Summary: opinion, editorials & articles
from around the globe
Noam Chomsky is a highly influential American linguist,
philosopher and political activist. He is professor emeritus of
linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and is
considered by many to be the father of modern linguistics. He has
also become known as an influential political activist and critic
of US foreign policy as well as that of other countries. In
addition to this, he is a key figure in contemporary philosophy
as well as being a prolific writer.
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Date Published: Dec 30, 2010 - 9:05 am
by James Surowiecki
The recession has been over for more than a year
now, but so many people are out of work that it doesn’t feel like
much of a recovery. In November, the economy added just
thirty-nine thousand jobs. The failure to translate G.D.P. growth
into job growth has given us an unemployment rate that remains
near ten per cent (twice what it was in 2007), and has swelled
the ranks of the long-term unemployed.
Why have new jobs been so hard to come by? One view blames cyclical
economic factors: at times when everyone is cautious about
spending, companies are slow to expand capacity and take on more
workers. But another, more skeptical account has emerged, which
argues that a big part of the problem is a mismatch between the
jobs that are available and the skills that people have. According
to this view, many of the jobs that existed before the recession
(in home building, for example) are gone for good, and the people
who held those jobs don’t have the skills needed to work in other
fields. A big chunk of current unemployment, the argument goes, is
therefore structural, not cyclical: resurgent demand won’t make it
go away.
Read full article here
Date Published: Dec 29, 2010 - 2:49 pm
by Stefan Theil
During
the financial panic of 2008, the Swiss had more reason than
most to be frightened. The country’s banks, dominated by Credit
Suisse and UBS, held assets worth an incredible
680 percent of Switzerland’s GDP (compared with U.S.
commercial banks’ assets of 70 percent of GDP). No one knew how
many of the Swiss holdings were toxic. What everyone knew was
that these banks were far too big for tiny Switzerland to bail
out in any full-blown banking crisis. Capital flight would
crush the Swiss franc and the country’s economy right along
with it. There were scary parallels to Iceland, another small
nation with an independent currency and outsize global banks.
After a severe blowout, Iceland is now in a deep recession and
on life support from the IMF.
Date Published: Dec 29, 2010 - 2:33 pm
by
Rebecca K. Morrison
Roast goose and red cabbage, bratwurst,
gingerbread, candles, hand-crafted wooden figures from the
Erzgebirge, blown-glass baubles for the Christmas tree, The
Nutcracker and “Silent Night”: these are some of the ingredients
that create Gemütlichkeit (a kind of jovial cosiness),
Geborgenheit (snug security) and Innigkeit (an inner warmth,
awareness of soul) – three words treacherous to translate yet
integral to a mood that sees millions flock to the Christmas
markets of Berlin, Nuremberg, Dresden and Cologne. German
Christmas receives uncharacteristically good press, capturing a
lost world of innocence, some argue, a holiday celebrated thus
since time immemorial.
Read full article here
Date Published: Dec 29, 2010 - 2:14 pm
Jane D'Arista is a research associate with the Political Economy
Research Institute (PERI), University of Massachusetts, Amherst
where she also co-founded an Economists’ Committee for Financial
Reform called SAFER, i.e. stable, accountable, efficient &
fair reform
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Date Published: Dec 29, 2010 - 5:10 am
Muntadhar al-Zaidi (Arabic: منتظر الزيدي Muntaẓar az-Zaydī) was
an Iraqi broadcast journalist who served as a correspondent for
Iraqi-owned, Egyptian-based Al-Baghdadia TV. Al-Zaidi's reports
often focused on the plight of widows, orphans, and children in
the Iraq War. On November 16, 2007, al-Zaidi was kidnapped by
unknown assailants in Baghdad. He was also previously twice
arrested by the United States armed forces. On December 14, 2008,
al-Zaidi shouted "this is for the widows and orphans" and threw
his shoes at then-US president George W. Bush during a Baghdad
press conference
Date Published: Dec 28, 2010 - 7:26 am
By Robert C. Lieberman
The U.S. economy appears to be coming apart at the
seams. Unemployment remains at nearly ten percent, the highest
level in almost 30 years; foreclosures have forced millions of
Americans out of their homes; and real incomes have fallen faster
and further than at any time since the Great Depression. Many of
those laid off fear that the jobs they have lost -- the secure,
often unionized, industrial jobs that provided wealth, security,
and opportunity -- will never return. They are probably right.
And yet a curious thing has happened in the midst of all this
misery. The wealthiest Americans, among them presumably the very
titans of global finance whose misadventures brought about the
financial meltdown, got richer. And not just a little bit richer; a
lot richer.
Read full article here
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Date Published: Dec 27, 2010 - 2:23 pm
Al Jazeera: Is it a case of art imitating life, or a sinister
force using art to influence life and death?
More at The Real
News
Date Published: Dec 27, 2010 - 1:19 am
Al Jazeera: Hollywood and the war machine: A look at the
Pentagon's influence on the film industry
Date Published: Dec 27, 2010 - 1:16 am
Executions have fallen by half since 1999. The number of new
death sentences is about one-third what it was at the 1996 peak.
Even in Texas, long the leading practitioner, death sentences are
off by 80 percent. Several states that retain capital punishment
have not administered a single lethal injection in the past five
years.
The exoneration of 138 death row inmates has weakened public
support for the ultimate sanction. In a recent Gallup poll, 64
percent of Americans endorsed it, down from 80 percent in 1994,
while opposition has nearly doubled.
A survey commissioned by the Death Penalty Information Center found
that 61 percent prefer that murderers get some sort of life
sentence instead. As a budget priority, the death penalty was
ranked seventh out of seven issues.
Read the editorial at the
Chicago Tribune
Also read
John Duty: human guinea pig in Oklahoma's cruel
experiment
Date Published: Dec 25, 2010 - 7:34 pm
Date Published: Dec 25, 2010 - 9:11 am
The U.S. economy is being slowly but surely destroyed and
many Americans have no idea that it is happening. That is at least
partially due to the fact that most financial news is entirely
focused on the short-term. Whenever a key economic statistic goes
up the financial markets surge and analysts rejoice.
Whenever a key economic statistic goes down the financial markets
decline and analysts speak of the potential for a "double-dip"
recession. You could literally get whiplash as you watch the
financial ping pong ball bounce back and forth between good news
and bad news. But focusing on short-term statistics is not the
correct way to analyze the U.S. economy. It is the long-term trends
that reveal the truth. The reality is that there are certain
underlying foundational problems that are destroying the U.S.
economy a little bit more every single day.
11 of those foundational problems are discussed below. They are
undeniable and they are constantly getting worse. If they are not
corrected (and there is no indication that they will be) they will
destroy not only our economy but also our entire way of life. The
sad truth is that it would be hard to understate just how desperate
the situation is for the U.S. economy.
Long-Term Trend #1: The Deindustrialization Of America
Long-Term Trend #2: The Exploding U.S. Trade Deficit
Long-Term Trend #3: The Shrinking Middle Class
Long-Term Trend #4: The Growing Size Of The U.S. Government
Long-Term Trend #5: The Constantly Growing U.S. National Debt
Long-Term Trend #6: The Ongoing Devaluation Of The U.S. Dollar
Long-Term Trend #7: The Derivatives Bubble
Long-Term Trend #8: The Health Care Industry
Long-Term Trend #9: Financial Power Is Becoming Concentrated In
Fewer And Fewer Hands
Long-Term Trend #10: Rampant Corruption On Wall Street
Long-Term Trend #11: The Growing Retirement Crisis That Threatens
To Bankrupt America
Read Michael Snyder's in-depth analysis at businessinsider.com
photo by karpidis
Ping web
site
Date Published: Dec 24, 2010 - 6:40 pm
The sound and fury over the Federal Communications Commission's
attempt to exert regulatory power over the Internet largely ignores
one important reality.
The legal footing for the authority the FCC has tried to claim with
its Tuesday vote is so shaky as to make these rules a tenuous
proposition at best.
It would be prudent for Congress to study the issue in hearings and
come up with proposed changes in law that would give the FCC the
legal wherewithal to take a light approach to regulating the
Internet.
Of course, the political reality of Republicans taking control of
the House might not make that idea very feasible, but that doesn't
change the fact that Congress is the appropriate venue for the
matter.
Read more:Editorial: Can FCC rule the Internet? - The Denver
Posthttp://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_16922886#ixzz193cvXGKK
Date Published: Dec 24, 2010 - 12:13 pm
