Moss-covered spruce trees in Melford, Alaska. From National Geographic."By the time the Group of 20 nations holds its summit in Cannes, France, on Nov. 3-4, the European Union aims to have a rescue plan sound enough to ensure the financial troubles of struggling governments don’t bring down the banking system. If Europe wants to avert a financial and economic disaster worse than that of 2008 and 2009, it had better apply overwhelming firepower."
I Saw 100 Taken to be Killed, Says Defector from Assad’s Forces from the Daily Telegraph [of the UK]
"In a safe house reached with the help of guides signalling a route through the warren of darkened streets, a clutch of Syrian army defectors plots the downfall of a feared regime."
I can't see this ending any other way for Assad and his cronies than in a blistering hail of bullets.
Globally Isolated and Economically Crippled: Why Hamas is Losing Gaza from Time Magazine
"Ayyash lost faith in the Islamists early, and in the six years since, he's been joined by many other Gazans who complain that Hamas' patronage politics favors the few while the majority suffer. ... "If you know someone strong, they forward your name." Such complaints, damaging to any political party, are potentially fatal to the Islamists."
Good News! No, Really! (Bill Keller) from the New York Times
"I bring relief. Like Nurse Jackie scavenging in the medicine chest for stray painkillers, I have assembled some capsules of hope from places you probably haven’t noticed lately, because the dominant news is so disheartening you can’t bear to proceed beyond the front page."
An unexpected endorsement of the OWS movement!!
"Occupy Wall Street": Approved! (Suze Orman) from the Huffington Post
"I want to publicly say thank you to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Thank you for not accepting the status quo. Thank you for not assuming there is nothing to be done. Thank you for rattling the cages. Much coverage of Occupy Wall Street has cast this as the beginning of something new. That's only partly true. What I find so encouraging is that Occupy Wall Street's more important message is that this marks an end point. An end to just shrugging and putting up with the inequity."
Protesters Debate What Demands, if Any, to Make from the New York Times
"In New York, the demands committee held a two-hour open forum last Monday, coming up with two major categories: jobs for all and civil rights. The team will continue to meet twice a week to develop a list of specific proposals, which it will then discuss with protesters and eventually take to the General Assembly, a nightly gathering of the hundreds of protesters in the park."
Occupy Protests’ Seismic Effect (Peter Beinart) from the Daily Beast
"Occupy Wall Street is a direct confrontation with capitalism and other powerful forces in American life—and marks the left’s decoupling from Obama and the Democratic Party, says Peter Beinart."
World Links Up with Occupy Wall Street Movement from the German Press Agency and Associated Press
"Tens of thousands gathered in cities across the U.S. and world Saturday in protest marches modeled on New York's Occupy Wall Street movement and sit-ins that began months ago in Spain."
Occupy Wall Street Spirit Spreads Through Pacific Rim from the Los Angeles Times
"The protests against corporate greed born last month on New York’s Wall Street spread to the world’s Asia-Pacific region Saturday, with similar marches staged in Australia, New Zealand, Japan and South Korea. The weekend protests were organized as part of what activists described as a global movement involving nearly 85 countries worldwide."
Losing Their Immunity (Paul Krugman) from the New York Times
"The modern lords of finance look at the protesters and ask, Don’t they understand what we’ve done for the U.S. economy? The answer is: yes, many of the protesters do understand what Wall Street and more generally the nation’s economic elite have done for us. And that’s why they’re protesting."
Army of Unemployed is Now Entrenched in U.S. (Howard Gold) from the Wall Street Journal's Market Watch
"Structural woes in economy creating ‘permanent underclass’"
This would be on top of the permanent underclass that the US has already been living with for decades.
Downward Mobility (Robert Samuelson) from the Washington Post
"A specter haunts America: downward mobility. Every generation, we believe, should live better than its predecessor. By and large, Americans still embrace that promise."
Veterans’ Unemployment Outpaces Civilian Rate from the Washington Post
"Despite the marketing pitch from the armed forces, which promises to prepare soldiers for the working world, recent veterans are more likely to be unemployed than their civilian counterparts. Veterans who left military service in the past decade have an unemployment rate of 11.7 percent, well above the overall jobless rate of 9.1 percent, according to fresh data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics."
US Student Debt Impact Likened to Subprime Crisis (Matt Kennard and Shannon Bond) from the Financial Times [of the UK]
"US university students and graduates are facing a double whammy of ballooning debt loads and high unemployment, raising worries that a potential delinquency crisis could bleed into the wider economy."
Leveraging Hostility Towards Wall Street (Steve Benen) from the Washington Monthly
"Romney got very wealthy heading up a vulture capitalist fund, which made money by breaking up companies and firing their American workers. ... By most measures, Romney is the strongest Republican candidate, but if voters are basing their decision in part on frustrations with Wall Street, a Romney nomination could very well be a gift to the Democratic Party."
Big Cash Edge Powers Obama in Drive for ’12 from the New York Times
"President Obama is exploiting his early lead in campaign fund-raising to bankroll a sprawling grass-roots organization and information technology apparatus in critical general election battlegrounds. He is doing so even as the Republican candidates conserve cash and jockey for position in what could become a drawn-out nominating battle."
He's going to need it!
Will the Tea Party Abandon Politics? (David Frum) from The Week
"With the moderate Mitt Romney the GOP's likely nominee, a frustrated and fed-up Tea Party might just give up on politics altogether."
Mitt Romney: Too Unloved to be Inevitable? from Politico
"None of Romney’s opponents has been able to derail him for long. But the simple fact remains: Whether it’s because of Romney’s ideas, his history of flip-flops or his personal political style, much of the Republican Party just can’t embrace its front-runner. The question now is whether the GOP is prepared to live with an unlovable nominee if that candidate has a good shot of defeating Obama.
Republican Campaign Apocalypse (Robert McCain) from the American Spectator
"Can the conservative grassroots stop Mitt Romney?"
Explaining Herman Cain (Leonard Pitts) from the Miami Herald
"Modern social conservatives, in my experience, do not hate black people en masse. To the contrary, there are two kinds of blacks they love. The first is those, like Rice, who are mainly mute on the subject of race, seldom so impolite as to say or do anything that might remind people they are black. The second is those who will engage on race, but only to lecture other blacks for their failures as conservatives conceive them. And that, friends and neighbors, is Herman Cain all over."
An insightful observation.
Is Cain What We’re Waiting For? (Jennifer Rubin) from the Washington Post
"Intended or not, this deadpan accounting of Cain’s strengths and weaknesses suggests that he’s an entertaining conservative (appropriate since he was a radio talk show host) but otherwise completely deficient as a potential president and commander in chief."
Rick Perry Raises $17.2 Million To Lead GOP Field, But Cracks Emerge (Paul Blumenthal) from the Huffington Post
"A closer look at the numbers brings out some worrying signs for the one-time GOP front-runner."
Yeah, just like the Titanic had some cracks.
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