This is why Liberal Democrats should make history and name Layla Moran the first openly LGBT+ leader of a major party – PinkNews

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Liberal Democrat leadership candidate Layla Moran. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

Lynne Featherstone, a member of the House of Lords and former equalities minister under the coalition government, explains for PinkNews why she believes Layla Moran should be the next leader of the Liberal Democrats, and make history as the first openly LGBT+ leader of a major political party.

As the first openly LGBT+ candidate for the leadership of a UK-wide political party, Layla Moran is a brilliant force in the Liberal Democrats and in the political landscape.

When she bounded into the news last year after coming out as pansexual, she clearly demonstrated that she treads her own path. Her vision for the Liberal Democrats is a fairer, greener and more compassionate country where everyone has the security to live life as they choose including her!

I know Layla well and have seen her in action as an energetic and passionate voice for our values.

She is incredibly active in standing up for the LGBT+ community. She recently tabled a motion to parliament to outlaw LGBT+ conversion therapy.

In an opinion piece for i, she excoriated the government for its lack of action two years on from pledging to ban this outdated and harmful practice As she stated: As a liberal, I believe that the right to love who you want is fundamental.

Lawmakers and the government have a responsibility to protect and support their citizens. That means all of us, irrespective of gender or sexual orientation.

Protecting LGBT+ people isnt an optional extra, or a nice fluffy liberal add-on. It is a fundamental right.

Layla is also incandescent about reports that Boris Johnson is planning to scrap reforms to the Gender Recognition Act that would make gender change easier.

Her position is crystal clear: Trans rights are human rights. Trans women are women. Trans men are men.

The trans community face a horrendous level of discrimination and harassment and Layla has vowed that she and the Liberal Democrats will stand in solidarity with them and tirelessly campaign for equal rights for all.

She is urging the government to remove the current ban on gay or bisexual men donating blood unless theyve been celibate for at least six months. She has argued that being able to donate blood should be based on scientific evidence not on sexual orientation, with individual risk assessments instead of arbitrary rules that exclude entire groups.

At a time when the NHS is urging men, in particular, to donate their blood and antibodies to use for research for treatments against coronavirus, the rules seem especially nonsensical.

Gay and bisexual men should not be denied the right to help in the fight against COVID-19. The health secretary should urgently amend these outdated rules and allow gay and bisexual men to donate blood and antibodies like everybody else.

But Layla is not just a great champion for LGBT+ rights. Her clarity of purpose and vision is carried through all that she believes in.

Her stance on education built on her experience as a former teacher, to invest in the early years to reduce inequality and introduce a nationwide adult retraining system.

On the economy consider wellbeing alongside GDP and introduce a Universal Basic Income so no one is left behind. On the environment have a green-powered recovery that ensures we become not just carbon neutral but carbon negative.

On all these areas, Layla has an ambitious, progressive and liberal vision to move the Liberal Democrats and the country forward and build a fairer and more compassionate country where everyone has a chance to thrive.

The face of the UK has transformed in recent years and it continues to change. Its time our country had a UK-wide party leader who embodies that and who can inspire future generations to be the best versions of themselves, reflecting the values of tolerance, inclusivity and diversity that are so integral to our modern society.

Today is the last day that people can join the Liberal Democrats and still vote for the partys next leader.

So I would urge anyone who isnt a member and agrees with these values to join us in making history and backing Layla so together we can continue fighting for a more equal future.

Layla is the fresh start we need. Just like Paddy Ashdown and Charles Kennedy this potential leader of the Liberal Democrats will make liberalism mainstream once again.

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This is why Liberal Democrats should make history and name Layla Moran the first openly LGBT+ leader of a major party - PinkNews

Understanding the collapse of liberal Zionism | Commentaries – St. Louis Jewish Light

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Theres a reason why most Israelis find it difficult to listen patiently to lectures from liberal American Jews. For Israelis, their country is a real place filled with real people and perplexing dilemmas that have no easy solutions. But for all too many American Jews, Israel is a dreamlanda place for intellectual tourism where we can project our own insecurities and anxieties on the Jewish state while expressing our moral superiority over the lesser beings who live there and lack our wisdom.

Which brings us to the problem of Peter Beinart.

Beinart, the former editor of The New Republic and columnist for The Atlantic, sought to carve out a place for himself as the leading liberal critic of Israel with his 2012 book The Crisis of Zionism. The book was as spectacularly ignorant as it was arrogant in its refusal to acknowledge the reality of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.

The conceit of the work was that Israelis needed to rise above their fears and recognize that a two-state solution was within easy reach. Anything that contradicted his assumptionslike the nature of Palestinian political culture or the continued rejectionism and obsession with the fantasy of Israels destructionwas either rationalized or ignored. Too immersed in their unseemly quest for security and profit, Israelis could only overcome the crisis of the title by listening to the wisdom of Beinart, a righteous American pilgrim, whose manifest good intentions should have generated respect and deference from his recalcitrant Israeli pupils

Much to Beinarts chagrin, rather than take the advice of a leading American public intellectual to heart, Israelis ignored it. In the eight years since then, Israel has endured more violence and political controversy while the Palestinians have continued to reject peace, whether along the lines laid out by President Barack Obama (whose alleged bona fides as a friend of the Jewish people was discussed at length in his book) or the less generous terms offered by President Donald Trump.

Instead of moving closer to moral and physical collapse as Beinart has been prophesying, Israel has only gotten stronger. Much of the Arab world has tired of Palestinian intransigence and largely abandoned advocacy for their cause, as many now perceive the Israelis as a vital ally in the struggle against Iran, as well as a needed resource in the areas of technology, agriculture and clean water. Peace with the Palestinians is not in sight. But until it becomes possible, the Jews of Israel will hold on and continue to thrive.

All of this has left Beinart deeply troubled. He understands that events on the ground have refused to conform to his ideas. So rather than stick to his tired mantra about two states, Beinart has decided to junk it.

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor in chief of JNSJewish News Syndicate. Follow him on Twitter at: @jonathans_tobin.

The result is an 8,000-word essay in Jewish Currentsthe far-left magazine where he now writes on Jewish affairs after having decided that the ultra-liberal Forward was no longer woke enough for himand a shorter version published in The New York Times in which he decides its time to give up on two states or rather the whole idea of a Jewish state. His Yavne: A Jewish Case for Equality in Israel-Palestine is a manifesto calling for the dismantling of Israel as a Jewish state, replacing it with a binational entity where Jews and Arabs will share sovereignty over all of the territory between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River.

Such a country will supposedly respect the rights of both peoples and provide a path to peace that was rendered impossible by the insistence of the Jews on having their own state in order to protect them from their unreasonable fears of another Holocaust. Having thus divested themselves of their unfair demonization of Palestinians, Israelis will prosper as Arabs mourn the Shoah and Jews will join them in lamenting the nakba (disaster) caused by the birth of the Jewish state.

There is, of course, nothing new about binationalism. It was championed by a small group of Jewish intellectuals in the 1920s and 30s whose naive and fearful approach was rendered obsolete by the Arab terror and rejectionism of that era. If Jewish life were to persist in its ancient homeland, sovereignty and self-defense were a must.

As scholar Daniel Gordis has written of Beinarts foolish essays, acceptance of his premise requires not so much imagination as ignorance even greater than that of the author. This means ignoring the fact that Palestinians still conceive of their national identity as inextricably tied to the destruction of Zionism and Jewish life, not a desire for peaceful co-existence. That Beinarts essays were published in the same week that the Fatah and Hamas movements announced their decision to join forces to oppose any compromise with Israel is not so much ironic as it is telling.

Beinarts call for a new Yavnea reference to the place where Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai built a yeshivah where Judaism could be revived after the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 C.E.is also deeply symbolic. The real-life Jews of today are not defeated, but are flourishing in their reconstituted Jewish state. But thats meaningless to Beinart because he believes the Palestinian refusal to accept Israel is a good enough reason to abandon the whole project. So hes prepared to throw in the towel and with it, not only Jewish security but also the revival of Jewish life and culture that was made possible by Zionism.

Should Israelis treat his intellectual journey as if it were the epic event that he and his friends at the Times think it is?

Beinarts chutzpah and self-importance demand satire, not respect. The notion that the state created by the sacrifice, blood, guts and brains of millions of courageous Israelis should be trashed because it doesnt measure up to the hopes of one presumptuous intellectual living on the Upper West Side of Manhattan is something so silly that youd have to be an idiot (or an editor at The New York Times) to believe it.

While we do well to mock Beinart, we still shouldnt ignore him.

Beinarts anti-Zionist broadside in Americas leading newspaper represents more than just his own appalling egotism. His abandonment of the Jewish state is also indicative of the crisis of faith within much of American Jewry, whose loyalty to liberal patent nostrums exceeds their love of their fellow Jews or the vibrant society that has flourished in Israel.

His delusions are also to be found in the boardrooms of all too many liberal American Jewish institutions and philanthropies. Their talk of disillusionment with Israel and along with their judgmental attitude towards the hardheaded realism of the overwhelming majority of Israelis is not dissimilar to Beinarts ideas.

The contempt for the achievements of Zionism and the fearful refusal to contemplate a future in which Jews can succeed despite the fact that insoluble problems remain unsolved has become part of the narrative of American Jewish life. Though Beinarts ideas are as unoriginal as they are lacking in insight, they have the virtue of mirroring the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of much of the liberal American Jewish establishmentboth philanthropic and religiousthat is more interested in kowtowing to a Black Lives Matter movement linked to anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism than it is to standing up for Zionism and the Jewish state.

The retreat of the defeated to Yavne is an image that has nothing to say to Israelis. Rather, it is an apt metaphor for the failures of an American Jewish organized world drenched in ignorance and Jewish illiteracy that is suffering both a demographic implosion and a crisis of faith. The surrender of the self-described leading exponent of liberal Zionism speaks volumes about the failures of American Jewry.

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor in chief of JNSJewish News Syndicate. Follow him on Twitter at: @jonathans_tobin.

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Understanding the collapse of liberal Zionism | Commentaries - St. Louis Jewish Light

Liberals are right to ignore deficit bogeyman – TheRecord.com

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Finance Minister Bill Morneau made one thing patently clear this week: As far as the federal Liberal government is concerned, deficits dont matter.

They really dont.

Justin Trudeaus Liberals have long been cavalier about deficits. In the 2015 election campaign, they promised to spend in order to get the economy moving even if that meant briefly running a deficit.

In the 2019 campaign, they dropped the word briefly, arguing that they could run deficits indefinitely as long as the federal governments debt as a percentage of the national economy was falling.

This week, they effectively abandoned even that target. Thanks to the pandemic, the debt-to- gross-domestic-product ratio has risen sharply. But that, said Morneau in his fiscal snapshot Wednesday, isnt reason to cut back spending or raise taxes.

In fact, he said, the government will spend $50 billion more. In the current fiscal year, the deficit is expected to balloon more than tenfold to $343 billion.

Dont get me wrong. I think the Liberals are right to abandon what had been, in the days of Paul Martin and Jean Chrtien, their fixation on deficits.

Since then, federal and provincial governments of all political stripes have used the deficit bogeyman as an excuse to slash social programs ranging from medicare to employment insurance.

Whenever a new social program, like pharmacare, is proposed, naysayers needed only raise the word deficit to scupper it.

So kudos to Morneau and Trudeau for acknowledging what many economists have long pointed out: countries like Canada can survive deficits quite handily. Government borrowing is not necessarily a recipe for disaster. In most cases, it involves Canadians borrowing from themselves.

Since April, for instance, the government has been borrowing at least $5 billion a week from the Bank of Canada. In effect, and properly so, the central bank is printing money to help fund the deficit.

Todays monster deficit stems from COVID-19. Shutting down the entire economy in order to preserve public health carries a cost. Morneaus fiscal snapshot predicts that Canadas gross domestic product will shrink by a stunning 6.8 per cent this year.

The governments response has been to devise a bevy of emergency programs designed to patch things up. Employers have been offered wage subsidies if they agree to keep workers on the job. Workers sideswiped by the virus have been offered benefits to tide them through temporarily.

Small businesses have been offered low-interest bank loans to stay afloat. Young people have been offered money for volunteering.

All of this is aimed at keeping the economy afloat until the pandemic has run its course. All of this assumes that the pandemic will run its course.

But what if it doesnt? What happens if the world doesnt return to a pre-pandemic normal?

Will people eat out as much? Or will they fear catching the virus? Will holidayers and business people be willing to travel as much as they did? Or will they try to avoid crowded planes and heavily frequented hotels?

Will we get through this first wave of the pandemic only to be sandbagged by a second? If so, do we just shut down again?

Most Canadians labour in the service industry. But it is workers in this industry, ranging from store clerks to nursing home workers to baristas, who have been hit hardest.

Never miss the latest news from The Record, including up-to-date coronavirus coverage, with our email newsletters.

The service industry was whacked by the first wave. Will it survive a second?

All of these questions were neither asked nor answered in Morneaus snapshot. They will have to be faced eventually.

But at least the finance minister made it crystal clear that hes not bothered by deficits. Thats not much. But its something.

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Liberals are right to ignore deficit bogeyman - TheRecord.com

Lebanons neo-liberal wheels sped to a dream future, but the past applies the brakes – FRANCE 24 English

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For decades, Lebanon was a poster child of the triumph of private enterprise, its failure to close its civil war chapter overlooked in the hopes that prosperity would overcome the weakness of the state. But now that the current economic crisis has ripped the neo-liberal band-aid, can the Lebanese confront the wounds of the past?

The trains in Lebanon are an unfortunate metaphor for the state. Theyre going nowhere. In fact, they havent budged since the national rail system ground to a halt during the 1975-1990 Lebanese civil war.

But they live in the public memory, an object of yearning and a testimony to the limitations of private enterprise. Artists put up shows offering sepia-tinted nostalgia of a heritage service. Newspapers feature profiles of Lebanons last living train driver. NGOs raise awareness, via songs and video clips, hoping it will lay the groundwork for a modern railway system linking cities as they did under Ottoman and colonial rule.

The wheels of the dream however are stuck, like the countrys trains going rusty in yards roamed by packs of wild dogs.

Meanwhile, Lebanon has a Public Transport and Railway Administration or Office des Chemins de Fer et des Transports en Common (OCFTC) in French. The department is staffed by civil servants and has a budget of more than $8 million a year.

But the OCFTCs only transportation offering is a fleet of public buses with a grand total of 35 vehicles officially running nine routes nationwide. In reality, many OCFTC bus drivers never get behind a wheel. Some confess they havent driven for years because theyre afraid of being attacked by the drivers of private minibuses, who dominate Lebanons public transport sector.

Transport regulation services, meanwhile, range from corrupt to non-existent. Red registration plates necessary for public transport vehicles are issued by the Transport and Vehicle Management Authority (TVMA) under the Interior Ministry. But they can be bought and sold or simply forged, with the number of red plate vehicles on the streets far exceeding TVMA-issued registrations.

But Lebanon nevertheless kept moving, its estimated 4 million citizens famed for their enterprise, resilience and business acumen getting where they needed to somehow. The rich and upper middle classes in their cars maneuvered traffic snarls, the less fortunate hailed minibuses or service Lebanons celebrated shared taxis.

The money also flowed, with Lebanese banks the historic jewel of the countrys economy offering high interest rates, attracting currency from local and regional depositors as well as the large Lebanese diaspora across the world.

Little Lebanon has long been the hailed liberal island in an autocratic Arab neighbourhood. After the civil war, it turned into a neo-liberal dream, the absence of effective state services, it was believed, could be filled by private enterprise, mirroring the post-Soviet zeitgeist of privatisation against the sin of bloated governments. International attention instead was focused on Lebanons precarious political equilibrium in a volatile region. The Lebanese, it was believed, could manage finance.

But the neo-liberal bubble has burst with deadly consequences. A spiraling economic crisis driven by a currency collapse is driving the state and its people into destitution. The Lebanese pound in recent days fetched more than 9,000 to the greenback on the black market, hyper-inflation has wiped meat off many Lebanese tables including the armys menu and the desperation has triggered a spike in suicides.

Four Lebanese killed themselves last week in suicides apparently linked to the economic downturn.

In one case, a 61-year-old man shot himself before a Dunkin Donuts shop in the heart of capital, Beirut. A suicide note on his chest quoted a line from a popular song, I am not a heretic. But hunger is heresy, according to local media reports.

IMF as defenders of widows and orphans

Meanwhile talks between Lebanon and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for an emergency bailout have stalled over the countrys inability to overhaul its entrenched patronage systems.

Two members of Lebanons negotiating team resigned last month, including one of the main architects of the governments rescue plan. Alain Bifany, the top civil servant in the Lebanese finance ministry, told a news conference he refused to be part of, or witness to, what is being done.

A blame game has since dominated the Lebanese airwaves. But it hasnt changed the facts on the ground. The collapse of talks was not due to differences between Lebanon and the IMF, the two negotiating parties. It was sparked by infighting within the Lebanese team, pitting civil servants against bankers and politicians over the extent of losses accrued by the banks, particularly Lebanons central bank.

The governments assessment of central bank losses of around $50 billion equivalent to more than 90 percent of Lebanons 2019 total economic output was rejected by the central bank governor and some parliamentarians who maintained the amount was lower, according to the Financial Times. The IMF is more in line with Lebanese civil service figures, estimating losses of over $90 billion.

The collapse of IMF talks is really disappointing. Basically, there is no plan B and it was the last hope to inject badly needed foreign currency which could offer a respite to the economy, said Karim Emile Bitar, senior fellow at the Paris-based Institute for International and Strategic Affairs (IRIS) and director of the Institute for Political Science at St. Joseph University, Beirut.

While IMF bailouts, with the accompanying austerity and belt-tightening measures, tend to be unpopular across the world, the reverse is true in Lebanon, Bitar explained.

The irony in Lebanon is that theres such a degree of egregious corruption, political clientelism and kleptocracy that the IMF ended up being seen as defending the widows and orphans, said Bitar in a phone interview with FRANCE 24 from Beirut. This is one of the very few cases when the IMF is seen on the side of social justice against political elites in cahoots with private interests, banks and big depositors the few who have over $10 million each [in bank deposits] and dont want to contribute to a fair solution.

The IMF bailout of around $5 billion in aid after Lebanon for the first time defaulted on its sovereign debt would pave the way for contributions from France, the EU, and Gulf states keen to rescue the country, but wary of pouring money into the morass.

But overhauling Lebanons entrenched patronage systems has proved to be easier said than done. You would not think this would be difficult, a senior European diplomat told the Guardian. We have been begging them to behave like a normal state, and they are acting like they are selling us a carpet.

Beautiful, but threadbare national carpet

The Lebanese national carpet though is a structurally threadbare tapestry of sectarian divides that has been historically managed more often mismanaged by feudal lords, warlords and their families and friends.

The carpet is ripped in times of war, but when the conflict ends with an invariable division of spoils the fabric of the nation is rarely strengthened. The countrys once warring elites and weary populace instead place their hopes on the magic of the market and the memory of the last bloodbath as a deterrent against future man-made disasters.

The roots of the current crisis lie in the 1975-1990 Lebanese civil war and the countrys failure to effectively close that historical chapter by addressing existential issues. The lessons of the past are important not just for Lebanon, but also for other countries in the region, such as Syria and Iraq, grappling with sectarianism and strife.

Lebanons brutal civil war between internecine sectarian groups backed by regional powers ended with the Taif Accord. The agreement reached in the mountainous Saudi city of Taif ended the fighting, but failed to effectively secure the peace. Instead of abolishing colonial era divide-and-rule policies, imperative for newly independent democracies, the parties merely updated the confessional equation.

Post-conflict justice and reconciliation was avoided in favour of national amnesia, encapsulated by the dictum la ghalib, wa la maghloub (no victors, no vanquished). The old system of zaims, or feudal overlords, providing protection and services in exchange for patronage survived with a few nomenclature tweaks: warlords became politicians, their funding sources switched to international business and finance, territories turned into ministries, and profiteering proceeded at usual unregulated levels.

>> Read more: Lebanons modern zaims, or feudal lords-turned-candidates

Mr Lebanon rebuilds corruption

The postwar healing focused on obliterating the visual signs of the conflict, particularly in Beirut with its bombed out buildings and pockmarked concrete carcasses.

But the national reconstruction, which was essentially a construction boom, soon became a symbol of the ailments infecting the state.

The countrys first postwar prime minister, Rafik Hariri, led a reconstruction that set the bar for politico-business enrichment. A businessman tycoon with close Saudi ties and dual citizenship, Hariri was the largest stakeholder in Solidere, a joint stock company that snagged most of his governments reconstruction projects. Hariri also owned Lebanons largest private construction company, whose director was appointed the head of the Council for Development and Reconstruction, leading an architect to explain to the Washington Post that the agency that the government used to control private development has now reversed its role.

The fact that Hariri was not a warlord and had the drive and pockets to rebuild his country made him a popular figure in Lebanon. The corruption was evident Hariri was called Mr. Lebanon but it was tolerated as the price of Lebanons reentry in the world as the businessman-prime minister repeatedly proclaimed.

Critics of his rebuilding particularly architects and heritage groups bemoaning the demolition of historic sites were brushed aside. Downtown Beirut turned into a glitzy giant shopping mall financed by debt on the detritus of Lebanons past, a perfect symbol of the reemerging nation.

We were sold a myth, that many had an interest in telling, that there was no need for a strong state, Lebanese resilience would always come on top. Today, those truly resilient are the oligarchs, ruling class and corrupt elites while average citizens are no longer capable of making ends meet, said Bitar.

The construction and reconstruction boom was financed by borrowing, increasing the countrys debt-to-GDP ratio to recent peaks of nearly 150 percent, putting Lebanon in the worlds top three most-indebted countries. Interest payments, meanwhile, covered more than a third of the governments annual spending.

But the banks, which own most of the debt, happen to be controlled by politicians and their families and friends who are sinking Lebanon.

Toward a zaim-less state

The Mr. Lebanon template for the state could be negotiated, with wry humour, by the affluent and upper middle classes. But it was never amusing for the less fortunate, who were driven to their communities Hezbollah for the Shiites, modern day zaim-politicians for others to survive. This entailed non-state patronage networks that often exploited the state.

The defunct railways was just one of several departments staffed by salaried cadres who secured jobs by wasta (influence) but did precious little. The system, at the very least, managed to prop a middle-class. But the current crisis has pulled the rug on that. The country had a solid middle class. Today, the middle class has all but vanished. Many are thinking of leaving the country, said Bitar.

The Lebanese, acutely aware of the brewing problem, have been trying to do something about it. Grassroots movements have included the 2015 You Stink protest campaign against the garbage collection problem. In the 2018 parliamentary elections, a record number of civil society figures, under an umbrella coalition called Kuluna Watani, stood for the long-delayed polls. But while that fired up hopes on the campaign trail, it did little to change the post-election power dynamic since electoral rules ensured the survival of the old guard.

Anti-government protests once again broke out in October, with demonstrators demanding an end to the system. They got, instead, a change of government with Prime Minister Saad Hariris resignation, but nothing changed. Ministry posts are still doled out on patronage terms, the trains are still stuck.

The only silver lining of the current crisis is that this time its so serious, the Lebanese will not be hoodwinked by a bailout band-aid on the national wound.

There must be a rejection of the old clientelist system. Many aspire to a new Lebanon based on citizenship rather than community affiliations, said Bitar. They want rights from the state without having to go begging to sectarian leaders begging for jobs, asking for money for medicine. Today, Lebanon needs a new social contract.

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Lebanons neo-liberal wheels sped to a dream future, but the past applies the brakes - FRANCE 24 English

Mudslides triggered by heavy rains kill 8 in northeast India – Las Vegas Sun

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Published Friday, July 10, 2020 | 12:52 p.m.

Updated Friday, July 10, 2020 | 12:52 p.m.

NEW DELHI (AP) Landslides triggered by heavy rain on Friday have killed at least eight people in Indias remote northeast, a top government official said.

They included four members of a family who were buried under a mudslide in Tigado, a village in Arunachal Pradesh state, said Pema Khandu, the states top elected official, in a tweet.

A mudslide killed another four people in Modirijo, another village in the state, Khandu said.

Hundreds of people hit by the heavy rains are being transferred to government-run relief camps, he said. Other details were not immediately available.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he was saddened by the loss of lives due to the heavy monsoon rain as well as landslides in Arunachal Pradesh.

Indias monsoon season began last month and is due to last through September. Hundreds of people die every year because of flooding, mudslides and collapsing homes.

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Mudslides triggered by heavy rains kill 8 in northeast India - Las Vegas Sun

Pandemic, Migration and the Education Crisis: How Capitalism Aggravated it – NewsClick

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The painful pictures of migrants heading home must be haunting many people. The reality is that there is no correct estimation of how many workers migrate internally in India, given the precarity and the unavailability of jobs. According to a World Bank estimate, there are nearly 40 million internal migrants. The figure was echoed in another news report where the government also stated similar figures.

In its data on migrants, the 2011 Census put down 4,14,22,917 persons as migrants for reasons of work or employment. Of these massive approximations, states like Bihar have huge share. A report on Bihar in June said that Government officials estimate that so far, around 32 lakh people have come back to the state. The Uttar Pradesh government calculated that 21.69 lakh workers had returned to the state. One government agency estimated that there were 26 lakh stranded migrants, while the Centre told the Supreme Court that it had transported 97 lakh migrant workers.

In a nutshell, the Indian state has no inkling of the huge, unidentified and invisible workforce that runs the engine of its so-called high growth development model. It is also important to note that this indifference towards the vast mass of this work force is not sudden, but has evolved over a period of time and has been intrinsic to the model of development that Indian capitalism has embraced.

This vast mass of population, which walked thousands of miles and which has been forgotten due to public amnesia generated through war rhetoric and nationalism, has suffered on account of its childrens education as well. The pandemic has compounded their problems, not just because it has left millions without jobs and any bargaining power in the labour market, but also because their children will be deprived of one of the most fundamental requirements of life a good education.

Concerns have been raised about the migrations impact on education because it would lead to dropouts (more among girls than boys), further inaccessibility due to the digital divide and its psychological impact on children due to aggravated poverty, health and learning inaccessibilities. Additionally, in this abnormal situation (which the state and many intellectuals call the new normal), the elimination of a face-to-face interface between the teacher and student will fundamentally alter possibilities of producing a socially just and equitable imagination of society.

For instance, the socio-political, cultural and emotional dynamics that exist between the EWS and the non-EWS, sitting together in schools, would have unravelled. However, it will no longer be a possibility in this virtual classroom. The debate among students in a school inside and outside classrooms, the performative dimensions of students and teachers in the classroom or outside it or the possibilities of subversion through tiny acts of students during the process of schooling, will all be lost. Whatever argument is put forth by the online enthusiasts, dialogic dimensions are lost in apps or through online platforms of teaching and learning.

It is being repeatedly argued that migration has led to educational crisis. This is a fundamentally erroneous conclusion because it does not: firstly, tries to comprehend what creates this precarity in economy and secondly, how this precarity leads to this educational crisis. In other words, the educational crisis cannot be understood in a de-historicised manner that leads to looking at developments as moments and thereby miss its historico-material roots and the systemic nature.

It is the same system that fails to guarantee a decent livelihood, housing, health and social security due to its logic of unabashed and deceitful wealth accumulation, which also denies education to children. This crisis in education could have been reduced to a great extent (not completely) if public education backed by the state would have existed. Indias educational universe is in a mess with tens of different kinds of public schools and a hundred varieties of private schools. The state never took a keen interest in establishing public education at par with best existing schools in terms of infrastructure, pedagogical innovation, or providing the best possible working conditions to its teachers.

There is a general sense of elation among the corporate world and within the government about the online education system. While it opens up new possibilities of accumulation in an area which was not permitted earlier, it carries in its womb the possibility of the diminishing financial obligation of the state. In 2018, the online education market was worth Rs 39 billion, and the number is expected to be Rs 360.3 billion by 2024, as per a report in April 2020.

For an industry which was concerned about different kinds of recognitions and accreditations that might hamper its growth, a pandemic like the present is good news for them, because the state is gradually moving in the direction of online teaching. In any case, our state visionaries had pointed out way back in 2015 that schools, colleges and universities as currently constituted will be redundant in 2035. Instead, we will have institutions of learning that are virtual/meta/open in character.

In fact, unlike my concern above about a socially just and equitable education were tackled by it by saying that there would be no school dropouts. All children would have access to quality and affordable education, independent of social, economic, geographic, physical and even mental constraints.

The only answer to a crisis in education lies in its takeover by the state, which provides the best resources for its development. A child should not be worried about shifting from one place to another because a good school will be present in every nook and corner then. Developments models which do believe in a state-run education or health system are bound to falter in a situation of extreme crisis. However, the Capitalism of our times flourishes through state withdrawal from ensuring equal and just access to basic needs of people from schools (Niti Aayog suggesting PPP models), health centres (National Health Policy, 2017), universities and so on.

The crisis that we have encountered is a systemic crisis of capitalism which has manifested in the education sector. It is a result of its mal-intent to serve private capital at the cost of public welfare. The response of the Indian state and the state governments to avoid the repetition of such a crisis lies in how it answers the initial question of whether they would ensure that all government schools are financed at par with Navodaya Vidyalayas, to ensure equality in access to each and every child.

The writer is Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at South Asian University. The views are personal.

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Pandemic, Migration and the Education Crisis: How Capitalism Aggravated it - NewsClick

Rakul Preet Singh: This crisis has taught us that productivity comes from shortage of resources – Hindustan Times

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Rakul Preet Singh: This crisis has taught us that productivity comes from shortage of resources - Hindustan Times

EU focuses on migration and sea rescue in the Mediterranean across several official meetings – InfoMigrants

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Migration in the Mediterranean became a focus as Germany took up the rotating presidency of the EU Council in July and the EUs foreign minister, Josep Borrell, visited Malta this week.

Just a week after Germany took up the rotating EU Council presidency, EU interior ministers held an online conference to discuss security and migration in theMediterranean. At the same time, the EUCommissions Vice President and High Representative for ForeignAffairs and Security Josep Borrell visited Malta, one of the first "in-person" vitis since the coronavirus pandemic struck.

Borrell said that the EU is facing severalchallenges in our southern neighborhood and I was glad to discussthem today in Malta" with Maltese ministers; including the foreignminister, the president and the prime minister.

In a press statement, Borrellacknowledged that Malta had been "facing huge pressure" regardingmigration and that the EU fully shared Maltas determination toaddress irregular migration in a comprehensive way.

Increasedcapacity for Libyan coastguard?

Borrellsaid that the starting point for this "comprehensive" policywould be to address the crisis in Libya and support the Libyanauthorities. He said that Libya was the "largest beneficiary inNorth Africa of the EU Emergency Trust Fund for Africa." Much ofthat money has gone to strengthening the Libyan coastguard. Borrellsaid that this work needed to continue, "in order to strengthentheir capacity of intervention to dismantle trafficking networks andconduct rescue operations in their area of responsibility."

At themoment, Borrell said, the work to dismantle these networks was beingdone mainly through the EU naval and air operation Irini and the EUBorder Assistance Mission in Libya (EUBAM). He added that Maltawanted to increase the capacities of the Libyan coastguard too.

'Shameful' handling of migration by EU, Seehofer

While Borrell was talking to the Maltese government, EU interior ministers were taking part in a two-day online conference todiscuss security and migration. Now that Germany has taken over therotating presidency for the next six months, this meeting was led by the German interior minister, Horst Seehofer.

Seehofer called on his European counterparts to agree on a better and fairer solution for the distribution of migrants rescued at sea. He said it was "shameful" that the EU has still not found a solution five years after the so-called migration crisis.

"Each boat requires painstaking efforts to achieve a distribution (of migrants) among member states," said Seehofer. "And each time, only a small number (of the member states) is ready to do so". He added that the EU cannot leave Italy, Malta, Greece or Spain alone to deal with this issue. "This is a situation that is not worthy of the EU," he said.

Seehofer called for Europe to take a "pragmatic" approach to "those who arrive at the external borders." He once again reiterated the need for "as many member states as possible" taking part in sharing the numbers of migrants who arrive and returning those who have no right to claim protection in the EU.

"Europeis a community of values. Respecting human dignity and human rightsis the most important thing, and preventing deaths in theMediterranean is our shared goal," said Seehofer in a pressstatement at the end of the conference.Migrants on cargo ship taken in by Malta

During the two day meeting it was announced that a group of 50 migrants who were rescued near Lampedusa by an animal cargo vesselhad been allowed on shore in Maltaafter repeated pleas from the ships captain and pro-migrant groups like Alarm Phone and Sea Watch.

Theship had been refused entry in Lampedusa and Malta. Malta, whosesearch and rescue zone the migrants were in when they were rescued,had said that they couldnt dock until other EU countries agreed toan automatic sharing out of migrants who arrive on the island nation.

'Bringing new momentum to the topic of migration'

Aheadof the conference, Seehofer already announced that "bringing newmomentum to the topic of migration," was one of the German EUpresidencys stated aims.

He said he found his counterparts around Europe "very willing tocontinue our focused discussions," and promised "conferences willbe held soon in Europe to agree on concrete steps." A conference in Italy on July 13 was announced where delegates would discuss "closercooperation with North African countries," to fight human smugglingand instigate an effective return policy.

Malta: Agreement for an automatic mechanism

After Borrell's visit, the Maltese government announced that it had reached an agreement with a number of European countries to relocate more than 280 migrants currently in Malta.

Malta has repeatedly asked for this mechanism to becomeautomatic, but so far, despite numerous agreements, the sharing out of new arrivals has been done on an ad-hoc and case-by-case basis.

Maltese Prime Minister Robert Abela called EU policy in this area a "failure" as Borrell stood beside him, reported dpa. He said they had received more help from Libya in this period than the EU.According to the UN refugee agency UNHCR, Malta received 1,200 migrants in the first four months of 2020. "Hundreds more have disembarked since then," wrote dpa.

Speaking to journalists, Borrell agreed that an automatic mechanismwas what was needed to be able to save people at sea and quicklydisembark them in Malta before sharing them across the EU. He said "solidarity" was needed on this point and that the EU wasworking on that. However, he also noted that "I cannot tell whenand even I cannot tell if the Member States will agree because therole of the Commission is to propose. The Commission proposes and theCouncil and the Parliament decide."

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EU focuses on migration and sea rescue in the Mediterranean across several official meetings - InfoMigrants

Will agriculture help twice-returned Saurashtra migrants tide over COVID-19 crisis? – Down To Earth Magazine

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Several Saurashtra migrants who had returned to work in Surat in May-end said they have fallen back on land resources for agriculture

The Saurashtra region in western Gujarat has been witnessing a second wave of reverse migration amid the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic.

Labourers employed in the diamond industry in Surat had first migrated back to their villages in Saurashtra when the Union government had first announced nationwide lockdown in March.

They, however, came back to Surat when the lockdown was lifted in May-end. Now, they are once again headed to their villages in the face of spiralling COVID-19 cases in Surat that has led to the closure of several industrial units.

Several migrants said they have fallen back on land resources for agriculture and are determined not to go back till at least Diwali. The good monsoon rainfall has been the silver lining, and most of them are expecting a good groundnut and cotton crop.

Sources on the ground said thousands of workers employed in the diamond sector went back home, again, after units started closing down fearing a surge in COVID-19 cases. Those who own land along with their other family members have taken to tilling while the others have taken to working as agriculture labour since a good rainfall has led to an increase in demand for agriculture this season.

The diamond units closed again and we were left with no choice. They only operated for a week or two after the lockdown was lifted? Why should we pay rents then? It is better to come back to our village and work on the family land, Rajeshbhai Thummar, a labourer from Amreli district, told DTE.

Another labourer Kamleshbhai Patel, who returned to Abrahmpura village in Savarkundla from Surats Varaccha, said, We will go back only after Diwali if things look promising. There are thousands like me who have come back home. We would rather spend time with our families than sitting in expensive hotels.

He added that good rains have assured them of subsistence.

Econmist Hemant Shah, who has been keeping an eye on reverse migration since the first lockdown, explained, The diamond industry is down by at least 60 per cent in terms of demand. It has been witnessing a slowdown for the last two years and does not hold much promise for its workforce.

He added that about 20 per cent of the workforce employed in polishing and finishing had come back to work when the unlockdown was announced, but were compelled to return during the second wave.

He expressed optimism over agricultural returns following a good rainfall.

Even if the groundnut crop is good, will it translate into farmers getting good money? The recent amendments in the Agricultural Produce Market Committee Act, with claims that it is farmer-oriented and a tool for development, will not yield results. This is because we all know how companies operate in a cartel with a monopolistic outlook.

Pointing to the cotton produce, he said farmers had to deal with pricing issues last year as well.

He said the government needs to come out with positive interventions and move towards establishing good storage facilities in co-operative sector so that the farmers can hold back their produce till they get proper remuneration.

The government made a budgetary provision of Rs 300 crore for setting up storage facilities, which is just Rs 10,000 for 30,000 farmers. It amounts to nothing. Does it serve the purpose for the over five million farmers in the state, he added.

Suresh Samani, an expert on agricultural economics in Saurashtra, had a different take on the issue. We need to understand the socio-economic dynamics with regards to people from rural Saurashtra who go to work in the diamond industry in Surat. They cannot be equated with migrants from other states who come in search of livelihood to Gujarat.

He added that a majority of workers from Saurashtra belong to the Patel community, which is into farming and owns a large chunk of land. It is often one or two members from a joint family who move to the diamond industry since the remuneration from farming is not ideal and the jobs in the diamond cutting, polishing and finishing sectors pay well.

Then there is also the attraction of a better standard of living in an urban centre, Samani said.

He explained that it is primary the fear of the virus that has driven labourers back to their homes: Since they own land and their roots are strong, they are confident of subsistence. The government interventions have also led to getting reasonable returns for both cotton and groundnut in the last few years, although the cotton prices are nowhere near the Rs 1,600 per bale mark that was there a few years ago.

A good rainfall in these areas may point to an increase in demand for agricultural labour that normally comes from Panchmahals and the adjoining state of Madhya Pradesh. But since the labour is not expected from these places this season, the vacuum will be filled by the returnees from the diamond sector, experts said.

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Will agriculture help twice-returned Saurashtra migrants tide over COVID-19 crisis? - Down To Earth Magazine

Let them eat baked beans – The Shift News

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The last few months have been tough and the uncertainty brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic has been tortuous. I am not quite sure if we are through the worst of it yet but for the moment we have a reprieve.

Like many families we lost a significant proportion of our income during these past months and, for the duration, our spending has been limited to the bare essentials. This took me back to when our children were young and we used to have Baked Bean Thursday. The very phrase brings a smile to my face.

I used to set myself a budget to spend on food each week, something like 40. I would plan our weekly menu based on seven core foods, Monday was beef mince, Tuesday was sausages, Wednesday was tinned tuna and Thursday was Baked Beans, you get the gist.

It is incredible the variety of dishes you can make with a couple of tins of Baked Beans, which meant that Thursdays offering was always keenly anticipated. I seem to remember that the winner was Baked Bean curry, closely followed by Baked Bean meatballs, but perhaps they were just humouring me. Anyway, they were fed and we got through some tough times with a smile on our faces and a few good stories.

We were fortunate that during this period of austerity we never had to rely on food banks, somehow we muddled through until the good times came.

The parcels distributed by the Foodbank Lifeline Foundation cost 25 for a family parcel which is intended to feed a family of four people for a week, but for me, the humiliation of having to ask a charity for help to feed your family is the greatest cost of all.

The government announced last week that it had racked up a bill of 1.7 million to host 425 migrants on boats during the COVID-19 pandemic; thats 4,000 spent on each individual. Not that thats a bad thing, but some context is necessary.

Please dont think that the boats used in this operation were, for one moment, fit for purpose and dont be fooled into assuming that each guest had an ensuite cabin with fresh sheets and clean towels, which is the very least I would expect on a 4,000 cruise.

The boats used were the Captain Morgan tourist day boats, the same red ones we see each year chugging around Grand Harbour or on their daily excursions to Comino. Only, on this occasion, they were struggling to chug around in circles some 13 nautical miles off the Maltese coastline for days upon end it honestly beggars belief.

Captain Morgan is part of the Zammit Tabona group. Michael Zammit Tabona happened to be Maltas disgraced former ambassador to Finland remember that Facebook post which compared Chancellor Angela Merkel to Hitler? He is also, completely coincidentally, of course, one of the Labour Partys large donors.

So while we were all at home working out how many tins of Baked Beans we could buy with the tatters of our monthly income, Zammit Tabona was reinventing his business model and selling it to the Labour government as a solution to the migrant issue simultaneously making a killing out of his redundant boats since the season was closed.

The boats were then very swiftly recommissioned as soon as there was the sniff of a tourist, so not quite the humanitarian. There is the distinct whiff of corruption and exploitation about this particularly pointless and inhuman exercise.

On a social level, during this same period, the number of people who applied to food banks for relief grew exponentially, with The Malta Trust Foundation feeling compelled to launch its own Food Aid Project in order to deal with the impending crisis that was bypassing the government.

Imagine what the food banks could have done with 1.7 million they could have bought 68,000 parcels and fed 1,250 families for a year and still have change.

The same money could have provided each of the 425 passengers on those boats with a food parcel every week for three years 272,000 meals. Meanwhile, asylum seekers are sleeping at the entrance to the capital city because theyve been kicked out of the open centres. Theres no Labour Party donor who can make money off that.

Whatever your views are on the migrant crisis and the governments attempts to bulldoze the EU (posturing, more than anything else), it can only be surmised from their actions and eagerness to provide Captain Morgan with some business that this was a greater priority to them than the welfare and humiliation of its vulnerable citizens.

Its not only those queuing at food banks who should be peeved at the ease with which this government has frittered away 1.7 million. There is a massive demand for social housing in Malta the price of property, the cost of renting and the opportunity to have your own home is out of reach for many working people.

The so-called Workers Party has promised social housing units in the Budget year after year, since Joseph Muscat had claimed it was a top priority in 2013. But only 10 units were allocated we dont even know if they were actually built. But the money was there all the time just not for social housing.

Maybe Robert Abelas Cabinet would benefit from having a Baked Bean Thursday just to give them a little soupcon of what life is like living on charity. I am assured that Baked Beans are a good match with fine vintage wine but that would perhaps detract from the humility of the meal.

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Let them eat baked beans - The Shift News

The Political Fix: Teflon Modis unabating popularity and 7 more takeaways from the middle of 2020 – Scroll.in

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India begins 2020 in turmoil.

Thats how we started the first Political Fix of this year, offering forecasts from Scroll.ins reporting team and one from me on what readers could expect in 2020 and, indeed, the forthcoming decade in India.

Spoiler alert: The words global pandemic do not turn up in those articles.

This week, as we pass the halfway mark of the year, the mostly unforeseen coronavirus crisis is all-encompassing, dominating every other development.

Five months after it was officially declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern, the Covid-19 pandemic and its fallout remain wildly unpredictable, with no clarity on how long it will disrupt what we considered normal life.

But even while the full impact of the Covid crisis on politics, on policy, on the economy and on all of our lives cannot yet be ascertained, we can still put down some notes on how the first half of 2020 went.

Key to what follows is the truism that crises like these do not upend the preexisting order, they only accelerate trends like Modis continued popularity, Indias economic struggles, a lacklustre Opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Partys divisive politics. There is, however, one major exception to that too.

Here is what we make of how 2020 has played out so far:

It has been year full of the sort of missteps that might have sunk another government: the economy was dramatically slowing because of economic mismanagement before Covid-19 hit; February saw the worst riots in Delhi in more than 35 years; the governments failure to plan for migrant workers as it went into lockdown resulted in a massive humanitarian disaster and China has managed to change the status quo on the disputed border, leading to the first deaths of Indian soldiers at the Line of Actual Control in more than four decades.

Despite all this, Prime Minister Narendra Modi reigns supreme.

It helps that he was re-elected with a massive mandate in 2019, meaning the coronavirus crisis is not an immediate electoral threat. But even if it were, Modi would have been the front-runner. Polls, though rarely reliable, show that the prime minister remains extremely popular, albeit with some ebbing of support from younger Indians. Some of the sustained popularity may be the rally-around-the-flag effect, which sees citizens supporting leaders in a time of crisis. Still, despite the year he has had, few believe Modis political preeminence faces any kind of threat.

In spite of the failure of Indias Covid-19 lockdown to break the transmission of the virus, as was the initial aim, and even though the country this week overtook Russia to record the third-highest number of global cases, there is still a sense that Modi has done better than expected. This is possibly because, unlike the leadership of the two countries above India on the list, Brazil and the United States, Modi never denied the dangers of the virus.

Yet Indias graph still points resolutely upwards, and the pandemic is shifting in intensity towards the east, where health infrastructure is minimal. Horror stories keep turning up from big cities and small towns, and there is no clarity on when India will peak and whether the country has done enough to beef up its systems for that eventuality.

As a consequence, as we enter the second half of the year, we simply do not have good visibility into how this crisis will play out, either from a public health perspective or a political one.

Even before the global pandemic hit, the Indian economy was gasping for air. Estimates for GDP growth in Financial Year 2019-2020 fell from 7% to 5% and Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in February triggered an escape clause allowing the government to borrow more than it was otherwise legally permitted. Most worryingly, the government did not seem to have a clear sense of why the numbers were so bad. Even as most commentators pointed to structural problems, Modi supporters insisting it was a cycle that wold turn.

Now India will certainly see a major contraction, by at least 4.5%, in Financial Year 2020-21. Even a quick bounce-back next year will not be enough to put it back on its earlier trajectory, never mind fulfilling the aim of becoming a $5 trillion economy.

The Covid-19 package announced by Modi relied almost entirely on liquidity measures with very little stimulus spending, which is not expected to address the widespread distress, especially as New Delhi has since embarked on an anti-Chinese protectionist effort.

There is talk now of higher fiscal spending later in the year, but the government continues to struggle restart economic activity and to pull in revenue. There is now even less trust that those in charge of the economy have a good handle on what needs to be done to turn the ship around.

Can India afford to deal with China as an adversary? The last few issues of our newsletter have considered this question, following the first fatal conflict between the armies of India and China in more than 40 years. It is one we will undoubtedly return to.

Stronger anti-China sentiment in Delhi may bring with it a closer alliance with the United States, but it will also likely bring hardship to many Indian business owners who had grown used to cheap Chinese goods.

Even as Modi will have to figure out how to deal with the situation on the Line of Actual Control, with or without dramatic visits to Leh, weaning India off of Chinese manufacturing, investment or indeed, entertainment apps may prove to be equally as hard.

Political scientist Suhas Palshikar told us in early May that Modi will get to play saviour while letting the difficult decisions (and the brickbats) go to the states. And indeed, from a political angle it looks likely that a number of chief ministers will face more direct accountability than citizens appear to expect from the prime minister.

Will Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray be seen as the one who was overwhelmed or the one who manage to wrest back control? What does Amit Shahs takeover of Delhis Covid-19 battle mean for Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal? Will Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa still be seen as a saviour now that cases in his state are steadily rising? Has crisis control revived the fortunes of Assams health minister Himanta Biswa Sarma?

The 2015 Bihar election was a massive political event, and would eventually prove that an anti-Modi alliance could win if conditions were favourable. Bihar polls are due again this year, yet despite potentially bigger questions to put to the Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies, the elections are already being declared a washout.

The Congress has tried to press Modi, on the Covid-19 crisis, on the migrant worker policy mess, on fuel prices and on China, but seems to have found few takers. Other parties have struggled to maintain a coherent line, not least because of Modis massive dominance of the national security question. Besides, many states will need Central support to just pay their basic commitments, never mind additional expenditure.

As as a result, even if there are enough issues on the table for another party with which to challenge the BJP, the chances of a genuine, national contender continue to remain minimal.

We started this year amidst a national protest movement against the governments Citizenship Act amendments that many see as religiously discriminatory. This was in fact the issue we thought might dominate the first half of the year. For the moment, however, the CAA and its promised follow-up, the National Register of Citizens, have been put on hold.

This, however, hasnt stopped the Centre and the BJP from continuing its efforts to vilify Muslims and divide Indian society on religious lines in pursuit of a pan-Hindu votebank. Early on, the discovery of an Islamic group had flouted guidelines and spread the virus led to a wave of Islamophobic messages amplified by the party and its social media army.

And under the cover of lockdown, the authorities have continued to file cases and jail many of those who have criticised this government. Even if the citizenship initiative takes some time to return to national prominence, there is no doubt that the Centre is continuing to pursue its polarising agenda.

Where Covid-19 may have accelerated pre-existing trends in many cases, the migrant crisis is the exception. It is hard to imagine a scenario that causes millions of Indians to move en masse from urban areas where they migrate seasonally for work to rural areas that they call home.

This huge reverse migration is expected to slowly unwind, as workers return to the parts of the country that have more industrial activity. But the patchy nature of Indias post-lockdown re-opening, efforts by states to employ at least some of the workers at home and a continued awareness that Covid-19 remains a threat at large, mean that not everyone will head back to the cities right away.

The effects of this are potentially far-reaching, from labour shortages and an upending of Modinomics because of a reliance on the rural economy (which we wrote about last week) to a spurt in property disputes and fears of many falling back into poverty.

If India began 2020 in turmoil, it marks the halfway point with despair at a virus that continues to spread, an economy that has fallen off a cliff, a conflict with China that threatens to get worse and a migrant crisis with impacts that cannot be predicted.

Will these be the issues we are discussing at the end of the year? Will some of those that came up at the start of the year return to prominence? Or does 2020 have even more surprises in store?

Tell us what you think. Write to rohan@scroll.in with what has been your takeaway from the first half of 2020 or if you have a suggestion for who we should featuring on our Friday Q&As. Thanks for reading.

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The Political Fix: Teflon Modis unabating popularity and 7 more takeaways from the middle of 2020 - Scroll.in

Standing in solidarity with migrants: Supporting civil society and other stakeholders in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic – World – ReliefWeb

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The UN Network on Migration salutes all actors providing vital protection, monitoring, advocacy, information and support to and in collaboration with migrants during the COVID-19 pandemic. Civil society organizations, migrant and diaspora associations, workers and employers' organizations, national human rights institutions, youth and women-led organizations, local authorities and communities, the private sector and others play a vital role in protecting many of those rendered most vulnerable by the pandemic and responses to it. The Network calls for increased recognition for this work, including through avenues for meaningful participation and greater governmental and financial support.

The challenges many migrants already faced are now exacerbated by responses to COVID-19 that, whether by design or indirectly, lead to discrimination and exclusion. Access to relief measures, government support and national COVID-19 policy responses such as income support and social protection measures have, for many, remained elusive. What has emerged is a picture of a response to a virus that is as unequal in impact as COVID-19 itself, reinforcing patterns of discrimination, alongside heightened racism, xenophobia and intolerance against migrant workers and their families, while also violating their human rights.

As noted by the Secretary-General in his 3 June policy brief on COVID-19 and People on the Move, the exclusion of people on the move is the same reason they are among the most vulnerable to this pandemic today. He further stressed that such exclusion of migrants from policy responses not only undermines their fundamental human rights but also collective public health strategies to control and rollback the pandemic. Inclusion will pay off and is the only way that we can emerge from this crisis and overcome COVID-19.

In the face of these gaps, civil society and other relevant stakeholders have stepped into the breach. They are providing multi-lingual information on COVID-19 adapted to the context migrants are living and working in, hotlines on gender-based violence and harassment, legal services and advice on complaint mechanisms, human rights monitoring, mental health support, training, advocacy and campaign support. They have created solidarity networks and provide support to migrants, including food, water, essential medicine, shelter, personal protective equipment and economic assistance. They have established relief funds for farm workers, domestic workers and others who lost their livelihoods as a result of the pandemic. Workers and employers organizations, including through social dialogue and in coordination with local authorities, are promoting equal treatment, decent work and respect for fundamental principles and rights at work. Civil society organizations and other stakeholders are also facilitating migrants to be included in the planning of policy responses to the pandemic. Concerted action of governments and stakeholders in developing COVID-19 policy responses is key in ensuring that migrants rights and contributions are addressed and fostered.

The UN Network on Migration has actively undertaken a COVID-19 online series of Listening Sessions to hear directly from stakeholders at local, national and global levels providing a platform to exchange information and mutually reinforce responses. Reflections from these individuals and groups on thematic and cross-cutting issues serve as a resource for examples from the ground and recommendations for good practices.

What is clear from these discussions, and other reports, is that in providing this vital assistance, these organizations are acting as a critical safety net when State measures are lacking and where movement restrictions severely limit the ability of others to effectively support migrants. Further, they are performing these roles at the very moment they too face a crisis of capacity brought on both by the scale of the emergency and increasing constraints on their own resources.

The UN Network on Migration calls for greater acknowledgement and support to these actors, particularly for their inclusive participation in planning responses to the pandemic and flexible and fast-tracked funding to civil society organizations and other key stakeholders, to address gaps and needs in response to COVID-19.

Such additional support, however, should complement and not replace the primary obligation for States to provide COVID-19 responses that are non-discriminatory and respect human rights. This must include ensuring access to government relief packages, social protection, healthcare, education and other basic services to all migrants, regardless of status.

The many States and local authorities that have initiated migrant-inclusive COVID-19 responses and support to stakeholders serve as examples of good practices. In a time of dramatically increasing strains on public financing, it is important that all these actors and their work with migrants are acknowledged as essential partners for a truly collective response to COVID-19.

The Network also urges governments to recall their commitments in the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM), including in their whole-of-society approach. The Network calls on States to also implement these recommendations where they apply to refugees and asylum-seekers and to protect the human rights of all migrants, regardless of status, including the human rights to the highest attainable health of everyone equally.

The Guiding Principles of the GCM recognise that the pursuit of principled migration governance requires the input of all sectors of government and society. Now, more than ever, is the time to ensure that this principle is upheld.

The United Nations established a Network on Migration to support the implementation, follow-up and review of the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM) as well as ensure effective, timely and coordinated system-wide support to Member States.

In carrying out its mandate, the Network prioritizes the rights and well-being of migrants and their communities of destination, origin, and transit. It places emphasis on those issues where a common UN system approach would add value and from which results and impact can be readily gauged.

Through its Mobility in the Time of Covid-19 briefings1, the Network will continue to support civil society through holding regular Listening Sessions with stakeholders to inform the responses of the UN system, and amplify civil society initiatives including through the use of the GCM.

Media points of contact:

IOMSafa Msehlismsehli@iom.int or media@iom.int

ILOAdam BowersPlanning and Coordination Officer for Communication+41 (0)22 799 63 48newsroom@ilo.org

OHCHRRupert ColvilleSpokesperson / Head of Media. +41 22 917 9767 rcolville@ohchr.org

UNODCMs. Sonya Yee Speechwriter and Spokesperson Office of the Executive DirectorUnited Nations Office on Drugs and Crime sonya.yee@un.org

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B-schools face a moment of reckoning – Livemint

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Bansal is in the middle of an online pre-orientation. Classes are expected to start soon, online again. The e-experience isnt something most students would have bargained for. Bansal, nevertheless, hoped that by the end of the course in 2022, she would pick up skills that would polish her into a better professional. She expects to be offered a job with an annual salary package of 17-18 lakh, more than three times what she was drawing in her last stint, as a brand executive in an e-commerce firm.

Like Bansal, millions of Indians continue to see value in an MBA degree every year. Not only is it a shot at a better pay, in a good deal of cases, the degree is a passport to switching careers. Of course, everything depends on the reputation of the school, what is taught, the alumni network, and the sort of companies that knock on the door during campus placements. India has nearly 5,000 management schools and by most accounts, an overwhelming majority of them are mediocre institutions that dont add much value to CVs.

India produces upwards of 400,000 MBAs a year. Only in 20 schools is the starting salary more than the fees paid. And only 19% of the MBAs are technically qualified to take up jobs, Shiv Shivakumar, group executive president of corporate strategy and business development at Aditya Birla Group and a former president of the All India Management Association (AIMA), informed.

The long tail of mediocre B-schools now faces a crisis. On the demand side is a tight employment market. Campus placements are usually conducted between December and April. According to AIMA, many management institutes have either halted or left the placement process incomplete in 2020 because of the lockdown. Most tier II and III B-schools are still struggling to place their students. Students who joined schools in 2019 may not get good internship opportunities. This will have a direct impact on the final placement of 2021, the body stated.

On the supply side, intake of students for one-year courses hangs in the balance. There is uncertainty about the path of the economic recovery and by extension, the jobs market next year.

The better schools are better off. Mint, in January, reported that the average salary offer was up 7-15% in top B-schools compared to the last placement season. But even they need a pivot. Online delivery of content is a new beast and professors are ill-prepared. Schools need to refresh what they teach as well as create new content since business models have undergone dramatic shifts in under two months.

Indias best management schools are mostly stand-alone institutions. Both academics and employers are questioning if they are capable enough to prepare students for complex problems in a world that is seemingly more multi-disciplinary.

Sunil Kant Munjal, chairman at Hero Enterprise, pointed out that three themes are consistent with every company at the moment. Every business is inducting more technology, building a new level of efficiency in operations and a completely new cost model. If business schools are not teaching these, they will get left behind," he said. Munjal is the chancellor of BML Munjal University and is on the governing council of IIM Ahmedabad and on the board of ISB.

The black swan event has raised yet another question: Are Indian business schools equipped to train people to expect the unexpected? The reality of life is that this is not the last time we will see a crisis. We will see more of them, whether it is due to climate change, technological changes, or cultural and social changes. The best and the smarter schools have to make this as an inherent part of their curriculumplan for the unplanned," Munjal said.

The supply conundrum

Mudit Gupta is a consultant with Indias ministry of statistics and programme implementation where he works on complex surveys. He is thinking of doing an MBAnext year. I am looking for an international business management programme for next year. Universities are offering an e-experience currently, which is not very valuable," he said. Gupta would much rather prefer networking with batch mates, the old-fashioned style. I want to get out and interact with peeps around. MBA is all about peers."

Thats one of the challenges B-schools face in 2020. Besides interactions with like-minded students, an MBA class gains from interactions with rockstar faculty and a great campus life, which is intellectually stimulating, pointed out Shivakumar. If I am doing an MBA this year, the experience will be very different because the bulk of the courses will be online. Students will ask if they should be paying 15-25 lakh for a reduced experience. Deferrals will be big," he said.

There are more nuances to the supply conundrum. There are broadly three types of MBA programmes. The conventional two-year course that is preferred by freshers and those with work experience of less than three years; a one year-degree that is tailored for professionals with work experience of four-five years or more. A third category is part-time programmes.

While the demand for MBA programmes that dont require prior work experience are expected to remain stable or even increase, B-schools that require work experience may see reduced intake in current circumstances. Why is that? If a person is already in a job, he would think twice before letting go and joining an MBA programme in 2020 given the economy. Keeping the job is a big deal now," Rekha Sethi, director general at AIMA, said.

In a good year, short-term management programmes are a hit with working professionals because they have to take only a years break from work. Recruiters seem to like it too but 2020 is tricky.

A top class one-year programme is superior to a two-year programme. The reason is that these programmes usually admit experienced people. From a recruiters perspective, it is easier to integrate a person who has already worked into a working environment versus someone who has never worked. This is why one-year programmes have a decent demand in terms of placement," A.K. Balaji Prasad, managing director of Drshti Strategic Research Services, a market research company, said. Prasad is secretary of IIM Calcuttas alumni chapter in Mumbai. However, now, two-year programmes would be preferable because by the time you are getting out, the economy would have had time to recover," he added.

So what happens to the long tail of mediocre institutions given the short to mid-term challenges? Their student intake is expected to dip but many of them would continue being afloat. Education is recession proof in India considering the countrys young demographic. In a crisis time, you need more hope. Educational institutions are organizations of hope. Thats why parents and young kids will continue to come to these institutions despite the fact that many of them provide low-level, low-quality education," Pankaj Chandra, vice-chancellor of Ahmedabad University and a former director of IIM Bangalore, explained.

What to teach

Around September of last year, Rishikesha Krishnan, professor of strategy at IIM Bangalore, taught case studies on the airlines industry and on Uber. The discussion on airlines revolved around competitive dynamics and commoditization; Uber was about how the company disrupted private transport.

Then, the pandemic disrupted the disrupterprivate transport is expected to make a comeback as people avoid shared mobility. And airlines companies face a sudden deep drop in demand. Content relevant a few months ago has gone stale. New content, therefore, has got to emphasize more on such contingencies and business continuity planning. Krishnan thinks the importance of resilience, managing crisis and climate change will be underlined in bold.

This is not just true of Indian schools. Global B-schools appear to be preparing for such changes, too. Vijay Govindarajan, Coxe distinguished professor of management at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, and Anup Srivastava, Canada research chair at Haskayne School of Business, University of Calgary, both seem to think that currently, schools focus a lot on algorithmic learning" or where there are predetermined answers to predetermined questions.

Schools will have to reduce emphasis on algorithmic learning and increase the emphasis on higher order skills", they stressed in an email response to Mints questions. These skills include creativity, empathy, leadership, conflict management, strategic thinking, understanding technological progress, disruption, crisis management, problem solving, and dynamic decision making among others.

Meanwhile, the dialogue around business ethics is expected to get sharper in India post the migrant crisis. For the last few decades, businesses have practised a very narrow kind of capitalism, which is to deliver financial results and profits. This drives the share price and total shareholder return (TSR). Rewards for executives are aligned to these goals, Anjali Bansal, founder of Avaana Capital, pointed out. Bansal is on the governing body of SP Jain Institute of Management and Research.

However, we need to have a greater focus on ethics, values, sustainability, building responsible businesses versus building just a business. Companies are talking of ESG (environment, sustainability, governance) goals, diversity and inclusion, being responsible. The leadership is expected to deliver on these goals," she said. It is a good time now to include this as part of the learning and development agenda in companies, both to educate and train the leaders as well as passing it on to their juniors who they mentor," she added.

A few academicians see a bigger role for management schools in the future. B-schools could metamorphose into a platform for dialogue between the government and other stakeholders such as businesses and NGOs, Rajendra Srivastava, dean of ISB, suggested. That could help resolve complex problems like the pandemic India is grappling with. Srivastava also spoke of a life-long learning contract" with students, going ahead. The speed of change and uncertainty implies that executives would need to refresh what they learnt every few years. That could mean shorter but more frequent executive management programmes for the alumni.

We should be teaching how to manage crises. Then there is new technology such as the Internet of Things and blockchain. Someone who has got their MBA 10 years back doesnt have this as part of their toolkit," the dean said.

The rise of tech

The ministry of human resource developments National Institutional Ranking Framework shows an interesting trend. IITs and other technology institutions that offer management programmes are climbing in the pecking order. In 2020, there are seven technology institutes in the top 20 when it comes to management rankings. There were just two in 2016. Recruiters see this trend accelerating post the pandemic with every company in the middle of a digital transformationtech institutions are set to become a bigger force in management education.

Only in recent years have we seen tech institutions such as IITs, NITIE and NITs gain prominence in management education. This is because 15 to 20 years ago, strategy and management consulting were considered two sides of the same coin. Subsequently, this shifted to strategy/management and operations consulting. Today, strategy/operations consulting and technology have become two sides of the same coin," Ramkumar Ramamoorthy, chairman and managing director of Cognizant India, said. In this changed context, no strategic road map or business process reimagining exercise can be undertaken without a deep understanding of what digital and related technologies can do to the organization," he added.

More competition for the top stand-alone B-schools isnt such a bad thing. It could force them out of complacency and aid in pivots, much like the businesses they supply talent to have done in recent months.

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How this 1950s self-help guru shaped Donald Trump’s attitude toward life and business – CNBC

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Both as president and in business, Donald Trump is often accused of being overconfident and self-serving. And according to his niece Mary Trump's upcoming book, "Too Much and Never Enough," Donald learned that from his dad Fred's obsession with famous 1950s self help author, Norman Vincent Peale.

Peale, a ministerwho "preached self-confidence as a life philosophy," according to Politico, wrote best-selling self-help book "The Power of Positive Thinking" in 1952, which has since been translated into 15 languages and has sold more 7 million copies.

And while Donald Trump was only 6 when the book was released, Mary says Donald's father was immediately drawn to Peale's teachings. So much so that his family joined the author's church, Marble Collegiate, in midtown Manhattan. (Donald was later married to first wife, Ivana, there in 1977.)

"Fred wasn't a reader, but it was impossible not to know about Peale's wildly popular bestseller," Mary writes in "Too Much and Never Enough," which is set to be released on July 14."The title alone was enough for Fred, and he decided to join Marble Collegiate although he and his family rarely attended."

Mary,55, who holds a Ph.D. from Derner Institute of Advanced Psychological Studies and has taught graduate courses in trauma and developmental psychology, writes that Fred was attracted toPeale's "shallow message of self-sufficiency."

"Peale's doctrine proclaimed that you need only self-confidence in order to prosper in the way God wants you to."

For example, Peale wrote in "The Power of Positive Thinking" that "[O]bstacles are simply not permitted to destroy your happiness and well-being. You need be defeated only if you are willing to be."

Mary writes that Peale's view confirmed what Fred Trump has always thought: "He was rich because he deserved to be." (Fred Trump was a real estate developerwhohad anet worth at around $250 million to $300 million at the time of hisdeathin 1999, according to The New York Times.)

Peale's book touts mantras like "Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities!"

A worn copy of Norman Vincent Peale's, "The Power of Positive Thinking."

MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images

"A sense of inferiority and inadequacy interferes with the attainment of your hopes, but self-confidence leads to self-realization and successful achievement," Peale wrote.

According to Mary's book, Fred viewed self-doubt as a weakness and passed on these attitudes to Donald "in spades."

Donald Trump and his father, Fred Trump, at the opening of Wollman Rink in Manhattan's Central Park in 1987.

Dennis Caruso | New York Daily News | Getty Images

In 2015, then-presidential hopeful Donald Trump told a crowd at the Iowa Family Leadership Summit that he remembered Peale's church sermons.

"You could listen to him all day long. And when you left the church, you were disappointed it was over. He was the greatest guy," Trump said,according to Politico.

Though Peale had a massive following, he also had critics.According to Politico, Peale was known as "God's salesman" and called a con man because "his simple-minded approach shut off genuine thinking or insight."

Neither a spokesperson for the White House or Marble Collegiate responded to CNBC Make It's request for comment. But on Tuesday, White House deputy press secretary Sarah Matthews said in a statement that Mary's book "is clearly in the author's own financial self-interest."

In the book, Mary says she did not write it to "cash in or out of a desire for revenge." Instead, the events over the last three years that Donald Trump has been president "forced" her hand, she says, and she could no longer remain silent.

"By the time this book is published, hundreds of thousands of American lives will have been sacrificed on the altar of Donald's hubris and willful ignorance. If he is afforded a second term, it would be the end of American democracy," she writes.

InJune, Donald's younger brother Robert Trump unsuccessfully tried to block the publication of the book in court, saying that his niece, who is the daughter of his and Donald's late brother Fred Trump Jr., is subject to a nondisclosure agreement and "not allowed to write the book."

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How this 1950s self-help guru shaped Donald Trump's attitude toward life and business - CNBC

Trump Says He Will Grant Road to Citizenship for Young Migrants – Voice of America

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U.S. President Donald Trump says he will soon sign an executive order on immigration that includes a path to citizenship for young immigrants who arrived in the United States illegally when they were children.

In an interview with Spanish-language television network Telemundo, Trump said DACA is going to be just fine, referring to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program under which young migrants have been allowed to stay in the United States temporarily.

"We're going to have a road to citizenship," he said.

However, this "does not include amnesty," White House spokesman Judd Deere said in a statement after Trumps television interview.

The White House statement said the executive order would establish a merit-based immigration system and reiterated that Trump would work with Congress on a legislative solution that "could include citizenship, along with strong border security and permanent merit-based reforms," but no amnesty.

The Trump administration has previously tried to end DACA, an Obama-era program that protects more than 700,000 immigrants.

Trump did not give details about the larger immigration order he says he plans to sign, only saying that it will include DACA, and I think people are going to be very happy.

When asked if the measure will be an executive order, as opposed to a congressional bill, Trump said the Supreme Court gave him tremendous powers to pass an executive order when they ruled on DACA last month.

The courts ruling said that the administration had not given adequate justification to rescind DACA. The courts ruling did not say whether DACA recipients have a permanent right to live in the United States and did not prevent Trump from trying again to end the program.

Deere said Trump is working on an executive order to establish a merit-based immigration system to further protect U.S. workers. Trump said he plans to sign it in the next four weeks.

The president has long said he is willing to work with Congress on a negotiated legislative solution to DACA, one that could include citizenship, along with strong border security and permanent merit-based reforms, Deere said in a statement.

Republican Senator Ted Cruz criticized Trumps plans, saying in a tweet, "There is ZERO constitutional authority for a President to create a road to citizenship by executive fiat."

Congressional lawmakers have tried on several occasions in recent years to pass comprehensive immigration reform but failed over deep divisions between Republican and Democratic proposals.

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Trump Says He Will Grant Road to Citizenship for Young Migrants - Voice of America

What Donald Trump has really done: The most troubling visa queries, answered – Economic Times

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Trumps June 22 order of temporarily suspending various categories of visas for immigrants did little to hurt the foreign students. However, a new order has now asked students to leave the US if their school or university is conducting online classes in fall 2020.

According to the US Immigration and Customs Enforcements order announced on July 6, only those students will be allowed to stay in the country whose university is taking in-person classes or a mix of online and in-person.

The agency has also made it clear that no new visas will be issued now and the students with existing stamped visas will not be allowed to enter the country. ET Online decodes some of the most pressing queries playing on Indian minds.

What if you have an H-1B visa but no job?One of the biggest drawbacks of the H-1B visa is that a visa holders lawful status in the US is based solely on employment. H-1B recipients cannot stay unpaid for more than 60 days.

H-1B visa holders who are out of work for up to 60 days (or until your status expires if its sooner than 60 days) have to either find another employer to sponsor them or apply for a change in visa status.

For those who manage to find a job, the new employer can file a petition and they can actually start working even before approval is obtained.

In case the H-1B visa holder fails to get employed, they have an option to apply for a "change of status to F-1, L-1 or H-4, based on what they qualify for.

These actions are necessary because unlawful presence in the US can invite a ban for 3 to 10 years, depending upon the overstay.

What if my visa status is about to expire?The US Presidents move to impose visa restrictions would not hurt those who may be employed but whose visa status is about to expire.

So, for those who find themselves in this situation, its crucial that their employer files an extension petition with the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) before the status expires.

In case an H-1B visa holder is past the 60-day grace period, they can apply for a nunc pro tunc decision (retroactively to correct an earlier ruling) with the USCIS through their attorney or employer.

The USCIS holds discretionary powers. Considering the coronavirus pandemic as exceptional circumstances, the immigration agency may grant an approval with an extension, allowing the visa holder to stay in the country.

What about those married to H-1B holders, or those with H-4?Spouses and children (other than US citizens) of H-1B visa holders would also be hit hard by Trump's proclamation.

According to the order, if an H-1b visa holder hasnt received the approval then the spouse will not either.

Spouses of the H1-B visa holders whose visas expired and weren't renewed before June 23, will now have to wait until the next year. The same applies to those whose visas are not stamped.

However, those who have a valid H-4 but are currently out of the US, will be able to return without any difficulty.

The new order also doesnt affect those H-4 holders who have applied for H-4 Employment Authorization Documents. While it is still a point of contention and the DHS has recently proposed to disallow dependents to apply for employment authorization, there does not seem to be any hiccups for the time being.

What if you are in India to get your visa stamped?Trumps proclamation is also likely to hurt those who were in their home country for the renewal of their visas.

H-1B visa holders and their spouses who do not have their visa stamped, will now have to wait for 6 months as Trumps executive order bans issuing of any new visa until December 2020.

The order implies that those who do not have a valid visa stamped on their passports as of June 24 will not be allowed to enter the US till the year-end. The curbs, however, does not impact those who managed to get their visa H-1B or dependent stamped before June 24. These people can travel back to the US any time they want.

What if you have a valid work visa?Those with a valid work visa have nothing to worry about. According to the executive order signed by Trump, new H-1B visas will not be issued. So those who have a valid visa, irrespective of whether they are currently in the US or not, wouldnt be affected by the visa freeze.

The proclamation would also not affect those with a valid status in the United States.

Also, the visa holders whose families are already present in the US shall not be impacted by the visa ban.

What happens to those with H-1B this year?Trump's latest ban on immigration visas will hurt people who have already applied for this year's lottery the most. With the lottery opening for applications in early-April, the cap for all categories was maxed out by April 19, 2020.

Under those who have been selected, two broad categories emerge foreign nationals who have applied for an H-1B as fresh applicants, and those who are already in the country on different visas, but now want to switch to the H-1B.

For those trying to convert to H-1B, as long as they are within the United States, the ban won't affect them. As soon as they get approved in the lottery system, they receive an I-94 which allows them to legally stay in the country. However, in case they have left the country or do so now, they will need a visa to get back which is where the ban comes in. For foreign nationals planning to move to the US on fresh visas, this ban would hamper their plans to join work this year October is the earliest employment start date for CAP H-1Bs. With visa processing slated to resume only after December 31, there could be further delays as well.

What happens to parents with H-1B, children status?"Household members" of non-immigrants, like elderly parents and partners, do not qualify for a derivative visa. Hence, they are allowed to enter the US on a B-2 visa.

This visa is exempted from Trumps executive order.

Meanwhile, children of those on H-1B are issued an H-4 visa. This means that whatever happens to their parents is likely to happen to them as well. However, US citizen children of the H-1B visa holders will remain unaffected by the proclamation.

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What Donald Trump has really done: The most troubling visa queries, answered - Economic Times

Vocal Opponents Of Federal Spending Took PPP Loans, Including Ayn Rand Institute, Grover Norquist Group – Forbes

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Organizations that vigorously oppose government spending took Paycheck Protection Program loans, including some that have criticized the CARES Act, which created the PPP program, according to data released by the Small Business Administration.

WASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 07: Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, (2nd L) ... [+] speaks as (L-R) U.S. Sen. David Perdue (R-GA) and Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin listen during a news conference on tax reform November 7, 2017 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Senate Republicans held a news conference to discuss "the need for tax reform and the impact it will have on American families, small businesses and the economy." (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Americans for Tax Reform Foundation, which says it educates taxpayers on the true cost of government and the realities of costly government programs, received between $150,000 and $300,000 in loans.

In a statement, Americans for Tax Reform claimed it never opposed the PPP program and defended the foundations decision to take government loans, which it said allowed the foundation to maintain its employees without laying anyone off after it was badly hurt by the government shutdown.

But ATR founder Grover Norquist has criticized the unemployment insurance provision of the CARES Act, which he said delays recovery, and signed a letter urging lawmakers not to approve a second stimulus bill.

The Ayn Rand Institute, named for conservative philosopher Ayn Rand, received a loan of between $350,000 and $1 million, which it called partial restitution for government-inflicted losses."

It would be a terrible injustice for pro-capitalists to step aside and leave the funds to those indifferent or actively hostile to capitalism, Ayn Rand Institute board member Harry Binswanger argued in May, stating that the organization would take any relief money offered us.

Citizens Against Government Waste, one of the countrys most prominent anti-government spending organizations and a frequent critic of the CARES Act, took between $150,000 and $350,000 in loans as well.

The PPP program has been accused of discrimination against black-owned small businesses and criticized for giving loans to politically connected companies and organizations, including some connected to members of Congress, President Trumps son-in-law Jared Kushner and even Trump himself. Several large chains, some backed by private equity, have also received loans from the program.

4,880,943. Thats how many loans were approved by the PPP program, according to the Small Business Administration.

Chinese electric vehicle startups Byton, Nio and Karma Automotive, the U.S. research and development center of Chinese state-owned carmaker Changan Automobile, German audio equipment maker Sennheiser, Kanye Wests apparel brand Yeezy and the Burning Man festival all received PPP loans, Forbes Siladitya Ray reported.

Forbes Media was approved to receive between $5 and $10 million in PPP funds, according to SBA data.

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Vocal Opponents Of Federal Spending Took PPP Loans, Including Ayn Rand Institute, Grover Norquist Group - Forbes

North Carolina PPP loan recipients: See the full searchable list of who received them – Citizen Times

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A Citizen Times photographer gets a COVID-19 test from her car. Asheville Citizen Times

North Carolina businesses that applied for and received a loan as part of a national effort to save small companies during the coronavirus pandemic is now public information.

The U.S. government has released a list of businesses that have received emergency pandemic loans of $150,000 or more.

Designed to cover expenses such as payroll and rent, the loans do not have to be paid back if at least 60 percent of the money is spent keeping or rehiring workers. Otherwise, it carries a 1 percent interest rate and must be repaid within two years.

Search through North Carolina businesses that benefited from the Paycheck Protection Program with our database by searching below. Narrow the list by typing in a business or city name.

(Note: Not seeing the search bar above? Click here.)

Results show the range of the loan received, jobs retained, date approved, and other details released by the Treasury Department and Small Business Administration Monday, July 6.

Across the country, more than 660,000 businesses received $150,000 or up to the $10 million maximum from the small-business lending program.

Known-names across the U.S. include:

The Ayn Rand Institute received a loan and defended it on Twitter.

Restaurant chains like P.F. Changs, Legal Sea Foods and Silver Diner either received PPP loans or had investors connected to the company that did.

Internationally, South Korean airline Korean Air received a PPP loan.

Wall Street investment groups, including Semper Capital Management LP and Domini Impact Investments LLC, which manage billions of dollars, also received PPP loans according to Reuters.

Politically, according to the Washington Post, companies with connections to a handful of federal lawmakers, like Foremost Maritime, which is a shipping business controlled by the family of Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, have received PPP loans.

John Farrell, a Republican donor and real estate developer also received a PPP loan.

Several law firms, including ones with ties to President Trump (Kasowitz, Benson & Torres) and former vice president Al Gore and film producer Harvey Weinstein (Boies Schiller Flexner) also received PPP loans.

The Roman Catholic dioceses in California, New York, Nevada, Tennessee and Kentucky also received loans.

Grace Pateras and Joe Harrington contributed to this story.

Daniella Medina is a digital producer for the USA TODAY Network. Follow her on Twitter @danimedinanews.

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North Carolina PPP loan recipients: See the full searchable list of who received them - Citizen Times

Norwalk Police Investigating Following Rescue of Man Heard Screaming in Water Offshore – NBC Connecticut

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Norwalk police are investigating following the rescue of a man heard screaming in the water offshore, police said Thursday.

The man, who has not been identified by police, was found just after 6 a.m. on Thursday.

Officers responded to the end of Second Street for reports of a man screaming in the water, police said. Callers had reported he went underwater.

Two members of the police department went into the water and pulled the man to shore, where he was given medical attention, police said.

He was transported to the hospital and is in intensive care as of Friday morning, according to police.

Detectives are now investigating.

Anyone who has information on the case is asked to call Detective Brendan Collins at 203-854-3191. People can also use the police tip line at 203-854-3111 or report a tip anonymously at norwalkpd.com.

CORRECTION (July 10, 10:08 a.m.): An earlier version of this article stated that the man had died, based on information provided by police. Police said they were updated Friday morning that the victim is still alive.

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Norwalk Police Investigating Following Rescue of Man Heard Screaming in Water Offshore - NBC Connecticut

Japan seeks massive jump in offshore wind power over 10 years – Nikkei Asian Review

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TOKYO -- The Japanese government said Thursday it is aiming to achieve a huge increase in offshore wind power capacity over a decade beginning next fiscal year.

Japan currently has only four sites generating offshore wind power -- for a total of 20 megawatts of capacity -- although as an island country surrounded by the sea, experts say there is huge potential for wind farms.

But now the government aims to approve three to four projects a year, starting from fiscal year 2021, according to the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, or METI. That means a total of 30 will be approved in the next 10 years.

The total of three to four projects would have a capacity of about 1000 megawatts -- almost equivalent to that of one nuclear reactor.

Currently, one of the proposed project sites has started the selection process to choose operators, while the process for another three will start this fall.

After the selection of the operators, it normally takes five to eight years until commercial operation can begin.

As Japan is often criticized by environmentalists for depending too much on coal power, the government will aim to promote private investment in renewables and phase out outdated coal power plants.

For example, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism plans to establish facilities to store construction materials and parts. Also, the ministry will invest in ports to enhance the country's capacity to install offshore wind turbines.

Furthermore, METI will renew regulations covering power grids in order to make their operations more flexible to enhance renewables. Starting from 2021, whenever there is spare capacity in power grids, renewable energy will be able to utilize the grids more easily, according to government sources.

The government's policy target is for renewable energy to account for 22% to 24% of all electricity generated by fiscal year 2030. In the fiscal year 2018, renewables made up 17%.

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Japan seeks massive jump in offshore wind power over 10 years - Nikkei Asian Review