The Burner

🔥 Ash Sarkar ponders whether the media’s elevation of Boris Johnson to symbol of the nation’s health is a sign of something rotten in the state of politics

🔥 Plus, Matt Hancock’s testing pledge comes a cropper as South Korea’s test, trace and isolate strategy bears fruit.

‘Stare long enough at a bean, or a grain, or an ear of corn, and you’ll begin to see everything – the whole world – inside it.’

James Butler dives into pandemic food shocks and the deep links between capitalist farming and viral outbreaks.

Aaron Bastani asks: where on earth is Labour going on economic policy? Can it avoid fighting the last war?

Plus, James Butler asks: are we facing a food crisis? Why?

James Meadway: https://novaramedia.com/2020/04/27/dont-fight-the-last-war-why-the-left-needs-to-look-beyond-austerity/

Raj Patel: https://novaramedia.com/2018/05/18/raj-patel-a-history-of-the-world-in-seven-cheap-things/

Why are Tory politicians speaking about the pandemic as if it’s just a natural disaster?

Will the borders close for good – and what happens where they’re already locked shut?

Plus, Dominic Cummings in the room: does it matter?

From 5G to bioweapons to “globalism”, the pandemic provides ample material for conspiracy theorists. James Butler asks: why? And does it tell us anything about the nature of politics?

Keir Starmer took on his first PMQs yesterday: Ash Sarkar asks what we learned about his strategy. What’s changed since Corbyn?

Plus, experts and NHS workers ask you to #ChantforPPE

Aaron Bastani asks: what does the pandemic reveal about Britain’s real position in the world?

Plus, James Butler takes a look at the European tussle over how to pay for the recovery.

How bad could the economic crisis get? Who will it touch? What hope of recovery – and what shape will it take? And does political leadership really matter?

An explosive story over the weekend exposed exposed just some of the government’s failures in dealing with the pandemic. James Butler asks: what did they know? And what do we know?

Pasolini: ‘I know’ (tr. Giovanni Tiso): https://overland.org.au/2012/03/what-is-this-coup-detat-i-know/

The lockdown is set to continue for three weeks more: but what does the new Labour leader think we should do about it? And is he right?

Plus we hear from the lockdown in New Zealand.