Republicans in the house seem to have concluded that they can't stonewall Democratic demands to restore funds for medical funds for American poor. So they dangled a supposed compromise which is strictly for suckers: vote for the Republicans' cuts now, and they will discuss later whether to restore those funds.

The Democrats were not tempted by this.

This says to me that the Republicans are under pressure to compromise and the Democrats can win.

Richard Stallman will give a talk in Munich, Germany, Tuesday, Oct 21, Free/Libre software and freedom in the digital society. The talk is in English, from 18:00 to 20:00, in the Technical University of Munich.

*High youth death rates [from Alcohol, suicide and injuries] are an "emerging crisis", global health study warns.*

The giant corporation Sysco dominates the food distribution business in the US, and is using this to mistreat truckers and restaurants.

Its success has driven many US restaurants to buy food of lower quality.

I don't see a reason to distinguish between "organic growth" and mergers as paths to over-concentration. Paying attention to that is based on trying to judge over-concentration as "fair" or "unfair", but that judgment is a distraction from the crucial point: over-concentration is very harmful.

We should prevent and eliminate over-concentration in business regardless of how it is or might be created, with the exception of natural monopolies, and those we should restrain by strict regulation.

Israel demanded that captive Australians who tried to bring desperately needed aid to Gaza sign a sort of confession or they might be imprisoned forever.

This is not as bad as what Israel does to the people of Gaza, but it is despicable. And no one should assign any significance to these confessions when prisoners do sign them.