December 4, 2009 – 12:33 pm
Dave Winer makes a good point in a post on the identity of government
The cure, imho, is to create new business entities that serve the users first. Sure the shareholders make money, when you take a risk and produce a product or service that people want, that’s great and there must be rewards or people [...]
September 12, 2009 – 11:31 am
Dean Baker makes an interesting observation in this post, The Post Says the U.S. Needs China to Hold Down the Value of its Currency:
The issue is that China is buying up U.S. dollars in the form of U.S. government debt. The Post tells readers that the country is dependent on these purchases of debt. [...]
August 14, 2009 – 6:21 pm
Professor Richard Edwards posts this article from The Independent entitled “The Brutal Truth about America’s Health Care System.” It’s very sad:
In the week that Britain’s National Health Service was held aloft by Republicans as an “evil and Orwellian” example of everything that is wrong with free healthcare, these extraordinary scenes in Inglewood, California yesterday [...]
August 14, 2009 – 1:46 pm
Diane Greco has an excellent response to the Mackey piece in WSJ. She delves into the heart of the issue’s complexity:
Mackey says the HSA-plus-high-deductible structure makes people “careful” about how they spend their healthcare dollars. I would say this just is rationing, except that it is the sick person who is now burdened with [...]
LAT’s James Rainey takes the media to task on critical elements on the health care debate:
Rather than try to explain to its viewers how such a commission might control Medicare costs, CNN cut away to an all-important update on . . . Alberto Contador’s ongoing war of words with fellow cyclist Lance Armstrong.
By all means, [...]
It seems to me that the healthcare issue is ultimately a series of paradoxes:
1. The doctor wants to provide care and the layperson wants care but the costs are typically too high for most people to pay.
2. Insurance companies are for profit agents and most people and doctors want what insurance companies don’t provide [...]
If minority leader, Senator McConnell believes this
“We can make incredible improvements in American health care, but I don’t think having more government — in effect putting Washington between you and your doctor — is the way to go.”
then how can he, again, accept FEHBP as an asset and a good?
As storytelling is in the bones at the moment, I haven’t been keeping up with news. But, I do wonder why any Congress person could argue an ideological position against a subsidized system. I think we have a pretty good handle on cost benefit. But why the politics? How can one [...]
The level of discourse and critical thought on social and political issues is definitely at a pitiful state. Severin is not alone, as the big tent of freedom illustrates.
It’s more dangerous at the leadership level, though. Decision makers should have the highest regard for reason. (He writes with a smile.)
Now we have The Los Angeles Times’ Miller and Barnes writing
Senior Bush administration officials signed off on the CIA’s use of waterboarding and other harsh interrogation measures in July 2002 after a series of secret meetings that apparently excluded the State and Defense departments, according to information released Wednesday by the Senate Intelligence Committee.
The Senate [...]
Information has been swirling around about the torture memos.
We have Dick Cheney pressing his typical case:
“I haven’t talked about it, but I know specifically of reports that I read, that I saw, that lay out what we learned through the interrogation process and what the consequences were for the country.
“I’ve now formally asked the CIA [...]
This business with AIG and the bonuses is troubling. People are angry, but people were angry about monster bonuses long before swaps hit the helpless news. I read the initial TARP language.
But I think the question of taxing employees’ bonuses is childishness. And I have to agree with any political entity that [...]
From Dean Baker
The fact that Senator McCain could make such an incoherent complaint about younger generations being mistreated, after they have just seen a transfer of close to $16 trillion in wealth from older generations, warrants attention from the media. It is far more newsworthy than President Obama’s comment’s about “bitter” working class voters that [...]
February 27, 2009 – 9:04 pm
John Derbyrshire writes in The American Conservative:
I repeat: There is nothing wrong with lowbrow conservatism. Ideas must be marketed, and right-wing talk radio captures a big and useful market segment. However, if there is no thoughtful, rigorous presentation of conservative ideas, then conservatism by default becomes the raucous parochialism of Limbaugh, Savage, Hannity, and company. [...]
February 26, 2009 – 6:30 am
What a wonderful display of ignorance on Morning Joe this morning. All talking heads admitting little understanding about banks and how someone should explain it all, please. Oh, how all of them were tricked and did not see the crisis coming (while reporting for years on proper power tie colors).
Little is required [...]
That Night I Wandered on my Homeward Way (DrunkenBoat 10)
100 Days: 100 Poems, Summer 2008
