UP-FRONT MILITARY SPENDING NUGGET!!
How to Save a Trillion Dollars? Start with Defense (Mark Thompson) from Time Magazine
A really good, readable, relatively brief overview of the military spending issue! Another good primer on the defense budget. Yesterday we posted an excellent critique of the defense budget done by the Pentagon itself and covered in Foreign Policy Magazine. These two together are must-reads!
"Aircraft carriers, born in the years before World War II, are increasingly obsolete platforms of war. They feature expensive manned aircraft in an age when budgets are being squeezed and less expensive drones are taking over. While the U.S. and its allies flew hundreds of attack missions against targets in coastal Libya last month, cruise missiles delivered much of the punch, and U.S. carriers were notable only for their absence. Yet the Navy, backed by the Pentagon and Congress, continues to churn them out as if it were still 1942."
Hooray! The Yanks are Going Home (Philip Stephens) from the Financial Times [of the UK]
"The harsh truth, though, is that Europe needs shock treatment. As long as they are nestling comfortably under the US security umbrella, Europeans will continue to inhabit a postmodern utopia in which the only thing to do with defence spending is to cut it and the only power worth talking about is of a distinctly soft variety."
The New Cold War from the Wall Street Journal
"There has long been bad blood between Iran and Saudi Arabia, but popular protests across the Middle East now threaten to turn the rivalry into a tense and dangerous regional divide."
US-Brazil Relations: Something Real, for a Change (Walter Russell Mead) from the American Interest
"Spurious “breakthroughs,” vacuous discussions of “chemistry,” “strategic partnerships”: the Preacher said it best in Ecclesiastes. It is striving after wind and a weariness of the flesh. But every now and then something actually happens, and even a summit meeting can register a real change in relations between countries. Something like this happened when Edward VII visited France in 1903, and it happened again during President Obama’s recent visit to Brazil. The relationship between the two countries is changing in truly momentous ways, and while the visit didn’t cause these changes (which have been gathering force for twenty years), it did help crystallize perceptions."
Wall Street Presses Republicans to Reach a Deal on Debt Ceiling from the Wall Street Journal
"During a recent series of meetings and fund-raisers, top Wall Street executives and lobbyists have urged Republicans to resolve the debt-ceiling debate quickly or risk turmoil in the bond market."
The Tea Partiers who are wagging the GOP dog right now COULDN'T CARE LESS about these Wall Streeters!
On Raising Taxes, 'Safe to Go Back Into the Water?' (Jim Tankersley) from the National Journal
"Tax increases have long been political shark bait. Obama's might not be."
A Tax Day Special—The U.S. is a Low-Tax Country from AmericaBlog
"From the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a few charts to comfort you on Tax Day."
The Triumph of Taxophobia: First Principles: Arguing the Economy (Jonathan Chait) from the New Republic
"The conservative movement’s embrace of taxophobia is probably the most important development in American political life over the last three decades. It is the one quality that most distinguishes American conservative elites from conservative elites in other countries. They’re more likely to question climate science, more sanguine about people dying for lack of health insurance, and less xenophobic (which is rather nice). But above all—far above all—they hate taxes. Taxophobia has spawned an epistemology of its own and has completely reshaped the landscape of American politics."
Right Doesn't Make Might for Boehner from Politico
"Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) keeps running smack into an uncomfortable truth: his large Republican majority hardly gives him a mandate to govern in divided Washington. A sizable bloc of 59 Republicans ditched his landmark budget deal Thursday, leaving Boehner in need of Democratic votes to drag the bill over the finish line – most of them rounded up by Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland."
House GOP Takes Another Look at Clean-Air Regulations from the National Journal
Some really good environmental nuggets under this rather predictable headline. It is because of critical "below-the-fold" issues like this that it MAKES A DIFFERENCE who is in the White House.
"Putting to rest almost a dozen Clean Air Act violations, the federally run TVA announced that it will shutter 18 of its oldest coal-fired boilers at its 11 coal-fired power plants—one of which will also close. The units make up 16 percent of its coal-fired fleet. ... The settlement represents the “largest coal retirement commitment in the history of EPA’s national enforcement initiative,” according to the regulatory agency."
Pouty Republicans Mad at Partisan Obama (Joan Walsh) from Salon
"Outplayed by the president, Boehner can't get GOP votes for the budget. Next up: Paul Ryan's plan to kill Medicare."
GOP Freshmen Revolt Picks Up Steam (David Frum) from FrumForum
"Over the course of the budget battles of the last few months, a growing group of freshmen have begun to lead a revolt against Republican leadership."
The Cook Report: Trump’s a Joke (Charlie Cook) from the National Journal
"Legitimate presidential candidates are at risk of being marginalized by a publicity-hungry reality-show host."
Obama: Donald Trump's Birth Certificate Talk Helps Me (James Oliphant) from the Los Angeles Times
“I think that over the last two and a half years there's been an effort to go at me in a way that is politically expedient in the short-term for Republicans, but creates, I think a problem for them when they want to actually run in a general election where most people feel pretty confident the President was born where he says he was, in Hawaii. He doesn't have horns,” Obama said in the ABC interview."
Supporting Obama's view is this item:
Poll: Trump takes the lead from Public Policy Polling
"Only 38% of Republican primary voters say they're willing to support a candidate for President next year who firmly rejects the birther theory and those folks want Mitt Romney to be their nominee for President next year."
**Thirty-eight percent!!** WOW!! From the time of the McCain campaign in '08 when GOPers began putting it out there that Obama was a Muslim, a terrorist, etc., establishment Republicans chose with few exceptions to say nothing. Some even cynically upheld these and other rumors, believing firmly I think that it would only undercut Obama's legitimacy. Having fed this monster for three years now, it finally turns out that the beast is going to EAT THE GOP instead. Pretty cosmic!
Romney Rides Again (David Bernstein) from the Boston Phoenix
"To win the GOP nomination, Mitt will need to do things differently this time. Here's how."
Poll: Floridians Have Strong Buyers Remorse After Electing GOP Gov. Scott from TalkingPointsMemo
"Only three months removed from Governor Rick Scott's (R) inauguration, a majority of Florida voters now say the state is headed in the wrong direction and that, if they could do it all over again, they wouldn't have elected Scott in the first place, according to a new Suffolk University poll."
Jon Huntsman: The Only Cool Republican? (McKay Coppins) from the Daily Beast
"Jon Huntsman is finishing up as Obama's ambassador to China, but his supporters are already crafting his "hip" persona—his motorcycle, cover band, youthful indiscretions. McKay Coppins on whether it'll be enough in 2012 to win Huntsman crucial under-40 voters, who swarmed to Obama in 2008."
Bill Clinton Recalls "Romantic" Days of Prostitutes in Times Square from NBC New York
"Former President Bill Clinton fondly remembers a "romantic" time when you could still get a prostitute in Times Square."
Ah -- OUR BILL!! I don't know that he'll ever quite fit the traditional mold of the respected elder statesman ex-President!
ANCIENT LANGUAGE NUGGET!!
Phonetic Clues Hint Language Is Africa-Born from the New York Times
"A researcher analyzing the sounds in languages spoken around the world has detected an ancient signal that points to southern Africa as the place where modern human language originated."
DINOSAUR NUGGET!!
That's Not a Dinosaur! from the Wall Street Journal
"As new fossils and research accumulate, scientific reality is increasingly at odds with popular images of the great creatures."
UNDERSEA CREATURES NUGGET!!
Colorful Creatures: Amazing 'X-ray Style' Images of Ocean Dwellers at Night (PHOTOS) from the Daily Mail [of the UK]
"This incredible set of photographs reveal capture some of the sea's inhabitants in a way you have never seen before. The stunning pictures, taken off the coast of Hawaii, were taken in the dead of night with a special flash to give a wonderful display of colours."
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