July 2015 was the hottest month ever recorded.

The part of Syriza that holds true to its opposition to austerity has renamed itself the Popular Unity Party. I applaud them.

However, I do not criticize Tsipras for calling new elections. That is clearly the right thing to do.

I think Greece (and the rest of the world) needs a Wooden Stake Party dedicated to destroying the vampires that are attacking Greece.

The negotiators of the TPP (Treacherous Plutocratic Poison) <2>were ready to consider supporting fair use instead of damaging it — but then the big movie companies started pushing the other way in Congress.

The TPP is meant to attack democracy. These fights about details only reinforce the point that we need to kill it, whether before or after it is signed.

The UK spied on famed writer Doris Lessing for 20 years.

How the 'Sharing Economy' Forces a Movement Towards Privatisation. Pay toilets tend to eliminate unlocked public toilets, just as bottled water tends to eliminate water fountains.

I can't possibly use Looie, for the same reason I can't possibly use Guber or AirBnB: they require (1) running a nonfree cr…app on a tracking device, and (2) identifying oneself. But I have a special loathing for Looie, because making people pay to use a toilet is vicious in itself. I could afford the fee, but poor people can't.

I don't see anything wrong in charging for a taxi ride or for renting a room. My criticisms of Guber and AirBnB are about how they do this. For Looie, the business is wrong in itself.

I read a copy of Ceptia's Free Toilet Paper in the 1970s, and I concluded that concluded that pay toilets are a bad thing, but it did not seem like an important issue since I hardly ever encountered any in the US. The problem is much worse in Europe, which never had anything like Ceptia. I go to great lengths to avoid giving them my money.

You can consider me a member-in-spirit of Ceptia, and I hope you will join in spirit too.

I think that restaurants, which are legally required to have toilets, should be legally required to allow anyone to use them, and to have a sign on the door to that effect. Restaurant owners that are unhappy with the number of people that come in to use their toilets should consider moving to a place with less foot traffic. Of course, they won't do that: the foot traffic brings them business. They must take the bad of the foot traffic along with the good of the foot traffic.