The Great Euro-Stench, dawn of the Johnson Era and noisy nocturnal sea defences.

PROFIT FROM MISERY

Last week the papers highlighted the winners gaining billions from the housing market slowdown. Now some Hedge fund managers have turned philanthropist to spread their embarrassingly large windfalls.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/business/specials/rich_list/article3780023.ece

With presidential elections coming up in November and Democratic primaries imminent in rust-belt Pennsylvania, the political mood falls in line with hard pressed small town America.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ world/2008/apr/20/usa.subprimecrisis

Unlike Slough’s attitude to the friendly bombs of criticism, the town depicted in the American version of ‘The Office’ welcomes the attention. ‘Michele Dempsey, a local architect and one of those behind a fan convention for The Office last autumn, believes the show has transformed Scranton's image from coal to cool.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ world/2008/apr/19/uselections2008.barackobama


MORTGAGE INHERITANCE OR HOLIDAY

You could inherit debt in the form of a Mortgage.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ commentisfree/2008/apr/20/children.debt

Take a holiday from it.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ money/2008/apr/20/mortgages.houseprices

Or holiday in someone else’s home with house-swapping, no need to put your house keys in a basket – its all done on the internet.
‘It also helps if you live somewhere attractive - although people with ordinary houses in mundane areas are also offered exchanges.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ money/2008/apr/19/consumeraffairs

And don’t buy a property on the cliffs; coastal erosion claims more bungalows.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ environment/2008/apr/19/climatechange.endangeredhabitats


JOHNSON ERA STARTS?

Stephen Bayley has a problem with Ken Livingstone’s record for Architecture in the capital. ‘True, under Ken, the volume of affordable housing has risen sharply, although very little of it is of striking architectural quality. If there is great new affordable housing in London, I don't know where it is.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ politics/2008/apr/20/london08.livingstone

AA Gill writes a beautifully observed character assassination of Ken that carefully avoids the issues.
‘There’s something about Ken’s whole demeanour that looks beaten. He’s losing from the inside out. He was always a grey man, the Stalinist version of John Major with a whiny south London accent. But now there’s a weariness, an absence of enthusiasm.’
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/news/politics/article3778963.ece

Some sections of the press can’t wait to write the political obituary of Ken.
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/non-fiction/article3765237.ece

Fake Banksy political messages of support for Ken? ‘Usually Banksy claims responsibility for his work, featuring it on his website. But yesterday there was silence. The mystery continues.’
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/ art/news/ story/0,,2275086,00.html

‘The Johnson Era’ has started already according to the Guardian. ‘There was no sense in building an individual up as a leader, he suggested, because what would happen if that one person was injured?’
Is this the perceived threat or risk of a Boris bike accident? No - I seem to have wandered onto the sports pages by accident.
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/ sport/2008/04/20/johnson_era_begins_with_a_nota.html


RIGGED TENDERS

The tax-payer loses as major construction companies own up to collusion and rigged tenders on large public jobs.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/business/industry_sectors/construction_and_property/ article3778501.ece


MODERNIST HOUSE SOLD AS ART

Neutra’s Kaufmann beach house in California is to be sold in auction as a work of art - a symptom of continuing art market inflation over property.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/ 0/9611695e-0c2d-11dd-9840-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1

Some of the shine comes off the Bilbao effect as the Guggenheim’s ex-finance director is accused of embezzlement.
http://www.independent.co.uk/ news/europe/guggenheim-sues-exfinance-boss-who-admitted-stealing-163400000-811243.html

The V&A’s hidden artwork is revealed in a new book.
http://books.guardian.co.uk/ review/story/0,,2274742,00.html

Art collectors take works of art on trust as one artist sells ‘nanoscuptures’ invisible to the human eye and stages events that may or may not have happened.
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/article3764099.ece


EUROSTENCH

Was the great euro-stench that enveloped the South of England last week due to German pig farming, unwashed French peasants or just hot air from Brussels? The right-of-centre press has a field day complete with Dad’s Army style invasion arrows. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/ pages/live/articles/news/ news.html?in_article_id=560495&in_page_id=1770&in_page_id =1770&ct=5&expand=true

Will Self on smell. ’ But really, smell defines a place more, arguably, than anything else.’
http://www.independent.co.uk/ opinion/columnists/will-self/will-self-psychogeography-809327.html

Buenos Aires is choking in a haze of smoke.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/news/environment/article3776077.ece


TOP TEN SOCIAL ILLS

Pioneering housing charity the Rowntree Foundation lists 10 evils of society today.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ society/2008/apr/20/communities.britishidentity

While the Telegraph soothes its readers with a ‘50 richest towns’ countdown based on property prices.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ property/main.jhtml?xml=/property/2008/04/15/prichlist115.xml

PUBS IN TROUBLE

Pubs are in trouble as hundreds close in the UK each month.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ business/2008/apr/20/fooddrinks.travelleisure


RENEWABLE SAUDI ARABIA

The Orkneys could be the renewables ‘Saudi-Arabia’.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/business/money/investment/article3779371.ece


ROLLER COASTER ARSON

Budding artist’s colony and Tracey Emin’s hometown Margate experiences murders and arson. ‘For years locals have been joking that the roller-coaster would 'meet with an accident', given that its listed status has impeded plans to turn the site into a retail and residential complex.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ uk/2008/apr/20/ukcrime.communities


FRENCH LIFE

The French don’t lose their taste for leisure as Sarkozy fails to enforce hard work. ‘No wonder Jacques Barrot, the former labour minister, called his country “a society of pétanqueurs [boules players]”.’
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/news/world/europe/article3780154.ece

Teenage gangs in Paris’ Gare du Nord don’t lose their taste for confrontation with the police and each other.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ world/2008/apr/20/france.internationalcrime


REGIONAL NEWS

The Evening Star reports on Felixstowe residents disturbed by sea defence work, with huge rocks deposited from barges at high tide in the middle of the night. ‘The Environment Agency has written to apologise to residents and ask them to be patient. Once low tides coincide with daytime the noise should reduce.’
http://tinyurl.com/4ope9k


INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Several modernist public buildings in Winnipeg are under threat as Tyndall stone facades crumble, but as in the UK – these structures have their supporters. ‘Back in the 1960s and '70s, Tyndall stone -- a 450-million-year-old form of limestone full of marine fossils -- was considered an acceptable building material.’
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/ local/story/4162457p-4749612c.html