News Nugget 476

A Mute Swan swims over some Chub fish in the Rhine River in Switzerland.  From National Geographic.

UP-FRONT POST-ELECTION MANIFESTO NUGGET!!
The Mandate from Ginandtacos.com via Daily Kos 
The 2010 midterm elections were a mandate for the new GOP sorta-but-not-really majority in Washington. The American voter has clearly demanded:
1. Social Security reform that guarantees my current level of benefits, alters someone else's, and cuts everyone's Social Security taxes to boot.
2. A world-class national infrastructure that can be built and maintained without tax dollars.
3. A balanced budget that doesn't sacrifice any of the government programs – especially the sacred military-industrial complex and the various old age benefits – that we like.
4. Clean air without pollution controls, clean water with a neutered and underfunded EPA, and businesses that do socially responsible things without any regulation whatsoever.
5. Consumer goods at Made in China prices that create high-paying jobs in America.
6. Giant trucks and SUVs that drive like Formula One race cars, look cool, fit into small parking spaces, cost under $18,000, and get the fuel economy of a Toyota Prius.
7. Complete freedom and complete security at the same time.
8. An America that acts like a swaggering, sociopathic asshole on the global stage yet is beloved by all the nations of the world.
9. Wars against every enemy, real or imagined, all of the time, with no U.S. casualties and no effect on the budget.
10. Incredibly rich and rewarding professional lives while supporting our employers' right to do whatever they want to us without recourse.
11. A vibrant, consumption-based U.S. economy with good jobs for anyone willing to look for one resulting from free trade policies that encourage money and capital flows to cheap labor markets.
12. A highly educated workforce produced by a school system that requires no tax dollars to achieve excellence, students who have no interest in learning, and a virulently anti-intellectual society.
13. Closed borders and an endless supply of cheap labor to keep prices low.
14. To buy whatever we want irrespective of what we can afford while maintaining the drumbeat of personal responsibility.
15. Health care that is cheap, superior, and readily available to me without the danger of the same being enjoyed by anyone I deem undeserving.

Obama Appears to Punch India's Buttons (Editorial) from the Japan Times [in English]
"Barack Obama's visit to India last week ended on a high note. After downplaying expectations for some months now, the U.S. president made all the right noises in his address to the Indian Parliament."

Insecurities Beneath China's Prosperous Exterior (Jim Hoagland) from the Washington Post
"The occasional shrillness and spitefulness of their public outbursts - the Nobel Prize denunciations are a prime example - betray a fragility that is usually missed in America's appreciation of this country's supposedly inexorable rise."

Who Will Stand Up to the Superrich? (Frank Rich) from the New York Times
"Unlike Whitman and the other defeated self-financing candidates, they are all but certain to cash in on the Nov. 2 results. There’s no one in Washington in either party with the fortitude to try to stop them from grabbing anything that’s not nailed down."

I Believe I Can Fly (Thomas Friedman) from the New York Times
"Reading the headlines these days, I can’t help but repeat this truism: If you jump off the top of an 80-story building, for 79 floors you can think you’re flying. It’s the sudden stop at the end that tells you you’re not. It’s striking to me how many leaders and nations are behaving today as though they think they can fly — and ignoring that sudden stop at the end that’s sure to come. Where to begin?"

Islam (and Reason) on Trial in Tennessee (David Waters) from the Washington Post
"A handwriting expert testified Friday that she uncovered a secret plot by who knows how many Middle Tennessee Muslims to sign documents, including a site plan application to build a mosque in a rural area zoned for religious meeting places."

CT-Sen: Republicans: It's Time to Move Forward (Ben Davol) from The Day [of CT]
"One definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. If the early whispers from some in the Connecticut Republican Party - and the rumors attributed to them - are true, the state's GOP needs a checkup from the neck up"

Who had the Worst Week in Washington? Michele Bachmann (Chris Cillizza) from the Washington Post
"Bachmann, who founded the tea party caucus in the House, was making bold proclamations about the power she wielded. She went so far as to tell Politico that she helped to "put that gavel in John Boehner's hand." Her colleagues - at least some of the more influential ones - didn't seem to agree."

CIVIL RIGHTS NUGGET!!
50 Years Later, I'm Still Trying to Integrate My School (Ruby Bridges) from the Washington Post
"On the morning of my first day of first grade at a new school, 50 years ago Sunday, U.S. marshals knocked on my family's door. They had been sent by the president of the United States, they said, to take me to school. …"

BOOK NUGGET!!
Book World: Review of The Dead Hand by David Hoffman from the Washington Post
""The Dead Hand" argues convincingly that America's victory in the Cold War wasn't nearly as triumphant as the most self-congratulatory among us have tended to believe. When the arms race between the two superpowers ended in the 1990s, a second terrifying competition replaced the first."
I just finished reading this book recently -- it is a must-read for anyone who wants to know more about what the Cold War almost led to and how it ended.

BOOK REVIW NUGGET!!
Founders Lite: A Review of Joseph Ellis's First Family: Abigail and John from the New Republic
"Having read most of what Ellis has written over this past decade, I am troubled to see how many simple points he casually gets wrong."
A really TOUGH review!  I was wondering if it was just me that was dissatisfied with Ellis' work and quality of scholarship.

MARTIAN NUGGET!!
Aerial Drone to Hunt for Life on Mars from Discovery News
"Now, one scientist hopes to bring flight to Mars and explore what rovers and orbiters have left behind."