JAMIE BRITTON recommends this fine analysis of the architectural, ecological and infrastructural destruction of the Gaza Strip
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Goodies and baddies
ALEX HALL puts on asbestos gloves to handle a simple-minded ideological work of the ruling class
DANGEROUS IDEOLOGUE: Anne Applebaum addresses the Central European University
[Central European University/Flickr]
NADIA JOSEPH welcomes a survey of the role that TV played in the debate over apartheid and race relations in Britain
New releases from Rosa Walton, Paul McCartney, and Aidan Thorne & Jason Ball
RON JACOBS welcomes a sharp, intelligent and witty exposé of the corruption and right-wing politics that have taken over international professional football
ALEX HALL welcomes the memoir of a prominent British academic of Ugandan/Zimbabwean heritage
JONATHAN TAYLOR reviews a collection of short stories wherein news - and the absence of news - changes lives
Autocracy, Inc. The Dictators who want to run the World
Anne Applebaum, Allen Lane, £20
THE world is divided into goodies and baddies. Baddies are identified by their nation and their leader, the principal ones being Russia and China with strong supporting roles for Venezuela, Iran, Belarus, Syria, Cuba, Zimbabwe and North Korea.
They all hang together in a club called Autocracy, Inc, a mixture of shadowy bodies that practice kleptocracy (“government by theft,”) rule with an iron fist, and empower a narrow elite at the top.
Their primary interests are being evil and acquiring power and money. All the baddies hate democracy. They tell a lot of lies, bedazzling the stupid populations in their own countries and abroad.
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