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IT’S MIDWAY THROUGH the week and you want to get up to speed on the latest news topics and catch up on opinions and insights.
We’re here to help you do just that, with our three midweek longreads.
Hafeez Contractor is building an “alternate India”, of green zones and skyscrapers – and wants to redevelop Mumbai’s slums. But Daniel Brook writes that Contractor is also the architect Indian intellectuals love to hate.
(NY Times Magazine, approx 29 minutes reading time, 5791 words)
While Contractor claims his structures, with their reliable utilities and sewage treatment, model best practices for the rest of India, critics like Das worry that giving India’s most influential citizens high-quality infrastructure amid India’s poverty removes the political will to make basics like reliable power and potable tap water universal.
A mysterious sound is having a serious effect on a lot of people – but what is causing it? Jared Keller investigates.
(Policy Mic, approx 16 minutes reading time, 3264 words)
“The Hum” refers to a mysterious sound heard in places around the world by a small fraction of a local population. It’s characterized by a persistent and invasive low-frequency rumbling or droning noise often accompanied by vibrations. While reports of “unidentified humming sounds” pop up in scientific literature dating back to the 1830s, modern manifestations of the contemporary hum have been widely reported by national media in the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia since the early 1970s.
The Government is preparing a ‘whistleblowers’ bill – but Fergal Crehan argues that it falls down in one particular area.
(TheJournal.ie, approx 6 minutes reading time, 1011 words)
The act also provides that compensation will be 25% less where the whistleblowing was not motivated entirely by a wish to investigate wrongdoing. In reality, whistleblowers are often driven partly by personal grievances as well as by an ethical motivation. Things they might have been inclined to turn a blind eye to can become intolerable once they are mistreated by a supervisor or passed over for promotion.
I love Northern Ireland; I really, really hope that Sinn Fein get into power so we can all unite.
I’d also sleep easier knowing that London didn’t have to pay the €5bn a year it costs to prop it up.
And would you continue to sleep easier with your tax hiking 2 points to pay for an economic policy written in crayon?
4 seats out of 18 is the reality SF in the 6 counties
The people of the North know SF haven’t delivered for them at all on any fronts
SF implement austerity up there awhile talking out of the side of the mouth down here about being an anti- Austerity party .
The people who voted up there seen through there lies and voted accordingly
SF gave up on a united Ireland decades ago. It’s now all about feeding their egos and securing power as a minority coalition partner with Unionists in a UK regional assembly.
It’s more like £10+ billion.
Lion King ,
SF have help implement austerity up north wether you care to admit it or not .
As for the people down South , it’s safe to say around 95% of the population here couldn’t give 2 f ** ks what happens up there
4% of the 5% are barstool republicans who never set foot in the 6 counties ,
SF are the new Labour Party in waiting , just trying to get their greedy noses in the trough
Where did you get the €5bn figure I thought it was closer to £10bn
More like 12 billion, keeps them dependent at the expense of impoverished northern English counties.
Wasting your time King talkin to these West Brits, as you’ll see by their comments all they care about is money money money. Celtic Tiger showed them up for greedy bunch of shite they are.
Good morning Diarmuid. I see we’re majority Nationalist party AGAIN. Oh The fools the fools eh lol. Ah how is that humble pie tasting now?
Bobby Sands seat handed over to the unionists , the people of Fermanagh and South Tyrone have spoken
Sinn Fein have failed them
they want real change and prosperity now
The shimmers managed to drop 2 seats in NI…..very telling!
Paul, celebrating losing a seat and overall drop in support? Kinda pathetic…
Any romantic idea that if Sinn Fein get into power we can all unite and live happily ever after, is what it is – a totally deceptive ideology derived and nurtured from within Cult Sinn Fein’s propaganda machine.
Rubbing out a line on a map,(as already attempted by them by murderous force) to create a ‘United’ territory is a far, far cry from creating a unity of minds which would be absolutely essential for any such Country to get established, let alone thrive.
Sinn Fein and their IRA have proved themselves to be nothing more than an evil, antichristian cult. If you don’t believe me, check out what their supporters comments are in the on-line Belfast newspapers, just for example. Here is but a typical one made in relation to the Bible and a Catholic prayer that was offered up for them to see sense:-
“You forgot to mention about Mary the virgin who managed to conceive a child without ever having sexual intercourse with a man. Of course she did have sexual intercourse but it was metaphorically performed with Jesus’s biological father (the god) who of course had an alibi as he was in heaven at the time. Her partner Joseph must have been fuming though, isn’t the bible amazing?”
Who could blame the majority of the population in the North (not exclusively Protestant either by any means!) for resisting ‘Sinn Fein’s United Ireland’. I certainly could never trust them to govern our land. Such an occasion would undoubtedly also lead to widespread violence which would then be our responsibility to deal with. Any financial aspects would therefore be humbled into oblivion in terms of protecting human lives and property for an infinitely long time.
Therefore, the best thing Cult Sinn Fein and their IRA could do if their dream is to ever materialise in a civilised, Christian manner is to totally disband and ‘go away’!
To the few illiterates who have posted here already. Giildernew’s vote was up [defeated by a Unionist sectarian pact], Molloy’s vote was up, as was Seely who increased SF vote in Upper Bann [Unionist stronghold], South Belfast vote was also up for the Shinners. [SDLP stronghold]. Onwards to the GE16.
A little reminder for the West Brits on here, who are getting a little uppity.
SF support is down overall, also losing one seat, despite their sectarian politics practiced by the likes of Gerry Kelly.
Scotland gets what it wanted so; Devo-max. All the decision making, none of the bills
@ je suis rep
Is safe to say – you talk a whole load of crap
Generalise much?
One piece of info missing from all the articles about this killing was whether or not the gunman was masked. Does anyone know?
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