Category Archives: Current Events

Paul Begala explains exactly what's wrong with the Dick Cheney vision of government.

Clay Shirky, an NYU Prof who specializes in the economic effects of the Internet, offers a theory as to why newspapers are going bye-bye on us.

Alan Wolfe on why it's ridiculous to call Obama a socialist. I sure get the feeling that the prominent folks suggesting he is one know darn well it's nonsense but think a certain part of their constituency is dumb enough to believe it.

Frank Rich on the end of the Culture Wars. Key sentence: "Americans have less and less patience for the intrusive and divisive moral scolds who thrived in the bubbles of the Clinton and Bush years. Culture wars are a luxury the country — the G.O.P. included — can no longer afford."

Michael Moore explains why he's not the Democrat's Rush Limbaugh. And my pal Bob Elisberg throws another reason onto the pile.

Speaking of historical accuracy in Frost/Nixon: Here's James Reston Jr. — a participant in the debates and a key character in the play and movie — telling what he thought of the play.

Michael Kinsley on the ethics of Stem Cell Research.

Fred Kaplan takes time out from telling us how Bush screwed up foreign policy to pay tribute to a great man of jazz. He covers two recent concerts recalling the late Thelonious Monk and even offers up sound clips.

Joe Conason asks why every civilized nation on this planet (and even some uncivilized ones) has some form of Universal Health Care except the United States. Bill Maher had a good riff on this topic on his show this week. The standard argument against U.H.C. takes the form of people saying they'd rather have medical decisions made by doctors than by bureaucrats. But the way things work in this country now, medical decisions aren't made by doctors or bureaucrats. They're made by insurance companies who are interested in spending as little as possible on us when we're sick. There's gotta be a better way.

Here's the kind of thing David Frum is writing that has the Rush Limbaugh fans calling for his head on a stick.

Fox News Polls are usually slanted a bit in their questioning, the better to get responses that support the network's agenda. Most polls connected with any sort of idealogue sponsor do this to some extent but the Fox News polls are especially interesting in that they don't always yield the kind of results that the network wanted. Take a look at this blog post by Eric Kleefeld, noting how a new survey says that America is happier with Barack Obama's economic policies than they would be with Ronald Reagan's.

Fred Kaplan, who can read and understand a lot of stuff I can't read and understand, actually reads and understands this nation's defense budgets. Looks like Obama's writing a sequel to Bush's.

Another Fred Kaplan article, this one about those who insist that this country must keep spending money on the F-22 Raptor fighter plane, even if they aren't good for much of anything.

Barack Obama has made some pretty grandiose promises/predictions (I'm not sure which they are) about reducing the deficit by the close of this term of office. I don't know if he can do it either…but it's encouraging to look back at how recent Democrats have done with the not-unrelated national debt as opposed to, say, administrations that had someone named Bush in or near the Oval Office. Take a look at this blog post and especially at the chart there.

Michael Kinsley on this nation's economic strategy. He doesn't understand it, either.