With her debut feature film Lotus Eaters, Alexandra McGuinness crystallizes the bright young things of London as this century begins its second decade: Less Than Zero with a touch of Araki’s turn of the last century’s Doom Generation, captured in glorious black and white evoking French New Wave and La Dolce Vita, Lotus Eaters follows a group of fashionable, wealthy and aimless twenty-somethings through the eyes of Alice, a former model with hopes of being actress.  In a career transition, worried about her dreamy, drug-addicted boyfriend, Alice herself is disintegrating.

“You look thin and not in a good way” remarks one of her “friends.”

Maybe Danny Boyle’s $42 million Olympic opening spectacle wasn’t a song of homage to working people, but it played one on TV.

It included a tribute to Great Britain’s National Health Service. The workers who built the arena served as honor guards for the arrival of the Olympic torch. There was a gritty look at the Industrial Revolution. And there were comic bits poking fun at the grandiosity of the event, including filmed sketch plus stunt-double-skydive that featured the Queen.

While it is fun to point out how horribly Romney’s attempt to prove he can handle international diplomacy quickly backfired, these actual reports about Romney’s trip this week are unlikely to change any votes.

The world’s greatest games are about to begin in London. But outside the sporting spectacle this summer, few will notice where the real cheating is going on: in Asian factories that churn out plush mascots and other Olympiad gear, corporations have freely exploited lax labor regulations. As the Olympics approach, activists are racing to push the brands behind the games to play by the rules of fair trade and human rights.

Trying to avoid an instant replay of London’s age of imperialism, the Play Fair 2012 campaign aims for accountability and transparency in the corporations scoring massive profits from cheap labor in the global south.

From high atop the western front of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, the stone figure of St. Paul looks down on the plaza below. St. Paul — a tentmaker by trade — has a clear view of the sprawling tents that have blossomed around the cathedral as part of the Occupy London Stock Exchange movement. The towers to the left and right of St. Paul are topped by pineapples — “a symbol of peace, prosperity and hospitality,” according to the St. Paul’s website.

We live in a culture that is more comfortable asking rape victims “why did you let yourself get raped?” than asking their attackers “why did you rape?” After a Toronto cop’s remark seemed to put the responsibility for rape on how a victim dressed, it lit a fuse of anger that has spread around the globe.

Slutwalk. “Because We’ve Had Enough”

It’s coming to Kansas City today, and maybe to your city next.

According to BBC radio: Prime Minister David Cameron has gone back to court to obtain actions that will be served to convicted rioters. These actions will cause the eviction of the rioters families as well as the termination of welfare payments.

Today, the New York Times announced that Malcom McLaren, the man behind the Sex Pistols–and Adam & the Ants and BowWowWow–has died of mesothelioma at a hospital in Switzerland. He was 64.