pampango
pampango's JournalA Pew poll taken in January supports what you are saying, particularly about 'compromising'.
http://www.people-press.org/2013/01/17/section-2-views-of-congress-and-the-parties/
The most resistant to compromise were conservative republicans and those who agree with the tea party. The most open to compromise were liberal Democrats and 'lean Democratic' independents.
Liberal Democrats were also more open to compromise than conservative Democrats which seems strange on the face of it. You would think that conservative Democrats would be more willing to compromise. In terms of policy beliefs they are closer to their 'conservative' buddies in the republican party.
Liberal Democrats must be more open to compromise for reasons other than policy positions since they are farther from republican policy choices than anyone else. Their willingness to compromise must be due to the fact that they are more open and tolerant of opposing views which is what you might expect from a group that values diversity and does not expect everyone to agree with them.
Pew: Tea Partyers are more likely than all other Americans to support reductions in foreign aid and
the budget of the State Department (but not the Defense Department)
Americans who identify with the Tea Party movement are more likely than all other Americans to support reductions in foreign aid and the budget of the U.S. State Department. But they are less likely to back trimming military spending and anti-terrorism efforts. This may be because Tea Party sympathizers are generally more hawkish than their fellow countrymen.
About three-quarters of Americans believe that Washington should reduce the government’s budget deficit through a combination of spending cuts and tax increases, with the greater share coming from belt tightening, according to a mid-February Pew Research Center survey. But 57 percent of Tea Party leaning Republicans think all deficit reduction should come from spending cuts.
In particular, Tea Party sympathizers would like to see a cut back in aspects of American soft power. More than eight-in-ten would decrease aid to the world’s needy, compared with 43 percent of all other Americans who support such economizing. And 41 percent of Tea Party adherents would reduce the State Department’s budget.
But U.S. hard power continues to receive Tea Partyers’ backing. Only 15 percent want to cut the Pentagon’s budget (compared with 27 percent of all other Americans who favor such action) and just 13 percent support reducing spending on anti-terrorism defenses.
http://www.pewglobal.org/2013/03/04/will-budget-cuts-isolationism/
Kind of confirms what we already knew. Tea partiers don't exactly try to keep their sentiments a secret.
Krugman: The EU is "one of the best things to have happened to humanity over the past century".
... one of the truly awful things about the Bush years was the deliberate conflation of the person sitting in the White House with the nation. If you criticized Bush, you were anti-American; if you denounced the Iraq war, you were attacking the troops.
So, look at what the Brussels tweeters are saying — namely, that an attack on the wrongheaded economic doctrine of Olli Rehn (European Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs) is an attack on Europe, that anyone who criticizes the hash they are making of policy must be an American who hates Europe. Um, no.
As it happens, I’m very much pro-European; I consider the European project, the path of peace through prosperity and integration, one of the best things to have happened to humanity over the past century. I’ve seen the good work Europe has done in promoting democracy.
My problem isn’t with Europe, it’s with the bad policies that are ripping Europe apart, and with the officials who for whatever reason — intellectual inflexibility, ideological blinders, or, I suspect, sheer personal vanity, an unwillingness to admit that they were wrong — have refused to consider any modification of these policies despite years of disastrous results. And the attempt of these officials to wrap themselves in the mantle of European unity is truly contemptible.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/07/bushifying-the-berlaymont/
I had always figured that Krugman was pro-EU, just anti-austerity believing that is both extremely bad economic policy and damaging to the idea of a "prosperous and integrated" Europe. This is the clearest statement of it that I have come across.
More evidence I guess for right wingers that Krugman is a socialist at heart.
UK Spreme Court may force government to follow EU pollution law
UK may be on verge of new pollution law, with case regarding obligations to EU being heard by lords on Thursday
The supreme court could force the government to take steps to urgently reduce dangerous air pollution in many British cities to meet European limits, following a landmark hearing this week.
ClientEarth, a group of campaigning lawyers that has brought the case, will say that the government has a legal duty to comply with EU timescales and its plans to reduce pollution are woefully inadequate.
It will say that the government has known that air pollution from nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and particulates now kill as many people each year in Britain as obesity and road accidents combined. The EU legislation was passed into European law in 1999 and Britain should have complied by 2010. However, it has refused even to apply for an extension until January 2015.
Government lawyers are expected to argue that Britain is under no legal obligation to meet air pollution time limits set by Brussels and that it is impossible to meet the targets.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/mar/07/supreme-court-air-pollution-legislation
Interesting case pitting the 'national sovereignty right' not to comply with regulations passed by international organization to which the country voluntarily joined versus the international organization's ability to force countries to comply with regulations that the body has adopted.
In this case the court is a British one, not an international one. It will be interesting to see how the court rules. While this case revolves around the UK's responsibility to comply with pollution laws adopted by the EU, the principle could be applied to other areas as well.
The Swedish (more 'socialist' than the US) stock market has doubled since January 2009.
Mixed economies can do just fine for investors but, as in the case of Sweden, distribute the financial gains more fairly in the society. Sweden has the most equitable distribution of income in the world even though their stock market does just fine.
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/sweden/stock-market
All of this nuance would confuse a tea partier who likes his 'facts' in short, simple sound bites. The real world is always more complicated than the 'sound bite' version.
Anyone who thinks the US is a 'socialist' country isn't using his head for anything other than a place to put his cowboy hat.
Great interactive graphic - on the prevalence of certain diseases, injuries around the world
and over time.
Disease and death around the world visualised
What kills people around the world - and how does it vary by country? The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation have published their latest report in to the global burden of disease today and alongside the release have launched a range of visualisations showing how the data breaks down by country. Explore one of the new interactives below and see how causes of death have changed over time. Use the drop down menu to view data by a specific country and to change indicator.
How has the burden of different diseases, injuries, and risk factors moved up or down over time?
Explore ranks and changes for causes or risk factors based on deaths, years of lives lost (YLLs), years lost to disability (YLDs), and disability-adjusted life year (DALYs) for 1990 and 2010. You can explore these ranks by age group, sex, region, and country
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/interactive/2013/mar/05/disease-death-world-data-visualised
In developed countries the big killers are heart disease and stoke. In the developing world: respiratory diseases and diarrheal diseases.
Information is compared between 1990 and 2010, with gender and age distinctions.
Russian trial against dead lawyer (who exposed massive tax fraud involving state officials) proceeds
Trial against dead Russian lawyer to proceedCritics say trial meant to discredit Sergei Magnitsky, who exposed massive tax fraud involving state officials.
A Russian court has ordered the trial of a dead anti-corruption lawyer to proceed next week, ignoring calls by his family and lawyers to abandon a case they say is absurd and politically motivated.
Defense lawyers said the 37-year old's trial will be the first for a dead person in Russia. "The trial is indeed absurd," said lawyer Alexander Molokhov after the court rejected his application to defend Magnitsky. The court had already appointed a legal team to defend Magnitsky after his own lawyers refused to take part in a trial, which his relatives say is politically motivated.
Magnitsky died while in custody in 2009, after he had complained repeatedly of being denied medical treatment. His death has damaged Russia's image and triggered an ongoing diplomatic row with the United States.
The case against Magnitsky was initially closed after his death in November 2009, but authorities reopened it in 2011 as international criticism over his death - and Russia's apparent reluctance to hold anyone criminally responsible - mounted.
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2013/03/2013342239999306.html
If you expose government corruption in Russia, the government will go after you even after you die in their custody.
I dare say that Assad's bombers, artillery, tanks and missles have attacked civilians way, way, way
more than 20 times. Most human rights organizations believe that his forces has killed more than 90% of the civilians who have died in Syria. Using bombers, artillery, tanks and Scud missiles in attacking urban areas leads to many civilian casualties - collateral damage perhaps in the eyes of the government.
Assad's position is exactly the opposite of Al Nusra: "You are with me or you are with the terrorists." (Kind of reminds me of our recent republican president.)
Juan Cole has written that the jihadists are the most effective fighter man-for-man but only represent 10-20% of opposition fighters in Syria now though that percentage increases as the civil war drags on. The Free Syrian army is composed of soldiers who defected and Syrian civilians who took up arms still represent 80-90% of opposition fighters according to Cole, but the civilians, in particular, are not very effective fighters.
Assad's government is based on a minority of the population, similar in percentages to the white government of apartheid South Africa back in the day. The majority (70%) of Syria's population is Sunni just as the similar percentage of South Africa's population was Black (70% Black, 20% white, 10% Asian and mixed.
I understand that for Assad's sect to continue to rule Syria, force is his only option. He never could, and cannot now, negotiate any opening up of the political system or he is history. I also understand the fear of retribution that his and other minorities in Syria have. Decades of repressing the majority has caused a lot of ill will and this last-gasp military campaign does not seem likely to lead to a happy ending. (The current civil war is something like what many predicted would eventually happen in South Africa. Fortunately, the minority government there was replaced without a civil war and subsequent retribution - thank you, Mr. Mandela and others.)
As you said, "No matter who wins, the people of Syria lose." I agree. If Assad wins, he has to rule by force as he (and his father before him) always has or he is gone. If the opposition wins, there jihadists are not going to go away quietly and the minorities in Syria will be endangered.
CAP: Republicans Ignore (and suppress) the Evidence About Higher Taxes on the Wealthy
My first thought is that "Republicans Ignore the Evidence About ..." is a useful beginning to any headline of a story about republican policies on anything.Think Again: Republicans Ignore the Evidence About Higher Taxes on the Wealthy
Shortly before Election Day in November, The New York Times published a report about a Congressional Research Service study that had been withdrawn after publication due to demands by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). The economic report, “Taxes and the Economy: An Economic Analysis of the Top Tax Rates Since 1945,” “found no correlation between top tax rates and economic growth.” This means that increasing taxes on the wealthiest Americans would not actually harm the economy in the way congressional Republicans have been asserting.
The study in question did not receive much attention before it was censored. Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-NY) mentioned it in a speech at the National Press Club, but only after it was pulled. Speaking to The Times, Sen. Schumer objected to what he termed the “banana republic” aspects of the Republicans’ actions, referring to the idea of a ruling plutocracy making the politically important decisions for the entire nation: “They didn’t like a report, and instead of rebutting it, they had them take it down.”
The study findings then began to receive widespread media coverage. Among them:The reduction in the top tax rates appears to be uncorrelated with saving, investment, and productivity growth. The top tax rates appear to have little or no relation to the size of the economic pie.
However, the top tax rate reductions appear to be associated with the increasing concentration of income at the top of the income distribution. As measured by IRS data, the share of income accruing to the top 0.1% of U.S. families increased from 4.2% in 1945 to 12.3% by 2007 before falling to 9.2% due to the 2007–2009 recession. At the same time, the average tax rate paid by the top 0.1% fell from over 50% in 1945 to about 25% in 2009. Tax policy could have a relation to how the economic pie is sliced—lower top tax rates may be associated with greater income disparities.
You can read the entire report, authored by Thomas L. Hungerford, a specialist in public finance with a doctorate in economics from the University of Michigan, here.
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/media/news/2013/02/28/54989/republicans-ignore-the-evidence-about-higher-taxes-on-the-wealthy/
As the story details, republicans did not just ignore the evidence about higher taxes on the wealthy; they actively suppressed this evidence.
Pew Poll: The Public Supports a Transatlantic Trade Pact – For Now
... the rising competitive challenge from China has increased the incentive for both Europe and America to develop common technical and regulatory standards for a $30 trillion transatlantic market to ensure that Western-style capitalism, not Chinese state capitalism, remains the global norm.
Publics on both sides of the Atlantic appear to be receptive to the idea.
The virulent European anti-Americanism of the last decade — owing to European opposition to the Iraq war and the policies of U.S. President George W. Bush — is ancient history. More than two-thirds (69 percent) of the French had a favorable view of the United States in 2012, compared with 42 percent in 2008, the last year of the Bush administration, according to Pew Research Center surveys. Fifty-two percent of Germans held a positive opinion of America, compared with 31 percent four years earlier. And 58 percent of the Spanish were favorably disposed toward the United States, much greater than the 33 percent who held such views in 2008.
There has been a similar, if less robust, rebound in American response to the European Union. In 2012, half the country had a favorable view of the EU, compared with only 39 percent at the nadir in 2004.
Moreover, contrary to the widespread assumption that protectionist sentiments are rising in the wake of the Great Recession, 58 percent of Americans say they support increased trade with the EU. The same feeling exists across the Atlantic. Three-quarters of the Italians, nearly two-thirds of the British (65 percent) and more than half of the French (58 percent) and Germans (57 percent) believe in deepening trade and investment ties between the European Union and the United States; 63 percent of Americans agree, according to a 2007 German Marshall Fund survey.
http://www.pewglobal.org/2013/02/19/the-public-supports-a-transatlantic-trade-pact-for-now-2/
Sounds like this is more popular now that Bush is history. Europe did not trust him and his administration didn't think much of 'old Europe' either.
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