Tiny Tips (2011)

The Tiny Tips column from the April 2011 issue of the Socialist Standard

MEXICO CITY (AFP) – A 19-year-old Mexican woman was in the ninth day of a hunger strike in front of the British embassy, demanding an invitation to the wedding of Britain’s Prince William and Kate Middleton, she told AFP:

(Dead Link)

#    #    #    #

An American couple who have sailed the world with a yacht full of Bibles were hijacked by Somali pirates, and the U.S. said Saturday it is assessing possible options:

  (Dead Link)

#    #    #    #

A record 5.26 million people worked unpaid overtime last year, clocking up an average of more than seven hours a week without pay, according to a new study. The TUC said workers were missing out on almost £5,500 a year, worth £29bn to the economy. One in five employees regularly put in extra unpaid hours last year, with public-sector workers most likely to work unpaid overtime, said the TUC:

(Link)

#    #    #    #

21-year-old Sacha Hall is facing trial for allegedly helping herself to food that had been thrown out and was awaiting disposal:

(Dead Link)

#    #    #    #

“We must be prudent. We know what our political line is: We don’t support invasions, or massacres, or anything like that no matter who does it. A campaign of lies is being spun together regarding Libya,” said Chavez, in a televised speech. “I’m not going to condemn him (Gadaffi),” he said.“I’d be a coward to condemn someone who has been my friend”:

(Dead Link)

#    #    #    #

Joseph Nye of Harvard’s Kennedy School wrote in The New Republic in 2007 that Muammar Qaddafi was interested in discussing “direct democracy.” Anthony Giddens of the London School of Economics wrote in the Guardian the same year that Libya under Qaddafi could become “the Norway of North Africa.” Benjamin Barber of Rutgers University wrote in the Washington Post, also in 2007, that Libya under Gaddafi could become “the first Arab state to transition peacefully and without overt Western intervention to a stable, non-autocratic government.” Great minds think alike? Actually, no: all were being paid by Libyan money, under a $3 million per year contract with a consulting group which promised to “enhance the profile of Libya and Muammar Gaddaffi” in Britain and the US:

(Link)

#    #    #    #

Death threats from Muslim fundamentalists have forced a British Imam to retract his claim that Islam is compatible with Darwin’s theory of evolution.

(Dead Link)

#    #    #    #

‘This week a report by government advisor Lord Hutton stating that public sector workers should work for ten years longer, for less pay, was released on the same day as the Forbes Rich list, which showed  that the number of billionaires in the world has risen from 1011 to 1210 in one year. If you plotted a graph of the wealth of the richest people in the world it would be shooting off the charts, with loads of fat cats looking on, toasting each other and chuffing on cigars:

(Dead Link)