The Monday Mix (30/05/2022)
Hi friends,
It’s the Queen’s Jubilee this week here in the UK, a celebration of her 75 years on the throne. As someone who would like to see the end of the monarchy, I won’t be one of those celebrating. Although I respect the Queen and have nothing against her, the idea of monarchy is one I fundamentally disagree with. In the 21st century, there’s no need for monarchies, they’re an anachronism of a bygone era.
It is insane to me that in a country which now has more food banks than McDonald’s, we are spending public money on an event with such pomp. Still, we get a four-day weekend so it’s not all bad. Anyway, after that rant, I’m travelling up to Scotland via the Lake District next week with a friend so that will be fun, and give me an opportunity to see some parts of my own country I rarely visit.
I wrote a piece this week about Monkeypox to look at how serious it is and whether it could be another pandemic, which I’ll share in the week as well as my reading list for May.
Here’s what I want to share this week
Why Hasn’t The World Copied Portugal’s Drug Strategy
The war on drugs has failed. Since the 1980s, millions have been spent on tackling the proliferation of drugs in many western countries, and what do we have to show for it? More epidemics, more people dependent on drugs and a policy that’s a complete failure but very governments want to change.
Well, one country tried a different approach and succeeded in tackling its drug problem. Portugal decriminalised all drugs in 2001 and saw a massive drop in drug use. This might sound like the opposite of what might happen but the figures in this article back it up. It was Einstein who said that doing the same thing over and over again and hoping for a different result is a sign of insanity.
Governments are guilty of this in relation to drugs. Their policies unintentionally feed the black market for drugs, allowing unscrupulous gangs to make billions hawking all manner of drugs to the general public and not having to deal with the fallout. Legalising all drugs might seem like a mad idea, but at least then they would be regulated and the supply taken out of the hands of criminals. It’s unlikely to happen anytime soon, but a different policy is needed as the current one is plainly not working.
Plastic Recycling Doesn’t Work
An interesting article on recycling plastic and why it doesn’t work. I abhor plastic and have tried to remove as much of it as I can from my life, which can be done but is tricky nonetheless. The piece rightly asserts that petrochemical companies are the new tobacco companies, whitewashing their efforts at recycling and neglecting to tell the true story of how damaging it is to the environment.
An Epochal Change?
I read this article in the New Statesman last week and had to read it twice to fully understood and take everyone in. It’s written by John Gary, one of my favourite writers, and looks at how rampant inflation hasn’t been tackled by the British government and could lead to the end of the market-based capitalism we’ve experienced since the rise of Thatcher and Reagan.
While focusing on the UK, this article still applies to most countries around the world. The events of the past few years have changed how we see society and what we want from our politicians The rampant free-market orthodoxy pursued over the past few decades culminated in the 2008 crash but was allowed to stumble on for almost a decade afterwards. Now it looks like a different economic paradigm is upon us. Hopefully, for the better.
Book I’m reading - The Great Crash 1929 by John Kenneth Galbraith
For a book detailing an economic event, no matter how important it was, this is a riveting read. Galbraith is a great writer, even if he is an economist and does a great job o conveying the madness and calamity of what happened in the Wall Street crash of 1929. A must-read if you invest, especially if you’re partial to crypto!
Quote I’m pondering: “Nothing is miserable unless you think it so; and on the other hand, nothing brings happiness unless you are content with it.” – Boethius
That’s all for this week.
Until next time,
Tom