]

Some brain samples from people without Alzheimer’s also had P. gingivalis and protein accumulations, but at lower levels. We already know that amyloid and tau can accumulate in the brain for 10 to 20 years before Alzheimer’s symptoms begin. This, says Lynch, shows P. gingivalis is a cause of Alzheimer’s, not a result.

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Social Europe: Can Italy survive its self-inflicted wounds?

Italy’s stand-off with Brussels over its 2019 budget deficit ended a few days before Christmas, after two months of intense negotiations, forcing the Italian Parliament hastily to approve the budget law on December 30th 2018. Many commentators spoke of a law ‘decided by the European Commission’ and the main opposition party—the Partito Democratico (PD)—filed a claim to the Constitutional Court against the government for rushing it through the Senate without allowing due time for debate. While the court eventually dismissed the claim, it warned that similar ‘law-making procedures should be abandoned as they may not survive future constitutional claims’. [...]

The Italian crisis with Brussels was completely self-induced, created and pushed by the populist forces solidly at the helm of the government: the Five Stars Movement and the League. The commission’s preoccupations did not stem from the size of the Italian public debt (131.2 per cent of GDP, according to the Italian statistics institute, ISTAT) nor the extent of any target deficit (whether 0.8, 2.04 or 2.4 per cent of GDP)—think about Japan, which has a public debt of over 235 per cent of GDP, or France, which is running a deficit of 2.7 per cent of GDP (OECD data). Rather, Italy has been on the brink of losing the confidence of domestic and foreign investors, and the European Commission, because of the budget choices the government made in the budget law. [...]

According to the latest figures published by ISTAT on November 30th, economic indicators are worrisome: the country’s output shrank by 0.1 per cent in the third trimester of 2018—the only EU country where this happened. Unemployment has grown to 10.6 per cent and youth unemployment to 32.5 per cent. In October, Moody’s downgraded Italy’s credit rating to one notch above junk, while Standards and Poors revised its outlook from stable to negative. A recent Goldman Sachs report forecast the economy to ‘flirt with recession’. The Bank of Italy has cut its growth forecasts to 0.6 per cent for 2019 and 0.9 per cent for 2020, from prior estimates of 1 per cent and 1.1 per cent, respectively. And the International Monetary Fund has revised down its own forecasts to match those of the Bank of Italy, since ‘concerns about sovereign and financial risks have weighed on domestic demand’. [...]

For example, the League has created the perception that Italy today has a problem with immigration, when the numbers say otherwise. It connected its proposal to curb immigrant arrivals with values of fairness and a sense of identity, supposedly under threat by immigrants taking Italians’ jobs. Similarly, the Five Stars Movement campaigned for the introduction of universal basic income as a measure of equity, easily connecting with the public need for economic justice, but insufficient to create the conditions for more and better jobs, the real problem suffered by Italians. Those policies were powerful drivers of a populist narrative which won handily at the March 2018 general elections.

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openDemocracy: Nicolás Maduro, the usurper

Between 2009 and 2012 we carried out a research on political leaders in Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Uruguay and Venezuela. We interviewed 285 leaders, including former Presidents, former Vice Presidents, acting Vice Presidents, mayors, deputies, senators, political party presidents, political journalists and trade union officials.[...]

The second type of leader is ambivalently democratic. He respects the rights of citizens, works cooperatively, but seeks to accumulate personal power. He is the type of leader who believes that in order to strengthen his position he needs to negotiate and make concessions.[...]

Unlike the democratic leader, the ambivalent one respects but does not strengthen democratic institutions. In fact, he can end up weakening democracy in his bid to increase personal power.

The weak usurper of power wavers between challenging and accepting the rule of law and State institutions. The historical context is crucial here, for it can allow, or block, the leader's capacity to increase his autonomy.[...]

His recurrent lies, the shortage of goods, administrative corruption, the profound deterioration of the economy, the rampant devaluation of the Bolivarian currency, political control, the empowerment of military sects, all come together in the usurpation of power and the establishment of a regime showing clearly totalitarian, militaristic and undemocratic tendencies.

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euronews: Far-right lawmakers in Germany walk out on Holocaust survivor's speech

"A party is represented here today that disparages those (democratic) values and downplays the crimes of the National Socialists," Charlotte Knobloch, a Holocaust survivor and President of the Jewish Community in Munich, told the regional assembly. [...]

"The so-called AfD bases it politics on hate and exclusion and doesn't abide by our democratic constitution," Knobloch said in her speech, given in remembrance of the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis. [...]

"It is scandalous that the president of the Jewish community in Munich abused a memorial service for the victims of Nazism to defame the whole AfD and its legitimate and democratically elected faction using evil blanket insinuations," she said.[...]

Two years ago, Bjoern Hoecke, the AfD's leader in the eastern state of Thuringia, triggered anger after he told supporters that Berlin's memorial to the victims of the Holocaust was a "memorial of shame" and that history books should be rewritten to focus more on German victims.

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Haaretz: Right-wing Extremists Murdered 50 Americans in 2018, Report Finds - and One-third of Them Were Jews

At least 50 Americans were killed by extremists in 2018, according to a report published on Wednesday by the Anti-Defamation League. The report noted that in each and every one of the 17 incidents involved, the killers were affiliated with right-wing groups, in most cases white supremacy movements. [...]

The number of Americans murdered by extremists was 35 percent higher in 2018 than in the previous year, but lower than in 2015 and 2016, according to the report. However, 2018 saw the largest number of fatalities attributed to right-wing extremists since 1995, the year that Timothy McVeigh bombed the Oklahoma City federal building.[...]

Responding to the findings, ADL Chief Executive Officer Jonathan Greenblatt said: “The white supremacist attack in Pittsburgh should serve as a wake-up call to everyone about the deadly consequences of hateful rhetoric. It’s time for our nation’s leaders to appropriately recognize the severity of the threat and to devote the necessary resources to address the scourge of right-wing extremism.”

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