Pages

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

News Nuggets 425

A baby Silver-leaf Langur with his parents at the Columbus Zoo in Ohio.  From National Geographic.

The Bomb Iran Debate From Hell from Mother Jones Magazine
"Despite Goldberg's breathless two-minutes-to-midnight schedule, there's no urgency whatsoever about debating military action against Iran. And then, of course, there's the question of the very premises of the to-bomb-or-not-to-bomb "debate." Perhaps, after all these years of obsessive Iran nuclear mania, it's too much to request a moment of sanity on the issue of Iran and the bomb. If, however, we really have a couple of years to think this over, what about starting by asking three crucial questions, each of which our debaters would prefer to avoid or ignore?"

Cover-ups and the Church in Northern Ireland from the Economist [of London]
"An official report confirms that authorities conspired to hush up a case of mass murder involving a Catholic priest."

Steal This Movie, Too (Thomas Friedman) from the New York Times
"While Washington is consumed with whether our president is secretly a Muslim, or born abroad, possibly in outer space, I’d like to talk about some good news. But to see it, you have to stand on your head. You have to look at America from the bottom up, not from the top (Washington) down. And what you’ll see from down there is that there is a movement stirring in this country around education."

Boehner's Cheap Opposition Strategy (Ruth Marcus) from the Washington Post
"So the Boehner plan boils down to the internally inconsistent demands that the president forswear any plan to increase taxes during a recession and that he immediately put the brakes on spending -- during that very recession."

The Backlash Against Obama's Blackness (Dan Kennedy) from the Guardian [of the UK]
"From Arizona to Ground Zero via birthers, the Republicans are riding a wave of white resentment. It's reckless and frightening."

Why the Tea Party is Toxic for Conservatives (Michael Gerson) from the Washington Post
"In the normal course of events, political movements begin as intellectual arguments, often conducted for years in serious books and journals. To study the Tea Party movement, future scholars will sift through the collected tweets of Sarah Palin. Without a history of clarifying, refining debates, Republicans need to ask three questions of candidates rising on the Tea Party wave:"

That's a Wrap, Folks (Marc Ambinder) from the Atlantic
"Hewing to my "good analysis is victory agnostic" nostrum, here's what I'm taking away from a night of surprises and triumphs."

AK-Sen: Miller on Verge of Toppling Murkowski from the Anchorage Daily News
"U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski is battling for her political life this morning against Republican primary challenger Joe Miller, the tea party-backed candidate who has a slim lead as ballots continue to be counted."
This would be quite a shocker if Murkowski were to lose.

"In an atypical move for vacationing presidents, Obama bought a stack of novels for his vacation on the seashore. Let the psychoanalyzing begin."

WORLD WAR II NUGGET!!
Finest Hours: The Making of Winston Churchill (Adam Gopnik) from the New Yorker
"Churchill’s words did all that words can do in the world. They said what had to be done; they announced why it had to be done then; they inspired those who had to do it. That fatal summer and those fateful words continue to resonate."

TRAFFIC NUGGET!!
The World's Worst Traffic from Foreign Policy Magazine
"Five places where soul-crushing gridlock is a way of life."
These places make LA look like a model of mass transit.

No comments: