State takes kids from parents found with small amounts of marijuana
A disturbing story in today’s New York Times:
Hundreds of New Yorkers who have been caught with small amounts of marijuana, or who have simply admitted to using it, have become ensnared in civil child neglect cases in recent years, though they did not face even the least of criminal ...
What’s happened to the liberal arts?
The liberal arts at American colleges “have been radically altered, both in format and function… What is being taught is no longer attuned to undergraduates looking for a broader and deeper understanding of the world.” So write Andrew Hacker and Claudia Dreifus in an interesting op-ed in the Los ...
This week’s articles of note
“What happened to Obama?” New York Times, by Drew Weston
“American tinderbox,” The American Interest, by Walter Russell Mead
“Liberals’ strange retreat on government spending,” The New Republic, by John Judis
“Leap of faith: the making of a Republican front-runner,” The New Yorker, by Ryan Lizza [on Michele Bachmann]
A BS lesson for America: “Tea Party will bring London riots to the US”
Richard Sennett (sociology professor at NYU and LSE) and Saskia Sassen (sociology professor at Columbia) have an op-ed in the New York Times this week that purports to explain the causes of the riots in London and the lessons from them for the US. It is muddle-headed, and indicative ...
This week’s articles of note
“President Obama’s big drags,” Politico, by Jim Vandehei and Mike Allen
“The progressive crisis,” The American Interest, by Walter Russell Mead
“Politics’ fatal therapeutic turn,” Dissent, by Zelda Bronstein
“Health now: a provocation,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, by Mark Edmundson
“Why the gender gap won’t go away. Ever,” ...
Calling the Tea Party “terrorists”
As the debt ceiling negotations were heading down to the wire, the liberal criticisms of the Tea Party representatives in Congress got more heated. By the end, there was little holding back.
Democrat representative Mike Doyle, in a meeting attended by Vice-President Joe Biden, referred to the Republicans as “terrorists” (Biden ...
The real cause of the US debt crisis? Slow growth
The pantomime political debate about the debt ceiling is distracting attention from the parlous state of the productive economy.
Read my spiked article in full here.
Weak GDP: an economy on edge
The latest gross domestic product (GDP) data shows the US economy’s recovery has come to a virtual stop.
GDP grew at an annual rate of less than 1 percent in the first half of 2011. Revised government data ...
Tea Party: maybe crazy, definitely winning
In her Sunday New York Times column on the debt ceiling business, Maureen Dowd points out the many ways in which the Tea Party is succeeding:
Consider what the towel-snapping Tea Party crazies have already accomplished. They’ve changed the entire discussion. They’ve neutralized the White House. They’ve whipped their leadership into ...
This week’s articles of note
“An un-American response to the Oslo attack,” Salon, by Glenn Greenwald
“Behind economic hard times, fear of the new,” Washington Post, by Robert Samuelson
“Stinger: James O’Keefe’s greatest hits,” New York Times Magazine, by Zev Chafets
“When patents attack,” NPR: This American Life, by Alex Blumberg and Laura Sydell
