Some thoughts on how to combat populist demagogues and links to other interesting news and views

How to Combat Populist Demagogues - Project Syndicate

We will never know whether greater honesty on the part of mainstream politicians and technocrats would have spared us the rise of nativist demagogues like Donald Trump in the US or Marine Le Pen in France. What is clear is that lack of candor in the past has come at a steep price.

 EU's Moscovici urges fast action against tax "vampires" after Paradise Papers - Reuters

The European Union needs a quick agreement on proposed rules for lawyers, bankers and other advisers that help devise ways to aggressively cut tax bills, the European tax commissioner said on Tuesday.... In a speech in the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Pierre Moscovici called on member states and EU legislators to agree “in the next six months” on proposals made by the EU’s executive commission in June that would force tax advisers to report tax- planning schemes devised for their clients.

How to Win the Battle of the Sexes Over Pay (Hint: It Isn’t Simple.) - New York Times

Cash is king, but $100 bills are for crooks - Money and Banking

How socialism helped to seed the landscape of modern religion - Aeon

We Don’t Have To Wait For Due Process To Hold An Opinion On Roy Moore - The Federalist

Due process is a vital legal concept that establishes rules and procedures to guard against unfair, arbitrary, untrue, or unreasonable treatment that deprives Americans of “life, liberty or property.” That’s because anyone can lie — including self-professed victims of sexual assault. You needn’t look further than the numerous young lives that have been ruined on college campuses by fabricated allegations to understand why due process is important. And anyone can be railroaded. Witchhunts are real. Mobs tend to form rather easily these days. The politically motivated smear the innocent for partisan reasons. Biased organizations peddle innuendo and gossip to exploit the public’s existing biases.
All of that is true. None of it means the allegations regarding Alabama’s Republican senatorial candidate Roy Moore are untrue. Don’t let healthy skepticism transform into tribal denialism.

Roy Moore's alleged pursuit of a young girl is the symptom of a larger problem in evangelical circles - Los Angeles Times

The allegations against Roy Moore are merely a symptom of a larger problem. It’s not a Southern problem or an Alabama problem. It’s a Christian fundamentalist problem.

FT editor Lionel Barber calls on 'deeply flawed' social media networks to 'drop the pretence' they are not media companies - Press Gazette

He Wrote The Book(s) On Scrabble. But Has He Been Playing By The Letter Of The Law? - NPR

The Catalan syndrom - Le Blog de Thomas Piketty

Is the crisis in Catalonia due to over-centralization and the intransigeance of the authorities in Madrid? Or is it instead due to generalized competition between regions and countries rivalling with each other, each pursuing their own interests, a process which has already gone much too far both in Spain and in Europe?