Blog Profile / Democracy in America
| URL : | http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica | |
|---|---|---|
| Filed Under: | Politics / US Politics | |
| Posts on Regator: | 1225 | |
| Posts / Week: | 11.2 | |
| Archived Since: | April 18, 2011 | |
Blog Post Archive
No scarlet letters
ON WEDNESDAY David Vitter (pictured), a Republican senator from Louisiana, proposed—and the Senate agriculture committee accepted—an amendment to the farm bill that would, in Mr Vitter's words, "prohibit convicted murderers, rapists and pedophiles from receiving food stamps." It's not hard to see why this amendment passed. Show More Summary
Let’s not call the whole thing off
AS THE story of the politicisation of the Internal Revenue Service continues to unfold, discourse in some circles has shifted from critiques of 501(c)(4) exemptions to condemnation of the IRS itself. Ron Paul has been beating this drum for years, and now Ted Cruz, the senator from Texas, is turning to Twitter to advance the cause. Show More Summary
Cell phones
MOST of the roughly 2.2m incarcerated Americans will eventually be freed. Those who remain in contact with loved ones on the outside are less likely, studies show, to return to a life of crime after serving their time. Much as voters hate criminals, they also have an interest in not being mugged. Show More Summary
The path to the path
THIRTEEN to five. That was the lopsided vote by which the Senate Judiciary Committee approved the immigration-reform bill it has been working on for the past few weeks. All ten of the committee’s Democrats voted for the bill, along with three Republicans, in spite of much greater scepticism in their party on the subject. Show More Summary
Is Silicon Valley getting too big for its boots?
"IF YOU'RE an engineer in Silicon Valley, you have no incentive to read The Economist," an unnamed tech entrepreneur tells George Packer in this week's issue of the New Yorker. "It's not brought up at parties, your friends aren't going to talk about it, your employers don't care." Whatever. Show More Summary
FOX News and Julian Assange
THE first outraged tweet I saw about it came from the Associated Press's Ron Fournier: the Department of Justice (DOJ) had " tracked FOX News reporter via key card and seized personal emails. #Chilling @AP ". That turned out to be a little off-point. Show More Summary
A destructive streak
OVER the course of three days in April 2011, around 300 tornadoes touched down around the south, centred in Alabama. At least one of them was large, but many were not, and it was shocking to see the amount of devastation even a small tornado could rain on a targeted area. Show More Summary
How can you tell a charity from a political front?
THE New York Times had a nice discussion group the other day between legal experts on how to solve the problem of 501(c)(4)s. Basically, this category of non-profits is supposed to cover groups like the Sierra Club, the NRA, and theShow More Summary
Uncontrolled demolition
SYRIA has been in a state of civil war long enough that it's now beginning to disintegrate, reports Ben Hubbard of the New York Times. His lead paragraph reads like a dispatch from the Wars of the Roses, or a trailer for a new season of Game of Thrones. Show More Summary
Pointless, punitive and permitted
A REPORT released earlier this month by the Census Bureau found that in 2012, for the first time, voting rates of black Americans exceeded that of whites: 66.2% of eligible black voters cast ballots in the last presidential election, compared with 64.1% of whites (in 2008, the numbers were 64.7% of blacks and 66.1% of whites). Show More Summary
Plot hole
THE inquiry into the Benghazi affair is lending increasing substance to opponents' charges that the Obama administration massaged its talking points on the attacks, playing down the possible involvement of al-Qaeda-linked extremists and playing up linkages to an anti-Muslim video, in order to [EXPLANATION OF WHY THIS WOULD MAKE SENSE TK]. Show More Summary
Spanner in the works?
THE scandal over the Internal Revenue Service targeting conservative non-profit organisations for extra scrutiny comes at an inauspicious time for the Obama administration. When Obamacare goes in to full effect in January, the IRS will be vested with an array of new powers. Show More Summary
Now and later
THE unwavering Republican line on fiscal policy is that it is unconscionable to saddle our children and grandchildren with a mountain of debt. John Boehner, the speaker of the House, repeated that mantra in January when making demands over the debt ceiling. Show More Summary
Look who's talking
WHEN the authorities want to obtain journalists’ phone records as part of an investigation into a crime, the Department of Justice’s guidelines state that their request should be “as narrowly drawn as possible”. What is more, they should...Show More Summary
The Richwine affair
JASON RICHWINE, a co-author of the widely trashed Heritage Foundation study on the the costs of immigration, "resigned" his post at Heritage Friday after his doctoral dissertation on immigration and IQ fell under a shadow of suspected racism. Show More Summary
In the long run, we are telepathic androids
KEVIN DRUM looks to have set the topic for the day with his article in Mother Jones on the economics of our robotic future. The argument is a good recap of several points that have also turned up in speculation by others, including Paul...Show More Summary
The IRS errs
WHAT bigger gaffe could the Internal Revenue Service commit than to single out groups that criticised the government for greater scrutiny? Republicans, naturally enough, are outraged by the revelation that America’s taxmen consciously...Show More Summary
In the long run, we'll live to 300 and work
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES'S contention that "in the long-run, we're all dead", is hard to dispute. Naill Ferguson, a professor of history at Harvard, raised hackles recently by suggesting that Keynes's seeming indifference to the welfare of future generations had something to do with the fact that he was childless and gay. Show More Summary
Come and take it
WHEN Texas was part of Mexico, and Mexico was a colony of Spain, the Spanish Mexican authorities lent a cannon to the denizens of Gonzalez, Texas, the better to thwart attacks from the area's indigenous freedom fighters. When the colonists...Show More Summary
Dear life
GUN-CONTROL legislation fell short last month in a close Senate vote, but some spy flickers of hope in the "world's greatest deliberative body". However, the sense urgency that followed the Newtown massacre has definitely faded, andShow More Summary