Ah, but did Sparta have ambitions of controlling the rest of Greece? They seemed much more interested in staying at home, when not forced to do otherwise by Persians or Athenians.
Funny events in anti-woke world
- Thread starter Agema
- Start date
Behold Thames Water, a depressing example of privatisation functioning exactly as intended.
Since privatisation its income has skyrocketed, bolstered by enormous loans. In 1990, its debt was near-zero; it now sits at >£14billion.
And what has this debt-fuelled capital funded? Investment in the infrastructure or lower prices, as Thatcherism promised? Of course not: gigantic shareholder payments. Dividend payments have often dwarfed profits, funded instead by debt. In 2007, profit was ~240m, and shareholder payments totalled >650m. And so the Australian firm Macquerie was able to buy-in in 2007, raise eye-watering debt, pay hundreds of millions to shareholders, then sell off in 2017... leaving someone else to finance that debt.
During this time, investment has catastrophically stalled, and water companies throughout the UK continue to engage in large-scale illegal raw sewage dumping. Companies are expected to treat sewage before discharge, with a storm-overflow system (leading straight to waterways) in place for days when huge rainfall outpaces their ability to treat it. Investigations have exposed how water companies (including Thames Water) simply use the storm-overflow system straight away, without bothering to treat it, even on dry days-- leading to 3.6 million hours of raw sewage dumping.
Of course the government has a plan! It requires illegal raw sewage dumping into bathing areas and areas of ecological importance to cease... by 2035. Anywhere else, the deadline is 2050.
Thames Water (and Water UK, the overarching body) say that drastic investment is required now to bring the system up to code, to make up for three decades of under-investment. They've published a plan which requires a 40% increase in customer bills to finance it-- getting the public to bail them out of a problem entirely of the corporation's making.
Of course, their plan still involves >35m a year dividend payments to shareholders, the one thing they apparently cannot compromise on in a period of colossal debt and desperation for income.
The regulator Ofwat is currently blocking the plan. But regulators in this country are toothless by design, so I expect them to buckle. Then my bills will rise again, and Thames Water will undoubtedly use the income to pay shareholders more before folding.
www.theguardian.com
Since privatisation its income has skyrocketed, bolstered by enormous loans. In 1990, its debt was near-zero; it now sits at >£14billion.
And what has this debt-fuelled capital funded? Investment in the infrastructure or lower prices, as Thatcherism promised? Of course not: gigantic shareholder payments. Dividend payments have often dwarfed profits, funded instead by debt. In 2007, profit was ~240m, and shareholder payments totalled >650m. And so the Australian firm Macquerie was able to buy-in in 2007, raise eye-watering debt, pay hundreds of millions to shareholders, then sell off in 2017... leaving someone else to finance that debt.
During this time, investment has catastrophically stalled, and water companies throughout the UK continue to engage in large-scale illegal raw sewage dumping. Companies are expected to treat sewage before discharge, with a storm-overflow system (leading straight to waterways) in place for days when huge rainfall outpaces their ability to treat it. Investigations have exposed how water companies (including Thames Water) simply use the storm-overflow system straight away, without bothering to treat it, even on dry days-- leading to 3.6 million hours of raw sewage dumping.
Of course the government has a plan! It requires illegal raw sewage dumping into bathing areas and areas of ecological importance to cease... by 2035. Anywhere else, the deadline is 2050.
Thames Water (and Water UK, the overarching body) say that drastic investment is required now to bring the system up to code, to make up for three decades of under-investment. They've published a plan which requires a 40% increase in customer bills to finance it-- getting the public to bail them out of a problem entirely of the corporation's making.
Of course, their plan still involves >35m a year dividend payments to shareholders, the one thing they apparently cannot compromise on in a period of colossal debt and desperation for income.
The regulator Ofwat is currently blocking the plan. But regulators in this country are toothless by design, so I expect them to buckle. Then my bills will rise again, and Thames Water will undoubtedly use the income to pay shareholders more before folding.
In charts: how privatisation drained Thames Water’s coffers
Decades of underinvestment and bumper dividends have left the firm debt-laden and under investigation
www.theguardian.com
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Yes, one should absolutely never privatize critical infrastructure. Because it can't be allowed to fail so the private companies know they can milk it and the public will keep it afloat.
Yes, and they tried.
Following the Peloponnesian War, Sparta imposed pro-Spartan ruling oligarchies on many Greek city states with Spartan governors to oversee the oligarchs. It is fair to say that many Spartans were not happy with this, who in the end they won the argument and forced the scrapping of this system, but Sparta nevertheless expected subservience from other city states, and would put Spartan garrisons in the more troublesome ones.
must've missed the cyberpunk story who predicted us being slowly smothered by our own piss shit cummy condoms n cloggy wet wipes somehow. really should be enough to make a population so incredibly angry and motivated. but instead we just have harder coordinated pushes toward conspiratorial scapegoating given a fond encouraging slap on the bottom by complacent news ecosystems groomed and monopolised to systematically block any remaining concept of structural investment or increased regulated nationalised services as actual solutions from public consciousness. what a horridly slow ugly death we're goosestepping into. with no option allowed left but to bring on the end faster. at least give us the bare fckin dignity of numbing ourselves as palliative care for the descent these kunts are determined to profiteer off.
US Navy Veteran Who Feds Say Rammed FBI Headquarters Had QAnon-Linked Online Presence
A report claims that accounts associated with the suspect suggested that he was also ready to join a militia.
Not to mention the fun and games you can have when your nations infrastructure is bought out by a company in another nation.
Ah, ok, was thinking more before and during the Peloponnesian War, overlooked the aftermath.
was easier before then to feel caught off balance from what appeared weird intersections of parody and constant thirst for violence. was always there though
twitter preview looks unhelpful for non users, non user friendly version I hope here;
Reagan, still so much kuntery we gotta die with today leads back to him. multitudinous cataclismic kuntery!
twitter preview looks unhelpful for non users, non user friendly version I hope here;
Reagan, still so much kuntery we gotta die with today leads back to him. multitudinous cataclismic kuntery!
Trump and Biden are both realists. It doesn't surprise me that Shivan picked Trump as the more capable realist/pragmatist, but I argue Biden is the better realist/pragmatist.
Abandoning Ukraine for Russian minerals, or threatening to do so to Ukraine for Ukrainian minerals is not a bad idea. I too don't want China to capture Siberia.
But a stronger EU with Ukraine in it could play out better for the US, fewer US troops in the EU means they could be diverted to Asia.
Israel, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and US allies in the region minus Qatar would benefit from Trump, but then US support around the world could crater, and we could have to make Saudi Arabia into another Japan which will one day mean war with Iran when Iran makes a play for the Saudi Oil fields near Kuwait. Which I am fine with, but US finances would mean trillions are going to be spent on another Mideast war for oil and a few startups from Israel, and Saudi Arabia. I would rather have something more durable like Rare Earths.
He got Asia wrong. Biden would continue the trend of attacking China, but Trump wouldn't just continue the trend. He would do more, which is fine by me, either makes sense. Biden would sway more ASEAN countries, Trump would impose more tariffs. So maybe don't invest in BYD, or Tencent, or invest too much in Chinese gachas, or even expect TikTok to be there in the future without at least a VPN.
He wouldn't get along with AMLO or Trudeau, but Trudeau will likely lose due to bad housing policy which means everyone blames his immigration policy. AMLO is where I don't know what he will do. Anywhere from Trump's drone strikes on Mexican cartels, to a Texas Border policy to, him getting along with AMLO over his dislike of Biden.
I know he will not lift Cuba sanctions like Obama.
Central and South America. I guess he would get along with El Salvador and Argentina, and hate Maduro, hate Columbia's New president who is lefty, maybe Lula could calm him down.
Edit: Africa IDC.
Honestly, I think if you want a useful vision of Trump as leader, I think John Bolton is pretty much spot on.
It's pretty hard to know what we'll get from Trump. As per Bolton, the king is going to sit on his metaphorical throne, with his short attention span, dedicated to self-aggrandisement. This means his cabinet will probably then be doing most of it, occasionally getting bawled out by their boss and even maybe having to seriously do what he wants if it can stick in his brain long enough. It will probably be erratic and chaotic governance, just like last time.
The question is then... who will be in his cabinet? Because I can't help but feel they are not going to be top grade material. Crazies, cranks, ideological extremists, whose principal qualification will be unswerving deference to Trump.
Right-wing Tik Tok in a nutshell.
And no I don't go searching for these videos, it will show pro-Palestinian videos in one video, a nazi video in another, then a video on Biden, then on the US military, then on Christianity, then on the German AFD then a video on Midwestern Marx. Tik Tok is bananas.
And no I don't go searching for these videos, it will show pro-Palestinian videos in one video, a nazi video in another, then a video on Biden, then on the US military, then on Christianity, then on the German AFD then a video on Midwestern Marx. Tik Tok is bananas.
My tiktok just shows me cosplay, e-girls, games and cat videos. Maybe take some ownership of the fact it runs of an algorithm that caters to your interests and engagement.
I have never actively looked at anything on TikTok beyond following occasional links from Google search, and even then the number of times is in low single digits.
It is a horrible idea.
If the US abandons Eastern Europe to bond with Russia, the Europeans will give up on the US allience and cozy up with China instead.
Do yourself a favour and block TikTok's domains on your router.
There are no negatives to this strategy.
Turns out Kyle Rittenhouse is too stupid for the military branch whose meme is they all eat crayons. The rest of this story is how this group polished up Kyle for his trial, got him to actually pass high school, then gave him a free ride through any college of his choice to do whatever he wanted, and he threw it all away.
Oh, but also