Conservative Hawks Are Incoherent Regarding Iraq Troop Withdrawal (Ted Galen Carpenter) from the National Interest
"Are conservatives implying that the Obama administration should have overridden Iraqi objectives and just imposed our will?"
Overhauling U.S. Policy in the Middle East (Leon Hadar) from the National Interest
"The shifting balance of power in the Middle East—triggered in part by eroding American influence in the region—is bringing to the fore realpolitik concerns that likely will overcome ideological considerations in the new Middle East. The Israel-Hamas prisoner exchange, the U.S. role in Libya’s civil war and the end of the U.S. military presence in Iraq all point in that direction."
Swimming Naked in China (Minxin Pei) from The Diplomat
"With the Chinese government tightening credit, the massive leakage from the formal banking sector into the ‘shadow system’ ultimately risks sinking the country’s financial system."
US Poverty Data: 1 in 15 People Among America's Poorest Poor from the Guardian [of the UK]
"Data shows about 20.5m Americans make up the poorest poor, defined as those at 50% or less of the official poverty level."
Bleak Portrait of Poverty Is Off the Mark, Experts Say from the New York Times
"Concocted on the fly a half-century ago, the official poverty measure ignores ever more of what is happening to the poor person’s wallet — good and bad. It overlooks hundreds of billions of dollars the needy receive in food stamps and other benefits and the similarly formidable amounts they lose to taxes and medical care."
Shale Gas Revolution (David Brooks) from the New York Times
"The shale gas revolution challenges the coal industry, renders new nuclear plants uneconomic and changes the economics for the renewable energy companies, which are now much further from viability. So forces have gathered against shale gas, with predictable results."
Will Voters Buy the Idea that GOP is Sabotaging Economy? (Greg Sargent) from the Washington Post
"Do you think the Republicans are intentionally stalling efforts to jumpstart the economy to insure that Barack Obama is not reelected? Yes 49 No 39 Undecided 12. This is only one state, but as Steve notes, “it’s a large, diverse swing state that both parties take very seriously.” And nearly half of these voters say they believe this — even though the question is asked in a very provocative way."
WOW!! I had largely dismissed the idea that this message would resonate with anyone outside the Dem base. Maybe not.
Hillary Wins Big in 2012 from The Hill
"The true political state of the union is best revealed in a recent poll in Time magazine that found that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton would win an epic and possibly realigning landslide in a presidential election against any Republican candidate."
'Silent Generation' May Get Loud In 2012 Election (Jeff Brady) from NPR's All Things Considered
"Pew researchers conclude that a generation gap — between millennials and silents — is growing. Younger voters now consider themselves more liberal, and older voters say they are becoming more conservative."
Marcus Welby as a cultural touchstone. MARCUS WELBY!! And Eisenhower. And the 1950s. Breath-taking. HERE's the original Pew report.
Is Romney Really the GOP’s Choice? (Eugene Robinson) from the Washington Post
"It’s hard for me to see how any of the other candidates can win the nomination — but it’s hard for me to see how Romney wins it, either. Between 20 percent and 30 percent of Republican voters support Romney, and the rest support somebody else. Actually, not somebody, anybody."
Herman Cain Campaign Considering Legal Action Against Politico: Report from the Washington Post
"A Herman Cain aide said Thursday that the Cain campaign is considering its legal options over the original Politico story, which revealed that the former head of the National Restaurant Association was accused of sexually harassing at least two women during his tenure in the 1990s."
What a dope!!
Sources Reveal New Details about Cain Allegation from Politico
"The new details—which come from multiple sources independently familiar with the incident at a hotel during a restaurant association event in the late 1990s—put the woman’s account even more sharply at odds with Cain’s emphatic insistence in news media interviews this week that nothing inappropriate happened between the two."
Let The Women Speak (Andrew Sullivan) from the Daily Beast
"I have to repeat my first impression: sexual harassment is almost never a one-off event; it is about abuse of power, always a relevant issue when assessing a possible president; the Clinton years revealed what can happen when politics is frozen by rigid denials of sexual misconduct."
Political Class Clowns (Timothy Egan) from the New York Times
"For a Republican Party that has spent the better part of its presidential campaign proving that most of its candidates are not smarter than a fifth grader, the real scandal around frontrunner-of-the-moment Herman Cain is not what he knows. It’s what he doesn’t know."
And he (like many GOP voters) doesn't care that he doesn't know. For me, it is this aspect that makes the Cain meltdown such a bizarrely compelling spectacle. Here is someone whose daily utterances SHOULD disqualify him from any serious consideration for the highest office in the land. And YET, each day goes by, and a substantial swath of Republicans continue to buy what Cain is selling. It's like watching someone defy gravity. It is this element that makes Cain's performance such an astonishing circus act!
Michigan Republicans Gives Anti-Bullying Bill A ‘Moral Convictions’ Loophole from Talking Points Memo
"Michigan Dems say the Republican Senate gutted an anti-bullying bill when they added a clause that allows bullying based on “moral convictions.” ... “I am ashamed that this could be Michigan’s bill on anti-bullying when in fact it is a ‘bullying is OK in Michigan law,’” Kevin Eppling, the father of the bill’s namesake, said in a letter."
This bill speaks VOLUMES about the basic mentality of the GOP! Fundamentally, conservatives despise "difference" -- and bullying (both by kids and adults) becomes a powerful tool for forcing compliance and uniformity.
CHINA NUGGET!!
Where an Internet Joke Is Not Just a Joke from the New York Times Sunday Magazine
"In China, it’s a form of defiance – and the government is not amused."
ISLAMIC CULTURE NUGGET!!
Disability and the Hajj to Mecca from the BBC Program Heart and Soul
"The annual Hajj pilgrimage - a religious duty that every adult Muslim is expected to do once in their lives - can be a tough challenge."
What a courageous group of pilgrims!
ANIMAL NUGGET [from March]!!
Taming the Wild from National Geographic
"Only a handful of wild animal species have been successfully bred to get along with humans. The reason, scientists say, is found in their genes."
This is a repost of a REALLY INTERESTING story from earlier this year!
WORLD ECONOMY NUGGET [of a sort]!!
The 19th-Century World-System: Yesterday and Tomorrow (Immanuel Wallerstein) from YaleGlobal
"A new world system, shedding the imbalances of centrist liberalism, will emerge."
An academic old-timer revisiting the 'world economic system.'
HIGH ED NUGGET!!
Our Universities: Why Are They Failing? (Anthony Grafton) from the New York Review of Books
"For most of them, in the end, what the university offers is not skills or knowledge but credentials: a diploma that signals employability and basic work discipline. Those who manage to learn a lot often—though happily not always—come from highly educated families and attend highly selective colleges and universities. They are already members of an economic and cultural elite. Our great, democratic university system has become a pillar of social stability—a broken community many of whose members drift through, learning little, only to return to the economic and social box that they were born into."
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