Month: July 2024

Leftist surge foils far right but French election ends in deadlock

Posted on by Lone Candle

“A left-wing alliance has won the most seats in the French parliament after tactical voting in Sunday’s second round election thwarted Marine Le Pen’s far-right party, but France will be left in political limbo after no party came close to winning an absolute majority.
In a surprise result, the New Popular Front (NFP) – a cluster of several parties ranging from the far-left France Unbowed party to the more moderate Socialists and the Ecologists – won 182 seats in the National Assembly, making it the largest group but short of the 289 required for an absolute majority, according to the French Interior Ministry.

President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist Ensemble alliance, which had slumped to a dismal third in the first round of voting last Sunday, mounted a strong recovery to win 163 seats. Despite leading after the first round of votes, Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally (RN) party and its allies won 143 seats.

The RN’s strong showing in the first round stirred fears that France could be on the cusp of electing its first far-right government since the collaborationist Vichy regime of World War II. But Sunday’s results come as a huge upset and show French voters’ overwhelming desire to keep the far right from gaining power – even at the cost of a hung parliament.”

https://www.yahoo.com/news/french-left-wing-coalition-projected-191124298.html

4 takeaways from the new Republican Party platform — or Trump’s playbook

Posted on by Lone Candle

“The party is leaving abortion up to the states, to decide how to rule on the contentious issue. The platform also takes credit for overturning Roe vs. Wade, the long-standing Supreme Court case that allowed abortions nationwide.”

https://www.yahoo.com/news/4-takeaways-republican-party-platform-023624611.html

Cities know how to improve traffic. They keep making the same colossal mistake.

Posted on by Lone Candle

“For decades, New York City has been trying to enact an ambitious experiment to reduce traffic and pollution on some of the most congested roads in the world by charging cars a fee to drive in parts of Manhattan and using the revenue to better fund public transportation.
It’s known as congestion pricing, and after many hard-fought political and legal battles, lawmakers and transit officials had finally agreed on a plan that was set to launch later this month. Mere weeks before the new fees would go into effect, however, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul postponed the implementation of the plan indefinitely, citing economic concerns.

Supporters of the long-planned, much-discussed effort are fuming. The plan’s ultimate goals were to get cars off the road, reduce carbon emissions, and improve public transit, including the New York subway and regional rail. Congestion pricing would have, in other words, made the city safer, cleaner, and easier to get around for the people who live there.

Now, it looks like the city has no plan B.”

https://www.vox.com/policy/354457/new-york-congestion-pricing-traffic-big-mistake

What Kenya’s deadly protests are really about

Posted on by Lone Candle

“parliament passed a bill increasing taxes — including on a bevy of everyday essentials like cooking oil, diapers, and bread — on a population already suffering from inflation and high rates of unemployment.
As protests increased in size and intensity, even breaching parliament’s chambers, they were met with violent repression. Nearly two dozen people were killed Tuesday.

After initial recalcitrance, President William Ruto said Wednesday he would not sign the controversial bill. His decision was a victory for the protesters, but the saga leaves the country’s future more uncertain than ever, both economically and politically.”

…

“Kenya’s troubles are a distillation of the problems facing several dozen developing nations, crushed under debt”

…

“Complicating matters are Kenya’s other economic problems. Corruption, cronyism, financial mismanagement, and the vestiges of colonialism have hobbled Kenya’s once-impressive economic development and exacerbated class and ethnic inequalities.”

https://www.vox.com/world-politics/357857/kenya-protest-tax-ruto-loans-china-imf

One change that would make cars safer for everyone

Posted on by Lone Candle

“Pedestrian deaths have increased 75 percent in the US since 2010, according to Smart Growth America’s latest report. The numbers started increasing dramatically in 2020, with pedestrian deaths reaching a 40-year high in 2022.
In the intervening years, I’ve learned a lot about the factors that make traffic fatality rates in the US 50 percent higher than they are in other comparable nations.

They include dangerous road design that makes it easy for drivers to speed, and a breakdown in traffic enforcement that allows some of the worst drivers to get away with it for so long that they eventually kill someone. I’ve also reported how drivers in the US spend more time using their phones while driving than people in other countries, and on survey data that seems to suggest that drivers in the United States have more lax attitudes toward road safety than their European counterparts.

But there’s one thing I still can’t understand.

Why has the government failed to address the fact that large, heavy vehicles are deadlier to pedestrians and cyclists than smaller cars? There is actually a way to make cars safer for everyone — and it includes changing how the government rates a “safe car.” In Europe, government regulators test new vehicles to see how dangerous they are for pedestrians and cyclists and include that information in their safety ratings. They’ve been doing it for years. The US does no such thing.

Those 5-star safety readings you see for cars? That rating is for people inside the car. So if you’ve read the news about the soaring numbers of vulnerable people being killed on roads, and thought about purchasing something that would be safer for them, you aren’t going to be able to find that information. The government currently isn’t testing for it.”

https://www.vox.com/policy/354561/pedestrian-fatalities-car-safety-ratings