At a crucial moment in the presidential campaign, Barack Obama chose not to pander by supporting a summer gas tax holiday that was supported by both Hillary Clinton and John McCain. This was good policy–we need to raise, not lower, the gasoline tax–and it turned out to be good politics: the public knew a gimmick [...]
Joan Walsh of Salon and I did a bloggingheads video that’s just been posted. Here are a couple of excerpts: http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/25550?in=14:08&out=18:24 http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/25550?in=35:20&out=41:50
It seemed ominous to me, crossing the border yesterday between Haiti and the Dominican Republic, that the last town in Haiti was called Malpasse — bad crossing. For many Haitians these days it has, indeed, been a terrible crossing — as I explore in this time.com story. Since making the drive nearly two weeks ago, [...]
My favorite cause seems to have picked up a new spokesman: Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell. We’ll see if the Little Girls of the United States Senate pay him any more attention than they have me. (In addition to the two links above, you can read more of my earlier arguments on this subject here, and [...]
The U.N. office in Haiti just sent out a note from Haitian President Rene Preval. The message is simple. With out any preamble it lists Haiti’s most urgent needs: 200,000 family tents to be given priority clearance at the airport so that the shelters can be in place before the rainy season starts in just [...]
I’m somewhat distracted today…and hope you’ll indulge me in a non-political recommendation. My wife and I are huge fans of British television mystery series and we just finished one that I simply can’t get out of my head: Life on Mars…about a Manchester detective who gets hit by a car in 2006 and wakes up [...]
To clarify my post below a little bit: I don’t think Americans are stupider than other people…though we may be stupider than we used to be. Indeed, I think the U.S. has been, historically, the repository for the smarter and more ambitious people from other countries–risk-takers, adventurers, those who felt suffocated by the absence of [...]
Absolutely amazing poll results from CNN today about the $787 stimulus package: nearly three out of four Americans think the money has been wasted. On second thought, they may be right: it’s been wasted on them. Indeed, the largest single item in the package–$288 billion–is tax relief for 95% of the American public. This money [...]
