Hundreds of thousands of wealthy residents have already left New York City, and more are leaving every day as America's biggest city rapidly degenerates into a hellhole. This is incredibly sad to watch, because in many ways New York had been an incredible success story over the past several decades. The 1970s and 1980s were nightmarish times for the city, but over the past several decades it was transformed into a virtual paradise for the wealthy and famous. Crime rates absolutely plummeted, the city was given a dramatic facelift and a booming financial community brought an unprecedented amount of wealth into New York. But now many of the old problems are starting to come back again, and a lot of wealthy New Yorkers have decided that it is time to look for greener pastures.

Of course the COVID-19 pandemic has been the primary motivation for a lot of the wealthy individuals that have been fleeing the city. According to the New York Times, there was a mass exodus of 420,000 New Yorkers between March 1st and May 1st...

Roughly 5 percent of residents — or about 420,000 people — left the city between March 1 and May 1. In the city's very wealthiest blocks, in neighborhoods like the Upper East Side, the West Village, SoHo and Brooklyn Heights, residential population decreased by 40 percent or more, while the rest of the city saw comparably modest changes.

In April I wrote a postscript to my critique of the 'unofficial left' (David Graeber, Noam Chomsky, Media Lens, etc.), criticising their non-response to the already highly suspicious coronavirus narrative. Things have moved on — now into the past tense — so here is the same summary, now updated and revised.

A deadly pandemic, we are told, swept across the planet, forcing governments to massively enhance state and police power, lock everyone up in their homes and bork the economy. National governments, transnational institutions and all media outlets were of one voice. Panic. We just had to put millions and millions of people out of work then shut them up in a heavily policed panic room. Anyone unable to perceive the foundations of the unofficial left might imagine that they would have interrogated this extraordinary situation, that they would have critically appraised official accounts of the severity of the 'pandemic', that they would have asked themselves what the likely effects might be of putting so many people out of work; or that it would have been the perfect time for 'radicals' to seriously question the functioning of the system, to explore wider questions about its stability and to critically investigate vested interests; perhaps also take a look at the universal denial of death and how easily people can be manipulated by playing on their fears, or even explore the possibilities for genuine revolt as the economy contracted. They would have been disappointed.

What was the response of the unofficial socialists mentioned in the original article? Did they criticise the official story? Did they ask if anything else might have been motivating their leaders than altruistic concern for human life? Did they question the extraordinarily repressive measures governments have taken to contain the problem? Did they question official figures (or even looked at them — many were surprisingly frank)? Did they take a second look at other epidemics and pandemics (such as the flu pandemics of 57 and 68: each of which were twice as deadly as C-19), or at deaths from influenza under normal conditions (around half a million a year — about the same as C-19), or at deaths from other similar illnesses, like pneumonia? Did they sound any alarm bells about rather suspicious proposed solutions such as an express vaccine, contact-tracing and so forth? Did any of these people ask any seriously critical, or even very interesting, questions? The answer to all of these questions was an almost entirely predictable no. Every man jack of them fell straight into line. Jonathan Cook peeped his head about the parapet for a split-second, spiritual astronaut Caitlin Johnstone asked one or two questions on peripheral matters before concluding that she finds 'the whole thing ultimately irrelevant and boring', XR started rubbing their hands, Afshin Rattansi vaguely gestured towards a few sceptical RT pieces and Paul Kingsnorth sat in a barley field and stared majestically into the sunset. But that was pretty much it.

'Target Tori' launches fundraiser for fellow viral retail worker 'Kroger Andy'
A Massachusetts manager who was nicknamed "Target Tori" when a customer shamed her online has now come to the defense of another viral retail worker dubbed "Kroger Andy" — and has raised $18,000 to send him on a vacation.

Tori Perrotti, a manager at a Target store in Swansea, Massachusetts, jumped into the fray when a customer griped on Twitter about Andy, also a manager, at a Kroger in Louisville, Kentucky.

In the tweet, the customer, Danielle Muscato, explained that she had gone to Andy after she confronted another shopper about not wearing a mask and was threatened with assault.

Mainstream media have denounced RT's Ruptly video agency for documenting Portland protesters burning Bibles, dismissing the unaltered footage as 'Russian disinfo' in an attempt at bad-faith 'shoot the messenger' gaslighting.

Protesters gather around a burning Bible, chanting "F*** Trump," as they neatly drapean American flag over the flames. A few of the demonstrators rub their hands over the tiny fire, aping warming themselves as the flames devour the book. The 90-second clip was part of a 4-hour livestream.

It's an incendiary image (no pun intended) - protesters already denounced from some corners as anti-American taking aim at beloved national and religious symbols - but Ruptly didn't attempt to interpret the video beyond explaining the events took place on the 65th day of protests, after federal agents had left the courthouse. The images speak for themselves.

The newly elected district attorney in Portland, Oregon, said Tuesday that under a new policy, his office will not prosecute people who have been arrested since late May on non-violent misdemeanor charges during protests in Oregon's largest city.

The new policy recognizes the outrage and frustration over a history of racial injustice that has led to more than 70 nights of sustained, often violent protest in Portland as well as the more practical realities of the court system, which is running more than two months behind in processing cases because of COVID-19, Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt said.

In practical terms, it means at least several hundred people who have been arrested in the past few months will not face criminal prosecution, according to statistics provided by Schmidt's office. People arrested on similar charges in future demonstrations will also not be prosecuted, he said.

Some Wisconsin state officials aren't fooling around when it comes to the spread of COVID-19.

In an email to employees sent out on July 31, the head of Wisconsin's Department of Natural Resources not only reminded employees of Gov. Tony Evers' mask order going into effect on Aug. 1, he also said that every DNR employee must wear a mask ... even while on a teleconference.

"Also, wear your mask, even if you are home, to participate in a virtual meeting that involves being seen — such as on Zoom or another video-conferencing platform — by non-DNR staff," Preston Cole said, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. "Set the safety example which shows you as a DNR public service employee care about the safety and health of others."

The epidemiologist in charge of Sweden's coronavirus response has dismissed the scientific evidence for mask-wearing as "astonishingly weak" and suggested that making face coverings mandatory could backfire.

Anders Tegnell, the face of his country's distinctive light-touch approach to Covid-19, said it was "very dangerous" to believe that facemasks on their own could control the spread of the disease.

He also conceded that Sweden had failed to protect its old people's homes against the virus but said the number of new infections in the care sector had dwindled away to a negligible level since the height of the outbreak four months ago.

Dr Tegnell has steered a markedly different course from those plotted by most other European countries, leaving bars, restaurants and most schools open throughout the pandemic.

XR is back in the headlines after a protest in central London. These middle-class eco-warriors are happy to fight for indigenous people in Brazil, but have no understanding of the plight of Britain's poor, nor do they care.

Last weekend, the sun came out and so did the cranks from Extinction Rebellion, bringing attention to the plight of indigenous people in Brazil, who have quite literally found themselves on the front line of fighting the fire of capitalism.

XR showed its solidarity by throwing fake blood down the steps of Trafalgar Square, to be cleaned up later by London's army of working-class people in high vis.

And what's wrong with that, you might say? I agree the indigenous people of Brazil need global support - they are battling the effects of Covid-19 while fighting for the future of the world's lungs, the Amazon rainforest. So why does Extinction Rebellion seem to get on everyone's nerves?

A new major study has found that transgender and "gender-diverse adults" are six times more likely to be diagnosed as autistic than the general population.

The fresh research by scientists at the University of Cambridge's Autism Research Center took data from more than 600,000 people and confirmed previous findings from smaller scale studies of a similar nature.

They combined five different data sets in which participants provided detailed information on their gender identity, autism diagnosis as well as any and all other pertinent mental health diagnoses, such as depression, schizophrenia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).

Across all five datasets, transgender people were three to six times more likely to be diagnosed with autism than non-trans or non-gender-diverse people.

Comedian Rowan Atkinson has incurred the wrath of woke warriors on social media after voicing his opposition to a controversial hate crimes law which he believes will stifle free speech and rational debate.

The British comedy legend was among a group of authors, journalists, philosophers and campaigners who signed an open letter against legislation put forward by the Scottish Nationalist Party, warning of the "unintended consequences" the bill could have.

The signees raised specific concern over provisions around making "stirring up hatred" an offence, even if it was not the intention of the person making the comments.

"The Bill creates stirring up offences without any intent being examined; merely that the words, action, or artwork might do so. This offence could even be applied to being in possession of materials produced by someone else, where sharing the material could stir up hatred," the letter states.

The unintended consequences of this well meaning Bill risk stifling freedom of expression, and the ability to articulate or criticise religious and other beliefs.

Concerns have been raised that people like JK Rowling could have been targeted by the new law, after she expressed her views on transgender issues.

Other prominent people to add their name to the letter include the human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell and the philosopher AC Grayling. The Law Society of Scotland, the Scottish Newspaper Society, the Scottish Police Federation and the Catholic Church have also raised concerns about the bill.